The Stone Circle: The Dr Ruth Galloway Mysteries 11

by Elly Griffiths

  ‘He can find out about music all he likes,’ says Judy, ‘but he won’t be able to play an instrument properly unless he has lessons.’ She has already earmarked a second-hand piano on Gumtree.

  ‘I used to play the guitar,’ says Cathbad, offering a chip to the greyhound. ‘Erik taught me. And I played the accordion at school. ’

  Judy doesn’t remark that, in this case, even Cathbad had lessons of a sort. She says, ‘Are you going back to the archaeological site? Leif’s site?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ says Cathbad. ‘It’s a beautiful place and it’s interesting archaeologically too. But, I don’t know, it felt odd being there with Leif. Too many memories of his father, perhaps.’

  Judy thinks of her trip to the site with Karen, Pete and Annie, the Hail Marys rising into the mist, the sad flowers in their cellophane wrapping. She remembers the figure that she saw on the beach, the hooded man looking out towards the sea. Had that been Leif, saluting the dawn?

  ‘What was Erik like?’ she asks. They have never really talked about him before.

  ‘He was a visionary,’ says Cathbad. ‘He could make you feel as if you were seeing the landscape through ancient eyes. He was an amazing teacher too. He made you think, really think, throwing out all your old assumptions and preconceptions. I was quite dazzled by him, at first. But now I think that he exploited me, used me to do his dirty work. Shona too. She was in love with him, you know.’

  ‘She still seems quite bitter,’ says Judy. ‘But she didn’t have to help him write those letters. They wasted a lot of police time.’

  ‘Love does odd things to you,’ says Cathbad. Judy turns to smile at him but he’s looking at the greyhound, offering it a chip.

  *

  Nelson’s phone buzzes as he goes up the stairs. He sees ‘Ruth’ on the screen and so waits until he’s in his office to call back.

  ‘Ruth? What is it? Is it Katie?’

  A deep sigh. ‘No, it’s not Kate. It’s me. I’ve had a letter.’

  ‘A letter? What sort of letter?’

  ‘One that reads like it was from the same person who wrote to you. Listen.’

  As Ruth reads, Nelson can almost feel his blood pressure rising. He remembers the letters arriving when Lucy went missing and then later with Scarlet. The same mocking, erudite, menacing tone. She called from the depths and you answered. It’s the same person, he’s sure of it.

  ‘Is it typed?’ he asks.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you touch it?’

  ‘Yes, of course I touched it. How else would I have opened the envelope?’

  ‘Well, don’t touch it any more. Put it in a freezer bag or something.’

  ‘I’ve put it in an evidence bag.’

  ‘Good. Hand delivered, you say? I don’t suppose anyone saw who delivered it?’

  ‘No. The department secretary just brought it in. It was delivered to the main reception.’

  ‘To you personally?’

  ‘Yes. To Dr Ruth Galloway.’

  Nelson can’t stop himself smiling. Ruth does like people to use her full title.

  ‘It does sound like the same person. “Out of the depths” – that sounds religious.’

  ‘“Out of the depths I cried unto thee, O Lord”,’ quotes Ruth. ‘Psalm 130. Also that bit about earth, sky and sea. That’s from a hymn. “Holy, Holy, Holy”.’

  ‘I’m going to talk to that Leif,’ says Nelson.

  ‘Do you really think it’s him?’

  ‘Judy and Clough have got the idea that it’s someone involved in the original case. A loner who collects stones. But I still think Leif Eriksson’s our most likely suspect. Like father like son.’

  ‘I don’t think writing anonymous letters is the sort of thing that runs in families, Nelson.’

  ‘You never know,’ says Nelson. ‘Take extra care at home. Lock all the doors.’

  ‘The letter writer sounds pleased with me, if anything,’ says Ruth. ‘Maybe I’ll find some flowers on my doorstep.’

  ‘Remember the last time someone left something on your doorstep,’ says Nelson. ‘Lock the doors and make sure the security light’s on. I’ll come round to see you tonight.’

  *

  Marj Maccallum seems delighted to see Judy.

  ‘I like to keep in touch with the force,’ she says. ‘And I’m always glad to see a woman officer doing so well.’

  Judy can’t help feeling pleased. Sometimes she feels that her career has stalled; with three detective sergeants at King’s Lynn, there’s not really anywhere for them to go. Her only options are to take her Inspector’s exam or move.

  Marj makes them tea and they sit in her sunny conservatory watching Mabel, Marj’s stunningly white Westie, running round the garden.

  ‘Lovely weather for early March,’ says Marj. ‘Almost warm enough to swim in the sea.’

  Judy had inadvertently stepped into the sea at the weekend, when on the beach with the children. It had been like standing in melted ice. But Marj has the fit, weather-beaten look of someone who swims all year round.

  ‘It is a lovely day,’ she agrees. ‘Thank you for seeing me. As I said on the phone, we’re keen to talk to anyone who remembers the Margaret Lacey case.’

  ‘I remember it all right,’ said Marj soberly, offering Judy a biscuit. ‘That poor girl. That poor family. Well, I hope that they find some peace now.’

  ‘What do you remember about the investigation?’ asks Judy.

  ‘Superintendent Brown and DS Burnett were sure it was the prowler. John something.’

  ‘John Mostyn.’

  ‘That’s right. But, I don’t know. I thought we should have looked more closely at the family.’

  ‘At the father, Robert Lacey?’

  ‘No, not Bob. He was the type who might kill a man in a pub fight, but not his daughter. He worshipped Margaret. No, I always thought the brother and sister were a bit odd.’

  ‘In what way?’ Judy remembers Kim saying that Annie had been a ‘cow’ and jealous of Margaret.

  ‘Annie was very highly strung. Well, that’s a kind word for it. She was the sort who was always shouting or in tears. I remember her yelling at her mum that nobody cared about her, only about Margaret. She argued with her dad too but I heard that she didn’t get on any better with her stepfather. The boy, Luke, just didn’t seem that interested. Normally youngsters – especially boys – are excited about a police investigation, despite themselves, even if it involves a family member. They want to know about fingerprints, clues, all that stuff. But Luke kept himself to himself. I thought at the time that he might be hiding something.’

  ‘That’s what DCI Nelson said.’

  ‘Well, he’s a shrewd man, Nelson. Not a dinosaur like Chubby Brown. He’ll dig down and get to the truth.’

  It’s odd that people use dinosaur as an insult, thinks Judy, as she drives back along the coast road. Marj used it to mean someone stuck in old ways but dinosaurs were experts at evolution, that’s why they lasted nearly two hundred million years. Humankind is never going to match that. She looks at the sea sparkling in the distance and thinks again of the mysterious figure on the shore. Marj had said that Nelson would dig down to get the truth. But archaeologists seemed to dig for days and find more questions than answers. She wonders how much Leif Anderssen knows about his father’s past.

  *

  Nelson is also thinking about Erik Anderssen. It’s hard not to, seeing as how he’s standing with Erik’s son very near the place where the Norwegian archaeologist breathed his last. And very painful breaths they must have been. Drowning must be the worst of deaths and, even now, Nelson doesn’t like to think about that night: the storm, the chase across the treacherous ground, the desperate search for the missing girl. Today, though, the marsh looks very different, the grass flecked with little yellow flowers and the sun shining on the distant sea.

  ‘It does your soul good, doesn’t it?’ says Leif, breathing in and expanding his chest like an advertisement for b
ody-building.

  ‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ says Nelson.

  He’d rung Leif as soon as he’d spoken to Ruth. ‘I’m on the site,’ said Leif, ‘but you could meet me here if you like.’ Nelson knew that he should delegate the interview to Judy and Clough. He has reports to write and teams to lead. He should, as Jo is always telling him, ‘be the hub of the wheel and not one of the spokes.’ But, on the other hand, he’s the one with the history here. He’s the only one who can really ask these questions about Erik. And, besides, the archaeological site is also now a crime scene. Really it’s his duty to be there.

  The site looks busy today, full of people digging and sifting and brushing soil away from what look like very ordinary bits of stone. The trench where Margaret was found is directly in front of them. Ruth says that the grave was fairly new – something about cuts and infill – but it still seems odd to Nelson that someone made this potentially perilous journey across the Saltmarsh to bury the bones with these other prehistoric remains. Almost against his will he remembers something Erik once told him. It’s the landscape itself that’s important. Don’t you see? And Nelson does see that there is something special about this place even though, in his mind, it’s special in the way that accident hot-spots are special.

  ‘Would you like a tour?’ says Leif, waving a hand towards the diggers and the trenches.

  ‘No, you’re all right,’ says Nelson. ‘I wanted to talk to you because some letters have been received.’

  ‘Letters?’ Leif tilts his head. He’s taller than Nelson, which is annoying.

  ‘Letters that recall other letters,’ says Nelson. ‘The ones your father wrote.’

  ‘My father wrote you letters?’ Leif sounds interested, even slightly amused, but Nelson doesn’t entirely buy the act. He thinks that Leif is also wary; his arms are crossed which Judy would say is a sign of defensiveness.

  ‘Your father once wrote me a series of letters,’ says Nelson, ‘which significantly impeded a major crime investigation. He would have been charged with wasting police time if he hadn’t . . . died.’

  Leif glances over his shoulder at the marshland, bright with spring flowers. So he does know where his father died.

  ‘I didn’t know,’ he says. ‘We weren’t always that close, my father and me. He was a free spirit.’

  A phrase that, in Nelson’s opinion, hides a multitude of sins. He says, ‘Were you at the University of North Norfolk this morning?’

  Now Leif really does look uncomfortable. He looks away, uncrosses his arms and crosses them again. Nelson waits.

  ‘I did call in at UNN,’ he says. ‘I’ve got a friend there. In the history department.’

  Nelson is not a betting man but he’s willing to wager that the friend is female.

  ‘While you were there,’ he says, ‘did you drop anything off at the archaeology department?’

  ‘At the archaeology department? No. Why? Is this about Ruth?’

  Nelson lets this hang in the air.

  ‘Are you a fan of T. S. Eliot?’ he asks.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘British-American poet,’ says Nelson. ‘Died in 1965.’ That’s what Wikipedia says, anyhow.

  ‘Oh,’ says Leif. ‘The man who wrote Cats.’

  Nelson is not sure if he is joking or not. ‘If you say so. You’ve heard of him, then?’

  ‘Vaguely. I don’t know much about English Literature.’

  ‘Speaking of which, are you acquainted with a lecturer in English Literature called Shona Maclean?’

  ‘I’ve heard the name,’ says Leif. ‘I think she was a friend of my father’s.’

  ‘She’s not your friend at UNN?’

  ‘No. My friend’s in the history department. Her name’s Chloe Jackson.’ Leif smiles, seeming to recover his poise. The sun gleams on his yellow hair. Nelson eyes him coldly.

  ‘Can I trouble you for a sample of your handwriting?’ he says. The letters were typed but he has the Jack Valentine note. Besides, he thinks the request might wipe the smug smile off Leif’s handsome face.

  On a scrap of paper which he finds in his pocket, Leif writes: To DCI Nelson. Tireless seeker after truth.

  It’s meant to be funny, Nelson realises, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

  *

  Michelle is also enjoying the sunshine as she walks to the village hall. For one thing, it will lighten her hair. Not having time to get her roots done is the single worst thing about having a new baby. But the sun also helps with the depression that she felt settling on her that morning as soon as Harry had gone to work and Laura to college. It’s a cloud that has been hovering over her ever since George was born. George is wonderful. He’s beautiful and really very good. Sometimes Michelle feels her heart almost exploding with love when she looks at him. But there’s also a feeling of isolation, almost of loneliness, that seems to be lying in wait for her, ready to pounce even when she’s with her family. Michelle tries to give herself pep talks: What have you got to complain about? You’ve got a loving husband and two gorgeous grown-up children. You’ve got a job waiting for you, appreciative employers (Tony and Juan sent a baby hamper from Harrods with a note saying, We miss you but enjoy this precious time with Baby) and lots of friends. Your baby is healthy and your mother is coming down next week to help look after him. You should be counting your blessings. In answer to this Pollyanna-ish monologue, Michelle can only answer: but I don’t have Tim.

  Did she love Tim? Sometimes, now, when she thinks about his face and his smile, the way his eyes softened when they looked at her, she thinks that she did. He had certainly loved her. He gave his life for her. It’s such a dramatic, Sunday School sort of phrase, but in this case it is literally true. He gave his life so that she and Laura could live. And she loves him for this. But she also knows that she would never have left Harry for Tim. Her love for Harry has been the most powerful emotion in her life for over twenty-five years, a quarter of a century. It’s a strong plant, this love, even if it has become slightly thorny over the last few years. It would take more than Tim’s grace and beauty to uproot it.

  But what if the baby had been Tim’s? This had been a very real possibility, something Michelle had hardly dared to admit, even to herself. If George had been Tim’s it would have been awful. Everyone would have turned against her, Harry would have divorced her – and, no doubt, married Ruth – and even her daughters would probably have disowned her. But at least she wouldn’t have this feeling that Tim has disappeared altogether and soon there will be nothing of him left. In her last months of pregnancy it was as if some essence of Tim was still wafting about, wanting to find out if he was the father. But now he’s gone and that is almost the hardest thing to bear.

  Maybe the mother and baby group will help. She remembers these gatherings from the first time round. Her NCT class and the local toddler group had proved invaluable sources of female friends and playmates for Laura and Rebecca. It had been hard to replace these friends when they’d moved down to Norfolk but she’d managed it, assiduously following up playground chats and meetings in the park or at the swings. But now, of course, those friends all have grown-up children, some are even grandmothers. She’d been horrified to see her friend Liz referring to herself on Facebook as ‘Nanny Beth’. Who the hell was Nanny Beth? Not Liz who liked to drink cocktails and once confided to Michelle that she’d had to resign her gym membership after she’d had sex with her personal trainer in an empty squash court.

  As soon as Michelle pushes open the door of the Nissen hut that calls itself the Village Hall and manoeuvres the buggy inside, she realises her mistake. These aren’t mothers, they are children. Some of the women look younger than Laura, younger than Rebecca. They sit casually on the floor in their skinny jeans and crop tops, texting and chatting whilst their babies lie on their backs on a slightly grubby ‘activity rug’. A child wearing a hijab looks up. ‘Oh, are you Michelle? I’m Saira, the community midwife. Come and join us.’

  Saira is friendly
enough, offering tea and coffee, cooing over George, but she’s so young. How can she be a qualified midwife? Michelle would have trouble trusting her to babysit.

  Michelle accepts a cup of burnt-tasting coffee and sits on a beanbag. George is mercifully still asleep. She feels overweight and overdressed in her Boden jeans and loose jumper. She is sure that the lounging girls think that she is George’s grandmother. Nanny Miche.

  ‘How old is your little boy?’ asks an infant with pink hair.

  ‘Just over two weeks,’ says Michelle.

  ‘Ooh.’ The girl peers into the buggy. ‘He’s a good size, isn’t he? Lots of hair. Is he your first?’

  ‘No,’ says Michelle, slightly cheered. ‘I’ve got two older girls.’

  ‘How old are they?’ says Saira.

  ‘Twenty-two and twenty-four,’ she says. There is a silence, broken only by George waking up and starting to cry. As Michelle picks him up, one of the youngest-looking mums, a waif with (natural) silvery blonde hair says, ‘Shall I hold him so that you can drink your coffee?’

  It sounds like the kindest thing anyone has said to her for weeks.

  ‘Thank you,’ says Michelle, passing George to the girl.

  ‘I’m Star,’ she says, juggling George skilfully. ‘My baby’s Ava. She’s over there, asleep under the baby gym.’

  Star. She even seems to be glowing slightly.

  Chapter 14

  Ruth doesn’t tell Kate that Nelson might be coming round that evening because, that way, Kate won’t be disappointed if he doesn’t turn up. But, at seven o’clock, she hears the familiar squeal of Nelson’s brakes and, despite herself, feels the familiar surge of excitement that comes with seeing Nelson on her territory. It has been at her cottage that all their most memorable encounters have occurred and, although she knows all that is in the past, Ruth stops at the mirror by the door to let down her hair, which has been scrunched up on top of her head, and check her teeth for spinach (she has been trying to add more greens to their diet).

  ‘What are you doing, Mum?’ says Kate, who is lying on the floor putting her Sylvanians to bed – unlike Kate they have a very strict bedtime regime.