by Phil Rickman
‘It may be that Jones has been in touch with Sollers Bull by now, and he knows what we’re moving towards. Or it may be that there’s no link between them at all. I don’t know. We’ll see.’
‘What does Frannie Bliss think?’
‘Why do you ask that?’
‘Just that there seems to have been quite a concerted effort to discredit him over this. Sollers Bull and Countryside Defiance? Whoever they are.’
‘Most of the time,’ Howe said quietly, ‘Francis Bliss is his own worst enemy.’
‘He’s had a bad few months. Domestically.’
‘So I understand.’
The Audi was alone now on the Brecon road, where it sliced through invisible Magnis. Night clouds were gliding like flatfish in the aquarium of a big pale sky. The Easter full moon was up there somewhere. Merrily was remembering her first meeting with Annie Howe. The clinical interrogation of Jane in the search for a missing girl. A bad start, getting no better, as she’d conspicuously sided with Bliss through the years of attrition.
Howe took a left towards the Wye. One of those lanes that you never had cause to go down because it didn’t lead anywhere apart from farms. Howe slowed, keeping the headlights dipped. Merrily dragged herself out of drowsiness, peering through the windscreen, following the headlights as they opened up the road, bleaching the grass at the verges. Annie Howe was talking again.
‘… under no obligation to cover up what Jones and Mostyn have been doing, but I intend to take it slowly. If you see any indication that Sollers knows more than he should about unconventional religious practices, I’d be grateful if you kept it to yourself until we’re out of there. And, yes, I am aware that you don’t work for the police.’
‘God tends to take a dim view of murder,’ Merrily said.
If only to see Annie Howe wince. The car slowed. A private-looking sign on a right-hand bend said: Oldcastle.
‘ Was it a castle at one time?’
‘No idea,’ Howe said. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Just wondered how long-established the family was.’
‘Long enough. Even for this area.’
Merrily checked her mobile. She’d left messages for Lol and Jane. Lol said he’d be in the Swan. Jane, presumably, was out with Eirion.
Near the top of a wooded rise, the full moon sprang out between the tall chimneys of the lightless farmhouse. It looked like a shell. A dead house. Merrily thought, who could live, unconcerned, overlooking the yard where a previous owner had been slashed and hacked to death? How long before the stain faded into a historical talking point, a footnote in a tourist guide?
Annie Howe drove down beyond the house, between well-grown oaks.
‘Sollers lives in a converted coach house.’
‘But he inherits Oldcastle?’
‘Seems likely. Doubt he’ll live there, but nobody can see him selling it. More likely turn it into a hotel or some sort of conference centre. Maybe even the official citadel for the increasingly wealthy Countryside Defiance. Their website carries a photograph of him in hunting pink with all the trimmings. And handcuffs.’
‘Huh?’
‘The countryside in manacles – the foxhunting ban and other issues. Sollers Bull lives to hunt.’
A caged bulkhead light came on over the porch as Annie Howe parked in front of a metal gate next to a small car. By the time they got the gate open and reached the porch door, a woman was coming out, wearing a calf-length sheepskin coat, its collar held together over her chin and mouth. Annie Howe stood in silence and watched her.
‘Thank you, Mr Bull,’ the woman said, her back to them now, ‘and I’m sorry to have bothered you. Goodnight.’
As the woman got into the small car and its engine started up, a man appeared in the doorway.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Annie.’
‘I tried to call, Mr Bull,’ Howe said. ‘But you were engaged.’
‘Bewildering times, Annie. The phone only ever stops when I unplug it.’ His voice was pitched up higher than you expected; you could hear it lofted across the fields, over the melee of a hunt. ‘You got something to tell me?’
‘To ask you. If you can spare the time.’
‘Of course. Coffee?’
‘No, thank you, Mr Bull. I suspect we’ve had rather too much of that today.’
The overhead light made a twinkling star in an ear stud as Sollers Bull turned to examine Merrily. She saw a man of a little over medium height. A keenly pointed face, with deep bevelled cheeks. He was wearing tight black jeans and a red T-shirt with a message on it in black: Not a fox-hugger. The small car pulled away, headlights on full beam. Maybe the woman was a journalist.
‘This is Merrily Watkins,’ Annie Howe said.
Didn’t explain further. She had her mobile out; it had evidently been on vibrate.
‘Excuse me.’ She took a step back on to the path, speaking into the phone. ‘DCI Howe.’ And then, after a silence, her voice low and deliberate, ‘When was this, Karen?’ before moving further away.
‘Erm…’ Merrily looked up at Sollers Bull. She was cold. ‘Would you mind if I had a coffee?’
‘I’ll put some on.’
She followed him into a very classy designer kitchen.
‘This an old house, Mr Bull?’
‘Not particularly. Nineteenth-century and fortunately not listed so I’ve been able to do what I like with it.’
‘The farmhouse must be listed, though.’
‘Grade Two. Starred.’
‘ Was it a castle?’
‘No. Older than that. The site was known as Oldcastle because of what was there before. Don’t know what it was, but the stones are probably in the foundations. ’
‘I see.’
Through a window, Merrily saw Annie Howe, in the light grey trench coat, up against a ranch-style fence, listening to the phone. When she came back, her face was paler than the coat, but no less grey.
‘Meant to ask you, how’s Charlie these days?’ Sollers said.
Sitting with his back to the red Aga, stretched out almost diagonally, feet under the hardwood table, hands behind his head. Charlie? This would explain him addressing Howe as Annie. It very much figured that the Oldcastle Bulls would be familiar with her dad.
‘I’ll come straight to the point, Mr Bull. Colin Jones – how well do you know him?’
Sollers looked blank. Genuinely so, Merrily thought, studying him: younger than he looked in the papers and not so distinguished: too flash for that.
‘ Byron Jones?’ Merrily said.
‘Oh, well, I know him,’ Sollers said. ‘Though not particularly well.’
‘Have you ever done business with him?’ Howe asked.
‘Kind of business?’
‘Cattle, for example. Ever sold any cattle to Mr Jones?’
‘I wasn’t aware that Mr Jones was even in the livestock business. Or the meat trade, come to that.’
‘That’s not quite answering the question, is it, sir?’
Annie Howe began unbuckling the belt of her coat, unhurried, like she was prepared to stay until she got what she’d come for. Only Merrily, sitting next to her, opposite Sollers, saw that her fingers were unsteady, fumbling it.
Sollers straightened up in his chair. His sleek, pointy face looked… foxy.
‘No, I’ve never sold any beasts to Mr Jones.’
‘Or maybe given him one?’
‘Do you know what Hereford cattle are worth?’ Sollers glanced from Howe to Merrily and back to Howe. ‘What exactly is this about?’
‘Just so that we have this clear, Mr Bull,’ Howe said, ‘you’re saying that, as far as you’re aware, no animal bred at Oldcastle has ever been sent to Colin Jones’s establishment. Sent either to Jones or his business partner, Kenny Mostyn.’
‘How would I know?’
‘As far as you’re aware.’
‘I think you’d better explain.’
‘I don’t have to explain anything,’ Howe said.
&
nbsp; Her skin looked cold as bone.
She hadn’t said what the phone call had been about. But then, police business, why would she?
69
Law of the Hunt
‘Thank Christ,’ Danny said.
Kenny Mostyn, and he was on his own and no longer wearing a dinner jacket.
Dressed for action, in fact: dark jeans, black fleece. Likely his suit was in the overnight bag over one shoulder; Danny had been worried that Mostyn might be staying the night at The Court and they’d still be sitting here when the sun come up, stiff as corpses. But mabbe Mostyn wasn’t overnight-guest material.
‘Looks like you was right then, Gomer.’
They had the old Jeep parked under a willow tree, edge of the parking area. Only a couple of dozen vehicles left. This was a select dinner party. Gomer had ID’d Councillor Lyndon Pierce, fellers on that level, usual suspects.
‘Mostyn just showin’ his face,’ Gomer said, ‘but he got business elsewhere to see to.’
‘Don’t switch on yet, let him get clear of the gate.’
‘En’t daft, boy. Keep our distance all the way.’
‘Only thing worries me,’ Danny said, ‘is what if the Scotch bloke’s told him about a feller lookin’ for him with a cock to put in the ring. Best I could think of at the time, see.’
‘Too late to get fussed about that.’
There was a furry growl under Gomer’s voice now. Likely due to seeing Mostyn dressed much the same as he had been that night in the snow. Everything coming back, and the worst of it was that – for just a short while, surrounded by these lithe, prowling young guys – he’d felt just a bit scared. And even worse than that…
… mabbe like an old man.
Gomer was gonner hold that against Kenny Mostyn for ever.
It was like Cornel was gobbling up the night, wildly excited as he guided Jane, limping, through the gap in the high wire fence. Holding her hand inside his, which was big and dry. The moon lit an open space, with army-type huts, metal gates leading to fields and woodland.
‘What is it?’
‘Big boys’ playground.’
Jane gave up. The way his mood had altered, she could only think he’d taken something. Maybe when he went off, apparently for a pee in the woods and she hadn’t heard anything. Snorting coke from a folded tenner.
‘Training centre,’ Cornel said. ‘Assault course, big pond they cross on ropes, professional shooting range… and all the things they daren’t do at The Court because it’s too close to the village.’
‘And cockfights?’
‘Cockfights, yeah, yeah, sure.’
‘So this is connected with The Court?’
‘Court’s just paintballing, clay-shooting, a few pheasant shoots and all that regular shit. And then you’re asked discreetly if you’d like to do some real shooting. Not for the wimps and the veggies. And that’s when you meet Kenny for rough shoots in the woods, back of The Court and then maybe this other guy, ex-SAS, leads a weekend in the Black Mountains or the Beacons, which is a lot tougher, and the hunting’s on a whole different level – you don’t kill, you don’t eat. And that’s where you start paying for yourself.’
‘You did that?’
‘Sure, sure, sure, but all the time – this is what pissed me off – you’re aware of other guys getting handpicked for really heavy shit. I wanted that – more than any of them.’
Cornel had his wire-cutters around a strand of barbed wire where a hole had been cut in the fence. Kept leaning on the handles, snipping bits off the wire. ‘When I was at the LSE, used to read all these SAS books. I identified with that. Different jungle, that’s all. And these other guys are going off at midnight in a Land Rover, and I go to Kenny – what about me? And he’s going, We don’t think you’re quite ready, Cornel, and I’m like, What exactly do you want me to prove? Name it.’
Jane was trying to ease her hand away, without making it seem like a snub, but Cornel kept squeezing it, words spurting out of him.
‘’Cause I thought he was like my mate. He’d start taking me on one side, whispering the kind of thing you appreciate knowing when you’re on a shooting trip and the others are all upper-class bastards who’ve been handling shotguns since they could walk. Thought it was him and me. One time I saw what I thought was this fox in the woods, about to pop it when I realized it was a dog. And that night, in the pub, when I was alone with Kenny, he said, why didn’t you just shoot it?’
‘Shoot a dog?’
Jane’s fingers stiffened.
‘“Lost a few points there, Cornel,” he said. And after that I was always aware he was watching me, making these little remarks, asking could I hold my drink, stuff like that. Like testing my resolve, how determined I was to move on. So I’m drinking more and I’m blasting off at anything that moves. Mostly missed, but not always. Getting better. Bought my own shotgun. Getting there. And he kept asking for more money, and I kept giving it to him. It’s a rite of passage, he’d say. Cost me over a grand for the cockfight, and that was before the betting started. That was him in the yard at the Swan. That was Kenny. My mate.’
His mate? Telling him his balls had fallen off and to go back and cry himself to sleep? Come and see me again when you’re grown up.
There was something horribly wrong about all this. Cornel’s fingers were easing Jane’s apart, pushing between them. Didn’t like that; made her think of sex. Jane let the hand he was holding go limp, thinking to slide it out of his grip and get the hell out. Her ankle wasn’t broken, only twisted. She could do this. Best to run into the conifers. He was fit and had long legs and he could get to her easily if he could see her. The trees were her only chance. Be like midnight in there.
Cornel said, ‘You ever meet Kenny?’
‘I’ve never even been in one of his shops. Look, Cornel, I didn’t lie. That night at the Swan, I didn’t actually see anything. It was too dark. I just heard some of it. From the bottom of the yard. And, like, I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want it to sound like I was trying to humiliate you or anything, OK?’
‘Absolutely fine. Fine, fine, fine.’
‘It’s actually not fine, is it?’
‘It’s answered a few questions.’
‘Like I keep telling you, I just want to see Savitch brought down.’
‘Sure you do.’
‘I do.’
Cornel stood in the space where the wire had been cut, looking down into the clearing as if he was trying to think what had happened next. Jane could see his jaw working in the moonlight, hear his teeth grinding.
‘So it was Kenny took me to the cockfight. Bunch of us were supposed to be going, but in the end it was just him and me, and a bunch of gyppos and local trash. Some experience, though. Booze and coke everywhere. Crazy. Like something from another century. And you get drawn in – it wakes you up, the excitement. Incredible violence. Real energy. Came over with the Romans, cocking, did you know that?’
‘They seem to have got off on cruelty,’ Jane said. ‘The Romans.’
She could feel the sweat forming between their fingers.
‘I was drinking pretty heavily,’ Cornel said. ‘Had a few hundred on this cock and the bastard lost. Felt pretty pissed off, and Kenny says, put it in a sack. Get Barry at the Swan to cook it for you. Losers get eaten. Law of the hunt. Makes perfect sense.’ Cornel looked around. ‘Right. It’s clear. Come on.’
Finally letting go of her hand, but before she could move away and maybe start running, his big hand was around her left buttock, steering her, his fingers lingering on the wet seat of her jeans.
‘Round there. The door’s in front of you.’
A big padlock was hanging loose.
‘Ha… good. Didn’t think they’d have time to fix it.’
Cornel pulled off the lock, tossed it over his shoulder. Jane looked up. It was just a big shed with a convex roof and heavy doors set into a wall of concrete blocks.
‘Are you sure-?’
�
��This is it. Go on… push.’
He prodded Jane with his torch and she went up against the doors, which immediately opened a body’s width, and she went stumbling through, down some steps he hadn’t warned her about. Pain jabbed into her ankle. She sank to her knees holding on to the step above her.
Heard the doors close behind her. Didn’t move.
‘Go on,’ Cornel said. ‘Go down.’
‘The dead bird in the sack,’ Barry said, ‘I just thought, get this bastard out of my bar. I’d had a bellyful of Cornel. Never once thought of cockfighting. Gomer sure about this?’
‘Doesn’t usually make mistakes,’ Lol said. ‘Not where Jane’s involved.’
‘Would Savitch do that on his own doorstep? I’d like to think it was him, and, yeah, if Cornel was involved… He’s not exactly compos mentis is he, Cornel? That makes sense – always needs somebody to blame. Fighting cock lets him down, he wants it cooked for his dinner. Juvenile. Well, worse than juvenile. I tell you what happened after that incident with Jane?’
‘I don’t think so.’
Lol felt the pull of the stitches in his wrist, remembering Cornel peering into the bar. Wherever you are, you little bitch, I just want you to know it doesn’t end here.
‘This is while everybody’s talking about Mansel Bull,’ Barry said. ‘Cornel – very drunk, if you recall – goes into the Gents’, presumably in search of paper towels. When he only finds a hot-air hand-dryer, he forces the lock on the cleaner’s room and then he smashes his way into a couple of cupboards to locate the necessary, which he leaves scattered all over the floor. Then he strips off his wet jeans and his underpants and marches upstairs to his room, naked from the waist down. Not long afterwards, a guest opens the door of her room to see a half-naked man pissing down the stairwell.’
Lol winced.
‘What did you do?’
‘I know what I wanted to bleedin’ do, but I’m a genteel hotel manager now. I did a mop-and-bucket job and then I rang the guy at the bank who booked Cornel’s room and said perhaps they should think twice about the kind of people they send on these courses. And he puts me on to another guy, and I tell him what happened, and he apologizes and says, in this meaningful way, to leave it with him. Obviously, I never heard from him again, and Cornel left the next night. At least I thought he’d left. Until he shows up with the bird in the bag.’ Barry finished his beer. ‘Odd that Danny hasn’t told you what they found at The Court.’