Banks paused at the door. ‘Atherton?’
‘Aye. Owns a farm between Lyndgarth and Helmthorpe. Or did. He’s dead now. I only mention it because Atherton’s son, Joseph, was something of a hippie.’
‘What happened?’
‘Fell down the stairs and broke his neck. Family never got over it. As I said, old man Atherton died a couple of years back, but his missis is still around.’
‘You’d no reason to suspect anything?’
Gristhorpe shook his head. ‘None at all. The Athertons were a decent, hard-working family. Apparently the lad was visiting them on his way to Scotland to join some commune or other. He fell down the stairs. It’s a pretty isolated spot, and it was too late when the ambulance arrived, especially as they had to drive a mile down country lanes to the nearest telephone box. They were really devastated. He was their only child.’
‘What made him fall?’
‘He wasn’t pushed, if that’s what you’re thinking. There was no stair carpet and the steps were a bit slippery. According to his dad, Joseph was walking around without his slippers on and he slipped in his stockinged feet.’
‘And you’ve no reason to doubt him?’
‘No. I did have one small suspicion at the time, though.’
‘What?’
‘According to the post-mortem, Joseph Atherton was a heroin addict, though he didn’t have any traces of the drug in his system at the time of his death. I thought he might have been smoking marijuana or something up in his room. That might have made him a bit unsteady on his feet.’
‘Did you search the place?’
Gristhorpe snorted. ‘Nay, Alan. There was no sense bringing more grief on his parents. What would we do if we found something, charge them with possession?’
‘I see your point.’ Banks opened the door and put up his collar against the rain. ‘I might dig up the file anyway,’ he called, running over to the car. ‘Enjoy the rest of your week off.’
Gristhorpe’s curse was lost in the sound of the engine starting up and the finale of Mussorgsky’s ‘Great Gate of Kiev’ on Classic FM, blasting out from the radio, which Banks had forgotten to switch off.
4
In addition to the cells and the charge room, the lower floor of Eastvale Divisional Headquarters housed old files and records. The dank room was lit by a single bare light bulb and packed with dusty files. So far, Banks had checked nineteen sixty-five and sixty-six but found nothing on the Atherton business.
Give or take a couple of years, Gristhorpe had said. Without much hope, Banks reached for nineteen sixty-four. That was a bit too early for hippies, he thought, especially in the far reaches of rural North Yorkshire.
In nineteen sixty-four, he remembered, the Beatles were still recording ballads like ‘I’ll Follow the Sun’ and old rockers like ‘Long Tall Sally’. John hadn’t met Yoko, and there wasn’t a sitar within earshot. The Rolling Stones were doing ‘Not Fade Away’ and ‘It’s All Over Now’, the Kinks had a huge hit with ‘You Really Got Me’, and the charts were full of Dusty Springfield, Peter and Gordon, the Dave Clark Five and Herman’s Hermits.
So nineteen sixty-four was a write-off as far as dead hippies were concerned. Banks looked anyway. Maybe Joseph Atherton had been way ahead of his time. Or perhaps Jerry Singer’s channeller had been wrong about the time between incarnations. Why was this whole charade taking on such an aura of unreality?
Banks’s stomach rumbled. Apart from that scone at Gristhorpe’s, he hadn’t eaten since breakfast, he realized. He put the file aside. Though there hardly seemed any point looking further ahead than nineteen sixty-six, he did so out of curiosity. Just as he was feeling success slip away, he came across it: Joseph Atherton. Coroner’s verdict: accidental death. There was only one problem: it had happened in 1969.
According to the Athertons’ statement, their son wrote to say he was coming to see them en route to Scotland. He said he was on his way to join some sort of commune and arrived at Eastvale station on the London train at three forty-five in the afternoon, 11 July 1969. By ten o’clock that night he was dead. He didn’t have transport of his own, so his father had met him at the station in the Land Rover and driven him back to the farm.
Banks picked up a sheet of lined writing paper, yellowed around the edges. A separate sheet described it as an anonymous note received at the Eastvale police station about a week after the coroner’s verdict. All it said, in block capitals, was, ‘Ask Atherton about the red Volkswagen.’
Next came a brief interview report, in which a PC Wythers said he had questioned the Athertons about the car and they said they didn’t know what he was talking about. That was that.
Banks supposed it was remotely possible that whoever was in the red Volkswagen had killed Joseph Atherton. But why would his parents lie? According to the statement, they spent the evening together at the farm eating dinner, catching up on family news, then Joseph went up to his room to unpack and came down in his stockinged feet. Maybe he’d been smoking marijuana, as Gristhorpe suggested. Anyway, he slipped at the top of the stairs and broke his neck. It was tragic, but hardly what Banks was looking for.
He heard a sound at the door and looked up to see Susan Gay.
‘Found anything, sir?’ she asked.
‘Maybe,’ said Banks. ‘One or two loose ends. But I haven’t a clue what it all means, if anything. I’m beginning to wish I’d never seen Mr Jerry Singer.’
Susan smiled. ‘Do you know, sir,’ she said, ‘he almost had me believing him.’
Banks put the file aside. ‘Did he? I suppose it always pays to keep an open mind,’ he said. ‘That’s why we’re going to visit Mrs Atherton.’
5
The Atherton farm was every bit as isolated as Gristhorpe had said, and the relentless rain had muddied the lane. At one point Banks thought they would have to get out and push, but on the third try the wheels caught and the car lurched forward.
The farmyard looked neglected: bedraggled weeds poked through the mud; part of the barn roof had collapsed; and the wheels and tines of the old hayrake had rusted.
Mrs Atherton answered their knock almost immediately. Banks had phoned ahead so their arrival wouldn’t frighten her. After all, a woman living alone in such a wild place couldn’t be too careful.
She led them into the large kitchen and put the kettle on the Aga. The stone-walled room looked clean and tidy enough, but Banks noted an underlying smell, like old greens and meat rotting under the sink.
Mrs Atherton carried the aura of the sickroom about with her. Her complexion was as grey as her sparse hair; her eyes were dull yellow with milky blue irises; and the skin below them looked dark as a bruise. As she made the tea, she moved slowly, as if measuring the energy required for each step. How on earth, Banks wondered, did she manage up here all by herself? Yorkshire grit was legendary, and often as close to foolhardiness as anything else, he thought.
She put the teapot on the table. ‘We’ll just let it mash a minute,’ she said. ‘Now, what is it you want to talk to me about?’
Banks didn’t know how to begin. He had no intention of telling Mrs Atherton about Jerry Singer’s ‘previous lifetime’, or of interrogating her about her son’s death. Which didn’t leave him many options.
‘How are you managing?’ he asked first.
‘Mustn’t grumble.’
‘It must be hard, taking care of this place all by yourself?’
‘Nay, there’s not much to do these days. Jack Crocker keeps an eye on the sheep. I’ve nobbut got a few cows to milk.’
‘No poultry?’
‘Nay, it’s not worth it any more, not with these battery farms. Anyway, seeing as you’re a copper, I don’t suppose you came to talk to me about the farming life, did you? Come on, spit it out, lad.’