Beneath the Soil

by Fay Sampson

  ‘No police tape,’ Tom said. ‘Guess we’re good to go on up.’

  ‘It may be different at the farmhouse,’ said Suzie.

  ‘We weren’t planning on making a social call, were we? It’s that footpath I’m interested in.’

  There had been rain since their last visit. The mud was softer underfoot.

  Suzie looked ahead over the hedge banks. She had been right. There were sheep grazing in the fields.

  ‘I wonder who’s looking after them? Those sheep.’

  ‘How much looking after do sheep need?’ Dave asked.

  ‘I’m not sure. It’s summer, so they probably don’t want much in the way of extra food, but somebody needs to keep an eye on them. See if there’s anything wrong with one of them. Decide when to take them to market. Move them to another field when they’ve grazed this one.’

  ‘I wonder whose responsibility it is,’ Tom said. ‘I can’t see the Bill knowing much about sheep management.’

  ‘There may be family.’

  ‘If there are, they’ve already cleared off, haven’t they? Didn’t want to stay down on the farm. I can’t see why they should want to come back, especially after this.’

  ‘Might be different,’ volunteered Dave, ‘if it’s their own now.’

  ‘It would have to go through probate,’ said Suzie. ‘I’m not sure how long that takes. Meanwhile, there are a couple of dozen sheep here, and who knows how many others elsewhere.’

  ‘And the collie,’ Tom said. ‘Don’t forget the dog.’

  Suzie pondered the implications of sudden death as she climbed. She and Nick had made their will, but how much were they really prepared for the consequences of unexpected loss? They’d made provision for Nick’s brother to act as guardian to the kids. Of course, that would only apply to Millie now. Tom was an adult, incredible though that seemed. She thought of the possibility that both she and Nick might die in a car crash or a terrorist bomb attack, and shivered.

  She hardly noticed the grind of an engine behind them, until Tom cried, ‘Hey up! We’ve got company. Guess the Bill’s finally caught up with us.’

  But when the three of them turned, it was a green Land Rover, not a police vehicle, rocking its way over the ruts towards them. They moved aside, but the vehicle drew to a halt beside them.

  A woman leaned out of the driver’s window. She had a mop of tousled hair and a broad, ruddy face. It must normally have given her a cheerful air, but today its lines were downturned in concern.

  ‘You’re not on the way to see Eileen, are you? Mrs Caseley?’

  ‘No. We …’ Suzie struggled to find a plausible explanation for their presence.

  ‘Only, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but there’s been a dreadful … I was going to say accident. I hope to God that’s what it was. But the police have got it into their heads that Philip killed her. Now why would he want to do a thing like that? I know times are hard – it’s the same for all of us – but we have to keep muddling on, don’t we?’

  ‘Yes, I heard about the mur— Mrs Caseley’s death. It’s terrible, isn’t it? We were only talking to her on Saturday.’

  ‘You know her? You’re friends?’ The woman looked curiously from one to the other.

  ‘Not exactly. We just came up here checking out my family history. I had folk who worked on this farm.’

  It was true, but it sounded rather thin, put like that.

  The woman frowned. ‘You’re not from the press, are you? Lord knows we’ve had them swarming all over the place, asking questions they’ve no business to.’

  ‘No. Certainly not.’ Suzie had forgotten that such a violent death would draw journalists and press photographers like wasps around a jam pot. She wondered if they were camped out around the farm ahead, or busy doing the rounds of the neighbouring farms and the people in Moortown, nosing out what they could about the Caseleys.

  ‘You won’t get much further,’ the woman said. ‘The police have cordoned off the farm. Goodness knows what they think they’ll find, now they’ve taken her away. You’ll have to excuse me. I need to get on. I’ve all the Caseleys’ stock to see to, never mind my own. No rest for the wicked.’

  ‘Isn’t there any family who could come and take over?’

  ‘There’s a son in Australia, got thousands of sheep on a ranch there. He’s on his way. But I can’t see him coming back to live at Saddlers Wood, can you? Farming’s a mug’s game here these days. No, it’ll be up for sale. Do us a favour, love, would you? Nip up and open that gate for me. Save me getting out.’

  Suzie assumed she was addressing one of the boys. She looked round. The track behind her was empty.

  She tried to hide her surprise as she darted ahead to the gate in the hedge and opened it wide. The Land Rover drove through. As it passed her, she saw sitting in the passenger seat a black-and-white collie dog, very like the one Millie had patted in the farmyard.

  She closed the gate and watched the woman and the dog get out. Then she turned back to the cart track. Dave and Tom had gone. She was quite alone.

  As she started up the track again, she was startled to see how close she had come to the farm. Ahead of her she could clearly make out the barrier of police tape across the path, and the sentinel figure of a tall policeman.

  She stopped, uncertain. It was only a short distance to where the footpath crossed this wider track. If she turned off along it, the officer would certainly see her. Would he challenge her, call her back to account for herself? She wondered if Tom and Dave had gone that way, but, knowing Tom, he had probably melted into the trees lower down and joined the footpath more stealthily.

  She felt the tension in her throat. But Tom had seized upon the unexpected offer of her company with a readiness that had surprised her. A middle-aged, middle-class, apparently responsible woman. He had relied on her to provide a plausible cover for their intrusion into these woods at such a time. Suzie would not arouse the instant suspicion that a pair of teenage students might.

  She racked her brains to think of a convincing reason why she might be here, without resorting to the sort of conspiracy theory which was beginning to sound hollow even in her own ears.

  What had they really seen, anyway? A car driving away.

  She walked on, trying to appear more confident than she felt. At the crossing of the ways she paused. It was too far away to read the police officer’s expression, but she knew that he was watching her. With swift determination she turned right and began to make her way along the narrower path. No voice cried after her. She wondered what the tall policeman was thinking.

  It was a relief to let the summer foliage fold itself about her. She even welcomed the brambles that reached long, thorny arms across the path. Each one was another barrier against anyone following her. She could see the prints of Tom and Dave’s passage in the soft earth. There were other, differently booted treads among them. If they were Philip Caseley’s, he had come along this apparently neglected path several times recently.

  She kept expecting to see the boys ahead of her. The path dipped down the hillside to the brighter clearing where the crumbled cottage stood. She felt that same odd lift of her spirits. To her twenty-first-century eye it was an idyllic spot, bright with sunlit flowers, and musical with the liquid crooning of the little brook just below. A blackbird carolled from a rowan tree.

  But the clearing was deserted.

  Suzie stopped, puzzled. She had been so sure she would catch up with them here.

  Then it struck her. Of course. It was here that they had all been startled by that sudden crack among the trees. Not a gunshot this time. The sound of a branch breaking. She hadn’t really believed Nick’s idea that it might be a squirrel landing on a rotten bough. They had all thought a piece of wood had snapped under someone’s foot. Suzie felt herself grow chillier as she remembered that insistent sense that someone was watching her.

  Tom and Dave must have ventured into the thicker tree cover around the clearing to look for signs that
someone else had been there.

  Why? What would that prove? This wasn’t a public footpath, but anyone with a map might have chosen to come for a walk here.

  A little nagging voice in her mind objected: but wouldn’t they have followed the footpath, or been investigating the ruins, like the Fewings? Why would they be hiding among the denser growth, as if they didn’t want to be seen?

  Perhaps whoever it was had gone off the path in search of an errant dog. But surely they would have heard him calling for the animal? Or her.

  The silence mocked her.

  More uneasy now, she decided she had no choice but to follow the path further on.

  The way sloped on down the hillside. The trees were starting to thin out now. She was beginning to glimpse green fields between the branches. Even the scuttle of cars along a road.

  Then she heard it, and breathed a sigh of relief. The sound of voices. It was too far away to be sure, but it must be Tom and Dave. She hurried forward.

  The boys were standing on a slope of grass and bracken. Occasional saplings speared their way up through the peaty soil. Tom and Dave were wandering around, picking their way cautiously. They had their heads down, surveying the ground at their feet.

  Suzie came out of the trees and stood watching them for several moments, trying to understand what they were doing. Then Dave lifted his head and saw her.

  ‘Hi, Suzie. Come and look at this.’

  She moved forward slowly. She was not sure what she was supposed to be seeing. But as she bent her head to watch the ground she was walking over she stopped dead. When she looked up, Tom was watching her intently. He smiled, not with laughter, but with a grave excitement.

  ‘You can see it, can’t you? Don’t come too far. We don’t want to trample all over the evidence. Somebody’s been here. Well, not just somebody. I’d say there were more than one of them. Look.’

  She followed his gesturing hand. Tom was right. All around her, over a wide area, the grass had been trampled, the young bracken crushed. A little way away from her, something glinted against the dark soil, half hidden by the bracken fronds. She walked carefully to retrieve it: a thick silvery nail about ten centimetres long with a slightly domed head. She bent to decipher the lettering around it.

  Tom was at her side in an instant. ‘What have you got there? Let’s see it.’ He took the nail from her. ‘Got it! See what it says? SURVEY POINT. So that’s what they’ve been up to. Someone’s been up here surveying this area.’

  Suzie snapped out of her mood of absorbed fascination. ‘So? What’s that supposed to mean? He could be selling the land off for housing. They’re obviously hard up.’

  Tom shrugged exaggeratedly. His blue eyes were sparkling now. ‘Only that Mrs Caseley wasn’t being entirely accurate when she said no one came down this path nowadays. Something’s certainly been going on here.’

  ‘She may have been right,’ Dave called from a little distance away. ‘You could probably get here from further along the road. No need to use that path through the woods.’

  They looked down the hillside. This rough ground ended at a field of brighter green grass, with another below it. Beyond the lowest hedge, they could see the occasional flash of a car roof passing.

  ‘So,’ Tom said thoughtfully. ‘Was Philip Caseley coming this way to meet someone? And does it have anything to do with whatever’s been going on here?’

  Suzie retorted, more sharply than she meant to, ‘And what’s this supposed to have to do with Eileen Caseley’s death?’

  SIX

  Suzie stood on the sunlit hillside, trying to make sense of what they had discovered. She let the boys wander carefully around the site while she thought. Presumably they were still on the land that belonged to Saddlers Wood Barton. Philip Caseley’s land. It was a rough outcrop of moorland, quite common in the farmland around the fringes of the moor itself. This patch, with its thin soil and granite boulders, would not be much good for farming. Sheep or cattle might be turned out on it occasionally. Yet someone else had taken an interest in surveying it. Why?

  Housing? It was quite a distance from the utility services and amenities of Moortown. Suzie doubted if planning permission would be granted for a housing estate this far out. Could they have been prospecting for gas, oil or minerals? She didn’t know enough of the geology of this area to be sure. You did hear of farmers suddenly striking it rich with the discovery of unexpected deposits under their land.

  But why would that lead Philip Caseley to kill his wife, just when they might be expecting an upturn in their strained fortunes.

  It might have had nothing to do with money. Perhaps Philip had discovered that Eileen was having an affair with somebody else. Goodness knows it was a common enough occurrence. A jealous husband assuming the right to act as executioner.

  ‘Tom!’ Dave’s sudden cry startled her. Had he found something else?

  But he was pointing to his wristwatch. ‘The time! We’re going to miss that bus!’

  Tom looked at his own watch. Suzie could not hear exactly what he said, but she suspected he swore. He turned to her sharply.

  ‘How fast can you run?’

  She turned obediently back towards the overgrown path through the woods.

  ‘Not that way! It’s much quicker to the road down the hill.’

  Dave was already running. Tom took off after him. They went flying down over the rough ground towards the distantly glimpsed road. She hoped Tom still had the survey nail in his pocket.

  Suzie ran too. She was glad of the ankle-hugging boots.

  She had assumed they would go through or over the gate into the field ahead and then down through the next one to the road. But suddenly Dave disappeared. Suzie almost tumbled over the edge after Tom. At the last minute, she saw how the bracken-and-grass-grown slope ended abruptly, not with the field hedge just beyond, but on the lip of a bank hiding a stony path deep below.

  She scrambled down after the boys. They had turned downhill following this hidden track. The road at the bottom looked much nearer now. On any other day, Suzie would have revelled in this deep-cut way, an old packhorse trail worn down between its banks over centuries of use. Now all she thought about were the uneven stones that littered the bottom and the trickle of water between them, even in this dry summer. She struggled to keep her balance without losing speed or turning an ankle.

  There was a glimpse of sunlight ahead beneath overarching trees. Dave was already standing at the roadside, holding out an arm.

  She saw the red bus come to a halt. Dave was scrambling aboard. Tom waited by the open door, holding the bus up until she got there. Breathless, she clambered up the steps and showed her ticket.

  She collapsed thankfully into a vacant seat. If they had missed this bus, they would have had to wait another hour.

  Tom grinned at her from the seat across the aisle. ‘Well done, Mum. I didn’t know you could run that fast.’

  She watched the farmland flow past on the way back to Moortown. Tom and Dave were chatting away, with no thought to keep their voices down.

  ‘What do you think’s going on, then?’

  ‘No idea. Do you suppose they’ve hit on something underground? Coal? Oil?’ Dave wondered.

  ‘Out here in the middle of a farm? Is that likely?’

  ‘Search me. Maybe it’s the site for an archaeological dig. Plenty of that around here – Bronze Age, Iron Age, medieval.’

  ‘Think about that little car that pulled out from the verge ahead of us,’ said Tom, ‘It didn’t say “archaeologist” to me. I’d have expected something a bit more rugged.’

  ‘And why would he shoot his wife over some Bronze Age village?’

  Suzie felt the woman in the seat beside her stiffen.

  ‘Are those your boys?’

  ‘One of them is,’ Suzie admitted. ‘The black-haired one.’

  ‘They ought not to be speaking ill of Philip Caseley. He’s got enough on his lap, poor man.’

  ‘You know hi
m?’

  ‘Most of us round here know Philip. And Eileen, God rest her soul.’

  ‘And what do you think happened?’

  ‘It’s not for me to say. You’ve been on Philip’s land then?’

  ‘We …’ Suzie looked sideways at the woman. About her own age, or a little older. A broad, strong face. She had a clutch of carrier bags on the floor at her feet. She must have been shopping in the bigger market town further south. ‘Last Saturday, we were taking a walk in Saddlers Wood. We wanted to see where my ancestors lived. We met the Caseleys. First Philip, then he sent us up to the farm to see Eileen. So when we heard … Well, there was someone else in the woods that afternoon. We just thought … well, there could be something there that might help Philip.’

  ‘Another man? I don’t see what good that’s likely to do him.’

  ‘No. Unless … But why should anyone else want to shoot her?’

  ‘You’d be better off minding your own business. But you can tell those boys they’re wrong if they think Philip would allow those mining people on to his land. He’s like the rest of us. Wouldn’t want anything to do with them. Tearing up the countryside, turning the place into an eyesore. And all those lorries and the dust. There’s some that will do it for the money, but not Philip.’

  ‘Mining? For what?’

  But the bus had drawn up in the square at Moortown. The woman hurried to gather up her shopping bags. Suzie stepped out into the aisle to let her pass. Her question was left hanging in the air, unanswered.

  ‘You did what?’ Nick exploded.

  ‘Give us a break, Dad.’ Tom was flourishing the survey point nail he had brought back as a trophy from their expedition. ‘We found this, didn’t we? Something’s going on there. It’s not just the run-down, back-of-beyond place we thought it was. If whoever was using this is right, Philip Caseley could be sitting on a gold mine. Well, not literally … though, come to think of it, why not? Who knows what might be lying under that granite? Anyone here know about geology?’

  The rest of the family looked back at him blankly.