The Calling Of The Grave

'OK?' Terry asked Dobbs. Without giving him a chance to answer he stepped up to Monk. They were of a height, but the convict somehow seemed twice his size. 'You want to make me really happy? Try something. Please.'

Monk didn't speak. His mouth was still curved in its illusory half- smile, but the black eyes were stone dead.

'I really don't think-' Dobbs began.

'Shut it.' Terry didn't take his eyes off Monk. 'How much further?'

The convict's big head turned to look back out at the moor, but then there was a distant shout.

'Here! Over here!'

Everyone looked round. Sophie was standing on a low rise some way away, waving her hands over her head. Her excitement was obvious even through the drizzle and mist.

'I've found something!'

Chapter 6

A buried body always leaves signs. At first the body will displace the earth used to refill the grave, leaving a visible mound on the surface. But as the slow process of decay begins, causing flesh and muscle to leach their substance into the soil, the mound begins to settle. Eventually, when the body has rotted away to bone, a slight depression will be left in the earth to mark the grave's location.

Vegetation, too, can provide useful clues. Plants and grasses disturbed by the digging will take time to re-establish themselves, even when they've been carefully replaced. As months pass and the corpse begins to decompose, the nutrients it releases will feed the flora on the grave, causing faster growth and more luxuriant foliage than in the surrounding vegetation. The distinctions are subtle and often unreliable, but there if you know what to look for.

Sophie was standing by a low mound that lay in the centre of a deep hollow, perhaps fifty yards from the track. It was covered in marsh grass, the tangled, wiry stalks rippling in the wind. I went over with Wainwright and Terry, leaving Roper with Monk and the other officers. The three of us had to detour around a thicket of gorse and an impassable section of bog to get to her. She made no attempt to meet us, staying impatiently beside the mound as though she were afraid it might disappear if she turned her back.

'I think this could be a grave,' she said breathlessly, as we slithered down the sides of the hollow.

She was right: it could be a grave. Or it could be absolutely nothing at all. The mound was about five feet long and two wide, perhaps eighteen inches tall at its highest point. If it had been in a flat field or parkland it would have been a lot more likely to be significant. But this was moorland, a rugged landscape full of random depressions and hummocks. And the grass covering the mound looked no different from that growing anywhere else.

'Doesn't look like much to me.' Terry turned doubtfully to Wainwright. 'What do you think?'

The archaeologist pursed his lips as he considered the mound. This was more his territory than mine. Or Sophie's, come to that. He prodded it disparagingly with his foot.

'I think if we're going to get over-excited about every bump in the ground it's going to be a very long search.'

Sophie coloured up. 'I'm not over-excited. And I'm not an idiot. I know what to look for.'

'Really.' Wainwright put a wealth of meaning into the word. He hadn't forgiven her for the earlier snub. 'Well, I beg to differ. But then I only have thirty years of archaeological experience to draw on.'

Terry turned away to go back. 'We don't have time to waste on this.'

'No, wait,' Sophie said. 'Look, I might not be an archaeologist-'

'That's something we agree on,' Wainwright put in.

'-but at least hear me out. Two minutes, that's all, OK?'

Terry folded his arms, his face shuttered. 'Two minutes.'

Sophie took a deep breath before plunging on. 'Where Monk's taking us, it doesn't make any sense. Tina Williams' grave was exactly where I'd have expected it to be-'

'Easy to say, now we know where it is,' Wainwright sniffed.

She ignored him, concentrating on Terry. 'It wasn't far from the track, which meant it was relatively easy to get to. And it followed the contours of the land: anyone leaving the track around there would naturally find themselves at that point. It made sense for it to be where we found it.'

'So?'

'So Monk won't specify where the other graves are. He's just leading us further out into the moor, which means he'd have to have carried the bodies all this way across moorland, in the dark. I don't care how strong he is, why would he do that? And he says he can't recall any landmarks to guide him back to where they were buried.'

Terry frowned. 'What's your point?'

'I'd expect him to remember something at least. When people hide something they use landmarks to align themselves, whether they realize it or not. But where Monk's heading just seems random. Either he's forgotten or he's deliberately leading us in the wrong direction.'

'Or you could just be wrong, 'Wainwright said. He turned to Terry with a supercilious smile. 'I'm familiar with the Winthrop techniques that Miss Keller refers to. I've used them myself on occasion, but it's mainly common sense. I find them overrated.'

'Then you're not doing it right,' Sophie shot back. 'I went back to the track to find the most likely spots where anyone carrying a body could have left it. Where the going is nice and easy, not too steep or permanently boggy. I've found a few of them over the past few days, but this time I tried a little further out.'

She levelled a finger back towards the track, some distance from where we'd left it to go to Tina Williams' grave.

'There's a spot back there where the moor slopes gently away from the track. It's a natural point for anyone struggling with the weight of a body to access the moor. The way the ground runs funnels you to that big patch of gorse. It's easier to go around the bottom side of it than the top, and then you find yourself in a gulley that brings you right here. To a concealed hollow, where there just happens to be a grave-sized mound of earth.'

She folded her arms, defying Terry to find a hole in her argument. His cheek muscles jumped as he looked back at the mound.

'This is a nonsense,' Wainwright blustered, no longer bothering to hide his animosity. 'It's wishful thinking, not science!'

'No, just common sense like you said,' Sophie retorted. 'I prefer it to pig-headedness.'

Wainwright drew himself up to respond but I beat him to it. 'There's no point standing round here arguing. Let's get the cadaver dog to check it out. If it finds something then we'll need to open it up. If it doesn't, we've only wasted a few minutes.'

Sophie flashed me a smile while Wainwright looked more constipated than ever. I couldn't resist twisting the knife a little further.

'Unless you're absolutely certain there's nothing here?' I asked, trying not to enjoy his discomfort too much. 'You're the expert.'

'I suppose it wouldn't hurt to make sure…' he conceded, as though it had been his idea.

Terry stared down at the mound, then sighed and strode up to the top of the hollow. 'Get over here!' he shouted at Roper and the rest, then turned to Sophie. 'I want a word.'

The two of them moved out of earshot. I couldn't hear what was being said, but it seemed heated. Meanwhile Wainwright prowled around the mound, testing it with his feet.

'Definitely softer,' he muttered. He was wearing a thick leather work belt, the sort used by builders to hold tools. He took a thin metal rod from it and began opening it out. It was a lightweight probe, a metre-long extendable tube with a point at one end.

'What are you doing?' I asked.

He was frowning in concentration as he unfolded short handles, so the instrument resembled a slender spade without a head. 'I'm going to probe, of course.'

Disturbed soil was usually less compacted than the surrounding ground, and often another indication of a grave. But that wasn't what I meant.