Page 9 of The Mercy Chair

‘Round the back.’

Anthony stepped off the path and on to the grass. Poe followed suit; the brown frosted leaves crunched under the thick soles of his boots as if he were walking on Pringles. As they neared the north-facing side of the church, the side that got no afternoon sun, the ground changed from mainly grass to mainly moss and creeping ivy. Tree roots crossed each other like pallet straps.

The light was thin and grey. Branches creaked in the breeze. Poe stopped walking. Something felt wrong. He took in a deep breath but all he got in return was damp earth and pine needles. Maybe the suggestion of grave flowers, perhaps some early snowdrops. Nothing funky. He took in another deep breath. Shut his eyes and let his memory do the heavy lifting. Therewasa hint of something else there, he thought. An unwanted seasoning, a smell he knew well. It was sweet and rancid.

Decay.

Poe opened his eyes. In the time it had taken him to stop and smell the flowers, Anthony had disappeared around the back of the tower. Poe followed the footprints he’d left in the frost.

And saw a murder.

Chapter 7

‘A murder?’ Doctor Lang said.

‘Of crows,’ Poe explained. ‘Technically they were carrion crows.Corvus corone. There were some magpies as well, but they’re skittish and didn’t hang around.’

‘But the crows did?’

‘They were full of meat and are lazy at the best of times. So, yes, theydidhang around. Stood around like vultures. A few cocked their heads like they were waiting for me to make a speech, but the rest remained motionless. I think this is the bit I remember most of all – the way they just stared. Watching, waiting, emotionless.’

‘This is what you see when you sleep?’

Poe nodded. ‘It was like something out ofHammer House of Horror, Doctor Lang,’ he said. ‘There were at least twenty on the ground, more in the trees. Creepy bastards, pardon my French.’

She waved away his apology. ‘We’re in a psychiatric hospital,’ she said. ‘This won’t be the last expletive I hear today. What happened next?’

‘Anthony, the bloke who’d fetched me from the pub, grabbed a fallen branch and started yelling and swinging it about.’

‘That scared them away?’

‘It did. To the trees at least. They watched us for the rest of the afternoon.’

‘And it was badgers?’

‘It was. The plot behind the church tower looked like a ploughed field. Clawed mounds of earth, two metres high.’

‘I knew badgers ate worms; I didn’t realise they also ate corpses.’

‘It’s not the corpses they like, it’s the easy digging.’

‘Easy digging?’

‘Yep. Although they have powerful forelegs, and long, non-retractable claws, at this time of year the ground is frosty and digging is hard. But, because graveyards are quiet and tend to be on ground that can be dug up with nothing more than a spade, they’re attractive to badgers. In other words, the essential characteristics of a graveyard are the same essential characteristics of a badger sett.’

‘And this badger was digging a new one?’

‘Judging by the amount of spill, it was a medium-sized cete.’

‘Cete?’

‘A group of badgers. At least four adults, Anthony reckoned.’

‘And they’d unearthed the grave of that man’s mother?’

‘They’d been digging parallel to it, and when they went deeper than six feet, they completely collapsed her grave. The coffin had toppled into the half-constructed sett. And that loosened the earth above. Foxes smelled a cheap meal and dug down for it. And in the morning, after the foxes had slunk back into their holes, the crows began feasting.’

‘How disgusting,’ Doctor Lang said. ‘I assume the coffin had cracked open. That’s what the foxes and crows were eating?’

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