He picked up a stone, knocked off some dirt, a held it up to the light to study it, like a diamond deal
examining the facets of a newly polished gem. Ma liked to watch Owen at work. He thought Owen w a completely different man when he was out on t hills. He never seemed at home in the briefing cent sitting in front of the little electric heater, hunched the assistant’s desk scattered with paperwork.
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‘What was it they wanted to know, Owen?’ Mark insisted.
Owen had been Mark’s friend and mentor throughout his assessment and training as a Ranger and during his first few weeks in the job itself. Mark had become accustomed to the comforting presence of the bearded man in the red jacket; he had glowed with pride as people greeted Owen like an old friend, laughed at all his jokes and bombarded him with questions on every subject - questions he never failed to respond to with courtesy, even when he plainly didn’t know the answer.
‘It was just questions,’ said Owen. ‘They want to make use of my local knowledge. Don’t they all?’ ‘The time of the next bus to Buxton, then? Or the nearest all-night chemist’s.’
Owen smiled at Mark’s tentative joke, a reference to a shared memory of an encounter with two elderly women on a remote track by a reservoir on the heights of the Dark Peak. It was enough to provide the surge of reassurance Mark needed, enough to ease the chill he had felt when he had first seen the expression on Owen’s face.
‘I wondered if the police might want to interview me again,’ said Mark.
‘You’ve told them everything, haven’t you?’ ‘I think so.’
But Mark knew he hadn’t, not everything. The policemen hadn’t been as easy to talk to as he might have hoped. There were some things you just couldn’t say when they were writing down every word. There were things that sounded too stupid and strange. For
a start, he didn’t know how to describe to the police the way that the woman had looked to him as she lay among the stones. The way that she had seemed to dance.
‘Anyway,’ said Owen as he handed Mark a topping stone, ‘it’s all over with now. You can forget about it. Get on with the job. Why would they want to start bothering you again?’
Mark started stacking the stones to one side, lining them up on the grass, ready to be replaced when Owen had rebuilt the lower part of the wall.
‘I don’t know,’ said Mark. ‘I’ve never … well, I’ve never been involved in anything like this before.’
‘I know, lad. Pass me the line.’
Owen took off his thick cotton work gloves and ran two lines between wooden pins along the damaged section of wall to mark out its alignment.
‘But the police aren’t so bad. They’re just doing their job, like you and me.’
Owen’s voice was slow and steady. Calming. It didn’t really matter what he was saying, because Mark found it reassuring just to listen to the sound. He had never heard Owen raise his voice. There had often been occasions when he might have done - when a mountain biker or a motorcyclist openly defied his friendly warnings that they were breaking the law and risking prosecution; when ill-equipped hikers ignored both his advice and common sense and put their own and others’ lives at risk; when a farmer, now and then, chose to be downright pig-headed. Farmers like Warren Leach at Ringham Edge, maybe. But Owen never got angry.
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‘So there’s nothing to worry about. You tell them what you found, Mark, and that’s all they need to know. As long as it’s simple for them, they won’t bother you any more. And if they do, just send them to see me, eh? I’ll give them a flea in their ear.’
Owen smiled, showing his teeth through his grey beard, his eyes crinkling at the corners. Like most Rangers, he never wore a hat, and his hair was permanently windblown and untidy, curling into his ears. ‘Owen,’ said Mark.
‘Yes?’ ‘Where were you?’
Owen smacked his gloves together to remove traces of mud and grit. ‘When, Mark?’
‘On Sunday afternoon. You know…’
Mark watched Owen ‘s puzzled smile carefully. This time Owen smiled without showing his teeth. His eyes narrowed, but the crinkles were absent.
‘You had a problem with the radio, Mark.’
‘I just thought that maybe you weren’t there…’ ‘But I wouldn’t let you down like that, Mark. Now, would I?’
Mark looked past the wall and down at the farm buildings of Ringham Edge. They were gathered defensively round a crew yard like a medieval settlement, their gritstone walls turned outwards to the rest of the world. The biggest shed was much newer than the rest of the farm. Its green corrugated steel roof was damp from the drizzle earlier in the day, and it gleamed now in the weak sun.
Mark thought for a moment of the woman on Ring
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ham Moor. Her death had at least been sudden; she had been given no time to consider, no time to reflect on what she had done with her life, for good or evil.
Owen had told Mark there were times when it was best to back off, to avoid confrontation, to let something go. He said that a soft word was better than an angry reaction, that a cool head was better than that hot surge of blind rage that was inevitably followed by the realization that you had made a terrible mistake.
Mark passed another stone. It was furred dark green with lichen, so he knew it had come from the north face of the wall. When a wall had been built by Owen, it was solid and reliable, the absolute symbol of stability.
Mark decided he would have to ask Owen again tomorrow about why he hadn’t been able to get hold of him on
