Against the Tide

by John Hanley

  Uncle Ralph seemed unlikely. Too much action. A stiff letter was more his style. I’d love to blame Kohler and it was possible they were German, trying to disguise their accents. Surely Eric and Fred wouldn’t play this rough to frighten me off?

  Apart from the message, Alf and his little bastard also seemed to suspect that Lawrence had been connected to this Brough Superior. But was this really the bike?

  Fred had always maintained that it was special and Malita had said something about it killing before. What about the others that Eric had mentioned? Were the UK security services involved? Perhaps they were just business rivals but that badge had looked official. Their menace had been real enough. Perhaps I should just go home, count my bruises and follow the advice I’d been given.

  I mounted up and snicked her into gear. My face blossomed with heat. How dare they? I’d never given in to bullies. Why should I start now? I’d find them and – well, I didn’t know what I’d do. I needed to know more about them first and I wouldn’t find that by trailing home with my tail between my legs. Besides, turning up in this condition would provoke questions I didn’t want to answer. I couldn’t ride without trousers though – I didn’t want to be arrested for indecent exposure. That left the contents of my holdall.

  30

  ‘I didn’t know you played cricket.’ Caroline’s initial amusement at my outfit turned to anger as she examined me. ‘I thought I told you not to come here.’

  My lack of smile matched hers.

  ‘Something’s happened, hasn’t it?’

  I didn’t even know why I was there. Boadicea had brought me and she hadn’t explained.

  Caroline sighed in exasperation. ‘I suppose you had better come in – but you’re not staying.’ She opened the door wider.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Hayden-Brown’s voice boomed from his study to the right of the tiled hallway.

  ‘It’s Jack.’

  ‘Jack, who?’

  ‘Jack Renouf, from the swimming club.’ She rolled her eyes and pulled me along the corridor and into the kitchen.

  I was expecting her father to come storming in and give me a lecture on keeping my nose out of other people’s affairs. However, there was no further response, though we could hear him talking on the telephone as his cigar smoke leached into the hall.

  There was still that awkwardness between us and I waited for a sign that she wanted a hug but she moved around the oak table and indicated that I should sit opposite her.

  ‘Lemonade? It’s fresh. Or perhaps you want something stronger?’

  ‘Give me a pen I want to sign the pledge.’

  ‘What have you been drinking? Don’t tell me. I bet it was cheap red wine. Here, drink this. Christine prepared a jug before she left.’

  The pert little Frenchwoman acted as a live-out maid and housekeeper and, I suspected, attended to more than her father’s dietary needs. I allowed Caroline to pour me a glassful but, as I was reaching across the table to pick it up, such an intense pain shot up from my bruised kidney that I dropped the glass.

  ‘Clumsy.’ She was turning to get a cloth from the sink when she stopped. ‘Christ, Jack, what’s wrong? You look white.’ She moved round the table and examined my face.

  I felt like retching and tried to suppress the nausea as she helped ease me back in the chair. I was gasping for breath, my face screwed up as the pain pulsed through me. I hadn’t tested my assailant’s prediction yet and didn’t really want to see my blood splashing into the toilet bowl. I gulped down another wave of pain mixed with fear but, as my side touched the wooden back of the chair, I clutched at it with my left hand.

  Caroline grasped my shoulders, pushed me forward and pulled my shirttails from my trouser band.

  She gasped. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Nothing. I fell off the bike, that’s all.’

  ‘Jack, you are a hopeless liar. Now tell me the truth or I’ll start playing nasty nurse on you.’

  I was surprised by the tenderness in her voice and let her press a cold wet cloth to my back while I tried to explain what had happened and my guesses about who might have given the orders.

  When I finished, she kissed me softly on my head. She wandered over to the sink, under the leaded window, and gazed out over the lawn. ‘I think you’ve got it wrong. My father wouldn’t hire thugs like those. It’s your uncle they’re after. I bet it’s something to do with his politics. My father and his chums are only obsessed with money.’

  This was ridiculous. She knew some of his “chums” were Germans, she knew about the diamonds and how important they could be for the Nazis.

  ‘Do you know who –’

  ‘Shush, I’m thinking.’ She was still staring out on the lawn but I could tell from the tension in her shoulders that she was struggling with something.

  The antique clock ticked solemnly. I focused on my breathing and the cooling touch of the cloth. I stared gloomily at her, aware of the long pendulum swinging in the Grande Sonnerie. It seemed to be synchronised with my pulses of pain. I counted them.

  After forty, she pushed herself away from the sink and turned to face me. Her eyes challenged mine. We stared at each other – an old game, which she usually won. This time she blinked first. ‘There’s something I need to tell you about Rudi –’

  ‘Caroline? Ah, here you are.’ Hayden-Brown filled the doorway. He gave me a cursory glance. ‘You’re still here I see.’

  I contemplated stretching out my hand to introduce myself and ask some questions about diamonds but thought better of it.

  His expression was icy. ‘If you’ll excuse us, John, I need to talk to my daughter.’

  ‘Don’t be so bloody rude. His name’s Jack, not John. How dare you come barging in here interrupting our conversation!’

  Bloody hell. If I’d spoken to my father like that, I would have woken up in hospital – if at all.

  He ignored her outburst and turned to me again. ‘Please leave. I apologise for any…’ he struggled for a word, ‘inconvenience. But I do need to talk to my daughter in private, if you don’t mind.’ He had sufficient mastery of sarcasm to qualify as a maths teacher. He pushed into the kitchen.

  I started to leave but Caroline shouted at me.

  ‘Stay. Don’t give in to the bully. Whatever he’s got to say, he can say in front of you.’

  Her father exploded. ‘Don’t be so bloody impertinent! We are not going to discuss family business in front of a stranger.’

  ‘Family business? That’s a joke. We don’t have a family, thanks to you!’

  ‘Caroline, I’ve just been speaking to your mother on the telephone. We need to talk. In private.’

  ‘What? She’s still talking to you?’

  ‘I’d better be going then.’ I moved towards the door again.

  ‘Jack, go see your uncle. That’s where the answers are,’ Caroline said.

  I hesitated.

  ‘It’s alright. I’ll be fine. He may be a foul-mouthed bully but he’d never hit me – would you, Father dear?’

  God, he must have been sorely tempted though.

  ‘Let yourself out. You know the way.’ She made no move towards me so I left them to it. As I reached the front door, she called out, ‘I’ll be in touch – soon.’

  Fred answered the door, stepped out and scanned the empty street in all directions. He spotted the damage to Boadicea but made no comment on that or my cricket gear before ushering me in. He was very agitated. Malita was there in her working clothes so I assumed she’d just come back for lunch. She didn’t speak.

  ‘Are you alright, Malita?’ I moved towards her.

  ‘No, she’s not bloody alright. She’s just been bloody sacked!’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Apparently an anonymous customer complained about her. It’s bloody crazy. She isn’t even allowed to talk to the customers. It’s just an excuse.’

  ‘But they can’t just sack her?’

  Fred shot a withering look at me. ‘You haven’t been li
stening to me, have you? They can do what they bloody like. Lita is a foreign national. She’s got no rights. That’s why they pay her so little. Bloody slave labour.’

  ‘But if she’s living with you –’

  ‘We’re not married so it makes no difference. If we were, she would have some protection but –’

  ‘Sit down, Yak. He is angry. Doesn’t listen. I am pleased. I hate job –’

  ‘That’s not the bloody point.’

  ‘It’s probably a silly question, Uncle, but why don’t you get married?’

  Malita studied the table. Fred stared into space.

  She got up, moved to the range and reached for the kettle. ‘Is good question, Yak. The answer, not so good.’

  Fred sighed. ‘What she means is –’

  ‘I still married. To bad man – in Spain.’ She spat onto the hot plate. Her venom sizzled.

  At this rate there’d be no more room in my mouth for my big feet. I didn’t know what to say.

  ‘It gets worse. They’ve taken my passport.’ Fred sat down. ‘I went to the Brittany this morning. I was going to meet Hélène in St Malo. I showed my passport as usual at the control desk but they wouldn’t let me through. One of the immigration officers came out and told me there was a problem with it. An irregularity. He was apologetic but said he would have to keep it until it was checked. No passport – no boat.’

  ‘Unbelievable, but surely you can protest. You’ve been using it without a problem.’

  ‘Jack, they open my mail, tap my phone, wreck my house, stop me getting a job, sack my… they have so many ways of making life difficult. If I told them I was leaving the island for good, my passport would be fine for any outward journey. They would find a way to stop me getting back in again though. Anyway, Eric phoned. I called him back from a public box. He was stopped at Southampton, questioned for hours. He doesn’t think he’ll be allowed to leave the country. We’re all trapped.’

  Malita banged the teapot down. ‘You silly. Give up too soon. Tell Jack your plan.’

  ‘I don’t want to get him involved again.’

  I stood up, pulled out my shirt and turned my bruised side to them. ‘It’s too late, Uncle. I’m more than involved.’

  I told them the story but left out my visit to Caroline’s.

  The silence that followed was so complete I could hear a clock ticking in the bedroom above. After what seemed like minutes, Fred rose and opened his mouth to speak but Malita gripped his arm so fiercely I could feel the pain across the table.

  She spoke softly in Spanish to him until he sank into his chair. She got up and moved around the table, helped me up and hugged me tenderly.

  Fred came over to us. His anger was gone, replaced by a stony demeanour that I had never seen before.

  ‘Can you describe them?’

  ‘The little one who hit me was about five foot four, wiry, with a lopsided grin and a guttural accent. The tall one called him Carl. He could have been Dutch or German.’

  ‘They are easy to confuse – go on.’

  The other, I think the younger one called him Alf, had a strange accent. It sounded as though he was trying to disguise it. He was closer to six foot, solid, balding, cold eyes, a twisted mouth. Do you know them?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘They seemed very interested in Boadicea.’ I’d have to ask him now. ‘Uncle, the other two questioned me about the bike as well. One of them gave me a date and a place and told me to look it up.’ I sucked in a breath. ‘Did Boadicea really belong to Lawrence of Arabia?’

  He seemed lost in thought.

  ‘Uncle?’

  ‘Yes, it was Ned’s bike.’ He sounded distracted.

  ‘Ned?’

  ‘Yes, Ned, Ted Shaw, Thomas Edward Lawrence. We were friends. But that was all long ago. There are more pressing problems to deal with.’

  ‘But isn’t this Lawrence thing part of the problem?’

  ‘Not anymore. It’s all over. He’s dead.’ He looked at Malita. ‘We’ve made sure his name is safe.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Not now, Jack. It’s a long story. I’ll tell you sometime.’

  I couldn’t stand his dismissive tone. I slammed my fist onto the table, making the crockery jump. ‘I want to know now. You treat me like a child but I have to take grown-up punishment. Don’t you trust me?’

  Malita laughed. ‘How you say? Chip off old block, eh? You tell him what he wants. The plan can wait.’

  He bit his lip in frustration but nodded at me. ‘Go ahead then. Ask your bloody questions.’

  ‘Okay, I’ve read about Lawrence, the accident –’

  Fred snorted.

  ‘Wasn’t it an accident?’

  ‘That’s the verdict the coroner gave the jury – before he started the trial.’

  This was going to be difficult. He’d taken refuge in an almost childish truculence. I felt like a housemaster interrogating a wayward pupil. How would I get information out of Alan? I decided to be indirect. ‘How did you first meet him?’

  He looked surprised. ‘Green Street slipway. July 20th 1896. We were both eight.’

  ‘That’s over forty years ago yet you remember the exact date?’

  ‘It was a rather special occasion.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He was drowning. I saved him.’

  I must have looked incredulous.

  ‘You remember when you fell off the wall at the pool and almost drowned when you were about six?’

  I would never forget. It was probably the reason I was still frightened of deep water. ‘I don’t remember the date though.’

  ‘Ned was always very precise about such things. We even celebrated the anniversary a couple of times.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘He slid off the slipway. I was there playing with some friends and pulled him out.’ He was agitated again. ‘I’m sorry, Jack, but this really isn’t important now. Can’t we leave it?’

  My side still throbbed with pain but I pressed on. ‘No. What was he doing in Jersey?’

  Fred gritted his teeth. ‘On holiday, with his mother. They were staying at Bramerton House, overlooking the beach. She waded in fully dressed to help pull him out.’ He paused. ‘She bought me an ice cream.’

  It was so incongruous that I laughed.

  ‘It was my first ice cream.’ He seemed lost in time again.

  I switched tack. ‘How did you get the bike?’

  ‘This is bloody silly. I got it. That’s what matters – and now I wish I hadn’t.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Alright, if you must. I was ordered to get reacquainted with Ned –’

  ‘By whom?’

  ‘The bloody party. Who else?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He had a certain use.’ He inspected his hands. ‘He knew people. Oh, bloody hell, he knew everyone. You must have read that in the paper.’

  ‘You said reacquainted?’

  ‘Yes, we were friends at Oxford.’

  ‘I didn’t know you went to university.’

  ‘There’s a lot you don’t know and, believe me, now is not the time for my life story.’

  ‘I understand, so just tell me about the bike.’

  He rubbed his hands together and gave Malita the “more tea” look. ‘After the inquest, his brother inherited the bike. I bought it from him and took it to the BUF.’

  ‘The British Union of Fascists? I thought you said you were working for the Communist Party?’

  He cracked his knuckles. ‘I was. I had to join the buffers – Oswald Mosley’s mob – to report on them. It’s how the Nazis got the votes – jackboots on the streets. The party were worried the same might happen in England.’ He leant back in his chair. ‘Mosley was very keen on Ned. Thought he could save Britain – mistook his love of Arabs for a hatred of Jews. Not too many brain cells in that organisation.’

  Was he trying to confuse me or had he led such a tortured existence that truth was on a long holi
day? If I stuck to the essentials, I might make sense of it.

  ‘Why did they want the bike?’

  He chuckled. ‘Mosley couldn’t have Lawrence but he wanted his bike as a talisman. He also believed that it had been sabotaged and that certain papers might have been hidden in it.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Oh, yes. That wasn’t reported, was it? Ned couldn’t stop writing – letters, books, diaries. After the accident, his cottage at Cloud’s Hill was searched but his most recent diaries weren’t found.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I’d already taken them.’

  Was there no end to my uncle’s nefarious activities? I looked askance at him. ‘What was so important about them?’

  ‘Names, places.’ He was serious again. ‘A few minutes before the crash, he sent a telegram to Henry Williamson to arrange a meeting with him to discuss something of importance.’

  ‘Who’s Henry Williamson?’

  ‘I’m surprised you haven’t heard of him. He wrote Tarka the Otter and the Patriot’s Progress. Joined Mosley after meeting Hitler at a Nazi rally in Nuremburg. Harmless, wouldn’t hurt a fly, but a true British eccentric. Also wealthy enough to be acceptable to Mosley. Great friend of Ned’s. He and GBS helped buy the bike.’

  ‘GBS?’

  ‘George Bernard Shaw, another of Ned’s friends. You must have heard of him.’

  ‘Of course but what was that about a telegram?’

  ‘The telegram is public knowledge. There was lots of press speculation about the purpose of the meeting.’ He leant forwards again. ‘Williamson was working with Mosley to arrange for Ned to meet with Adolf Hitler.’

  31

  I was stunned. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I was working for Williamson – as his chauffeur. Ned got me the job. Look, Jack, this is so complicated. Do you really want to know more?’

  I wanted to know why I’d been beaten up by one group and followed and threatened by another. Both were connected by their interest in the bike.

  ‘Let me get this straight. You bought the bike and gave it to the BUF. What happened to it then?’

  ‘They had me strip it and check every part for sabotage. It hadn’t been tampered with, though it did need a complete service. The rear brake needed relining but had worked in his emergency stop. The front brake cable had snapped though. He was in second gear and travelling at about thirty-five miles per hour at the time.’