‘He told me he had a few boats, up in his room in Belvoir Road. Invited me up to see them, once, but I didn’t get round to it.’
That figured. Mossy operated his alcoholic Samaritan service in the public bar of the Duke of Portland and nowhere else. Wise man. Safety in numbers.
‘You don’t know what number Belvoir Road?’
‘House called Abbey-something. Abbeygate, Abbeyfield? Third or fourth along on the right hand side, Tanner said. Said it had domes with spikes on top; like a German helmet. Said it gave him the bloody willies, but it was cheap.’
I got away from Mossy in the end. After another couple of pints. I reckoned I’d better walk the drink off, so I might as well walk up to Belvoir Road and try to find Abbey-something. Belvoir Road’s not far; the first road above the Pond; the back gardens run down the hill to the edge of the Park.
I must say, Abbeywalk, when I found it, gave me the willies too. It made the other Gothic fantasies in the road look quite homely. Because it wasn’t really Gothic in style; more a sort of sickly art nouveau. The window-frames looked like they’d begun to melt and droop in folds. There was a large and weird glass canopy over the front door. I just walked up to it. There was no front gate, and the weeds in the thin gravel drive were two feet high and dead. Last summer’s. Or the summer before that. Not a sign of a car, or any other sign of life. The ground-floor windows were opaque with sawdust and cobwebs. A large plywood sign, starting to peel back into its separate layers, announced that the ground floor had once housed Abbeywalk Fine Fitted Kitchens, but the sawdust was grey and old, and there was no sound of industry within.
There was, however, a row of faded red plastic buttons on a black-speckled brass box screwed to the door-jamb. With names behind strips of plastic. Sometimes crossed out, with another name squeezed in above; all faded to a greater or lesser degree. And one of the most faded crossed-out ones was A. Tanner; neatly typed, but a ghost on the verge of extinction.
Tanner had been there; Tanner was gone. For some reason, it angered me greatly, that he should have escaped me. Now the wrecked destroyer would hang around my workshop gathering dust for ever, and with me not daring to do a damned thing about it.
So, reluctant to quite let go, I walked round the back of the house. The back door was as solidly bolted and unmoving as the front. All the windows had that coating of sawdust. But there was a little brick building, about the size of a garage, and the green blistering door of that was slightly ajar. I went over and pushed at it. It gave, but only a little. I pushed harder; very hard indeed in my anger. There was the sound of something like cardboard splitting, and now the door gave way enough for me to poke my head through, into the dim glimmer that came from yet another dusty window.
The place, once whitewashed, was piled high with suitcases. Old, bulging suitcases, with straps round them. Cardboard boxes, full of what looked like jumble; a battered electric kettle, two dusty floral cushions, a scarf trailing down the outside of a box. One box had burst open, spilling out woolly bobble-hats and gloves.
And among all this worthless tat lay askew a lovely scale model of a paddle-steamer; the sort that used to ply round the Kent coast to Margate and Ramsgate. It had been roughly tossed in upside-down, and the foremast was broken off short, sticking out at me like an accusing finger. The name on the bow was Royal Daffodil.
It could only have belonged to the man who made the wrecked destroyer . . . and then I realized what the jumble really was. The detritus of bed-sitters. Stuff left behind and never sent for. Chucked out here by a landlord whose patience was obviously exhausted, if its battered and knocked-about appearance was anything to go by.
I wanted to plunge in and rescue the Royal Daffodil there and then. But it was impossible. The bursting of boxes that had let me push my head round the door had released an avalanche of stale, damp-smelling worldly goods that ensured the door would open not another quarter of an inch. And I certainly wasn’t going in for burglary in broad daylight, or carrying a three-foot paddle-steamer home under my arm.
So, with reluctance, I let the door swing to, and managed at least to get the sneck on, so it was not obviously ajar.
I walked back, wildly lusting after the Royal Daffodil and wondering, just a little, what had happened to its late owner.
As I passed the public bar entrance to the Duke of Portland I hesitated, hovered. A feeling was coming over me that I knew all too well. A temptation to do something dodgy. I fought against it for a minute, but I knew I was going to give in. The paddle-steamer had been slowly growing bigger and bigger in my mind. Lying there unloved, defenceless in that old out-house.
You might think that thieves do a lot of harm in the world of antiques; but they don’t really. I mean, they don’t harm the antiques. I mean, what’s the point of stealing something if you’re not going to look after it? Every bit of damage drops the price . . . no, the people who do harm to antiques are the nutters and vandals who smash them up. I mean, somebody may nick a Van Gogh from the Tate and it may vanish for years, but you know it’s safe somewhere, and will turn up none the worse eventually. Whereas those religious maniacs who attack works of art with razors, or acid, or shotguns, they’re the ones who need putting away for life. And there are the less spectacular nutters who in the fifties smashed up long-case clocks for scrap, or the nutters in the sixties who painted good mahogany furniture canary-yellow and stuck floral transfers all over it. I remember one Viennese wall-clock that came into my shop. Somebody in the First World War had taken the eagle off the top and stamped it into dust in a burst of patriotic fervour. Then somebody else in the twenties had removed all the ornamental turned knobs, to make it look more ‘modern’. Then somebody in the sixties had painted it bright blue, over mahogany veneer. And finally somebody in the eighties had thrown it into the dustbin, breaking the glass. Hounding a good clock to a slow death – worse than fox-hunting. The dustmen brought it to me, and after a fortnight’s hard work, it was back perfect and worth five hundred, and it would go on living for ever. That’s what I call a moral act . . .
Anyway, so I told myself, as I turned in at the door of the Duke of Portland. Mossy was still in his usual place.
‘Any luck, squire?’ Was the man clairvoyant?
‘He’s gone, all right. Everybody’s gone, from the look of the place.’
‘Dodgy old house, that!’ I gave him an old-fashioned look. How did he know?
‘So I’ve been told,’ he said quickly. ‘So I’ve been told.’
‘I went round the back. There’s another model boat in a sort of brick outhouse. On top of a lot of old junk. Thick with dust.’
‘Shame,’ he said, with a flick of interest. ‘Shame how people neglect good stuff. Good as the destroyer, was it?’
‘Maybe better.’ I took a deep breath. ‘I mean, if somebody brought it into my shop, I’d willingly pay him three Cs for it.’
‘Good as that? Let me get you a pint, Mr Morgan.’
He came back with brimming glasses. It was fascinating how he placed them exactly in the centre of the beer-mats.
‘Cheers.’
‘What worries me,’ I said, ‘is if some vandals got to it. The door’s jammed shut with the weight of stuff against it. But they might get in through the little window . . .’
‘Quite,’ he said. ‘Quite.’ And turned to the topic of the problems of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club.
About ten the next morning, a van pulled into my yard. A youth in spectacles mended with insulation tape came into my workshop.
‘Got any interest in model boats?’ he asked, shuffling diffidently.
‘Depends,’ I said, and walked out to the van with him.
The paddle-steamer was there, under a dirty white sheet of plastic. I checked it. It was in good nick, apart from the broken mast. Couple of lifeboats missing, but James could soon copy the ones that were left.
‘Gorra couple more,’ said the youth, and pulled off tw
o more plastic sheets. A nice model of a tug in good nick. And a model of a North Sea lightship that had been dealt one savage blow that had flattened the superstructure half-way to the deck.
‘How much you want for them?’ James had come out for a nosy, so I had to keep up the charade.
‘Three for the paddle-steamer and two and a half for the tug. Fifty for the lightship . . .’
‘Throw in the lightship free and you’ve got a bargain.’
‘Done.’ Then he added, ‘Mossy sent you a message. Dunno what it means, but he said to tell you that Tony Tanner left all his gear. Clothes, pots and pans, the lot. There were name-tags on the suitcases. That make sense?’
Half-way to my wad of notes, I paused. In one way, it made sense. In another, it made no sense at all.
Where the hell had Tony Tanner gone?
Come to that, where had all the other people gone, whose wretched possessions were piled in that little out-house?
‘Bastards,’ said James, which was very strong language for him. He was handling the wrecked lightship with grieving, loving hands.
‘Reckon you can do anything with it?’
‘Well, it’s all there. Long job with a pair of pliers, that’s all. Bit of soldering. ’Sa glass-case job, this. Never been in the water. Wouldn’t float properly. No engine or anything. And there’s a maker’s name-plate. Ross and Makepeace. Number 18734.’
I pricked up my ears. I’d never heard that name before. But you live and learn, in our trade.
‘Must look them up in a book,’ I said.
‘Probably worked for shipbuilders – real ship-builders I mean. You know, model to show the customer, afore the real one’s built.’
‘Yeah,’ I said. And forgot about it. But not for long.
Then we had the business about the bomb; and then the business about the firemen.
The students were thrilled to bits to have found a bomb. Though it was only a very small one. They were thrilled to bits until the police arrived, and moved everyone away from the Pond, so that they couldn’t get on with their work.
As we waited for the bomb disposal squad, I was surprised at the amount they bickered among themselves. Really spiteful it was; they had one girl in tears. I truly felt like smashing a couple of the men’s faces in for it. But Hermione went and smoothed things over, and brought the girl back to the caravan for a cup of tea. She was a pretty little thing called Ruth. A bit frail and forlorn; I suppose you could write her down as one of life’s victims, but I liked her.
She sipped her tea and said, ‘Bastards! This is the nastiest dig I’ve ever been on. People are so good-tempered, usually.’
‘They have been a bit much,’ said Hermione, running her hand through her hair. ‘And it’s getting worse. Sometimes I feel like sacking the lot of them, and getting in a fresh bunch.’
‘Bloody good idea,’ said Ruth feelingly. ‘All girls for a change.’
‘The girls are being as bad as the men,’ said Hermione. ‘Bitch, bitch, bitch.’
‘Maybe it’s the mud,’ I said. ‘And the smell. And those kids hanging around trying to nick stuff . . .’
‘Rory really hurt one of them again this morning. I’d not be surprised if the boy’s mum came up. With a lawyer. Rory’s not his usual cheerful self at all. I’ve worked with him before . . .’
It was just then we saw the firemen. Two of them, running along the edge of the Pond, one after the other, about twenty yards apart. They had stripped down to their vests in the heat, but were still in uniform on their lower parts.
The front one was carrying some sort of box, and throwing bits of white stuff from it into the Pond.
‘What’s this – a paper-chase?’ asked Hermione, shading her eyes with her hand and staring at them. ‘Now there’s three of them.’
The third man, a hundred yards behind, was still in full uniform. He was running more reluctantly, somehow, and falling behind. And all three of them were shouting at each other.
They drew nearer.
‘That’s a sandwich-box,’ said Hermione. ‘He’s throwing his sandwiches into the mud. Why? There’s not a duck in sight.’
Now the leader was only fifty yards away; still turning his head to shout over his shoulder. He threw what looked like a small apple-pie into the Pond, and then what was certainly an orange.
And then, not looking where he was going, he tripped over the muddy frame of a bicycle that somebody had dragged out of the Pond and left lying about; and went full-length. He was up in a flash, but limping now, and in another ten yards, the second man was on him.
I suppose we expected some kind of horseplay. It dawned on me that the first man must not have been throwing his own sandwiches into the Pond, but the sandwiches that belonged to the pursuing second man. Or perhaps we just expected a nasty argument. Certainly we never expected what happened.
A fist flew. There was a cry of pain, and the first man doubled up, holding his nose with fingers from which blood flowed.
The second fireman raised his boot and kicked him in the gut. He collapsed, screeching. Then the second man began to kick him as he lay writhing on the ground.
We all stood paralysed. I don’t think we were cowards. We just couldn’t believe our eyes. I mean, we’re conditioned to think our London firemen are wonderful, even if we’re starting to have doubts about our policemen. Firemen are supposed to rescue people: from burning buildings; from having their heads stuck through railings. Firemen are compassionate and caring: they come and rescue your dear pussy-cat, if it gets stuck up some tree.
Firemen do not kick each other to a bloody pulp.
It was lucky for the first man that the third man arrived when he did.
‘Rogers!’ he roared, with the voice of authority. ‘Stop that!’
Rogers might have stopped for all of thirty seconds, then he aimed another kick at the groaning man.
‘Rogers, I’m putting you on a charge!’
The kick went home, with a dull thud. The third man tried to grab the kicker. The kicker lashed out at him. He only just dodged back in time.
‘Right, Rogers, you’re suspended from duty, as of now.’
Rogers lashed out at his superior officer again, narrowly missing. The leading fireman backed off, and began to talk into his radio, which was clipped to his tunic. Now Rogers just stood, wild-eyed, panting. The man on the ground groaned horribly, and curled up into a tighter ball, hands holding his gut. I could tell he was really seriously hurt.
I felt I should go across and help him; but the wildness of the fist-clenched figure standing over him . . . it was Hermione who ran to help the injured man. Rogers nearly kicked her, till he saw she was a woman; he seemed as if he was coming out of some sort of fit. He seemed not to know where he was . . .
Now, in the distance, we could hear a siren. And at that dire sound, Rogers suddenly ran away round the edge of the Pond.
We all gathered round the man on the ground. But there wasn’t much anyone could do. He yelled out in pain if you tried to touch him. He was violently sick, and I thought there were streaks of blood in the vomit.
A police car swung in through the Park gate. Two uniformed constables got out and stared at the groaning body.
‘Who did it?’
The leading fireman pointed up the shore of the Pond, where Rogers was backing away further, and shouting something we couldn’t make out. There was something so strange, so . . . crazy about the way he was pacing up and down and shouting incoherencies, that I saw the constables look at each other with raised eyebrows. Then one of them radioed for back-up, and they began to move up the shore fairly cautiously. I noticed that they stayed together.
Another siren. Two now. One would be an ambulance, I hoped. I didn’t like the noises the man on the ground was making at all.
Ambulance and police car together. The ambulancemen very calm and slow-moving; the two fresh policemen making their way round the Pond the other way, talking int
o their radios.
We listened to them take the injured man away; but we watched Rogers across the water. There was something so strange and restless about him; more like some animal. He shouted at the policemen as they closed in; then there was a sudden rush of blue shirts, and he was face-down on the ground.
We turned away, letting out deep breaths of relief.
‘What the hell was all that about?’ I asked the leading fireman. He wiped a sweating face.
‘Bloody sandwiches. They were larking about one minute, then it suddenly just blew up. Those two have never liked each other, but . . .’
‘It must be the heat,’ I said. ‘And the smell . . .’
‘And the flies,’ he said. ‘Those bloody flies. Great fat things, and they keep on landing on your face.’
‘Flies? We haven’t had flies much here . . .’
‘Then just thank God for it. They’re driving us mad, down the far end. We’re changing the pumping crew daily now . . .’ He looked at me unbelievingly, and then at where the police were leading Rogers away. ‘That man has lost his job, and he’s probably going to prison. And all for what? A box of sandwiches. It’s mad . . . mad.’ Then he walked away back to his remaining crew, head down.
Two idle, hot, bickering hours later, the bomb disposal squad turned up and walked out on the ladders to the bomb. They didn’t hang about. We heard distant police loudspeakers telling people to open all their windows, then they blew it up with a small, controlled explosion. We watched from the road, well back. There was a lovely tall spout of mud, out there in the middle, and a nice little bang, but we never heard of any windows reported broken.
It was only a very small bomb, they said.
Crittenden turned up that evening to take a statement about the firemen. I was having a drink on the flat roof that overlooks my back garden. Of course, my back garden is full of shed, but other back gardens still have trees; and I have a little roof-garden with potted conifers, so it’s quite pleasant sitting at my little pub cast-iron table, with four aluminium repro French rococo chairs, from B&Q. I offered him a drink, and he had a lime-juice.
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