Page 93 of The Mercy Chair

‘There were six self-penned alphanumerical tattoos on the thighs and torso of Cornelius Green.’

‘There were.’

‘And we think there were six courses that hadn’t been recorded anywhere.’

Poe nodded. ‘We do.’

‘This is where things get slightly more complex,’ Bradshaw continued. ‘When we discovered that Nathan Rose, one of the course attendees, had CSM.12.R2.CL tattooed on his foot, we suspected there was a link between the courses and Cornelius Green’s tattoos.’

‘That was the logical leap.’

‘And it was the correct one. However, we were mistaken when we thought the tattoos were some sort of obscure course code or a type of one-time-pad.’

‘What are they then?’

‘They’re locations, Poe,’ Bradshaw said.

‘Locations? Like a grid reference?’ Poe’s brow furrowed. He had been taught to read maps in the army and he still preferred using Ordnance Survey to GPS. Maps could be trusted; GPS relied on batteries – which could run out – and hackable satellites. Not that he’d ever tell Bradshaw that, of course. If Cornelius Green’s tattoos were grid references, he’d been using a system with which Poe was unfamiliar. Admittedly, grid references varied, but they all tended to work on intersecting lines, and they all had an even number of digits – half denoted the vertical axis and half denoted the horizontal. Ordnance Survey divided the UK into 100-kilometre squares and assigned a two-letter code to each one. Within each square, the standard numerical grid reference was used.

‘They’re sort of like grid references, Poe,’ Bradshaw said. ‘But only in the sense that each tattoo denotes something specific on the ground.’

‘Maybe it was where each course took place?’

‘No, that’s not it.’

‘What then?’

‘They’re graves, Poe.’

Chapter 81

‘Graves?’ Poe said. ‘Does this mean Cornelius Green isn’t our only victim? There might be six more bodies out there?’

‘I don’t know what’s out there, Poe,’ Bradshaw replied. ‘Idoknow that each one of those tattoos represents the location of an officially registered grave.’

‘But we could have a serial killer?’

Bradshaw shook her head. ‘Not unless he’s been active since the Second World War.’

‘I think you’d better explain, Tilly.’

She pulled a sheet of paper from the portable printer she carried everywhere.

‘This is the tattoo found on both Cornelius Green and Nathan Rose,’ she said.

She placed the sheet on the desk.

CSM.12.R2.CL

She circled ‘CSM’ with a red pen.

‘CSM stands for Christ and Saint Mary,’ she said. ‘It’s a church near Ulverston.’

‘There’s more than one Christ and Saint Mary in Cumbria, Tilly,’ Poe said. ‘How do you know it’s that one?’

‘I’ll get to that, Poe.’ She circled ‘12’ and ‘R2’. ‘Their graveyard is set up in rows. Therefore, the middle section of the tattoo refers to grave number twelve on row two.’

Poe nodded. ‘And CL?’

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