There was a pleasing warmth within the room which Kirby enjoyed, and he loosened his tie.
'Sit down,' said Lambert, and the doctor gratefully accepted, placing himself at one end of the sofa.
Debbie emerged from the kitchen. She was wearing a faded old blue blouse and jeans and Kirby ran an appreciative eye over her figure.
'Hello,' she said, gaily.
The doctor tried to rise but she waved him back. 'Would you like a drink? Tea, coffee or something stronger?'
'Tea is fine,' said Kirby, smiling.
She retreated into the kitchen and Lambert pointed to the briefcase lying beside Kirby. He flipped it open and took out a number of manilla files, each stamped with a number and name. He laid them on the coffee table before him and opened the first one.
'Ridley,' he announced. 'Like I told you over the phone, Tom, it was heart failure. The rest…' he hesitated, '… was done afterwards.'
There was a long silence as the policeman flicked through the slender report. He closed the file and looked at Kirby. 'You said over the phone that the scratch marks on Ridley's face matched those on the other three victims.'
Kirby nodded.
'What conclusions would you draw from that?'
The doctor shrugged. 'I'm not a policeman, Tom.'
'Imagine you were. What would you think?'
'I would say, against my better judgement, that Ridley was killed by the same man who killed the other three.'
'Which of course is impossible,' said Lambert, something mysterious dancing behind his blue eyes.
'Well of course it's impossible. Mackenzie's dead,' said Kirby, almost smiling.
Lambert got to his feet and crossed to the drinks cabinet. He poured himself a large scotch and downed a sizeable gulp before continuing.
'John, there was another reason I wanted you here tonight. I think it might be linked with Ridley's murder.'
Kirby interrrupted him. 'He wasn't murdered. He died of a heart attack.'
'He died of fright,' said Lambert, his voice rising in volume slightly. 'Besides, some mad bastard did that to him. Some fucking headcase tore out his eyes and hung him up.' There was anger in his voice, tinged with something else which seemed, to Kirby, like fear. The policeman drained his glass. 'Look, as I was saying, something else happened up at the cemetery. The graves of Mackenzie and Brooks were tampered with.'
Kirby looked vague.
'Dug up. Desecrated. Call it what you like. The bodies were taken.'
'How do you know?' Kirby swallowed hard.
'I ordered the graves to be opened. Both bodies were gone.'
'So how does this tie up with Ridley?' Lambert poured himself another drink and inhaled slowly.
'What would you say if I told you I think Ridley was killed by Ray Mackenzie?'
Kirby almost smiled. 'I'd say you should consider visiting a psychiatrist.'
'You said the marks on the faces of all four victims matched.'
'Tom, he's dead. I did the autopsy myself,' said Kirby incredulously.
Debbie emerged from the kitchen carrying a cup of tea which she handed to Kirby. He thanked her and sipped tentatively at it. She got one for herself and joined them, curling up in one of the armchairs beside the fire. Lambert too, sat down, his third glass of scotch cradled in his hand.
Kirby smiled. 'You do realize, Mrs. Lambert, that your husband is a total lunatic?'
'This is no joke,' snarled Lambert. 'What's your explanation?'
Kirby eyed the Inspector warily and stirred his tea needlessly. 'Tom, there must be a logical explanation for what happened. It's some sort of sick imitator. They must have read about the other murders in the paper and well…' He let the sentence trail off.
'No details of the murders were published in the paper,' Lambert corrected him, 'especially the taking of the eyes.'
'Coincidence,' said Kirby.
'Bullshit,' snapped Lambert. He took a sip of his drink. 'Look at what we've got here. A man is murdered, or mutilated anyway, in exactly the same way as three previous people. We've got two empty coffins, one of which belongs to a killer. Now, you tell me why anyone would want to steal those bodies and kill Ridley.'
There was silence in the room. The glow of the fire and single table lamp which had at first seemed so comforting now became almost oppressive. Shadows in the corner of the room were thick, black, almost palpable, and Debbie drew her chair closer to the fire.
'Tom, you're a logical man, for Christ's sake,' said Kirby.
Lambert held up a hand. 'O.K., let's look at it logically. God knows I want to find a logical explanation for all of this. Both coffins were empty, right? Both had large holes in the lids. The wood was bent outward.' He paused. 'Any theories?'
Kirby shrugged. 'Body snatching.'
'But why? Who'd want to steal two corpses? What are you going to do with them? Hang them over your fireplace?'
Debbie suppressed a grin, especially when she saw the pained expression on her husband's face. 'There is another explanation,' said Kirby.
'I'm waiting,' Lambert said, impatiently.
'Have you ever heard of catatonia?'
'I've heard of it, but I don't know exactly what it is.'
Kirby put down his tea. 'It's very rare now; it was quite common at one time but, what with advanced examination procedures it's become more or less obsolete.'
'Get to the point, John,' demanded Lambert, quietly.
'In a catatonic state, sometimes called a catatonic trance, the patient displays all the appearances of death. The bodily functions slow down, sometimes even stop altogether. It can last for seconds or hours.'
'So what are you saying?'
'That Mackenzie could have been in a state of advanced catatonia when he was buried.' A pause. 'He could have been buried alive.'
Lambert shook his head. 'John, he fell over a hundred feet from that hospital room. That's what killed him. He was dead. Dead as a bloody doornail and to hell with your scientific explanations. Besides, the grave of Brooks was empty too. Even if this crap about catatonia was right, the chances of it happening to two men at exactly the same time are millions to one.'
'What else do you have?' said Kirby, wearily.
Lambert shook his head. 'Nothing. Not a goddam thing.'
The three of them sat in silence. Outside, a motorcycle roared past, breaking the solitude for a second before the harsh sound gradually died away. Kirby sipped his tea but found that it was cold. He winced and put the cup down again, declining when Debbie offered him another.
'All right,' began Lambert, 'sticking with this idea of catatonia, how do you explain the holes in the lids of both coffins?'
Kirby shrugged. 'They were trying to get out.'
Lambert shook his head. 'Have you ever felt a coffin lid? It's about two inches thick. Solid oak. You'd need to be bloody strong to punch a hole in that. And then, assuming they managed that, they clawed their way up through six feet of earth?'
'Tom, you've just defeated your own argument. It's impossible. It had to be body snatchers, there's no other logical explanation for it.'
Lambert shook his head. 'Why does the answer have to be a logical one? There's been nothing logical about this whole bloody case ever since it started; why the hell should we start worrying about it now?' He took another hefty swallow from his glass before continuing. 'Look at the facts, John. An ordinary man in an ordinary job with an ordinary family suddenly goes crazy. Butchers his family, tears out their eyes then kills another woman, tears out her eyes. During the day he's in a torpor. At night he's like a wild animal. A brain test shows that, to all intents and purposes he's dead, but what happens when the lights go out-he gets up and kills himself and another man. Now, two weeks after he's buried, our vicar is found hanging from his own bell rope, both eyes tom out after having died of fright and the grave of the murderer is empty.' Lambert's voice had been rising steadily as he spoke but now he was almost shouting, his breath coming in quick gasps. Now, the veins on his forehead standing out angrily, he slammed his fist down on the coffee table and shouted: 'Now you tell me that's logical.'
He slumped back into his chair, hands covering his eyes, totally drained. No one spoke, then, after what seemed like an eternity of silence Lambert said, 'And there's another thing.' His voice had regained its composure; it was low, resigned almost to the horrors he had just described. 'Mackenzie had a medallion with him. It was old, very old. There was inscriptions on it, in Latin. I think that is the key to all of this.'
'Where is it now?' asked Kirby.
'Trefoile, the antique dealer in town, has got it. He said he recognized it from somewhere.'
'What makes it so important, Tom?' Kirby wanted to know.
Lambert smiled humourlessly. 'Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps this is what's known as clutching at straws but, right now, it's all I've got.'
'What are you doing about Mackenzie and Brooks?'
'What can I do? Tell my men to be on the look out for two of the living dead? Report in lads, if you happen to bump into anyone who was buried recently, that sort of thing? Frankly, John, I don't know what the fuck to do.' He looked long and hard at the doctor. 'All I know is, it must be kept out of the papers. If the press get hold of this, we'll have half the country crawling over Medworth trying to find out what's going on.'
'Call in help.'
'Where from?'
'Tell your superiors what's going on.' Lambert laughed bitterly. 'Can you imagine what Detective Inspector John Barton would make of this? He'd have me locked up. No, I can handle it for now.' He exhaled deeply. 'Christ, if only we had a motive. I mean, what kind of person steals corpses?'
The Inspector's eyes suddenly flared. He pointed an inquisitive finger at Kirby.
'Assuming, just assuming, that someone is trying to imitate Mackenzie's crimes and also working on the assumption that that same person stole the bodies, then surely they would have taken the corpse of Emma Reece as well.'
'Why?' Kirby wanted to know.
'Because she was one of his victims.'
'Was her grave tampered with too?'
'I don't know, I never thought about her at the time.' The Inspector got to his feet. 'We've got to find out now.'
Debbie looked worried. 'Tom, what are you going to do?'
'We have to see if her body has been taken as well,' he said flatly.
'You mean dig her up?' gasped Kirby.
'We've done it twice today already,' said Lambert.
Kirby lowered his head. 'But…'
Lambert's tone was soft, but stern. 'We have to know.'
The doctor swallowed hard and looked up at Lambert. He nodded almost imperceptibly. A thin smile creased the policeman's face, and he hurried out of the house to fetch the tools. Debbie and Kirby stared at one another, neither of them able to speak. The cold draft from the open back door blew into the room, temporarily driving away the warmth and making them both shiver.
Lambert returned a second later with a spade and a garden fork. He held them out in front of him.
'Ready?' he said.
Kirby nodded. 'We'll take my car.' He took the tools from Lambert and walked out to his car. Inside, Debbie and the Inspector heard the sound of the engine being started. She pulled Lambert close and he held her head on his chest.
'Lock all the doors,' he said quietly and kissed her on the forehead. He turned quickly and ran out to the waiting Datsun. Debbie, watching from the front window, saw him slide in beside Kirby, and a few seconds later the car disappeared into the darkness.
She hurried to the back door and drew the bolts across then repeated the procedure at the front. Then she walked back into the living room and crouched in front of the fire, suddenly gripped by an icy chill which seemed to cling to her like frost to a window pane.
It was a long time before she was warm again.
***
The drive to the cemetery took less than twenty minutes. Kirby brought the Datsun to a halt and switched off the engine. Both men got out, their breath forming clouds in the cold night air. The doctor unlocked the boot of his car and took out the spade and fork. The latter he kept for himself, the other implement he handed to Lambert. The Inspector reached into his pocket and pulled out a torch and flicked it on, checking the power of the beam. Satisfied, he nodded and the two men set off up the gravel drive which led them into the cemetery. The noise of their shoes on the rough surface sounded all the more conspicuous in the silence.
To their right, the church. A dark mass, the huge black edifice stood surrounded by a sea of shadows. Lambert shuddered as he looked at it, remembering what he had found in there the day before.
'Where is the grave?' asked Kirby, whispering.
'Over near those trees,' said Lambert, motioning with the torch.
They continued up the gravel drive, turning with it as it curved around to the left. Finally, they left the gravel drive and took one of the muddy paths which ran between the rows of plots. It was at this point that Lambert flicked on his torch, sweeping its broad beam back and forth over the marble headstones and crosses. The mud squelched beneath their feet, and once Kirby almost slipped over. Lambert held out a hand to steady him and the two men continued on their way. A row of poplars grew with military precision along the edge of one of the paths, and it was beneath the shade of one of the trees that Lambert's torch beam picked out the chosen spot. In the cold white light, both men read the name on the headstone.