Bones and Silence

'Sorry,' repeated Pascoe. 'But as an observer, how would you say things were generally between the Swains?'

Again she shrugged.

'It was a marriage,' she said. 'Anything's possible.'

Pascoe laughed and said, 'That's a touch cynical, isn't it? If you don't believe in the power of true love, I think you've got the wrong book.'

She picked up her discarded Jane Eyre.

'You mean it ends happy?' she said. She sounded disappointed.

'Afraid so. You'll need to try men for unhappy endings,' said Pascoe with gentle mockery. 'Try Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Or Anna Karenina. Now they're really miserable!'

He grinned as he spoke and was rewarded with a second faint smile.

'What's the rest of this building used for?' he asked.

'Down below, you mean? That was the old byre and stables, I think. Now it's used for garages and to store stuff they don't like to leave out in the wet.'

'Is it open? I'd like to take a look.'

'It'll be locked. Dad doesn't trust anybody.'

She picked up a bunch of keys, rose and led the way down the outside stair. She was right. All the doors were padlocked. She stood and watched as Pascoe poked around in a desultory fashion. He had little hope that he was going to find a barrowful of dope out here, and if it were hidden by the thimbleful, it would take a trained dog to sniff it out.

Finished, he walked out into the yard again.

'Same kind of stuff over there?' he asked, looking at the barn on the far side.

'No. That's empty.'

'Better have a glance all the same.'

Again she was right. The stone floor was swept clean. He looked up into the rafters, screwing his eyes up against the darkness. He thought he saw a movement. There were certainly patches of darker darkness against the dull grey of the slates.

'Bats,' said the girl.

'What?'

'Bats. Pipistrelles, I think they call them.'

He took an involuntary step backwards. Dark places he'd never cared much for, even less since his experience down the mine. And the creatures of darkness, in particular bats, made him shudder. Ellie, in whom he detected a definite green shift in recent months, had become a member of a local Bat Preservation Group. Had she opted for whales or wild orchids, he could have gone along with her in passion, perhaps even in person; but while intellectually one hundred per cent in favour of the rights of bats, the thought of actually touching them filled him with horror.

'It's all right. They're hibernating,' said Shirley Appleyard.

Ashamed of being detected in this unmanly behaviour, Pascoe said brusquely, 'Why's this place not used for anything?'

'Don't know. There was some talk of Mrs Swain turning it into an indoor shooting gallery.'

'And what happened?'

'Came to nowt. Mebbe because of the bats. You can't disturb them, you know. Or mebbe Mr Swain didn't like the idea because of his brother.'

'His brother?'

'The one who used to own this place. Tom Swain.'

It rang a faint bell.

'Didn't he . . . ?'

'Shot himself a few years back. In here,' said the girl, deadpan.

'In here? Not very lucky with guns, the Swains, are they?'

The girl didn't reply. Pascoe looked around the barn. Bats and a ghost. He couldn't blame Swain for objecting to his wife's proposal.

He said, 'It looks as if someone's got some plan for it now.'

'Because it's been cleared out?' The girl shrugged. 'There was nothing but a load of rusty old farm stuff here. Mr Swain got rid of it a couple of weeks back.'

'So he is planning to use it?'

'Mebbe. I think he were more interested in the money he got for the scrap.'

'Really?' said Pascoe, alert to this hint of financial problems. 'Money a bit short, is it?'

'You'd need to ask Mr Swain or my dad about that,' said the girl.