Innocent Graves

I

An early rambler from Middlesborough set off from a bed and breakfast in Skield and found the girl’s body tucked away in a fold of Witch Fell, above the village, at eight o’clock on Sunday morning. An hour later, the detectives from Eastvale and the Scene-of-Crime Officers began to dribble in, closely followed by Dr. Glendenning, who was out of breath by the time he had climbed up to where the body was.

Banks stood at the edge of the terrace, which he suspected was a lynchet, an ancient Anglian plowing strip leveled on a hillside. Such lyncheted hills went up in a series of steps, of which this was the first. The strip was about ten yards wide and dipped a little in the middle.

The girl’s body lay spread-eagled in the central depression, as if cupped in the petals of a flower. The little meadow was full of buttercups and daisies; flies and more delicate winged insects buzzed in the air, some pausing to light on the girl’s pale, unyielding skin for a moment.

Several buttercups and daisies had been twined in her long blonde hair, which lay spread out on the bright green grass around her head like the halo in a Russian icon. Her blouse had been torn open and her bra pulled up, revealing small, pale breasts, and her short skirt was up around her thighs, her discarded panties on the grass beside her. As Banks got closer, he noticed the discoloration around her neck, and the open shoulder-bag by her arm, some of its contents spilled on the grass: lipstick, a purse, compact, nail-file, chewing gum, perfume, keys, address book, earrings, hairbrush.

The similarities to the Deborah Harrison scene were too close to be ignored. And Banks had just convinced himself that Deborah had been murdered by someone she knew for some sort of logical reason. Now it looked as if they were dealing with a sexual psychopath-one who had murdered two young girls in the area.

Banks stood back as Peter Darby took photographs and then watched Dr. Glendenning perform the on-scene examination. By then, Superintendent Gristhorpe had arrived and Jimmy Riddle was rumored to be pacing at the bottom of the hill trying to decide whether to attempt the short climb or wait until the others came down to him.

Banks sniffed the air. It was another fine morning. A couple of sheep stood facing the drystone wall as if just wishing it would all go away. Well, it wouldn’t, Banks knew. No more than the tightness in his gut, which felt like a clenched fist, would go away before tomorrow.

“Well?” he asked, after the doctor had finished his examination.

“As we’re not in court, laddie,” said Glendenning, with a crooked grin, “I can tell you that she probably died between ten o’clock last night and one or two o’clock in the morning.”

“Do you think she was killed here?”

“Looks like it from the lividity on her back and thighs.”

“So he brought her here alive all the way from Eastvale?”

Banks made a mental calculation. The girl, Ellen Gilchrist, had disappeared on her way home shortly after eleven o’clock last night. By car, it was about thirty miles from Eastvale to Skield, but some of that journey was on bad moorland roads where you couldn’t drive very fast, especially at night. For one thing, the sheep were inclined to wander, and as anyone it has happened to will tell you, running into a sheep on a dark road is a very nasty experience indeed. Especially for the sheep.

It would probably have taken the killer an hour, Banks estimated, particularly if he took an indirect route to avoid being seen. Why bother? Why not just dump her in Eastvale somewhere? Was location important to him, part of his profile? Did he hope the body would remain undiscovered for longer here? Not much hope of that, Banks thought. Skield and Witch Fell were popular spots for ramblers, especially with the good weather.

“There’s a nasty gash behind her left ear,” Glendenning said, “which means she was probably unconscious when he brought her here, before he strangled her. It looks like it could have been caused by a hammer or some such heavy object. Cause of death, off the record, of course, is ligature strangulation, just like the last one. Shoulder-bag strap this time, instead of a satchel.”

“And the bag’s open, also like last time,” Banks mused.

“Aye,” said Glendenning. “Well, you can have the body sent to the mortuary now.” And he walked off.

Banks tried to run the scenario in his mind as if it were a film: girl leaves friends at end of School Lane, walks onto King Street, busy during tourist hours but quiet at night, apart from the odd pub or two. Some street-lamps, but not an especially well-lit area. Most kids are still at the dance, but Ellen’s going home ahead of her curfew because she has a headache, or so her friend said. She walks alone down the hill towards the Leaview Estate, not more than ten minutes at the most. Car pulls up. Or is it already waiting down the road, lights turned off, knowing there’s a school dance, hoping someone will be careless enough to walk home alone?

He’s standing by the car, looking harmless enough. He can’t believe his luck. Another blonde, just like Deborah Harrison, and about the same age. Or did he know who he wanted? Had he been watching her? Did he know her?

As she passes, he grabs her and drags her into the passenger seat before she knows what’s happening. She tries to scream, perhaps, but he puts his hand over her mouth to muffle her. He knocks her out. Now she’s in the passenger seat, unconscious, bleeding behind her ear. He straps her in with the safety belt and sets off. Maybe someone saw the car, someone else leaving the dance? He has to get her to an isolated spot before he’s seen.

All the way to Skield, he savors what he’s going to do to her. The anticipation is almost as thrilling as the act itself, maybe even more so. He anticipates it, and later he relives it, replays it over and over in his mind.

He parks off the road, out of the way, car hidden behind a clump of trees, perhaps, and drags her up the hillside. It’s not very far or very steep, the first lynchet, but he’s sweating with the effort, and maybe she’s coming round now, trying to struggle, beginning to realize that something terrible is about to happen to her. They get to the lynchet, and he lays her down on the grass and does…whatever he does.

“Alan?”

“What? Oh, sorry, sir. Lost in thought.”

Superintendent Gristhorpe and DC Gay had come to stand beside him as uniformed officers searched the area.

“We’d better get back to the station and get things moving,” said Gristhorpe. “We can start by questioning all the friends who were at the dance with her again, and then do a house-to-house along King Street, check out the pubs, too. I’ll get someone to ask around Skield as well. You never know. Someone might have been suffering from insomnia.”

“Sir?”

Both Banks and Gristhorpe looked around to see PC Weaver, one of the searchers, approach with something hooked over the end of a pencil. When he got closer, Banks could see that it was one of those transparent plastic containers that 35mm films come in. Living with Sandra, he had seen plenty of those.

“Found this in the grass near the body, sir,” he said.

“Near the shoulder-bag?” Gristhorpe asked.

“No, sir, that’s why I thought it was odd. It was on the other side of her, a couple of yards away. Do you think it could be the killer’s?”

“It could be anyone’s, lad,” Gristhorpe said. “A tourist’s, maybe. But we’d better check it for prints as quickly as we can.” He turned to Banks. “Maybe we’ve got one who likes to photograph his victims?”

“Possible,” Banks agreed. “And we already know one keen amateur photographer, don’t we? I’ll get Vic Manson on it right away. He should be able to do a comparison before the morning’s over.”

Just at that moment, a red bald head, shiny with perspiration, appeared over the rim of the meadow. “What’s going on?” grunted Chief Constable Riddle.

“Oh, we’ve just finished here, sir,” said Banks, smiling cheekily as he walked past Riddle and headed down the slope.

II

The church was hot and smelled like dust burning on the element of an electric fire. Owen remembered hearing somewhere that most household dust was just dead skin. Which meant the church smelled like dead bits of people burning. Hell? All flesh is grass. The heaps of dead, dry grass burning in allotments, or autumn stubble burning in the country fields, vast, rolling carpets of fire spread out in the distance, palls of smoke hanging and twisting in the still twilight air.

Owen took off his jacket and loosened his tie. He had never been comfortable in churches. His parents were both dyed-in-the-wool atheists, and the only times he had really been in church were for weddings and funerals. So he always wore a suit and tie.

Of course, it was all right when you were a tourist checking out the Saxon fonts and Gothic arches, but a different story altogether when there was a vicar up front prattling on about loving they neighbor. Owen had always distrusted overly churchy types before, feeling that the church offered a public aura of respectability to many who pursued their perversions in private. But the vicar in this case was Daniel Charters, now one of the few allies Owen had in the entire world.

Today it was the hoary old chestnut about how you get nothing but bad news in the papers and how that can make you cynical about the world, but really there are wonders and miracles going on all around you all the time.

That morning, Owen could certainly relate to the first part of the sermon, if not the uplifting bit. Just before he had set off for church, he had screwed up the News of the World in a ball and tossed it across the room.

Judging by the looks he got when he walked into St. Mary’s, and by the way so many members of the congregation leaned towards one another and whispered behind cupped hands, even the upmarket clientele of St. Mary’s had had a butcher’s at the News of the World over their cappuccino and croissants.

And there it was, blazoned across the front page in thick black letters: THE STORY THEY COULDN’T TELL IN COURT. Obviously Michelle’s journalist friend had probed her thoroughly. There was a reference to Owen’s liking to take photographs, phrased in such a way that it sounded downright sinister, and a mention of his love of kinky positions. He also, it appeared, liked his sex rough and, as far as partners were concerned, the younger the better. Michelle came out of it sounding more like a victim than a willing lover. Which, Owen supposed, was the intention.

There was also an old, slightly blurred, photograph of the two of them and a scrap of a letter Owen had written Michelle once when he was away at a conference. The letter was a perfectly innocuous can’t-wait-to-see-you again sort of thing, but in this context, of course, it took on a far more disturbing aspect.

He recalled the day the photograph was taken. Shortly after Michelle had moved in with him, they had taken a holiday in Dorset, visiting various sites associated with Thomas Hardy’s novels. In the small graveyard at Stinsford, where Hardy’s heart was buried, they had asked an American tourist to take a photograph of them with Owen’s camera. It turned out a little blurred because the tourist hadn’t quite mastered the art of manual focusing.

Somehow, seeing the photograph and handwriting reproduced in a Sunday tabloid angered Owen even more than the innuendos in the article. Michelle had obviously handed them over to the reporter. It was a violation, a deeper betrayal even than what she said about him. He was quickly beginning to wish that he had killed Michelle.

The whole article screamed out his guilt, of course, protested a miscarriage of justice, though the writer never said as much, not in so many words. Mostly, he just posed questions. Owen wondered if he should consider suing for libel. They were clever, though, these newspaper editors; they vetted everything before they printed it; they could afford a team of lawyers and they had the money put aside to finance large law suits. Still, it was worth considering.

The pew in front of Owen creaked and brought him back to the present. He realized he was sweating, really sweating, and beginning to feel dizzy and nauseated, too. Churches weren’t supposed to be this hot. He hoped it wouldn’t go on much longer; he especially hoped that Daniel wouldn’t say anything about him.

They sang a hymn he remembered hearing once at a wedding, then there were more readings, prayers. It seemed to be going on forever. Owen wanted to go to the toilet now, too, and he shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

One of the readers mentioned seeing something “as in a mirror, dimly” and it took Owen a moment or two to realize this was the approved modern version of “through a glass darkly,” which he thought pretty much described his life. How could they, the English teacher in him wondered, utterly destroy one of the most resonant lines in the Bible, even if people did have trouble understanding what it meant. Since when had religion been about clear, literal, logical meaning anyway?

Finally, it was over. People relaxed, stood, chatted, ambled towards the doors. Many of them glanced at him as they passed. One or two managed brief, flickering smiles. Some pointedly turned away, and others whispered to one another.

Owen waited until most of them had gone. It had cooled down a little now, with the doors open and most people gone home. He still needed to go to the toilet, but not so urgently; he could wait now until he got to the vicarage. That was the plan: tea at the vicarage. He could hardly believe it.

When there were only one or two stragglers left, Owen got up and walked to the door. Daniel and Rebecca stood there chatting with a parishioner. Rebecca put her hand on his arm to stop him going immediately outside, and smiled. Daniel shook his hand and introduced him to the old woman. She looked down at her sensible shoes, muttered some greeting or other, and scurried off. This would obviously take time.

“Well,” said Daniel, taking out a handkerchief and wiping his moist brow. “I suppose we should be grateful Sir Geoffrey and his wife weren’t here.”

Owen hadn’t even thought of that. If he had considered the mere possibility of bumping into Deborah Harrison’s parents, he wouldn’t have gone near the place.

Daniel obviously saw the alarm in Owen’s expression because he reached out and touched his shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It was insensitive of me to say that. It’s just that they used to attend. Anyway, come on, let’s go.”

Owen walked outside with Daniel and Rebecca, pleased to be in the breeze again and glad to know he wasn’t entirely alone against the world. Then he saw four policemen hurrying down the tarmac path from the North Market Street gate. He told himself to run, but like Daniel and Rebecca, he simply froze to the spot.

III

“So, we meet again, Owen,” said Banks later that Sunday in an interview room at Eastvale Divisional Headquarters. “Nice of you to assist us with our inquiries.”

Pierce shrugged. “I don’t think I have a lot of choice. Just for the record, I’m innocent this time, too. But I don’t suppose that matters to you, does it? You won’t believe me if it’s not what you want to hear. You didn’t last time.”

Very little light filtered through the barred, grimy window and the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling was only thirty watts. There were three people in the room: Banks, Susan Gay and Owen Pierce.

One of the public-spirited parishioners at St. Mary’s had heard about the Ellen Gilchrist murder on the news driving home after the morning service, and he had wasted no time in using his car-phone to inform the police that the man they wanted had been at St. Mary’s Church that very morning, and might still be there if they hurried. They did. And he was.

In the distance, Banks could hear the mob chanting and shouting slogans outside the station. They were after Pierce’s blood. Word had leaked out that he had been taken in for questioning over the Ellen Gilchrist murder, and the public were very quick when it came to adding two and two and coming up with whatever number they wanted.

People had started arriving shortly after the police delivered Pierce to the station, and the crowd had been growing ever since. Growing uglier, too. Banks feared he now had a lynch mob, and if Pierce took one step outside he’d be ripped to pieces. They would have to keep him in, if for no other reason than his own safety.

Already a few spots of blood dotted the front of his white shirt, a result of his “resisting arrest,” according to the officers present; there was also a bruise forming just below his right eye.

Banks started the tape recorders, issued the caution and gave the details of the interview time and those present.

“They hit me, you know,” Pierce said, as soon as the tape was running. “The policemen who brought me here. As soon as they got me alone in the car they hit me. You can see the blood on my shirt.”

“Do you want to press charges?”

“No. What good would it do? I just want you to know, that’s all. I just want it on record.”

“All right. Last night, Owen, about eleven o’clock, where were you?”

“At home watching television.”

“What were you watching?”

“An old film on BBC.”

“What film?”

“Educating Rita.”

“What time did it start?”

“About half past ten.”

“Until?”

“I don’t know. I was tired. I fell asleep before the end.”

“Do you usually do that? Start watching something and leave before the end?”

“If I’m tired. As a matter of fact I fell asleep on the sofa, in front of the television. When I woke up there was nothing on the screen but snow.”

“You didn’t check the time?”

“No. Why should I? I wasn’t going anywhere. It must have been after two, though. The BBC usually closes down then.”

His voice was flat, Banks noticed, responses automatic, almost as if he didn’t care what happened. But still the light burned deep in his eyes. Innocence? Or madness?

“You see, Owen,” Banks went on steadily, “there was another young girl killed last night. A seventeen-year-old schoolgirl from Eastvale Comprehensive. It’s almost certain she was killed by the same person who killed Deborah Harrison-same method, same ritual elements-and we think you are that person.”

“Ridiculous. I was watching television.”

“Alone?”

“I’m always alone these days. You’ve seen to that.”

“So, can you see our problem, Owen? You were home, alone, watching an old film on television. Anyone could say that.”

“But I’m not just anyone, am I?”

“How’s the photography going, Owen?”

“What?”

“You’re a keen photographer, aren’t you? I was just asking how it was going.”

“It isn’t. My house was broken into while I was on trial and the bastard who broke in killed my fish and smashed my cameras.”

Banks paused. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“I’ll bet you are.”

Banks took out the plastic film container and held it up for Owen to see. “Know what that is?”

“Of course I do.”

“Is it yours?”

“How would I know. There are millions of them around.”

“Thing is, Owen, we found this close to the body, and we found your fingerprints on it.”

Owen seemed to turn rigid, as if all his muscles tightened at once. The blood drained from his face. “What?”

“We found your fingerprints on it, Owen. Can you explain to us how they got there.”

“I…I…” he started shaking his head slowly from side to side. “It must be mine.”

“Speak up, Owen. What did you say?”

“It must be mine.”

“Any idea how it got out in the country near Skield?”

“Skield?”

“That’s right.”

He shook his head. “I went up there the other day for a walk.”

“We know,” said Susan Gay, speaking up for the first time. “We asked around the pub and the village, and several people told us they saw you in the area on Friday. They recognized you.”

“Not surprising. Didn’t you know, I’m notorious?”

“What were you doing, Owen?” Banks asked. “Reconnoitring? Checking out the location? Do you do a lot of advance preparation? Is that part of the fun?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I admit I was there. I went for a walk. But that’s the only time I’ve been.”

“Is it, Owen? I’m trying to believe you, honest I am. I want to believe you. Ever since you got off, I’ve been telling people that maybe you didn’t do it, maybe the jury was right. But this looks bad. You’ve disappointed me.”

“Well, excuse me.”

Banks shifted position. These hard chairs made his back ache. “What is this thing you have for rummaging around in girls’ handbags or satchels?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Do you like to take souvenirs?”

“Of what?”

“Something to focus on, help you replay what you did?”

“What did I do?”

“What did you do, Owen? You tell me how you get your thrills.”

Pierce said nothing. He seemed to shrink in his chair, his mouth clamped shut.

“You can tell me, Owen,” Banks went on. “I want to know. I want to understand. But you have to help me. Do you masturbate afterwards, reliving what you’ve done? Or can’t you contain yourself? Do you come in your trousers while you’re strangling them? Help me, Owen. I want to know.”

Still Pierce kept quiet. Banks shifted again. The chair creaked.

“Why am I here?” Pierce asked.

“You know that.”

“It’s because you think I did it before, isn’t it?”

“Did you, Owen?”

“I got off.”

“Yes, you did.”

“So I’d be a fool to admit it, wouldn’t I? Even if I had done it.”

“Did you do it? Did you kill Deborah Harrison?”

“No.”

“Did you kill Ellen Gilchrist?”

“No.”

Banks sighed. “You’re not making it easy for us, Owen.”

“I’m telling you the truth.”

“I don’t think so.”

“I am.”

“Owen, you’re lying to us. You picked up Ellen Gilchrist on King Street last night. First you knocked her unconscious, then you drove her to Skield, where you dragged her a short distance up Witch Fell and strangled her with the strap of her handbag. Why won’t you tell me about it?”

Pierce seemed agitated by the description of his crime, Banks noticed. Guilty conscience?

“What was it like, Owen?” he pressed on. “Did she resist or did she just passively accept her fate. Know what I think? I think you’re a coward, Owen? First you strangled her from behind, so you didn’t have to look her in the eye. Then you lay her down on the grass and tore her clothes away. You imagined she was Michelle Chappel, didn’t you, and you were getting your own back, giving her what for. She didn’t have a chance. She was beyond resistance. But even then you couldn’t get it up, could you? You’re a coward, Owen. A coward and a pervert.”

“No!” The suddenness with which Pierce shot forward and slammed his fist into the desk startled Banks. He saw Susan Gay stand and make towards the door for help, but waved her down.

“Tell me, Owen,” he said. “Tell me how it happened.”

Pierce flopped back in his chair again, as if the energy of his outburst had depleted his reserves. “I want my lawyer,” he said tiredly. “I want Wharton. I’m not saying another word. You people are destroying me. Get me Wharton. And either arrest me or I’m leaving right now.”

Banks turned to Susan and raised his eyebrows, then sighed. “Very well, Owen,” he said. “If that’s the way you want it.”