The Cipher Garden

by Martin Edwards

  The ringtone of her mobile pierced the silence.

  ‘Hannah Scarlett.’

  ‘Nick.’

  ‘Oh, hi.’

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yes, sure.’

  ‘I mean, you sounded…never mind.’

  ‘You wanted to talk?’

  ‘How about this afternoon?’

  ‘I’m off duty but Marc’s driving down to Derbyshire. I’d thought of going to a skydiving event. You might like to come along.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘There’s an ulterior motive.’

  A laugh. ‘Why doesn’t that surprise me?’

  ‘Kirsty Howe is one of the parachutists and I’d like to talk to her again. We didn’t get off on the right foot. She may be more relaxed if we meet on her home ground.’

  ‘If she’s a skydiver, maybe she doesn’t do relaxation. But I’m happy to meet you there.’

  ‘We can have a heart to heart.’

  Suddenly, she wanted very much to be with a man who cared for her. Not a lover, but someone she could rely on. Would she tell Nick about the baby? Not yet, it was too early. She needed to see her GP to confirm the result from the testing kit, but her guess was that she was a month gone. She wasn’t intending to broadcast the news until she’d made it through the first twelve weeks. So much could yet go wrong. She was frightened of tempting fate.

  ‘I couldn’t do it,’ Louise said. ‘I just couldn’t do it.’

  ‘I can see the appeal, in a funny kind of way,’ Miranda said. ‘Skydiving is all about living dangerously, isn’t it?’

  Behind the wheel, Daniel uttered a silent prayer that she wouldn’t develop a new passion for extreme sports. Dodging bikers on the narrow lanes was dangerous enough.

  ‘I’m keen to continue living, I suppose,’ Louise said. ‘Danger, I can do without.’

  Miranda gave a sigh of dissent. Louise was going home the day after tomorrow, Daniel thought, Miranda had won. She didn’t need to bite her tongue any more, didn’t need to avoid petty disagreements for the sake of diplomatic relations.

  ‘We all need a little danger in our lives, if you ask me. I can see the appeal of jumping out of a plane with nothing to rely on but your parachute, no one to trust but yourself. Women are supposed to be well suited to it, Kirsty said so last night when we were leaving. They have the physical flexibility as well as stamina.’

  ‘She didn’t look well to me. Pale and drawn. I hope she’s going to be all right.’

  ‘Lovesick,’ Miranda diagnosed. ‘She fancies Oliver.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I saw the way she looked at him when she thought nobody was watching. Not even him. Poor thing, my bet is, she’s doomed to be disappointed. If you ask me, he only has eyes for Bel.’

  The airfield stretched across low, flat terrain on the southern tip of the county. It had been an RAF base during the Second World War, but since then it had seen little action more exciting than the occasional car boot sale. In the Nineties, skydiving enthusiasts from universities and colleges had begun to utilise it and today there was a huge banner above the entrance proclaiming the Lakeland Parachutists’ Club Annual Charity Freeflying Day.

  The lane skirting the perimeter had been colonised by traders selling ice creams, floppy hats and sun block and a field had been turned into a car park. The Lexus was air-conditioned, but the moment Hannah climbed out, the heat smothered her. The afternoon was so humid that she could scarcely breathe. It was an effort to drag one leg after the other as she crossed the lane. How much of her exhaustion was down to the weather, and how much to pregnancy, she wasn’t sure, but she was praying for a thunderstorm to cleanse the atmosphere.

  She made a donation to the students rattling tin boxes at the entrance and looked around for Nick. Each of the students wore a sweatshirt bearing the question Fancy a Jump? Upwards of two hundred people were milling around on this side of a fence and a signboard labelled – Danger – Keep Out – Dropzone. The first face she recognised belonged to Tina Howe. She was wearing a sleeveless top and a short white skirt that displayed long tanned legs. When their eyes met, the older woman stared in surprise, but after a brief pause, she pushed past a group of lager-swilling girls and made her way to Hannah’s side.

  ‘I didn’t expect to see you, Chief Inspector. What brings you here?’

  ‘Curiosity, I guess, Mrs Howe. I’ve seen skydiving on TV, but never in real life. I thought it was time to fill the gap in my education.’

  ‘You know Kirsty’s freeflying today?’

  Hannah nodded. ‘Sounds terrifying to me. I did a little research. Freefly involves falling through the air with your head facing down?’

  ‘Twice the speed of conventional skydiving, she tells me.’ Tina exhaled. ‘I’ve only dared to watch her once before and my heart was in my mouth when she hit the ground. According to her, the only serious risk is if you try to show off with some hair-raising stunt and miscalculate so that you hit the ground hard instead of skimming over the dropzone and landing perfectly. But when I tell her to take care, she says I’m a whuffo.’

  ‘A whuffo?’

  ‘An American term, it’s what skydivers call sane people who ask the obvious question. What for you guys jump out of them aeroplanes? Kirsty reckons skydiving is the best fun she’s ever had.’ She folded her arms across her breasts. ‘Tell you what, I never had hundreds of people watching the best fun I ever had, but it takes all sorts. Are you here with anyone?’

  ‘I might ask you the same question.’

  ‘I sent Sam for ice creams, Peter’s gone for a pee. So you’re on your own?’

  ‘Looking out for a friend of mine.’

  ‘Another police officer?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  A scornful noise. ‘You’re not telling me you’ve suddenly developed an interest in skydiving. You’re here for a reason.’

  Hannah held her gaze. ‘Kirsty must have stacks of courage. Any skydiver must, I’d say. Yet she seems to me to be worried sick. It’s the contradiction that fascinates me.’

  ‘She is a brave girl. Sensitive, too, her feelings are close to the surface. Not like me or her dad. Or her brother, come to that. But you’re wasting your time if you think you’ll be able to worm something out of her about Warren’s murder. She won’t tell you anything new. There’s nothing to tell.’

  ‘Daniel!’ Peter Flint was gorging on his cornet and there was a smear of vanilla ice cream on his chin. His shorts exposed bony knees and made him look like an overgrown schoolboy. ‘I didn’t expect to see you here.’

  ‘We had a meal at The Heights yesterday evening,’ Daniel said. Miranda and Louise had wandered off to look at the bric-a-brac for sale on the stalls. ‘Kirsty mentioned that she’d be here today and we decided to take a look.’

  ‘Just as exciting to watch as to participate, if you ask me, and a hell of a lot safer. Not that Kirsty would agree. She keeps assuring her mother that freeflying is statistically less risky than fly-fishing. Anglers are constantly slipping off wet rocks and drowning in rivers or lakes, it seems. Parachutists come through thousands of jumps without a scratch.’

  Daniel laughed. ‘You know what they say about lies, damned lies…’

  ‘And statistics, yes. Glad to bump into you. I was meaning to get in touch.’

  ‘I’m still mulling over your sketches.’

  ‘I wasn’t meaning to hassle you for business. Sam mentioned something that I thought would interest you. He once heard his father talking about a garden at Tarn Fold.’

  Daniel stared at him. ‘Warren Howe?’

  ‘Yes. According to Sam, he knew people in Brackdale, they told him the story.’

  ‘What story?’

  ‘Perhaps I was too hasty with my ideas for a redesign. I’d hate to be accused of vandalism.’

  ‘Sorry, I don’t understand.’

  ‘A long time ago, the garden at Tarn Cottage was well known in the valley. There was some sort of folk-
tale attached to it. People called it the cipher garden.’

  The Cessna 206 Turbo was small and uncomfortable. There was only room for six passengers, even with all seats except for the pilot’s removed. They were sitting on a mat with their backs to the pilot, legs splayed with a spectacular lack of dignity that provoked endless rude jokes. Kirsty’s companions were four men and one other woman, an anorexic redhead who was having an affair with the pilot. Their eyeline was below the level of the window, but through the clear plastic roller door she could see tiny farms and copses and a caravan park. Soon they would circle over the broad expanse of Morecambe Bay and its bright, treacherous sands.

  The noise inside the plane was drowned by the thoughts roaring inside her head. Her first instructor had preached that three-quarters of skydiving took place on the ground. So much depended on how you prepared for the jump.

  Flying to altitude would take twenty-five minutes. This was always a time she found peaceful, a time when everything else in her life meant nothing. She’d been taught to relax and visualise herself doing what she had set out to do. Yet whenever the pilot called two minutes, her nerves would fray and over and over again she played through the malfunction procedure in her head. Checking release pins, cut-away and reserve handles, and to make sure that bits of parachute were safely inside the rig. Everyone looked out for each other. If a pilot chute deployed inside the plane with the door open, it could tear off the wings and they would all be dead.

  Fear. Skydiving was all about conquering fear. As a raw novice about to make her first jump, Kirsty had found her heart beating faster, she’d taken rapid shallow breaths. The irony was, her trainer said, that survival instinct made your muscles tighten when you needed to relax. Embrace the fear was his mantra, along with hips down, head up. You needed to contain the surge of adrenaline. Over time, she’d learned to focus. Leaving the plane remained the moment of deepest fear, but she would scream out, ‘Up, down, go!’, breaking the tension in her chest by forcing out the air. And then she would fall.

  ‘I was telling Daniel about the cipher garden,’ Peter Flint said.

  Sam uttered an unintelligible grunt. Despite the heat, he was tucking into a ketchup-coated burger in a bap and plainly couldn’t be bothered with idle chit-chat.

  ‘What can you tell me about it?’

  A shrug. ‘Not much to tell. I heard my dad speak about it once when I was a kid. That’s all.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  They could hear the plane high above, heading towards the bay. Sam spat casually on the ground, then wiped his lips with the back of his sweatshirt sleeve. His breath smelled of fried onions.

  ‘Only that there used to be a cipher garden over at Tarn Fold in Brackdale.’

  Peter Flint said, ‘He never mentioned it to me.’

  ‘You’re an off-comer,’ Sam said brutally. ‘This was just a local tale. A legend, like. He heard about it when he did a spot of work at Brack Hall.’

  ‘What was the legend?’ Daniel asked.

  ‘I dunno exactly. About why the people died, the people that owned the garden? Something like that.’

  ‘A family called Gilpin owned our cottage for years. Originally, it was built by a man called Quiller. In between, it kept changing hands.’

  ‘Maybe people were afraid there was a curse on it.’

  Daniel stared. ‘A curse?’

  ‘The cipher was about death. There was a message in the garden, it was supposed to explain how the people who lived happened to die.’

  ‘Fascinating, don’t you think?’ Peter Flint asked. ‘And not a little spooky.’

  ‘What else do you know about the cipher?’ Daniel demanded.

  The young man finished his bap. It was evidently more satisfying than the conversation. ‘That’s all. I never paid much heed.’

  ‘I’d like to take another look at your garden,’ Peter Flint said, ‘see if I can make out this cipher. Actually, Daniel, you have some pretty wicked plants growing around the tarn. Venomous plants are like weeds, you know. Give them time and they proliferate. I’m not just talking about all your foxgloves, or the belladonna. Hellebore is seriously toxic; the roots are poisonous as well as the leaves. Even its flowers strike me as sinister. As for mandrake…’

  Sam bared his teeth. ‘Yeah. Mandrake is supposed to scream when you pull it out of the ground.’

  ‘Sorry I’m late.’ Nick was flushed after jogging over from where he’d parked, but Hannah thought he looked good in T-shirt and shorts. She liked his hairy arms and he had much better legs than Peter Flint. ‘The old lady who lives next door fainted as I was about to set off and I had to take her to Casualty. It’s the heat, none of us are used to it.’

  ‘Let’s cool down with a drink after Kirsty’s done her thing. Once I’ve had talked to her, you and I can have a word in private.’

  ‘Hey, someone’s waving at you. Don’t I know him?’

  Hannah turned her head and saw a familiar face. Carefully, she said, ‘As a matter of fact, that’s Daniel. Ben Kind’s son.’

  ‘Of course. I’ve seen him on the box. Do you know the women with him?’

  ‘I’d hazard a guess at his partner Miranda and his sister. Let’s go and say hello.’

  As they jostled through the crowd, Hannah caught Daniel’s eye. Impossible not to glow at the spontaneity of his smile. As introductions were performed, she considered the women in his life. Miranda was depressingly gorgeous; no longer did she find it so hard to understand why he’d thrown up his career to move to the Lakes with her. As for Louise, at first glance she didn’t look much like Daniel. But the resemblance was there if you set about looking for it – not least, she had her brother’s cool appraising stare. Ben Kind had had it too.

  ‘You look cheerful. I didn’t realise you were so keen on skydiving.’

  He jerked a thumb in the direction of the plane circling overhead. ‘It’ll be interesting to watch. But there’s no way I’d go up there. A group of students tried to persuade us to book a tandem jump. We had to drag Miranda away.’

  ‘It must be so liberating,’ Miranda said dreamily. ‘Imagine floating through mid-air.’

  Hannah caught Louise’s caustic glance. Not much love lost between those two, she guessed. Daniel noticed as well, and was quick to move the conversation on.

  ‘I’ve just had some exciting news. From Peter Flint and Sam Howe, of all people.’

  Out of the corner of her eye, Hannah spotted Nick’s brow furrowing. For once she could read his mind: how come Daniel Kind knows Peter Flint and Sam Howe? Perhaps she was taking more of a risk than Kirsty, up there in that little tin can, but she couldn’t just walk away.

  ‘Tell us.’

  ‘Ever heard of a cipher garden?’

  When she shook her head, he told them what he’d learned. His animation amused her. He was so natural, not at all her idea of an Oxford don or someone who had presented a television series.

  ‘So what do you think the cipher represents?’

  Miranda tugged at Daniel’s sleeve. ‘Look! They’re about to jump!’

  They craned their necks. The plane was directly above the field that served as the dropzone. A microscopic figure, little more than a dot, had appeared at the door.

  ‘That’s Kirsty,’ Hannah said. ‘Her mother told me she’d be first to go.’

  ‘How high would you say they are?’ Louise asked.

  Nick said, ‘Nine thousand feet, at a guess. Maybe ten.’

  ‘A long way to fall.’

  ‘Right.’

  Kirsty leapt from the plane. She was gliding through the air, elegant as a bird. As she came closer, they could make out her canary-yellow jumpsuit. But as they watched, she raised an arm.

  ‘Jesus,’ Daniel said. ‘What’s she doing?’

  Nick swore. ‘She’s taking off her helmet.’

  Kirsty pulled the helmet free and it flew away.

  Hannah’s stomach lurched. She found herself squeezing Nick’s hand tight.

/>   Miranda let out a cry. ‘What’s she doing? Is she mad? She’s…’

  The figure in the sky was uncoupling her parachute.

  ‘She’s not wearing goggles,’ Nick said.

  The parachute was flapping around the skydiver’s legs. It was as if she was dancing, as she tried to wriggle free.

  ‘Shit, she’s lost her parachute!’

  People screamed as the white parachute billowed and spiralled away. Tears were running down Miranda’s cheeks, Louise had covered her eyes.

  Kirsty was falling through the air, lying on her back, knees bent towards her chest.

  Hannah thought she was going to be sick. She saw Daniel put his arm round Miranda. Their eyes were locked on the girl in the sky.

  Kirsty arched her back and put her head down, pointing towards the ground. They could see her long red hair, rippled by a breeze. Her body spun in mid-air and then plunged towards the dropzone.

  People were shouting. ‘No! Oh God! No!’

  As the girl hit the ground, Hannah retched.

  PART TWO

  Chapter Fifteen

  Tears filled Daniel’s eyes as he stuffed one more sack with clumps of grass and stinging nettles. He’d striven to expel the vision of Kirsty Howe’s shattered body from his mind through sheer hard labour, but in vain. However many times he bent his back, the scene at the airfield kept replaying in his mind. That tiny yellow figure in mid-air, intent on destroying herself.

  What drove someone to such despair that suicide was the only way out? He’d wrestled with the question a thousand times since Aimee had hurled herself from that tower in Oxford, and never found an answer. To him, life was the most precious gift. To toss it away was unthinkable.

  Chaos had engulfed the airfield the instant the girl hit the ground. People were crying out in shock and disbelief, strangers clutched at each other, unable to make sense of what they had witnessed. While Daniel, Miranda and Louise huddled together for comfort, Nick raced off to take charge of the scene. Once Hannah finished vomiting, she followed him. Daniel thanked God he wasn’t a police officer, charged with sorting out other people’s ruined lives. How had his father coped with the horror?