68

‘WHERE DID YOU FIND THESE?’ ASKED HARRY.

‘Environment Agency archives,’ said Gareth Fletcher. ‘Watch those crisps, I’ll get throttled if I get grease on them.’

Harry put his crisp packet down and leaned over the maps. ‘Catchment maps,’ he said. ‘I’ve never heard of them.’

Gareth lifted his pint and drank. A week before Christmas, the White Lion in the middle of Heptonclough was busy and even at nearly five o’clock in the afternoon the two men had been lucky to get a table. Harry almost wished they hadn’t, that he and Gareth Fletcher had been forced to reschedule the chat they’d had planned for days. He’d wanted to help Evi find and talk to Gillian. That was not something she should have to face on her own.

‘No reason why you would,’ said Gareth. ‘The water authorities produce them. They show the countryside from the point of view of the water resources.’

‘And that means what, exactly?’ asked Harry. Across the room, a party of office workers were in high spirits. Several wore paper hats. When they stood up, most seemed unsteady on their feet.

Evi had refused to let him go with her. Gillian was her patient, she’d said, her responsibility.

‘Most maps are about roads, towns and cities, right?’ said Gareth.

‘Right,’ agreed Harry.

‘This one is about rivers. See, this is the river Rindle. Starts as a spring way up in the hills and gradually makes its way down to where it joins the Tane. All these other streams and rivers are its tributaries.’ Gareth leaned across the map, pointing out faint, wiggling lines with his finger. ‘They all feed into it and it gradually gets bigger and bigger. The area they all cover is called the catchment.’

‘OK, got that,’ said Harry, who’d been watching a dark-haired girl with a purple paper hat who reminded him of … how soon could he phone her? Was she with Gillian right now? ‘And the water authorities need these because …’ he prompted, forcing himself to concentrate.

‘If a stream dries up, if it gets polluted, if there’s a fish kill, or a flood threatening, the authorities need to know where it is and what other water-courses it’s going to impact upon.’

‘OK.’ I could be struck off for this, Harry, she’d said to him, as they’d argued at the church gate. You have no idea how serious it is.

‘The modern maps are easier to read, all the different catchments are coloured differently,’ Gareth was saying. ‘This one must be eighty years old. It does, though, have something the more modern ones don’t. This one shows the underground streams. Even some of the deeper aquifers. It dates back to the days when people dug their own wells and needed to know where they might strike lucky.’

‘Still following,’ said Harry. She trusted me, and I’ve let her down in the worst possible way.

‘Now, you can see how a fairly sizeable subterranean stream starts right up here, just below Morrell Tor, and winds its way down through the village, feeding quite a few wells as it goes, probably all abandoned and covered over by now, and eventually goes under the church.’

‘We saw it that day we went exploring. The monks had turned it into a sort of drinking fountain.’

‘Exactly. Now, as we know, it disappears into a grate, running under the cellar, and – this is the important bit, are you concentrating?’

‘Oh, I’m riveted.’ If anything happens to her it’ll be my fault.

‘Just after it leaves the church foundations, it forks in two. The main stream continues down, through the graveyard, under the Renshaws’ garden and then on down the moor. The other part heads west and follows the line of the church wall.’

‘Seriously weakening it?’

‘In my view, yes. If you ask me, there’s not a lot of point rebuilding that wall until you can divert that offshoot of the stream.’

‘If we block it off, will the water continue down the hill with the rest?’

‘Probably, although I’d need to check it out with my friends in water resources. Do you want me to do that before you speak to God about releasing the funds?’

‘Yes, thank you. What’s this?’ In an attempt to take his mind off what might be happening with Gillian and Evi, Harry had been trying to spot places he knew around the town on the map. He’d found Wite Lane, had followed the track he sometimes ran along up the hill. He was pointing at a double circle within a rectangle.

‘Looks like a bore hole, an old drinking well,’ said Gareth. ‘Although why there’d be one way up there I have no idea.’

‘It’s just below the Tor, isn’t it? Wasn’t there an old mill up there?’

‘That’s right. I’ll bet this is inside that hut. The one the kids call Red Riding Hood’s cottage.’

Harry nodded. He knew the one. ‘Belongs to the Renshaws,’ he said. ‘DCS Rushton was telling me how they searched it when they were looking for Megan Connor. I don’t think he mentioned a bore hole.’

‘If it’s been covered over and forgotten about, he might not have known it was there,’ said Gareth, finishing his pint. ‘There are wells and bore holes all over the place that nobody knows about. Another one?’

‘I think I’m still drunk from last night,’ said Harry. ‘One more won’t make much difference.’

Gareth grinned. As he stood up both men heard the tinny notes of the Bob the Builder tune. ‘Mine,’ said Gareth, pulling his mobile from his pocket.

Gareth continued walking as he held the phone to his ear. He made it as far as the bar then turned on the spot, shot a quick look at Harry and left the pub, pushing aside two boys who looked barely old enough to drink.

For a second Harry didn’t move. Then he got to his feet. It would be a problem at Gareth’s work, he told himself, nothing important. The noise in the pub seemed to have increased. Over at the office-party table girls were squealing, and blowing on the paper trumpets that came out of crackers.

He took a step towards the door.

Millie would be fine. She’d been shopping with her mother that morning, the last big shop before Christmas, nothing could happen at the supermarket. A waitress was walking from one diner to the next. ‘Sherry trifle?’ she was saying. ‘Who ordered the sherry trifle?’ Even the till at the bar seemed unnaturally shrill.

‘Merry Christmas, Vicar,’ people called after him as he made his way through the crowd. He ignored them. Millie would be fine. She was never allowed out of her mother’s sight these days. Someone dropped a glass just behind him, he might even have knocked it over himself. It shattered on the tiled floor.

He pushed at the door; the cold evening air hit him and so did the silence. He took a deep breath and looked around. It was completely dark. Gareth was fifteen yards further up the hill, about to get into his truck, and for a moment Harry just wanted to let him go. He didn’t want him to turn round; he didn’t want to see that look on anyone’s face again as long as he lived.

‘Hey!’ he shouted, because for the life of him he’d forgotten what the other man was called.

Gareth turned back. There it was again, that look: sheer terror. He opened his mouth and Harry could just about make out what Gareth was croaking at him. Not Millie then, Millie was OK after all.

Joe was the one who’d gone missing.