The coffee he’d made was bitter on her tongue but she drained the cup anyway. Better make the most of his solicitude; it wouldn’t last. At once she rebuked herself for cynicism. He was making an effort. She slid off the stool. All she’d felt like eating for breakfast was a single slice of unbuttered toast.
‘What about the shop?’
‘Tim and Melanie can look after things for a few days. I’ll cancel the Haydock Park fair.’
‘OK, let’s talk about it tonight.’
‘I’ll call you later.’
‘No need. I thought I’d go into work later this morning.’
‘Are you serious?’ He caught her hand, squeezed her fingers between his. ‘You’ve had a miscarriage, for Christ’s sake!’
Miscarriage. It sounded so dramatic. Actually, what had happened was more like a painful and very heavy period. Her GP, a severe woman whose no-nonsense manner wouldn’t have been out of place in a sergeant-major, was brisk to the point of being dismissive. These things were commonplace in the early weeks. Nature’s way of telling you that something wasn’t quite right. Hannah fled from the surgery before she could be told that her loss was a blessing in disguise.
‘The sooner I get back to normal, the better.’
‘You need to look after yourself! Work can wait. You’re not indispensable.’
The kitchen tiles were cool under her bare feet. Already the sun was beating down outside. When was the weather going to break? She wasn’t an invalid and she had no intention of succumbing to self-indulgence. Right now, she needed the job more than the job needed her. Better to drag her mind away from what had happened and bury herself in that overflowing in-tray. But she couldn’t face an argument.
‘All right.’
‘Great.’ When he smiled, the white even teeth and laughter lines around his mouth reminded her why she found him so difficult to resist. ‘You’ll feel like a different person once you’ve had a proper rest.’
A different person? Confident and in control, not diminished by emptiness and loss?
‘Yes.’
His dry lips brushed her cheek. ‘Listen, Hannah. I’m so sorry about this. Perhaps — it just wasn’t meant to be.’
The doctor had said the same, but Marc’s meaning was different. His sympathy was genuine, yet she detected a lightness in his manner that had been absent after she’d told him she was pregnant. As if he’d been granted a reprieve.
Unworthy, unworthy, unworthy. She hated herself for thinking he was selfish. But even as she felt his fingers ruffling her hair, she knew she was right. Sifting out the truth from a jumble of confusing evidence was what she was supposed to be good at, after all.
‘So Kirsty’s father was murdered.’
Miranda was gasping as she dragged herself up to the top of the path leading up the slope of Tarn Fell. Daniel pulled his floppy hat down over his eyes. The sun had disappeared behind clouds and the air was heavy. The heat had become a physical presence, an unseen oppressor. Each stride forward felt as though you were pulling against a ball and chain. He’d hoped it would be cooler on Priest Edge, but there wasn’t a hint of breeze.
‘Hacked to death with a scythe,’ she continued. ‘Mrs Tasker was regaling a customer with the story when I went to the shop first thing. The papers are full of it. Maybe Kirsty was killed by someone with a grudge against the family.’
As Louise moved along the narrow stony ridge, Daniel muttered, ‘She ripped off her own helmet, unhooked her own parachute.’
‘What if she’d been drugged?’
‘Do the reports suggest that?’
‘No, but the police might not be telling.’
‘They’d drop a hint to the journalists, off the record. You know how they work.’
Louise came to a stop where the path broadened out. ‘Wasn’t there a skydiver once who staged his suicide to make it look like murder?’
‘Allegedly,’ Daniel said. ‘Nobody knew for sure and the inquest recorded an open verdict. This is different. We all saw what happened.’
For all the heat of the morning, Louise shivered. ‘Unspeakable. I’m not surprised you’re not sleeping, Miranda.’
Miranda took no notice. She’d had another bad night, but over breakfast they’d agreed that a walk would do them good. ‘Remember how uptight she was in the restaurant? What if she was frightened of someone? Suppose she’d been threatened? Darling, are you planning to talk to Hannah Scarlett?’
‘There’s no way she’d share confidential information with me.’
‘Come on. She’s taken a shine to you. It was written all over her when we met at the airfield.’
He threw her a sharp glance, but her expression was mocking rather than suspicious. ‘I spoke to Marc Amos yesterday when I was checking out the history of the garden and he told me Hannah wasn’t in work. She’s off sick.’
‘You don’t imagine police officers being stressed out by an encounter with sudden death, do you? You’d think they were hardened to it.’
‘They’re only human,’ Louise snapped.
They walked on in silence. Daniel thought: you weren’t so forbearing when Dad made his great mistake. He knew better than to voice what was passing through his mind. Lately, he’d felt closer to his sister than ever, but in a few hours she would be leaving for home. This wasn’t a good time to reopen old wounds.
Miranda mopped her brow. ‘This humidity — I can scarcely get any oxygen into my lungs. Thank God the forecasts are promising a drop of rain. Shall we turn back?’
The Sacrifice Stone lay ahead, a dour grey boulder. As they approached, Louise said, ‘Close up, it looks smaller than when you look up from the cottage. But my God, what a view!’
Brackdale stretched out below them. Daniel’s eyes travelled along the thin ribbon of road that ran through the village, past the church and the last resting place of the Quillers, beyond the Hall and Tarn Fold, towards the abandoned quarry workings and the stern crags that closed off the far end of the valley. A small, enclosed world. He imagined living here a century ago. Jacob and Alice Quiller would have felt bereft after the death of their only child. Lifelong believers, they must have found that John’s death tested their faith to destruction. How could they not feel betrayed by God?
In their horror and confusion, he was convinced, lay the secret of the cipher garden.
‘Hannah? This is Nick. How are you?’
He sounded as anxious as a first-time offender. Touched by his concern, she said into the cordless handset, ‘Much better, thanks. I’ll be in tomorrow.’
‘Nobody here can remember you taking a day off sick.’
‘I’m becoming a hypochondriac in my old age. Probably could have made it today, but Marc came over all protective.’
‘Thank God you listened to him. You push yourself too hard.’
‘I don’t need wrapping up in cotton wool. The doctor tells me I’m suffering from a touch of sunstroke. It’s the fashion.’
It was an off-the-cuff lie. She trusted Nick, but she hadn’t figured out how to handle the miscarriage in her own mind, whether to talk about it with friends or simply behave as though it had never happened. For now she wanted to keep both options open.
‘What happened to Kirsty Howe was grisly. Enough to knock anyone sideways.’
‘Maybe that was a factor, I don’t know.’ Nor did she know whether it had played a part in the miscarriage. ‘What’s the latest on her death? Any suggestion of anything untoward?’
‘I spoke to a couple of guys working on the investigation. The forensic gurus are crawling all over her kit, but witnesses saw her checking it herself, as per standard procedures. The jump was routine, she’d done it hundreds of times before.’
‘Remember what the good book says. Think murder.’
‘Pity the Murder Investigation Manual doesn’t go into detail about death by skydiving. There’s not a shred of evidence to suggest sabotage. She died because she ripped off her gear and didn’t take any of the precautions that might have saved her life.’