He shall feed His flock
Like a shepherd …
It was Jemma. Davies felt his mouth fall open and he sat back, his eyes riveted. She looked so magnificent in her long black dress, her neck and face warm in the lights. A deep smile snaked across his tired face.
‘So. You were surprised?’
‘As much as I’ve ever been.’
She put her thickly coated arm in his as they walked towards the bus stop. ‘It’s so angelic,’ she said. Softly she began to sing again: ‘He shall feed His flock …’
‘Tum-tum, tum-tum, tum-tum,’ mumbled Davies.
‘You didn’t bring your car, Dangerous? Mine wouldn’t start.’
‘Nor mine. Kitty wouldn’t let me get in,’ admitted Davies. ‘He’s in a bad mood. I took him down by the canal this afternoon and he’s tired.’
They had reached the bus stop. It had begun to rain gently and darkly. No one else was at the stop. They stood below the shelter. ‘You’re still on the trail then?’ she said. ‘Lofty.’
He shrugged. ‘It niggles me. I talk to people, like I did this afternoon in those industrial units … I just wanted to know if anybody had seen anything … I talk to them and I know sometimes they’re lying. I can see they are. But about what? Anything almost. People are always lying, especially to the police.’ Traffic was sizzling by. The yellow lights of a bus materialised in the distant drizzle.
‘Everyone’s got a past,’ she pointed out. ‘Lofty was no different.’ She still had her warm arm in his. The bus splashed alongside the kerb. They boarded it and went to the seats at the front, on the top deck. Apart from two chewing girls in the rear seat, there was no one else.
The conductor appeared, an Indian, not pleased at having to traipse to the front of the bus. ‘Sorry, mate,’ said Davies. ‘I like pretending I’m the driver.’ He made a mime of turning a steering wheel. The man smiled dispiritedly.
When he had gone, Davies said: ‘There’s one basic thing that doesn’t make sense. How that old man came to go into the canal, at the particular place he did, and take the ruddy pram with him.’
‘Where’s the pram now?’ she asked.
‘In my garage.’
She stood up. ‘Next stop,’ she said. ‘D’you want to come home? I’ll make some coffee.’ He was still sitting.
‘Is Edie still with you?’ he inquired defensively as they went down the bus stairs.
‘She’s gone,’ said Jemma. ‘Poor woman. You should try some compassion. It doesn’t cost anything.’
Edie had certainly gone but her place had, to Davies’s deep disappointment, been taken by an old man who sat in the same chair and scratched.
‘I didn’t realise he was coming here tonight,’ Jemma explained. Her eyes came up with a suspicion of an apology. ‘Betty, one of the other social workers, must have brought him around after I’d left. I understood he wasn’t going to be homeless until tomorrow.’
‘Why,’ asked Davies moodily, ‘didn’t Betty take him home with her?’
‘Betty’s got problems at home,’ said Jemma, going into the kitchen. ‘Social workers frequently have problems.’
Davies followed her to the kitchen door. It was a small space and he stood close to her. ‘I can believe that,’ he said. He turned to study the old man who was busy scratching his chest but then, changed his attack to his legs and after that, with a reach like a spider, over his shoulder to his back. ‘He’s quiet anyway,’ he observed. ‘Just the sound of his fingernails.’
‘You’re a very hard man,’ she said quietly. ‘Life’s full of people who need help.’
From behind he put his arm around her waist. ‘I’m one of them,’ he said. He eased his chin forward, touched her neck with it and then kissed her on the cheek. She eased her cheek more firmly against his mouth. ‘You’re a funny old-fashioned thing, Dangerous,’ she said. There was a ring at the doorbell. Davies’s face drooped. ‘It’s probably a few lepers,’ he sighed.
She went out and returned with Mod, who appeared pleased. ‘Tracked you down,’ he beamed.
Davies regarded him irritably. ‘So you have,’ he agreed. ‘Did you get lonely?’
Mod sat in the remaining armchair and agreed to join them for coffee. ‘What’s wrong with him?’ he inquired, looking at the scratching man.
‘He itches,’ sighed Davies. ‘All over. What brings you here?’
‘A splendid bit of deduction. I sometimes think I’m a better detective than you.’
‘Who isn’t?’ shrugged Davies.
‘I decided to come after you,’ said Mod. ‘I thought you might be walking into one of your customary traps, be beaten up, maimed, killed. I just missed you at the church hall. I just missed the bus too.’ He looked smug.
‘All right,’ said Davies. ‘Tell us.’
‘I had a phone call tonight. I’ve been making inquiries, as you say, and I’ve found Lofty Brock’s old commanding officer from the prison camp. And his sergeant major.’
Five
Both Davies and Mod were parochial men, rarely straying from their gritty patch of North-West London, and the long journey to Yorkshire was an adventure. There was, even before they embarked, the uncertainty of whether the Vauxhall Vanguard would get there. It was like an elderly elephant, large, ragged and impressive, but for many years untried over distance.
The garage mechanic was dubious. ‘It could crumble,’ he said. ‘If I were you, Dangerous, I’d leave well alone.’
A further problem was Kitty. ‘You’ll have to come with us,’ Davies informed the dog as he wiped its eyes. ‘Yorkshire – where the terriers come from. You could do with a bit of fresh air.’
They set out at dawn, a measly sky moping on the housetops. Early people, almost senseless at bus stops, eyed them as they drove off to the north.
Mod had armed himself with facts about their route, filleting through the library guidebooks and marking the information on cards. As they drove up the motorway, he read aloud: ‘St Albans. Cathedral city. Hertfordshire. Population – 52,470. Early closing – Thursday. Named after Alban, the first English martyr.’ Kitty had begun howling at the unaccustomed duration of the journey and the unfamiliar scenery, but he had now settled into a tangled pile and was snoring in the wrecked rear seat.
The car was coughing at intervals but otherwise behaving well. Davies kept it below forty miles an hour, steadfastly in the middle lane of the motorway, provoking a series of horn blasts and signs from antagonised drivers.
They stopped at a service area to let the car simmer down, have a cup of coffee and walk Kitty on his rope through the surrounding ornamental copse.
It took them all day and half the next to reach Topling-on-the-Moor. They stayed overnight at a bed-and-breakfast house in Derbyshire, with Kitty sleeping in the car.
As they journeyed, the dog began to take an increasing interest in the wide white flocks of moorland sheep. He pressed his massive head against the car window and sounded grunts which became growls and finally howls.
‘Stop him for God’s sake!’ shouted Mod, covering his ears.
‘How? I can’t stop him,’ bellowed Davies. ‘He’s never seen sheep.’
Kitty had to be released from the car at intervals and eventually, at a bleak and misty place, with no livestock in view, they stopped.
‘Now don’t go far,’ warned Davies, getting out of his car and opening the dog’s door. ‘You’ll be falling down a hole.’
Kitty projected his hairy bulk from the back seat and with a manic barking pounded over the nearest brown hill, disappearing from their view. ‘Kitty! Kitty!’ shouted Davies hopelessly.
To his astonishment the dog at once reappeared, heading in their direction at speed. Behind him came a dirty white cavalry charge of fierce sheep, led by a rampant ram, head down.
‘Let’s go,’ said Mod. He jumped into the front seat and slammed the door. Davies bellowed: ‘Run!’ at the dog and threw open the rear door. Kitty came down the slope at a gallop, and flung
himself heavily into the back of the car. Davies slammed the door and ran for the driving seat. He started the engine, making the snorting ram and the sheep swerve. As the Vanguard roared away, they ran beside it. Gradually, they dropped back and Davies saw them in the driving mirror, grouped in the road, glowering. Kitty looked up and barked defiantly from the rear window.
It was almost midday when they reached the higher moor, which rose like a brown blanket, and Davies pointed the Vanguard’s sturdy nose on the final upward track. Mist came down, then drizzle within the mist, while the road curved and canted. Mod saw a long drop over his side of the car and fell silent. Eventually they reached a sign which said ‘Topling-on-the-Moor’, and beyond that the broken silhouette of a long building. ‘Topling Hall,’ read Mod from the gate. He peered through the drizzle. ‘Toppling it seems to be,’ he said.
The house was half-demolished, one wing lying in grey rubble, rafters and beams standing out like bones. They left the car and doubtfully walked towards it. Only the front portion was complete, its windows staring apprehensively, with the expressions of condemned men. A notice, like a personal warning to Davies, said: ‘Keep out – Dangerous.’
Within the stone porch was a bell-pull in the shape of a nose. Davies pulled it. A dull dong echoed within the house, followed eventually by the squeaking of metal and the scraping of the door. As it opened pulverised plaster showered from the lintel. A stout untidy man stood there, debris on his black overcoat. ‘This place gets terribly dusty,’ he said, attempting to brush it off. ‘Gome in, will you.’
He led them through a giant hall, pillars and vaulted ceiling, with half-concealed portraits peering out like spies. ‘This part of the building’s all right,’ he assured them. ‘It’s the middle portion that’s unsafe. The back’s already fallen down, as you probably saw. I was going to have it double-glazed, but it scarcely seems worth it now.’
They followed him into a big and chilly chamber. A single-bar electric fire stood balefully in the void of a grand fireplace, an armchair drawn close to it. A dog like a dinosaur glanced up at their arrival but collapsed back to its prostrate place before the meagre warmth. ‘We squabble over the fire,’ said the man. He smiled surprisingly brightly through his dust. ‘I’m Robin Ingate,’ he said, revealing a hand from his overcoat sleeve. ‘I’m so glad you came. I don’t get many visitors. How about a drink?’
Davies introduced himself and then Mod. ‘It’s good of you to agree to see us, Colonel Ingate,’ he said. His eyes travelled about. ‘I expect you’re kept pretty busy.’
The old officer was pouring long measures of sherry from a decanter. ‘Bloody good stuff, this is,’ he said, handing it to them. ‘All that’s left, the cellar. I’ve still got ten or fifteen years to get through down there.’ He went to the chair and motioned them to a threadbare six-seater sofa. Davies rummaged behind his back and produced a massive bone from a crevice. The colonel leaned forward and took it from him. ‘We wondered where that had gone,’ he said amiably. He raised his glass and they raised theirs.
‘Just marking time, now,’ he said, as if he owed them an explanation. ‘Just trying to synchronise what’s left, so that when I die the rest of the damn place will fall on top of me. Make rather a grand tomb, don’t you think?’
They laughed uneasily. The colonel said: ‘I was delighted with your call. Not many people telephone me these days. In fact, I’m surprised the blessed thing still functions. I can’t recall paying a bill for some considerable time.’
Davies regarded him with sadness. ‘Do you,’ he ventured, ‘live here by yourself?’
‘Absolutely!’ exclaimed the colonel cheerfully. ‘Except for this bloody dog.’ He prodded the sprawled animal with his carpet-slippered toe. ‘Only way, old boy. Wife passed on ten years ago and, frankly, I didn’t want to live with anyone else. Perfectly happy. Can’t stand staff around the place. Anyway, can’t afford the blighters now. So here I am. Just waiting, really.’
Mod coughed awkwardly. ‘I discovered your whereabouts from the Stalag 62 Ex-POW Club, sir,’ he said. ‘They send their best wishes and asked me to tell you that you would be an honoured guest at the annual dinner.’
‘I know, I know,’ sighed Colonel Ingate. ‘But I won’t go now. I’m not going down to London to hear a lot of museum pieces talking about dead men and dead battles.’ Regret crossed his strong face. ‘Being a soldier is like being in a club,’ he said. ‘And being a prisoner too. Nobody else is interested. So I don’t go. It was all such a long time ago.’
Leaning forward, Davies said: ‘We were hoping that you would be able to recall something of it for us. About the prison camp.’
‘The old Clickety-Duck,’ smiled the old man.
‘Pardon, sir?’
‘Clickety-Duck. Stalag 62. Housey-Housey, you know. Played a lot of Housey-Housey, there. The Boche used to love it.’
‘You let them … er, join in then?’ asked Davies. ‘Play …? The Germans?’
‘Oh, gracious yes. They weren’t so bad, you know, and we were all stuck there together. And the Boche were the only means we had of getting prizes, apart from the stuff we’d saved from Red Cross parcels and so forth. Cigarettes mostly. But you didn’t come to talk about that.’
Davies smiled. ‘It’s all related. We wondered if you could remember a British soldier called Wilfred Henry Brock.’
The old man started to shake his head. ‘There were three thousand British in the camp …’ he began.
‘Known as Lofty,’ prompted Davies.
The colonel’s face brightened. ‘Ah, yes … Lofty Brock! Deuce, I do remember him! Yes, young Lofty.’
Davies leaned forward. He felt the thin firelight touch on his face. ‘Anything you can remember might be useful. He died a couple of months ago … in rather odd circumstances … and it may have a long history …’ From his pocket he took the small bag and slid from it the medal they had found with Brock’s papers. ‘He won this,’ he said.
‘Ah, the DCM,’ said Colonel Ingate. He held the medal in the palm of his hand, tenderly, it seemed. He turned it over and read the name. ‘Fancy that,’ he said. ‘I don’t recall it. Won just before Dunkirk. It’s a long time ago now.’ He handed the medal back. ‘So he came to a bad death, did he? What a shame,’ he said. ‘Now let me see. He wasn’t there all that long, because, I seem to remember, he was one of the contingent shipped off to Silesia.’
‘Oh, they moved?’
‘Half the camp. Went off early in 1945, as the Russians were advancing. It was very bad. Some of them died, not always at the hand of the enemy. There was warfare within the camp among the prisoners of different nationalities. But I remember young Brock, right enough, when he was with us in Stalag 62. You could hardly miss him … He was the camp goalkeeper.’
Davies felt his mouth drop. ‘Goalkeeper?’ he said. ‘Brock?’
‘Indeed, very agile too for his size, as I recall.’ On a thought he rose. ‘Wait a moment. I might even have a picture of him. In the team. I’ve got a whole lot of rubbish from those days in the next room.’ He put down his sherry glass and stumped off towards the adjoining room.
Davies eyed Mod. ‘A goalkeeper?’ he muttered. ‘He must have worn springs.’
‘Or they had small goals,’ said Mod.
From the other room came a muffled crash, a shout, and a low discharge of dust through the open door. They rose anxiously but the colonel appeared, newly coated but triumphantly carrying a bound album. ‘Got it,’ he said. ‘Put my hand on it at once. Unfortunately it was half-buried in there. Holding up a part of the wall, actually. Thought the blessed lot was coming down.’ He brushed himself ineffectually and handed the album, opened, to Davies. ‘That’s the team,’ he said. ‘1944. That’s Lofty Brock at the back. See, his name’s underneath.’
Together Davies and Mod peered at the browned photograph. The man standing at the rear of the team, wearing the roll-necked jersey, was all of six feet six inches.
Six
The
journey to Botfield was less demanding. They left The Babe In Arms at noon, to the incredulity of drinkers and staff, and drove down into December Hampshire.
‘“The New Forest,”’ read Mod aloud as they travelled. ‘“Established by William the Conqueror in the eleventh century as a hunting ground …”’
‘Fascinating,’ mumbled Davies, narrowly watching the unaccustomed motorway ahead. They rarely overtook anything. ‘And there, in the Forest, is former Sergeant Major George Bing. Late of Silesia.’
Mod grunted: ‘About forty years late of Silesia.’ He returned to his information cards. ‘“King Rufus met his untimely end at Stoney Cross, near Lyndhurst,”’ he recited. ‘Arrow in the eye. Was it an accident? Now, there’s a real mystery for you, Dangerous.’
‘I’d rather find out who shoved Lofty in the canal.’
Mod sighed. ‘Has it ever occurred to you that he fell in … accidentally, I mean, really? He fell. Splash! The official version. Don’t you think that sometimes these little whims of yours get a bit out of hand?’
The lines deepened on Davies’s face. He knew Mod had been waiting to say it. ‘No, I don’t,’ he said.
Kitty, who had so far slept through the journey, woke with a gaping yawn and blinked out of the window. They were chugging past trees and fields with red roofs showing between winter branches. The dog began to moan.
‘Shut up, you,’ ordered Dangerous in the direction of the dog. He glanced acidly sideways at Mod. ‘It’s not a bloody whim.’
‘Dangerous,’ insisted Mod. ‘All I’m saying is that you might be wrong. When you get one of these bees in your bonnet nothing will stop you. But, there are times when the most obvious explanation is the right one. Lofty Brock fell in the canal. How, we don’t know. But he just fell.’
Grimly, Davies said: ‘So you think all this investigation is just a waste of time?’
‘Not at all. It gets us out in the fresh air. Away from the pub … Yorkshire … Hampshire. It’s very interesting.’
The Complete Dangerous Davies Page 32
