They were sitting in the mobile unit, as close to the Calor gas as was physically possible without actually bursting into flames.
They’d had a call from the pathologist to confirm what Marvel had already surmised at the scene – that Yvonne Marsh had drowned and had almost certainly been held underwater. Marvel had imparted the news with a remarkable lack of I-told-you-so’s, which had, in turn, opened the door to one of their few discussions where neither was trying to score points.
They’d been talking about the incident with Danny Marsh.
Marvel and Grey had stepped in to stop Jonas Holly, but Jonas had stopped himself, so they had hauled Danny to his feet instead. His riding hat was askew but had still protected all the important stuff.
The horse had skidded into several parked cars on its destructive way up the road and had later been caught by someone down on the playing field.
The crowd had dispersed in almost complete silence.
Elizabeth Rice and Alan Marsh had ushered a tearful Danny inside, where the local doctor – a man who looked as if he was popping in on his way to a surfing competition – had given him a sedative.
Marvel had gone over to the Beetle and said something biting to Jonas about police brutality but hadn’t really meant it. Somebody had needed to stop Danny Marsh and, for the first time since coming to Shipcott, he felt Jonas Holly had done the right thing, albeit a little over-enthusiastically. There might be some fallout from that, but somehow Marvel doubted it. The mood in the street had been one of relief that it was all over, rather than shock at how.
And now Reynolds had a theory.
‘I was thinking about what you said. About the link between Margaret Priddy and Yvonne Marsh.’
‘Yes?’ said Marvel, mildly encouraged that this particular ‘proposal’ might be based on something sensible.
‘There’s something called the tipping point,’ said Reynolds. ‘You heard of it?’
Marvel hated that kind of question. If he said no, Reynolds would elucidate in minute detail; if he said yes, he’d be lying and then might not grasp what came next.
‘No,’ he said, in a tone that demanded that Reynolds take no more than thirty seconds to explain it to him. It was a very specific tone and Reynolds knew it well, so he did his best.
‘It’s something which tips the balance and creates a deviation from the normal path of events.’ That wasn’t wholly accurate, but it wasn’t long enough to piss Marvel off.
‘For instance, you know all those Japanese kids who commit suicide – a whole bunch of them, one after another, like it’s catching?’
‘What’s your point, Reynolds?’
‘The theory is that one suicide can spark others. People become aware of the suicide, and kids who wouldn’t have gone that far before suddenly consider it. A few more actually do it – as if they have permission to kill themselves because it seems that everybody’s doing it – it’s no longer taboo. And before you know it, kids are topping themselves because their dog ate their homework, and you’ve got an epidemic on your hands. You’ve passed the tipping point.’
Marvel said nothing, so Reynolds knew he had his attention.
‘You asked me about the link. And I was thinking of what you said about Margaret Priddy and Yvonne Marsh both being a burden to their families. The methods are different, not consistent. Maybe the killers are different too. Maybe the killer of Yvonne Marsh felt he had permission because someone had already killed Margaret Priddy.’
‘So you’re saying Alan Marsh could have killed his wife because Peter Priddy had already killed his mother?’ said Marvel.
‘It’s a theory,’ said Reynolds a little defensively. ‘You imagine taking care of someone like Yvonne Marsh for years. Stark staring mad. Wandering off. Doesn’t know who the fuck you are after forty years of marriage. You imagine the strain of that. Maybe it only takes a nod and a wink in the way of permission for you to feel that it’s OK to go right ahead and drown her in a stream.’
Marvel nodded. He could see the logic. ‘In the way that serial killers take many years to build up to their first murder. The first one is difficult, but after that it gets easier and easier, more and more casual.’
‘Same thing,’ agreed Reynolds. ‘Someone breaks the taboo.’
Marvel stared into the distance and nodded slowly. ‘The unthinkable becomes thinkable.’
The two men sat pondering in rare harmony.
‘I hope you’re wrong,’ said Marvel.
And, for once, Reynolds hoped he was too.
Seven Days
The ground was frozen and they couldn’t have dug a hole for Yvonne Marsh even if her body had not been retained as evidence, but the funeral went ahead anyway. ‘Interment to follow at a later date’ was what was written in biro under the order of service.
Jonas looked at it and was reminded of the note under his wiper, and he wished now that he’d kept it for the purposes of comparison with every bit of handwriting he came across. As the service got under way, he looked at the Reverend Chard with new eyes.
Alan Marsh sat in the front pew with his son. Danny had a black eye to go with his suit. Jonas blushed to see it.
‘I should apologize,’ he whispered to Lucy.
‘Not today,’ she whispered back. ‘Today is about his mother.’
Jonas nodded but felt uncomfortable. Marvel had hissed at him that he’d be lucky to keep his job, but all he had seen in Marvel’s eyes was relief that someone had stepped up to the mark and done something to end the stand-off.
He looked around and caught Marvel’s eye at the back of the church. No doubt he was there because of the chance that the killer might attend the funeral of his victim. Margaret Priddy had not yet had a funeral service, at the request of her family, but Alan Marsh had insisted on one.
‘She’s gone,’ he’d told the Reverend Chard. ‘She’s gone and I want to say a proper goodbye.’
So here they all were.
Jonas hadn’t asked Marvel if it was OK to come, and half smiled at the thought that the killer might be running up and down past Margaret Priddy’s house while he was here, banging on the door and taunting the little brown dog. It was all bollocks anyway, and he no longer felt any guilt about leaving his post. The business with Danny had jolted things into new focus for him. Although he felt guilty about hitting him, at least he had taken some action at last. At least he had made a decision – even if it was probably the wrong one.
The service was sombre. They sang ‘Abide With Me’ and then ‘All Things Bright And Beautiful’, which made Lucy squeeze his hand. It brought a hard lump to his throat and he dared not look at her.
Afterwards there was tea in the church hall. Linda Cobb and the other ladies had done it; they hadn’t even consulted Alan and Danny Marsh – they’d just gone ahead and spent the money that the Reverend Chard had given them from the poor box bolted to the church door. Everyone thought it was money well spent.
Jonas and Lucy did not go to the church hall. They watched Alan Marsh support his son out of the church and then left. Jonas drove Lucy home carefully up the gritted lane, changed out of his black suit and into his uniform, then walked back down into the village to resume his doorstep vigil.
The darkening village seemed especially still. The blanket of snow and the fact that almost every adult was off eating egg sandwiches in the church hall added to Jonas’s sense of isolation. Not even Linda Cobb was there to hand him his World’s Best Mum mug.
On days such as this he felt like the last man on Earth. Sometimes he felt that way up on the moors, where it was so quiet you could hear a car coming a mile away. Last summer he’d walked up to Blacklands and sat down on the cushion of heather that covered the mound there. He could see the roofs of Shipcott in one direction, but otherwise no sign of civilization – or that civilization had even been invented.
He remembered now how the sun had warmed his eyes through his closed lids, and smiled even though he was standing in the snow on t
he doorstep of one murdered pensioner and had just attended the funeral of another.
If only all memories could be as sweet.
It was already dark when Jonas saw the stranger.
In summer, a stranger was a faceless part of a bigger whole, which invaded like an army, wore uniform hiking shorts and map bags, and cleared Mr Jacoby out of milk and sandwiches. But in winter, a stranger was a curious and somehow sinister thing. Why would anyone come to Shipcott in winter? Their motives must be suspect. If the stranger were a woman or child it was easy to imagine them to be a visiting sister or niece; if it were a man, it was tempting to imagine them to be so much more – and not all good and friendly. Prime among those winter strangers were hunt saboteurs, who came armed nowadays with everything from placards to Mace.
Jonas did not have Marvel’s experience or cynicism, but even his suspicions were raised when the man saw him, then blatantly turned and walked hurriedly back the way he’d come.
After only a very brief inner tussle, Jonas left his post.
He followed the man at a distance of about a hundred yards, taking in all he could about his appearance. Shortish, thinnish, wearing a long green waxed jacket over dark trousers and town shoes, with a waxed Stetson which marked him out as a likely customer at Field & Stream as he’d passed through Dulverton; locals did not wear waxed Stetsons. The wide brim shadowed his face as he passed under the orange streetlamps.
The snow showed Jonas that the man’s shoes were small – probably a size seven or eight – with a distinctive herringbone tread.
The man bustled along quickly, glancing behind him once – which only made Jonas more determined to keep following him, even if he felt a bit as if he was doing this for no other reason than because he was bored and cold, and the man was a stranger in a stranger’s hat.
The man walked into the alleyway beside Mr Jacoby’s shop, which Jonas knew was a dead end. Jonas approached more slowly now, waiting for the man to turn around and come back out, but he didn’t. After a couple of minutes, Jonas followed him into the alleyway.
He was gone.
The dark little courtyard behind the shop contained a few wheelie bins, some old beer barrels filled with soil which Mr Jacoby laughingly referred to as ‘the garden’, and a recycling box filled with glass bottles. The back of the courtyard was hemmed by a high fence, above which a spray of brambles formed an effective barrier. The only way out – other than through the back door into the shop – was over a four-foot-high stone wall between this property and the next. Footprints in the snow showed that that was where the stranger had gone. Jonas’s heart started to race. The man had climbed over the wall and must have gone down the matching passage that ran along the side of the neighbouring house, rather than turn around to face him. It was not the action of a casual visitor who’d taken a wrong turning.
Jonas was about to vault the wall and go after him, when he heard a car burst into life out on the road.
Shit.
He ran back down the alleyway, slipping awkwardly on the cobbles. He overshot the pavement and skidded to a halt in the middle of the white road, looking up and down the narrow street.
There was no sign of the man or the car.
Shit again.
Jonas went back to the exit of the second alleyway and followed the distinctive herringbone footprints to a new gap between the parked cars. The fresh tyre tracks were still clear and snow-free – and had a loop in them before straightening up, which showed that the car had fishtailed. A quick getaway.
Jonas felt stupid. He should have got closer and followed the man into the alleyway immediately. Instead he’d assumed he would turn around and come back out. In his head he heard his old English teacher, Mrs O’Leary: Assume makes an ass out of u and me.
Jonas was just not used to being that suspicious – even of strangers. The thought that he might have lost the killer because he hadn’t wanted to face the social awkwardness of confronting him in Mr Jacoby’s ‘garden’ made him squirm.
He walked briskly up to the school, then back down to Margaret Priddy’s without catching a glimpse of another person, let alone the stranger. The snow kept everyone indoors. At least he’d got a look at the man: his stature, his clothing, his style of walking, with its short townie steps. Probably late thirties to early forties. He’d recognize him again. Maybe.
He considered telling Marvel, then immediately discounted the idea. On the face of it, all he’d done was desert his post on a smidgeon of a hunch and a barrowful of boredom – and he had nothing to show for it. All he’d be doing would be inviting Marvel to have another pop at him. So far the man hadn’t needed any excuse; Jonas didn’t feel like giving him one now.
Jonas sighed. The deaths of Margaret Priddy and Yvonne Marsh felt like his first real challenges as an officer of the law, and he was failing at every aspect of their investigation. He couldn’t even tail a suspect successfully in his own village – even in the snow.
As if to mock him, the snow started again, quickly filling in the herringbone footprints.
Jonas got back to his doorstep thoroughly defeated.
As though she’d known he would fail, Linda Cobb immediately opened the door and handed him his mug.
*
Reynolds felt well disposed towards Jonas Holly for no other reason than that Marvel didn’t.
He was on his way to get fish and chips at the Blue Dolphin when he saw Jonas standing on the doorstep with his hands around a mug. He pulled the car over and got out.
‘Hi,’ he said, sticking out his hand. Jonas took it and Reynolds could feel the residual warmth of the mug.
‘You know, we haven’t been properly introduced, what with all that’s going on. I’m DS Reynolds.’
‘Jonas Holly,’ said Jonas, wondering what Reynolds wanted.
But he didn’t seem to want anything very much.
‘Local officers are a big help to us,’ said Reynolds.
‘Yeah?’ said Jonas, raising a wry eyebrow.
‘If you’ve not been given that impression then I’m sorry,’ said Reynolds carefully. ‘But if you have any concerns or would like to talk about any aspect of this case, please give me a call.’
He took out a card and handed it to Jonas. ‘My mobile number’s on there.’
Jonas looked at the card, which was too thick to be standard police issue. Reynolds must have had his own made.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘I will. Thanks.’
Reynolds started to turn away.
‘I saw a stranger,’ Jonas blurted. Immediately he realized how dumb it must sound to the ears of someone not living in a tiny village.
Either way, he described what had happened.
Reynolds listened to Jonas’s story with an interested look on his face, and made sketchy notes – ‘waxed hat’, ‘long coat’, ‘herringbone prints’, ‘ducked into alleyway’ – all the time feeling faintly ridiculous at the amateur-sleuth nature of the whole thing.
‘I don’t know if it’s relevant,’ said Jonas at the end, and Reynolds guessed that it wasn’t. Hopping over a low wall was hardly jumping the wire on a motorbike.
He thanked Jonas anyway. Let the man think he was being taken seriously. Couldn’t hurt.
Reynolds almost asked Jonas if he wanted anything from the chip shop, but then thought that might be taking fraternizing with the natives too far. And there’d be the issue of whether he meant Jonas to pay or not. It would all be a bit awkward. So he just said goodbye and got back in his car, happy that he had bypassed – and therefore undermined – Marvel in even the smallest way.
*
Danny Marsh was calling his name. From somewhere.
Not grown-up Danny – boy-Danny.
Jonas hid from him. He didn’t know why. He just knew that hiding was best, here in the bales of fragrant, itchy hay. He hid and listened to his heart between his ears. Every time it pumped, his head got hotter. His heart was pumping molten rock and he felt the pressure build and build until he thou
ght the top of his head would blow off and the river of rock inside would shoot into the night sky like a fiery geyser. His head was burning up but his feet were freezing cold, and he looked down to see that the reason was that Danny’s dead mother was draped across them, her slack grey bra pulled up to reveal her flaccid breasts pooled like pancake mix across her chest.
Jonas jolted awake with a shiver and a kick and found that Lucy was hogging the covers; his feet were exposed. He breathed heavily, his hair and neck damp with sweat.
‘Jonas!’ the voice hissed in his ear. He jerked his head to the side. No one was there. It was a wisp of a dream that had escaped into the real world.
The room was dark and Lucy was breathing so low that he strained to hear her at all. He glanced at the alarm clock. Just gone 3am.
Moving carefully, he rearranged the covers with his feet, and his breathing started to calm a little as his nightmare fragmented behind him.
‘Jonas!’
He froze.
He took Lucy’s arm from across his chest and slid out from beneath it, laying it gently on the warm sheet and covering it with the duvet.
In the flannel pyjama bottoms and T-shirt he wore to bed in the winter, Jonas crossed to the window and looked down at the front garden, glimmering pale under the stars.
Nothing.
His eye caught a movement in the lane beyond the gate.
Somebody?
Or something?
Something watching the house. Something watching him.
Something underneath.
His mind lolled between sleep and wakefulness, blurring the edges of both, as his overworked eyes sought the caller of his name.
In his gut he knew it was Danny Marsh. Come to talk in the dead of a snowy night. He felt once again the threat that had come off Danny in waves. Part of him wanted to go down there now – right now. To run out into the snow and finish what he’d started in the street. Beat him to a pulp. End it.
He must have stood half-dozing at the window a long, long time, because when he finally went back to bed and spooned up behind the wife he loved so fiercely, the first light of the late dawn was turning the world grey.
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