Still, there were areas where courage failed. They refused to enter the family boneyard, but did walk its perimeter peering around and behind weathered markers and memorials. It took a gathering of nearly all to summon enough collective guts, encouraged sternly by Stark and Ware, to enter the cavernous barn and poke through all its myriad hidey holes.
“Old Ezekiel’s haunt for workings.” Franklin Knox lazily slid his gaze about the decaying structure. “If one could make these walls divulge their secrets, surely they would scream in terror. Oh, the horrors they have witnessed, the marvels they…”
“Please, Mr Knox.” Stark’s voice was sharp, but low.
“Sorry, Sergeant.” He sighed and continued to sweep the barn with a fascinated gawp. Stark did not think he sounded sorry at all, but when he spoke again it was in a whisper: “I’ve written several monographs about the Strykers and what happened here so long ago, yet this is the first time I’ve actually been in the barn.”
“We’re not here gathering information for a book,” Ware said.
“Quite right, Constable.” Knox moved off. “Sorry.”
Stark, again, did not think he sounded sorry one little bit.
“He’s an odd one,” Ware admitted, noting Stark’s look. “Says he doesn’t believe in magic or the old stories, but he writes about them as if they really happened.” She shook her head. “Never quite know what’s going on with him.”
“Did he live here at the time of the murders?”
“He’s a life-long villager; seen him all my life,” she said. “He would have been, I don’t know, maybe in his early twenties then.”
“You don’t know him well, then?”
“More now than I did as a kid, but still nothing much. My mum told me to stay away from him.”
“Oh?”
“Thought he was a poof or…” Her face reddened. “Sorry, I did not mean… Well, it’s just that in Mum’s generation… She thought that anyone not married by… She even got onto me about…”
“Calm down, Constable,” Stark said. “No one’s taking notes.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, dubiously.
“Is he?”
“Is he what, Sarge?”
“A poof.”
Again she reddened. “No, I don’t think so. He’s not married, no girlfriend anyone knows of, but there’s nothing to that. He’s private like, just keeps himself to himself, always has. Still, he does get out and around. He’s popular at the Broken Lance because he stands a round now and then. That’s probably why some of the wrinklies are willing to talk to him about things better left unsaid.”
“Gets them liquored up, does he?”
“Well, not pissed to oblivion, but talkative.”
Ware and Stark had to keep the searchers on point at times, but the real whip hand was Mildred Drinkwater’s. Let any of the silly prats get sidetracked by strange signs or symbols chalked on walls or suggestive splatters of what might be blood, she made them more fearful of her than of spooks or demons. Perhaps the strappers had started out occult agnostics, Ware decided, but they would finish up, to a man, as true believers.
The barn yielded no clues to the whereabouts of the missing boy, but did raise old spectres. Even Stark felt uneasy. In London, about three years earlier, he and DI Clane had run to ground Jasper Dickerson, the Bethel Green Butcher, cornering him in the abattoir where his victims spent their last moments. This barn held the same odour of old blood, the same chill, the same hush of death.
Stark did not shudder, but was glad to step back into the light.
None wanted to enter the death house itself, except Knox, who seemed all too eager to Stark. Long-time villagers and newcomers alike had become believers in the ‘Stryker curse.’ They ignored Stark and Ware, and not even Mildred’s harangues could stop them from imitating a flock of Shropshire sheep.
Stark was glad when he heard the approach of a distant motor. Even if the addition of DCI Ravyn did not turn the tide, they would at least be able search the farmhouse efficiently; the others, with Ware supervising and Mildred pushing, could be set loose on the remainder of the property.
He frowned when two figures appeared over the rise. One was the familiar form of Ravyn, but the other was unknown, thinner and greyer. The second man moved in odd spurts, weaved a little, and occasionally held Ravyn’s arm for support.
“You!” Mildred rushed forward. “What are you doing here?”
“It’s Henry Winsell,” Ware murmured to Stark. “What in the world is he doing here?”
“Looks like the poor git is ready to topple.”
Ware turned, ready to stem any hostility against the newcomer, but the searchers were yammering amongst themselves. Strappers previously ignorant of village lore now listened raptly to ghost-and-gore tales told by men who were now true believers.
Franklin Knox, she saw, stood apart, watching the approach of Ravyn and Winsell. She could not figure his expression. There was an odd mix of recognition, wariness, confusion and surprise. Then he turned, snagged several startled sheep, and set off toward the eastern reach, in the direction of Braikey Pond and the marshy area encroaching the farmstead.
“I…I just wanted to help,” Winsell was saying.
“Don’t need anything from the likes of you,” Mildred said.
Ware touched her arm. “Mildred, we need everyone’s help.”
Winsell trembled, started to swoon, but caught Ravyn’s elbow till the moment passed.
Mildred’s features softened. “I’m sorry, Mr Winsell. Thank you for coming. I appreciate your effort.”
The former banker forced a smile. Her voice was distant and small. He nodded, though he understood little of her meaning. He was aware of her, of DCI Ravyn at his side, of a few faceless others, but everything was nearly overwhelmed by the terrible immensity of the empty sky trying to crush him.
“We were getting ready to search the house, sir,” Stark said.
“We can do that easily, you and I.”
Ware looked to the remaining searchers. “We’ll go opposite to the track taken by Knox and the others. Stay with me, Mildred.”
Mildred was already moving off. “Let’s go.”
“Knox?” Winsell’s voice was all but inaudible.
“This way, Mr Winsell,” Ravyn said. “Stay with us.”
“When we get a chance, sir,” Stark said softly, glancing at the man between them, “there’s something I need to discuss.”
Ravyn nodded, and they entered an open door at the side of the murder house. Winsell ceased trembling, seemed to gather strength from the closeness of the walls, but his pallor remained. They were in the kitchen, empty of anything but a table and a chair. He moved a few steps from the detectives, gazing out a grimy window. The man might be Knox, but he was too far off to be sure.
“Have you been here before, Mr Winsell?” Ravyn asked.
Winsell turned from the window. “No, but I’ve read stories.”
“You should have stayed in the village,” Stark said.
“Perhaps.” He smiled weakly. “The outing may yet kill me, but at least Mildred Drinkwater won’t. At least I don’t think so.”
“You stay here, Mr Winsell,” Ravyn said. “DS Stark and I will search the house.”
“I can help.”
“You’ve achieved what you set out to do.”
“I suppose I did at that.” He sat.
Ravyn and Stark searched the house. Each vacant room held signs of interrupted lives, items dropped or knocked over, never picked up or straightened. Splatters and splashes of old blood had left rusty stains on peeling wallpaper. Doors had been kicked in. Every single room gave mute evidence of a young boy’s murderous and boundless rage.
“It was quite a sensation at the time,” Ravyn said. “Even made the London tabloids for a few days.”
“Not long for something like this.”
“Reporters encountered a solid wall of villagers.”
Stark nodded. “I can imagine.
”
“Speculated on bare facts, fabricated stories, then moved on.”
“You involved at all?”
Ravyn shook his head, less in denial than in resignation. He had already briefed Stark on the Stryker murders, but it would be easier to replow that field than to dredge the swamp of Stark’s mind for memories already planted.
“No, I was a newly promoted detective constable investigating a burglary ring specialising in jewellery stores,” Ravyn said. “The unfortunate detectives assigned were DI Morris Highchurch and DS Lionel Marquest.”
“Why unfortunate?”
“Stafford wanted it solved quickly, the villagers not at all.”
“Because none of them wanted Dale Stryker brought back in any way, shape or form.” Ravyn felt a leap of joy, then the sergeant said: “At least that’s what Constable Ware told me.”
Ravyn sighed.
“Knowing who committed the murders and yet being unable to actually close the case had a price,” Ravyn said. “DI Highchurch was urged into an early retirement, and Marquest resigned, moved to Brighton, if I recall correctly.”
It was Stark’s turn to sigh, but he held it. As if there were any bloody moment Ravyn could not recall correctly. Stark wondered if, perhaps, the guv’nor was practising for giving evidence in court or chatting up mere mortals, instances when he must seem to struggle for memories, as other men must. Stark found it annoying.
They came to a small room at the back of the house. The wall beside the door was crushed, as if something had been slammed into it. A black pool covered the floor.
“The mother’s body was found here.” Ravyn looked at the dark stain. “Thrown against the wall, then gutted.”
“You said you…”
“I read the report once.”
A worm of a memory writhed in Stark’s mind. Had Ravyn told him all this before? Maybe the facts? Surely, not the details. The guv’nor had said a lot about Knight’s Crossing during the drive, so maybe this had been included. Stark could hardly be expected to remember every niggling little detail. Broad strokes were useful in understanding a village’s character, but not every detail of a crime more than thirty years done, no matter how heinous.
Stark examined the shattered door. “Whose room was this?”
“Young Dale’s.”
“The boy who committed the crime?”
“So they say.” Ravyn stepped into the room.
“Why would he break down his own door?”
“The theory was that one of his sisters, either Millie or Heather, tried to hide while he was busy elsewhere,” Ravyn said. “Neither girl was found in here. Nor was any trace of them.”
Stark kneeled over twin gouges in the rough wooden floor. Had the chair, now several feet off, been jammed under the knob, its legs might have made such marks when the door was forced in. Anyone taking refuge here would have been killed here, unless… He turned his gaze towards the open window.
“Investigators found the window as it is now,” Ravyn said. “It’s logical to conjecture an occupant escaped through it.”
“You don’t think Dale Stryker killed his family?”
“The evidence was circumstantial, but damning.”
Stark waited.
“There was a rush to judgement,” Ravyn said. “Villagers didn’t want secrets revealed, Wizard Ezekiel’s or their own. Highchurch and Marquest gave in to obstruction from villagers, pressure from above. They did not investigate the case as they should have.”
“Did Dale Stryker do it?”
“I don’t know. But if not Dale, then who? No one else was in the frame. And if he didn’t, why did he run?”
Stark looked out the open window, the barn to his right; ahead, barren fields, brambles, rain-sluiced ravines, standing stones and, in the distance, the terrible Worship Oak and boundary fence. He saw searchers working their way across the land.
“No place to run, no place to hide.”
“Three decades ago it would have been less wild, less gone to ruin, but you’re right,” Ravyn said. “No place safe.”
Stark considered the possibility of a young boy wronged and felt a measure of sympathy. His own youth had been punctuated with such incidents, times he was either blamed for the actions of others or forced to assume responsibility. Thinking of his ouster from the Met and subsequent exile to the wilds of Hammershire, he reflected that some things never change.
“It’s logical, Dale Stryker being in his own room…”
Stark let his words trail, imagining a boy gripped by terror as a family was slaughtered, barring himself in his room, then escaping when his barricade proved futile. He would have run from the house. To the barn? The blood-spoor found there argued against that. Not around the house to the road. Only across the fields, toward the village. Except he was never seen again. Stark leaned forward, both fists against the sill.
If only Stark’s memory matched his imagination. Ravyn then dismissed the thought. It was unkind. Nor was it, he knew, a realistic expectation. Men like Stark were the measure of the world, not men like himself. And Stark was improving under his tutelage, his ability to remember approaching that of his observational skills. He was doing very well at relaying complex conversations verbatim, and his written reports no longer had to be returned for a third or fourth rewrite, usually.
Ravyn considered for a moment that his unkind thought might have had its genesis in envy. Stark was gazing out the window, but he was also endeavouring to peer more than three decades into the past, to imagine events never beheld. Ravyn could easily link facts read, actions seen or words heard, could scrutinize anything caught forever in the webs of memory, but the eye of his imagination never seemed to open, just as Stark’s never seemed to sleep.
“What’s this?” Stark bent down. He picked up a stubby pencil, just over an inch long, point broken. “All this time?”
“What was it you wanted to discuss?”
Stark frowned at the pencil. “What?” He dragged his thoughts to the present and shoved the pencil into his pocket. “Oh, yes. Ware doesn’t believe our visit has anything to do with the missing boy.”
“Oh?”
“She thinks we’re here to decide whether she remains village constable,” Stark said.
“Where would she get such an idea?”
“I asked. She refused to say. But…”
Shouting interrupted the moment. They looked out the window. One of the searchers near the cluster of megaliths was yelling. Ware was closing in, followed by Mildred. Knox ambled slowly towards them from the direction of the barn, hands in pockets.
“What’s all the shouting, Mr Ravyn?” Winsell asked as the two detectives rushed through the kitchen. “The boy? Is he found?”
“Wait here,” Ravyn ordered.
Winsell nodded, but Ravyn and Stark were already out of the farmhouse and well along. He stood, moved to the grimy window, and watched all converge on the Stones. It had been years, but the carvings, the unreadable glyphs and the eye in the Elder Sign, shimmered in the darkness of his memory. He noted that Knox, who had always prided himself on his fitness, now moved with an elderly gait. None of them were what they had been. Certain of his solitude, Winsell searched the farmhouse, though he held no real hope of finding anything after so many years.
Stark had height, stride and youth, but he managed only a close second to Ravyn. Ware was talking to the searcher, and Mildred had his left arm in a death grip. Ravyn joined them.
The stone ring was similar to other megaliths Stark had seen. The standing stones were identical to the ones in the village, but compared to the weathered stones rising before him, those on the Green might have been set in place only yesterday.
The stones rose from weeds and brambles that grew denser and more entangled approaching the ring’s centre. At one time, Stark surmised, the central area had been clear. He wondered if the odious Stryker clan had here also danced and chanted on pagan days, sky-clad and howling like mad dogs at the dark of the
moon.
“Like a moan, it was,” the searcher was saying. All listened, but heard only the wind’s sigh. The man added: “I surely heard it, not the wind, but something dreadful from the depths of…”
“Don’t be daft.” Mildred shook him savagely.
He broke her grip. “From hell it was, echoing up.”
“What’s at the centre, Constable?” Ravyn asked.
She shook her head. “Been covered for years. Some say a blood stone, others a shrine. My gran told my mum, and my mum told me it was the well where the Strykers got water for ceremonies.”
“They were on the line,” Stark said. “They had plumbing in the house and running water in the kitchen.”
“Water from the earth’s dark heart,” Ware said. “Sacred water.”
Ravyn dropped to one knee. “See? The bushes here are broken, the earth disturbed. A slight incline starts.” He stood. “Something fell though and tumbled down to the centre.”
“Harold!”
Ware and the searcher held Mildred back, lest she throw herself into the darkness at the centre of the thickets.
“Get this cleared,” Ravyn ordered. “Not all, just a swath from here inward. Quickly. But be careful.”
Stark set searchers to frantic work. Using tools found in various sheds, they attacked the rank vegetation.
“Given the incline, I think we’ll find a well or a sinkhole at the centre,” Ravyn said. “It has to be searched.”
“I’ve rope in the boot,” Ware said. “Two hundred feet.”
“Get it.”
“I’m going in, aren’t I, sir?” Stark said. After all, Stark thought, wasn’t that why God created detective sergeants, to chase villains, scrape up dog vomit for evidence and to descend into the depths of any hellholes they find? “If there’s an opening, that is.”
“Not if you don’t want to,” Ravyn said. “Or can’t.”
Stark considered the darkness, the vanishing light as he moved downward, the tightness as the walls closed in, the possibility of being buried if the hole collapsed. He also thought of the stories he had heard whispered in village after village, of the things that dwell in the depths of the earth, waiting.
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