Simon Beckett - The Chemistry of Death

'You looked suitable. Good qualifications, excellent references, and ready to come and work out in the middle of nowhere for the pittance I'm offering.'

'I would have expected an interview first.'

He brushed aside the comment with his pipe, wreathing himself in smoke. 'Interviews take time. I wanted someone who could start as soon as possible. And I trust my judgement.'

There was a certainty about him I found reassuring. It wasn't until long afterwards, when there was no longer any doubt that I'd be staying, that he laughingly confided over malt whiskies that I'd been the only applicant.

But right then such an obvious answer never occurred to me. 'I told you I don't have much experience in general practice. How can you be sure I'm up to it?'

'Do you think you are?'

I took a moment to answer, actually considering the question for the first time. I'd come here so far without thinking very much at all. It had been an escape from a place and people it was now too painful to be around any longer. I thought again about how I must look. A day early and soaking wet. Not even sense enough to come in out of the rain.

'Yes,' I said.

'There you are then.' His expression was sharp, but there was an element of amusement. 'Besides, it's only a temporary post. And I'll be keeping an eye on you.'

He pressed a button on his desk. A buzzer rang distantly somewhere in the house. 'Dinner's usually around eight, patients permitting. You can relax till then. Did you bring your luggage or is it being sent on?'

'I brought it with me. I left it with your wife.'

He looked startled, then gave an oddly embarrassed smile. 'Janice is my housekeeper,' he said. 'I'm a widower.'

The warmth of the room seemed to close in on me. I nodded.

'So am I.'

That was how I came to be the doctor at Manham. And how, three years later, I came to be one of the first to hear what the Yates boys had discovered in Farnham Wood. Of course, no-one knew who it was, not straight away. Given its evident condition the boys couldn't even say if the body was that of a man or a woman. Once back in the familiarity of their home, they weren't even sure if it had been naked or not. At one point Sam had even said it had wings, before lapsing into uncertainty and silence, but Neil just looked blank. Whatever they had seen had overwhelmed any terms of reference they were familiar with, and now memory was baulking at recalling it. All they could agree on was that it was human, and dead. And while their description of the abundant sea of maggots implied wounds, I knew only too well the tricks the dead can play. There was no reason to think the worst.

Not then.

So their mother's conviction was all the stranger. Linda Yates sat with her arm around her subdued youngest son, huddled against her while he halfheartedly watched the garishly coloured TV in their small lounge. Their father, a farm worker, was still at work. She'd called me after the boys had run home, breathless and hysterical. Even though it was a Sunday afternoon, there was no such thing as off-duty in a place as small and isolated as Manham.

We were still waiting for the police to arrive. They clearly saw no reason to rush, but I felt obliged to stay. I'd given Sam the sedative, so mild as to be almost a placebo, and reluctantly heard the story recounted by his brother. I'd tried not to listen. I knew well enough what they would have seen.

It wasn't anything I needed reminding of.

The lounge window was wide open, but no breeze came through to cool the room. Outside was dazzlingly bright, bleached to whiteness by the afternoon sun.

'It's Sally Palmer,' Linda Yates said, out of the blue.

I looked at her in surprise. Sally Palmer lived alone on a small farm just outside the village. An attractive woman in her thirties, she'd moved to Manham a few years before me after inheriting the farm from her uncle. She still kept a few goats, and the blood-tie made her less of an outsider than she might otherwise have been; certainly less than I was, even now. But the fact she made her living as a writer set her apart, and made most of her neighbours regard her with a mixture of awe and suspicion.

I hadn't heard any talk of her being missing. 'What makes you say that?'

'Because I had a dream about her.'

It wasn't the answer I expected. I looked at the boys. Sam, calmer now, didn't seem to be listening. But Neil was looking at his mother, and I knew whatever was said here would be spread around the village the moment he got out of the house. She took my silence as scepticism.

'She was standing at a bus stop, crying. I asked her what was wrong, but she didn't say anything. Then I looked down the road, and when I turned back she was gone.'

I didn't know what to say.

'You have dreams for a reason,' she went on. 'That's what this was.'

'Come on, Linda, we don't know who it is yet. It could be anyone.'

She gave me a look that said I was wrong, but she wasn't going to argue. I was glad when the knock came on the door, announcing the arrival of the police.

There were two of them, both solid examples of rural constabulary. The older man was florid-faced, and periodically punctuated his conversation with a jovial wink. It seemed out of place under the circumstances.

'So, you think you've found a body, do you?' he announced cheerily, shooting me a look, as if to include me in an adult joke that was over the boys' heads. While Sam huddled against his mother, Neil mumbled responses to his questions, cowed by the uniformed authority in their home.

It didn't take long. The older police officer flipped his book closed. 'Right, we'd better go and take a look. Which one of you boys is going to show us where it was?'

Sam burrowed his head into his mother. Neil said nothing, but his face paled. Talking was one thing. Going back there was another. Their mother turned to me, worried.

'I don't think that's a good idea,' I said. In fact, I thought it was a lousy one. But I'd dealt with the police enough to know diplomacy was usually better than confrontation.

'So how are we supposed to find it when neither of us know the area?' he demanded.

'I've got a map in the car. I can show you where to go.'

The policeman didn't try to hide his displeasure. We went outside, squinting in the sudden brightness. The house was the end one of a row of small stone cottages. Our cars were parked in the lane. I took the map out of my Land Rover and opened it on the bonnet. The sun glanced off the battered metal, making it hot to the touch.

'It's about three miles away. You'll have to park up and cut across the marsh to the woods. From what they said the body should be somewhere round here.'

I pointed to an area on the map. The policeman grunted.

'I've got a better idea. If you don't want one of the boys to take us, why don't you?' He gave me a tight smile. 'You seem to know your way around.'

I could see by his face that I wasn't going to have any choice. I told them to follow me and set off. The inside of the old Land Rover smelled of hot plastic. I wound both windows down as far as they would go. The steering wheel burned my hands as I gripped it. When I saw how white my knuckles were, I made myself relax.

The roads were narrow and meandering, but it wasn't far. I parked in a rutted semicircle of baked earth, the passenger door brushing against the yellowed hedge. The police car bumped to a halt behind me. The two officers climbed out, the older one hitching up his trousers over his gut. The younger, sunburned and with a shaving rash, hung back a little.

'There's a track across the marsh,' I told them. 'It'll take you to the woods. Just keep following it. It can't be more than a few hundred yards.'

The older policeman wiped the sweat from his head. The armpits of his white shirt were dark and wet. An acrid waft came from him. He squinted at the distant wood, shaking his head.