‘I’ll keep an ear to the ground, sir – it’s a nasty business with these sheep being slaughtered.’
Skelgill nods grimly.
‘Most flocks are in-bye now – let’s hope that’s enough to deter whoever’s doing it.’
The fine weather has encouraged a hatch of insect life – indeed Skelgill is staring at what appears to be a little cloud of St Mark’s flies – and the eyes of both men flick about as small wild trout sporadically sip unlucky emergers from just beneath the surface film of the tarn.
‘Do you fish, sir?’
Skelgill turns his head to regard his young colleague. He is a short man, though stocky, with cropped ginger hair, lively blue eyes and a naturally eager countenance liberally scattered with freckles.
‘Aye – never tried here though – looks too shallow for my kind of fishing.’
The constable nods.
‘You could probably wade out thirty yards before it was above your waist, sir.’
Skelgill turns back to survey the water, his eyes narrowed.
‘Not easy to drown.’
The constable shakes his head.
‘I was thinking that, sir – unless you’d taken a lot of trouble to get out of your depth – you’d have a job to drown by accident.’
Skelgill nods pensively.
‘No pile of beer cans by the shore?’
‘No, sir – what I’ve heard of him, he was teetotal – you’d occasionally see him skulking round Coniston, but he wasn’t the sort of tramp you’d find on a bench with a bottle of strong cider for company.’
Skelgill loosely casts a hand in a small arc before them.
‘DS Jones tells me you’re from round here.’
‘Grew up in Great Langdale, sir – we had the Post Office – but we moved to Coniston when I was twelve.’
‘So you knew of Ticker?’
‘That’s right, sir.’ The constable blinks a little self-consciously. ‘Me and a pal – we used to go up into Blackbeck Wood – birds’ nesting and the like – secretly we were always hoping to find what we called Ticker’s Nest.’
‘And did you?’
The constable shakes his head, though the hint of a smile teases the corners of his mouth as he revisits the memory.
‘I reckon we might have got close once or twice – he chased us out of there a few times – that was part of the fun – pretending he was a cannibal, living off his wits and stray nippers like us.’
Skelgill tips his head to one side in a gesture of approval; this is exactly the kind of adventure that formed part of his own childhood.
‘I heard folk would leave food for him – in hiding places?’
The constable appears unsure about this possibility, though he frowns in a way that suggests it strikes some chord. He shakes his head uncertainly.
‘I don’t know about that – I can ask around – but there is a spot I’ve seen him more than once – when I’ve been driving through to Santon Bridge.’
‘Aye?’
‘Sir – you know the stone they call Meg’s Hat – at the foot of Blackbeck Wood?’
Skelgill purses his lips – for once he appears stumped as regards his Lakeland heritage.
‘I’ve heard of Long Meg – by the stone circle over at Little Salkeld – named after the witch from Meldon.’
‘That’s her, sir – well this one’s shaped like a pointed hat – it’s easy to miss though – it’s over the wall from the road, just where a little beck passes through a culvert – about halfway between the track to Blackbeck Castle and the Little Langdale village sign.’ (Skelgill nods as though he can picture the location.) ‘The story goes that Long Meg was travelling over to Boot and had stopped to drink – she’d knelt down and taken off her hat – but she was almost ambushed by a gang of witchfinders and had to flee into the forest. They say she cast a spell and turned her hat to stone so they couldn’t carry it away as evidence.’
8. TICKER’S NEST
If Long Meg’s petrified ‘hat’ is actual size, then indeed her stature would correspond to the eponymous megalith some twenty-five miles hence (as the broomstick flies) at Little Salkeld – the twelve-foot outlier of the circle reputed to be her coven of daughters, themselves turned to stone in the act of sorcery by Scottish wizard Michael Scott. Skelgill stalks cautiously around the object – perhaps inadvertently doing so widdershins (being left-handed?) – a rather sceptical expression creasing his features. Certainly it is roughly pointed, and dark in colour, with a greenish hue typical of the local slate, but in shape it lacks the tapered precision of the stereotypical enchantress’s headgear. It is impossible to tell how much of its bulk lies below ground, but it protrudes to a height of about four feet – and thus is invisible to road users beyond the dry stone wall that borders the woodland. As the constable’s anecdote had implied, it is set just a few feet from a small clear stream that plunges into an ancient-looking culvert beneath the base of the wall.
Skelgill’s scrutiny, however, is not directed upon the jagged shard of rock itself, but on the ground that surrounds it. Try as they might (and not that they often do try), humans are far from expert at disguising their tracks. So, if tourists regularly visited this place, Skelgill would expect to see a patch of worn earth beneath the easiest part of the wall to scale, and around the monument itself. There is no such balding of the vegetation; indeed the only indication that any animal form comes this way is a six-inch-wide badger-path that leads away from the base of the ‘hat’ into the undergrowth. But even this assessment would be flawed. Badgers might be creatures of habit, over generations wearing distinctive tracks from sett to foraging grounds – but they are not prolific sightseers. In possession of this knowledge, Skelgill is unfoxed.
The bank of elder shrub into which the narrow path disappears is already in leaf, racing to put on growth before the budding woodland canopy steals the sun and casts a permanent shade. But elder is a friend to the adventurer, lacking the thorns and impenetrability of hawthorn, and Skelgill easily parts the spindly branches of adjacent bushes. Yet now he pauses, and pulls a handful of bruised foliage to his face – and inhales deeply. The constable was not the only boy to be a birds’ nester – and the mephitic smell of elder evokes for Skelgill such heady days of discovery, spring evenings after school spent searching, probing into hedgerows, on tiptoes stretching precariously, twigs snapping, heart racing, small hands feeling for the hot shock of a fresh clutch of eggs, of song thrush, blackbird, dunnock or linnet. He detaches a cluster of leaves and rubs them vigorously between his palms, discarding them and then smearing the residue over his forehead, face and around his neck. In days gone by an ostler would wreathe his horses’ harnesses with elder to repel flies – and Skelgill knows this same trick: the woodland midge is deterred by the plant’s bitter aroma of cyanide.
Once he has slipped through the elder grove the forest floor becomes less crowded, as the gradient steepens and rocky outcrops forbid much undergrowth. The path, too, widens in places, and is more heavily worn where the terrain demands a high step. However, Ticker plainly knew what he was doing in attempting to conceal the whereabouts of his abode. Not only had he moved with great care near the standing stone, leaving only the impression of animal activity, but also he had another card up his sleeve. Now Skelgill finds the route traversing the hillside and returning to meet the little beck. And, here, it stops dead.
He casts about, but beyond the little rocky gully there is no trace of a regular footfall. The earth is thick with soft moss and tumbling lichen, a carpet that would certainly yield and soon betray the regular passing of human feet. Skelgill steps across the beck and regards the ground more carefully, checking that the path does not pick up again a couple of yards further on – but to no avail. At this juncture, a hound engaged to track the old man of the woods might be thwarted, but Skelgill is able to employ a detective’s nose (and a good-sized one, at that). Though no reader of fiction, in effect he applies the maxim of Sherlock Holmes: when all othe
r avenues are exhausted, that which remains must provide the solution, however implausible. The beck and the path are one and the same.
Accordingly he begins to follow the diminutive watercourse upstream. This is not a matter of wading, for the bed is rocky and the flow continually cuts between boulders and dives beneath fallen logs. There are level footholds aplenty, and indeed the route – taken without haste – is deceptively easy, a natural staircase that steadily takes its passenger up through the forest. Skelgill continues this way for several minutes, and though he frequently scans left and right in case the path returns to the woodland floor, he finds no cause to digress. However, when the ground suddenly steepens and the stream becomes a tinkling waterfall that pours glistening down a mossy cliff of some ten feet, Skelgill halts – this barrier would challenge a skilled climber, let alone a septuagenarian tramp.
At the base of the outcrop the brook tumbles into a clear pool, maybe a yard in diameter and a couple of feet deep. Skelgill inspects this and nods with some satisfaction. It is just the place to dip a pot (indeed it would accommodate his own Kelly Kettle – and he perhaps rues its absence). He notes that around the pool’s edge large flat rocks have been arranged to create a level though natural-looking pavement. If he were to make a camp himself, it would be close to a reliable source such as this – for drinking, cooking and, on a discretionary basis, washing.
The main considerations for wild living and – perhaps more pertinently – sleeping are protection from rain, wind and cold. Overarching these requirements, the wish for concealment clearly figured high on William Thymer’s list of attributes. On the face of it a cave would satisfy all of these criteria, and the preponderance of old mines in the vicinity might suggest an obvious solution for his hideaway. However, such tunnels are often damp, with an unforgiving bedrock that chills to the bone; the air may be stale, and potentially poisonous and the darkness a depressing constant. Certainly, these would be Skelgill’s perceptions, and consequently he follows his own instincts in an alternative direction.
Some fifteen yards from the pool, upwind in a westerly direction, the woodland appears to thicken. This shadowy impression is created by a clustering of mature Norway spruces, majestic evergreens that strike sixty feet skywards, to the exclusion of other less vigorous species. There is a silence now in the wood as daylight wanes, and only the faintest ‘cork-on-glass’ song of a tiny goldcrest emanates from high above. Skelgill tilts back his head and sniffs, rather like a stag that tests the breeze for danger. He appears perplexed, as if the resinous scent of pine is tainted, and sets off purposefully towards the conifers. They cast an apron that creeps beyond the tips of their boughs – a fine brown carpet of needles, scales of bark, finely toothed twigs and curling cones – that remains dry in all but the most prolonged of rains, and conveniently accepts no tracks. But Skelgill’s course is driven by intuition. He ducks beneath a low sweep of branches and emerges into a hidden clearing, and – sure enough – there stands his object, a bender. Roughly the size and shape of a two-person tunnel tent, its frame of withies is cloaked with a colourful patchwork of split fertilizer sacks anchored to hand-carved wooden pegs by guys of orange baler twine.
And thus Skelgill’s consternation of a minute earlier finds its explanation: however, it is not the sight of the construction itself that furrows his brow, but the leafy adornments recently added. Draped all over the shelter, and likewise dangling from the branches of the surrounding spruces, are perhaps as many as thirty bunches of partially wilted elder foliage. It seems that Skelgill is not alone in putting this rather nondescript shrub to good use.
A flap of clear though tarnished polythene covers the mouth of the shelter, and more elder hangs here; he carefully moves it aside before lifting what is the door. It is gloomy beneath the conifers, and even darker inside the bender – but as his eyes become accustomed to the lack of light it is a scene of some order that greets him. On the left is a bed – a cot made from strips of hazel interwoven between stakes hammered into the earth, this frame filled to overflowing with dry bracken – traditionally harvested for winter bedding for livestock – and overlaid with perhaps as many as a dozen threadbare blankets topped by a grubby sleeping bag. On the right is a wall of crates and boxes, plastic tubs, canisters and large tins. The open-top containers hold soot-blackened cooking utensils (pot, frying pan, kettle), plate, mug, cutlery and various implements; tools (spade with broken handle, wooden mallet, rusty hacksaw, a useful-looking axe); and a sizeable assortment of tinned food (though predominantly baked beans); while those vessels with lids – inspected by Skelgill – conceal such staples as oats, candles and matches, and desert island luxuries in the form of many new-looking bars of chocolate, and by contrast a yellowing collection of second-hand books, including titles such as Food for Foragers, The Compendium of Magical Herbs and The Apothecary’s Flora.
Skelgill seems satisfied that this inventory is largely innocuous (although he ponders for a moment over the literature, and might reasonably question the provenance of the confectionery), yet he lingers upon his haunches, perhaps considering what life would be like inside this rudimentary dwelling, already beginning to feel at home. He tests the roof with the spread fingers of his left hand – though flimsy, it appears watertight, the slit fertilizer bags having been tiled from the ground up, and correctly overlapped along the sloping ridge. Eliminating rain and wind goes a long way towards defeating the cold – although when the mercury plummets the insulating bracken and pile of blankets would be a necessary refuge. He presses down on the bed with both palms – it yields with a reassuring crackling springiness, suggesting that the bracken has been recently replenished – Ticker’s Nest is a fitting epithet.
He checks his watch – the hour has crept past six, and if he is to escape the wood before dusk he must soon depart. In a rather ungainly fashion he crawls out of the shelter, like an unpractised sprinter struggling to come to terms with his blocks. But he pauses overlong in the ‘set’ position – his eyes studying a pattern of hitherto unnoticed score marks in the ground. He hauls himself to his feet and steps away for a wider perspective. Enclosing the bender a ring is scraped into the pine needles and, at intervals, a succession of triangles each has its apex touching the inside of this circle. He extracts his mobile phone, and steps away to the rear and takes a photograph, the flash firing to emphasise the failing light.
Skelgill now hesitates – his job is done here at the campsite, and he must decide which route to take. His car is parked at the same spot he and DS Jones used yesterday, a good distance from the site of Meg’s Hat, where the stretch of road is narrow and lacks a suitable verge or laybys. He rips open the flap of his trousers’ map pocket and produces a compass. A quick check appears to confirm what he already suspects, and he sets off in the opposite direction from that in which he arrived, picking a path that continues to traverse the afforested hillside. After about ten minutes’ steady walking the lie of the land presents him with a choice of a rising bluff or a slightly trickier boulder-strewn course. He opts for the latter, clambering between the rocks, greasy with algae and liverworts, as a cliff rises to his right. But the reason for his choice soon becomes clear – for in another minute or so he reaches the mouth of the ravine that he explored with DS Jones. Now, of course, there is a faintly trodden path, which brings him to the high boundary wall of Blackbeck Castle; from here it is a simple matter of retracing his steps of yesterday.
It is just after he has passed the impenetrable grey gate when something catches his eye. Bluebells – yet to flower – swathe good parts of the woodland floor with their prolific bottle-green foliage, and amongst one patch of these a metallic glint attracts his attention. In fact he continues for several paces before the visual incongruity registers with his consciousness and induces him to investigate. He steps cautiously through the foliage – as though to avoid damage to the tender shoots – and reaches tentatively to extract the foreign item. It is an old book, hardbound in black clothette, only th
ree-and-a-half inches by five, though a good inch-and-a-quarter thick. The fine pages are gilt-edged – explaining its reflective gleam – and he rotates the spine to reveal the title: The Holy Bible. With reverent thumbs he separates the front cover from the first page. A small label announces, “Presented by the Blue Coat School, Everton” and inscribed in faded blue ink at the top left corner of the endpaper is the name, W. Thymer.
9. LITTLE LANGDALE
‘Where are you, Guv – it sounds like you’re in a pub?’
‘You ought to have been a detective, Leyton.’
‘Very good, Guv – I’ll remember that one.’
Skelgill raises his eyebrows to nobody in particular.
‘I’m still at Little Langdale, Leyton – bird in the hand.’
‘I can recommend the pie, Guv – I was just saying to the missus I should have bought a couple and saved her cooking.’
‘I’ll bring you some back if you want, Leyton – you can have them tomorrow night.’
‘Blimey, Guv – don’t trouble yourself – know what I mean?’
Skelgill shrugs, this gesture also invisible to his colleague.
‘Anyway – what’s the story?’
DS Leyton hesitates for a moment – there are strident background noises that could be the sound of small children engaging in some form of aquatic sibling rivalry. Skelgill has evidently called his sergeant’s mobile at bath time.
‘Did you get my message, Guv – is that why you’re ringing?’
Skelgill momentarily takes his handset away from his ear and taps at the screen. He scowls.
‘I’ve had none come through – the signal’s worse than useless over here – I’ve only got one bar now.’
‘Oh, right, Guv.’ The penny seems to drop with DS Leyton that his superior has called him not out of urgency but more likely boredom. ‘Actually it was no news really, Guv – just that they’ll have some preliminary test results on the drowning victim by about ten in the morning.’
Murder by Magic (Detective Inspector Skelgill Investigates Book 5) Page 7