‘Sore point. I didn’t hear about it until this afternoon, so I’ll have to make do with photographs. Not ideal, but that wasn’t really why I was brought in.’
‘Oh?’
She hesitated. ‘Well, I don’t suppose it’s a secret. They asked me here because if this is one of Monk’s victims the others might be buried nearby. They want me to advise on the most likely places the graves could be. That’s sort of a speciality of mine, finding where things are hidden. Especially bodies.’
‘How do you do that?’ I was intrigued. There had been a number of technological advances to help locate buried bodies in recent years: everything from aerial photography to geophysics and thermal imaging. But grave location was still a hit and miss affair, especially on a place like Dartmoor. And I wasn’t sure how a behavioural specialist could help anyway.
‘Oh, there are ways,’ she said, vaguely. ‘Anyway, now you know what a BIA does. Your turn.’
I gave her a potted outline of what my work involved, breaking off when the landlord arrived with the food. He set the plate down in front of me hard enough to slop the gravy on to the table. At least I hoped it was gravy: the greasy brown liquid could have been anything.
Sophie and I considered the mess of over-boiled vegetables and grey meat. ‘So you decided against the smoked salmon and fois gras,’ she said after a moment.
‘It’s the perks that make the work worthwhile,’ I said, trying to spear a disintegrating carrot on my fork. ‘So where are you from?’
‘Bristol, but I live in London these days. I used to come on holidays around here when I was a girl, though, so I know Dartmoor quite well. I love the openness. I’d like to move out here some day, but with work . . . Well, you know how it is. Perhaps if I ever get tired of being a BIA.’
‘I’m reserving judgement on Dartmoor, but I know Bristol a little. It’s nice country round there. My wife’s from Bath.’
‘Oh, right.’
We smiled at each other, knowing that parameters had been drawn. Now we’d established I was married we could relax without worrying about putting out any wrong signals.
Sophie was good company, sharp and funny. She talked about her home and her plans for the future; I told her about Kara and Alice. We both spoke about our work, although the subject of the current investigation was avoided. It was an ongoing case, and neither of us was about to give away too much to a virtual stranger.
But when I looked across the room and saw Terry and Roper heading towards me I knew that was about to change. Terry looked startled when he saw the two of us at the table. His expression became guarded as they approached.
‘Didn’t realize you two knew each other,’ he said. Roper hung back just behind him.
Sophie gave Terry a smile that seemed to have an edge to it. ‘We do now. David’s been telling me what he does. It’s really fascinating.’
‘Is it,’ Terry said, flatly.
‘Do you want to join us?’ I asked, made uncomfortable by the sudden atmosphere.
‘No, we won’t interrupt. Just came over to give you the news.’ He spoke over his shoulder to Roper. ‘Get the beers in, Bob.’
Roper blinked but hid any displeasure he felt at being ordered around. A trace of aftershave lingered behind him as he went to the bar.
‘News?’ I said.
Terry addressed me as though Sophie wasn’t there. ‘You know this morning when I told you I’d got to go somewhere? Well, I went to Dartmoor prison to see Jerome Monk.’
That explained Terry’s secrecy earlier: no wonder he’d seemed keyed up. But Sophie jumped in before I could ask anything.
‘You’ve been to interview him? Why wasn’t I told?’
‘Take it up with Simms,’ he shot back.
Sophie was furious. ‘I still can’t believe you questioned him without consulting me first! Why bring a BIA in and then not use them? That’s just stupid!’
I tried not to wince. Tact obviously wasn’t her strong point. Terry’s face darkened.
‘I’m sure the SIO’ll love to hear how stupid he’s been.’
‘You said you’d got news?’ I said, trying to head off the row.
Terry gave Sophie a final glare before turning to me. ‘Monk claims he can’t remember who he buried where, but he’s agreed to cooperate.’
‘Cooperate how?’
Terry hesitated, as though he didn’t entirely believe it himself. ‘He’s going to take us to the other graves.’
4
The prison van bumped along the narrow road. Police cars and motorbikes flanked it front and back, blue lights flashing. The procession made its way past the grassed-over ruins of an old waterwheel, one of the remnants of the tin mines Wainwright had told me about, and pulled up near where a helicopter stood on a patch of clear moor, its rotors turning idly. The doors of the police cars opened and armed officers climbed out, the snub shapes of their guns gleaming dully in the early morning drizzle. Now the front doors of the prison van opened as well. Two guards climbed out and went to the rear. The clusters of uniforms there obscured what they were doing, but a moment later the doors swung open.
A man stepped out of the back. The police and prison guards quickly formed a tight cordon around him, screening him from clear view. But the big, shaved head was clearly visible, standing out like a white football in the centre of the encircling figures. He was bustled across the moorland to the waiting helicopter, hunched over as the two guards hurried him beneath the whirling rotor blades. He climbed into the cabin clumsily, as though unused to the exercise. As he pulled himself up he slipped, going down on one knee. Hands reached out from inside the helicopter, grabbing his arm to steady him. For a second he could be fully seen, shapeless and doughy inside the prison-issue jacket.
Then he was inside. One of the guards followed him aboard and the door slammed shut. The rotors picked up speed as the other guard retreated back towards the prison van, clutching his hat to his head as the downdraught from the blades rippled the grass. The helicopter lifted from the ground, tilting slightly as it turned, and then it was angling away across the moor, shrinking until it was little more than a black speck against the grey sky.
Terry lowered the binoculars as the sound of its rotors diminished. ‘Well, what did you think?’
I shrugged, hands stuck deep into the pockets of my coat. My breath steamed in the fine drizzle. ‘Fine, apart from when he slipped. Where did you find him?’
‘The double? He’s some slaphead PC from HQ. Nothing like Monk when you see him up close, but he’s the best we could do.’ Terry gnawed at his lip. ‘The guns were my idea.’
‘I wondered about that.’
He gave me a look. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘It seems a lot of trouble to go to, that’s all.’
‘That’s the price of a free press. This way they get something to photograph and we can get on with the job without the bastards getting in the way.’
I couldn’t blame him for sounding disgruntled. Even though it was supposedly a secret, word had inevitably leaked out about Monk’s involvement in the search. Keeping the press off open moorland would have been impossible, so the decoy would distract their attention while the real business was under way. Finding a grave out here would be hard enough without journalists trampling all over the moor.