Cut to the Chase

by Ray Scott

  ‘It’s a long story,’ Wallace began.

  ‘Ah’m listenin’ !’

  ‘All right,’ Wallace answered. ‘You’re on…but can I make one request first. I’ve a feeling those blokes outside may put two and two together and start jumping on barges to look for us, could I suggest you cast off and move away, about half a mile or so, or more if you can.’

  Fred considered the request and then nodded.

  ‘Arright…’ he said. ‘Makes sense, yo’ stay ’ere!’

  He disappeared on deck, after pulling on a faded “T” shirt and donning his cap. They could feel the barge tipping from side to side as he moved around on deck, then they heard the sound of voices.

  ‘Christ! Who’s he talking to?’ Wallace was near to panic.

  ‘Our friends, by the sound of it, just keep your head down. If your friend Fred could see out when we first arrived, anyone else can probably see in,’ McKay said coolly.

  ‘What if they jump aboard, it’s three against one.’

  ‘Three against three,’ McKay corrected him and picked up the frying pan from the stove. ‘If they come in here it’s war.’

  But they didn’t. Maybe it was just a casual enquiry about the general vicinity, and Fred Hackett, Wallace had no doubt, would have looked them squarely in the eye and continued busying himself with the task of casting off. Then the boat began to yaw again and they both tensed. They heard the sound of the engine firing and the barge began to vibrate.

  ‘We’re moving,’ said McKay. ‘Thank God for that!’

  ‘Now comes the difficult bit,’ Wallace said ruefully. ‘What do I tell him?’

  ‘I’d be inclined to tell him the truth,’ said McKay. ‘He looks a decent enough fellow, not the sort to go blabbing to the press, and he seems to have some loyalty to you. What’s that about?’

  Wallace told him about the fracas at the pub and that he knew Fred from the day before when he came aboard and wanted some sugar. Then he described in more detail his part in joining the fight down the road from the pub.

  ‘What made you do that?’ McKay asked after Wallace had finished. ‘Don’t get me wrong, you did the right thing. But you could have blown your cover or suffered severe injury, and you don’t strike me as a fighting type.’

  ‘I wasn’t, until three weeks or so back,’ Wallace said. ‘I guess everything just boiled over. As you said, he’s a decent fellow, and those bastards attacking him and his mate were not.’

  ‘Look, we’ve got to trust somebody and if he gets us out of here I reckon he deserves the truth, and I mean the whole truth, miss nothing out. How he’ll react to that, well, we’ll just have to take a chance.’

  Fred Hackett didn’t return for about a half an hour, the boat steadily moved and vibrated and they could feel the occasional yawing, though in the main the journey was very smooth. Wallace risked a look through the port; he could see the canal bank slipping past. It looked as if Fred was going to move the barge a fair distance on from where he had been buttonholed by their pursuers before he moored it again. This proved to be the case, the boat turned slightly and then slowed, followed by a gentle bumping. Clearly Fred was coming to a mooring spot. The kettle had boiled and Wallace rummaged around and found where Fred kept his tea.

  The boat eventually came to a standstill; they heard the sound of footsteps above. McKay stationed himself near the doorway of the small cabin, clearly he was taking no chances of anyone else having boarded, but his fears were groundless. Fred pushed himself into the small cabin, cleaning his hands on a piece of cotton waste. He noted McKay’s positioning behind the door and gave a wry smile.

  ‘Doan fuss yoursel’… I dai give yo’ away. I di’nt like the look of the buggers any’ow,’ he drew his pipe from his pocket. ‘Sed they wuz coppers, but ah know a copper when I sees one, an’ that they wort!’ He shook his head emphatically.

  Wallace could see McKay was having translation difficulties, but Wallace was used to Fred’s accent by now.

  ‘He said he knows coppers when he sees them and they were not,’ Wallace explained and Fred gave a broad smile as the translation was made. He emitted vast clouds of smoke, and then removed the pipe from his mouth. He looked at Wallace enquiringly who realised the time had come to give some explanation. He had a momentary urge to gild the lily a little, but remembered McKay’s advice and decided that Fred Hackett merited better than that.

  ‘It’s a long story,’ Wallace said. ‘I made the tea by the way.’

  ‘I got the time,’ Fred said laconically. ‘Milk and three sugar.’

  So Wallace told him, he did the job properly, starting with his previous ASIO connection and then the Jakarta caper with the nearly botched handover at the University lecture room. Fred sat in stolid silence as Wallace recounted everything that had happened, his eyes wandered over to McKay occasionally after Wallace reached the point where McKay entered the lists. Wallace wasn’t sure whether Fred accepted McKay entirely but there were times when Wallace wasn’t sure whether he himself fully accepted McKay either!

  ‘So that’s it,’ Wallace had dealt with the flight from Albrighton, which is where he assumed he had been incarcerated, and the train journey from Bridgnorth and the night in the church in Kidderminster. He even mentioned the bottle of port and the monks’ cowls, and he saw Fred smile at that. Wallace finally finished with their hitching a lift on the goods train and the hurried exit from it at Smethwick West.

  Fred didn’t say anything immediately. He reached over to a shelf over the small table and pulled out a newspaper.

  ‘That’s thee ain’t it?’ Fred said.

  The paper was dated about three days ago, Wallace looked at the picture on one of the inner pages, it was a better likeness than the one Saul had provided. He recognised the shot, it had been taken in Australia, as he saw it something jarred in his mind, he struggled to grasp what it was, but like last night’s dream, it evaded capture.

  ‘Yes!’ Wallace admitted. ‘That’s me!’

  He thanked his lucky stars he hadn’t tried to bullshit Fred Hackett and was grateful to McKay who had advocated being 100% honest with Fred. Had he spun him a yarn, his standing and credibility with Fred would have been zero, as he already had an inkling of Wallace’s predicament from the newspaper. If Wallace had given Fred a cock and bull story about running from gambling debts or a jealous husband it would have probably ended with him tipping Wallace overboard. Wallace was unaware of the story or the publicity as he had not seen a newspaper for days, this particular edition must have been issued while he had been incarcerated in Kalim’s safe house.

  ‘If you knew all this, why didn’t you report me to the police?’

  ‘Yo’ saved my bacon, an’ Bert’s, that night. If ah wuz a-goin’ to rat on you I’d have told you fust!’

  ‘You didn’t know you were going to see me again.’

  He said nothing, just nodded, then asked:

  ‘What’m yo’ goin’ to do now?’

  McKay decided he’d better say something.

  ‘We’re trying to reach London,’ he said. ‘We need to reach…’ he hesitated, then, like Wallace, decided that Fred Hackett either had to be trusted fully or not at all, ‘…we need to reach the Australian High Commission in London.’

  Fred sat with one arm resting on the table, puffing out clouds of pipe smoke. He was thinking and Wallace decided it was best to leave him to it. McKay cleared his throat preparatory to breaking the silence but Wallace nudged his foot under the table. Fred had to work this out and make a decision on his own. The silence seemed an eternity, in reality it was probably about two minutes.

  ‘Ah could do with some ’elp with the locks,’ he said eventually.

  When the boat reached the outskirts of the city of Birmingham, they worked hard. Wallace and McKay spent more time off the boat than on it as they traversed one lock after another. There was a long bank of locks at one point and they could see city buildings in front of them slowly coming closer as they emptie
d and filled one lock after another.

  Wallace had already negotiated this lot on his way north from London, luckily when he had been heading north he had been following another pleasure craft that had been very short in length and his longer ex-barge had been able to enter the lock in company with the other, so he had been able to share the load. How Fred managed in the normal course of events he could not imagine, for one man per barge it must be back breaking work. As it was, Fred placidly puffed on his pipe sitting on the stern of the vessel, starting and stopping the engine as the barge moved up the incline lock by lock.

  It took two long days to reach the city and then start on the way down. They developed a routine. They worked hard on the locks and came aboard for meals and tea breaks. Then Fred called a halt at 5.30 each afternoon, they had a meal and then visited a pub, he knew them all. Then back to the boat, where they all slept. McKay and Wallace slept on the cabin floor when it rained, and on the deck the second night as it was quite warm.

  On this second night McKay and Wallace talked about their situation, something they had hitherto been unable to do with Fred within ear shot and in company. On this night, maybe he was still in ear shot, but he was below and the two of them were on deck.

  McKay was still puzzled about the leak, and how Kalim, Rivera and Co had locked onto Wallace, and also the other mystery men who appeared to have been followers of Ravindran. How had they locked onto the Broad Street basin? How had Kalim and his men locked onto Amblecote and also known Wallace was likely to turn up at Adele Briscoe’s shop to contact or spy upon Murray Craddock?

  ‘Did you tell anyone about Broad Street basin and Amblecote?’ McKay asked.

  ‘No!’ Wallace said emphatically. ‘The only person I mentioned those two locations to, and the bookshop, was you. I haven’t mentioned these places to anyone else, and that includes Murray Craddock, except to you.’

  ‘I can’t understand how they locked onto all three. I’m sure we only had one conversation, one telephone conversation, when we mentioned those places.’

  ‘That was when I was at Knowle with Ben Wakefield,’ Wallace replied. ‘I can remember telephoning you from Ben’s home office. But Ben is all right. He wouldn’ know a Communist or a Muslim Fundamentalist from a true blue Tory. In any case, he couldn’t have heard what I was saying to you.’

  ‘Are you sure of that?’

  ‘Positive, he was watching a football match on TV when I rang you. What’s more, how would he have known anything about Kalim or Ravindran?’ Wallace protested. ‘Ben didn’t even know I was in England until I rang him.’

  ‘Well this doesn’t make sense to me,’ McKay rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand. ‘I thought this canal idea was tops, but they appear to have been on to it.’

  ‘Is there anyone doubtful at the High Commission? I remember Major Lincoln said something about a suspect cleaning worker at the Jakarta Embassy.’

  ‘I haven’t discussed this with any staff at the London High Commission. They wouldn’t take too kindly to being in the know if I’m dealing with anyone sheltering from the police, especially a murder suspect.’

  ‘What about this chap Alan Kelsey?’

  ‘He’s intelligence, like me and Bramble, and I suppose to a lesser extent, like you,’ McKay replied. ‘He arrived at ASIO after you departed from it. He’s ex-Navy and he used to be a Lieutenant-Commander in Naval Intelligence. Alan is head of the counter intelligence and terrorism section at Canberra. He’s only just arrived in England on a temporary basis at the High Commission. What about Saul Prosser?’

  ‘He wouldn’t know a political animal or a Muslim if he saw one. I can’t see him tipping off an organisation like Kalim’s or the Communists. Why should he, I’m worth money to him and they’re not.’

  ‘Well he seems to have given them a very good picture of you that’s woken up the press again.’

  ‘He couldn’t have done, he would never have had that picture. That was taken in Australia.’

  ‘What about your agent in Australia, what’s her name? Christine somebody?’

  ‘Christine Norton would never have had that photograph. I can remember that one. It was taken at my in-laws’ house when I was still married. I recognised the boundary wall behind me. It had climbing plants on it.’

  ‘Yes, I remember the background in that picture,’ McKay nodded thoughtfully. ‘Well somebody supplied it, are you absolutely sure Christine Norton wouldn’t have?’

  ‘Quite sure, she would never have had that photograph. It was in an album and probably still must be.’ Then the nebulous thought that had been coming into Wallace’s mind of late, which had nagged away at his consciousness and then evaporated when he tried to grasp it, suddenly crystallised. He hit his forehead with a clenched fist.

  ‘Hang on…wait a minute! Bloody hell!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve just remembered, something Kalim said when I was in the attic in that house, something on the lines of: ‘Hell hath no fury…especially so in your case!’ No wait a minute, he said: ‘Hell hath no fury, indeed so in your case, very much so’. I remember him saying that.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘That bitch Elsie…! Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned… they’ve been onto her and she’s been talking.’

  ‘Elsie?’ McKay asked. ‘Oh, you mean your wife…sorry…ex-wife?’

  ‘She supplied that photograph to somebody, and the press either got hold of it or else she gave it to them direct.’

  ‘Drawing a long bow aren’t you?’

  ‘Long bow my arse! She’s the only one who could have supplied that photograph. They’ve been onto her, either Kalim or the police.’

  ‘Well, that doesn’t answer our other questions does it?’

  Wallace thought deeply for a moment, and clenched his fists against his temples.

  ‘It bloody well could,’ Wallace answered finally. ‘Let’s assume it was Kalim, or if not him personally, some of his bloody henchmen in Australia who contacted her. Somehow we’ve been compromised and I reckon it could be through Ben Wakefield. Remember that phone call? She knew everywhere I would be likely to go in England. I have friends and relatives in London, Surrey or Birmingham.’

  ‘But she wouldn’t know you were in England would she?’

  ‘Whether she did or didn’t, if someone else told her I was here, they could then ask where I’d be likely to go, who I would contact.’

  McKay sat bolt upright, and considered it. His brow puckered as he thought over the possibilities, and he gave a brief nod.

  ‘Possible,’ he said slowly. ‘That’s very possible.’

  ‘Another thing I’ve just thought of,’ Wallace added, and a trace of excitement must have come into his voice. ‘Ben Wakefield. Ben and I went out one night to the pub, he took a lot of time locking up, he said he’d recently had a burglary, somebody had broken in but he couldn’t find that anything had been taken.’

  ‘Maybe they were disturbed by neighbours, or by Ben himself, sometimes burglars do leave empty handed. Wait on! I’ve just had a thought.’

  ‘What?’ Wallace asked.

  ‘Maybe they did leave empty handed, but were they empty handed when they went in? Could they have left something behind?’ McKay drummed his fingers on the deck.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘A bug. Could they have placed a bug on Ben Wakefield’s telephone? One that picked up and transmitted all his calls, incoming and outgoing.’

  ‘Why should they…?’ Wallace began, but then the answer became obvious. With what they had in mind for Ravindran, and the plan to involve Wallace in it, they would have taken all eventualities into account. If Wallace was going to be used as the patsy then knowing his movements, where he was likely to go and where he was likely to be at any given moment would be an asset, in fact it would be an essential.

  ‘Who else would you be likely to call on while you were here?’

  ‘Norman Harrison, my cousin in Surrey, and an uncle and aunt
in Surbiton.’

  McKay sat back and plucked at his chin as he thought.

  ‘I have to make some phone calls,’ he said. ‘Give me the addresses of your relatives here, especially the cousin in Surrey. Does your friend Fred have a mobile telephone?’

  ‘Doesn’t ASIO supply those these days?’

  ‘Yes they do, smart arse! But I left mine in the car at Albrighton.’

  Fred did have a mobile telephone. There was no problem lending it to McKay who took it on deck and commenced dialling. Wallace knew who he was ringing, he heard him say ‘Alan?’ So he gathered McKay was calling his colleague Alan Kelsey at the High Commission. Wallace decided to stay in the cabin with Fred as he had offered both of them a cup of tea and Wallace felt it would be churlish to leave him alone. McKay returned after about a quarter of an hour.

  ‘Thanks Fred,’ he said as he handed the phone back. ‘Just a call to London, but they’ll be ringing back sometime if that’s OK?’

  The boat ambled slowly on through Birmingham inner suburbs, there were many locks to negotiate as Wallace had discovered to his cost on the way up. Fred had had to call in to a depot to pick up some cargo and to offload some, so they had a day in Birmingham. McKay and Wallace decided to go into the city for the afternoon while Fred dealt with his cargo. Apparently he was carrying pipe ware from Dudley, which was his main cargo, but he was picking up two cases of engine parts also destined for the capital.

  Wallace and McKay didn’t want to be hanging around as they felt they would stick out like sore thumbs and could attract attention. They arranged to meet with Fred half way down a bank of locks south of the main city, Fred grinned broadly as he stressed the half way aspect so they could do some more heavy work for him. They had no objection, they were glad of being able to give him some recompense for putting up with them.

  After a day in the city streets and wandering around the shops, they made their way back into the canal system, and bought a few items of groceries on the way. They saw his barge approaching from way off up the bank of locks, so they walked up to meet him. Fred saw them coming and gave a wave.