The Possessions of a Lady

by Jonathan Gash

  'I'll follow in a sec. Go now.'

  He went, grumbling. I'd no illusions. If Cradhead's men were watching, they'd arrest Tinker, not me. There was still the threat of Derry and Bonch. Sheehan's malignant troops wouldn't leave with a job half done. When the fashion show ended I'd lose my last chance of escape. This way, with Tinker leaving apparently alone, they'd assume I was hiding in the purple trailer and follow Tinker. Maybe they'd crash Tinker and his lorry over some handy cliff. There were plenty about. It'd be the usual story, drunken old driver mishandles his wagon off some lonely Pennine road.

  If all went well, though, I could get to Brannan Hey, thank you very much. Much safer than in Tinker's lorry pulling its gaudy least unnoticeable trailer in the known world. It was the sort of decoy a coward like me wanted. When the going gets tough, this tough gets out.

  Whistling noisily, I strolled towards the chapel, now a glittering galaxy of noise and lights. Between motors, I ducked and ran for it.

  37

  The well, and the big motor, were a mile up on the moors above the chapel. I sat on a stone in the dark, watching the gleams of the stallholders' departing trucks, the unwieldy carousel lorry manoeuvering on the Blackburn road. The fashion riot was oddly reduced to something warming, beckoning even, instead of maddening. I imagined I could hear Lydia, and pretty Faye boosting the fashion parade. I kept looking about at the black moors.

  The moors frightened me. I once got lost in a June snowfall with my cousin Arn, children out marauding. A chance bus came along a chance road. The conductor wouldn't let us on, not enough money. An hour later, same road, an elderly lady demanded explanations. She trudged us through the snow, put us on another bus, had a shrieking war with the conductor. We'd had enough coppers all the time. I've never forgotten the two vital lessons: always remember the possibility of chance malice from a jack-a'back. And, countryside might promise a warm June day, but it's secretly planning a blizzard.

  A stone skittered. I froze. Remembering childhood always scares you. Something flew past my face. I hunched, arms wrapped round my head. Something screeched, another creature whimpered. I stifled a moan. Countryside is sheer unprovoked carnage. I was sweating cobs from fear. I'd been forced into this, all for, how had I started the auction, 'The possessions of a lady.' Though all antiques, all mankind, me, are the possessions of some lady somewhere.

  Down below the music bumped. I longed to be back there, among enemies. At least foes are human.

  'Come on, Tinker, you drunken old sod.'

  It was high time he left. I could see light reflected on the roof of the purple caravan—moving! The thicker black rectangle between it and the other vehicles shifted slowly. Tinker was doing it. I couldn't hear the engine. Some show event caused a momentary uproar, obliterating it. Rockets shot skywards of a sudden. I ducked, foolish in the glare. Tinker's lorry stilled. Sensible.

  The coloured light dimmed. I heard his engine thrumming. Good old Tinker started up in the explosions. The music resumed. Time to go.

  The old motor was on a slope. I could leave the moor along the track, emerge in Rivington. I got the motor going, drove carefully. Nothing for it but to use the headlamps. Who'd notice me, with all the excitement down there?

  One faint niggle. Had there been a light inside the purple caravan? I'd thought for one second that maybe . . . But there were still some two hundred cars there reflecting gleams. Inevitable, with rockets overhead and sudden strobe lights shafting the darkness. It must have been my inbuilt terror making for panic.

  Quarter of an hour later, I put the great car down the metalled road that left the moorland near a small lake. Let night anglers wonder. I rolled serenely towards the town. With growing confidence I turned up the side road to Brannan Hey. There, I'd finally ditch the Braithwaite, whip the pinkos off the Victorian dresses, have a quick shufti at Mayor Tom's antiques in Tinker's lorry—fingers crossed. Undo the purple trailer. Anything else?

  'Yes, Lovejoy,' somebody whispered in my ear.

  With a sharp howl, I swerved almost into a stone wall, slithered to a halt, stalling the engine. I gibbered, recoiling from the apparition behind me.

  'Sorry, darling. Did I startle you?'

  'You stupid fucking cow!' I put my face into my hands and gasped, panted, inhaled life back.

  'Well you did ask, Lovejoy! You've been talking . . .'

  'I was talking to myself, you silly mare!'

  Nicola was quite put out. 'There's no need for abuse, Lovejoy. If we're to live together . . .'

  I leaned back, eyes closed. What the hell was she on about? I hardly knew the bloody woman. She was talking like we'd wed. I groped for lies.

  'You're right,' I said. Start with a winner. 'Doowerlink. Will you do something?'

  'Of course, darling!' she cried.

  'Wait by the farm gate, please. Tinker will be along. We don't want him driving past, do we?'

  'His lorry, that big caravan? Have you ever seen such a horrid purple? What is Amy thinking about?'

  'Thanks, doowerlink.' I bussed her. 'He'll see you in his beams. Okay?'

  'Very well, sweetheart. Will it be safe?'

  'That's a promise,' I lied magnanimously.

  'Right, darling. A kiss, please?'

  We snogged. Just when you're desperate for something else instead of the one thing that matters, you get the one thing that matters. I ripped my lips away.

  'Goodness!' I cried. 'We'll never get away if we keep on!'

  The engine started, I bowled into the farmyard, looking for Tinker's lorry. We'd arranged that he'd wait with his lights off.

  No Tinker. No lorry. I brought the Braithwaite to a halt. Its engine panted, rocking the chassis. I switched off. Silence. The headlights seemed suddenly too dim. I wanted light, a searchlight tattoo.

  The farm buildings felt derelict, empty. Nothing on the exterior staircase that led to the upper floor. No comforting red flicker of a fire sinking to embers.

  The grey Pennine stone merged with the darkness. Not even a lantern. Had I told Tinker to leave the outside one lit? If I had, he should have, the drunken sot. If I hadn't, he should have used his hooch-addled brain and left a lamp burning. I get narked at folks' lack of enterprise. And Nicola should have come with me instead of waiting at the gate, selfish cow.

  Then I talked myself into sense, sitting in the motor, the wind moaning, rain now tapping the bonnet.

  Who saw me leave? I demanded. Nobody. I'd sloped off quietly. Everybody else was at the show hoping to get their faces on telly. Therefore I was safe, because I was here alone.

  Maybe I'd actually seen the last of Wanda? I fervently hoped so. Wanda might be so grateful at the profit she'd made, that she'd let me go. If Briony's antiques bought my freedom, it was a small price for her to pay. If Briony didn't agree, she shouldn't be selfish.

  My feet plopped on the farmyard mud as I got down. I hesitated. Why not wait until Tinker bowled up? Two's company, one's at risk. It's headachery. But things are predictable. Lonely farms are never haunted. Those squeaks, like one I'd just heard, are always bats. They're famous for squeaking all night long. Nothing in real life is mysterious, either. Every six weeks, sure as eggs, some holy statue'll cry its blood-soaked eyes out, like in Civitavecchia or Eire's Grangecou, or shed blood from its ribs as in Salerno's pottery mural of Padre Pio. Not blasphemous, I persuaded myself, feeling my heart beat a little faster than it had. Real life shirks fable. Aesop of fable fame learned the hard way that real life is different, when a tortoise fell on his head and killed him. It was the only irony he'd never written a fable about. Real life's different, no mystery.

  A car swished past on the wet moorland road. It didn't turn in. Where was Tinker? Surely he wouldn't have stopped off at a pub?

  No noise. Unless you counted that creak. It was a sort of old floorboard creak, a slow sort of creak. The creak you get in farmhouses.

  It came from the barn to my right. Probably a fox. Did I want to go and investigate? Not likely. I stepped
across, started up the non-creaking exterior staircase. I could have gone in through the front door, but didn't. This doesn't prove that I was scared, because I don't get spooked. Not even if it's something really scary, like a midnight film. I just carry that sort of fear off light-heartedly, the very idea.

  I don't watch scary films.

  Going slowly up the stairs to the landing where the door I forced a grin. Me, worried? The things I've been through?

  Tinker would be along any minute. I realised I was getting soaked, standing with my hand on the latch. I must have been there several minutes. Less"- I was wet through, rain outside, sweat within.

  Creak. Who the hell? I was listening for, and hearing, creaks that weren't even creaking. Honest to God. I mean, [king it out, who was possibly against me, now the whole thing was done with? Roadie? I could handle him any day of the week. Or at least I could scarper faster. Deny and Bonch lid prove a problem, but Big John Sheehan has a sort of rum fairness, ends up with you in the mire and him righteous at St Cuthbert's at evensong. Skulking isn't his game.

  The reason I didn't go straight in was the door was ajar. I could feel the draught on my face from the slice of deeper black. I shoved it experimentally. Was Briony here? But there'd been no car below. Aureole? No car below for her either. Vyna? Carmel? But n.c.b.

  Lydia, come to make up, pulled by my sheer animal magnetism? Hardly. She detested me now. And she must still be at Scout Hey with Wanda going over the auction list. Thekla? No.

  Two choices. One, go inside, believing in the friendly real world. Or stay out here like a lemon, scared by figments, old frights.

  The door opened as I shoved. Why didn't it creak, then? I tried to remember if it had creaked before, or if the floorboards had creaked when Wanda and I had made smiles. Couldn't recollect. Step inside, I'd know for sure.

  Inside, then. My leg took a lot of persuading to move, my foot to find the floor, my weight to sway forward. I did it, almost sinking with relief. An engine, car approaching. Lights switched across the interior of the great old farmhouse. I saw that nobody was here at all. But the car didn't turn down the track. No Tinker.

  The light dowsed, the engine silenced. Might it be linker, after all? I stepped forward, confident, felt for the rail. The upstairs was more of a balcony, rather a wide landing, and could be used as an impromptu bedroom for some rustic visitor. It was bounded by a stout wooden railing that became a banister down the interior staircase to the living-room floor.

  No flashlight. I fumbled for matches. Had I kept them, when lighting the fire? No. Wanda, selfish bitch, had used her cigarette lighter. I remembered her returning it to her handbag. That's how helpful she is.

  The stairs creaked as I went down, a step at a time. Definite, creak, creak. Very like any old wooden staircase would creak, as when a person descended. Or ascended. So as to be behind anybody entering from the exterior staircase, say? Coming in through the door above, at balcony levels I reached the ground floor, relieved and safe.

  So as to be behind?

  A flashlight snapped on behind me, casting my grotesquely huge shadow onto the chimney breast. I was almost blinded, turned, felt about in front of me, hands spread.

  'So you're Lovejoy.'

  'Eh?' I screwed my eyes up. 'Who're you?'

  I could hardly see against the light, but I was sure I'd never seen the bloke before. He was a small intense man, should be at his books instead of haunting remote farms. Specs, waistcoat shopsoiled. It wasn't his normal condition, I could tell. He held a knobkerrie.

  'Terence Entwistle?' I was guessing.

  'Lovejoy.' He was interested. 'You're the one who stole the antiques I hid at the mansion. You gave them to Stella's auction.'

  'No,' I lied swiftly. 'It wasn't me, Terence. They'll be here any sec. For you. I want to help, see?'

  'You made her auction a success, Lovejoy. I planned to make it fail.'

  'I didn't!' I cried, gauging the distance to the stairs, any door. But he held the light on me, swung the knobkerrie the way somebody might who knew how to use it. I pressed on, desperate to lie my way out. 'Where you'd hidden them was bound to be discovered, see? So I had them moved. They're in a truck. Tinker my mate's bringing it.'

  'Don't try to run, Lovejoy.' He was smiling, really proud of something. 'My friend's at the door.'

  'Friend?' I swallowed. 'Two of you?'

  'I was sabre finalist, Lovejoy. I know hand weapons. Tell me about Stella and Enderton.'

  'Eh? I don't know! Honest! I only just met him.'

  'Own up, Lovejoy,' Tubb said from the landing above, leaning nonchalantly on the rail, looking casually down as if at a play. 'Terence was betrayed all along, weren't you, Terence?'

  'It's true!' Entwistle's cheeks were a single point of red outrage. 'By that . . . politician!’

  'Tubb?' I said stupidly. Him, and this madman?

  'Me, Lovejoy. I'm here to help Terence. He's going to do for you.' Tubb sighed, shook his head. 'Terence's plan would have worked. The auction would have been a failure, Stella would have hated Mayor Tom. Terence wouldn't have lost his wife. But you messed it up.'

  Entwistle swung the weapon, rolling it as a drum major does a marcher's mace. I stepped back. He stepped after, shining the torch in my eyes.

  'Terence. Please. One more minute!' I begged, hands joined in supplication. This wasn't fair. T know you've been wronged. I understand . . .'

  'Terence,' Tubb said regretfully. 'Are you going to listen to him?'

  'No.' Terence swung the implement. Christ, he looked strong. That knobkerrie, perhaps from some old African campaign. 'You must pay, Lovejoy.'

  'Please!' I shouted, retreating to the inglenook, but my voice only echoed up the chimney. I was standing in the warm ashes of the peat fire that had burned so welcomingly. 'Please, Terence. I'm your friend!'

  Tubb heaved a great sigh, enjoying it. 'Don't believe his crap, Terence. A friend, spoiling your clever plan? Lovejoy and Stella were more than just old friends. He was her boyfriend years ago. That's why I tried to . . .'

  'Crisp me in the archway!' I yelled. It suddenly dawned. 'Tubb!' I pointed, aghast. 'You! You who did Spoolie! And tried to molotov me.' I'd shrunk to a crouch among the ashes, hoping to avoid the blows that were going to fall. My shoulder caught on the jack spit, its great iron hook.

  'Who?' Terence paused. 'Spoolie who?'

  'The police are looking for Spoolie's murderer!' I bawled hysterically at Entwistle, pointing with a shaking hand. 'It's him!' I raised my shoulder. The iron hook lifted, fell behind me into the ash.

  'Don't try it, Lovejoy.' Tubb lit a cigarette. 'Don't listen, Terence.'

  'And that Viktor Vasho bloke! You did him, too?'

  Tubb shook his head, as if at a querulous child.

  'Viktor Vasho tried to defect from Roger's arrangements, so of course he had to suffer. Viktor reneged on the plan to raid a few fashion houses that Vyna was picking out. You don't understand the forces, Lovejoy. Roger pays well. Him and Carmel are an unstoppable pair, Lovejoy. You had your chance.'

  'What is this?' Terrence's weapon had almost stilled.

  'Lovejoy's trying to distract you, Terence.' Tubb blew a smoke ring. He had muscles to spare, the demented workouts he was always doing. I'd thought him a wimp. Now, he seemed to grow before my eyes. 'Does it alter the wrong he's done, Terence?'

  'No,' Entwistle said dully. He hefted his weapon, stepped close. 'It's in the Good Book, Lovejoy. An eye for an eye.'

  The door behind Tubb suddenly swung inwards. A woman's voice called, 'Lovejoy?'

  'Stella!' I screeched.

  Entwistle turned, caught himself as he recognised that the voice wasn't Stella's. I grabbed the hook and swung it across in front of me out into the room where Entwistle was standing before the hearth. It met something with a thunk. Wetness spurted onto me, poured down my face. I was blinded.

  I rolled, begging and whining, clawed at my eyes, then screamed some more as my face slammed into Entwistle's. He wa
s on the wooden floor, gagging, seeming to be trying to speak. Blood was everywhere.

  'No!' I screamed, standing up. He had an iron hook in his throat. Blood spurted out five, six feet, going whirr, whirr. I tried to back away, hearing myself howling, seeing the room in dreadful tableau. 'No! No!' I kept bawling, blotting my eyes.

  The torch had fallen against a couch, sending shadows slantwards. Tubb had hold of Nicola, his hand over her mouth. I picked up the knobkerrie. It was slippery. I had the sense to wipe it on my jacket, get a grip. I could hear myself whining, keening.

  'Lovejoy!' Nicola cried, struggling. Tubb semi-throttled her to silence.

  Entwistle stopped threshing. He lay there, the blood down to a trickle. I judged Tubb. He looked even bigger, Nicola small and terrified. Thinking always comes too late.

  'They'll be here soon, Tubb.'

  'Who?' He actually seemed to be enjoying himself. He hauled Nicola up, lifted her so she sat on the railing over the drop. 'All your friends?' And he laughed. I'd never seen him laugh before. 'Roadie? He was our informer, Lovejoy. Roger? He pays me. Carmel? She's Roger's partner. Thekla, well, wanted to warn you. Good job you were too stubborn to heed her, eh?'

  'Thekla?' A friend? When she'd made me homeless?

  'I'm coming for you, Lovejoy.' Tubb set Nicola screaming by pretending to let her drop over. 'It's time.'

  I tried not to look. Entwistle had stopped breathing, I think. I pulled the hook from his throat. Like a fool, I said, 'Excuse me, please.' Then, 'Let her go, Tubb.'

  ‘I hate that nickname, Lovejoy.' He sighed, hard-done-by. 'What good do you think that hook's going to do you? And that shillelagh? I pick my teeth with bigger sticks than those. I'll drop the woman.'

  'Chuck her, then, Tubb.' I stepped towards the staircase, not rushing because I wouldn't know what to do when I got there. 'She's no good to me.'

  'Lovejoy!' Nicola shrieked, struggling. One of her shoes flew off, whizzed by me.

  'As long as you know what day it is, Tubb,' I said on the bottom step. I moved to the next. For the first time he looked uncertain.

  'Day? What day?'