Val McDermid: A Place of Execution

‘According to PC Swindells, she’d knocked every door in Scardale first, though,’ Lucas said drily. ‘Don’t take me wrong. It’s not that they’re hostile to the police. They’re just…not very forthcoming, that’s all. They’ll want Alison found. So they’ll put up with us.’

The car breasted the rise and began the long descent into the village of Longnor. The limestone buildings crouched like sleeping sheep, dirty white in the moonlight, with plumes of smoke rising from every chimney in sight. At the crossroads in the centre of the village, George could see the unmistakable outline of a uniformed officer, stamping his feet on the ground to keep them warm.

‘That’ll be Peter Grundy,’ Lucas said. ‘He could have waited indoors.’

‘Maybe he’s impatient to find out what’s happening. It is his patch, after all.’

Lucas grunted. ‘More likely his missus giving him earache about having to go out of an evening.’

He braked a little too hard and the car slewed into the kerb. PC Peter Grundy stooped to see who was in the passenger seat, then climbed into the back of the car. ‘Evening, Sarge,’ he said. ‘Sir,’ he added, inclining his head towards George. ‘I don’t like the sound of this at all.’

Wednesday, 11 thDecember 1963. 8.26 p.m.

Before Sergeant Lucas could drive off, George Bennett held up one finger. ‘Scardale’s only two miles away, yes?’ Lucas nodded. ‘Before we get there, I want to know as much as possible about what we’re getting into. Can we give PC Grundy a couple of minutes to give us some more details?’

‘A minute or two can’t do any harm,’ Lucas said, easing the car back into neutral.

Bennett squirmed round in his seat so he could see at least the dim outline of the local man’s face. ‘So, PC Grundy, you don’t think we’re going to find Alison Hawkin sitting by the fire getting a tongue-lashing from her mother?’

‘It’s Carter, sir. Alison Carter. She’s not the squire’s daughter,’ Grundy said with the faint air of impatience of a man who sees a long night of explanations ahead of him.

‘Thank you,’ George said mildly. ‘You’ve saved me putting my foot in it over that at least. I’d appreciate it if you could give us a quick briefing on the family. Just so I have an idea what we’re dealing with.’ He held out his cigarettes to Grundy to defuse any idea the man might have that he was being condescended to.

With a quick glance at Bob Lucas, who nodded, Grundy slipped a smoke from the packet and fumbled in his overcoat pocket for a light.

‘I’ve told the inspector the set-up in Scardale,’ Lucas said as Grundy lit his cigarette. ‘About how the squire owns the village and all the land.’

‘Right,’ Grundy said through a swathe of smoke. ‘Well, until about a year ago, it was Hawkin’s uncle who owned Scardale. Old Mr Castleton. There’ve been Castletons in Scardale Manor as far back as parish records show. Any road, old William Castleton’s only son was killed in the war. Flew bombers, he did, but he got unlucky one night over Germany and the last anyone heard was he was missing believed killed in action. His parents had been a good age when young William were born, and there were no other children. So when Mr Castleton died, Scardale went to his sister’s son, this Philip Hawkin. A man that nobody in the place had cast eyes on since he was in short trousers.’

‘What do we know about him?’ Lucas asked.

‘His mother, the squire’s sister, she grew up here, but she married a wrong ’un when she wed Stan Hawkin. He were in the RAF back then, but that didn’t last long. He always claimed he’d taken the rap for one of his senior officers, but the long and short of it was they threw him out for selling tools out the back gate. Any road, the squire took it on himself to see Hawkin right, and he got him a job with an old pal of his, selling cars down south. From all accounts, he never got caught on the fiddle again, but I reckon a leopard never changes its spots, and that’s why the family stopped coming up for visits.’

‘So what about the son, Philip?’ George asked, trying to speed up the story.

Grundy shrugged, his bulk making the car rock. ‘He’s a good-looking beggar, I’ll say that for him. Plenty of charm and smarm, an’ all. The women like him. He’s always been all right wi’ me, but I still wouldn’t trust him to hold the dog while I went for a pee.’

‘And he married Alison Carter’s mother?’

‘I was just getting to that,’ Grundy said with slow dignity. ‘Ruth Carter had been a widow close on six years when Hawkin arrived from down south to take up his inheritance. According to what I’ve heard, he was right taken with Ruth from the off. She’s a fine-looking woman, it’s true, but it’s not every man who’d be willing to take on another man’s child. Mind you, from what I’ve heard, that were never a problem to him. He never let up on Ruth, though. And she wasn’t averse to it, either. He put a sparkle back in her eye and no mistake. They were wed three months after he first showed his face in Scardale. They made a handsome couple.’

‘A whirlwind romance, then?’ George said. ‘I bet that caused a bit of ill feeling, even in a place as tight-knit as Scardale.’

Grundy shrugged. ‘I’ve heard nowt of the sort,’ he said. George recognized a stone wall when he saw it. He’d clearly have to earn Grundy’s trust before the village bobby would hand over his hard-won local knowledge. That the knowledge was there, George didn’t doubt.

‘Right then, let’s head on into Scardale and see what’s what,’ he said. Lucas put the car in gear and drove through the village. At a ‘no through road’ sign, he took a sharp left off the main road. ‘Well signposted,’ George commented drily.

‘Anybody that needs to go to Scardale knows the road there, I reckon,’ Bob Lucas said as he concentrated on driving up a narrow track that seemed to double back on itself in a series of switchback rises and falls. The twin cones of the headlamps made only a slight impression on the darkness of the road, hemmed in as it was by high banks and uneven dry-stone walls that bulged and leaned at apparently impossible angles against the sky.

‘You said when you got in the car that you didn’t like the look of this, Grundy,’ George said. ‘Why’s that?’

‘She seems like a sensible lass, this Alison. I know who she is – she went to primary school in Longnor. I’ve got a niece was in the same class and they went on to the grammar school together. While I was waiting for you, I popped in and had a quick word with our Margaret. She reckons Alison were the same as usual today. They came home on the bus together, just like always. Alison were talking about stopping off in Buxton after school one night this week to buy some Christmas presents. Besides, she says, Alison’s not one for running. If there’s ever owt wrong, she faces it head on. So it looks like whatever’s happened to Alison, it’s likely not happened from choice.’

Grundy’s heavy words sat like a stone in George’s stomach. As if to mirror their ominous nature, the roadside walls disappeared, replaced by steep cliffs of limestone, the road weaving through the narrow defile in a route entirely dictated by topography. My God, George thought, it’s like a canyon in a Western. We should be wearing stetsons and riding mules, not sitting in a car.

‘Just round the next bend, Sergeant,’ Grundy said from behind, his breath bitter with tobacco.

Lucas slowed the car to a crawl, following the curve of an overhanging pinnacle of rock. Almost immediately, the road ahead was blocked by a heavy barred gate. George drew his breath in sharply. If he’d been driving, unaware of the obstacle, he’d have crashed, for sure. As Grundy jumped out and trotted to open the gate, George noticed several paint scrapes in a variety of colours along the rock walls on either side of the road. ‘They don’t exactly welcome strangers with open arms around here, do they?’