White Horse
JOSS STIRLING

One More Chapter

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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

Copyright © Joss Stirling 2020

Cover design by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2020

Cover images © Shutterstock.com

Joss Stirling asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008422615

Ebook Edition © October 2020 ISBN: 9780008422608

Version: 2020-09-17

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter 1: Leo

Chapter 2: Jess

Chapter 3: Leo

Chapter 4: Jess

Chapter 5: Leo

Chapter 6: Jess

Chapter 7: Jess

Chapter 8: Michael

Chapter 9: Jess

Chapter 10: Leo

Chapter 11: Leo

Chapter 12: Jess

Chapter 13: Leo

Chapter 14: Jess

Chapter 15: Leo

Chapter 16: Leo

Chapter 17: Michael

Chapter 18: Leo

Chapter 19: Jess

Chapter 20: Leo

Chapter 21: Jess

Chapter 22: Leo

Chapter 23: Jess

Chapter 24: Michael

Chapter 25: Leo

Chapter 26: Leo

Chapter 27: Jess

Chapter 28: Leo

Chapter 29: Jess

Chapter 30: Leo

Chapter 31: Jess

Chapter 32: Leo

Chapter 33: Jess

Chapter 34: Leo

Chapter 35: Leo

Chapter 36: Jess

Chapter 37: Leo

Chapter 38: Jess

Chapter 39: Jess

Chapter 40: Leo

Chapter 41: Jess

Chapter 42: Leo

Chapter 43: Jess

Chapter 44: Jess

Chapter 45: Leo

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by Joss Stirling

About the Publisher

To Caroline Walsh – thank you for many years of working together. You’ve always been a rock of stability through the ups and downs of the book world – you are much appreciated!

Chapter 1
Leo

Detective Inspector Leo George knew that death was never pretty, but sometimes it had an infernal majesty, like a fallen angel. It opened a fracture in daily life to remind humanity that we were always standing on the edge of an abyss.

The body was stretched out along the back of the White Horse. She rode on the chalk figure cut from the turf three thousand years ago by unknown hands. The hands that put the victim here were equally mysterious, though only the work of a few hours ago. The girl’s blank face stared up at the dawn sky. How long had she been here? Were the skies dark when she died? wondered Leo. This was too popular a destination for walkers to allow for a body to be left here during daylight hours without anyone noticing.

Leo wished he could take her away from this awful stage-setting, but that was not the job.

He moved round the victim with as much care as he could, hard though that was to do in the white boiler suit and blue coveralls for his shoes. These made him feel as if he were in some clumsy mascot suit for a grim Disney parade. He paused to take in the scene from a new angle. The blood had trickled downhill so that it stained the chalk like a cut to the horse’s neck.

Such a waste of a young life.

The girl’s pale skin was now flushed with an unnatural warmth as a finger of light groped in from the east. The sun had just edged over the crest of the Downs, an ancient landscape of trackways and chalk hills. He stood in the dark and silent past while over to the southwest, modern Swindon with its electric lights and wind turbines hummed awake.

The police pathologist, Geraldine Jones, strode down the bank towards Leo. The White Horse lay just off the crest of the hill, best seen from across the valley rather than at close quarters.

‘So, what’ve you got for me, Leo?’ She always acted as if Leo laid out the victims for her like a banquet he had specially prepared.

He responded as usual with a calm recitation of the facts. You cannot bring emotion on to a murder site, no matter how you may hate what you see.

‘Morning, Gerry. Apologies for the early hour. The body of a young woman, Caucasian, blonde, probably in her late teens or early twenties. Dressed in a white robe fastened at the waist with rope – hemp rather than nylon. Single stab to the heart, done precisely, a small puncture wound so there is little blood splatter but she then bled out. No sign yet of the weapon but we’re looking. She is arranged on the chalk-cut horse so she appears to be lying on its back near the neck.’

Geraldine nodded and crossed her arms, taking her first good look. She made a stocky figure in her wellingtons and overalls, auburn hair caught up in a neat coil at the back of her head. You could imagine Geraldine as a vet, birthing calves from labouring cows, or administering shots to a sick elephant. She had chosen instead the life of a pathologist, the last person to care for the dead.

‘Are you thinking a ceremonial killing?’ she asked. The photographer crouched to get a closeup of the hip where it touched the chalk line. A blood-pattern expert took measurements of the splatter marks.

‘Has to be a possibility. The white robe looks handmade. We’re a few weeks off Halloween so it’s not so likely to be a fancy-dress party or student prank gone wrong.’

‘OK, leave her with me. I’ll let you know what I find.’

Leo walked away, consigning the dead to the forensic experts. His scene of crime team were already organising a search of the approaches to the White Horse, with particular care being taken around the car park and footpath that led there. The victim wasn’t wearing shoes and her feet showed no sign of dirt or abrasion, which meant she didn’t walk here like that. She either hiked in, changed, and her belongings were hidden or removed, or she came by car, dead or alive, and was carried. Leo hoped the forensics would be able to tell him.

DS Wong, a young high-flyer in CID, was interviewing the couple who found her. Leo had asked Suyin to do so rather than his other sergeant, Harry Boston, as Harry had already described them as fucking tree-huggers on the strength of the crystals dangling from the driver’s mirror. Leo suspected that the unlucky pair had come up here for a spiritual dawn vigil only to find a very different experience awaited them.

From the snatches he overheard, Suyin had the interview well under control so he circled the car park. Their campervan was the only vehicle apart from those belonging to the police and the National Trust warden. Powder blue, it had seen better days, rust eating its way up the wheel arches. Peering through the windows, he could see piles of blankets, sleeping bags, clothes. A reason and a warrant to search it would be welcome but so far the team was taking the witnesses at face value.

Harry busied himself logging the contents of the waste bin into evidence. It would be sorted out in the lab.

‘Do we have to do the dog bin too?’ he asked, nose wrinkling in disgust. Harry Boston had the bearing and stature of a heavyweight boxer just going to seed but it was wise not to forget he knew how to deliver a punch. Harry was no fan of Leo’s promotion above him in rank, protesting that Leo had not served as many years on the streets.

‘That’s correct, Harry. Bag it all up. There’s no sign of a weapon or her belongings so we have to be certain they weren’t hidden somewhere here.’

Harry knew this; he was just pushing at Leo, chipping away at his authority. ‘Any word on her identity?’ he asked, waving on the constable who had the unenvied task of bagging up the dog waste.

‘I’ve asked Missing Persons to run her, but no luck yet. We will have more chance of finding out who she is when her description goes out on the morning news.’

‘Yeah. She looks too well-groomed to be long-term homeless. Someone is going to notice she’s not where she should be.’ Harry got out a cigarette, saw Leo’s look, and put it away again. ‘The National Trust wants a word.’ He indicated a man wearing a green fleece with the trust’s logo, standing miserably by his jeep. The National Trust managed public access to the site which included the chalk figure of the White Horse and the nearby Iron Age hillfort called Uffington Castle. The warden’s face was grey and craggy, his hair and beard white; he looked like a Biblical patriarch brought unwillingly to modern times.

‘Thanks.’ As Leo walked away, the cigarette came out again. Leo had long since decided to pick his battles with Harry. This wasn’t one of them. ‘Mr Chamberlain? Hello, I’m Inspector George, Thames Valley. I’m the senior officer in charge of this investigation.’

The warden shook hands. He had the calloused grip of a gardener who digs the soil, one of Leo’s off-duty tribe. ‘Bad business this.’ His voice rang deep and resonant, the kind used to introduce trailers of epic films. ‘I spend my life chasing off vandals, advertisers, and druids who all want to use this site for their own ends, but this is worse than anything I’ve seen.’ He rubbed a hand over his face. ‘Desecration, that’s what it is.’

If murder wasn’t so wretched, Leo would have enjoyed hearing this modern-day Moses say words like ‘desecration’. ‘You think the site is holy in some way?’

He looked uncomfortable with the question. ‘Not sure I’d go that far, Inspector, but sacred to our island story. It’s the first great artwork we know of in England.’

Leo turned to look back up the hill. ‘I hadn’t thought of it like that.’

‘It would have had some practical purpose. A sign to warn off outsiders, maybe? But it is delivered with such minimalist style and flair; artists still struggle to beat it.’

Leo had to agree with him. A horse galloping across the brow of a hill described in five lines. It was the spirit of the horse, not one of the Iron Age’s stubby British ponies. It anticipated the arrival of the Arabian horses several millennia later, the same ones that now stocked the racehorse studs thriving close by on the Downs. ‘My colleague said you wanted a word. How can I help you?’

‘I realise my concerns are petty in the face of that –’ his gaze went to the ambulance making its way to the White Horse ‘– but I just wanted to ask how long you think the site will be closed off to the public?’

That was always the challenge for a murder enquiry: the police were stuck at the moment of death while others pressed for life to go on. ‘Shut at least for today, maybe longer, depending on what we find. This site as well as the approaches. I suggest you use the old standby of closed “until further notice”. Are you a local man, Mr Chamberlain?’ He had responded very quickly to the call, getting here only minutes after Leo.

‘Yes. I live in the village just down there.’ He pointed into the Vale of the White Horse where lights twinkled. ‘My house is on the edge of Kingston Beauchamp, near St Martin’s Church.’ Leo knew from weekend drives that the villages in the valley were picture-postcard English with thatched houses, stone buildings, slow rivers, and shady old trees.

‘Would you say it’s a small community where most people know each other?’

He scratched at his beard. ‘People are much less friendly than when I first moved to the area. But I know a few of the families.’

‘It would be helpful if you would look at a photograph of the victim, in case you recognise her.’

‘Oh, I … I suppose I can do that.’ His gaze shifted over Leo’s left shoulder as another van pulled in. That would be more scene of crime officers arriving, hopefully with the blood detection dog Leo had requested to sniff out the trail of the murderer leaving the scene.

Leo drew the warden’s attention back to the photo. ‘I should warn you that this is a photo of the victim. You don’t have to do this, but it would be helpful to our enquiries.’

He closed his eyes briefly. ‘Oh God. What if I see someone I know?’

‘We have no idea at this stage if she is a local but the facts aren’t going to change, Mr Chamberlain, whoever you see in the photo.’

‘It’s just that I’ve never been very good with that stuff. I chose a quiet life working for the National Trust. You need my older brother – he was the one who went into the army. Yes, you need Roger. He lives in the village too.’

He was trying to push Leo off onto his brother which was an odd ducking of responsibility for a mature man. Leo would’ve moved away rather than take a job near a relative who always made him feel like that. Some patterns set in childhood never changed though. ‘But he’s not here and you are. Will you do it?’

Breathing deeply through his nose, the warden gave a nod. Leo showed him a closeup of the girl’s face, one the photographer had taken as soon as there was enough light. He released a breath.

‘No, I don’t know her, thank God. That fair hair is distinctive, isn’t it?’ She was almost platinum blonde with pale eyebrows, suggesting that the colour was natural. ‘No, I’m fairly certain she’s not from one of the village families.’

‘Thank you, Mr Chamberlain.’

He drew a hand over his eyes. ‘I wish I could unsee it now.’

‘Believe me, there are much worse things.’ This girl looked almost peaceful in her death. In fact, her perfection might have been what the killer wanted. That was certainly something to add to the report.

‘I bet there are.’ The warden’s smile was friendly now that the ordeal was over and he had done his bit.

‘Thank you, Mr Chamberlain. No more questions for the moment. We’ll will be in touch if there’re any follow-ups.’

‘You’ll be down in the valley later?’ he asked, getting into his jeep.

Leo rested his hand on the door frame to detain him. ‘She had to come from somewhere. Please don’t talk about the victim to anyone, particularly any details you may have gleaned about how she was found.’

‘Don’t worry, Inspector. I’m not the kind to run my mouth off.’ Leo dropped his hand and the warden started his car. As he drove away, the black Labrador in the passenger seat started barking, lunging at the window to reach Leo, and not with friendly intent.

There came a shout from the footpath that led out of the car park. It went in the opposite direction to the White Horse, along the ancient Ridgeway, heading for the barrow of Wayland’s Smithy, a mile southwest.

‘Sir, sir, we’ve found something!’

Chapter 2
Jess

Flicking through a book on paganism, I was accosted by German elves. Their leader, an Orlando Bloom wannabe, addressed me in what I suspected was Elvish.

‘Sorry, I don’t speak that dialect,’ I said. ‘You could try me with Vulcan but I don’t speak that either.’

This flummoxed them. ‘Dwarvish?’ the elf lord asked, really trying hard to find something in common.

I tapped my pointed ears and then my fake uptick eyebrows. ‘Not an elf – or a dwarf. I’m Spock, or maybe his sister.’ I leaned closer and said in a confidential manner, ‘You see, I’m not exactly taking this seriously.’

Star Trek cosplay was evidently despised by those who fancy themselves one of the Elder Race. The little flock of elves swivelled away in a flap of grey cloaks.

‘Live long and prosper!’ I called after them.

This was brilliant. I just loved it here. Michael’s promise that the Frankfurt Book Fair would be fun had been fulfilled in spades, or in photon torpedoes, as I should say in my current garb. I was in a huge exhibition centre, one hall of many, surrounded by books and freaky people like me who thought donning a costume was a great way to spend their Saturday. I had a little game going with myself where I tried to identify who was who. I was batting about half and half: some good hits, but many whizzed by me, showing me that I was well behind on all the new series that had been spawned by the growth of streaming services. So far, I had spotted the entire superhero universe, or several universes; enough Witcher and Game of Thrones characters to stage a battle between them without CGI-ed extras; some steampunk gangs from … I wasn’t sure where; a few Discworld (I thought) refugees; and a motley selection of assassins, aliens, and warrior princesses.

Michael rumbled up in his chair, not avoiding the soft shoe tips of the departing elves in the squash. His ‘sorry’ did not sound at all sincere. I grinned at seeing him dressed as Captain Kirk in a gold sweater and black trousers, blasting his way through the enemy ships. He did this for me, as his part of our bargain that I come with him to the awards ceremony later today.

‘This place is Bedlam!’ he growled. ‘Has everyone gone mad?’

I kissed him on the cheek in sympathy. ‘Everyone was already mad, Michael. I thought you knew?’

He harrumphed but he was smiling now.

‘How was your meeting with the publisher?’ I asked. We were in front of the display of the shortlisted books for the European non-fiction award that he was up for. ‘What’s the news?’ I knew this meant a lot to him, even though he had been trying to play it down for the last two months since the invitation came through.

‘We’re meeting for coffee if you want to come. Petra’s been promised a place in the top two by the organisers,’ he said, scowling now at his competition. Petra was his editor who worked with him on his bestseller, Type M for Murder, his book on the psychology of killers. He based this on his research in secure hospitals for the severely mentally disturbed. On the table before us, Type M found itself banged up with some strange cellmates. There was the book on modern-day paganism I had been leafing through when the elves arrived, called Pagan’s Progress. Next to that was a lament to the lost ecosystems of the American west coast, entitled Last of the Pelicans. The final contender in this rogue’s gallery was a piece on artificial intelligence with the punchy title You Are F*cked. Is that the last message we’re going to get from computers before they do away with us? I wondered. It started so well with ‘Hello, World!’, but I suppose it was the logical progression.

Michael was getting jealous as I lingered over the opposition. ‘What do you think of them?’ he asked.

‘I see you aren’t alone with the literary pun.’

‘Last of the what?’

‘Mohicans … Pelicans. I thought you’d know that since you know everything.’ I had decided, now we were redefining our friendship after our breakup, that I had been put in this world to tease Michael. ‘I note the dishonourable exception among your foursome. It’s taken the “swear at the general public” route that seems so popular at the moment.’ Any trip to a bookshop meant being confronted by a wall of asterisked covers, your brain supplying the obvious swear words intended.

‘A cliché,’ he sniffed. ‘Cheap ploy to grab attention.’

I secretly thought it worked but he didn’t want to hear that. ‘Absolutely. And you should never judge a book by its cover, of course. That’s what I’d call my book.’

‘You? Write a book?’

We headed for the café where he had arranged to meet Petra. ‘Is that so impossible to imagine?’

He wisely pleaded the Fifth.

‘Anyway, my book will be called Don’t Judge Me by My Cover. Good, hey?’

‘Too many words. Mine’s a black coffee; the lady will have a hot chocolate,’ he told the barista.

‘Don’t you just love that it’s cold enough to have hot chocolate again?’ I hugged my arms to myself. October had arrived and it was chilly here by the doors to the smoking area. I had a pack in my bag but Michael had been moaning at me to kick the habit. Sometimes we still acted like a couple even though we had theoretically got through that.

‘Do you ever stop drinking it?’

He had me there. ‘On very hot days.’

‘Jessica, you always have a cappuccino in the morning, hot chocolate in the afternoon, white wine in the evening.’ He paid for our drinks and I carried them to a table.

‘I don’t!’

‘You do.’

Actually, he might have been right. ‘OK, maybe I do. I’m sure I drink tea too.’ I swiped the dirty cups into the bin to clear a space.

‘Not in cafés.’

‘I’m not paying two quid for hot water and a teabag! I could make that at home for next to nothing.’ I moved a stool so he could bring his chair closer. ‘Some days, though, I have been known to cut out the hot drinks and just stick to the wine. I’m a purist that way. It’s my Drink Wine and Die Young but Happy Diet. I should pitch it to a publisher.’

He snorted in his patrician way. ‘You’re glossing over the risk of liver disease and alcoholism.’

‘Always such a party pooper. Anyway, I’m not being serious.’

‘With you, it’s sometimes hard to tell.’

‘Meow!’ I grinned approvingly at his bitchiness. ‘Point to you.’

His smile turned more reflective. ‘I remember that you did have a phase of drinking green tea.’

That was when I had been with Drew, my ex, who had given me up for the life of a vegan yoga teacher. I didn’t think he had struggled much with the exchange, not like I had. He led me to my rebound guy, Jago, who in turn had swum off into the wild blue yonder on his latest documentary project, with fond feelings and no regrets. My record with men was about as good as my communication with German elves.

Petra approached with a gaggle of her publisher friends. I liked Michael’s editor. I sensed she was hiding him from a life of chaos under the pretence of ruthless efficiency. There was a slightly desperate look in her grey eyes, and an attitude of feverishly attacking life, that I recognised from the mirror. She had her red hair in a feathered cut that framed her face, but neatness went out the window when she was stressed and it stuck up like ruffled plumes on a hen.

‘Michael, Jess, I’ve brought some people I think you should meet before this evening. Michael, this is Tanglewood White, author of—’

‘Yes, I know, Pagan’s Progress.’ Michael smiled tightly at the fifty-something woman with platinum blonde hair that brushed the nape of her neck. I knew he’d very much prefer not to see his rivals as it was far easier to disparage them from afar. He lifted his hand from his lap to the waiting woman. ‘Good to meet you.’

The author made the usual adjustment that people went through when they met Michael. Good-looking guy with glossy auburn hair, seated in a wheelchair, thanks to a close brush with death at the hands of a crazed killer. And what did she see when she looked at me? Smallish blonde bombshell attempting to channel Marilyn Monroe? Only in my most generous dreams.

‘I’m so pleased to meet you,’ she said. ‘I’ve been wanting to meet you ever since Petra mentioned you both. And you must be Jessica Bridges?’

‘Call me Jess.’ I shook her hand.

Disconcertingly, she turned her attention to me, rather than the literary star. ‘Petra said you live in Oxford and look for missing persons, Jess? I mean, that’s what you do for a living?’

‘For my sins.’ Petra had been introducing me like this to her colleagues because saying I was Michael’s definitely-not-his-partner was harder to explain.

‘I’m so glad.’

Odd. I glanced at Michael.

‘I’m afraid Jessica isn’t here to work, Tanglewood,’ said Michael.

I wished I were in the right spot to elbow him. ‘Not that I ever turn work away.’ My bottom line wouldn’t allow that.

‘Good. Great, in fact.’ Tanglewood scrunched up the programme she’d been given, then smoothed it out when she noticed. ‘Can we talk after the ceremony?’

‘Of course. You’ve lost someone and you want me to find them?’ I asked.

‘Oh no. I know exactly where they are.’

I wondered what part of ‘I look for missing persons’ she wasn’t getting. ‘Are you sure you need me then?’

‘Yes, because she’s lost herself and I’m hoping you can help her find her way back. Before it’s too late.’ She looked quickly over at Petra and the woman who I assumed was Tanglewood’s editor. They were ordering generously from the bar for themselves. Don’t you just love expense accounts? ‘I’m sorry. It’s complicated. I’ll explain later.’

My mind was now spinning. ‘Just one quick question: who is this person to you?’

She clasped her hands to her neck in consternation. ‘I should’ve started with that. Sorry. I’m not thinking straight. It’s my daughter. Lisette.’

Chapter 3
Leo

Two members of the search team had found a bundle of material in the hedgerow. Lifting it out carefully, they unrolled it on a plastic sheet spread on the path. It resolved itself into a green cloak and a pair of leather sandals – sturdy Jesus creepers rather than flimsy fashion ones. The female officer held them up in gloved hands.

‘No size marked but I’m a six. These are around a four or a five, sir. A woman’s shoe – or a child’s.’

About the same size as the victim’s feet then.

‘Good work, Diana. Bag them up for forensics. Tag for blood and DNA.’ Leo tried to imagine how they might have come to be there. One possibility was that the girl put them in the hedge herself, tucked out of the way for collection after whatever she expected to happen on the hill concluded. Surely she hadn’t expected to die if she walked in? Those who killed her might not even know where she’d left her things. She could have walked the rest of the way on the short downland grass, which would explain why her feet were clean and unmarked. Alternatively, if they went with the theory that her killer dumped her stuff here, that begged the question why. Why not dispose of it entirely?

He looked down the track to the southwest. If this was a ceremonial killing, then that fact told him that they were going to have to expand the search.

‘Harry, are you done with the bins?’ Leo called.

‘Yes. All bagged and tagged.’ His sergeant stubbed out his taunting cigarette.

‘Take two officers and head over to Wayland’s Smithy by car. Close it off and question anyone you find there. I’ll join you shortly. I’ll take a team and walk there.’

‘You don’t want me on a bigger team on the search of the path?’ Harry was always so ready to second guess.

‘No, our priority is to stop members of the public disturbing any evidence before we have a chance to examine the barrow.’

‘You really think there are two sites involved in this?’ The DS beckoned a couple of searchers to join him.

Just do your job, Harry, thought Leo. ‘It has to be a strong possibility considering the stage-setting of a sacrifice and a second famous prehistoric site so close. I’ll contact you if I find anything on the path.’

Leo took with him the two officers who’d found the bundle – he had a much easier rhythm with them. They fanned out across the path. A well-used route, there was little to be made from the footprints in the churned earth, but Leo couldn’t rule out more traces of the victim in the bushes and long grass along the fence line. They had to look. On this quick survey, there was nothing to find apart from a depressing number of cans and plastic rubbish. A follow-up team would collect it for examination – one slight good thing to come out of this.

His phone buzzed.

‘Good call, Leo,’ said Harry. ‘There are signs all over the barrow of recent activity. Some kind of religious ceremony by the looks of things. I can see traces of candle wax on the top of the stones, some scratches, and a burnt-out campfire. We’ll need SOCOs to go over it with a fine-tooth comb.’

Thank you, Captain Obvious. ‘I’ll send one of the vans. You didn’t go inside the barrow, did you?’

‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist. Just me and only to check there’re no more victims.’

‘Did you find anything?’

‘No. It’s a hell of a creepy place though. We’ll need lights but the activity looks like it happened by the entrance.’

‘We’ll be with you in a few minutes.’

Leo’s small search team approached the barrow from the northeast, tracing in reverse the path the victim and killer – or was it killers? – might have taken. Leo had been here several times when walking along the Downs. If the White Horse was about a space dedicated to the sky, Wayland’s Smithy was about the earth. A long, low mound, nestled among trees, it was fringed at the southern end by four large standing stones and some smaller ones. Sarsen stones, they were called locally; etymology disputed. It either meant alien, as in ‘Saracen’ stones, or troublesome, from the Anglo-Saxon sar-stan. Leo considered the second more prosaic origin was likely to be correct: the rock that was the bane of any ploughshare. Our ancestors found a use for them and moved them here. The two largest guarded the passageway leading into the barrow, a path almost blocked at two places by shorter sarsens. The doorway itself was a simple construction of two upright stones and one flat stone across the top. He didn’t need a professor of archaeology to tell him what those who constructed the tomb had been thinking. As he looked directly into the dark mouth of the barrow, it felt like a womb. Put another way, this was the view a midwife got when delivering a child. We came from the womb, thought Leo, and the barrow reminds us that we return there to Mother Earth.

The six officers stood in silence before the Wayland’s Smithy entrance, taking in the scene. Detective work was about stopping in order to solve puzzles as much as it was activity. They knew that Leo needed quiet to think. In the hush, he noticed a strange ringing in the air and wondered for a moment if his mind was playing tricks.

‘Can you hear that?’ he asked his team.

Harry smirked. ‘Yeah. Put the wind up us when we first heard it. Kyle tracked it down to metal tags on the trees.’

The young officer blushed as he spoke, cursed as he was with the ruddy cheeks of the fair-skinned. ‘Yes, sir. I think they’re put there by the landowner to mark the beeches for his records.’

But any neopagan rite would have loved the special effects. Leo imagined hearing that at night in the candlelight.

‘Are you thinking they started here with whatever it was they were doing, then headed to the horse?’ asked Harry.

‘If these signs are connected, then yes.’ Leo could see them in his mind’s eye: a procession, probably lit by flaming torches, excitement. How many had known that a real death was about to happen? Would someone crack and tell them what had taken place here? Or had that atrocity been done by a smaller, select number?

‘If they were poncing about here, doing their satanic ritual or whatever, it means we’re looking for more than one person involved in the killing.’

‘I agree, but what makes you think that?’

Harry waved to the stones. ‘There were enough candles here to light a cathedral. It’s no laughing matter trying to keep a candle alight outdoors. Tried that for my mother last August – eighty fucking candles on her birthday cake. By the time you get to the last one, the first will have long gone out.’

Thanks to Harry, Leo could see that part now. Acolytes tending the flames while the senior figures in this drama enacted their parts in the centre by the stones. ‘Good point.’

‘Does it look like a c**t to you?’ Harry used a crude word, knowing Leo would have to pull him up on it. It was a war of attrition between them.

‘We’re on duty, Harry.’

‘You don’t mind Old Harry’s foul language, do you, Liv?’ he asked, picking out one of the officers he’d brought with him – the youngest.

She stood to attention, hands behind her back. ‘Actually, I do find it offensive, sir.’

That irritated Harry enough that he muttered, ‘A cult killing involving a c**t, sorry womblike tomb? The press are just going to love this, no matter what you snowflakes think.’

‘That’s enough, Harry. That language has no place in the Thames Valley Police.’ Leo turned to the team. ‘And they can dress it up how they like, light as many candles, chant as many prayers, but this is still murder. A girl has lost her life. It’s our task to get her justice. Let’s do our job.’

Chapter 4
Jess

I sat between Michael and Petra in the Frankfurt Fair auditorium in which the presentation was taking place. This was probably the closest I’d ever come to an Oscar ceremony so I was determined to enjoy it. Sorry to report that the goodie bags weren’t up to Hollywood standard: mainly proof copies of books the sponsors wanted to flog and a few bookmarks for things I’d never read. Here was I hoping for at least chocolate.

However, the organisers had spiced up what could’ve been a tedious hour with presentations on each of the shortlisted books by students from Goethe University. I was amused how each group had interpreted their brief. Michael’s book got a tense drama, a reenactment of one of the interviews in his chapter called ‘The Psychopath Among Us’. All well and good. The response in the room was electric and my hopes rose. They were then dashed as the book on the pelicans got a nature documentary. Someone, presumably the deep-pocketed publisher, had paid for the team to fly to Seattle and film in Puget Sound. It was a frighteningly professional job from the media students. The AI doomsday book had attracted the programmers to come up with a computer-generated piece of music in the style of Beethoven, which the makers called ‘Ode to Despair’. Very gloomy and Germanic; it didn’t win many fans, even if it was a glimpse of our future as slaves of the machine. But my favourite was what they had done for Tanglewood’s book; this had been handed over to the students on the Master of Arts programme and they’d come up with an interpretive dance. I kid you not. Five young people – three men and two women, all in black – dancing to a track that sounded like the weird offspring of Enya and Kanye. The performance involved a ram’s skull, a wicker man, and something obscure to do with stones. I guessed I’d have to read the book to decode that part. It was all very sexual. As they exited to bemused applause, I decided I would totally vote for that book if I weren’t already biased towards Michael’s.

Throughout the presentations, Michael looked pained at what he probably considered a vulgar bid for entertainment.

‘Be grateful you didn’t get the interpretive dance,’ I murmured.

‘Oh, I am. I definitely am,’ he said fervently.

And now the big moment arrived. The trophy sat on a pedestal on the stage: a glass star the size of a dinner plate. Where would anyone put that? Michael had been promised a place in the top two so he could afford to relax a little until the big announcement. First to be presented were the books in the judges’ ‘Highly Commended’ category. These were awarded to Pagan’s Progress and You Are F*cked. The winners didn’t get to make a speech. They passed quickly across the stage to receive their certificate, cheque, and little glass star trophy. Applause was polite and barely covered Tanglewood’s return to her seat. I gave her a commiserating look, then reached over and squeezed Michael’s hand.

‘And now, the runner-up in the Frankfurt Non-Fiction Book of the Year is …’ The announcer had seen too many TV programmes where they spin out this moment. She took her time opening the envelope. ‘Type M for Murder.’

Oh dear. I leant over and hugged Michael.

‘Fucking pelicans,’ he muttered in my ear before pulling away and wheeling himself onto the stage. Over to our right, the publishing team for Last of the Pelicans was already celebrating, attracting much of the attention that should have been given to Michael. I stood up and cheered Michael, then added a whistle to draw people back to his progress to the stage. Petra joined me and this shamed those around us to follow suit. At least Michael received his award to a standing ovation. His winner’s speech wouldn’t be needed though. When he got back to us, medium-sized star trophy on his lap, the pelican guys were already bounding over to pick up their prize as a montage of pelican shots flew on the screen behind them.

‘It’s a zeitgeist thing,’ said Petra in commiseration as the applause echoed around the auditorium. ‘It’s the environment’s moment, what with Greta Thunberg and the fact that we’re all going to die if we don’t stop climate change.’

‘Well, that certainly puts things in sunny perspective, Petra,’ I said cheerily. ‘So, let me guess, you’re a glass-half-full kind of person?’

‘It’s still very good, Michael. And we’re still in with a good chance with the Guardian Readers’ Book of the Year,’ said Petra, wisely ignoring my sarcasm. ‘Keep up the tweeting.’

Michael grimaced. It was exhausting, as he had already told me, finding time to carve out a following for himself in the public arena. He didn’t mind kicking off debates but he hated the ‘vote for me’ aspect of what his publishers wanted him to do. He teased me for my effortless audience of hundreds of thousands for my fake cat lover Instagram account. Well, it wasn’t exactly fake as I did like cats, but I kept it so I could follow back other people whom I was pursuing for professional reasons. They were unlikely to suspect CuteCat4567 of anything other than a dubious obsession with hilarious cat antics. Thanks to regular uploads to my account of new videos, I seemed to have become peculiarly popular … from which I deduced that the internet wanted more kittens, and not politicians, doing funny stuff.

We were both in dire need of a drink by the time the pelican people had done their lap of honour and thanked everyone including their primary school teachers and Susie from the post room. (I might be exaggerating but when have you ever found a list of thanks the least bit interesting when you know none of the people mentioned?) We spilled out into the reception. I cornered an unfortunate German teenager who bore a tray of drinks and took the whole thing from her. She was too shocked to protest. Michael parked up in a corner, I set the tray before us, and we began to make our way through the contents. Petra had vanished. I hoped this wasn’t a sign of waning interest from Michael’s publisher?

‘Jessica, have I ever told you how I like your style?’ said Michael, selecting a beer from the array. ‘No one else would have the guts to do this even though it’s what they all want to do.’

‘It’s my signature move.’ I shifted a crate of leaflets over so I could sit down. The pelican guys didn’t need their material advertising their wonderful lives flying round the world to lament the loss of habitat to rising CO₂ levels. ‘Look at all the trees they’re killing,’ I said, planting my butt on their collection.

As expected, this invitation to knock the winners cheered Michael up. We agreed that the book should never have been nominated. A European book award given to one about America? Come on. What were they like on the judging panel?

‘Kickbacks,’ I declared. ‘I bet the publisher bribed them.’

Michael knew I was only joking. ‘With what?’

‘Cash or blow jobs. Maybe both?’

He spluttered into his beer.

‘Did that go down the wrong way? I’ve heard that can be a problem.’ I underlined the innuendo with eyebrow wiggling.

‘I don’t remember you ever having that problem.’

Now it was my turn to cough on my gin and tonic.

Well-oiled with booze, we were sniggering like thirteen-year-olds when Tanglewood found us. I offered her a selection from the diminished drinks on our tray. She grabbed an elderflower cordial. That was fine: neither Michael nor I were going to dilute our alcohol haze with that.

‘Bad luck,’ I said. ‘To both of you. I mean, what did the pelicans do for us, hey? That’s what I want to know.’

‘You should’ve won, Michael,’ Tanglewood said. ‘There’s nothing original in that book, and yours has such an interesting story to tell, something we all need to understand as we grapple with the presence of evil in our lives.’

‘And yours – I thought they did you a disservice handing it over to a dance troupe,’ said Michael, not at all gauging his audience.

‘I loved the dance group!’ I said indignantly. ‘Best bit of the whole evening.’

‘I quite liked them too, once I recovered from the surprise.’ Tanglewood gave me a little smile. ‘My book is about the reinvention of old ideas so it was oddly appropriate.’

‘How do you mean? Sorry, I haven’t read it yet.’

‘I must give you a copy, if you’d like one.’

‘I’d totally like that. But go on about reinvention. I’m just about sober enough to listen.’

‘Being drunk is definitely an old tradition. We find drinking vessels at all the ceremonial sites. My book’s thesis is that modern pagans often latch on to a fragment of an idea that was once embedded in a whole social context. They lift it out and turn it into something that says far more about our time than about anything authentically ancient.’

Most of that went over my head … and that head was spinning. I attempted a summary and raised my glass. ‘So we agree: psychos and pagans are the business, pelicans are pants?’

‘How much have you had to drink, Jess?’ asked Tanglewood.

I pointed to the empties on the tray. ‘Half of those.’

‘She’s had the wine and spirits; I’ve had the beer,’ said Michael. ‘We are going to have one sick Jessica on our hands tomorrow.’

‘So now isn’t a good time?’ asked Tanglewood.

‘Oh God, our conversation!’ I tried to slap myself out of my merry daze. It didn’t work as I somehow missed my aim and sloshed tonic over myself.

Ah, I see what I did wrong: I didn’t put down my glass.

Michael took it out of my hand. ‘Yes, I think you’d be better talking to her tomorrow. But in the afternoon. Are you staying on?’

She shook her head. ‘I’m on the one-thirty to Heathrow.’

‘That’s good because so are we. You can talk to Jessica then. I’ll make sure she’s sober.’

I didn’t make a very good poster girl for my business in this state, as Tanglewood had noted. ‘Is she any good at what she does?’

Michael paused for a moment. ‘Surprisingly, I have to say that she is.’

‘Aw, Michael, you say the sweetest things now you’re no longer such a dick,’ I said, commandeering another tray of drinks.

Chapter 5
Leo

Leo began his enquiries in the valley with the brother of the National Trust warden. Looking him up revealed that the man’s full name and rank was Major Roger Horatio Chamberlain, formerly of the Royal Green Jackets. He appeared in many social postings of the local VIP kind: mayoral banquets, political campaigning (for the Lib Dems, surprisingly), and among the racing fraternity. Leo chose the major first, not just because he was interested in seeing this paragon of courage, but also because the major was the chief landowner in these parts. A quick search run by one of the team revealed that Major Chamberlain owned the manor at Kingston Beauchamp and surrounding fields, though he himself lived in the converted manor stable, closer to the centre of the village. That kind of man – privileged, well-connected, a big fish in his own small pool – was bound to be a pain in the neck. He’d have the Chief Constable on speed dial.

Leo drove into the cobbled yard and parked alongside Major Chamberlain’s Range Rover. More dogs – this time beagles – ran out to greet him. Tails thrashed his trousers like whips. Gauging their interest to be friendly, he scratched heads as he took in Chamberlain’s home. This stable block was built at a time when landowners spent more on the comfort of their horses than they did their own children. Their sons and daughters were sent to spartan public schools; their prized mounts were snugly housed in heated stalls and tended to with zealous care. In the conversion from stable to home, one wing had been kept to show the original wooden divisions, complete with iron mangers and golden horsehead finials to denote the lodgings of the most notable stallions and mares. The other three sides of the courtyard had become a spacious family home. Apart from the lack of a garden, which was a serious drawback, Leo found himself envying the major’s deep pockets that could afford this.

‘Can I help you?’ The superficially friendly question was delivered with icy disdain. The speaker, a woman in her early sixties with ash-blonde hair, a silk Hermès scarf, and quilted jacket, was on her way out if the evidence of the car keys gripped in her hand was anything to go by.

Leo showed her his warrant card. ‘Inspector George, Thames Valley CID. Mrs Chamberlain?’

‘Yes.’

‘Might I have a quick word – and with your husband, if he’s here?’

‘I’ve a coffee morning in Burford.’

Leo stood firm. Such privilege pissed him off, but he was good at not letting his emotions show. He’d had years of practice, most of them before joining the police. ‘Then I won’t take up more time than is absolutely necessary.’

With a toss of her head, she turned on her heel and went back into the house. ‘Roger! Roger! The police are here.’

Leo decided she must’ve meant him to follow her. It was odd that she didn’t seem curious as to why he was calling. Normally that was the first question. Had something happened to a loved one? Had there been an accident or a robbery? Perhaps her brother-in-law had already told them to expect a call from the police?

Inside, the house got even better. Their manners might be lacking but Leo couldn’t fault their taste. They had left the central wing open so that you could still see all the way down what would once have been the tack room and storage space for carriages. The floor was flagstones with a central aisle of herringbone-laid bricks. Arrangements of furniture separated the room into different spaces for sitting, dining, or watching a large flatscreen. Leo noted that the television was tuned to racing, though the sound was off.

He turned to take it all in. Something was missing. Perhaps it was a little too much like an upscale hotel lounge? It didn’t feel lived in, not in the messy sense of a family who was relaxed enough to allow shoes or opened post to lie for a while before being cleared away. This looked like the Chamberlains expected a visit any moment from a photographer to feature it in a glossy magazine.

A man strolled in from the far end, holding a bone-china mug of coffee. Leo could at once see the strong family resemblance to his brother, though Roger Chamberlain was clean-shaven with white hair slicked back from a high forehead.

‘Why are you making that racket, Madeleine?’ he asked, rather rudely considering there was a stranger present.

She waved her car keys in Leo’s direction. ‘The police. An Inspector George. He wants a word.’

Leo discounted the idea they would offer him refreshments even though he had been up since the early hours and could do with a coffee. ‘Major Chamberlain, Mrs Chamberlain, as you may have heard, there’s been a serious incident on White Horse Hill last night. The body of a young woman was discovered there near to dawn. As a result, we are conducting house-to-house enquiries in Kingston Beauchamp today. So far, the victim hasn’t been identified and we are asking locals if they know her, either as someone who lives round here or because they may have seen her yesterday as she passed through the village on the way to the hill.’ Leo watched them both for a response but got nothing. Not even a ‘how did she die?’

‘What’s this to do with us?’ was what the major did ask.

Leo concluded then that if the National Trust brother, Andrew, were an Old Testament prophet, Roger was more like a New Testament Pontius Pilate, ready to wash his hands of any problematic business. ‘We are seeking to identify her. We won’t know if she connects to you until we know who she is.’

‘Connects to us? How could she?’ Mrs Chamberlain sounded put out by the very suggestion. Apparently, to be found dead on the White Horse was enough to suggest you weren’t one of their type.

‘There are many possibilities. She could be the daughter of one of your neighbours, for example, or someone you recognise from a local shop. I take it you don’t have a daughter yourself?’

‘Of course we do. Two. Iona, whom I saw just this morning, and Ella.’

‘Is Ella here?’ If the parents refused to be helpful, perhaps the daughters would be better subjects for his questions.

‘Obviously not. She’s in South Africa on her gap year.’

And how was Leo supposed to have known that? ‘The girl might be one of your daughters’ acquaintances, someone you would know by sight.’ He was hesitant to show them the same photo he had showed the brother. It sounded very unlikely it was either of their girls – surely the uncle would’ve identified her? – but he couldn’t be certain of that. The warden had just glanced at the image and the girl’s eyes were shut.

‘Describe her,’ rapped out the major, as if Leo were some junior officer reporting to him.

‘I have an image I could show you. It’s of the body so I will understand if you’d prefer not to see it.’

‘Too right I’d prefer not to see it. Had enough of that in the army. Describe her. Distinguishing features and whatnot.’

Leo gave them a brief summary: age, height, likely weight, colouring …

‘Very blonde hair, you say?’ interrupted the major, showing his first spark of interest. ‘It’s not us you want then; it’s my tenant at the manor. He surrounds himself with blondes.’

‘Awful man,’ muttered Madeleine.

‘But he pays up on time. That’s more than I can say for that friend of yours from Cheltenham.’

Before they launched into a domestic argument, Leo tried to get the interview back on track. ‘And what is your tenant’s name?’

‘On the lease he’s down as Terence O’Brien, but in his little commune of nubile beauties, he’s known as Father Oak.’ Was that an envious glint in the major’s eye?

‘Father Oak?’

Major Chamberlain snorted. ‘Exactly. He’s got some New Age scam running, a sort of commune thing. Druidic and Karma Sutra hotchpotch. But as everyone appears above the age of consent and they keep the grounds beautifully, I say “live and let live”.’

Madeleine rounded on Leo with her steely glare, standing shoulder to shoulder with her husband. She acted as if the policeman had taken issue with their choice of tenant. ‘It’s a free country, Inspector.’

That was not a matter that Leo felt he needed to weigh in on. It was a much more complex question than that throwaway comment suggested. He glanced down at the notes he had taken. ‘To sum up, you don’t know any young women locally with strikingly blonde hair, apart from the ones living in your manor?’

‘I wouldn’t say we know those women either. We are aware of them,’ corrected the major.

‘Did either of you notice any strange activity around the village last night? Anyone heading up the hill to either Wayland’s Smithy or the White Horse?’

‘We played bridge here with the Frazers last night. We didn’t go out, did we, Madeleine?’

‘Exactly. So we can be of no further use to you. Really, Inspector, I have to go.’ Madeleine gave Leo a chilly nod as she passed him on her way to the car.

There was something Leo wanted to look at more closely before he left. He needed just a moment alone. ‘Do you have a contact number for your tenant, Major Chamberlain?’

‘In my files.’ His gaze slid past Leo to latch onto the screen where a race was just lining up in the starting gates, the horses shying and bucking.

‘I’d be very grateful if you could dig that out.’ Leo gave no sign of moving. If the major wanted to catch that race, his quickest route to doing so was by giving the policeman what he wanted.

With a huff, he gave in. ‘One moment then.’

As he disappeared back through the door through which he had entered, Leo moved closer to the grand piano with its collection of family photos in silver frames. The Chamberlains were pictured in variations of the same pose with their two girls, shown at different ages. The older one had dark hair and the younger fair; there appeared to be at least a ten-year age gap between them. The pictures went all the way up from infancy to the early twenties and thirties of the pair. The most recent image showed a smiling young woman in a bridesmaid’s dress of gold silk. She stood alongside the dark-haired bride in the doorway of what Leo recognised as the local church, St Martin’s. The groom wasn’t present for that moment, or if he had been, then he’d been cropped out. The bridesmaid wore a garland of wild flowers woven with corn, giving the impression of being gold all over. Her hair rippled forward over her shoulders. She was quite stunning, even putting her attractive sister in the shade. Unfortunately, she also looked disconcertingly like the victim, though her hair was wavy rather than straight and perhaps a shade darker.

‘They’re my daughters, Inspector. Ella. Iona.’ Roger handed Leo a Post-it with a number written on it. ‘That’s Iona’s wedding earlier this year.’

‘You’re sure Ella is in South Africa?’ Leo asked.

He immediately returned to the defensive. ‘Do you think I don’t know where my own daughter is?’

‘You wouldn’t be the first parent to lose track of the whereabouts of their grown-up children.’

‘Well, I haven’t. Goodbye, Inspector.’ And very firmly, he showed Leo to the door.

Leo wasn’t going to give up so easily. Something about this couple got under his skin and made him want to dig in his heels. ‘Does Iona live locally?’ Leo asked on the threshold, thinking that if the father wouldn’t answer questions then maybe the oldest daughter would.

‘Yes.’

It was like getting blood from a stone. ‘And where can I find her?’

‘At the vicarage. She’s the rector here.’

Leo felt as if he’d missed a step. That hadn’t come up in the searches. ‘I see.’

For the first time, the major revealed a glimpse of a deeply-buried sense of humour. ‘That’s what I thought at first. Now I’m used to it. Not that either Madeleine or I are God-botherers ourselves. But if you’d seen Iona at nineteen, you wouldn’t have expected her to seek ordination a decade later.’

Naturally, the local vicar was on the list of people to interview. This was all useful stuff. Leo felt a little less resentful of their stiff-necked reception. He gave the most persistent of the beagles another pat as a peace offering.

‘Thank you, Major.’

There was no ‘good luck with your enquiries’ or anything like that. Roger simply shut the door and went back to watch the three o’clock at Newmarket.

They were an odd couple. Leo tried and failed to imagine what growing up in that household had been like. They almost made him thankful for his own dysfunctional mother. At least he had never doubted that she was human.

***

St Martin’s was bathed in the glow of honeyed autumn light as Leo approached the main doors. It was a blocky chalk building with a square tower topped by a pitched grey roof. You could feel the Anglo-Saxon roots here; no fancy Gothic flourishes or Norman excesses. Former parishioners lay in neat rows, many headstones leaning in the same slightly drunken orientation away from the building, like they were straining to look up to the tower. The door was open, so Leo went inside.

‘Hello?’

The nave was very narrow, with no side aisles. A cold white light gave it an underwater feel, like he had plunged into the Arctic ocean. On the whitewashed walls were the usual tributes to past squires and ladies, but at the altar end a local artist of not-so-many generations ago had been let loose. Under the influence of the Pre-Raphaelites, they had left a fabulous frieze of red vines with hanging grapes, which stood out starkly against the creamy plaster. The vines curled up either side of the choir towards a painting of two blue-clad angels kneeling above the altar. It was an unexpected jewel. For Leo, this was a little slice of heaven. An urge just to sit down and take it in stole over him. He wished he could let the tendrils curl around him and root him to the spot.

‘Magnificent, isn’t it?’ The rector approached from behind, a pumpkin embraced in her arms to add to the harvest display that was accumulating by the altar. Less polished today than in her wedding photo, she was still an attractive woman with her bob of dark hair and large hazel eyes. Leo imagined they were around the same age, mid-thirties, the see-saw point between youth and middle age. It was odd to think of someone of his own generation being a vicar. He had always pictured priests to be old men in faded cassocks. The Reverend Iona had surprised him a little by wearing denim and a fleece, just like his friends would.

‘Iona Chamberlain?’

‘Chamberlain-Turner.’ She lodged the pumpkin on a pew and offered her hand. ‘Couldn’t just take my husband’s name as it would sound like a boast.’

It took Leo a moment to compute. I own a Turner.

‘I don’t know what my parents were thinking. At least Jimmy isn’t a Bucket or a Stamp.’ She gestured to a couple of the memorials which were indeed in those names. ‘Could be worse.’

Leo chuckled. ‘I met your parents earlier. We’re making house-to-house enquiries.’

‘And you’ve made your way from the house of Chamberlain to the house of God? Fair enough.’ She literally invited Leo to take a pew. ‘I suppose this is about the poor girl found up on the Downs. How can I help?’ Unlike her mother, this sounded a genuine offer.

‘You’ve heard already?’

‘I’m the vicar; of course I’ve heard.’ She smiled slightly. ‘First port of call for any trouble.’

‘Really?’

‘I had my uncle who you met earlier in here in a state, telling me about it but swearing me to secrecy until you’ve made an official statement. Poor Uncle Andrew, he doesn’t deal well with stress.’

‘He said he didn’t recognise the victim, so I was wondering if you’d be willing to look at a photo of her?’ Leo explained that it was postmortem, but that didn’t seem to faze her. He supposed that vicars, like policemen, must see a lot of dead people as part of their job consoling the grieving.

‘Let’s have a look.’

Leo felt he had to say something before she did that. ‘I did notice that she bore some resemblance to your sister … from the family photos.’

‘Ella? Oh, Ella’s in South Africa.’

‘So your parents said.’ Leo held out the screen, but watched her face carefully. ‘Do you know who she is?’

The shock was instant. ‘I … I … no, it can’t be.’ She shook her head and took the phone from him to enlarge the picture so she could see the features in greater detail. ‘Oh my God. Ella? No. It has to be someone who looks very like her. The hair’s wrong – too short, too straight, too fair.’ She was grasping at straws of hope.

‘Is there any way of checking if Ella is really in South Africa? Just to rule her out?’ Leo asked gently.

Iona rested her head on her arms supported by the pew in front. ‘It’s just the shock. Sorry, what did you ask? Ella? Oh, no – at least, not easily. She’s working at an orphanage way out in the wilds. No phone reception and only intermittent emails.’

Leo’s unease grew with each of these admissions. ‘Does your sister have any distinguishing features? A scar or a tattoo maybe?’

‘Aside from her hair? She has her tramp stamp.’ Iona blinked like an owl dragged into daylight. ‘Never told our parents. It’s vine leaves, like these ones in the sanctuary, but in the shape of angel wings. Designed it herself. She’s clever that way. There’s a tattoo artist in the next village who does them; it’s a kind of cottage industry.’

Leo sent a quick text to the pathologist. ‘OK, I’ll get that checked out. Can I get someone for you while we wait?’

Having taken her moment, Iona was now rallying. ‘It’s fine. Just a superficial likeness. Has to be. God, I’ve been missing her. I’m seeing her everywhere.’

‘How long’s she been gone?’

‘Flew in and out again for my wedding, which was about four months ago. I didn’t really see her properly. You know how it is; you don’t get to talk to anyone at your own wedding. Too busy.’

He didn’t actually know, never having been married. ‘And the last message?’

‘Two weeks ago. Just the usual “I’m fine, how are you?”’

‘Any photos? News about her work?’

Iona shook her head. ‘One thing to understand about Ella is that she doesn’t like any of us knowing what she’s up to. I only know about the tattoo because of the fittings for her bridesmaid’s dress.’

Leo got an instant reply back from Gerry.

No tattoo on back. One on shoulder. Heart made of two entwined flowers. Sweet peas.

Some of his tension unwound.

‘I’ve had confirmation. Nothing on the lower back of our victim.’

‘Good. I mean, not good, obviously. Someone is still dead.’

‘I know what you meant.’

‘Just had a bad moment there.’ Iona braced herself. ‘OK, I’m back online. Do you have any more questions for me?’

‘I’m afraid so. Were you here last night?’

She grimaced. ‘I suppose you have to ask everyone for their alibi, don’t you? I was. I began decorating for Harvest Festival with a few of my local ladies. I can give you their names. I find I quite like doing that kind of thing. The artistic challenge of it.’

‘What time did you leave the church?’

‘About nine. Went straight home.’

‘Where’s the rectory?’

‘It’s not the draughty old house next to the church, if that’s what you’re asking. The church sold that years back. The Frazers live there now. Bankers.’ She shrugged, in an accepting way. ‘We’ve a new house in a little development on the edge of the village near the river. Much easier to heat.’

That was on the opposite side of Kingston Beauchamp from the hill.

‘How did you get there?’

‘Drove. I was ferrying fruit and veg all evening. Normally I’d walk or cycle.’

‘Did you notice any unusual traffic, or anything out of place?’

‘Nothing out of the ordinary. The pub was busy. It’s a popular place. We get a lot of outsiders passing through. I guess that’s what she was, poor girl. I was tucked up with my husband by nine-thirty. Neither of us went out again. We’re watching a box set about drug lords for relaxation.’ She laughed at herself. ‘I know; that sounds wrong.’

‘Sounds pretty normal to me. Your parents suggested that if I were looking for young, fair-haired women I should try the manor and someone called Father Oak.’

‘Terry O’Brien? I suppose that makes sense. He does love to surround himself with girls of that kind.’ She now looked sad and weighed down by care – not the result of Leo’s questions but something more permanent, he would guess. ‘What do you see around here, Inspector?’ She gestured to the church.

‘Really, I’m not sure …’

‘Please. Humour me.’

‘I see a gem of a building, a sense of ages past.’

‘That’s what visitors expect and it’s what they get if they drop in for a few minutes. But the truth is far different if you stay for more than an hour or two. You haven’t asked me why I came back to minister here.’

‘I assumed to be near your parents?’

She gave a hollow laugh. ‘You didn’t spend long with them then? No, not that. They would much prefer me to have stayed in Cambridge where I trained. That at least sounded respectable, serving from a distance. They weren’t happy when I felt called back here.’

‘So what called you?’

‘There’s a battle here. I saw it as a child.’

‘A battle?’

‘Against the forces of darkness.’

And he had been liking her so much … ‘Right.’

‘You’re not a man of faith, Inspector?’

‘I’m not much of a joiner. I keep my views to myself.’

‘Yes, I can see that.’ And Leo felt uncomfortably that she did see him rather too clearly. ‘I’m a moderate person. I don’t have the fire of a martyr like St Martin.’ She smiled self-deprecatingly. ‘But I do believe that some people, some places, are given over to evil. Surely as a policeman you must come across that?’

‘In the people, yes, maybe. Some killers are sick or inadequate, but some you come across for whom there is no explanation or excuse. But places? No, they’re just that: places. Not good or bad unless we make them so.’

‘I think I would’ve agreed if I hadn’t lived here all my life. This place is just difficult. St Martin’s is the single beacon of light in the village – or I try to make it so. I’ve got other parishes in my care, other churches, but this one is far and away the most challenging spiritually. It might look like a postcard, but something is wrong here.’

‘What kind of wrong?’

She rubbed her face, looking almost sheepish. ‘God, I just know that you’re going to hate what I say next.’

‘Try me. I’ve just come from a murder scene. I might be more sympathetic than you expect.’

She still feared his scepticism. ‘I know it’s a lot for a logical person to believe, but there is a spiritual war being waged here. I don’t know if it comes from inside a person, or if they open themselves to something out there, but it’s real. For the moment, the darkness is winning, and has been for centuries.’

It was relevant that he was dealing with a ceremonial killing. There had to be others around who took their twisted version of religion seriously if they were murdering for it. Iona might know something that would help him, names even of people involved in the rituals. ‘And do you have a source for this darkness, a name or names?’

‘No single source. It’s just outside the door – in the people who live here, the woods, the stones and the rivers. It looks very ordinary but this place does extraordinarily wrong things, and makes me very aware of my own failings.’ She rose to her feet. ‘But, speaking more practically for your purposes, I would say starting with O’Brien would be a good way to go.’

He got up from the pew. ‘Thank you. That’s most helpful.’

She walked with him to the door, something she doubtless did for many visitors who crossed this threshold in all stages of hope and despair. ‘Mind how you go, Inspector.’

He lifted a hand in acknowledgement as he headed out.

‘I mean that sincerely. Watch your back. This isn’t a place you can trust.’

He left her in the doorway where she had stood for the wedding photo with her sister. Only now did he notice the wreath of plaited straw with corn dollies hanging over the lintel. The straw girls, held by threads around their necks, swayed in the wind like bells.

Chapter 6
Jess

I hated myself. And I hated – what was it? – Prosecco mixed with gin and tonic. And maybe a martini … or two?

I knew before I started drinking that I would feel like this the next day, but did that stop me? Did it hell! And now I was paying the piper. I just wished he’d stop blowing his bloody bagpipes in my skull.

Oh no, not pipes. That was the calming ‘you’re about to take off and possibly crash and die’ music airlines think will get us in the right mood for the short play they do on each flight. Why do they like to remind us of all the horrific possibilities? Before they told me, I hadn’t been thinking of running for the nearest emergency exit, asphyxiating as the air fails, getting lost at sea with just a little light on my life jacket to show rescuers where I was. Now I could think of nothing else, apart from my throbbing head, that was.

Michael considered my condition amusing. I remembered that I hated him too and told him so.

‘No, you don’t,’ he said, adjusting the window blind for this short flight back to London. ‘I got you extra legroom.’

It was the case that, as Michael’s plus one, I got to sit next to him on the row at the front. His wheelchair had been stowed in the hold and he had travelled here via a combination of airport golf cart and crutches. I wasn’t much help as I’d felt like throwing up during the transfer. I thought the aircrew had me down as a complete waste of space and a failure as a companion – both of which were true.

By the time we were airborne and I’d downed a bottle of water and a couple of painkillers, I was feeling a little more human. Michael noticed.

‘Tanglewood is in 8A,’ he told me, prodding me with the cheery disaster leaflet from the seat pocket. ‘There’s an empty seat next to her if you’re up for a conversation.’

Oh yes, the lost-but-not-missing daughter. It would at least distract me from the dull pain behind my eyes.

Once the seatbelt light was switched off, I headed down the aisle before the drinks cart could mow me down.

‘May I join you?’ I asked Tanglewood.

The fat guy (sorry, but it’s true) in the aisle seat was none too pleased that I squeezed past him and forced his pudge back onto his side of the armrest. They really should sell seats on width as well as legroom.

‘How are you feeling?’ asked Tanglewood.

‘Like I should’ve listened to my good angel last night, but it’s always the little demon on my other shoulder that seems to have the most fun. She made me do it.’

‘You are looking a little pale.’

‘Pale and interesting, I hope?’

‘Pale and close to vomiting.’

I leant back and closed my eyes. ‘Sadly, that’s accurate but I can manage if you just tell me what I need to know. I’ll listen even if I don’t say much.’

The drinks cart caught up with us and Tanglewood ordered a Bloody Mary. ‘Can I get you anything, Jess?’

‘A tranquilliser gun, loaded for a rhino?’ I suggested. Sleep would be good right now.

‘I don’t think they stock those.’

‘Ginger beer then.’ I was hoping that would settle my stomach.

Once our drinks were balanced on her tray table, she began her story. I rested my head and tried to concentrate.

‘Lisette is my only child. I was last with her two years ago after she graduated. Then, she was twenty-one, bright, passionate about the environment … a joy to behold. She said she was looking for somewhere to put her energy. I made all of those motherly suggestions – graduate training schemes, working for an environmental charity, even VSO, but none of that was what Lisette White wanted. No thank you, Mother. Now she’s twenty-three and hates me; she cut off all contact.’

‘Is there a Mr White? I mean, Lisette’s father? Is he in contact?’

‘No, he’s never been in the picture. I conceived Lisette through a sperm donor. I was in my late thirties, aware of the biological clock ticking and there was no prospective man in my life so I took matters into my own hands.’

The man next to me grumbled and prodded me with his elbows as he plugged himself into noise-cancelling headphones. At least now we had privacy.

‘Literally your own hands, like with a turkey baster, or via a clinic?’ I was a details kind of person.

This shocked a laugh out of her. ‘Clinic! A clinic!’

‘It’s just that you hear of … OK, never mind. Go on.’

‘I believed that Lisette had never felt the lack of a father, that I was enough for her. And my parents were alive then. My own father was an excellent role model.’

I elbowed the fat guy back as I shifted. ‘It’s OK, Tanglewood, you don’t have to justify your choices to me. But if you do want an opinion, that all sounds fine and natural. Well, not exactly natural, but fine. Loads of people grow up in unconventional family settings these days.’ I was blithering so I shut up.

Her voice turned wistful. ‘Lisette started raising the subject of her biological father when she turned eighteen. She wanted to know if there was any way of tracing the donor. The anonymity law was changed in 2005 but that was too late for her as it wasn’t retroactive. It depends on whether the donor chose to lift his anonymity. Last I heard, he hadn’t and that sent her into a … well, a lost state. I think she was looking for some replacement father figure. She ended up joining this peculiar community near Oxford. It’s in a village called Kingston Beauchamp. Have you heard of it?’

I shook my head, regretted the movement, then said, ‘No, but I’ve not lived in Oxford long.’

‘It’s out towards Swindon in the Vale of the White Horse.’

That was undiscovered country to me as I didn’t have a car. ‘Right, the geoglyph.’

‘You actually know what that is? I’m impressed.’

‘Earth pictures, like the Nazca monkey in Peru and the Marree man in Australia.’

‘That’s right. I thought only a few people in my academic area talked about them.’

‘I like that stuff and I go down lots of rabbit holes on YouTube. Landing zones for UFOs and all that? The theories are so crazy they make me feel sane.’ I’d better change the subject. I was admitting rather too much. ‘What kind of community has she joined?’

‘They call themselves the Children of the White Horse.’

I pulled a face. ‘I hadn’t realised your daughter’s search for a father had gone quite so bestial.’

Tanglewood gave a sour laugh. ‘It’s a cult really, or a scam. I can’t work out if the leader actually believes what he preaches.’

‘It has to be a “he”, of course.’

‘He calls himself Father Oak.’ Her tone was admirably sarcastic. ‘He likes beautiful young women. Like my daughter.’

‘So you think she’s got tangled up – sorry, no pun intended – with some scammy sex cult?’

‘Druidic spiritual exploration, according to the website. Lisette told me she thought I’d approve, seeing as how I study these things for a living. I don’t approve. This one is rooted in nothing but the ego and earthy imaginings of Father Oak. I can’t see a genuine druid recognising any of his beliefs in what that man teaches. Anyone who knows anything about ancient belief systems would laugh at it.’

‘You told your daughter this?’

‘I did.’

‘And let me guess … she said you didn’t understand, that sexy Oakman knew better than you, which means she now knows better than you, and you should stop raining on her druidic parade?’

‘Or words to that effect.’

‘OK. I get that, but what do you think I can do about it? I would think it’s a question of time until she gets fed up with the lifestyle or sees through the guru.’

‘Archpriest apparently.’

‘Archpriest Oak. Wow. That doesn’t sound corny or anything.’

‘That’s what I hoped for the first eighteen months – that Lisette would see how bogus this all was. But now I’m no longer content to do nothing and let the brainwashing continue. She’s not going to come to the realisation on her own. She needs help.’

‘What kind of help? Isn’t this more Michael’s bag, something needing psychological intervention?’

‘No, I need a more practical intervention.’

‘Like what?’

‘I need you to join the cult and persuade her to leave.’

‘What?’ I opened my eyes with a jolt. Yes, she was still there and I hadn’t dropped off to sleep.

‘I’ll pay you very well for your time. Twenty thousand pounds – that’s what I can pull together from my savings. I can’t reach her so I’ve decided that I’ll spend every last penny getting her out. Will you help?’

I rubbed my eyes. ‘Am I still drunk? You’ll pay me twenty thousand pounds to join a sex cult?’

‘Ten thousand up front. The other ten if you get her out.’

It was time to be honest. ‘For that money you can get someone better. I did work undercover recently on a film set but in very different circumstances. I don’t have a lot of experience.’

She counted off the points in my favour on the fingers of her left hand. ‘You’re experienced with looking for people; you are unknown to my daughter and these cult people; you’re highly recommended by Petra; you’re young and blonde. Yes, I think I have the right person.’

She could have finished off the finger counts by adding ‘strapped for cash’ and ‘recklessly impulsive’. Many people would run screaming at the idea of joining a sex cult; for me that sounded like a grand idea. In fact, I should’ve thought of it before.

‘OK, I’ll take the job.’ I gulped down the ginger beer. It was only a dinky can so it didn’t take more than a few swallows. If I was going to do this, I was going to have to be on my best form. I needed to kick this hangover to the kerb. ‘Wake me when we land.’

Chapter 7
Jess

‘You’re not doing it.’ Michael was steaming as we took the car home from the airport. ‘When I sent you to speak to Dr White, I did not expect her to ask you to do something so outrageous!’

‘So it’s “Dr White” now, is it? Not Tanglewood?’ I wondered how much the driver was hearing. Michael hadn’t been discreet, blurting out emotive words like ‘cult’ and ‘sexcapades’ so I’d bet our chauffeur was taking in every word. I patted Michael’s hand. ‘Michael, may I remind you that you aren’t the boss of me?’

‘Have you asked Charles what he thinks?’

Charles Haslam, Michael’s friend, was also my doctor and had steered me through some very rough patches in my mental health. ‘No, I have not, as we only just got off the plane.’ I checked my reflection in the mirror. My blonde hair apparently was something of a calling card for this cult. You either had it naturally or got yours dyed so you could join the White Horse followers.

‘I know Charles and he’ll agree with me.’ Michael actually got out his phone to make the call like he could appeal to VAR, the video assistant referee. ‘He’ll tell you that you’re giving in to your impulses again.’

‘No, he wouldn’t, because he signed me off. I’m cured, didn’t you know?’ Michael shook his head. He knew, and I knew, that you can’t be cured of what I’ve got; you’re just temporarily stabilised. ‘I’m acting rationally and sensibly.’

‘Jessica—’

‘No, Michael, I am.’ I pushed down the hand holding the phone. ‘I have a business and, if I do this right, I’ll earn a huge chunk of what I need to invest in it properly. I can’t continue bumping along hand to mouth. With this kind of money I can get my own place and stop lodging with Cory.’

‘I thought you liked Cory?’

‘I do, but she has her family and it’s a squeeze. I can’t run my business professionally from a back bedroom.’

He grunted but he couldn’t argue with the truth.

‘And how much risk do you think there is in some latter-day flower-power thing? They’ll be eating lentils, making love, plaiting garlands. I’ll slip in, make friends with Lisette, see how the land lies, and hopefully disillusion one brainwashed daughter.’

‘I don’t like it.’

‘You don’t have to. I’m doing it.’

Michael’s opposition actually helped. We’d had a rocky five years living together and I had finally learned to enjoy disappointing him. If he had approved, I think I might’ve had colder feet but, at this moment, they were toasty warm.

‘I see you aren’t listening,’ he grumbled.

‘I am. I just don’t agree with you.’

‘So when are you going to do this?’

‘I can’t see any point in delaying. I thought I’d hitch over there tomorrow.’

‘Hitch?’

‘It’s not on a bus route and it’ll look out of character if I turn up in an Uber. I’m supposed to want to live off-grid.’

‘I’ll drive you.’

‘Oh, Michael, you don’t have to do that!’

‘I know I don’t, but I feel responsible. You would never have met Tanglewood if you hadn’t come to keep me company in Frankfurt.’

‘But you only asked me to cheer me up after they arrested my dad for stalking. And we both had fun. No favours owed on either side.’

Michael gave a grumpy huff.

‘Anyway, she was set on this course of action before she went. I just swam right into her orbit. I think she sees it as confirmation.’

‘Confirmation of what?’

‘That this was meant to be. She believes in fate.’

‘Of course she does. She studies paganism.’ We turned into Cory’s road where I lived. ‘All right. What time do you want to go?’

‘There are no official opening hours at the commune. I was thinking of arriving around noon.’

‘I’ll pick you up at eleven.’

I leant over and pecked him on the cheek. ‘Thanks for the Frankfurt trip, Michael. I had a blast.’

He gave me one of his genuine smiles, the sort I used to spend so much time fishing for when we were together. He was much more generous with them now. We were both nicer people when we were apart. ‘It was fun, wasn’t it?’

‘Bloody pelicans,’ I said.

‘Yes, I mean, what did the pelicans ever do for us?’

‘You’re parroting me now!’ Laughing, I scrambled out and grabbed my carry-on from the boot. ‘See you tomorrow, sunshine!’

‘Call me if you come to your senses and I’ll take you out for a pub lunch instead.’

‘Goodbye, Michael.’

The car drove away and I picked up my case. Time to tell my landlady what I was up to.

***

‘A cult? Oh, that’s so exciting!’ Cory was in many ways Michael’s opposite. Whereas he was always preaching caution, Cory found her life much enlivened by my shenanigans. In her mid-thirties and recently divorced, she was looking to find a little sparkle in her life again. As her own had gone flat, she depended on me to provide the fizz. Tucking a lock of her chin-length brown hair back behind an ear, she delved under the grill and returned victorious with only a little smoke. She placed a fish finger on Leah’s plate. The three-year-old began carefully to dissect it, taking off the orange breadcrumbs to leave the pallid white interior exposed.

‘I think she’s going to be a doctor, or a pathologist,’ I predicted, dipping a breadstick into the hummus Cory had put out for us grownups.

Benji frowned at his charred offering. ‘Mum, you’ve burned it.’

On cue, the kitchen smoke alarm started to beep. Knowing my role in this frequent drama, I grabbed a magazine and waved it under the sensor while Cory pumped the backdoor to and fro to dispel the fumes. Our little rescue team was effective in record time and we returned to our places.

‘Always good to check the alarm is working,’ I told Benji. He continued to scowl. ‘How is it that a F I V E-year-old can see through us?’ I asked Cory, spelling it out.

‘Because we are transparent,’ she said. ‘Eat up, love. There are children around the world who would be grateful for a meal like that.’

Benji poked his fish finger. I had to say, I was in his camp on the attractiveness of what he’d been served.

‘You did not just say that, Cory!’ I hissed. ‘That’s such a terrible old chestnut.’

‘But it’s true.’ Cory was a development expert and assessed international aid programmes for refugees, among other things. She’d just come back from a week in Beirut and had been particularly depressed about the state of the world ever since. I needed to help her lighten up or Benji would be carrying the cares of our pitiful times on his shoulders. I swooped down and stole his blackened fish finger.

‘I don’t know about poor children but there’s a Jessica who wants it!’ I gulped it down, carbon and all. ‘Yum!’

Benji sniggered. ‘Mum! Jess stole my dinner!’

‘You can have mine,’ I told him, offering him a blob of hummus on the end of a breadstick.

‘Yuck!’ He batted it away so it fell to the floor.

‘OK, kiddo, this is war!’ I told him, and handed him a new breadstick. We had a quick fencing match which resulted in yet more crumbs on the tiles as our swords got progressively shorter. Leah watched us with clinical detachment, chewing her fish, while Cory smiled fondly at the mess we were making. As she always said, what were brooms for?

Benji was supplied with a slightly less charred specimen, and soon mealtime was over. The children were sent off to change into their pyjamas, and I helped with the clean-up. After all, I had made most of the mess.

‘How long do you think you’ll be gone?’ Cory asked, switching on the dishwasher.

‘A week maybe? Two? It depends how difficult it is to talk some sense into Lisette.’

‘Might take longer than that.’ Cory filled the kettle as I emptied the crumbs into the food bin. ‘Have you ever had anything to do with anyone in a cult?’

‘Er, no?’

‘I had a friend who got caught up in one once. Took years for him to break away and, to be honest, he’s still not a fully functioning member of society even now. He finds how we live so weird.’

‘It is, isn’t it? Everything is weird when you stop and think about it.’

‘True, but it’s like driving. If you start to think too much about it, you’ll lose the knack and drive into a wall.’

‘So we shouldn’t think too hard?’

‘Exactly. Where is this cult anyway?’

‘Very near the White Horse, in a village called Kingston Beauchamp.’

‘That’s a strange coincidence.’ She spooned some decaf into the coffee pot.

‘What is?’

‘It’s been in the news. A girl’s body was found up there a day or two ago. I don’t think they’ve identified her yet. I imagine the place will be swarming with police.’

‘Oh.’ I wondered if my favourite policeman was on that investigation. In the wild swimming case a few months ago, I’d found myself a little intrigued by a certain inspector in Thames Valley CID. I have to admit that I’d been enjoying a few daydreams where I didn’t come quietly with him, if you know what I mean.

‘I haven’t heard that there’s any connection with your commune but …’ She called up the story on the BBC local news.

I scanned the piece quickly. ‘It’ll make slipping in more difficult. They’ll be wary of outsiders.’

‘You’ll have to find a way of earning their trust.’

‘Hmm.’ I accepted the coffee she’d poured me and added some milk. ‘I wonder …’

Cory smiled indulgently. ‘I can see your mind is working overtime.’

‘I was just wondering how I can get a foot in the door. I need someone to vouch for me, or some other reason for being there.’ An idea came but it would all depend on whether Michael would play ball. ‘How do you think I can best persuade Michael to have a blazing row with me in front of someone from the commune?’

‘Give him a back rub?’

That would probably do it but I didn’t want to revisit that page in our relationship.

‘Any other suggestions?’

‘You could offer to do him a favour in return at a time of his choosing.’

‘Like feed his cat when he’s away? I’d do that anyway.’

‘He doesn’t have to know.’

‘Do you think he’ll go for it?’

‘Jess, you know the man far better than me. Do you think he’ll like having you in his debt?’

‘Oh yeah, he’ll like that.’

***

Michael and I took the exit off the A420 to head for the village.

‘This is ridiculous,’ muttered Michael.

‘But you’ll do it?’

He grunted, which I interpreted as a ‘yes’.

‘We just need to find the right person, you get mad at me, and I flounce off to weep.’ I finger-combed my hair, having left it loose. A little rinse had taken me a few notches up to almost white blonde. I was hoping this would attract the eye of my target. ‘I haven’t been this colour since I was five.’

‘And this is exactly the kind of idiotic plan a five-year-old would come up with.’ He clearly had never met Benji who wouldn’t do anything so foolish. He sighed. ‘OK, Jessica, where do you want to stage this row of yours?’

‘It’ll have to be somewhere public. Let’s have that pub lunch you mentioned and see who turns up. From the pictures online, the commune people stand out in their white robes. It shouldn’t be hard to find one.’

We turned into the car park of the Smithy Arms to find it surprisingly full for a Monday. Some of the cars belonged to the police. What were the chances of meeting someone we knew? Michael advised the police on cases involving psychopathic killers.

We exchanged a look.

‘Shall we try something else?’ Michael suggested.

‘You have an idea?’

‘Ring the doorbell.’

‘That’s your plan?’

‘You have to trust me. We can still have our argument, but let’s make it hit the right target. The last people you want knowing you’re here are the police. They’ll blow your cover in two seconds.’

He had a very good point. ‘All right, let’s ring that bell.’

Chapter 8
Michael

There was something about spending an extended period of time with Jessica that always ended up with him doing something insane. This was no exception, thought Michael. At least this way, taking her right to the front door, he would get to see exactly what she was letting herself in for and, if necessary, he could drag her away if he judged it too dangerous.

They approached Kingston Manor. The gates were wrought iron, supported by stone pillars topped with statues of lions with long curling tails. They each held a shield with the coat of arms of the family who originally built the place. Through the gateway, Michael could see the house at the end of a short tree-fringed drive. A few brown leaves were drifting down in a sombre kind of confetti. The style of architecture appeared to be eighteenth-century neoclassical, fawn stone and balustrade pediment, perfectly symmetrical. The manor was the kind a great lord would have termed a hunting box as it only had one wing and, at a guess, about thirty rooms, but to modern eyes it was palatial.

‘Nice place,’ said Jessica laconically. ‘Being a cult leader must pay well.’

He steered the car to the right so he could reach the intercom.

‘Doesn’t really go with the whole druid thing, does it? Electronic security? I’d’ve thought a couple of elves with staves would’ve been more in the spirit,’ she commented.

Only Jessica. ‘The manor is rented. I imagine this was put in by the owner.’ He buzzed.

They waited.

He buzzed again. This time the intercom crackled. The voice was female. Impatient. ‘Yes? If you’re a reporter, we’re not giving any more interviews.’

‘No, I’m a doctor. Dr Harrison from Oxford University. I need to see Mr Oak on a confidential matter. It’s urgent … about a case of mine.’

‘Wait one moment.’

Jessica’s brows shot up. ‘A doctor?’ she mouthed.

‘Technically I am, a Doctor of Psychology. If the person on the other end makes links to an unspecified urgent medical matter, then that’s her affair. And you’re my case,’ he explained aside.

‘Nutcase?’ Jessica sniggered.

The gatekeeper was back. ‘All right, Dr Harrison, you can come as far as the entrance and explain your business to Father Oak in person.’

With a smooth movement the gates swung open, first the left, then, after a fraction of a pause, the right.

‘Clever,’ said Jessica. ‘You got us in.’

‘Curiosity got us in.’

‘Anyone would think you might know something about how the human brain works, Dr Harrison.’

‘People hate mysteries. If they refused to see me, it would bug them not knowing what I wanted.’

‘But you’ve only got us as far as the hallway.’

‘Have a little faith in me, Jessica. I’ve met this type before.’

‘What type?’

Michael raised a brow.

‘Oh my God, you think he’s a psycho?’

‘He’ll at least have a narcissistic personality disorder. He’s a cult leader – it goes with the territory. Watch your step, Jessica. I mean it.’

‘I know, I know. I’m not interested in him. I just want to help Lisette. I’ll keep out of his way.’

‘Let’s hope he doesn’t get too interested in you.’

It took Michael a while to get out of his car. Jessica had become quite good at offering just the right amount of help, steadying the wheelchair during transfer but letting him do the brunt of the work.

‘You’re my much put-upon research assistant, agreed?’ he told her. ‘Anything I say in there is for effect.’ He had already told her this on the drive here but he was worried she would take it to heart. Sometimes home truths leaked out when you were acting angry with someone.

‘Got it, captain.’

‘Look less … perky.’

She turned her nervous smile into a sulk. It was unlikely to stay on her face long because her default setting was cheerful, so they had better hurry up, he surmised.

‘I apologise in advance; I’m going to imply you provide more than just note-taking. I want to make him think you’re easy.’

She rested her hand lightly on his shoulder. ‘Michael, stop fretting. We’ve got this.’

Of course a house like this didn’t come with anything so civilised as a ramp. Jessica went inside to see if she could locate one and returned with two hefty men wearing what Michael would’ve described as kaftans. Both had bleached hair.

‘No ramp, sir, but I did find these nice young men to help,’ she said.

The two seized the chair and lifted Michael bodily up the flight of six steps. He felt like he was in some opera scene: Arrival of the King of Sheba.

‘Thank you,’ he said to his Nubian slaves, not feeling very thankful at all.

They opened the doors and stood either side, making his arrival far more ceremonial than he had intended. He entered, Jessica following a few steps behind. Father Oak – for it had to be the man himself – was waiting on the bottom step of a flight that went straight up behind him. It then split in two before joining the upper floor. The hall was a marble chessboard of white and grey tiles. Ancestor portraits looked down on them, their silks and satins at odds with the plain white cotton worn by the Children of the White Horse.

Seeing that Michael was in a wheelchair, Father Oak relinquished his advantage of the stair and approached, hands out in welcome or blessing. He was in early middle age and could be described as a good-looking man. His black hair was silvered at the temples in distinguished ‘trust me’ wings. Interesting that he was the only one to have his dark colouration. Another way of separating himself out, Michael supposed. Oak’s eyes were an almost hypnotic blue ringed with black, very intense and calculating. He radiated charisma as so many of his kind did.

‘Dr Harrison.’ Oak’s eyes went to Jessica. She had cleverly stood in a patch of sunlight so she was spotlighted. Jessica knew a thing or two about psychology as well, Michael acknowledged.

‘This is my … er … assistant, Jessica. Jessica, stop daydreaming and do something useful.’ He made his tone snappish and overly familiar towards her, acting the part of a misogynistic academic. ‘I apologise for arriving unannounced, Mr Oak, but I couldn’t think how else to introduce myself. You see, I’m afraid I’ve lied to you.’

Jessica darted him a distressed look. Have a bit more faith, love. I know what I’m doing, thought Michael.

‘Really? How … refreshing that you admit it.’ His voice was baritone and mellifluous. Michael could easily see the elements that made him a forceful leader.

‘I’m a fellow at Magdalen College. I specialise in unusual psychology. I’ve recently completed a prize-winning book on the criminal mind, and I’m now turning to the religious. I was wondering if you’d like to be interviewed?’

Oak got out his phone and googled his visitor. ‘Congratulations on second prize.’

‘Beaten by pelicans,’ said Jessica, then giggled in her best bimbo act.

‘Jessica!’ Michael said sharply.

‘Sorry, Dr Harrison.’ She pouted her apology.

‘Any more lip from you and you can kiss your reference goodbye. I’ve had quite enough of you already today.’ He said this in a furious undertone as if he didn’t expect his voice to carry.

She turned away and folded her arms. ‘That wasn’t my fault.’ She muttered something that sounded like ‘you need Viagra for that.’

Amused, Michael cleared his throat, hoping he came across as embarrassed. ‘Sorry, Jessica is very unreliable. I’ve had far better student assistants. Where were we? Oh yes. I want to do a chapter on you and your commune. I find it so interesting that these pagan ideas are springing up again in our post-modern world and would value an opportunity to interview you and your followers to find out what makes you tick.’

Father Oak shook his head sadly. ‘I’m sorry, Dr Harrison. I’m flattered but I really don’t think our little commune is suited for your project. To understand us you’d have to stay here and live with us, experience our way of life from the inside. Standing apart from us, analysing us, you’ll never grasp the truth.’

Michael had expected an answer on these lines. ‘I … er … can’t offer you any money for your time, but you would gain publicity,’ he said. Giving up too quickly would look suspicious.

Oak’s smile was almost pitying. ‘We believe that those who need to be with us are brought here by the path that lies hidden beneath their feet. They don’t know it is there until they look back.’

‘Oh, wow, that’s so true,’ said Jessica softly.

‘Professional detachment, Miss Bridges. How many times do I …? Oh, never mind. You’re never going to learn, are you?’ Michael turned his back on her as if giving up. ‘So, I can’t change your mind, Mr Oak?’

‘I’m afraid not.’ His gaze cooled.

Michael realised that he and Jessica weren’t the only ones playing parts here. He was already fairly certain this man was a con artist rather than self-deluded. He would in truth make a very interesting study. Perhaps the book idea wasn’t such a bad one? The psychology of the cult?

‘If you change your mind …’ Michael tried to hand him a card but Oak didn’t move to take it. He put it down on one of the mahogany side tables. ‘Thank you for seeing me, albeit briefly. I’ll just have to find myself another neopagan commune. Such a shame; you were so convenient for Oxford.’

The leader bowed, hands held to his chest. ‘You are always welcome to return, Dr Harrison, if you are ready to come in a more questing spirit.’

At Oak’s nod, his two flunkies lifted up Michael’s chair and carted him back down the steps, Jessica dragging her feet behind, casting longing looks at Father Oak. Now was the time for their row, while the door stood open.

‘Well, that was a bloody waste of my time. I told you to research properly before we approached anyone, Jessica!’

‘But I thought they sounded so nice, so loving,’ said Jessica in a whine. ‘They don’t realise you really want to work with them.’

‘How can you be so naive? I don’t want to work with them; I want to study them.’

‘But maybe Father Oak’s right? Maybe we can’t work on beliefs this way? Maybe we have to go deeper?’ She clutched her hands to her breasts, her eyes doe-like. Only he could see the glitter of enjoyment in them.

‘Miss Bridges, do you understand the first thing about psychology or am I wasting my time on you?’

She reared back, as if hurt. ‘I don’t know. You employed me. You saw my references. You said you thought I have promise.’

‘To be frank, my dear, I employed you because you were the only applicant who was willing to suck me off to get the job!’

She flinched. It read to their interested audience as if he’d insulted her but he knew that she was really just surprised he had come up with that. It hadn’t been so far off their first encounter back at UCL. ‘Oh, but I thought you loved me! You told me you did when we …’ she sniffed ‘… did it together in the Bodleian stacks.’

What a picture that painted. Concentrate, Michael told himself. ‘Loved you? Miss Bridges, you are a good lay but a shitty assistant.’

She picked up a file of his supposed research and threw it at him. ‘I hate you! You’re vile! I’m going to report you!’

He took the file in the face, letting the papers flutter to the ground. ‘Ah. You attacked me before witnesses. Thank you. That’s just what I needed.’

‘I’ll get you back for this!’

‘If you report me, I’ll charge you with assault. I think you can consider your contract terminated with immediate effect.’ He levered himself into the car, folded and lifted the lightweight chair in after. This took a little too long for the drama but Jessica did a good performance of sobbing and telling him how she hoped his cock would rot off. ‘Good luck finding your way back to Oxford from here, sweetheart. I believe there’s a bus once a week.’ He started the car, reversed, then headed down the drive. In the mirror, he could see one of the flunkies had come down to comfort the sobbing Jessica while the other gathered up the pages. If the man looked, he would find the print-out of a learned article on the subject of religious mania – another reason for Father Oak to hate the prying academic.

One little undercover agent delivered. Michael had to hope that he’d done the right thing.

Chapter 9
Jess

I tried not to worry as Michael drove away. Enjoyable as our little scene was, now I was alone and I had to carry on the make-believe as a solo act. I’d have to dial up the dumb-blondeness. My first decision was to be passive, let them take the lead in to what to do with this snivelling wreck of an assistant.

‘Take Miss Bridges into the day room, Brother,’ Father Oak told Flunky One. ‘She’s had a distressing morning. I’ll be with you in a moment.’ I saw that he wanted to have a quick look at the file I had thrown at Michael.

The hand around my shoulders steered me into a large reception room. The fireplace was dominated by two statues that supported the mantlepiece, both in the shape of devilish-looking satyrs with horns and goat legs – Mr Tumnus’s wicked twin brothers. He took me to a rose-pink sofa that had curved legs and wooden arms. It could have been a Chippendale (the furniture maker rather than the dancers).

‘Can I get you anything?’ he asked. There was a Nordic accent rumbling under his English.

‘A glass of water and a new life?’ I asked, trying for a brave smile through tears.

‘I can manage the first; maybe Father Oak can help with the second?’

He headed to the door.

‘Hey, what’s your name?’ Please make it Sven.

‘Brother Pine.’

‘New names for your life here, am I right?’

He nodded.

‘Then I’d be Sister Weeping Willow or something?’ I gestured to my tissue. ‘Sorry, I’ll pull myself together. It’s just that I thought … oh, it doesn’t matter what I thought. All men are bastards. Present company excepted.’

Father Oak appeared in the doorway. ‘I’m relieved to hear that.’

‘Oh!’ I made it a little embarrassed squeak. Was that too much?

‘Leave us, Brother. I want to have a word with Miss Bridges in private.’

Apparently not.

‘Of course, Father.’ And just like that, mission to fetch me water cancelled, the Nordic pine walked out.

‘Miss Bridges—’ Oak took the seat next to me.

‘Jessica. Please call me Jessica.’

He smiled patiently, like you do to a child who spoke out of turn. ‘Miss Bridges, how may I help you?’

‘I … I don’t suppose you have someone who could run me back to Oxford?’

‘You have somewhere to go?’

‘I … er … I suppose not. You see, I was living with Michael … Dr Harrison, I mean. I guess that’s at an end too?’

‘It does seem that way. I was impressed, though, that you appeared to understand our way of life far better than the good doctor.’

‘He’s not good. He’s mean!’

Oak chuckled indulgently. I wondered how he didn’t see right through me. Did men really buy this big-cupsize-means-small-intelligence thing? I adjusted my best assets to bring them more to his attention. My shirt was unbuttoned to the point where he was getting quite an eyeful.

‘You may feel like that now, but you’ll see, if you stay with us, that Dr Harrison acts like that because he’s trapped in an old and corrupt way of seeing the world.’

‘I … I can stay with you?’ I acted as if he was offering me the last lifebelt on a sinking ship.

‘I usually sense within seconds of meeting someone whether they are meant to be here. I felt that about you. You might like to experience our novice programme, to see if it would suit you.’

‘Novice programme?’ Yes, Father Oak, I’m just a parrot without a crafty thought in my head.

‘It means you would live as part of the community. You would take the first level of vows but you’d be free to walk away at any time if it doesn’t work out for you.’

‘And how long does this novice programme last?’ I bit my lip.

‘As long as you feel you need it. Some move on to the second level after three months; some take a year. If you aren’t ready to move on after twelve months, I normally suggest that you aren’t on the right path and we part ways amicably.’

I hung my head. ‘I don’t feel like I’ve ever been on the right path. I can’t see the way forward no matter how hard I try.’ This was pretty much the truth about my life, actually.

He placed a hand on my bent head. ‘Child, you sound so lost. Let me help you.’

‘Oh, I am lost, so lost.’ I hiccupped a little, hiding my dry eyes in the fall of my hair.

He gathered me to his chest. ‘Not anymore. Jessica, you’ll find that all of us first arrive here like you have: confused, without purpose, lonely. Here you’ll find acceptance, friends, and a purpose. Will you try us?’

‘Oh yes. Please let me try.’

‘Good girl.’ He patted my back. ‘So, do you still want me to find you that lift back to Oxford?’ He chucked me under the chin.

‘Oh no, sir.’

That made him smile. Yes, you slime ball, I’m pressing your dominator button and you like it. ‘Not “sir”. Father Oak. And I’ll give you a new name for your novitiate: Sister Poppy – that one is available.’

Ugh. ‘Oh wow. Thank you, sir. I mean … Father Oak.’

‘Sister Ivy is in charge of our novices. She’ll see to you and explain the rules. I take it you’ve read our profile on the website so you understand our basic beliefs?’

‘You believe in Mother Earth and Father Sky, not literally as gods but as an expression of the balance we should seek in our inner being.’ I repeated it like a student who had swotted for her homework assignment. ‘You believe that the old ways of the people who once lived in harmony with nature, worshipping in groves and by springs rather than shut up in buildings, that these can teach us how to find a new way of relating to the world.’

‘Good. I see you’ve already absorbed many of the key ideas. In addition to these beliefs, we live in community, sharing our goods, not dressing to distinguish ourselves from one another but to create a sense of family. As a novice, you won’t be asked to sign over your personal wealth—’

I laughed. ‘Just as well. I’m afraid I only have debts.’

He smiled indulgently. ‘Even so, we won’t take the small things that mean so much to a person, such as jewellery or photos, but we do ask you to surrender your phone. This is as much for your own health as it is for the community.’

I had to think quickly. ‘Oh. But I left it in Dr Harrison’s car. That was silly of me!’ And it really wasn’t sitting in my handbag. No, sir.

‘Then that won’t be a problem. A clean break with the outside world, that is what we practise here.’

A willowy woman appeared in the doorway. ‘Father Oak?’

‘Ah. Sister Ivy, perfect timing. Poppy here is ready to be initiated into first order vows and to change.’ He turned back to me and kissed me on the brow in what was a very chaste manner. I was beginning to think that this particular sex cult leader was not that into me. ‘I’ll see you at dinner, Poppy.’ He got up and glided out.

There was a small pause as we both admired his impressive butt exiting the room.

‘This is all very sudden and unexpected,’ I began, shaking my head in disbelief.

‘It can be overwhelming at first, but you’ll soon adjust.’ Ivy smiled benignly, giving me something of a Stepford Wife thrill. ‘Please, come with me.’

‘Can you show me the loo first? I’m busting.’ I needed a moment to remove my phone and stick it down my bra.

‘There’s one in the changing room where I’m taking you. We encourage newcomers to bathe or shower to signal they are passing from one life to another.’

‘Like a baptism?’

She wrinkled her nose at the Christian reference. ‘A little, I suppose.’

Finding Lisette was going to be harder than I had imagined if we were all going around with new names dropped on us at random by Father Oak. ‘How long have you been here, Ivy?’

‘I was the first.’ That explained the Stepford glint in her eye. ‘I came with the Father when he moved here three years ago. We were in Yorkshire before then.’

That was too long ago and the woman looked a decade too old for Lisette. Still, she might be a good source. ‘Why the move?’ I picked up my sparkly handbag from where it had fallen by the sofa.

‘The Father felt called here.’ She gestured through the big windows to the Downs with their magnificent White Horse. ‘The energy is very special in this place.’

‘Oh yes, I can feel it too.’ We crossed the hallway and went down a passageway to the part that once would’ve been servants’ quarters. The paintwork was utilitarian green and the floor was flagstones. At the very end she opened a door onto a communal changing room.

‘Please take off all your old things and leave them on the bench. Keep only the essentials from your bag: prescription medicine, glasses if you wear them, that kind of thing …’

‘Cigarettes?’ I asked but I feared I knew the answer.

She crossed her hands primly in front of her. ‘We would ask you to refrain from smoking while part of our community. We don’t pollute our bodies.’ She had the manner of an air hostess, calm and unflappable.

So I was about to go cold turkey from cigarettes far faster than I’d expected. Maybe that was just as well as a slow giving up wasn’t really my style and I had been wanting to kick the habit. ‘OK. I’ll try my best.’

Apparently, I was not fervent enough. ‘I’m afraid we have punishments for infractions.’

And, just like that, my head went to a very kinky place. ‘Really? What kind?’

‘Extra kitchen duties, that kind of thing.’

‘Oh.’

‘You sound disappointed.’ Was that a hint of humour?

‘I don’t mean to— I’m just feeling my way, so to speak.’

She went to a locker and took out a set of folded clothes. ‘These are for you. While here, we wear nothing belonging to the outside world. We make our own clothes.’

And the dressmaker had only one pattern: sack.

‘How … er … inspiring. Wait, everything? Underwear included?’

She nodded. ‘There’s no point just making a superficial change, is there?’

I disagreed entirely as that was the reason I was here, but I was only thirty minutes into this undercover operation; I couldn’t blow it on an argument about knickers. ‘Right. Let’s get this done.’

I was relieved that she left me to shower, promising to return in ten minutes. I quickly stripped, got wet without much application of soap, just enough to convince her I’d washed away the old life. I towelled dry and quickly sorted through the new clothes. The underpants were closer to what my great-grandmother had worn: drawstring bloomers. Were they having a laugh? They presented a problem as the phone wouldn’t stay tucked in there. Why did designers make modern phones so big and heavy? I could have done with one of those little folding designs from the early 2000s. I rooted through the rest of the clothes. Hang on a minute: no bra, just a tank top. My girls were going to be bouncing about unfettered. That was not as fun as it sounded. Without proper support, my back ached after a very short time and it was bloody painful to run or do anything physical without a sports bra. I didn’t have time to work out a solution so I finished with the final layer: the sack dress. It fell to an unattractive knee length that reminded me of my school uniform. I remembered that Ivy had hers to the ankle. Maybe that was a novice thing? The skirts got longer, the longer you were here?

Nothing else for it. I tied the rope waistband tight and dropped the phone and charger down so it sat in the hollow by my hip, bound by the rope. I was going to have to find a better hiding place at the first opportunity as they were likely to drop right through when I walked.

I was just folding my clothes in a neat pile when Ivy returned. She beamed at me.

‘Well done. So many people try to keep their old underwear and I see you’ve understood the necessity to put on a complete new skin.’

I folded my arms. ‘I’m pretty big up top. Do you make anything for that?’ Ivy, I noted, was flat-chested like a ballerina.

‘Sister Foxglove has a similar figure. She binds her breasts with cloth and swears it is as good as any bra.’ Oh yeah? ‘I can supply you with some for tomorrow but I’ll need to get permission from Father Oak.’

And that was not creepy? ‘Thank you. I wouldn’t want to break the rules so soon.’

‘Excellent. Take a seat and I’ll explain what’s expected of you as a novice.’

I took a seat obediently on a bench, feeling like I was back in school and the nice games mistress was going to explain exactly why we all needed to go on a hearty cross-country run in the rain, rather than shelter sensibly indoors.

‘Novices sleep in a dormitory and unless called away to another work party, you’ll spend most of your time with them.’

‘How many of us are there?’

‘Now? Just two men and two other women. There have been a recent wave of vacancies as novices have moved on.’

‘OK.’ I wanted to ask if the genders shared the same dormitory but I supposed I’d find out.

‘We have a series of bells in the manor. We rise at five-thirty.’

‘Oh goody.’

She actually smiled at my tone. Maybe I was getting through to her? ‘You’ll find you get used to it quickly. We have an hour of meditation, six until seven; breakfast; then morning work until the noon meal. Afternoon work or recreation carries on until five when we have another hour of meditation. Dinner is at six-thirty. We go to bed at ten unless we have a special celebration or starlight ceremony.’

‘I like the sound of that.’

‘Unfortunately, there aren’t any planned this week but maybe soon. There’s been a loss locally and we feel we should cleanse the site once it has reopened to the public.’

She must have meant the murder up on the White Horse. ‘Are you talking about that poor girl who was dumped up on the hill?’

She gave me a sharp look. ‘That was a tragedy. But nothing to do with us.’

I couldn’t afford for her to get suspicious on day one. She might think I was some kind of undercover reporter after juicy details on the murder. ‘Cleansing ceremony … that sounds wonderful. Anything else I need to know?’

‘So much, but I won’t load you down right now. There are some basic house rules that you need to know from the start. I’ve already mentioned no smoking, but we also don’t drink alcohol, we eat mainly what we grow, and sexual relations between community members are banned.’

That was unexpected. ‘You don’t have sex?’

‘Not with other members of the community. Father Oak rightly teaches that it breaks apart the bonds of fellowship to seek this from each other.’

‘But you don’t leave either?’

‘That’s right. You thought we were into free love?’

‘I guess I hoped you were,’ I said with a wry smile.

She squeezed my knee a little too hard. ‘You’ll understand soon why this is the right way for us. It is all part of our philosophy.’

I’d been expecting a sex-crazed cult and I’d got myself a bunch of nuns and monks. I’d better find Lisette quickly and get out of here before I did something terrible and proved I was not a suitable recruit. ‘Great. So where first?’

‘I think I’d better show you to your room so you can meet your fellow novices.’

Just what I wanted. I was hoping that Lisette was one of the other two women. Otherwise this might feel like a very long visit.

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