Beware of the Trains (23 page)

You will have gathered that the lock is more or less the central feature of the Basin. The canal joins the Estuary at right angles, and the lock has to be a specially deep one, since even at high tide the river water is still six to eight feet below the level of the canal, while at low tide (when, of course, the lock can’t be used) there is nothing but a stretch of sand and mud over which the gulls wander, scavenging. Along the west bank of the canal stretches a line of boats—boats of all ages, kinds, and sizes, one or two falling to pieces through sheer neglect, others painted and polished and cared for like the idols of some pagan tribe. Their mooring-ropes create a series of death-traps along the tow-path. There is nothing beyond this tow-path except some fields, in which the grass is kept brown and scanty by the salt winds, and the wooden hut in which the Yacht Club gear is kept. On the other side of the canal (which, by the way, can be crossed by the inner or outer lock gates or by a footbridge farther up) are the houses, with the
Land of Promise
standing a little apart on the road which comes in from Hartford. This road ends in a kind of gravelled car-park in front of Mrs. Porteous’s house and the house of Charley Cooke, the lock-keeper. Finally, I ought perhaps to say that although the Basin can be warm enough in summer, at other times of year it’s often bitterly cold, for it catches the east wind which blows up the Estuary. Just such an east wind was blowing on the afternoon three years ago when I …

But you will hear of that in its proper place.

As usual, I was sent to bed at half-past nine. I climbed the stairs to my room with a feeling of pleasant anticipation, for I had arranged to meet Margaret Porteous unlawfully at midnight, when we proposed to do a little innocent detective work. This involved climbing out of my bedroom window, and also—what from experience I knew to be a far more difficult job—keeping awake until the appointed time.

We intended to investigate the Maoris—two women and two men—who lived amid indescribable squalor in a broken-down house-boat some way up the canal. Their bickerings and beatings were a perpetually interesting topic of conversation to the local people, as was also the problem of their livelihood, for they would disappear for months at a time, and then return to resume their existence in the house-boat as though they had never been away.

Probably the police knew all about them, but they were a complete mystery to us. I had some notion, I think, that they worshipped their native gods, with fearful rites, in the watches of the night, and it seemed to me important that Margaret and I should witness these proceedings.

At half-past ten I heard my father lock the door of the bar and retire, with one or two favourites, into the kitchen (it was another part of the Vanderloor ritual that he and my father should play a game of chess some time during his visit). Shortly after eleven, the mate, engineer, and crew of the
Vrijheid
emerged somewhat noisily from the taxi which had brought them back from Colchester, crossed the lock gates, singing a sentimental Netherlands ditty, and boarded their ship. After that I must have dozed, for the next thing I remember is hearing the Hartford church clock strike midnight.

I splashed some water from the jug on to my eyes, and then opened the window and climbed out. This brought me on to a sloping roof of grey tiles, and from there I could slip down easily enough to the penthouse roof, which overlooked the kitchen garden and was tarred—with the deliberate intention, I always suspected, of making my foothold on it precarious. Here I was held up for a short while, as old Charley Cooke, the lock-keeper, chose just this moment to depart for home. I wasn’t worried, however. Charley was a sober enough man during the week, but every Saturday night he was in the habit of drinking as much beer as he could carry, and generally a bit more on top of that. So
he
wasn’t likely to notice anything.

When he had gone I jumped down from the penthouse roof. I didn’t like doing this, as it was a six-foot drop, and you got rather a jar when you landed.

Margaret was waiting for me in the garden.

“I was afraid you weren't‘t coming,” she whispered.

“Don’t talk here, idiot,” I whispered back.

We made our way towards the lock. A fresh, cold wind was blowing, and the night sky was full of clouds, so that the weak moonlight came and went spasmodically. It was clear enough when we reached the lock, however, for us to be able to see that no one was about, though we could hear Charley Cooke singing as he approached his house. We crossed by the inner gates of the lock, and walked along the tow-path, feeling our way carefully among the mooring-ropes. Then, by the Yacht Club hut, Margaret stopped.

“I’m frightened,” she whispered.

I was surprised. Margaret was a nervous child, but nervous in the way which welcomes rather than avoids an adventure. She was quite unlike me in that respect: I was unimaginative in the normal way. but prone to deep and sudden panics.

“What are you frightened of?” I asked.

“Suppose they don’t like being watched?”

This consideration had also occurred to me, but at the moment I was not prepared to admit it.

“They won’t know we’re there,” I said.

“They will if one of us coughs or sneezes or anything … You go and look, Daniel, and then come back and tell me if there’s anything interesting.”

I was annoyed. The Maoris’ pagan sacrifices seemed considerably less fascinating now than they had in prospect. But male honour could hardly admit defeat—at any rate, in front of a girl.

“All right, I’ll go,” I said shortly. “You stay here. Shan’t be long.”

“Be careful.” She was shivering a little, but that may have been only the wind.

It had taken us, I suppose, three minutes to get to the Yacht Club hut. In another five I had reached the Maoris’ houseboat, passing Murchison’s launch on the way. The cabin was lit up and I could hear voices, but I didn’t delay. As it turned out, my precautions in investigating the house-boat were needless. It proved to be completely deserted. Either its occupants had not yet returned, or they had chosen this day to decamp.

I admit that I was relieved, but at the same time it made our truancy rather pointless. The Hartford clock struck a quarter past midnight as I left the house-boat. I had only gone a yard or two when I met Margaret, who had come to meet me.

“Mummy keeps opening the door,” Margaret said. “Do you think she knows I’m not in bed?”

“I expect she’s waiting for Helen,” I said. “Helen’s out tonight. isn’t she?”

“Yes.”

“There’s no one in the house-boat,” I explained. “We’d better go home, I suppose.”

“I
can’t
go home now Mummy’s on the watch…
Oh, Daniel
…” She sounded so miserable, and she was shivering so much, that I put my arm round her shoulders—and the next moment, embarrassed, hastily withdrew it.

“You can get in round the back,” I said encouragingly. “You’d better not go over the foot-bridge, though, or you might be seen. Come on. We’ll go the way we came.”

We returned along the tow-path as far as the Yacht Club hut. We had no sooner arrived there than, across the canal, Mrs. Porteous’s door opened, and I could see framed in the oblong of light Mrs. Porteous herself, Anne, and my father. Almost at the same moment someone left Murchison’s launch and crossed the canal by the foot-bridge.

“They
do
know we’ve gone, then,” I whispered. “Come on—I’m going to try and get back before Dad does.”

We continued on our way, and crossed the lock, this time by the outer gates. Here I unchivalrously left Margaret to her fate. But I had only just got inside the garden when Anne and my father caught up with me.

“So
there
you are,” he said. I was expecting to be punished, but he seemed unusually preoccupied, and simply ordered me to get off to bed, and stay there. He himself remained for some time downstairs, talking to Anne in the kitchen. And I just heard him say, as I closed the door behind me: “Curious about that blood…”

I would have liked to stay and listen, but I didn’t dare. I went upstairs and undressed, congratulating myself on my escape, feeling slightly ashamed of having deserted Margaret, and yawning as though I’d not slept for years. Then, when I came to take off my shoes, I found stains on them-dark red patches, sticky in places, but for the most part almost dry.

I assumed at once that this was blood, and although such romantic guesses are not often correct, this one was. I wondered whether this was what my father had been referring to, and then rejected the idea, for he would certainly have asked about it. I wondered, as I crawled into bed, whether I should go down and tell him. I was still wondering when I fell asleep.

As it was holiday-time, I was allowed to stay in bed until half-past eight if I wanted to, but the following morning was so gloriously fine that I got up at half-past seven. As soon as I looked out of my window I could see that something unusual was afoot. A little knot of men were looking at something at the edge of the lock—among them were Charley Cooke and my father. And when one of them moved aside I was able to make out what had drawn their attention—a dark, broad. irregular stain. You may imagine that I got downstairs and outside as soon as I could, and the general preoccupation was so intense that I was able to go quite close without being noticed. My father had sent for a long pole; now he was pushing and dredging with it in the water of the lock. And in a little time a face, white and curiously peaceful, rose towards the surface and sank again. The drowned do not float until five or more days after they are dead, and Murchison had been in the water only seven or eight hours.

After the body had been taken away, it was not at all easy to keep me out of the proceedings which followed. For one thing, I could hardly be confined to my room; for another, I was by way of being a witness, since I had been out and about somewhere around the time when the murder occurred. That it
was
murder, there seemed little doubt. And, as I realised at the time, the police were going to have no difficulty in ferreting out motives for it. There were motives everywhere; at one time or another, Murchison had succeeded in falling foul of a number of people at the Basin.

When breakfast was over I managed to slip out and inspect the bloodstains. From the pool (I call it a pool, though by now, of course, it was dry) at the edge of the lock, a trail of blood led almost to Charley Cooke’s doorway. And here there was a second pool. I inspected these things with interest, but wasn’t able to deduce much from them. Subsequently I went along to Mrs. Porteous’s house and discovered Margaret in the garden. She had been soundly slapped on her return the previous night, and moreover had suffered from nightmares; so she was decidedly subdued. I made some attempt to enlist her co-operation in making a search round the lock-for what, I wasn't clear—but she had been forbidden to go out. I saw nothing of Helen; as it was a Sunday, she was pretty certain to be still in bed.

I wandered back to the canal side. Hardly anyone was about; a sort of expectant hush hung over the Basin. Captain Vanderloor was on the deck of the
Vrijheid
, but doing absolutely nothing; in the usual way, unloading would have started by now. I Suppose he anticipated that it would be interrupted in any case by the arrival of the police. and was not sorry for an excuse to delay putting to sea again. A colony of jackdaws were quarrelling in the tall pine tree near the
Land of Promise
. The sun shone brightly. I felt oddly purposeless and impatient.

Then I saw the weapon. It was a long, black, wooden stave, carved in loops and whorls at the top, and it was floating in the canal almost within arm’s length of the bank. I called to Captain Vanderloor, and he seemed, for a moment, startled.

“What is it?” he shouted back in his heavy, guttural voice.

“Look!” I called. “Come and look!” I heard him descend the creaky wooden gangway of the
Vrijheid
, and then, unable to wait until he arrived, I got down on my stomach and began fishing for the stave; after considerable effort I managed to pull it ashore, just as Captain Vanderloor came up to me.

He inspected it carefully.

“H’m,” he said. “There are still traces of the blood on it.”

“It means the Maoris must have killed him,” I pointed out.

The Captain took out his cigar case; he did not reply for a moment. Then: “Yes,” he said slowly. “It must mean that. Shall I keep this stick to give to the officials?” He must have glimpsed the disappointment in my face, for he added gravely: “I shall be careful to emphasise that it was you who found it.”

Little mollified by this promise, I was preparing to argue the point when the police arrived from Hartford, in a rather dilapidated-looking car. There was an inspector and a sergeant and a constable, together with a doctor whom I didn’t know. The Inspector was not impressive. and I was sadly disillusioned. He wore no uniform. and he was a weedy, undersized young man, with a marked Cockney accent, and fingers stained a deep brown by incessant smoking. His name was Watt, and he seemed to be totally lacking in any kind of method. On that Sunday morning he wandered about the Basin, talking to anyone he happened to come across, staring with vague interest at the scenery, and strolling in and out of people’s houses more, it seemed, in accordance with some passing whim than for any definite purpose. I was at the age when I expected a detective to be hawk-eyed and ruthless, and I felt cheated.

The doctor and one of the constables hurried straight into Charley Cooke’s house, to which Murchison’s body had been taken. The Inspector strolled towards Captain Vanderloor and myself.

“Morning,” he said. “Is that the weapon that did it?” That was the first experience I had of his particular idiosyncrasy, which was to ask all and sundry for their personal theories about the crime. Most of what he heard must have been absolutely worthless, but I realise now that he did it partly in order to form a judgment about the person to whom he was speaking, and partly for the sake of the scraps of information which sometimes slipped out. He had, too, a disconcerting habit of silence, which sometimes forced one, from sheer embarrassment, to say more than one had intended.