Blott On The Landscape (24 page)

He switched off his torch and listened. Above him the pine trees sighed in a light breeze and for a moment Sir Giles hoped he had been mistaken. The next moment he knew he hadn’t. An extraordinary whistling, wheezing noise issued from the wood. “Must be a cow with asthma,” he thought though how an asthmatic cow had got into the pinetum he couldn’t imagine. A moment later he was disabused of the notion of a cow. With a horrible snort whatever it was got to its feet, a process that involved breaking a number of branches, large branches by the sound of things, and lumbered off with a singlemindedness of purpose that seemed to bring it into contact with a great many trees. Sir Giles stood and quaked, partly from fear and partly because the ground beneath his feet was also quaking, and when finally the creature smashed through the iron fence at the edge of the wood with as little regard for property as for its own health and welfare he was in two minds about going on. In the end he forced himself to continue, though more cautiously. After all, whatever he had disturbed, it had run away.

Sir Giles came to the gate and stared at the house. The place was in darkness. He walked quickly across the lawn and round to the front door. Then taking off his shoes he unlocked the door and stepped inside. Silence. He went down the corridor to his study and shut the door. Then he switched on his torch and shone it on the safe – or rather on the hole in the wall where the safe had been. Sir Giles stared at it in horror. No wonder Hoskins had talked so insistently about incinerators and inflammable material and health risks. It hadn’t been Dundridge who had been threatening to go the police. It was Maud. But had she been already? There was no way of telling. He switched off the torch and stood in the darkness thinking. There was certainly one way of ensuring that if she hadn’t been already she wasn’t going to in future. Any doubts he had had, and they were few, about the wisdom of disposing of Handyman Hall and Maud disappeared. He would make certain of the bitch. He opened the door of the study and listened for a moment before tiptoeing down the passage towards the kitchen. Kitchens were the logical place for fires to start of their own accord and besides there were the oil tanks that fed the Aga cooker. On the way he stopped to put on his Wellington boots in the cloakroom under the stairs.

The twang of the iron fence woke Lady Maud. She sat up in bed and wondered what it portended. Iron fences didn’t twang of their own accord and rhinoceroses didn’t go charging across rockeries in the small hours of the morning without good reason. She switched on the bedside lamp to see what time it was but thanks to the power failure at Guildstead Carbonell the light didn’t come on. Peculiar. She got out of bed and went to the window and was just in time to see a shadow slip across the lawn and disappear round the side of the house. It was a distinctly furtive shadow and it came from the pinetum. For a moment she supposed it to be Blott, but there was no reason for Blott to be running furtively about the park at … she looked at her watch … half past two in the morning. Anyway she could always check. She picked up the phone and dialled the Lodge.

“Blott,” she whispered, “are you there?”

“Yes,” said Blott.

“Are the gates locked?”

“Yes,” said Blott, “why?”

“I just wanted to make sure.” She put the phone down gently and got dressed. Then she went downstairs quietly and tried the front door. It was unlocked. Lady Maud looked around. A pair of shoes on the doorstep. She picked them up and sniffed. Giles. Unmistakably Giles. Then she put the shoes down again and shutting the front door behind her went round to the workshop. So the little beast had come back. She could imagine what for. Well, come back he might but he wouldn’t get away so easily. A moment later she was running, remarkably swiftly for so large a woman and so dark a night, across the lawn towards the pinetum. Even there in the pitch darkness her pace did not slacken. A lifetime’s familiarity with the path gave her an unerring sense of when to twist or turn through the trees. Five minutes later she was at the gate to the footbridge. She reached into her pocket and took out a large lock, fitted it to the bolt and closed the hasp. Then, having tested it to see that it was firmly fastened, she turned and made her way back towards the Hall.

In the kitchen Sir Giles took his time. The essence of successful arson lay in simplicity, and murder was best when it looked like natural death. The Aga cooker was self-igniting. It came on automatically at intervals during the night. Sir Giles shone his torch on the time switch and saw that it was set for four o’clock. Plenty of time. He took an adjustable spanner out of his pocket and undid the nut that secured the feedpipe from the oil tanks to the stove. Oil began to pour out over the floor. Sir Giles sat down on a chair and listened to it. It slurped out steadily and spread under the table. Presently it would begin to run down the passage into the hall. There were a thousand gallons of heating oil in those tanks and as Sir Giles knew they had recently been filled. He would wait until they were empty and then replace the feedpipe but not tightly. To the police and the insurance investigators it would look as though there had been a simple leak. Yes, a thousand gallons of heating oil would certainly do the trick. Handyman Hall would turn into a raging furnace in seconds. The fire brigade would take at least half an hour to come from Worford and by that time the place would be in ashes. So would Maud. Sir Giles knew her too well to suppose that she would be sensible enough to jump from her bedroom window even if she had time. She might not even wake before the flames reached the first floor and if she did her first thought would be to rush out on to the landing and try to save her precious family home. It would be Blott in the Lodge who would raise the alarm. It was a pity about Blott. Sir Giles would have liked him to be cremated too.

Outside in the garden Lady Maud stood looking at the house. Giles had come back to look for the negatives of the pictures they had taken of him. Well, he was hardly likely to find them. Blott had cut them into strips of six and had taken them back to the Lodge with him. Or perhaps he had come to get those photographs from his safe. He was going to be disappointed there too. Whichever way she looked at it he was going to be in for a nasty surprise. She went round to the front door and picked up his shoes. It might not be a bad idea to remove those while she was about it. She took them round to the garage and put them in an empty bucket and she was just coming out again when it struck her that there might be a more sinister purpose in Giles’ visit. Six years of cohabitation with the brute had taught her that he was as ruthless as he was devious. It would pay her to be careful.

“I had better watch my step,” she thought, and went round to the kitchen door. She was just about to unlock it when she stepped in something slippery. She steadied herself and reached down. Oil. It was seeping out from under the kitchen door and down the steps into the yard. A moment later she understood the purpose of his visit. He was going to burn the Hall down. By God, he wasn’t. With a howl of rage Lady Maud hurled herself at the door, unlocked it and charged into the kitchen. For a moment she remained upright, the next she was flat on her back and sliding across the floor. So was Sir Giles though in a different direction. As Lady Maud’s great bulk swept under him carrying his chair with her. Sir Giles catapulted through the air, landed on his face and slid irresistibly down the corridor and across the marble floor of the great hall. As he floundered about trying to get to his feet in a sea of oil he could hear Maud ricocheting about the kitchen. By the sound of things she had been joined by the entire complement of pots, pans, and kitchen utensils. Sir Giles slithered to the front door and managed to get to his feet on the mat. He grasped the handle and tried to turn it. The fucking thing wouldn’t turn. He groped in his pocket for a handkerchief and wiped his hands and the doorknob and an instant later he was outside and reaching for his shoes. The bloody things weren’t there.

There wasn’t time to look for them. Behind him Maud had finally overcome the combined forces of grease and gravity and was coming down the passage promising to strangle him with her own bare hands. Sir Giles waited no longer. He galumphed off in his gumboots down the drive and across the lawn towards the pinetum. Behind him Lady Maud slithered into the downstairs lavatory and emerged with a shotgun. She went to the front door and opened it. Sir Giles was still visible across the lawn. Lady Maud raised the gun and fired. He was out of range but at least she had the satisfaction of knowing that he wouldn’t come near the house again in a hurry. She put the gun back and began to clean up the mess.

In the Lodge Blott heard the shot and leapt out of bed. Lady Maud’s telephone call had disturbed him. Why should she want to know if the gates were locked? And why had she whispered? Something was up. And with the sound of the shotgun Blott was certain. He dressed and went downstairs with his twelve-bore to the Land-Rover which he had parked just inside the archway. Before getting in he checked the lock on the gate. It was quite secure. Then he drove off up to the Hall and parked outside the front door and went inside.

“It’s me, Blott,” he called into the darkness. “Are you all right?”

From the kitchen there came the sound of someone sliding about and a muffled curse.

“Don’t move,” Lady Maud shouted. “There’s oil everywhere.”

“Oil?” said Blott. Now that he came to think of it there was a stench of oil in the house.

“He’s tried to burn the house down.”

Blott stared into the darkness and promised that if he got the chance he would kill him. “The bastard,” he muttered. Lady Maud slithered down the passage with a squeegee.

“Now listen carefully, Blott,” she said. “I want you to do something for me.”

“Anything,” said Blott gallantly.

“He came in through the pinetum. I’ve locked the gate there so he can’t get out but his car must be up at Wilfrid’s Castle. I want you to drive round there and remove the dis … the thing that goes round.”

“The rotor arm,” said Blott.

“Right,” said Lady Maud. “And while you are about it you might as well put extra locks on both the gates. We must make quite sure that innocent people don’t get into the park. Do you understand?”

Blott smiled in the darkness. He understood.

“I’ll take the rotor arm off the Land-Rover too,” he said.

“A wise precaution,” Lady Maud agreed. “And when you have finished come back here. I don’t think he’ll return tonight but it might be as well to take precautions.”

Blott turned to the door.

“There’s just one other thing,” said Lady Maud, “I don’t think we’ll feed the lions in the morning. They’ll just have to fend for themselves for a day or two.”

“I didn’t intend to,” said Blott and went outside.

Lady Maud sighed happily. It was so nice to have a real man about the house.

At Finch Grove Ivy Bullett-Finch’s feelings were quite the reverse. What was left of the house seemed to be about the man and in any case what was left of Mr Bullett-Finch was real only in a material sense. He had died, as he had lived, concerned for the welfare of his lawn. Dundridge arrived with the Chief Constable in time to pay his last respects. As the firemen carried her husband’s remains out of the cellar, Mrs Bullett-Finch, relieved of the burden of guilt about the oven, vented her feelings on the Controller Motorways Midlands.

“You murderer,” she screamed, “you killed him. You killed him with your awful ball.” She was led away by a policewoman. Dundridge looked balefully at the ball and crane.

“Nonsense,” he said, “I had nothing to do with it.”

“We have been led to understand by your deputy, Mr Hoskins, that you gave orders for random sorties to be made by task forces of demolition experts,” said the Chief Constable. “It would rather appear that they’ve carried out your instructions to the letter.”

“My instructions?” said Dundridge. “I gave no instructions for this house to be demolished. Why should I?”

“We were rather hoping you would be able to tell us,” said the Chief Constable.

“But it’s not even scheduled for demolition.”

“Quite. Nor to the best of my knowledge was the High Street. But since your equipment was used in both cases -“

“It’s not my equipment,” shouted Dundridge, “it belongs to the contractors. If anyone is fucking responsible -“

“I’d be glad if you didn’t use offensive language,” said the Chief Constable. “The situation is unpleasant enough as it is. Local feeling is running high. I think it would be best if you accompanied us to the station.”

“The station? Do you mean the police station?” said Dundridge.

“It’s just for your own protection,” said the Chief Constable. “We don’t want any more accidents tonight, now do we?”

“This is monstrous,” said Dundridge.

“Quite so,” said the Chief Constable. “And now if you’ll just step this way.”

As the police car wound its way slowly through the rubble that littered the High Street, Dundridge could see that Hoskins had been telling the truth when he called Guildstead Carbonell a disaster area. The transformer still smouldered in the grey dawn, the Primitive Methodist Chapel lived up to at least part of its name, while the horribly mishapen relics of a dozen cars crouched beside the glass-strewn pavement. What the iron ball hadn’t done with the aid of the telegraph pole to end Guildstead Carbonell’s reputation for old-world charm, the conflagration at Mr Dugdale’s garage had. Ignited by some unidentifiable public-spirited person who had brought out a paraffin lamp to warn passers-by to watch out for the debris, the blast from the petrol storage tanks had blown in what few windows remained unbroken after Blott’s passing and had set fire to the thatched roofs of several delightful cottages. The fire had spread to a row of almshouses. The simultaneous arrival of fire engines from Worford and Ottertown had added to the chaos. Working with high-pressure hoses in total darkness they had swept a number of inadequately clothed old-age pensioners who had escaped from the almshouses down the street before turning their attention to the Public Library which they had filled with foam. To Dundridge, staring miserably out of the window of the police car, the knowledge that he was held responsible for the catastrophe was intolerable. He wished now that he had never set eyes on South Worfordshire.