Perfect Gallows (17 page)

The Yank driver was true to form—any more “practice” would have meant broken front teeth. They pressed their bodies against each other for support. A pleasant pocket of warmth grew between them. No chance of talk through the drum of the downpour on the canvas roof, and the clatter of the bodywork and the roar of the engine, but on the last smooth swoop down the new tarmac inside the lodge gates Jean put her mouth to his ear.

“Sweet Lord, you play me false,” she whispered.

In the near dark under the canvas he stared into her eyes, letting the tension rise. The growl of gears as the lorry took the turn into the camp entrance drowned his answering line, but she must have heard the sincerity throbbing in his voice. He'd been expecting the lorry to brake and let them down there, but it bounced on across the park, turned left again and stopped by the sergeant's store-huts. The moment it was still Andrew put his arm round her and kissed her as if he meant it. The rain thundered down.

A hand appeared at the rim of the tailgate. Andrew was on his feet and lifting Jean's bike to pass it down by the time the tailgate fell, but instead of waiting to receive the bike Sergeant Stephens climbed up into the shelter of the canvas.

“Jesus!” he said. “You call this summer! Been wanting to talk with you, Mr Wragge. It's my folks back home. I wrote them about you maybe being the heir and all—it ain't easy to know what to put in a letter—and that's got them all worked up. They think Britain's full of barons and duchesses and they can't see why I ain't meeting any, so when I tell them about Sir somebody and his long-lost heir they gotta know more. So if you'll pardon me asking, how's it going?”

Andrew laughed. He didn't believe the sergeant's excuse, and wasn't even certain the sergeant expected him to. It was a sort of clumsy politeness pretending he wasn't himself being inquisitive, excited by the notion of all that money … but Andrew owed him for the ride, especially the last few seconds.

“There's a new chapter in the drama,” he said. “D'you remember the picture in the Saloon, the family one?”

“Sure.”

“There's a boy in it with a gun under his arm—Charles, Sir Arnold's only son. He was missing presumed killed in the First War, but now a man's turned up saying he's him.”

“Jesus! And is it him?”

“My Cousin May says so. My Cousin Elspeth isn't sure. Sir Arnold won't say. Some of the servants knew the real Charles, and they aren't sure either.”

“Somebody's on your side?”

“I haven't got a side—I'm just an interested spectator.”

“Crap. You gotta fight it. You tell me anything you need.”

“Only if you know a good cheap private detective.”

“1 got the man right here in the kitchen. Used to be a private eye in Albuquerque.”

Andrew hesitated. He didn't want to stand around arguing. He had asked about the detective as a joke, a quick dismissive impossibility to get the conversation over, so that he could go off alone through the rain with Jean.

“I can fix him for furlough,” said the sergeant.

“But …”

“Money? Listen here. I got a proposition for you. You a betting man? What odds'll you give me against you being the one who inherits?”

“Oh … fifty to one?”

“Hell, I'll give you better than that. Twenty to one, how's that sound? So I lay five hundred bucks on you at twenty to one—OK? That's for Phil's travel and expenses. If he can't dig up nothing useful, then that's my five hundred bucks gone, and you ain't out a dime. But if your number comes up and you inherit the whole thing, then you pay me ten thousand bucks. What do you say?”

“Can I think about it?”

“Sure. Come up here tomorrow and meet Phil. What time?”

“All right. It'll have to be about half past nine, because of getting off to church. Can I bring someone with me—one of the servants? He's very interested. He might be able to help.”

“Sure.”

“What was that about? You never told me,” said Jean as they walked their bikes back across the valley with the rain buffeting down on to their capes and sou'westers. Andrew had kept quiet about the inheritance business. It wasn't part of his strategy—long-lost heirs are supposed to be young and a bit unreliable—though the hard luck of losing it all to Charles might have come in useful later. Besides, all that concerned Andrew. It was Adrian who was supposed to be playing his game with Jean.

“It's a bit of a story,” he said.

“Do tell me.”

They squelched on. He was conscious of the dovecote, down to their left, coming and vanishing as the rain-veils parted and closed. Too soon. Besides, he hadn't got it ready.

“I wish we had somewhere to go,” he said.

“Dolly says it's going to clear up after milking. She's usually right.”

“Can you get out?”

“Well …”

“Look. Let your back tyre down before you get home. Say you've got a puncture. Put it in a shed Mrs Althorp can't see from the kitchen. I'll meet you at the stile.”

“What'll you say?”

“It's cleared up and I feel like a walk.”

“Oh, I wish I was a man!”

“No you don't.”

Her cheeks, freckled, tanned, streaming with rain despite the sou'wester, reddened appetizingly.

It was hard to imagine Phil leaning in a doorway with a fedora tipped back on his head and a smoking automatic in his hand. He was round and rubbery with a high bald brow and doggy eyes, but he took notes on a pad and asked what sounded like the right questions. Samuel answered most of these, usually with a shake of the head. Now that the family was living up in the nursery wing he had fewer opportunities for listening to their talk, and in any case Charles, thanks to his memory-loss, real or phoney, had given very little away. There was only the air-raid on Hull, plus a few laundry-marks on the ragged clothes he had arrived in. Cousin Blue had given Samuel these to burn, but he had kept them. The laundry-marks were all different, probably because the clothes had been begged at doors. Even if Phil found the donors it wouldn't prove much.

From the moment Andrew had suggested it Samuel had taken the inquiry completely seriously. He wasn't happy about the bet with Sergeant Stephens, and offered to pay the costs himself—he had a little money saved up, he said—but Andrew had refused, not really believing the inquiry was worth spending money on. Only if a Yank chose to chuck his dollars around, well, that was his look-out. In fact, left to himself Andrew would probably have told the sergeant he'd decided against the idea. His whole instinct was to stay as neutral as possible, to do nothing whatever to make himself Uncle Vole's heir. Then, if it happened, he would still be free. Anything else, and The Mimms and its fortune would become a huge trailing weed on his smooth hull. So now he let Samuel take the responsibility both of deciding to send Phil off to Hull and of answering his questions while he, Andrew, stood back and watched. While Phil looked shruggingly at the laundry-marks Sergeant Stephens came over and edged Andrew yet further aside.

“You didn't say he was a nigger,” he muttered.

Andrew had in fact noticed the change in the two Americans' looks when he had brought Samuel into the hut, but had put it down simply to surprise at seeing a darkie in butler's uniform in the middle of green England.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “Does it matter?”

“Sure does. You wouldn't understand. Me, I'll do a deal with any colour. But you just tell your pal not to come wandering into the camp looking for me. Specially after dark. The guys here—they're bored, they're frustrated, they're a long way from home, they don't care a whole lot about your British laws. Next few weeks some real rough guys'll be coming through. I tell you, there's guys homesick for a good lynching. I can see your friend's got his heart set on proving you're the real thing, much more'n you do, Mr Wragge. He'll be after me for news. That's OK, but you tell him he's gotta phone me first, and I'll arrange a place to meet him. Look, I'm taking a risk, fixing Phil's furlough. I don't want nobody asking questions. So you tell your pal to lay off, take it easy, phone me first if he wants to talk. OK?”

“We could just forget the whole thing if you like.”

“Jesus, no. I'm interested. Just that it's gotta be done my way.”

“OK, I'll tell him.”

The discussion about the laundry-marks seemed to have ended. Phil looked up.

“I'll need mug shots,” he said.

“I better lend you my camera,” said Sergeant Stephens.

“It may be a bit tricky persuading him, specially if he's a phoney. I'll have to get my Cousin May to coax him somehow. I can tell her you want the picture to send to your folks back home, but … Tell you what—she's quarrelled with General Odway.”

“She and who else?”

“The point is the General used to let her have extra butter and now he's stopped it. I don't suppose you could …”

“No problem.”

TWO

Though he was later than he'd said, Andrew climbed the plantation path slowly. His legs were still rubbery tired after the ride from Southampton. No harm in keeping her waiting—and when he got there, still no hurry. She'd had five days to brood since Sunday's farewells. Things had gone with a rush after the Saturday evening tryst at the stile among the still-dripping beeches. She might easily have become frightened again. So just chat to begin with, perhaps about the rather amusing business of watching Cousin Blue cajole Charles into joining a family photograph—picture to be taken tomorrow morning—to send to Sergeant Stephens's folks back home. (Equally amusing, though he could not tell Jean this, had been Cousin Blue's delight at being allowed an entry into the mysterious world of the Black Market. The Sergeant's butter wasn't a gift. She was paying for it, at real black-market prices. Thrilling!) Then, perhaps, ask about the farm gossip …

A cry in the still woods—a sort of squawk, cut short. A throaty growl continuing. A mad high cackle. That was Brian. Before that Dave's snarl. The squawk had been human too—when Sergeant Stephens had hoisted Jean into his lorry she …

Andrew ran up the slanting path. Rage made him stupid, those two repulsive louts barging in and ruining everything—but in a few strides he slowed. The imagined scene cleared in his mind, Jean threshing in Dave's grasp, Brian standing by with his father's blackthorn stick, thick as a cudgel, himself rushing into the dell. Dave was far stronger than he was. Brian too.

He slowed to a fast stride, still trembling with fury. Brian's mad laugh filled the underwoods. Andrew picked up a fallen branch and drew a deep breath.

“This way, men!” he yelled. “Up here!”

“Coming, Sarge!”

He thrashed the branch against a holly as he passed.

“Get moving! Set the dogs on 'em!”

He barked, yaps, mixed in with deeper baying, inarticulate human shouts. He thrashed at the bushes. Brian's laughter had stopped. Where the path levelled Andrew forked to one side, still yelling and baying and threshing his feet through the leaf-litter. Between the tree-trunks he saw Brian scampering ape-like up the paddock towards the cow-sheds, but the dell with the stile was empty.

A muffled movement under the hedge hazels. He ran into the open shouting in his own voices

“Over here! Sergeant! There they are!”

Dave broke from a hollow under the hedge and scurried away up to the right. Andrew ran a few paces after him shouting in three voices and thrashing his branch around, then, still yelling and barking, turned and made urgent signals to Jean, who was climbing to her feet with her fists clutched at the waistband of her riding-breeches.

“Thataway!” he shouted. “Up by the hedge!”

“You OK, lady?”

She pulled herself together and ran for the path, up over the ridge. He loosed one more flurry of baying and trampled around, calling to himself, losing the trail, then followed her at a wallowing run all the way down to the Amphitheatre, catching her just beyond the Green Room huts. As he touched her shoulder she swung round, snarling, her fingers griped into talons. He caught her wrist before she could claw his face.

“It's me, darling. Andrew. You're all right. You're all right.”

Calm, assurance, power.

Her face went white and her mouth gaped like a hen's. He thought she was going to faint, but she fell conscious into his arms. He soothed her back with gentle strokes as she sobbed.

“Did he hurt you?”

“No … not really … only …”

He kept his eyes on a slant of path he could see between the tree-trunks, just in case Dave realized what had happened and came after them. At last Jean raised her head and looked dumbly round.

“Where … Where are the others? The dogs?”

“Only me.”

“No. No. The others; the wood was full of them.”

“‘The noise of hunters heard. Enter divers spirits in the shape of dogs. Ariel setting them on.'”

“All … you?”

He nodded. The conceit was real. The power was there. If a dozen yokels had broken from the wood with cudgels and hay-prongs he would have faced and cowed them. Adrian—the secret spirit whom nobody else in the play was aware of—could do it. The whole arena between the sunlit wood and the shadowed slope of derelict lawns was filled with his private magic, so strong that it changed the physical shape of things—she was staring up at him, her green eyes and ginger lashes wet, her lips parted, her whole face trembling. He saw that from now on he could make her do whatever he wanted. He kissed her gently and let go.

“You mustn't sleep at the farm tonight.”

“No. Oh, no.”

“We'll go and talk to Cousin Elspeth. She'll know what to do. She's a magistrate, anyway. Don't worry. I'll do the talking.”

“The difficulty,” said Cousin Brown, “is that Mrs Althorp cannot run the farm without the men. Our local Land Army officials are not really up to the job—in fact they are thoroughly spineless. We have had several cases of this kind, and I am sorry to say my male colleagues on the bench tend not to take them seriously. They regard the war effort as more important than what they see as a minor misfortune for the poor girl. Anyway, clearly Jean will have to transfer …”