The Blood-Dimmed Tide (40 page)

‘I’ve no taste myself for the hangman’s rope. The practice is barbaric. But there’s never been a man I wanted to lay hands on more. Aye, and hoped to see swing. But I doubt we’ll set eyes on him now. We’ve missed our chance, and we won’t get another. He’s gone for good.’

Sam turned at the gate and whistled.

‘Come along, Sally. Get a move on, old girl.’

The dog hesitated in the lighted doorway, unwilling to leave the warmth of the kitchen. Behind her he could see Bess’s anxious figure. The cook’s pink face, even more flushed than usual from the tears she’d shed, radiated distress like an alarm beacon.

‘You’ll let us know what they say, won’t you, Sam?’ she called out to him.

‘Of course I will, love. What’s more I’ll get them moving. You can tell Mrs Ramsay that, too.’ Sam slapped his thigh. ‘Now that’s enough of that, Sal. Come on!’

It would be dark in less than an hour and he wanted to get over to the barn again while there was still some light to see by.

‘Sally!’

At last she moved, crossing the yard reluctantly, with that shuffling gait which showed her arthritis must be hurting, poor old thing, following him out. With a last wave to Bess he shut the gate behind them and strode off.

Still fuming.

His attempt to ring the Midhurst police to see if they had any news of Eddie had ended in fiasco, his call having been answered by a green young copper – at least, that was what he’d sounded like – one who didn’t seem to know what day of the week it was. And when Sam had demanded to speak to someone more senior he’d been told there was no one available just then.

‘They’re all out,’ the bloke had said, reducing Sam to near apoplexy.

‘I’m trying to report a missing person,’ he’d roared down the phone. ‘Someone who might have been hurt in an accident. Don’t you have lists?’

If they did, no one had told the young copper about them, it seemed.

‘I’ll have to ask someone about this,’ he’d said, sounding unsure. ‘If you could just leave your number, sir…’

‘Never mind. I’ll come in myself.’

Sam had slammed down the phone, then wished he hadn’t. No doubt the young copper was doing his best, but it was a fine thing when police stations were left in the hands of babes and sucklings.

And he still had no news of Eddie.

Sam’s anger had been fuelled partly by fear. In the midst of making the call to the police he’d remembered something from his visit to the barn. It had sent a chill up his spine.

Eddie’s work clothes… where were they?

He’d found his boots all right, both of them, lying on the barn floor, as though they’d been chucked there. As if Eddie had been in haste to depart somewhere. He recalled that the lace of one had been broken.

But where were his dirty clothes?

He wouldn’t have shed his boots alone, surely. He wouldn’t have set out for Hove, or anywhere else, wearing the same soiled garments he put on every day for work. Sam had seen clean clothes in the wardrobe. But he remembered clearly now that there’d been no sign of the others.

Which didn’t mean they weren’t there somewhere. (At once Sam had sought for reassurance.) Tucked away in a corner, perhaps, or in the small cupboard under the washstand. But it was something he had to find out – for his own peace of mind, if nothing else. Because if the clothes were really missing, then Eddie couldn’t have gone anywhere, which meant something really had happened to him, some accident, and it might have occurred closer at hand than anyone had imagined. In the barn itself, perhaps, or nearby.

Given that the light was fading fast now, he had to get moving, and having ended his phone call abruptly, Sam had hastened back to the kitchen where he’d found that Bess, too, was concerned about the gathering dusk, though for a different reason.

‘It’s time Nell was back.’

She’d been standing by the window, gazing out in the direction of the path that led across the fields from Wood Way.

‘The bus must be late. The days are so short now…’

Sam had told her he was leaving, but not why. This was one fear he couldn’t share with her.

‘Did you talk to the police?’ she had asked. When she turned to him he saw she’d been crying. ‘Did they tell you anything?’

He’d shaken his head. ‘Something’s going on at the station – they’ re at sixes and sevens. I’ll have to go there in person. I’ll do it on the way home.’

He could see she was hoping he would stay longer. But he already had his coat on.

‘Don’t worry about Nell,’ he told her as he opened the back door and called to Sally. ‘I’ll keep an eye out for her. I’m going that way.’

He hurried now along the path, glancing up at the grey-shrouded sky and wondering how much longer the daylight would last. He could light one of the oil lamps, if necessary, if he had to make a search, he thought, drawing his coat closer about him. A bit of a wind had got up in the last hour. In time it would blow away the mist and fog, but for the present it only sharpened the biting cold, and Sam was grateful he’d been able to stop at home on his way back from Tillington earlier and collect the coat. It was the same one he’d had all through the war, but better now since Ada had got her hands on it. She’d sewn a good thick lining of padding on the inside and once it was buttoned up, as it was now, it was proof against even the coldest weather.

Sam paused to look back and saw that Sal had already fallen behind.

‘Come on, old girl!’

She was having a bad day – it was the cold, stiffening her joints even more than usual – and she was dealing with it the only way she knew how, by not hurrying.

He walked on, quickening his own pace. He could see the top of Wood Way now, where it came through the trees on the ridge, but there was no sign of Nell yet. He was close to the point where the two paths met, and where a small coppice blocked his view for a few moments. Coming out of it he looked up the path and saw her now, descending from the ridge, her white school hat bobbing up and down, walking fast, half breaking into a run as she approached the spot where the gap in the hedge led to Coyne’s Farm.

He waved to her, and she waved back.

Looking round for Sal, he saw she had stopped some distance off to sniff at a bush; taking a breather. Sam grinned. He decided to leave her be. She’d catch up with him in due course.

Turning again, he started up the path… then stopped.

There was no sign of Nell. She’d vanished.

Unable to believe his eyes, he stood staring.

Only a moment before she’d been bounding down the path towards him.

Then he realized something else. Peering narrow-eyed through the dusk, he saw there was an object lying on the ground up ahead: a round white shape.

It was Nell’s school hat.

He barely had time to register the fact. The next moment the sound of a scream came to his ears. Though faint, and quickly cut off, the cry was enough to break the spell that held him frozen to the spot. And to shock him into action.

‘Nell!’ He roared out her name in response.

The hat lay by the gap in the hedge, and Sam ran flat out towards it, charging up the path, yelling out her name as he went.

‘Nell… Nell!’

Madden backed his car onto the chalky track so that he was pointing in the right direction, then waved to Billy Styles, who was standing nearby. He wound down the window.

‘I almost forgot. Do me a favour, would you, Billy? When you get a chance, give Helen a ring and tell her I’m on my way home. She’ll be getting worried.’

‘Yes, of course, sir.’ The sergeant smiled.

‘I don’t know where you’ll end up spending tonight. But if you can get back to Highfield, there’ll be a bed waiting for you.’

‘Thank you, sir. If not tonight, then tomorrow. There’s that car of mine I have to pick up.’

With a final wave Madden drove off. He had stayed as long as possible, hoping to the last that some clue to Lang’s whereabouts might be discovered, meanwhile offering what moral support he could, listening while Sinclair rang Bainbridge, the Midhurst solicitor who’d handled the renting of the cottage, but seeing from his expression even before their conversation was over that there was nothing to be learned in that quarter.

‘Apparently Lang spun him a yarn. Told him he’d recently returned from Batavia where he’d worked for a rubber company, and was spending a few months in England prior to returning to Holland. Said birdwatching was his hobby and he was writing a treatise on the migratory habits of certain northern European species. Even that wasn’t enough to persuade Bainbridge, who’d taken a distinct dislike to him, so he added a line about having lost his wife in the East to cholera and wanting somewhere secluded to mourn her passing. Our friend seems to have mistaken his calling: he should have been writing romantic novels. Bainbridge said he held out till Lang volunteered to rent the place till the end of the year, cash down. It was too good an offer to refuse. His client’s a widow who needs the money.’

Sinclair had handed the phone to Meadows when he’d finished, but the clerk had exchanged only a few words with his employer, who’d already been informed of the situation by the chief inspector.

‘Mr Bainbridge says I’m to stay as long as you need me sir,’ he’d told Sinclair in a tone of resignation after he’d replaced the receiver. ‘I’ll have to lock up, anyway.’

‘You needn’t worry about that, Mr Meadows. We’ll see to it.’ The chief inspector had got over his annoyance with the clerk. He was regretting his earlier harshness. ‘You can leave now. You’ve got your bicycle, have you?’

‘Oh, yes, sir.’

‘Then you’d better be off. It’ll be dark soon.’

‘Well, if you’re sure, sir…’ Meadows was already looking for his coat and attache case.

The light was beginning to fade as Madden walked up with Billy to where he’d left his car near the top of the wooded ridge, both of them striding along briskly in the cold breeze that was blowing. Glancing sideways, Billy noted the familiar scowl of preoccupation on his old chief’s face.

‘Don’t worry, sir. We’ll get him.’

‘I hope so, Billy. I hope so.’ Madden had paused by his car, smiling now. ‘Well, at least I’ll be out of your hair.’

‘Sir?’

‘It’s my impression you’ve been keeping an eye on me, Sergeant Styles. Did Mr Sinclair give you an order to that effect?’

Billy had grinned, but said nothing.

‘Well, you can both relax. I’m on my way.’ Madden had chuckled.

Approaching the top of the ridge now, driving carefully over the rutted track, he came on the figure of Henry Meadows. The clerk was pushing his bicycle up the slope, which steepened over the last twenty yards or so. Bulky in his coat, and with the added burden of his attache case, which was strapped to a carrier on the back of his bike, he was making heavy weather of the climb. Hearing the sound of the car behind him, he moved off the road. Madden drew to a halt.

‘Would you like a lift, Mr Meadows? I’m going by Midhurst.’

‘Oh, goodness, sir… thank you.’ The doleful look on the clerk’s fleshy face was dispelled in an instant. A smile of relief took its place.

‘We can put your bike in the back.’

Having done so, they were soon on their way again and within minutes had rejoined the paved road.

‘What an afternoon, sir! I still haven’t got over it.’ Seated beside Madden in front, with his hat, containing his bicycle clips, perched upside down on his knees, Henry Meadows seemed disposed to relive his experience. ‘The men bursting in like that. I don’t know when I’ve had such a shock.’ He hesitated, unsure whether to continue. ‘Sir, what’s he done, this Mr De Beer? No one would say.’

‘I can’t tell you that, I’m afraid.’ Madden glanced at him. ‘But you can take it he’s a dangerous man.’

Silenced by these words, the clerk swallowed.

‘What did you make of him?’ Madden switched on his headlamps. Although it was not yet dark, the light was dull and leaden.

‘Nothing, sir. I mean, we hardly spoke. He must have known I was coming: he’d left a note on the kitchen table with the keys. If I’d have been ten minutes later he’d have gone. But he never said goodbye or anything; he just drove off.’

‘He was in a hurry, was he?’

‘Oh, yes… no doubt of that.’ Meadows nodded. ‘He looked at his watch twice, I remember, even in the few minutes we were there together. It was as though he had somewhere to go, somewhere else to be.’

‘Somewhere else?’ Madden repeated the words. But his attention had shifted to the road ahead where a bus had appeared, blocking their forward progress. He saw a group of men bearing tools on the verge beside the vehicle and realized they had reached the roadworks, where the surface narrowed. The bus was motionless; the driver seemed to be waiting for him to make way.

‘There’s a parking area just behind us, sir.’ Meadows had noted the problem. ‘It’s for Wood Way. Ramblers going to the Downs use it.’

Twisting about, Madden saw the space he was referring to and put the car into reverse. When he reached the entrance to the gravelled area, he spun the steering wheel hard and continued backing into it, avoiding a small van that was parked there. The bus had already begun moving forward.

‘Sir?’ Meadows spoke beside him. He’d turned round in his seat while Madden was reversing and he was still looking back.

‘Yes?’ Madden’s eyes were fixed on the bus as it lumbered past.

‘That car of Mr De Beer’s… the one the chief inspector was asking me about. He wanted to know the model, but I couldn’t tell him…’

‘I remember… what about it?’ Madden changed gear and they started forward.

‘It was just like that one over there.’

Madden put his foot hard on the brake. Turning, he peered through the narrow rear window and saw, on the far side of the parking area, half hidden by the overhanging branch of an oak tree, the vehicle Meadows was indicating. He changed into reverse again and backed rapidly across the area, wheels spinning on the loose gravel. As they drew near the spot, he saw that the car was a black Ford sedan.