Ruth Galloway (16 page)

‘Lots of books,' he says, when Ruth comes in with coffee and biscuits on a tray.

‘Yes, I love reading.'

Nelson grunts. ‘The wife belongs to a book club. All
they do is moan about their husbands. They never talk about the bloody books at all.'

‘How do you know?'

‘I've listened when they meet at our place.'

‘Maybe they talk about the books when you're not listening.'

Nelson acknowledges this with a slight smile.

‘Did you find anything?' asks Ruth, ‘from … from Sparky?'

Nelson takes a gulp of coffee and shakes his head. ‘We won't know until tomorrow at the earliest. I've had the letters tested again as well. We're checking the prints and DNA results against known offenders.'

Ruth wonders what has prompted this course of action. Nelson sounds very much as if he has a ‘known offender' in mind. Before she can ask, Nelson puts down his coffee cup and looks at his watch.

‘Have you got a spade?' he asks briskly.

Now the moment has come, Ruth feels curiously reluctant to go out into the garden and bury Sparky. She wants to stay inside drinking coffee and pretending that nothing bad has happened. But she knows it can't be put off and so she gets her coat and shows Nelson to the tool shed.

Ruth's garden is a tiny square of wind-blown grass. When she first moved in she had tried to plant things but they were always the wrong things and nothing ever seemed to grow except thistles and wild lavender. Next door, the weekenders have a smart deck which, in summer, they adorn with terracotta pots. Today, though, it looks as forlorn and empty as Ruth's garden. David's garden is even more overgrown though it does contain an elaborate bird
table complete with a device to repel cats (Ruth fears it doesn't work).

There is a dwarf apple tree at the end of the garden and it is here that Ruth asks Nelson to dig the grave. It is odd watching someone else dig. He does it all wrong, bending his back rather than his legs, but he does the job quickly enough. Ruth looks into the neat hole and automatically checks out the layers: topsoil, alluvial clay, chalk. Flint watches them from the apple tree, tail flicking. Nelson hands Ruth the box. It feels pathetically light. Ruth wants to look inside but she knows that this would not be a good idea. Instead, she drops a kiss on the cardboard lid, ‘Goodbye Sparky,' and then she places the box in the grave.

Ruth gets another spade and helps Nelson fill in the hole and, for a few minutes, the only sound in the garden is their breathing as they shovel in the heavy earth. Nelson has taken off his jacket and hung it on the apple tree. Flint has disappeared.

When the hole is filled in, Nelson and Ruth look at each other. Ruth feels as if she understands now why burials are therapeutic. Earth to earth. She has buried Sparky but her cat will always be there, part of the garden, part of her life. Then she remembers the Lucy letters.
Lucy lies deep below the ground but she will rise again
. She shakes her head, trying to rid herself of the words.

‘What about the candle?' she asks Nelson.

‘I'll do it on Sunday. A decade of the rosary too.'

‘Only a decade?'

‘Two decades and a Glory Be for luck.'

They look at each other over the newly dug grave and
smile. Ruth feels that she ought to say something but, somehow, silence feels right just then. Geese call, high overhead, and a light rain starts to fall.

‘I'd better be going,' says Nelson, but he doesn't move.

Ruth looks at him, the rain falling softly on her hair. Nelson smiles, an oddly gentle smile. Ruth opens her mouth to speak but the silence is broken by a voice that seems to come from another world, another existence.

‘Ruth! What are you doing out here?'

It is Peter.

*

When Nelson drives away, gruff and professional once more, Ruth makes more coffee and sits at the table with Peter.

He looks good, thinks Ruth. His gingery blond hair is shorter, he is about a stone lighter and he even has a tan, something so unusual (Peter has typical redhead's skin) that it makes him look almost shockingly different.

‘You're looking well,' says Peter.

‘I'm not,' says Ruth bluntly, aware that she is wearing no make-up and that her hair has gone crinkly from the rain.

There is a short silence.

‘Who was that man again?' asks Peter.

‘It's a long story,' says Ruth.

Peter is a good audience. He is satisfyingly shocked at the death of Sparky – he did love the cats, she remembers – and properly fascinated by the Iron Age bodies and the causeway. She tells him a little about the police investigations, but not about the letters, and he says that he has read about the Scarlet Henderson case.

‘Poor little girl. Terrible for the parents. Do the police
really think that the murderer might have killed Sparky as a sort of warning to you?'

‘It's a possibility, they think.'

‘God, Ruth. You do live, don't you?'

Ruth doesn't reply. She thinks she detects a tinge of envy in Peter's voice for her supposedly exciting life. She wants to tell him that, far from being excited, she actually feels lonely and rather scared. She looks at him, wondering how honest she wants to be.

It is odd to see Peter in the cottage again. He and Ruth had lived here together for a year. Ruth bought the cottage a few years after the henge dig, still drawn to the Saltmarsh and its eerie, desolate beauty. By that time she and Peter had been living together for two years and there was some talk of their buying the place together. Ruth had resisted, at the time she wasn't even sure why, and Peter had given in. The little cottage was hers alone, and she remembers that when Peter moved out, the house didn't even seem to notice. There were a few gaps on the walls and in her bookshelves but, on the whole, the house seemed to close in on her, satisfied. At last they were alone.

‘I've missed this place,' says Peter, looking out of the window.

‘Have you?'

‘Yes, living in London you never get to see the sky. There's so much sky here.'

Ruth looks out at the expanse of stormy, gunmetal sky where the lowering clouds are chasing each other over the marshes.

‘Lots of sky,' she agrees. ‘But not much else.'

‘I like it,' says Peter, ‘I like the loneliness.'

‘So do I,' says Ruth.

Peter is looking sadly into his coffee cup. ‘Poor little Sparky,' he says. ‘I remember when we first brought her home. She was no bigger than that squeaky mouse toy we bought her.'

Ruth can't take much more of this. ‘Come on,' she says. ‘Let's go for a walk. I'll show you the causeway.'

*

The wind has grown stronger and, as they walk, they have to lower their heads to stop the sand blowing into their eyes. Ruth would be happy to stomp along in silence but Peter seems keen to chat. He tells her about his work, his recent skiing trip (hence the tan) and his views on the government, which had just been elected that heady summer ten years ago. He doesn't, once, mention Victoria or Daniel. Ruth tells him about her work, her family and the Iron Age bodies.

‘What does Erik think?' asks Peter. He is walking fast, striding over the uneven ground. Ruth almost has to jog to keep up with him.

‘He thinks they're all connected.'

‘Oh yes.' Peter adopts a thick Norwegian accent. ‘The sacred site, the power of the landscape, the gateway between life and death.'

Ruth laughs. ‘Exactly. Phil, on the other hand, thinks it's all coincidence pending geophysics reports and radiocarbon dating.'

‘What do
you
think?'

Ruth pauses. She realises that Erik never once asked her this question.

‘I think they're connected,' she says at last. ‘The first
Iron Age body marks the beginning of the marsh, the causeway leads almost straight to the henge which marks the point where the marsh became tidal. I don't know about the Spenwell bones but they must mark a boundary of some sort. Boundaries are important. Even now, look how important it is that we keep things in their proper place. “Keep your distance” people say. I think prehistoric people knew how to keep their distance.'

‘You were always keen on your own space,' says Peter, slightly bitterly.

Ruth looks at him. ‘This isn't about me.'

‘Isn't it?'

They have reached the first buried post.

Peter pats the oak stump meditatively. ‘Will you have to uproot the posts?'

‘Erik doesn't want to.'

‘I remember all that fuss when we dug up the henge. The druids tying themselves to the posts and the police dragging them away.'

‘Yes.' Ruth remembers it too. Vividly. ‘The only thing is … we did find out a hell of a lot about the henge by excavating. The type of axe used to chop the wood down, for example. We even found some of the rope used to tow it.'

‘Honeysuckle rope wasn't it?'

‘You've got a good memory.'

‘I remember everything about that summer.'

Seeing Peter looking at her intently, Ruth avoids his gaze. She stares at the sea, where the waves are breaking a long way out, white against the grey. A stone skims past her, jumping once, twice, three times.

Ruth turns to look at Peter who grins, flexing his arm.

‘You were always good at that,' says Ruth.

‘It's a man thing.'

They are silent for a moment, watching the waves come closer and closer to their feet. There is always the temptation, thinks Ruth, to stay just a little bit too long, to stand on the water's edge until the spray actually gets you. And it's not always the wave you expect, the spectacular breakers hurling themselves against the shore. Sometimes it's the sneaky waves, the ones that come from nowhere, sucking the sand away from your feet; sometimes it's these waves that take you by surprise.

‘Peter,' says Ruth at last, ‘why are you here?'

‘I told you, to research my book.'

Ruth continues to look at him. The wind is whipping the sand up into a storm. It flies in their faces, like a fine gritty rain. Ruth rubs her eyes, tasting salt in the air. Peter, too, brushes sand out of his eyes. When he looks back at Ruth, his eyes are red.

‘Victoria and I, we've split up. I suppose I … I just wanted to come back.'

Ruth takes a deep breath that is almost a sigh. Somehow, she thinks, she had known this all along. ‘I'm sorry,' she says. ‘Why didn't you tell me before?'

‘I don't know.' Peter speaks into the wind so it is hard for her to catch his words. ‘I suppose I wanted everything to be like it was before.'

After a few minutes, they turn round and walk back towards the house.

*

Halfway back, it starts to rain; sharp, horizontal rain that seems to sting their faces. Ruth has her head down and doesn't realise that they have drifted right, northwards, until she sees the hide in front of her. She has never seen this hide before, although she remembers it from the map. It is on a shingle spit, almost at the tide mark. You would need to be an extremely determined bird-watcher, she thinks, to venture this far across the marsh.

‘Ruth!'

Blinded by rain, Ruth looks up to see David standing by the hide holding a plastic bag which looks as though it contains litter. She remembers Nelson shouting at his subordinate to bag up the litter from another hide, the first time she met him.

‘Hallo,' says Ruth. ‘Clearing up?'

‘Yes.' David's face is dark. ‘They never learn. There are notices everywhere and still they leave their crap all over the place.'

Ruth tuts sympathetically and introduces Peter, who comes forward to shake hands.

‘David is the warden of the bird sanctuary,' she says though she does not explain who Peter is.

‘Must be an interesting job,' says Peter.

‘It is,' says David with sudden animation. ‘This is a wonderful place for birds, especially in winter.'

‘I came here years ago, for a dig,' says Peter, ‘but I've never really got it out of my system. It's so lonely and so peaceful.'

David looks curiously from Ruth to Peter and then he says, ‘I saw a police car outside your house, Ruth.'

‘Yes,' Ruth sighs. ‘You know I'm helping the police with an investigation, with the forensic side.'

‘Ruth's cat was killed,' Peter cuts in, to Ruth's annoyance. ‘The police think it might be significant.'

Now David looks really shocked. ‘Your cat was killed? How?'

Frowning at Peter, Ruth says shortly, ‘Her throat was cut. They think it could be linked to the investigation.'

‘My God. How awful!' David makes a gesture as if to touch Ruth's arm but doesn't quite make contact.

‘Yes, well, I was upset. I was … fond of her.'

‘Of course you were. She was company.' He says it like he knows the importance of company.

‘Yes, she was.'

They stand there awkwardly for a few minutes, in the rain, and then Ruth says, ‘We'd better be getting back.'

‘Yes,' says David, squinting towards the horizon. ‘The tide's coming in.'

‘I nearly drowned once on these mudflats,' says Peter chattily. ‘Got cut off by the tide.'

‘Easy to do,' says David. ‘The tide comes in faster than a galloping horse, they say.'

‘Let's gallop off then,' says Ruth. She is fed up with both of them.

As they trudge away, Peter says, ‘Funny chap. Do you know him well?'

‘Not really. I've only really spoken to him in the last few months. Which is why' – she glares at Peter – ‘I don't want him to know all my business.'

Peter laughs. ‘I was only being friendly. Remember that, Ruth? Friendly?'

Ruth is about to retort when her phone rings. For some reason she knows it will be Nelson.

It is a text, short and to the point.

Have arrested Malone. His prints on letters. HN
.