The Crossing Places

Nelson gives her a sharp look before continuing. He looks tired, she realises. There are dark circles around his eyes and he obviously hasn't shaved that morning. In fact, he looks more like a face on a 'wanted' poster than a policeman.

'There's been a letter,' he says. 'Remember I told you about the letters that were sent during the Lucy Downey case? Well, this looks to be from the same person. At the very least someone's trying to make me think it's from the same person, which may be stranger still.'

'And you think this person may be the murderer?'

Nelson pauses for a long time before replying, frowning darkly into his coffee cup. 'It's dangerous to make assumptions,'

he says at last, 'that's what happened with the Ripper case, if you remember. The police were so sure the anonymous letters came from the killer that it skewed the whole investigation and they just turned out to be from some nutter. That may well be the case here. Nothing more likely, in fact.' He pauses again. 'It's just… there is always the chance that they could be from the killer, in which case they could contain vital clues. And I remembered what you said, that day when we found the bones, about ritual and all that. There's a lot of that sort of thing in the letters, so I wondered if you'd take a look. Tell me what you think.'

Whatever Ruth had been expecting, it wasn't this.

Gingerly, she takes the file and opens it. A typewritten letter faces her. She picks it up. It seems to have been written on standard printer paper using a standard computer, but she assumes the police have ways of checking all that. It's only the words that concern her: Dear Detective Nelson,

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven. A time to be born and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to pluck up what has been planted. A time to kill and a time to heal. A time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together.

She lies where the earth meets the sky. Where the roots of the great tree Yggdrasil reach down into the next life. All flesh is grass. Yet in death are we in life. She has become the perfect sacrifice. Blood on stone. Scarlet on white.

In peace.

There is no signature.

'Well?' Nelson is watching her closely.

'Well, the first bit's from the Bible. Ecclesiastes.' Ruth shifts in her chair. She feels slightly queasy. The Bible always does this to her.

'What's all that about a tree?'

'In Norse legend, there's a tree called Yggdrasil. Its roots are supposed to stretch down to hell and up to heaven.

There are all sorts of legends attached to it.' As she says this she remembers Erik, that great teller of Norse tales, sitting by the camp fire, his face radiant in the half light, telling them about Odin and Thor, about Asgard, the home of the Gods and Muspelheim, the land of fire.

'The letter says its roots reach down into the next life.'

'Yes.' This was the first thing to strike Ruth. She is surprised to find Nelson so perceptive. 'Some people think that prehistoric man may have believed that heaven was below the earth, not above. Have you heard of Seahenge?'

'No.'

'It was found on the coast, near the Saltmarsh, at Holme-Next-the-Sea. A wooden henge, like the one at Saltmarsh, except there was a tree buried in the centre of it. Buried upside down. Its roots upwards, its branches going down into the earth.'

'Do you think this guy,' – he picks up the letter – 'may have heard of it?'

'Possibly. There was a lot of publicity at the time. Have you thought that it might not be a man?'

'What?'

'The letter writer. It might be a woman.'

'It might, I suppose. There were some handwritten letters the first time. The expert thought the handwriting was a man's but you never know. The experts aren't always right. One of the first rules of policing.'

Wondering where this leaves her, Ruth asks, 'Can you tell me something about the child? The one who's gone missing.'

He stares at her. 'It was in the papers. Local and national. Bloody hell, it was even on Crimewatch. Where have you been?'

Ruth is abashed. She seldom reads the papers or watches TV, preferring novels and the radio. She relies on the latter for the news, but she's been away. She realises she knows far more about happenings in the prehistoric world than in this one.

Nelson sighs and rubs his stubble. When he speaks, his voice is harsher than ever. 'Scarlet Henderson. Four years old. Vanished while playing in her parents' front garden in Spenwell.'

Spenwell is a tiny village about half a mile from Ruth's house. It makes the whole thing seem uncomfortably close.

'Scarlet?'

'Yes. Scarlet on white. Blood on stone. Quite poetic isn't it?'

Ruth is silent. She is thinking about Erik's theories of ritual sacrifice. Wood represents life, stone death. Aloud she asks, 'How long ago was this?'

'November.' Their eyes meet. 'About a week after we found those old bones of yours. Almost ten years to the day since Lucy Downey vanished.'

'And you think the cases are connected?'

He shrugs. 'I've got to keep an open mind, but there are similarities, and then this letter arrives.'

'When?'

'Two weeks after Scarlet vanished. We'd done everything.

Searched the area, drained the river, questioned everyone. Drawn a complete blank. Then this letter came.

It got me thinking about the Lucy Downey case.'

'Hadn't you been thinking about it already?' It is an innocent enough enquiry but Nelson looks at her sharply, as if scenting criticism.

"I thought about it, yes,' he says, slightly defensively.

'The similarities were there: similar age child, same time of year, but there were differences too. Lucy Downey was taken from inside her own home. Terrible thing. Actually snatched from her bed. This child was on her own, in the garden…'

There is a faint edge of censure in his voice that leads Ruth to ask, 'What about the parents? You said… it's sometimes the parents…'

'Hippies,' says Nelson contemptuously, 'New Agers. Got five children and don't look after any of 'em properly.

Took them two hours to notice that Scarlet was missing.

But we don't think they did it. No signs of abuse. Dad was away at the time and Mum was in a bloody trance or something, communing with the fairies.'

'Can I see the other letters?' asks Ruth. 'The Lucy Downey letters. There might be something there, about Yggdrasil or Norse mythology or something.'

Nelson is obviously expecting this enquiry because he hands over another file which is lying on the desk. Ruth opens it. There are ten or more sheets inside.

'Twelve,' says Nelson, reading her mind. 'The last one was sent only last year.'

'So he hasn't given up?'

'No.' Nelson shakes his head slowly. 'He hasn't given up.'

'Can I take these home and read them tonight?'

'You'll have to sign for them, mind.' As he roots around on the desk, looking for a form, he surprises her by asking.

'What about the bones we found. What's happened to them?'

'Well, I sent you the report…'

Nelson grunts. 'Couldn't make head nor tail of it.'

'Well, basically it said it was probably the body of a young girl, between six and ten, pre-pubescent. About two thousand, six hundred years old. We excavated and found three gold torques and some coins.'

'They had coins in the Iron Age?'

'Yes, it was the start of coinage actually. We're going to do another dig in the spring when the weather's better.' She hopes Erik will be able to come over for it.

'Do you think she was murdered?'

Ruth looks at the detective, who is leaning forward across his untidy desk. It seems strange to hear the word 'murdered' on his lips, as if her Iron Age body is suddenly going to form part of his 'enquiries', as if he is planning to bring the perpetrator to justice.

'We don't know,' she admits. 'One strange thing, half her hair was shaved off. We don't know what that means but it may have been part of a ritual killing. There were branches twisted around her arms and legs, willow and hazel, as if she was tied down.'