Dying to Sin (18 page)

Cooper stopped. ‘Oh? What sort of questions?’

‘He wanted to know what all the police activity was. What was going on up at that old farm? He wasn’t very subtle about it. His English wasn’t too good, but we could see what he was after. Nosing about, wanting the gossip.’

‘Could you get an idea of his nationality?’

Dain shook his head and flapped the moisture out of a bar cloth. ‘Not really. He looked like you or me. Not totally dark or anything, I mean. Not that kind of foreigner. He sounded like some of those blokes that have been doing the building work at Pity Wood.’

‘East European?’

‘Probably. I couldn’t be sure. A few of those builders came in here on Thursday, chattering away to each other. He sounded like them.’

‘Can you describe him? Age? Height? How was he dressed?’

‘Hold on, that’s too many questions all at once. I suppose he’d be about twenty-five or twenty-six, not above average height. Oh, and I do remember he was wearing a sort of black padded coat. You know, you see asylum seekers wearing them when they get pulled off the EuroStar.’

‘And you didn’t find anything else out about him?’ asked Cooper, sure that the landlord must have tried.

Dain wiped an imaginary spill off the bar counter with his cloth. ‘Close-mouthed, he was. I’d go so far as to say ignorant. I can’t do with folk like that, who come in here and don’t know how to make conversation. They take offence if you ask them an innocent question or two.’

‘Funny, that,’ said Cooper.

17

‘Bloody man. He never mentioned to me that his mother was still alive,’ said Fry when Cooper reported on his visit to the Dog Inn.

‘He probably thought she wouldn’t want to talk to you.’

‘Well, why –? Oh, never mind. It sounds as though you did well, Ben.’

‘Thanks,’ said Cooper, knowing that he hadn’t yet learned how to keep the note of surprise out of his voice on the rare occasion that she said something complimentary to him. ‘It’s a shame Mrs Dain didn’t have any photographs she could show me. I might try to make time to call at the heritage centre and see what they’ve got.’

‘Put it on your list,’ said Fry.

‘What’s next, then?’

Fry smiled. ‘I think I’d like to have a chat with your PC Palfreyman.’

‘Ex-PC.’

‘Whatever. Do you fancy a trip out?’

‘He’ll be absolutely delighted to see us,’ said Cooper.

David Palfreyman emerged from his kitchen to answer the door. Although he was in the house, he was still wearing his floppy hat. When a man wore a hat all the time, it usually meant that he was completely bald. But Cooper knew that Palfreyman still had some hair. Perhaps it was all those years of wearing a helmet that made his head feel naked.

‘Do you live on your own, Mr Palfreyman?’ said Cooper. ‘I never thought to ask you last time.’

‘I’m divorced. You know what it’s like – they can only stand the job for so long.’

‘Of course. It happens a lot.’

Cooper refrained from saying that he thought what police officers’ partners couldn’t stand wasn’t the job, it was coming second to the job. If he ever got married himself, he’d make sure it didn’t happen. Not to the point of divorce, anyway.

‘So no woman in the house, then?’

Palfreyman looked at Fry. ‘Not until now.’

When they were seated in the lounge, Fry stepped in and took over the conversation.

‘Mr Palfreyman, DC Cooper tells me you know pretty much everything and everyone in Rakedale.’

The ex-bobby’s eyes flickered sideways to Cooper. ‘Yes, pretty much. What do you want to know?’

‘We need to know everything about the Sutton brothers at Pity Wood Farm,’ said Fry.

‘Of course you do. I’ve watched the news and read the papers. Two unidentified bodies now, isn’t it? Unless there have been more since the last news bulletin …?’ He raised an enquiring eyebrow at Fry. ‘But, of course, you came here to get information, not to provide it.’

‘You must have visited Pity Wood Farm occasionally when you were on the force.’

‘Yes, a few times. Courtesy calls, that’s all. I don’t suppose you do that any more? No, I thought not. You wait until a crime has been reported before you meet the law-abiding public. And then it’s already too late to form a proper relationship.’

‘We didn’t come here for a critique of modern policing methods,’ said Fry.

Palfreyman sighed. ‘My views are of no interest to you. I understand, Sergeant. I’m just an irrelevant old dinosaur. I can’t possibly know anything about policing now that I’m retired.’

‘Pity Wood Farm …?’ said Fry.

‘I was never called to an incident there. I never heard of any other officers attending an incident either. There were certainly no missing persons reports during my time. None made from the farm, none that led to enquiries at the farm. But you must know that; you’ll have checked.’

‘Of course. But during your courtesy visits, did you meet any of the itinerant workers employed there? Did you have any reason to wonder what had happened to any of them?’

‘You’re presumably thinking of the women? You don’t say so, but it’s obvious. Your theory is that one of the workers was killed during her employment there and buried on the farm. No – two of them?’ Palfreyman’s eyes twinkled. ‘Interesting theory. Two murders, both of which went undetected. And three years apart, if the media have it right.’

‘Approximately,’ said Fry, through audibly gritted teeth.

‘Careful, Sergeant, you’re almost revealing information. Not quite, but it
was
confirmation.’

Cooper could sense that Fry was likely to stop playing the game soon. She wasn’t long on patience, and Palfreyman was pushing her close to the limit. The ex-bobby wouldn’t like it if he saw her other side.

‘I can’t remember whether you asked me how long ago I retired,’ he said, in a more conciliatory tone. Perhaps he, too, was able to recognize that look in Fry’s eye. ‘I’ll tell you anyway – I hit my thirty just over four years ago. Celebrations all round, kind words from the chief, a bunch of the lads getting pissed at the pub. And then I was out of the door, with my pension in my pocket. And no one ever thought of Dave Palfreyman again. I was history as soon as I handed in my warrant card.’

‘Your point is …?’

‘I wasn’t in the job when your murders happened, Sergeant. If they
were
murders. Do you have direct evidence?’

‘You’re not my DI,’ said Fry.

‘No.’

‘Well, stop talking to me as if you are.’

Palfreyman inclined his head. ‘I apologize. Sergeant.’

An uneasy silence developed. Cooper shifted uncomfortably in his chair, desperately wanting to say something to break the silence, but afraid of wrecking Fry’s strategy. Presuming she had a strategy. But she could keep silent as long as she needed to, and it was Palfreyman who broke the mood.

‘You went to see the Brindleys over at Shaw Farm yesterday, didn’t you?’ he said.

‘Very observant. You know them?’

Palfreyman nodded. ‘Yes, I know them. Alex and Jo. They have two teenage kids, Chrissie and Evan. The parents are kind of snobbish, academically speaking.’

‘They’re a bit fussy who their children mix with?’

‘Fussy? Any kid who wants to visit their house has to take an entrance exam. Stand-offish, the Brindleys are. Stuck up. You probably noticed.’

Fry didn’t smile. ‘You seem to know a lot more about them than they do about you.’

Palfreyman shrugged. ‘That’s the way it is. That’s the way I like it, if the truth be known.’

‘They’re not local people, are they? I mean, they haven’t been in Rakedale very long?’

‘I know what you mean.’ Palfreyman eased himself into his armchair, like an old dog settled into its basket. ‘Well, they’ve lived in the village since they were married. And the oldest kid, Evan, is eighteen. So they must have been here twenty years or so. Not very long, as Rakedale goes.’

‘Twenty years?’

‘As a family, that is.’

He looked at her expectantly, inviting her to ask the next question. No, that wasn’t what she was getting from his expression. He was
challenging
her. Challenging her to ask the right questions, if she wanted the answers.

‘One of them was here in the village before they married?’ she said. ‘Alex or Jo?’

‘Jo. She was Joanne Stubbs before she married. And that house they live in is hers – she inherited it from an aunt. She was only a lass when she first came to Rakedale, hardly into her twenties. I remember it well. Bit of a hippy, she was. All crystals and meditation. God knows where she picked that stuff up from. It certainly wasn’t from her aunt, or any of the other Stubbs family round here. They were all chapel-goers.’

‘So Jo actually is a village person. She said she wasn’t.’

‘Well, she’s right,’ said Palfreyman. ‘Joanne Stubbs has never fitted in, and never will. She knows that perfectly well.’

Fry was trying to play along with the ex-PC’s game. ‘There’s some kind of history here. What has Jo done to upset the village?’

‘Well, when she first came to Rakedale, some of the local people thought she was a bit strange. They didn’t really take to her tarot cards and joss sticks, all that rubbish. Not to mention the stuff she kept trying to force on to people if she thought they showed signs of being ill. Herbal remedies, she called them. Me, I reckon they were mostly based on cannabis, but I never took any action on that suspicion. I never knew anyone accept her remedies, or it might have been different. I suppose you think I was wrong in that?’

Neither Cooper nor Fry reacted. He looked slightly disappointed, but went back to his story.

‘And there were all those cats she had, as well. Too many cats to be natural. A woman living out there on her own? You can imagine what the gossips were saying about her.’

‘Only too well,’ said Cooper.

‘Anyway, one day she came home from doing her shopping in Bakewell, and her house had been broken into. It looked as though nothing had been stolen. But she thought the intruders must still be in the house, because she could hear noises somewhere. Not voices exactly. She described what she called surreptitious bumps and whisperings, scraping sounds and scratches. Sensibly, she called the police and got herself back outside the house to wait. When the FOAs went upstairs, they found three crows flapping about in her bedroom.’

Cooper shivered. He knew what that meant. It was the old warning against witches. Until now, he thought it had died out in the eighteenth century. Someone in Rakedale had a long, long memory to remember that custom. And an even deeper well of superstition to consider putting it into practice.

‘What did you do?’ he asked. ‘I mean, I take it you were one of those officers responding to the emergency call?’

‘Aye. And a young lad who turned up from Edendale to assist. He was a bit wet behind the ears, but he had a bit of sense. He knew enough to leave everything to me.’

‘Like a good young copper.’

‘Like some, anyway,’ said Palfreyman, giving him a sly look.

‘And so …?’

‘We got rid of the crows without much damage. Just a few splodges of shit on the carpet, and she soon got that cleaned up. Then we checked over the house to see it was secure, and we left. Called it in as a false alarm. Listed as NFA.’

‘No further action?’

‘Not officially. Well, there aren’t many folk who have the know-how and the wherewithal to catch a set of crows, not to mention the nerve to turn them loose in someone’s house. I called and had a few words. It never happened again.’

‘But didn’t Mrs Brindley want to report the break-in?’

‘Look, you have to understand something about the eighties,’ said Palfreyman. ‘We were allowed to use our discretion then, and no one asked any questions, provided you got the job done. It meant we did things you would never dare do. You’d be too afraid of getting your arse kicked and losing your pension.’ He glanced sideways at Fry. ‘Or not getting that promotion you want so badly, eh?’

‘All right, it was different back then. We get the message.’

‘Well, just don’t judge me on your own terms. In those days, we always knew who needed a quiet word in the ear, and who needed something a bit more … robust.’

‘You’re living in a dream world,’ said Cooper. ‘Those days have been over a long time. You joined the force in – when was it, 1972?’

‘That’s right. The blokes who taught me the job were old school. But they’d all gone by the time I retired.’

‘That old-fashioned coppering had already disappeared in the eighties. My dad complained about it often enough.’

Palfreyman smiled slyly. ‘Oh, aye – your dad. Sergeant Joe Cooper. Did you think I didn’t know who you were? Joe Cooper was my shift supervisor for a while.’

Cooper felt the anger rising, and knew he was changing colour, the red flush rising uncontrollably into his cheeks.

‘He would never have tolerated a copper like you on his shift,’ he said.

Palfreyman smirked. ‘That’s what you think.’

Fry put her hand on Cooper’s arm. ‘Ben,’ she said, warningly. She was probably just in time.

Palfreyman shook his head. ‘Anyway, Joanne wanted to go on living there, didn’t she? It wouldn’t have done her any good with the neighbours to kick off a burglary enquiry. Someone might have been arrested and charged, and she’d never have lived easy in Rakedale after that. As it was, she was left alone with her cats and her herbs, thanks to me. Nobody talked to her much, of course. But if you’ve seen some of the characters round here, you’d reckon that was a blessing.’

‘But she’s been here more than twenty years now.’

‘Aye. She’s married and she has children, and they’re all considered respectable enough. Alex Brindley seems to have done very well for himself. But don’t think that means people forget.’

‘Mr Farnham, now – he seems quite a different individual.’

‘You’ve talked to Tom Farnham as well, eh?’

‘Yes.’

For a moment, Palfreyman weighed her up, as if taking her seriously for the first time.

‘I hope you know how to tell when someone is lying, Sergeant,’ he said.

‘Of course. We’re trained these days.’

Palfreyman rolled his eyes. ‘Psychology seminars? Body-language recognition techniques? I thought so. Well,
we
didn’t need training. In my day, any good copper learned to develop an instinct for when someone was telling the truth.’ He slapped his stomach. ‘My gut always told me when I was hearing a lie. It was never wrong.’

‘If your instinct was never proved wrong, it was only because you were allowed to hide your mistakes,’ said Fry.

Palfreyman tried to laugh, but couldn’t get the right shape to his mouth.

‘What do
you
know? You know nothing. You don’t belong to this part of the world, and you don’t belong in the job, if the truth be known. I bet you were a graduate entrant – am I right?’

‘I’m not ashamed of that.’

Cooper watched Fry and Palfreyman as they faced each other across the room, with the light from the window falling on them both equally. Fry looked slight and brittle, perched on the edge of her chair in an attitude that was both tense and belligerent. In contrast, PC Palfreyman was enormous – twice Fry’s size at least, but soft and heavy, his weight crushing the sofa in a more passively hostile manner.

From where he sat, Cooper could see the outside world going on beyond them: birds flicking across the sky, lorries moving slowly up the hill into Rakedale. He was struck by how different these two were, the former village bobby and the ambitious DS. Not only physically different, but psychologically and technically, and in the way they’d been trained. Well, different in every way he could think of, in fact. Watching them was like seeing the past and future facing each other across a green rug and an IKEA coffee table.