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‘What?’ said Abigail, half-laughing.
‘I know,’ said Strike, ‘but he seemed to attach significance to this. I wondered whether she went missing at any point, prior to her death.’
‘Not that I remember… but I wouldn’t’ve put it past ’er to claim she could be invisible. Make ’erself out t’be magic, like ’er muvver.’
‘OK, this next question’s also odd, but I wanted to ask you about pigs.’
‘Pigs?’
‘Yeah,’ said Strike. ‘It might mean nothing, but they keep cropping up.’
‘’Ow?’
‘Sheila Kennett says Paul Draper got beaten for letting some escape, and Jordan Reaney’s wife says he used to have nightmares about pigs.’
‘’Oo’s Jordan Reaney?’
‘You can’t remember him?’
‘I… oh, maybe,’ she said slowly. ‘Was ’e the tall one who overslept, who should’ve been on the truck?’
‘What truck?’
‘If ’e’s the one I’m thinkin’ of, he should’ve been with Cheryl – Cherie – on the vegetable run, the morning Daiyu drowned. If ’e’d gone, there wouldn’ of been room for Daiyu. It was a small flatbed truck. On’y room for two up front.’
‘I don’t know whether he was supposed to be on the vegetable run,’ said Strike, ‘but according to Pirbright, Reaney was forced to whip himself across the face with a leather flail by Mazu, for some unspecified crime she seemed to think merited the police.’
‘I toldja, that sorta fing ’appened all the time. An’ why’s Reaney’s wife talkin’ for ’im? Is ’e dead?’
‘No, in jail for armed robbery.’
‘Waste of a gun,’ muttered Abigail. ‘’E knows where Mazu is.’
‘Kevin Pirbright also wrote the word “pigs” on his bedroom wall.’
‘Sure ’e wasn’ talkin’ abou’ the police?’
‘He might’ve been, but “pigs” might also have been a reminder to himself, about something he wanted to include in his book.’
Abigail looked down at her empty glass.
‘Another one?’ suggested Strike.
‘Tryna get me drunk?’
‘Repaying you for giving me your time.’
‘Charmer. Yeah, fanks,’ she said.
When Strike returned with her fourth drink, Abigail took a gulp, then sat in silence for nearly a minute. Strike, who suspected she wanted to talk more than perhaps she realised, waited.
‘All righ’,’ she said suddenly, ‘’ere it is: if you wanna know the troof. If people ’oo were at Chapman Farm in the nineties are ’aving nightmares about pigs, it won’ be because fuckin’ farm animals got out.’
‘Why, then?’
‘“The pig acts in the abysmal.”’
‘Sorry?’
