by Jack Benton
‘You slipped when you were running away. You must have known you left prints. What happened to your boots?’
‘I threw them in a skip outside Bodmin a couple of days later while I was out buying fencing supplies. After I heard the police got called in. The police asked to see my work boots so I showed them a different pair I sometimes used out on the tractor. They get really muddied up when the fields are waterlogged—’
Slim lifted a hand. ‘So let me get this straight. The boot prints that were the main evidence to suggest Amos Birch headed out onto the moors were not made by Amos, but by you.’
Michael sighed again. ‘Right.’
‘And you bolted because you saw him come out of his workshop?’
‘Yeah, I saw him go off with that gear, and I thought I’d better get out of there. Something just felt weird, you know? Like I was seeing something I shouldn’t have seen.’
‘I have one last question then I’ll leave you in peace. Which way did he go?’
‘Up the lane toward the main road.’
Slim nodded. Another piece had fallen into place. ‘And you’re being truthful with me, aren’t you?’
Michael put a hand over his chest. ‘I swear that’s everything. I didn’t kill anyone. I might not have said everything when the police came round, but I was scared. And what does it matter whether he went onto the moor or up to the road?’
‘I don’t know if it matters at all,’ Slim said. ‘Thanks, Michael. You’ve helped a lot.’
He left the farmhand to his business. So, Amos hadn’t gone onto the moor at all. It removed many of the possibilities running through Slim’s mind, but it also added a few more.
Wherever Amos had gone, he had gone there with purpose, but something had happened to prevent him ever coming back.
40
It took Slim three phone calls to discover that Amos Birch’s membership to the British Clockmaking Guild had been rejected just three months before his disappearance. A longstanding clerk sounded almost proud to tell him that Amos had rejected the society’s rules of membership, which governed the production of clocks and watches, and his scheduled attendance at a prestigious clockmaker’s fair had been cancelled.
From his vantage point on a hill looking out at Bodmin Moor, Slim began calling clockmakers in the Black Forest. Some spoke no English, others knew Amos Birch by reputation but not personally. Slim’s phone was nearly out of battery when he remembered the number Kay had given him.
A gruff voice answered in German. Slim introduced himself and discovered that the man—a wood supplier and clock dealer called Ralph Schwimmer—spoke decent English. Slim explained who he was and told Schwimmer he was on the trail of the missing Amos Birch.
‘My father retired in 1998,’ Schwimmer explained. ‘He might have known Herr Birch.’
‘Would it be possible to speak to your father?’
‘I’m afraid not. He died last year. If it’s helpful, I could have a look through his old correspondence for anything relating to Amos Birch. I have heard the name.’
‘Thanks. I’d really appreciate it.’
Slim hiked back down to Penleven and headed to the Crown for dinner. On a chilly Thursday night June was alone in the bar. Slim ordered a beer to wash down a plate of chips, then felt a sudden hardening of his resolve and refused to drink it, letting it sit while he stared at it like an artifice if the devil himself.
‘It’s been a few days since I last saw you,’ June said. ‘Have you solved the big mystery yet?’
Slim shrugged. ‘I’ve only created more questions. I don’t suppose you know who frequented this place in the early nineties?’
‘I could find out. What is it you’re specifically after?’
‘I want a list of staff and regulars circa 1993.’
June laughed. ‘You don’t ask for much, do you?’
‘I’m looking for someone who might have committed a crime.’
‘What kind of crime?’
‘A rape.’
June’s eyes widened. ‘What does that have to do with Amos Birch?’
‘I’m not sure yet.’
‘Well, you could start with that lot above the bar.’
Slim looked up. ‘Where?’
‘There. The picture of the darts team in 1993. They won the cup that year. If you want a conclusive list of regulars, you don’t need to look much further than that. We’re not overrun with participants round here. Anything like that is pretty much all hands on deck.’
June came around the bar, reached up and unhooked a dusty, faded photograph from above the bar. She took a cloth and wiped it down, then laid it out in front of him.
Seven men stood in a line, with the man in the middle holding up a trophy. Another bigger man stood slightly off to the side, while in the background, Slim recognized the Crown’s bar.
‘That one there’s old Reg,’ June said, indicating a middle-aged version of the old-timer who propped up the bar. ‘Those two youngsters are Michael and Davy.’
Davy, Slim remembered, was Michael’s skinny drinking buddy. But while Davy had a bored look on his face, a cherubic Michael beamed at the camera.
‘Handsome lad,’ Slim said. ‘Amazing what time can do.’
June laughed. ‘Ah, he’s still doing okay. Believe it or not, I used to look okay with the lights on too.’
Slim let his laughter give her the benefit of the doubt.
‘Any of these other guys still around?’
‘That one, that’s Les. Doesn’t come in much these days. Grew out of pub life, maybe, although you see him pottering around his garden now he’s retired. That one’s old Bob—he’s long gone, by all accounts. That’s Ted—used to work in the China clay quarry. Lost him to cancer just a couple of years back. The big guy’s Alan, the old landlord … and that guy with the beard, I’m not sure who that is, but he doesn’t come in anymore.’
Slim stared at the last face, feeling a hint of recognition.
‘I don’t suppose you’d have a list of fixtures for that year, would you?’
June lifted an eyebrow. ‘Slim, this is pub darts, not the Premiership. I doubt if there ever was a list of fixtures. Then, as now, I expect, games were on a Wednesday. One week at home, the next away. The league runs from Oct right through the end of March.’
‘On a Wednesday. Thanks.’
‘Are you going to drink that beer? Or do you want me to pour you a cold one? I’m enjoying the company but I prefer not to drink alone.’
The door rattled and old Reg marched in. He missed a step as he took in Slim, then recovered himself to reach his regular stool.
‘Actually,’ Slim said, ‘I’ll have one for me and whatever Reg is drinking.’
‘Don’t mind if I do,’ Reg muttered as June gave Slim a sly wink. Then, noticing the picture, Reg said, ‘What’s all this then?’
Before Slim could speak, June said, ‘Slim here’s thinking of buying a property in the area. Wanted to get to know a few locals.’
‘Oh aye.’
‘You’ve aged well, Reg.’
The old man coughed. ‘Sense of humour like that and you’ll fit right in.’
‘June was just showing me some old pictures. I recognise a couple of guys, eh. I met Les the other day, and that’s Michael—’
Reg shook his head. Slim had deliberately indicated the man with the beard, but Reg pointed to the real picture of Michael.
‘No, that’s Michael there. That guy with the beard … God, I forget his name. John, maybe. He was one of Davy’s college friends at Marjons in Plymouth. Didn’t used to drink here, but was a deadeye and we were short. He didn’t come back the next season and we finished fifth.’
‘What happened to him?’
‘Graduated college, got a job, I’d guess. Davy didn’t come back either—got a job in the shipyards for a few years until his ma died. He wasn’t much of a loss though—we used to try and fix the draw so he took one of their certain winners.’
They both l
aughed and clinked glasses. Slim reluctantly took a sip.
‘For an out-of-towner, you’re all right, lad.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Still on the trail of old Amos?’
‘I’m still interested, but I’m close to giving it up. There’s nothing to go on.’
‘He was after a list of regulars from ninety-three,’ June said. ‘Something about a rape.’
Slim shot June a sharp look but it was too late. Reg turned to Slim, eyes hardening.
‘What does anything like that have to do with Amos Birch? Weren’t no rape around then that I remember. You want to be careful what you go around saying about people.’
‘I haven’t accused anyone of anything, and I’m not about to.’
‘Who is it who’s supposed to have been raped?’
Slim took a deep breath, wondering if he was about to kick the hornet’s nest one time too many.
‘Celia Birch. I heard something, is all.’
Reg coughed a mouthful of beer across the bar. June frowned as she reached for a cloth.
‘What I heard about that girl was you’d only need to slip her a fiver and she was yours for the night. Weren’t no need to get yourself involved in some criminal rubbish.’
‘Reg, you shouldn’t talk like that,’ June said.
‘Just me opinion,’ Reg said. ‘Nothing wrong with that, is there? If you ask me, people pussyfoot too much around what they really mean.’
‘We’re not asking you, Reg,’ June said. Banished, Reg grumbled inaudibly into his pint while June turned to Slim. ‘What did you hear?’
‘That Celia might have been the victim of an assault, and that the person responsible might have been involved in Amos Birch’s disappearance.’
It wasn’t an outright lie, but Slim figured he might as well add his own speculation to the mix. He wondered if, among the jousting of rumour, hearsay, and lies, one story would arise victorious.
‘Never heard nothing about it,’ Reg grumbled, not looking up.
‘Was there ever a rumour that Celia Birch might have had a child?’ Slim asked. ‘I mean, she worked here, didn’t she? It would have been obvious, I’d have thought.’
Reg shook his head. ‘I never heard a thing. Although the girl did pull a vanishing act. It’s been so long that I can’t put timeframes on these things, but she worked down the kitchen a few nights a week, then she stopped and Alan got someone else in.’
‘Can you remember what time of year, even?’
Reg shrugged. ‘Spring, maybe? Just as business was picking up. Left Alan in the lurch, I’ll say. I remember Mike and Davy down in that kitchen for a few nights. Alan paid them in beer, as I recall, even though the lads were underage.’
Reg chuckled as though that was his best memory of the year.
‘Girl was fifteen, wasn’t she?’ June said.
‘About that.’
‘Probably quit to go swot for her exams.’
Slim looked from one to the other. Reg frowned, then shrugged. June smiled.
‘You boys might like your stories, but you can’t find a mystery in everything.’
Slim remembered school well enough to recall that few kids spent much time swotting for their fifth-year exams. It wasn’t an impossible scenario, but Celia hadn’t come across to Slim as a particularly studious person. He had been considering that the whole rape tale might have been a cover-up for something salubrious to which she didn’t want to admit—an affair with a well-known married man, for example.
‘Where you been hearing these things, anyway?’ Reg asked.
Slim shrugged. ‘Around.’
‘Place like this, there ain’t much else to do but throw around talk. Now, if old Amos showed up again, that’d be something, wouldn’t it?’
‘What do you remember about his wife?’
Reg lifted an eyebrow. ‘Think she knocked him off, do you?’
Slim shook his head. ‘Far as I can see she had no motive. She was wheelchair-bound and sick. Couldn’t work. No income but disability apart from what he brought in.’
‘That’s about what I remember,’ Reg said. ‘The Birches—save that daughter of theirs—didn’t get out much. He was a recluse by design, she by circumstance. Used to see him out in the fields from time to time, and he’d go around to fix a clock if you asked him, but he wasn’t exactly Mr. Parish Council.’
‘So you didn’t know her well?’
‘He met her up-country, I remember,’ Reg said. ‘At one of his clock functions. He then took over his old man’s farm, and she had no choice but to come down here with him. She never really took to country life. You’d hear her in the store from time to time, snapping that they didn’t have this type of cereal, or that type of bread. No one much liked her, but she didn’t seem to care. Then she starts getting sick. You’d not see her for months, then it would be with a stick, then a walker, then a chair. By all accounts she was bed-bound by the time the end came.’
‘And Celia looked after her?’
‘God, no. That girl was gone almost as soon as he was. Might have popped in from time to time, but there was always a home help outside, parked in their yard.’
‘Where did Celia go?’
‘Washed her hands of it. Girl always was bigger than Penleven, if you get my meaning. And had probably run out of men to snare.’
‘Reg!’
The old man lifted a hand. ‘Sorry, love, just I never liked her, eh. Girl didn’t fit in round here.’
Without realizing it, Slim had drunk his way through three pints. The old clock above the bar showed just after ten, but it was that point of the night where Slim had to make a decision. He could try to leave now, or he could wake up in a ditch somewhere, covered in his own vomit.
He pushed himself to his feet, alarmed at how unsteady he felt.
‘Thanks for the conversation,’ he said. ‘I’d better turn in. Ghosts to hunt tomorrow.’
‘Good luck, boy,’ Reg said.
After June too wished him goodnight, Slim stumbled out into the dark. Halfway back to the guesthouse, he felt an overwhelming need to call Celia, partly to apologise for rejecting her, and partly to keep her up-to-date on what he had discovered.
He continued walking, up past the guesthouse and along the road that gradually rose out of Penleven’s valley toward the A39 to Camelford. As soon as the mast indicator on his phone appeared, he dialed Celia’s number.
It was late, and she was likely working, so he didn’t expect an answer. Words were tumbling over themselves to be left in a cluttered, jumbled order on her voicemail, but the dialing tone never came. Slim tried again, then a third time.
Staring at the display which even in his intoxicated state he could see clearly said Celia Mobile, he frowned.
Her phone was either switched off or had got broken somehow, which, given the circumstances, was unexpected.
41
The next morning, with a thumping headache he had come to expect, he tried calling Celia’s number again, but got the same lack of dial tone. He checked the number to the one he had written down, and found no mistake. Celia had gone offline.
Unable to contact her, he instead turned his attention to some of his new leads. He caught a local bus into Camelford and walked up a steep hill to a small public library, where he found out that ‘Marjons’ was a euphemism for The College of St. Mark and St. John, a possible explanation for the nickname of the man Reg remembered only as John. When he called their administrative office, however, he was told that in order for them to track down a former student, he’d need more information than a nickname of John and a prowess at darts.
Stumped for the time being, he moved onto his next lead. Something Maggie Tinton had said to her husband in the yard at Worth Farm had got caught in Slim’s mind and now rattled around like a marble in a glass jar.
She had referred to the farm as cheap. Glancing through a copy of the local newspaper, Slim found no farms for sale with a price even close to cheap, several in
the seven-figure region. Using the newspaper as a guide, he rang around the local estate agents, trying to find out who had listed the sale. When that line of enquiry came up blank, he called up a couple of local property auctioneers on a whim, and finally found it.
The property had gone to auction in late 2006, six months after Mary Birch’s death. However, it hadn’t been listed by Celia Birch, but by the bank.
Worth Farm had been sold as a repossession.
As a family farm, Slim found it hard to believe that the Birches had still been paying a mortgage, and surely any debts could have been cleared with the sale of an outlying field or two.
Getting hold of the auction house responsible, he discovered that Worth Farm had been remortgaged in the mid-nineties, and payments had been rare or late thereafter. By the time of Mary Birch’s death, the family had been virtually bankrupt.
Where had the Birch family wealth gone? Celia might have the answer, but her phone was still disconnected.
He was beginning to worry about her safety. She had said she worked as a nurse, so Slim found the numbers for all the major hospitals in Plymouth and rang to enquire. By the time he finished his last call half an hour later, his worry had turned to suspicion. None had either a Celia Birch or a Celia Merrifield on their staff roster.
It was too late to check on her, because by the time he had walked back to the bus stop, he had missed the last bus to Tavistock. Instead, he headed back to Penleven. Just off the A39 he got off early so he could check his phone for messages as he walked down the hill.
It was nearly half past five and he found even Penleven had a semblance of a rush hour, with an emphasis on the rush. Several times he dived into the hedge to avoid being mowed down by returning commuters far more confident on the roads than he would be. As he reached the crossroads just above the village where connecting lanes headed right to Trelee or left to another village called Culminster, a dirty Escort hacked past him, cut left, and accelerated down the hill. Slim considered an irate wave, but he recognised the man at the wheel. He turned down the lane, hearing the car engine cut out just over the brow of the next hill.
