Annie Delamere could tell something was wrong.
They’d spotted the sign as they were walking from the car to the footpath. It was attached to what had once been a bus stop, though Annie had no idea if any buses now passed up this way. The sign itself was pitted with rust, and read simply: ‘Buses no longer stop at Hell Bank’.
Gary, as usual, had treated it as a joke and embarked on one of his familiar routines, wondering if the service had been discontinued because too many demons had crowded the back seats, or because customers couldn’t buy return tickets. He’d ended, inevitably, by questioning whether Hell Bank offered a savings account. Annie had had sufficient experience of Gary’s sense of humour during her years of working with Zoe to tune it all out until he’d exhausted his ideas, which generally didn’t take long.
Zoe normally seemed to do the same. Today, though, she turned away while Gary was still speaking and strode away up the footpath towards the moorland, clearly unhappy. Gary had finally stopped talking, aware something was wrong. ‘Oh, God,’ he said. ‘Have I said the wrong thing again? It’s like walking on eggshells with Zoe sometimes.’
‘She’s probably just tired,’ Annie said. ‘We’ve had a tough few weeks.’ She was beginning to think it had been a mistake to come today. It had been her idea originally. Gary was supposed to be away this weekend on one of his football trips. Annie’s partner Sheena was stuck in London attending some Labour Party event. As she and Zoe were both at a loose end, Annie had suggested a joint outing to enjoy what promised to be the first decent weekend weather of the year. Then Gary’s trip had been cancelled at the last moment, and he’d decided to tag along as well. And, as always in the Peak District at the first sign of good weather, everyone else seemed to have had the same thought.
They’d already had one run-in while parking the car. Most of the available roadside spaces had been taken, but Annie had eventually managed to squeeze the car in beside a couple of badly parked motorbikes. The two heavily-built bikers had watched her manoeuvres with evident disapproval while making no effort to position their bikes more helpfully. As she’d climbed out of the car, one of them had muttered something about ‘women drivers’.
On another day she might have pointed out to them that she was an expert driver, who’d succeeded in parking her car in a space considerably smaller than that occupied by their two bikes. But she was feeling relatively relaxed, looking forward to nothing more than a bracing walk and afterwards a bite to eat in Bakewell. She was content just to treat them to one of her icy looks and walk on by.
But Zoe’s behaviour had made her uncomfortable. She didn’t know if there was some issue brewing between Zoe and Gary, and she’d no desire to be an onlooker if anything should come to a head. But there wasn’t much she could do about it now, other than leave Gary to chase after his wife while she followed more slowly behind. If they had something to discuss, she was happy to leave them to it.
Annie had been up here the previous summer with Sheena. It had been a fine clear day like today, but later in the year and several degrees warmer. The moors had seemed to bask in the heat, rich with heather, dramatic views opening up in every direction. The walk had been exhilarating, and she’d wanted to return.
But now she remembered other aspects of that walk. At the time, they’d only added to the fascination of the place, giving an eerie extra dimension to its beauty. The open moorland was dotted with prehistoric barrows, cairns and stone formations, an epitaph to those who had once lived and died in these high spaces. Their walk had culminated in a visit to Hob Hurst’s House, an ancient barrow mound on Harland Edge. Sheena, who made a point of reading up on the places they visited, had told her it was thought to be of Bronze Age origin and that the rectangular shape of the barrow was unusual. She’d probably said much more, but Annie recalled no further details except that the name of the barrow referred to some kind of sprite or hobgoblin. Or perhaps to the devil.
As they emerged from the trees on to the open moorland, she stopped and looked around, already able to identify the undulations that marked the sites of barrows and burial mounds. From where she was standing, the land fell away across the moorland, opening up to the Derwent Valley and the Chatsworth estate to their left. It was a glorious spring day with only a few white clouds dotting the clear blue of the surrounding sky. But a sharp breeze was blowing from the east, and she found herself shivering.
Gary and Zoe were waiting for her at the end of the path. Zoe still looked tense, but there was no other sign of any disagreement between the couple. ‘You okay, Zoe?’ she asked.
‘Just a bit cold suddenly.’ Zoe was gazing around her. ‘Funny old place this, isn’t it? I’d forgotten.’
‘Striking views,’ Gary offered.
‘Definitely that.’ Annie looked back. On the path behind, she saw the two bikers, who had removed their leathers and were strolling along in sweatshirts, shorts and walking boots. She half-expected they might say something as they passed, but they were deep in conversation.
‘But the burial mounds,’ Zoe was saying. ‘Don’t you find them a bit – creepy?’
Gary stared out across the moor, as if evaluating what she had said. ‘They’re only bones.’
‘You two just ignore me. I’m in one of my weird moods. Let’s get a breath of air, then we can go and get some lunch.’
They continued along the path, occasionally encountering other walkers who invariably nodded an amicable greeting. It ought to be hard to be spooked on a day like this, Annie thought, with the sun shining and the whole Peak District thronged with visitors. If they’d come on a dank November day with a mist lying heavily across the moor, it might feel rather different.
They eventually reached Hob Hurst’s House. As far as Annie could see, there was little left other than a broadly rectangular arrangements of stones, largely overgrown with bracken and heather. Gary stopped by the English Heritage sign. ‘Probably built around 1000 BC, apparently,’ he said. ‘Though some people think it might be later— What is it?’
Annie was looking past him out to the open moorland. ‘What’s going on over there?’
Zoe and Gary turned to follow her gaze. ‘Where?’
‘There. It’s those two bikers.’
‘Bikers?’
‘What are they up to?’
The bikers were a hundred or so yards away from them, standing among the heather, apparently engaged in a heated discussion. One of them was pulling the other’s arm as if trying to force him to look at something. The second biker gave an odd cry and dragged himself away, turning his back on whatever his companion was showing him. A moment later, he was doubled over, vomiting into the undergrowth.
‘I’m going to check everything’s all right,’ Annie said. She was already on her way, striding unstoppably across the moor. As she drew closer, she saw the first biker look up at her, his expression a mix of fear and disgust.
‘Is everything okay?’ she called.
The sun was high in the clear sky, throwing the grassland into sharp relief. She could see something on the ground beside the bikers, an object largely hidden by the undergrowth.
‘I don’t think you’d better—’ the biker said. ‘We need to get some help.’ He gestured towards Gary, who had been following behind her with Zoe in his wake. ‘Maybe your friend there can help us deal with it?’
Annie was almost tempted to laugh. From what Zoe had told her, Gary had many good qualities but providing practical support wasn’t generally one of them. ‘What is it?’
The second biker was still dry-heaving, having apparently emptied his stomach of that morning’s breakfast.
It was only as she drew almost level with the two bikers that she finally saw it, half concealed among the heather. The breeze was blowing towards her and there was no mistaking the stench, even in the open air.
It was a naked human body, a white male. The undergrowth around was stained thickly with blood, now dried almost to black. The throat had been cut almost to the point of decapitation, and the torso and limbs were savagely mutilated. There was a haze of flies above the body. Her guess was that it had been here for some days.
‘I did try to warn you, love,’ the first biker said, in a tone that sounded inappropriately triumphant. ‘Now, perhaps you could ask your friend to help us call the police so we can get this properly dealt with.’
Her eyes had been fixed on the body, her brain collecting as much information as possible about what she was seeing. Now, finally, she looked back at the biker. ‘He doesn’t need to. We’re already here.’ She reached into her pocket for her warrant card. ‘I’m DI Delamere and the woman over there is my colleague, DS Everett.’