‘Well, thank you – maybe an espresso would be nice, thank you.’

Beeson shouted the order out, loudly, to someone in a back room, then turned to Jason. ‘You know, country folk can be very superstitious. They can’t look at a coincidence without calling it a curse. All communities get their share of tragedies – they get twenty old folk dead in a coach crash on what should have been a jolly outing, or an entire village church choir wiped out in a minibus. That doesn’t make the place cursed, it’s just terrible luck and dreadfully sad. You need to maintain perspective. The village of Cold Hill dates back centuries, and the old mansion, Cold Hill House, was a very grand place, owning most of this village, and had a lot of land – over five thousand acres, once. Everyone in the village in former times worked for the estate. I’ll bet that if you took all the recent deaths here and up at the old house, plus all the historical ones, and then divided them up evenly over the past centuries, you’d end up close to the national average, maybe even below it.’

Jason stared hard at him. ‘Did you say church choir?’

‘Yes, sadly.’

‘Do you mean the church choir from this village was in a minibus accident?’

‘Yes. It was terrible. There were twelve of them, all from the village and around here, the youngest was eight. They’d been invited to sing in a festival of church choirs at Canterbury Cathedral. Reverend Fortinbrass was driving them in a rented vehicle and they broke down on the motorway on the way back, in pelting rain. He left them all in the minibus on the hard shoulder of the M25, to stay dry, and went off to find the SOS rescue phone. When he came back, there was nothing left of the bus – it was like matchsticks, I’m told. A lorry driver fell asleep at the wheel and veered off the road, hitting it at 60 mph. Dreadful.’

‘How long ago was that?’

‘Eight years – be nine, next March.’

‘Bizarre in a way,’ Jason said, ‘that he kind of escaped death by going to phone for help, only to be killed in a road accident some years later.’

‘Yes, you could say bizarre. But he was never right after that tragedy. He always blamed himself – and struggled with his faith. He was pleasant outwardly – but –’ Beeson fell silent for a moment – ‘inwardly, he was broken. From that night it happened, onwards, he was like a dead man walking. That choir had been his passion, he lived for it.’

48

Tuesday 18 December

Jason drank his coffee hastily, making small talk with Beeson. His mind was in turmoil, and he paid his bill and walked swiftly back out to his car. As soon as he was inside, he dialled Emily’s mobile, but it went straight to voicemail. He tried Louise’s number. She answered after a couple of rings.