A story looking back on Who Killed Harry Field?
I thought it would be fun to try a different viewpoint for this one...it turned out to be a lot harder than I expected to fill in the thoughts behind Morse's actions and words. I might have scrapped the whole idea if not for that wonderful "I'm sorry to tell you, Lewis…" moment that I've itched to get my hands on for years now. I hope I've done it justice.
Disclaimer: This is solely for fan purposes. No copyright infringement intended.
What the Chief Inspector Saw: The Harry Field Case
Based on Who Killed Harry Field by Geoffrey Case.
Chapter One
After the preceding grey, rainy days and long, restless nights, Chief Inspector Morse's thoughts were bleak and downhearted; he was far from viewing this new case as an exciting puzzle waiting to be solved. The day had dawned bright and clear, but the body lying in the middle of the shady woods ruined whatever enjoyment he might have eked out of being out of doors in a beautiful and rustic setting.
To make matters worse, his sergeant was nowhere to be seen. Had been nowhere to be seen all weekend. Off on some frivolous family holiday spent in Yorkshire of all places. If a man must seek time away from his useful and usual place, surely he should make off to somewhere…well, somewhere that would nourish his soul, feed his spirit—Verona, perhaps, or Rome. But Yorkshire? His sergeant had deserted him for Yorkshire. What could there possibly be in Yorkshire that warranted Lewis leaving him to the luck of the draw and the mercies of the duty sergeant? If there had been a case over the long, unending weekend he'd just survived who knew what green, uncouth, and untrained sergeant or, God forbid, constable he would have been stuck with while Lewis ran around shooting blurry snaps of green dales and wooly sheep? And, knowing Lewis, the odd pig.
Morse sniffed unhappily and, in spite of himself, leaned down to examine the dead man's hands. A nice, satisfying murder to solve was often just the ticket for Morse; but that didn't mean he wanted to have to examine the body at its core. Nothing like. This one (fiftyish male, long and lean, longish hair) wasn't the worst he'd ever had to see. No visible wounds or blood. But, still, very much dead. A body robbed of its life. A vivid reminder that death came for all. A sight he had no wish to dwell on, but as his sergeant wasn't about to note the details, one he was forced to, like it or not. One with something dirty under—
"Good morning, Sir," Lewis' familiar voice said from above him. Morse looked up to see his sergeant looking down from the old, stone bridge sheltering the body.
"Relaxing weekend, Lewis?" the chief inspector queried. Not that he much cared if Lewis had enjoyed his weekend; not knowing how his sergeant's desertion had ruined his own.
It took Lewis a moment to answer a surprised and somewhat tentative, "Yes, thanks, Sir."
That only figured. There had been Lewis and the family enjoying themselves in the dales, while Morse had been stuck in rainy Oxford dreading a call out without a reliable sergeant to back him up. There probably hadn't even been a drop of rain or a cloud in the sky to darken their weekend. "Just as well," Morse murmured, turning back to the dead man and his dirty fingernails.
For some reason that at first mystified Morse, Lewis' first words to him when he'd made his way down the roughhewn stairs from up above was to ask, "Tired, Sir?" Ah, but, then, Lewis had been up above with Constable…oh, with the constable who'd spoken even poorer grammar than his sergeant and who had drawn Morse's reprimand on another matter or two as well in the short time since the chief inspector's arrival on scene. The man had doubtlessly complained to Lewis about his perceived ill-treatment. His sort always did.
"Yes," Morse said quietly. "I am tired."
"And why's that?" Lewis asked as though he'd never had a sleepless night or two himself. And quite possibly the man hadn't…not the sort Morse himself had endured at any rate. Lewis was fond of saying he slept like a log; sleepless nights on his part had more to do with colicky babies or self-imposed overtime than restless hours of tossing and turning or sitting and brooding.
"Lack of sleep," Morse answered shortly. Insinuate as much as he liked, the sergeant was wrong in assuming Morse was simply in a foul mood from lack of sleep and hence the complaints from Constable…what's his name.
"Have you tried pills?" Lewis asked like a man who truly did sleep like a log and had never been forced to explore the deplorable aids for sleep out there for those who spent their nights tossing and turning.
"No." Morse said. It was high time his sergeant got to work. He pointed vaguely toward the body while avoiding having to have another look himself. "There's a lot of um...earth or something under his fingernails..."
Lewis, who as always wasn't bothered by getting close and personal with a corpse, leaned over the dead man with interest. "A farmer or gardener?" he mused before noting, "Big strong hands." Morse wondered what his sergeant thought the relevance of their murder victim's hand size had to do with his having been murdered. Really. He'd spent the weekend dreading a call without Lewis at his side for this?
Morse had had enough. As he headed back to his car, he informed Lewis, "No identification. Fourteen pounds in his pocket...it's almost as if he just popped out for a minute."
"Yeah," Lewis said, "in the middle of nowhere."
"Quite." Climbing the stairs back up to the road, Morse continued filling Lewis in, "He's been dead for a few days."
"Well, he certainly hadn't 'popped' here on Friday," Lewis noted. "There was a woman here walking her dog right past." Well, then, the constable must have dug her up between his report to Morse himself and the arrival of his AWOL sergeant.
"And," Morse said, "he certainly wasn't here on Saturday or Sunday."
"How do you know?" Lewis asked as though Morse were a psychic.
"If you hadn't been to sunny Yorkshire for the weekend, you'd know," Morse said pointedly. "It poured with rain here. The body is dry. It's been kept somewhere."
By then, they'd topped the slope and headed towards Morse's Jag parked along the edge of the bridge. A red X marking the spot above the crumpled body of their murder victim.
"I was wondering, Sir, any chance of a chat at some point?" Lewis asked him.
Still disgruntled at the thought of his wet and gloomy weekend while Lewis had been gallivanting in the sun, Morse had to ask, "Who with?"
"Um…you and me," his sergeant said, and there was something hesitant in his voice that made Morse narrow his eyes.
"I suppose so," Morse allowed before asking, "What about?"
He hadn't quite demanded an answer but come close to it, nevertheless his sergeant failed to satisfy him with a useful reply. Instead he fumbled out, "Oh, well, when we've got a bit more time." Morse frowned over the car at Lewis, but Lewis climbed in as though he didn't notice.
And what was that all about? The chief inspector wasn't sure he wanted to know. It had poured all weekend in Oxford, a not infrequent happening. His sergeant was the capable sort. Trustworthy, loyal, hardworking. They could use men like him all over the country. Even in sunny Yorkshire…but, no. Lewis' chat was bound to be something else…the constable's complaints perhaps. Though Lewis had never seemed to have any particular trouble in dealing with such things among the junior officers before. Still, something of no more import than that would be the topic of their little chat. Surely.