According to local lore, that lass Imogen from the castle had a mind of her own. From an early age she’d led Fred Hadda’s lad, Wilf, by the balls. Tossed him aside like a shit-sac from a spring nest when her dad found out, but sat up and took notice when he turned up five years on with a walletful of money and his manners mended.
Then comes the trouble and she divorces him while he’s still on trial and marries his lawyer! And when the daughter she’s dumped on the Continent in the care of a bunch of foreigners goes to the dogs and dies, she brings her body back to be laid to rest at St Swithin’s, then doesn’t show up more than once a year to pay her respects!
In other words, though there was next to no sympathy for Hadda himself, there was a lot less for his former wife than might have been expected.
She was still holding his hand after the conventional shaking period had elapsed.
She said in a loud clear voice, with that indifference to being overheard no matter how personal the topic that marks the ruling class, ‘Mr Hollins, I understand you’re the main point of contact locally with my ex-husband.’
He noted she gave him his correct name with sufficient aspiration to let him know that she was aware she was doing so.
He said cautiously, ‘I do see Mr Hadda from time to time, yes.’
‘Then I wonder if you know where he is just now?’
He said, ‘To the best of my knowledge, he’s up at Birkstane.’
She let go his hand and frowned.
‘Then the best of your knowledge isn’t worth much, Mr Hollins. I called there last week and all I found was a black woman who, I gather, is his psychiatrist. When I called again yesterday, there was still no sign of him, and his vehicle wasn’t in the barn.’
‘He is not, so far as I know, constrained to stay within the house,’ he said.
The rest of the party were still peering at the tomb, apparently taking no interest in the conversation, though Hollins suspected Kira was recording it verbatim. A small, thin-faced dark-complexioned man, wearing only an exquisitely cut lightweight suit despite the cold, came to stand alongside Imogen. The second husband? guessed Hollins. He had noticed him sitting close to her and sharing a hymn book in the castle pew.
‘In my country he would be constrained to stay in a prison cell,’ he said.
While Hollins was wondering why an English solicitor should talk like a foreigner, Sir Leon said punctiliously, ‘Don’t think you’ve met. Paddle Nicotine, cousin of my wife’s, Mark Collins, our vicar.’
Hollins for once didn’t mind Sir Leon’s cavalier way with his name when he saw the small man wince and heard him say, ‘Pavel Nik-EET-in.’
Now another member of the castle party, a slightly florid man beginning to run to fat, got in on the act and declared somewhat officiously, ‘If you do know where he is, Vicar, and it turns out he’s breaking the terms of his licence, you realize you too would be guilty in the eyes of the law?’
Imogen frowned at the interrupter then said apologetically to Hollins, ‘My husband. He’s a solicitor, therefore sees everything in legal black and white. Toby, be civilized. Mr Hollins is our vicar, not a hostile witness.’
‘Sorry,’ said the man, offering his hand. ‘Toby Estover. It’s just that it’s a bit worrying, Hadda wandering round loose. Of course we may find it’s all been cut and dried with his probation officer. You don’t happen to know who that is, do you?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ said Hollins.
‘No?’ said Estover dubiously. ‘Thought you might have set up some kind of liaison with him, in the circumstances.’
‘The circumstances being?’
‘A man on the sex offenders’ list living on your doorstep, a man who must presumably still be the cause of some concern to our probation service if his prison psychiatrist is making home visits; doesn’t that concern you, pastorally if not personally?’
‘It’s the Law that let him out, Mr Estover, not the Church,’ said Hollins. ‘Maybe you should be talking to somebody else. Sorry I can’t be more helpful, Mrs Estover. Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I can smell my turkey burning.’
He moved back towards the church.
‘Beat you on penalties, I reckon,’ said Imogen to her husband.
Nikitin laughed and Estover said sharply, ‘I think he’s more worried than he’s letting on, which suggests he may have more to worry about than he’s letting on.’
Lady Kira, accepting that the tomb was played out as a focal topic, now joined in.
‘I’ve been telling Leon to get rid of him ever since I first saw him,’ she declared.
‘Keep telling you, the living’s not in the castle’s gift, not for a century and a half,’ said Leon. ‘As for Wolf, why all the fuss? You complain when he’s on your doorstep and you complain when he’s not. Can’t see why you’d want to see him anyway, Imo.’
‘Can’t you, Daddy?’ said Imogen. ‘Let’s go home. I wonder what’s for lunch?’
She moved away. Pavel Nikitin hurried to catch up with her.
‘Imo OK, is she?’ Sir Leon said to his son-in-law.
‘As far as it is possible for anyone ever to say,’ said Estover. He turned his head slowly, taking in the landscape beyond the church and the scatter of village houses. The fells lay sharp as wolf fangs against the cold blue sky, their edges gleaming white, their craggy lower slopes like diseased gums smudged with black where the frost had lost its grip. He longed to be back in London.
‘Could be the bloody Caucasus,’ he said with a shudder.
Lady Kira shrieked an unexpected laugh.
‘Don’t be stupid, Toby,’ she said. ‘It is nothing like. In the Caucasus, Mr Collins would have been dragged apart by wild horses long since.’
She set off after her daughter and cousin several times removed.
‘Reads a lot,’ said Sir Leon apologetically. ‘Far as I know, she’s never been nearer the Caucasus than Monte Carlo.’
The two men shared a rare moment of bonding, then gathered up the rest of their party and set out after Kira.
And finally the few villagers who’d lingered beyond the churchyard wall headed home to their dinners, satisfied that the raree-show was over for this Christmas Day.
3
Two days after Boxing Day Wolf Hadda moved slowly through the green channel at Luton Airport, hardly distinguishable from the geriatrics who accompanied him, leaning on their contraband-filled trolleys like Zimmer frames in an effort to win sympathy from any suspicious customs officer.
As he emerged he saw Edgar Trapp standing among the welcomers, most of whom advanced to greet their elderly relatives as if they’d just got back from the Thirty Year War. Before he could reach Trapp, a hatchet-faced woman in a pink jump suit and matching wimple with enough cigarettes on her trolley to carcinomate a convent, flung her free arm round his neck and gave him a long sucking kiss.
‘Lovely to meet you, Wally,’ she said. ‘You got my address safe? You be sure to keep in touch, dearie. Go safe with Jesus.’
He disengaged himself with difficulty and a promise of everlasting friendship.
Trapp said, ‘Looks like you made an impression there. She really a nun?’
He said, ‘If she is, God help us all! I don’t know what the NHS is feeding these people, but it ought to be banned. Ed, what were you thinking of?’
‘You said you wanted to blend in. Pensioners’ package to Fuengirola seemed perfect.’
‘I’ll ignore that. How’s Sneck been?’
‘Growled once at Doll, but she spoke firmly to him and he’s been good as gold since.’
Hadda nodded understandingly. If Doll Trapp had spoken firmly to him, he too would have been good as gold.
When they got into Trapp’s old Toyota, Hadda, who felt his solicitor was a bad enough driver without distraction, did not speak till they were clear of the airport and running down the M1.
‘Have a good Christmas?’ he asked.
‘Usual. You?’
‘I think
you’re being cheeky, Ed.’
‘I mean, the other.’
‘Oh that. Yes, fine.’
‘Bad as you thought then?’
‘Bad as I thought.’
‘I’m sorry. By the way, there’s messages on your mobile from that Scotch geezer. Sounds a bit agitated. Or maybe it’s just the accent.’
He’d bought a new PAYG mobile to use in Spain and left his old phone with Trapp. He didn’t want any calls made abroad to register on the old one. The new one lay in several pieces in several litter bins in Fuengirola.
Traffic on the M25 was heavy and it was dark by the time they pulled up at Trapp’s house in Chingford. It was a substantial prewar semi, built well enough to have survived with dignity for the best part of a hundred years and now worth more than the whole street had cost back in the 1930s.
When Trapp opened the front door, they were met by Sneck, his back arched, his teeth bared in a long threatening growl. Then, reproof administered for his owner’s callous dereliction of duty, he advanced to offer forgiveness by the vigorous application of wet tongue to Hadda’s face.
‘Dogs and nuns,’ said Trapp. ‘You got it made.’
Doll Trapp appeared, pushing Sneck aside unceremoniously to give Hadda a hug.
‘Wives, too,’ he said, giving Trapp a wink over the woman’s head. ‘Christ, Doll, don’t crush me to death.’
Mrs Trapp was large enough to make two of her husband, with a broad face whose naturally stern expression she attempted, unsuccessfully, to soften by her choice of hair colouring. Today it was blush pink.
‘You’re skin and bones, Wolf,’ she declared, releasing him. ‘It’s all that foreign muck. You must be starved. Come on through. Supper’s ready.’
They went through into the dining room. There were things Hadda would rather have been doing, but when Doll spoke, obedience was the best policy.
They ate steak-and-kidney pudding followed by apple pie and custard, all washed down with strong tea. Alcohol wasn’t an option in the Trapp household. Trapp had been on the wagon for a couple of decades now and Doll was determined that he would never be led into temptation in his own home.
It was a comfortable meal, the conversation such as it was led by Doll. Anyone seeing and hearing her might have set her down as a confirmed Hausfrau, her interests centred on kitchen and family, but Hadda knew better. Trapp’s decisions, professional and personal, were all filtered through her. He wouldn’t be sitting here at this table if she hadn’t given the nod, and it was an endorsement he valued more than his lost title.
At the end of the meal Doll said, ‘You with us long, Wolf?’
‘Just tonight. I need to get up to Carlisle tomorrow to see my minder, so I’ll be off early in the morning to beat the traffic. No need for you to get up.’
‘Don’t be daft. I’ll want to say goodbye to old Sneckie, won’t I? I’ll really miss him.’
Hadda glanced down at the dog lying alongside his chair and got a return look which, if he’d been anthropomorphically inclined, he might have interpreted as, ‘And what’s so odd about that?’
Trapp said, ‘I’ve put your phone in your room. And my update.’
He said, ‘Thanks,’ and excused himself.
On the bed lay the phone and a file.
First he checked his messages. There were a couple from Luke Hollins, hoping all was well and asking him to get in touch. And three from Davy McLucky, starting the previous day, growing increasingly imperative, the last left only a couple of hours earlier.
‘Hadda, last fucking chance, whatever you’re doing, give me a ring. We need to talk. Now!’
He pressed the return call key.
‘McLucky.’
‘Hadda. You left a message.’
‘Where’ve you been?’
‘Nowhere. Sorry not to get back to you sooner. Let my battery run down and I’ve just recharged it. So what’s so urgent?’
A silence. The silence of disbelief? Maybe. But why should the Scot react to a very believable lie with such scepticism?
Now he spoke.
‘The old mate from my Met days that I got Medler’s address from gave me a bell. Said if I hadn’t made contact yet, not to bother. The good life’s over for Arnie. He’s dead.’
‘What?’
‘You didn’t know then?’
‘No, I didn’t. Has it been on the news?’
‘No, and probably won’t be. Yard’s been notified because he was one of their own, but seems there’s been a note to keep it under wraps as much as possible. Must have been a pretty heavy note as there’s nothing the press likes more than a nice grisly human interest story over the festive season.’
‘Grisly? What the hell happened?’
‘Wife found him Christmas morning. He was in their lounge. His hands were on the patio. The security shutter had come down and chopped them off. He bled to death.’
‘Jesus! Your mate tell you anything else?’
‘That he had more booze in him than a cross-Channel ferry, and the local cops reckon he was so pissed that either by accident or design he pressed the shutter control then fell forward with his arms outstretched across the patio door.’
‘That’s terrible,’ said Wolf.
‘That’s what I said. Then my mate asked me, dead casual, if it had been anything important I wanted to get in touch with Arnie about.’
‘And what did you tell him, Davy?’
‘Well,’ said McLucky slowly, ‘I know what I should have told him, being ex-job, not to mention a PI with his licence to worry about. I should have told him, I’ve been working for this guy, got form, been paying me good money to find out where Medler lived, his habits, the layout of his villa, all sorts of stuff. You might want to give him a pull, check how he spent Christmas . . .’
Now it was Hadda’s turn to be silent.
He said, ‘I think we should meet.’
‘You don’t expect me to go wandering round that fucking wilderness you live in again, do you?’
‘I’ll be in Carlisle tomorrow, could you manage that again? It’s not like leaving the kingdom; it was once the capital of Scotland, they tell me.’
McLucky wasn’t in the mood for lightness.
‘Same time, same place. I’ll be there.’
The phone went dead.
Hadda switched off and sat in thought for a few moments.
Then he picked up the file and opened it. It only took ten minutes to read. Trapp was not a man to waste words.
He finished, opened his grip, put the file inside and took out a large bottle of expensive perfume, a handsome gold-plated watch and a compact digital recorder. He was at the door when he remembered something and went to the wardrobe. From one of the shelves he took a package. It was Luke Hollins’s Christmas gift that some atavistic superstition had prevented him from opening before Christmas.
Trapp and his wife were sitting before a glowing fire in a living room that could have been a tribute to the seventies.
Hadda said, ‘I’ve got a little recording I’d like you both to listen to. Then I’ve got a sad and rather troubling story I need to tell you. But first things first. Christmas prezzie time! Sorry yours aren’t wrapped.’
He handed Doll the watch and Ed the perfume, then said, ‘Whoops, I was in prison a long time,’ and swapped them round.
They both smiled and said thanks, then watched as Hadda unwrapped his parcel.
It was a postcard-size picture stuck in a gilt frame. It showed a bearded man with a halo. He carried what looked like a small tree in one hand and an axe in the other. There was a post-it note attached to the frame.
It read: This is St Gomer or Gummarus. The double name may come in useful if you’re ever asked to name three famous Belgians. He is the patron of woodcutters and unhappy husbands. Hope he might come in useful. LH
Hadda began to smile and finally he laughed out loud.
‘What?’ said Doll.
‘Nothing. Just my friendly local vicar. I tol
d him I didn’t care to be preached at, so I think he’s decided, if you can’t convert them with sermons, next best thing is to have a laugh with them!’
He looked at the picture again, then nodded, and added, ‘You know, he could be right!’
4
The nearest Alva Ozigbo got to the pleasures of a traditional Christmas was the rather grisly festive atmosphere that hung over the hospital wards.
The balloons and decorations stopped short of Intensive Care but nowhere was beyond the reach of the sucrose notes of old Christmas hits seeping out of the in-house radio system. When she arrived, she’d found her father scheduled for angioplasty the following day and her mother in a state of near collapse. Alva was prepared for this, being aware since childhood that Elvira’s way of dealing with bad situations was to anticipate the worst, as if by embracing it, she could avert it. Her gloomy prognostications were uttered in a tone which her husband and daughter had often theorized would surely have won her a part in that Bergmann movie if only she could have produced it at the audition.
The operation went well, and by Boxing Day patient and wife were both making a good recovery. Indeed, Ike Ozigbo already seemed bent on proving the truth of the old adage that doctors make the worst patients, and his surgeon, Ike’s registrar, told Alva that her father should be ready to move back home by the New Year, adding ‘and that’s by popular appeal!’
Elvira’s superstitious gloom having achieved its goal, she reverted to her usual brisk efficient self. Her husband’s health naturally still preoccupied her mind, but other concerns were now allowed to surface, principle among them being a probing inquisitiveness about the state of her daughter’s sex life.
Even in her time of deepest Scandinavian depression, she had registered that Alva was taking phone calls from a man. This was Wolf Hadda, who rang twice, once on the evening of her departure from Cumbria to check she’d reached Manchester safely, the second time a couple of days later. Moving out of range of her mother’s hearing but not her speculation, Alva found herself going into what seemed later to be unnecessary detail about Elvira’s behaviour. Hadda said, ‘I’m with your ma here. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst, that’s sound sense. Inside, we’re all hoping for the best. So feed the hope and put up with the rest. But I’m teaching my granny to suck eggs.’
The Woodcutter Page 26