by Oliver Tidy
I pointed to the desk diary from the upstairs office that I’d placed on the worktop. I put down my glass and opened the marked entry page.
‘You remember the dates and times marked in my relatives’ diary I told you about? And the single word: PLUTO?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s not just a cartoon dog or an ex-planet. I know what PLUTO means and I can prove a connection between PLUTO, Dennis Flashman and my relatives. Something specific and local.’
She sipped. I thought it was more for something to do than because she was enjoying the vintage. She forgot to make a face, looked serious instead and said, ‘Go on.’
I explained everything I’d learned. I also mentioned the coils of water pipe that had been piled up in the barn I’d been dumped in.
Talking it through with someone did something to my understanding. It elevated it to a higher level – and with a racing of my pulse I thought I might finally have a good idea of what they were doing.
With the anxiety of someone holding an ugly baby, I unveiled it. ‘I think they’re planning to run their own pipeline under the ocean.’
She made a face like I’d pulled out dentures she hadn’t been aware of. ‘With small bore plastic tubing? No way. Think about the logistics of it and the physical demands on the tubing. That’s silly.’
I was smiling at her. ‘What if they already had an outer sleeve in place?’ She went to interrupt but I held up my hand. ‘I know. I said that all the original pipelines had been salvaged. That’s what the website said. Actually, thinking about it, the website only mentioned a salvage operation. But what if they hadn’t been? What if one, or more, was still down there, on the bed of the Channel and connected either end? There were seventeen laid. It’s the only thing that makes any sense of what they were doing. If they have twenty miles of water pipe then they have enough tubing to stretch the width of the English Channel.’
Whether she was going for it or not, Jo decided to play along. ‘If an original pipeline is still connected either end, why the new tubing?’
It all became clearer and clearer, as Alice’s antithesis might have been tempted to remark. ‘Two reasons. One, with smaller-bore pipe they wouldn’t need as much pressure to send something from one end to the other. Two, it suggests that whatever they do, or did, intend to pass along could have been managed in a much narrower pipe.’
She’d had enough. She threw back the remainder of her drink. ‘It’s the stuff of fantasy. It’s a ridiculous idea.’ Now, I was smiling broadly at her. ‘What?’
‘I seem to remember reading that’s what they said about PLUTO when it was suggested and look what happened there. It could have won the Allies the war.’
‘It’s like something out of the Famous Five.’
‘Doesn’t matter, if I’m right. Truth can be stranger than fiction.’
‘All right, clever clogs. Time for the sixty-four-thousand dollar question.’
I played along, humouring her, and gave voice to her thought. ‘What’s the commodity? There’s only one thing it can be to justify that kind of outlay, commitment, practical constraint, secrecy and disregard for human life: drugs.’
‘If I agreed with everything you’ve said so far, I think I’d have to agree with that too. That Chinese ready?’
***
38
We walked together and while I felt comfortable with that – not awkward, nothing forced, natural – I experienced a strange and tingling sensation that we were being observed: a presence of something malevolent and threatening. I didn’t want to alarm Jo with my paranoia, so I said nothing. But I kept a keen eye on the shadows and, when the opportunity presented itself, I manufactured a reason to glance behind and around our progress.
Apart from us, the Chinese was empty. Wendy seemed both pained and pleased for my business. I understood both.
The walk home was uneventful. The food was excellent and the new wine Jo insisted on picking up from the mini-market was a definite improvement, even if it was double the price of what I’d supplied.
We hadn’t put the television on, which was nice.
After we’d finished the meal we took our glasses down to the shop. I’d promised her I’d show her the PLUTO website. Before I did that, I was curious to know the price of water pipe.
The wonders of the Internet, again. The narrowest gauge water pipe could be bought in hundred-metre coils. List price off the shelf where I was looking was sixty pounds plus the dreaded at twenty per cent. But buying it through the building business would have allowed someone to claim the VAT back.
Some quick and rough calculations making allowances for discounts for purchasing in those sorts of quantities gave me to understand I could buy enough of the stuff to span the Channel and have change from thirty thousand pounds. Even Jo, the sceptic, had to concede that sort of outlay would be small potatoes when compared with the rewards determined and serious importers of drugs could stand to reap if they got a good operation up and running and then some longevity into the bargain.
For the sake of argument, we got around to discussing that if the drugs idea was right how they’d do it.
‘I suppose whatever it was would have to be pumped down the line,’ I said. ‘That would involve a fluid. Water would be cheapest. Maybe they could even utilise the seawater on their doorstep. There’s a lot of it and when it reaches the other side it can simply be drained back into the Channel. At Dungeness that would just mean letting it drain into the shingle bank and finding its own way home. No one would need to be any the wiser and no great water bills.’
‘So, we’d be talking something like shrink-wrapped capsules or pills. Something small and light to go with the flow. Solids, not powder or liquids.’
I agreed.
‘Pump them through and filter them out. That wouldn’t be hard, would it? A big sieve would do it. Box them up and drive them away to market. Show me about PLUTO.’
I got a couple of chairs up to the screen and we sat close together and leaning in. We were being pretty relaxed and whereas she was, naturally, engrossed by the information in front of her, being quite familiar with it, I found myself distracted by her nearness.
I got up and paced about a bit. She trawled through it a couple of times.
After I thought she’d had long enough, I said, ‘If it’s like I think, they’re taking a hell of a risk. They couldn’t be sure the original pipe would still be serviceable after all this time down there.’
‘What isn’t a risk when you’re dealing in drugs? And like I said, twenty, thirty grand would be a drop in the ocean, excuse the pun, if it came off. They’d only need to run it for a good month to double or treble their investment. The rest is all gravy.’
I sat down next to her again. ‘What are you going to do?’
She tapped a nail against her front teeth. It was a nice nail and they were nice teeth.
‘I’d like to have a look for myself before I start sounding the alarm.’ She smiled at me. ‘You’ve done a good job of selling me a fantastic tale, but I would look pretty stupid if I went to my senior officers with it and it turned out to be nothing of the sort. You understand that for a female detective, even in the twenty-first century, a career is much harder to carve out than for a man, especially in a place like this. That is the sad reality. I can’t afford to have a false alarm on this scale as a skeleton rattling around in my locker. I’d be the laughing stock of the district.’
I had no choice but to accept this. At least she appeared to be taking me seriously.
She went on, ‘And, from what I understand, they don’t have all the pipework in place and it’s not operational. If we go busting in there it’s likely we’d frighten off the big fish. If you are right, this is going to be a massive operation, something that could swamp the UK. The big fish are going to be very big indeed.’
‘And it wouldn’t hurt the career of a lowly but ambitious police Detective Constable stuck in a provincial male-dominated rural backwater to be ab
le to claim responsibility and brownie points for uncovering something like that?’ I’d rumbled Detective Cash’s sudden self-interest and while I couldn’t blame her for thinking that way my concerns were more immediate. I wanted those responsible for murdering my relatives brought to justice.
She turned something on me then, something womanly and as potent to a red-blooded male as a snake-bite to a mouse. The female of the species is more deadly than the male. I was destined to be kneaded like the proverbial putty. But I’d want something in return.
Across the short physical distance between us she gazed with something approaching a desperate feminine pleading sincerity into my eyes. ‘Our priorities are going to be different. I understand that. You’ve suffered a terrible personal loss and you want quick justice for those responsible. Believe me, I do understand that. But you’ve highlighted the possibility of a much bigger picture here. We could bumble in and make some arrests, if they’re still there, but those responsible higher up the food chain would get away with it. Also, I won’t pretend that exposing a big drugs operation, if that’s what’s at the root of this, and solving three murder enquiries wouldn’t hurt my career. It’s your call, David. You want me to rouse the troops and storm the pumping station that’s what I’ll do. But if you want to see whether there is a bigger picture here, others involved in the deaths of your family members, not to mention the possibility of an international drugs ring threatening the UK, then we should hold back and tread softly, increase our understanding and knowledge and then act.’
I think it was her openness and honesty that got me in the end. But it could have been the promise of something I’d not been getting for a long time that I believed I saw in the look she gave me. Still, she’d left me with a card to play.
‘What if I said my cooperation and connivance will cost you? I want to be involved?’
She weighed that for a few seconds. I realised that with that simple demand I’d risked significantly altering the dynamic of our relationship. If she went for it, she wouldn’t feel she owed me anything and with that I would virtually scupper the possibility of her demonstrating her appreciation in other ways. We would become partners. I would need her and she would need me. If not exactly equals then collaborators.
‘I’ll think about it.’
If it wasn’t an outright no then she’d have to. But I was encouraged. Despite being physically drawn to her, as I was increasingly becoming, I’d rather have a direct influence in bringing those implicated in my relatives’ murders to account than anything else I could think of.
‘Could I find my own way to the pumping house easily enough?’
‘You could, but I could show you and maybe it would look less conspicuous two people out for the air at Dungeness rather than one. I’m not doing anything tomorrow morning I can’t put off.’
‘What about your book order?’
‘You know what, I’m having second thoughts about fulfilling it.’
That surprised her. ‘Really? Why? What second thoughts?’
‘Actually, it was something you said, suggested.’
She frowned at me.
‘About the potential for this place.’ I took a deep breath to explore further and give voice to something I’d fleetingly thought about in the last couple of days. ‘I might keep the place on and turn it into a book-themed coffee shop.’
I waited for that to sink in and become something. She just stared at me with a bemused look.
I went on. ‘I need something that can offer some permanence in my life. I’ve been drifting aimlessly for too long. I stand to inherit quite a bit of money, as well as all this.’ I indicated our surroundings. ‘I could turn this into something good, something people might travel to see, to enjoy. Dymchurch already has a number of regular visitors who come for the beach. They don’t all want to sit in steamy cafes, eating fish and chips and suffering other people’s kids tearing around high on fizzy drinks.’
‘So what? No kids allowed in here?’
‘Sounds like a plan.
‘There’s something else, right?’ She was being insightful.
‘Yes. There’s something else. My relatives worked hard for years to build up this business and their collections only for some ruthless bastard to rob them of their reward. It’s their money. I’ll do it to keep something of their memories alive.’
She shook her head at me, not in a bad way. ‘I didn’t have you down as a sentimental.’
‘Me neither. Maybe it’s got something to do with my near-death experience.’
‘What about your life in Istanbul, your wife?’
‘I don’t think either of us is harbouring any illusions about our future.’
She rolled out her bottom lip and looked sad.
The reminder of the responsibility I’d shirked did something disagreeable to the atmosphere. After a moment of awkwardness she stood and said she’d better be getting home. There was nothing to argue. I said I’d walk her out to her car.
There were no lights out the back and, with only a sliver of moon, it could be darker than a dirty secret. Add to that a recent spate of violence and I was feeling a little responsible, if not a little protective towards Detective Cash. Mind you, with my injuries still troubling me, I’m not sure I would have been any use in a fight if it came to it.
There was a chill in the air. The sky was as clear as a baby’s conscience; stars shone down brilliantly from the heavens in their trillions. Our feet crunched across the gravel as we walked without speaking side by side. She went around to the driver’s door and I stood at the passenger side, four feet of metal between us, a fine buffer for misguided intentions.
‘I’ll call you in the morning. Let you know what I’ve decided.’
I nodded but couldn’t be certain she’d seen it. ‘Thanks for the meal and for the company. And thanks for listening.’
‘Goodnight, Mr Booker.’
‘Goodnight, Detective.’
I lit up and watched her negotiate the car park until her tail lights disappeared around the fence at the end.
Another car started up outside the village hall and drove sedately away. I didn’t think anything of it.
***
39
Saturday. I woke early and thought I’d give my feet and ribcage a try out on the beach. It didn’t have to be a run. A brisk walk would do. I’d settle for a spirited hobble. I was feeling stale. I needed fresh air and exercise.
It was a glorious morning: bright sunshine, a seasonal chill in the crisp salty air. A rich belt of virgin sand spread out before me. The sea seemed at peace with the world. Gulls did what gulls do with unswerving regularity. I was able to put one foot in front of the other, switch on the autopilot and think.
I hadn’t heard from Jo. I couldn’t say whether she’d agree to my proposal or not once she’d slept on it and there wasn’t much to be gained from second-guessing her. It was out of my hands. It didn’t stop me though.
In truth, my hopes were not high for involvement. She had all the help she needed behind her and she had her position, her career and her professionalism to consider. This was, after all, modern Britain not the Wild West of America where mavericks made up the rules as they went along. I’d given her plenty to take to her seniors that would still make her look good as a detective. She didn’t need me. But still, I wondered whether she might have her reasons for going off the procedural piste.
Once I’d gained the beach, I’d started west towards St Mary’s Bay out of habit, again. When I noticed where I was headed I swore and stopped, again. My aunt’s floating corpse surfaced in my memory, again, reluctantly dragged up as her sodden dead form had been dragged out of the sea.
I had been more than half serious with Jo the night before when I had mentioned my business plans for my new home. If I were truly serious about it, I would have to confront and deal with the ghosts of my dead relatives. If I sold up, took the money and hid away on the other side of the world, I’d still carry the memories aro
und in my head. You can’t run from that sort of thing; you can’t run from knowledge. If I were to try to carve a life out for myself in Dymchurch then I would need to develop an attitude that enabled me to live with what I couldn’t unknow without continually being brought up short when unsavoury recollections were turned over like roadkill with the toe of a boot.
Even so, I turned for home before the outfall. It would take time and maybe I’d feel, if not better about it all, more at peace when I had some closure.
The sun was on my face now. Simple, hard and uncompromising. I took something from it. I’d been walking. I started to run.
*
Jo rang as I was making toast. Her voice was becoming something familiar and to be enjoyed, savoured even.
‘You’re up then?’
‘Probably before you, Detective.’
‘I enjoyed last night. Thank you for it.’ She sounded like she meant it.
‘I enjoyed it too. Thank you.’ I tried to sound like I meant it. ‘What have you decided to do?’
‘Trust my instinct.’ That wasn’t very helpful.
‘Not knowing you well enough to understand the implications of that, I’ll need you to be a bit more specific.’
‘I want you to show me the pumping station for starters.’
I had a job keeping the pleasure out of my reply. ‘When?’
‘I can pick you up in an hour?’
‘Toot your horn out the back and I’ll come down’.
*
She arrived fifty minutes later. Our greeting was friendly. I was glad to be back in her company and so soon. She drove and I was able to relax and enjoy the scenery.
It occurred to me that I was seeing the Marsh in a new light. I was coming to acknowledge a new-found sense of belonging I was not resistant to. Perhaps my impending inheritance combined with my self-imposed exile for too long in a concrete jungle was responsible for this, or perhaps it was the promise of a purpose, a goal, some ambition that had brought about this change in my outlook.
