The Echo of Crows, page 4
‘Sorry, that’s your name? Like the season…’
…that normally started off warm and sunny, Merrily thought, but usually ended the way life itself often did. A descent into decay.
‘Autumn Wise. I came to just one of your meetings with my mother. It was a gathering to introduce the meditation sessions to anyone who might want to join the group.’
Merrily nodded. An introduction forum was held every year, to accommodate newcomers and mainly people from outside the parish who’d shown an interest in spiritual or semi-spiritual discussions other than the usual church services. The meditation was the most popular.
‘It’s quite common for people to find out what’s on offer, and then they don’t come to an actual session for months…’ Looking more closely at Autumn Wise. ‘So we don’t find out who they are until— Oh, God…’
Merrily suddenly knew where she’d seen the face and backed sharply into the stone entrance, propelled by a powerfully shocking memory: a hard-edged picture – from a paper or TV – of tangled, smoking metal in a country lane. And then the blurred, frozen face of a woman that didn’t change its expression. Which meant she was looking at a photo of, not Autumn, but…
‘Your… mother? Did I see your mother before she – died?’ The mother–daughter resemblance was startlingly clear.
That crash was undoubtedly the worst road accident Merrily could remember happening in this rural area. The artist George Wise and his wife, Anna, had been killed when their car collided with an overturning car and exploded into flames on a narrow country lane near the south-west Herefordshire border. The couple, both in their fifties, were lying dead in an ambulance within half an hour of the crash, which had closed the road for four days at the end of August last year or thereabouts. The other driver, thought to have been thrown clear, was never found.
Traffic cops had put out numerous appeals to help identify the other car, which appeared to have gone out of control on one of those tortuous bends approaching Longtown. In the end, it was said at the inquest that the car was uninsured and had been stolen a year earlier, most probably for use as a shared ‘pool’ vehicle by drug-runners. Several different number plates had been found in the boot; a well-used method for evading police stops.
‘We did hope to come to your meetings. Definitely intended to, after the first introduction, but then the crash happened and my life changed completely. I’m still trying to pick up the pieces since my parents died.
‘They had rented a house that was part of a farm but the owners decided to sell the whole lot and my parents were driving around looking for somewhere else in the Black Mountains on the day they died.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Merrily said, putting a hand on the caped shoulder. ‘People were talking about that crash for months. The police appeals for the other driver to come forward were in the papers a lot, including a couple of months ago on the first anniversary. That’s why I recalled it so readily. Must have been awful to see the crash photos again. To lose both parents so suddenly was such a cruel blow. Have you got support and somewhere to live now?’
Autumn grabbed a tissue from a pocket and dabbed her eyes.
‘I was due to go back to university, but I didn’t. I kept on with a part-time job I had in the summer holidays, guiding tours and giving talks to visitors up there. Early medieval history is my subject. I lived with my grandparents nearby but the place is too small even for them. Couldn’t find anything I could afford for ages, then, just this week, I’ve moved into a convenient little place virtually rent-free, which was such a stroke of luck. The landlord lets me use his car, too, which got me here. It’s all going better but, and it’s a big BUT… er, there’s something…’
A ringing from the phone in Autumn’s shoulder bag.
‘Get it,’ Merrily said. ‘It might be important.’ She busied herself by propping back the church door while Autumn dealt with the call.
‘Probably not, I…’ Autumn pulled out her phone. ‘Hello… Oh, Eddy. Look, it’s not really…’ She went quiet, listening. ‘OK, I’ll try, but it might—’ The call ended abruptly.
She hurriedly put the phone back in her bag. ‘Sorry, I have to go.’
‘Perhaps we can talk some other time,’ Merrily said.
‘I’d be really grateful if we could, and soon. Do I call your office?’
Merrily was shaking her head.
‘I won’t be in the office tomorrow, but I’ll give you a card with my home number.’
‘I’m sorry, I have to go now and talk to these people… I’ll call you in the morning. I was just going to tell you about this little place I’m in, which I really need.’
‘Where is it?’ Merrily said.
‘Longtown.’
‘Sounds good.’
‘No. Not good,’ Autumn said. ‘Not good at all. Which is why I need your help. Something has to be faced. Something… beyond the normal.’
Merrily gave her the card.
She was also darkly dressed but not in clerical vestments, having decided the meditation nights should be kept casual, even borderline secular. She wasn’t sure Huw Owen would approve but Huw had gone, anyway.
‘My mum…’ Autumn hesitated, then the rest came out in a rush, ‘…told me what an exorcist can do if you’re troubled by something. I’ll just tell you…’ She looked suddenly swollen with things that needed saying. ‘From where we lived, north of Hereford when I was growing up, we could look over the city towards the Black Mountains, and my mother used to say that was where my ancestors came from and we’d go back there one day. Thinking my dad’s paintings might take off commercially, but they never did. But Mum said she always knew I was destined to be in the Black Mountains. She got me interested in the area and its history. While other children were told fairy stories, I learned about the Black Mountains and a load of stuff from Ella Mary Leather’s Folk-lore of Herefordshire.’ She paused. ‘Where the crows came from…’
‘Crows?’
‘All over that area, and they appear in Mrs Leather’s stories,’ Autumn said. ‘As a child, I grew fascinated by them, tried to talk to them in their own language, look like them. It’s like I’m part of their family, even more so now.’
Merrily quickly recalled Mrs Leather writing about walkers seeing the Devil as a large black crow which put out people’s lanterns and made them lose their way. Was Mrs Leather aware of another side of the Black Mountains’ most familiar scavengers?
Wildlife always seemed closer in Herefordshire, the higher you went. To Merrily, the muffled Autumn Wise suddenly seemed like a part of something that had come down crow-like to the shadowed church.
She said, incredulous, ‘You want to look like a crow?’
Autumn didn’t seem at all fazed by the question, although she lowered her voice before replying.
‘I suppose,’ she said, ‘that I want to sense… what a crow senses. If they can see, from up there, everything we’re doing, and, perhaps, be aware of some of what we’re thinking.’
Merrily said hoarsely, ‘You’re saying they can?’
Pulling her hood back up, Autumn stepped forward as several people walked past Merrily, some saying ‘Good evening’ and others giving a nod or a quick smile. Her face half-hidden made Merrily think how closely and uncannily Autumn resembled a hooded crow against a shadowed bough. Merrily wished she hadn’t thought of it.
‘Crows are an intelligence,’ Autumn said, when the newcomers were out of earshot. ‘They pass on things we need to know, even if we don’t think we do. I didn’t think I could, but… then I began to rely on them… to sense evil, when it’s there…’
‘Evil?’
‘An insidious evil… the kind that someone like you should be aware of. My mother… After we’d listened to you that night, my mum said priests identified it… felt it coming from people and certain places. She said you didn’t talk like a priest, but surely you feel it, too… sometimes. Don’t you?’
‘Well, I… maybe…’ Merrily said. ‘I imagine we all do, don’t we? If it’s strong enough to…’ She saw another group of people walking up the path.
‘I’ll call you tomorrow,’ Autumn said, hurriedly.
‘Take care on the way home,’ Merrily said. ‘Good evening.’
She watched Autumn fade into the shadows of the lychgate and become absorbed by the advancing darkness. Before going into the church Merrily stopped. She felt the need to turn back and add, ‘God bless you and keep you safe.’
PART TWO
… on the subject of death – they really are a doom-laden lot at Longtown.
Michael Raven: A Guide to Herefordshire
7
A shooting
WITH THE DI off duty, DC David Vaynor assumed that, as he’d be bag-carrying for DS Karen Dowell, he’d be expected to do the driving, but…
‘I’ve never actually driven to Longtown,’ he admitted, ‘so it won’t be very fast. Sorry, Sarge, despite being born and raised in this county, I haven’t been up there in a car – mine or anyone else’s – since before I left school. You feel as though you’re not meant to.’
‘I’ll drive, then.’ DS Dowell pushed the phone away. ‘They’re not the easiest of roads, even in daylight.’ She stood up and straightened her skirt. ‘And how about you stop calling me sarge?’
‘Oh.’ He found himself nodding, though he still wasn’t sure why. ‘Sorry, Sergeant.’
‘I prefer “Karen”, if you don’t mind.’
‘OK, then, no sarge or longer versions.’
The DS was in charge tonight. In charge of Vaynor, anyway. He’d been told she could have taken further promotion a while back, but was said to be content to be a DS for ever, conveying commitment to the Job but no great ambition.
Vaynor got to his feet, which made him over a foot taller than she was. He sat down again.
‘So, what exactly’s happened out there… um… Karen?’
‘I’m told there’s a man dead and we have to decide how he got dead.’ She put an arm into a sleeve of her fleece. ‘Pretty quickly, I’m thinking. He was shot and I’m told it doesn’t look like suicide.’
From her tone, it could have been another case of shoplifting from an off-licence. Within minutes they were pulling out of the station parking area in a police Ford Focus, Vaynor wondering if it was wrong for him to be feeling vaguely excited when she clearly wasn’t.
‘A shooting at… Longtown?’
An old village, well up in the border hills and remote. Reached by obscure, twisty roads that Vaynor had never become familiar with.
‘Thereabouts,’ Karen Dowell said. ‘I’ve told the DCI I’ll call her as soon as we know something.’
‘She coming out?’
‘Depends what I tell her.’ They were heading out of the city centre, through flashing traffic, some cars, no doubt, carrying Hallowe’en party-goers.
She turned to give Vaynor a flashing glance.
‘You don’t seem to know that area much,’ Karen said. ‘Which, as you were born here…’
‘I was born in Hereford. It’s like entering a different county up there. Even a different country, wild and…’
‘…a bit weird,’ Karen said uncertainly. ‘It’s kind of like nowhere else with its own history and stuff. And not much crime.’
They left Hereford city behind, along with its not very bright lights. The Focus slid south, turning off to find the narrowing Golden Valley road and then the even narrower, more tortuous lanes that would lead eventually, under greying layers, to the old village of Longtown.
Which wasn’t a town any more and came to a natural stop just short of the Black Mountains.
‘I used to think Longtown was in Wales,’ Vaynor said as the road curled into deep countryside.
‘It used to be,’ Karen told him. ‘The border was changed several times over the centuries. Don’t know the exact details of when and why. The Black Mountains haven’t moved.’
‘Are they all in Wales?’
‘Mostly. The farmhouse we’re looking for is just under the mountains.’ She cleared her throat, hesitated. ‘Ahm… does the name Eddy Davies mean anything to you?’
‘Eddy—’ After a couple of seconds, Vaynor whirled his head to her in the darkness. ‘That’s the dead guy?’
‘Of course, there’s always a tiny chance of mistaken identity, but I’ve just been told that’s the name.’
Headlines were suddenly unrolling in Vaynor’s head: – rich… richer… richest… The Hereford Times. Recent but not all that recent; maybe a year or so. The computer in his mind was freezing a picture of a young guy filling a glass from a plastic bottle of cider. Huge beam, and not just a smile for the camera. It was the luminous laughter of triumph. The printed word richest unrolled again, followed by the full headline: I GUESS I’M NOW THE RICHEST YOUNG FARMER IN THE COUNTY.
Vaynor sat up into silence.
‘You mean…’ the headline was wobbling in his memory ‘…the National Lottery winner. This is the guy who’s been shot?’
He’d become aware of a lurid blue light revolving in the middle distance.
‘That’ll be for us.’ Karen Dowell pulled into the side of the lane and switched off her headlights. ‘No confirmation, David, but I think it has to be him. Which is why we’re going to have to approach this… with some care. It’ll be all over the media.’
Vaynor was still putting it together as Karen added, ‘I think the last report I saw said he was buying a farm or a farmhouse here.’ She gave a short laugh. ‘Bigger, I’m guessing, than the one his older brother inherited from their dad.’
‘His winnings were huge,’ Vaynor said. ‘He was in the news round here for weeks.’
The full weight of it had landed. Vaynor expelled a breath. This would have to be approached delicately. Social and national media would erupt once news got out. This lottery winner had collected over…
‘Over fourteen million, if I remember,’ Karen said mildly. ‘Massive for this area. And it was early last winter, I think. Everybody trying to save up for Christmas and here’s Eddy Davies winning more than fourteen million. He apparently had a couple of quid in change at a newsagent’s, swapped it for a lottery ticket, without thinking much about it, and… that was the one. The big one. Triple Rollover.’
Vaynor whistled, aware of the car crawling towards the blue light, a cluster of small house-lights beyond it in a misty, dark bank that he thought must be the lowest of the mainly uninhabited mountains.
‘And evidently he didn’t want to keep quiet about it,’ Vaynor said.
‘No, he didn’t,’ Karen Dowell murmured, slotting the Ford in behind the patrol car, switching off her engine and zipping up her fleece.
They sat for a moment, rhythmically bathed in forensic blue light from what Vaynor now identified as the main rural crime car, usually carrying a fast-response team.
‘And certainly not as quiet as he apparently seems to be now,’ Karen said.
8
The corpse
THE AIR WAS unexpectedly cold and still and carried an intimate hush. A death hush, Vaynor thought, staring into the darkening distance and wondering if he was overdramatizing it, because the hush seemed to be coming from the body, as if it was exuding its own silence.
It was somehow threatening. Possibly because, until he was a policeman, he hadn’t really experienced unnatural death, then the deaths had come at him with machine-gun speed, even in Herefordshire. On consecutive, short-lived uniformed days, he’d encountered mortality in a small kitchen with tidily drawn blinds: a woman, suicide. Then between the brick walls of a suburban church porch: a homeless rough-sleeper. In Herefordshire? And again, the same afternoon, on the pitted tarmac of a motorway’s slow lane he’d seen blood oozing like strawberry jam from a smashed jar. Another young driver stopped in life’s tracks.
These were the first dead people he’d been called to see, leaving images embossed on his memory. But this was before he was a detective, when none of the deaths were particularly suspicious. As a DC he’d been close to others that definitely were, though not like the ‘dead’ people he’d seen in TV fiction. Eddy Davies, dead, could have been an actor, a celebrity. Vaynor recognized him at once from the press and TV pictures that the self-proclaimed richest young farmer in the county was eager to pose for.
In a small, shadowed field behind a half-lit house, the dead man lay, partly tented, in a pool of hard police light, one arm thrown out and the sheen of a shotgun not far from the tips of clawed fingers.
Just out of vision, the hush was dispelled by a buzz of voices from somewhere, and Vaynor was aware of a peripheral glow: torch and lamplight from a cluster of people. Here, on the edge of this famously ancient village, violent death had lassoed a late-night audience. Vaynor tried to work out how many spectators were here before forcing himself to edge nearer the dead man for a closer look. If the blood-splashed face carried a final expression, it was one of surprise: eyes wide and lips slightly parted in the lamplight.
‘Take a good look.’ A bulky man, who Vaynor recognized as the crime scene supervisor, was pulling him back by an arm. ‘But don’t get too close, all right?’
‘Can’t be suicide?’ Vaynor asked. ‘Or accidental?’
‘I can tell you the wounds are all upper body. Fairly close range.’
Vaynor didn’t look too fixedly at the corpse, just at the crime-scene man: Fiddler. Didn’t know his first name, but DI Bliss called him ‘Slim’ Fiddler, because of his conspicuous weight, and it had stuck. Bliss liked everybody to have a nickname. He called Vaynor ‘Darth’ – ‘Darth Vaynor’, almost like from Star Wars, and that had also stuck. Vaynor wished the DI was here now. Felt out of his depth as a detective constable, even with his doctorate – especially with his sodding doctorate.
He looked around for Karen Dowell, who must have seen quite a few exploded chests in her CID years. The crime-scene team was taking pictures in the gassy white light of a lamp attached to a car battery and blanching the circle of grass.
‘Any burn marks?’ The question came from Karen, as she carefully closed the field gate and stood next to Vaynor. Fiddler shook his head.
