Robin scented opportunity. Only once before, on the night little Bo had gone missing from the children’s dormitory, had the rigid group structure at the farm dissolved. If everyone was going their separate ways, spreading out over the church grounds, she might be able to accomplish something. Taking a quick survey of the hall, she spotted Becca approaching the table where Emily was sitting and issuing instructions. Robin was certain the group had been told to stick together during the search.
Will Edensor, by contrast, was already leaving the hall, alone. Grabbing her porridge bowl, Robin hastened to put it on one of the trolleys before following.
It was warm, but a light summer drizzle was falling. Will was heading for the courtyard, his head bowed as he scanned the ground. Pretending to look for the lost pendant herself, Robin proceeded slowly past the barns and laundry, keeping a covert eye on Will, who soon reached the courtyard and started searching it. Robin was peering around the base of the Healer Prophet’s tomb, the rain sliding down the back of her neck, when a loud voice said:
‘Oi’ve already looked thar.’
‘Hi Shawna,’ said Robin, her heart sinking.
‘Will!’ called Shawna, whose pregnancy was now becoming evident, ‘Oi’ve looked thar, too!’
Will gave no answer, but turned and traipsed off in the direction of the farmhouse. To Robin’s disappointment, two other men joined him, and Robin guessed by their gestures they were suggesting a systematic joint search of the garden behind it.
‘I heard someone saying it might have fallen off in the children’s classroom,’ Robin lied to Shawna, determined to throw the girl off if she could. ‘Apparently Mazu was in there a couple of days ago.’
‘Come on, then,’ said Shawna.
‘I can’t,’ said Robin regretfully. ‘They told me to do the kitchen after the courtyard, but I can’t see why it would be there. I bet whoever finds it’s going to be a bit of a hero.’
‘Ah,’ said Shawna. ‘They will. Oi’m gonna do the clarsrooms.’
She bustled off. Immediately Shawna was out of sight, Robin headed, not for the laundry but for the passage between the men’s and women’s dormitories, eyes on the ground, still pretending to be looking for the fallen fish. She knew she’d be taking a risk in crossing the field by daylight to enter the woods, but as Emily and Will were currently beyond reach, she was determined to fulfil one of her objectives.
Robin kept to the edge of the field rather than taking a straight line across it, glancing back frequently and wishing she could be wearing any other colour than white, which would stand out against the hedgerow should anyone look over the gate. At last she reached the sanctuary of the trees and began her search for any trunk that seemed old enough to contain the hollow and hatchet described by Niamh Doherty.
It was strange to be in the woods by daylight, and even stranger not to be taking her usual route to the plastic rock. The woods were overgrown, untended and perhaps even dangerous for the children who played there, given the number of fallen boughs. Ducking under hanging branches, lifting her feet high over roots and nettles, feeling around trunks to check for hollows, Robin knew she’d be exceptionally lucky to find the right tree in the time she could remain there safely.
The light rain pitter-pattered on the leaves as Robin moved past a thick oak whose trunk was disappointingly solid. She soon found herself on the edge of the small clearing she’d entered once before by night, where a circle of thick posts had been driven into the ground. These had mostly rotted away to stumps, though a couple showed evidence of having been hacked at with an axe.
Robin stepped carefully into the ring, once again noting its ritualistic appearance. The ground underfoot was uneven and slippery with rotting leaves. Somebody had definitely cut down the posts, and now Robin asked herself whether this was the reason a hatchet had been taken to the woods: to try and destroy the ring. Possibly the axe had then been hidden because of the difficulty of smuggling it back up to the main farm? Better, surely, to let suspicion of theft hang over everyone, than be caught with it?
She bent down to examine something black she thought might be a lump of coal, but it wasn’t; after a few seconds, Robin decided it was a knot of charred rope. Instead of picking it up, she took a tiny pebble from the ground, which would serve as today’s marker, and was just slipping it into her bra when the unmistakeable crack of a twig breaking under a human foot made her whirl round. Jiang was standing between two trees on the edge of the clearing.
‘Jiang,’ said Robin, forcing herself to laugh, though sweat had broken out on her neck and chest, ‘you really made me jump.’
‘What’re you doing?’ he asked suspiciously.
‘Looking for Mazu’s pendant,’ said Robin. At least she’d been found bending over, staring at the ground.
