Blackstone and the Heart of Darkness

by Sally Spencer

  It had been a very messy business, all right—but then that was only what you would expect when blasting went wrong.

  *

  The Number One Evaporation Pan in the Jubilee Salt Works had an elevated position above the street, which made it a perfect vantage point for observing what was going on below, and it was from there that the two watchers had been following the movements of the man from London.

  Both men were dressed in frock coats, though the taller man’s was newer and more stylish than the one worn by the smaller man. But their manner of dress was not the major feature that distinguished between them. The taller man had an arrogance about him which suggested that he expected to be obeyed at all times. The shorter of the two, in contrast, had the hang-dog look of a man who would willingly embrace the protection of someone stronger than himself, even if, with that protection, came the prospect of the occasional beating.

  The policeman from London had been walking up and down the lane for close to half an hour—as if by covering the same route over and over again he would find the answer to some question that had been troubling him—but now he came to a definite stop in front of the Red Lion Inn, not fifty yards from where the watchers had stationed themselves.

  The taller watcher backed away from the observation post, turned and headed for the salt store. The shorter watcher obediently followed him.

  Once inside the salt store, the taller watcher selected a block of salt, sat down on it and took a hip flask out of his pocket. He uncorked the flask and took a generous slug of whisky. He did not offer the flask to his companion, nor did the shorter man make any attempt to sit down in his presence.

  ‘So our worst fears have been proved to be no more than correct,’ the taller watcher said, though there was no evidence of any particular concern in his words ‘Tom Yardley did indeed write to his old friend Inspector Blackstone. And now Blackstone is here in the village.’

  ‘Perhaps he won’t stay,’ the shorter watcher said nervously.

  ‘Won’t stay? Why wouldn’t he stay?’

  ‘When he learns what’s happened, he may decide there’s no point in being here, and catch the next train back to London.’

  The taller watcher laughed. ‘Have you read anything at all about this Inspector Blackstone?’

  ‘Well, yes, I—’

  ‘Then you’ll know all about him rescuing that little nigger prince?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And how he caught the fire bug who threatened to burn the whole of London down?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So having read all that, does he strike you as the kind of man who’s likely to just walk away? Because that’s certainly not how he strikes me!’

  ‘But if you believe he’ll stay, how can you remain so calm?’ the smaller watcher wondered.

  ‘I can remain calm because I am a planner—because when things happen, it is because I want them to happen.’

  ‘You can’t have wanted this!’

  ‘True. But “this”—as you call it—may prove to be no more than a minor distraction. I’ve laid my plans very carefully, and thus far I’ve managed to fool the police, the customs-and-excise officials—and this whole village. So why should you assume that I can’t fool him?’

  ‘Because he’s different! You said so yourself!’

  ‘Yes, I did, didn’t I?’ the taller watcher agreed. ‘And possibly you’re right. Possibly he will have the perception and intelligence to see through all the camouflage I’ve thrown up around my little enterprise. In which case, we’ll just have to deal with him, won’t we?’

  ‘Deal with him?’

  ‘Stop pretending you don’t know what I mean. When I say “deal with him”, what am I talking about?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘What am I talking about?’

  The smaller man looked down his feet. ‘You’re talking about arranging a fatal accident,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Just so,’ the other man concurred.

  *

  The blinds that had covered the pub windows had been pulled clear, and now Blackstone heard the bolts on the main door being drawn.

  The door was opened by the landlord, a man in his late forties, with sandy hair. As he was pulling the pint of bitter that Blackstone had asked for, the Inspector noticed that he was still wearing a black armband.

  ‘From your accent, I’d say that you’re not from round here,’ the landlord said, as he slid the foaming pint across the counter.

  He sounded as if he were doing no more than making conversation, Blackstone thought. But was he?

  Tom Yardley didn’t trust the local police force, and maybe he didn’t trust this landlord, either. So, until he’d spoken to Tom himself, it would perhaps be wisest to give away as little as possible.

  ‘No, I’m not local,’ he admitted.

  ‘I’d guess you’re a Londoner,’ the landlord said.

  ‘And you’d be right.’

  ‘We don’t get many Londoners in the village.’

  ‘I imagine you don’t.’

  ‘If you think I’m being too nosy, you could just tell me to shut up,’ the landlord suggested amiably.

  Blackstone sighed. Despite his best efforts, the conversation had reached a point at which he would draw more suspicion on himself by saying nothing than he would by telling a half-truth or two, he decided.

  ‘I’ve got a little bit of business that I need to attend to in the port of Liverpool,’ he said.

  ‘Then why aren’t you in Liverpool?’ the landlord asked. He chuckled. ‘You don’t think this village is Liverpool, do you? The little canal that runs through here joins the mighty River Mersey, but nobody’s actually ever mistaken it for the Mersey before.’

  Blackstone chuckled himself, as if he were sharing in the landlord’s joke. ‘No, I haven’t made that mistake,’ he agreed.

  ‘Well, then?’

  ‘I have a friend in this area, and since I had to be here anyway, I thought I’d take the opportunity to visit him.’

  ‘A friend?’

  ‘An old comrade from my days in the army.’

  ‘Now who might that old comrade be?’ the landlord wondered. ‘There’s quite a number of men from Marston who have served in the army, at one time or another, you know.’

  Blackstone sighed again. In seeking to be discreet, he had only succeeded in turning himself into a man of mystery.

  Was there any point in keeping his friend’s name a secret any longer? Surely, in a village this size, everybody would know who he’d come to see the moment he talked to Tom. Besides, the important fact to hide was not that Tom was his old comrade, but that he himself was a police inspector, and it was because of that fact that Tom had practically begged him to come.

  ‘You probably know the man I’ve come to see,’ he said jauntily. ‘It wouldn’t surprise me if he wasn’t one of your regulars, since he’s a salt-miner, and I’m told that job’s enough to give any man a raging thirst.’

  The landlord was looking increasingly uneasy, as if, in his head, he was piecing together the bits of information about Blackstone’s old comrade’s probable age and his occupation.

  ‘This friend of yours...’ he said, tentatively.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It’s not Tom Yardley by any chance, is it?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, it is.’

  The landlord’s face turned suddenly mournful. ‘Then I’m sorry to tell you you’ve come too late,’ he said.

  ‘Too late?’

  ‘That’s what I said. We’ve just buried the poor bugger.’

  Four

  Blackstone, standing outside the pub, watched as the villagers came down the bridge, on their way back from the funeral. As the procession drew level with him, one man—a miner by the look of him—peeled free of it and made a beeline for him.

  ‘Are you that inspector from London?’ the man asked. ‘Because if you are, Tom Yardley’s told me all about how the two of you fought together in Afghanistan
, and how you were the best sergeant he’d ever served under.’

  ‘Did he mention that he saved my life once?’ Blackstone asked. The miner shook his head. ‘Not that I can recall.’

  No, he wouldn’t have, Blackstone thought. Not Tom.

  ‘What if I am “that inspector from London”?’ he said aloud. ‘Why should that be any concern of yours?’

  ‘Tom told me he’d sent you a letter,’ the miner said. He checked quickly over his shoulder, to see if anyone was listening. ‘And he...and he told me that if anything happened to him before you got here, I was to let you know about it. I was goin’ to write to you tonight, but now you’re here...’

  ‘Can I buy you a drink?’ Blackstone asked.

  The miner looked down the street at the slowly retreating column of mourners.

  ‘I’m supposed to go straight back to work once the funeral’s over,’ he said, apologetically. Then he slashed his hand through the air in an angry gesture, and added, ‘To hell with work. I need a bloody drink.’

  The miner’s name was Walter Clegg. He was around the same age as Tom Yardley, but there all resemblance ended. Tom had been a big man, broad-shouldered and inclined to beefiness, while Walter Clegg was small and wiry. And the differences were not only physical. The Tom that Blackstone had known could have become a leader in time, but this man had been born to be a faithful follower.

  ‘Tell me what happened down the mine,’ Blackstone said, as he placed the two pints and two whisky chasers on a table in the corner of the pub where the other man was waiting for him. Clegg picked up his whisky, and swallowed it in a single gulp. ‘Ever been down a salt mine yourself?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ Blackstone admitted.

  ‘Then before you can make any sense of it, I’ll have to tell you what it’s like down there.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘Salt mining’s not like coal mining. Coal runs in seams, through other rocks. The seam can be narrow, or it can be wide. It can go on for miles, or it can come to a sudden stop not far from where it started. Salt comes in drifts that are twenty-six feet thick—sometimes even more—an’ seem to go on for ever.’

  Blackstone nodded. ‘Understood.’

  ‘Another way it’s different is that we don’t need to put up pit props, like they do in coal mines. When we’re hackin’ our way through the drift, we don’t cut it all away. We leave pillars of salt behind us, to support the roof.’

  ‘Is it really so important that I should know that?’ Blackstone asked impatiently.

  Walter Clegg nodded. ‘Yes, it is—if you’re to make sense of what I’m about to tell you.’

  *

  The ‘hall’ at the base of the main shaft is where the stables that house the pit ponies are located—ponies that will never again see the light of day, because they came down here as foals, and now are too big to be taken to the surface ever again.

  It is Tom Yardley’s habit to bring a little present for the ponies—usually in the .form of lumps of sugar—and the first thing he does when he gets out of the cage is pay the ponies a visit.

  As he strokes the animals and talks softly to them, the rest of his crew stand around smoking cigarettes. Though they are paid by the load for their work, they do not begrudge Tom his time with the ponies, because they have come to appreciate how lucky they are to have him as their blaster.

  Tom knows just how much explosive charge to use—and just where to place it so that the rock crystal comes off the wall in manageable lumps, rather than in huge chunks that it almost cripples them to load into the wagons. It is not a talent that all blasters share, and there is not a rock-getter in the whole area who would not gladly change places with one of Tom’s crew.

  There are several tunnels leading off the hall, each one going to a different gallery. Tom’s crew go down the one that leads to the gallery they have been working for some time.

  The drift master, Mr Culshaw, is already at the rock face, standing next to the pile of crystal-salt boulders that the crew left behind them when they clocked off the previous week.

  ‘You should have already shifted this,’ he says, and the look on his face shows that he is in a foul mood this morning.

  Tom shrugs. ‘We didn’t have time.’

  ‘You should have made time.’

  ‘My lads put in ten hours’ solid graft on Saturday. By the time they were finished, they felt as if their backs were broken an’ their throats were on fire. I wasn’t going to ask them to do any more.’

  ‘What about the big order that Mr Bickersdale’s got to meet?’

  ‘That’s not our concern. If he can’t meet it, he should never have taken it on in the first place.’

  ‘You understand nothing about doing business,’ Culshaw says contemptuously.

  ‘Maybe not,’ Tom Yardley agrees. ‘But I understand how hard rock-gettin’ is—which is somethin’ you seem to have forgotten yourself since your promotion to drift master.’

  ‘What am I to tell Mr Bickersdale when he wants to know why we’re falling behind?’ Culshaw asks, almost wheedling now.

  ‘Tell him that if he wants to increase production, he should put more men into that other mine of his,’ Tom suggests.

  ‘You know that would do no good. The Melbourne Mine’s just a bloody white elephant—and the last thing I’m going to do is remind Mr Bickersdale that he was conned into buying it.’

  ‘Then you’ve got a problem,’ Tom says.

  Culshaw’s mood swings again, and now he is very definitely angry.

  ‘No, you’re the one with the problem,’ he says. ‘Because if you don’t follow the new instructions I’m about to give you, I’ll sack the lot of you and bring in a new crew.’

  ‘You’d never do that,’ Tom tells him. ‘You’d never get a crew that works harder than mine does.’

  ‘I might.’

  ‘You’d be takin’ a very big gamble.’

  ‘And why wouldn’t I gamble? What have I got to lose by gambling? If I don’t get the results Mr Bickersdale wants, I’ll be out of a job myself.’

  Tom thinks about it for a moment. He decides that Culshaw is right, and probably will carry out his threat if he’s pushed.

  ‘What do you want us to do?’ he asks.

  ‘Next time you blast, I want you to use a bigger charge that’ll bring a hell of a lot more off the wall in one go. And then I want you to work a damn sight harder at loadin’ the bloody stuff.’

  ‘We’re too close to the nearest pillars to use a much bigger charge,’ Tom says.

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that,’ Culshaw replies. ‘I was a blaster while you were still sucking on your mother’s tit—and I say it’s all right.’

  *

  ‘Tom wasn’t happy about the way things were turnin’ out at all,’ Walter Clegg told Blackstone. ‘But he could see that Culshaw meant what he said, and he must have thought he could get away with using more explosives after all, because he finally agreed.’

  *

  While his crew load the rock crystal left over from the previous Saturday on to trucks, Tom Yardley drills a series of. holes in the rock face, and then packs them with explosive charges.

  Twenty minutes go by, then Tom says, ‘I’m setting the fuse now, so take cover.’

  The cover that he means is the salt pillars.

  ‘Not there,’ he shouts, when he sees the crew going behind the pillars nearest to the salt face. ‘This is a bloody big charge I’m using. I want you all at the very end of the gallery.’

  *

  ‘We didn’t think that was necessary,’ Walter Clegg told Blackstone.

  ‘Not even though he was using more explosive than usual?’

  ‘No, they’re massive things, them salt pillars—twenty-five yards square. They have to be that big, because they’re supportin’ several hundred feet of rock above them.’

  ‘But you went anyway?’

  ‘Torn was the boss. Tom knew what he was doin’.’

  *


  The crew retreat to the back of the gallery, as instructed.

  Another two minutes pass, then Tom calls out, ‘I’m going to light the .fuse now.’ And even before his words have stopped echoing around the vast cathedral of salt, there is a huge, deafening explosion.

  *

  ‘A good blaster knows how to set the fuse so it will give him more than enough time to take cover with everybody else,’ Walter Clegg said.

  ‘So Tom made a mistake, did he?’ Blackstone asked.

  Walter shook his head. ‘No, I don’t think he did.’

  *

  For a while, the crew are so stunned by the ferocity and unexpectedness of the explosion that they do nothing. And even when they do force themselves to move, the air is so thick with salt that it is almost like being caught in a snow storm.

  Walter Clegg is the first member of the crew to reach the rock face, so he is the first to see the pile of boulders that the explosion has ripped away from the wall—and the first to notice that projecting from this pile is a human arm.

  He knows he has no chance of pulling Tom clear—knows that the best thing he can do will he start clearing away the boulders—but his instincts have taken over; so he tugs at the arm anyway.

  And it comes away in his hand.

  *

  ‘He was a mess,’ Walter said, his voice choking as he spoke. ‘There were bits of him all over the place. He just looked like so much meat. I was sick. We were all sick. But we collected him up as best we could.’

  ‘And you don’t think it was his own mistake that killed him?’

  Walter shook his head again, more violently this time. ‘It couldn’t have been more than a second between him setting the fuse an’ the explosion. He’d never have miscalculated it that badly.’

  ‘So what did happen?’

  ‘I can’t be sure,’ Walter Clegg admitted. ‘I’m not an expert like Tom was. But it seems to me that them explosives had to have been tampered with—either by Culshaw or by some other murderous swine.’

  Five

  There were three people in the pony trap that was making its way down the narrow country lane. One was a uniformed police constable, who was sitting on the box and gently urging the pony on whenever it felt inclined to slacken its pace a little. The other two people—a man and a woman—were sitting behind the box and looking around them. Jed Trent appeared to be enjoying the change of scenery and the fresh air. Dr Ellie Carr, on the other hand, looked at each and every new hedgerow suspiciously—as if expecting an ambush.