“You might have come to the wrong place,” Rebecca said. “You wouldn’t want to join a losing cause. Remember, my husband is still under suspicion.”
“Yes, but he has carried on in the face of it all. And I know you believe in him. You’ve stuck by him. So have a lot of other members of the congregation, I’m sure. Don’t you see, Mrs. Charters, we’re both victims, your husband and I?”
Rebecca thought for a moment, remembering the hypocrisy of some parishioners. “All right, then,” she said. “I can’t guarantee anything, but I’ll talk to my husband.”
“Thank you,” breathed Owen.
“But will you do one thing for me?”
“Of course.”
“Will you come to church tomorrow morning? I’m not trying to convert you or anything, but it would be good if you could be seen there. The people who still come to St. Mary’s have, for the most part, stuck up for Daniel and believed in his innocence, as you say. If we take you into the congregation, they might do the same for you. I know it might sound hypocritical, the way people judge by appearances, but they do, you know, and perhaps if…Why are you laughing?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Charters, I really am. I just can’t help it. Of course I’ll come to church. Believe me, it seems a very small price to pay.”
III
It was just after two o’clock in the morning and Banks kept waking up from disturbing dreams. He and Sandra had been out to a folk night in the Dog and Gun, in Helmthorpe, with some old friends, Harriet Slade and her husband, David. The star of the evening was Penny Cartwright, a local singer who had given up fame and fortune to settle back in Helmthorpe a few years ago. Banks had first met her while investigating the murder of Harold Steadman, a local historian, and he had seen her once or twice in the intervening years. They chatted amicably enough when they met, but there was always a tension between them, and Banks was glad when the chit-chat was over.
Her singing was something to be relished, though. Alto, husky on the low notes but pure and clear in the higher range, her voice also carried the controlled emotion of a survivor. She sang a mix of traditional and contemporary-from Anon to Zimmerman-and her version of the latter’s “I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine” had made Banks’s spine tingle and his eyes prickle with tears.
But now, after a little too much port and Stilton back at Harriet and David’s, Banks was suffering the consequences. He had often thought that the blue bits in Stilton, being mold, had mild hallucinogenic properties and actually gave rise to restless dreams. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t yet found a scientist to agree with him; he was sure of it. Because every time he ate Stilton, it happened.
These weren’t satisfying dreams, the kind you need to make you feel you’ve had a good night’s sleep, but abrupt and disturbing transformations just below the threshold of consciousness: computer games turned into reality; cars crashed through monitor screens; and the ghost of a young woman walked through a foggy graveyard. In one, he had terminal cancer and couldn’t remember what his children looked like. All the while, voices whispered about demon lovers, and crows picked bodies clean to the bone.
Thus Banks was not altogether upset when the phone rang. Puzzled, but relieved in a way to be rescued from the pit of dreams. At the same time, apprehension gripped his chest when he turned over and picked up the receiver. Sandra stirred beside him and he tried to keep his voice down.
“Sir?”
“Yes,” Banks mumbled. It was a woman’s voice.
“This is DC Gay, sir. I’m calling from the station.”
“What are you doing there? What’s happened?”
“I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but it looks like there’s been another one.”
“Another what?”
“Another girl disappeared, sir. Name’s Ellen Gilchrist. She went to a school dance at Eastvale Comprehensive tonight and never arrived home. Her mum and dad are climbing up the walls.”
Banks sat up and swung his legs from under the covers. Sandra turned over. “Where are they?” he asked.
“They’re here, sir, at the station. I couldn’t keep them away. I said we’re doing all we can, but…”
“Have you called her friends, boyfriends?”
“Yes, sir. That’s all been done. Everyone her mum and dad and her friends from the dance could think of. We’ve woken up half the town already. As far as I can gather, she left the dance alone just after eleven o’clock. Had a headache. Her parents only live on the Leaview Estate, so it’s not more than a quarter of a mile down King Street. They got worried when she hadn’t turned up by midnight, her curfew. Called us at twelve-thirty. Sir?”
“Yes?”
“They said normally they’d have given her till one, more likely, then give her a good talking to and pack her off to bed. But they said they’d heard about that killer who got off. Owen Pierce. That’s why they called us so soon.”
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Banks rubbed his eyes, trying once and for all to rid himself of the Stilton dreams. He sighed. From one nightmare to another. “All right,” he said. “Get someone to put on a strong pot of coffee, will you, Susan? I’ll be right over.”
Chapter 17
I
An early rambler from Middlesborough set off from a bed and breakfast in Skield and found the girl’s body tucked away in a fold of Witch Fell, above the village, at eight o’clock on Sunday morning. An hour later, the detectives from Eastvale and the Scene-of-Crime Officers began to dribble in, closely followed by Dr. Glendenning, who was out of breath by the time he had climbed up to where the body was.
Banks stood at the edge of the terrace, which he suspected was a lynchet, an ancient Anglian plowing strip leveled on a hillside. Such lyncheted hills went up in a series of steps, of which this was the first. The strip was about ten yards wide and dipped a little in the middle.
The girl’s body lay spread-eagled in the central depression, as if cupped in the petals of a flower. The little meadow was full of buttercups and daisies; flies and more delicate winged insects buzzed in the air, some pausing to light on the girl’s pale, unyielding skin for a moment.
Several buttercups and daisies had been twined in her long blonde hair, which lay spread out on the bright green grass around her head like the halo in a Russian icon. Her blouse had been torn open and her bra pulled up, revealing small, pale breasts, and her short skirt was up around her thighs, her discarded panties on the grass beside her. As Banks got closer, he noticed the discoloration around her neck, and the open shoulder-bag by her arm, some of its contents spilled on the grass: lipstick, a purse, compact, nail-file, chewing gum, perfume, keys, address book, earrings, hairbrush.
The similarities to the Deborah Harrison scene were too close to be ignored. And Banks had just convinced himself that Deborah had been murdered by someone she knew for some sort of logical reason. Now it looked as if they were dealing with a sexual psychopath-one who had murdered two young girls in the area.
Banks stood back as Peter Darby took photographs and then watched Dr. Glendenning perform the on-scene examination. By then, Superintendent Gristhorpe had arrived and Jimmy Riddle was rumored to be pacing at the bottom of the hill trying to decide whether to attempt the short climb or wait until the others came down to him.