I hovered uncertainly, standing on tiptoe to peek through the rather grimy pane. The car had stopped, its headlamps doused but sidelights still on. To get a better view I clambered onto the lid of the loo and cautiously opened the window a few inches. A door slammed, followed by the sound of footsteps on the gravel; but rather to my surprise these did not seem to be coming towards the house but stayed crunching about where the car was parked in front of the old stable. I could just detect the murmur of voices and saw the sudden gleam of a cigarette.
I continued to squint through the window and then heard what sounded like a bolt being drawn back or the clank of a padlock. I screwed up my eyes and saw that the stable door had swung open and the car boot was gaping wide. Then in the next moment two vague shapes disappeared into the stable. I let out my breath which I realised I had been holding for a good two minutes … What on earth was going on? It hardly seemed that Charles had returned, and besides the car certainly wasn’t his (a low-slung Alvis which Agnes regularly cursed). This was much bigger, though from my vantage point it was impossible to discern the make.
As at other moments of tension I suddenly seemed to hear my brother’s voice. Oh really Prim, nosy as always. I suppose the next minute you’ll want to go and take a closer look. Typical! ‘Actually,’ I mentally riposted, ‘that is exactly what I propose doing. I consider there is something deeply suspicious about all this, and as Charles’s friend it is my duty to investigate.’ Thus resolved, I found my way to the side door and slipped outside, quietly locking it behind me. For a moment I loitered in the shadows, assessing how best to approach in safety.
The corner of the stable was only a matter of yards: if I could get there I would have a clearer view while at the same time using it as cover. I started to move stealthily but stopped abruptly – the gravel seemed horribly loud! But there was a patch of thick grass to my left stretching as far as the corner. I tiptoed on to this and stumbled my way to the lee of the wall.
Being now that much closer I had a clear view of the waiting car: very classy – a Humber Hawk. For a couple of seconds nothing impinged except the car itself, and then with a jolt I thought of Emily and her swearing blind that it had been a Humber she had seen bearing Topping towards Newhaven. Surely this couldn’t be the same, could it? I nearly let out a yell of triumph but curbed it just in time, for out of the stable came the tall figure of a man carrying what looked like a large box or case. He tottered towards the open boot, heaved the thing over the sill and then went back inside. Two minutes later he was out again with another load.
Fascinated, I gingerly inched my way along the wall to the shelter of a climbing magnolia from whose foliage I could peer out like the legendary Green Man. Oh lor’ Primrose, came Francis’s voice again, do leave off. You are bound to be seen and then we shall all be in the cart! Again I ignored his words and doggedly stood my ground, determined to get to the bottom of it.
Squeezed thus between the rough wall and the shrub’s branches I recalled a similar situation an age away, when as children we had spied on the neighbours, casting them as enemy agents UP TO NO GOOD. I smiled into the darkness; but the next instant froze, hearing voices again and then footsteps as this time both men re-emerged from the stable each now burdened by boxes. I strained eyes and ears trying to make out if the shorter was Topping but really couldn’t be sure. Certainly the height was the same but other features were shrouded by a mac and slouch hat. One of them spoke. ‘That’s it then. Let’s get the hell out of here. It’s cold. Hurry up, I need a drink.’ (Hear! Hear!) There was a murmured response and I saw the lid of the boot being pushed down. The next moment they were in the car, and with headlights reignited the Humber trundled back up the drive; the sound of its engine gently fading into the night.
For some seconds I remained stock-still – like some playgoer surprised by the fall of the curtain and numbed by the sudden black silence. But I knew that this scene had been no make-believe. It had been real all right and I was jolly well going to find out more. Something very peculiar was afoot and I had a good idea of what it was. Thus disentangling myself from the magnolia’s branches I walked briskly towards the stable entrance.
The door was shut and, needless to say, had been re-padlocked. Curse! I wondered if there was a side entrance or even a window I might squeeze through, and was just about to make a reconnaissance when my foot clinked against something on the ground. Yes, miraculously it was the key … Hah, not so clever are we, I thought: fancy racing off and dropping that! Presumably it had been haste for the drink that had prompted such carelessness.
Shining the torch I saw that the ancient stable was just as one might expect – a filthy uneven floor, desolate loose boxes, broken hay byres, and here and there even bits of abandoned tack slung forlornly on rusting hooks. I looked up at the cobwebbed rafters and imagined bats; and then flashing the torch into grimy corners thought of rats. I flinched. There were bound to be some. But curiosity stifled distaste and I began to hunt around for some sign of the intruders’ purpose. If the shorter of the two men had indeed been Topping then the reason for his being here humping boxes about could mean only one thing: the place was being used as a storage depot. And if Ingaza and MacManus were right then in all probability the goods were drugs – consignments of which were being regularly collected from the Newhaven docks.
I mooched about feeling increasingly cold and seeing nothing to suggest recent activity. The stable had that eerie static quality hinting of death and the decaying past. But then as I gave a final glance round I noticed a half-opened door in a far corner at the end of the row of stalls. Gingerly I pushed it wider and went in. The torch displayed a dingy narrow room, perhaps a place for forgotten grooms to sling their gear or clean their boots. There was a small table and a ramshackle set of shelves. Other than these the place was bare except for several cardboard cartons, a few on the shelves and others strewed haphazardly on the floor. In the pallid light I inspected these but all appeared empty and apparently hastily discarded. Some bore what looked like stamped numbers but otherwise there was nothing to indicate either contents or address.
Whatever had been stored here was obviously all gone; and judging from the earlier comings and goings it looked as if the place had been deliberately cleaned out – made redundant through change of requirement or plan. I stood there cold and dispirited. Sneaking about watching those two had been a strain, and yet despite my vigilance I had nothing to show for it. No proof had emerged either of the goods themselves or indeed the identity of their handlers. The Humber might have been the same one that had transported Topping the other evening, and the short man in the raincoat might have been him. And yes, the contents of the cartons may well have been drugs – but then again for all I knew it could equally have been pots of jam. In Wilkie Collins’ parlance there was a distinct dearth of tangible evidence. Gloomily I started to make my way back to the main door, caught my foot in the sluicing gulley and fell flat on my face.
Amazingly, other than being badly shaken and with tingling knees I was moderately all right. However, to regain both breath and equilibrium I elected to stay temporarily on all fours staring furiously at the hard brick floor. And it was from this ungainly pose that I saw the packet. It lay by the stable door, a few yards from my nose and spotlit by the ray from the fallen torch.
Still on bruised knees, I gazed at it curiously, puzzled by the shiny whiteness of the wrapping. It had the neat, clinical look of something prescribed from a doctor’s surgery. I crawled forward and reached for both it and the torch; and on closer inspection saw that its cover wasn’t paper at all but cellophane, cellophane sealed tightly around what looked like white powder or castor sugar.
Starting to ache from top to toe and having had enough excitement for one night I was eager to leave and get home as quickly as possible. Thus I levered myself up from the floor, thrust the packet into my handbag, padlocked the door and – unlike the other visitors – slipped the key into my pocket.
; The return journey seemed far longer than when coming, fatigue and painful knees taking their toll. But it gave me time to think and review matters.
The first thing I thought about was the packet at the bottom of my bag. Other than vital aspirin I knew nothing about drugs but vaguely recalled Nicholas referring to cocaine as being ‘white goods in handy packs’. Was this the sort of thing he had meant? To me the description suggested self-raising flour, but not being abreast of the underworld and its terminology, who was I to cavil? The likelihood of some solitary addict wandering into the stable and negligently losing his supply seemed remote, and in any case it was far too clean to have been lying there long … It must surely therefore have slipped from one of the boxes the men had been carrying to the car.
The more I thought, the more certain I was of what had been going on. Unbeknown to Charles his disused stable had been commandeered as a drugs cache; and now for some reason it had grown surplus to requirements and what I had witnessed were the dealers making the final clearance. For a while I felt highly delighted. At least now there was a piece of tangible evidence. What luck!
But then an awful thought struck me … supposing Charles himself had known about it all the time, had perhaps sanctioned the whole thing! Or maybe he had hired out the stable for a business he had chosen not to confront; had taken the rent and conveniently turned a blind eye to its usage. And as to why the ‘clients’ should now decide to end the arrangement – well conceivably it was do with the projected orangery and his conversion plans. Had he given them notice on the grounds that nurture of oranges took precedence over storage of dope?
I trudged along more than a little dismayed by such reflections. And then I suddenly stopped, transfixed by an even greater fear … Oh my God, if Charles were somehow involved in, or aware of, the drugs operation, could he also have been party to the fate of Carstairs? My heart pounded at the thought of such an appalling possibility. And was Agnes in it too, raking in ill-gotten gains to fund her sojourn in Tobago? After all, she had been there long enough, swanning about in all that Caribbean sun. Supposing I had been wrong all along and that it had been she and not Topping who had been the engineer of Carstairs’ misfortune …
Ablaze with such visions and now indifferent to my bruises I thrust forward grimly. If my conjectures were correct it was utterly scandalous. And how on earth should I treat Charles when we next met – with a casual nonchalance or steely disdain? A problem indeed!
Fortunately it was Maurice who brought me down to earth. Seeing the cat’s disapproving face peering out from the bars of my garden gate had the effect of a douse of iced water, and I felt suitably ashamed and sobered. How ignoble to be maligning poor Charles and Agnes, a more decent and upright pair it would be hard to imagine. A wave of guilt flooded over me. How could I possibly have entertained such thoughts? Doubtless a nervous reaction after the night’s alarming events. Of course it was none of their doing … a certainty which took me back to my odious quarry. If Hubert Topping could make a daily fetish of wearing a pink rosebud then he could also sport a slouch hat gone out of fashion at least a decade ago. Oh yes, the smaller man had been him all right!
That settled and firmly clutching my handbag with its vital contents, I rounded up Maurice and – as far as knees would allow – marched to the house and the sanctuary of bed.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
The Dog’s View
‘Do you think she is round the bend?’ I asked Maurice.
‘Who?’
‘The mistress, of course.’
‘They are all like that,’ the cat replied, licking his foot, ‘take F.O., for example.’
‘Ah, but he wasn’t right round, only half.’
‘As good as.’
‘But Maurice,’ I told him, ‘you have always said that there are degrees of human bonkers and that we shouldn’t confuse one degree of bonkers with another.’
‘Hmm,’ he agreed sleepily, ‘I daresay I did. But frankly, after tonight’s charade I may have to revise my view somewhat. There may be fewer gradations than I had imagined.’
I frowned, trying to work that out. Then I gave a puzzled snort. ‘Isn’t that just what I said? THE PRIM IS BARKING!’
‘In-dub-i-tab-ly,’ the cat murmured and closed his eyes.
I stared at the shape under the table – Duster who was snoring his head off with some stupid harness clamped in his paws. I wondered if all cairns were like that, secretly off their chumps like humans. I mean why did he want to have that? Any normal dog would have settled for a ball or a toy rabbit or some old sock. But oh no, the cairn has to have its harness. And what’s more the Prim had gone to fetch it for him … all the way to Podkennel she went. Can’t see her doing that for me! Mind you, it’s just as well she did, because as we started to think about bedtime and closing the hatches for the night the ruddy cairn didn’t half set up a rumpus – chasing his tail, growling at shadows, tossing the cushions about. It was driving Maurice berserk. In fact he went outside and started yowling at the moon, and I could see him through a chink in the curtains stalking round and round and swishing his tail fit to bust (always a bad sign), which is probably why he is still sleepy today – worn out with wailing!
Still, the point is that at last the Prim came back and things calmed down a bit, or at least we did; but she seemed in a right old lather – effing and blinding about her knees (don’t know what she’d done to them but they looked sort of blue and murky) and at the same time grinning like a daft Cheshire cat. Her hair was a bit odd too – all fuzzy with a couple of leaves stuck in it. Perhaps she had gone through one of those hedges Duster seems so keen on.
As a matter of fact, I am getting to quite like that fellow, though as said he can’t half be a funny beggar. Take last night. You see the first thing P.O. did when she came in was to put her bag down and fish out that harness. That did it! He let out a godawful yelp, leapt up and nearly snatched it out of her hands. ‘WAIT!’ she roared. Well, of course, he didn’t wait and kept snapping the air and dancing round her feet like Maurice when he’s practising his cat-tango. So she slung the thing under the table and said ‘Fetch.’ He shot after it, grabbed it, and after a quick scrabble flopped down like a stone – for the rest of the night. (In fact he is still out for the count now – and it’s morning with the sun shining through the window!)
Anyway, after the palaver with the cairn the mistress took something else out of her bag and put it under the cushion on the kitchen chair. I was a bit puzzled by that, because if I’ve got a bone that I want to keep hidden I wouldn’t put it there … I mean there’s bound to be some great arse who would come along and sit on it. Still, like the cat says, humans are not known for their brightness. And talking of Maurice, I could see him watching her like a lynx. So when she had gone up to bed I said to him, ‘What’s that about, then?’
‘I don’t know, Bouncer,’ he purred, ‘but we shall have to find out, won’t we?’ And in a tick he had darted to the chair, lifted up his left paw – the strongest and the one with the white patch – and tipped the cushion onto the floor.
Underneath was something white in slippery paper. I stood on my hind legs and was about to clamp it in my teeth, when the cat cried, ‘Desist!’
Now you might think I don’t know the meaning of ‘dee-sist’, but I jolly well do. You don’t live with Maurice without learning a word or two. And I know that ‘dee-sist’ is cat-speak for ‘Stop it, you bad boy’ or ‘Don’t do that, you little bugger.’
‘Keep your fur on,’ I said, ‘just testing.’
He ignored that and started to prod it with his paw and gave a couple of licks.
‘Well?’ I said eagerly, ‘what is it?’
‘Hard to say,’ he replied, ‘there is no taste and no smell.’
This time I pushed him out of the way and put my own muzzle on to it. ‘Huh!’ I said, ‘you bet there’s a smell, anyone can smell it!’
The cat didn’t like that, because he said all hoity-toity: ‘Fortunate
ly not all of us have bloodhound in our genes.’ (Of course what he really meant was that I am the best sniffer in the business.) And then after a bit he added, ‘So if you don’t mind my asking, what does it smell like?’
‘It smells,’ I said, ‘like the white stuff you had all over your whiskers that time you went doolally in the garden.’
There was a hiss and his ears flattened. ‘I did not go doolally! I merely had a mild turn – doubtless brought on by the challenge of living with you.’
I grinned and wagged my tail. ‘But you like it really, don’t you, Maurice? Helps to exercise that old steely brainbox; keeps it sharp and top-notch.’
That did the trick. He smirked and examined his claws, something he does when he is pleased – which isn’t often – and even gave a sort of purr.
‘Well now, Bouncer,’ he said, all matey, ‘we must put our heads together and pursue this further, but meanwhile I propose to retire. What with the cairn’s antics and P.O.’s nonsense I am really quite shattered.’
‘Right-o,’ I said, and jumped into my basket.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
The Primrose Pursuit Page 20
