Who Guards a Prince?

by Reginald Hill

  It had been about two years earlier, the summer of Mavis’s death. It was a period McHarg did not care to remember, but his subconscious was cunning and frequently pushed small insignificant memories to the surface of his mind to lure him unawares into those gloomy depths.

  And this was such a one. It was a memory of a television programme. McHarg was no television addict and now he didn’t even own a set. His only period of concentrated viewing had been during those last few weeks when the cancer which had been his wife’s slyly persistent companion for nearly a decade suddenly exploded into frenetic activity. A year earlier McHarg had resigned from Special Branch where his Royal Bodyguard duties could keep him away from home for six months at a time. There’d been lots of rumors about his reasons for resigning, but the truth was simple.

  His only child, Flora, a student at East Anglia University, had told him with a coldness that should have been beyond her years but which he recognized as his own that his frequent absences leaving Mavis in their small London flat were helping to kill her mother. Flora herself had been on the point of going to America for an exchange term at Boston University. With the perversity of youth, on her return, instead of being delighted that McHarg had transferred to Sanderton CID, she was angry that he had chosen this small south coast town, which was nearly twice as far from her University as London.

  But there’d been good reasons for choosing Sanderton. It was his old friend Tim Davison’s patch and that had made the transfer easy. More importantly, Mavis had loved that part of the coast and made the choice herself, though Flora was always reluctant to accept this.

  For nearly a year, her health had seemed to respond to the tonic of open countryside and fresh sea air. Then the decline had started and soon she could go out no further than the garden, and spent all her evenings in front of the flickering television screen with McHarg in an equal agony of spirit by her side.

  And now the memory came, slyly opening the door on to all kinds of other memories.

  With an effort of will he pushed them aside and concentrated on his recollections of the programme.

  It had been the sight of the familiar portico of the Old Bailey which had caught his attention. The camera tracked in, mixed to the gloomy splendor of No 1 court and dwelt for a moment on the sharp, anxious features of the man in the dock. He moved his right hand wearily across his brow, as though to brush away sweat, then allowed the fingers to droop rather awkwardly over his left eye. Now the camera passed to the judge, seated high in full judicial regalia. A big close-up showed him speaking, but the words that McHarg heard were not the words on his lips. “…these several points I solemnly swear to observe without evasion, equivocation, or mental reservation of any kind, under no less a penalty, on the violation of any of them, than that of having my throat cut across, my tongue torn out by the roots and buried in the sand of the sea at low water mark…”

  That was it! Yes. That was the memory that this daft business with the dog had triggered off.

  Now the presenter’s voice had come in. “Did any memory of this, the first of many such extraordinary and extreme oaths a Freemason has to take to protect the secrecy and the interests of his fellows, pass through the mind of Mr Justice Bucknill when, in 1911, he observed the poisoner, Seddon, make a Masonic distress signal from the dock?

  “If it did, he did not let it sway him from his duty.”

  The camera backtracked to show the judge wearing the black cap. His voice came up speaking the old words of the death sentence as the picture mixed to Seddon, who raised his right hand to his brow once more, then dropped it hopelessly to grip the edge of the dock.

  The presenter resumed. “Yet for many people, despite the good works, the open-handed charities, the neutral stance on politics and religion, Freemasonry still raises the question—what special privileges are available to members? How far does Masonic loyalty go?

  “How many times have Masonic distress signals been made—and answered?”

  CHAPTER 7

  “You mean, the dog was a Freemason who talked?”

  Chief Superintendent Davison regarded McHarg with a lopsided grin that a neurotic underling might have construed as a sneer. McHarg didn’t. He wasn’t neurotic and he’d known Davison too long. They had been friends and equals once in their early days with the Met. Now equals no longer, they remained friends as far as their differences in rank permitted.

  “No, I don’t mean that,” said McHarg. When McHarg didn’t think something was amusing, there was a coldness in his look which sooner or later stilled laughter and erased lopsided grins.

  “Where’d you get all this Freemason stuff?” asked Davison, almost sulkily.

  “I remembered it. There was a television programme about it a couple of years ago. The Master Builders. One of those investigative documentaries. I checked at the library this morning. It’s there in the oath. But I don’t need to tell you this.”

  “Because I’m a member of the Sanderton Lodge, you mean?” said Davison.

  “It’s a small town, sir,” said McHarg neutrally.

  “And no secret either,” said Davison equably. “Do you object?”

  “What you do in your spare time’s your own business,” said McHarg. “If you start wandering round the office in a blindfold and an apron, I’ll get worried.”

  “Thanks, Douglas. I’ll try not to worry you. So what’s the tie-up? You remember some sensationalized TV programme which gets most of it wrong …”

  “You did see it, then?”

  “…and somehow make a connection between a Masonic ceremony and this poor bloody mongrel. I don’t see it. What’s bothering you?”

  “Listen, man,” said McHarg, becoming more Scottish in his exasperation. “I’m not saying there’s any direct link. But something happened on that beach. Something nasty, however you look at it. Something that smacks of ritual and goes a bloody long way beyond whatever puerile mummery your mates indulge in down at the Lodge!”

  “For God’s sake, Douglas! Be careful what you say!” Davison had let himself be exasperated at last.

  McHarg bared his teeth in a ferocious grin.

  “Might affect my career? Too late, the virgin cried.”

  The two men looked at each other. They had arrived here in Sanderton by different routes. But they both knew that while for Davison it was a staging post, for McHarg it was almost certainly the end of the line.

  “Come on, Douglas,” said Davison wearily. “There’s no reason why you shouldn’t get a leg-up still. But not if you play around with daft stuff like this. So drop it, will you? Leave it to the RSPCA. You’re managing to do the work of two men as it is. And you’re due up in London tomorrow for the Partington trial.”

  “That shouldn’t keep me long. I’m only the arresting officer. And I can drive back nights,” said McHarg.

  “No way!” exclaimed Davison. “You relax a bit, taste the good life. I don’t want you back here till you’re done. And don’t imagine it’s going to be easy. You did a damn sight more than arrest the bugger, and he’ll be pulling all the stops out on this one. He’s got money and influence. It could drag on for ages.”

  McHarg couldn’t disagree. At the end of the ’sixties, Stanley Partington had been a bright young politician with a head for figures, widely tipped as a future Chancellor and thought by some to be capable of going all the way. His bluff good looks and ruddy complexion, which won him the nickname “Sailor,” made him a perfect media figure. By turns Minister of State and Opposition Spokesman on a whole variety of subjects, his star seemed to burn ever brighter.

  But it was casting shadows too.

  His name began to be associated with many of the financial scandals which were such a feature of business life in the ’seventies. Nothing definite, nothing proven, but in the end he resigned his parliamentary seat “for health reasons,” promising to return at the earliest opportunity. Two years later, as official interest grew in the dealings of one of his African companies, his health
once more required that he should convalesce in a Swiss sanatorium. At just that time a fire had swept through his company headquarters in London, totally destroying all records. Rumors of his personal involvement were rife. He successfully sued Private Eye for printing some of them, but two years later an official investigation into Partington, despite meeting obstructionism on a huge scale, was coming to a head.

  McHarg knew only what he read and he certainly had had no idea that mild December evening just before last Christmas that the Commander of the Fraud Squad was pressing the case for an arrest warrant to be issued. The issue was in doubt, but it was going to be a close enough thing for alarm bells to start ringing.

  And in McHarg’s office, the phone rang too.

  The voice wasn’t very distinct, drunk rather than disguised he thought. And there’d been a lot of strange background noises. But the message came through loud and clear. “Sailor” Partington was planning a little Christmas cruise in the Atlas Rose, a Weymouth 42 motor cruiser presently moored in Sanderton Marina.

  That was it. Another man might have spent time contacting the Yard to see if this information was significant, or at least might have chatted to his own immediate superior.

  McHarg pulled his coat on, climbed into his old Volvo and headed straight for the marina.

  He was just in time. The boat was nosing its way from the moorings. McHarg stepped on board but made no attempt to interfere with Partington at the controls. “Just keep going,” he invited.

  A couple of hours later the cruiser returned. There’d been trouble with the engine, McHarg explained. They’d drifted around a bit till it was put right.

  Curiously it was Partington, the experienced amateur sailor, who seemed to have suffered most. Grey-faced and retching, he had looked like a case for hospital but he’d been taken back to the station instead where McHarg formally arrested him. When the news reached the Yard there’d been mingled jubilation and consternation, the former from those who’d wanted a warrant to be issued, the latter from those who’d argued there wasn’t yet enough evidence—and won the day.

  There was more evidence now. From the boat McHarg produced a large quantity of money, various interesting papers and a signed statement which there was not a cat in hell’s chance of getting admitted in court. But the newspapers were on to the arrest in a flash and now even the most reluctant of the top brass had to concede that the case should go forward, which it was now doing, three months later.

  “That reminds me,” said McHarg. “Something curious. That business with the tongue put it out of my mind last night. You remember the tipoff I got about Partington? I think I know who gave it.”

  “Do you now?” said Davison. “And does he admit it?”

  “Hardly. I think it was that poor sod who got himself burned to death yesterday morning,” said McHarg. “That journalist, Morrison. There was a background noise to that phone call, sort of creaking, groaning, bubbling. I thought of something urban, an old boiler perhaps, or a laundry. But after I came away from that fire there was something going on in my mind, some kind of echo. I made Potter go out there again yesterday evening. He wasn’t pleased.”

  “I know,” said Davison drily. “I’ve had him on the phone complaining.”

  “And I thought I’d been mistaken,” continued McHarg. “But just when I was ready to leave, the waterwheel started turning again. And that was it! I’m sure that phone call came from that cottage!”

  “Or any other cottage or house near a mill wheel,” said Davison.

  “True. But I might just do a bit of checking on friend Morrison’s background when I’m up in town.”

  “Oh, come on, Douglas!” said Davison. “You’re not crying ’murder’ now, surely! Potter was quite adamant about the cause of the fire.”

  “Who said anything about murder?” said McHarg innocently. “If Morrison, a journalist, knew enough to tip me off, I’m just interested to know who might have tipped him off, that’s all.”

  “For Christ’s sake,” said Davison. “You’ll kill yourself sooner or later, Douglas. Haven’t you got enough on your plate without chasing every little hare you start?”

  McHarg stood up.

  “What I do in my own time’s my own business isn’t it?” he asked neutrally.

  “I wish I could believe you had some time of your own,” answered Davison. He glanced at his watch. “I’m meeting Heather for lunch in the Atlanta. Why don’t you join us?”

  “No, thanks,” said McHarg. “I don’t eat at lunchtime.”

  “A drink then. You do drink, don’t you? Even at lunchtime.”

  There was perhaps more sarcasm in his voice than he had intended. But not much.

  McHarg looked at him coldly for a moment.

  “Yes, I drink,” he said. “You can buy me a drink if you like. Sir.”

  Heather Davison, the Chief Super’s wife, was already in the bar of the Atlanta Hotel. She greeted McHarg warmly. Since his wife’s death, McHarg had contrived by simple lack of response first to weary, finally to alienate, nearly all the friends he and Mavis had shared. Heather Davison had persisted, however, and her reward was that two or three times in the past six months he had come round for supper and shown signs of enjoying it.

  “Are you lunching with us?” she asked.

  “Sorry, I can’t,” said McHarg.

  “He can do without food,” said Davison, placing a large Scotch before his subordinate. Heather shot him a sharp, disapproving glance.

  “You’re looking tired, Doug,” she said.

  McHarg looked at her affectionately. She was an attractive woman with deep brown eyes and a warm smile.

  “I was up pretty early,” he said.

  “I know. So was Tim, but he doesn’t look like you. You need that holiday. Are you all ready?”

  “Ready?” he said blankly.

  “Yes. Visa, traveller’s cheques, air ticket. You’re not planning to swim to Boston, are you?”

  “He might walk on the water,” grunted her husband, sipping his sherry.

  “Yes, I’m ready,” said McHarg. “That doesn’t mean I’ll go, though.”

  “Not go?” said Heather, astonished. “But Flora—she’ll be so disappointed.”

  “Perhaps. She hasn’t written for three months.”

  He tried to keep the hurt out of his voice. He’d understood Flora’s attitude at first. The end had come so quickly. When the terminal deterioration had set in, Flora had been in the middle of her final examinations. Mavis had pleaded with him not to contact her till they were finished. A couple of days would make no difference. McHarg was not a man given to weakness but weakly he had agreed.

  It had seemed at first that Mavis was right. Then on the day that Flora finished her exams, Mavis had died. McHarg was by her bedside, clumsily arranging some flowers he had brought and telling her about his plans for the garden. And suddenly he had realized his words were falling into a silence deeper than the despair they were trying to conceal.

  Time became meaningless thereafter.

  Then suddenly she was there. Flora. His daughter. Shoulder-length hair, so richly black that it seemed to smol-der, as did the huge accusing eyes in the pale strong face.

  “How long had you known?” she cried. “How long?”

  “A few days. Three, four. It started and she said, your mother said…”

  “What?”

  “Not to tell you. Not to bother you. Not till your exams were over. She said it would be all right. She said…”

  “She said? She said?”

  “Yes,” said McHarg, perplexed. “I didn’t want to, but she made me promise. She thought…she seemed…your mother…”

  “Liar! Liar! Liar! It was you. Always you! You didn’t want…you didn’t like…YOU…”

  McHarg moved forward, hand outstretched.

  His daughter turned and rushed out of the room, out of the house. Later she had returned, anger contained in a rigid case of cold, polite control. McHarg had made no
attempt to break through it, believing that now time would be his friend.

  But there had not been any time.

  After the funeral Flora had said, casually, “I think I’ll take up that offer in the States.”

  McHarg knew, mainly via his wife, that Flora had made an excellent impression during her term at Boston and there had been talk of a post-graduate place, part teaching, part research. They suspected there was a man involved, but Flora had made it clear she put being close to her mother first.

  Now: “There’s nothing to keep me here,” she said.

  McHarg had nodded, poker-faced, as at the start of an important interrogation. But had nothing to ask his own daughter.

  That night he drank a full bottle of Scotch. He had seen her once more before she went.

  And since she went he had not seen her at all.

  They exchanged short infrequent letters, assuring each other of good health and reasonable weather. Flora made no mention of returning to England and it was Heather Davison who six months earlier had come up with the notion that McHarg should visit the States. Once proposed, she did not leave the idea alone till she’d got McHarg to admit to a desire to see his daughter again, or at least a flicker of interest strong enough to be called a desire by comparison with anything else in his life.

  Unfortunately Flora’s interest flickered even more fitfully. At six months’ distance from the proposed visit, her neutral response to the idea was interpretable, via Heather, as undemonstrative acceptance. But the silence of the last twelve weeks, preceded only by a brief note on a Christmas card, seemed less ambiguous to McHarg.

  “But you have to go!” said Heather, upset. “Perhaps a letter’s got lost. You know what the post’s like these days. Look, Doug, perhaps if I tried to get in touch with her…”

  “Inspector McHarg, sorry to interrupt, could I have a word?”

  McHarg looked round, grateful to the interruptor till he saw that it was Dr Wainwright, wearing an overcoat and carrying his black bag.