Mackenzie looked at Fry, who allowed herself a smile. Where’s the best place to hide something so that it won’t be found? Where it’s already been looked for. She wished she could remember who’d told her that, so she could thank them. It had been well worth repeating.

‘So Henry Pearson wasn’t expecting this outcome after all?’ said Mackenzie.

‘Not at all. It knocked the ground from under him completely. He won’t be doing any more media interviews for a while.’

‘Interesting.’

‘More sad than interesting. He was still clinging to the belief that David and Trisha had managed to get out of the country and change their identities. Somehow he’d convinced himself that they’d covered their tracks so well that no one could make contact with them, not even him. So he just carried on playing his part regardless.’

‘And yet his son and daughter-in-law have been dead for … well, how long would we say?’

‘Shall we say about two years, four months, at a guess?’ said Fry.

‘From the moment they disappeared, then.’

‘Yes.’

Mackenzie looked at the remains in their makeshift grave. The edges were crumbling, and the thick plastic was scattered with debris, stones and lumps of peat. The damage had been done by the fell runners. The impact of scores of feet pounding over the cover had shaken it loose and broken it into two pieces, which lay just inside the shaft. According to the initial reports from witnesses, one of the back markers had almost fallen right through.

‘Is it possible,’ said Mackenzie, ‘that someone knew David Pearson was planning to do a bunk and followed him up here to stop him?’

‘To make sure he didn’t escape justice?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, it’s possible,’ said Fry. ‘We’d have to go through his business records again, follow up on everyone affected by his activities. But …’

‘What?’

‘Well, if the bodies haven’t been buried here the whole time since the Pearsons disappeared, where were they until now?’

A short while later, Liz Petty arrived at the Light House with her crime-scene kit, looking a bit disgruntled at the call-out.

‘There’s a much better crime scene than this across the moor there,’ she said. ‘Two nice bodies, and all I get is a smelly cellar. I bet it’s full of spiders, too.’

‘Yes, it is,’ said Villiers.

Cooper heard her voice from the bottom of the steps.

‘Liz?’ he called.

‘Hello?’

‘It’s all right. It’s me. Come on down.’

‘Where are you?’

‘In the cellar, of course.’

Liz’s face lit up when she saw Cooper.

‘Ah. Did you do this just so you could see me before tonight?’

‘Obviously,’ he said.

‘I think I’d better get out of the way,’ said Villiers. ‘I’ll be upstairs if you need me.’

As soon as she looked at Cooper properly, Liz drew in a sharp breath at the sight of the bruise on his temple. He’d almost forgotten it himself, though his arm and shoulder were painful when he moved suddenly. But this was the first time Liz had seen him since it happened. He’d forgotten that, too.

‘Oh, that looks sore,’ she said.

‘It’s not too bad.’

She touched the side of his head gently with the tips of her fingers. Luckily she’d removed her latex gloves, and the touch was quite soothing.

‘What on earth were you doing, going there on your own without backup?’ she said.

‘Oh, don’t. It’s just something that happens now and then.’

‘Not to my husband.’

‘Future husband.’

‘Well, I want to make sure you’re still around by then.’

She looked at the bruise again, and winced as if she felt his pain. But he wouldn’t ever want her to do that.

Liz smiled and took Cooper’s arm – a firm, affectionate touch that made him forget for a while that he was on duty and working.

‘We shouldn’t,’ he said.

‘I know. But it’s a cellar, and no one else is around.’

‘Even so.’

She squeezed his arm again. ‘You’re so well behaved. You could relax a bit more sometimes, you know.’

Cooper felt the temptation, but pulled himself together. It was a shame, but there were more urgent things to deal with.

‘What was that you were saying to Carol just now about another crime scene?’ he said.

‘They’ve found two bodies. Haven’t you heard?’

‘Damn it. No, I hadn’t.’

Cooper looked at his phone, and saw Network lost. They were below ground level, of course. Even if there was mobile phone reception on this part of the moor, the signal would be blocked by the cellar walls and the depth of peat lying around them.

He hated being out of touch. It was bad enough at the best of times, but now there seemed to be a major development, and he was unreachable. But someone could have called the officer outside on his radio. Airwave worked here, surely.

That led him inevitably to the suspicion that he was being deliberately kept out of the loop. The thought made him unreasonably angry.

‘The bodies,’ he said. ‘Is it the Pearsons?’

Liz looked at him in concern at the change in his tone. ‘Oh, I couldn’t say. But that seems to be the assumption being made right now. Two bodies, dead for some time. They were found in an abandoned mine shaft up on the moor.’

Cooper gritted his teeth. ‘A mine shaft? Really.’

‘You don’t sound too surprised.’

‘No, I’m not,’ he said. ‘I suppose the bodies haven’t been there for two and a half years, though. Not likely.’

‘Again, I couldn’t say. You’ll have to ask someone else for information, Ben. I’m just a crime-scene examiner.’

He tried to calm himself. Of course it wasn’t Liz’s fault. Far from it. He shouldn’t be speaking to her as though it was.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘It’s okay.’ She looked round the cellar. ‘But we have our own scene, such as it is. So what’s here?’

‘It’s more what’s not here,’ said Cooper.

‘Such as?’

‘Chest freezers.’

‘What?’

‘There are no chest freezers. They must have had big freezers here. They left all this equipment in the pub when they went – the kitchens are full of stuff. But no freezers.’

‘Okay.’

‘Look,’ he said, ‘there’s a space against this wall where something of that size has been standing. You can see still the shape of it on the floor.’

‘Stay back,’ said Liz. ‘There are shoe marks in the dust right in front of you. And if someone carried a freezer out, there might be prints on the wall.’

Cooper took a step backwards. ‘And I think we should check the whole cellar for traces of blood.’

‘Oh Lord, that means turning the lights out.’ She sighed. ‘Your theory being that this might be a primary crime scene?’

‘Yes, possibly.’

‘In that case, I’ll need to call in and get a full team,’ she said.

‘But I’m guessing everyone is fully committed already.’

‘Yes, we’d have to wait some time.’

‘Come on, Liz …’

‘Oh, now you’re turning on the charm. You know I can’t resist. Okay, you can leave me to it.’

‘Thanks. I owe you a favour.’

‘I’ll think of something, don’t worry.’

Cooper ran up the steps, and Villiers met him at the top.

‘Have you heard, Ben?’ she said.

‘Yes, just now. Two bodies.’

‘That stinks, doesn’t it?’

‘To high heaven.’

Villiers gave him a hand up out of the hatch. The space behind the bar counter was awkward and narrow. It couldn’t have been easy for a man of Maurice Wharton’s size to get through.

‘If it is the Pearsons,’ said Villiers, ‘they should be able to ID them pretty quickly. There are DNA profiles on record. And of course there’s a family member on hand. It depends what condition the bodies are in, I suppose.’

‘It would be very useful to know that. I mean, what stage the decomposition is at. I wonder when anyone will bother to tell us.’

‘Briefing tomorrow, at a guess?’

‘That’s no good.’

Villiers looked thoughtful as they walked out of the pub, past the rattling tape.