Stephen Booth - The Corpse Bridge

Oh, well. He’d soon find out whether it was enough, by what task DS Cooper sent him on next.

Ben Cooper was waiting at the top of the trackway leading down to the Corpse Bridge. He was studying the landscape, trying to achieve an overall view of the topography in a way that he couldn’t get from a map, or even from a satellite image on Google.

From here the bridge was invisible, standing way down among the trees at the foot of the slope. The only buildings within half a mile were those derelict field barns on the Derbyshire side. The ruins had been searched, but nothing else had turned up, no signs of recent activity or occupation. Not even a homeless person or lost hiker would have taken the trouble to fight their way into one of the roofless shells through the tangle of overgrown birch trees and dying brambles.

Each side of the valley, pathways snaked up the hillsides until they reached a narrow B-road and the occasional isolated farmstead. The nearest farms had been visited by uniformed officers, but no one could have seen or heard anything from there. Working farmers were in bed and fast asleep at the time Sandra Blair must have been killed. They’d awoken to the first signs of police activity.

With a frown, Cooper scanned the countryside around. To the south of the Corpse Bridge, the River Dove formed a loop and created that wide area of flat, fertile ground in the bottom of the valley. Lit by a shaft of sunlight in the distance was Knowle Abbey, sitting elegantly among its acres of parkland as if posing for photographers. Only the white scar of a disused limestone quarry immediately behind it created a slight flaw in the picture.

Cooper remembered a visit to this stately home when he was a teenager. His mother had loved these sorts of places. Chatsworth House, Haddon Hall — anywhere the aristocracy lived seemed to hold some strange kind of fascination for her. She enjoyed gawping at the antique furniture and endless family portraits, exclaiming at the size of the dining table and the four-poster beds, wandering round the immaculate gardens and choosing a souvenir from the gift shop. And she wasn’t alone, judging by the crowds of visitors who flocked to these historic houses. Like Isabel Cooper, most of them had far more in common with the servants who’d worked away in the kitchens and pantries than with the aristocrats in the portraits.

Knowle wasn’t quite in the Chatsworth House league, though. While Chatsworth’s façade was a familiar sight on postcards and in guides to popular Peak District attractions, Knowle Abbey rarely made an appearance. The Duke and Duchess of Devonshire were much better known than the Earl and Countess Manby. The Manbys were a bit of a mystery. They never seemed to get their pictures in the papers supporting local charities or opening summer fêtes. Cooper knew the Devonshires by sight, but had no idea what Earl Manby looked like.

A little to the west, conveniently out of sight of the abbey, was the estate village of Bowden. Its quaint stone cottages were inhabited by workers on the earl’s estate. The village had been built for that purpose, so that all the gamekeepers and gardeners and domestic staff could live near their work, while paying rent to the earl as their landlord.

Bowden had its own little church, where for centuries a clergyman appointed by the earl would have preached to his little flock about duty and morality, and about knowing their place. There was a village hall too, and at one time a small schoolhouse for the estate workers’ children. The present children went to school in Hartington and the church saw only the occasional visit from an overworked vicar covering five parishes. But otherwise, Bowden hadn’t changed much.

To the north of the bridge the River Dove came down from its source on Axe Edge Moor. On the Derbyshire side a long string of limestone quarries ran southwards from the town of Buxton along the A515. As a result this narrow strip of the county was left almost isolated between the quarries and the river. There were only a few small communities here — Earl Sterndale and Crowdecote, Glutton and Pilsbury. They were tiny places, with nothing of any size until you reached Hartington to the south.

The hills were strange too, even for a county like Derbyshire. Their shapes looked unnatural, like animals or artificial constructions from the ancient past. This was certainly an area where myths and legends would thrive. You only needed one look at those hills to make you believe in anything.

‘What do you want me to do next, Ben?’ asked Irvine after he’d reported to Cooper.

‘You can come with me to Crowdecote. And then Hartington. The tea rooms should be open now.’

‘Crowdecote? Well, I got the address…’

Cooper held up an evidence bag from among the items retrieved from the body.

‘And we’ve got the key too,’ he said.

The roads in this area were slippery with mud and wet leaves. Farm vehicles had been busy working well into the autumn, trimming hedgerows and verges, scattering more debris on the already difficult surfaces. Cooper drove carefully, conscious of his tiredness, the risk of a momentary lapse of concentration on a treacherous bend.

Sandra Blair had lived in a stone cottage in a small row of them close to the edge of a narrow road that dipped and twisted its way through the hamlet of Crowdecote like a ski slope, dropping down to the Dove. A few yards away, set back from the road, was the village pub, the Pack Horse Inn. And almost directly opposite, a lane swung off towards Earl Sterndale.

The cottage was separated from the road by a short stretch of iron railings. Behind them there was no room for anything that could be called a garden, just a climbing rose against the front wall and a bird feeder with an empty feed tray positioned right in front of the sash window. The cottage hadn’t been decorated for a while, but a carriage lamp and a hand-painted ceramic name plate had been added by the front door in recent years. It had been given the name of Pilsbury Cottage.

‘What car does Sandra Blair drive?’ asked Cooper, hoping that Irvine had used a bit of initiative when he got her address.

‘A red Ford Ka,’ Irvine said promptly.

Cooper nodded. And there it was. A red Ford Ka, tucked into a tight parking area at the side of the cottage, where it was just clear of the road. Did Sandra get a lift from someone else last night to the place where she’d met her death? Or was she another bike owner, like Rob Beresford? Cooper’s money was on the first possibility — it would certainly be much more helpful to the investigation. The second option seemed like too much of a coincidence, at the very least.

‘When we’ve finished in the cottage, the neighbours will have to be spoken to,’ said Cooper.

‘We’ll be looking for anyone who witnessed Mrs Blair leaving home last night,’ said Irvine, looking over the Ka.

‘Or, failing that, someone who can help us to narrow down the time. If a neighbour can confirm when she was still at home, that would help a bit. And of course-’

‘Any sightings of a vehicle calling at Pilsbury Cottage,’ added Irvine. ‘Or the name of a boyfriend, anyone she might have been going out with last night?’

‘Very good, Luke.’

Irvine peered through the driver’s window of the Ford. ‘Are the car keys on the ring with those for the house?’

Cooper jingled the keys. ‘No. Let’s see if they’re inside.’

‘Shouldn’t we knock first?’ asked Irvine.

‘Why?’

‘Well, just in case … there might be someone at home.’

‘Go ahead, then.’

Irvine gave a loud rap on the front door, while Cooper waited, rattling the keys. He was conscious of faces appearing at windows nearby, wondering who they were and what they were up to. There might be a few calls to the local station shortly.