‘I still haven’t mentioned Mansel Bull,’ Annie Howe said.
‘Don’t treat me like a clown.’
‘You knew Mr Bull well?’
‘I was acquainted with Mansel and his… family.’ Byron blinked. ‘ Mansel Bull. You’re making something out of it because his name’s Bull. That’s all this is. Am I right?’
Howe said, ‘Do you know who killed Mansel Bull?’
‘How would I?’
‘Am I right in thinking that in this… virtual ceremony of the slaughter of the bull, it’s considered important that the candidate imagines himself covered in its blood?’
‘You can find all this in books and on the Net. But if you really think I’d go out and carve up a neighbour-’
‘Let’s end it there.’ Annie Howe began packing her laptop into her case. ‘I’m glad you felt able to open up to us, Mr Jones.’
Byron didn’t look at her, or at Merrily. At the door, he glanced back.
‘I once thought of asking you to join us, William. When they package you off, maybe you should think about it. Bring you alive when you’re least expecting it. Unimaginable, mate.’
‘But purely a psychological thing,’ Merrily said. ‘Just a discipline.’
William Lockley rose to his feet, flexing his shoulders.
‘Is there an offence of desecrating an historical monument, Annie? Because, as I see it, that’s all you’ve got.’
‘May not even be an ancient monument,’ Howe said.
‘He’s not your killer. That’s my opinion.’
‘You’re probably right.’
‘It’s an oddball thing, but if he’s used it to turn around his fortunes, good luck to him. Though if he thinks it’ll ever be embraced by the Credenhill boys…’ At the door, Lockley turned, smiled. ‘Worthwhile exercise, ladies, and I may be in touch to clarify a few points. Anything you want from me, you know where I am.’
Annie Howe strode across the room and shut the door firmly, stood with her back against it, her angular face unusually flushed.
‘What would Spicer’s reaction have been, do you think, on learning about the murder of Mansel Bull?’
‘I doubt it would’ve helped him sleep.’
‘All right, I’ll tell you something else. We have a witness who saw a man in a field, on the night of the killing, drenched in blood and apparently high on the experience.’
‘ High?’
‘Well, in a state of some apparent euphoria, according to our witness.’
‘Oh.’ Merrily stood up. ‘Bloody hell.’
‘Bit of a coincidence, isn’t it? Jones said he knew Mansel Bull and his… at which point he hesitated and then said family.’
‘I remember that, too.’
‘Mansel Bull didn’t have a family, as such,’ Howe said. ‘He had two ex-wives.’
‘So I gather.’
‘And a brother.’
‘Yes.’
‘Have you met Sollers Bull?’
‘Never.’
‘He’s an ambitious man. Someone I suppose you’d call a member of the new countryside elite.’
‘Elite.’
Annie Howe thought for moment.
‘Would you mind coming to meet him, if he’s available?’
‘Well, I… ’
‘Give me half an hour,’ Howe said. ‘Get yourself a cup of tea and a sandwich.’
Merrily wound up crossing the street to the pizza place, grabbing a salad with hummus and couscous and a coffee. Sitting in the window with her phone, on which Neil Cooper had left a message with his home number.
‘Sorry, Neil, I was going to call you back, wasn’t I?’
‘If you remember, we got as far as Mithras. Magnis is very much my ongoing project, but I’ve been wondering all day if it’s conceivable that you know something I don’t.’
‘You can relax, I don’t really know anything. I would have asked you if there were any Mithraic remains in this area.’
‘Not… as far as we know. The fact is, although signs of Mithraic worship are common enough in Germany and Italy, evidence in the UK is rather sparser. You’re looking at four suggested centres of worship – London, York, Chester and Caerleon. Now, as it happens, the principal Roman road linking Caerleon, in South Wales, and Chester, on the northern border, passes through Credenhill.’
‘So it would’ve been used by soldiers travelling between two significant Mithraic centres. Through some fairly hostile country, I would have thought.’
‘And as they built a base here which became – as we’re gradually finding out – quite a substantial community, surviving into the fifth century… well, I’ve often wondered.’
‘Why did they build a base here?’
‘All to do with the Wye,’ Neil said. ‘They were probably using the ford at Hereford to get across. You see the reason I wondered if you might have heard something is that there’s a rumour been going round for a while about something of this nature being found in Herefordshire.’
‘Rumour?’
‘Within archaeological circles. Stories of aerial photographs showing interesting linear patterns. I’ve never met anyone who’s seen one, but we’ve been monitoring aerial surveys. Nothing found, so I was thinking it might be apocryphal. Unless you – or someone – know otherwise?’
‘You checked, erm, the Brinsop area.’
‘Actually, we have. Nothing obvious there that we didn’t already know about.’
‘I suppose if somebody wanted to keep quiet about it, they could just cover it up. With a temporary building or something.’
‘It is a thought,’ Neil Cooper said.
Part Six
Throughout the vision, I thought I was being obliged to recognise that we are sinners who commit many evil things that ought not to be done and who omit many good deeds that ought to be done. We deserve to suffer pain…
Julian of Norwich
Revelations of Divine Love
66
The evening sky was blotched with small clouds, like a field of late mushrooms, brown and rotting. Jane stood on the grass bank, watching Cornel taking the leather bag from the back of the van.
A mile or so out of Credenhill, he’d swung the van between some overhanging bushes, branches ripping at the side windows. When he’d hit the brakes, Jane had been thrown forward, the rotting seat belt snapping, her head bumping painfully into the windscreen as the mobile started vibrating in her hip pocket.
She slid it out now and checked it while Cornel was messing with his tool bag. All she could see were small fields keeping wedges of woodland apart and, ahead of them, a conifer screen at the top of a rise. The eastern horizon was formed by the great wooded bank of Credenhill itself, like a crouching bear.
A new text from Eirion – J… whr t L r u?
What she wouldn’t give to be able to return the call. To be with Irene with his reticent smile and his solid body, just slightly overweight.
Other people would surely be missing her by now. OK, Mum would think she was with Eirion, but if Eirion rang Mum…
‘Cornel,’ Jane said, ‘if you’re worried about going to this place, maybe we could do it some other time?’
He’d become morose, his mood turning like the sky. It was getting cold, too, and the van’s heater didn’t work. This whole thing with the van… it showed a calculating side of Cornel, a secretive side.
A jangle of tools. What did he need tools for?
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘but wasn’t it you that wanted to go?’
‘Not in the dark.’
Jane glared up into the fungal sky, wondering now if she really had persuaded him, if it wasn’t the other way round. He’d been all too ready for this, with the van and whatever was in the rucksack and the leather bag.
‘It’s always in the dark,’ Cornel said.
And Jane imagined some squalid gathering in an underground chamber. It was going to be horrible, gruelling – she wasn’t sure she could even watch.
‘How far do we have to go?’
‘Mile or so?’
‘A mile? But it’s all muddy!’ She felt it was important to retain something of girlie. ‘This is my best jacket. We’re not all loaded like you.’
It seemed to disarm him.
‘If you get messed up I’ll buy you a new outfit.’