In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner (Inspector Lynley, #10)(13)
Phoebe had at first believed that there had to be a message in the symphony of death that she'd been taking part in for the past years. But she was beginning to find that this kind of death had too many tentacles, and those tentacles sought to curl tenaciously round victims too diverse to form a pattern. From years of experience, she knew that death was perfectly impartial, claiming great and small, important and utterly insignificant, rich and poor, strong and weak. No matter one's power, prestige, or potential, one did not bargain when the reaper came. But this death, this particular ending during which the medical fire brigade put out one inferno only to be confronted by another … This was the worst.
So she walked and she prayed. And when Benbow wanted to pick up the pace, she was willing to do so. In this manner, they strode into the heart of the moor, ambling along one path, forking off onto another. Phoebe wasn't worried about becoming lost. She knew that they'd begun their walk southeast of a limestone outcrop that was called Agrícolas Throne. It comprised the remains of a great Roman fort, a windswept outlook shaped not unlike an enormous chair that marked the edge of the moor. Anyone sighting off the throne during a hike was unlikely to get lost.
They'd been trekking for an hour when Benbow's ears pricked up and his stance altered. From shuffling along happily, he came to a sudden halt. His body elongated, back legs stretching out. His feathery tail stiffened into an immobile quill. A low whine issued from his throat.
Phoebe studied what lay before them: the copse of birches she'd intended to allow Benbow to gambol in. “Gracious me,” she murmured. “Aren't you the clever one, Bennie?” She was deeply surprised and just as touched by the mongrel's ability to read her intentions. She'd silently promised him freedom when they reached the copse. And here the copse was. He knew her mind and was eager to be off the lead. “Can't blame you a bit,” Phoebe said as she knelt to unhook the lead from his collar. She wound the rope of braided leather round her hand and rose with a grunt as the dog shot ahead of her into the trees.
[page]Phoebe walked after him, smiling at the sight of his compact body bouncing along the path. He used his feet like springs as he ran, bounding off the ground with all four legs at once as if it was his intention to fly. He skirted a large column of roughly hewn limestone on the edge of the copse and vanished among the birches.
This was the entrance to Nine Sisters Henge, a Neolithic earth-banked enclosure that encircled nine standing stones of varying heights. Assembled some thirty-five hundred years before the time of Christ, the henge and the stones marked a spot for rituals engaged in by prehistoric man. At the time of its use, the henge had been standing in open land that had been cleared of its natural oak and alder forest. Now, however, it was hidden from view, buried within a thick growth of birches, a modern encroachment on the resulting moorland.
Phoebe paused and surveyed her surroundings. The eastern sky—without the clouds of the west—allowed the sun to pierce unimpeded through the trees. Their bark was the white of a seagull's wing, but patterned with diamond-shaped cracks the colour of coffee. Leaves formed a shimmering green screen in the morning breeze, which served to shield the ancient stone circle within the copse from an inexperienced hiker who didn't know it was there. Standing before the birches, the sentry stone was hit by the light at an oblique angle. This deepened its natural pocking, and from a distance the shadows combined to effect a face, an austere custodian of secrets too ancient to be imagined.
As Phoebe observed the stone, an unaccountable chill passed through her. Despite the breeze, it was silent here. No noise from the dog, no bleating of a sheep lost among the stones, no call of hikers as they crossed the moor. It was altogether too silent, Phoebe thought. And she found herself glancing round uneasily, overcome by the feeling that she was being watched.
Phoebe thought herself a practical woman to the very core, one not given to casual fancies or an imagination run riot. Nonetheless, she felt the sudden need to be away from this place, and she called for the dog. There was no response.
“Benbow!” she called a second time. “Here, boy. Come.”
Nothing. The silence intensified. The breeze stilled. And Phoebe felt the hair stirring on the back of her neck.
She didn't wish to approach the copse, but she didn't know why. She'd walked among Nine Sisters before. She'd even had a quiet picnic lunch there one fine spring day. But there was something about the place this morning …
A sharp bark from Benbow and suddenly what seemed like hundreds of ravens took to the air in an ebony swarm. For a moment they entirely blocked out the sun. The shadow they cast seemed like a monstrous fist sweeping over Phoebe. She shuddered at the distinct sensation of having been marked somehow, like Cain before being sent to the east.
She swallowed and turned back to the copse. There was no further sound from Benbow, no response to her calling. Concerned, Phoebe hurried along the path, passed the limestone guardian of that sacred place, and entered the trees.
They grew thickly, but visitors to the site had trod a path through them over the years. On this, the natural grass of the moor had been flattened and worn through to the earth in spots. To the sides, however, bilberry bushes formed part of the undergrowth, and the last of the wild purple orchids gave off their characteristic scent of cats in the tough moor grass. It was here beneath the trees that Phoebe looked for Benbow, drawing nearer to the ancient stones. The silence round her was so profound that the very fact of it seemed like an augur, mute but eloquent all at once. Then, as Phoebe drew near the circles boundary, she finally heard the dog again. He yelped from somewhere, then emitted something between a whine and a growl. It was decidedly fearful.