Beneath the Soil Read Free Page B

And where
had
Philip Caseley been when he fired that gun?
    Nick got to his feet. ‘You’ve been really hospitable, considering we just walked in on you off the street. But we ought to let you get back to whatever you were doing when we turned up. So it’s back down the track and turn left?’
    â€˜You’ll see it. There’s not many footpaths through those woods.’
    She did not try to detain them. Suzie sensed her relief that they were going.
    She gave Eileen her warmest smile. ‘I’m really glad to have met you. I spend so much time hunting up my ancestors from the past. And now and then I stumble across a relation I didn’t know about who’s alive today. I’m going to have to get my charts out and see if I can find where we fit together.’
    â€˜I wouldn’t like to go poking around in the past too much. You never know what you might find.’
    Mrs Casely watched them walk through her kitchen. But she did not respond to their thanks and farewells.
    â€˜Well!’ Millie exploded, when they were safely across the yard. ‘Not exactly a bundle of fun, was she?’
    â€˜Walk in her shoes,’ Tom said unexpectedly. ‘How would you like to live out here, with precious little money, and only two of you to run all this?’
    â€˜It would give me the creeps. Do you suppose they have any children?’
    â€˜Well, I didn’t see any Lego on the floor. No homework books on the kitchen table or wacky DVDs in the living room. Guess, if they have, they’ve grown up and left.’
    â€˜If it was me, I couldn’t wait to get away from this place. All these trees around it – I’d feel smothered.’
    â€˜It occurs to me,’ Nick said. ‘That path she told us to take. It’s the one Philip Caseley went down when he left us.’
    â€˜So? We’d better talk amongst ourselves while we walk along it,’ Tom laughed. ‘Let him know it’s humans coming and we’re not something for the pot.’
    They found the footpath without difficulty. Mrs Caseley had been right about the brambles. Nick pushed them aside where they arched over the path through the trees, but they sprang back behind them.
    The way led downhill, becoming softer underfoot. Presently sunlight glinted through the branches.
    Suzie stopped and gave a cry of delight. ‘This has to be it!’
    The mounds of red-brown earth, stippled with grit and straw, had almost melted back into the soil they had been dug from. They were cloaked with ivy. Around them, spears of fireweed flamed with bright pink flowers. Nettles spread a less welcoming blanket. Here and there, young trees were beginning to grow back. A little stream ran through the combe below.
    â€˜At least she didn’t have far to carry water,’ Millie observed. ‘Could be worse.’
    A sudden snap made them start. Suzie was instantly aware how much her nerves were still on edge. They stood alert, listening.
    â€˜Philip Caseley?’ Nick asked. He raised his voice to call. ‘Hullo, there!’
    Nothing answered him out of the darkness of the woods around them.
    â€˜Probably just a squirrel landing on a dead branch,’ he said.
    â€˜Or a deer,’ Tom added. ‘There must be some in this wood.’
    Suzie said nothing. The hairs on her arms prickled. She had an uncomfortable feeling that they were being watched. It was silly. She had not yet recovered from the shock of that sudden gunshot. But if Philip Caseley was here, there was no reason for him not to show himself, as he had before.
    Nick let out his breath. Then he got out his camera. ‘I expect you want me to do the usual?’
    He moved around the ruins. Suzie could tell he was enjoying the play of sunshine on the mellow cob and the colourful fireweed. More photographs to enliven her files on the Day family.
    She stroked the rough cob. What a contrast it must have been to move from this rural