Simon Beckett - The Chemistry of Death

'It's too hot for this. Don't suppose you want to show us where you think it is?'

He sounded half-hopeful, half-mocking.

'Once you reach the woods your guess is as good as mine,' I told him. 'Just keep an eye out for maggots.'

The younger one laughed, but stopped when the other looked at him balefully.

'Shouldn't you let a scene of crime team do this?' I said.

He snorted. 'They'll not thank us for calling them out for a rotting deer. That's all it usually is.'

'The boys didn't think so.'

'Well, I think I'd rather see it for myself, if you don't mind.' He motioned to the younger man. 'Come on, let's get this over with.'

I watched the two of them clamber through a gap in the hedge and make their way towards the woods. He hadn't asked me to wait, and I couldn't see any point in staying. I'd brought them as far as I could; the rest was up to them.

But I didn't move. I went back to the Land Rover and took a bottle of water from under my seat. Tepid, but my mouth was dry. I put my sunglasses on and leaned against the dusty green wing, facing towards the woods where the police officers were heading. The flatness of the marsh had already swallowed them from sight. The heat gave the air a steamy, metallic taint, full of the hum and chirrup of insects. A pair of dragonflies danced past. I took another drink of water and looked at my watch. There was no surgery today, but I had better things to do than stand around on a roadside waiting to see what two rural policemen found. They were probably right. It could have just been a dead animal the boys had seen. Imagination and panic had done the rest.

I still didn't move.

A while later I saw the two figures heading back. Their white shirts bobbed against the bleached grass stalks. Even before they'd reached me I could see the pallor of their faces. The younger one had a wet stain of vomit on his front that he seemed unaware of. Wordlessly, I handed him the bottle of water. He took it gratefully.

The older one wouldn't meet my eye. 'Can't get a bloody signal out here,' he muttered as he went to their car. He was trying for his earlier gruffness, but not quite making it.

'It wasn't a deer then,' I said.

He gave me a bleak look. 'I don't think we need keep you any longer.'

He waited until I was in the Land Rover before he made his call. As I drove away he was still on the radio. The younger police officer was staring at his feet, the bottle of water dangling from his hand.

I headed back to the surgery. Thoughts were buzzing away in my head, but I'd erected a screen, keeping them out like flies behind mesh. I kept my mind blank by an effort of will, but the flies were still whispering their message to my subconscious. The road leading back into the village and the surgery came up. My hand went to the indicator and then stopped. Without thinking about it, I made a decision that would echo down the weeks to come, one that would change my own life as well as that of others.

I went straight on. Heading for Sally Palmer's farm.

The farm was bordered by trees on one side and marshland on the others. The Land Rover threw up dust as it jolted along the rutted track that led to it. I parked on the uneven cobblestones that were all that was left of the courtyard and got out. A tall corrugated-metal barn shimmered in the heat. The farmhouse itself was painted white, peeling and fading now, but still blindingly bright in the sun. Bright green window boxes were fixed either side of the front door, the only shot of colour in a bleached-out world.

Usually, if Sally was in, her Border collie Bess would set off barking before you had chance to knock. Not today, though. There was no sign of life through the windows, either, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. I went to the door and knocked. Now I was here my reason for coming seemed pretty stupid. I stared out towards the horizon as I waited, trying to think of what I should say if she answered. I supposed I could always tell her the truth, but that would make me look as irrational as Linda Yates. And she might misconstrue it, take the reason for my visit as something more than a nagging disquiet I couldn't explain.

Sally and I had, if not exactly a history, then at least something more than a casual acquaintance. There had been a time when we'd seen quite a lot of each other. Not too surprising, really: as outsiders who'd both moved to the village from London, we had our past metropolitan lives in common. Plus she was around my age, and the outgoing sort who made friends easily. And attractive. I'd enjoyed the few times we'd met in the pub for drinks.

But that was as far as it had gone. When I began to sense she might want more I backed off. She'd seemed puzzled at first, but as things had never really had a chance to develop between us there had been no ill feeling or embarrassment. When we bumped into each other we still chatted easily enough, but that was all.

I'd made sure of that.

I knocked on her door again. I remember I actually felt relieved when she didn't open it. She was obviously out, which meant I wouldn't have to explain why I was there. Come to that, I didn't even know myself. I wasn't superstitious, and unlike Linda Yates I didn't believe in premonitions. Except she hadn't said it had been a premonition, not exactly. Just a dream. And I knew all about how seductive dreams can be. Seductive and treacherous.

I turned away from the door, and the direction in which my thoughts had started to travel. It was just as well she wasn't here, I thought, annoyed with myself. What the hell had I been thinking of? Just because some hiker or birdwatcher had died was no reason to let my imagination run away with me.

I was halfway back to the Land Rover when I stopped. There was something bothering me, but until I turned around again I didn't know what it was. It still took me a few moments before I realized. It was the window boxes. The plants in them were brown and dead.

Sally would never let them get that way.

I went back. The soil in the boxes was baked hard. No-one had watered them for days. Perhaps longer. I knocked on the door, called her name. When there was no answer I tried the handle.

It wasn't locked. It was possible she'd got out of the habit of locking her door since she'd lived here. But she was from a city, like me, and old habits died hard. The door stuck as I opened it, caught on the mound of envelopes that lay behind. They slithered in a mini-avalanche as I pushed my way in and stepped over them into the kitchen. It was as I remembered: cheerful lemon walls, solid rustic furniture and a few touches that showed she hadn't been able to leave behind all traces of the city – an electric juicer, stainless-steel espresso maker and large, well-stocked wine-rack.

Other than the build-up of post, at first glance there was nothing wrong. But the house had a musty, unaired smell, overlaid with the sweet scent of decaying fruit. It came from an earthenware bowl on the old pine dresser, a still-life memento mori of blackened bananas, apples and oranges furred white with mould. Dead flowers, now unrecognizable, hung limply over a vase on the table. A drawer by the sink was half-open, as if she'd been disturbed as she was about to take something from it. I automatically went to close it, but left it as it was.

She could be on holiday, I told myself. Or been too busy to bother throwing out old fruit and flowers. There were any number of possible explanations. But I think at that point, like Linda Yates, I knew.

I considered checking the rest of the house, but decided against it. Already I was starting to think of it as a potential crime scene, and I knew better than to risk contaminating any evidence. Instead I went back outside. Sally's goats were in a paddock around the back. One glance confirmed that something was badly wrong. A few were still standing, emaciated and feeble, but most were lying prone, either unconscious or dead. They'd almost stripped the paddock of grass, and when I went to the water trough it was bone dry. A hose was lying nearby, obviously used to fill it. I hung it over the edge of the trough and followed the other end back to a stand-pipe. As water spluttered into the metal trough one or two of the goats tottered over and began to drink.