by Ngaio Marsh
Rosamund’s large green eyes widened even further, was Matron really threatening to sack her if she didn’t hand over a tenner? Matron was waiting, one hand out for the money, the key to the safe in the other.
‘I, well, I—’ stuttered Rosamund.
‘It would be awfully difficult getting a job right now, don’t you think, Miss Farquharson? Let alone without a reference. Still, I’m sure there are some factory jobs, somewhere about. Or land work, I believe there are quite a few young ladies working with the shearing gangs these days, what with the shortage of manpower.’
‘You wouldn’t,’ Rosamund was flustered, her face as red as her lipstick, ‘I thought—’
‘That I was a pushover, just because I’m not vinegar-sharp like Sister Comfort? Then you have another think coming, young lady. Let’s be quite honest, shall we?’ Matron squared her shoulders and turned to face Rosamund, ‘Your behaviour has been abysmal, since the day you arrived. You’ve made a fool of yourself with Private Sanders, and don’t make that face, I could hardly have failed to notice, you have the entire team of VADs gossiping about you, and goodness knows what the soldiers in Military 1 say in private, given their words in public are bad enough. There is a man dying here tonight, alone but for a grandson who, I now discover, barely knows him and chose not to visit him until tonight, despite several requests. You have a chance to redeem yourself, take the consequences of your actions and get to work on a new start. It is the one chance I will give you.’
Matron’s voice was low and considered, but her words cut far deeper than Sister Comfort’s scolding. Rosamund tried to respond but, when she opened her mouth, she found she had no words to express her shock. Matron nodded in satisfaction.
‘Leave your winnings with me, I shall lock the money in my safe and, when your shift is finished in the morning, you may collect the balance of ninety pounds.’
Matron finished her words, emphasising the word ‘ninety’ to assure Rosamund that she meant to follow through with her threat.
Rosamund clicked open her purse, dumped the bundle of notes on Matron’s desk and rushed from the office. Had she been in any state to slam the door behind her, she would have done, instead the warm wind did the job for her, slamming the door and rattling the whole office with its force.
Matron sat down and looked at the notes, at the key in her hand, and the neatly gathered pile of unpaid demands littering her desk. The small office shuddered as another gust of wind battered the thin weatherboard walls, a shock of lightning briefly lit the sky beyond the bare window, a stronger crack of thunder hard on its heels, and finally the downpour began. Matron leaned back in her worn leather chair and nodded. At least the torrent would keep anyone else from her door for the moment.
CHAPTER SIX
The occupant of the private room at the front of Military 1 was also having a difficult evening. He had been trying for some time to write a letter, a letter that was overdue and yet, for the life of him, he couldn’t seem to put pen to paper this evening. Nor had he managed to do so on any of the three evenings preceding. The rain now drumming a fierce tattoo on the corrugated iron roof above, syncopated with that which fell on the curved frame of the porch beyond, might have had something to do with it, but he feared his inability to express himself on paper was the symptom of a deeper malaise. It was just possible that he was homesick.
‘My dearest Troy’, he began again.
He stopped, looked at the page, crossed out the three words and took a clean sheet of paper.
‘Darling Troy’.
Shaking his head, he took up a third sheet of paper and tried once more.
‘My Troy’.
Again he faltered. ‘You utter dolt, Alleyn,’ he whispered to himself, conscious of the ward full of men mere feet away beyond the flimsy partition walls that formed the small private room he had been assigned as the base for this operation.
‘Troy is far from being a fool,’ he went on, ‘she knows very well there is a great deal to do with your work that you cannot say to her and even more that you struggle to say in person, let alone on paper. And God knows when this letter will get to her. Just write the words, you blasted idiot.’
He could not. Whether it was the incessant rain drowning all possibility of contemplation, or the sense of several dozen men beyond the thin walls, few of them sleeping, all with their own worries, all missing their own loved ones, Alleyn knew himself defeated.
He stepped away from the small table that served as a desk, stretching as he did so. He reached for his pipe and lit it, holding the match for a moment in his long, thin fingers. By the light of the match, and that thrown from the dimmed desk lamp, he saw himself reflected in the side window. A tall man stared back, a raised eyebrow rapidly followed by a frown. He rubbed his nose and sighed, cracking the window open a little further to shift the reflection and let in the scent of the drenched roses that were all about the hospital. The roses, at least, would be glad of the rain. Alleyn was glad of it himself, he’d been sleeping badly in the fierce heat of the past week, and it hadn’t helped that the secrecy of his task here at Mount Seager meant he had been cooped up in this private room almost the whole time since he had arrived under cover of darkness a week earlier, awaiting word from his superiors. The reason for his arrival at Mount Seager was known only to Alleyn himself, the Chair of the Hospital Board, an old and trusted friend of the most senior man in the New Zealand police force, and a single contact at the hospital. Matron appeared to have bought the story that Alleyn was the Chair’s English cousin, a writer collecting traditional tales in the Antipodes, cut off from home by the war and struck down by the kind of nervous distress known only to the most modern of artists and then only those with a private income. The tale was given out that he needed rest and quiet, and so rest and quiet—or as much as the men of Military 1 would allow—had been prescribed. He had been in place for the past week, listening through the partition walls, noting movement beyond this side window and the smaller one that opened onto the porch with a good view of the yard beyond, and studying the notes and observations passed on by his contact. As yet, there had been no development worth reporting to his superiors and nothing at all to write to Troy.
Alleyn looked at the travel alarm clock on his table, it was almost a quarter past ten. The grumbling and subdued guffaws of the men next door would abate soon. He sat down at the table, took up a clean sheet of paper and tried again.
My dear Fox,
As will be abundantly clear to you, my perspicacious friend, I am now well and truly arrived in New Zealand. You know I began my work in Auckland, welcomed rather fulsomely by the estimable local police force of that fair city. You will understand when I say I am grateful to have been spared their enthusiasm any longer. I was diverted almost at once from my appointed city and, that matter dealt with—a longer tale, for another time—I have been sent on dispatches to an altogether different part of this astonishing land. Of course I am not able to indicate precisely where, suffice it to say that were I allowed to have a good look around I should come back to you with tales of glorious scenery and majestic landscapes. There is, understandably, a growing unease to do with matters offshore. For those of us at home in London it has, I confess, been a little too easy to assume these lands at the end of the earth are safe from the ravages of war, but while their cities remain unharmed, their people are a different matter. A great many sons have left for King and Country, and too many have not returned. Those who have returned have often done so in very different health from that with which they left. There is a mix of concern for ‘Home’ as many of them still call it, an understandable concern for their own young men, coupled with a palpable worry that Japan is edging closer by the day. I must say, I fear they are right and it turns out my superiors in this endeavour hold the same view, with good cause. It is to be hoped that Troy is as accommodating as our own dear Scotland Yard. In addition to the personal trials of being so long from home, I admit to finding the idea of yet anot
her summer Christmas quite absurd, however extraordinary the surrounding scenery. I fear I shall never accustom myself to the idea of good old St Nick in cricket whites. The time, Brer Fox, is quite out of joint.
I shan’t go into the details of my current abode, other than to say that my legendary skills have detected not one but two affairs of the heart that are, true to form, failing to run smooth. I have also noted an understandable if tiresome degree of complaint from the stout fellows confined to the ward rather than barracks. The Matron here has a very modern approach to their convalescence, giving them ample opportunity, once they are well enough, to roam the grounds, play card and board games, read from well-stocked shelves. She maintains that distracting them from their injuries and illness will afford them far faster recuperation than the more usual enforced rest. She may well be right, they are very young after all, and young heads can be easily swayed when difficulty hits. Many of these chaps are the good sort who signed up right away, gung-ho and ready to take on the worst that Hitler could throw at them, the youngest among them have had to grow up awfully fast. No doubt they’ve seen sights akin to those that you and I cannot forget. The bonds forged between unlikely mates are as strong as one would expect and yet once back home it seems their fiercest gripe is an over-strict regime, the cost of a pint or a badly-ridden filly. As if all they have been through were but a dream. What a piece of work is man, eh Fox?
So it is that I end this missive where I began, unable to tell you my exact location, nor why I am here, nor to whom I must answer. I trust that by the time you receive this, the winter nights will be shorter, the evenings drawing out. No matter the world we find ourselves in whenever this war is finally over, I have no doubt there will always be need of the long arm of the law, we will be kept in busy employ.
He signed the letter with a careful hand and addressed the envelope with his customary precision. If he could not write the letter he ought to write, he would at least make a damn good fist of the one he found himself able to complete.
Alleyn looked at the clock for the third time that hour, noted that time was passing no faster than it had yesterday evening or the evening before and took a file of notes from a combination-locked briefcase. He found the pages that had given him pause when he’d first received the file and read them through once again.
In early November a garbled message had been picked up by local services monitoring radio frequencies. It didn’t appear to be in code at first, merely a message sent out, quite possibly from a youthful radio enthusiast, in the hope that anyone out there might respond. It was only when the message was picked up once more, and then a third time, each time from a different frequency, that the information was passed up the ranks. Once the counterespionage team had the information they quickly linked the timing of the messages to brief sightings of a Japanese submarine off the east coast. The vessel had been sighted twice, once reliably confirmed, the second time less certain, but when it became clear that the sightings coincided with the despatch of the second and third radio messages, even the unconfirmed sighting was taken seriously. From there it took but a short time to break the code. The actual information in the messages was not of any great substance, for they noted the military presence at Mount Seager hospital which was a matter of public knowledge and the submarine had already disappeared from view. However, the combination of radio messages and the two sightings was felt serious enough for the senior statesmen in Wellington to despatch Alleyn to Mount Seager to pick up what information he could from locals and patients alike. Alleyn and his superiors both understood that they might well be on a wild goose chase, the submarine had not been sighted for over five weeks, no further coded messages had been intercepted, and what the Inspector found was a simple country hospital, a set of army offices and, beyond the usual human dramas that any group of people were prone to, nothing to report. Until a day ago, when Alleyn’s contact at the hospital had delivered the latest sealed file. A new message had been intercepted, in a different code, not all of which had been deciphered, but it was now believed that a series of coordinates were to be transmitted in the morning after midsummer’s night. There was no information as to what the coordinates might reference, and still no clear understanding of the intended recipient of the messages, but the time factor meant that Alleyn had spent all day yesterday and most of last night on alert and, as midsummer’s night began, was no closer to knowing who or what he was looking for. It was all exceedingly frustrating.
‘There are more things in heaven and earth—’ Alleyn muttered under his breath, the end of the line cut off by a tremendous clap of thunder and simultaneous flash of lightning, illuminating the length of the yard beyond the front window and then the rain took on an even more driving tone. By now, the racket of the downpour was almost farcical, Alleyn decided he was incapable of rational thought and took to his bed. If he must play the invalid, he might as well act the part. There would be no sleep with this noise, but at least he might lay down and read. Twenty minutes later Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn of Scotland Yard was happily roaming the blasted heath with King Lear, the wind, rain and thunder outside providing admirable support.
CHAPTER SEVEN
In the private room of Civilian 3 another tragedy was finally played out. Young Sydney Brown had pulled himself together enough to return to his grandfather’s bedside and the little nurse in the room had sensibly allowed him the privacy that this time required. Forty-five minutes later when Sister Comfort came to check on Sydney she had found him hunched over a pillow, hugging it to his chest as he looked on in horror at the old man, still and already becoming cold in his bed. Now Father O’Sullivan prayed quietly, the nurse awaited Sister Comfort’s orders, Sydney tried not to show his revulsion at sitting alongside a dead body for the first time in his life, and failed miserably.
Dr Hughes knew enough about nurses and their understanding of patient protocols to take his cue from Sister Comfort, so he waited in silence for the older woman to speak. After an appropriate time of silence had elapsed, the exact number of minutes being something Sister Comfort had judged to perfection after all these years, she spoke up and, with no effort to lower her voice or soften her usual strident tone, gave her orders.
‘Dr Hughes, wait here, I’ll fetch the relevant paperwork and be with you in a moment. I shall pop in to Matron when I go to the Records Office and let her know.’
Dr Hughes offered to fetch the paperwork himself, but he was over-ruled as Father O’Sullivan sprang up from his hard wooden chair at the head of the bed, ‘No need for either of you to divert yourselves, I’ll alert Matron. You’ve plenty to do. I’ll go to her straight away.’
He was gone from the small room before Sister Comfort could protest that it was more usual for her to pass on this kind of news and for the vicar to stay with the bereaved.
Her next words to Sydney were sharper to match her frown, ‘Mr Brown, if you’d like to go along with the nurse, she’ll find somewhere for you to rest for the night.’
‘What? Rest? Nah, no thanks, Sister, but I can’t be—’ he shook his head, ‘I mean, I’ve got to go, things to do.’
Sydney Brown sounded as if he might make a run for it at any moment and Sister Comfort immediately squashed him.
‘I’m afraid not, Mr Brown. The next transport is not due to leave until six o’clock in the morning and even then it will depend on the state of the roads. Frankly, I’d be very surprised if anyone leaves Mount Seager tomorrow morning. A storm like this has a bad habit of bringing down a flash flood and making the bridge too dangerous to cross. It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve been cut off by the river and I doubt it’ll be the last. Nurse, if you will?’
The shocked Sydney Brown stumbled to his feet, fidgeting with his collar and cuffs as if he might square up for an argument and then, seeing the determination in Sister Comfort’s eyes, he followed the nurse, his feet scuffing at the polished floor, his arms still wrapped around the pillow he held as a comforter.
Dr Hughes was no longer surprised by Sister Comfort’s brusque manner. Whatever the situation, whether he would have spoken carefully or forcefully himself, Sister Comfort could be relied upon to crash into any scenario with neither care nor finesse. He noticed now, as he had several times before, that her manner was actually remarkably useful. The little nurse, who appeared as inexperienced with death as Sydney Brown, had assumed the mantle of her office and was now the epitome of efficiency, as Sister Comfort had no doubt intended, while Father O’Sullivan had left with his unusually prayerful demeanour quite put away. In fact, he had looked much more like his regular self, a figure Rosamund Farquharson once mischievously but accurately described as looking ‘like a bank clerk who somehow found himself in a priest’s cassock and forced to deliver a sermon’.
Sister Comfort turned to Dr Hughes when the others were gone, ‘I shall send Will Kelly to deal with the body and get it down to the morgue. We’ll have to be fast, he’ll not keep in this heat.’
She turned on a silent heel and was gone.
Left alone with the corpse, Dr Hughes shuddered and turned his back on the dead man. He had seen far too much of death in the past two years and even an old man dying of natural causes disturbed him. He tried to calm his breathing, clenched his fists to still his shaking hands, but it was no good, the sight of the dead man took him back to the heat of battle, the stench of war, the bloody and broken young men calling for his help. These were the cries that infested his dreams, interspersed with the awful silence of death, the silence that now woke him whenever he tried to sleep. Dr Hughes became almost faint, quite dizzy and turning into the room, he grasped the foot-rails of the bed to steady himself. He forced himself to open his eyes. Here he was, in the old man’s room. There was the corpse. Yes, the man was dead, but he was old, nothing dreadful had happened to him, his was not a life cut off in its prime.
