A Room Full of Bones: A Ruth Galloway Investigation

this sort of thing has happened before. Judy feels that she would give a lot to know what Romilly Smith had been doing at one a.m.
    Judy makes her report, skating over certain aspects such as her lack of judgment in going to the yard on her own in the first place. She does, though, give Clough full credit for rescuing her. Whitcliffe keeps trying to send Clough home to rest but he insists on hanging around, limping like Long John Silver and eating a vast McDonald’s breakfast. ‘Could be a commendation in this,’ Whitcliffe tells him. Clough grins at Judy, wiping ketchup from his chin. Typical. She cracks the case and Clough gets all the glory.
    Forensics teams are currently swarming all over Slaughter Hill Stables and have unearthed enough drugs ‘to float the QE2’, though why an ocean liner would want to float on pure Colombian cocaine is a mystery to Judy. The Drugs Squad thinks that the cocaine came via Dubai. Presumably, whenever a batch of horses was flown over from the Middle East, one or two were carrying the drugs inside them. She wonders how many of the stable ladswere involved. She remembers Billy’s anxious squint, the studied nonchalance of the jockeys. Quite a few of them would have had to be in on it, given the regularity with which the ‘mules’ were collapsing. Judy believes, though, that Randolph and Caroline were completely in the dark. Randolph might have a recreational drugs habit but Tamsin was the professional. Nelson told her about the mysterious ‘lady’ that the Vicar was meeting at the museum. Was that Tamsin? The museum, deserted and almost invisible in its colourless back street, might have been the scene for many such meetings. Neil Topham, another man with an expensive habit, was probably in on it too. And Danforth Smith, the man who apparently loved and understood his horses. Had he known?
    Tanya Fuller has interviewed Randolph and has texted Judy to say ‘phwoar’. Very well put, thinks Judy, remembering Randolph in his white shirt, riding off into the night. The Highwayman.
He’d a French cocked hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin
. She would fancy him herself if she had the energy.
    At half-past nine, Judy has finally finished writing reports and is just tidying Nelson’s office when Clough puts his head round the door. He’s still chewing, she notices.
    ‘I’ve just heard from Michelle. The boss is on the mend.’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Yeah. He regained consciousness at about three this morning, apparently. The docs think he’s going to be OK.’
    Three in the morning, thinks Judy. Half an hour after Randolph agreed to return the skulls to their ancestors. Not that she believes in any of that rubbish.
    ‘Are you going home now?’ she asks.
    ‘Think so. I need my beauty sleep.’
    Judy does not make the obvious retort. Nor does she mention that Clough is now limping with the wrong leg. She owes Clough; she’s going to have to be nice to him for about a year. It’ll be tough, though.
    She is just putting the Operation Octopus files in the Case Closed cupboard when her phone rings. Cathbad. She has been expecting this call, she realises, all night. She suddenly feels desperately tired, as if she could lie down on the dirty carpet tiles and sleep for a week.
    ‘Hallo Cathbad.’
    ‘Hallo Judy.’
    ‘Have you heard about Nelson?’
    ‘No. What?’
    ‘He’s regained consciousness. They think he’s going to be all right.’
    ‘I’m glad.’ Cathbad doesn’t sound surprised, she notices. But then he doesn’t really do surprise.
    ‘Where are you?’ she asks.
    Cathbad laughs. ‘I’m at Ruth’s. It’s a long story.’
    Isn’t everything, thinks Judy, straightening the pens on Nelson’s blotter.
    ‘Can I see you later?’ asks Cathbad. ‘I’ve got a lot to tell you.’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ says Judy. ‘There isn’t going to be any later.’
    Ruth approaches the bed. Nelson lies with his eyes shut, his chin dark with stubble. He has surprisingly long eyelashes, thinks Ruth, as she has thought before. A wireextends from a clip on his finger and a nurse is fiddling with a blood pressure cuff. She looks up.
    ‘I’m afraid you can’t bring the baby in here.’
    ‘Just for a minute,’ pleads Ruth. ‘She’s his daughter.’
    The nurse looks at her sceptically, obviously remembering Michelle, and Nelson’s other, older, daughters. At that moment, Nelson opens his eyes.
    ‘Hi Ruth.’
    ‘Hi Nelson.’
    ‘Is that Katie?’
    Ruth holds