Liz was leaning up against a sofa, which looked like it should’ve seen a bonfire years ago, her PCSO uniform hidden beneath her motorbike leathers.
‘No milk anyway,’ she said, then tapped her right foot against a grubby looking sack on the floor, ‘unless you want some of that.’
‘What is it?’
‘That’s dried milk for lambs,’ Liz explained. ‘You use it if you have to hand feed them. Sometimes mothers reject their own, or you get triplets and have to take one away. Smells great, like really sweet custard powder, or a Caramac bar, but I don’t think it would work too well in a brew.’
Harry looked for somewhere to sit down, eventually pulling a chair out from under a dining table, which itself was covered in unopened letters held down with a scattering of shotgun cartridges. The chair looked sticky but Harry went for it and hoped that when he got up that he wouldn’t leave the place with ruined trousers.
‘So then, Liz,’ Harry said, as Jim shuffled along and took up another seat, Liz staying where she was against the sofa, ‘what exactly happened?’
‘All I was doing was talking to him,’ Liz said. ‘He was in a proper state over what he’d found so I was just trying to calm him down and find out what had gone on.’
‘And you met him here?’
Liz gave a nod. ‘Jim sent him here to calm him down and get him away from the accident.’
‘And he just buggered off?’
‘Yep, out of here, like I’d set a rocket up his arse.’
Harry smiled just a little at that. ‘Why was he up here in the first place? And how did he know where to find the deceased? Doesn’t strike me as all that normal to just walk up into a field to meet a friend.’
Jim said, ‘All I know is that when I got to the scene he was in a flap, properly jumping around and not making much sense.’
‘Liz?’ Harry asked. ‘He say anything to you?’
Liz screwed up her face and gave a little shrug.
‘What is it?’ Harry asked.
‘It’s just that he said he was out here because John sent him a text,’ Liz said, then held up her hands as if to fend off any accusations of making stuff up. ‘Don’t look at me like that, it’s what he said.’
Harry glanced at Jim with a raised eyebrow. ‘He mention this to you?’
Jim shook his head. ‘He can’t have sent one, can he? John’s been dead a couple of days, easily. Nick’s talking bollocks.’
‘And that’s your professional opinion?’ Harry asked, a crease of a smile in the corner of his mouth.
‘It’s the opinion of someone who’s known him all his life.’
‘Exactly my thoughts,’ Liz said. ‘But that’s what he said, or at least that’s what I could make out from his hysterics. He said John sent him a text, that he needed help, and when he arrived he found what you’ve all seen, John not exactly being in a fit state to have sent him a text in the first place.’
Harry folded his arms and felt his brow crease as he tried to deal with what he’d just been told. ‘So this Nick bloke reckons he received a text from John, who’s clearly dead, telling him to come to the field this morning? You’re sure that’s what he said? Absolutely positive?’
Liz gave a short, sharp nod.
‘And then he just ran? Was there anything you said that set him off?’ Harry asked, eyes back on Liz. ‘Anything you said or did?’
Liz was quiet for a moment. ‘When I arrived, Jim had him pretty calm, so I just took over.’
‘He was probably still in shock,’ Jim said.
‘And having seen the body, that’s more than understandable,’ Harry agreed.
‘That bad?’ Liz asked.
Harry and Jim both nodded.
Liz’s eyes grew wide at this, but she kept on speaking. ‘Anyway,’ she continued, ‘he was quiet to begin with, so I just tried to keep it like that, but then he started getting agitated.’
‘About what?’ Harry asked.
‘John texting him and John being dead and how could a dead person send him a text, and then he kind of just started leaping about a bit.’
‘Leaping about a bit?’ Harry said then gestured to the room they were in. ‘How does anyone leap about a bit in here without doing themselves a mischief?’
‘He had a good go,’ Liz said. ‘And he’s not that big, not much taller than me if I’m honest. It’s what he does anyway, never seems to stand still, like he’s always agitated, but he was worse than ever.’
‘So where is he now?’ Harry asked.
‘When I said that you and Matt were up there as well, with Jim, he kind of just went silent, then just did a runner, jumped in his van, and buggered off.’
Something jogged Harry’s memory. ‘When was this?’
Liz checked her watched. ‘Twenty minutes ago?’
‘That’ll be the car we heard then,’ Harry said. ‘Raced off up the road. Any idea where he was heading?’
‘None,’ Liz said. ‘But we know where he lives.’
Harry fell silent. They had a body in a field which looked like cause of death was a little suspicious. Nothing concrete, but enough to call it in and investigate further. And now they had this Nick bloke going up to meet the deceased at the field because apparently the deceased had sent him a text asking for help. Which was either total bollocks, or something much, much worse. Harry knew he’d be wanting to have another look at the field then, that was for sure. If a text had been sent, did that mean there was a phone lying around? And if there was, who had used it? Because if there was one thing he was pretty sure the dead didn’t do, it was send text messages to friends.
‘So,’ Harry said at last, the word rolling out on the end of a long, slow breath, ‘and just to
