‘Mr Danes!’ Lester Beeson said. ‘What can I get you?’

‘A Diet Coke, please.’

‘Ice and lemon?’

‘Thanks. Could I also have a lunch menu?’

‘The restaurant’s not open today but we have the bar snacks menu available.’

‘Perfect.’

Fears was still glaring at him. He gave the farmer a smile but got no reaction.

When Beeson set his drink down on the counter, Jason said to him, ‘I’ve a couple of photographs of people, I wonder if you might know – or have known – them?’

‘Let’s have a butchers.’

Jason showed him the image of Roland Fortinbrass that he’d taken off the website.

The landlord clearly recognized him instantly. ‘That’s our late vicar, God bless his soul.’

‘Roland Fortinbrass?’

‘Yes.’

‘He died in 2015?’

Beeson thought for a second.

The expression on Albert Fears’ face changed suddenly from hostile to uncomfortable, and the farmer and the landlord exchanged an odd glance.

‘That would be right,’ Beeson said. ‘2015.’

‘He wasn’t very old – how did the Reverend Fortinbrass die?’

‘Yes, well.’ Again, the farmer and landlord’s eyes met. ‘A very unfortunate accident.’

‘I killed him,’ Fears said, suddenly, with no trace of remorse in his voice, just bitterness. ‘And the poor sod with him. Bloody fool turned right across me path in me tractor. I didn’t have a chance to touch the brake pedal. Hit him side on, crushed him. Yeah. A man of the cloth and all.’ He sipped his pint.

There was a brief silence before Fears went on. ‘What hope does that give the rest of us, when God can’t even look after his own, eh?’ His mouth twitched, as if nervously seeking some solidarity, or even sympathy from the two men.

Although shocked by the admission, an irreverent quote popped into Jason’s mind. He saw an opportunity to break the ice with the old man. ‘Well, wasn’t it H. G. Wells who said, I never drive a motor car in France, because the temptation to run over a priest would be too great.’

‘Don’t know no Wells bloke,’ Fears said.

Beeson smiled uneasily, and said to Jason, ‘The other?’

He flicked to the photograph he had done of his pencil sketch of the woman, and held it up. ‘This. Do you have any idea who she might be?’

The landlord took the phone, expanded the image with his huge fingers and studied the face of the woman with short, dark hair. ‘Do you have any actual photos of her?’ he asked.

‘No.’

He frowned. ‘Looks familiar but I can’t place her. She from this area?’

‘I don’t know.’

He stuck the camera in front of Fears’ face. ‘Know this lady, Albert?’

‘No, but I’d like to. Heh!’ He fleetingly gave a lecherous leer before becoming surly again. ‘Hear you’ve had another accident up your place – yesterday?’

‘Another?’ Jason queried.

‘Someone killed, I heard.’ He made a cut-throat sign with his hand. ‘Head clean off.’

Beeson nodded, clearly aware of the news.

‘I saw it,’ Jason said. ‘I saw it happen.’