He cleared his throat, and as he opened his mouth to start, a murmur of surprise, then welcome, ran through the group, and Reynolds looked up to see Jonas Holly.
His heart sank.
He watched people turn to shake Jonas’s hand or carefully pat his shoulder. It seemed as if they’d seen about as much of him over the past eightteen months as Reynolds had. There was certainly less of him to see. Despite his irritation, Reynolds was taken aback by how much weight Jonas had lost, when there’d been so little to lose in the first place. His cheekbones were too high and his eyes too big. He looked haunted.
Reynolds wondered whether the message was still on the answering machine, growing less tragic and more plain
Jonas had stopped shaking.
Walking down the hill into the village – into the midst of the people he knew must despise him – had been an un nerving experience. This was not like driving to Mr Jacoby’s shop to pick up baked beans, when he could hide behind jeans and jumper and his father’s old fishing hat that he’d found in the cupboard under the stairs. This was him very publicly in uniform – once more assuming the mantle of authority that had so spectacularly failed the village where he’d been born and bred.
He’d stopped at the playing field on the way to the Red Lion. The playing field with the skate ramp and the swings, and the little stream where Yvonne Marsh had died. To stave off the moment when he would have to rejoin society at the Red Lion, he’d crossed the field. The grass had crackled almost as loudly from drought as it had with frost two winters ago. He’d stared into the rill under the old blackthorn and remembered the pain in his legs where the icy cold had seeped into his very bones as he’d bent over the half-naked woman …
Jonas had had to stop again in the bus shelter and breathe deeply. He watched his hands tremble like a drunk’s, and fought down the panic that had swelled into a great bubble in his chest. He couldn’t do this. He needed to go home.
Bob Coffin passed by in his crumpled green Barbour and gaiters, despite the weather, and touched the front of his flat cap at Jonas.
‘Mr Holly,’ he said, as if they’d just met yesterday.
Jonas nodded shakily at him.
Bob Coffin stopped. He’d been the Blacklands huntsman for nigh on forty years, and his legs were bowed but sturdy from the hard labour of walking hounds. His eyes were deep-set and bright blue, and watched Jonas like those of a small, careful bird. He barely reached Jonas’s chin, and yet when he inclined his head briefly towards the Red Lion and said, ‘Coming?’ Jonas only hesitated for one more second – then followed him like a lamb.
And so he’d got to the car park late, just as Reynolds was about to start speaking, and had been embarrassed that he’d been noticed and that people had turned to him and made a fuss. They were kind. So kind. Shaking his hand and grasping his shoulder and murmuring good wishes. Elizabeth Rice had put an arm around him and surprised him by pulling his cheek down so she could kiss it hello. Nobody had made a joke about it. For Lucy’s sake, he guessed.
He’d been relieved when they’d all turned back to listen to Reynolds and left him alone, and he’d been able to breathe again.
When he had calmed down enough to actually look properly at Reynolds, he noticed he had hair.
All over his head.
Reynolds put up his hand to call for silence so that he could speak, but nobody was looking at him, and before he could clear his throat again there was the metallic sound of hoofs and at least thirty horses clattered up the road and milled at the entrance of the car park, to a spontaneous cheer from the volunteers.
The Midmoor Hunt had turned out in support of John Took, even if he
‘Good morning,’ he said in a voice that would have sounded well at the Globe Theatre. ‘I believe we have some children to find.’
Once more the volunteers cheered and clapped and turned to face him, so that Reynolds found himself looking at a hundred shoulders. Even his own officers were showing him their epaulettes.
Proles.
‘We’re just here to help.’ Stourbridge nodded at him modestly, and Reynolds disliked him instantly. Of course they were here to help! What did Stourbridge
When the search party finally turned back towards Reynolds, he started. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, you all know why you’re here and—’
‘Can’t hear you at the back!’ said a gruff voice. ‘Speak up!’
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he started again.
‘Yes, we got
Reynolds felt sweat beginning to form at the base of his plugs. Suddenly his speech seemed a bit flowery and superfluous. Wasted on a crowd of earthy farmers like these.
‘I have some maps here!’ he shouted. ‘I’ve split the moor into twelve squares around a five-mile radius of Dunkery Beacon!’
Charles Stourbridge’s horse opened the crowd like the Red Sea as he rode over to the coal bunker and held out his hand for a map with such expectant authority that Reynolds could do nothing other than give him one. He rested it on his horse’s neck and studied it.
‘What I want us to do,’ shouted Reynolds, ‘is to concentrate on outbuildings, barns and copses. Places where the children might be hidden!’
Reynolds hoped they’d all understand the subtext – that right now they still hoped to find Jess and Pete alive.
‘What if they’re dead?’ said the same gruff voice. Reynolds searched for the speaker in annoyance, but couldn’t pick out the culprit. He looked at Jonas Holly – easy to spot because of his height – but the man was looking at him attentively.
The crowd had gone quiet at the question, and there was no need for Reynolds to shout now. ‘There’s no reason to believe that Jess and Pete are dead. This is not a hunt for bodies, ladies and gentlemen, it’s a search for two scared children desperately in need of your help.’
There was a smattering of applause, and Reynolds felt the balance of power swing back towards him.
‘Good,’ said Stourbridge immediately. ‘Then let’s not waste time making speeches. Let’s crack on!’
Another cheer and suddenly the coal bunker was rocked by people clamouring and snatching at maps, even though Reynolds had worked out a careful system of small groups of volunteers, each under the supervision of a police officer. Instead, Stourbridge said, ‘Right. My lot will take squares one, two, three, five and six. Lots of ground to cover and we’ll be faster over it.’ Before Reynolds could disagree, he’d ridden out again through the sea of people, and the hunt was moving off at a rattling canter.
If Reynolds had had a gun, he’d have shot him in the back.
The search took more than a hundred people three solid days. They concentrated on outbuildings and barns, simply because concentrating on open moorland would have taken a thousand people a year and might still not have turned up any trace of Jess Took or Pete Knox.
The weather was spectacular.
The force helicopter criss-crossed the search area using thermal imaging cameras, and its noise – a distant whirr or an overhead cacophony – became the soundtrack to the operation.
Charles Stourbridge controlled the riders and Reynolds settled for controlling those on foot and in cars.
Rice continued discreetly to check the volunteers against the sex offenders register, and on the second
