Текст книги "Dying Fall"

Автор книги: Elly Griffiths

Соавторы: Elly Griffiths
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CHAPTER 29

‘I hope you don’t mind me calling round like this,’ says Elaine.

Ruth does mind but Elaine doesn’t actually seem dangerous or deranged. In fact, she looks rather forlorn, standing there in the twilight. In contrast to her glamour at Clayton’s party, she looks distinctly scruffy in faded jeans and an oversized jumper. She also looks very young.

‘Come in,’ says Ruth.

‘I’ve been driving round all day,’ says Elaine. ‘Trying to get up the courage to come and see you.’

Ruth takes Elaine into the sitting room; it seems more formal somehow than the kitchen. It is only when they are sitting on the sofa that Ruth notices her laptop on the coffee table, open at Dan’s diaries. Will Elaine look at the screen? Surely not, but even so Ruth wishes that she could move it. But how can she do this without drawing attention to it?

Elaine, though, seems hardly to notice anything. She sits, huddled in her big jumper, her knees pulled up to her chest.

‘I’m so frightened,’ she says. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

‘I’ll make you a nice cup of tea,’ says Ruth, aware how ridiculous this sounds. She hurries out, casually sweeping up the laptop on the way. In the kitchen, she hides the computer in the larder and crashes about with mugs and biscuit tins. She wonders about offering Elaine a drink (she could certainly do with another herself), but, remembering Dan’s diary, thinks it’s safer to stick to tea. It looks as if their conversation is going to be sticky enough without alcohol.

When she goes back into the sitting room, Elaine is still in the same hunched position. Ruth puts a mug in front of her.

‘Here’s some tea. There are biscuits in the tin.’

‘Thank you,’ says Elaine tonelessly. ‘You’re very kind.’

Ruth waits, wrapping her hands round her mug and listening for noises from upstairs. But the only sound in the room is Elaine’s ragged breathing. Ruth wonders if she’s ill.

‘I’m so scared,’ says Elaine, again.

‘Why?’ asks Ruth.

Elaine looks at her. She has very pale blue eyes and blonde eyelashes. It gives her an exotic albino appearance.

‘Guy says you’ve found Daniel’s laptop.’

Ruth thought at the time that her story about the police having the laptop hadn’t convinced Guy. He must have guessed that she would have taken copies of the files. If so, he knows exactly how much she knows. She thinks of her computer, at this moment crammed into the larder next to the cornflakes and teething rusks. Luckily, Elaine doesn’t wait for an answer.

‘If you’ve read his diary, you’ll know all sorts of things about me. I thought I ought to come and set the record straight.’

‘You don’t owe me any explanations,’ says Ruth. She is dreading a heart-to-heart with Dan’s ex-girlfriend. Oh God, why doesn’t Cathbad come back?

Elaine ignores her. She is crying now but makes no attempt to stem the tears; they run, unchecked, down her pale cheeks.

‘I loved Daniel,’ she says. ‘I thought he loved me but he didn’t. I was convenient, I was next door. But when I started to get heavy he dumped me. He could be a cold-blooded bastard, you know.’

Funnily enough, Ruth can believe this. Hadn’t she felt a faint chill, reading his diary just now? Against her will, she feels sorry for Elaine.

Now Elaine reaches forward and grabs Ruth’s hand. ‘But I would never do anything to hurt him. You must believe that!’

Gently Ruth extracts her hand. ‘No one thinks you did,’ she says.

‘The police do,’ says Elaine. ‘That awful detective, the fat one, he came round asking all these questions. I know he suspects me, he kept giving me these horrible looks. And the other one, the good-looking one, he kept asking about the White Hand.’

‘Well, they think the White Hand might be involved,’ says Ruth. ‘After all, they’re Neo-Nazis, they’re capable of anything.’

Elaine stares at her. Wet with tears, her eyes look almost white.

‘Don’t you understand? We were in the White Hand, all of us.’

*

Cathbad hadn’t realised how late it was until he went into the garden and saw that the hills were in darkness. Thing, clearly delighted to be back in his old home, is running around, barking at the gathering birds. Cathbad doesn’t wear a watch as they tend not to work on him (too much natural electricity, he suspects) and there don’t seem to be any clocks in the house. Pendragon didn’t have a TV or a radio or any electrical gadget – if you ignore the high-tech office upstairs, which Cathbad is trying to. He fumbles in his pocket for his mobile phone and looks at the display. It’s eight-thirty. He’d better get back to Ruth.

It had been easy to extract the cottage keys from Gary. Once he’d had a sniff that Cathbad might want to take over the rent, he had fallen over himself to be helpful. Yes, take the keys. Drop them back tomorrow. Take as much time as you want. So Cathbad had spent a peaceful afternoon at Dame Alice’s cottage, praying for Pendragon’s soul and offering libations to the good spirits. Anxious to cover all spiritual bases, he said a decade of the rosary (his grandmother would be proud of him) and made a symbolic sacrifice of one of Pendragon’s old robes, which he burnt in the sun-dial. He even forced himself to make a trip to the woodshed where he scattered herbs and said the Catholic prayer for the dead. ‘Eternal rest give unto him, O Lord. And let perpetual light shine upon him.’ Despite this cleansing, Thing had flatly refused to enter the shed.

Sometime during the afternoon, Cathbad realised that all the contents of the house belonged to him. Really, he could just move in tomorrow. Now, as he is locking up, he wonders whether he should take the crucifix from Pendragon’s bedroom. It might transfer some of its protection to Ruth and Kate. But when he stands by the bed, as smooth as a shroud, he feels curiously reluctant to touch the heavy wooden cross. After all, it didn’t bring Pendragon much luck. He is about to leave the room when his eye falls on the book beside the bed. Old English Ballads, it’s called. He opens the book and sees that a page has been kept by a bay leaf. A verse has been annotated in pencil. Cathbad reads, Thing panting at his side.

The wind doth blow today, my love

And a few drops of rain

I never had but one true love

In cold grave she was lain.

*

The word ‘she’ has been changed to ‘he’. The ballad is called ‘The Unquiet Grave’. Cathbad stands still, listening to the silence of the house. There is no wind today and no rain. Why did Pendragon mark this poem? Was he thinking of his own mortality? Of the fact that he was planning to take his own life? The will gave no instructions about a funeral or interment but Cathbad has an idea of what his friend would have wanted. Is this bleak little verse referring to an unmarked grave on Pendle Hill? Is that where Pendragon wanted to lie at rest? And who was Pendragon’s ‘one true love’? Cathbad never heard him mention a woman but he supposes that everyone has one true love in their lives. Not wanting to think about this, he takes the book and makes his way downstairs. It’s cold now so he borrows a cloak that’s hanging on a hook by the back door. He also liberates a large packet of dog biscuits. Everything else can stay where it is.

He sends Ruth a quick text and, with one last farewell to Dame Alice, sets out for the car.

*

‘What do you mean “all of you?”’ whispers Ruth.

Elaine seems to understand what she means. ‘Oh, not Daniel. He couldn’t join, could he, being Jewish and everything. No, me, Guy and Clayton.’

The casual anti-Semitism shocks Ruth almost more than anything. But Elaine had loved Dan. Ruth notices again how, alone of all his acquaintance, Elaine always refers to him by his full name.

She still can’t quite believe it. ‘You belong to a Neo-Nazi group?’

‘You don’t understand,’ says Elaine, sounding quite impatient. ‘The Neo-Nazis on campus, stomping around protesting about Chinese cockle-pickers in Fleetwood, they weren’t anything to do with us. The White Hand was different. It was about going back to the old days. The days of the High King.’

‘King Arthur?’

‘Yes, even before we joined the White Hand, we used to talk about recreating Camelot, the four of us. Clayton was King Arthur, I was Guinevere, Guy was Lancelot. Pendragon was Merlin.’

‘So why did you join the White Hand?’

‘Pendragon told us about it. He said there were magical powers associated with belonging to the group. Strong psychic energies. And he was right. We had an initiation ceremony on Pendle Hill. It was wonderful. There were lights in the sky, voices from the heavens, a great black bird appeared above us with wings of fire.’ She smiles reminiscently.

There is a lot that Ruth could say to this. You can admire the Arthurian legends without belonging to a sinister secret society associated (whatever Elaine says) with racist and homophobic groups. As for the heavenly voices and the fiery blackbird, she suspects the presence of hard drugs. But there are other things she needs to know.

‘Who else was in the White Hand?’ she asks. ‘Who was in charge? Who was the Arch Wizard?’

Elaine’s eyes flicker from side to side. ‘I don’t know. You only know your chapter and our chapter was the four of us.’

‘Someone must have known.’

‘Clayton, Guy and Pendragon were knights. They had messages from the Arch Wizard sometimes but I don’t think they ever met him.’

‘And you weren’t a knight?’

‘Oh no. Women weren’t allowed to be knights.’

Sexist as well as racist and homophobic, thinks Ruth. But surely someone must know who the Arch Wizard is. Somebody prancing round in robes, setting people’s houses on fire, that can’t stay a secret for long. She thinks of the masked figure on the riverbank and shivers.

‘Who was Dan?’ she asks. ‘Did he have a role in all this?’

‘Oh, he didn’t know about the White Hand. We couldn’t tell him. But he was Percival, wasn’t he? The one who found the grail.’

So when Dan wrote about the White Hand, he had no way of knowing that two of his closest friends and his boss were actually members. But, even so, both Guy and Clayton had clearly been scared of someone or something. Guy had insisted that the bones be stored in a safe place and Clayton had received threatening letters (or so he said). Did they know the identity of the Arch Wizard? Did they know that he was capable of murder?

‘Elaine,’ she says. ‘Do you know who killed Dan?’

Elaine seems to sag in her chair, becoming young and vulnerable again. When she speaks, it is in almost a baby voice.

‘I didn’t have anything to do with the fire. Guy and I had been to the pub. When we got back, there were flames everywhere. I thought it was our house at first. Guy called the fire brigade. It was awful. I was screaming. We saw them bring Daniel’s body out. The paramedics were giving him mouth-to-mouth but Guy wouldn’t let me go to him. I was hysterical. I had to take a tranquiliser.’

Ruth declines the invitation to pity Elaine. Instead she says, ‘You know something, don’t you? That’s why you’re so scared.’

Elaine looks at her. Her face is not so much pale as drained of life. Her lips are almost white and Ruth can see the veins beneath her skin. She looks around the room, hands clenching and unclenching.

‘Elaine,’ says Ruth, more gently. ‘Why did you come to see me?’

‘I think the White Hand killed Daniel,’ says Elaine in a whisper.

She sounds so scared that, despite herself, Ruth looks over her shoulder. The French windows are dark now and the night is quiet. She would give anything to hear Sandy’s patrol car driving past. She turns back to Elaine, who is still clenching and unclenching.

‘Do you know why they killed him?’

‘Guy thought that Daniel had discovered something about the High King,’ she says at last. ‘Daniel didn’t tell Guy what it was but Guy suspected.’

So much for it being a joint project, thinks Ruth. She is unreasonably pleased that Dan hadn’t shared his suspicions with Guy, even though he had planned to take her into his confidence. Despite his protestations in his diaries, Dan obviously hadn’t completely trusted Guy.

‘What did Guy suspect?’ she asks.

‘He didn’t say,’ says Elaine. ‘But he thought it could be something that could dishonour the High King. Daniel didn’t understand, you see. He liked the idea of King Arthur but all he cared about was making a great discovery. He wanted to be famous.’

Don’t we all, thinks Ruth. Once again, she feels a terrible sadness for her friend, who was, indeed, on the verge of great distinction in his field. And Elaine will never know how much Dan too was under the spell of King Arthur. It’s just that he didn’t care if the Raven King was black or white. All that mattered to him was the truth.

‘Does Guy know who killed Dan?’ she asks.

‘No,’ says Elaine. ‘But I know he suspects it was on the Arch Wizard’s orders.’

Ruth leans forward. ‘Elaine, is Clayton Henry the Arch Wizard?’

‘I don’t think so. He was so fond of Daniel.’

‘Was it Clayton who switched the skeletons?’ She doesn’t think it’s worth pretending that she doesn’t know about this. Everyone will know by now that Ruth has spotted the switch. Only yesterday she had the C14 results on the two sets of bones that she examined at CNN Forensics. They are a few hundred years old, no more. Ruth wonders where they came from. But, at the time, Clayton had seemed genuinely surprised.

‘No,’ says Elaine. ‘I don’t know who did that. It wouldn’t have been Clayton. He wanted to carry on with the investigations. He thought that he could make a lot of money out of the tomb of King Arthur. He’s terribly in debt, you know.’

‘Where are King Arthur’s bones now?’

‘I don’t know. Guy thinks they’ve probably been burnt on a funeral pyre somewhere. That would be the respectful thing to do.’

Despite everything, Ruth feels a pang for those precious, irreplaceable bones. If they are gone, there is no way that Dan’s discovery can ever be tested. All that will remain will be the DNA and isotope findings, Susan’s photos and Dan’s diary. Not enough.

She looks at Elaine, now calmly sipping tea. ‘Why are you telling me all this?’ she asks again.

Elaine looks back, wide-eyed. Her expression is utterly transparent and candid and Ruth does not trust her an inch.

‘Well, you know anyway. You’ve got the memory stick.’

‘You said you were scared. What are you scared of?’

Elaine’s gaze does not falter. ‘I’m afraid they’ll kill me too. They know I’m emotional. Occasionally I drink too much. I’m a liability.’

Ruth remembers what Guy said about Elaine, the woman he claims to love like a sister. Mental health issues … sometimes, the slightest little thing … She thinks of Dan’s diary and the description of Elaine, drunk, in the hotel bar. She can imagine that Elaine – sensitive, highly-strung, bruised from an unhappy love affair – would be a threat to any secret society. But does Elaine really think that her fellow White Hand members would kill her? Ruth looks at Elaine, huddled on the flowery sofa, and believes that she does. There is fear everywhere at Pendle University. There was fear in that first letter from Dan, fear in Clayton Henry’s eyes when he realised that the bones had been switched, fear in Guy’s face when he sat on the pier telling Ruth how he wanted to continue Dan’s work. And Pendragon, of course, was scared enough to kill himself.

She is about to speak when Elaine stiffens and looks round. She has heard something. A wheezing, snuffling sound just outside the back door. Ruth gets to her feet, just as a tall cloaked figure appears at the window. For a moment, Ruth is frozen in terror. Is this it? The Grim Reaper? The Arch Wizard come to exact his revenge? But then the door opens, and a white dog rockets into the room.

Elaine screams.

‘Hi, Cathbad,’ says Ruth, struggling to contain Thing’s welcome. ‘What time do you call this?’

CHAPTER 30

One way or another, Ruth is not looking forward to her meeting with Clayton Henry. But it’s their last day in Lytham, the bags are packed, the house is clean and the car full of petrol. Cathbad is going to take Kate to Nickelodeon World (to her great delight) so, hopefully, she will sleep the whole way home. Ruth is meeting Clayton at his office at eleven. They will see the relics, which are being held at the university, and she should be finished by midday. Ruth will pick Cathbad and Kate up at the Pleasure Beach, they can call in at Beach Row to collect Thing, and then they’ll be on their way. She never has to think about Elaine, Guy, Clayton or the White Hand, ever again.

Ruth has rung Tim to tell him about Elaine’s revelations but is currently getting no reply. In the light of day, Elaine’s story seems stranger than ever. Is there really an Arch Wizard whose command has to be obeyed on pain of death? And is it possible that no one knows the name of this demonic figure? Did Elaine really not know who killed Dan? Does Clayton not know who moved the bones? Elaine doesn’t trust Guy, Guy doesn’t trust Elaine and neither of them trusts Clayton. Ruth doesn’t understand any of it. All she knows is that the sooner she and Kate (and Cathbad and Thing) are out of this place the better. Sandy still doesn’t know who is sending the texts but Ruth is pretty sure that her every move is being watched. It’s a horrible, frightening thought. Kate will have some happy memories of this holiday – the donkeys, the sand henge, the water park – but for Ruth, Lancashire will always be the place where the courtly Arthurian legend dissolved into the darker realm of the Raven King.

When she had told Cathbad about Elaine and the recreation of Camelot, he had quoted dreamily, ‘Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable, Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat.’ Except that this Elaine is not loveable or even (in good light) particularly fair. But maybe it was her Arthurian name which started this dangerous obsession. Ruth thanks God that she resisted the temptation to name her daughter after a tragic character in legend or literature.

She tries ringing Tim again but his phone goes straight through to voicemail. She hesitates for a moment and then rings Nelson.

‘Hello, Ruth.’ He sounds wary. She wonders who is listening.

She tells him about Elaine’s visit and about the revelation that she, Guy and Clayton were members of the White Hand.

‘I’ve been trying to get hold of Tim all morning.’

‘They’ve gone to Lancaster. They’ve got a lead about the White Hand.’

Ruth laughs, she sounds slightly hysterical. ‘They should talk to Elaine. She knows all about the White Hand. Apparently they all dressed up in Arthurian clothes and had a ceremony on Pendle Hill. Does Sandy know about that?’

‘Sandy knows that Clayton Henry was involved in some way. Tim found a picture of him on Pendragon’s computer.’

‘Does he think Clayton was behind Dan’s death?’

‘I’m not sure.’ Nelson sounds rather put out. ‘He doesn’t confide in me.’

‘I’m seeing Clayton Henry today,’ says Ruth. ‘He’s going to show me some artefacts found at the site.’

‘Jesus, Ruth.’ Nelson’s voice is sharp. ‘Be careful. Man sounds like a nutter. Katie’s not going with you, is she?’

Kate’s the one he’s worried about, thinks Ruth. She can have a breakfast meeting with Jack the Ripper as long as Kate is safe.

‘Cathbad’s taking her to Nickelodeon World.’

‘Well, she can’t come to any harm there.’

*

Nelson puts down the phone feeling frustrated. He wishes he could ask Ruth not to go to her meeting, he wishes he could haul Elaine Morgan in for questioning. But he’s not Ruth’s husband and he’s not the officer in charge of this enquiry. And even if he was her husband, he reflects gloomily, he doubts if she’d listen to him. Over the last few days Michelle has been pleasant but detached. She and her mother are always whisking off to places, ostensibly leaving him free to relax, in reality to fret about the case and wish that he could do more than just attend interviews ‘as an observer’. Sandy’s warning had disconcerted him too. On the one hand, the idea of old Sandy as a marriage counsellor is laughable. On the other, if Sandy has noticed something between him and Ruth, who else might become suspicious? His sisters? His mother? Michelle’s mother?

He doesn’t like all this stuff about Arch Wizards and King Arthur. In his experience, when people start dressing up they lose track of what is real and what is make-believe. Maybe whoever killed Dan Golding thought that they were preparing a sacrificial victim, atoning for some ancient wrong. In reality, a man was burnt to death in his own home. He can’t bear the thought of Katie (or Ruth) mixing with these people. At least they’re going home this afternoon. Katie can have a nice morning at the Pleasure Beach with Cathbad, then back to Norfolk and safety. Jesus, it’s come to something when he thinks of Cathbad as the perfect babysitter.

He knows that Sandy and Tim have gone to Lancaster on the trail of some suspected White Hand members. Nevertheless, he leaves a message for Sandy, saying that he has some new information and asking him to ring as soon as possible. Then, on impulse, he dials a more familiar number.

‘Detective Sergeant Dave Clough.’

‘Hi, Cloughie.’

‘Boss! How are you? Is it grim up north?’

‘You don’t know the half of it, Cloughie. What’s it like being in charge?’

Clough is nominally in charge of the department, but with Nelson and Judy away his team consists of only three people: a frighteningly simple PC called Rocky Taylor, a grizzled old hand called Tom Henty and an extremely keen WPC, Tanya Fuller.

Nevertheless Nelson can almost hear Clough expanding his chest. ‘Not too bad. Think I’m running a pretty tight ship. Everything’s under control.’

‘That’s good to hear. Listen, I need a favour. Could you check the files for anything on a woman called Elaine Morgan.’ He spells it out.

‘What’s this about? Thought you were on holiday.’

‘It’s a long story. I’m almost looking forward to coming back to Norfolk.’

Clough laughs. ‘As bad as that? Leave it to me, boss.’

Nelson switches off his phone feeling slightly better. He trusts Clough to find the information, and though he hates to admit it, it feels good to be called ‘boss’ again and to have someone jump to do his bidding. He paces Louise’s spotless front room, wishing there was some more action that he could take, the more forceful the better. One of his abrupt turns brings him into collision with a small table bearing a bowl full of pot-pourri. Nelson scoops up the mess, cursing under his breath. Louise’s house is full of such things. Normally, he gets some pleasure from staying in such a pretty, well-ordered home but now, somehow, it gets on his nerves. How many fragrant leaves and sea shells does one house need, for God’s sake?

‘What are you doing, Harry?’ Michelle is standing in the doorway. He can see her feet, which are clad in unusually low-heeled shoes. She must be going out for a walk.

‘Knocked something over.’

‘Do try and be careful. Mum keeps the house so nice.’

Nelson ignores this. ‘Where are you going?’

‘Pendleton. For a walk and a pub lunch. Are you coming?’

Pendleton. That must be near Pendle Hill and that awful, spooky witch’s house. Nelson never wants to see the place again. He thinks of searching the house with Cathbad, neither of them knowing that its owner was hanging, lifeless, in one of the outhouses. He thinks of the garden and the raven in the tree, of the twinkling dream-catchers and the herbs brewing on the range.

‘I’d better stay here,’ he says. ‘Sandy might call.’

‘Honestly, Harry.’ Michelle tosses her blonde pony tail. ‘This isn’t your case, you know.’

‘I know.’

‘You’ve been so funny this holiday. Even mum has noticed it.’

‘I’m useless at holidays. You know that.’

‘You might try, Harry.’ Michelle gives him a significant look, eyelashes lowered. ‘For my sake.’

‘All right,’ says Nelson. ‘I’ll get my hiking boots.’

*

Ruth parks outside the cigarette factory. As it is now August, there will be no one at reception and Clayton has told her to come straight up to his office. Standing outside the building, looking up at its grim grey industrial walls, she feels an odd disinclination to go inside. Come on, Ruth, she tells herself, best foot forward. Jesus, even the voice in her head is sounding like her mother now. She squares her shoulders and climbs the steps to the main entrance.

As she passes through the atrium full of pictures of scientists, Ruth thinks about Dan, who must have walked past these dusty display cases every day. She feels that she hasn’t really justified Dan’s faith in her. True, she spotted the trick with the switched skeletons but she hasn’t managed to track down the original bones and now fears that they have been burnt on some pseudo-Arthurian funeral pyre. She hasn’t made any archaeological breakthroughs herself though she now understands the nature of Dan’s great discovery. The trouble is, without evidence, she might well be the only person who ever knows the truth about the Raven King. Still, it will be interesting to see the artefacts today, and the tomb itself may be worth a paper or two. She dismisses this ignoble thought as she starts to climb the metal stairs.

She doesn’t really feel any closer to Dan, even though she is in his university, working with his colleagues. In some ways he seems further away than ever. He was sleeping with several women but didn’t love any of them. He had friends but didn’t seem to take any of them into his confidence. He felt an outsider, as indeed he was. The only emotions with which Ruth can completely empathise are the professional feelings – the sense that his career has stalled and then the incredible excitement of a new discovery. She can imagine the febrile, intense atmosphere of the days surrounding the excavation. It must have been something like the henge dig all those years ago when she was falling in love with Peter. Although she hadn’t known it at the time, Erik, Cathbad and Shona had also all been conducting clandestine business of their own. Strange how a dry academic exercise like an archaeological dig can arouse such violent human emotions. Both excavations, in their way, led to murder.

She is out of breath by the time she reaches the fourth floor. She should have started going to the gym again after Kate was born. Oh well, plenty of time for that when the new term starts. She takes a deep breath and heads for the door marked Prof. C. Henry.

Clayton Henry is sitting at his desk. It is some moments before Ruth notices the silver paper knife protruding from his chest.