found in the trench. When he shouted, someone had run up to him, thinking he’d hurt himself, while Nikolai, the foreman, had been cursing in the background. All perfectly clear, but for one thing.
‘Gavin, have you got the list of builders’ names and addresses?’
‘I hope you don’t want them in English.’
Fry flicked through the list she was given. She could see what Gavin meant — most of the names sounded East European. She wasn’t familiar enough with the different nationalities in that part of the world to tell where exactly they might be from, but the officers taking details had helpfully filled in the nationalities, too. Polish, Czech, Slovakian. Apart from two, who were Irish nationals, none of the construction crew would have English as a first language.
Then Fry corrected herself. Gaelic was being restored to Ireland these days. The two Irishmen might not consider English their first language, either. It was advisable to tread carefully on these issues. She didn’t want to be sent on diversity training.
‘Several of these men give the same address in Macclesfield,’ she said.
‘Yes, it’s some kind of workmen’s hostel or B amp;B,’ said Murfin. ‘According to the foreman, most of them are employed by an agency and they move around the country, wherever the work happens to be. Just at the moment, they’re living in Macclesfield. Tomorrow, the moon.’
‘Gavin, round up a couple of uniforms and speak to all these men again. I want to know which of them was working near Jamie Ward when he uncovered that body. Jamie says that one of them ran up to him when he shouted, but he can’t remember who. I’d like to find out.’
‘OK, I can do that.’
Murfin trudged away again, looking miserable. Fry seemed not to notice.
‘This woman is worrying me,’ she said to Cooper. ‘Not knowing anything about her is very frustrating. It means we can’t piece together any relationships she had, or formulate any theories about how she died. It’s possible she committed suicide, or died accidentally. And then somebody buried her.’
‘Deliberately?’ asked Cooper.
Fry laughed. ‘Is it possible to bury a person accidentally?’
‘On a farm? Well, yes. Somebody might be standing in the wrong spot and get in the way of a trailer load of silage, or the slurry hose. People get killed on farms all the time. But you’d generally know you’d done it. Even if you were looking the wrong way, or you didn’t hear them scream over the noise of your tractor engine, you’d soon notice they were missing. Well, wouldn’t you?’
Fry stared at the ground. ‘It might depend on who it was that got buried. Nobody seems to have noticed
Cooper nodded. ‘You know, despite what they say, I think everyone in Rakedale knows everyone else.’
‘Yes, I agree. At least it means there’s no need to spend our time looking for connections with the Suttons. An individual who
‘Which means they all have a potential connection to the victim, too. All of the people we’ve talked to could have visited Pity Wood Farm at some time.’
‘But we have a whole different set of people, too,’ said Fry. ‘These itinerant workers have been in and out of Pity Wood Farm for years, apparently. No one seems to know who
‘How do we go about tracing itinerant farmworkers?’
‘It depends on the quality of the records, Ben.’
‘Poor to non-existent, I would guess.’
‘They could have been illegals, then,’ said Fry. ‘Derbyshire has had its share of refugees over the last few years. Mostly from Bosnia, Croatia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia … There was a reception centre for Kosovans at Alfreton, wasn’t there?’
‘Yes, but the numbers are quite small. At least this isn’t East Anglia. We don’t have seventy thousand casual workers coming through every year to work in the horticultural industries. There’s nothing in this area that’s labour intensive enough to create a demand for large amounts of cheap labour at short notice.’
‘It sounds bad enough to me.’
Cooper shook his head. ‘Go to somewhere like King’s Lynn, and you’ll see the difference. According to a contact I have on the force there, their illegal immigrants run into thousands, sleeping in sheds and garages. They have to keep working to pay off the money they owe for a false passport and a trip to Britain. Organized crime is entrenched in the casual labour market. I don’t mean foreign students taking part in some seasonal agricultural workers scheme — those are pretty well regulated. I mean the poor bloody Chinese peasants trying to work to send money home to pay off their debts. It takes them years to work their way out of slavery.’
‘Slavery? That’s a bit strong.’
‘It’s exactly what it is, Diane. Gang masters are sometimes unscrupulous operators, but criminals have been moving in. Triad or Snakehead gangs. You see Chinese people standing outside a station with bundles of possessions. They’re very suspicious of police, too scared to report anything. Very few speak English, either — and while police are arranging an interpreter, they disappear.’
‘Can you talk to your friend and get some more information? It would be interesting to hear whether Norfolk have any intelligence about gangs operating in this area.’
‘Of course. I should have thought of that.’
‘It still gives us a lot of suspects,’ said Fry. ‘Too many.’
A weary voice broke in. Suddenly, DI Hitchens was standing behind them, mud ruining the casual look of his jeans.
‘Did I hear someone worrying about the potential number of suspects?’ he said.
‘Yes, sir. Why?’
Hitchens sighed. ‘Well, I don’t know if this makes it any better, or worse. But the digging teams have just found a second body.’
11
Another body tent was going up, right where Jamie Ward had pointed out the disturbed earth. Fry watched three PCs in high-vis jackets struggling with the fibreglass frame, giving each other conflicting instructions. A few yards away stood a yellow-and-white crime scene tent. It was twice the size, but it seemed to have gone up more easily — perhaps, she thought, because one woman had done it on her own.
‘This one is an older burial, I can tell you that,’ said Mrs van Doon, dusting off her gloves. ‘I bet you didn’t really need me for an opinion, did you? Complete skeletonization is evident. Dr Jamieson will have to watch out for disarticulation when he removes it from the soil. But his team know what they’re doing. This is not my pigeon, Inspector. I need some soft tissue. Preferably a few internal organs.’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Hitchens.
‘Both of your victims were wrapped in heavy-duty plastic sheeting before they were buried,’ said Mrs van Doon. ‘It looks like the same material to me, despite the difference in the date of the burials. They were killed, bundled up in plastic, and buried.’
‘We can’t persuade you towards suicide then, Doctor?’ asked Hitchens.
The pathologist gave him a glacial look, but didn’t bother to reply.
Hitchens sighed. ‘Pity.’
The DI was beginning to look worn down. Fry suspected he was starting to reflect on whether his initial decisions had been the right ones. Maybe there should have been a bigger operation from the start, an assumption that they were dealing with murder.
Hitchens looked up and saw Wayne Abbott passing by with a Quickstep ladder over his shoulder and called him over.
‘We’re going to have to dig the rest of this place up,’ he said. ‘There might be more bodies.’
‘Dig it up? Do you know how long that would take?’
‘I think it will have to be done, Wayne.’
Abbott put his ladder down. ‘Ground-penetrating radar — that’s your answer. It’s not much use in woodland
