by Ngaio Marsh
‘And if you can possibly ensure that no one else disappears before sunrise, Miss Farquharson, I shall be enormously grateful.’
This time they ran to the cave, Alleyn leading with a sure-footed fury that both unnerved and impressed Brayling. He was unnerved because he was still to face his superiors or his family with his transgressions, and Alleyn might yet turn out to be his only witness for the defence. He was impressed because the detective was making his way along to the caves at an enormous lick and in the dark at that. Brayling looked around him and reconsidered, it was not dark. He could see his own feet on the ground, his hands before him. It would be darker yet, briefly, and then it would be day. He didn’t know why Alleyn was so fussed about dawn, but he knew it mattered. In no time they were at the mouth of the cave. Alleyn dived into the cool darkness with Brayling immediately behind, both men alert and ready.
Alleyn whispered to Brayling, ‘Hopefully we can use the false dawn to our advantage. With the growing light behind us our faces will be hidden. If Sydney is inside and, as I expect, at the back of the cave, he will be more exposed. We will need to do our best to read him, and fast. Follow my lead, Brayling. I’m trusting you.’
The two men advanced into the darkness, their eyesight adjusting as they went. Without the white blanket of light from the torch, flattening rocks and crevices, the cave itself seemed more hollow, deeper, and there, right at the back of the main body of the cave, standing on the ledge where it became a bridge between the cave floor on one side and the depths of the tomo on the other, stood young Sydney Brown, his pale face a shock of white against the dark grey rock. He seemed to be shaking and his hands were clasped together in fear or hesitation, but he looked directly at the two of them as he spoke, his voice not only remarkably clear but also reverberating slightly, a disembodied witness, telling his truths above an abyss.
‘I’ll do it, if you come any closer, I’ll jump.’
Alleyn held out a steadying hand to Brayling who seemed about to spring, whether to leap up and drag the young man back to safety or to run from the cave and whatever curse Sydney was about to bring upon them, Alleyn couldn’t tell.
‘Sydney,’ Alleyn spoke gently but with determination, his careful voice firm and reassuring, ‘don’t be foolish, we can help you. I can help you.’
‘No one can, you don’t understand,’ Sydney responded, all trace of the surly young man gone, now he was just a lost boy, fearful and cold, hiding in the dark.
‘I know you got yourself into a pickle of some sort, a little while back. I know you thought there was only one way out, you were told there was no way out.’
‘I had no choice,’ Sydney whimpered.
Alleyn wanted to shake the young man, to drag him down from the ledge and force him to see sense, make him admit that of course there had been a choice, there was always a choice to do right or to do wrong, but now was not the time.
‘I know you didn’t want to take on the farm, Sydney.’
‘I wanted to be an engineer.’
‘Yes, the farm is worth a good deal though, isn’t it?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
Standing beside Alleyn, Brayling couldn’t help but agree with the tortured young man. Alleyn had said time was of the essence yet here he was discussing sale prices for farmland, it was crazy.
Alleyn pressed on, his tone calm, rational, ‘It costs to study, a fair amount I imagine, to get a good degree. Perhaps you thought you might sell the farm to do so. Perhaps you talked to your grandfather about your hopes, your plans?’
‘I didn’t even know my grandfather.’
‘So you said, and yet here he was, leaving you this great estate.’
‘Nothing great about it, half the land’s run down, the stock are in an awful state, nothing’s been looked after since my old man left, he didn’t bloody care for it either.’
‘Are those your words, Sydney, or someone else’s? Someone who knows more about farming than you?’
Sydney’s laugh was bitter, ‘Everyone round here knows more about farming than I do. I didn’t ask for it. He should have left it to my old man, that’s the right thing to do, not that the lazy bugger would have thanked him for it.’
‘And still your grandfather chose to leave the farm to you. It was coming your way and you’d had word that he was ill, you knew he was asking for you.’
‘So what?’
Alleyn frowned, stroking his long index finger against his forehead, ‘You see, Sydney, what I don’t quite understand is why it took you so long to come and visit him?’
‘I told you, I didn’t know him from Adam, I didn’t want it. I didn’t fancy some deathbed scene, all playing upset with fake words and false tears.’
‘I think there was more to it than that,’ ventured Alleyn.
‘Don’t know what you’re on about,’ the young man mumbled.
‘No?’ Alleyn asked, his voice very measured. Brayling thought he could hear a warning of thin ice in the detective’s tone.
Sydney shrugged but gave no answer.
‘Shall I tell you what I mean? Do you want me to spell it out?’ asked Alleyn.
Sydney did not respond, but he turned and stared far down into the depths behind. Alleyn and Brayling held their breath in the semi-darkness, there was no sound but the slow drip drip of rainwater seeping through the earth above them and into the pools below.
Alleyn decided this was the moment and he spoke roundly into the cool air, taking a step forward as he did so, ‘You didn’t come to the cave to jump into the tomo, Sydney, you only went to that end of the ledge when you heard us entering. You were at the other end when you heard us approaching, weren’t you? Didn’t you come into the cave so that you could go along the tunnel? Make your way down to the Bridge pub?’
‘I—no, I don’t know about no tunnel,’ Sydney protested, but from the corners of his eyes he looked towards the end of the ledge, where it sloped downwards towards the tunnel entrance.
‘Come, Sydney, tell the truth and shame the devil.’
Sydney laughed bitterly, ‘Shame him? It’s not the devil who has the shame, Inspector.’
Alleyn was thoughtful, ‘No, I see that now. It must have been very difficult for you, these past few weeks, trying to work out what to do, which line you could bear to cross, how far you would allow them to push you.’
Sydney stood stock still on the ledge, as if he was waiting for Alleyn’s next words, as if those words might help him decide what to do.
‘They have been pushing you, haven’t they? They told you that you owed them far more than you could afford, isn’t that right, Sydney?’
There was an interminable silence, Alleyn could feel Brayling beside him, utterly bemused, and he wondered if perhaps he was on entirely the wrong track. He was just about to speak up again, to chance his hand, when a small whimper of agreement came from the young man on the ledge and Alleyn saw Sydney’s shoulders settle a little, his body turn ever so slightly back towards the cave.
Alleyn continued, hopefully and carefully, ‘I understand there has been an awful lot of gambling going on, particularly among you younger men. You were in debt to these people, weren’t you? They said you had to pay up. There was no more time and they threatened you, they demanded the money now.’
Another murmur of agreement, another quarter-turn back in, away from staring into the gaping core of the earth.
‘But when you explained that you couldn’t pay, having discovered that the farm would be terribly hard to sell, and even if you could find a buyer willing to take it on in such a state it would take months before the proceeds came through, when the old man kept lingering on, week after week, at death’s door but not crossing the threshold, they demanded another form of payment, didn’t they?’
‘I can’t say, I can’t.’
‘You must, Sydney. It’s not too late, whatever is going to happen this morning, you can still do the right thing, you can change the course. Listen to me,
blackmail is a filthy crime, the very worst. The people who are blackmailing you always knew they would ask you to do this thing for them eventually. They planned it all, making you think they were happy to wait for their money and then demanding it in the few days leading up to this morning, now. They knew there was no way you would be able to repay them and they knew they would force you to repay the debt in another way. They have used you from the start.’
‘Even if they did, even if you’re right, it’s too late.’
Alleyn ignored him and went on telling the tale, hoping he was right, a word out of line now and it could all come crashing down, ‘Your grandfather was dying, you knew that and so did they, the people to whom you owe money, but the old man was dying too slowly for you to get any money from the farm. After so many requests for you to visit, you finally came out to Mount Seager, but your grandfather’s request wasn’t the only reason you agreed to be here tonight, was it, Sydney? Those people, the ones calling in your gambling debts, they wanted you to do something else for them, didn’t they? Something they would accept as a down-payment, until you inherit the farm, until you sell it and pay them back? Something to prove they could trust you.’
There was another silence and Alleyn heard Sydney shift ever such a little. He held his breath, worried that he had gone too far. He could feel Brayling at his side, looking at him in horror, equally worried that these words would push the young man beyond sanity. Even so, Alleyn knew he had to go on. It was less than thirty minutes before dawn, he had to force the truth from Sydney somehow.
He went on, ‘And that person to whom you owe your debts, they knew that you would be given time alone to grieve. They asked you to use that time to get a message from someone here at the hospital and then to pass it on just before dawn, didn’t they?’
Out of the darkness there came a small, pained voice, ‘Yes.’
‘The message came from Private Pawcett?’
‘How did you know?’
Brayling spat and Alleyn answered plainly, ‘Private Pawcett has made himself rather conspicuous by his absence. Were you told to take this message to someone at the Bridge pub?’
‘No, not the Bridge. They just said I was to go along the tunnel and they’d find me.’
Alleyn took a deep breath, he hated to do this, but there was no choice, it was all too close, too late. He took a step forward, ‘Sydney, I’m giving you a chance. When were you to deliver this message?’
‘Now, right before sunrise. He said, Pawcett said, they’d know what to do with the information, but I wasn’t to give it until just now. He said if I gave it earlier then they might be tempted to use the information earlier and we’d all be sunk.’
Alleyn started, ‘Were those his exact words?’
‘Yes.’
With a speed that took both Sydney Brown and Brayling by surprise Alleyn leapt athletically from the edge of the narrow pool to the ledge, he advanced the half dozen steps to Sydney’s position in no time at all and took hold of the young man’s arm. At this end of the ledge there was less than a foot’s width separating the two of them and the chasm beneath.
Alleyn spoke urgently, ‘You have a choice now, Sydney, a real choice. You can come along with us, we can get through the tunnel in time for you to offer whatever password you’ve been told, and help us catch the culprit or culprits red-handed. I know you feel bitter about the hand life has dealt you, but I cannot believe you feel so harshly done by as to risk the lives of your fellow countrymen. Even if you genuinely care nothing for your country or for its servicemen, this is a chance to finally do something for yourself. You are in trouble, as you and I both know, or you’d not be standing here. But you didn’t jump before and you haven’t jumped since we came in. I don’t think you want to jump, Sydney. I think you want to try again. Come with us, man, do try again.’
Alleyn waited, his mind racing. On one level he knew full well that he was taking an absurd risk, that Sydney Brown might take the chance he had rashly offered by holding onto him and pulling them both into the abyss in a moment of madness. On another level he too weighed the lives of the many against those of the few and made his own decision. Alleyn knew that he had placed himself squarely in the camp of the few and Sydney now, quite literally, had the upper hand.
Alleyn paused for a second and then, making sure that his voice was so quiet that Brayling could not hear them, he whispered, ‘I know what you did, Sydney, all of it. What’s done is done, but you can still try to do some good. Now, before it’s too late. This is your chance to do some good in a night of terrible wickedness.’
In the seconds that followed, Alleyn found himself thinking of Troy, of the time they had already been apart, of the indeterminate time before he saw her again. He saw in his mind’s eye her beautiful thin hands, her intelligent brow, her reticence, almost fear, in the face of anything emotional, anything revelatory that was not in her control. He thought too of how very foolish he had been in misreading her for so long, wasting time before being open with her. He hoped he had not misread Sydney Brown now.
‘I’ll tell you,’ Sydney said, his voice low and dispirited.
‘Good man,’ declared Alleyn, his relief forcing the words out in a rush, ‘Better than that, you’ll help us, won’t you? You’ll come with us through the tunnel, go ahead a little way and then give the signal without alerting your contact in any way, and you’ll allow us to catch them red-handed. Say you will, Sydney. Be a man.’
Getting down from the ledge was slower than Alleyn would have liked, the awful drop behind them was terrifying and whatever bravery had allowed Sydney to take his place on the bridge of rock had drained away with his confession, and he painstakingly edged his way towards the wider part of the ledge. It occurred to Alleyn that perhaps the greater fear was what awaited him, not only at the end of the tunnel but afterwards. The boy showed more courage than he might have expected when they finally arrived, several agonizingly slow minutes later, at the entrance to the tunnel itself.
‘Torch or no?’ Sydney asked.
‘What were you told?’
‘No torch, no light, no sound.’
‘Then we shall go along with you and play out the scene exactly as you were told.’
Alleyn led the way and the three men walked forward into the tunnel, the silent darkness closing in around them.
They were nearing the point where the tunnel met the morgue when Sanders’s voice, barely audible, whispered, ‘Sir?’
Alleyn whispered behind to Sydney Brown and Corporal Brayling, ‘Wait there a moment.’ Then he walked on another few steps, turning his head to the voice, ‘Sanders? Where are you?’
‘To your left, Sir, I know you said I oughtn’t to come into the tunnel itself, but the opening is dead peculiar and I kind of found myself here before I knew where I was.’
‘It can’t be helped now. What did you find?’
‘Clean as a whistle, Sir, nothing to report in the pathway itself. I did as you said, followed the route from Matron’s office and I’ve been right here ever since. It’s a terrifically steep slope from Matron’s office, stone me if I didn’t lose my footing a few times. Right at the end, just where it levels off and before it opens into the tunnel with no warning, there’s a dead sharp twist round to the right, so it’s almost like you come into the tunnel from alongside it. That’ll be why you didn’t notice it before,’ he added, sparing Alleyn’s blushes.
‘Very kind, Private. Do you think someone or something might have been down there all along, hidden from sight in this recess?’
‘I reckon it would be dead easy to miss anything there, especially if you didn’t even know it was there in the first place.’
‘Wait a moment, will you? I need to give instructions to our unfortunate young man.’
He made his way back to Sydney and Brayling, ‘All right, Sydney, we’re almost at the way into the morgue. My guess is your contact will either be waiting there, ready to pounce, or expecting you to head on to the Bridge H
otel, where the tunnel opens into the pub’s cellars. Are you sure they gave no instructions as to where you were to wait?’
‘None, Sir.’
‘Very well, you must go on alone. We will be close behind. You cannot undo what has been done, but you can use this opportunity to begin to make amends.’
Alleyn felt rather than saw Sydney hear the words and understand the enormity of what lay ahead. He gently held the young man’s shoulder and then guided him forward. Sydney moved away into the tunnel, towards the morgue and the Bridge pub beyond.
Alleyn waited until the soft thud of Sydney’s steady step was a few more feet away and then turned back to call the soldiers to action, his voice was very quiet but extremely clear, ‘If my calculations are right, Sydney will be alongside the morgue in less than five minutes. I believe his contact will meet him in the morgue, there is no time to waste.’
He gave his orders with military efficiency and the two soldiers departed swiftly along the tunnel back to the cave, keen to play their part. Alleyn found himself smiling for a moment and shook his head, ‘Not yet, Roderick old man, it’s not time to hang out the flags just yet.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Much later Alleyn would remark to Troy that what happened next appeared to him exactly as preposterous and as well-choreographed as the final act of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, when the actors all tumble in together from their night in the wood outside Athens, sweet dreams are unmasked, lovers revealed and secrets quickly shuffled out of sight, in order to pretend that all is well. Before that moment, and before Puck swept away the whole play as if in a dream, there was one final set piece to come.
While Alleyn headed on alone, Brayling and Sanders carefully let themselves into the morgue. In the quick sprint back along the tunnel, through the cave and the barrier of rose bushes, then along the yard to the morgue, their eyes became accustomed to the dawn growing lighter by the minute. The morgue, with the heavy door silently closed behind them, seemed intensely dark. They edged their way into the body of the morgue itself and waited. They could see nothing and hear nothing other than their own breath, blood rushing through their veins, pounding in their ears. Both men had faced action, both had been scared for their lives, for the lives of comrades. This was nothing like war and yet it had a feeling of those days, a time to which they would soon return.
