The Girl in the Field

Chapter 1 – The Body

‘I’m here too late,’ said a dark-suited man as he rushed from the long black taxi towards the field with its yellow grasses. Already an ambulance was moving away slowly, watched by a small clutch of earnest men with side-parted hair and white overcoats.

He paced towards them anyway, running up against the low, shambling wall that ringed the field and where a small crowd had gathered. There, he was surprised to see the figure still lying in view.

‘Thank God,’ he said to the dead girl. ‘I’ve caught you up.’

After his relief though, he remembered the ambulance. He looked up, alarmed; but it was only turning around to enter backwards through the gate.

‘Don’t come any closer!’ he instructed the driver loudly. The dark-suited man came around the corner of the field to find its entrance, though when he reached the gate it was blocked by a young man, also formally dressed, and two sombre figures in white, holding either end of an empty stretcher.

‘Sir, we need to take her,’ said the young officer. Like the newcomer, he had neat hair, a serious expression, and hadn’t loosened his tie or collar despite the warm weather.

‘Two minutes,’ said the rushing man, who was understood to be the more senior. Whatever the others’ reservations, such was the man’s conviction that they respected it and stood back with their stretcher. In his dark suit against the bright morning, he firmly but respectfully walked through the knot of men, all broiling in the heat.

They stepped back to reveal a picture of a young woman, a very young woman, in a pale blue dress with turquoise hem, lying on her side with her arms and legs apparently in motion.

‘She looks like a runner, doesn’t she?’ observed the officer at the gate.

‘But what was she running from?’ asked his boss.

The ground around the body drew his attention.

‘You’ve trampled it to hell!’ he snapped.

‘Sir, the sun’s been out all morning. We needed to take the photos and get her moved.’

‘This town’s two hours out of London,’ he said. ‘You could have waited for me.’

‘We weren’t told when you’d be here.’

The standoff remained as the man took the short time he had available, observing, scrutinising. Occasionally he’d ask a question, and the younger man at the gate would answer him. Questions such as,

‘When was she found?’

‘First thing this morning, two separate calls to the local station.’

‘The time exactly?’

‘I don’t have that.’

‘What?’

‘Well, there’s no phone near here, so I don’t know how long it took each person to get word to the Station House.’

The older man turned from the body a moment, scrutinising his colleague, who didn’t crumble. Instead he explained,

‘This is what it’s like in these parts.’

‘Then get back on to the pair of them, and get the times down exactly.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Time of death?’ he asked, turning his gaze back to the girl.

‘The Doctor couldn’t say precisely – it was a cool evening.’

‘Her skin looks fresh.’

‘Yes,’ his colleague agreed, ‘it had to be some time last night.’

‘And is he still around?’

‘The Doctor? He completed his initial examination hours ago. He’s already gone back to prepare his surgery to receive the body.’

‘That’s quick work.’

‘He was already in the area on house calls.’

‘Right. Is that a purse around her shoulder?’

‘Yes, sir. We’ve taken a peek. Nothing in it but a bit of change.’

The word ‘peek’ plagued the older man – it was too playful, not solemn enough for a body.

‘And any other belongings?’

‘No physical evidence, sir. And as for boot marks around the body, this is a working field covered in flattened grasses. Honestly, it doesn’t look any different now to when we got here.’

‘Well, we need this field searched, and the next one.’

‘Four woodentops are already on it, sir.’

He stood up and looked around but couldn’t see the uniformed policemen.

‘They’ve already done this end, and now they’re up past that ridge there,’ explained his man. ‘We’re all out of Norwich, sir. We’ve been here since eight this morning.’

The older man continued to stare downwards, as if soaking up the scene, burning it to memory.

‘She might have taken a blow we can’t see,’ said his colleague. ‘The Doctor will know for definite this afternoon, once we’ve got her to him…’ The younger man changed to a whisper, adding, ‘Sir, are you done yet, sir?’

Sir gave no reply.

‘Sir, a body going off in the midday sun… how’s that going to help anyone?’

Finally, after an excruciating delay, he stepped back and let the white overalls do their work. It was solemn work, conducted in near silence but for murmured instructions between lowered heads.

There were gasps in the crowd and people crossed themselves, as the girl was lifted gently from her grassy bed and onto the stretcher. The ambulancemen drew a starched white sheet over her, before moving her away.

‘It wasn’t right to leave her out there,’ said someone.

‘A relief,’ said another, ‘a relief.’

The newcomer watched them work.

‘Everything was photographed, sir,’ said his colleague to reassure him. ‘Nothing was missed. Now, we’ve got a lot to catch you up on. There’s nothing here that won’t wait for an hour. Pay off your cab, and we’ll drive you back to the station.’

But the man didn’t want to come back with them. Instead, he waved a message to the waiting cabbie, who quickly left the scene, knowing he’d be paid on the police account. Then he went to stand beside the small crowd, still staring at the now-empty field from behind the scruffy wall.

‘I’m here too late,’ he said, a third and final time.

‘Too late to save her?’ asked a woman standing nearby. ‘We were all too late for that, love.’

‘How was she found?’ he asked the congregation.

‘Just as you saw her,’ answered an old man in a waistcoat and flat cap. ‘Tossed there, like a rag-doll,’

The man in the dark suit stared at the yellow grasses, now trampled by half a dozen pairs of feet.

‘Any blood?’ he asked.

‘A bit around the mouth maybe.’

‘Footprints?’

‘Hard to see.’

‘I’d have seen,’ he answered. Though his fury soon gave way to hopelessness. ‘Well, we work with what we’ve got.’

‘It’s been a while since we’ve had one that bad,’ said the old man.

‘Really, who was that?’

‘Old Man Lorimer – a stand-up fight outside the Three Lights. Punched dead with one blow. He was a goner before he hit the floor.’

‘Do things like that happen often?’

‘That’s the last in my memory.’

‘And that’s a long memory,’ joked another.

‘Two-score summers and counting,’ confirmed the old man. ‘And might I ask, sir, who are you?’

‘Inspector Underwood,’ he answered, ‘Thameside Station.’

Chapter 2 – The Gaffer

With the shock of finding the victim slowly fading, urgency took over. Underwood looked around, asking,

‘So, who’s the Gaffer around here?’

‘I imagine that would be me, sir.’

He turned to see a short, round, ageing officer in black uniform with polished silver buttons and numbers on the shoulders.

‘Gull, sir,’ he introduced himself. ‘I’m the Constable for this district. I live at the Station House back in town.’

Underwood was taken aback at this figure.

‘Is something wrong, sir?’ asked Gull.

Underwood thought about the young, thrusting squad he had left back in London; then looked at Gull. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a policeman that old, and certainly not one who hadn’t risen from the rank of Constable over all those years. With his whiskers and soft accent, he seemed to belong to another age. Even his uniform looked archaic, with its tunic buttoned right up to the neck under the midday sun.

‘Not at all,’ answered Underwood. ‘I’m just not used to how things run in a town like this. I’m pleased to meet you, Gull.’

‘Likewise. It’s always a pleasure to learn what London can teach us.’

Underwood took the dig. A nearby officer smirked momentarily. But he had been at enough crime scenes to recognise the moment – a body had been found, a horror faced… and then the body was taken away and it brought a nervous relief. A joke might come, a giggle, however misplaced. And they had to take that relief where they could find it, for it was going to be a tough time for all of them.

‘A moment, Gull?’ Underwood beckoned him away from the others. He took a small black notebook from his traveller’s case and opened it on the bonnet of a squad car.

‘You saw the scene, Constable?’ he asked.

‘I was there to watch over her before the Doctor and the Norwich lads came.’

‘A sad thing.’

‘Yes,’ answered the man, who Underwood judged to have been old enough to know a sad thing when he saw one.

‘So, tell me how the land lies.’

‘Cardow’s a port, sir. A village. Small compared to most places, tiny next to London. We haven’t seen a thing like this in the twenty years I’ve been here; nor, to my knowledge, in the twenty years before that.’

‘Old Man Lorimer?’

‘A pub fight, so I was told. Not a murder; not a girl.’

‘They say she wasn’t touched?’

‘That’s how it looked, sir.’

Underwood shook his head, ‘It doesn’t fit any crime pattern that I can think of.’

‘If you mean, it doesn’t look like some bloke’s drunken fumble gone wrong, then you’re right, guv. She’s not been dirtied-up enough for a start. Her clothes, I mean. It’s like she dropped out the sky. There’s hardly any harm done to her!’

‘Well, someone did do something to her.’ Underwood’s tone darkened, ‘So, are there any locals worth us knowing about?’

‘What, who’d kill a woman right out in the open?’

‘We don’t know where she was killed yet. Any troublemakers? Wife beaters? Prowlers? Peepers? Anyone who’s ever given a woman a hard time?’

‘I don’t know who I could name for you, guv.’

‘This is no time for local loyalties, Constable.’

‘I mean, Inspector, that I have the easiest job on Earth out here along our quiet coast, tending to this gentle flock. I check the doors along the High Street are locked last thing at night; on Fridays I might stop one fellow three-sheets-to-the-wind threatening to bash another’s head in. And about once a leap year we have a fisherman go missing; and as likely as not, a week later have his body wash up along the beach – that’s the way the tides turn along here, you see, Inspector.’

Gull went on,

‘But anything like this? Well, if it’s brought a fellow up from London to solve it, then I reckon it took a fellow up from London to do it.’

‘I want a list of five names by the time we get back to your Station House.’

Gull shook his head, answering,

‘And have some shop boy given two black eyes by sundown, swearing his life away to anything you tell him to?’

Underwood bristled. But Gull went on,

‘I mean no disrespect, Inspector. But I hear talk of what goes on in your city, just like the rest of us up and down the country do. Now, I daresay that you might accuse me of not knowing how things work in the Big Smoke. And, after twenty years away from there, I won’t say that you’re not right in making that assumption. But, it makes little sense to me take the way you do things in the city and bring them to a town like this. We don’t have five rowdies to round up for you. We don’t have your kind of criminal.’

‘But you have our kind of crime. Or, at least you do this day, Constable Gull.’

‘Aye, aye, we do that.’ Gull took the point, and went on, ‘I don’t know why she’s dead. Lord only knows, I wish she wasn’t. I don’t know who she was, and I don’t know who did it. Hell, I’ve spent the better part of this morning feeling like I don’t know very much at all anymore. But, I know she isn’t anyone from around here. And I know that he isn’t either, whoever he is. And so I still don’t have one local name to give you.’

There was stalemate between the men, but grudging respect. Underwood asked,

‘In that case, have the roads been closed?’

Gull half-smiled, ‘There’re three roads out of town, Inspector: north, south, and west. To flee east, you’d need a fishing boat. And, as the body was left here any time before six o’clock this morning, then he’s had, oh, three hours to get half-way to Liverpool, Leeds or Birmingham by now.’

‘And the man who found her?’

‘Phipps, a woodsman off to an early job.’

‘Any history?’

Gull breathed deeply before answering, ‘If you want me to be shocked with this London-way of doing things, Inspector, then let me say that I’ve seen what one man can do to another in a land without law.’

‘France?’ asked Underwood, in knowing code.

Gull nodded, ‘Trust may not be as easy to come by on your patch as it is on mine, but I still take no man’s word for granted. Phipps and I have shared a drink every Sunday at the Three Lights since Nineteen Forty-Six. And every word of what he told my sister on the phone this morning rang true. But, still, if it hadn’t have done…’

‘Your sister?’ asked the Inspector as an aside.

‘We share the Station House. She’s my housekeeper. Neither of us married.’

‘And Phipps?’

‘He has a wife and daughters.’

‘Now, you tell me straight…!’

Gull paused, then answered,

‘There has never been a word against him, nor a shadow of a stain on his character. And, if a policeman’s gift is his intuition, then mine has never sensed a flicker with that man or that family.’

‘Gull, Gull!’ called another man.

‘I fear I’m needed, sir. If that was all?’

‘Get everything set up at the Station House,’ instructed Underwood, needlessly. And then he let Gull free to see what called for his attention.

Chapter 3 – The Town

Underwood turned back to the small crowd.

‘So,’ he asked again, ‘what did any of you see?’

‘Only the same as you saw,’ answered the same old man he’d spoken to earlier.

‘The car’s this way, sir,’ offered a young plain-clothes officer being helpful.

But Underwood shook his head, saying, ‘I’ve only just got here. I’ll catch you up.’ To those watching it seemed obvious that this new player was in charge.

‘It’s a bit of a walk…’ advised the young officer; but his concerns were waved away.

Instead, his boss asked the gathered locals,

‘Do you know her?’

All shook their heads slowly and looked down.

‘Is there a school or university nearby?’ Further negatives. ‘A typing college? A big office?’ He turned to a woman who caught his eye, thirty-something and smartly turned out, ‘Do you recognise her clothes? How would you say she looked?’

‘Smart, pretty,’ answered the woman, ‘not tarty. And, to answer your question, there are some small offices in town – I run a typing pool there; but I’m called along the High Street most days and I haven’t seen her before.’

‘And how far away is town?’ he asked.

‘Two miles. It’s where most of us came from this morning, when we heard the news. Though some might live nearer.’

‘What is near here then?’

A farm hand answered, ‘Not a whole lot of anything.’

They were standing at the corner of the field, right at the crossroads.

‘Where do these four roads lead?’ asked Underwood.

‘Town’s that-a-way,’ said someone pointing north, ‘the coast’s that way…’ pointing east.

Underwood looked and could just see the sea, could hear the breaking waves.

‘That way’s Norwich,’ the person added, pointing west. ‘And southward, there’re a whole lot of fields and empty beaches.’

‘And what’s nearer?’ he asked again. ‘What’s within a walking distance; a short car ride?’

‘Farms…’ suggested one.

‘Fields…’ offered another.

‘A whole lot of nothing,’ repeated the farm hand.

‘So, is there much traffic along these roads?’

The locals stared at Underwood, as one asked,

‘Have you seen a car pass in the time you’ve been standing here?’

With the girl removed, one by one the townsfolk left. Underwood watched them go, deducing their roles from their clothes: the leather apron of a butcher; the flour-coated baker; the floral housecoat of a housekeeper; the open-necked shirt of a lad running errands on a warm day. He turned to see only one remaining figure. It was the young man who had offered him a lift, little older than the errand boy. He wore a new suit in which he stood awkwardly. He watched the newcomer, as if waiting for instruction.

‘You’re one of ours?’ asked the boss.

The boy nodded. ‘I’m attached to you.’

‘Underwood,’ said the man in introduction, putting out his hand.

‘Yes, Inspector,’ said the boy, eagerly taking it to shake. ‘We’ve been told all about you.’

‘Well, don’t worry, only half of it isn’t true. And you are?’

‘Oliver. Constable Oliver.’

‘And what do your mates call you?’

‘Barrie. Though I prefer Oliver on the job, Inspector.’

‘Well, Oliver, I go by sir – no need for rank.’

‘Right, sir.’

‘And you can start by telling me everything you fellows have learnt since six o’clock this morning. Such as who owns this field.’

‘Well,’ he began, ‘most of the land to the south of the town was owned by a local family. But, after the last of them died without an heir, it fell to a trust in London…’

‘So, there’s no one local to talk to?’

‘There are tenant farmers, but Sergeant Peacock’s already arranging to speak to them.’

Underwood smiled,

‘Peacock. That was the officious little fellow who wanted to rush the body away just now?’

‘He’s very good, sir. You’ll only hear good things about him from Norwich Station. The hours he puts in…’

‘Yes, he does seem a little like a rising star.’

Underwood worked off a hunch,

‘So, are you local, Oliver? Because you’ll be a lot more use to me if you are.’

‘From a farm three miles north of town, sir. I’ve lived around here all my life. At least, until I left for my police training.’

‘Then that’s exactly the answer I wanted to hear.’

Underwood turned from Oliver, and visually inspected the scene one final time.

‘Is everything all right, sir?’

‘Yes… yes. It’s just disorienting, seeing a scene like that… in a place like this.’

‘It isn’t a common sight around here, sir.’

‘No, not for London either.’

‘No, sir?’

‘No. Half the bodies we turn up have been in and out of our cells since they were boys. There are women too, of course. But I haven’t had one as… untouched as this one for a while.’

Then he announced, ‘I need lunch.’

‘Well, there’s nowhere to eat out here, sir.’

‘Then, you lead me back to town, Constable. And, as we go, you tell who every one of those people were, and how they know each other.’

Chapter 4 – The Walk

As they began the trudge to the local police station, Underwood threw his jacket over his shoulder, indicating Oliver could do the likewise if he wished. He did so eagerly, as he began his run-through of the morning’s crowd,

‘Well, there was the butcher, O’Leary…’

‘Irish?’

‘Only from long back. He has a salting yard behind his shop in town. The miller – I don’t know his name, he’s just called Miller by everyone – Four loaves, Miller, they say.’

‘Yes, yes.’

‘He works in town also. He has a house near here though, so he was probably on his way back home when he saw the crowd.’

‘It’s a long way to walk home for lunch.’

‘A miller’s day is as good as done by opening time – he’s been up baking since five. That was his wife looking over the wall also.’

‘Really?’ The last fact intrigued Underwood. ‘They weren’t standing together. I wouldn’t have guessed they even knew each other. Do they get along?’

‘I’ve never noticed.’

‘Then start noticing. And the lad?’

‘That’s Gerry, he’s only a kid, two years below me in school. He takes parcels and deliveries all over, from the shops in town.’

‘And there was an old man there too.’

Oliver smiled, ‘That’s Old Joe.’

‘Does he live nearby?’

‘No. Though he roams all over.’ If that fact puzzled Underwood, the calm look Oliver wore on his face reassured him.

‘And what about the well-dressed blonde?’ queried Underwood after a brief pause, trying to ask too casually, and having left her till the end.

‘Well, that’s Miss Grey of Swift Fingers.’

‘Of course, her typing pool. She seemed distinct from the others. Well, I might try and catch up with her when we reach town.’

‘Very good, sir.’

‘And, Oliver, you’re still forgetting one person.’

Oliver’s puzzlement deepened, as he scanned his recent memory for faces in the crowd.

Underwood helped him out, ‘New suit, brown hair, five-eight to five-ten, wearing a look of nervous expectation…’

Oliver smiled as he recognised himself.

The pair of them walked on, past fields exactly like the crime scene, large and low and flat, full of dry grass blowing stiffly in the sea breeze. Underwood asked,

‘So, have you seen a body before?’

‘Yes,’ Oliver answered quickly, ‘but only after everyone else was there. I’ve never found one.’

‘It will happen,’ said his boss. ‘You’ll be called to a shut-up house with bad drains – or what the neighbours think are bad drains. Or, heaven forbid, you’ll find a stabbing victim behind the bins in an alleyway. Or maybe that’s only a London thing?’

‘I hope so,’ the Constable agreed. Underwood went on,

‘And where would you have left a body, if you found one on your hands out here, sometime last night?’

This question shocked Oliver more, though still he answered, gulping,

‘I’d go to the beach – the tide’s almost in view,’ he started. ‘Or else in the woods along the Norwich Road.’

‘But not out in a field for all to see, eh?’

‘No, sir. Most definitely not.’

‘So, this typing pool…’ he asked.

‘It’s just a few girls,’ answered Oliver quickly, ‘in one of the shopfronts, just off the High Street.’

Underwood caught something and smiled, asking,

‘And an office full of secretaries holds no interest for you at all, my friend?’

Oliver went beetroot red, so Underwood dialled it back, asking more generally,

‘And who are their customers?’

‘Local businesses who need letters typing, their books written up. And Claude, of course.’

‘Claude?’ repeated Underwood, mulling over this new name. He made a mental note to seek him out. Though the questions were piling up behind his eyes.

‘And so, the nearest town or city is Norwich?’ he asked.

‘There’s also Yarmouth to the north.’

‘But, you wouldn’t go between them on this road?’

Oliver chuckled, ‘Look at the traffic, sir – have we seen a car pass us on this walk?’

‘And no big offices?’

‘I don’t think we have any,’ said Oliver. ‘Why ask, sir?’

‘Because the girl wasn’t wearing that smart dress to see a butcher or a baker or a candlestick-maker, and she was miles from anywhere else.’

The road had brought them out to the coast, with the beach getting ever closer on their right-hand side.

‘So how far is the town?’ asked Underwood.

‘We’re nearly there.’

‘This is it?’

Before them were just a few buildings: shops, a big pub, and some covered stalls selling farm produce. Underwood could also make out signs further along for a bank and an insurance office.

‘It gets a little busier at the Harbour-end,’ said Oliver. Though his superior doubted that.

‘And that must be the Station House.’ Underwood was supremely underwhelmed at the sight of a small, white-plastered cottage with the blue lamp hanging over the door.

‘Yes, that’s Constable Gull’s place,’ said Oliver with warmth. ‘Those aren’t his cars though,’ he added, observing two long, black Ford Zephyrs parked outside.

‘Well, I’m not the only one who’s been brought in.’

Before they entered the Station House, Underwood stopped his junior officer, and turned to face him.

‘Sir?’ asked Oliver.

‘This isn’t right, is it? Any of it?’

Though Oliver didn’t know what to say.

Chapter 5 – Gull’s House

Beneath the blue lamp was a stable-style door, split at waist height. The top half was tied back, while the bottom half was still closed, and acted as a front desk.

‘Shop!’ called Underwood.

Approaching them appeared Constable Gull, presenting much the same buttoned-up image as before, except, of course, a policeman never wore his helmet indoors.

‘Sir, Oliver, come on through.’

Gull pulled the latch; but Underwood let Oliver go through alone, holding Gull back in the sparse, working hallway.

‘So, who’s this Old Joe?’ he asked. ‘He roams around the place, so I’ve heard. He was there this morning.’

Gull sighed, ‘What you and I saw in the last War, Joe saw in the First. Only, he brought a bit of it back with him. He wouldn’t hurt a fly.’

‘And there’s a delivery lad on his cycle. He could have seen something.’

Gull nodded, ‘That’s young Gerry. He has a paper round in town first thing. He didn’t get to the scene till not long before you did, sir.’

Gull paused, then asked,

‘Are we going to go through this with every man you meet in Cardow, sir?’

Underwood stood back, breaking the spell, before following Oliver in.

‘Two more cups please, Audrey!’ called Gull through to another room, without enquiring whether the arriving officers needed tea. Though, as Gull surely knew, after walking into town on such a day, both men were gasping.

He brought the Inspector into his study, which was a long, whitewashed room fitted out with a desk, a bureau full of pens and ink for writing up reports, and in the centre a dark-wood table, around which two other men looked up. They stood when they saw the Inspector.

The besuited officer who had been supervising the crime scene spoke first,

‘We weren’t properly introduced earlier,’ he began, with what Underwood wondered might have been some attitude. ‘Sergeant Peacock, down from Norwich Station. And this is Sergeant Bowden, who came with me.’

Underwood looked briefly to the two of them, standing at the table, smoking and looking idle. Though he turned away, pretending to riffle through some papers on Gull’s desk.

‘Very well, sir,’ said Peacock, ‘if you’re not going to be civil. I was prepared to overlook it the first time…’

‘You weren’t going to wait for me before moving the body!’ declared Underwood, spinning to face him.

‘She was out in the sun! The Doctor…’ But none of it cut any ice. ‘Are you like this with everyone?’ asked Peacock.

‘I haven’t noticed many crimes solved by politeness,’ answered Underwood, which was the only answer Peacock was going to get. ‘Why don’t you just tell me your brief?’

‘I’m here with Bowden and Oliver and several uniforms,’ said Peacock, ‘for house-to-house calls and to start the case file.’ Peacock breathed, before continuing, ‘Which we’d already be doing if we hadn’t been kept waiting at the crime scene, and then for another half an hour while you sauntered back from the crossroads, sir!’

Underwood stared at the impudence. He was impressed: face to face, the younger man didn’t lose his resolve. Underwood turned to Gull,

‘Is this how you teach the men to speak to senior officers in this part of the world, Constable?’

Gull didn’t have a chance to answer though, before Underwood had turned to resume his questioning of Peacock,

‘And so, what have you learnt about this town from behind your car’s wound-up window, Sergeant?’

‘What do I need to learn?’

‘Location.’

‘What does that matter?’ spluttered Peacock. ‘There’s a girl in a field! We go through every man within a mile’s radius. Then two miles. There’s hardly anyone here anyway!’

Underwood returned to the papers on the desk, saying,

‘Location is everything. The crossroads are the last point of civilisation for miles before that endless coast. There was a