by Ngaio Marsh
Alleyn let out a low groan and leapt across to Matron’s office. As soon as Bix saw him move the sergeant came hurtling from the other end of the yard, which meant that he was just behind Alleyn and close enough to hear the detective’s vehement curse as he opened the door to Matron’s empty office.
Shaking his head angrily at himself, Alleyn turned to Bix, ‘I’ve been a damn fool, Sergeant. I was so keen to preserve the crime scene for your local force, I neglected to pay proper attention to the scene itself. A stupid mistake, one I’d tear a strip off a junior officer for making and I sincerely hope we don’t all pay for it. Call those three soldiers of yours and tell them to rip out this office entirely. They’re not to touch the safe, I’m sure there are fingerprints a good local man can yet discover, but I want everything else lifted and shifted until they find the exit the vicar used. I imagine there must be a way into the tunnels beneath this office that we have missed. Double quick.’
Bix ran off to call his soldiers to work and Alleyn took a second to berate himself, ‘Very clever indeed, Roderick. Now stop feeling so damn sorry for yourself and get on with the job.’
He turned at the sound of running feet and Bix was at the door with Brayling and Sanders. Bix looked sick, while the two soldiers looked fit to bust, Brayling in particular appeared to be holding in his anger with huge difficulty, his hands formed into tight and ready fists.
‘What now, Bix?’ Alleyn asked.
‘Private Pawcett, Sir. Nowhere to be found. Cleared out.’
Brayling spoke up first, ‘We were waiting just inside the ward, Sir, like you said. Then I saw you run across the yard so I came out on the porch and I could’ve sworn Bob was behind me, on my oath. Only I turned round and he was gone.’
‘Bastard,’ muttered Sanders, underlining Bix’s clear inference that Pawcett was a villain, while Brayling uttered an oath in Māori which Alleyn found both convincing and, had he been in Private Pawcett’s shoes, extremely disconcerting.
Choosing to placate the men in order to ensure their co-operation rather than stoke their fury while it had no outlet, Alleyn held back his own frustration to say simply, ‘Suspects do seem to be revealing themselves at a rather alarming rate. Sergeant, let’s leave these good men to get on with their work, you and I must head to the morgue post haste.’
‘I thought you’d want that, Sir and I’ve ordered the others back into the Transport Office in the meanwhile. No word about the vicar, of course, but it won’t take long for them to work it out.’
Alleyn checked his watch as they left and grimaced. The scant information from his superiors had been clear on one point only, that the dawn after midsummer night was the most likely moment of contact. What that contact might entail, whether transfer of information to the Japanese submarine sighted, lost and sighted again within the past fortnight, or something even more disturbing, and by what means, they had no way of knowing. Pawcett certainly appeared to have put himself in the frame as to whom, Alleyn sincerely hoped they might find the rascal before they were confronted with what.
‘Do you know, Bix,’ he said as they neared the Transport Office, ‘It feels as though I’ve spent the last week painstakingly searching for a needle in a haystack and just as the shining eye of the needle in question shimmered into view, the entire unstable edifice has been overturned by the altogether nightmarish events of this short night. I fear the whole scene is about to come to a crashing finale. Frankly, were Bottom to emerge from the bush with a cohort of fairies and Titania fast on his tail, I wouldn’t be at all surprised.’
‘You what, Sir?’ Bix answered, unable to contain himself this time.
Alleyn shook his head and then held up a hand for silence as he heard the unmistakable sound of an engine turning over, failing to catch, spluttering to a stop and then cranking up again, more forcefully this time, before catching into a low rumble of life.
Inside the Transport Office Mr Glossop first howled, then leapt to his feet and, pushing Sister Comfort and Dr Hughes out of his way, let out a strangled cry, ‘My van, that’s my flamin’ van, how bloody well dare he?’
With an agility none of those assembled would ever have suspected, and even Rosamund Farquharson knew better than to comment upon, Glossop flew down the steps like a fat wood pigeon taking flight in alarm. He jumped over the bed of the shrubs between the offices and ran straight into the long drive of the hospital. The others raced after him, Alleyn issuing stern orders for Glossop to come back, orders which Glossop utterly disregarded.
‘Stop, damn you, stop!’ Glossop yelled in the direction of the van, the driver impossible to see with the headlights off and dawn not yet arrived.
Picking up speed, Glossop threw himself in the way of the van, which swerved just in time to avoid knocking him clean over and, having mounted the lawn briefly, the driver then righted the van’s course and continued a stalling, stop-start getaway along the driveway. Whoever was driving did not know the peculiarities of the vehicle as well as Mr Glossop, but they knew enough to drive faster than Glossop could run and, as they all watched in horror, the van picked up speed and made straight for the hospital entrance and the bridge beyond.
‘Whoever’s driving, they must be desperate,’ Sarah Warne said. ‘Even if the water level has gone down enough to get onto the bridge, those loose boards will catch any tyre, let alone a flat one.’
‘There were no flat tyres,’ Alleyn said darkly. ‘The van was driven unevenly because the driver was in a blind panic, all four tyres were good as new.’
‘But that can’t be,’ Glossop stuttered, ‘she said, Matron said, there were no spares, she said—’
‘No time to explain,’ Alleyn shook his head and turned to Sarah Warne, ‘I assume you know your transport bus better than most, Miss Warne?’
‘I’ll say,’ said Sarah, ‘it’s a tricky beast at the best of times, but I think I’ve found my way with it.’
Alleyn held up a hand. He looked around him for a moment, taking in the fear in the faces of everyone staring at him, and made his decision. ‘Take Bix with you in the bus as far and as fast as you can, after Mr Glossop’s van. Hughes, you’re to go with them. Whoever is driving is in a reckless state and may well be in need of medical assistance if they attempt to cross the river. I trust they will not.’
The doctor dithered for a second until Sarah took his hand and he seemed to pull himself together. They hurried off.
‘And Hughes,’ Alleyn called after them.
‘Sir?’
‘You’ve been out in the field, do your best to make sure they don’t do anything—’ he paused and Sergeant Bix thought the detective was being rather too coy with his language for such an emergency.
‘Damn stupid, Sir?’ Bix said, ‘I’m sure the young doctor will be on top of that. Off you go, you two. Set the engine running, I’m right behind you.’
Hughes and Sarah rushed for the bus while Bix took his orders from Alleyn.
‘Do whatever you must, Sergeant. I can’t imagine the driver, who we must assume is Father O’Sullivan, however out of control he is, will attempt to cross the bridge, and yet that remains a distinct possibility. Use your discretion and, for God’s sake, man, let’s try to avoid any further alarums before dawn.’
Bix hared after Sarah and Dr Hughes and Alleyn turned to Sister Comfort, ‘Sister, check on each of your nurses and make sure they understand they are under the strictest of orders not to leave their posts, nor their charges their beds until I say otherwise. Miss Farquharson, fetch some hot sweet tea for Mr Glossop, take him with you to the kitchen. With any luck Bix will be back in no time with the thief and Mr Glossop can breathe again. Take Mr Kelly and Sydney Brown along with you too.’
For once, Glossop was silent, stunned as he was by almost losing his life under the wheels of his own van and the fact that he could not stop thinking about the truth the detective had pointed out, that none of the tyres were flat.
Much as he might have enjoyed the moment when Glossop finall
y worked out exactly what that must mean, Alleyn tore himself away, leaving them with a nod, ‘I’m afraid there is another matter that simply cannot wait any longer for my attention.’
Alleyn raced off leaving Rosamund Farquharson to raise an eyebrow and comment under her breath on the Inspector’s elegant inscrutability even in a moment such as this, before taking Mr Glossop’s arm and leading him to the kitchen.
They were almost there when the penny dropped and Mr Glossop yelped, ‘No, she can’t have. You mean she lied about the tyres? But why?’
Sarah reached the main entrance to the hospital driveway and took the road towards the bridge, the sound of the still-rushing water very strong now. She was driving as fast as she dared and a good deal faster than usually felt safe in the old transport.
‘It must be Father O’Sullivan in Glossop’s van, musn’t it, Sergeant?’ Dr Hughes asked Bix, ‘I didn’t see him when we ran out into the drive and he hasn’t appeared since. How on earth did he get out of Matron’s office with all of us watching the door?’
‘Less speculation, Dr Hughes, let’s allow Miss Warne to concentrate on driving us safely, shall we?’
Bix’s response was short, his mind on the bridge ahead, the rushing water beneath. He too hoped that Father O’Sullivan was not desperate enough to attempt the crossing, but he had seen desperate men in the past and there really was no telling what awaited them when they caught up with the van, if they did.
Alleyn turned back towards the offices as Sanders and Brayling came running.
Sanders spoke first, ‘Sir, we’ve found it, the office has an opening, heading down. It slopes right under the yard. I went a very little way along and there’s what looks like an entrance into the tunnel, but it’s hidden on the tunnel side, so you’d never know it was there.’
Alleyn raised an eyebrow, ‘And no doubt there’s a further passage that leads out to a forgotten mine beneath the mountains where the king of the faeries hoards his gold. Very well, Sanders, you’re to use the entrance from the office and head along the passage to the tunnel, but stay in that section, do you hear? I don’t want you to go into the tunnel itself, nor to the morgue. Take a torch and check every inch of the path.’
‘What am I looking for, Sir?’
‘Much as I wish you might find a beautiful fingerprint, carefully outlined in dust that has not been touched for centuries, which not only points in the direction of our culprit, but notes their name at the same time, while explaining the entire convoluted mess, I fear the time for wishing is past. Signs, Sanders, you’re looking for whatever doesn’t seem right.’
‘With respect, Sir, none of it seems right.’
‘Quite. Brayling and I will head in the other direction towards the Bridge.’
‘And what are we looking for, Sir?’ asked Brayling.
Alleyn frowned, ‘We’re looking for hieroglyphs and hoping that in finding them we will also be granted the power of translation, Corporal. Anything that looks out of place, unusual, unexpected.’
At which precise moment Rosamund Farquharson appeared, ‘You’re also looking for Sydney Brown, Inspector. I’ve been all round the houses, I’ve irritated the night nurses no end, not that they aren’t already awfully put out about not being able to leave their posts and no one letting on a word about why and, to use the local vernacular, stone me but I can’t find the little bugger anywhere.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Sarah drove off into the dark, Dr Hughes in the passenger seat directly behind her, Bix across the aisle from him. None of them spoke as they stared out into the darkness beyond. Sarah recalled crossing the bridge not twelve hours earlier. It was a fierce river with brutally cold water fed directly from the mountains beyond the foothills, many the unsuspecting traveller caught in a whirlpool or hidden current, their breath stolen by the heart-stopping chill of the ice-cold water. Locals knew to be wary of the river, to respect it. Father O’Sullivan was a local, whatever mess he had got himself into, he must know it would be terribly dangerous now that they’d had such a dreadful storm, surely he wouldn’t try to cross?
She drew the bus up to a careful halt as the road gave way to the swollen river, the bridge directly ahead. Something was on the bridge and it was not stable.
‘Turn on your headlamps, Miss Warne, we need to see this, whatever it is,’ Bix said.
The sudden glow of the headlamps showed clearly that not only had the bridge lost half a dozen planks, open scars giving way to rushing water beneath, but there, not halfway across, was Mr Glossop’s van, peculiarly angled. It was leaning heavily on the white-painted rail, the only thing holding it in place was the left back wheel, sunk into a gaping hole where one of the planks was missing. The van rested precariously against the rail, swaying slightly, and with each deceptively gentle lurch seemed more likely to release itself from the gap and roll over into the violent river below.
Sarah was out of the driver’s seat and ready to run over the remaining boards to the van when Sergeant Bix held up his hand, ‘Wait.’
‘We can’t wait, look at the angle it’s on, it’ll go over any moment now,’ she replied, clambering from the bus.
‘I heard someone. Wait,’ the sergeant demanded with the force he used to command dozens of spirited young men.
Sarah stopped, they quietly climbed from the transport bus and stood in the semi-darkness of the false dawn, the water rushing past just feet below them. There it was again, a call, a cry for help.
‘I can’t make it out,’ Luke said. ‘Is it coming from the van or from down there, along the bank?’
‘Hard to tell,’ answered Bix, ‘the river’s so loud, it’s as if the sound is coming from all over the place and then not at all.’ He looked from Sarah to Hughes and quickly sized them up, ‘Now listen, Miss Warne, I know you’re a darn sight smaller than the doctor here, but I’m not going to let you chance it. He’s been out in the field, he knows what he’s about. I don’t mind the two of us taking a risk, but I’m not going to let you go for it as well. Dr Hughes, you get over to the van—and for Gawd’s sake, take it slowly—I’ll try to scramble down the bank and see if I can spot anyone along the siding.’
Sarah shot an agonized glance at Luke as he nodded his agreement, he caught it and whispered to her, ‘I have to. You don’t know how much I have to do this.’
‘Both of you, take care,’ she said, trying to hide her fear with a cool tone. ‘I’ll wait by the bus in case we need to transport someone back, if they’re hurt.’
As she finished speaking, they heard it again, distinctly now, it was a plaintive call for help, and sounded like someone in pain.
Hughes and Bix parted, leaving Sarah to climb back into the bus, the engine ticking over just in case.
Hughes carefully made his way onto the bridge, doing his best not to look to the raging river below. He inched his way along, holding the creaking wooden rail, bending out over the churning water every time the van lurched a little more to the left.
Bix lowered himself over the edge of the bank and down towards the river’s edge. It was still very high, a good three or four feet higher than usual and even in the pale light he could see the water grasping at the bank, tearing at tree roots, patches of scrub, rocks. Bix was not an elegant swimmer, but he had a strong stroke and that usually helped him to feel at ease in the water. There was nothing about the river that felt easy to him now.
Hughes reached the van and took care to hold fast to the bridge itself, rather than the swaying vehicle. Bix scoured the sides of the bank. At the very moment the two men both realized they had not heard a cry for help for several minutes, they heard, as clear as the day that was coming, Sarah’s voice, high pitched but strong.
‘Help, hi! Help!’
And then nothing, a dreadful silence, and next came the horrible sound of the transport bus gears grinding, the vehicle slammed into reverse and driving off in a shower of loose shingle. Ignoring all danger, both men threw themselves back the way they had come. Th
ey arrived together, in time to see the bus rumble away.
Sarah had been sitting, heart in mouth, watching Luke edge carefully towards the van. She heard Bix call out once, twice, but no answer came. She was readying herself to run at Luke’s call, to help him deal with whatever he found in the front seat of the van, an injured Father O’Sullivan or worse. She was thinking about how much she loved Luke, how strong he was now, surely he must see that about himself? He was a good man and a brave one.
Then suddenly the gloaming turned pitch black, the false dawn was swallowed by a dark blindfold pulled roughly over her eyes. She was wrenched from her seat and tumbled to the floor of the bus. She just had time to call out for help when her mouth was gagged by the same cloth, her hands pulled behind her back and tied. She was rolled along the dusty floorboards of the bus and heard scuffling, shuffling, something being hoisted into the bus and dropped down, and then the bus lurched into action and reversed, turned, drove off. Sarah was jolted and bruised against the floor and the edges of seats. She counted one, two bends, one big bump and a smaller one, a corner and another. If Father O’Sullivan was driving, and surely it must be he at the wheel, he knew his way around these roads as well as Sarah did herself. It felt almost as if they were driving in a circle and back to the hospital, which made no sense. Then the bus came to an abrupt halt and her heart sank when she recognized Father O’Sullivan’s voice now that the sound of the engine was gone. She had assumed he was talking to her and didn’t understand why his frantic whispers were so quiet. When she heard the voice that answered him her blood ran cold.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
After Rosamund’s announcement about Sydney Brown’s disappearance, Alleyn took no time at all to recalibrate his plans. Sanders was to do just as he had been instructed, Brayling was to come along with Alleyn himself to the cave, Rosamund to make sure she kept an eye on Glossop and Kelly.
