The Hanging Wood

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‘I must talk to Hannah Scarlett, it’s a matter of life and death.’

Orla shaded her eyes from the July sun. Her right hand trembled so much that she dropped her mobile into the shallow ditch and had to reach down to fish it out. In front of her stood the hedge marking the boundary of her father’s farm.

‘Life and death,’ she hissed into the phone.

‘May I have your name?’

‘Orla … Orla Payne.’

A long, long pause. ‘You spoke to DCI Scarlett yesterday afternoon?’

The detective constable sounded young and sceptical. Orla pictured her, pursing her lips, searching for a politically correct way to say get lost. A gatekeeper, tasked with making sure her boss wasn’t disturbed. She’d written Orla off as a drunken time-waster, just because her voice was too loud and she’d slurred her own name. So what if she’d downed a few cans? This was supposed to be a free country, it wasn’t against the law to drown your sorrows.

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