A Shroud of Leaves

by Rebecca Alexander

  She coughed, the sound echoing around her. She reached out and caught a good handhold in front of her, a sharp spur on the other side. Thank God she hadn’t fallen down that channel, she could have been impaled. She rested for a moment, trying to think. The slab on top had pivoted sharply. But they had been on the earthwork all week, hadn’t they? She closed her eyes, trying to remember. Trent had been digging around it, on the barrow; she recalled seeing a line of soil scraped free on either side of the slab. She hadn’t wanted to stand on it before, it was green with slippery algae. But when she did, it tipped her into the larger of two shafts. The ancient people who created the mound laid the rocks – could they have designed it to trap something?

  She tried to ignore the pain in her shoulder and swung her second knee onto the outcrop, the rough edges biting into her skin through saturated jeans. The water was already several inches over the ledge as she shuffled on. Could she stand? It seemed like there was a handhold above her head, and she scraped one foot up, then pulled on the outcrop with her good arm. It was a lot harder than she expected. Her wet clothes made her feel heavier and the pain – and shock, probably – added to the cold to weaken her. Her foot slipped an inch and she gripped the handhold even harder, until she could balance on both feet. Standing, she could catch her breath.

  The opening was only a little over her head but the letterbox-shaped gap was three feet away, on the other side of the other shaft, falling away into darkness. It looked smooth at the top and tapered in. There were no obvious handholds. She screamed again. ‘Help! Help me, somebody, help me!’

  She rested her chin on her hand, still clutching the handhold for balance. Did she hear something? Her heart hammered in her ears. She tried a rusty scream.

  ‘Sage? Sage!’ The voice, Felix’s, was sharp with alarm and sounded far away. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Inside the barrow, under the rock.’ She could feel tears running down her face in relief, tickling her upper lip. ‘The stone is loose at the top. Be careful.’

  She could hear more shouting, like Felix was calling to other people.

  ‘Sage, we’re going to get you out.’

  ‘I’m hurt.’

  ‘We’re coming. Here, Nick—’ Felix must have turned away, the voice became muffled.

  Nick? She rubbed her face on the sleeve of her jacket. ‘Nick!’ It was meant to be a scream but it was a hoarse whisper.

  ‘Sage! I’m here.’ The light above darkened for a moment and she screamed. When she looked back up she could see a hand in the light. ‘We’ve been looking for you for hours.’

  ‘How long have I been down here?’

  ‘It’s late. You’ve been gone half the day.’

  The water was already over her knees again. ‘It’s filling up with water. I’m afraid I’m going to drown.’

  ‘We’re going to get you out. We’re getting the fire brigade. Just stay put and talk to me.’

  Her fingers were going numb. Standing on a ledge put a lot of strain on the hand clinging to the sharp spur. ‘I don’t know how long I can stand here. I’ve hurt my arm and it’s really narrow. I’m hanging on but it’s so cold.’

  ‘I understand. Just keep talking. We’re just waiting for some equipment.’

  She rested for a moment, her chest tight. ‘I can’t breathe,’ she said, realising how hard it had become. ‘I mean, I can but it’s hard.’

  ‘We’ll have you out soon. I came in with Felix – we’ve been looking for you. Alistair Chorleigh is blind drunk but he mumbled something about the barrows.’

  ‘He saw me fall in here. I think Lara Black fell in here too. It’s some sort of trap.’

  ‘Sage?’ Felix’s voice was deeper than Nick’s. ‘The fire brigade are on their way. Don’t move.’

  ‘I’m afraid I’ll fall.’ Her voice had become small and dreamy. ‘I’m frozen. It’s full of water.’

  There was some scuffling and talking then the light went altogether, which made Sage scream again. When it came back it was blinding. ‘I can see an arm!’ Nick shouted, and something warm grabbed her wrist. ‘It’s OK, it’s me.’

  She let go of the rock spur and turned her hand to grasp his fingers. Nick could reach in far enough to offer her comfort but she doubted he could hold her weight if she slipped.

  ‘I do want to get married.’ It was the first thing that rose to the top of her frozen brain.

  There was a long silence as she fought for her balance, gripping his fingers.

  ‘You have crazy timing.’ Nick’s voice was filled with something. Laughter, joy – he could do joy in a way that Max did, in a way that she held back from. ‘Let’s get you out in one piece first.’

  Her fingers burned with cramp, pins and needles. Waves of nausea washed over her, she could hear a buzzing in her ears blocking Nick out. ‘Nick…’ She couldn’t speak, the dizziness was washing over her.

  ‘Sage! Stay with me. Felix…’ She could hear him talking, but the cold was seeping into her. It was climbing now, up to her chest, leaching away her remaining energy. Her breaths sounded louder in her head. She wasn’t shivering now, she felt oddly calm as she swayed on the ledge. Max, the baby, only he wasn’t a baby any more. She could see him on Nick’s lap, laughing, patting Nick’s hands in some crazy rhyme he had made up. Dada, Dada, shouted louder and louder. Her hand slipped in Nick’s, but it didn’t matter, she was so cold it was almost warmer in the water, where she was numb. She balanced for a long moment, vaguely hearing shouting, seeing a crack of light above her head as the stone slid open slowly, a cascade of soil and mosses drifting onto her upturned face.

  ‘Sage!’

  The shouts were very far away now, lost in the humming in her ears. Her fingers relaxed, she could feel the grasp around her wrist tighten until it felt crushed in Nick’s warm hand. She swayed again, this time feeling the rocks slip under her feet, under the cold, as she slid down. She thrashed her good hand away from Nick, scrabbling for the handhold but missed. The water closed over her head.

  36

  ‘The missing gentleman is named EDWIN MASTERS, late of Balliol College, Oxford, and recently a visitor at Chorleigh House on the Fairfield Road. We were called to the house on 12th July after Mr Masters was found to be absent after working on a prehistoric excavation he and Mr Peter Chorleigh were carrying out, with the landowner’s permission. Mr Chorleigh raised the alarm when his friend could not be found. His jacket and spectacles were retrieved from the top of an earthwork the young gentlemen had been excavating. PC Evans noted that some digging was apparent on the top of another raised bank, which Mr Chorleigh had identified as an old well, but there was no obvious ingress and no one responded to our calls. The stones of said well were found to be wedged with stones and foliage and except for the digging, undisturbed. Upon questioning, Mr James Chorleigh said his son and daughter (Mary) were on the train to Edinburgh, being called to a family emergency. Mr Masters’ belongings have been packed up and are to be held for his return. Mr Chorleigh raised a question as to the young man’s character.’

  Police report, Sergeant Chance, Chilhaven Police

  37

  Later, Wednesday 27th March, this year, in the barrow

  A pain through Sage’s scalp brought her abruptly round, a burning in her throat forcing her to cough. A hand roughly fumbled under her injured arm and pulled. She screamed until he let go, her left hand grabbing the wrist of the person holding her hair. Hair that had enabled him to pull her head out of the water, anyway.

  ‘Broken,’ she spluttered. ‘Shoulder, dislocated or broken.’

  Another hand anchored her good wrist and started pulling. ‘We have to get you out.’ It was a strange voice, and for a moment a light attached to a helmet blinded her. ‘This is going to hurt for a short time, but as soon as we get you out, we’ll give you morphine and get you off to hospital.’ He shouted something over his shoulder then turned back to her. ‘Stay with me, Sage. A few more minutes and you’ll be safe.’

  He pul
led and it felt like her good shoulder was coming out of its socket before she got a foot onto the ledge, slipped off, found it again. ‘Nick,’ she mumbled.

  ‘He’s here, they’re all here.’ She could see the gleam of light on his teeth now.

  ‘Don’t fall on top of me.’

  ‘I’ve got three burly lads holding me. All you have to do is let us pull you up. I can’t put a chest harness on you, I think you’ve broken your collarbone, maybe more. So we’ll try and drag you up by whatever we can reach.’ He looked up. ‘Wedge that stone open, lads, I want to bring her up the way she went in.’

  At least she wouldn’t have to slide out the letterbox slot. She screamed when they pulled again, her feet lifted off the ledge. Her teeth were chattering. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, just do it.’

  The rescuer’s face was just above hers, the tendons in his neck straining. ‘A couple more and you’ll be out. Two… three—’

  This time she was prepared and managed to contain the scream to a groan, but another pair of hands reached for her clothes, half dragging her by her shirt and her wrist. Then she was face down on the grass of the barrow, sobbing with pain, rolling off her broken bones.

  ‘Nick!’

  ‘I’m here, it’s going to be OK…’

  She moved enough to throw up away from him.

  The man with the torch leaned over her, handed her something. ‘Gas and air. It will help while we get you in the warm.’ The shivering was back, great spasms that jolted her shoulder despite the pain relief. Lifting her onto the stretcher made the world white out with pain and she screamed again, but at least the ambulance was bright and warm. They were quick to start cutting her wet clothes off. Every inch of exposed skin was wrapped in blankets.

  ‘Come in, mate.’ She could see the rescuer now, in a fireman’s uniform grinning down at her. ‘Good luck, love. That was a tight squeeze, well done.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Tears seemed to flood down her face, scalding her cheeks.

  ‘No trouble.’ He disappeared and Nick leaned over her.

  ‘Bloody hell, Sage, I thought that was it.’ She could see tears dotting his long eyelashes.

  ‘So did I.’ She looked across at where a woman was poking at her arm with a needle. ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Sit still. You need some fluids.’ The woman smiled at her. ‘There you go. Now you can have some pain relief.’

  Sage managed a tired chuckle. The warmth slowly invading her extremities was making them burn with pins and needles. ‘Good.’

  Nick stayed with her as her arm was strapped close to her body – another moment of unconsciousness – and she came around to the rattling of the ambulance in motion. Nick was still by her side. ‘You’re going to be all right,’ he was saying. ‘Everything will be OK now.’

  The shivering had lessened but she was still cold. ‘Hurts.’

  ‘I know. But we’ll get you to hospital, warm you up, fix your shoulder.’ The pain receded, and the word that came to the top of the stack of things she could say was, ‘Felix?’

  ‘He worked out what might have happened. He thinks he knows what the barrow actually is.’

  ‘Wolf trap,’ she mumbled, lifting her head to look out of the open doors. ‘Dark.’

  ‘You’ve been gone hours. It’s gone eleven.’

  ‘Chorleigh. He hurt the horses in the forest.’ She wasn’t sure if the words all made it out but Nick was nodding.

  ‘It’s OK. We can talk about it later. Everything’s going to be OK.’

  ‘No, Alistair told me, then he chased me. He saw me fall into the barrow.’

  ‘He did? He did mumble something about the barrow but he was very drunk.’

  The paramedic squeezed something into her arm and a warm numbness spread through her body.

  ‘You’re OK,’ Nick said. ‘You can talk about this later.’

  ‘Hm.’ She felt the ambulance slow as she fell into sleep.

  38

  ‘Yesterday, a search was undertaken by the Chilhaven police and volunteers after the disappearance of an Oxford man, Edwin Masters. Mr Masters has not been seen since 12th July this year and has had no communication with friends or his family. Dog walkers joined the search of farmland and the common lands around Chorleigh House. No clues were found, and railway porters and omnibus drivers were questioned to no avail.

  Mr Masters, a visitor at Chorleigh House for the summer, is of tanned complexion, with dark curly hair and brown eyes. Of average height, he is of stocky build and usually wears spectacles. He is twenty-two years old.

  Mr James Chorleigh, the householder, had nothing to add to the investigation, and saw no advantage to further searching his lands after a thorough police examination. Mr Masters’ mother, Mrs Alice Masters, is staying in Lyndhurst and has offered a reward of fifty pounds to anyone offering information leading to the whereabouts of her son. Her maternal uncle, General John Bishop, provided the reward and is joining the search with his own men. Professor Robert Conway, of Balliol College, Oxford, is assisting the search and is supporting Mrs Masters. Her late husband, the Reverend William Masters was a chaplain in the Second Boer War, and died of wounds received in that campaign.

  Please share any information about Mr Masters, no matter how small, with the Chilhaven police or with Mrs Masters at the White Hart Hotel, Lyndhurst.’

  The Fairfield Recorder, 27th July 1913

  39

  Thursday 28th March, this year, hospital

  Lenham pulled a chair up to Sage’s hospital bed. She covered her eyes from the sun slanting through the window and he pulled the blind before he sat down.

  ‘Do you feel better?’ The chair creaked when he sat back.

  ‘I’ll mend. Thank you.’ She managed a smile. ‘They are going to operate on my broken bones tomorrow. Trent’s already been in and I don’t think Felix has left.’

  ‘No, he’s outside with your partner. Nick, is it? They say you’re basically going to be OK.’

  ‘So they tell me.’ She couldn’t bear to close her eyes, in case she dreamed she was back there. Great. More nightmares.

  He looked down at her hand, as if he wanted to take it. ‘I was really worried we weren’t going to find you, like Lara.’

  ‘I was lucky; the water was half filling the shaft. It broke my fall but didn’t drown me. But Chorleigh knew, because he had seen it happen to Lara. He herded me back onto the trap.’

  ‘I know. The pressure of being questioned about Lara and the terror that they would find out he’d been attacking horses all over Hampshire made him lie about what happened. His father accused him of killing her, and punished him by refusing to let him care for his animals. It must have been awful for the lad, knowing the horses didn’t even have water. Eventually, his father despatched the dying horses; the necropsy showed they’d had their throats cut, very precisely. As chief agister, Chorleigh senior would have known how to put an animal down in an emergency. He didn’t want anyone knowing what he’d done to them.’

  ‘And then he beat Alistair up?’

  ‘I think so. Perhaps he still wouldn’t tell his father what had happened to Lara. He was hurt badly enough to put him in hospital, anyway. His father covered it all up and got the search warrant rescinded. He probably thought Lara was there, buried somewhere.’

  ‘But she wasn’t.’ Sage swallowed the lump that was forming in her throat, it made her voice husky. ‘She was injured and stuck in the dark waiting to die.’

  He seemed to hesitate. ‘Lara’s injuries were much more extensive than yours. She fell into a dry shaft; the water cushioned your fall. We’ve retrieved her remains now. She had a fractured skull, it was probably very quick.’ He looked at his hands. ‘At least her family know what happened now and they can bury her remains.’

  She blinked away a few tears. ‘I got Alistair completely wrong.’

  ‘He didn’t kill Lara, he just kept silent for twenty-seven years. She probably walked up there to look at the view and, well, you know what happen
ed. He should have warned you, or called for help.’

  ‘I could have died.’

  Lenham shrugged. ‘He’s confessed, at least. After he was expelled from school, for sexual experimentation with a pony there, he went on to release his anger at his father on local animals. He was admitted to a private clinic after he got out of hospital, that’s why no one could interview him again. They sent him home after all the treatment they could throw at him. Drugs, electroshock therapy, the works.’ He looked at her. ‘At least it stopped the animal attacks. But what I really wanted to tell you is that we’ve made an arrest for the murder of River Sloane.’

  ‘The stepfather?’ Tiredness was overwhelming her again but the ache in her shoulder, suspended over her head in a sling, kept her sharp.

  ‘No, but the dental tape and blood made us look at him very closely, including his family. Owen Sloane a.k.a. Jimmy Macintosh used to own a lockup garage with his ex-wife, which she got in the divorce. When they split, she let him store things in it, including a set of golf clubs, one of which matched the bruise on River’s head.’

  Sage rested her head back on the pillow. The cold expression on Sloane’s daughter’s face had haunted her since the first day at the crime scene. ‘Was it Melissa?’

  He looked at her in surprise. ‘We think so. She’s only fourteen. But she cold-bloodedly lured her stepsister down to the lockup on Saturday around lunchtime, and bashed her head in with a golf club. She used trying on ice skating boots as an excuse. Apparently she had a crush on River’s boyfriend.’

  It was all so horrible. Sage shut her eyes but the memory of River’s serene face emerging from the leaves intruded. ‘Poor kid.’