06.The Dead Place Page 25

  Many armies had marched across Derbyshire over the centuries, and not just in the Civil War. It struck Cooper that Alder Hall would have been newly built when Bonnie Prince Charlie led his Jacobite rebels south as far as Derby in the winter of 1745. Wasn’t it the Duke of Devonshire’s regiment, the Derby Blues, who abandoned the city ahead of the advancing Highlanders? But instead of pressing on to London and overthrowing King George II, the Young Pretender had begun the retreat to Scotland. A major turning point in history had happened right there.

  Cooper wondered whether the Saxtons had been Jacobites in those days, or loyal to the king. Catholics or Protestants, Royalists or Parliamentarians. There were times when everyone was expected to take sides.

  In one of the bedrooms, he heard the sound of an engine, and looked out of the window. Down below, a small blue car was turning in the driveway, making a slow three-point manoeuvre that barely caused a crunch of gravel. From two storeys up, he could make out that the driver was a woman in a short skirt. He could see her legs, and one arm on the steering wheel, but that was all. He wasn’t even sure of the make of the car – a lot of those compact models looked the same. And he was at the wrong angle to get a view of the number plate. The vehicle had moved out of sight to Cooper’s left before he could glimpse a single letter.

  ‘Will you want to inspect the grounds?’ asked Casey, without much hope of escaping just yet.

  ‘We’d like to see the woods near the eastern boundary.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Well, in that case, we could visit Fair Flora.’

  She stood on a pedestal in a high clearing, deep among rhododendrons. She’d been named after the Roman goddess of flowers, and she held a garland in her left hand, clutched across her breast.

  ‘The statue is said to have originated at Chatsworth House,’ said Casey. ‘But she was given to the owner of Alder Hall a long time ago by one of the dukes.’

  ‘It’s a strange place to stick a present from the Duke,’ said Cooper. ‘Shouldn’t she be in the house?’

  ‘She was originally. But the arrival of Fair Flora coincided with a period of ill fortune for the family at Alder Hall. Hauntings, too, they say. Anyway, they decided Flora was to blame, so she was banished to the woodlands.’

  Cooper smiled. ‘Is that the official story, or the local tradition?’

  ‘Oh, the local tradition is different,’ said Casey. ‘As you might guess. The older residents will tell you that the statue is a memorial to the daughter of one of the Saxtons who owned Alder Hall. She was a young woman who either died at the hands of a jealous lover, or drowned in the river as she was eloping – depending on which version you choose to believe.’

  ‘Tradition loves a romantic tragedy.’

  ‘Yes. Well, either way, the legends agree on one thing – Flora attracts the spirits of the dead. Through her beauty and innocence, they’re drawn to wherever she is. So as long as Flora stands out here in the woods, the spirits of those dead Civil War soldiers won’t return to their bones.’

  Cooper shivered a little, thinking of the cobwebbed skulls in their damp crypt.

  ‘Anyway, this part of the estate is owned by Alderhall Quarries now,’ said Casey. ‘They’ve worked the quarry just above the road there since the beginning of last century. Alderhall sandstone used to be highly valued for some purposes, but not any more. Still, the company allows Flora to receive visitors.’

  ‘She doesn’t get many, judging by the state of the footpath,’ said Cooper.

  ‘No, it isn’t exactly well used, is it?’

  The grounds of Alder Hall had been sculpted into a panorama of gently sloping lawns. But beyond the parkland successive Saxtons had planted trees. Cooper could see trees and more trees, marshalled into plantations that Casey told him were named after major battles of their day – Corunna Wood, Ladysmith Piece, Sebastopol Carr. Their management had been neglected for years, and now the orderly rows were ragged round the edges, like frayed carpets.

  Where the grass slopes had been left unmaintained, tides of bracken had encroached from the hillside. Jeremiah Saxton would be upset to see how far his property now failed to match the grandeur of the Duke’s estate further down the Wye Valley.

  Cooper looked around for Fry. She’d taken a call on her mobile, and was standing a few yards away so she was out of earshot. Now she caught his eye and started making winding-up signals.

  ‘Someone has left flowers here,’ said Cooper. ‘Recently, too.’

  John Casey looked at the spray of flowers in the grass at the foot of the statue. ‘Well, as I said, Flora does get visitors occasionally.’

  ‘Why would anyone leave flowers?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘They’re white chrysanthemums, too.’

  ‘Yes? Does that mean something?’

  ‘Ask any florist, Mr Casey. White chrysanthemums are for a death.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘There’s a card, too, inside the cellophane.’

  Cooper brushed drops of rain off to read the message. Then he stood up as Fry strode across the clearing, putting her phone away.

  ‘Could you take us back to the hall please, sir?’ she said.

  ‘By all means,’ said Casey.

  Before they got in the car, Cooper showed the card to Fry.

  ‘What do you think it means?’ she said. ‘“Watch over the bones. They must forget.”’

  ‘I’ve no idea, Diane.’

  She looked around the clearing, staring at the statue and the dense plantations of trees.

  ‘Ben, do you think he’s been here? Our mystery caller?’

  ‘Someone certainly has.’

  ‘Well, it’ll have to wait. Everything’s set up for the execution of a search warrant at Hudson and Slack.’

  ‘When are we going to do it?’

  ‘The DI’s putting things together right now.’

  ‘This afternoon?’ said Cooper.

  ‘As soon as we can get there.’

  A few minutes later, Casey dropped them off on the gravel in front of the house. He didn’t look sorry to be seeing the back of them.

  ‘If you want to find out any more about Alder Hall and the Saxtons, you ought to ask Fair Flora herself,’ he said.

  Cooper frowned. ‘We’ve just seen her, sir. But I’m not sure that talking to her would do much good.’

  The property agent laughed. ‘I didn’t mean the statue.’

  ‘Didn’t you?’

  ‘No, of course not. I meant the real person.’

  22

  Melvyn Hudson glared at Diane Fry with barely restrained fury. For a funeral director, he had quite a temper below that dignified exterior.

  ‘I have no idea what all this nonsense is about,’ he said. ‘But you can’t hold up our work. We have a funeral to do in ten minutes’ time.’

  ‘Everything you need to know is on the search warrant, sir,’ said Fry coolly. ‘And we have no intention of interrupting your business for a moment. Please carry on as normal. Our people will try to cause the minimum of disruption.’

  ‘Minimum of disruption? With police crawling all over our premises? How do you think this looks to our clients? There’s a family coming here this afternoon to bury their loved one.’

  ‘Let’s hope so, sir,’ said Fry.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  Hudson was starting to get very loud. Fry looked at the team assembling outside the doors.

  ‘If you’ll show these officers where records of your funerals are kept, we’ll get on with the job as discreetly as we can,’ she said. ‘The sooner we get started, the quicker we’ll be finished. And then we can get out of your way, sir.’

  ‘It’s an outrage,’ said Hudson, starting to go red around the ears. ‘Damn it, it’s an outrage. This is not the sort of scene a bereaved family expect to see when they deal with Hudson and Slack.’

  Fry knew that various members of staff would be able to hear their conversation. They were standing in the middle of
the general admin office, and doors were open nearby. She could see what looked like a staff room to one side, with a table, kitchen chairs and a sink unit. Behind the office, she glimpsed a filing room with a row of metal and wooden cabinets.

  ‘With respect, sir,’ she said, ‘the only person causing a scene at the moment is you. I suggest that might not be what a bereaved family expect to see from their funeral director.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘But I insist on being here while you’re doing whatever you need to do.’

  ‘That’s your privilege, sir. But what about your funeral?’

  ‘My wife’s in the chapel. I’ll ask her to conduct it.’

  ‘Fine.’

  Fry looked round and saw a woman watching from a doorway. She was dressed in a smart black suit, a sort of female equivalent to Hudson, though her hair was dark and tied neatly back. Barbara Hudson, presumably. Her expression wasn’t too friendly.

  Instead of facing her, Fry turned towards the workshop. There were all kinds of smells coming from these back rooms that hadn’t penetrated the public areas. She wondered how they achieved that. She might like to use the technique in her flat, to keep out the whiff of the students.

  ‘Does your warrant extend to the workshop, Sergeant?’ said Hudson behind her shoulder.

  ‘Do you mind me looking around, sir?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I do.’

  ‘Surely you’ve nothing to hide?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘What’s at the end of the corridor?’

  ‘The preparation room.’

  ‘And what do you do in there?’

  ‘We perform miracles, that’s what we do,’ said Hudson. ‘People have no idea what goes on in the preparation room. And they don’t want to know.’

  ‘But I’m asking, Mr Hudson,’ said Fry politely. And she was being polite, too, as far as she could manage. ‘Could we take a look?’

  ‘I’m sorry, but there’s a case on the premises at the moment.’

  ‘There’s a what?’

  Hudson inclined his head slightly towards her, as if acknowledging a rebuke. ‘A deceased person under preparation. Without the express permission of the family, I’m afraid …’

  ‘I understand.’

  He turned suddenly and shouted over Fry’s shoulder. ‘Vernon, you can leave that car alone now. Go inside and give Billy a hand with the flowers. Then get yourself changed. You’re driving.’

  Vernon must not have responded quickly enough, because Hudson started to go red again.

  ‘And get a move on, you lazy bugger!’

  Fry turned in time to see Vernon slam the bonnet of one of the limousines and wipe his hands on a cloth. He had a sullen look on his face, like a teenager who’d been told to clean his room.

  ‘That lad,’ said Hudson when Vernon had wandered off. ‘He drives me up the wall. But I can’t get rid of him.’

  ‘Because of his grandfather?’

  ‘Old Abraham, yes. He says we should give the lad a chance. But Vernon’s away with the fairies half the time. Look at him. The wheel’s still turning, but the hamster’s dead.’

  ‘How long has he been with you?’

  ‘A couple of years now. It seems like a lifetime.’

  ‘Old Mr Slack doesn’t play a part in the company any more?’

  ‘He’s in his seventies now. Abraham and I still own equal shares of the business, but I draw a salary as general manager on top of that.’

  ‘I see. So you pretty much have sole control of the company.’

  ‘On a day-to-day basis, I suppose I do.’

  ‘And your partner died, didn’t he? Vernon’s father?’

  ‘Richard was killed in a road accident last year. I expect you know that, Sergeant.’

  ‘And this other gentleman is Mr McGowan, if I remember rightly?’

  Hearing his name, McGowan looked up at Fry. Then he edged past to get through the door. Back in the office, Fry looked at the row of filing cabinets.

  ‘You seem to be busy, Mr Hudson,’ she said.

  ‘We get about a hundred and fifty calls a year.’

  ‘A hundred and fifty funerals?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And your job is to make all the arrangements?’

  ‘We serve the family’s needs,’ said Hudson. ‘That’s how we like to put it.’

  ‘Mr Hudson, we’re concerned with one particular family at the moment. The family of Audrey Steele, whose funeral arrangements were handled by Hudson and Slack eighteen months ago. On the eighth of March last year, to be exact.’

  ‘I can’t possibly remember one funeral out of so many,’ said Hudson.

  ‘Unless there was something unusual about it, I suppose.’

  ‘Well, yes.’

  ‘Do you remember Audrey Steele’s funeral?’

  ‘No. Look, let me check the diary. It might ring a bell. We record the main details in there.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Last year? March, you said.’

  ‘Yes, the eighth.’

  Hudson leafed through the pages of a large desk diary, the day to a page type. ‘Ah, yes. Steele. Yes, we did that job. I can’t remember it, but the details are here.’

  ‘Would you have seen Audrey Steele’s body before her funeral, sir?’

  ‘Not personally. It was a morning funeral. The deceased would already have been prepared and casketed when I came in.’

  ‘You mean the body was in the coffin?’

  ‘Yes. Somebody else would have done the setup. I mean, they’d have dressed the body and prepared it. Sometimes we do cosmetics and arrange the body with flowers for viewing by the grievers.’

  ‘Did the family want to view the body on this occasion?’

  ‘No. It was a closed-casket funeral. It’s a lot better that way. No matter how good the preparation, there can still be a little purge.’

  ‘Purge, sir?’

  ‘A release of body fluids.’

  ‘Ah. Not very nice, I presume?’ said Fry.

  ‘No. It’s rather unpleasant for the grievers. When their loved one has been interred or cremated, we like our clients to go away with a sense of satisfaction that the whole thing has been done properly.’

  ‘Would it have been possible for Audrey Steele’s coffin to have gone to her funeral empty?’ asked Fry.

  ‘No, no, quite impossible.’

  ‘What if the body had been removed, and the coffin weighted with something to disguise the fact that it was empty?’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ said Hudson. ‘That trick might work for a burial. But Audrey Steele was cremated. If there was no body in the coffin, it would be immediately obvious to the operators at the crematorium.’

  ‘I see.’ Fry looked around the office. ‘What’s security like here?’

  ‘We had our security system upgraded earlier this year,’ said Hudson.

  ‘After the breakin?’

  ‘Yes. Look, Sergeant, are you going to tell me what this is about?’

  ‘While we’re collecting the files, you might want to dig out the rest of the information we need,’ said Fry. ‘We want a list of all your staff, including anyone who was working here eighteen months ago but has since left.’

  ‘That will take some time,’ said Hudson.

  ‘Your personnel records not up to date, sir?’

  ‘Of course they are.’

  ‘Then it shouldn’t be any trouble.’

  Hudson sighed heavily, but went to speak to the secretary.

  Fry moved back towards the door, and found Cooper at her shoulder. ‘Why can’t we seize the personnel records as well, Diane?’ he said.

  ‘They aren’t specified on the search warrant.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Fry looked at him ‘Softly softly, remember? Someone decided on a compromise.’

  Before they left, Cooper took a peek into the workshop. Three men were working inside. One of them was Vernon Slack, another the thick-necked Billy M
cGowan he’d seen helping to carry the coffin at the crematorium. This morning, McGowan had his jacket off and his shirt sleeves rolled up as he lined a coffin with satin-like material and tacked a name-plate on the lid. He had so many tattoos on his arms that his skin looked like blue cheese. He might as well have had two rolls of ripe Gorgonzola hanging out of his sleeves.

  A line of coffin trolleys stood to one side of the workshop. Along the walls, cupboards and shelves held rubber tubing and jars of red fluid, a stock of handles, linings and name-plates. Past the trolleys, Cooper could see a series of lockers. He supposed the staff must need several sets of clothing – formal funeral wear, something smart for collecting bodies, casual clothes for jobs in the workshop or mortuary. One of the lockers stood open; a black leather jacket hung on the door.

  Cooper thought they ought to go carefully with Melvyn Hudson and his staff. Hudson and Slack was the sort of business that survived on reputation. It could suffer badly from gossip and unfounded rumour. Besides, these were people of guarded emotions, practised at putting up a façade. It was difficult to judge whether Hudson did it out of habit, or was trying to conceal some emotion that you wouldn’t want to see on the face of your funeral director.

  McGowan looked up and noticed Cooper. He smiled and flexed his muscles. One of his tattoos moved as the skin stretched. A dragon spread its wings, its mouth opening and flickering with blue flames.

  As he was leaving the building, Cooper saw Vernon Slack jog past towards the compound where the hearses and limousines were parked. Vernon’s bony wrists protruded from his cuffs as he tried to adjust the knot of his black tie. But doing it while he was running only made things worse. The way he moved reminded Cooper of Tom Jarvis’s dog, Graceless. He looked the sort of clumsy innocent who’d end up getting hurt, simply because he knew no better.

  The tree that had been planted over the body was no more than six feet high – a weeping willow sapling with slender, whippy branches and bark that looked almost yellow in the afternoon sun. Below it, the ground was barely disturbed. The earth would soon grass over and blend with the surrounding area, becoming a natural part of the young woodland. Only a small plaque wired to the trunk of the tree marked the spot as a grave.