Sunday morning dawned clear and cold. A brisk March wind blew, restoring the sun and the delicate colours of early spring to the lower hillsides. Women hung on to their hats and men clutched the lapels of their best suits as they struggled to church along Mortsett Lane in Relton. The police car, a white Fiesta Popular, with the official red and blue stripes on its sides, turned and made its way up the bumpy Roman road to Maggie’s Farm. PC McDonald drove, with Craig silent beside him and Banks cramped in the back.
The view across the dale was superb. Banks could see Fortford on the valley bottom and Devraulx Abbey below Lyndgarth on the opposite slope. Behind them all, the northern daleside rose, baring along its snowy heights scars of exposed limestone that looked like rows of teeth gleaming in the light.
Banks felt refreshed after an evening at home reading Madame Bovary, followed by a good night’s sleep. Luckily, Dirty Dick had phoned to cancel their pub crawl, claiming tiredness. Banks suspected he had decided to drop in at the Queen’s Arms-just around the corner from his hotel-to work on Glenys, but Burgess looked relatively unscathed the next morning. He seemed tired, though, and his grey eyes were dull, like champagne that had lost its fizz. Banks wondered how he was getting on with Dorothy Wycombe.
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As the car pulled onto the gravel outside the farmhouse, someone glanced through the window. When Banks got out, he could hear the wind chimes jingling like a piece of experimental music, harmonizing strangely with the wind that whistled around his ears. He had forgotten how high on the moorland Maggie’s Farm was.
His knock was answered by a tall, slender woman in her mid-to late-thirties wearing jeans and a rust-coloured jumper. Banks thought he remembered her from his previous visit. Her wavy chestnut hair tumbled over her shoulders, framing a pale, heart-shaped face, free of make-up. Perhaps her chin was a little too pointed and her nose a bit too long, but the whole effect was pleasing. Her clear brown eyes looked both innocent and knowing at once.
Banks presented his warrant and the woman moved aside wearily. They knew we were coming sometime, he thought; they’ve just been waiting to get it over with.
“They’d better not damage anything,” she said, nodding towards McDonald and Craig.
“Don’t worry, they won’t. You won’t even know they’ve been here.”
Mara sniffed. “I’ll get the others.”
The two uniformed men started their search, and Banks sat in the rocking chair by the window. Turning his head sideways, he scanned the titles in the pine bookcase beside him. They were mostly novels-Hardy, the Brontes, John Cowper Powys, Fay Weldon, Graham Greene-mixed in with a few more esoteric works, such as an introduction to Jung’s psychology and a survey of the occult. On the lower shelves rested a number of older, well-thumbed paperbacks -The Teachings of Don Juan, Naked Lunch, The Lord of the Rings. In addition, there were the obligatory political texts: Marcuse, Fanon, Marx and Engels.
On the floor beside Banks lay a copy of George Eliot’s The Mill on the Floss. He picked it up. The bookmark stood at the second page; that was about as far as he’d ever got with George Eliot himself.
Mara came back from the barn with the others, three of them vaguely familiar to Banks from eighteen months ago:
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Zoe Hardacre, a slight, freckle-faced woman with frizzy ginger hair and dark roots; Rick Trelawney, a big bear of a man in a baggy paint-smeared T-shirt and torn jeans; and Seth Cotton, in from his workshop, wearing a sand- coloured lab coat, tall and thin with mournful brown eyes and neatly trimmed dark hair and beard framing a dark- complexioned face. Finally came a skinny, hostile-looking youth Banks hadn’t seen before.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Paul’s not been here long,” Mara said quickly.
“What’s your last name?”
Paul said nothing.
“He doesn’t have to say,” Mara argued. “He’s done nothing.”
Seth shook his head. “Might as well tell him,” he said to Paul. “He’ll find out anyway.”
“He’s right, you know,” Banks said.
“It’s Boyd, Paul Boyd.”
“Ever been in trouble, Paul?”
Paul smiled. It was either that or a scowl, Banks couldn’t decide. “So what if I have? I’m not on probation or parole. I don’t have to register at the local nick everywhere I go, do I?” He fished for a cigarette in a grubby ten- pack of Players. Banks noticed that his stubby fingers were trembling slightly.
“Just like to know who we’ve got living among us,” Banks said pleasantly. He didn’t need to pursue the matter. If Boyd had a record, the Police National Computer would provide all the information he wanted.
“So what’s all this in aid of?” Rick said, leaning against the mantelpiece. “As if I need ask.”
“You know what happened on Friday night. You were arrested for obstructing a police officer.” Rick laughed. Banks ignored him and went on. “You also know that a policeman was killed at that demonstration.”
“Are you saying you think one of us did it?”
Banks shook his head. “Come on,” he said, “you know the rules as well as I do. A situation like this comes up, we check out all political groups.”
“We’re not political,” Mara said.
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Banks looked around the room. “Don’t be so naive. Everything you have here, everything you say and do, makes a political statement. It doesn’t matter whether or not any of you belong to an official party. You know that as well
