Craddock (19 page)

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Authors: Paul Finch,Neil Jackson

BOOK: Craddock
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Difficult, terrifying times. Always hungry, always tired, always either too hot or too cold. If captured, you could expect horrific torture. If wounded, you relied solely on the strength of your few comrades. Oddly though, as he sat there, swathed in snug material, Craddock now saw those past events differently. The ice-gashed corries of the Kashmir highlands became the sodden reed-beds of the English fens; lowering boulder-strewn glens became rippling meres and noisome lagoons. The shrieks of death were the same, of course – that never changed. The screams of defiant anger from those determined to cast off foreign hegemony were much the same as they’d always been. The clangour of blade on blade, the gutty
chunk
of steel shearing flesh rarely altered.
But other things had.
Brazen canon-balls no longer tore the air. Instead, earthenware pots filled with burning oil flew spinning from the scoops of catapults. Replacing the whine and
ptchung
of musket-ball was the whistle of the gray-goose shaft, and the
thwack
as it broke upon mail-clad hide or linden-wood shield. Craddock watched as skiff-loads of men, laden with mail coats, kite-shaped shields and conical iron helms, rowed themselves over the brown, boiling waters. Ahead of them, from beyond a vast bulwark of earth and rocks and upright sharpened logs, a deluge of missiles descended: stones, spears, pellets from slingshots. Many skiffs foundered and sank, those aboard screeching and gurgling as their weighty arms took them to watery graves. He saw flimsy causeways, built from tarred timber and inflated cattle-skins, with phalanxes of knights advancing bravely across them. The clouds of projectiles took a fearful toll here too. Men sank to their knees, blazing head to foot or feathered with arrows. The footing was smashed by boulders, the Normans themselves crushed and broken. With each impact, the tearing of flesh, the sickening crunch of splintered bones – more howls of agony and outrage. The response-artillery now let loose: archery machines and mangonels, great constructs of timber and leather, all sodden with rain or charred by fire.
And above it all the cacophony, the blaring of horns and pounding of drums, the splashing and plunging and deafening belly-roars. And then the reek: the churned mud of the fens, the rotten miasma of the bogs, and of course the roiling stink of guts and blood and open bowels, of sweat and iron and sizzling human fat …
“
Major !” someone hissed. “Major!”
Bleary-eyed, Craddock glanced up. A milky light filled the cathedral, the crack of day filtering through its high, narrow casements. Hendricks stood there. He still wore the cloak he’d huddled under during the night, but now it hung loose. His collar was open, his cheeks gray and sallow.
“
Nothing … nothing happened,” he stammered.
Craddock struggled to stand up. Cramps shot through him. “What time is it?”
“
Nearly seven.”
“
Seven!
God-damn!
”
“
Like I say, nothing happened.”
Craddock knew that he’d slept, but was convinced that had anyone tried to pass him during the night, he’d have woken. He hurried down the steps into the crypt, stopping on the way to grab the lantern. By the wavering flame, the undercroft was as still and undisturbed as before. He strode to the farthest wall, casting his light into the unfinished recess. Again, it showed nothing, just rubble and blackness.
“
You’re right,” he finally said. “No-one’s been down here. And that puzzles me.”
He’d strongly suspected that something would happen during the night. If the intruders were mortal, how would they know not to come here on this particular occasion, and if non-mortal why shouldn’t they come anyway?
“
What now?” Hendricks asked tremulously. He looked pale, sickly. Neither a soldier nor a policeman – probably never anything more than an academic – the stress of the last few days and nights was visibly damaging him.
“
I’m here in the capacity of detective,” Craddock muttered, vexed with himself. “So I suppose I’d better start detecting. But first … breakfast.” He rolled his shoulders. They were stiff and aching. “And a good hot bath. I’m afraid I’ll be leaving you to your own devices today.”
By the looks on Hendricks’s face, he was just glad the night had ended.

 

The
Wake-on-the-Water
was slowly coming to life when Craddock returned to it.
The front door stood open and new flames crackled on a heap of kindling in the hearth. Nobody was around, but he could hear the sound of someone working – stacking crates and bottles in the ante-room behind the bar-counter. He went straight upstairs to change his muddy clothing. The narrow stair was deserted, as was the landing at the top. No sound stirred from beyond the closed doors of the other bedrooms.
The curtains were still drawn inside his room; it was dim and cold. Wearily, he threw his hat and scarf onto the bed, and stripped his gloves and greatcoat off. He yawned and stretched. His cramped muscles cracked; a timely reminder that he wasn’t a dashing young blade any more. He went to the crockery on the dresser, to splash water on his face, but it did little to revive him – he was too tired. He decided he’d lie down for a couple of hours, and get back on the case around mid-morning. It was only as he towelled his face that he caught a flicker of movement in the mirror. His soldier and police instincts combined in quick-fire association:
movement – intruder - danger!
He spun around.
But not quickly enough.
A blunt object smashed across the back of his skull, throwing him forwards over the dresser. It didn’t have the desired effect. On first spotting his assailant, he’d moved – infinitesimally, but enough to avoid the full impact.
His head swam and sparks flashed before his eyes, but he retained consciousness sufficiently to scrabble around for a weapon. His revolver sat in his coat, which was out of reach on the bed. But from the jumble of crockery in front of him, he grabbed the water-jug, flung himself around and swung it in an arc. It connected with the head of a squat, ape-like figure behind him, and shattered, shards shooting everywhere.
The head went sideways as though hinged, the body beneath it buckling. Craddock caught a glimpse of a criminal’s
cosh
– a hunk of wood, wrapped in coarse material – dropping to the carpet. He also saw several other figures behind the one he’d just felled, maybe three or four. Only the handle of the water-jug remained in his grasp, but it was heavy and jagged, and he drove it at the closest target the way a prize-fighter would a slugging punch. The blow was full-on, impacting on the bridge of a nose. There was a mighty
crack
, and it wasn’t the jug-handle. Craddock’s fingers were crushed with the force; it jarred his arm. But the attacker staggered backwards, black blood cascading down the white smudge of his face.
Then the others joined in.
It was no contest. Craddock struck again and again, as cleanly and viciously as he could. But a second cosh smote his temple, and sent reality reeling. A heavy fist hacked into his belly, expelling the wind from his lungs. Another blow landed from a cosh, this one across the back of his neck. He collapsed to his knees. Someone twisted the shattered remnant of water-jug from his hand, and used it against him. It gashed his brow, set the bones in his head ringing. The dim world of his hotel room was blotted out.
The last thing he remembered was lying on his back, gazing up at a gaggle of intruders. Of all their leering faces, only one was familiar: he had an ashen pallor and thick, heavy cheek-bones. An aged scar linked the left corner of his mouth to his left ear; strands of lank red hair dangled from under his greasy bowler. Even as consciousness faded, Craddock remembered the boor on the stagecoach from Norwich.

 

The next few hours passed like a blur.
Craddock was vaguely aware of being bundled down a darkened stair, and out into an open yard. After that, he was on a trolley or cart, being pushed along a pathway. The outlines of burly men surrounded him. They spoke together quietly, but he detected Cockney accents and coarse colloquialisms. His face was slathered with clotting blood, his hair a matted, gluey mess. He passed in and out of consciousness, though the cold morning air was slowly reviving him. He thought there were five ruffians in total. They were of brutish build, and wore brightly-coloured neckerchiefs, which, with the exception of the stagecoach man – who behaved like their leader – they’d drawn up to over their faces. Despite this, two of them bore marks of the major’s resistance; one had a deep, bloody gash across the bridge of his nose, while another’s cheek was black with bruising. These two were particularly hostile to him, glowering down as he was trundled along.
All of them were armed. Coshes and knives were shoved into the tops of boots. One wore a cutlass, while others carried pistols in their belts. The stagecoach man carried a heavy-bore shotgun, which he’d sawn down to half a foot in length.
Craddock saw all this through puffy, bloodshot eyes. When he tried to move, he felt knotted ropes holding him down. The stagecoach man noticed that he’d come back to his senses, and laughed.
“
Nothing like a toff who’s found his proper place in the world, eh?”
In bright daylight, his broad face had a mottled, leathery complexion, as though the dirt and grime in which he’d been raised had become part of his being. From out of this leaden mask, his eyes glittered like chips of tarnished metal.
“
What … what are you about here?” Craddock found the strength to ask.
“
Want to be gagged, cozzer?” The man held up a wad of bloodstained cloth. “Then shut your piggin’ hole!”
Craddock was still groggy, still wrestling with stupour. He tasted blood in the back of his throat; it had probably dribbled there from inside his broken nose.
“
You men realise you’ll to spend the rest of your lives in fetters for this?” he said. “On the treadmill, or the rock-pile.”
There were snorts of laughter as they drove him on. Skerries of gray cloud scudded by overhead. The cart bounced and slid. There was now a smell of salt in the air. The tall lashes of reed-ronds were visible to either side.
“
You’ve assaulted a senior constable,” Craddock added. “Have you any idea what penalty that will bring?”
“
We’re familiar with the law and its penalties, major,” the stagecoach man replied.
“
You know who I am?”
“
I reckon. How couldn’t I, you meddling the way you have?”
“
You mean at the church? You’re the ones who’ve been trespassing at St. Brae’s?”
“
Trespassing?” one of the other men said, laughing “In the house of God? Where’s it written that even the commonest folk can’t go to the house of God?”
“
Enough horseshit!” the stagecoach man said harshly. “We’re here!”
They cantered down a steeply sloped track, loose ground crumbling beneath them, finally coming out onto a swathe of river-debris; sand, mud, bleached pebbles. Craddock craned his neck to look. They were in a depression, a natural trough. Ripple-ridged flats and pieces of driftwood suggested it was a small estuary. The white skeleton of a tree stood in the middle of it at a crazy angle, like some forlorn remnant of the saurian age. They pushed the trolley over to this, and stripped the major of his bonds. Lifting him up, they thrust him against the tree-trunk and bound him in place, fastening his hands tightly behind his back, drawing a length of cord across his throat, almost cutting his air-supply.
When they stood back, they looked grimly satisfied.
“
Five of you against one,” he gasped. “You must be pleased with yourselves.”
The stagecoach man gave a toothy grin. “Oh we are. One peeler less in the world makes it a good day’s work.”
“
I doubt you know the meaning of ‘work’.”
The stagecoach man grinned all the more. “Just you have a good gander round … mainly down that way, towards the coast. It’s about a mile off from here.” He pointed north-east. “Course, this being spring and all, and a good time for high tides, it won’t be that far for long.”
The other men chuckled.
“
I see,” Craddock replied.
“
You soon will. You’ll see the sea alright. How’s that, lads?”
The chuckles became hoots of laughter.
“
And which lunatic asylum did
you
escape from?” Craddock asked.
The man’s smile became a vicious snarl. He rammed the barrels of his shotgun under the major’s chin. “If only it was that easy,” he snarled. “If only that was the reason.”
Craddock said nothing. He fancied something of importance was coming.
“
In case you’re interested, cozzer … I’m Charnwood.”
“
Jake
Charnwood?” Craddock asked, astonished.
“
That’s right, major. You rode in a carriage all the way from Norwich with the most wanted man in the United Kingdom … some cozzer you are!”

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