Dead People

by Ewart Hutton

  In the meantime I logged in the information I had got on Evie Salmon, and started the process for the collection of the DNA samples. I found a note from Bryn Jones informing me that Jack Galbraith had agreed to include me on the investigative team. I tried not to show my pleasure in the midst of other people’s pain and anguish, but it was hard to keep the self-satisfied smile off my face. It was a sad fact that the prospect of dealing with death and mutilation felt like a return to the nest.

  To compensate I floated out a silent promise to Evie. We’re going to get him for you. Him? Her? I recalled last night’s spooked hunch on the hillside, the phantom tree root. Them?

  I was helping the technicians assemble desks in the ballroom when David Williams stuck his head round the door. ‘I couldn’t find you. I’ve just taken a call from Dr MacLean.’

  ‘What did she want?’

  ‘She asked if you’d call her back. She sounded a bit upset.’

  I started to dial the number he had given me. I looked up at the clerestory window. We still had light.

  I borrowed David’s Land Rover to handle the by-way. When I reached Tessa’s camp I was surprised to see a SOCO vehicle parked by the dig. Tessa came out from under the canopy as I parked. She watched me with a hand shading her brow from the setting sun.

  ‘I heard about the accident,’ she said, as I got closer.

  I touched the dressing instinctively. ‘It’s nothing serious.’

  She squinted at my face. ‘It makes you look a bit lopsided.’ She softened the judgement with a grin.

  ‘I got your message.’

  ‘You didn’t have to come all this way.’

  ‘That’s okay.’

  She nodded. She suddenly looked preoccupied. ‘I heard that you’d discovered another body. Jeff isn’t up to talking. I tried to go over, but it’s all cordoned off.’

  ‘We’re trying to keep the press out.’

  ‘Is it another skeleton?’

  ‘I can’t divulge that information, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Please, Sergeant?’ She didn’t try to play it coy. It wasn’t a plea. She was just making it plain that this was important to her.

  ‘In strictest confidence?’

  She nodded once.

  ‘We’ve found the recently interred body of a young woman.’ I didn’t bother informing her that she had arrived in two halves.

  ‘Oh my God . . .’ Her face drained. A tremor ran through her. ‘What’s happening . . .?’ She stared at me. The question was involuntary.

  ‘That’s what we’re trying to investigate.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ She forced a smile.

  I smiled back. But I was really wondering what had caused this reaction. She had been so composed with that first corpse. So what had upset her so much about this one?

  She read my mind. ‘I’m used to skeletons. It’s the archaeologist in me. Fresh graves disturb me. We have to sleep up here at night, remember?’ This time the smile broke through to let me know that she wasn’t entirely serious. ‘Thank you. It is actually better to know.’

  ‘You’re welcome. And I’m only ever a phone call away.’

  She nodded gratefully, and then gestured behind her to the dig canopy. ‘I’d show you mine if it weren’t so crowded in there.’

  ‘Who’s here?’ I asked, nodding at the SOCO vehicle.

  ‘Your forensic anthropologist. She’s come to make sure that I haven’t been duped,’ she explained, more amused than annoyed. ‘At least mine was here first. And has an excuse for being here.’

  ‘I thought you didn’t know that?’

  ‘This is an ancient ridgeway, so we’re working on the assumption that he probably died in transit and was buried by his travelling companions.’

  ‘Fellow Gallowglass?’

  She shrugged and smiled wistfully. ‘It’s an intriguing and romantic notion. We’re playing with a loose theory that they could have been military emissaries from the Irish going to offer their services to the Princes of Maelienydd against Henry II.’

  ‘The Scots, Irish and Welsh against the English?’

  She smiled. ‘Sound familiar?’

  We were distracted by the flap on the dig-enclosure opening. The forensic anthropologist emerging, followed by two SOCO people. She nodded, surprised to see me.

  ‘Satisfied?’ Tessa asked.

  ‘Yes, what a beauty,’ she enthused. The two women beamed at each other, in joint communion over a corpse.

  ‘You can discount this one?’ I asked the FA.

  ‘Definitely. How come he’s so well preserved?’ she asked Tessa.

  ‘I’ve had a soil analysis done. There’s a lot of galena present, which could explain it.’

  ‘Right . . .’ The FA nodded, digesting this. ‘Fascinating.’

  ‘Phew, in the clear . . .’ Tessa exclaimed, mock-dramatically, making a show of wiping her brow, as we watched the SOCO vehicle drive off.

  ‘What’s galena?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s a lead ore. It could have acted as a sterilizing agent. Killed off the microflora and stopped total decomposition.’

  ‘Right.’ I nodded sagely.

  ‘Want to meet him?’ Tessa asked?

  I didn’t really, but I didn’t want to lose Tessa’s grace either. ‘Yes, please,’ I said enthusiastically.

  The light inside the enclosure was muted. There was a soft hum of machinery. A dehumidifier, Tessa explained, attached to the polythene bubble that protected and isolated Redshanks from what had turned out to be his future. Two young assistants, with their tiny trowels poised, looked up patiently from the excavation that surrounded him, waiting for yet another interruption to pass them by.

  It wasn’t a skeleton, the body was covered with desiccated skin, the colour and texture of tea-stained parchment, and there were even some scraps and wisps of what must have been cloth, and the odd shard of leather that looked like dried and twisted cat turds.

  I scoured my repertoire and came up with noises appropriate to the admiration of a long-dead and deeply dehydrated Scotsman.

  Tessa nudged me, and nodded towards the entrance. ‘Well?’ she asked, when we hit the outside air again.

  ‘He looks like I feel.’

  She let out a short laugh. Then suddenly she was looking at me with concern. ‘Does it hurt?’

  I realized that I hadn’t looked in a mirror for hours. ‘What colour is my face?’

  She cocked her head and studied me for a moment. ‘It’s quite a rainbow around the dressing. Yellow through purple with magenta highlights?’ She qualified it with a grin.

  ‘I should have telephoned.’

  She shook her head and briefly touched my wrist. ‘No, the visit was appreciated.’

  It was a start.

  6

  Weirdly, I was wakened by silence. There had been an owl flitting around outside, but now it had gone. There was still the sound of the river, but that was a constant. Apart from that, the night acoustic was flat and empty. Too empty.

  It was two o’clock in the morning and it was cold out of bed. I pulled a sweatshirt on over the T-shirt I slept in, and walked through to the living area to put my anxiety to sleep so that I could get back there myself. As I approached the large rear window that overlooked the river the clouds pulled back and the moon swathed the opposite bank with a pale opalescent light.

  The figure standing on the other side of the river outlined by the strange light startled me.

  A chill emanated from my brainstem and ran straight through me. I started to look beyond time and reason for an explanation before I forced myself back into the now. Concentrate, I told myself. This is a man. He’s here because he knows you.

  I went back to my bedroom and pulled on a pair of jeans and shoes. I half expected him to be gone by the time I got round to the riverbank. A big part of me hoped that he’d be gone.

  He hadn’t moved.

  His head was in the shadow of a tree. It was those pale heron-thin legs under the shorts that g
ave him away. ‘Mr Gilbert,’ I called out across the river, ‘what are you doing here?’

  ‘I remembered something,’ he called back, his voice just strong enough to be heard over the sound of the river.

  ‘Come round,’ I said, gesturing at the bridge, ‘we can talk in my caravan.’

  ‘I can’t cross the river at night.’

  I should probably have realized then where this was going. ‘Stay over there, I’ll come to you.’

  By the time I had run round he was waiting for me on the other side of the bridge. He surprised me by holding up a hand like a cop halting traffic as I approached my side of the bridge. I stopped.

  ‘Walk across backwards,’ he instructed.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Then you can see which ones are trying to follow you.’

  I didn’t argue, I just humoured him. I didn’t bother checking for the ones who might be following me, though. I was too busy keeping an eye on my feet. It was tricky walking backwards in the gloom on the shaky planks and with gaps in the deck of the wooden bridge.

  ‘Couldn’t you have come over to me that way?’ I asked when I reached him.

  He shook his head, his face deadpan. ‘No. Mine have learned the tricks.’

  I saw a whole new minefield opening up there, so I didn’t pursue it. ‘What did you remember?’ I asked instead.

  He stared at me intently. His eyes were very pale and he was blinking. Probably myopic. The combined effect, with his thin hair and the wispy beard, was of a goat on the verge of distress.

  ‘I remembered the lights.’

  ‘At the wind-farm site?’

  He nodded.

  ‘How long ago?’ I asked carefully.

  He shook his head. ‘Time doesn’t matter to them. They’re beyond that construct. They wouldn’t be able to get here otherwise.’

  I wised up then. ‘Mr Gilbert, are you talking about UFOs?’

  His sad pale face lit up for a moment. ‘Have you seen them too?’

  ‘Not for a long time. They’re gone now.’

  He dipped his head sadly. ‘They must have completed their mission.’

  ‘Moved on,’ I concurred. ‘But thank you for coming to tell me.’

  He nodded gratefully. My heart went out to the poor old bastard. He had sought me out. Had that last talk of ours sparked something in him? A realization that he could still commune with another human being?

  ‘Mr Gilbert, have you ever had any dealings with a Mr Gerald Evans?’ It was a long shot, but if I’d managed to open a communication window I might as well try to take advantage of it. ‘From Pentre Fawr Farm.’ I gestured off in the vague direction of where I thought Evans’s place lay.

  He just stared at me expectantly, as if he was still waiting for the question. I decided to bring it closer to home. ‘Do people still trespass on your land?’

  This one got through. ‘Not since I put the fence up,’ he answered. ‘That stopped them talking about taking my land back from me.’ He chuckled.

  ‘Who was that?’

  ‘The son and the daughter and the other one. When the girl was still alive.’

  I assumed that the son and the daughter were the Cogfryn children: Owen and Rose, the dead daughter. ‘The other one?’ I asked.

  ‘The one who was meant to marry her.’

  ‘But she died?’ I prompted.

  He nodded.

  ‘When?’

  He shrugged. ‘I don’t know, I wasn’t there.’ The subject didn’t interest him. He stared at me. Even in the gloom I could see that his expression had turned hopeful. ‘Do you think they’ll come back?’

  ‘Who is that, Mr Gilbert?’

  ‘The lights.’

  I patted him gently on the shoulder. ‘I’m sure they will.’

  I didn’t bother to walk backwards over the bridge after I left him. Perhaps, in hindsight, that was a mistake. It would have saved a lot of grief if I could have seen who was trying to follow me then, before it all went shitty.

  The ballroom at The Fleece had been built in the twenties, and had since functioned as a cinema, a bingo parlour and, once, to the local population’s total mystification, as a Hatha Yoga centre. It had a high, water-stained ceiling, clerestory windows that let in a drab dusty light, and pine floorboards, the lacquered surface brittle and peeling like old nail polish. It felt like the sort of place that could have been commandeered to act as a temporary mortuary for train-wreck victims.

  The circus had got into town early. When I arrived everyone was busy eating the breakfast that David and Sandra had provided. Proper filter coffee, croissants and fruit. I wondered how long this would last.

  Alison Weir, a DC from headquarters, who was to act as collator, waved at me from behind her computer terminal. There were two other male DCs from Carmarthen who were on wary, sideways-nodding terms with me. Emrys Hughes shot me a glance that would have burst a child’s balloon. Beside him three uniformed PCs hovered in their own territorial space, new to this, not yet knowing what was expected of them.

  ‘Have I got a title?’ I asked Alison quietly.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, without having to check the roster. ‘Local Liaison Officer. Impressive, eh?’

  ‘It just means I know how to tell the different ends of a sheep apart.’

  Luckily we had a front lobby door that creaked. So that when Jack Galbraith made his entrance we were all on our feet. I was glad that I was the only one in the room not having to brush crumbs off themselves. I wasn’t glad to see the man standing beside him. Kevin Fletcher. I caught Alison’s sidelong glance at me. She was gauging my reaction. She obviously knew that Kevin and I had a History.

  Jack Galbraith stood by the door and took in the room. His smile was meant to be easy, but we all knew we were under inspection. He nodded towards the table with the breakfast trays. ‘I’m glad to see they’re treating you well.’ We all chuckled dutifully, and felt immediately guilty.

  He moved into the room and took up his stand in front of the display board. Fletcher followed him. ‘Right, as you all know, I am the senior investigating officer. This is Detective Chief Inspector Kevin Fletcher, who has been seconded to us from Metro, and is going to act as my field officer. DCI Fletcher will be in charge of the incident room, and the day-to-day running of the operation.’

  I winced inwardly. The bastard had had yet another promotion. The last I had heard, Fletcher had been a detective inspector. And it was almost as if he had been fitted with a receptor that picked up on my anguish. ‘Glyn . . .’ he announced loudly, striding over to me with his hand out, ‘. . . Glyn Capaldi, it’s been a long time. How are you doing?’ He could have stayed where he was to acknowledge me. By coming across he was making a statement, reminding the others of the height that I had dropped from, unmasking the leper.

  ‘I’m fine, Kevin,’ I said, shaking his hand unenthusiastically.

  ‘It looks painful,’ he commented, drawing everyone’s attention to the fresh dressing on the side of my head that we had all been trying to ignore.

  He left me and worked the field, shaking hands all round, and ended up back beside Jack Galbraith. In the old days, I remembered, he would have looked smug, now it looked like he had been taking lessons in benign authority.

  Jack Galbraith gave us the overview on the two bodies. No identification was as yet possible on the skeletal victim. Following my tentative identification they were now waiting for DNA confirmation that the recent body was Evie Salmon. Apart from the red shoes there were no remains or traces of clothing in either of the graves, so it had to be surmised that they both had been naked when they had been interred. Also, so far, there were no indications as to the cause of death in either case.

  Galbraith held a silence for a moment, reeling in our attention. ‘These people were killed unlawfully. There are a lot of theories that will fit, so let me give you mine, before Kevin sends you to sleep with the forensic evidence.’ We chuckled on cue. He held up two fingers. ‘Two bodies. We are working o
n the possibility that there are more up there. But, at the moment, there is no pattern, there is no clear and shining path pointing the way ahead. So my hunch is that this is a dumping ground, and that these people were killed at a far remove. Someone tell me what’s wrong with that?’ he asked, looking straight at me.

  I obliged. ‘If the young woman is Evie Salmon, she was local. She also disappeared over two years ago.’

  ‘Correct, Evie is the spoiler. But forget the emotive word “disappeared” and stick with the facts. She left home two years ago. She never disappeared, she has existed somewhere. Statistically that somewhere is probably a city. And that is probably where our man found his other victim.’

  ‘It’s too coincidental, though, sir,’ I protested, ‘to think that Evie met her killer in a city, and he just happens to use her particular back yard as a burial ground.’

  Jack Galbraith beamed. I was unintentionally playing his foil. ‘It’s not coincidence, it’s our connection. Our killer has an association with Dinas. Which is how he and Evie came into conjunction. That’s our starting point. Evie met our man. Now, was this man from Dinas, or visiting Dinas?’ He paused and gave us his goshawk stare. ‘Someone ask me something pertinent?’

  Kevin Fletcher complied. ‘Why the time lag?’

  Jack Galbraith nodded. It was the question he wanted, which made me wonder if they were working a double act. ‘Six to eight years. We may have to rethink this if we find anything more on the hill. But let’s stick with that timeline. It’s a big gap between psychotic urges. So maybe he’d been able to sublimate them on less-extreme outlets. Then Evie comes along. Still no outburst. They manage nearly two years together. Then something flips. He regresses. But what’s worrying is that there is now a new element of showmanship. As far as we can tell the first body’s burial was meant to be permanent. Evie was there to be dug up and put on display. He even left her shoes on for us.’

  ‘Is he changing, sir?’ one of the DCs asked.