Restless Dead (Harry Grimm Book 5) by David Gatward (english reading book TXT) 📗

There was clearly a place for everything, and everything was very much in its place.

‘So, what do you know about farming, then?’ Harry asked as they walked through the yard and down to the barn.

‘Not much at all,’ Jadyn said. ‘Probably less than you.’

‘That’s saying something.’

‘I’m a Bradford lad,’ Jadyn said. ‘Closest I got as a kid to farming was buying milk.’

‘So, why are you here, then?’ Harry asked.

‘Used to come up here on holiday a lot with my family,’ Jadyn said. ‘Not one for holidays abroad, my parents, not that they wouldn’t like to, it’s just a simple case of economics. You know, those kinds of holidays cost a lot of money and they haven’t got much to be splashing about. Always liked the place, because it’s pretty special, isn’t it? So, when the opportunity came up to get placed up here, I took it. Thought I’d broaden my experience, if you know what I mean. I know the city well, like. Up here is different.’

‘I’m impressed,’ Harry said. ‘My experience of new constables, in which I include myself, is that it’s all about being in the city, right in the thick of it.’

‘Rural police work has that, too,’ Jadyn explained. ‘And I needed to get out, you know, see the world a bit?’

Harry smiled to himself then, at the idea that Jadyn thought going to work in the dales qualified as seeing the world. But then, why shouldn’t it? In many ways, he would’ve been hard-pressed to find anywhere more different to Bradford, or any other major town or city for that matter, than the dales.

‘This is the barn, then,’ Harry said, walking up to a metal gate to look inside. ‘Notice anything?’

Jadyn stood beside Harry and peered in.

‘No sheep?’

‘It’s always best to start with the obvious,’ Harry smiled. ‘And that covers something which should be here, but isn’t.’

‘What about forensics?’ Jadyn asked. ‘Shouldn’t we be calling them in?’

‘That’s what we’re here to decide,’ Harry said. ‘Right now, it’s hard to say if we need to call in the Scene of Crime team, and I don’t want to be dragging them over here if there’s bugger all to see. And even if we do, this is hardly going to be high on their priority list, is it, an empty barn and some missing sheep?’

‘We called them CSI in Bradford,’ Jadyn said. ‘The SOC team, I mean.’

‘Well, it’s the same thing, just a sexier name, that’s all,’ Harry said. ‘And it’ll be a while, I think, before it takes over completely.’ He opened the gate. ‘After you.’

Jadyn walked into the barn and Harry followed, noticing how the air changed from the fresh, crisp outdoor smell, to one richer, deeper, more earthy.

Once inside, Harry paused, Jadyn coming to a stop at his side. The barn, like the farm, was ordered and clean. The floor was covered in straw, with feeding and water troughs dotted about. Around the walls of the barn were dotted wire cages filled with hay. The smell of it in the air grew stronger the further in they walked, mixing with the tang of lanolin from the fleeces of the sheep filling the space beneath the roof overhead.

‘So,’ Harry asked, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, ‘how does someone empty a barn like this of sheep, then? And manage to do it without anyone noticing?’

‘No idea,’ Jadyn said. ‘And how many were there?’

‘Jim said fifty,’ Harry said. ‘So, it’s not like someone just decided to pop in and throw a couple into the back of a trailer and sod off, is it?’

‘No,’ Jadyn agreed. ‘This was an organised job. They knew what they were doing. Reminds me of a gang we dealt with in Bradford that could clear a street of its cars in under fifteen minutes. They had all these drivers who were experts at breaking into cars. They’d just choose a street, turn up together early morning, then all break into a car at the same time and drive off without waking a soul. Amazing, really. You can’t help but admire something like that. I mean, I’m not condoning it, but you know what I mean, right?’

As Jadyn was talking, Harry knew that what was worrying him the most, and had been from the moment he’d heard just how many sheep had been taken, was that the only way to do it, the only people capable of pulling something like this off at all, was a well-organised gang, and probably one that had done it before. Because if it was organised, then there was every chance that what they were dealing with wasn’t just a one-off, but a larger operation, something involving manpower and money and criminal connections that Harry was pretty sure the dales wasn’t exactly prepared for.

‘Right, you go that way and I’ll go round over here,’ Harry said, gesturing with a wave of his hand for Jadyn to walk on down the right-hand side of the barn.

‘And what am I looking for exactly?’ Jadyn asked.

‘Anything that shouldn’t be there and is, and the opposite of that,’ Harry said. ‘Anything that should be, but isn’t.’

‘Knew you’d say that,’ Jadyn said.

‘Then why ask?’

As Jadyn headed off, Harry took himself in a wide sweep down the left side of the barn, scanning the ground. But all he saw was straw and sheep droppings and tufts of wool. And by the time he met with Jadyn at the far end, the only sign he had that the sheep had been taken was simply that they weren’t there anymore. And that wasn’t exactly much to go on.

Harry leaned on a gate, staring out across the fields at the back of the barn.

‘Looks like they just drove in and took them,’ Jadyn said. ‘That’s ballsy, isn’t it? Coming in across the yard like that. Must’ve been pretty confident that Jim and his mum and dad weren’t going to bother them.’

‘Hmm,’ Harry said.

‘What’s that mean?’ Jadyn asked.

‘Either they were confident that they weren’t going to be discovered,’ Harry said, ‘or they