Blood on the Marsh

by Peter Tickler

  ‘Here’s your tea, Constable.’

  Lawson put the Oxford Mail down, and took the mug that Bella was offering. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘You’ve got the short straw, babysitting me, haven’t you?’ She smiled her brightest smile as she said this, daring him to agree.

  Wilson took a sip from his mug. It wasn’t as hot as he expected. There was more milk in it than he ideally liked. But he wouldn’t have dreamt of complaining about it. ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Liar’, she said, and walked back into the kitchen. For the second time Wilson admired her back view. She dropped something on the floor, and Wilson continued to watch, as she bent down to search for the recalcitrant object, and then slowly raised herself up again. She turned round, and momentarily they locked eyes. Then he ducked his head and busied himself with his tea.

  He heard rather than saw her walking back across the room, and only when she slumped into the armchair next to him did he look up. She was leaning back, observing him. ‘Sometimes, lying is good. Better than the truth,’ she said. And she crossed her right leg over her left so that it dangled dangerously close to him. Wilson, suddenly flustered, sat himself up straighter, and took a sip from his tea. Lawson flirting with him was one thing, but this was altogether something more complicated. It wasn’t as if Bella Sinclair wasn’t attractive. Far from it. But to have someone of her age making a play at him was unnerving.

  Bella sat up too, mimicking his posture. She demurely pulled her legs close together, and leant forward earnestly. ‘Tell me,’ she said, as seriously as if she was interviewing him for a job. ‘What made you want to become a policeman?’

  Wilson did a double take, momentarily flummoxed by the sudden change. ‘I guess I always did.’

  ‘Your father wasn’t a copper, then?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Nor your mother?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Your grandmother, then? I bet she was!’

  Wilson almost laughed. ‘You’re teasing me!’ he exclaimed. As she was, of course.

  ‘Me, Constable! Not me!’

  They both laughed. Actually, Wilson admitted silently, for all her age, she was bloody attractive. For several seconds they looked at each other, in silence. Bella smiled again. ‘Is the tea all right?’

  ‘Yes, thank you.’ Wilson looked down, took a long sip as if to demonstrate how much he appreciated her tea-making skill, and then glanced up at her.

  ‘Waste not, want not, Constable.’ The smile had become a grin. ‘That’s what my mother always told me.’

  He wasn’t sure he was interested in what her mother always said, but he was finding Bella herself hard to ignore. In fact, he was returning her grin now. He was a puppy, eager to please. If he’d had a tail, it would have been wagging like crazy. Maybe Bella did fancy him. You read about it often enough in the papers – older women and younger men. Why not? He felt flattered. He felt light-headed. He felt, he suddenly realized, very tired.

  He yawned. Bella was still watching him, her head now cocked to one side, but the grin had been replaced by a quizzical frown, as if she was weighing her chances. He suddenly felt unsure of himself. Suppose she did make a make a move on him? He was meant to be watching her, not.… He tried not to finish the thought. Instead, like a toddler with its security blanket, he put the mug to his lips again, almost draining it. It tasted, he realized, slightly funny. And slightly sweet. But he didn’t mind. Suddenly, he didn’t mind at all.

  Bella Sinclair was just past the Littlemore roundabout when she finally got hold of David.

  ‘Where the hell are you?’ she demanded, her mobile clamped to her ear. ‘I’m on the way. I’m coming to get you. But where are you?’

  There was no immediate reply, for David was bent over in the undergrowth, panting. He was young and naturally fit. He often walked around Oxford, but running helter skelter through the undergrowth with a pack on his back was altogether different. Yet that wasn’t the only reason he was temporarily speechless. He had avoided Jarn Way, and had instead followed the path that ran roughly parallel to it through the trees. He had kept running until he reached the road – and had almost run slap bang into the police. Fortunately the van carrying them was noisy, and he had stopped in the undergrowth moments before it drove past from left to right, followed by a police car. He knew the road. It led to the scout camp. That was where they must have been, so where were they off to now? He edged forward, and watched them disappear down the road, and then turn right. They were going up towards the Jarn. He bent over, trying to think what to do, and that was when his phone rang. He saw it was Mother, and answered it. But Mother was shouting, and he was panting and shaking, and the police were headed for the Jarn which meant … which meant what?

  ‘I’m headed for the main road,’ he said firmly to his mother.

  ‘What main road?’ She was still shouting.

  He tried to think. ‘The main road over Boars Hill. That leads to the pub. The Fox.’ That was it. The name of the road. He remembered it from looking on Google Maps before he had left home. ‘Foxcombe Road.’

  The name of the road meant nothing to Bella, but the pub did. Roy had taken her there once. She’d let him drive her up there, and she’d let him pay. And then she’d let him take her home and had let him stay. ‘Right,’ she bellowed. ‘Wait there, on the main road. I’ll be with you in five minutes or less.’

  ‘OK.’ He thrust the phone into his anorak pocket, clipped the pocket shut with its popper, and began to jog up the road. By the time the police had finished searching up near the Jarn, he would be safe in Mother’s car. In five minutes he would be safe.

  Rob, the spotter, had a bad feeling. He’d woken up feeling the day wasn’t going to be a good one, and right now as he gazed down over Boars Hill, with its thick green woods, he wasn’t feeling any more optimistic. The guy could be anywhere. A guy in a red anorak – probably with a rucksack. That was the description, which wasn’t so bad. Red was an easy colour to spot, and a rucksack too if they flew low enough, but the bloke could be anywhere in the woods. And if he stayed there, undercover, only the guys on the ground would find him. Larry, the pilot, peeled suddenly to the left. Rob looked forward briefly, wondering what the cause was. He turned further, saw that Liz, his fellow spotter, was staring intently out of her side of the helicopter, and swivelled reluctantly back to the task. They had been scouring the far side of Boars Hill – the far side, that is, if you lived in Oxford, which he did. But now Larry was making a wide looping arc across the fields to the east of Wootton.

  Rob, who was on the right hand side of the helicopter, watched as the Wootton to Abingdon road slid past. A single red figure briefly caught his attention, but the red coat was a long one, a woman’s. The helicopter tilted further to the left, signalling a turn towards Oxford. The Harley Davidson dealership appeared down below them and Rob stared enviously down, envious because his wife wouldn’t let him have one, while Liz turned up for work every day on hers. Bitch, he thought. Bitches, they were, both of them.

  They were travelling straight now, though climbing gradually, as they followed the line of the road and the contours of the hill. In fact, they were as near as dammit right over The Fox pub now. Rob couldn’t see it from his side, but he knew it well enough. Below him, the open fields had given way to woods, to the large houses and larger gardens of the rich. He fought hard to concentrate, scanning the open spaces for a red man with a rucksack, but no joy. Typical! He was muttering to himself, now, giving full rein to his innate pessimism. A wild bloody goose chase!

  ‘There he is!’ The shout came from behind him, from Miss Harley Bloody Davidson herself. ‘And he’s getting in that car!’

  David had barely shut the passenger door before the car jumped forward. Bella wrenched hard down on the wheel and rammed her foot hard to the floor, so that the rear wheels spun as the back end slid round.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Somewhere safe.’ Bella’s face was set in a mask of concen
tration as she accelerated the Peugeot back up towards the top of Hinksey Hill.

  ‘But where?’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, David, not now!’

  Where? She wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure what she was doing at all. Except that she was rescuing David. She – not Maureen – was rescuing him, because she was his real mother, and after this he would appreciate it. She just had to get him somewhere safe, and when it had all calmed down, when she had gained David’s trust, she would take him to the police station, and everything would be all right.

  At the top of Hinksey Hill, she braked late at the junction and swung right, all in a single movement. A car approaching fast up the hill hooted angrily, but she stuck up her middle finger and hit the accelerator pedal hard.

  ‘I know what you did to me.’

  ‘Shit!’ It wasn’t David’s statement that had caused her to swear. In fact she hardly noticed it. It was the fact that out of the corner of her eye, up to the right, she had just spotted a helicopter. The pilot was descending fast, towards them. She knew with a start what it meant.

  Coming up fast on the left was the turn for Kennington. She delayed to the last moment, then hit the brakes and spun the wheel, and then she was off down Bagley Wood Road, the car bouncing around like it was a crazed kangaroo.

  David raised his voice, and said it again. ‘I know what you did to me!’

  She flicked a glance at him. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked, but her head was elsewhere. How the hell was she going to get him somewhere safe now? How could she lose a helicopter?

  ‘I know you were a drug addict.’

  They were right in Kennington now. She wrenched the wheel right, squealing round the mini roundabout, towards Radley. But where the hell then? Abingdon? Maybe, amidst the traffic and the side streets, she could lose them there.

  ‘I know!’ David was shouting now, screaming. ‘I know what you did! Dad told me. My dad Jim told me. He told me everything.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid, David. The man’s a liar.’

  Don’t be stupid. The trigger words. David began to scream. ‘Stop the car!’ he wailed. ‘Stop!’

  But she wasn’t going to stop. Not until they were safe. David, however, was scrabbling at the handle of the door, trying to push it open against the slipstream. There was a sudden blast of air and Bella knew she had no choice but to stop. She hit the brakes, and the passenger door swung wildly open, so that David half fell and half rolled out. She screamed in sudden terror, but David bounced back up onto his feet like a crazed jack-in-the-box. For a second he looked at her, and then he spun round. In front of him, and dropping away from the main road, was a lane, and it was down here that he now began to run, legs pumping and arms flailing, like a marionette that had snapped its strings and was making a desperate break for freedom. Bella gunned the car into life again, and followed.

  ‘The car’s stopped’ a voice was telling Holden. ‘He’s out. He’s running off down the lane there.’

  ‘Which bloody lane?’ Holden snapped. ‘I don’t live in Kennington. Give me instructions!’

  ‘Sandford Lane. And the car is following him.’

  ‘Sandford Lane,’ Holden shouted, though this was for the benefit of DS Fox, not the moron in the helicopter.

  ‘I know it, Guv.’ Just when it was needed, Fox’s local knowledge and unflappability rose triumphantly to the fore. He was driving fast down the same bump-strewn Kennington street that they had travelled much earlier that morning, but this time he was driving fast, lights flashing, siren wailing, testing the vehicle’s suspension to the limit.

  ‘It’s a left turn. There are trees close up on either side of the road.’ The moron in the helicopter had woken up and was actually giving helpful instructions. ‘I’m hovering over it,’ the moron continued. ‘I’ll wait here and guide you in.’

  ‘Ouch!’ Holden’s head hit the ceiling as Fox hit a speed bump harder than ever.

  ‘Sorry, Guv!’

  ‘Shut up, Sergeant!’

  Up in the helicopter, Liz was straining forward in an attempt to see where the car and runner had gone. They had been out of sight for over a minute, but that hadn’t stopped her scanning left to right and back again for any sign of them.

  ‘Here come the cavalry!’ Larry could see the police car now, hurtling down the hill towards them.

  ‘Thank God,’ Liz muttered under her breath, almost meaning it. For she had just seen her quarry again. Her binoculars and her eyes were now trained forward, on one spot. ‘Red-coated subject in view,’ she called out. ‘He’s standing on the parapet of the bridge! By the railway.’

  Halfway down Sandford Lane, Fox brought the car to an abrupt, juddering halt. He was forced to, because another car was slewed across the road. Holden was out of her seat before the engine had died, and set off at a sprint towards the redheaded figure of Bella Sinclair, who was standing in the middle of the road looking up at her son. She was holding her hands up, though whether in surrender or supplication only she knew.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here? And where is Wilson?’

  ‘David rang me. I had to come. On my own.’

  ‘Where is my constable?’

  ‘Asleep.’

  ‘Asleep?’ The incredulity in Holden’s voice was obvious.

  ‘Do you think he’ll jump?’

  Bella had dropped her hands to her sides, but was still looking up at her son. She hadn’t even glanced at her questioner.

  Above, the helicopter drifted closer, its rotors beating their remorseless rhythm. Holden felt its sudden downdraft, and waved it angrily away. ‘Jesus,’ she shouted against the engine noise, and to no one in particular, ‘do they want to scare him witless?’

  Holden walked a few paces forward. Fox and Bella both advanced with her. The helicopter was already wheeling away into the distance, taking its noise with it.

  ‘Hi David,’ Holden shouted. ‘Do you remember me?’

  ‘You’re the police.’

  ‘My name is Susan.’

  ‘You’ve come to lock me up.’ David was shouting back at her, but in a matter of fact way. ‘You think I killed them.’ And he raised his arms, like a diver preparing to spring off the high board. He was, Holden reckoned, some twenty-five feet above the road. If he jumped he’d damage himself badly, maybe fatally.

  ‘I know you didn’t,’ she said, speaking slowly and loudly in imitation of him. ‘You’re a good man, David. I just need to talk to you.’

  ‘Why should I believe you? Everyone lies to me.’

  ‘I just want a chat, David. Just you and me, and your mother if you want her there.’

  David said nothing. His arms were still raised, though they had lowered from the position of a high diver to that of a man about to be crucified. Otherwise, there was an almost unnatural silence. The helicopter had disappeared, and somewhere in the bushes to the right a blackbird was defiantly singing its song of existence.

  ‘I’m here.’ Bella had taken half a step forward. ‘Mother is here. She will look after you, David, I promise.’

  ‘You promise.’ David’s arms dropped further, until they were hanging down either side of his body, as if in agreement or resignation. But his voice told a different, harsher story. ‘Why should I believe your promises? You abandoned me.’ He raised his right hand, pointing it directly at her. ‘When I was a baby, you abandoned me. You left me. You betrayed me.’ His voice had reached a crescendo now.

  But as Holden opened her mouth to intervene, she became aware of other noises. A car was approaching from behind them. She turned and saw it skid to an untidy halt beyond the others. Two figures got out: Lawson from the driver’s seat, and Maureen. Thank God! Holden turned back. ‘Here’s your mother now, David. I promise she’ll be there at any meetings we have. I promise.’

  There was the noise of a train too, but so distant that it didn’t immediately register with any of them.

  Certainly not with Maureen who was running towards them as fast as her squat
body would allow. And not with Holden who had turned to see how David was reacting to Maureen’s arrival. And not with Bella either, whose brain was screaming at the injustice of life and the ingratitude of her son.

  Maureen was panting as she pushed past Holden and stopped just in front of them all.

  ‘David,’ she shouted, through the gulps of air. ‘I want you to keep very calm.’

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘Do you understand, David? Keep very calm.’

  ‘They are going to arrest me, Mum.’

  ‘I won’t let them.’ The words were firm, decisive, allowing (she hoped) no argument.

  ‘They are going to lock me up. They think I killed Dad, and that other man. And Nan Nan. They think I murdered her too. My Nan Nan!’ His voice rose to a crescendo of pain, as he strove to be heard over the noise approaching from his right.

  ‘You didn’t kill them, David, did you?’ She shouted back. ‘So they can’t lock you up!’

  But the logic of this argument had no impact on David. ‘I won’t let them lock me up. I won’t.’ And he turned round, and slowly raised his arms up high again.

  Everything then happened in slow motion, or that was how it seemed to Lawson, rooted to the spot by her car.

  Bella was shouting: ‘Don’t be so bloody stupid, David!’

  The Oxford-bound express was greedily devouring the space that separated it from the bridge.

  Holden, Fox, and Maureen were setting off at a run towards the bridge, but doomed never to get there in time.

  David’s arms were almost vertical. Against the pale blue sky, Lawson could see his whole body quiver uncertainly in the air.

  And then, even above the roar of the oncoming train, Lawson heard Maureen wail in agony. She was shaking her arms. ‘I killed them, David!’ she screamed. ‘I killed the bastards. So the police won’t lock you up.’

  David may have heard. He half turned, and for the briefest of moments his eyes locked with Maureen’s. And then his wavering body lost all balance, and Lawson saw him fall forward into the path of the train.