The Black Country (8 page)

“Agreed.”

“I mean it, Nevil. You are not invincible. You have a tendency to leap before you properly think a situation through.”

“I’m touched that you worry about me.”

Day shook his head and smiled. He searched his pockets until he found his flask and took a deep swallow from it. He held it out to Hammersmith.

“Take a drink. It’ll kill the poisons.”

“No, thank you, sir. I’d prefer tea.”

“Of course. But brandy will keep you healthy.”

Hammersmith took the flask and raised it in a mock salute to Day. He took a swallow and handed the flask back. The two men stood and looked around the room.

“Well,” Day said. “Are you ready to go and risk our lives in the woods behind an unsettling village in the middle of the night?”

“It’s what I live for,” Hammersmith said.

“Then after you, Mr Hammersmith.”

He swung the door open and waved the sergeant through, then stepped out into the hall and closed the door behind him. The two men stepped over the tray of empty bowls and steins and walked to the staircase. Without a look back, they headed down into the flickering darkness of the inn.

F
ires banked forty feet into the air, throwing the landscape into sharp contrast and spreading shadows of the four men across the snowy fields. Constable Grimes led Day, Hammersmith, and Calvin Campbell past the furnaces, which worked night and day, smelting ore and creating the slag that bordered every path. Day and Hammersmith had seen the furnaces from the train windows when they arrived, but the effect was much more dramatic in the dark. Everything was indigo and white, and as they drew nearer the forest, shadows capered beyond the tree line, a fairy dance for the unaccustomed audience.

Day let Hammersmith and Campbell walk ahead. The two men seemed to have found an easy camaraderie based on their shared fear for the life of little Oliver Price, but Day wasn’t ready to trust the stranger yet. He held out his hand in front of Grimes to slow the constable down.

“Tell me about him.” Day nodded in the direction of Campbell’s back.

“Nothing much to tell,” Grimes said. “He’s been around the village for a week or two. Staying at the inn. Studying birds of the region, he says.”

“Rose doesn’t like him.”

“Rose likes him well enough,” Grimes said.

“He didn’t want Campbell with us out here.”

“No,” Grimes said. “You misunderstand. It’s nothing to do with Mr Campbell. He’s probably harmless enough.”

“Then what?”

“I think Mr Rose was trying to protect you.”

“But you just said that Campbell’s harmless.”

“Not from Campbell. It’s only that most of the people round here are superstitious. Rose is the same as any. He didn’t want you out here tonight.”

“I’d say he didn’t. He drugged Sergeant Hammersmith and me.”

“Drugged you?”

“Put something in our supper to make us sleep.”

“I’m sure he didn’t mean to harm you. He doesn’t always think. They’re good people here, they really are, but they’re closed off.”

Day didn’t say anything. He waited.

Grimes sniffed and looked at the trees ahead of them. “You understand I’m not one,” he said.

“One what?”

“Like the others in Blackhampton. I don’t believe in the . . . I don’t think the same things about it all.”

“Rose thinks he knows what happened to that family, doesn’t he?”

“Not just him. Lot of the folks here do.”

“That’s why you sent for us?”

“I had to. I couldn’t find that family myself. And nobody else wants to help.”

“So where does Rose think they are?”

“Down below.”

“In the mines?”

“Yes.”

“What makes him think that?” Day said.

Grimes said nothing.

“Should we be down in the tunnels,” Day said, “rather than out here in the woods?”

Grimes shrugged. “I didn’t say I thought they were in the tunnels.”

There was another long silence. The two of them walked on. They drew up alongside Hammersmith and Campbell, who had stopped at the tree line where the snow abruptly ended.

“Let’s get in there,” Campbell said.

Day nodded, and Hammersmith produced a box of matches. He withdrew a long wooden match and lit each of the men’s lanterns. Day looked around at the faces of the three other men. Hammersmith wore his customary expression of determination. Campbell’s face was partially hidden in shadow, and the light from his lantern cast yellow highlights under his cheekbones that made him seem cadaverous and deadly. Day looked at Grimes. The constable’s eyes were wide and his nostrils flared. He had the appearance of a high-strung horse ready to bolt.

Hammersmith plunged into the forest, his lantern held high ahead of him. Campbell followed close behind. Day grabbed Grimes’s elbow and held him back.

“What is it?” he said. “What’s got you so frightened? What’s got the innkeeper poisoning the police? There’s something you’re all tiptoeing around out here.”

“It’s nothing,” Grimes said. “Let’s go.”

“Tell me what Rose has told you.”

“Let go of me!” Grimes pulled away, and his lantern swung in a wide arc. Day staggered, but caught his balance. The constable shook his head and stared down at the footprints they had made in the snow. “I apologize,” he said. “Disrespectful of me.”

“Tell me,” Day said.

“Rawhead and Bloody Bones,” Grimes said.

“Rawhead and . . . What does that mean?”

“Rawhead and Bloody Bones. He what waits in the mines and takes people. That’s who has the boy and his parents. What Rose and the others think, anyway.”

“Who is Rawhead?”

“It’s a children’s rhyme. A monster. Nonsense, really.”

“But Rose, the other villagers here, they think the monster’s real?”

Grimes nodded his head and said nothing. Day opened his mouth to ask another question, but before he could speak, Grimes hurried past him and disappeared into the dark forest.

“Rawhead and Bloody Bones,” Day said. He sighed and thrust his lantern into the shadows, and allowed himself to be swallowed by the trees.

C
laire Day had thought ahead and packed a pair of sturdy boots for her husband, along with a short-brimmed hat and a quilted vest. Wearing them now, Walter Day looked out ahead at the dark tangle of low briars and the patches of snow and ice that had gathered despite the canopy of branches above and he counted himself lucky.

As he did every day.

He allowed Constable Grimes to lead the way into the dark, wild country. He followed Grimes closely, but kept careful track of Sergeant Hammersmith and Calvin Campbell, who were spread out ahead of him. There was always the possibility that the villagers might lead Day and Hammersmith into the woods and lose them or, worse, do them harm. Of course Grimes had sent for Scotland Yard in the first place. It was a good indication that he wanted to find the missing family. But there was something about Campbell that Day didn’t trust. He was the only stranger in the village, and yet he seemed more concerned than almost anyone else about the Prices. And, most especially, about finding little Oliver Price. Day felt certain the birder knew something that he wasn’t sharing.

Grimes crunched his way through brambles and around trees, and Day kept up as well as he could. His vest had several pockets, and he had filled them with matches, a compass, a good folding knife, his flask, and his Colt Navy. He was a trusting person, but he wasn’t foolish.

Snow-covered branches swept low across the path and reached out for him, knocking his hat off and sending a rivulet of freezing water down his collar. A deer rushed across the path in front of him and he stood still, listening to it as it crashed away through the underbrush.

A hand on his shoulder startled him and he jumped, then felt a moment of embarrassment. He turned, and the giant Campbell leaned toward him.

“The path will end soon,” Campbell said.

“Doesn’t it go far?”

“No.”

“Did you see the deer?”

“Something must have spooked it.”

“What could have spooked it?”

“A wolf.”

“There are wolves here?”

“Oh, most definitely.”

“If Oliver and his parents are out here . . .”

“If they’re out here, they’re dead.”

Day nodded and sighed. “Still, we’ll find them.”

He turned and saw Grimes tromping toward them, leaves crunching under his heavy boots. Hammersmith followed close behind the constable.

“The path splits here,” he said. “It might be best if we separated to cover more ground.”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea to divide our manpower,” Day said. “More of us might be lost.” He meant himself, of course, but he didn’t want to say so and risk looking vulnerable.

“Two groups of two, then?”

“I’ll stay with Mr Campbell,” Day said. If Campbell had a secret, he might be dangerous. Best to keep an eye on him.

“Yes,” Grimes said. “It might be better for Mr Campbell and myself each to stay with one of you Londoners. I’ll go with the sergeant. But we’ll stay close to each other, both groups. Shout out if anyone finds anything.”

“We’re off this way,” Campbell said. He walked away to the left before the others could say anything.

Day gave Hammersmith a pointed look, hoping that he had communicated the need for caution, then turned and plunged into the woods after Campbell. When he looked back again a moment later, the other men were gone, swallowed up by the dense skeletal winter wood.

Campbell’s broad back filled the view ahead of Day. He looked down and saw that they were leaving footprints in the snow, black on grey, and was comforted by the notion that Campbell would not be able to turn him around and lose him in the trees. If that was his goal, Day would be able to trace his own steps back to the tree line.

They veered to their right so as to keep the other search party nearby, Campbell leading the way. Finally, Campbell stopped and turned and glared at Day.

“What do you know?” Campbell said.

Day stopped walking and took a step backward. He felt the comforting weight of the Colt Navy at his side. He was confident that he’d be able to draw it before Campbell could reach him.

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“You know me?”

“I know the name you’ve given me.”

“Nothing else?”

“What should I know about you?”

“Nothing. Nothing that has any bearing on the disappearance of Oliver Price.”

“Do you know where he is? Where the family is?”

“I do not, sir.”

“Mr Campbell, I’m here to find a missing family. To rescue them if possible, to avenge them if they’re already dead. Your behavior makes me more suspicious with every moment that passes. If you’ve killed those people or hidden them away, I’ll find out. And I’m not alone. If you plan to kill me here and leave my body in these woods, you’ll have to kill Mr Hammersmith, too. He won’t be easy to kill. And neither will I.”

“I have no wish to kill you.”

“Good. I have no wish to be killed.”

“Please believe me when I say that I mean no harm to anyone, that I only want to find Oliver alive and well.”

Campbell bit his lower lip and looked off to the side. He raised his head and opened his mouth to speak, but his eyes rested on something over Day’s shoulder and a look of alarm suddenly appeared on his face.

Day whirled around and scanned the woods. He saw nothing but dark trees and thickets. He turned back in time to see Campbell disappear. The big man faded back into the trees and was gone without a sound or any trace.

“Campbell,” Day said. “Campbell!”

There was no response. Day drew his Colt Navy. He stood in place and turned in a circle. There were trees behind him, in front of him, on every side, and they all looked the same. Grey and brown and black and, occasionally, a bit of the starry night sky high above. There was no indication of which direction to go. He realized that the comforting trail of footprints in the snow had been false. Here there was only damp underbrush; no snow had made it down through the canopy to the ground. It had all been caught by the branches above and melted away.

What had frightened Campbell? Was there something in the forest or had it been an act meant only to distract Day long enough for the big man to leave him? Had he abandoned Day or was he setting the inspector up for an ambush? Could Day count on Grimes to find him? Or was Grimes cooperating with Campbell? Had Hammersmith been abandoned, too?

There were too many questions. Anything was possible, and Day decided that conjecture was useless. The best he could do was be cautious and be brave. He thought of Claire and his unborn baby.

He drew his compass from a pocket in his vest and opened it, waited until the needle pointed north. When he had got his bearings, he started walking.