Murder at the Meet

by Bruce Beckham

  ‘That’s it, Guv – Patrick Pearson – farm beyond Slatterthwaite, if I got the map reading correct.’

  10. PATRICK PEARSON

  Wednesday 12.50pm, Slatterdale Rigg

  ‘Struth, Guv – this is hillbilly country if I ever saw it.’

  Skelgill, concentrating hard on navigating the rutted track, which is unsuitable for much less than a Defender and comfortable only for a tractor, smirks without looking aside. It might be his sergeant’s turn of phrase, or perhaps his tone of consternation that amuses him. His colleague, of course, is a stranger to such environs. A Londoner, with a young family and metropolitan instincts for multiplexes and malls, he has little inclination to explore the fells, so bereft are they of chicken nuggets. But he is probably inured to urban badlands that might cause Skelgill equally to baulk.

  To his more complacent eye their surroundings hold no fears; it is simply wild country of the sort that makes up much of the Lakeland landscape. A rising U-shaped valley with its foaming beck and fellsides that steepen as grass becomes bracken, becomes heather, becomes scree; the bleat of sheep, the mew of a buzzard, the stone-tapping chack of a wheatear on a stretched telephone wire, tilting into the wind; against an exposed crag a solitary browning rowan; blooming late in the verges canary-yellow tormentil and flimsy powder-blue harebells.

  He knows of dozens of such places, where metalled roads end and rough tracks continue to isolated farmsteads. Not so long ago – as vouchsafed by his treasured Victorian map – even some of today’s essential routes, taken for granted, were similarly hostile to motor vehicles; not least the nearby Honister Pass – there was no shortcut from Buttermere to Balderthwaite in those days!

  Still, it strikes him that it is several years since he last came this way, and he likely paid scant attention, being on a mission to complete some substantial circuit, or was running, or was toting heavy rescue gear – he can’t quite remember which. Perhaps he ought to heed those features that are the cause of his sergeant’s wonderment. For on reflection he might agree that, yes, perhaps Slatterdale, as this upper limb of Borrowdale is sometimes called, does possess a more sinister quality than other uplands. The atmospheric conditions are playing their part – what was patchy cloud when they left Keswick has merged and descended to cloak the fell tops, a dark lowering ceiling from which wraiths stretch ghostly fingers that seem to warn or even threaten to assail them. And the rain that had begun to patter during Skelgill’s pit stop has become a steady drum, requiring the wipers on maximum and obscuring sight between sweeps of the blades. The interior is steaming up, amplifying the claustrophobia, the sense of being walled in by the ever-encroaching mountains and oppressive sky; if this were a horror movie they would ultimately be crushed.

  But it is not the landscape alone that has triggered his partner’s response; there is the human-inflicted blemish upon it, a lack of care. It had begun with the first gate (to open which his long-suffering sergeant was despatched into the rain). Rickety, collapsing, it was tethered by a loop of frayed blue baler twine. Skelgill’s shouted reminder for it to be shouldered, scraping the rocky ground, back into place had seen it almost disintegrate. Thence, onward and upward, they have passed tumbling walls; paddocks overgrown with inedible rush and poisonous ragwort; precious few sheep, looking unhealthy and unresponsive; randomly abandoned machinery, corroded and overrun by nettles, a harrow, a baler, a rusted manger, a muck-spreader with a sapling growing out of it. Then a small breaker’s yard populated by the rotting carcasses of obsolete cars, variously cannibalised, lacking wheels and doors, piles of rotting tyres, bumpers and miscellaneous fragments of vehicle scrap. And the farmstead itself, which they now approach, a straggle of buildings clinging to the fellside, irregular sheds and byres with their roofs holed and sagging – and finally the narrow farmhouse, smothered by an invasive thicket of elder and blackthorn within an area walled off to keep out sheep, once upon a time a kitchen garden, but now unguarded by a rotting gate lying off its hinges. So overgrown is it that a virtual tunnel leads to the lean-to porch, and only part of the upper floor is visible; render flakes from the stone beneath, the paintwork of the first-floor windows is long beyond redemption, roof tiles are missing, and cast-iron guttering leaks profusely.

  Skelgill halts the car and lowers the window by a couple of inches. He stares, unblinking. The chimney lacks a pot – from here a miserly stream of smoke is pressed flat in the wind, spun like a strand of grey wool; incongruously, amidst the dilapidation and decay a new-looking satellite dish juts from the southern side of the stack.

  ‘Come on, Leyton.’

  The second Skelgill steps out dogs set up barking manically. DS Leyton hesitates – he stands close to the vehicle in case he should retreat for his own safety. But there is no onslaught – the animals must be penned at the rear of the property. The sergeant grins nervously.

  ‘I pity the postie, Guv.’

  Skelgill shrugs indifferently.

  ‘There were a box by the first gate, Leyton – old Pat, she doesn’t have to come up here.’ He evidently knows the lady in question.

  Skelgill slams his door – unusually for him; typically he presses it shut – but it seems he wishes to announce their arrival, as if the dogs’ clamour were not enough, or perhaps not sufficiently specific. He leads the way, ducking twigs and tendrils, moving purposefully through the downpour. Beneath the porch the inadequate front door is ajar and Skelgill pushes it wider. He can hear a radio or television; the sound muted by a closed door somewhere ahead. He steps over the threshold into dank air heavy with spores. He calls out into the gloom of the passage.

  ‘Mr Pearson? It’s the police.’

  There comes a shout – unintelligible – but he takes it to mean they are to proceed – although equally it may be a command to the dogs; on cue, they fall silent. The hallway zigzags past a dingy kitchen on their right – a glimpse of a single tap dripping into a stained Belfast sink – and then on their left a cramped staircase. A little further is the plain door of the living room. Skelgill knocks and in the same movement pushes it open.

  The inharmoniousness of the exterior is carried through to this interior chamber. In a bare room ineffectually darkened by frayed and shrunken curtains, upon exposed floorboards beside a small tiled hearth where meagre embers glow in the grate stands a state-of-the-art widescreen TV set. On the other side of the hearth the sole piece of furniture, a shabby wingback chair, faces the television and – at a diagonal – the detectives. They are consumed by the second incongruity: the giant of a man slumped in the armchair.

  Jean Tyson, Nick Wilson, Aidan Wilson and Megan Nicolson – despite their local origins, these were all effectively strangers to Skelgill. But this time he recognises their interviewee. Even now, reclining and in his seventies, he seems enlarged in all proportions, feet, hands, limbs, torso – it seems a wonder he finds clothes to fit; he wears an old-fashioned collarless shirt, much stained, and equally disreputable trousers fastened by a belt of twine; the elongated feet are stockinged, hob-nailed boots cast aside; perhaps the explanation for the biting rancidity that permeates the air. But it is not only the man’s size that makes him distinctive. His long cadaverous head has a great square forehead above a massive ridged monobrow, beneath which his heavily lidded eyes are cloaked in shadow. He makes no word of greeting, nor any effort to rise.

  DS Leyton seems dumbstruck by the man’s appearance. Skelgill, too, is staring hard – although no longer at the person – but at a shotgun that is propped within his reach beside the fireplace. Skelgill clears his throat. He realises he is going to have to speak over the television.

  ‘Mr Pearson. It’s DI Skelgill and DS Leyton. You received a call from one of our colleagues.’

  Patrick Pearson seems to be regaling them – he in particular – with what Skelgill sees as a look of contempt, and he wonders if the mention of his own surname has given the man cause for disdain; some ancestral family reason of which he is unaware (but would not be surprised about)
. Or it could simply be that he is a policeman, not a universally popular profession.

  With great gnarled hands that seem crippled by arthritis Patrick Pearson fumbles for a remote control and contrives with knotted fingers to lower the volume to about half of its original level.

  ‘Tha’s early.’

  Skelgill has acquired the distinct impression that the man would complain whether they were early, late or even on schedule – but DS Leyton takes him at his word, and addresses him in a friendly tone of voice, taking half a step forward and gesturing to the television.

  ‘I believe you can pause the programme with that model of equipment, sir.’

  Patrick Pearson responds with some phrase that is indecipherable even to Skelgill’s native ear, but shows no inclination to adopt the suggestion. Skelgill thinks he has mentioned the word yowes – so he takes it that there is some imminent task, and no time to spare. He opts to press on.

  ‘Mr Pearson, the case of Mary Wilson is now a murder investigation. Naturally we’re talking to those folk who last saw her.’

  He curtails any further words of introduction. The man’s gaze seems to have drifted back to the popular local bucolic soap opera that is playing out its repeat upon the screen. For his part, Skelgill remains silent. He senses that DS Leyton is becoming agitated at his side. But, finally, his patience draws a response.

  ‘Thou won’t be talking to arl Walter.’

  Skelgill glances at his colleague.

  ‘No, sir. That makes you an even more important witness.’

  Patrick Pearson produces a phlegmy growl; he sounds like he suspects he is being buttered up. But just when it seems nothing more will be forthcoming, he responds.

  ‘We were in t’ Twa Tups – me an’ Walt conferring. Lass deeked in t’ window. That were it. That’s the story.’

  Skelgill responds somewhat offhandedly.

  ‘There was a suggestion that she was looking for you – something to do with judging her stall.’

  The man’s massive brow seems to gather, if it were possible to appear more ominous.

  ‘If she were, she changed her mind.’

  ‘She didn’t come in?’

  There is a grunt and a lateral movement of the huge head that Skelgill takes as a negative.

  ‘What about after that, sir?’

  The man seems disinclined to answer – as if the question is too vague, and does not sufficiently compete with the on-screen drama. Skelgill tries again, more incisively.

  ‘What did you and Mr Dickson do after you left the Twa Tups?’

  ‘Went back t’ meet. There were judging to be finished.’

  By coincidence a change of scene in the soap opera sees a Border Collie gathering a flock of Swaledales. Skelgill finds his gaze drawn to the television. While the dog looks like it knows what it is doing, the actor playing the shepherd is unconvincing. He is clean-shaven, his complexion too even when it might be ruddy, no hair out of place; and Skelgill is thinking that a real shepherd would use not voice commands but whistles over that distance. Meanwhile the background birdsong is wrong for the time of year. Patrick Pearson, however, does not seem to share his scepticism, and is watching intently. Skelgill resumes his questioning.

  ‘I understand you raised the alarm, sir? You alerted Mary Wilson’s husband – at her mother’s cottage – Jean Tyson’s place.’

  It is only the final mention of Jean Tyson that prompts the man to look sharply at Skelgill. His expression is one of annoyance, as though there might be some hint of an insinuation to which he objects.

  ‘I were driving right past her front door.’ Again he makes the disagreeable sound in his throat. ‘For all I knew, Mary were there. Gone back for t’ bairn or sommat. That’s what folk thought.’

  He says it scathingly, as though Skelgill must be stupid for asking such an obviously pointless question. Skelgill, however, is unperturbed.

  ‘But her car wasn’t there.’

  The man does not answer, but continues to look at Skelgill.

  ‘What was Aidan Wilson’s reaction?’

  Now Patrick Pearson looks away. But though he fastens his eyes upon the television a movement of his jaw muscles suggests he is contemplating more than the inadequacies of the shepherd. And perhaps – although Skelgill considers it an optimistic notion – there is the realisation that he is being asked to be the eyes and ears of the detectives – and that what he says might be regarded as significant.

  ‘He didn’t seem fussed. Except he were complaining about her stock being left.’

  Skelgill shows some interest in this statement.

  ‘I thought he went straightaway to look for her?’

  ‘Aye – after Jean mithered him. It were her that were spooked. Cur dog had garn yam itsen.’

  Skelgill snatches a glance at DS Leyton, and winks to advise him he has understood the dialect. The man merely means the dog found its own way home.

  ‘What did you do, Mr Pearson?’

  ‘Might have stayed for a mash.’ His tone sounds resentful of Skelgill’s question. ‘Went on us way after a bit. There were no reason to think owt of it.’

  Skelgill, who has been standing perfectly still, shifts from one foot to the other and presses the knuckles of both hands into the small of his back. It seems to mark a hiatus, as though he has dealt with whatever significant questions there were to be asked.

  ‘Have you always been on your own up here, sir?’

  But his more casual manner seems to cut little ice with Patrick Pearson. And though his reclusiveness is local knowledge that Skelgill might reasonably possess his reply comes grudgingly.

  ‘Since t’ arl folks passed away. Above thirty year.’

  It is evident that he refers to his immediate forebears, though it seems odd that he uses the descriptor when he himself is in his seventies. Skelgill raises his head in comprehension, and then he produces from his jacket the Balderthwaite shepherds’ meet brochure he took from the Twa Tups. In keeping with its traditional layout it is mainly occupied with the forthcoming programme of events; on its back cover, however, is a list of all the previous year’s winners. He displays the reverse to show to what he refers.

  ‘You must know some number of folk hereabouts.’

  ‘I keep to mesen – can’t show favouritism.’

  Skelgill peruses the densely typed page of classes, with the names of those triumphant, runners-up, and highly commended. While there are the likes of the Johnsons and the Thompsons, he sees no representative of the Pearson clan. But are there any other Pearsons in the dale? It would appear this man has no issue, no sons or daughters to take up the farm in his lieu. Perhaps what he says has something in it – there is no temptation to show prejudice. But then the familial name does catch his eye, at the foot of the sheet: “Judges. Senior – P. Pearson, Understudy – S. Nicolson.” He raises the leaflet.

  ‘I see you’re head judge these days.’

  ‘Since arl Walt died.’

  ‘And that’s Sean Nicolson?’

  ‘Aye, he’s understudy now.’

  Skelgill nods. The man is being rather more forthcoming.

  ‘How does that work?’

  Patrick Pearson casts his eyes briefly back at the television, as if he cannot be bothered with this explanation. But then he yields.

  ‘Sheep classes – you judge separately. Then confer. Senior judge holds sway. Exhibitors and ancillary classes – understudy judges them.’

  Skelgill makes as if to speak, but then checks himself. The action seems to be exaggerated, as if to suggest he is thinking on his feet, as though ideas are occurring to him.

  ‘Mr Pearson – going back to the meet – the year Mary Wilson disappeared – you were judging the stalls, aye?’

  ‘What if I were?’

  Despite Skelgill’s best efforts the hostility is never far below the surface; he is obliged to row back.

  ‘It’s just that you probably looked at her stall more closely than anyone else. Say there’
d been a note pinned – about when she was due back. Especially if she knew she was being judged for best exhibitor.’

  ‘How would I remember that? There weren’t nowt.’

  That he adds the rider seems to Skelgill to gainsay his proposition. But rather than highlight the contradiction he simply continues.

  ‘Had she made an effort? I mean – was she trying to win?’

  Skelgill glances at DS Leyton, whom he can sense is wondering where the conversation is headed. But when he looks back he finds Patrick Pearson staring at him, properly for the first time during their visit; the eyes are dark and brooding.

  ‘She did win.’ His voice is thick with acrimony. Skelgill blankly returns his gaze; it seems to have the desired effect. ‘I fixed the winner’s rosette to her stall. It was us that noticed she’d gone.’

  He places an unusual degree of emphasis upon his final sentence – it is hard to say why – perhaps he resents that there is some credit overdue for this, recognition that he never received. Though it seems a small and rather dubious accolade. In what Skelgill considers is inconsistent with the pitiless nature of this man, he wonders if the disappearance of Mary Wilson might have affected him more than anyone would guess; after all, Mary was a close neighbour’s child, of parity in age had he fathered offspring of his own. Skelgill is prompted to play a little trump card, that of his own provenance.

  ‘I were just a strip of a lad. I were at school with Jud Hope. I went with Arthur Hope’s search party. Between Seathwaite and Seatoller.’

  Skelgill’s gamble elicits a reaction from the big man, who shifts awkwardly in his seat, although from his bleak expression there would be no cause to anticipate a positive rejoinder.

  ‘He’s alreet, Art.’

  ‘He’s retired now – just fixes up his bikes. Jud’s got the farm.’

  Patrick Pearson scoffs.

  ‘There’s no such thing as a farmer retiring.’

  Skelgill chuckles amenably.