The Kill Call

passed for fun in these parts. Well, as much fun as you could have in the rain.
    A lone rider cantered down the road, a woman in a red coat who dug her knees into her horse’s flanks to turn it as she approached them. The mare trotted over the last few yards of wet grass, hooves thumping on the soft ground, steam spurting from its nostrils.
    The rider’s boots and jodhpurs were splattered with mud and her face was red from exertion and the cold air.
    ‘What’s the problem, Inspector?’
    ‘This is Detective Sergeant Fry,’ said Redfearn. ‘She’s investigating a suspicious death in this area.’
    ‘I saw the activity across the way. Thought your people had just got lost.’
    ‘This is Mrs Forbes,’ Redfearn told Fry. ‘Joint master of the Eden Valley Hunt.’
    Fry didn’t think she’d ever been quite so near to a horse before. She knew absolutely nothing about them, except that they bit at one end and kicked at the other.

    She explained to Mrs Forbes what she wanted. As she spoke, the rider looked down at her with an expression she’d seen on the faces of the hunt supporters when the saboteurs got too close. An unmistakable hint of contempt, probably just the instinct of the mounted person looking down from a great height on the lowly pedestrian.
    ‘You think any of our members might know something about this?’ said Mrs Forbes. ‘What nonsense.’
    ‘If we could just speak to the people –’
    ‘I can’t allow you to speak to anyone. It’s just some mad story made up by those antis.’
    Fry could feel the horse’s breath blowing from its nostrils in warm jets. She suspected that the animal regarded him with much more benevolence than its owner did.
    ‘One way or another, I’ll speak to your huntsman, and anyone else who was in this area at around eight thirty this morning,’ said Fry. ‘If you prefer, we can stop the hunt altogether while we do that.’
    Beside her, Redfearn cleared his throat nervously, but said nothing. Mrs Forbes stared from one to the other, her hands gripping the reins tightly, as if it was her horse that was on the verge of getting out of control, rather than her own reactions.
    ‘Do what you like,’ she said finally. ‘Who is this person who got himself killed?’
    ‘We don’t know yet.’
    Mrs Forbes snorted, and pulled at her reins. ‘I’ll give Widdowson instructions.’
    Fry watched her go, the mare’s tail flicking from side to side as if bothered by invisible flies.
    ‘Widdowson?’ she said.
    ‘The huntsman,’ said Redfearn.
    The inspector’s radio crackled, and he listened for a moment.
    ‘This body of yours, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘Did I understand that he died some time this morning?’

    ‘About eight thirty. Why?’
    ‘Funny thing, that’s all. One of my officers is reporting that some of the sabs got a bit over-excited. They said they heard three long, wavering notes on a hunting horn. It sounded to them like the signal that calls in the hounds to kill the fox, or the terrier men to dig him out. That got them all worked up. But it was too early, the hunt hadn’t even moved off. So I think they must have been mistaken.’
    Fry had lost interest, but tried to appear polite. ‘Well, thank you for your co-operation, Inspector.’
    Redfearn looked offended. ‘Well, I just thought you should know. In case it was relevant that some of the sabs say they heard the kill call.’
    Fry turned back. ‘The what?’
    ‘That’s the name of it,’ said the inspector. ‘Three long, wavering notes. It’s known as the kill call.’

5
     
     
    A few minutes later, Diane Fry was sitting in her car and fuming. She had gone barely a few yards out of the gateway before she met the entire hunt coming back from the direction of Birchlow. Horses, dogs, people in Land Rovers and vans, others trailing behind on foot. It was a complete carnival.
    Traffic was brought to a halt at a crossroads on the A623 while the hunt went by. As the horses passed, the sudden clattering of hooves on tarmac was uncomfortably loud inside the Peugeot. For a few minutes it completely drowned out the mutter of her idling engine and even the efforts of Annie Lennox, who was hurling Songs of Mass Destruction at her from the CD player. As the hunt pressed around the car, a powerful whiff of sweating horse crept in through the driver’s window, followed by a rich aroma of saddles, cotton jodhpurs and manure.
    Many of the mounted hunt supporters seemed to be young girls, wearing