Dancing With the Virgins

29

Mark Roper wasn’t under arrest. But he had heard that Owen was, and the thought was making him nervous. He assumed that Ben Cooper had acted on what he had told him about the dog-fighting. But gradually he was realizing that the questions were about something else. And when he got nervous, he got angry. He had never learned to keep a cool head, like Owen.

‘It’s the women who are the worst,’ said Mark.

‘Who told you that?’ asked DI Hitchens.

‘Owen did.’

Mark glanced at the tapes, as if feeling guilty at mentioning Owen’s name.

‘They’re so absorbed in themselves that they don’t notice what they’re doing. They don’t notice what’s going on around them,’ he said.

‘It upsets you when people litter the countryside, doesn’t it, Mark?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘They’re destroying the environment. They don’t understand the damage they’re doing with their rubbish. Their drinks cans and plastic bags kill animals and birds and all sorts of small creatures. I’ve seen them. I know.’

‘And you think it’s part of your job to clean up after people?’

‘It’s part of the job of a Ranger to care for the environment.’

‘Perhaps you sometimes take it too far, though, Mark?’

Mark looked sulky. ‘Someone has to care.’

‘Did you see Jenny Weston leave any rubbish?’

‘I didn’t see her at all. I mean, I didn’t see her until she was dead.’

‘No, of course. What about anybody else? Did you see anybody else that day on Ringham Moor?’

Mark shook his head.

‘Say it aloud for the tape, please,’ said Hitchens.

‘No, I didn’t see anybody on the moor. There was nobody.’

‘Ah, but you’re wrong there, Mark. If Jenny was already dead when you saw her, then obviously there was somebody.’

‘Yes, all right. There must have been. But I didn’t see them.’

‘I expect you’re quite good at following the signs, though, aren’t you, Mark?’

‘The signs?’

‘Signs that anybody has been around. Tracks, damage to plants, the rubbish they leave. You must have learned to see that someone has been past that way.’

Mark shrugged. ‘It’s obvious, sometimes.’

‘And that day?’ said Hitchens. ‘Could you tell someone had been on the moor?’

‘I could see the bike tracks,’ said Mark. ‘A mountain bike. But they were hers, weren’t they?’

‘Yes, we think so.’

‘She’d been out to the tower and back across to the Virgins. That was obvious. I picked some rubbish up at the tower. I don’t know if it was hers or not.’

‘Did it annoy you that she was there?’

‘It’s private land,’ said Mark. ‘There’s an access agreement, but there shouldn’t be mountain bikes up there. It’s against the by-laws.’

‘Would you have told Jenny Weston that? If you had seen her alive, I mean.’

‘Of course I would. Some people think they can just go anywhere they like, and they can’t.’

‘Isn’t there a Right to Roam Act or something now?’

Mark snorted. ‘Right to roam! Responsibilities go with rights. But some of them have no sense of responsibility. They think they just have rights. And the women are the worst.’

Now Mark looked confused. He watched the tapes going round. So many people seemed to do that in the interview rooms, as if somehow they could will their words to erase themselves from the recording.

‘Owen again?’ said Hitchens.

Mark looked stubborn. ‘He talks to me a lot. He’s joking most of the time.’

Hitchens nodded. ‘But can you tell when he’s not?’

‘Sometimes,’ said Mark. ‘Have you talked to Warren Leach? Was I right about the dog-fighting? Is Owen involved?’

Nobody answered him. Hitchens produced an evidence bag made of clear plastic, bearing a yellow label. He showed it to Mark. ‘We found these in a locker at Partridge Cross,’ he said. ‘We think they’re yours.’

Inside the bag was a plastic wallet full of newspaper cuttings and photocopies. Some of them were ageing and yellow. They referred to incidents that had taken place over a period of several years — rescues and accidents, the recovery of dead bodies from the moors, searches for missing children.

‘They’re not important,’ said Mark.

‘We checked them out with your headquarters at Bakewell. The newspaper reports don’t say so, but it seems all these incidents have one thing in common — they all involved Peak Park Rangers, and in every case one of the Rangers was Owen Fox.’

‘Yes. That’s right.’

‘A bit of a hero to you, is he, Mark? It might be advisable to choose your heroes more carefully in future.’

‘Look at that one,’ said Mark. He pointed at a front page from an old Eden Valley Times. One story took up the whole of the page, with several photographs of the scene of the incident and some of the people involved. There were head-and-shoulders pictures of three young men, and one of a team of exhausted Rangers with rescue equipment. The three young men had died when they had climbed a fence on Castle Hill, Cargreave, to chase their ball towards a slope. It was a steep, convex slope, but you couldn’t tell until it was too late, when you couldn’t go back and could no longer stand upright on the grass. The three boys had plunged into the rocky gorge below Castle Hill in front of tourists queuing for admission to the show cave.

‘We know Owen Fox was one of the Rangers who recovered the bodies from the gorge,’ said Hitchens.

‘Yes. But you see those lads that were killed,’ said Mark. ‘One of them was my brother.’

When Owen Fox frowned, his eyebrows looked worn and ragged. They tended to spread across his forehead like well-used brushes. He took his hands away from his face and studied them. He had fingers that were thick and shabby, and his palms were creased like an antiquarian map of the Peak, all narrow valleys and hills.

‘I thought you brought me here to ask about the photographs,’ he said.

‘Not really,’ said Tailby. ‘Is that what you’d rather talk about?’

‘I didn’t know what I was doing.’

‘That’s what they all say.’

Owen seemed to rally for a moment. ‘In my case,’ he said, ‘it’s true.’

He told them that he had bought the computer after his mother had died, using the money she left him. He needed a distraction to take his mind off his memories of her. For so many years, she had been all that he had, apart from his job. Other memories had begun to come back to him, too — more memories of death.

At first, Owen said, his only idea was to learn about computers because they were coming into the Ranger Service and he didn’t want to be left behind by the young ones. He was terrified of having to retire early. What would he retire to? So he bought the computer to teach himself at home, where no one would see his ignorance.

He had heard of the internet, he said, but had never thought of using it. It had come as a surprise that the PC he ordered came complete with an internal modem and pre-loaded with software to get free internet access. Naturally, he had tried it out.

At first, Owen had joined innocent newsgroups on national parks and non-league football. He had found a website for the Dry Stone Walling Association. But then he had begun to notice spam messages on the newsgroups, and out of curiosity he had visited the sites they were promoting. He had been absolutely amazed at what he had found. Amazed and guiltily fascinated. There had never been anything like that in the house at Cargreave, certainly not when Mum was alive.

‘If a TV programme got a bit saucy, we had to switch it off,’ he said.

Then Owen learned how to download images on to his hard drive. He had found that he was spending more and more time on the net, surfing from site to site. He realized he was becoming addicted, but he couldn’t stop. He had missed parish council meetings for the first time, and people in Cargreave had thought he must be ill. He had been spending entire evenings on the internet, forgetting to eat, staying up into the early hours of the morning.

DCI Tailby nodded at that. The police team had found Owen’s latest phone bill — it showed three hundred hours of calls to an 0845 number.

Owen said he had given his address several times when asked to register for free access to new sites. Then he had suddenly found that he was in contact with other people around the world, people he had never heard of, who sent him e-mail messages. He was delighted that they addressed him as if he were an old friend. They seemed to regard him as someone with the same interests. He had become part of their community.

When Mark Roper had been sent home and Owen Fox had been allowed a break, Diane Fry found DI Hitchens already in the DCI’s office. They watched her warily when she produced a report sheet from the folder she carried.

‘Yes, Fry? What have you got there?’

‘This is the latest surveillance report on Ringham Edge Farm.’

‘Have we still got that surveillance on?’

‘We have. This is the report from last night.’

‘Riveting stuff, is it?’ said Hitchens.

‘Well, judge for yourself. On Friday, the two boys left for school at the usual time in the morning. Their father saw them off. After that, Warren Leach went about his normal work on the farm, as far as could be ascertained by the officers on surveillance duty. Their reports are a bit lacking in technical detail, but some of Leach’s observed activities did involve cows and a tractor, so I suppose we have to take it on trust.’

Tailby didn’t seem interested. ‘We could get Ben Cooper to de-brief them, I suppose. He might spot some anomalies, if you think it’s worthwhile.’

‘Maybe. The report goes on to say that the only visitors to the farm were the postman and the milk tanker driver, both early in the morning. That was it until the boys came home from school, when they were dropped at the bottom of the lane by the school bus. There was nobody at all for seven hours, apart from Leach. Not even a feed sales rep. It must be a pretty quiet life at Ringham Edge.’

‘It sounds idyllic to me at this moment.’

‘I’d call it downright tedious,’ said Hitchens.

‘Saturday was even worse. The tanker driver came as usual, but not the postman. There was no school for the boys.’

‘We can’t justify continuing surveillance on the basis of that sort of report. Call the team off, Paul.’

‘There is one thing, though,’ said Fry.

‘Yes?’

‘DC Gardner was the last officer on surveillance duty. She has added a note on the report at the end of her shift yesterday.’

‘What did she see?’

‘It’s more a question of what she didn’t see.’

Tailby began to get irritated. ‘Don’t play Sherlock Holmes with me, Fry. That’s my role.’

‘Sorry, sir. Gardner says that she understood there were two adults and two children resident at Ringham Edge. She observed the movements of the boys and their father, but not their mother. She never saw any sign of the mother at all, on either of her shifts. DC Gardner queries the whereabouts of Mrs Yvonne Leach.’

Tailby sat up straight. ‘Damn.’

‘Do you think it might be important?’ said Hitchens.

‘It’s something we’ve overlooked. Check the rest of the surveillance reports, Paul. But I’m pretty sure that you’ll find she was never mentioned. Not in any of them. But nobody thought that was in the least remarkable, did they? Not until Toni Gardner.’

‘The others probably assumed Mrs Leach was slaving over the kitchen sink or something,’ said Fry.

‘Idiots.’

‘If she was there, she would have seen the boys off to school in the morning, at least. In fact, she would probably have walked them down the lane to the bus. There’s a killer about somewhere, after all. Any mother would do that. If she was there.’

‘Yes, you’re right, Fry. Let’s establish when she was last seen. We’ve all been going up and down that lane for a week, right past the gate. Somebody must have seen her.’

‘Can I take Ben Cooper with me?’ asked Fry.

Tailby nodded. ‘Good idea. Keep his head down and his mind focused.’ He looked at Hitchens. ‘I’ve got a bad feeling, Paul.’

‘There’s probably an innocent explanation. She may have gone away to stay with a relative or something for a while. She may be ill in bed. There’s a bit of flu about, they reckon.’

‘I’ve still got a bad feeling. Everything about this case gives me a bad feeling.’

When they finally let Mark Roper leave, he knew exactly where he had to go. Though Owen had said the local farmers were important, and that Rangers had a good relationship with them, Ringham Edge was one farm where Mark could see it wasn’t true. Warren Leach reminded him of the man his mother lived with, his so-called stepfather — a man who needed everyone to be submissive to his will to be at ease with himself.

Leach regarded the Ranger with unconcealed hostility when Mark found him in the tractor shed.

‘Well, if it isn’t Ranger Junior. What do you want?’

Mark tried to recall Owen’s advice about dealing with aggressive reactions. Sometimes you had to turn the other cheek, he said, to ignore rudeness and provocation. He had called it diplomacy.

‘I want to talk to you about Owen Fox, Mr Leach.’

‘Him? I heard he got a bit of a shock. Found out what he’s been up to, have they?’

‘Do you know anything about it?’

‘I know I’m not likely to shed any tears over him,’ said Leach. ‘I’ve got my sons to think of.’

Mark frowned. It wasn’t the response he had expected. ‘What about your sons?’

‘What about them?’ Leach looked suddenly even less friendly. ‘I hope you’re not interested in my lads, Ranger Junior. What’s your mate been teaching you?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Some folk took it out on those two youths in the quarry. But personally, I would have trusted those youths a damn sight more with my boys than I’d ever trust that friend of yours.’

Now Mark was confused. The conversation seemed to have drifted away from him to some other subject. ‘Who are you talking about?’

‘Who do you think?’ Leach laughed, without any humour. ‘I’m talking about the Lone Ranger. God in a red jacket. Your mate, Owen Fox. Do you know the kids round here call him Father Christmas? When he goes in the schools, they think Santa has arrived. I bet he likes to get the little boys on his knee and give them a nice present, all right.’

For a moment, Mark didn’t understand what the farmer was saying.

‘What’s up?’ said Leach. ‘Bounced you on his lap a time or two as well, has he? I’d have thought you were too old for him. I reckon he likes them a bit younger, the dirty bastard.’

Mark felt the anger rushing up through his body before he even understood the reason for it. It was a physical response, visceral and frightening, a great flood of rage burning through his veins and overwhelming his judgement. Before he knew what was happening, he had hurled himself at the farmer, lashing out wildly with his fists.

Leach spread his shoulders, drew back a meaty hand and punched Mark in the mouth, knocking him down. The farmer laughed, thrilled at the chance to hit somebody. Mark got back up, flushed and furious, but his blows were uncontrolled and fell harmlessly against Leach’s chest and shoulders. The farmer knocked him to the floor twice more with blows to the face, until the Ranger was bloodied and crying.

Mark wiped the blood from his mouth and touched a loose tooth. He knew he was helpless. But the only thing he could think of was that he wanted to tell Leach that he wasn’t crying because of the pain.

Then Leach noticed his sons watching, wide-eyed, from the corner of the shippon. He looked at Mark on the floor and saw that he was only a boy, too, beaten and humiliated.

‘Go on, clear off,’ he said.

As soon as the Ranger had gone, Warren Leach felt a black depression descend on him. The boys had vanished somewhere. They didn’t even have the excuse of the calf needing attention now. The animal had brought in a bit of money at market. Not much, but enough to pay a fraction of the bills. They had food on the table for a day or two, and a cupboard full of bottles of whisky, which was one of the necessities these days, Leach was discovering.

The boys had gone somewhere they didn’t think he would find them. They didn’t want to be near their father any more, he realized that. Why should his own sons avoid him? He was sure it was because of their mother. After all these years, she seemed to have become his enemy. He was convinced she was in touch with the boys somehow, turning them against him. He didn’t know how she was doing it, but she was poisoning their brains. They had always been such good lads before.

Leach was aware he hadn’t always been a perfect father. And he shouldn’t have let Will and Dougie see him hitting the young Ranger. At first, he had thought they would admire him, see him as the strong father he used to be, a man who was afraid of no one. But the feeling didn’t last long. It became mingled with a sense of shame. The boy he had beaten could just as easily have been one of his own sons, in a few years’ time.

When Leach tried to think about what had happened in his life over the last couple of months, his mind shied and balked at the enormity of it. It was a problem so huge that he couldn’t contemplate it, couldn’t even begin to consider how to cope with it. He could only follow helplessly the little trickles of thought that ran this way and that in his brain, seeking a way out of the nightmare.

And finally, Warren Leach faced the possibility that he might not be around to see his sons reach Mark Roper’s age.