But there were no more yelps; no sign that he had hit anything else. And they had bottles with rags in the top; she had seen their glint in the light of the torch.
Rose sat in her daze; she no longer had the heart; she despaired. She was just glad the children had something to occupy themselves in their last moments; that they were still fighting and not afraid. Oddly, she was proud of them. Philip would have been proud of them too . . .
She thought sadly of Philip; of what he would have to face when he came. But she thought he would survive it, somehow. Make a new life for himself, eventually . . . perhaps the minister could help him. Perhaps Philip would work like hell to put two and two together, drive the police frantic with the power he had in the company and his important friends. Philip might even prove murder, have revenge.
But what good was revenge? She and the kids would all be . . .
‘I think they’re going to have a go, Mum,’ said Timothy, quietly. ‘They’re getting all worked up to it.’ Then he added in disgust, ‘Half of them are drunk.’
He was ever his father’s son. No time for the peasants of this world. He probably would kill one of them, before the flames got too high. Maybe more than one.
Well, he was entitled.
Then she heard him say, startled.
‘Hey, what’s that?’
She ran to the window.
A pair of searchlights, up towards Wallney. Little searchlights that were nearly parallel to the ground, but bobbed and swayed upwards, uncertainly.
A car, forcing its way up the old path from the village. She could hear its heavy engine now, and the smashing of branches. Some other aid to killing them?
But the faces in the lane had turned to watch the lights come. And they stood very still; not like men who are welcoming support. They stood with their arms flaccid by their sides; suddenly for some reason no longer wary even of the danger of the air-pistol. Something had made them quite forget about the danger of the air-pistol . . .
The saving headlights got nearer; the throb of the diesel engine louder, the crashing of the branches more frantic. And now there were blue lights, revolving and winking above the headlights. The red legend
STOP POLICE
It stopped about fifty yards away, its headlights lighting up everything. And under the brilliance of those lights, the crowd in the lane began to . . . melt, dribble away, vanish.
‘That won’t save them,’ said Tim with great satisfaction. ‘They can run as far as they like. I recognised half of them. The woman from the mini-market was there. And her husband.’
Rose shuddered at his tone; there wasn’t the slightest trace of mercy in it. Everyone was going to pay to the uttermost penny.
But it was time to welcome their saviours, who were getting out of the white, striped Range Rover, and walking along the path to the cottage. Two policemen, with white covers to their caps; one without a white cover, and a bare-headed man in the middle. She strained her eyes to make out who it was; but the figure was in silhouette against the headlights.
It was too short and squat for Philip; too broad for the little minister. Certainly never Miss Yaxley . . . who was it?
The figure stopped at the gate and turned, lifting its face to the upstairs window.
It had black spectacles; mended on the bridge with black adhesive tape. It wore dirty rubbers.
‘You all right, missus?’ shouted Mr. Gotobed. She shouted yes.
‘That’s good. Wiv had one killin’. We don’t want no more.’
‘They killed the cat,’ she shouted. ‘It’s lying in the front garden.’
Tim shone his torch, at where the body lay.
But there was no body; there wasn’t even any blood. Of Yaxley’s cat, there was no sign.
They spent the night at the police station in Sheringham. They spent the night, but they didn’t sleep. Philip was there before midnight; hurling his weight about with the police. The little minister was there, desperately concerned, trying to help. And policemen asking questions and telephoning. And Jane, now it was all over, keeping on rushing off to be sick. And Timothy, telling all he knew, consigning people to custody without blinking an eye.
‘And there was a tall thin bloke with reddish hair cut very short – I’ve seen him in the post office. He drives a tractor – a Fordson tractor – I can’t remember the number-plates. I think he’d got a tattoo on his left wrist . . .’ Tim demonic, tireless, sipping endless cans of Coke and damning souls to hell. The avenging angel. He frightened her now, more than the old man with the spectacles had frightened her. And Jane, at his shoulder, backing him up between her bouts of sickness, nodding at every word he said. Every power of the state at his command; the perks of the rich. And Philip standing watching him, approving, equally avenging, equally merciless.
She could almost feel sorry for the villagers she saw being led past the police station’s swinging doors. Shrunken, baffled, hopeless. Ripped out of their tiny cosy world into a huge world that wanted only their names and addresses and their confessions and their punishment.
Rose felt more alone than she ever had in her life.
The little minister came across to her, and put an arm round her and unashamedly held her hand.
‘Oh, Father,’ she said. ‘Is there no mercy anywhere?’
‘Yes, there is mercy,’ he said, nodding wearily.
She hoped he wasn’t going to talk about God; try to stick God over every wound like a sticking plaster.
And he didn’t let her down.
‘In Mr. Gotobed,’ he said.
Then added, ‘And in you yourself, my dear.’
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Robert Westall was born in North Shields, Northumberland in 1929. After taking degrees in fine art from Durham University and London’s Slade School, Westall worked as an art teacher and was also a freelance journalist and art critic for The Guardian.
It was not till later in life that Westall turned to fiction, having been inspired to become a writer after telling his son Christopher stories about his childhood during World War II. His first book, The Machine Gunners, was published in 1975 when he was 45; it was a major success, winning the Carnegie Medal, and has been recognized by critics as a lasting classic of children’s literature. He would go on to publish over 40 books for young readers, including works that drew on his boyhood during the war, stories involving cats, and tales of the ghostly and supernatural. Besides The Machine Gunners, Westall is perhaps best known for The Scarecrows (1981), which won him a second Carnegie Medal and which his obituary in the Independent called ‘one of the most searing and haunting child-eyed views of divorce yet to have been written’, and Blitzcat (1989), which won the Smarties Prize. The Watch House (1977) and The Machine Gunners were also adapted for television serials.
After retiring from teaching in 1985, Westall worked briefly as an antique dealer, an experience that partly inspired his sole work of fiction for adults, the ghost story collection Antique Dust (1989). The first edition’s jacket lists his hobbies as ‘nosing round old buildings, studying cats and looking for the unknown’ and notes that ‘he has never seen a ghost but has not yet given up hope’.
Robert Westall died in 1993 at age 63.
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