Just then, Alec spotted a couple of members leaving the bar and they quickly slid on to their vacated stools. ‘That’s better, we can see the action in comfort now,’ he said smugly.
The nubile Joan Parnell was wrapping herself enthusiastically around their surgeon on the dance floor and Peter Bright, though enjoying the feel of a lithe body in his arms, was casting wary glances around the room as they revolved slowly to the music.
‘Pete’s on the lookout for the evil eye from Memsahib Robertson,’ explained Watson, his boyish face alive with interest at the goings-on around him. ‘Though I haven’t seen her here yet, maybe the shooting has given her the vapours.’
Tom was still doggedly working out the romantic permutations. ‘Her husband’s here, anyway. You reckon he’s having a fling with this Lena woman, the one that our gasman is keen on?’
‘That’s it – and rumour has it that for years he’s been playing away with Rosa, until just recently.’
‘Who the hell’s Rosa?’
‘The wife of his manager, Douglas Mackay. They’re here somewhere, I’ve seen them.’
‘Bloody hell, this is like something out of Somerset Maugham!’
Tom buried his face in his Tiger while he sorted out the machinations in his mind. ‘Any more shenanigans I should know about, while you’re at it?’ he asked, when he surfaced.
‘Not that I know of,’ admitted Alec regretfully. Then he brightened a little, ‘Apart from our dear Commanding Officer, of course!’
‘Jesus, don’t say he’s been rogering someone too? I thought he was married?’
‘He is – that’s the point! His missus was out here with him until two months ago, then she suddenly ups and goes home to UK. She was a right old battleaxe and the whisper is that she got fed up with him. But no one knows why?’
‘Where does he live, then?’
‘He’s still in his married quarter in Garrison, thank God. By rights, he should quit and come to live in the Mess, now that he’s on his own. That would be bloody awful, having the old bastard amongst us, but I think he’s got some pull with the Brigadier, who’s letting him stay on in his house. He’s only got three months to go before RHE, so perhaps we’ll escape a fate worse than death!’
Howden looked along the bar to where James Robertson was regaling another relay of listeners with his tale of derring-do.
‘Doesn’t he know his wife’s having it away with Peter Bright?’ he murmured.
Watson shrugged. ‘Dunno – but it’s difficult to keep any secrets in an incestuous place like TT. If the padre farts, everyone knows within ten minutes, so even though Jimmy Robertson is as thick as two short planks, he must surely have his suspicions.’
‘Maybe he doesn’t want to know, especially if he’s at it himself.’
Alec nodded over his glass. ‘Quite possible – he’s had plenty of practice, I hear. The delicious Diane is said to have been putting it about for years. Not much else to do around here,’ he added cynically.
Their scandalmongering was interrupted when a beckoning hand waved at them from one of the tables. It was Major Hawkins, the Matron, resplendent in a pink dress that looked like a floral bell-tent. She was sitting with four other girls who Tom assumed were QAs.
‘Come and meet some of the staff, doctor,’ she said kindly. Tom was warmed by her words, as he hadn’t been called ‘doctor’ since he left Tyneside – it was either ‘Captain’ or ‘Howden’. The two men perched on the arms of the girl’s chairs and Alec helped the Matron to introduce them. Tom caught a couple of names, but remembered only one afterwards as Lynette, a slightly chubby brunette with a pretty round face and a Yorkshire accent.
They all launched into the usual polite babble of ‘Where do you come from . . . was it cold at home when you left . . . d’you play tennis . . . what d’you think of it so far,’ until Tom was in a haze of pleasant disorientation, but temporarily cured of his homesickness.
Of course, Alec knew them all – and probably all their business – and after a while, went off to dance with one, so Tom recklessly asked Lynette if she would like to take the floor. He was an indifferent dancer, but in the confines of the tiny space, now filled with shuffling couples, there was little harm that he could do to her feet. He acquitted himself fairly well and thoroughly enjoyed it.
The ice broken, he danced with a couple of the others and even offered himself to Doris Hawkins, who tactfully declined on the grounds that she had a bunion. At that moment, a gong was hammered by one of the club servants to announce that the buffet was served and everyone began streaming towards the dining room next door. Standing back to let the ladies through first, Tom found Alfred Morris behind him.
‘Fast workers, you Geordies!’ he chaffed. ‘A nice little girl, that Lynette.’
‘I suppose I’ll be the target for gossip tomorrow,’ grinned Tom.
‘Tomorrow? It’ll already have started, lad.’ The Admin Officer suddenly stopped and Tom noticed his head jerk round, then swing back.
‘We’ve got company, son.’ As they shuffled towards the dining room, they were overtaken by a lean figure shepherding a spectacular blonde. The men stood aside to let Diane Robertson through, Desmond O’Neill following closely behind, a fixed grin on his saturnine face.
‘Where the hell did he find her?’ muttered Alec Watson.
‘Maybe that’s why his wife went home in a huff!’ hazarded Tom.
The young Scot glared at him pityingly. ‘Come off it, he’s old enough to be her father. Even the fabulous Diane wouldn’t touch old Death’s Head.’
When they got inside the other room, they saw that their Commanding Officer had ushered the blonde over to her husband, who was vigorously attacking the sandwiches, chicken thighs and curry puffs. James did not seem to be particularly excited at the delivery, giving his dearly beloved a grunt as he handed her an empty plate and serviette.
‘Does the colonel come here a lot?’ Tom asked Alf Morris, who he found alongside him as their turn came to pile their plates with food.
‘Plays bridge quite a bit and uses the pool, but he only started coming to the dance night since his wife went home.’
The pathologist looked across at where their lord and master was picking at his food. Though almost all the other men just wore shirt and tie, O’Neill had a rather old-fashioned cream linen jacket over his, contrasting strongly with the wide red, blue and gold stripes of the Medical Corps tie that hung down from his collar. It reminded Tom of his grandad, who used to wear a similar jacket with a straw hat when he went to play bowls in Gateshead Park.
After they had all eaten, the music began again, but to Tom’s disappointment, the depth of which surprised him, Lynette had been commandeered by a lanky officer from the Gurkhas. The bar was less crowded now, as James had vanished and his audience had dispersed.
Tom got himself another beer and signed his chit, wondering what sort of a hole his bar bill would make in his pay at the end of the month, both here and in the Mess. By the sound of it, pretty soon he would have to scrape together enough for a second-hand car – especially if he was to fully enter into the social life, for which a wide back seat seemed to be essential.
The heat seemed to hit him again, the air being an almost palpable mixture of damp, perfume and curry fumes, so he ambled with his glass out through the open doors on to the terrace above the swimming pool, which was a large concrete-walled tank with a sloping floor.
The tables just outside the lounge were occupied with couples gazing into each other’s eyes, so he walked to the far end, overlooking a badminton court. As the club was built on the slope of a hill, the court was set a dozen feet lower than the terrace. Normally it was lit at night by fluorescent tubes, but on dance nights, it was dark and deserted. At least, no one was playing badminton there, but as he stood quietly with his beer listening to the still-novel sounds of insects chirruping and frogs burping, he could see two shadowy figures and hear their voices. The figures came closer together in the gloo
m – very close indeed, until he could see only one larger shape in the dim light from the open doors of the lounge.
‘When can you get away, say for two days? I’ve got to go to KL, to see about some machinery . . .’
Suddenly feeling guilty at eavesdropping, Tom moved away, back towards the doors, but his guilt somehow evaporated sufficiently for him to sink into a vacant chair just inside and accidentally still be there when Lena Franklin walked in, still spectacular in her slinky blue dress. She gave him a glowing smile as she passed on towards the Ladies’ Room near the entrance. A moment later, James Robertson stalked in and plumped himself down at the bar, no doubt determined to enlarge once again on the story of his escapade the previous night.
The anxious disc jockey came to the end of his rumba and was being importuned by one of the nursing sisters, who was grasping Montmorency by the hand as if saving him from drowning. As they negotiated with the Tamil for a cha-cha, Alec Watson was abandoned by the girl he had been dancing with and he came across to collapse into the chair next to Tom.
‘Too bloody hot for these energetic sports!’ His shirt had arcs of dark sweat beneath each armpit.
‘Was that one of the QAs you were with?’ He had been dancing with a very thin girl, who looked no more than seventeen.
‘No, that was one of the daughters of the Commandant of the MCE.’
The pathologist frowned at yet another set of initials.
‘That’s this mysterious place I’ve got to go to on Monday morning, where I get my blood from, apparently. What the hell is it?’
‘Military Corrective Establishment – the chokey, the hoosegow, the jail!’ explained Alec. ‘The RMO of the West Berkshires has been filling in since your predecessor went home last month, but it’s traditional that the pathologist does the sick parades over there, as that’s where you get your blood donors.’
He explained that the prisoners were only too willing to exchange a pint of their blood for a bottle of Tiger – in fact, they fell over themselves to offer and their donations had to be strictly rationed, for fear of them exsanguinating themselves in return for a few beers. Light dawned upon Tom, as this explained why he hadn’t seen a Blood Bank refrigerator when he walked around his lab for the first time that day.
‘I see, so the blood is kept “on the hoof”, so to speak?’
‘Sure, it’s kept sterile and at body temperature – and it never gets out of date!’
Their haematological discussion faded as they watched Diane Robertson come in from the dining room and join a group of men at the bar, Peter Bright amongst them. She was worth watching, thought Tom, her shoulder-length fair hair contrasting with a low-cut dress of black Chinese brocade. Diane seemed to have got over her terror at the previous night’s shooting and was laughing and flirting with her attentive escorts, one of whom was Les Arnold, though her husband pointedly ignored her.
‘How the devil did she manage to arrive here with O’Neill?’ he asked Watson, who Tom now looked on as the fount of all knowledge.
‘Percy Loosemore said he arrived in the car park just before them. Apparently she turned up in a taxi, as it doesn’t look as if she’s speaking to her husband and her own car has been shot up. The CO arrived at the same time in his Armstrong Siddeley and gallantly shepherded her inside.’
Tom didn’t know that TT had any taxis, but learned later that there were two battered Wolseley 6-80s and a Ford Consul run by a Chinese garage owner behind Main Street.
‘The colonel looked as if they had just got engaged, not just walking her in off the car park!’ he grunted. ‘Think he’s got a crush on her?’
‘God knows what goes on in that twisted mind of his!’ grumbled the Scot. ‘He’s certainly loosened up since his missus went home. She kept him on a pretty short leash, that’s why he took it out on everybody at BMH, we reckon.’
The beers had loosened Tom’s tongue a little beyond the point of discretion and he told his friend about the assignation he had seen between Diane’s husband and Lena Franklin. ‘Sounded as if he was trying to fix up a dirty weekend, the lucky devil!’
Alec nodded. ‘Good job it was you that heard them and not Dave Meredith. There’d have been blood on the badminton court if he had!’
He leaned a little closer with a conspiratorial air. ‘It was my turn last Friday to overhear Jimmy Robertson. I was in the Gents, standing at attention below that high-up window. He was outside, getting a right earful from his wife, something about her finding a hotel bill. I couldn’t hear the rest, as they moved away, but from the tone of her voice, if she’d had a knife, she’d have stuck him there and then!’
Tom shook his head in wonderment as he reached forward for his tall glass of Anchor. ‘We don’t need a war out here, there’s enough “aggro” going on between the residents!’
He looked across the room to where Rosa Mackay was sitting bolt upright, looking very Latin in a lacy white blouse and a black skirt. She was holding a glass of Pimm’s and though exotically immaculate, looked very unhappy. Her scrawny husband, looking old enough to be her father, sat alongside her, both of them silent and withdrawn.
‘How the devil did those two get together?’ asked Tom. ‘They seem totally unsuited to each other.’
As usual, Alec Watson had the answers – the pathologist decided that the Army would have been better off drafting him into the Intelligence Corps, rather than the RAMC.
‘I heard that he was working on an estate down in Johore before the war. He was interned in Singapore by the Japs and apparently had a hard time in Changi Prison. His first wife died of dysentery in an internment camp in Sumatra. Douglas met Rosa in a hotel in Malacca, where she was the receptionist. It seems that the manager was pestering her and Douglas’s interest was a means of escape.’
‘He’s not exactly love’s young dream, is he? Not for a cracking-looking woman like her?’ objected Tom.
Watson shrugged. ‘What! A Eurasian with no better prospects than slaving in a fleapit beach hotel with the manager trying to pinch her bum all the time? A European husband, her own bungalow far away – not a bad catch. And he’s Scots,’ added Alec with a grin.
Looking across the room at the smooth-faced woman from Gunong Besar, Tom had his doubts about her contentment, which the ruthless Watson soon confirmed.
‘Of course, they say that Jimmy Robertson has been servicing her for years, probably ever since the Mackays came up here in 1950.’
The pathologist’s eyebrows rose on the part of his face still visible above his glass. ‘You really are a wicked young gossip,’ he grated, when he came up for air. ‘I don’t know how much of your slander is true and how much you invent!’
The young doctor, who looked almost angelic in spite of his genius for trading scandal, shrugged off the criticism. ‘I just keep my ears open, that’s all. And I’ve got a good memory!’
He finished his drink and stood up. ‘I’m off for a pee, then a couple of turns around the floor again, before heading for bed.’
‘And no listening at the bog windows tonight, Alec!’ chastised Tom, as he looked around to see if Lynette was available now.
FOUR
Next morning, Steven Blackwell sat alongside his Malay driver as the dark blue police Land Rover turned into the gates of the garrison. The barrier went up and the superintendent raised his stick to return the stiff salutes of the two red-capped MPs outside the guardroom. Unlike the hospital compound, the much larger enclave of the Twenty-First Commonwealth Independent Infantry Brigade had a central road passing straight up from the main gate, with a number of side lanes reaching across to the perimeter track that ran round inside the wire. The Headquarters was near the centre, an untidy collection of brick, concrete and wooden buildings set around a parade ground, where the Union Jack and the blue flags of Australia and New Zealand hung limply from a tall flagpole.
The driver, wearing his songkok, a black boat-shaped cap, pulled up at the side of a flat-roofed two-storey brick building, which shou
ld have been the despair of any self-respecting architect. Telling him in Malay to wait in the car park along the road, the police officer climbed a metal staircase to the upper floor and went into a short corridor. Familiar with the place from many previous visits, he tapped on the second door and went in unbidden. It was an outer office, with some spartan desks behind which a couple of corporals were working. A staff sergeant in the far corner turned from a filing cabinet.
‘Colonel Flynn’s expecting you, sir.’
He tapped on an inner door and stood aside to let Blackwell enter. The inner office was almost as dreary, but large maps pinned to the walls brightened it up a little.
Three men were sitting around the solitary desk and rose as he came in. He knew them all well and after a handshake and a few pleasantries, they all sat down again, with the colonel in his own chair behind the desk. The Director of Operations was a tall, lean man with slight stoop, a pair of intelligent eyes peering out from beneath bushy fair eyebrows. Each shoulder carried the crown and pip of his rank and he wore the flash of the Airborne regiment from which he had been seconded. He was a military planner, who with the more senior brass in the Brigade, coordinated the campaign against the terrorists in that area, subject to the directions – or what he often felt was the interference – of Command Headquarters down south in Seremban, and their bosses at GHQ FARELF in Singapore.
The other two soldiers were a rather plump captain from the Intelligence Corps and a burly SIB staff sergeant from Ipoh, who looked every inch the Coventry detective he had been before joining the Special Investigation Branch of the Military Police. Though a non-commissioned officer, he had a ponderous presence that made him seem a peer of the senior men. The office sergeant brought in mugs of tea and when he had left, they got down to business.
‘We have to decide what this damned affair at Gunong Besar was all about,’ began Flynn. ‘We’ve got a big operation planned up towards Grik and I don’t want it to be sidetracked by a wild goose chase nearer home.’
Dead in the Dog Page 7