I told her that I was there to meet a Miss Teveyddyadd.
She gave me a broad grin that was slightly worrying in its fervour.
‘Ah,’ she said. ‘You’re here to see the blessed sisters.’
I said that I was rather afraid I was, and she gave me directions.
The plots were laid out on neat rectangles of lawn between shaggy olive-green hedges. As I crunched down the gravel access drive I could see heat haze wavering over the white aluminium tops of the caravans. A huge half-naked white man, his belly an alarming lobster colour, dozed in a black and white striped deckchair under a porch awning. In front of the next caravan an elderly couple in matching yellow sun hats sat side by side, drinking tea and listening to
The Archers
on a digital radio.
A fat bumblebee meandered humming past my ear – I gave it a suspicious look, but it ignored me and headed off towards the fat man. Maybe it thought he was an aubergine.
Ahead I could hear high pitched yells and screams – the sound of children playing. Beyond a five-bar gate was what Nightingale insists on calling a sward, an area of naturally short grass, dotted with trees and picnic tables, edged with a steep bank that led to the river. There was a scatter of adults sat at the picnic tables or in the shade of the trees, but the children were all down in the water. Here the river was over ten metres across but shallow enough that I could see the smooth green stones of its bed. I watched from the bank as the kids thrashed around in the water – a froth of bright tropical blue, purples and yellows and distressingly pale limbs. Although I did notice at least one mixed-race boy amongst the others.
I had a sudden urge to pull off my boots and socks, roll up my trousers and go for a paddle.
‘Stop that,’ I said out loud.
The water stayed cool and inviting but I took a step back. And, because being police is something that never goes away, I did a quick safety assessment to ensure that sufficient adults were supervising.
Satisfied that nobody was about to get themselves drowned in fifteen centimetres of water, I turned left and walked along the bank until I reached the gate which marked the entrance to the orchard. A pale little boy with bleached-white blond hair was standing on the bottom rail and staring inside. When he heard me coming, he hopped off and turned to give me a suspicious look.
‘You can’t go in there,’ he said.
‘Why not?’
‘Because there’s poo everywhere,’ he said. ‘It’s disgusting.’
He was right, I could smell it. Only it was definitely animal – sheep shit, at a guess.
‘I’ll watch my step,’ I said.
‘And there’s witches,’ he said. He had a Black Country accent, so witches came out with a long e –
weetches
.
‘How do you know?’ I asked.
The boy hopped from one foot to the other. ‘Everybody says so,’ he said. ‘You can hear them singing at night.’
I moved to open the gate and the boy scurried away to take up position at what I assumed he thought was a safe distance. I gave him a wave and stepped through the gate and straight into some sheep shit. The culprits, or possibly their relatives, came scampering over to see if I’d been stupid enough to leave the gate open. At first I thought they were goats, but then I realised that the pale shorn look was due to them having been recently sheared. They looked like a herd of stereotypical English tourists – all they were missing were the knotted hankies on their heads.
Despite the shade it was hot and still under the branches of the apple trees and the air was thick with the shit odour, green wood and a sweet smell like rotting fruit. On this side of the hedge, the slope of the riverbank was less steep and held in place by clumps of mature trees. Right on the edge, sitting amongst the trees and so grown about with long grass and climbing flowers that I almost didn’t spot it, was a campervan.
Sighing, I headed towards it – scattering sheep as I went.
It was a genuine VW Type 2 Camper van with a split windscreen and ‘A’ registration number plate just visible through the long grass and wild flowers, which dated it back to 1963. It was painted RAF blue with white trim and all the windows I could see, including the windscreen, had paisley pattern curtains drawn across.
When I paused to check the tyres – it’s a police thing – I saw that they’d all but rotted away and that the van had been there long enough for the roots of a young tree to tangle itself in the wheel arch. From the other side of the van I could hear a woman humming to herself. And I could smell, appropriately given the vehicle, that someone was smoking a spliff. I smiled. Because it’s always a comfort when you’re the police to walk into a situation knowing that if all else fails you can still make a legitimate arrest.
The humming stopped.
‘We don’t drive it around much these days,’ said a woman from the other side of the van. ‘You can’t get the wheels anymore, or so I’m told.’ I recognised the voice from the phone call – it was Miss Teveyddyadd. Or more properly, as five seconds on Google had revealed, Miss Tefeidiad. Or even more precisely, since we were on the English side of the border, the goddess of the River Teme. Nightingale calls them Genius Loci, spirits of a locality, and says that the first rule of dealing with them in person is to remember that every single one of them is different.
‘They are, after all,’ he’d said, and smiled, ‘spirits of a specific locality. It’s only logical that they will be somewhat variable.’
Miss Tefeidiad was as tall as I was, with a shaggy head of blonde hair with a grey streak over her temple, a long straight nose, thin lips and black eyes. It was the sort of face that had become attractively interesting around puberty and was going to stay that way until the owner was carried out of their nursing home feet first. She appeared to be in her well-preserved mid-sixties, but I’d learnt not to trust appearances.
She stood waiting for me on the far side of the VW, where a heavy red and gold awning was attached above the open side doors and stretched out on a pair of poles. In its shade was an old wooden kitchen table covered in a red and white check vinyl table cloth.
‘You must be the famous Peter Grant,’ she said, and ushered me into one of four grey metal folding chairs set around the table. Another of the chairs was occupied by a handsome middle-aged white woman with long brown hair, hazel eyes and the same long straight nose as her – sister? mother? Relative, certainly. She wore an orange sun dress and broad-brimmed straw hat.
‘This is my daughter Corve,’ said Miss Tefeidiad.
Corve reached out and shook my hand. Her grip was firm and the skin rough from hard work.
‘Delighted to meet you, Peter.’ Her Welsh accent was less pronounced than her mother’s. I noticed that there was no visible sign of the spliff.
I nodded and said likewise. The Corve was a tributary of the Teme – I’d looked up the whole watershed before coming over.
‘Lilly, love,’ called Miss Tefeidiad. ‘Why don’t you be a dear and put the kettle on.’
Something groaned and stirred inside the VW, which rocked alarmingly. I realised then that the back end of the van was dangling over the edge of the bank, as if the ground had eroded away after it had parked.
Beyond where I was sitting a path dropped down to the river, tree roots entangling to form a disturbingly regular flight of steps. At the bottom, the action of the river had carved a pool, deeper and darker than the shallow water immediately downstream. I wondered if the kids playing less than ten metres downstream ever ventured into it for a swim – or what would happen if they did.
A white face appeared in the shadowed doorway of the VW, stared blearily at us from eyes heavily outlined in black, grunted and then swivelled to address the compact cooker that was Germany’s contribution to family holidays in the 1950s.
‘My youngest,’ said Miss Tefeidiad, and got an answering snarl.
‘Don’t mind her,’ said Corve. ‘She’s been like that since Ralph de Mortimer married Gladys the Dark.’
‘So Scotland Yard is back in business,’ said Miss Tefeidiad. ‘Gaily rushing in where even the saints fear to tread.’
I wanted to ask where Beverley was, and how the Teme family just happened to have her phone. But if there’s one thing Nightingale has taught me, it’s to let other people talk themselves out before giving anything away. It’s something he has in common with Seawoll and Stephanopoulos, and all the top cops that I know.
‘I’m just lending a hand with the search,’ I said.
‘For the missing girls?’ asked Corve.
‘Yes.’
‘Well, we haven’t seen them,’ said Miss Tefeidiad. ‘I can tell you that for nothing.’
Lilly’s pale face emerged from the gloom of the camper van and looked around before fixing on me. ‘Do you want sugar?’ she asked. Her left eyebrow was practically hidden behind a row of studs, and loops of silver pierced her left ear from lobe to tip.
‘No tea for me,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’
‘You could have said,’ she snorted, and withdrew.
‘Don’t you go back to sleep now, Lilly,’ said Corve. ‘We still want a cup.’
‘Let me tell you something, Constable Grant,’ said Miss Tefeidiad. ‘Where you are now is not London – it’s not even England.’
‘Yes it is, Ma,’ said Corve.
‘Only in a political sense,’ snapped Miss Tefeidiad over her shoulder, before turning a slightly less than reassuring smile on me. ‘We remember your lot when they first started, and a more arrogant collection of . . . gentlemen . . . you will never meet. But we have long memories that go all the way back, you see, back to when your beloved Thames was still scuttling around with his tongue jammed up a Roman backside.’
‘We used to get heads,’ said Corve. ‘The druids used to throw them in along with the other offerings.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Miss Tefeidiad. ‘You got some respect in those days.’
‘Not that we’re looking for heads these days,’ said Corve. ‘We’ll take cash or goods in kind.’
‘So when your lot got themselves all massacred or whatever,’ said Miss Tefeidiad, ‘we weren’t exactly crying into our tea. And I have to say that we’ve got a little bit used to managing our own business in recent years. So, it’s not that we don’t like visitors . . .’
‘We love visitors, really we do,’ said Corve. ‘Liven the place up.’
‘But I think we’re going to have to insist on certain minimum standards of navigational etiquette in future.’ Miss Tefeidiad gave me an expectant look.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Stakeholder engagement is a vital part of our modernisation plans going forward.’
‘Look,’ she said, ‘do you want your girlfriend back or not?’
I wanted to tell them that she wasn’t actually my girlfriend and that they better release her before her mother, goddess of the important bit of the Thames, found out they were detaining her and came over to have words. But my life is complicated enough these days and I try not to make things more difficult for myself.
‘Yes, please,’ I said.
Miss Tefeidiad nodded and then looked over at Corve who got to her feet and went to the top of the tree-root stairs. I got up and followed to look over her shoulder.
‘Bev, love,’ called Corve. ‘Your ride’s here.’
She walked out of the pool stark naked – except for the lavender full-body neoprene wetsuit and a Tesco bag wrapped around her hair to keep it dry. She glared at Corve, and then turned her black eyes on me, her full lips twisting into a half smile.
‘You took your time,’ she said.
‘I’ve been busy,’ I said.
Beverley turned to Miss Tefeidiad. ‘Can I have my bag back?’
A purple sausage bag came flying out of the dark interior of the VW. Beverley grabbed it out of the air and slung it over her shoulder.
‘And I believe this is yours,’ said Corve and handed Beverley her phone. ‘Bit of a revelation, that,’ she said. ‘We didn’t know they made them waterproof – very handy.’
‘I can’t be doing with those things,’ said Miss Tefeidiad and sniffed.
Behind her, Corve made a face.
‘Laters, ladies,’ said Beverley and, grabbing my arm, urged me away.
‘So, you won’t be staying for tea then?’ asked Miss Tefeidiad.
Beverley urgently squeezed my arm, so I told them we couldn’t.
‘I have to get back to the investigation,’ I said.
‘That’s a shame then,’ said Miss Tefeidiad.
And me and Beverley got while the going was good.
‘Not a word,’ said Beverley, who was so keen to get away we were halfway back to the car before she realised that she was walking barefoot on gravel. We paused long enough for her to extract a pair of flip flops from her sausage bag and then walked briskly the rest of the way. She didn’t relax until we were in the car and the River Teme was a kilometre behind us.
‘That was close,’ she said.
‘What was all that about?’ I asked.
She pulled off the Tesco bag and shook out her locks, flicking me with water and filling the Asbo with the smell of clean damp hair.
‘I thought it would be quicker to get here by water,’ she said, rummaging in her carryall and bringing out a yellow and blue beach towel. ‘Should have used an M&S bag,’ said Beverly and started squeezing out her locks in bunches. ‘That bitch Sabrina failed to mention the weird sisters were still in residence and I ran right into them at Burford.’
‘They didn’t like you trespassing?’
‘I’m lucky to be alive,’ said Beverley. ‘You don’t mess with someone’s river without getting permission first.’
‘You should have driven up,’ I said.
‘I’d still have had to cross the Severn, and if you do that you’ve got to stop and give some respect to Sabrina or she throws a right strop,’ said Beverley. ‘I thought that if I was getting my hair wet I might as well take a short cut.’
‘What are you doing out here, anyway?’ I asked.
‘I’ve been deputised,’ she said. ‘And sent out to assist in your investigation.’
‘Who by?’
‘Who do you think?’ she said. ‘Your boss wanted someone out here who knew one end of a cow from the other.’
‘And that’s you, is it?’
‘One of us spent a year rusticating with their country cousins,’ she said. ‘And do you remember whose bright idea that was?’ She bunched her fist and punched me in the shoulder – hard enough that I almost put us in the hedgerow. ‘And did I get one visit?’