Ann Cleeves - The Moth Catcher

Back in the station, Vera was in the office with Holly. ‘Billy’s pretty sure he knows where Shirley Hewarth was killed. He thinks she was stabbed in her own car. There’s blood on the driver’s seat and the wheel. And then more blood in the boot.’

‘That doesn’t mean Shirley was stabbed inside the car.’ Holly was frowning. ‘The blood on the driver’s seat and wheel could have come from residue on the murderer’s clothes.’

‘So it could, Hol.’ A wide smile from Vera to show them she’d got there already. ‘But the important point is that she could have been stabbed anywhere, then the killer stuck her in the boot and dumped her in the valley.’

Joe wondered why it had been done that way. ‘Could we be looking at a different murderer? Could the body have been left in the valley so that we made the connection with the first two victims?’

‘Eh, pet, that’s a bit elaborate for me. I’m a simple soul. A body turns up a spitting distance from two other murders and I assume they’re connected. Especially when there’s already a link between the victims.’ Vera suddenly got to her feet and grabbed her bag from the desk. ‘Come on, you two. Let’s get out there before the rain comes. Let’s a have a ferret around the valley and see what we come up with.’

‘You think that’ll help?’

She grinned at him. ‘It can’t do any harm and I’m going stir-crazy in here. Think of the time when we worked together on that case in the National Park. It was years ago, Joe. The one with those women doing an environmental survey. They talked about ground-truthing. Checking that their data matched what was actually happening in the field. Sometimes it’s important to do that in policing too.’

Joe said nothing. He could remember the case, but he wasn’t quite sure what Vera was on about.

The three of them squeezed into the front bench-seat of the Land Rover. A bank of cloud covered the sun as they drove out of the town. When they reached Gilswick there was a sudden downpour, the rain bouncing off the dry soil, forming a pool of water in the road close to where Randle’s body had been found. He wasn’t surprised when Vera turned into the drive of the big house. Under the trees it was almost dark. Joe sensed Holly, tense and uncomfortable, beside him. He thought briefly that she seemed even more uptight during this investigation than usual.

Vera was speaking again. ‘I think the killer used Randle’s car to dump his body in the ditch. No other vehicle’s been reported in the valley.’

‘Have Forensics come up with anything to support that?’ This was Holly’s first contribution since they’d left the station.

‘No blood in the boot, but maybe the murderer was more careful the first time. He’d had time to plan it.’ Vera grinned. ‘And as the car belonged to Randle, we would expect to find evidence that he’d been in it.’

Holly didn’t reply and Vera went on. ‘My theory is that after getting rid of Randle’s body, the killer brought the lad’s car back here and left the keys in the ignition. We always thought that was a bit odd. Even out in the wilds, most of us lock our cars and it would have been a habit for Randle.’ She brought the Land Rover to a sudden stop, so it skidded a little way in the gravel. ‘The big question’s this: was Benton already dead by then? And if so, why move Randle’s body to the ditch?’

She looked across at them, but didn’t seem to expect an answer. She shoved the gearstick to reverse and turned the Land Rover to face the road.

‘Let’s take a look at where Shirley Hewarth’s body was found, shall we? It was hard to get any sense of it on Friday night, with the dark and the chaos and all those people milling around.’

She brought the Land Rover to rest by the gate that led onto the hill. Remnants of the investigation remained: blue-and-white crime tape caught in the wind like kite tails, tyre tracks and footprints. Vera got out of the vehicle and Joe and Holly followed. It was unlike the inspector to move unless she had good reason. And in fact she only walked a couple of steps to the gate.

‘You can’t see the new conversions from here.’ She leaned against the Land Rover so that she was looking down to the valley. ‘There’s the dip in the hill that hides them. If that body had been dumped anywhere else, you’d see the car stopping.’

‘You think that’s why Shirley was left here?’ Joe was starting to see the sense in this trip now. It wasn’t just one of Vera’s weird ideas. ‘They must have known that the body wouldn’t go undiscovered for long, though – not that close to the footpath and at the start of the weekend.’

‘Maybe they didn’t mind her being found. They just didn’t want an audience while they were lifting the body from her car.’

Despite herself, Holly was starting to get engaged. ‘That might tell us something about the time of death. At least about the time the body was carried onto the hill. Because you wouldn’t care if you could be seen from the house, if it was nearly dark.’

‘You’d be taking a chance to do it in broad daylight, though!’ Joe thought the idea was crazy.

‘Would you?’ Vera looked away from the hill again and across the valley. ‘You might not be able to see the houses from here, but you’d hear any car coming from the development. You’ve got a view of the footpath right to the top of the hill and down to the burn. I’d say you’d be prepared to take the risk. Especially if you knew the habits of the folk at Valley Farm. Like when Janet O’Kane was most likely to be out with the dogs and when she’d be inside, pandering to that husband of hers.’

‘You think one of the Gilswick residents killed three people?’ Joe thought Vera was mad. ‘They’re old!’

‘Not much older than me.’

‘But they’ve got no motive.’

‘Then we’d better find one.’ There was a rumble of thunder in the distance. Vera opened the Land Rover door and climbed in before them. ‘That means it’s back to Valley Farm to talk to the retired bloody hedonists.’ She slammed her door shut and started the engine. ‘But I can’t face them again today. All that respectability in one place – it gives me the creeps.’

Lizzie woke early when it was still dark and lay still. She’d woken with a start in the middle of a dream: a prison officer screaming at her, his face so close to hers that she could only see his open mouth and yellow teeth, yelling at her that she’d never be let out. It took her a while to realize it had been a dream and she’d still be released that morning. The relief made her feel like laughing out loud, but she didn’t want to disturb the others. There were so few times in prison to feel alone.

She sensed the emptiness beyond her window. The space was like pressure on her skin, her eyes and ears. She imagined herself as a diver or someone in deep space. Of course in an open prison there was more freedom; it was possible to be outside, and her work on the farm gave her plenty of fresh air. But in a way that had just made her confinement more disturbing. It was as if she was constantly being told: You can go this far, but no further.

It started to get light. There was the bright song of a blackbird. Other noises. The day-shift screws’ cars arriving. A shouted greeting. This is the last time I’ll hear this . Not knowing whether she was terrified or exultant. Then she remembered the photos in the book she’d found in the library and decided that the hugeness of the world was a pool to dive into, not somewhere to drown. She loved the image, repeated the words in her head so she wouldn’t forget them, and wished she had time for one more meeting with the writers’ group so that she could share it. She knew the teacher would be impressed.