The Once and Future Con (Nick Madrid)

by Peter Guttridge

  I nodded then went over to the long window and gazed down on the ruined castle. It looked magnificent as the sea raged around the base of Tintagel Island, throwing up great plumes of spray. I'd forgotten how steep the flight of steps was that led from the haven up to the gatehouse perched on the island's cliff-top. I saw a figure in a bright orange anorak trudging up them. I squinted to get a better look. It was Faye.

  The steps wound out of sight round the cliff-face. Faye disappeared from view then re-appeared a minute or so later at the gatehouse. She followed the path into the castle remains. As she walked past the ruins of the main hall I noticed a man loitering in the shelter of a half-standing wall. It was very windy, I could see by the way his coat and her anorak were billowing, and I thought at first he was sheltering from the wind. But he turned abruptly away when she happened to look his way and then I had a darker thought.

  The Camelot Killer.

  Faye walked toward the top of the island. I groaned as I saw the man following her, some hundred yards behind.

  There was an old-fashioned telescope on a stand on the terrace of the hotel. I rushed outside. A couple of kids were messing with the telescope, pretending it was a machine gun. A quick clip round the ear took care of them. In my dreams. Cost me a fiver to wrest it from them.

  I focused on Faye just as she reached the summit of the island. She stopped beside the walled garden and looked out over the sea, totally oblivious to any danger. I swung the telescope onto the man who was following steadily behind.

  As I watched his back-I couldn't make out his features-I saw him pat his pocket.

  A gun? I cupped my hands and bellowed Faye's name. The wind blew it back at me. I vaulted off the terrace onto the path and set off at a run toward the castle.

  To get there from the hotel I had to descend by a steep path into the bay-Tintagel Haven-then climb up the steep flight of steps Faye and her pursuer had used. Even as I ran I knew that if the man did wish her harm I would never get there in time.

  Getting down to the beach was easy, the incline speeding my progress. I had to go more slowly as I picked my way through the rusted remains of the derricks and capstans that had been set in place here a hundred and fifty years before for use in the slate-cutting trade. And getting up the steep steps onto the island was a nightmare.

  I was out of breath after the first twenty steps. Gasping I hurried on, totally winded by the time I ducked through the Norman archway into the castle. It took me another five minutes to get to the kitchen garden on the top of the island. The wind howled around me and when I stepped off the path I sank up to my ankles in the boggy ground.

  I doubled over for a moment, struggling to catch my breath.

  There was no sign of either Faye or her pursuer. I looked round wildly. The ruined chapel-one wall still standing-was a hundred yards in one direction, a man-made tunnel, almost like a grotto, a hundred yards in the other. If any harm had come to Faye, it would be in the grotto, out of sight.

  I approached it with an unwise lack of caution but it was empty, the cobbled stones glistening with the water dripping from the arch above. I hurried to the eastern edge of the cliffs and looked down, my heart pounding, frightened of seeing an orange anorak floating on the water. There was nothing.

  I followed the cliff edge round the upper rini of the island. When I had almost returned to the inner ward and the steps by which I had reached these heights, I caught sight of the orange anorak, slipping behind a pile of rocks on the edge of the haven. I shouted again but now I had the boom of the sea to contend with as well as the wind gusting around me.

  I took the steps two at a time. When I reached the level ground just above the haven, I glanced to my left, towards Merlin's Cave. The cave was a cavern the sea had hollowed out, which linked Tintagel Haven with the beach in the next bay. It was accessible at low tide, submerged at high. I glimpsed someone going into it.

  I was pretty sure it was the man who had been following Faye. I looked down at the water rushing into the haven. The tide was coming in. Quickly. I estimated it would cut the cave off in about ten minutes.

  It took me four to reach the entrance to the cavern. I stepped in cautiously. The booming of wind and sea was muted here. I clambered over rocky outcrops, peering into the gloom for a sight of the man I thought I had seen enter.

  I was about halfway through the cavern-I could see a sliver of light and a glimpse of the other bay some twenty yards ahead-when I heard a noise behind me. I whirled round and someone or something hit me. Very hard.

  I went down. And stayed down.

  I had this dream. (I know, I know. I hate them too, but I really did-and at least it wasn't one of those dreams in italics. I really hate that.) I was lying naked in a field. And a snake came out of my stomach and coiled itself around me. Then a woman came to me. A real looker.

  She lifted me up and took me to the top of a high mountain. She placed me on a wheel on which there were seats, some rising and some falling. I looked to see where I was sitting and I saw I was at the highest point of the wheel. The snake had gone, by the way.

  She said to me: "Where are you?" "I'm on a high wheel," I said, to show she wasn't dealing with a fool. "But I don't know what kind of wheel it is."

  "What can you see?" she said.

  "I think I can see the whole world," which was also true. (This is a dream, okay?)

  But when I next looked down I could see deep black water squirming with snakes and hideous coiling creatures. And suddenly I felt the woman push the wheel. I fell and fell, down among the snakes and coiling creatures. They wrapped themselves around me. And far, far away I could hear someone calling my name as the creatures dragged me deep into the boiling ocean.

  I woke vomiting water, Genevra tugging at me and screaming my name.

  "Nick! We've got to get out of here before the tide comes in any farther!"

  Still vomiting, I tried to stand but my knees buckled. I sank to my waist in the water.

  "Nick-come on!" she cried, dragging me through the water.

  I tried to stand again and this time I was more successful. We struggled out of the cave. The waves were rolling in, quick and fierce. There was a thin strip of sand they had not quite reached.

  We waited for a lull in the water's inward progress then waded across the near lagoon onto the dry beach. I slumped to the ground but Genevra pulled me back onto the path.

  "What happened?" we said simultaneously.

  I barked a laugh. She cradled me in her arms. It felt good.

  "You know," she said. "When I asked if you wanted to skip the next session I was sort of assuming you'd spend the time with me, not go off for a walk on your own."

  "I wasn't walking, I was-"

  "Looking for a place to toss yourself off-so to speak. I know. I spotted you wandering along the cliff edge peering over. Doesn't do a lot for a girl's self-confidence when she proposes a second helping of rumpy-pumpy and the guy immediately dashes for the nearest cliff-top."

  "I'd seen Faye up here-"

  She squeezed me. Hard.

  "I don't think I want to hear this-now it's former-lover time."

  "Some bloke was following her. I think he had a gun. Where is Faye? Have you seen her?"

  I shuddered. I suddenly felt very cold, but then I was sitting in a howling wind, soaked to the skin, in the middle of winter. To make my day complete, the heavens opened again.

  "Let's get you back inside," Genevra said, helping me to my feet and hugging me as she led me up the path back into Tintagel. "Faye's fine. I passed her on the way down here. I was just in time to see you go down to the haven. I came looking for you just as the tide was coming in-I didn't know if you knew it filled the cave."

  "I knew," I said, my teeth chattering. "Did you see anyone else? The person who hit me?"

  "Somebody hit you? I didn't see anybody but if they went out on the other side then I wouldn't."

  I touched the back of my head gingerly, expecting to feel blood. Genevra
put her fingers gently in the same place.

  "Some egg you've got there."

  We were both sodden by the time we got back to the King Arthur Hotel. The session was still in progress so there was nobody about. Genevra took me straight up to her room.

  She stripped off her wet clothes unself-consciously then, wearing only pants and a bra that stood no hope of holding in her lovely breasts, proceeded to strip me.

  "You know, I don't feel as bad as I did," I said as her left breast brushed across my cheek for the third time.

  She ignored me and went into the bathroom to run a bath.

  I stood in the doorway, a towel around my shoulders, and watched her as she sat on the rim of the bath, leaning over to splash bath salts in the water. Ulp.

  "I said I was feeling a bit perkier," I said.

  She glanced at my face then looked down my naked body. "So I see," she said, shutting off the taps.

  She turned, reached out, and drew me to her with the nearest part of me that came to hand.

  We joined the others in time for the final session. Our session. Buckhalter was sitting with Faye at the front of the room. The computer screen was set up.

  Without preamble, the presentation I'd already seen unfolded. When it was over Buckhalter stood up. He preened a little then intoned: "It's the job of everyone here today to save yesteryear for tomorrow. But how we do that has to meet people's expectations of historic sites."

  He looked directly at me.

  "Nostalgia ain't what it used to be," he said, though I wish he hadn't. "The Avalon project puts the future-in terms of the latest technology-in the service of the past."

  "Yeah, but what's the added value?" someone called from the back. I thought I recognized Jefferson's voice.

  "Good question. And I'm going to answer it." Buckhalter stuck his chest out. God, he was an asshole. "You know there are at least half a dozen rival sites claiming they were Camelot. There are contenders in Cornwall, at Bamburgh, and Alnwick in Northumberland, at the Mote of Mark in Scotland, and in South Wales at St. Govan's Head and Dinas Powys."

  He smirked. "Anyone of them could have done what we've done except they don't have our added value." He paused. "They don't have the remains of King Arthur and his Queen Guinevere."

  There was uproar in the audience.

  Buckhalter shouted above it: "The tomb containing the bones of Arthur and Guinevere will form the centerpiece of our Avalon theme park."

  He stood smirking in his silly pullover as a wave of applause swept over the audience and a barrage of flashbulbs suddenly went off. Faye sat beside him, a small smile on her face. Genevra looked at me and shrugged.

  A long-haired white guy in a yashmak-a yashmak??stood up in the third row.

  "All very interesting, Bucky," he shouted. "But I'm here from the Hengist and Horsa Experience in Kent to announce that we have found the real body of King Arthur, buried with his horse on the site of the battle of Camlann, his final battle."

  Buckhalter pursed his lips and glanced down at Faye, who was maintaining her smile, as further uproar washed around them. Buckhalter had been using a stand-up mike. Now a woman in an ankle-length flowered dress strode to the mike, her dress billowing around her like a tent, and took control of it.

  In a hectoring tone, as more flashbulbs went off, she declared a double whammy: a farmer on the outskirts of Glastonbury had found the Holy Grail and the body of Joseph of Arimathea.

  There were no further attempts to outbid Buckhalter, though had someone declared they'd found Lancelot's retirement home, a wattle and daub bungalow called "Dunjoustin," I wouldn't have been surprised.

  While journalists and other delegates clustered around Buckhalter, the guy in the yashmak and the woman from Glastonbury, I went over to Faye. Sitting nearby was the young man from Duck Land, flicking glumly through his ring-binder of illustrations of unusual ducks.

  "How are you doing?" she said. "Shagger."

  "It's-" I began, but she squeezed my arm.

  "She's a lovely girl. Much more-"

  "But it's you I want!" The words burst out before I could hold them back. "Always has been."

  There, I'd said it, although I was surprised to hear myself say it-and so vehemently. I looked round guiltily to see if Genevra had overheard.

  "Nick ..." Faye squeezed my arm again.

  "Never mind that now," I said, drawing her to one side. "What happened on Tintagel Island?"

  "What do you mean, what happened?"

  "Did you meet a man there?"

  An odd expression passed across her face.

  "I thought you were in danger-I saw a man following you. Why were you there?"

  She looked bewildered.

  "I wanted a walk. I'd never been there. Why are you asking?"

  "I was attacked."

  "You were attacked?"

  "And left to drown in Merlin's Cave. If it hadn't been for Genevra I'd be sleeping with the fishes now."

  "And you think it was this man you say you saw?"

  "Say I saw?" I touched the back of my head. "Somebody clobbered me, that's for sure."

  "But you don't know if it was the same person who was following me. Nick, we have all sorts of people homing in on us. King Arthur brings out the fruitcakes. Remember that man we saw in Glastonbury? Could it have been him following me?"

  "No way," I said. I wondered whether I should tell her my theory about the Camelot Killer. "Faye, some cranks tried to kidnap Genevra on the way down. And after what happened to Lucy, you should be especially careful."

  "Rex thinks she was the victim of some nutter passing through. You think it was one of these cults that are hassling us?"

  Before I could reply Buckhalter joined us.

  "Is the feeding frenzy over?" I said. He ignored me. No change there then.

  "We've got to get back, Faye. Gennie's coming along, too. Madrid, you're going to stay on here and check the place out, see if there's anything we can use."

  "Whoa, cowboy. I don't take orders from you and ['in a journalist, not a researcher."

  "Tsk, tsk-multi-tasking, remember?" I frowned as I watched Faye walk away.

  "How can I forget?"

  They left me Genevra's car, which was good. But I had to check out of the hotel, which was bad, given that out of season there weren't many places in Tintagel to stay.

  I was directed to a guest house a couple of miles along the coast road. I parked in front of an unprepossessing thirties bungalow, its garden stacked high with gnomes. A sign declared "There's No Place Like Gnome World." Two doors down a sign in front of another bungalow announced "Straw's Cornish Zoo." The guest house was the one in between.

  A young woman in tight jeans, check blouse, and pink, fluffy slippers opened the door. She was cradling a baby.

  "Quite a little theme park on this street," I said as she let me in.

  "We're the official guest house for Straw's Cornish Zoo. Visitors can come and use us as a base for their visit to the

  "You could do a double ticket with Gnome World," I said.

  "No, that's rubbish that is. They make me laugh, they do really. One day they're doing B & B like everybody else. The next day he comes home with a job lot of smoke-damaged garden gnomes from a fire sale in Penzance. They plonk a plastic pond in the back garden, take down the clothes line, stick a sign on the garden shed saying `Pixie Grotto' and start up as Gnome World." She looked down at her baby.

  "Ooh, she likes you. She's clicking her tongue. You have to click back."

  I stymied a smile. I'm impervious to babies. "Sorry, I never learned tongue clicking at school."

  "Oh, go on," she said. "Look how she's grinning at you.,,

  "Straw's Cornish Zoo is better, is it?"

  "Well, Beryl's back garden is bigger for one thing. Her late husband Dennis Straw started it up. He had an eye for a business opportunity-he was what you might call an entrepreneur. They had a couple of garden sheds that were just used for storing junk. Dennis did them out as an
Aviary and a Snake House. He had half a dozen snakes he bought cheap along with some exotic birds when Tropical World in St. Austell went bust. Then there were a couple of calves, a goat, and a donkey for kiddies to ride. They do all right."

  The baby was beginning to sound like a metronome. I looked at the grinning little thing. It did look quite nice. Steady, Madrid. You have enough trouble looking after yourself.

  She led me up a flight of narrow stairs, her big bum swaying above me in the too-tight jeans. Feeling self-conscious, I called after her: "You've not thought of doing something similar yourself?"

  She half-turned her head.

  "Not likely. Well, would you like it? People with peeling faces and pacomacs under their arms poking round your back garden. You'd never have any privacy. There'd always be someone peering through the kitchen window, catching you in your curlers. Beryl hated it at first-the snakes gave her the willies; the birds made a terrible racket; and the goat ate half of her smalls off the washing line."

  She opened a door at the top of the stairs.

  "It's en suite," she said as I squeezed past her and the baby into the room. "Will it be a full English breakfast?"

  "Muesli and herb tea will be fine."

  "Herb tea?"

  "Do you have any?"

  "Yes, we've got Earl Grey or Darjeeling."

  As bloody usual. The room was okay. Sort of. It was full of those bizarre things you see advertised in the back of Sunday magazines. For instance, there was a large furry thing like an elephant's foot by the bed. It had a zipper down the front. It was to put your feet in to keep them warm.

  In my en suite bathroom-little more than a converted cupboard-there was soap on a rope and the spare toilet rolls were in a knitted tube with a toadstool cap on them.

  The woman's husband was a would-be poet. The walls were covered with his poems, displayed in exuberant typefaces. He was very fond of the semi-colon; shame he didn't know how to use it. It was song lyric stuff. One began: "I have rode the highways." Above my bed was an "Ode on the Anniversary of Diana's Death." Aaagh.

  I dumped my stuff and immediately drove back into Tintagel, parked the Range Rover, and walked slowly along the windswept street. When I saw a bloke in a ten-gallon cowboy hat and chaps go into the King Arthur Arms I wondered if the bump on my head had been more serious than I thought.