Perfect Gallows

by Peter Dickinson

  “Higher …”

  Holding the piss-pot in his left hand he swung his clenched fist into the extended diaphragm. Andrew let go as the vomit came, then helped guide the body forward and down until it was on its knees in front of the chair, retching into the pot. Samuel caught the whole mess, put the pot to one side, rolled the body over and wiped the grey and sweating face with the towel.

  “Learnt that trick from an English footman way back,” he said. “Saves a lot of mess in the night. Baas Wragge always liked to get ’em drunk—‘See what you’re made of,’ he’d say.”

  He did Uncle Vole’s voice spot on.

  Florrie had already turned the bed-clothes back, going round the rooms during family supper. They heaved the body on to the mattress and covered it with the blankets. Samuel stood gazing at the life-worn face, strangely blank, emptied of character, like a saint in ecstasy.

  “What do you think?” said Andrew.

  “Tisn’t him. Baas Charlie could hold his liquor. Weren’t good for much else, but he could do that.”

  “He’s had a rough life … What will Sir Arnold do?”

  “Let him stay, I reckon.”

  “Because he thinks he might be his son?”

  “Don’t matter. Provided there’s a fight between Miss May and Miss Elspeth. Course, he’d like it to be Baas Charlie come back. Don’t like to think of himself going off into the dark leaving nothing behind. So I reckon he isn’t going to make up his mind for a while. ’Nother thing—suppose he goes and decides it is Baas Charlie. Always hated doing anything about changing his will, because of it reminding him of dying. Last will he made was after he lost his case to make Master Nicholas—that’s Baas Charlie’s son—a ward of court. He went raging along to the lawyers about it.”

  “What does it say?”

  “Don’t know. All I know is Mr Oyler didn’t like it—said it wasn’t right law somehow—but Baas Wragge he put his foot down and made ’em say what he wanted. Mr Oyler, he’s been at him time and again to change it, but Baas Wragge he wouldn’t listen, not till he suddenly went and sent for you. I reckon till this fellow turned up, he was still thinking about putting you in …”

  He gazed at the figure on the bed, shaking his head slowly from side to side in one of his strange half-trances. His fingers felt in a pocket of his striped waistcoat. He turned and showed Andrew on the palm of his hand a disc of lightish-coloured wood with a knob the size of a hazel nut in the middle. Andrew picked it up and looked at the image of himself.

  “I guessed from my bit of marge that you must have finished,” he said. (The tours Cousin Blue had arranged had meant the cancelling of three Nada readings, so he hadn’t got right through the book in the hols. Week-ends were no good: Saturday afternoon was spent at the flicks with Jean, Sunday afternoon most of the servants went out.)

  “Third one I made,” said Samuel. “First two not right. Not going to bother making one for this feller.”

  The sudden side-slip into nigger-talk was extraordinarily contemptuous.

  Andrew peered at the tiny head. It was very odd. Just a knob. Knife-pecks for eyes and mouth, a ridge for a nose. It could have been anyone, but it was him. Not Adrian, Andrew. He was glad to hand it back.

  “It’s going to be tricky to prove he isn’t Charles,” he said. “I suppose you could go to Hull and try and find out if a shelter was bombed, see if anyone remembers him at the hospital. Even if you found out what he was calling himself before that it mightn’t help. I mean the real Charles would have had to call himself something. You’d have to find the name and then trace it back to before 1917, wouldn’t you?”

  “Just have to do best we can,” said Samuel. “Listen to everything he does and says. Maybe we’ll catch him out. All I know is, if he isn’t Baas Charlie then it isn’t right he should inherit.”

  On Saturdays Andrew rose at seven, breakfasted in the kitchen and walked across to the farm to help Jean get through her morning’s work. Mrs Althorp couldn’t object as Cousin Brown had arranged this specifically to release Jean by eleven. Jean would then bicycle round, bringing a packed lunch, while Andrew walked back. They would rehearse for an hour, and after that bicycle off to the flicks at Petersfield.

  “You are being admirably patient,” said Cousin Brown, “but I am afraid it is the only way with a child like Jean. I have to drill her and drill her. With only one rehearsal a week and then six days to forget …”

  “It’s interesting,” said Andrew. “Specially the love scenes. Like coaxing a bird to eat out of your hand.”

  (Before the war there used to be an old one-eyed sailor who did that with sparrows—first the darting snatch and flurry to safety; then, still trembling with the terror of nearness, perching on a finger to peck at crumbs in the palm; fear shading into trust, the spread fingers imperceptibly rising at each visit, upright round the cupped palm, the bird in the middle, got you! Usually the old boy held the sparrow a few seconds, peering with his short-sighted eye at the pattern of head-feathers; but sometimes, if the right child was watching, he would gape with broken orange fangs and pretend to bite the head off.)

  That Saturday was sheeting wet. They both had capes, but on their way back from the flicks the rain densened till it was like a waterfall and they were forced to stop for shelter under a railway bridge. The downpour made pearly curtains over both arches. They talked about the film, a silly thriller, and the trailer for next week’s war-film. Jean didn’t care for war-films. The rain drenched on. Chill breathed from the slimy bricks. She shivered.

  “Practise a bit?” he suggested.

  She blushed—she knew at once what he meant.

  “Might warm us up,” he said.

  “Oh, all right.”

  He undid the buttons of his cape. When he moved to do hers she edged back.

  “We don’t want to squelch,” he said. “Now, for Pose A—this is the one right at the end of the flick. You know, sunset, palms, two dozen violins. It’s in profile. I ought to have something to stand on so you can tilt your head up—I’ll have to do it tip-toe and you bend your knees. Fine. Arm there and arm there. Don’t giggle …”

  He clowned it lightly, helping her do the same. As soon as he felt her hand moving on his shoulder-blade he broke off, laughing. A train crossed the bridge, filling the cave below with its dull thunder.

  “Pose B is your sort of thing—costume, duels, elopements. Let’s say your guardian’s taking you to the brutal viscount he’s making you marry, and I’m the highwayman who’s held you up. Your dowry’s in the coach, but I’ve been a gallant idiot and said I’ll let you go in exchange for a kiss. You’re dead against it, but your guardian says what about the dowry? So down you come from your coach. Long sweeping dress, high heels, utter disdain. This is my cloak, OK? I’ll lead, you follow. Just think about your guardian peering out of the coach, getting more and more pop-eyed. OK, off we go.”

  She was heavy enough to make Pose B a strain in its later stages. Beyond the blurred curve of her cheek he could see the crinkled stream of water slithering over the road-surface towards its drain. The guardian’s eyes would be popping all right, he thought. Promising. The slosh of falling water drowned the noise of the approaching motor almost until it reached the arch. He lugged her upright with a second to spare.

  “Lorry coming,” he gasped.

  A bulging khaki bonnet barged through the curtain. They pressed against the wall to let it pass, but before it reached the further arch it braked. A head, unrecognizable in silhouette, craned out.

  “Want a ride, Mr Wragge?” called Sergeant Stephens.

  Andrew glanced at Jean. Discontent? Yes. But the bridge was no use for anything beyond clowning, and anyway his strategy demanded that he should override her wishes, the way a parent might a child’s.

  “Thanks,” he called.

  Sergeant Stephens climbed down, lowered the tailgate
and lifted the bikes for Andrew to stow in the lorry, which was empty except for a pile of loose boots in the far right corner.

  “Room for the young lady up front,” he said.

  “We’ll be OK in the back, thanks,” said Andrew, letting the eyelid Jean couldn’t see droop for an instant.

  “You’re welcome,” said the sergeant, and before Jean could move he took her under the arms and heaved her bodily up. She produced a curious sound, between a squeak of surprise and a shriek of outrage. He didn’t even smile. The tailgate banged up.

  “It’ll be a bumpy ride,” said Andrew. “You know how Yanks drive.”

  They settled next door to the pile of boots with their backs to the cab.

  “It smells like a pub,” said Jean.

  It did, too, and as the lorry lurched off Andrew put his palm on the floor to steady himself. The floor was wet—not surprising in this weather, but when he sniffed his hand he smelt whisky. Spilt not long back, either. A broken bottle—but no glass splinters. A whole case then, one bottle broken, taken into Southampton hidden under the pile of boots. The rest of the stores unloaded, but the boots brought back for next time. Mr Trinder? He’d been driving out to meet the sergeant back in March …

  The Yank driver was true to form—any more “practice” would have meant broken front teeth. They pressed their bodies against each other for support. A pleasant pocket of warmth grew between them. No chance of talk through the drum of the downpour on the canvas roof, and the clatter of the bodywork and the roar of the engine, but on the last smooth swoop down the new tarmac inside the lodge gates Jean put her mouth to his ear.

  “Sweet Lord, you play me false,” she whispered.

  In the near dark under the canvas he stared into her eyes, letting the tension rise. The growl of gears as the lorry took the turn into the camp entrance drowned his answering line, but she must have heard the sincerity throbbing in his voice. He’d been expecting the lorry to brake and let them down there, but it bounced on across the park, turned left again and stopped by the sergeant’s store-huts. The moment it was still Andrew put his arm round her and kissed her as if he meant it. The rain thundered down.

  A hand appeared at the rim of the tailgate. Andrew was on his feet and lifting Jean’s bike to pass it down by the time the tailgate fell, but instead of waiting to receive the bike Sergeant Stephens climbed up into the shelter of the canvas.

  “Jesus!” he said. “You call this summer! Been wanting to talk with you, Mr Wragge. It’s my folks back home. I wrote them about you maybe being the heir and all—it ain’t easy to know what to put in a letter—and that’s got them all worked up. They think Britain’s full of barons and duchesses and they can’t see why I ain’t meeting any, so when I tell them about Sir somebody and his long-lost heir they gotta know more. So if you’ll pardon me asking, how’s it going?”

  Andrew laughed. He didn’t believe the sergeant’s excuse, and wasn’t even certain the sergeant expected him to. It was a sort of clumsy politeness pretending he wasn’t himself being inquisitive, excited by the notion of all that money … but Andrew owed him for the ride, especially the last few seconds.

  “There’s a new chapter in the drama,” he said. “D’you remember the picture in the Saloon, the family one?”

  “Sure.”

  “There’s a boy in it with a gun under his arm—Charles, Sir Arnold’s only son. He was missing presumed killed in the First War, but now a man’s turned up saying he’s him.”

  “Jesus! And is it him?”

  “My Cousin May says so. My Cousin Elspeth isn’t sure. Sir Arnold won’t say. Some of the servants knew the real Charles, and they aren’t sure either.”

  “Somebody’s on your side?”

  “I haven’t got a side—I’m just an interested spectator.”

  “Crap. You gotta fight it. You tell me anything you need.”

  “Only if you know a good cheap private detective.”

  “1 got the man right here in the kitchen. Used to be a private eye in Albuquerque.”

  Andrew hesitated. He didn’t want to stand around arguing. He had asked about the detective as a joke, a quick dismissive impossibility to get the conversation over, so that he could go off alone through the rain with Jean.

  “I can fix him for furlough,” said the sergeant.

  “But …”

  “Money? Listen here. I got a proposition for you. You a betting man? What odds’ll you give me against you being the one who inherits?”

  “Oh … fifty to one?”

  “Hell, I’ll give you better than that. Twenty to one, how’s that sound? So I lay five hundred bucks on you at twenty to one—OK? That’s for Phil’s travel and expenses. If he can’t dig up nothing useful, then that’s my five hundred bucks gone, and you ain’t out a dime. But if your number comes up and you inherit the whole thing, then you pay me ten thousand bucks. What do you say?”

  “Can I think about it?”

  “Sure. Come up here tomorrow and meet Phil. What time?”

  “All right. It’ll have to be about half past nine, because of getting off to church. Can I bring someone with me—one of the servants? He’s very interested. He might be able to help.”

  “Sure.”

  “What was that about? You never told me,” said Jean as they walked their bikes back across the valley with the rain buffeting down on to their capes and sou’westers. Andrew had kept quiet about the inheritance business. It wasn’t part of his strategy—long-lost heirs are supposed to be young and a bit unreliable—though the hard luck of losing it all to Charles might have come in useful later. Besides, all that concerned Andrew. It was Adrian who was supposed to be playing his game with Jean.

  “It’s a bit of a story,” he said.

  “Do tell me.”

  They squelched on. He was conscious of the dovecote, down to their left, coming and vanishing as the rain-veils parted and closed. Too soon. Besides, he hadn’t got it ready.

  “I wish we had somewhere to go,” he said.

  “Dolly says it’s going to clear up after milking. She’s usually right.”

  “Can you get out?”

  “Well …”

  “Look. Let your back tyre down before you get home. Say you’ve got a puncture. Put it in a shed Mrs Althorp can’t see from the kitchen. I’ll meet you at the stile.”

  “What’ll you say?”

  “It’s cleared up and I feel like a walk.”

  “Oh, I wish I was a man!”

  “No you don’t.”

  Her cheeks, freckled, tanned, streaming with rain despite the sou’wester, reddened appetizingly.

  It was hard to imagine Phil leaning in a doorway with a fedora tipped back on his head and a smoking automatic in his hand. He was round and rubbery with a high bald brow and doggy eyes, but he took notes on a pad and asked what sounded like the right questions. Samuel answered most of these, usually with a shake of the head. Now that the family was living up in the nursery wing he had fewer opportunities for listening to their talk, and in any case Charles, thanks to his memory-loss, real or phoney, had given very little away. There was only the air-raid on Hull, plus a few laundry-marks on the ragged clothes he had arrived in. Cousin Blue had given Samuel these to burn, but he had kept them. The laundry-marks were all different, probably because the clothes had been begged at doors. Even if Phil found the donors it wouldn’t prove much.

  From the moment Andrew had suggested it Samuel had taken the inquiry completely seriously. He wasn’t happy about the bet with Sergeant Stephens, and offered to pay the costs himself—he had a little money saved up, he said—but Andrew had refused, not really believing the inquiry was worth spending money on. Only if a Yank chose to chuck his dollars around, well, that was his look-out. In fact, left to himself Andrew would probably have told the sergeant he’d decided against the idea. His
whole instinct was to stay as neutral as possible, to do nothing whatever to make himself Uncle Vole’s heir. Then, if it happened, he would still be free. Anything else, and The Mimms and its fortune would become a huge trailing weed on his smooth hull. So now he let Samuel take the responsibility both of deciding to send Phil off to Hull and of answering his questions while he, Andrew, stood back and watched. While Phil looked shruggingly at the laundry-marks Sergeant Stephens came over and edged Andrew yet further aside.

  “You didn’t say he was a nigger,” he muttered.

  Andrew had in fact noticed the change in the two Americans’ looks when he had brought Samuel into the hut, but had put it down simply to surprise at seeing a darkie in butler’s uniform in the middle of green England.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Does it matter?”

  “Sure does. You wouldn’t understand. Me, I’ll do a deal with any colour. But you just tell your pal not to come wandering into the camp looking for me. Specially after dark. The guys here—they’re bored, they’re frustrated, they’re a long way from home, they don’t care a whole lot about your British laws. Next few weeks some real rough guys’ll be coming through. I tell you, there’s guys homesick for a good lynching. I can see your friend’s got his heart set on proving you’re the real thing, much more’n you do, Mr Wragge. He’ll be after me for news. That’s OK, but you tell him he’s gotta phone me first, and I’ll arrange a place to meet him. Look, I’m taking a risk, fixing Phil’s furlough. I don’t want nobody asking questions. So you tell your pal to lay off, take it easy, phone me first if he wants to talk. OK?”

  “We could just forget the whole thing if you like.”

  “Jesus, no. I’m interested. Just that it’s gotta be done my way.”

  “OK, I’ll tell him.”

  The discussion about the laundry-marks seemed to have ended. Phil looked up.

  “I’ll need mug shots,” he said.