That night, as soon as it was dark, a strong police force rounded up the six leading Volunteers in Ballybor, and took them out to Moran’s house in two Crossleys, arriving as the full moon was showing over the top of the mountains.
At the first knock on the door Moran came out, his face contracted with fear, which turned to relief on seeing the uniforms of the police; but when he saw the six Volunteers he nearly collapsed. Blake now ordered Moran to lead them to the cemetery, and so great was the man’s terror that he started off across the bog without a word.
After walking over a mile in the moonlight, they came to a low ridge of limestone mounds running through the bog and parallel to the mountains. Here in a hollow was the old graveyard, which looked like a disused sheep-pen, such as the country people use for the rounding-up of mountain sheep when the different owners pick out their own sheep and lambs to brand them. The cemetery was surrounded by a stone wall, broken down in many places, and inside was a tangled mass of elder and thorn bushes.
After posting sentries round the graveyard, Blake made Moran point out the latest grave, and after the trembling man had shown them a mound between two bushes, he ordered two of the Volunteers to start opening the grave with spades brought by the police. Presently one of the spades met something in a sack, and on opening the sack they found the body of a short dark man—obviously a peasant—whereas Drake had been a tall fair man. On examination they found wounds in the body and left leg.
For a moment Blake was quite nonplussed—he had been so sure that the body would be Drake’s. He was certain that the station-master had spoken the truth, and there seemed no reason to doubt Moran’s evidence, though why he should be in such a state of terror was not plain. Further, it was now five days since Drake was supposed to have been murdered, and the body they had just dug up had obviously been in the ground two days at the most, probably only one.
A careful examination of the cemetery showed that there was no other recent grave.
Blake’s thoughts were interrupted by one of the Volunteers, a man called Brogan, asking with his tongue in his cheek and an impudent sneer: “Is yer honour satisfied now, and will we be after burying this poor fellow decently agin?”
Taking no notice of Brogan’s question, Blake told a sergeant to make the Volunteers carry the dead man to the Crossleys, and to wait for him there. After they had gone he made Moran go down on his knees and swear on his oath that the body they had dug up was the man who had been executed on the previous Monday; but Moran could only swear that he had been so frightened at the time that he had not taken any notice of the prisoner, but that to the best of his belief the body was the one he had buried. Moran then broke down, and had to be half-carried, half-led to his cottage, where they left him, and returned to Ballybor with the Volunteers and the corpse for a military investigation.
The failure to find Drake’s body in the bog cemetery forced Blake to follow up the other rumours regarding his sudden disappearance, but every rumour and clue failed them, and it looked as though Drake’s fate was to be added to the long list of unsolved Irish crimes.
Two days after the police had visited the cemetery, Blake received information that arms for a police ambush had been brought into Murrisk townland, and also that poteen was being freely made and drunk there.