The Coffin Trail

by Martin Edwards

  ‘I suppose you think I’m crazy, to imagine for a moment that he was innocent. Probably it is crazy. After all, we were only together for a few days, a long time ago.’

  ‘Why do you believe in Barrie? In his innocence, I mean?’

  ‘Because people don’t change, that’s what I believe. They learn, they make mistakes, they grow, they get older – but their nature doesn’t change. And the Barrie I knew was kind, not cruel.’

  He left the room for a few moments. When he returned, he was carrying an aged Revelation suitcase. He opened it up and took out a thick photograph album, thumbing through the pages. Each picture was carefully pasted in, and carried a brief caption in careful, immature script. On the final page, he came to a snapshot of two boys, leaning against a beech tree. In neat childish handwriting the shot was labelled: Barrie and me, in his garden.

  ‘There,’ he said. ‘The very last photograph my father took for the family album. Recognise the scene? Dad took this, he was standing outside this window. Barrie used to help his mother in the garden, but you can see it was wild even then.’

  Miranda studied the photo. ‘Neither of you believed in combing your hair for the camera.’

  He grinned. ‘Like I said, people don’t change.’

  ‘How did you meet?’

  ‘I bumped into him at the start of the holiday, after Dad decided we’d climb to Priest Edge while the girls looked round Brack. Barrie was coming in the opposite direction. He said hello – abruptly, he had a jerky way of talking, but I didn’t mind. Soon we were in deep conversation. My father went on ahead, but Barrie showed me a short cut along the coffin trail.’

  She knitted her brow. ‘The coffin trail?’

  He pointed through the window, towards the hillside. ‘See the stony track in the distance, disappearing behind the trees? That’s the coffin trail.’

  ‘So it’s a path?’

  ‘Yes, there are several in the Lakes. Often called corpse roads. Years ago, the trail was the route that mourners took when they buried their dead. There was no church in the next valley in those days, so a packhorse carried the body over the top of the hill and then down to St Helen’s in Brack.’

  Miranda’s eyes widened. ‘They loaded a dead person onto a horse?’

  ‘Having first blindfolded it. When the funeral party was ready to start the journey, they put on blinkers.’

  She shivered. ‘Poor creature.’

  ‘What amazes me is how those ponies managed to pick their way up and down the fells with such a burden on their back. The coffin trail is steep, although it makes a terrific short-cut. My father was a fit man, but Barrie and I reached the Sacrifice Stone first. From that moment on, we were firm friends. I’m not sure that Barrie had ever made a friend before. The fact that I came from outside made a difference. He could show me places, be in charge. I didn’t have any preconceived ideas, I just took him at face value. I think he liked that.’

  ‘What about Mrs Gilpin?’

  ‘She made me nervous. Barrie was in awe of her. He might have been clumsy, but even at that age he was big and strong. Nothing seemed to make him afraid – not swinging from a tree branch, not picking up an adder and wrapping it over his hand. But he was terrified of his mother’s wrath. She was small and fragile, but when she went on the warpath, he would cower in a corner and make noises like a stuck pig.’

  ‘But he wasn’t violent?’

  He shook his head. ‘Let me tell you a story. A couple of days before the end of my holiday, Barrie persuaded me to follow his lead. He loved to swing from the tree, over the tarn. I kept waiting for the branch to snap, but it never happened. He assured me it was perfectly safe and in the end I accepted his dare.’

  ‘Don’t tell me – the branch broke.’

  ‘No, more embarrassing than that. I lost my grip and fell into the tarn. The shock of the cold water nearly stopped my heart. It was choked with weeds and when I went under I was afraid I’d never get back to the surface. For a few seconds I was sure I was about to drown.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Barrie jumped in and rescued me. He picked me up and put me under his arm and seconds later he’d laid me out on dry land. I was crying from the shock, but he calmed me down. When his mother came out to see the cause of the commotion, he made up a story. I was embarrassed by my own foolishness, but he didn’t let me down. I never told anyone except my father what he did for me that day. If my mother had found out, she would have panicked. So it was our little secret.’

  ‘Which you’ve never forgotten?’

  ‘How could I?’ Daniel paused. ‘I bet my father never forgot it, either. Barrie saved me from the consequences of my own bravado. More than that, he saved my life.’

  An hour later, they headed out to The Moon under Water for an evening meal. The original building was a couple of hundred years old and had been much extended. It boasted beamed ceilings, uneven floors and décor with a Hitchcock movie poster theme. Miranda amused herself by picking a table where Daniel had to sit beneath a picture of James Stewart from The Man Who Knew Too Much.

  ‘So is it the way you remember?’ she asked as they studied the menu chalked up over the counter.

  ‘It’s doesn’t seem as busy and the air’s not as thick with smoke. Maybe it’s less of a pub, more of a restaurant than it used to be. The bar was always packed to the rafters with locals and fell-walkers. Louise and I were kept awake every night by the drinkers downstairs in the bar. She complained endlessly about the raucous laughter and the stink of beer. But I liked the twisting staircases and tucked-away alcoves. We whiled away time by telling each other the legends of Lakeland.’

  He ordered their food from a young woman whose carelessly buttoned cheesecloth shirt revealed more than it concealed, then moved along the counter to buy the drinks. The landlord had a perma-tan and highlights, along with a receding hairline and a designer shirt that had been the height of fashion a few years back. His pinched, quizzical face reminded Daniel of a fox, but of a fox with an especially high opinion of himself. As he pulled a pint, he introduced himself as Joe Dowling. When he learned that Daniel and Miranda were the new owners of Tarn Cottage, his eyebrows wiggled.

  ‘So you’re the television star, then?’

  ‘Never a star, I’m afraid. Anyway, I’ve given all that up.’

  Dowling stashed his money in the till and said, ‘So what brought you to Brackdale? Most people drive straight past on their way to the Lakes. They don’t even know the valley exists. Thank God for that, I say, even though a bit more passing trade would put a smile on my bank manager’s face.’

  ‘I stayed here on holiday as a boy. We had a room in this pub, matter of fact.’

  ‘You’re kidding! In the days of old Dick Hubbard?’

  ‘My sister and I used to call his wife Old Mother Hubbard. Predictable to a fault. I didn’t expect they’d still be around. They both looked about one hundred even then.’

  ‘Dick passed on seven years back, and Millie followed soon after.’

  ‘I see you still advertise bed and breakfast.’

  ‘You wouldn’t recognise the rooms if you haven’t been here for twenty years. En-suite, tea and coffee making facilities, Corby trouser press, you name it. I know three star hotels in Windermere with less to offer. The wife and I built on at the back as well as refurbishing. Ex-wife, I should say. Glenda and I split up a while ago.’ The landlord cast a proprietorial glance at the milky white cleavage of the young woman taking food orders. As if trying to recapture his youth, he pulled his stomach in. ‘Lynsey and I are tying the knot in the summer.’

  ‘So that’s what you call it?’ said a man standing next to Daniel. ‘Now if you’ve finished bragging about your love life, mine’s a pint of Best.’

  ‘You’ll have to excuse my friend,’ the landlord said. ‘Very uncouth, but I suppose if you’ve settled in the valley, I’d better introduce you. This is Tom Allardyce. Tom, meet Daniel Kind. He and his other half have just bought the
cottage up in Tarn Fold.’

  Allardyce nodded, but his expression was as welcoming as a shower of sleet. His brown hair was cropped to the scalp, his complexion weathered by years out of doors. His hands were callused, the nails short and dirty. The sleeves of his ancient Black Sabbath T-shirt were rolled up to the elbows. On each hairy forearm, dragons breathed fire.

  ‘I’ve heard your name.’

  ‘News travels fast round here,’ Daniel said. ‘You live in the valley too?’

  ‘I’m the tenant of Brack Hall Farm. Mr Dumelow may be a property tycoon, but I look after his own land.’

  ‘If you ask me,’ Joe Dowling said, ‘the man’s more interested in the tax losses. Tom’s family has looked after that farm for generations, Mr Kind. He’s forgotten more about farming than Simon Dumelow will ever learn.’

  ‘No skin off my nose, as long as his lordship leaves me to it. It’s when he starts interfering that I get hot under the collar.’

  ‘And does he interfere?’ Daniel asked.

  Allardyce snorted. ‘Just a bit. We had a few sheep get out a while back. Sort of thing that’s always happened, always will, but he went apeshit because the fence was broken. Just as well my lease is watertight, or he’d have me out on my arse. Though her ladyship might have something to say about that. She and the wife are as thick as thieves.’

  ‘Your wife helps on the farm as well?’

  ‘Jean takes care of the Hall, she’s head cook and bottle-washer. She’s already got her orders for your dinner at the weekend. The lovely Tash doesn’t like to dirty her pretty hands with cooking or cleaning. It might interfere with pretending to be an artist.’

  ‘She’s a bonny-looking woman.’ Joe Dowling smacked his lips in a parody of lust.

  ‘Out of your league, my friend,’ Allardyce said. ‘So, Mr Kind, you’ve bought Cissie Gilpin’s cottage?’

  ‘It was a stroke of luck,’ Daniel said. ‘Miranda and I were taking a break up here and we saw that Tarn Cottage was up for sale. I remembered it from my first visit, on holiday twenty years back. That was when I met Barrie Gilpin.’

  ‘You knew Barrie?’ The landlord seemed taken aback. ‘Bloody hell, it’s a small world.’

  ‘We bumped to each other on my first day here and became friends,’ Daniel said. ‘Most days, we played together.’

  ‘That must have been a first,’ Allardyce said. ‘He never had any friends as I can remember. Not right in the head. That was the excuse they always gave for him being such a bad-mannered bastard. You’d be in the middle of a conversation with him and he’d walk away, just like that, for no reason.’

  ‘Asperger’s Syndrome, they call it,’ Joe Dowling said.

  ‘Is that right?’ Allardyce scoffed. ‘They’ve got a name for everything these days.’

  His derision provoked Daniel. ‘I liked him a lot.’

  ‘Then you won’t know what happened?’ Joe Dowling said.

  ‘I know he’s supposed to have murdered a tourist.’

  ‘No suppose about it,’ Allardyce muttered. ‘He battered her face and cut her throat so she was as good as beheaded.’

  ‘Stripped her naked,’ Joe Dowling added. The prurient gleam in his eyes made Daniel’s flesh creep.

  ‘Then he laid her out on the Sacrifice Stone, high above your own little cottage. So much for your boyhood pal, Mr Kind. Not that likeable after all, eh?’

  ‘He was never charged with a crime, let alone tried and convicted.’

  ‘You can’t prosecute a corpse.’

  Daniel took a sip of beer. ‘Maybe his death was convenient for someone.’

  Allardyce scowled. ‘And who might that be?’

  ‘Whoever really killed Gabrielle Anders.’

  ‘You serious?’ Allardyce demanded. As his voice rose, the bar area fell quiet. People turned to look, then quickly turned away again. Daniel guessed that locals didn’t fancy making eye contact with the farmer when he was in a temper.

  ‘That girl’s death caused a lot of upset round here,’ Joe Dowling said quickly.

  ‘Everyone agrees, Barrie Gilpin was as guilty as hell.’

  Daniel glanced over his shoulder and caught Miranda’s eye. She gave a pointed glance at the glass of white wine he’d bought her, then mimicked downing it in a single gulp.

  ‘What if everyone was wrong?’ he asked. ‘Suppose Barrie was innocent, that in more ways than one, he was the fall guy.’

  ‘I never heard such a load of crap.’ With a contemptuous snort, Tom Allardyce banged his tankard down on the bar. Some of the beer sloshed on to the counter and trickled over the edge on to the floor.

  Joe Dowling frowned. ‘Barrie Gilpin must have killed that girl. Who else could it have been?’

  Daniel shrugged and picked up the drinks. As he wove through the crowd, a woman in an alcove looked up from her meal and smiled. Leigh Moffat. She was having dinner with a woman with shoulder-length auburn hair whose cast of features resembled Leigh’s so closely that she had to be a younger sister. He paused by her side, breathing in the rich aroma of a steak and kidney pie drenched in onion gravy.

  ‘I suppose that after serving food to your customers all day long, the last thing you want to do at night is stay at home and cook.’

  Leigh smiled. ‘Joe Dowling doesn’t have any greater pretensions to haute cuisine than me. But I wouldn’t like you to think I spend all my evenings pigging myself with pub meals. My sister and I only come here once a fortnight, don’t we? Dale, this is Daniel Kind. I mentioned him to you, remember?’

  ‘How could I forget?’ Dale gave him a teasing grin and offered a small ringless hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Daniel. In fact, the food in the pub down the road is at least as good as this, but The Moon has a nostalgic pull for us. We both used to work here.’

  ‘For Joe Dowling?’

  Dale giggled and put her hand over her mouth as hiccups threatened. Where Leigh’s manner was thoughtful, considered, Dale seemed to have a mischievous instinct. She’d opted for a seat next to a poster depicting Ingrid Bergman getting up close and personal with Cary Grant in Notorious.

  ‘Casanova himself, yes.’

  Leigh gave her sister a reproving glance. ‘I saw you, talking to Tom Allardyce.’

  ‘You make it sound like a hazardous sport.’

  The sisters exchanged looks and Dale said, ‘Let’s just say he isn’t someone you’d want to meet in an alley on a dark night.’

  ‘I bet. We heard a rifle shot in the woods, or the fields beyond. Might that be Allardyce?’

  ‘Uh-huh. His trouble is, he still thinks he’s in the army.’

  ‘He was a soldier?’

  ‘In Northern Ireland, yes. His father and granddad farmed all their lives, but Tom joined up after school. He’s a rebel by nature. But Brackdale never prepared him for Belfast during the bombings. He saw some pretty grim things, so the story goes. One night he beat up a Republican suspect, and the powers-that-be kicked him out. So back he went to farming.’ Dale forked in a mouthful of beef bourgignon. ‘Even he decided there’s no point in fighting against Fate, I suppose. He likes animals right enough, better than people actually, but that doesn’t stop him shooting those that get in his way.’

  When Daniel told her about the rifle shot he and Miranda had heard, Dale nodded. ‘That would be Tom. He likes letting the foxes know who’s boss. Tom’s not someone you’d want to fall foul of.’

  ‘Frankly,’ her sister said, ‘most people round here give him a wide berth.’

  ‘Except mine host?’

  Dale smirked. ‘Tom’s wife is Joe’s cousin, but even Joe’s scared of Tom. See him quiver when Tom shouted at you? Not wishing to be nosy, but if you’ve never met the man before, what was that all about?’

  In a few sentences he explained about his doubts over Barrie’s guilt. ‘It’s a long time ago, of course, but I just can’t imagine him as a murderer.’

  Dale shrugged. ‘It’s not much to go on.’

  ‘The police didn’t look an
y further,’ Leigh said. ‘Hannah’s old boss was in charge of the enquiry. I don’t know whether her new job will cause her to re-open the case.’

  Daniel caught Miranda’s eye. She looked with theatrical despair at her watch and he offered an apologetic smile. A waitress emerged from the kitchen, carrying their meals. But there was one more question he had to ask.

  ‘Hannah?’

  Leigh nodded. ‘Marc Amos’ partner, Hannah Scarlett. She’s a police officer, one of the team that investigated Gabrielle Anders’ murder. Didn’t you catch her on the regional news the other night? She’s in charge of a team that’s been set up to investigate cold cases. You know, unsolved crimes.’

  Chapter Eight

  The renovation of the cottage was proceeding at a pace Daniel had believed impossible outside the fantasy world of TV makeover programmes. Surely it was too much to hope that their luck could last? Joiners, plasterers, plumbers and electricians came and went more or less as per timetable and the gleaming new kitchen equipment functioned with supernatural efficiency. Yet somehow there were always more jobs to be done.

  Miranda presided over the activity with irresistible enthusiasm and was forever locked in earnest debate with the self-appointed foreman. Eddie was a shrunken fellow in his fifties with a piratical patch covering a glass eye that was presumably the legacy of some long ago breach of health and safety legislation. He didn’t disguise his appreciation of Miranda’s tight tops and even tighter jeans and took voluble pride in making sure that her every wish was the builders’ command. His younger colleague, the hunky Wayne, didn’t say much. Daniel suspected that talking, and probably thinking, took up effort better devoted to ogling.

  They were counting the days to the start of work on the bothy. On the rare occasions when either of them found time and energy for writing, they shared a laptop, but the plan was for each of them to have a dedicated office. The secret of homeworking, Miranda explained, was to separate business activity from space devoted to domestic life. She’d once written an article about it.