The Magus of Hay (20 page)

35

Cold history

T
HEY SAID THAT
if you drove west from London, the Black Mountains would be the first actual wilderness you encountered. Probably true. Living in Hereford, in the river valleys, you were unaware of them for much of the time. Unless you were a hiker or a fell runner or a member of the SAS, you really didn’t know your way around the high ridges and exposed summits with arcane names that weren’t on the road maps. Didn’t know your Black Hill from your Cat’s Back.

A secret wilderness, Merrily was thinking, and destined to stay secret because no road crossed the mountains from England. Capel-y-ffin wasn’t much more than a mile over the Welsh Border, but it still took over half an hour to get there from the Hereford side.

Along the Gospel Pass. The best road, not to say the only road, twisting roughly north–south through the mountains. So called because legend said St Paul had been this way, maybe St Peter, too.

How remotely likely was it that Middle-Eastern Biblical icons would have travelled this route? Seemed more likely the stories had been invented by the monks at Craswall Priory in the north or remote Llanthony Priory to the south, in the days when monks knew all there was to know about everything, and needed money.

Still, if St Peter and St Paul
had
been this way, chances were they’d still recognize it. You forgot what kind of road this was,
how many times you had to pull into the hedge, as it climbed and climbed, like a vein up an arm, to let oncoming all-terrain vehicles through and a few ambitious tourists.

She was late. There’d been a hold-up in Hay, some problem on the car park. Already late getting away from the vicarage with having to show Martin how the kitchen worked while resisting, one more time, his determination to explain –
oh God
– the circumstances of his sacrilege.

But he was OK, really, was Martin. Nothing wrong with being vulnerable, insecure, paranoid. If it came to it, he was likely to get more out of Sylvia Merchant than George Curtiss had.

She held the Freelander on the handbrake at an awkward junction. Craswall? No, couldn’t be. She followed the twist to the right and came out on the road to Hay Bluff, a sheep-shorn plateau with vast views. Popular with walkers, a meeting place for hang-gliders and probably the last place offering safe, level parking before Capel-y-ffin.

Two empty cars and a Land Rover, lined up alongside the stone circle by the roadside. A pagan statement on the Gospel Pass, if not much of one; it was ragged and irregular, only one stone of any size, bent over like a lonely gravestone beside a pool of brown water. From here, the road was only going to get worse.

Unlikely this was going to be worthwhile, now. Any obsession of Huw’s would be interesting, but Bliss… she was feeling, with hindsight, a bit annoyed with Bliss.

That’s not how we work, the police. Not many points for preventing the hypothetical.

But then, quite suddenly, hypothetical was no longer the word.

The CD player in the Freelander was playing up, kept cutting out, so she’d had the radio on, and the ten o’clock news had it as second lead.

‘Police on the Welsh Border have begun a major operation to find a twenty
-
two
-
year-old policewoman missing from her home
in Herefordshire. More than a hundred officers from two forces are involved in the search for PC Tamsin Winterson, who…’

What?

Merrily braked, reversed back to the stone circle, while a policeman, not Bliss, was saying Tamsin Winterson was a capable officer with a good knowledge of the area, but…

She sat and stared out over God knew how many counties and then pulled the phone from the dash and called Bliss.

‘Let me call you back,’ Bliss said.

‘I can’t wait for—’

‘Five minutes.’

She couldn’t go anywhere because you couldn’t rely on a parking place or a signal after leaving the Bluff.

Tamsin?
Was this some appalling coincidence? How often did police officers just disappear? Why this one? Why now? The dizzying views before her were across the lower hills of Radnorshire, Herefordshire, Shropshire. She looked over her shoulder, to where the soiled sky lay like a gloved hand on a long thigh of naked mountain. A helicopter in the distance.

The phone chimed.

‘Where are you?’ Bliss said.

Meaning was she on her own?

‘Hay Bluff. I said last night that I’m supposed to be meeting Huw Owen. Have you—?

‘No,’ Bliss said. ‘Nothing. I was gonna call you… at some point.’

‘You think this…?’

‘Merrily, I don’t know, do I? It might be totally unconnected. We… they found her car a couple of hours ago, on the car park at Hay.’

‘Oh, hell… I passed it, wondered what was happening. Nobody saw—?’

‘Nobody saw anything. Nobody saw her getting out of the car, but it could’ve been in the middle of the night. And there’s a little gate at the bottom of the car park accessing an endless network
of footpaths. Miles of them. Up into the mountains to where you are. Lorra ground to search.’

‘You have any idea why she might’ve… gone off somewhere?’

‘No. And then there’s the possibility, not so remote, that when the car got here it wasn’t Tamsin at the wheel.’

‘That sounds even worse.’

‘Yeh. That is worse. I can guess what Brent’s thinking. He’s thinking Tamsin, out of uniform, just another nice-looking girl, only this one’s going to places where nice girls don’t go on their own. And maybe some creep chats her up or just spots her somewhere quiet and goes for it.’

‘It’s not impossible, is it?’

‘No.’

‘She’s just a kid,’ Merrily said.

‘She’s a serving police officer.’

‘That’s what you keep telling yourself.’

‘Yeh.’

‘In between wondering how Tamsin being missing could possibly be connected with the drowning of an old wizard.’

And wondering, too, no doubt, if all this would be happening if he hadn’t come back to work until his wounded nervous system could cope with bright lights.

The grey sky was visibly moving in, and she was feeling exposed between the empty cars and the broken relics of cold history. Would a woman come up here alone, when it was even quieter? Well, yes, maybe, because the country
wasn’t like that.

If you didn’t think too hard about, say, the couple who’d been shot dead on the Pembrokeshire Coast long-distance footpath and all the bodies dumped in ditches and the rarely publicized increase in rural organized crime.

‘In all honesty,’ Bliss said, ‘I don’t know how it could possibly connect with the man in the pool, and it could be I’ll be the only bugger even asking the question. Cross-border inquiry now. Brent’s moved in with the Welsh, and I’m just a spare prick at a wedding. Me and Karen’s in Cusop, which I’m convinced still
has things to tell us, but I’m buggered if I can think what they might be. Coppers don’t go missing like this, Merrily, it doesn’t happen.’

‘I liked her,’ Merrily said.

Liked?
Past tense? For God’s sake…

‘Keep me in the loop,’ Bliss said. ‘I have to get back.’

You came round the corner from switchback hell – tight bends, risky roadside drops, cynical mountain sheep shaving the stubbly grass – and then the lane dipped and the stony landscape softened into a tunnel of trees. And there, close to the roadside, about eight interminable miles from Hay Bluff, was the tiny white St Mary’s Church, the
capel
, with its squat, crooked bell tower like the cap on a rusting petrol can.

Not much of a settlement, otherwise. A track opening up into a paddock, a farmhouse across the narrow road. Sheepdogs barking as she climbed down from the Freelander, but no human presence.

The yew trees in the churchyard were whispering about how
ancient
it all was as she approached the porch. The chapel had been built in 1762, dedicated to St Mary in a place of far older worship, doubtless on both sides of the Christian era.

She went in. Some churches, no matter how small, would greet you with a menacing yawn, but this wasn’t one of them. This was a galleried shoebox with the sense of sanctuary you only found in remote places. The window at the east end was plain, apart from engraved lettering which said,

I shall lift up mine eyes to the hills from whence cometh my help.

And there were the hills on the other side of the glass, stark and promising nothing as Merrily turned to the altar, thinking about a prayer for Tamsin Winterson.

‘Cosy as buggery, eh, lass?’

She spun. He could move quietly when he wanted to, in his old trainers, his frayed and etiolated denim jacket.

‘How long have you been here?’

‘Bloody hours. What kept you?’

‘Traffic congestion. In Hay. There’s a missing girl.’

She told him about Tamsin. Huw walked back towards the door where he stood with his hands behind his back, hair like old silage around his bone-yellow dog collar. He stared down at a little sculpted mouse on the font lid.

‘Well, that’s a bit coincidental. I was going to tell you about another.’

‘Another what?’

Huw looked up through the window at the hill from whence might come help. Or not.

‘Another missing girl. Two, in fact,’ he said. ‘I’ve arranged for this bloke to meet us here in a hour. Local. Knows about Rector and a lot besides. Just gives me time to show you what makes Capel the strangest place I know.’

36

The Wire

M
OST OF THE
short journey to Hay, Betty was silent. They weren’t exactly not talking, but they certainly weren’t communicating. Too much had happened inside a single day. And a single night.

She’d been waiting for Robin in the hallway of the bungalow, with the folding table they were taking for a book display. She’d watched him prising himself from the truck at the side of the road, edging up the bungalow’s shared driveway with his back to the fence. She’d observed his attempts to look normal, absorb the pain. She’d winced at the stricken grin when she’d asked him,

‘So how was the Black Lion?’

‘It didn’t have you, Bets, otherwise…’

‘Now that’s odd. Because when I rang the Black Lion they said that nobody called Thorogood was staying there. So, in case you’d checked in with a woman under an assumed name, I described you.’

‘Jesus, Betty!’

‘And nobody—’

‘Maybe it was the Swan.’

‘And then I rang the Swan, just in case I’d got it wrong.’

‘I… What am I supposed to say?’

‘I’m taking it that you slept at Back Fold.’

He looked like he’d been mugged and left in the gutter. Bloody
idiot.

‘All right,’ he’d said, ‘I slept at Back Fold and I’ve had better nights. OK?’

*  *  *

She hadn’t let it go and got it out of him in the end: for reasons so crazy and convoluted that he must indeed have been very pissed last night, Robin – a man who needed an orthopaedic mattress, for heaven’s sake – had
slept in the bloody bath.

If she hadn’t been driving and it hadn’t been so bruised, she might have smacked his face.

He’d said that he’d had bad dreams. Somebody had told him he’d be living on the site of centuries of animal suffering and slaughter and he’d had a creepy encounter with a creepy old lady who whistled in the night and he’d had too much to drink, and he’d seen all the changes that were needed in the shop and it had all gotten on top of him and no, he was never gonna sleep there again, not until there was a bed and both of them were in it, OK?

‘Robin…’ Betty was peering beyond the line of cars. ‘What’s going on here?’ She saw police. Several police cars, police tape, vehicles being redirected, some turned away. ‘What is this?’

‘No idea,’ Robin said. ‘None of it was happening when I left.’

A policeman came round to Betty’s side window. She lowered it, and the policeman leaned in.

‘Did you, by any chance, park here yesterday, madam?’

Robin said, ‘I did.’

‘Until when?’ The cop came round to Robin’s side. ‘When did you leave?’

‘Um… this morning? Half-seven?’

‘Can you tell me where you were parked, exactly?’

‘I dunno, somewhere down the far end? The place you got all taped off?’

‘And you’re saying you were here all night?’ The expression in the policeman’s eyes altered, like traffic lights changing from amber to red.

‘Not me,’ Robin said. ‘The truck.’

‘This truck was here all night?’

Betty saw that half the car park had been taped off. The cop pointed to a space on the right.

‘Park there, please, sir, and let’s have a chat.’

‘What about?’

‘Just park there. I’ll follow you over.’

By the time they were parked, both of them out of the truck, the policeman had been joined by a thickset man in plain clothes, who introduced himself as DS Stagg, of West Mercia Police. They wanted Robin’s name and address and the address of the shop. They wanted to know what time he’d parked yesterday and why he hadn’t gone home last night. A group of other police had gathered some distance away, watching them. Betty began to get concerned, Robin was just getting irritated.

‘The fuck’s this about?’

‘Please don’t swear at me, sir,’ DS Stagg said. ‘Just tell us why you left your vehicle here all night.’

The police were starting to spread out in a casual half-circle. Betty started to feel a little nervous. Robin was leaning against the box of the truck. He looked awful. He was sweating.

‘My husband has orthopaedic problems,’ Betty said.

Wrong.
Why would she just say that? Stagg looked at her.

‘Were you with your husband last night?’

‘I… no. I had to stay at home all yesterday. We’re selling our house. I had to show some people round. What’s all this about? What’s happened?’

‘Why didn’t you go back home to your wife last night, sir?’

‘Because…’ Robin closed his eyes on an indrawn breath ‘… because I guess I’d had too much to drink.’

The cops looked at one another. A fair-haired man in a soft leather jacket was moving close enough to listen to everything. Betty stared at Robin. Robin’s smile was strained with incredulity and back pain, his hair sweated to his forehead.

‘I figured I was doing the responsible thing, you know?’

‘You’re saying you were drunk?’

‘I’m saying I had cause to believe I was over the alcohol limit for being on the road.’

‘Where were you drinking?’

‘Uh… Gwenda’s Bar? Down by the clock? I was with some booksellers. We’re opening a bookstore here.’

‘So there are people who will vouch for you being there until… when? What time did you leave Gwenda’s Bar?’

‘I don’t entirely recall. Eleven?’

‘And where did you go then?’

‘I… just kind of walked around, to sober up? Then I went to our… bookshop in Back Fold, and… No, hell, I came back to the truck.’

‘You came back here, late at night.’

Betty listened to Robin explaining how he’d come to fetch an old coat and some sacks to use as bedding, so he could spend the night in the shop. She could have wept. Could tell the police weren’t believing any of it, and she was hoping to all the gods that Robin would not even attempt to explain why he was so determined to spend the night in Back Fold.

When he stopped talking, there was silence. He stared hard at the cops, backed up against the tailgate of the truck.

‘OK. Let’s deal with this. Whadda you think I did?’

‘Why do you think we’re here?’ This was the fair-haired man moving in. ‘Hmm?’

‘How the fu— How would I know
that
?’ Robin spreading his arms. ‘When I went home to pick up my wife, it was all normal here!’

‘DCI Brent, West Mercia,’ the fair-haired man said. ‘This is a joint operation with Dyfed-Powys Police. We’re looking for a missing person, and we’re talking to everybody who might have used this car park yesterday.’

‘So whyn’t you just say?’

‘And your name is…?’

‘Thorogood.’ Robin spelled it out. Robin Thorogood. That’s my wife, Betty Thorogood.’

‘So far, sir,’ Brent said, ‘you’re the only person we’ve found whose vehicle was here all night. For reasons which, I have to say, don’t make immediate sense to me. If you thought you were over the limit why didn’t you get a taxi?’

‘You know how much cabs cost? ’Sides, where do you start looking for a cab in Hay?’

‘You look in a bad way, Mr Thorogood.’

‘I
am
in a bad way. Some of the time. I have injuries.’

‘Injuries you received last night?’

‘Oh, sure. I had a couple fights, then I was run over by a—’

‘He was…’ Betty put herself in front of Robin. ‘He was in a serious accident a few years ago.’

‘And still has the bruises?’ Brent said.

Stagg said, ‘I don’t see a disabled sticker in your windscreen.’

‘I don’t…’ Robin’s face was going red, his teeth were clenched. ‘I don’t
have
a disabled sticker. If they ever offered me one, I’d refuse it. I don’t like to abuse the system. Plus I like to suffer, which I’m doing right now.’

Betty wanted to scream at this Brent that he should know that Robin was a stupid, volatile, arrogant bastard who thought there was some kind of stigma attached to a sticker allowing him to park in convenient places without risk of prosecution. Who actually thought there was a stigma attached to being disabled.
Him
being disabled.

But she kept quiet. Let them find out, if they wanted to. Let them check his medical records or whatever they did.

‘You’re American,’ Brent said.

‘Makes ya think that?’

‘How long have you been over here?’

‘Years. I’m a UK citizen. You wanna see my papers?’

‘And you’re the owner of a bookshop here,’ Brent said. ‘Did I get that right?’

‘We rent one,’ Robin said.

‘Where?’

‘Just across the road. Back Fold.’

‘And you’ll be open all day? You’ll be there, both of you?’

‘All day. Whatever. Who’s missing?’

‘And why, for heaven’s sake,’ Betty said, ‘would you think my husband would have had anything to do with it just because he left his truck in a car park overnight?’

Brent didn’t reply. One really infuriating thing about the police was their belief that asking questions – and how far was this from an interrogation? – was a one-way street.

‘You’re saying don’t leave town?’ Robin said. ‘You’re truly saying that to me?’

‘What I’m saying—’

‘Ya know what? I always used to be impressed by the British cops. Specially compared to some of the brutalized bastards they allow to police New York. I thought you guys were civilized. Now – no, listen, hear me out – now I think you’re watching too fucking much of
The Wire.
And pretty soon no one will ever trust you. And just like in New York, no one will ever talk to you without a lawyer. And that’s when this country will lose what little remains of the fucking decency and the fucking charm that made people like me wanna fucking
live here
!’

‘We’ll probably want to talk to you again, sir.’

‘For leaving my truck overnight on a parking lot? Paying the full fee? You wanna see my ticket?’

‘You know what I think?’ Brent said. ‘I think you
were
in a physical confrontation last night. Sustaining the kind of injuries most people might have taken to an A and E unit. Or, if
they’d
been assaulted, to a police station.’

‘I’m not fond of hospitals.’

‘Or police stations?’

And then Stagg asked Robin, in an almost perfunctory way, if he’d noticed a light-green Renault Clio, which he said he hadn’t. They asked him if he’d seen a young woman on the car park. Red hair, freckles, medium height. He shook his head.

Betty started to feel sick.