The Bone Hill

by James D Mortain

  ‘I guess we’ll find that out once we discover who once lived in that body. Ranford was clearly shielding others with his open admissions in interview, knowing that we’d concentrate on him.’

  Sarah’s mouth was wide.

  ‘We need to work backwards from this murder,’ Deans said. ‘And our person of interest may just show themselves.’

  ‘But…’ Sarah spluttered. ‘Where do we start?’

  ‘We start by finding out who is lying on that slab.’

  CHAPTER 6

  As Deans and Sarah Gold drove deeper into the North Devon countryside, the lanes appeared to grow narrower and the hedgerows taller. Jackson had given them Archie Rowland’s home address and told them to pay him a visit and arrange a meeting at the mortuary. This was different scenery to the one Deans had become accustomed with in North Devon. The air was still with inactivity. They parked in the centre courtyard of three developed barn conversions, each designed to a high specification from the looks of it. Deans had guessed pathologists were good earners – this was the proof. He looked down at the tyre tracks in the shingle driveway. He sniffed and caught Sarah making for one of the stable-doors.

  ‘I suppose this is the main entrance,’ she said.

  Potted fir trees and curly nut bushes either side of the doorway meant that she was probably correct in her assumption. She knocked on the door and they both waited silently in their own thoughts.

  ‘Do we know what he drives?’ Deans asked. ‘There’s an old Land Rover over there.’ He pointed to the end of the side property, to where the nose and front wheels of a silver-coloured Freelander was visible.

  ‘No idea,’ Sarah replied. ‘I’ve never met him.’

  Just at that moment, the door opened and a woman of retirement age stood in the narrow gap. The smell of baking escaped out into the still, cool air and made Deans feel hungry. His mind wondered and he realised he had not eaten anything since yesterday lunchtime.

  ‘Yes,’ the woman said abruptly.

  ‘Hello, sorry to disturb you,’ Sarah said. ‘Mrs Rowland?’

  The woman tightened her grip around the door handle.

  ‘We are looking for your husband, Archie,’ Sarah continued. ‘Is he here with you at the moment, please? It’s very important that we speak with him.’

  Mrs Rowland’s face dropped. ‘No,’ she said. ‘He’s at the mortuary.’

  Deans then realised Mrs Rowland was peering at their suits.

  ‘Are you…?’ she asked.

  ‘We are detectives from Torworthy CID,’ Deans said. ‘We were expecting to meet Mr Rowland at the mortuary, but he wasn’t there. We were wondering if you knew where he might be instead?’

  ‘Oh!’ Mrs Rowland muttered.

  Deans studied her stilted movements, her far away eyes and her stiff limbs. ‘I’m sorry if our visit has surprised you,’ he said.

  ‘Archie didn’t come home last night,’ Mrs Rowland said. She began mouthing something silently to herself.

  ‘What is it Mrs Rowland?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘Well, when I spoke to Annie earlier, she said Archie was at the mortuary.’

  Deans leaned forwards on his sticks. ‘Annie?’

  ‘Yes, our…’ she hesitated over the next words. ‘…Youngest daughter.’

  All of a sudden, Deans’ scalp crawled as a bolt of energy shot from the crown of his head and down his spine. He shuddered as the force grounded through his feet. He turned to Sarah – she had not noticed. Annie, he thought.

  ‘Do you know what time that was?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh… around eleven,’ she replied.

  Deans looked at his watch. It was almost five-twenty.

  Mrs Rowland let go of the door handle for the first time and took a small step towards them. ‘Should I be worried about this?’ she asked nervously.

  ‘No, no,’ Sarah said quickly. ‘I’m sure we’ll speak to him soon enough. Would you let him know we are keen to catch up with him, when you see him, please?’

  ‘Yes. Yes of course.’

  ‘What about his phone?’ Deans asked. ‘Surely you can contact him on his mobile?’

  Mrs Rowland tittered sarcastically. ‘I’m afraid my husband still lives in the past. He does not own a mobile phone. In fact, he refuses to have one. He says they are the cause of modern society’s inability to converse correctly.’

  ‘Then how do you get messages to one another?’ Deans asked.

  ‘He has a phone at work. And a pager.’

  ‘Have you tried that since you last saw him?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s not unusual for Archie to sleep over at the hospital when he is involved with a detailed job. I would rather he rested there, than risk driving home when he’s shattered. I sometimes don’t hear from him until he walks through this door.’

  ‘Okay,’ Deans said. ‘Thank you for your time. I’m sure we’ll catch up with him sooner or later.’

  They crunched back to the car having watched Mrs Rowland return inside the house.

  ‘So what are we going to do now?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘Can you drop me off in town? I need some time to think.’

  ‘Do you want some company?’

  Deans felt for his wedding band and rolled it around his finger. ‘No. Thanks. I just need some time alone.’

  ‘I understand,’ Sarah said quietly. ‘What about Archie Rowland?’

  ‘Update Jackson and give me a call the moment you hear anything. I’m desperate to speak to Archie Rowland about Maria.’

  Sarah looked away.

  Deans noticed the sour look on her face.

  ‘What?’ he asked.

  ‘Andy… please don’t torture yourself with… well, you know.’

  Deans did know. But it wasn’t torture he was after. Not for him anyhow.

  Sarah did as requested and dropped Deans in Torworthy and drove back to the station to update Jackson. Deans made his way to the coffee shop inside the covered market that Sarah had taken him to the time before. It wasn’t Nixi’s back home, but it was a pretty good substitute and it stayed open until seven in the evening. The same barista was serving as before. Deans nodded to him as he approached the counter.

  ‘Hey, you’re the chap who was in here with Sarah?’ the barista said.

  ‘Yeah,’ Deans said. ‘Dan. Right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Dan said. ‘Good memory.’

  Deans flicked an eyebrow and glanced around the room.

  ‘You work with Sazzy?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Sazzy?’

  ‘Oh, sorry… Sarah,’ Dan chuckled. ‘You must work with Sarah.’

  ‘Must I?’

  Dan made a point of looking at the five other sad and lonely faces in the café. He then pointed at Deans’ clothing. ‘Only people around here who wear suits are estate agents, solicitors, or detectives.’

  ‘I’ve been to a funeral,’ Deans said in a lacklustre voice.

  ‘Oh,’ Dan said, turning his back on Deans, dispensing freshly ground coffee from the bean hopper.

  ‘I haven’t ordered yet,’ Deans said.

  Dan looked over his shoulder as he filled the brew head with coffee powder. ‘Americano – if I’m not mistaken?’

  Deans slanted his head. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’ll bring it over,’ Dan said. ‘Looks like you need both hands for those crutches.’ He smiled and turned back to the task in hand.

  ‘Sure,’ Deans replied, and took a seat in the corner of the room with his back to the wall.

  He needed this me-time. He was struggling to rationalize recent events and much of what was happening. He watched Dan making the drink. He was efficient, but something was making Deans’ radar twitch.

  Dan came over with a bowl-like mug. ‘One Americano for sir.’ He leaned over the table and Deans took a hold of the mug, but Dan hesitated for a second, before releasing his grip.

  ‘Thank you, Dan,’ Deans said.

  ‘So,’ Dan wavered, ‘what did you do to your leg?’r />
  Deans looked sideways at the kid. ‘Skiing accident,’ he said.

  Deans saw a flicker in the corner of Dan’s eye and the makings of a knowing smile. ‘Oh,’ Dan said. ‘Nasty.’

  Deans noticed someone was waiting beside the counter. He nodded over in that direction and Dan took the hint.

  ‘Oh, okay,’ Dan said. ‘Enjoy your coffee.’

  Deans watched him all the way back to the service area and counted the seconds until Dan next looked his way.

  Nine.

  Deans creased his brow. That was less than he’d anticipated. He blew the steam from his drink and took the first satisfying slurp of decent tasting coffee in a while.

  He continued to study Dan who kept on checking his watch, even though a large shabby-chic wall clock was only feet away from him.

  Dan scratched the top of his head and steered another glance in Deans’ direction.

  Who are you waiting for, Matey, and why so interested in me?

  Deans checked his phone. There was nothing from Sarah, but as he placed it back onto the table, his phone pinged. It was DS Savage.

  Checking you are okay, Deano? I hope you know that you have friends back home who are concerned about you. Let me know if there is anything I can do. Speak soon. Mick

  Deans huffed and drained the remainder of his coffee in three large gulps, placing the mug back down on the table with a solid thump. He rested his head in his hands, stared at the table and sat like that for a number of minutes.

  ‘Have you finished?’ Dan asked.

  Deans looked up at him with bleared vision.

  ‘Yeah. Sorry.’

  He pushed the mug towards the edge of the table and Dan retrieved it, but didn’t walk away.

  Deans puckered his brow and gazed up at the lad.

  ‘Are you staying here long – in Torworthy, I mean?’

  What’s it to you, kid?

  ‘How do you know I don’t live here?’

  Dan chuckled. ‘Oh, I think I know pretty much everyone who lives here.’

  Deans wiped moisture slowly from his bottom lip with the back of his hand and looked deeper into Dan’s eyes. ‘How do you know Sarah?’ he asked.

  Dan scratched the side of his nose with his free hand. ‘We used to go out. We had a good thing.’

  Deans nodded. Thought so.

  ‘She’s a nice girl,’ Deans said.

  He noticed Dan munching his jaw, like he was chewing something. He wasn’t.

  ‘Something on your mind, Dan?’

  ‘Don’t make yourself comfortable here.’

  Deans leaned back in his seat and exhaled with a groan.

  ‘Kid, you really don’t want to piss me off right now – walking sticks or not.’

  A smile spread on Dan’s lips. He looked down at Deans’ leg and shook his head. He peered back at Deans with an increasing grin. ‘You’ve got no idea – have you?’

  CHAPTER 7

  Deans met Sarah twenty minutes later at the front of the station. She had driven to meet him. He opened the passenger door and clambered inside, tossing his sticks on the back seat.

  ‘We need to go back to the mortuary,’ he said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s time to take control of this situation.’

  ‘It’ll be closed.’

  ‘Then we’ll open it back up again.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘What I do best – police work.’

  Deans waited a while for Sarah to join the traffic and settle into the half-hour drive ahead before he spoke.

  ‘Just had an interesting chat with an old flame of yours,’ he said.

  ‘Who?’ Sarah said, quickly swinging around.

  ‘Eyes on the road, please,’ Deans said.

  Sarah huffed and returned her gaze back onto the road ahead.

  ‘Dan, the coffee man. Nice boy.’

  Sarah’s hands fidgeted on the wheel.

  Okay, that hit a nerve.

  ‘And if I’m not mistaken, he was warning me to stay away from you.’

  Deans saw her hands grip the wheel so hard, the tight skin of her knuckles turned white.

  ‘You can tell him he’s got nothing to be concerned about – obviously,’ Deans said.

  Sarah’s cheeks flushed pink.

  ‘So how long ago did you guys go out?’ Deans asked, noticing her quick-fire blinking.

  ‘We didn’t,’ she said sharply. ‘He’s just got the wrong idea.’

  ‘It didn’t sound that way.’

  Deans noticed their speed increasing. They were still within the town-limits, but the engine was working hard under Sarah’s irritated right foot. He decided it was best to leave this particular conversation alone and within thirty minutes they were back at the mortuary car park. Sarah had wanted to inform DS Jackson of their return but Deans had stopped her.

  He tried the mortuary door. It was locked. He peered at his watch: seven-seventeen in the evening. This time he thumped loudly with the ball of his fist and turned back to Sarah, but she was already walking along the front row of windows trying to look inside the building.

  ‘Is there another way inside?’ Deans asked.

  ‘I don’t know. Should we try to go inside if there is nobody here?’

  ‘Urgent police work trumps most things,’ Deans said joining Sarah at one of the windows.

  The mortuary was connected by a narrow glass corridor to another single storey building.

  ‘Let’s try in there,’ Deans said, making in a determined fashion towards the other entrance.

  They were met by an exceedingly tall woman, wearing a long white laboratory jacket and a hospital lanyard dangling in front of her chest.

  Deans flashed his police badge. ‘We’re trying to access the mortuary, but no one seems to be answering the door. Can you help us, please?’

  ‘It’s closed.’ The technician looked at her watch. ‘They left over an hour ago. Who did you want to see?’

  ‘Well, we really need to see the pathologist,’ Sarah said.

  The technician shook her head. ‘I haven’t seen Archie all day, I’m afraid. He must be sick.’

  ‘Actually,’ Deans interrupted, ‘we need to view the corpse again. We were here earlier. Can you grant us access?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘This is an ongoing, highly sensitive police investigation,’ Deans said. ‘Ten minutes is all we need. We won’t be touching the body at all, and we will be forensically aware.’

  The technician looked down at Deans’ walking sticks and scowled. ‘Ten minutes?’

  ‘Tops.’

  ‘Okay, just bear with me.’

  The technician darted back into the building and returned just as quickly.

  ‘We can go through this way.’ She led them through the glass corridor and within moments, Deans and Sarah were again inside the mortuary.

  ‘We know where to go,’ Deans said.

  The technician gave them both another once over and waited inside the doorway.

  ‘Hello?’ Deans called out into the silence. ‘Hello?’

  The ceiling lamps illuminated automatically the further they moved into the eerily still building.

  ‘Right, let’s get garbed up,’ Deans said and walked first into the scrubs room.

  ‘Don’t go getting us into trouble,’ Sarah said in hushed tones.

  ‘Don’t fret – don’t touch anything and you’ll be alright.’

  Deans left his sticks and dragged his leg through to the pre-examination room, and saw the body exactly where they had earlier left it. He pulled back the covers, exposing the gruesome carcass once again and dragged the sheet completely away, visually examining the body at close proximity.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘They’ve been married a long time. If there are any distinguishing features on this body, then Mrs Rowland should know about them.’

  ‘What?’ Sarah gasped. ‘Do you think this is Archie Rowland?’<
br />
  Deans peered up at her, his forehead puckered with surprise at her comment.

  ‘Think about it,’ he said.

  Sarah stumbled backwards by several steps and looked over to where the head should have been. ‘Oh my God!’ she said grabbing the sides of her face.

  Deans took a pen and sketched the outline of the corpse into his scratch pad, highlighting any distinctive marks; such as birthmarks and surgery scars.

  He turned to Sarah whose face had turned putty-grey. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘We can only do the front, but we’ve got enough to go back to Mrs Rowland.’

  Within the hour later and they were back at the Roland farm, standing in the living room that looked like it was straight out of a John Lewis Christmas advert. Deans looked around, there were exposed ceiling beams and a fire place large enough to stand inside.

  ‘Mrs Rowland, when was the last time you saw your husband?’ Deans asked. This time, he decided to be more direct with his approach.

  Mrs Rowland covered her mouth with a bony hand. Her eyes raked between Deans and Sarah.

  ‘Mrs Rowland,’ Sarah said softly. ‘This could be important. Can you remember exactly the last time you saw your husband?’

  ‘Around six p.m., yesterday evening,’ she spluttered from behind her fingers.

  ‘Where did he say he was going?’ Sarah asked.

  Deans could tell that Sarah had a better rapport with Mrs Rowland, so he kept quiet… for now.

  Mrs Rowland pulled a tight face and shook her head, as if that was a silly question to ask.

  Deans could see her building confusion, so he made it easier for her.

  ‘Did he go to the mortuary?’ he asked.

  Mrs Rowland nodded and her fingertips moved to her lips.

  ‘Because there was a job?’ Deans continued.

  Mrs Rowland looked at Deans with a fixed stare.

  ‘Go on,’ Deans encouraged with an open palm offering Mrs Rowland time to expand.

  ‘Well…’ Mrs Rowland faltered. ‘You asked him to go there.’

  Deans shot a look at Sarah. ‘Who exactly?’ he asked quietly. ‘Try to remember who in particular asked your husband to return to the mortuary?’

  ‘Well… Annie. She called him on the landline, said the police were requesting he attend for another “big job” like the one he did before.’