Dying to Sin

13

Aaron Goodwin was between clients. Nevertheless, he gave Fry the impression that he’d charge her by the hour if she took more than five minutes of his time.

‘Why did we buy the farm?’ he said. ‘I can answer that in one word. Horses.’

Fry didn’t know what Mr Goodwin looked like, but she was enjoying a mental image of him arriving at Pity Wood Farm in its present condition. She pictured him wincing at the mud, the abandoned builders’ equipment, the police tape protecting the grave sites.

‘My wife and my daughters are mad about horses,’ he explained. ‘They’ve plagued me for years to find a house in the country where we could have our own stables and paddocks, a menage, somewhere to park a couple of horse boxes. As soon as we had enough money, it was just a question of locating the right property.’

‘And Pity Wood was it?’ asked Fry, barely able to keep the incredulity out of her voice.

Goodwin paused, as if checking his watch. ‘It was a bit of a stretch, admittedly, considering all the work that needs doing to the place. The cost of the alterations and renovation is almost as much as the purchase price, to be honest. I really hope it’s going to be worth it.’

‘Well, you’re certainly going to be in the country,’ said Fry. ‘Have you any experience of rural life?’

‘Not at all. We’re strictly city people.’

‘Then I’m afraid some things might come as a bit of a shock, sir.’

As a city girl herself, Fry might have felt a degree of kinship with the solicitor, if it weren’t for the fact that he was moving to the countryside voluntarily. He was bringing it all on himself, and it diluted her sympathy. But perhaps she ought to enlighten him a bit.

‘Country people can seem like an alien race, you know. They’re very, er … conservative, in some ways. In others, their activities are way out on the edge. Their lives seem to revolve around the church and the village pub.’

‘Rather than the office and the bistro, you mean?’ said Goodwin.

‘And a lot of them really do like shooting things, I’ve found.’

‘We have that in Manchester, except they shoot people instead of foxes and grouse. But at least they make you feel part of a community out there, don’t they?’

‘You haven’t visited Rakedale, then?’ asked Fry.

Goodwin paused. ‘We didn’t make the decision lightly. There are some questions you have to ask yourself before you move to the country.’

‘Oh, yes. Like whether you can cope with mud and the stink of a freshly fertilized field.’

‘I was thinking of whether you’ll be able to survive without theatres and nightclubs. But perhaps you never had to ask yourself those questions, Detective Sergeant.’

‘Not really.’

There was a moment’s silence, and Fry had a suspicion that the solicitor was only half listening, perhaps taking the chance to read a file before his next client arrived.

‘Mr Goodwin, are you at all aware of the history of Pity Wood Farm?’

‘Its history? What do you mean? The estate agent’s details mentioned the date the house was built. Late eighteenth century, I believe.’

‘You must know something about the previous owners. Did you ever meet them?’

‘No, never. The property was already empty when we viewed it.’

‘Are you sure? What about Mr Raymond Sutton?’

‘Sutton is the name on the deeds, that’s all I know. Why do you ask?’

‘I wondered if you’d visited Pity Wood some time previously.’

‘Oh?’

‘I thought you might have had your eye on it as a suitable property if it ever came up for sale. It’s the sort of thing people do when they have a plan, like yours for keeping horses. They see the ideal place, and they keep it in mind for the future.’

‘Yes, I suppose they do. But that wasn’t so in our case. To be honest, Sergeant, I’m not all that familiar with the Peak District, let alone Rakedale.’

Fry had to accept that it sounded like the truth. ‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Now that you mention the farm’s history, though …’ said Goodwin.

‘Yes?’

‘This murder case gives it rather an interesting history, doesn’t it? Bodies buried in the farmyard and all that.’

‘We don’t actually know for certain — ’ began Fry.

‘No, no, of course. But it’s rather a selling point.’

‘A selling point? It won’t put you off the place, then?’

‘Not at all. It adds a macabre charm. Something to tell our friends when they come to visit.’

‘You’re really looking forward to living at Pity Wood Farm, aren’t you?’ said Fry. ‘You really are.’

‘You sound as though you’re trying to put me off.’ Goodwin chuckled. ‘You know, some people told us once that, when we move to the country, we’ll have to keep quiet for at least five years. Don’t go poking your nose in, they said. No organizing things, or making changes. It’s considered interfering. You’re an outsider and you have to serve an apprenticeship, until you’re accepted.’

‘And I suppose you don’t think that will apply to you?’ said Fry. ‘Well, Mr Goodwin, you don’t know the half of it.’

Cooper was discovering that there could be a whole social history buried in farm records. It was possible to trace the changes that had taken place in farming over the decades through the day-today details of income and expenditure.

For example, until the 1980s, government grant schemes had been committed only to increasing food production, which meant they often supported plans to improve rough pasture or increase grazing levels, which damaged conservation interests. But for some years now, grants had been moving towards environmentally friendly land management and biodiversity. There was the Countryside Stewardship Scheme of the early 1990s. Then the reform of CAP and environmental stewardship, encouraging farmers to manage land in a way that enhanced the landscape and conserved wildlife.

Somehow, though, the Suttons and Pity Wood Farm had fallen between two stools. It seemed as though they’d been too slow to change. Perhaps they’d been confused by the conflicting pressures, baffled by the fact that practices encouraged in their younger days were now considered almost criminal. Their farm records showed that their attempts at diversification had been half-hearted at best, and misguided at worst.

Cooper felt a twinge of sympathy for them. The Suttons weren’t alone in failing to grasp that conservation was now more important than the production of food.

There was an irony in the pattern the Suttons had followed. By the mid-1990s, the brothers could have got a decent price for Pity Wood Farm, if they’d decided to sell. But, like so many farmers, they probably thought they could get through the bad times and things would improve.

So they’d missed their chance to capitalize on the myth of the countryside idyll, which had been widespread in the 1990s. Living in the countryside had become the city dweller’s dream. Features in the Sunday supplements suggested the countryside could provide the space to be yourself, to have the freedom to live your life without close neighbours, busy roads, the daily struggle to get to work. Nobody spoke of the downsides — the isolation, inadequate services, having to walk a mile to the nearest bus stop, if there were any buses. No one pointed out that within a few years there’d be no shops or hospitals, nor even a post office.

Feeling weary, Cooper got up to fetch himself a coffee. It had been a long day already, and he wasn’t finished yet. When Fry returned, she’d want hard facts, not some gloomy reflection on the state of the countryside.

He gazed out of the window while he drank his coffee and rubbed his weary eyes. The past fifteen years had dispelled that myth of the countryside idyll. People in rural areas lived shorter lives, had fewer medical facilities, and were more likely to get depressed and kill themselves. One in four people in the countryside lived below the poverty line, just as in urban areas. Their children were injured on the roads more often, it took a lot longer to get to a hospital if you suffered a heart attack, and if you used a mobile phone you were more likely to suffer from brain tumours than someone in a city. There wasn’t quite such a rush into the country any more.

Cooper went back to the records. The only big surprise was that Pity Wood had survived into the middle of the first decade of the twenty-first century. It had already been an anachronism by then, dead on its feet, sinking into debt.

He knew, from the articles in Farmers Weekly that Matt showed him, what the situation was. Farm incomes in the national park had fallen by seventy-five per cent over ten years. The potential return from livestock farming had ceased to match the investment of time and capital. Without subsidies, only a few dairy farms in the Peak District would be making any money now — a ludicrous average of four or five thousand pounds a year, as long as there was no allowance made for paying the farmer and his family. For beef and sheep farms, it was even worse. Their bottom line would be a minus figure.

So what had the Suttons done to try to escape this looming disaster? All the wrong things, it seemed to Cooper. A poultry enterprise had been the major decision in recent years. He remembered the old poultry sheds, empty of birds but still smelling powerfully of ammonia. No battery cages, but deep bedding, so there had been some attempt at humane treatment of the chickens, at least.

Cooper searched the records in vain for purchases of any major equipment, such as a straw spreader. It looked as though the Suttons hadn’t been able to find six thousand pounds or so to spend on such a luxury item, so presumably the straw in the poultry houses had been spread by hand.

The fields had still been cut for silage in the last few years, though there were no ruminants left at Pity Wood to eat it. No cattle or sheep to get through the winter. The Suttons must have intended to sell it to their neighbours — and, indeed, there were some records of earlier sales. But Cooper had seen this year’s cut of silage himself, still sitting in its bags in the yard.

When Fry returned to the office, Cooper was surrounded by papers that spread across two desks. He was holding a glossy four-page brochure, unable to control the expression of amazement on his face.

‘What have you got there, Ben?’

‘The estate agent’s details for the sale of Pity Wood Farm. The photographs make it look quite attractive. Somebody managed to find a sunny day. And they used a camera with a wide-angle lens. But not so wide that it showed the mud.’

‘“A rare opportunity to purchase a farm holding with superb potential in a most sought-after area,”’ read Cooper. ‘“Traditional farmhouse and adjoiningbarns with further buildings and grassland extending to ninety-five acres. Pity Wood Farm comprises a delightfully situated south-facing property in an unrivalled position. A range of stone outbuildings provide scope to extend to convert into holiday lets, subject to obtaining planning consent. The farmhouse requires some refurbishment, modernization and general upgrading …”’

‘You can say that again.’

‘“… but once complete will create a truly enviable residence in an idyllic rural location.”’

‘Funny how people use that word “idyllic” to mean “primitive”.’

Cooper didn’t reply. He was concentrating on trying to make all the buildings listed by the estate agent fit the map on the old conveyance and his memory of Pity Wood Farm. To the front of the property is a walled garden area and patio. That must be the overgrown patch where the old caravan was parked.

He made a quick note. Had Scenes of Crime got round to the caravan yet? Who had been living in there? He bet it had been overlooked, amid all the other excitement and conflicting priorities.

Three-bay general-purpose building of block construction, two corrugated-tin-sheet sheds, timber-framed slatted house with feed barriers and a slurry store, monopitch block-built shed, timber-framed cowshed, implement sheds, useful six-bay general-purpose building … The list seemed endless, yet some of those buildings must be in ruins. Well, the estate agent did mention renovation.

‘“A mains water supply is available,”’ said Cooper out loud.

‘A mains water supply,’ said Fry. ‘That’s a selling point, is it?’

‘In this area, yes.’

‘So what have you got from the farm records, Ben? What exactly were they doing at Pity Wood Farm to earn money — I mean, enough to make it profitable? And was Raymond relying on the sale of the farm to meet the cost of his residential care for the rest of his life?’

‘Apparently not. They brought Tom Farnham in to introduce some new enterprises. They could see that Pity Wood would never survive as a livestock farm alone. That was quite perceptive of them, you know. I mean, it’s obvious to everyone now, but in those days a lot of the old farmers were just crossing their fingers and hoping things would pick up. Most of them couldn’t face the idea of changing their way of life. A farm like Pity Wood, that’s been in the same family for generations — well, it would take someone very forward-looking to see what was necessary at such an early stage. From what I’ve heard of Raymond Sutton, he doesn’t seem that sort of person. He’s very traditional.’

‘It would have to be Derek, then. He was the younger brother, after all.’

‘Maybe,’ said Cooper. ‘How old would Derek have been at the time?’

Fry did a quick calculation. ‘Fifty-six when Tom Farnham came into the business.’

‘Mmm. I think we should ask Farnham how he met the Suttons. Did they invite him into the business, or did he do a sales pitch on them?’

‘You think he might be some kind of con man?’ asked Fry.

‘I think the Sutton brothers might have been an easy target for a clever talker.’

‘Would that fit your assessment of him?’

‘Possibly,’ said Cooper.

‘By the way, did you get anything from the IND?’

‘Hold on, let me check my notes.’ Cooper flicked back through his notebook. ‘OK, Section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration Act. The law makes it a criminal offence to employ a person who is subject to immigration controls and has no permission to work in the UK. The only statutory defence is if the employer can show that they carried out checks on the documents of potential employees. The confusing area seems to be the A8 countries, Diane.’

‘The accession states.’

‘Yes. The Czech Republic, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Latvia and Slovenia. Individuals from those countries are entitled to come to the UK and work, but they have to register with the Home Office. Once you’ve been working legally in the UK for twelve months you have full rights of free movement and you no longer need to be on the Worker Registration Scheme.’

‘Twelve months?’

‘It’s a critical time period, isn’t it?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘The thing is, some employees don’t bother. It works well for the larger firms, but not for the smaller ones who employ a couple of people. And this isn’t exactly Bernard Matthews.’

‘The turkey man?’

‘My contact says Bernard Matthews employs a thousand Portuguese workers in Great Yarmouth. But that’s a different kettle of fish. There are translators, bi-lingual trainers, everything done right. Small-scale employers are the problem. The paperwork is too much trouble for them, not to mention the cost. I imagine a lot of small farmers might think they can get away without paying seventy pounds to apply for a certificate. Besides, there’s the forgery issue. A worker brings along a standard letter from the Immigration Service and a forged passport, and a small employer doesn’t look twice. I was told to watch out for Ernest Xavier Ample.’

‘Who on earth is Ernest Xavier Ample?’

‘E.X. Ample,’ said Cooper. ‘It’s the made-up name the forgers take off sample work permits. No imagination, some people. Or perhaps they think it’s a normal English name.’

‘For heaven’s sake. So we could be looking at a procession of Slovaks, Lithuanians and Latvians passing through Pity Wood?’

‘Something like that,’ said Cooper. ‘Many of them might have gone on to be legit later, though, if they changed employers.’

‘Are there any gaps in the farm records? Periods that aren’t accounted for?’

‘No, but the accounts don’t come right up to date, of course. They end nine months ago. There was a period of time after Raymond Sutton gave up the farm and before the builders moved in. Only a few months, but it might just be in our time frame.’

‘And the farm was empty for that time?’ asked Fry.

‘Yes, and I bet there were plenty of people around Rakedale who knew it.’

‘Damn it, that doesn’t help us at all. Unless forensics can give us some evidence to narrow down the time of death, we’re going to have to concentrate on identifying the victims and establishing a link between them.’

‘Anyway, the most recent enterprise at Pity Wood seems to have been a poultry business,’ said Cooper. ‘That can be quite viable, I believe. But it’s no wonder the Suttons’ enterprise failed. They weren’t producing enough birds to make a realistic profit. It was hardly worth their while running the sheds.’

‘Is there much expense involved in raising poultry?’

‘A lot of overheads when the birds are housed indoors — heating, bedding, all their feed and antibiotics. But the main cost here seems to have been the wage bill. The way the Suttons ran the enterprise must have been pretty labour intensive. No capital to invest in machinery, I suppose.’

‘Or the way Tom Farnham ran it.’

‘Yes.’

‘So what about the wages? There must be a list of employees’ names?’

‘No, damn it,’ said Cooper. ‘Just initials. No indication of who they were, what they did, whether they were male or female. The only fact I can work out is that they seem to have employed a dozen people at any one time. But the initials change quite often, so the turnover of staff must have been quite high. It was unpleasant work, I suppose — killing, plucking and gutting.’

Cooper gazed out of the window, trying to make the facts fit. How did the number of workers represented by these wage bills correlate with the output from the poultry production units? Well, the answer was that it didn’t. Those workers must either have been sitting around doing nothing for a large part of their time — or they must have been doing something else entirely.