for regulations, a well-worn face with a more-than-once broken nose, cheap shirts and aftershave and even cheaper jokes, the DI appeared to be a dinosaur from a previous age of policing. Davies was known to associate with various members of Plymouth’s criminal classes. ‘In the line of duty’ was his excuse. ‘Lining his pocket’ was how Riley saw it. But there was another side to Davies. He was the main carer for his wife, disabled after a riding accident. Riley rated her as one of the most attractive and graceful women he’d met. The contrast with Davies was unsettling.
Davies trudged away with a cigarette in his mouth, leaving Riley to continue.
‘Are you sure this wasn’t natural causes?’ Riley said to DC Carl Denton, walking in a circle around the body so he could view it from all angles. ‘Something getting at the corpse? A stray dog or a fox?’
‘Sorry, sir. The pony was slaughtered.’ Denton’s eyes moved to the rear of the animal. He reached up and scratched the pronounced scar on his cheek. ‘And worse.’
‘Tell me you’re joking?’ Riley said, wondering what his old friends on the Met would say if they could see him now. The sick jokes would be coming thick and fast.
‘No, sir. He’s been interfered with, something shoved up his rectum and the genitals cut off. No way a dog did that. Anyway, what about those burn marks on the ground?’
The burn marks were apparent in several places, piles of white ash surrounded by black earth and scorched grass. Boy racers up on the moor for a party, Riley had thought at first. But the positioning of the fires was too uniform. Five of them. Straight lines had been scratched in the earth from each fire to the ones opposite and a circle had been drawn through all the points too. The result was a pentagram with the dead animal in the centre.
‘Jesus,’ Riley said, shaking his head and then laughing at his use of the word. ‘Or not.’
‘Not, sir.’ Denton seemed unamused at Riley’s quip. The lad knelt at the head of the pony and peered at the neck, where the jugular vein had been severed. A pool of red-brown earth showed where the animal had bled out. Flies buzzed, flitting from the blood to the neck. There was already a whiff of something bad in the air. ‘Not Jesus by a long way.’
‘We’ve had this before though, yes? Animals being tortured?’
‘Sort of.’ Denton looked up at Riley and then stood. ‘But not like this. We had that deer with a crossbow bolt through the head in Plymbridge woods a while back. There was a horse shot with an air gun last year. Then there was a pony slashed in the genitals over on Bodmin Moor. The animal survived though. Not like this one.’
Denton stared past Riley, his eyes roaming the vista of moorland, farther away, a tor rising to pierce the blue sky. The poor lad looked shell-shocked, Riley thought. He knew Denton had been off sick for a couple of months. ‘Gone mental’ was the squad room gossip, but as one of the few people Denton confided in, Riley knew better. Denton had become infatuated with DC Calter but she’d been having none of it. A bunch of flowers bought as a Valentine’s present had been returned with a polite ‘no thank you’. An invitation to dinner had been rejected. Riley reckoned poor old Denton would have been OK, had a close relative not died soon after. Rejection followed by loss had pushed him over the edge and into full-blown clinical depression. On his return to duty he’d gone on various training courses and had come back to a new position working as a Wildlife and Countryside officer in DI Maynard’s newly formed Agricultural Crime Squad. The role was a largely solitary one and Riley wondered if Denton was coping with the isolation. At least Denton was his own boss. Riley and Davies came under the direct control of Maynard, and the DI never failed to let them know he was in charge. Thankfully Maynard was off on his annual birdwatching holiday, and for a couple of weeks at least Riley had a little more freedom.
‘So is this of interest to the ACS or not?’ Riley said. ‘Only we’ve got some sheep rustlers to catch.’
Denton turned back to Riley, not catching the irony. ‘Could be if we want it. Those other incidents were down to kids or bored city folk. “Having a laugh”, they’d call it. This is something different. I wouldn’t have thought the pentagram was the kind of thing some kids would think up. I reckon we’ve got something much more disturbing.’
‘You’re talking about the occult? Animal sacrifice? I thought that sort of stuff belonged in movies.’
‘That’s your job to find out, sir. If the ACS’s remit extends that far.’
‘Shit.’ Riley shook his head again. He and Davies had been stuck with Maynard for the best part of six months. The sheep rustling case the pair of them were working on was to be their last one, Detective Superintendent Conrad Hardin having belatedly decided Riley’s talents were wasted in the ACS. ‘I guess it does, although I’m not sure what Maynard’s going to make of all this. Especially if it means a bit of covert ops watching a bunch of gothic types frolicking naked under a full moon.’
Denton didn’t smile. ‘The animal’s been brutally slaughtered, sir. You’ve seen what they did to the rear end. It’s not a joke.’
‘Sorry, of course not,’ Riley said. ‘We’ll get on it. You’ll give me a written report and let me know if you find anything else, OK?’
Denton nodded, then Riley turned and walked away, leaving the lad staring down at the corpse. Davies stood over by their car. He dropped his fag and stubbed the butt out on the ground.
‘Any good? I know I was moaning earlier but if this case can get us away from those bloody sheep for the rest of the month I’ll bite.’
‘Carl reckons some kind of ritual took place. Not sure it’s our bag or one for the RSPCA. Depends on whether it goes any further than this I guess.’
‘Ritual?’ Davies grinned as he opened the door to the car. ‘You mean orgies and nude chicks on altars? Right up my street.’
‘Don’t mention that to Carl, sir.’ Riley went round to the driver’s side and got in. ‘He’s a wee bit sensitive on the issue.’
Half an hour later, Savage stood staring out across Brixham. A jumble of white houses tumbled down the hillside to the harbour while seagulls wheeled above fishing boats unloading their catch. Tourists thronged the harbour walls, many with ice creams or chips in hand, even though it was still only mid-morning; Brixham was a downmarket version of Dartmouth, not quite as picturesque and strictly for the kiss-me-quick brigade.
Savage turned from the view and eyed a row of shops on the quayside. At the far end of the row stood an estate agency, one belonging to a local firm with a sprinkling of offices in South Devon. There were branches in Exeter, Sidmouth, Teignmouth and here, in Brixham. Inside the tiny waterfront box a shape moved. Somebody fiddling with the window display.
Owen Fox.
Owen resembled his father, the Chief Constable, only in the fact that he had jet-black hair. His facial features were much softer, a cherub-like face reminding Savage that the lad was only in his early twenties. He already had a wife, two children, a mortgage to pay. He’d already killed someone.
Fallon had dropped her at the harbour a little while earlier, giving her directions and another pep talk.
‘Take a look, Charlotte. See what you think. The lad took away something you loved and in my book that makes what you’ve planned legit. I’ll park up and grab myself some breakfast. Call me when you’re done.’
Now,
