James Hawkins: Missing: Presumed Dead

“I wonder what did happen then.”

“We’ll know as soon as the body turns up.”

“If it turns up,” said Bliss, reflecting uneasily on the prisoner’s supreme confidence. “What about a motive, Pat? Have you any ideas?”

“He says he had his reasons … and don’t forget, Guv, we’ve got the confession.”

“I’ve had at least three murder cases where innocent people have confessed.”

“Why?”

“Just to get their fifteen minutes I suppose. But this one’s different — I’ve always started with the body before — two bodies in one case. Anyway, enough speculating. I guess we’d better go and see his wife; it’s nearly ten.”

The enquiry counter was under siege as they headed out the door. “Bloody vandals … trampled flower beds … tyre tracks in the grass … half-filled a grave …” A balloon-nosed madman in a dog collar was blasting away at the clerk with a pew-side manner he’d honed as a prison chaplain.

“What do you mean, young man — ‘it’s not a crime’?” griped the vicar, “I’d like to speak to someone in authority …”

“Serg,” the clerk caught them with a look of relief, “is it a crime to fill in a hole?”

“Not as far as I know, lad — never has been. Now digging one …”

“What about the Ecclesiastical Courts Jurisdiction Act?” demanded the vicar.

Patterson flipped through his memory of legislation but couldn’t place anything relevant. “Sorry, Sir, I’m in a bit of a rush.”

“Wait,” said Bliss, half out the door. “What did he say, Pat?”

“Something about a … shit!” he turned. “When was this, Sir?”

“Last night … sometime after evensong. I was …”

“Where?” Bliss demanded hastily.

“St Paul’s. In the churchyard, of course. It took three days to dig, what with all the rain. The funeral’s in less than two hours. The family will be furious. They had to get special dispensation from the diocese. Officially the churchyard’s been closed to new internments for the past ten years … no … I tell a lie, longer, probably twelve or more …”

“Sir,” Bliss tried butting in again, but the vicar, having got an ear, was unwilling to relent.

“All recently departed are supposed to go to the town cemetery,” he continued. Then added, “Or the crematorium,” with a little shudder and a face that said he felt that if God approved of cremation he would have equipped humans with an ignition cord.

“Sir,” Bliss tried again, more forcefully. “Please tell me exactly what has happened.”

“Like I said, Constable, someone’s driven over the grass and …”

“No. What did you say about a grave?”

“Filled it in — that’s what I said. During the night. What I want to know is what you intend doing about it. The funeral starts at eleven.”

“I’ll send a team of men to dig it right away, Sir.”

“Please be serious, Constable …”

“Actually, Sir, I’m an Inspector and I am quite serious. If you’d care to return to the churchyard we’ll be along in a few minutes. You can show the men where to dig; we’ll have it out for you in no time.”

“Well, I never,” said the vicar, shuffling toward the door, his faith restored, muttering his intention of writing to both the Chief Constable and The Times.

Sergeant Patterson pulled Bliss to one side as soon as the old man was out of earshot. “Guv, we can’t let that funeral go ahead. It’s a crime scene — Forensics will be there for hours scavenging for clues.”

“I know that — but I’m not going to get into an argument with the local bishop yet. As soon as we find the body we’ll look as surprised as anything and we’ll have no choice but to postpone the funeral and cordon off the entire area. He’ll be more than happy to co-operate, but if we suggest it now he’ll start bloody moaning.”

“Good thinking, Guv … And didn’t I tell you he wouldn’t have taken the body far?”

“Get the car warmed up; I want a quick word with our man,” said Bliss, angling himself back toward the cells, refusing to offer hasty praise.

“We’ve found your father’s body,” he said, poking his head round Dauntsey’s cell door, not bothering to enter fully.

“I somehow doubt that, Inspector,” replied Dauntsey with a polite cockiness that immediately annoyed Bliss.

“Are you going to tell me where it is then?”

“Inspector! If you think I’d fall for a silly trick … I don’t play those sort of games.”

“Suit yourself. I’m off to church.”

Dauntsey’s face remained impassive. “Say one for me.”

“I have a feeling you’re going to need it,” he retorted.

No sooner had they got into the car than the question which had hovered on Patterson’s lips for the past hour sprang out. “So what brings you to the sticks, Guv?”

“It’s no big deal,” he replied with a dismissive shrug, knowing that he was lying, knowing that it was a big deal — a very big deal — and he quickly changed the subject with a note of triumph. “I told you Dauntsey was cunning, Pat. I saw it in his eyes the moment I met him.”

“Not cunning enough for you though, Guv.”

Bliss picked up the sarcastic vibe and brushed it aside. “Nothing to do with me, Serg — it’s just Lady Luck.”

“I guess he wasn’t supposed to get away with it.”

“Cunning though — what a place to hide a body. Who would ever think of looking in a grave, especially when there’s another occupant?”

“D’ye realise we would never have found it, even with an infra-red from a helicopter. The detector would have picked out a new grave alright — even the body …”

Bliss nodded. “And the Vicar would have said, ‘That’s old Mr. So and So. We buried him this morning.’”

“Talk about a close call, Guv.”

“That’s Lady Luck for you — even moaning old clerics have their uses.”

“It’s not getting the luck, Sergeant; it’s knowing what to do with it that counts.”

Bliss drove to the churchyard, explaining, “I may as well get to know my way around, Pat.”

But no sooner had they pulled out of the car park than Patterson started digging for more information. “So where were you stationed last?”

“Various nicks … I got around a fair bit.”

“Which ones?”

“What is this, Pat, the third degree?”

“No. I just wondered why you chose to come here, that’s all.”

Why am I here? he wondered, letting his mind drift, driving on autopilot.

“Watch out!” yelled Patterson, suddenly realising that Bliss had missed a fast approaching red light.

“Shit,” shouted Bliss, standing on the brakes, slewing to a halt with the bonnet nosing into the junction. A cyclist, head down against the drizzle, skimmed across the front bumper, then turned in her saddle to give Bliss a pugnacious glare and stab a rude finger in the air.

“Little cow,” said Patterson, then gave Bliss an accusatory look. “You nearly clobbered her.”

“Sorry,” he said, his voice strained by anxiety, his hands frozen so hard to the wheel he could feel the vibration, his pulse racing through the roof.

“I thought you’d seen the light,” continued Patterson, unaware of the turmoil in the mind of the man next to him.

“Sorry,” he said again then excused himself with a mumble about the unfamiliar roads, the lousy weather and his pre-occupation with finding the Major’s body.

It only took a couple of minutes to the churchyard. The vicar was ahead of them, sheltering under the thatched lych-gate, his black robes and white collar standing out sharply against the fuzzy backdrop of the Norman church, its squat square tower drifting in and out of the murky grey drizzle like a castle’s keep in a fairy tale.