Dancing With the Virgins (42 page)

30

When Ben Cooper and Diane Fry drove into the yard
at Ringham Edge Farm early next morning, they had to swerve to avoid the front bumper of a milk tanker.
When they got out, they could hear Warren Leach yel
ling at the driver.

‘What good is that to me?' he was shouting. 'How am I supposed to survive?'

‘It's not my fault, mate. Your cell count is way up. You know the way it works as well as I do.'

‘They're robbing me blind. I need that milk cheque to live on.’

Cooper saw Leach and the driver facing each other.
They had their hands on their hips, and both looked
angry and stubborn. Leach had been loading a stack of
heavy fencing posts into a trailer attached to the back
of his tractor.

‘
I can't help you,' said the driver. 'It's nothing to do with me. Do you want me to take this milk or not?
’

‘
What's the bloody point?’

The driver finally lost patience. 'Suit yourself then. I
can't hang around any longer.’

He got back in his cab and the diesel engine rumbled.

Leach grabbed a fencing post and hurled it like a javelin.
It bounced off the back of the tanker, leaving a small
dent in the paintwork above the rear number plate.

‘I wouldn't do that, Mr Leach,' said Cooper.

‘Piss off,' said Leach.

‘
Some trouble with your cell count, is it? That can be
tricky to sort out. Not mastitis, I hope.'

‘They reckon I'm not cleaning the equipment properly. Not changing the .filters. So they've docked my
milk cheque. Now they're threatening not to take my
milk at all. Bastards.'

‘That would be pretty serious, I suppose.'

‘
Serious?' Leach went goggle-eyed with amazement
at the understatement. 'My cows give better milk
than any in Derbyshire. What the hell did you want, anyway?'

‘We're hoping to speak to Mrs Leach.'

‘You can hope, then.'

‘Where is she?'

‘She's gone, that's where.'

‘Left?'

‘Aye. So why don't the rest of you bugger off and leave me alone as well? I've had enough.'

‘Can you tell me where she is, Mr Leach?'

‘No, I can't.'

‘We'd like to speak to her.'

‘
Well, you can do what I have to do — speak to her
solicitor. That's what the letter says that I got. If I want
to communicate with her in the future, I have to do it
through her solicitor. And I'm her husband! I didn't even know she had a bloody solicitor.'

‘Perhaps you could give us the name of your wife's solicitor then.'

‘Bloody hell. Will you go away and leave me alone, if I do?'

‘For the time being, sir.’

Leach turned and marched towards the house. They
began to follow him, gradually closing the distance.

‘Stay here,' snapped Leach, and slammed the door behind him.

They had no option but to wait until Leach came back. A ginger tom cat strolled across the yard and
stared at them. The cat was scrawny, its ears bitten. But
it was a farm cat, used to fending for itself and finding its own food in the dark corners of the buildings, used to fighting its own battles against rats, dogs and other
cats. Cooper clicked his tongue at it and held out his
hand in a friendly gesture. But the cat ignored him.

Fry walked over to look at the house. She found some
black plastic bin liners by the back door that were split
and bursting with rubbish. She looked at Cooper and screwed up her nose. There was a lace curtain across
the window which prevented her from seeing in.

When Leach returned, he had a letter which he pushed in front of Cooper's face.

‘
Yes, divorce proceedings,' said Leach. 'What do you
think of that?’

Fry found herself behind Leach, near the open door of the farmhouse. Out of the corner of his eye, Cooper
saw her stand on the step and push the door open a
bit more so that she could see inside, being careful not
to enter.

Cooper wrote down the name and address of Mrs Leach's solicitor in his notebook.

‘I'm sorry to hear that, Mr Leach. What about the boys? It's always tough on the children.’

Leach stared at him suspiciously, but said nothing.
'That's all I need for now, sir, thank you,' said Cooper.
Leach turned suddenly, moving quickly for a big ‘

man, and saw Fry standing in his doorway. The
expression on her face seemed to infuriate him.
'Bitch!’

Leach hurled himself across the few yards that separ
ated him from Fry. He was like a charging bull, and looked likely to flatten her against the wall. Cooper reacted too slowly, reached out and tried to grab his
belt, but missed. He saw Fry step away from the door,
giving herself a bit of clear space, flexing her leg to test
the strength of her injured knee. She put out her left
hand, her palm facing out towards Leach like a traffic
officer. It looked like an appeal, a feeble defensive gesture, but Cooper knew it was her weak hand that she
was offering as she adjusted the balance of her body.

Leach threw a vicious punch. His fist whistled past
Fry's shoulder as she blocked his elbow with her right
forearm. She jabbed her heel into the back of his knee
and he hit the ground heavily, rolling on to his face in
the muck left by the cows.

‘
Ouch,' said Fry, as she stumbled, rubbing her ankle. 'That damn cattle market has something to answer for.'
Cooper finally caught up. He put his knee in the flat
of Leach's back and grabbed for one of his wrists with
the intention of getting the kwik-cuffs on. But he hesi
tated. All the fight had gone out of the farmer suddenly.
His body was slack and unresisting.

‘
Going to be sensible, Mr Leach?’

The farmer grunted. The grunt didn't seem to communicate much, but Cooper let go of his wrist and didn't bother with the cuffs.

‘
What are you doing, Ben?' asked Fry.

‘It's all right.’

Cooper checked Leach's breathing, his pulse and his
heart. The farmer still didn't resist. In fact, with small
movements of his arms and legs, he seemed to be trying
to dig himself deeper into the mud. An indistinguish
able mumble came from his mouth. Cooper turned the
man's head and looked at his face. Suddenly, he got up
and dusted off his trousers. Leach still didn't move,
except to turn his face back into the muck as Fry came
across to stand over him, limping slightly.

‘
Is he all right?'

‘Let's go,' said Cooper.

‘
Hold on. He might need medical attention. Let me take a look.'

‘
No. Leave him.'

‘Ben?'

‘Let's leave it. No harm done.’

Fry shrugged. 'He didn't touch me, anyway.'

‘
I know he didn't. No point in making a charge, is there?'

‘He's not worth the paperwork. You sure he's all right?

‘
He's all right, Diane. Trust me.'

‘
OK. Let's go.' She hobbled back towards the car.

‘As right as he'll ever be,' said Cooper, quietly.

As they drove away, Cooper glanced in his rear-view
mirror. Warren Leach had got up from the ground. He
sat slumped against the tailgate of his trailer with his
head in his hands. He had only the ginger cat for com
pany now. And even the cat was looking at him with something like pity.

*

After a phone call to his client by the solicitor, Cooper
and Fry were given an address near Bakewell. They
found it was a small B & B, its rooms empty now for
the winter. Yvonne Leach had a first-floor room, over
looking a similar row of Victorian semi-detached houses
with dark brick porches and dormer windows.

‘I got too frightened of him,' she said. 'I stood it as long as I could, really I did.'

‘
Are you saying you suffered physical abuse, Mrs
Leach?' asked Fry. Cooper could see her trying to relax
the woman, who was plainly intimidated by having the two detectives standing in the room. Mrs Leach looked
round at the cheap dresser and the washbasin in the
corner and shrugged, as if accepting things were out of
her control now.

‘
Not really,' she said. 'He never hit me, I mean. I'm
not making a complaint about that.’

She rubbed her hands together and felt the radiator
under the bay window. The room was chilly and miser
able. She pulled her cardigan around her shoulders and
stared out of the window.

‘The Ranger was the only one I could ever talk to.
Owen. He used to come to the house sometimes to see
if I was all right. But only when Warren wasn't around.
Warren wouldn't have him near the farm, if he could help it.’

Cooper sighed with relief. That sounded much more
like the Owen Fox that he knew. How could Mark Roper
have got it so wrong about the reason for Owen's visits?

‘
Do you think I should go back?' said Yvonne.

They stared at her. 'Mrs Leach, there must have been
something that frightened you enough to make you leave,' said Fry.

Yvonne Leach nodded. She made them sit down on
the bed. Then she told them how her husband used to
threaten her when she wouldn't have sex, how he had
broken the lock of the door when she had gone to sleep
in another room.

‘He's a highly sexed man. He always has been. It's one of the things that attracted me to him, once.’

She told them how much worse her husband had
been since the farm had got into financial trouble. She
knew that things were bad. She didn't know what the
debts were - Warren never told her things like that -
but she knew it was very bad. She could understand why Warren drank. It was very hard on him, the way things had gone. But it made his temper even worse,
and he always took it out on her. She seemed to provoke
him simply by being there. She had left, she said,
because she didn't want the boys to see it any more.
She thought, if she was out of the way, he would have
less to provoke him and wouldn't drink so much.

‘
It was the most difficult decision I ever made,' she said.

Cooper realized Yvonne Leach was one of those women who had to feel they were needed, that they had a role to perform to give meaning to their lives.
Some women were afraid of stepping out of their place
and finding that the gap they left had closed up behind
them straight away. He imagined Yvonne's fear was that everyone would forget about her in a single
moment and carry on with their lives as if nothing had
happened, as if she had never been there. And then she
would know that her life had never had any meaning
at all.

‘
Because I love him, you see,' said Yvonne.

*

The landlady knocked on the door and brought in a
tray of tea for the visitors, looking at them curiously,
with the air of being prepared to welcome them as long as they didn't put their shoes on the bed and steal the
soap.

Cooper tried his tea and found it weak and insipid.
'Mrs Leach, did your husband have many visitors?' She hesitated. Her face set into a stubborn line that
reminded him for a moment of her husband's
expression. There must have been a time when they had something in common.

‘
You've wondered yourself what happens in the big
shed, haven't you?' he said.

Yvonne nodded, and she looked as though she might
cry at the softness of his tone.

‘
It was awful. The men started coming at night, after
the boys had gone to bed. Warren warned me to stay
in the house. But I heard the dogs, the snarling and the
howling. I could imagine what was going on. He told me it was the only way to make some money to pay
off the debts. But with people like that, something was
bound to go wrong. He isn't a very clever man. I knew
they would take advantage of him.'

‘And what did go wrong, Mrs Leach?'

‘
I don't know. But one morning, after they had been,
he was in a terrible temper. He was frightened, too. But
angry.'

‘You don't know what had happened?'

‘No, he never told me.'

‘How long ago was this?'

‘
Oh, six weeks or so. I remember, because the men
haven't been back since then. They used to come every
week. Every Sunday night.'

‘Why do you think they stopped coming?'

‘
I always thought it was because of the Ranger,' she
said.

‘
Owen Fox? Are you saying he was involved in this?'
asked Fry.

‘No, no,' said Mrs Leach. 'But he knew. I think he
knows everything that goes on in the area. He came to
the farm and asked me to use my influence to persuade
Warren to stop it happening. My influence! He didn't understand the way it was, of course.'

‘
But why did he do that? He could just have reported
it,' said Fry.

‘
He said he didn't want to get Warren in trouble. He
was worried it would be the last straw for Warren. The
Ranger understood that.'

‘And did your husband take any notice?'

‘Not of me. Nor of the Ranger.'

‘But something made them stop,' said Fry.

‘Yes.’

Fry looked at Cooper. He shook his head, and she frowned.

‘What about women?' she asked.

‘They were all men, I think,' said Yvonne. 'But, of course, I never saw them.'

‘
I mean other women your husband may have met.'
Yvonne Leach put down her teacup. She hadn't drunk
any of it. But then neither had the two detectives.
'I thought you might mean that.'

‘You said he was highly sexed. Do you think it's
possible that he might have looked elsewhere?'
Yvonne smiled and shook her head. 'You don't
understand the life of a small farmer. Warren wouldn't
have the time or the opportunity for an affair. Where
would he meet women? He spends every hour working
on the farm.'

‘Are you sure?'

‘
Oh, I've seen him looking at the hikers sometimes.
You know, the women who come past on the track up to the moor. Sometimes, when I didn't know where he was, I thought he might have gone up there to look at
them. In the middle of summer, you can see them all
gathered round the stone circle, the Nine Virgins, all
the young ones. But he would never do anything except
look, I'm sure.’

She must have seen the sceptical look on Fry's face.
'Warren is a good man, really,' she added. 'Things just
haven't gone right for him.'

'What about the boys, Mrs Leach?' asked Cooper.

‘
I wanted to bring them away with me, of course. But
how could I?' She gestured at her surroundings. 'I had
to come here, because I've got no family to go to. But
I can get a job, can't I? I've been looking. I can earn some money and I'll get somewhere bigger that I can take the boys to.'

‘
But in the meantime . . . are you quite sure they're
safe?’

She shook her head vehemently. 'Oh, Warren won't
do anything to harm the boys. He thinks the world of
them. They're his whole life, but for the farm. He wouldn't do a thing to harm them.’