Pursuit of Arms

by Gerald Hammond

  “You mean —?”

  “Yes.” Keith’s idea of an evasive answer was well known.

  Keith spared a few minutes to put flesh on the bare bones of the story which Ronnie had been telling, while Janet put food on the table. Then, between mouthfuls, Ronnie made his report.

  “Those lads may be well-drilled for the city streets,” Ronnie said, “but outside of the city they’ve just no idea. They think that because they can see for a mile they can see everything in it. I went up the ditch between the kale and the stubble and then I was in dead ground. That damn covey of grey partridges that hatched by the midden was in front of me. I tried to keep them moving gently. If they’d been redlegs I could’ve done it but, being greys, they sprang of a sudden. Well, to a watcher, that might only have meant a fox. But when some pigeon came over and jinked when they saw me, they should have known there was somebody there. I was expecting a man with a pistol any minute, so I got behind a whip-bush and made ready to jump him if I had to. But not a bit of notice did they take. Silly sods!

  “The dead ground got me to the corner of the stack of straw bales, and by then I was out of sight of the beggar in the barn. Those bales are too tight together to get between, but I could see in and there’s a trailer in there right enough. So we’ve found the guns.”

  “Never mind the guns,” Molly said in agony. “Tell me about Deborah. Before you came in, Keith, he was saying that he’d heard Deborah’s voice.”

  “Don’t rush him,” Keith said. “I want to know the details.”

  Ronnie nodded and went on. “Neill McLelland has his tractor and his fork-lift parked between the gable and the stack of bales, so I tucked myself between them and was wondering what the hell to do next when I heard Deborah’s voice. They were in the bathroom. The window’s round the back, but there’s a ventilator fan in the back wall. I heard Mrs McLelland’s voice, too, and a man telling them to hurry up and get back next door. Deborah was needing to do a widdle, and Mrs McLelland had gone with her to help her with her things.”

  “She doesn’t need help any more,” Molly said indignantly.

  This maternal pride was so ill-timed that Keith, whose feelings needed a safety-valve, gave a hoot of laughter. After a moment the others joined in, Molly with them.

  Sir Peter Hay chose that moment to poke his shaggy head round the door. His equally shaggy eyebrows went up.

  “Come in, Peter,” Keith said. “Come and join us. And don’t think us mad, laughing at a time like this. We needed to blow off steam. Have you eaten?”

  “Thanks to you, no. I’ve spent what would usually be my lunchtime hunting through the estate office.”

  “You got it?”

  “I did. My memory was, for once, correct.” Sir Peter joined them at the table. He pulled out a folded plan and began to open it. “I sold Lairy Farm about ten years ago, to tidy my boundaries. But when the alterations went ahead, a plan was filed with me, quite unnecessarily. I think the architect thought that I was still superior of the feu or else a conterminous proprietor. We still had it on file. Ah, thank you, my dear,” he added, as Janet put a plate in front of him.

  “If anybody else turns up,” Janet said, “they’re out of luck.”

  While Sir Peter tried to find words of cheer for Molly, Keith made a space on Janet’s table and spread the plan of Lairy Farm between himself and Ronnie. He found the bathroom. “Here?”

  Ronnie squinted at the plan, muttering. “Looks right,” he said.

  “That would make sense. The big bedroom given over to the hostages, with the bathroom next door. One man on a chair in the passage could guard the lot of them. You couldn’t see whether the windows were boarded up?”

  “Not from where I was. When I go back to collect Munro, I’ll see if I can’t pull in somewhere and take a look through the faur-keeker.”

  “Telescope,” Molly said sternly. “Don’t you go teaching your niece to talk like that.”

  Keith was still looking down at the plan. “Ronnie,” he said, “will you draw every damn thing you can remember. The positions of fences and hedges, the straw bales, the tractor and so on. We don’t want somebody walking into them in the dark.”

  “I’m not much of a hand at the drawing,” Ronnie said anxiously.

  “Do the best you can.” Keith shifted his eyes to a different drawing and swore softly. “Hot damn! Those two rooms are in the flat-roofed bit. I hadn’t realised.”

  Ronnie looked up from his attempt to draw a plan view of a tractor and withdrew his tongue from between his teeth. “That bit was the old dairy,” he said. “I mind that when they came to extend the house the roof of that bit was just hanging, so they put a flat roof on instead.”

  “Does it matter?” Molly asked.

  “I don’t know yet. The windows will be sealed unless those men are daft — which, in spite of what Ronnie says, they’re not. And the walls are stone. People forget about roofs, but what’s been put up a piece at a time can be taken down the same way. I was hoping to get onto the roof, lift a few pantiles and cut through the battens under cover of the noise of a helicopter or something. But a flat roof’s all nailed together and the nails are probably rusted into place by now.”

  “Can’t you get her out, then?” Molly was near tears.

  “Yes, of course I can.” Keith sounded surprised that anybody, especially Molly, could doubt his capacity for miracles. “I don’t know how yet. But to every problem there’s a best solution and it’s just a matter of thinking of it beforehand instead of afterwards. Peter, can you manage the other things I asked for?”

  “No special problems. A tractor and trailer will be waiting behind the industrial estate from ten p.m., with a load of small straw bales, nothing over a hundredweight. Fold Farm will be deserted this evening. For noisemakers, I couldn’t manage a helicopter but a light plane will be standing by and I’ve hired a low loader with two earth-movers aboard, to climb the hill whenever you say.”

  “Well done,” Keith said. “Just send me the bills as they come in.”

  “My dear boy, just consider it my contribution towards my god-daughter’s salvation.”

  The others were struggling to follow the reasons behind these exchanges. “Why Fold Farm?” Molly asked.

  “Because it’s a long way away,” Keith said, “and because it’s much the same layout as Lairy. I want some rehearsals in daylight before we start moving around in the dark. It looks like being a clear night. No moon, and no mist or cloud to diffuse the town’s lights. Just starlight, and that’s not a lot of light. Peter, could you seek out at least twenty of your most willing men, foresters and farm workers? No weaklings, mind.”

  Sir Peter nodded gravely. “If I tell them that they’re rescuing a kidnapped child there’ll be no holding them back.”

  “Great,” Keith said. “But tell them nothing for now. We’ve seen what happens when word gets around of our doings. At knocking-off time, have each of them told that there’s a late job on. Report in wellies or soft shoes, no tackets, at Fold Farm at eight.”

  “Will do.” Sir Peter hesitated. “Is that all you want from me?” he asked wistfully. Sir Peter, Keith knew, was bored by the role of wealthy landlord, to which he had been born, and hankered after an active part in the excitements which occasionally came Keith’s way.

  “Not by a mile,” Keith said. “I want you up on the hill, just below the main road, with a rifle and a night-sight. You keep scanning the ground through the infra-red sight to make sure that nobody I don’t know about arrives unexpectedly.”

  “I thought Wal could do that,” Janet said.

  Keith went on speaking to Sir Peter. “And you watch specially for a bright red spot which means that somebody else is doing the same thing. And if you see it you start shooting quickly and straight, because the odds are that he’s seen the bright spot of your sight. Janet, you were saying?”

  “Nothing,” Janet said.

  “You wanted Wal tucked well out of harm’s way,” Keith s
aid. “I’ll try not to put him in danger, or anybody else. But if you don’t want him exposed to any risk at all, say so now and we’ll drop him from the team.”

  Janet shook her head. “He’d never forgive me,” she said.

  “Anyway, Wal’s short of three fingers and Peter’s far the better rifle shot.”

  Ronnie, busily drawing shaky lines on the plan, had fallen behind the discussion. “What’s with the labourers and the straw bales?” he asked.

  Keith sighed. It was torture to his quick mind to stop and explain. “I’m hoping,” he said, “to get Deborah and the McLellands out, quickly and cleanly. Once they’re out and away, we can solve the problem of anyone else in the farmhouse any way we want. Frankly, I don’t give a damn whether we arrest them, leave them to scatter or kill the lot of them. But during the first stage, the last thing we want is for men with guns in their fists to come rushing out of the doors. By the grace of God, there’s tarmac right up to the front door at Lairy and a paved path to the back, so men in wellies can move silently even carrying a straw bale each. Ten straw bales stacked against each door should buy us some time.”

  “Clever,” Ronnie said. “Could we not manage a steel plate between the door and the bales?”

  “Anybody pulling open the door and shooting, as he thought, into the night would give himself a hell of a fright,” Keith said. “But we couldn’t handle heavy enough plate quietly. That’s very good,” he added, looking at Ronnie’s sketches.

  “It’s gey rough.”

  “It tells us what we need to know.”

  “What about the windows?” Molly asked.

  “I was coming to that,” Keith said. “I don’t expect any surprises there, because if I know farmhouses the windows have been painted shut for years and it takes time and noise to come out through glass. But the men who brought the bales take up positions, one each side of every window. Each man has a pick-handle and also a shotgun slung on his back, muzzle downwards. If anyone with a gun comes out of a window they clobber him if they can, and if they can’t they blow him in half. Do we have twenty medium-priced shotguns in stock, Janet? I’m not letting that mob loose with Purdeys or Perazzis.”

  “We can manage,” Janet said. “But aren’t you taking an awful chance with the law?”

  “Book them out to me personally,” Keith said, “on sale-or-return. That way the business needn’t suffer. We’ll need something to make a sling for each gun, and a few rounds of heavy shot per man.”

  Sir Peter Hay had started to make notes on several lists, to Keith’s pleasure. When the baronet turned his attention to organisation and logistics, nothing would be forgotten. “Is that all you want the men for?” he asked.

  Keith was still looking down at the drawing. “We’ll decide later, when we have a final plan complete with contingency alternatives and signals. For the moment, I think there may be one task for them before they move to the windows. Janet, can I count on you for one special job?”

  “Why Janet?” Molly asked. “Why not me?”

  “Because you’ll be passing signals. And because, in the same way that Deborah’s growing up among guns, Janet grew up among farm machinery. None of us knows more about tractors and things . . .”

  *

  Paul York arrived promptly at 3 p.m. Keith led him up to the flat.

  The shop had been closed, with an apologetic notice on the door. Wallace had been elected to go and relieve Superintendent Munro. Armed with lists, Molly, Janet and Sir Peter had been sent to gather equipment and to set in motion the whole complex operation, all in utmost secrecy.

  Only Ronnie remained. The three men sat round Janet’s dining table. Ronnie was very quiet. It had been explained to him, forcibly and with threats, that he was present as a witness and for support in the event of anything rough developing and that he was to keep his ears and eyes open and his mouth firmly shut.

  “The time may have come,” Keith said, “for out-and-out co-operation.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” York said.

  “It depends whether you’re who I think you are.”

  York blinked. “You know who I am,” he said.

  “I know who you say you are.” Keith produced the Le Mat revolver from under the table. It looked enormous. “And if that’s who you really are, you spend the night in the basement under the shop. Eddie’s position in all this is too damn suspect.”

  “All right, then. Who do you think I am?”

  “I think you’re a copper with a background in the martial arts, and that you were seconded from the Lothian and Borders fuzz to join Special Branch and go underground, all under a carefully faked cloud.”

  Hitherto, Keith had been distracted by York’s size and his balanced movements and had hardly noticed his face. Now he realised that it was round, bland and neutral, its expression in the eye of the beholder. It was not a face to invite either trust or suspicion and Keith stopped trying to read York’s soul in it. Only by reading the faint stiffening in York’s frame could Keith detect that the big man was disconcerted.

  “Just what leads you to that extraordinary conclusion?” York asked slowly.

  “By which you mean, who told me? Nobody said a word. But I’ve never met anybody who moved, as you do, with the precision of a well-lubricated machine, except for dancers and top men in karate, kendo, judo and similar arts. And I have my own source in the police. Your information generally overlapped with his, but sometimes you were ahead of him and sometimes behind. That suggested that your information wasn’t coming from the uniformed branch.”

  Paul York was silent for a few seconds. Then he shrugged. “You win,” he said. “I’m Special Branch. I’ll have to be more careful from now on.”

  “I’d hate to hurt your feelings,” Keith said, “but it could be that you have a source in Special Branch without being in it. If you’re a member, no way would you be separated from your card. So let’s have a keek at it.”

  For the first time, York’s face registered an expression, mild amusement. “Rather than spend the night in your cellar,” he said, “I’ll indulge you.” He took off a shoe and removed a card from under the insole. This had been issued only a few months before. It carried York’s photograph, and identified him as a chief inspector in Special Branch.

  “So far so good,” Keith said. “I take it that you thought Eddie Adoni might be up to something?”

  “One load, two purchasers,” York said. “The same source tipped us that he was looking for a mincer, and for an inducement he recommended me for the job.”

  “You let the robbery happen, and so the murders, just so that you could find out who the other clients were?”

  “Christ, no! Eddie must have rumbled me early on, because he pulled the wool over my eyes from the start. We’d assumed that the switch would happen after you’d done your stuff, so that the eventual buyer would get sound merchandise. We forgot that terrorists aren’t always so fussy and that Eddie, who’s made some heavy losses in the last few years, was desperate enough about money to save your fees. My guess is that I was meant to die with the rest. But the lorry got away early and Eddie kept me talking. He seemed to be discussing a phony fire in your factory, after we’d brought the overhauled and converted guns out the night before and substituted junk. In fact, I see now that he’d got wind of the changed destination of the load and was trying to winkle it out of me without giving himself away. So he saved my life without meaning to. He’s been pulled in now and making a poor job of answering some very difficult questions.”

  “But he left you with egg on your face, which you’re trying to remove by making your own contribution to the case.”

  “You can put that to music,” York said, “and sing it.”

  Keith thought to himself that if policemen wouldn’t dangle their chestnuts in the wrong places he would not be asked to pull them out of the fire, thereby adding himself to the numbers of those in trouble. But the comment seemed better left unspoken.

  “How�
�s your night vision?” he asked.

  York raised his eyebrows. “Very good. Well above average. What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “That was the big question,” Keith said. “If you’d given the wrong answer, you’d have spent the night in the cellar wondering why it was wrong. How good are you at the martial arts?”

  “I started as soon as I could toddle, and I’ve gone as high as I can go. They fly me out to the Orient to judge contests.”

  “Could you take out an armed man in the dark?”

  York stared at him. “I could. Easier than you could peel a banana, all things being equal. Whether I would is a different question. If you know where the guns and the gang are, you’ve done your bit. Tell the police.”

  “I would, but —”

  For the first time, York showed emotion. “You can’t have taken in what I said. This gang’s too dangerous for amateurs like you. Tell me where they are, and the matter’s out of your hands.”

  Keith decided that the time for putting Paul York in his place had arrived. “I’d agree with every word,” he said, “except that, to stop me interfering, they’ve snatched my daughter. But I know where they are, and they don’t know I know. I could tell the police, but I’m not content to trust my daughter’s rescue to any group which does not have her safety as their first and only priority; and especially not to a group which is far from blameless in the matter of the original crime.”

  “You’re laying that at my door, are you?”

  “I didn’t say so. But if the cap fits, wear it. A lot of the blame belongs to Munro, our local super., who wouldn’t believe me when I told him that the load was at risk. And you two are the only officers who’ve had the gall to come to me for help. Well, you’ll get help. I can give you the guns, and Munro the gang. But you’ll get help on my terms or you’ll stay here until it’s all over; and that’ll look bloody good on your record.”

  York took no offence at this blunt speech, but Janet’s clock ticked half a minute away while he thought it over. “Let’s see whether your terms are too stiff,” he said at last. “What do you want me to do?”