The Way, the Truth and the Dead

by Francis Pryor

  ‘No, they won’t,’ Flower replied. ‘They agree the most important thing is experience of deep Fenland stratigraphy. Stan had it, but not as much as you. I’ve already spoken to the EH inspector and the regional scientific advisor and mentioned your name in confidence, and they both approved heartily.’

  John Cripps stepped forward and shook Alan’s hand. ‘Look, Alan, you don’t have to make your mind up this minute. Here’s my card. Give me a ring in the next week or so. Then we can meet and discuss practical details. We’d like to see the project started in the New Year, if possible. And now I must take Lew to the station and Peter back to his ivory tower in Cambridge.’

  * * *

  Alan was lost in thought as he watched the three men hasten towards the exit. Instinctively he glanced down at his watch. He hadn’t noticed Candice was still there, so her voice close by his left shoulder came as a surprise. ‘Don’t worry, Alan, they’ll make it. In all our years together, I’ve never known John miss a train yet.’

  There was a short pause while they both surveyed the people around them. Alan was still feeling rather dazed by what he had just been told.

  Candice continued. ‘I know you knew Stan quite well at uni, but did you ever meet his parents?’

  ‘No.’ Alan smiled ruefully. ‘Things in those days weren’t like they are now. We were students in the late ’80s and early ’90s, and in those days nobody admitted to having a family. Somehow it wasn’t cool.’

  ‘Same here.’ She smiled, looking around her. ‘Look, they’re over there, just beyond the buffet, talking to the Head Keeper, Bert Hickson. He was the poor man who found Stan’s body. And he’s with John’s father, Barty. Follow me, I’ll introduce you.’

  As they drew nearer to the buffet another large man, although not quite as massive as Sebastian, was pretending to wring out an empty bottle of Champagne into his wine glass. He was wearing a freshly-pressed Norfolk jacket with matching tweed knee-breeches. He looked every inch the Victorian gamekeeper. With him were two other tweed-clad keepers and several estate workers.

  ‘Hey, Mrs Cripps. Do you have a mangle we could put this bottle through?’ he called across to Candice as they passed.

  It wasn’t funny, especially given the occasion, but the people around him smiled, and Alan could see he had quite a following.

  ‘Thank you, Joe. I get the hint, but I’d remind you, this is a wake, not a party.’ Alan could see she was having trouble concealing her irritation, so she changed the subject. ‘Have you met Alan Cadbury?’

  ‘No, missus, us folks wants drink, not chocolate.’ This was delivered in a terrible Somersetshire accent, complete with forelock tugging. His audience had gone quite quiet. Even they couldn’t believe what they were hearing.

  If that had been me, Alan thought, I’d have hit him. But Candice handled it well. She put on the voice of an irritated primary school teacher.

  ‘Mr Joe Thorey, you are a disgrace. Now I want you to be serious for a moment.’ She turned to Alan. ‘Alan here is an archaeologist who knows a great deal about the Fens, and was a good friend of dear Stan.’ Alan could see Joe was about to attempt another stupid remark, but Candice was too quick for him. ‘You may have seen him on Test Pit Challenge.’

  The mood of the group changed.

  ‘Yes, I thought his face was familiar …’ someone said.

  ‘So did I,’ another replied. ‘Couldn’t think where I’d met him.’

  Joe stared at Alan. Alan stared back.

  ‘Can’t stand silent broody types. I hope you’re a bit more talkative than Stan.’

  Alan bristled. Candice put her hand on his arm.

  ‘Joe, that was unnecessary. I think it’s time you went home.’

  By now his audience was wide-eyed. Two of the young women covered their mouths with their hands. One man muttered, ‘You asked for that, Joe.’

  But Candice had already turned away. As they walked across to Stan’s parents she whispered to Alan, ‘That man always goes too far. If it were up to me, I’d have sacked him long ago, but Sarah and Sebastian say he’s a superb head keeper and the estate shoot has never done better. But even so …’ She was clearly very angry. As they approached the group by the buffet, she said quietly, ‘If you don’t mind, I’ll introduce you and then leave. I’ve got to start getting things ready for the reception. Anyhow, it’s been great meeting you, Alan, and I’m sure we’ll be hearing from you soon.’

  * * *

  After Candice had left them, the atmosphere in the small group with Stan’s parents became less formal, despite the fact that her father-in-law, the 3rd Baronet Arthur Cripps of Fursey – generally referred to as Barty – was with them. Alan didn’t know it then, but it was typical that the elderly aristocrat should choose to look after the three people most affected by Stan’s death: the deceased man’s parents and the ex-soldier, who found the corpse. Hickson had clearly been much affected physically and mentally by the shock, but Alan detected strong self-discipline: he was determined to get better.

  ‘Can I get you a chair, Mr Hickson?’ Alan asked. He was genuinely concerned.

  ‘No, that’s all right, thank you very much, Mr Cadbury. I’ve got to relearn how to stand on my own two feet.’

  ‘And you hope to throw away that stick in a month or two, don’t you, Bert?’ It was the kindly baronet.

  ‘Yes, I do, sir.’ He paused, then added, ‘With a bit of help.’

  ‘It must have been a horrible shock for you.’ Alan said. ‘I’m so sorry. I know dear old Stan would not have wanted it. He was a lovely bloke.’

  ‘So you knew him well?’ The baronet enquired.

  ‘We were at university together and were old friends.’ By now Alan was unable to contain his curiosity. He might never again get the chance to question the man who actually discovered his friend’s body. ‘But tell me, were there any obvious major injuries that could have caused the death: a blow to the head, that sort of thing?’

  It was a bold question. Hickson stared back at him, open-mouthed. Stan’s mother grabbed her husband’s arm and looked away. Stan’s father looked appalled. Then Baronet Cripps intervened. ‘I fear grief has affected your judgement, Mr Cadbury. You must forgive us, but we, too, are having problems coming to terms with Stan’s accident. I think such direct questions are probably best left to the authorities at this early stage.’

  Alan felt mortified. He had behaved like a complete idiot.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Mr Hickson, that was unforgivably insensitive. It’s just that … I want to do the right thing by Stan.’

  The older man looked up and attempted a smile. But it was Barty who stepped into the breach. ‘Alan,’ he said, ‘Jack and Dorothy have been very worried about what is going to happen to Stan’s notes and papers. As you may know, he was a great deal more than just a working archaeologist. Archaeology was his entire life.’

  ‘Yes,’ continued Jack Beaton. ‘He was always out tramping the fields on weekends and his room at home is quite literally stuffed with notebooks and boxes.’

  Alan tried to conceal it, but he’d had more than his fair share of notebooks and boxes recently, having just finished writing-up his two previous projects at St Guthlic’s Church and the DMV (deserted medieval village) at Impingham. Admittedly, he’d been paid by English Heritage to finish off these two projects, one of which had ended unexpectedly, but even so, he was now keen to get out of the office and back into an excavation. The last thing he needed was what sounded like a rather routine literary executor task.

  The baronet seemed to detect Alan’s hesitation. ‘No, don’t worry, it isn’t urgent at all, and will probably keep until next autumn. You see, Stan and Peter Flower have completed writing the report on earlier research at Fursey and we’ve decided to publish it ourselves. We’ll be able to sell it in the museum and farm shop here and the money it raises can then go straight back into the research. I’ve discussed it at length with John and Candice and both are agreed on that.’

  ‘That s
ounds very generous.’ Alan was genuinely impressed.

  ‘It’s a wonderful idea,’ a familiar voice said from just behind him. Alan turned to catch the smiling face of Clare Hughes, the county council archaeologist. ‘And I’m sure the county can do something to help. Maybe with publication?’

  ‘Thank you, my dear.’ The baronet was clearly a fan of hers. ‘That would be splendid. Most welcome.’ He paused, frowning, then turned his full gaze on Alan. ‘So the three – no four – of us think this a wonderful opportunity to provide Stan with a lasting memorial, something that most archaeologists will have on their shelves.’ He swallowed. ‘In a very real way, Stan will continue to be among us.’

  By now Dorothy was sobbing quietly on her husband’s shoulder and Alan was feeling thoroughly ashamed of his earlier reluctance to help them out. He must make amends. He turned to Stan’s parents. ‘Look, why don’t I come over to see the extent of Stan’s archive? I’ve been confronted with stacks of notebooks and piles of boxes before, and very often they’re not so hard to deal with, especially if the person who was responsible for them was methodical. And we all know that Stan was nothing if not methodical.’

  Alan glanced at Clare, who was looking serious, but nodding in approval.

  Dorothy wiped her eyes and pulled out a pale-green diary from her handbag. ‘How about this Sunday – for lunch?’

  Alan pretended to look at a non-existent calendar on his phone. ‘Yes, that’s fine.’

  As Alan finished speaking, the gathering was called to order. It was John Cripps. Candice was standing beside him, her hands clasped in front of her, her head slightly bowed. Her pose told Alan what was likely to come next. And he was right. Instinctively he felt resentful: he detested the Church and churchiness, but almost immediately he felt ashamed of himself; on this, of all occasions, surely religion could play a part? He found that his head, too, had bowed.

  ‘My friends,’ John Cripps’s voice declared. ‘We could not meet together to celebrate Stan Beaton’s life without also praying for his immortal soul.’

  To his left Alan could sense Stan’s parents were both weeping freely. He detested the phrase, but he hoped the grieving process would eventually bring them relief, if not closure.

  Then the Vicar started to read from the Book of Common Prayer. Her voice was clear and firm.

  ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word.

  For mine eyes have seen thy salvation.’

  Salvation? What salvation? The familiar words of the Nunc Dimittis were having an unexpected effect. Alan could feel Stan standing alongside him. Had Stan been seeking some kind of salvation through drink or suicide? The idea was so ludicrous that Alan almost cried out at the sheer injustice. Stan was, above all else, rational. He was sensitive, too, and wouldn’t knowingly have put his parents through the hell they were now experiencing. Suddenly, deep, deep inside him, he realised that Stan’s death wasn’t suicide, nor an accident. He had never ‘departed in peace’.

  Alan was angry. But he was also at last weeping – freely.

  * * *

  It was getting late and the afternoon light was starting to fail as Alan crossed the car park, still occasionally wiping his eyes with his sleeve. He climbed aboard the Fourtrak and glanced at his watch: 3.30. He was running 15 minutes late and he knew Detective Chief Inspector Richard Lane hated being kept waiting. He put his foot down and swore under his breath as the rear wheels skidded on the loose gravel. Several people looked up at him, startled. Oh shit, he thought, that was not the way to be seen leaving a close friend’s funeral. He could imagine Stan up there, staring down at him, grinning hugely. He’d always loved a good cock-up.

  Two

  The weather had changed while Alan had been in the marquee and what had promised to be a nice clear Bonfire Night was shaping up to be fairly typical of late autumn so far: drizzle, patches of fog and low cloud. Put another way, Alan thought, bloody miserable. The wake had left him feeling very low: both tired and fed up. He wanted to be out and about; get the blood circulating. He sighed heavily. An oncoming car swerved slightly and sounded its horn. Suddenly Alan realised he was driving a grey vehicle on a grey foggy day and the light was starting to fade. Quickly he flicked on the headlights.

  Although it was only a short distance away, it was getting quite murky as he drove into the car park at Smiley’s Mill. Lane’s car was parked close to the footbridge and Alan could see he was drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. Not a good sign. He glanced at his watch. Twenty minutes late. He sighed heavily: too bad.

  Lane and Alan went back a long time together and Alan had helped him untangle at least a couple of difficult cases after their first meeting on what was the very beginning of Forensic Archaeology, the now famous Saltaire Forensics MSc. course of 1996–8. Alan had been a part-time tutor on it, following his failure to complete his PhD. It had been a two-way process for them: Lane raised Alan’s spirits after his doctorate debacle and Alan taught Lane the basic skills of archaeological excavation. They’d been very close for those two years, then their lives had gone their separate ways. But last year they had come together again to sort out a difficult investigation in Leicester. In his heart of hearts, Lane was very keen to work on another case with his old friend.

  He looked over towards the four-storey stone mill with the central arch leading to the internal waterwheel. A couple of fallen branches were snagged against the mill race’s heavy iron protective grill.

  Lane got out of his car, as Alan drew up alongside him.

  There was no small talk, just a perfunctory handshake, before Lane said, ‘Let’s get along to where we found the body while the light’s still with us.’

  For a moment Alan hesitated. He had very little dress sense, but he was slightly worried that the thin, black Oxford lace-up shoes that he’d bought the previous day to go with the only smartish pair of trousers he possessed, might not be ideal footwear for a muddy walk. Should he slip on some wellies? But Lane was already halfway across the footbridge and rapidly heading north. Sod it, he thought, it’s only money.

  They strode along the path, through the gate and into the woodland, where it was now very much darker. In the reduced light of the wood, Alan realised why Lane had been in such a hurry. After a further short walk they arrived at the spot and Lane indicated where the body had snagged against the wire.

  ‘Which suggests it floated downstream from the mill, because the tail-race bypass channel rejoins the main cut down there.’ He pointed to a gap in the opposite bank of the cut, about 50 yards downstream of where they were standing.

  ‘Yes, that makes sense, especially as even the mill race was in spate after all that rain in September and October.’

  Alan tried to make this sound conversational, but in his mind he could see Stan being washed into the mill wheel. A hand reached out weakly to grab at a railing – his last effort to hang onto life –but it failed. Alan didn’t want to think about what happened next. To his relief, Lane distracted him from his thoughts by showing him press pictures of the collapsed willow tree and the smashed grill.

  ‘That’s what it looked like the day before the body was found.’

  Alan’s reply of ‘Horrible’ was feeble.

  Thankfully, Lane spoke again. ‘Yes, the Fursey Estate fixed it for them double quick. That new grille was up just two days after the accident.’

  ‘Ah, so that’s why it looks so freshly painted.’ Alan was glad they were discussing screens and paint. It was reality. He must keep a clear head. Still, it was hard, so hard, when a close friend was involved.

  ‘And I’ve just had the results of the post-mortem: his blood alcohol count was massively up. About three times the legal limit for driving.’

  For a sad moment Alan recalled Stan proudly sipping his Virgin Mary. No, he sighed, it didn’t add up. ‘And they’re certain of that, are they? It’s just that the body starts to produce alcohol as part of decomposition …’

  Lane
smiled. ‘You’ve got a good memory, Alan. But this doesn’t happen when the body’s in the water for such a short time. And it was cold water, too.’

  ‘So you’re in no doubt, Richard?’

  ‘No, none. And neither are forensics.’

  Alan was shocked. So he really had been back on the booze again, poor sod. ‘Bloody hell. Poor old Stan. What on earth was he thinking of? Why come to a mill when the rivers are all in spate? It’s madness.’

  Lane could see Alan was upset, and paused before saying gently. ‘Unless, of course, he wanted to put an end to his misery.’

  ‘What – suicide?’

  Alan still found this impossible to accept. It was so unlike Stan. And not at this stage in his career when everything was starting to look so good. But then, he thought, what if he couldn’t shake the booze? He’d never do the site or its report justice. And he must have known that.

  Lane gave Alan some time to think before continuing. ‘It’s not uncommon to drink a lot first, just before you jump. Dutch courage.’

  ‘Well …’ Alan hesitated; such a simple explanation still didn’t feel right. ‘I suppose you might be right. But even so …’ He trailed off.