The Memory Trap

by Anthony Price

  Mitchell ignored him. ‘Yes. We’ve traced the policeman, David.’

  ‘He wouldn’t be dead, by any chance?’ Richardson refused to be ignored.

  ‘He lives with his widowed sister in a village near Hereford, David,’ said Mitchell pointedly. ‘We have arranged for you to talk to him this morning.’

  Richardson leaned forward. ‘Did you talk to him, Dr Mitchell—last night?’

  ‘Yes, Major.’ Mitchell bowed to the urgency in Richardson’s voice. ‘We got him out of his bed at midnight. And we talked to him.’

  ‘Did you ask him about the spade?’

  Mitchell looked at his watch. ‘We’ve got a good half-an-hour’s drive, David. Shall we go?’

  ‘Did you ask him about the spade?’ Richardson refused to be gainsaid.

  Audley nodded to Mitchell.

  Mitchell stared at him for a moment, then turned to Richardson again. ‘Yes, Major Richardson—we asked him about the spade.’

  ‘And—?’

  A stronger gust of wind swirled over and around them, carrying the word away up the valley.

  ‘We also checked up on your own little accident, in London. And that was a lot easier. We only had to wake up a succession of irritable civil servants, as well as policemen, and pull rank on them. Plus the Defence of the Realm and the anti-terrorist regulations, and the Third World War.’ Mitchell took his revenge steadily. ‘And we established that you’d had an accident which wasn’t your fault. As a result of which an Irishman named Murphy was fined £15, with £25 costs, after pleading guilty to careless driving. Although his present whereabouts—and the whereabouts of a million other Murphies—‘

  ‘The devil with my accident, Mitchell!’ At the third try, Richardson got his word in edgeways. ‘What about the spade?’

  ‘The spade?’ Mitchell decided not to settle for one small victory, even for the time being. ‘That was PC Jenkins, retired. And you know how many Jenkinses there are in Wales—retired and unretired? Even Policemen Jenkinses? “Daft”, they thought I was, at first. And then “bloody daft” when I told them you’d lost a spade fifteen years ago, maybe. But now you wanted it back, and—‘

  ‘Paul—‘ Audley cut him off sharply ‘—that’s enough. Just tell us about the spade.’

  Mitchell looked at him, not so much twitchingly now as tired. And angry with it. ‘Right, David. So … I won’t tell you the rest of it, then—not even when I had to get Henry Jaggard to phone up the Chief Constable? After the Duty Sergeant told me to piss off—?’

  Just for a spade! thought Audley. With no poor crooked scythe to go with it—never mind any hammer-and-sickle. But … six men, in two countries, had died because of that spade, maybe. And, but for Jack Butler’s “error of judgement”, and then Colonel Zimin’s possible error, he himself might have been one of them, by God!

  ‘No.’ There might come a time to make a joke of this, if they outlived this day, and came safe home: Normandy had been like that. But this was neither the time nor the day. ‘Just tell us about the spade.’

  ‘Okay.’ Mitchell shrugged at him, and then at Richardson. ‘He didn’t remember the bloody spade—not at first … He didn’t even remember you, Major—not at first, when we gave him your name, no matter that you remembered his: he thought we were “daft”, too.’ Against all the odds, Mitchell brightened slightly. ‘But then, in the end, he did remember. Only not because of you, Major. It was the owners of the spade he remembered. Because they were unfinished business—that’s what he called them: “unfinished business”—‘

  ‘What owners?’ Richardson was calm now, almost ingratiatingly so.

  ‘The owners.’ Just as suddenly, Mitchell forgot to be angry. ‘The owners of the crashed van you reported—? It was their van … and they’d reclaimed it. And then they came back for their spade—‘ Now he was calm too. ‘Yes—?’

  ‘Were they the drivers?’ Richardson shook his head. ‘When I came on that van, it was on its side, in the road, with no one in it. And the windscreen was broken—it had hit the bank, and turned over … And there was blood all over the front seats. And … there was the spade there—on the floor—?’

  ‘So you called the police, like a good citizen.’ Mitchell nodded. ‘But the owners said it was stolen. And the police never found the drivers. But that was what PC Jenkins remembered, eventually: he thought they’d be in the local hospital, cut-and-bruised … or, preferably, worse. Like, detained for observation, with suspected fractures, to make it easy for him. But they weren’t … which he thought was odd. But … the spade wasn’t odd, Major.’

  Richardson frowned at him. ‘But I told him to show it to his boss—to find out who it belonged to. I told him what he ought to do, in fact, damn it!’

  ‘Well, he did find out that.’ Mitchell stared back at him defiantly. “The owners came in to collect it. And he only remembered that because he already knew them: they were a couple of “general dealers” from Abergavenny. Two right old lags he’d known for years … receiving stolen property, plus a bit of sheep-stealing, and all that. And he’d reckoned at first, once he’d traced the ownership of the van, that they’d be the ones who’d turn up black-and-blue—that they’d both been pissed when they crashed the van, and had run off so that they could sober up and establish an alibi … Which they had, of course—had an alibi: they said the van had been nicked from their yard, and they didn’t even know it was gone until the police phoned them up.’ He shrugged again. ‘So there wasn’t anything he could do then. Because they clearly hadn’t been bashed-up in any accident—not on that occasion, anyway.’

  ‘Not on … that occasion?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Mitchell grinned. “The real reason why he remembers the pair of them was that he did get ‘em in the end—for drunk-driving, that is.’ He nodded. ‘It was about eighteen months afterwards. Only this time they ran out of road in a more public place, not on a little back-road. And this time it wasn’t a van they were in—it was a damn great three-year-old Jaguar. Which turned out to be theirs. And that also surprised him, because they had been near-bankrupt for years. But he reckoned they must have pulled off a big burglary somewhere off his patch, probably over in England, and got clean away with it. Which was another reason why he started to remember everything. Because it narked him that they were able to pay the drunk-driving fine so easily, after the magistrates threw the book at them. And not even the five-year driving disqualification hurt them, either. Because they then de-camped off to Spain after that, to the “Costa del Crime” where all the rich villains go. While the poor old honest PC Jenkins himself retired on his police pension to keep house with his sister—‘ Mitchell broke off as he realized that Richardson was no longer listening to him, but was nodding to Audley.

  ‘That just about wraps it up—eh, David?’

  ‘The spade—‘ began Mitchell sharply. But then he broke off again as he began to interpret his own story.

  ‘They were sent to collect it.’ Richardson stared through Audley. “They must have spotted me—someone must have spotted me … After all, I was hanging round for about an hour or more, that afternoon … late afternoon, early evening—I was late for dinner with … my friends at Pen-y-ffin.’ He focused on Audley again. ‘Being a good citizen! This is what I get for being a good citizen, David!’ But there was no amusement in the reflection, only bitterness. And then the glazed stare returned. “The Russians couldn’t have known for sure that I’d spotted it. So they had nothing to lose, and maybe everything to gain, by sending their two locals to pick it up … But they couldn’t be sure—‘ He stopped as abruptly as Mitchell had done. And then his face became stone as his teeth clamped together. ‘So that wraps it up.’

  It did just about wrap it up, thought Audley—and not “just about”, either: the two venal “locals” (always go for professional petty criminals, that was what the book laid down: they were more easily scared into absolute obedience if you chose them carefully, balancing their relative lack of intelligence again
st their cost-effective greed and more limited ambition—and, most of all, the limits of their curiosity!); and, indeed, the proof-of-that-pudding was there in this whole sequence of dusty events from long ago, from a minor accident on the Welsh border, via another one in a London street, to the presumed suicide of an elderly and impoverished Italian lady in her heavily-mortgaged

  palazzo on the Amalfi coast. Only, until now, it had been an unconnected sequence. And now that it was connected it looked quite different.

  ‘

  Yes, I suppose it does, Peter. So far, anyway.

  ’

  ‘Wraps up what?’ Mary Franklin looked from Richardson to Audley, understandably irritated by them both.

  ‘I don’t really need to see PC Plod—Constable Jenkins.’ Richardson ignored her. ‘Like I said last night, David … our best bet is the SAS at Hereford. All this territory is theirs, pretty much—it used to be, anyway. From the Forest of Dean and the Black Mountains, northwards … And they’ll have contingency plans, you can bet—for the IRA, if not the Russians. And—‘

  ‘Dr Audley!’ Mary Franklin had graduated from annoyance to anger. ‘What is all this about?’

  ‘The spade, Mary.’ It was Mitchell who spoke, nodding to her as he did so. ‘Major Richardson’s little all-purpose spade. That’s what it’s all about—eh, David?’

  Little spade—Mitchell had got there, then!

  Little all-purpose spade, from long ago, carelessly lost—criminal carelessness, that would have been. But quickly recovered, nevertheless. And, meanwhile, that original mixture of bad-luck-accident and criminal carelessness had been attended to with the appropriate antidote of well-calculated ruthlessness—

  ‘Every Russian soldier has a spade.’ Mitchell nodded to her agaon, almost dreamily. ‘Eh, David?’

  It wasn’t really surprising that Mitchell had got there on his own, any more than Mary Franklin’s present incredulity was unsurprising. Getting there was what they were both paid to do, but Mitchell’s private obsession with all things military had given him the edge this time. Indeed, if he hadn’t been so stretched by other events, and so plain dog-tired, he might have got there last night, when the little all-purpose spade had surfaced again, at last.

  ‘It was a Russian spade?’ Spades, evidently, were tools in garden-sheds to Mary Franklin, with which gardeners dug gardens. ‘How do you know—?’ She spread the question among them. Only now she was less angry and surprised than frankly curious, to her credit.

  ‘A Spetsnaz’ spade?’ This time, at last, Mitchell addressed Richardson. But it wasn’t really a question: Mitchell was moving on already, to unwrap what had been wrapped up, with all the excitement of understanding animating him, after all his recent humiliations, through not-knowing what was happening down to having to ask for help from Henry Jaggard last night, when all else had failed.

  ‘What’s a Spetsnaz spade?’ Mary Franklin was on the same road now, but still at its beginning.

  ‘Same as a Russian army spade, Mary.’ Mitchell still concentrated on Richardson. ‘Every Russian soldier’s most important possession, after his Kalashnikov: the moment he stops shooting, he starts digging. Or paddling. Or cutting up his bread. Or … he sharpens it up, just in case?’ Now it was Richardson who got the nod. This one would have been Spetsnaz-sharp—right?’ Then Mary Franklin got her nod again, at last. ‘That’s for throwing, Mary. Because it’s so well balanced that it’s also one hell-of-a-weapon, in its own right—‘ Then Audley himself got the rest of the nod ‘—the best entrenching tool since the Romans, David? Isn’t there some ancient text about a Legion driving off the barbarians with their spades, when they were attacked while building one of their forts, eh? You’re our resident Roman expert—?’

  ‘And you are our resident Spetsnaz expert, Dr Mitchell?’ Richardson’s voice had lost all of its animosity. ‘As my successor?’ But then he smiled his old easy smile at Mary Franklin. ‘Dr Mitchell is absolutely right, Miss Franklin: it was a razor-sharp little spade I found. And it was … really, quite distinctive. Because it’s a ruler, to measure … whatever needs to be measured—the length of the handle, and the length and breadth of the blade: 32 plus 18 equals 50, by 18 … centimetres of course. And matt green, overall.’ The smile faded slowly. ‘They’ve got one at Hereford, in their collection—‘ He looked around suddenly, first at the ruins, and then at the wooded hillsides above them ‘—I’d be delighted to show the Hereford one to you, if you still doubt me—and Dr Mitchell, Miss Franklin—?’ Having made his point, he came back to Audley at last. ‘So, now that I really am one of your team, Dr Audley … shall we go, then?’

  Audley felt the first spots of rain in the wind spatter his face, out of the darker clouds which had been drifting like smoke among the topmost trees of the ridges.

  ‘Ah—David … Dr Audley—‘ Mary Franklin had assimilated everything she hadn’t known before, both about Russian military entrenching-tools and about Major Peter Richardson. So now she was as sharp as a Spetsnaz spade turning over in the air before it struck ‘—I must report in, to say where we’re going.’

  And she must do bloody-well more than that, now they had wrapped up fifteen-years-ago, to give Henry Jaggard all he needed for his horse-trading. ‘Yes, Miss Franklin.’ Apart from which, he badly needed to know what Henry Jaggard himself was doing, after his own advice from last evening, which not even Jaggard could safely have ignored; but which, equally, he couldn’t ask for now, in front of Richardson, who wanted blood, not glasnost! ‘And perhaps you can also ask Henry to alert Hereford—the SAS—to expect us, while you’re about it.’

  ‘And to get them off their arses, too.’ Outwardly, Richardson nodded, prudent, one-of-the-team-again commonsense, in agreement. But Audley caught more than that in his enthusiasm. ‘We need to seal off this whole area, if Lukianov is back in it. But not crudely, Miss Franklin: we’ve got to make sure he gets in first. Otherwise he’ll back off—do you see?’

  ‘Yes.’ For the first time Major Richardson got a Mary Franklin smile. ‘I do take your point, believe me.’ Then Audley received a Mary Franklin frown, which froze him with his mouth slightly open. ‘We have a phone cleared here, Dr Audley. So … if you would stay here—or, maybe get into my car, perhaps?’ Mitchell received the rest of the frown. ‘And, if you care to go with the Major, Dr Mitchell—to Hereford? After I have reported in—?’ The frown reversed itself, quite dazzlingly, as the original smile hit Richardson between the eyes again. ‘I’m sure Dr Mitchell knows the way, Major. And I will follow you, with Dr Audley.’

  She might not know about spades. But she knew what she wanted—and how to get it exactly, with that movement order, which split them neatly, beyond argument.

  No trouble, Charlie had said.

  But … what a waste—that loyalty to Henry Jaggard! Audley thought. ‘Very well, Miss Franklin. Right, Peter—?’

  2

  ‘DAMN THIS WEATHER.’ Mary Franklin squinted through the rain-blurred windscreen at the rear lights of the Porsche. ‘And we shouldn’t be doing this, anyway. It isn’t necessary.’

  ‘No.’ Audley settled back comfortably for the first time in days. And she smelt good, too. ‘Is that what Henry Jaggard said?’ He could imagine what Henry Jaggard had said: Don’t let the bastards out of your sight, Miss Franklin. ‘Don’t worry, Paul will look after the Major. And I know the way, if we lose them. I know all this country quite well, as it happens. From my old days.’

  ‘Yes?’ In spite of what he’d said (but because of what the egregious Jaggard had said?), she was determined not to lose the Porsche. But she gave him a quick glance, nevertheless. ‘How was that? You’ve never had anything much to do with the SAS, have you?’

  It was hardly a question; she had his long professional curriculum vitae at her fingertips for sure, Jaggard would have seen to that too. ‘No, not much—hardly anything, really. But I meant the old old days, Miss Franklin … may I call you “Mary”, Miss Franklin?’

  ‘Of course, Dr
Audley.’ She had the measure of the Porsche now: she was a good driver, predictably. And the Porsche was also slowing down somewhat—also predictably, as its occupants began to talk to each other, each having no doubt decided that there was more to be gained from the other by a temporary alliance than by chalk-and-cheese antagonism. ‘What “old” old days?’

  ‘When I was a student. And after.’ The past pointed conveniently to the present. ‘The Middle Ages was my special period. And the Welsh Marches are very … medieval, Mary. Lots of big castles … Chepstow, Raglan up ahead … Pembroke, to the west.’

  ‘Yes?’ She nodded politely into the murk. ‘You wrote a book about the Earl of Pembroke, didn’t you?’

  ‘William Marshall—yes.’ That would have been in the CV. ‘And lots of smaller castles. And middling ones, like the “quadrilateral”—Skenfrith, Grosmont, White and Maerdy, from Marshall’s time. Although Hubert de Burgh held them then, of course.’ He threw the names in deliberately. ‘They control the Monow valley, which is the way into Wales from Hereford. And out of it, into England—Hereford-Worcester, Hereford-Gloucester … and Cheltenham.’

  ‘Cheltenham?’ Her interest stirred, as he intended it should.

  ‘Indeed. And do you enjoy working for Henry Jaggard, Mary?’

  The rain slashed down more heavily. ‘I thought we were talking about medieval castles, Dr Audley?’

  ‘You ought to work for Research and Development. You’d have much more fun … Did you do what I asked, last evening? Has Henry made contact with the Russians?’

  She reached forward to increase the speed of the windscreen-wipers. ‘A meeting has been arranged for this afternoon. At 4 P.M.—‘

  Audley frowned. ‘As late as that?’

  ‘Is that late?’ She peered at a signpost. ‘”St Briavels Castle” … Is that one of your “middling” castles, Dr Audley?’