‘Ajoutez une noix. . . . Add a knob of butter. I’ve changed my mind. I won’t go to bed, I’ll potter about indoors until I get some strength back. There’s one job I could do more or less one-handed, and that’s to develop your holiday snaps if you do the loading into the spiral tanks for me.’
Molly nodded. The demands of the shop, the child and a husband in hospital had relegated photography to a low priority. It would mean taking Deborah along to the shops, but at least Keith would be kept safe and quiet. ‘What comes next?’ she asked.
‘Retirez du feu. . . . Hell, I think it says something about a blue touchpaper,’ Keith said. ‘Where’s the pocket dictionary?’
*
It was late afternoon before the warning note of the burglar-alarm told Keith of Molly’s return. He heard the note stop as she punched the code to cancel the system and her cooing voice as she put Deborah into her playpen. While the last prints were fixing he began, by the glow of the red safe-light, a conscience-stricken clean-up. Molly was fussy about her dark-room. By the time she tripped over the dogs which were waiting patiently on the landing outside the dark-room door, he had wiped up the worst of the spillages and restored some order. The working surface was clear except for a pair of antique pistols.
‘Can I come in?’ Molly’s voice asked.
Keith opened the door and switched on the main light, blinking in the sudden glare. He was glad to take a seat again on the high stool.
‘Sorry I’ve been so long,’ Molly said. ‘I chased Ronnie all over the town. In the end I had to put your note through his door just as you said, so I could have saved my time. Have you been working all afternoon?’
‘I lay down for a bit while the negatives dried.’
‘Wallace says that several people phoned to ask where we were. He and Janet just said “Near Riberac”, and told them that letters would be forwarded and messages passed on.’
‘That’s what I thought.’
While she spoke, Molly was looking around. The negative strips were neatly racked, contact prints were pinned to the wall while overhead hung and fluttered many dozens of drying enlargements. She sidled along, studying the photographs. ‘What have you been up to?’ she demanded. ‘Have you run me out of paper? I didn’t think I even had this much.’
‘I cut up some big sheets.’
‘Do you know what that stuff costs? And I was taking photos of places. You’ve only printed cars. And why the pistols?’
‘I didn’t have anything more modern handy,’ Keith said, ‘just in case the wrong sort of person came to call. The way I see it, somebody was alerted that we’d bought something they wanted or feared – probably by that snippet in The Scotsman. So they found out that we were still in France and near Riberac. They didn’t know that we were on a buying trip and shipping boxes of stuff home, so they decided to intercept our car. That meant picking us up around Riberac and following us home. Well, every time we parked, you hopped out and took photographs of the place. It would be interesting if the same car turned up too often, or if we could spot one which we’d seen on the road home. After all, if somebody was dropping hitch-hikers in front of us in the hope of our picking them up, he must have overtaken us several times.’
Molly nodded. There was usually some sort of method in Keith’s frequent bouts of madness. ‘And can you spot anything?’
‘There must be a thousand cars in these photographs. And I’m tired. I think I’ll go and lie down again until food’s ready.’
‘Good idea. Do you want a quick fry-up, or will you wait for a proper meal?’
‘Both,’ Keith said.
*
Keith slept that night like the dead, awoke feeling a little less like a wet flannel and ate most of a substantial breakfast.
Molly had set a card-table and chair outside the dining room french window, in a paved sun-trap sheltered by a jungle of overgrown rhododendron and azalea bushes. ‘You need fresh air and sunshine,’ she said. ‘And if you keep the two dogs with you nobody can get near without you knowing.’
Keith settled down with the photographs, pen, paper, magnifier, radio and his two duelling pistols. Molly, ever the opportunist, brought out a rug, the playpen and Deborah. The dogs lay down, watching them both. Molly retired to her housework, secure in the knowledge that her charges were gathered together and safe under each others’ supervision.
Ten minutes later her tranquillity was shattered by the sound of a shot.
A tray of dishes landed in the sink and Molly ran, heart in mouth, into the garden. At first glance all seemed safe. She leaned back against the jamb of the french window and held her heart.
To the evident delight of Deborah, Brutus, the young labrador, was presenting Keith with a bright bundle of feathers. ‘I got that magpie that’s been raiding other birds’ nests,’ Keith said happily. ‘Would you fetch down my bag of loading gear?’
There was peace for an hour. Then the dogs stirred and looked towards the driveway. Keith could tell that the visitor was somebody known to them, but the dogs had met a thousand people on their forays with their master, not all of them beyond suspicion. Keith raised one of his pistols. The large and rugged frame of Molly’s brother came plodding round the corner of the house. Ronnie always looked to Keith as if he had been carved carelessly from the roots of a fallen oak.
He regarded Keith’s pistols with amusement. ‘You reckon to hit anything with those doodads?’ As a stalker by profession, as well as a ghillie, Ronnie was inclined to despise anything smaller than his own favourite rifles.
‘I just got a magpie,’ Keith said.
‘They’re rifled, then?’
‘Scratch-rifled.’
‘Ah. Sir Peter’s on the way. He’s just having a crack with Molly. I’ll away and fetch some chairs.’ He disappeared towards the shed where the garden chairs were stored.
Keith made a few more left-handed notations, but he was smiling. Ronnie’s employer, Sir Peter Hay, might be the biggest landowner thereabouts but he had been a good friend and patron to the Calders. Keith struggled to rise as the baronet’s lanky form in its usual well-worn kilt came out through the french windows and Deborah, quick to recognize a plentiful source of sweets, held up chubby arms.
‘Don’t get up, my dear boy.’ Sir Peter pushed him down with a fatherly hand on his shoulder and Keith felt the heat of a large cigar on his ear. ‘I can see you’re still weak as a kitten. I’ve been up north but Ronnie kept me posted. Got yourself shot, eh? Crossbow. Can’t think of many husbands with one of those. Don’t get on your high horse,’ he added quickly. ‘Only joking. I know you’re a happily married man, now. You say so often enough. Molly was going to make coffee, but I said beer would do.’
‘If you’re smoking,’ Keith said, ‘take that cigar away from the playpen. I gave Deborah my powder-flask to chew on and she found out how to work the shutter. There’s Black Silver gunpowder all over the rug and if anybody drops a spark she’ll probably go up in a mushroom cloud.’
Sir Peter threw his cigar into the bushes and took one of the chairs which Ronnie had brought out. He lifted Deborah on to his knee, at the same time stooping to fuss with the dogs. ‘I gather you owe your continued existence to this old beggar?’
‘Not for the first time,’ Keith admitted.
‘Ronnie’s big with tidings.’
Molly joined them with a tray and Ronnie contained himself while rings were pulled and glasses filled.
‘Now,’ Keith said.
‘Aye.’ Ronnie paused and took a pull at his glass. As Sir Peter’s stalker he could read the writings of nature far more easily than he could a book. Verbalizing what he could read was more difficult. ‘I went to Foleyhill and looked around, the way you asked. You’ll mind that it was more than a week back, and very little soft ground. Mostly, all I could go by was faint tracks here and there. And where there was any kind of a path or a deer-track folk had mostly kept to it. There was once I found I was tracking myself.’
‘If
I’d thought it was going to be easy,’ Keith said, ‘I wouldn’t have had to bother with you.’
Ronnie took the flattery as no more than his due.
‘M’hm. The ambulance-men had come and gone the same way and their track was clear. That took me to where Tanya had stopped and barked. They’d gone to her and she’d led them to where you were lying. From there, I picked up other tracks. There was a mannie who stalked and killed the roe, hung it in the tree and went off. I lost his track, but picked him up coming back again – I’m guessing it was the same lad. He’d settled himself down in bracken about fifty yards from the carcass and where he could see it. His bum-print was still clear to be seen.’
‘And the other two?’ Keith asked.
‘That’s not so easy. The police had been over the ground, and I couldn’t separate his tracks and yours from theirs. But there was yin body that was lighter than the rest and with smaller feet. I’d guess that’d be the lassie. She’d just come up the once and hid herself behind a blackthorn. I lost her again after that.’
‘Was there any sign that the man with the crossbow talked with anyone else?’
‘I’d think not,’ Ronnie said. ‘I was wondering that myself. But if ever his tracks crossed with anyone else they just went straight past and no sign of either of them stopping, so I’d guess that they were made at different times.’
‘That’s small enough news to be big with,’ Keith said.
‘I’m not done yet. That was all I could see up there, and there was nothing dropped or left except blood and the deer’s carcass. But I took a look at the face of the hill, and the other thing you asked, you were dead right. There was a line of fence-posts been set out up the hill, and the first half dozen had been let into the ground – not very cleverly, one was fallen down already.’
‘Ah!’ Molly said. ‘So the man that fetched you up there, Keith, had something to do with the organization of the sanctuary. Is that it? Wouldn’t they have known they were giving themselves away?’
‘You never know how people’s minds will work,’ Keith said. ‘I thought it was worth Ronnie’s while having a look. I wanted to know whether somebody had picked on the place just because it’s a lonely spot. But they knew so exactly the bait that I’d be bound to rise to. . . .’
‘What comes next?’ Molly asked. ‘The police?’
Keith frowned. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘I want to know a bit more before I give Munro anything to work on.’
‘Just in case you can cut yourself in on something,’ said Sir Peter.
‘Maybe. I always like to know what I’m doing before I commit myself. So the first step is to find out who runs the sanctuary at Foleyhill.’
‘You’ll have your work cut out,’ Sir Peter said bitterly. ‘It adjoins my bit of moor and two of the farms on the other side are mine. What with roe-deer and rabbits coming over into the farmland and crows and foxes scouring the moor for grouse-chicks, I’m getting to detest the very sound of the name. So I’ve been trying to track down the . . . the sponsors, or whatever you call them.
‘First of all, I thought that a wildlife sanctuary had to have some sort of official recognition, so I contacted the local authorities, who’d never even heard of it. I tried the R.S.P.B., who damned the operation as bringing their own reserves into disrepute by sheer bad management. Farquhar, the local kingpin of the Scottish Wildlife Trust, spoke his mind a bit more freely than I’d care to repeat. Nobody seemed to know who the hell, if anybody, was running the place, just reputedly “a bunch of students”.
‘Next, I looked into the ownership and found that the land belonged to Henry Batemore. I rang him up and he said that his stepson had begged the use of it for some organization he was connected with, and, since it was useless except for the few bits of forestry, he’d let them establish their sanctuary on it.’
‘Stepson?’ Keith said. ‘Would that be Brian Batemore?’
‘It would.’
‘I thought he was the son. There’s even a family resemblance.’
Sir Peter shook his head. ‘Henry Batemore married late and for money, and from what I hear he got the worst of the bargain. The bride was some sort of a cousin of his, which might explain any resemblance. A widow with a ewe-lamb. I asked Batemore whether he’d sell me the land, and he said that he might but that he wouldn’t want to commit himself until he’d spoken to his stepson, who’d just gone abroad again on holiday.’
How long ago was this?’ Keith asked.
‘Couple of days ago.’
‘He was here last week. The bastard who enticed me up to Foleyhill used Brian Batemore’s name, so the police lugged him into the hospital and set up an identity parade. I’d never seen him before that I could remember.’
‘Well, he’s gone again,’ said Sir Peter. ‘Farquhar said he thought the place was being run by some offshoot of the League Against Cruel Sports. Possibly a hunt saboteur’s association, he guessed. Well, you don’t find those people in the local phone book.’ Sir Peter sighed deeply. ‘Sign of the times. All of a piece with not wanting to do a decent day’s work for a good day’s pay. Class hatred and all that rot.’
‘If you think about it, it was always predictable and it’ll get worse,’ Keith said. (Molly sighed and waited for a passage of home-spun philosophy. Keith could never recognize a trend without puzzling out an explanation to satisfy at least himself.) ‘Look at it this way. This is an age of machinery and automation and microchips. In the developed world we can produce all the food and clothes and tellys we need without everyone slogging away for sixty hours a week as they used to. Even the forty hour week’s too long. We’re entering an age of leisure and nobody’s teaching the poor little bastards to use it creatively. At the same time, people have drifted into the cities. And they can’t drift back again easily. You can’t even get planning permission to build a rural house any more, not unless you’re a farmer.
‘So you have people – students mostly, because they’re at the age for radicalism – with loads of education, less knowledge, little understanding and bugger-all sense, wondering how to fill in their time for the betterment of the world. God knows there’s nothing much to do in a city,’ Keith said with deep feeling. ‘Only the best of ’em will find anything useful and creative to do. The rest’ll march to ban this, or join the league against that, or decide to sabotage the other thing, because they have tiny minds and can only think negatively. Most of them will grow out of it.’
‘They’re a bloody nuisance until they do,’ Sir Peter said. ‘And I don’t really believe that somebody shot you in defence of the birds that might otherwise be shot by you or your customers. What’ll you do next?’
Keith pointed to the many little stacks of notes and photographs, weighted down against the fitful breeze by his two pistols, powder-flask and bullet-bag. ‘I’m going to try to get a line on them through these. Nobody could follow as snap-happy a photographer as Molly around France without getting their car into a picture or two.’
‘Good luck to you!’ Sir Peter said. ‘You’ll not be fit to come out on the twelfth, I suppose?’
‘I’ll be there.’
‘You can’t shoot with your arm strapped up like that.’
‘It won’t be. I’ve another week to heal. And if I can’t stand the kick of a twelve-bore I can bring something smaller. Or I’ll pick up for you.’
Sir Peter looked doubtful but he was too polite to argue. ‘I’ll look forward to seeing you both, then,’ he said. He kissed the top of Deborah’s head and passed her to Molly. ‘Time we were away, Ronnie. Again, Keith, don’t get up. You’ll need all your strength for the twelfth.’
Molly put Deborah back in her playpen and went to see the visitors off. She came back in a few minutes. ‘I gave Ronnie his prunes-in-Armagnac,’ she said. ‘He borrowed some custard to go with them.’
Keith shuddered and went back to his photographs.
*
In mid-afternoon Keith appeared suddenly in the kitchen, a pistol in each
hand. Molly squeaked and dropped a spoon. ‘Wock –’ She stopped and cleared her throat. ‘What’s happened?’
‘Nothing.’ Keith looked down at his pistols. ‘You know what these are worth? I wasn’t going to leave them in the garden.’
‘You left Snookums in the garden.’
‘With the dogs. They’ll soon let us know if anybody comes near. Look.’ Keith lifted his elbow and scattered photographs from under his arm on to the kitchen table. ‘Could you pull these bits up bigger? The ones I’ve boxed in red? There’s some paper left.’
Molly sighed. She flipped a photograph over. ‘You didn’t think to put the negative number on the back. And you’ve only printed the bits with cars in. How in hell do you expect me to find these fragments?’
‘Do something clever,’ Keith said hopefully.
‘You do something clever. I’ve got dinner to cook.’
‘I’ll do that for you. You get enlargements sharper than I do.’
‘That’s because I don’t clump around or play the radio while they’re exposing.’ Molly paused and balanced the pros against the cons. The desirability of Keith baby-sitting and of eating a meal that she had not had to cook for herself lost out against the tedium of searching the negatives for Keith’s fragments and the stark horror of having to clean up the kitchen after him. ‘I’ll do dinner,’ she said.
‘Whatever you say.’ Keith laid down one of his pistols and put an arm round Molly. They pressed together for a second and then parted. As he turned away Keith let himself frown. He enjoyed hugging his wife, but since his emergence from hospital he had felt no urge to make love. He carried his photographs up to the dark-room with a renewed determination to track down the man with the crossbow. The doctor had said that his impotence was the aftermath of shock and would soon clear up. But if the doctor was wrong, somebody was going to suffer.
*
By the afternoon of the following day, Keith had made his blow-ups and was back in the garden, complete with pistols, dogs and Deborah. His researches were almost complete when the dogs again gave warning of a visitor. This time it was Wallace’s stringy form which arrived and flopped down into one of the garden chairs.
Cousin Once Removed Page 5
