by Jack Gerson
'We should talk to Oliphant again,' she went on.
'If he pulls through.'
'He's got some of the best medical men in London looking after him. Old friends. Kerry Tobias was at university with me. He's the best there is. Incidentally I told him to ring here if there was any change in Oliphant's condition.'
Crane sighed. 'I'm glad the old man's in good hands. I was beginning to like him.'
Two hours later, Crane was wakened out of a deep, dreamless sleep by the telephone ringing. He answered it drowsily and a voice asked for Dr Anne Reynolds.
He crawled out of bed and knocked on the spare room door. Anne took the call on the living room extension with Crane wearily slumped once again in the armchair.
"Yes! Yes, I understand. Yes.' She was as brisk and wide awake as she would have been had she slept for the entire night. Crane vaguely marvelled at her energy.
Yes, I understand. I'll tell Mr Crane,' she looked around at Crane, as if for confirmation of her next statement. 'No, I don't think we know of any next of kin.' A pause. Yes, I realise you have to do that. Thank you, Kerry.'
She hung up and faced Crane.
'Oliphant died an hour ago. They don't know how or why. Of course there will have to be a post mortem... but Kerry did say something strange...'
Crane was feeling sick. 'What?'
'He said it was as if... as if his brain had been burnt out...'
TWELVE
Anscott Lodge stood back from the road about a quarter of a mile from the tiny picturesque village of Anscott. Nestling in a fold of the Chilterns, the village consisted of five cottages, seven largish houses, a small inn and the lodge keeper's cottage on the edge of the village.
The Lodge itself was an old dower house, part of an estate long since gone. A small driveway led from the main road through a cluster of trees and curved onto a pleasant lawn in front of the house.
Crane and Anne drove out from London late that morning. They lunched at a pub in Wendover and arrived in the village at about two o'clock. Outside the Anscott Inn an argument ensued.
'You wait here!' Crane insisted. 'I go up to the house myself.'
'I'm coming with you!'
'Look, Anne...'
'If Drexel is in that house it could be dangerous.'
'All the more reason why you stay here. If I'm not back by, say, four o'clock, phone Scott-Erskine. He'll arrange for a rescue operation.'
Anne shook her head. 'By the time he got out from London it could be too late.'
'Too late for what?' Crane smiled.
'I don't know. But, damn it, Tom, you can't go into that house alone if Drexel is there.'
'And if he is I certainly can't take you with me.'
She stared at him angrily. Suddenly he leaned forward and kissed her. She continued to stare for a moment, then tears' gathered in her eyes.
'Why did you do that? You shouldn't have done that.'
He thought, now she's a young girl again.
'I wanted to,' he replied. 'First time since Julia's death I've wanted to do anything other than find Drexel. Now you go into the inn and you wait. I'll leave the car here and walk to the Lodge. Promise me you'll do what I tell you.'
She nodded silently, choking back emotion. Then she leaned forward and kissed him with force and passion. Then without saying anything she got out of the car and walked into the inn.
Crane got out of the driving seat, locked the car and went to the inn door. The interior was dim but pleasant, dark polished wood reflecting the daylight from the door. The bar was empty but for a large man, the landlord, polishing glasses, and Anne standing, back to the door, head up, affecting to stare at some hunting prints on the wall.
"You forgot the keys of the car/ Crane said and, as she turned, he tossed the keys to her. She caught them awkwardly and in the dim light he could see the tears were still in her eyes.
Crane could see the innkeeper, out of earshot, peering curiously across the bar.
'Pick you up later, darling,' he said loudly for the innkeeper's benefit. 'Little spot of business shouldn't take more than a couple of hours.'
He went quickly with a cheerful grin that he did not in any way feel.
He walked up to Anscott Lodge.
As he rounded the curve of the drive and saw the house he felt that Oliphant had made a mistake. This peaceful English upper middle class home looked far removed from a 'safe' house for a secret organisation.
The lawn in front of the house was neat and well kept, and croquet hoops sprouted from the ground in one corner.
Stone steps led from the lawn to a small patio at. one side of the front door, and on the patio stood the usual garden furniture, a metal table with sub-shade, three upright metal chairs and two deck chairs.
Crane approached the front door with a determined stride. Since the night before he had been considering how he should present himself at this house. He had considered breaking in surreptitiously but dismissed this thought quickly. An attempted break-in would place him in a position outwith the law and any retaliation could be justified as defensive action against an intruder.
He had decided on a direct approach, a pretext that would allow him to obtain entry. And then, once inside, he felt he would be able to judge as to whether or not Oliphant’s belief that Drexel was in this house was true.
He pressed a round bell at the side of the door and waited. After a minute there was the sound of shoes clip-clopping across a wooden floor and the door opened.
She was a diminutive figure, well under five feet in height. She wore a uniform which Crane thought had been done away with in the late thirties; that of a housemaid with black blouse and skirt, over which was a snowy white apron. On her head, pinned into hair of nondescript colour and style, was another stripe of white material, a linen diadem of her occupation.
'Yes, sir?' said the maid, cockney accent creeping through.
'This is Anscott Lodge?' Crane enquired.
'This is the Lodge, sir.'
'Could you tell me, is there a Mr Drexel in residence?' The direct approach which might be considered unexpected.
The maid blinked but her expression did not change. 'I'm sorry, sir, but I ain't ever heard of the gentleman.'
'Could you tell me who owns the Lodge?'
Another blink, not caused by nerves but a natural quirk.
'That would be Mrs Hitching. Mrs Hitching lives here with her daughter and her brother.'
'I see,' Crane was projecting an image of calm inscrutability. 'I wonder if it would be possible for Mrs Hitching to see me for a few moments?'
After some understandable hesitation on the maid's part, Crane was shown into a large bright room to the left of the main hall, and there he was left while the maid scurried off to find her mistress. Crane stared around the room. He smiled to himself. It was almost like a stage set for one of those brittle West End comedies set in a country house in the Home Counties. Noel Coward or Frederick Lonsdale would have been at home in this room.
Above the large open fireplace in which a coal fire was burning hung a portrait of an elegant looking woman in a flowing blue gown. It was by Sargent. On the mantelpiece below the painting was a beautifully wrought antique clock on either side of which were some finely detailed Meissen figurines.
The furniture comprised three leather armchairs and a matching sofa all with a comfortable, lived-in, look. French windows looked out onto the green lawn and croquet pitch, and on either side of the fireplace were deep fitted bookshelves rising from floor to ceiling. The one on the left consisted of handsome leatherbound volumes of some antiquity while the shelves on the right held an extensive selection of novels ranging through a half century of popular fiction.
Crane was drawn to the portrait again and was staring up at it when the door behind him opened and he turned to face a tall handsome woman in her late fifties. There was a fleeting resemblance between this woman and the portrait.
She smiled pleasantly as she came towards rum, h
and outstretched.
'I'm Margaret Hitching. How do you do?'
Crane introduced himself.
"Yes,' Margaret Hitching went on. 'I've seen your photograph in the Sunday supplement. And read some of your articles.'
Her tone was warm, friendly and assured. A woman in her own home, greeting a stranger whom she had at that moment realised was a mild celebrity. Crane couldn't resist a brief glance to the portrait and back to Mrs Hitching.
She noticed the glance.
'My mother,' she explained. 'Painted by Sargent. She was considered quite a beauty. When I'm in a conceited mood I like to think a fraction of it has passed to me. But I change my mind every morning when I see myself in the mirror. But what can I do for you, Mr Crane? Sally, our maid, mentioned you were looking for someone. A Mr Drexer or Dexter..?'
'Drexel, Mrs Hitching. I was told Edward Drexel was staying here.'
'I'm afraid you've been misinformed. This is my house. Inherited from my late husband. I live here with my daughter and my brother,' she smiled and added by way of explanation. 'My brother is a bachelor and retired. Charles Graydon. And I'm afraid we have no house guests.'
Crane felt himself flush. There had to be a mistake unless the woman was lying. And if so, she was a consummate actress.
'I don't think I've ever heard of a Mr Drexel staying in the village or anywhere in the neighbourhood. But mind you I do get out of touch. Anyway you'll stay for tea, meet my brother Charles and my daughter. If there is anybody by the name of Drexel around, my daughter would know. She knows every male arrival within a twenty miles radius, no matter what age they are. Mind you, she's much more interested in the younger gentlemen.'
Crane made some mild protesting sounds about the invitation to tea. He was embarrassed and awkward, the certainty growing within him that Oliphant had made a mistake.
Margaret Hitching ignored his protest. 'Of course you'll have tea with us. Charles and I are becoming so housebound it's a pleasure to entertain a new face. Especially a journalistic celebrity.'
She rang a bell on one wall for the maid. Crane had an opportunity to study her. Twenty years before she would have been a woman of considerable attraction and even today she had a pleasing handsome face and a poised manner. Yes, Margaret Hitching had been and still was a charmer. He thought of another Margaret back in Edinburgh; Margaret Christie, her twisted body huddled against the wall of an abandoned warehouse, dead, lying surrounded by rivulets of her own blood. There could be no connection between that pitiful body and this assured, pleasant English widow.
As the maid entered with a tea trolley, a thin, greying man in tweeds came in behind her.
'Mr Crane, this is my brother, Charles Graydon,' Margaret Hitching said as she sat down beside the tea trolley.
Graydon shook hands affably. 'Nice to meet you. Do you ride?'
'Rarely,' Crane confessed, again feeling embarrassed. Oliphant must have been wrong.
'Pity,' Graydon replied. 'Could have let you have a hack for the weekend.'
'Mr Crane is not a house guest, Charles. Although, of course, he'd be very welcome.' Margaret Hitching interjected. 'He's looking for a friend... what was the name?'
'Drexel.'
'A Mr Drexel. Apparently thought he might live hereabouts.'
'Never heard the name. Does he ride?'
'I'm afraid I don't know,' Crane smiled.
'One lump or two?' Margaret Hitching asked, pouring tea.
'Er, one, thank you.'
As the maid left the room, a young girl of about eighteen entered boisterously.
'Mummy, Uncle Charles, just one cup and I must dash. Willie D'Estivet is taking me over to Mason's farm to look at the new foal.' She suddenly became aware of Crane's presence. 'Oh, sorry, didn't know we had visitors.'
'Mr Crane, my daughter, Elspeth.'
'Hello.'
'Hello, Mr Crane. You're new around here.'
'Just passing through.'
'Pity. We could use a new face or two around here.'
Margaret Hitching cleared her throat. 'Mr Crane is looking for a friend, a Mr Drexel. Would you know of a Mr Drexel in the neighbourhood?'
'Sorry. Never heard of him. Sounds like a mouthwash. Try Drexel for sore throats. That kind of thing. But I still haven't heard of him.'
Margaret Hitching looked up at Crane.
'And our family have lived here for two hundred years. And never heard the name Drexel.'
In the village, Anne was also drinking tea with the innkeeper, a plump, red-faced individual who seemed to epitomise innkeepers in general, towering over her.
'Anscott Lodge... no, we don't see much of the folk up there. They don't mix in the village,' he was explaining.
'Have they been there long?' Anne asked.
'No, no, bought the place over just after the war. Lot of people in and out but they never come here. And we don't go up there.'
Anne felt uneasy, as if she had heard something that ought to be important but wasn't.
At once she wanted to tell Crane; to warn him to be on his guard.
Back in London, deep down in the basement of a building owned by the Ministry of Defence, Scott-Erskine stood behind a diminutive computer operator who was studying long sheets of printed material.
'Of course the computer doesn't think, Mr Erskine,' the operator explained.
'I am aware of that fact.'
'It's just a massive piece of engineering that stores memory.'
'I am aware of that too.' Scott-Erskine cleared his throat irritatedly. 'But these recent read-outs from the machine...'
'Nothing the matter with them. No, nothing. Indicates what's going on in there. Like a ruddy masterpiece of electronic engineering. That's all.'
Scott-Erskine looked down at the rolls of material tabulated and listed from the machine.
'That's just a test piece,' the operator explained, then he frowned. 'Mind you, look at these big leaps in the printout sheet.'
Scott-Erskine picked up one of the sheets. At one point the wavy line flared in a chaotic mass.
'It's on the print-outs several times in an evening. Over some days now.'
'What causes it?'
'Don't know.'
'Surely you must have some idea..?'
The computer operator scratched his head. 'Energy. Like a big flare up of energy somewhere in the machinery. In the circuits. We'll need to do a check up. But something's in there giving off energy.'
'Or something has got in there,' Scott-Erskine murmured, turning away.
At Anscott Lodge, Tom Crane was drinking a second cup of tea.
'Of course I've been riding hounds all my life,' Charles Graydon rambled on. 'Blooded when I was eight and been with various hunts all my life.'
Crane shuddered inwardly at the idea of the eight-year-old Charles Graydon covered in the blood of a dead fox.
'Pay no attention to Charles,' Margaret Hitching cut in. 'Oh, he still rides but he's given up hunting years ago.'
"Nonsense, Maggie!' Indignation rose in Graydon's voice. 'I'd be out tomorrow given half a chance...'
Crane sipped his tea as they chattered on. The girl, Elspeth, he noticed occasionally drew him a sidelong glance; a look of mild amusement as if she was sympathising with him at the small talk of her mother and uncle.
At least he thought it was that at first.
Crane found himself at once completely relaxed and at his ease. The embarrassment he had felt when he became convinced Oliphant had made a mistake, had gone. These people were pleasant, hospitable, kindly and boring in their chatter. He would finish his tea, thank them for their courtesy and walk back to rejoin Anne in the village.
A thought came into mind. What was it Oliphant had said? When you want to project into another's mind, relax, don't force it. He was certainly relaxed now and there was no thought of mind projection.
Margaret Hitching was saying something of which he was only vaguely aware; something about the garden and the countryside outside, t
he English countryside, he noted chauvinistically, not the Scottish. He turned slightly and stared at the young girl, Elspeth.
The innocence was gone, the hair was wild, dishevelled and the mouth was twisted lasciviously. But it was the eyes that shook him; full of dark, vicious, perverse hatred.
Crane shook his head in an attempt to clear the distorted image. But again Oliphant's words came to him.
'Remember, nothing is what it seems.'
He looked up.
The handsome, elegant hostess was no longer there. In her place was a clever actress, a woman who assumed personalities as she might change her dress. Crane found it difficult to reach into her mind through layer after layer of affectation, of posing, of falsity. But underneath the layers there was a darkness, an evil twisted mind demanding something.he could only dimly perceive; a vision of powers that could be attained through following another presence, one more evil than her own.
The man, Charles Graydon, was something less than the woman. A shallow opportunism was combined with jealousies and hatreds that arose from a sense of failure and futility. Charles Graydon was negligible, a paid poseur, overplaying a part.
He turned to the girl, Elspeth, again. Crane had always admitted his own sensuality to himself but in this girl it was something else. A carnality possessed her that was at once intense and sadistic. Inside her mind she was writhing in some fantasy of which he, Crane, had been granted a part and could not gainsay the sense of arousal in all that he saw. Their naked bodies were entwined, sweating with lust, vicious in the patterns of their coupling. And he knew that if he allowed himself to enter -into such a situation, the culmination, the orgasmic moment would only bring satisfaction to the girl with his death at that moment. Inside her mind he could see her body covered in his blood and her pleasure at the image.
Shaken, Crane gripped the sides of the chair and stood, dropping his teacup and saucer, splattering the dregs of the tea over the pile of the carpet.
They looked around, the woman, the man and the girl, polite surprise registered on their three faces. They reacted with an automatic quality he had to admire.
'Look, let's stop the performances,' he heard himself say. 'Where is Edward Drexel?'
