THE HOUSE AT SEA’S END

we can do about it.’ He grins happily as he says this.
    Ruth walks towards the cliffs. She can see there has beena recent rock fall, rubble and stone have spilled out onto the beach and the cliff face is streaked black and grey.
    ‘Round here,’ says Ted.
    In the furthest, most inaccessible corner of the beach, there is a gap in the cliff, a narrow cleft running from the coarse grass at the top to the beach below. This has been partly filled with rubble from the cliff fall but Ruth can see where some of the debris has been cleared away. She approaches carefully. ‘Look first,’ her mentor, Erik Anderssen, used to say. ‘Look, then plot, then dig. You will never get that first look again.’ She takes pictures of the cliffs and the rock fall and draws a map in her notebook. Then with Ted’s help she clears away some of the bigger stones. In the narrow space between the two cliff walls, the sand has been worn away, exposing something that looks at first like more stone, smooth and white.
    Bones.
    Ruth leans forward. She can see at once that there must be several bodies buried here. The bones are piled on top of each other but she can make out at least three thigh bones. Long, sturdy bones, which means the bodies may well be male. There is also a faint smell of rotten eggs. For a moment Ruth feels dizzy, remembering other mass graves, bones white in the sun. She takes a deep breath. She must plot this find, mark where the bodies are lying. ‘Sometimes,’ Erik used to say, ‘the most important thing is the direction.’
    ‘What do you think?’ comes Ted’s voice.
    ‘There are several bodies here,’ says Ruth. ‘We need to tell the coroner.’
    ‘Do you think they’re recent then?’ asks Ted.
    ‘There’s a good chance they’re recent.’
    Ruth thinks that she has seen hair and teeth – signs that the bodies could be fairly modern but, then again, only the year before last she found a perfectly preserved body buried in a peat bog, that turned out to be over two thousand years old. But peat is alkaline, which preserves bone; sand is acidic. Digging on sandy sites, you are unlikely to find human remains because the bones have been eaten away. If these bones, buried in sandy soil, are still in relatively good condition, they may well be modern.
    ‘Dave said he’d tell the coroner on Monday,’ says Trace in an off-hand voice.
    Ruth looks at her curiously. So it’s true that Trace is dating Dave Clough. Rather her than me, she thinks.
    ‘We should do it today,’ she argues.
    ‘Isn’t the boss man back on Monday?’ says Ted. ‘Maybe they’re waiting for him.’
    ‘He’ll be jet-lagged,’ says Trace. ‘Probably won’t be in until Tuesday.’
    ‘He’s only in Lanzarote,’ says Ruth.
    There is a short silence.
    Ruth steps over the wall of rubble. The gap between the cliffs is only about a metre wide, getting narrower as it goes back. It is much colder here and the air smells dank. Ruth shivers, and not entirely from the cold. Who would bury bodies here, in this inaccessible spot? She is willing to bet that it wasn’t for any good reason. She has her excavation kit with her but she doesn’t want to do any digging yet. Just look, says the voice in her head. If Trace is right aboutthe tides, when they clear away the rocks this grave site will be destroyed altogether. All the more reason to make proper notes now. The bodies are lying north to south. She thinks that they are in correct anatomical position, stretched out, back-to-back. Taking her trowel, she scrapes away a little of the sand. There are definitely two bodies below, maybe more.
    ‘How many there?’ asks Ted, peering in.
    ‘Not sure. At least four.’
    ‘Four dead bodies, buried fairly recently,’ says Ted. ‘You’d think somebody would have noticed.’
    ‘Yes,’ says Ruth. She has seen something else, though she doesn’t want to mention it just yet. The bodies are bound, their hands tied behind their backs.
    They can’t get a signal from the beach so Ruth, Ted and Trace climb the slope by Sea’s End House. Ruth is out of breath by the time they have reached the top. She has got her figure back after having the baby, which is a shame – she was rather hoping to get someone else’s. Pre-pregnancy Ruth weighed twelve and a half stone, now she is almost thirteen. On the whole this doesn’t bother her. She always wears loose dark clothing and doesn’t look in mirrors much. What she doesn’t like, though, is feeling