S Bolton - Blood Harvest

‘Good morning, ladies,’ he said, wondering where he was going to find the energy to be polite to small-minded, nosy old crones, who were probably only here because they were enjoying the drama unfolding on their doorstep.

‘Vigil, was it, Vicar?’ asked Minnie, her eyes travelling to his feet and then up again.

‘Something like that,’ agreed Harry.

‘Church open?’ asked her friend.

Behind him, Harry heard Evi’s car engine start. He nodded.

‘We’ll help ourselves then,’ said Minnie. ‘Sort you out with breakfast in a minute, Vicar.’

Harry turned just as Evi drove past without even glancing his way. Stanley Hargreaves, another of his parishioners, was walking down towards them with two other men. Then a Land Rover appeared from the moor road and pulled up outside the butcher’s shop. Jenny and Mike Pickup sat in the front. Lights flickered on inside the shop. Dick Grimes and his son appeared from a rear door and came out into the street.

‘They won’t wait for the police,’ said Minnie’s companion. ‘They’ll start just as soon as you’ve finished prayers.’

‘Prayers?’ said Harry.

‘Prayers for the little lad,’ said Minnie, taking his arm and leading him towards the church. ‘For his safe return. Come on, Vicar, you seem a bit dopey, if you don’t mind me saying so. I think you need a cup o’ summat hot inside you.’

Evi wiped her eyes as she drove round the corner and could no longer see the church in her rear-view mirror. They filled again in seconds. Gillian was standing outside the front door of her flat. As their eyes met, Evi took her foot off the accelerator and the car slowed down. But she couldn’t stop – what on earth would she say? She put her foot down again and the car shot forward.

Was Gillian planning to join the search? I’ve spent years walking over the moors, I know all the best hiding places. She certainly wasn’t dressed for it, in a thin denim jacket and high-heeled boots.

A sudden vision filled her mind of a small boy’s body, lying under a hedge. The collies would sniff it out, probably even before the police dogs arrived, and it would all be over.

Stop it. Stop it. It’s not over.

She looked at the clock. Saturday-morning surgery ran from ten a.m. to twelve noon. John Warrington was the GP on duty today. The press conference started at ten and would probably run for around forty minutes. It would be tight, but do-able. There was time. It wasn’t over.

So why couldn’t she bloody well stop crying?

The church hadn’t been empty since before dawn. Within half an hour of Evi’s departure, Harry had been fed bacon sandwiches and strong coffee and was holding an impromptu service for the search party. Someone had cleared away his makeshift bed of the night before. Someone else had told him not to bother with robes; in the circumstances, jeans and a sweater would do just fine.

Five minutes after he started, the building was nearly full. Most people had just remained standing at the back and down the sides, as though they could spare the time to pray, but not the time it would take them to sit down. After eight minutes, the police arrived, filing in silently at the back.

Sinclair and Christiana Renshaw entered through the vestry door and took their usual pew. Gillian slipped in behind the police and stood, shivering, at the back. He could see people starting to get fidgety. A movement in the gallery caught his eye. Gareth and Tom Fletcher were standing there. A second later, Alice joined them, with Millie in a rucksack on her back. The family was due to make a television appeal for Joe’s safe return later in the morning. Until then, they weren’t wasting any time. Harry closed his book.

‘Let’s go and find Joe,’ he said. He was the first to leave the building.

AGRIM DETERMINATION SEEMED TO HAVE GRIPPED THE people of the moor. ‘We’ll find him,’ Harry had heard muttered more than once. ‘We’re not losing another one.’

He certainly couldn’t fault the efficiency of the police. DC Andy Jeffries had taken thirty of the more able-bodied men and older boys to the highest point above the town. Once on the top road, they’d spread out and begun making their way down the moor. They were looking for anything unusual, they’d been told: clothes, toys, a shoe, anything that might suggest Joe Fletcher had passed this way. When they reached the bottom of the field they turned west and did the same thing again, heading upwards this time.

The sky had been thick with cloud. Harry didn’t want to think it could be holding snow, but every time he looked up the lump in his chest seemed to harden. Just before eight o’clock a yellow glow in the east told him the sun was trying to make an impact on the day. He couldn’t even give it points for effort. The wind, mercifully, was light, but the day seemed to be getting colder with every half-hour that passed.

So far the search had been fruitless. Thirty heartbeats had gone into overdrive when one of the Pickup collies had started barking at a clump of rocks. The decomposing hind-quarters of a sheep had been pulled out.

When they’d been on the moor for nearly two hours and the cold was creeping in through even the thickest coat, they heard the steady, insistent humming of a helicopter. None of the searchers could see it above the cloud, but the rise and fall of the engine volume told them when it was coming close, when it was circling away again. After five minutes, Harry wasn’t sure how long he’d be able to cope with the steady assault on his ears. After ten, it felt as if he’d always had the noise in his head. Fifteen minutes after the helicopter arrived, DC Jeffries blew his whistle.

‘The boss is calling us all down.’ He had to shout to be heard above the drone of the chopper. ‘There’s too many people on the moor.’ He pointed upwards to demonstrate his point. ‘The thermal-imaging equipment hasn’t got a hope,’ he went on. ‘We have to evacuate.’

The party turned and headed down to the town.

‘I don’t know what to say,’ Alice was saying. ‘I can’t think of a single thing to say.’

‘Just say whatever’s on your mind,’ said the press officer, a woman in civilian clothing who had been looking after the family since they’d arrived at the constabulary’s headquarters. ‘People will know what you’re going through. This is about letting as many people as possible know that Joe is missing. We want everyone out there looking for him. How are you doing, Tom?’

Tom looked back at her. ‘Fine,’ he said automatically.

She was bending down to him. She smelled of oranges and toothpaste and her green suit was too tight. ‘If anything occurs to you, Tom, feel free to say it,’ she went on. ‘If you have a message for Joe, for example. He may be watching.’

‘Will he?’ Tom turned to his mother. ‘Will he, Mum?’

His mother nodded and Tom felt his throat start to ache.

‘Is it time yet?’ asked Gareth as Tom began taking deep breaths. He couldn’t cry, not on television, not when Jake Knowles might be watching. Except Jake was on the moor, wasn’t he, with his dad and his brothers? Tom had seen them in the church, he’d watched them set off up the road. Jake Knowles was out there right now, looking for his brother.

‘There’s Evi,’ said Alice.

Tom turned round to see Evi wheeling her chair towards them. Funny, he’d always thought of Evi as being pretty. Nearly as pretty as his mum. She didn’t look pretty any more.

‘Vee vee,’ said Millie, from her father’s arms.

‘Evi, thank you for coming,’ said Alice. ‘Do you think you could have Millie? She’ll probably stay with you.’

Evi held up her arms and Gareth put his daughter down gently on to Evi’s lap. Millie grabbed Evi’s hair and started bouncing.