lady would explain. From the way she said ‘Old Religion’, he could tell the words had capital letters. But if he was too impatient again, or said the wrong thing, he knew he would never find out what she meant. She would become one of Fry’s ‘Three Monkeys’ in an instant.
So he waited. But instead of explaining, Mrs Dain slid the photographs back in the drawer with an air of finality, and picked up her cigarette from the ashtray. She put it to her lips, sucked, blew, coughed, and had to sit down suddenly.
‘The Old Religion,’ said Cooper. ‘What do you mean by that?’
But it was no good. The moment had drifted by.
‘It’s all in the past,’ said Mrs Dain. ‘Beatrice Sutton is long dead. Things like that don’t exist any more, so there’s no point in talking about it.’
‘I’d be interested to hear — ’
‘There’s no point,’ said the old lady firmly, ‘in talking about it.’
Cooper raised the palms of his hands in a placatory gesture. He didn’t want to antagonize her, not when he’d been doing so well. Mrs Dain had accepted him into her world, and he’d made good progress with her. She would tell him the rest of it when she was ready.
Fry took delivery of a small envelope that had been left for her at the front desk in West Street. It was a grubby white envelope, with her name scrawled on it in felt-tipped pen and her rank spelled wrongly.
She pulled on a pair of gloves before she opened it. You couldn’t be too careful. She was pretty sure it wasn’t a letter bomb, but there were plenty of people who might think of sending her other unpleasant items by way of greeting.
But inside the envelope she found only one thing — a small, cheap crucifix with part of the base chipped away.
Fry let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.
‘Thank you, Nikolai,’ she said.
Cooper took the opportunity to take a toilet break, and discovered that the toilets at the Dog Inn were reached through a series of winding stone passages that seemed to lead almost into the next village.
When he returned to the bar, it was as if Ned Dain had been given some kind of signal by his mother, or maybe it was just the fact that she’d agreed to speak with Cooper for so long that had given the official seal of approval. Whatever the reason, Dain sidled up to him before he left the pub and whispered in a conspiratorial manner.
‘I thought you ought to know, there was a foreigner in here last night, asking questions.’
Cooper stopped. ‘Oh? What sort of questions?’
‘He wanted to know what all the police activity was. What was going on up at that old farm? He wasn’t very subtle about it. His English wasn’t too good, but we could see what he was after. Nosing about, wanting the gossip.’
‘Could you get an idea of his nationality?’
Dain shook his head and flapped the moisture out of a bar cloth. ‘Not really. He looked like you or me. Not totally dark or anything, I mean. Not that kind of foreigner. He sounded like some of those blokes that have been doing the building work at Pity Wood.’
‘East European?’
‘Probably. I couldn’t be sure. A few of those builders came in here on Thursday, chattering away to each other. He sounded like them.’
‘Can you describe him? Age? Height? How was he dressed?’
‘Hold on, that’s too many questions all at once. I suppose he’d be about twenty-five or twenty-six, not above average height. Oh, and I do remember he was wearing a sort of black padded coat. You know, you see asylum seekers wearing them when they get pulled off the EuroStar.’
‘And you didn’t find anything else out about him?’ asked Cooper, sure that the landlord must have tried.
Dain wiped an imaginary spill off the bar counter with his cloth. ‘Close-mouthed, he was. I’d go so far as to say ignorant. I can’t do with folk like that, who come in here and don’t know how to make conversation. They take offence if you ask them an innocent question or two.’
‘Funny, that,’ said Cooper.
17
‘Bloody man. He never mentioned to me that his mother was still alive,’ said Fry when Cooper reported on his visit to the Dog Inn.
‘He probably thought she wouldn’t want to talk to you.’
‘Well, why — ? Oh, never mind. It sounds as though you did well, Ben.’
‘Thanks,’ said Cooper, knowing that he hadn’t yet learned how to keep the note of surprise out of his voice on the rare occasion that she said something complimentary to him. ‘It’s a shame Mrs Dain didn’t have any photographs she could show me. I might try to make time to call at the heritage centre and see what they’ve got.’
‘Put it on your list,’ said Fry.
‘What’s next, then?’
Fry smiled. ‘I think I’d like to have a chat with your PC Palfreyman.’
‘Ex-PC.’
‘Whatever. Do you fancy a trip out?’
‘He’ll be absolutely delighted to see us,’ said Cooper.
David Palfreyman emerged from his kitchen to answer the door. Although he was in the house, he was still wearing his floppy hat. When a man wore a hat all the time, it usually meant that he was completely bald. But Cooper knew that Palfreyman still had some hair. Perhaps it was all those years of wearing a helmet that made his head feel naked.
‘Do you live on your own, Mr Palfreyman?’ said Cooper. ‘I never thought to ask you last time.’
‘I’m divorced. You know what it’s like — they can only stand the job for so long.’
‘Of course. It happens a lot.’
Cooper refrained from saying that he thought what police officers’ partners couldn’t stand wasn’t the job, it was coming second to the job. If he ever got married himself, he’d make sure it didn’t happen. Not to the point of divorce, anyway.
‘So no woman in the house, then?’
Palfreyman looked at Fry. ‘Not until now.’
When they were seated in the lounge, Fry stepped in and took over the conversation.
‘Mr Palfreyman, DC Cooper tells me you know pretty much everything and everyone in Rakedale.’
The ex-bobby’s eyes flickered sideways to Cooper. ‘Yes, pretty much. What do you want to know?’
‘We need to know everything about the Sutton brothers at Pity Wood Farm,’ said Fry.
‘Of course you do. I’ve watched the news and read the papers. Two unidentified bodies now, isn’t it? Unless there have been more since the last news bulletin …?’ He raised an enquiring eyebrow at Fry. ‘But, of course, you came here to get information, not to provide it.’
‘You must have visited Pity Wood Farm occasionally when you were on the force.’
‘Yes, a few times. Courtesy calls, that’s all. I don’t suppose you do that any more? No, I thought not. You wait until a crime has been reported before you meet the law-abiding public. And then it’s already too late to form a proper relationship.’
‘We didn’t come here for a critique of modern policing methods,’ said Fry.
Palfreyman sighed. ‘My views are of no interest to you. I understand, Sergeant. I’m just an irrelevant old dinosaur. I can’t possibly know anything about policing now that I’m retired.’
‘Pity Wood Farm …?’ said Fry.
‘I was never called to an incident there. I never heard of any other officers attending an incident either. There were certainly no missing persons reports during my time. None made from the farm, none that led to enquiries at
