by Shaun Baines
“It has.”
“For who?” Holly asked, lying on another rock. “If Derek doesn’t get a job soon, we’ll have to leave regardless. I’ll probably have to sell the cottage.”
Callum was motionless, only his breath and the movement of his chest gave him away. He was like the hill they lay upon; part of a larger landscape that didn’t need to shift and jump to prove it was there.
“Your parents left you that cottage for a reason,” he said.
“Maybe they knew I needed a safety net.”
“What happened to them?”
In the distance, Holly thought she could see the deer. Like Callum, they were part of the estate. Like her parents had been.
“Dad died of CWP. Coal workers’ pneumoconiosis.” Holly picked up a stone and rolled it around her hand. “Mam died two days later. She wound down like a broken clock. I wasn’t there for either of them.”
“You were making a life for yourself,” Callum said. “Like they expected you to.”
“What kind of daughter only visits her parents after they die?”
Callum took the stone from her hand and placed it on top of a carpet of moss. “You’re here now. Part of the place as much as anyone else. They’d be proud of you.”
“Proud?” Holly asked with a snort. “What difference am I making to Little Belton?”
“You made a difference to Old Jack because he’s relying on you,” Callum said. “Nancy, too. The Winnows and Big Gregg. They all have a new friend because you’re here. This isn’t about one person. It’s about everyone as a whole, working and living together.”
Holly gazed at the contours of the land, around trees that were beginning to bud and onto streams gathering fragments of sunlight in their ripples. Her eyes went to the horizon where she saw the rooftops of Little Belton. They were undefined, like a stubborn smudge on the lens of her binoculars, but no matter how many times she had attempted to wipe it away, it remained.
Holly and Callum were the only two people for miles around. They were in an estate so vast, they could disappear without anyone ever finding them, but under the netting, snuggled shoulder to shoulder, Holly’s world shrank to a pair of green eyes refusing to look at her.
“I’m sorry I made you think I was going to leave you,” she whispered.
Callum pressed his head gently against hers, his lips an inch from hers.
“Then you’ll stay?” he asked.
“I thought you’d set this trap for someone else,” Holly said with a smile. “Were you trying to get me up here on my own?”
Callum poked out his tongue. “I had nothing but honourable intentions. We’re here because of a feeling.”
“And what are you feeling now?” Holly asked.
“Right now, I’m feeling like Arnold has been following you.”
Holly sat up abruptly, the netting draping over her face, like the veil of a dark bride. She yanked it free and threw it to one side. Callum tried to cover them again, but Holly batted his attempts away.
“He’s been following me?” she asked.
Callum swallowed. “It’s the only explanation. The best way to avoid detection is to stay close to your quarry. It’s every predator’s first instinct. They stay close and wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“An opportunity. Everybody knows you’re investigating Nancy’s disappearance. When his bulbs got shipwrecked, it wouldn’t have taken him long to figure out you’re involved in that disappearance, too.”
“That was you,” Holly said. “Not me.”
“It was both of us,” Callum said.
Holly glanced around her, searching the shadows, but there were too many. If Arnold Salting was following her, he could be anywhere.
“And how long have you known this?” she asked, recalling her suspicions as she sat by Knock Lake.
“I told you,” Callum said, his face strained. “It’s just a feeling. How else would he know we had the bulbs? And I reckon he’s trailed us to this hill and he’s figuring out how to get those bulbs without us getting to him first. Which is why I’ve left them out in the open for the world to see.”
Undoing her jacket, Holly tried to get more comfortable. It seemed like a long shot. And a long wait if Callum was wrong, but if he was right, it meant Arnold had been following her.
Holly didn’t know which option she preferred. “Does that mean you’re using me as bait?”
Callum pointed down the ridge to a shape weaving along a track from the north. “Look. I was right.”
As the shape grew closer, they saw it was a car, the sound of the engine confirming it needed a tune-up. It approached carefully, slowing around bends, pausing on crests, as if searching for something.
Callum and Holly watched it through their binoculars.
“He knows we’re out here,” Callum said. “As soon as he stops, we rush him.”
“We?” Holly asked.
“Okay, me, but we have to get within striking distance.”
Holly adjusted the sights on her binoculars, focusing on the car. It was a hatchback with dinted wings. A crucifix swung like a pendulum from the rearview mirror.
“This doesn’t feel right,” she said. “How did Arnold get his hands on a car?”
Jamming the netting into a rucksack, Callum threw it over his shoulder.
The driver was hidden behind the glare of the windscreen, but Holly saw him unfold a paper map, consulting it as he crawled along.
“If this guy has been watching me,” Holly said, “you’d expect him to know where he’s going.”
The car stopped ten feet from the salmon tins. They were in full sight, stacked neatly and looking at odds with the wilderness they inhabited.
Callum scratched his chin, making no move to descend from the ridge.
The driver got from the car and gazed around. He was a portly man in his sixties with ruddy cheeks and a perplexed look on his face. His beard was twisted into a ponytail and he played with it nervously. He walked to the tinned salmon and propped his hands onto his hips.
“I don’t believe it,” Callum said. “It’s Reverend Applecroft.”
Chapter Thirty
The vicarage was reached through a rainbow garden of the Reverend’s design. Swathes of purple crocuses nestled under the boughs of blossoming magnolia, their flowers like cups catching the morning dew. Green leaves unfurled and the first of the spring insects took succour from the nectar.
The building itself nestled in the church grounds. It was stern looking with a red brick face, but the inside was at odds with first appearances. Holly and Callum sat on the edge of a tweed sofa, afraid to disturb the array of cushions behind them. Some were embroidered with flowers. Others with verses from the New Testament.
The Reverend’s partner Bryan had introduced himself when they arrived. He gave a handshake to Callum and a hug to Holly. He was younger than the Reverend, but sported the same ruddy cheeks. He had a gap between his front teeth when he smiled, which was often and without discernible reason.
Bryan served tea on a tray, placing it on a wooden coffee table embossed with an image of the Turin Shroud. “Sugar or lemon?” he asked.
In the corner of the room was a gilded cage housing a black bird with golden patches around its eyes. It hopped along its perch, ruffling its feathers and barking like a dog.
“Give it a bleedin’ rest.” Bryan grimaced at Holly and Callum. “Casandra is a Mynah bird.”
“Are those the ones that talk?” Callum asked.
Bryan worked fingers into his temples. “Supposedly, yeah. We adopted her from a parishioner who couldn’t look after her anymore. What we didn’t know was that the parishioner also had two Jack Russells. Instead of talking, Cassandra learned to yap like a dog.”
He got from his seat and draped a cover over the cage. “Still, she’s good for deterring burglars.”
“Where is the Reverend?” Holly asked.
“I think you rattled the old bugger,” he said, droppin
g sugar cubes into china cups. “He’s drawing himself together in the bathroom. Won’t be long.”
Holly sipped her tea, enjoying the warmth. “We didn’t mean to startle him.”
Bryan waved her concerns aside. “He’s harder than he looks. Worked the mines when he was a boy, but he knew it wasn’t for him. Taking up the Bible was harder than taking up a pickaxe in those days. You might say he saw God’s light at the end of the coal tunnel.” He wheezed, his laugh whistling through the gap in his teeth. “Battenberg cake?”
On the tray was a teapot with steam curling from its spout. There were four cups, bowls of sugar and slices of lemon, together with wedges of cake, a selection of cheese scones and a tower of sausage rolls threatening to spill onto the carpet.
“Sorry about that,” the Reverend said, entering the room. He had changed into a tracksuit, though his round stomach said it was more for comfort than exercise.
“Did you have any Battenberg?” he asked.
“Not yet,” Callum said. “We’d prefer to ask you some questions first, if you don’t mind?”
The Reverend walked around a room crammed with battered furniture and chipped vases. The walls groaned under the weight of paintings and framed photographs. A fire raged in the hearth, keeping the occupants warm.
He tugged on his ponytail beard as he joined them around the Jesus table. “I’ll do what I can.”
“Who told you to find those tins?” Holly asked, a chewed Biro pen in her hand.
The Reverend frowned. “You did.”
The notebook slipped from Holly’s grasp and her fingers struggled to pick it back up. When she straightened, the Reverend was peering at her over the rim of his glasses.
“Of course, I realise now that I was duped,” he said.
“Someone pretending to be me asked you to the intersection?” Holly asked.
Bryan poured a cup of tea, dropping in a lemon slice and gave it to the Reverend. “His heart is bigger than his head, sometimes, but he can never ignore a person in need.”
“What did they say?” Holly asked.
“It was a phone call. I was in the vestry and the line there isn’t very good.”
“They ought to fix it,” Bryan said, nibbling on a scone. “Hardly our fault.”
“The cows use the telephone poles as scratching posts,” the Reverend said. “Can’t hear a thing. All because some bovine has an itchy bum.”
Callum held up a hand. “If you don’t mind, you were talking about a phone call?”
The Reverend nodded. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m a little shaken up since you ambushed me.”
Seeing the Reverend loading the tinned salmon into his car, Callum and Holly had rushed down the hillside. Callum was leagues ahead while Holly struggled to stay upright, swearing she could hear a rattle in her lungs. The Reverend turned in fright at their arrival. Callum had snatched the tins away, loading them into the hessian sack.
Holly did her best to offer an explanation between gasps, but together with her red face and shaking limbs, they thought it best to retire to the vicarage for tea and cake.
“We should have handled that better,” Holly said, rubbing her aching legs, “but if you could tell me what they said, I’d appreciate it.”
With a slurp of hot tea, the Reverend continued. “She introduced herself as you and said you’d had a car accident. She said you were fine, but you’d spilled your shopping all over the road. It was a driving hazard.”
“Why contact you?” Holly asked. “Why not my husband?”
“Presumably because I don’t know your voice very well. I’ve only ever heard you shouting at Mr Masterly. I was an easy target.”
Bryan placed a hand on the Reverend’s knee and gave him a tender look.
“What else did they say?” Holly asked.
“Not much. Your car was out of commission and would I mind retrieving your shopping. I said, I’d be happy, too.”
“I know this might seem weird,” Callum said, “but are you sure it was a woman?”
Holly’s face flushed, but she bit her tongue. She knew why Callum was asking. It wasn’t a woman they were hoping to trap.
A grandfather clock chimed somewhere in the vicarage. Its bell was deep and sonorous, commanding attention. The Reverend let it sound while he considered his answer.
“The line was bad and now I’m not really sure of anything,” he said, “but I think so. It could have been.”
“So, it could have been a man pretending to be me?” Holly asked.
“I don’t know,” the Reverend said. He put down his cup, spilling a puddle of grey tea into his saucer. “Why on earth were you buying all that tinned salmon anyway? Mr Winnow does an excellent range of fresh fish.”
“Tell me about it,” Callum said into his chest.
Holly rubbed her face and got to her feet. She was drawn to the window over-looking the rainbow garden.
“Which one of you is the horticulturist?” she asked.
“That would be Bryan,” the Reverend said. “He’s the expert. I’m just the lump at the end of a spade.”
Bryan brushed scone crumbs from his front and beamed. “I wouldn’t say expert, but I have an interest.”
Holly turned back into the room. “That wasn’t my shopping and those tins don’t contain salmon.”
She nodded at Callum, who produced the tin he’d shown to Mr Winnow. It was already open and he tilted the contents toward Bryan. “Do you recognise this bulb?”
Bryan held it up to the shaft of light coming from the window. He spun it around slowly, his lips pursed in concentration.
“Well, it’s not a bulb for starters,” he said. “It’s a corm. They’re smaller than bulbs meaning the flowers are usually smaller, too. Wait here a second.”
He bustled out of the room, taking the corm with him.
“You haven’t told me what this is all about,” the Reverend said.
“We’re trying to find Nancy Foxglove,” Holly said, retaking her seat, together with a sausage roll for good measure.
“And these corms have something to do with that?” the Reverend asked.
Holly shrugged. “Do you know much about the two sisters?” she asked, churning pastry around her mouth.
The Reverend handed Holly a serviette to wipe her chin of crumbs.
“Not much at all. They weren’t very sociable,” he said. “Not church-goers. I once asked them to buy a raffle ticket for the tombola. They gave me such a stare, I couldn’t sleep for a week.”
“Someone must know something,” Holly said.
“I’ve heard the story from Old Jack,” the Reverend said, “same as everyone else. How both the sisters went missing. How they survived the cold. It didn’t seem right to me, but then, I didn’t know them very well. There’s another story I think is true, though.”
“What’s that?” Holly asked, swallowing the last of the sausage roll.
“They didn’t like each other very much.”
“Who told you that?”
“It was just gossip. Snippets you pick up.” The Reverend clasped his hands over his round stomach. “I’d see them in The Travelling Star now and then. They’d eat their meal in silence. Never spoke to each other.”
“That sounds like every couple who’ve been together too long,” Holly said. “Doesn’t mean they don’t like each other.”
Holly had rushed to the Foxglove’s defence too quickly and she shifted in her chair. Most of her evenings with Derek were spent that way.
“You’re right, but if Nancy didn’t like the cold, why did she spend so much time out wandering around the estate away from her sister?” the Reverend asked.
Bryan returned to the room, swinging a large book in his arms like a baby. Pushing the teapot and cups aside, he laid it flat on the table.
“The Flowering Bulb Dictionary,” he said.
The book looked well-thumbed with a soil stain on its cover.
“Seems like a favourite of yours,” Holly said.<
br />
“Books are what we have instead of the internet,” Bryan said. “There isn’t a flower growing in Northumberland that won’t be in here.”
“So did you find the name of the corm?”
“Nope, but then books don’t come with Google search. It’s going to take some time.”
Rather than watch Bryan flick through the dictionary’s pages, Holly and Callum decided to leave him to it. After her gallop down the hillside, Holly was hungry and took two more sausage rolls. Bryan confirmed he would keep searching for the mysterious corm and Holly and Callum went outside to the Defender.
“There’s something odd about the Reverend’s story,” Holly said.
“Which one?” Callum asked. “The one about Nancy and Regina? Or how he came to find the salmon?”
Holly kicked the tyre of his jeep. “We’ve both met Regina,” she said. “I’d prefer to brave the weather than spend a lifetime with her. Plus we already know the truth behind Old Jack’s story. No, I’m talking about the phone call.”
“He doesn’t know if the person who called was a man or a woman. Do you think he was telling lies?”
“No, I think he was being manipulated,” Holly said. “It was his explanation of why they’d called that felt strange. He’s right about Derek. He would have known the voice on the phone wasn’t me, but there are other people they could have chosen. Old Jack. Big Gregg. The Winnows. Like he said, I’ve never really spoken to the Reverend. Why choose him?”
“His name starts with an A. Maybe he was just the first person they found in the directory?”
Holly watched a fledgling chaffinch swaying on the tip of a lilac tree. Its feathers stuck out at odd angles, the chirping beak too big for its body. The parent chaffinch fed the fledgling and flew off in search of more unfortunate grubs.
“Did you believe what Bryan said about the Reverend?” Holly asked. “About him looking after his flock so enthusiastically?”
Callum nodded. “He’s devoted to this village. Everyone knows that.”
“That’s my problem,” Holly said. “Everyone knows that. I think that’s why he was chosen. He’d do anything to help. They knew he would go along with whatever he was told.”