Dead on Dartmoor

by Stephanie Austin

  ‘Has he ruined it?’

  ‘I’d already covered these with masking fluid,’ she said, pointing at the white, unpainted stalks of cow parsley, ‘so they were protected. But some of this background will need repainting.’

  ‘Oh, Soph, it’s taken you ages! What did you say to him?’

  ‘Not much. I didn’t need to.’ She chuckled. ‘Pat gave him a real ear-bashing.’ She pushed her big red-framed specs up the bridge of her tiny nose. ‘Well, you know what she’s like.’

  Pat was one of most generous and kind people I knew, but she seemed to have it in for Gavin. ‘I hope she doesn’t piss him off too much, I don’t want him to leave. I need his rent money.’

  ‘It’s one of those days, I suppose.’ Sophie blotted a tiny flower with a corner of paper towel. ‘I was supposed to be taking some stuff to that new arts centre near Dartmeet. I got it all packed up, ready to go.’ She turned her dark eyes on me mournfully. ‘But I’ll have to cancel, I can’t get there now.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Mum’s had to work and has taken the car.’

  ‘I’ll take you.’ I heard the words come out of my mouth before I’d even thought about it.

  Sophie continued to gaze at me soulfully. ‘Don’t you have to work this afternoon?’

  ‘I said I’d help Ricky and Morris, but they won’t mind. I can put some time in for them later. I’ll give them a call.’

  I’d kept Nick’s old phone in his living room, sitting on the floor. Like the bedroom, it was empty, cleared of his furniture, walls painted, floorboards sanded down and varnished, new spotlights in the ceiling: just waiting to be rented by traders or to be moved into by me. Pat was of the opinion that the rooms were haunted; at least that’s what she told Gavin to wind him up. I’m not sure I believe in ghosts, but I still couldn’t walk into those rooms without thinking of Nick, hearing his chuckle, seeing his wicked blue eyes. My call made, I went back down into the shop.

  ‘Gavin,’ Pat called out when I appeared, ‘what have you got to remember to tell Juno?’

  He looked up from his reading, returning to the real world after a definite pause. ‘What?’

  ‘What happened yesterday?’ Pat insisted.

  ‘Oh … yes,’ he responded, peering vaguely through his specs as if struggling to remember. ‘Some woman came in, enquiring about a unit.’

  ‘Great!’ I was instantly cheered at the possibility of more rent. ‘What does she do?’

  He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I told her she’d have to come back when you were here.’

  ‘Well, did you take her number?’

  ‘No … sorry,’ he added, in the voice of someone who really couldn’t give a shit and tried to return to his reading.

  ‘Well, if she comes in again, or if anyone else comes in enquiring, will you be sure to take their details, please? I need to fill these units.’

  ‘Oh? Yes, of course.’

  ‘And by the way,’ I added, addressing the room in general, ‘I had eighteen pounds extra in my cash box last night. Someone must have taken a sale for me yesterday. Does anyone know what it was?’

  ‘That was me.’ Gavin was beginning to look sheepish. ‘You sold a silver thing … a rounded knife, bone handle … um … bit like an apple corer.’

  ‘That would have been the stilton scoop,’ I told him, ‘it would have been written on the label.’ I was trying not to lecture him but failing miserably. ‘That’s why we all label everything, Gavin, so we can keep track of sales. Next time, please write the details in the book on the counter. That’s what it’s for.’ It was a simple enough system if we all followed it. Poor Gavin; if I’d had any idea what terrible things were about to happen, I like to think I’d have been more patient with him, more understanding of his complete lack of interest, his callow lack of charm – but probably not.

  Once we’d loaded Sophie’s paintings, we put EB in the back of the van. He wanted to ride in the front, but dogs tend to make Sophie wheeze, although EB’s mum would have pointed out indignantly that Miniature Schnauzers’ coats never shed hair. But I made Sophie check she had her inhaler with her before we left, I know what she’s like. We weren’t taking any of her big hedgerow pictures, but some of her miniatures: charming studies of birds, bees, dragonflies and amphibians. We took boxes of these together with a portfolio containing prints of her larger works. She had, after a great deal of nagging from me, begun to paint pet portraits, but so far EB was her sole commission.

  We took the road to Buckland. No sooner had we climbed the wooded hill towards the church and farmland opened out beneath a wide blue sky, than an irritating ping from my bag announced my mobile phone had returned to the land of the living, and a fuzzy buzzing noise told me that a call was coming in. ‘I bet that’s Elaine. Have a look, will you?’

  By the time Sophie had dug the phone out of my bag, it had switched to voicemail. She listened as I pulled into a gateway to let a farm vehicle pass in the narrow road, a huge machine with spiky arms folded up in front of the cab like the claws of a praying mantis, something to do with hay cutting, probably: the long, dry spell meant that many farmers locally had managed a second cut.

  ‘Alan’s fine,’ she reported, phone to her ear, as the deeply cut treads of the machine’s giant tyres rolled past my window, bending my wing mirror out of position. ‘He’s had a stent fitted and he’s staying in hospital for a couple of nights. Elaine’s home and you can take EB back whenever you like.’

  ‘Would you text her and say I’ll be an hour or two?’

  She nodded and got busy with her thumbs.

  After we’d left Sophie at the collection of old stone farm buildings, which had been converted into the new gallery and arts centre, I took EB for another walk. At the end of the lane we sat on a drystone wall and gazed over fields of stubble scattered with golden rolls of hay. A second crop had been harvested here. In the distance, a machine was lifting the rolled bales into a pile, wrapping them in black plastic ready for silage, an activity we didn’t usually see in September.

  Back to the arts centre, where we waited for Sophie in the shiny new cafe and tested their crumbly apple cake. She appeared after another twenty minutes, grinning broadly and empty-handed except for her portfolio.

  ‘They’re taking all my paintings,’ she announced happily, ‘sale or return.’

  I offered tea and cake in celebration but she declined, and we decided to get going. I put EB into the back of the van, but Sophie decided to hang on to her portfolio and we started off for home.

  ‘This is going to deplete your stock at the shop,’ I said, after we’d rattled over a cattle grid and turned onto the road that led home across the moor. The rough grass on either side was parched after the drying winds of summer, the leaves of stunted hawthorn bushes already withering and yellow. ‘You’re going to have to get busy with that paintbrush.’

  ‘Actually,’ she admitted after a sly, sideways glance at me, ‘they asked for some local scenes.’

  I groaned. ‘Isn’t that what I’m always telling you?’ I took my hand off the wheel to wave an arm at the rolling grandeur of the moor around us, a ragged granite tor like a ruined castle snagging the horizon. ‘Local scenes sell!’

  She ignored this completely and switched on the radio.

  ‘Honestly, Soph, what’s wrong with painting Buckland Church or Hound Tor?’

  ‘Everybody does it!’ she said dismissively. This was an argument we’d had before. ‘Can you smell burning?’

  ‘Don’t change the subject. What about some paintings of Ashburton? I’ve got lovely photos of St Andrew’s churchyard in the snow … Yes I can!’ There was a definite whiff of burning and a blue haze was rapidly filling the cab. ‘I’m going to pull over.’ I’d barely made it to the verge before tiny bright flames began licking their way up from under the dashboard. Sophie dabbed at them ineffectually with her fingers.

  ‘Out!’ I ordered her, switching off the engine. ‘Get out now!’

 
She already had the passenger door open, her portfolio clutched to her chest. Smoke was pouring from under the dashboard, hot and black. I had just the time to rescue my bag from the footwell. I held my breath and grabbed the vehicle’s paperwork from the glove compartment. ‘Ring the fire brigade!’ I yelled, coughing. ‘I’ll get EB out of the back.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  I count that moment when I tried the handle on the back door of the van and it refused to turn as one of the worst of my life so far. It had never stuck before. I jiggled it. It wouldn’t budge. I pressed down hard. Inside the van EB was barking, trying to tell me how wrong things were.

  ‘It’s OK, EB!’ I called. But it wasn’t. I yanked on the handle, bracing one foot on the adjoining door to give myself extra pulling power. The smoke from the engine was blowing back towards me, rolling over the roof of the van, stinging my eyes, making me cough. It must be filling up inside. I looked around me desperately for a stick, anything I could use for leverage. Behind me I could hear Sophie screaming down the phone.

  There was a fist-sized lump of granite lying in the ditch and I picked it up, raised it in both hands and clobbered the handle with it. No good. I could hear EB scrabbling at the door with his claws, whimpering to be let out. I rushed to the front of the van. Could I get back inside and rip out the grille behind the driver’s seat, get him out that way? But I couldn’t get near it. Choking black smoke belched from the open doors; it would be impossible to see, let alone breathe. Orange flames were shooting up from under the bonnet, the air above quivering with heat, with a suffocating smell of boiling oil and melting plastic, of engine fluids sizzling, getting way too hot. How long before the fire brigade could get here? There was a retained service at Ashburton, but by the time they were mustered it would be too late for poor EB. There was a bang from the engine, the bonnet burst open, flames and sparks spiralling into the sky. Those sparks could set the dry countryside alight. I didn’t care. All I cared about was EB.

  I tried the stone again, raising it above my head. I could hear the terrible sounds of EB choking. Don’t let him burn, I whispered to whatever god might be listening, please, don’t let him burn. I brought the stone crashing down, feeling the shockwave up my arms. Sophie was running about in the road, screeching. I tried the rock again. Dimly I heard a voice ordering me to stand back. It barely registered before I was thrust aside and a fist with a lump hammer in it struck a mighty blow at the lock. The door burst open and smoke poured from inside as EB’s inert little body was hauled out and carried to the side of the road. I followed, dazed.

  A Cherokee Jeep was parked a few yards behind us, its doors wide open. Sophie must have flagged it down. Its driver was laying EB down on the grassy verge. An older man, in baggy tweed jacket and a flat cap, was approaching my blazing van with a car fire extinguisher.

  ‘He’s not dead?’ I knelt down next to EB.

  His rescuer was rubbing EB’s furry chest. ‘Come on, little fella,’ he kept saying encouragingly. ‘Come on.’ But EB didn’t move.

  ‘EB, please!’ I begged stupidly.

  Sirens in the distance announced the fact that the fire brigade was coming. A few moments later it arrived, blue lights flashing, air brakes hissing as the engine drew to a halt. Suddenly the road was full of men in yellow helmets and big boots, and hoses unreeling; all too late for my van.

  ‘Got a casualty, have we?’ A young fireman squatted down by the roadside and then yelled over his shoulder. ‘Ed! Bring out the MARS, will you?’

  The MARS turned out to be a resuscitation machine about the size of a diver’s air tank. The fireman fitted a plastic mask over EB’s muzzle and turned on the oxygen. After a few heart-stopping moments, EB’s head jerked, and he snuffled and coughed his way back to life.

  ‘Oh, thank God!’ I cried, as he raised his head. The fireman gave EB a few more deep breaths of oxygen before he removed the mask, by which time his patient was already trying to scrabble it off his nose with his front paws.

  ‘He’ll be fine,’ he assured me, picking up his machine. I drew EB onto my lap and cuddled him hard, rubbing my face into his smoky-smelling fur.

  ‘And the next!’ the fireman called out cheerfully. It was only then I looked around for Sophie. She was sitting in a heap on the grass verge, white-faced and in serious danger of overdosing on her inhaler.

  ‘Oh, Soph!’ I hurried over, clutching EB in my arms like a baby. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘The petrol tank won’t explode, will it?’ she gasped nervously as the van gave vent to a belch of black smoke.

  ‘Contrary to what they’d have you believe in films,’ the fireman replied a little severely, as he fitted the mask over her face, ‘petrol tanks rarely explode.’

  I looked around for our rescuer, but he was standing by his jeep, barking orders into his mobile phone. His companion, the old guy with the flat cap and fire extinguisher, hovered deferentially at his elbow, an air of subservience about him; the younger man was obviously the boss.

  So I sat by the roadside, and watched the fire brigade’s finest having a wonderful time hosing down the smoking, blackened hulk that had once been my van. Steam rose hissing and fizzing, and shiny rivulets of water ran off the tarmac into the grass.

  ‘I hope you’re insured!’ one of the fire crew called to me jovially.

  Of course I was insured: third party, fire and theft. Trouble was, my insurance company was not going to pay out megabucks for a clapped-out old Astra. It was worth next to nothing. The paint job on the sides had cost more than the vehicle; the paint job that was now just a leprous rash of blisters on scorched and buckled metal.

  The fireman with the MARS machine, whose name, he told us, was Andy, had finished with Sophie.

  ‘Will she need to go to hospital?’

  ‘I’m all right,’ she assured me wheezily. ‘And I’m not going to sit around in casualty for hours just to be told to go home and rest.’

  Andy gestured with his mask towards me.

  ‘I don’t need it.’

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that,’ he insisted.

  ‘Juno, you do look dreadful,’ Sophie added solemnly.

  It was only as I breathed in cool, clear oxygen that I realised how sore my chest and throat felt from inhaling scorching smoke. I began to cough. Andy told me to relax and breathe deeply. Whilst I sat there, breathing obediently, he went away and came back with a can with which he sprayed the pads of EB’s feet. ‘Floor of that van would have been hot,’ he remarked in a mastery of understatement. ‘This will cool his paws down.’

  Sophie put an arm around my shoulders and gave me a hug. ‘I’m so sorry about your van. What are you going to do?’

  I couldn’t answer. I didn’t know. I didn’t even know how I was going to get us home. The firemen had obviously done all they could. They were rolling up their hoses.

  ‘Well, it could have been worse,’ I coughed. ‘If this had happened on the way there instead of on the way back, we might have lost all your lovely paintings as well.’

  ‘We got EB out.’ Sophie smiled, rubbing his head. ‘That’s the main thing.’

  ‘Well, someone did.’ EB was huddled in my lap, very subdued, very frightened. He licked my hand.

  ‘Ah, ladies!’ cried a cheerful voice and we all looked up. The tall figure of EB’s saviour was standing in the road in front of us. ‘Is everyone OK?’

  ‘Thanks to you,’ I told him. ‘I can’t thank you enough. I—’

  He dismissed my thanks with a wave of his hand. ‘Not at all,’ he said, ‘damsels in distress and all that!’

  He squatted by us and stroked EB’s head. ‘How is the little fellow?’ This was the first time I had looked at him properly. He was younger than I’d thought, about my age. Beneath short blonde hair he had lively blue eyes and an engaging smile. He was pretty bloody gorgeous, as a matter of fact.

  ‘Now, what’s going to happen is this,’ he began, as if he were an army officer addressing chaps about to go on a mission,
‘I’ve phoned a break-down firm and they’re sending out a lorry to haul away your van. Well, what’s left of it,’ he added, grinning. ‘It can stay at your local garage until your insurance assessor arrives. Moss,’ he indicated the old chap in the flat cap, ‘will stand by here until the break-down lorry arrives.’

  Moss did not look thrilled, but he was obviously under orders. ‘Sir,’ he muttered.

  ‘Meantime,’ our hero continued, ‘I will drive you ladies home.’

  ‘We live in Ashburton.’

  ‘No trouble at all,’ he assured me.

  ‘Well, thank you, Mr …’

  ‘Jamie.’ He held out a large hand. ‘Jamie Westershall.’

  We shook hands and introduced ourselves. We all stood up. I was still carrying EB, who whimpered when I tried to put him down.

  ‘I’m afraid I shall have to call in at home on the way,’ Jamie warned us, as we clambered into the back of the jeep. ‘I hope that’s not inconvenient.’

  The fire brigade were climbing back into their engine and slamming doors. As we pulled away, we left Moss standing gloomily in the road, next to the smouldering, blackened hulk that had once been my pride and joy.

  ‘Um, how will Moss get home?’ Sophie asked, turning back to look at him.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Jamie responded breezily. ‘He’ll think of something.’ He pulled out his phone as he drove along, obviously unconcerned about the rule of law. ‘Danny!’ he called loudly after a few seconds. ‘James here. You still at Home Farm? About to pack up? Excellent! How did we do? All clear! No reactors at all? Well, that’s fantastic news. Listen, you couldn’t come up to the house when you’re done, could you? I’ve got a little casualty I’d like you to run your eye over. You can? Splendid!’ He disconnected. ‘My vet,’ he explained, thrusting his phone back into his pocket, ‘he’s just been checking the herd for TB.’

  ‘You’re a farmer?’ Sophie asked.