The Echo of Crows, page 9
Bliss moved to the door.
‘Right. And I’ll see what the score is with the medical checks. See you later.’
*
From the mobile in his new electric Toyota, Bliss called Annie Howe in her Gaol Street office.
‘This a good time, ma’am?’
‘No,’ Annie said. ‘Give me ten. Use mobile two.’
Bliss started up the car and took the road out of Longtown that sooner or later would take him to Hereford. He pulled into what might once have been a lay-by near the village of Michaelchurch Escley and called Annie Howe back on his private phone. She addressed him as Francis this time so he knew it was safe to talk.
He said, ‘You interviewed the suspect yet, guv?’
No reply, but she was still there.
‘I rather thought you should stay with that,’ she said eventually. ‘I’ve been on the phone to Worcester. To the Management.’
Was he missing something? The lay-by was otherwise deserted. He raised his window all the way, switched the mobile over to speakerphone.
‘Not a problem, is there, Annie? I mean this is turning out to be a bigger one than we thought. National TV are here, as you probably know. You’ll be talking to the press in bulk, them picking up on what’s all over social media.’
‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘You will—’
‘Huh?’
‘You, Francis, will almost certainly be senior investigating officer on this. As of now. I’m going home, I’m owed time off and I’ll be taking some. Two weeks. I’ve cleared it with the chief.’
‘What?’
Silence. And this time she might have hung up. Bliss was shattered. He climbed urgently out of the Toyota, quivering, as if his body had become connected to the car’s weighty batteries and he had to disconnect himself. He switched off, called Annie’s phone back, got no response. His head was spinning. Annie was always owed time off. She didn’t like time off. Certainly not with a big murder on her desk. He’d ask her later, when she was more relaxed.
The signal died. Slowly, he got back into the Toyota. With no engine noise, he found the silence around him intimidating and drove fast to Hereford and Gaol Street. And Annie, if she was still there.
*
Reports on his desk, a mostly empty CID room and no Annie. Bliss made himself coffee and decided his personal life would have to wait. And not for the first time. He had reading to do and a pressing phone call.
‘I need some info and a favour, Merrily,’ he blurted out after a few polite preliminaries. ‘We’ve got a woman who was taken into custody after the shooting in Longtown. Guess you’ve heard about that?’
‘Well, yes,’ she said, warily.
‘And I guess you’ve met her because we found your calling card in her bag. Remember giving it to a woman who dresses to look like a crow?’
‘How could I forget? It was only yesterday. She came to church before the late afternoon get-together and got a call to leave after chatting for a few minutes. That’s when I gave her the card. She was going to call today when we’d have more time to talk. She was certainly troubled about something. And it was more than the tragedy of losing her parents.
‘Matter of fact, she used the name Eddy to whoever called last night from Longtown so when I heard the radio report name the dead man, I did feel uneasy. Seemed more than a coincidence.’
‘She’s had a bad time, I know that,’ Bliss said, ‘and I can see why she might want to talk to somebody like you. But Longtown – that’s not in your parish, is it?’
‘Not by over fifteen miles, but it’s in my deliverance manor. And that seemed to be why she wanted to talk to me. I know you can’t say too much, but is she a suspect? I can’t imagine her as a killer.’
‘Well, probably not. But killers come in all sizes and guises,’ Bliss said. ‘So, anyway, did she give any hint as to why she needed you?’
‘Like I said, I don’t know what she wanted to talk to me about precisely but it did seem to involve the place she’s just moved into. Can’t tell you more than that.’
‘Right. Thanks, Merrily. I’ll save asking you the favour. I’ll maybe call again when I know more.’
16
A-minor; Julia
LOL BOUGHT A sandwich for tea at the Black Swan then returned to his cottage and the song he was trying to finish, a song that wouldn’t leave him alone.
It was after dark that it had first come to him, walking home and hearing it from what was left of the orchard that had once smothered the village, and an owl prowling the night.
He’d always liked owls, but he hadn’t been sorry to abandon the song. Been working on it, periodically, for – what? – three weeks, had to be. Bloody hell, in the old days, three hours would have been pushing it. But in the old days there would always be some space for a new song on the next album.
That was when there was always going to be a next album.
‘You won’t get another offer like this,’ Prof said on the phone when he got home. ‘I’m saying this as your manager, your producer and also your friend. I’m saying it at what I hope is the end of the worst year in your career.’
‘I can see that,’ Lol said, ‘and I know that if you miss out the words “the worst year in”, you might be getting closer to the truth.’
‘Laurence, it doesn’t have to be over – you were close to taking off again,’ Prof said. ‘Your career should only end when you decide you want it to.’
‘Or when you run out of the kind of ideas an audience can feel.’
And when your producer rings and you have to choose between two words. One is yes, meaning OK, whenever… The other is… goodbye.
Lol waited. He was no longer looking for national, let alone international fame, just the means to go on living here with Merrily, whose situation was still uncertain. She’d gone off to help clean the church, volunteers being an increasingly small group. He kept offering to help but she’d told him, smiling, that he wasn’t holy enough.
And never would be, he knew that. He didn’t stay with her because she was a vicar; in fact, the words ‘in spite of’ had often occurred to him in this context. Equally, it wasn’t just because she was attractive and likeable and appeared to enjoy his music. There was something more, something he couldn’t define though he’d attempted to in lyrics, hoping the music would expand them. Songs of Merrily. He’d tried to compose some between other songs…
Songs that were failing even to make any money any more.
‘Things will change,’ Prof said. ‘I’ve been in this business forty-plus years, and I can tell you with some authority that prospects for a working musician have never been worse. Even if streaming vanishes tomorrow and you start selling records again.’
‘Which obviously isn’t going to happen.’
‘I’ll still need an answer by the end of tonight. You going to join this Moira Cairns tour, early next year? Means meeting up pronto, to sort things out. It just might kick-start—’
‘Prof, you’ll get an answer.’ Though he had no idea what the answer should be. ‘I’ll call Moira and then get back to you if it’s not too late.’
He enjoyed gigging with Moira Cairns but didn’t want anything approaching charity. And if he kept appearing with Moira, he’d just drag her into the mud that was now starting to dry around his elderly acoustic-guitar amp.
‘She’s a nationally established artist,’ he told Prof, knowing how pathetic he’d be sounding. ‘I’m just an ageing newcomer who’ll probably never be anything else… except I’ll lose the word “newcomer”, and increase “ageing”.’
‘Ageing so slowly it doesn’t matter. Moira thinks you work well together.’
‘She’s being kind.’
‘Call me back tonight, or in the morning,’ Prof Levin said and hung up. Lol reached for the Boswell guitar Merrily had somehow bought for him, and slid into the chord sequence. Back in the village street, the pub closed, all the people gone, the only sound an owl hooting from an apple tree before swooping down to the street.
…claws finding spillage from the village, he heard in his head, getting out his penny whistle as the phone rang again.
*
‘How’s the lass, then?’
The new caller hadn’t identified himself, but Lol didn’t know anybody else with an accent as pungent as black pudding.
‘I’d say your lass,’ Huw said, ‘if I were sure you and she were inseparable.’
Lol had been feeling for a while that Merrily’s spiritual adviser was watching him, assessing the level of his role in the deliverance aspect of her ministry: the iffy side of Merrily’s work. There wasn’t anything significant about her and exorcism that Huw Owen didn’t know, but Huw was rarely upfront about these issues with Lol, who rested an elbow on the desk and invited him to explain.
Huw said, ‘I were talking to Sophie at t’Cathedral. She’s back in th’office. I also had a call from th’Archdeacon. Both her and Sophie are well chuffed to have the lass back in business. See, I’m readin’ in the press as woo-woo’s gone up since every bugger was in lockdown wi’ no noise. Suddenly, after months of cynicism, media’s spook-heavy. Even prominent galleries here and abroad doing exhibitions on mystical art and tarot cards. So folks like Merrily are back in demand.’
‘Mmm.’
‘Just make sure you’re there for her. For her, not for… it. That stuff’s incidental. Be there for her. Geddit?’
Lol said nothing. The phone was silent long enough for him to think Huw had gone. A chord shivered from the Boswell guitar propped up against a wall. Lol tensed; was that a real chord? Had the guitar let itself become dislodged, or was it talking to him, trying to catch his attention?
No… ridiculous.
Huw said, ‘She needs a life partner who’ll always be there to halve the load. Know what I’m saying? Also, you need to know automatically when it’s best to keep your head down and do nowt, or you’ll drop yourself in it and forget to have a life.’
The guitar again. A-minor: a serene chord that usually sounded kind, especially in the evening.
‘I don’t sleep too well any more,’ Huw said. ‘Sometimes I’m lying awake and thinking about what might’ve been if I’d met a certain woman earlier. And if she were lying there next to me and…’ He paused. ‘The lass never told you about Julia, did she?’
‘Erm… I don’t think so.’
He thought maybe she had, but wasn’t sure whether she’d been supposed to. He kept his lips closed.
‘Julia and me, we had what you might’ve called an emerging relationship,’ Huw said. ‘We met in Brecon Cathedral, then we met there again, a few times. It were nice. She were nice. Cut a long, long story short, happen it’d’ve ended in us gettin’ wed. Which is better than dead.’
Suddenly, he sounded close to tears. Hardly what you expected from…
‘Huw?’
‘I didn’t know,’ Huw said. ‘I didn’t know how close she were to real evil. When I tell you her daughter might’ve been one of the unknown victims of Fred West.’
‘The… serial killer… That’s certainly real evil,’ Lol said, not liking the way this conversation was going. Merrily hadn’t told him specifically about this, only saying that most priests encountered more evil than most lay people and Huw Owen more than most priests.
‘I hadn’t known Julia long enough to penetrate little secrets like that,’ Huw said. ‘A few girls went missing in the area around the time of them West murders, but the cops had no bodies to prove owt.’
‘I gather they never did,’ Lol said, ‘…until it was too late.’
‘Julia couldn’t live wi’ it in the end. Me, I didn’t see it coming. Happen I were too preoccupied wi’ priestwork. Them days, it were more important than any private life.’ Huw sighed. ‘Nearest to the end for me and Him, that were. Then I realized learning to suffer is part of life’s lessons.’
Lol changed hands to hold the phone, which had begun to feel warm and damp.
Huw said, ‘I didn’t… didn’t realize how attached I’d become. The thrill of just seeing her and needing her in my life.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Lol said inadequately.
‘But I should have!’
Silence. Then A-minor again, and this time he thought he saw the guitar shake.
‘If you ever find Merrily’s not there any more,’ Huw said, ‘that’s when you’ll truly know how important she’s become…’
The room was cold, and it seemed to be coming from the phone.
‘Suicide. She obviously decided she couldn’t go on and maybe hoped she’d see her daughter again, reunited in death. It’s a lesson: to listen to what’s unsaid and hold people close enough to lean on you wi’out suffocating ’em. Think on, Lol. That lass is special and she needs someone to be there for her. Are you that? And if you are, commit to her, make the vow. Or let her find someone else who can step up. Don’t be just a dreamer. There isn’t always a tomorrow.’ Suddenly, the call ended.
‘I will,’ Lol said to a silent handset, ‘if she wants me.’
17
Another victim
‘HE BOUGHT HER THIS?’ The pathologist laid down the shotgun almost reverently. ‘He could’ve paid a good deal less for a used sports car!’
‘You’re serious?’
Bliss touching the broken double-barrel with a tentative forefinger through its exhibit wrap and then watching Billy Grace picking it up with what you could call total respect. Billy’s military background meant he knew a lot about firearms, and his immediate family was mildly into blood sports. Although there was nothing much in that to admire, Bliss had always found him more useful to have around than any other pathologist he’d worked with.
‘Francis, there’s normally a lengthy queue of people waiting to pay that kind of money for one of these. Before you lock it away again, I’d make sure your police insurance will cover you. That’s why I’ve brought it back personally and quickly. Have you read the forensics report? Saw it on your desk when I put mine there.’
‘Yeh,’ Bliss said. ‘No gunshot residue on Autumn but both guns fired one cartridge. Still hoping to get fingerprints on the cases, other than Eddy’s.’
‘And the one that killed him was fired at close range, which made a hell of a mess of his chest and heart. Bottom line on my report is that his general health was good. He was a fit young guy.’
‘Thanks for pushing that through fast, Billy. Leaves us with Autumn Wise as probably another victim and not a suspect. Got a quick drug-screen back from the medic and it detected Rohypnol which would account for her memory problem and fatigue.’
Billy’s eyes widened. ‘It certainly would. Good that a drug test was done early on. It’s the drug of choice for practised rapists, as you know, and it leaves the system within as little as eleven hours. You almost certainly wouldn’t find a trace after a day.
‘Sadly, it’s a drug that’s not difficult to get from criminal suppliers. And from your point of view, she’s not going to be able to help you much. For the whole of the time it’s in the body, memory is on hold. Nothing is recorded until it leaves the system so you’re just left with info she can summon from before and after.’
‘Yeh, that about sums it up,’ Bliss said. ‘Autumn is clever though and – there’s always a chance she can put us onto something. She’s also – how can I put this – something else we don’t like to be heard talking about… er… for now, let’s just say perceptive. She seems to understand things I wouldn’t get near. And she’s got a strange affinity with crows. Just to add to the mix.’
‘Ah.’ Billy Grace nodded, barely perceptibly. ‘Like that, is it, Francis? Can’t help you with that one, I’m afraid, but I’m sure you’ll sort it out.’
Billy Grace left with a hand in the air. ‘You perhaps need a think… and a shrink.’
Or maybe a certain vicar again, Bliss thought.
18
Desolation
WHEN VAYNOR WALKED into the apartment his relief came out in a long, if mainly silent, sigh. He’d feared that Maya Madden had left Hereford for good, leaving a colourless gap in his life. Instead, he learned that she’d been in Bristol, signing a new contract with her production company. After leaving Longtown, he’d had time to get some sleep. Some. He’d twice woken up feeling isolated. Then came an oh-sowelcome call.
She’d phoned and given him her new address. Added to that, she actually knew Autumn. It was a surprise bonus to find it was Maya, in fact, who’d ‘discovered’ Autumn and provided the ticket to a TV debut. All tiredness left him when she readily said yes, he could come over straight away. He had the impression she was also relieved he’d found her again, or was he just telling himself that?
‘Autumn has a kind of unearthly beauty,’ Maya said. ‘You must have noticed. Partly composed now, I have to say, of sadness.’
Autumn Wise was gazing from the laptop screen on the kitchen table. Vaynor aware of the desolation behind Autumn’s eyes and how it brought back his own feelings about Maya. Hadn’t realized at first how often he’d thought about Maya’s dark-brown hair shading into her light-brown skin. He’d thought that maybe she hadn’t wanted to see him again. Why the hell should she? The regional TV programme about Wordsworth, in which she’d originally wanted him as an interviewee, had been cancelled because of the covid lockdown. And the fact that they’d occasionally met up since, that was just two professionals sustaining a professional relationship.
Or perhaps not. It certainly hadn’t seemed enough earlier when there was a suggestion that Maya had left town and their working relationship had run its course.
‘Her personal history always comes back to haunt me whenever I see her,’ Maya said.
She’d disclosed that Autumn Wise was actually the person who’d be presenting a documentary programme she was producing about Harold, the last Saxon King of England.
She said, ‘Is this about the accident, David? Has something surfaced about the death of her parents? Is that why you’ve suddenly come here? Have you found the other driver?’
