The Man in the Moss (44 page)

           
Cathy clutched at the bed rails. 'They never told me
that!'

           
'Had to drag it out of them myself. Soon as they get you
in hospital you're officially labelled 'moron'.' His features subsided into
that lugubrious boxer-dog expression.

           
'What's it mean, Pop?'

           
'Coronary thrombosis? Means a clot in the coronary
artery. Means I was lucky not to christen Matt Castle's grave for him. Means I
have to rest: Putting on a pompous doctor-voice. '"We have to get
ourselves together, as they say, Mr Gruber." Tell me about Joel. Please
tell me he didn't sleep under the church.'

           
Cathy said carefully that she hadn't seen him today. Not
a word of what she'd heard about him rampaging around the place in his
post-funeral fury, ripping down anything that hinted of paganism. Just that she
hadn't actually seen him. And that she didn't know where he'd slept.

           
'Storm gathering inside that chap,' Hans said. 'Hurricane
Joel. Wanted to make sure he was somewhere else when it blew.'

           
'Don't you think about it, Pop. Get some rest. Let them
do their tests, try and endure the hospital food and don't refuse the sleeping
pill at night.'

           
'Cathy ...'

           
'I know, but it's not
your
problem.'

           
Hans's head lolled back into the hard vinyl chair. 'I
keep the peace. It's taken me years to strike the right balance.'

           
'Don't worry, they'll sort him out, Ma and the Union.
They'll deal with him.'

           
'But ...'

           
'They sorted you out, didn't they?'

           
Cathy smiled for him. Trying to look more optimistic than
she felt.

           
Hans said bleakly, 'Cathy, Simon Fleming came to see me.
They want me to go to the Poplars "for a few weeks" convalescence'.'

           
'Where?'

           
The Church's nursing home in Shropshire. Ghastly dump.
Full of played-out parsons mumbling in the shrubbery. Nobody gets out alive.'

           
Cathy felt desperately sorry for him but couldn't help
thinking it might be the best answer, for a while. Let the Mothers handle it.
Whatever there was to be handled.

           
He didn't seem to have heard about the disappearance of
the bog body, and she didn't tell him. He had enough to worry about already.

'Look, all you need,' Roger
Hall said, 'is an exhumation order. That's not a problem, is it?'

           
Backs to the doors, the Press people assembled on the
other side, Chrissie and Alice looked at each other. Roger playing detective.
Didn't suit him. Chrissie wondered idly if Inspector Garry Ashton was married
or attached. She thought this business was rather showing up Roger for what he
was: pompous, arrogant, humourless - despite the nice crinkles around his eyes.

           
Ashton said, a little impatiently, 'You were convinced
earlier that the body was hidden in Bridelow.'

           
'Still am,' Roger said smugly.

           
'Go on,' Ashton said, no longer at all polite. 'Let's
hear it.'

           
Chrissie liked his style. Also the set of his mouth and
the way his hair was razor-cut at the sides.

           
Roger said, 'I attended a funeral in Bridelow yesterday.
Matt Castle, the folk musician.'

           
'So I understand,' Ashton said. 'Mr Castle a friend of
yours, was he?'

           
With a tingle of excitement, Chrissie suddenly knew what
Ashton was wondering: did
Roger himself
have anything to do with the theft? The police must have spoken to the British
Museum by now, learned all about Roger's battle to bring the bogman back up
North. And why was he so keen to keep pointing the police in other directions?

           
Gosh, Chrissie thought ... And Roger's obsessive
attitude! The bogman intruding everywhere. And when the bogman was in a state
of, er, emasculation, Roger himself was ... unable to function. And complaining
of clamminess and peat in the bed and everything. And then suddenly Roger could
... with a vengeance! And the bog body had acquired what appeared to be an
appendage of its own.

           
Chrissie felt a kind of hysteria welling up.
Stop it!
I'm going bloody bonkers. Or
somebody is.

           
Suddenly she didn't want him touching her again.

           
'Castle?' Roger said. 'Not what you'd call a friend, no.
But he was always very interested in the bog body, as many people were. Kept
ringing me up, asking what we'd learned so far. And actually turned up here
twice, wanting to see the body, which, of course, was
not
available for public viewing. Although I did allow it the
second time.'

           
'Why'd you do that?'

           
'Because ... because he was with someone I judged to be
more reliable.'

           
He didn't elaborate; Ashton didn't push the point either.
Chrissie thought of the writer, Stanage.

           
'So, anyway,' Roger said, 'it was Castle's funeral
yesterday, and I thought I ought to show my face. I only went to the church
service. Left before they actually put him into the ground. But I very much
wish I'd stayed with it now, seen him buried.'

           
'I might be thick,' said Ashton, 'but I'm not following
this.'

           
'All right, let's approach it from another angle. We've
all been assuming that the break-in took place last night, right?'
           
'Have we, Dr Hall?'

           
'Ashton, look - can we stop this fencing? I know you're
an experienced policeman and all that, but I've been doing
my
job for over twenty-five years too.' Angrily, Roger drew his
chair from under the desk, scraping the Inspector's legs.

           
'Look. Because of the funeral and one or two other
things, I didn't come in here at all yesterday. And you only found out - about
the burglary before me because our normally lazy caretaker just happened to try
the doors for a change. Correct?'

           
Ashton came slowly down from the desk, stood looking down
at Roger. Interested.

           
'But if he'd bothered,' Roger said, 'to check the doors
the night before - and if he says he did he's probably lying, I know that man -
he'd probably have found them forced then. My strong suspicion is the break-in
happened the previous night. And that the body wasn't here at all yesterday.'
           
'And what does that say to
you?'

           
'What it says to me, Inspector - and I might have to
spend a bit of time explaining this to you - but what it says to me is that my
bog body is buried in St Bride's churchyard.'

           
'I see,' Ashton said thoughtfully. 'Or do I?'

           
'The funeral!' Roger raised his hands. 'The grave - it's
a
double
grave! What I'm saying is,
dig up Castle's coffin, you'll find our body lying underneath. Trust me.'

... and there it was.
           
Oh, Lord. Oh, Mother.

           
Ma Wagstaff could see the thing from the top of the
churchyard, the highest vantage-point in Bridelow.

           
It hadn't been there a week ago, had it? There was a time
when she knew this Moss better than anybody. Couldn't claim that now. Getting
owd now. Letting it slide.

           
Ma leaned on her stick and wondered if she could make it
all the way out there without some help. She'd have been able to yesterday, but
yesterday was a long time ago. Yesterday, though she hadn't realised it at the
time, she still had some strength.

           
She'd thought that sooner or later it would come to her,
but instead it had sent her an invitation. Brought by a little lad who for no
good reason had decided the dragon - because the dragon was there - was
responsible for breaking up his Autumn Cross.

           
And in a way he was right.

           
Right about that thing out there; Ma could feel its black
challenge. And looking across at it, she could tell why he thought it was a
dragon - those little knobbly horns you could make out even from this distance.

           
Only an owd dead tree, as sometimes came out of the Moss
when there was storms and flooding.

           
Bog oak.

           
Except there hadn't been a storm.
           
So it was black growth, like
the blackness that grew in Matt Castle, and she had to gauge its strength.
           
Ma hesitated.

           
Not one to hesitate, wasn't Ma, but if she went out there
she'd be on her own. As well as which, somebody needed her help this side of
the Moss; she'd known this for days. Well, aye, people was always needing owd
Ma's help, but this was somebody as didn't want to ask, hadn't for some reason
been able to overcome a barrier, and until this barrier was overcome there was
nowt Ma could do. Now she could feel the struggle going on, and when the plea
came she must be there to answer it.

           
Pulled this way and that, between the flames and the
torrent. Oh, Lord. Oh, Mother, which way do I turn? Let it slide for so long,
losing me grip.

           
I'll walk out then.

           
Walk out there following the river, staying near the
water, gathering what power I can. Happen I can deal wi' this quick, nip it in
t'bud. Stare it down, give it the hard eye, reshape it, turn it back into wood
and only wood.

           
Leaning heavily on her stick, Ma Wagstaff followed the
old, steep narrow path down from the churchyard, meeting the thin river at the
bottom of the hill where it went under the path - a little bridge, no more than
a culvert - and there was a scrubby field to cross before they reached the
Moss.

           
I can make it. I can. Can I lean on you, Mother?

The last few steps were
going to be the hardest, by far.

           
From two yards away, Ma Wagstaff's front door looked like
the golden gates of heaven: unattainable.

           
Liz Horridge was aware of her mouth being wide open,
gulping, a fish out of water, metabolism malfunctioning

           
Agoraphobia.

           
Say it!

           
AGOR ... A ... PHOBIA!!! Common-enough condition, always
so hard to imagine, until it came upon you in panic-attacks, convulsions,
stomach-cramps.

           
Yet this ... more like
claustro
phobia ... not
enough
air ... lungs bursting.

           
She'd tried to do it in planned stages, like an invalid
learning to walk again. The first stage had been waiting for the postman, whom
she hadn't seen face-to-face for months. When the van drew up, she'd be
watching from the dining-room window, and if the postman was carrying a parcel
she would run to open the front door, leaving it slightly ajar, and by the time
he was tossing the parcel on to the mat, Liz had taken cover.

           
Yesterday, almost sick with apprehension, she'd waited
for the post van down by the main gate, rehearsing how she'd handle it. Just
taking a walk. Normally go the other way. Yes, it is cold. Bright, though.
Bright, yes. Thank you. Good morning.

           
When the postman didn't come, she was so relieved. It had
been foolish. Trembling, she'd returned to the house to make Shaw's breakfast.
But Shaw had gone. To be with
her
.
Whenever he went out without saying even vaguely where he was going, it would
always be to be with
her
.

           
Therese Beaufort had come into the house only once, had
been polite but dismissive, had shown a vague interest in everything, except
Liz, at whom she'd looked once, with a chilly smile before reappraising the
drawing room, as if sizing it up for new furniture. Now she merely parked
outside and waited, expressionless, not looking at the house (yes, I've seen
your mother now, thank you).