The Dead Ground by Claire McGowan

on a tray, slopping over on the floral pattern. Magdalena straightened up. ‘We’ll not need the tea after all, Brendan. Our guests won’t be staying. I can’t see anything for wee Alek, not yet. Let’s pray the Virgin comes to me soon.’
    Gerard gave a quizzical look at Paula, who was still shaking, dragging herself to her feet. He said, ‘OK. Thanks for your time, Mrs Croft.’
    Paula stopped at the door. Her voice was trembling as much as her hands. ‘Alison Bates. Does that name mean anything to you?’
    The woman’s face was blank as water. ‘I think everyone knows who Dr Bates is. Everyone who follows God’s way, that is.’
    ‘What does that mean?’
    ‘It means she’s evil. That woman kills children. The people of Ballyterrin don’t want her living among them, spreading her sin.’
    ‘Have you ever met her? Have you seen her recently?’
    ‘How would I ever meet a person like that?’ Magdalena Croft stood there, her face placid and unreadable.
    Gerard caught Paula’s arm. ‘Come on, Maguire, let’s go. Thanks again, ma’am.’
    ‘You OK?’ Gerard looked at her curiously as he started the Jeep, wipers clearing a new fall of snow from the windscreen. A new car had arrived in the car park, inside it a young couple who seemed to be having a tearful row. More supplicants to Magdalena?
    ‘Yeah. Just cold.’
    Gerard fiddled with the heater, letting stale hot air spew in, and drove out to the road. ‘You reckon there’s anything to it, what she does?’
    ‘Of course not. It’s tricks is all – the same as what fortune tellers do.’ That’s all it was. It was easy to see a pregnancy, wasn’t it, if you knew what to look for? Tess Brooking, Guy’s wife, had guessed it nearly a month ago, with her midwifery expertise.
    ‘I’d an aunt went to Croft once,’ Gerard was saying. ‘Auntie Louise. She was desperate for a wean – ten years married and nothing. This Magdalena gave her some kind of powder to put on her tongue. From the Virgin Mary, she said. Load of crap.’
    ‘And did she get pregnant?’
    ‘Oh. Well, she did, actually. But you hear that a lot, don’t you, when people believe it can happen.’
    ‘Yeah. It’s bollocks. She’s just a fraudster, like Guy – Inspector Brooking says.’
    Gerard glanced at her again. ‘Why’d you ask that about Dr Bates? I thought we hadn’t put out yet that she’d gone missing.’
    ‘No. I know. But I remembered Croft mentioned her once, at one of her rallies or whatever they are. It was on YouTube. She basically denounced the doctor, said she was going to Hell.’
    ‘So did a lot of people, though. She was hardly flavour of the month in town.’
    ‘I know. Let’s just go, OK?’ Whether it was the cold or what had happened, Paula didn’t stop shaking all the way back to Ballyterrin.
    When they arrived at the unit, it was clear something was different – that familiar tang in the air, activity and fear.
    She still had her coat on when Guy came out of the office. He wore a black sweater over his shirt and tie. ‘Well?’
    He was holding his phone.
    ‘That was Corry. We’re going to the town centre.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘After you left, Magdalena Croft went into a trance. She’s told them exactly where to find Alek.’
    ‘And was she right?’
    ‘That’s what we’re going to see.’

Chapter Nine
    Ballyterrin was full of churches. Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian – there was one on nearly every street, and the largest was the cathedral, a gloomy Gothic structure in the heart of town, among the charity shops and discount stores that passed for a retail hub in these post-recession times. By the time they reached it, it was snowing so hard the building was nothing but a shadowy bulk.
    ‘You stay here,’ said Guy, pulling on his coat.
    ‘But—’
    ‘I mean it, Paula. Tactical Support are still in. It could be dangerous. I’ll send for you.’ And he was gone, wrenching the door open in the gale, so the breath of snow blew her