LITMIR.BIZ

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get somebody to do a proper job of it, but this will do for now,’ said Hitchens, oblivious to the exasperated look that Fry gave him. ‘What do you make of it?’

      Cooper bent over the map. ‘Well, you’ve got an area that includes a dozen villages and one small town. Several dales on the western side, including part of the Wye Valley. The main A6 between Bakewell and Buxton is down here, and near the top there’s a smaller trunk road that cuts right across the A623.’

      ‘A busy area, would you say?’

      ‘Only parts of it, sir. The two main roads carry a lot of traffic. And there are some popular tourist spots, such as Tideswell and Monsal Head. And Eyam of course, on the eastern side.’

      ‘That’s the plague village, isn’t it?’

      ‘Plague?’ asked Fry.

      ‘Oh – Ben will tell you the story some time.’

      ‘I’ll look forward to it.’

      Cooper moved a hand across the map, spanning his fingers over tight clusters of contour lines and long bands of green woodland. ‘But there are much quieter corners here, too. This is part of the Derbyshire Dales Nature Reserve. Only walkers can get into some of these smaller dales, and the woods on the valley sides are quite dense. What roads there are tend to be single track and too narrow to take a vehicle of any size. On the other hand, the eastern and northern parts are limestone plateau. That’s farming country, with a few small villages and the odd abandoned quarry thrown in.’

      Fry watched Cooper and Hitchens poring over the map. They looked like two schoolboys marshalling their armies of toy soldiers to act out a desktop battle.

      ‘We’re looking for somewhere within this area that might be referred to as “the dead place”,’ she reminded them.

      Cooper stood up and drew a hand across his forehead. ‘The possibilities are endless.’

      Fry sighed. ‘Ben, that isn’t what we wanted to hear.’

      ‘I’m sorry.’

      ‘It’s not your fault,’ said Hitchens. ‘Let’s think about this logically. What are the possibilities.’

      ‘“The dead place” …’ said Fry. ‘Well, does he mean the place itself is dead, or is he referring to a place for the dead.’

      ‘As in a cemetery?’ said Cooper.

      ‘Hold on, let’s take the first option,’ said Hitchens. ‘What did you say – where the place itself is dead?’

      ‘Yes. It depends what sort of bee he has in his bonnet.’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘Well, it could be some kind of anti-quarry protest, or some farmer driven to the end of his tether by Foot and Mouth Disease. Are there any disposal pits for incinerated cattle around here?’

      ‘Not that I know of. Foot and Mouth never reached these parts, but there were some farms affected down on the Staffordshire border.’

      ‘Factory closures, then. Any major employers gone under?’

      ‘Not since the pits closed in the east of the county. Lots of communities almost died out there. But not here.’

      ‘Toxic waste dumps?’

      ‘OK, wait … yes, there’s one near Matlock.’

      Hitchens shook his head. ‘Too far. It’s way outside of the six-mile zone.’

      ‘What about a place for the dead, then?’ said Fry. ‘A cemetery. What better place to hide a dead body than among hundreds of others?’

      ‘He’d still have to bury it, or conceal it in some way,’ said Cooper. ‘People visit cemeteries all the time. I’m sure they wouldn’t be used to seeing a fresh body left lying around.’

      ‘There must be some abandoned cemeteries,’ said Fry.

      ‘Well, plenty of closed churchyards. Most of the older ones are full now and don’t have room to expand. In a lot of villages they have to send you to the municipal cemetery, or to the crematorium.’

      ‘Mostly the crem these days, isn’t it? I don’t think I’ve ever been to a burial in my life. Everyone I’ve known who died has been cremated.’

      ‘But the churchyards are still there.’

      ‘OK. Anywhere else you can think of, Ben?’

      ‘It depends what you mean by a cemetery. There are plenty of burial places, some of them thousands of years old – Neolithic sites, remains of chambered cairns. A lot of them are in fairly remote locations, but hikers like to visit the more historic sites. You couldn’t leave a body in full view for long without it being discovered.’

      ‘Like the Nine Virgins,’ said Fry.

      ‘Exactly.’

      Cooper remembered the Nine Virgins well. The body of a murdered mountain biker left inside the stone circle had been found within minutes of her death. No such luck in this case, though.

      ‘Some sites aren’t so well known, of course,’ he said. ‘There’s the Infidels’ Cemetery, for example.’

      ‘The what?’

      ‘The Infidels’ Cemetery. Oh, it’s really a tiny, neglected nineteenth-century graveyard on the road between Ashford in the Water and Monsal Head. Last time I saw the place, it was waist high with nettles and weeds. And it’s in the middle of nowhere – you’d drive right by without knowing it was there.’

      ‘And why is it there?’

      ‘I think it was actually the graveyard for a community of Baptists. They weren’t regarded very highly by their neighbours, I suppose.’

      ‘Why “infidels”?’

      ‘Well, the story is that the inscriptions were recorded by a local historian, who noticed that none of the epitaphs contained references to the Bible, God or Jesus. That was so unusual at the time that it was considered very suspicious.’

      ‘Between Ashford in the Water and Monsal Head?’ Fry remembered the DI mentioning Monsal Head. ‘It’s not far from Wardlow, then.’

      ‘Very close.’

      ‘Let’s go take a look. I’d like to get the lie of the land around Wardlow anyway.’

      She looked at Hitchens, who nodded. ‘I can handle everything here. It’s going to be a question of waiting at the moment.’

      ‘Do you have time, Ben?’ asked Fry. ‘You’re the obvious candidate for a guide.’

      ‘I’ll get my coat.’

      In the CID room, Gavin Murfin had seen Dr Kane leave after the meeting.

      ‘You know, I didn’t realize they made profilers so young,’ he said.

      ‘Actually, she doesn’t call herself a profiler,’ said Fry.

      ‘Oh no, of course not. Not since the Washington Snipers, and the Rachel Nickell case. Not to mention Soham, when the SIO took the wrong advice. Even profilers start to get themselves a bad name after too many disasters. So obviously they have to change their name to something else.’

      For once, Fry didn’t try to shut him up. It was DI Hitchens who started to look annoyed. ‘As a matter of fact, DC Murfin, the real professionals have always tried to play down the hype that the press generate around psychological profiling. Dr Kane has asked us to refer to her simply as a specialist advisor because she wants to avoid publicity.’

      ‘To keep a low profile, in fact,’ said Murfin, and laughed.

      Hitchens went a bit red around the ears. It was interesting to watch, because the DI was known as a man who found

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