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337
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Looking at Cooper’s face now, she knew that this was what it was really all about for her. This was why she had let him persuade her into this mad expedition, this spell of unauthorized surveillance. It was the sheer strength of his conviction, the intensity of his belief in himself. All he had done was put a few facts together with a whole load of half-baked ideas, instincts
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and feelings that were entirely his own, and as a result he was filled with a pure, heartfelt certainty that he was right. She could see that Ben Cooper was a man who believed strongly in things; he had faith, he had genuine passion. It was ridiculously attractive.
‘Ben — you’ve made this mistake once already. You’re not even on the case any more. You should back off now, or you’ll regret it.’
‘And what exactly have I got left to lose?’ he snapped.
‘Shh. You’ll let everybody down there know we’re here.’
‘I promise you I’m right.’
‘OK, OK.’
Immediately below their position was a patch of woodland clinging to the side of the hill. It was full of the quiet noises of creatures settling down for the night or stirring, ready for their evening’s hunting. The woods petered out fifty yards away, where the millstone grit erupted from the hillside and the ground became bare and rocky. At their backs were the ‘tors’ themselves — gritstone outcrops sculpted by geological forces and the weather into strange, twisted shapes. Their names owed a lot to the dark imagination of the rural Peak dwellers — the Horse Stone, the Poached Egg Stone, the Mad Woman.
But I’m the mad woman, thought Fry. I’m mad for even being here.
Cooper knew he had to handle her carefully. She was like a coiled spring — one wrong word and she would walk off and leave him. But it was difficult to avoid the wrong word with Diane Fry. Besides, there were so many things he wanted to ask her, away from the office. Number one on his list was what had happened between her and DI Hitchens on their trip to Yorkshire. But it might be wise to save that one for later.
338
‘Is Mr Tailby still hopeful of Andrew Milner?’ he asked, steering the way into a saier subject.
‘Your diagram encouraged him. That and the lack of evidence
o o
against Simeon Holmes. If Harry Dickinson was protecting somebody, it has to be Milner.’
‘Yeah. Harry doesn’t think much of Milncr, but he’d protect him for the sake of his daughter. For the sake of the family.’
‘Family loyalty. As you say, a powerful motivation.’
‘Yes, it fits,’ said Cooper sadly.
‘Milner had been pushed to the limit by Graham Vernon. Maybe he finally cracked and took revenge.’
‘Not only was he pushed to the limit by Vernon, but he was also reminded of his failure by his own family. Harry in particular taunted him with his weakness. If Harrv found out what had
j
happened, he would have felt guilty — partly responsible, in fact. He would try to make amends. I can see that.’
Cooper cast his mind back to his first visit to Dial Cottage. He remembered the bloodstained trainer standing on the kitchen table on a copy of the Buxton Advertiser, the atmosphere of tension lying on the cramped rooms like a thick blanket. He remembered the old lady, distressed by something beyond the innocent discovery of a missing girl’s trainer.
‘I wonder if that was what the row was about,’ he said. ‘And, if so, who was on which side?’
Fry frowned, but let it pass. ‘Anyway, Milner’s account of his whereabouts was crap from the start.’
‘Really?’
‘There was no possibility of tracing anyone who could remember him. He could have been anywhere at that time.’
‘But he can’t be placed at the scene either.’
‘The DCI thinks he’s worth pursuing. And that one is no Harry Dickinson, either. Mr Tailby will have been running rings round him back at Division.’
Cooper was silent for a moment, lying quite still to ease the pain in his chest.
‘Andrew Milner isn’t in the frame,’ he said.
‘But you just said it fits!’
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‘Of course it does. It fits the facts, anvwav. But he can’t have killed Laura Vernon.’
