Well of the Winds

by Denzil Meyrick

  ‘Why the stopover in Kinloch? You’d have made the ferry after your flight here.’

  ‘I need something from you.’ Harris casually lifted his pint glass and drained it in a couple of gulps. ‘Can I get you another?’

  Daley shrugged. ‘Sure. I’ve nothing to rush home for, but you’ll know all about that, I’m quite sure.’

  Ignoring the mild barb, Harris got to his feet. ‘Large one?’

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  ‘I think you can answer that question yourself.’

  ‘The journal?’

  ‘Got it in one. Now, give me a minute, and I’ll do my best to tell you why.’

  Daley watched Harris go to the bar. Despite his friendly, informal manner, he detected a formidable individual at work. He could have arrived unannounced in Daley’s office and demanded Urquhart’s journal. The fact that he hadn’t proved that he at least wasn’t hidebound by protocol.

  Even so, Daley knew he had to be on his guard. Harris’s appearance confirmed that there was much more to the disappearance of the Bremner family than met the eye.

  26

  Kinloch, 1945

  Urquhart pushed the big key into the lock of the grey cell door and opened it. Mitchell, lying curled up in a rough blanket, didn’t move. The inspector walked over to him, prodding him gently with the tip of his shoe to rouse him.

  ‘Time to get up, Mr Mitchell. You’re free to go.’

  The young man jolted awake and stretched. ‘Och, longest lie-in I’ve had for ages. How come you had tae keep me here o’ernight, though?’

  ‘If you go to the sergeant at the bar office, he’ll give you back your things,’ said Urquhart, ignoring the young farmhand’s question.

  ‘I’m off the hook then.’ Mitchell yawned and got to his feet.

  ‘You’re in exactly the same position as you were yesterday, son. I’m investigating the death of Mr Kerr, and I’m not sure that I have the full picture yet.’

  ‘He was unlucky. I telt you, he was always taking risks wae they beasts. No’ jeest that: up ladders wae nae stops, or naebody standing at the bottom. Never breaking his shotgun when he was climbing fences. He was asking for an accident.’

  ‘I believe Mr Kerr’s nephew is taking charge of the farm today.’

  ‘Aye, mair than likely. That’s me oot o’ a job, then.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Mr Mitchell. One tragedy after another. Now, go and get your things.’ He watched as Mitchell lurched down the corridor, yawning and stretching. ‘Oh, and don’t go leaving the country. If you’re thinking of going anywhere, I want you to let me know.’

  Mitchell turned, nodding his head in reply.

  Urquhart had to admit, for such a young lad, he had remained unruffled. But he knew something else. The farmhand was lying, and all he had to do was prove it.

  He walked to his office, where McColl was typing up Mitchell’s statement, sighing as his finger, yet again, caught an unwanted key.

  ‘Leave that for now, McColl. I’ll let the sergeant finish it off.’

  ‘I’m sure I won’t be too much longer, s-sir,’ apologised the young man.

  ‘I have something else for you to do. You can drive, yes?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Good. Andrew Mitchell is just about to be released. I want you to take the car and follow him. Be discreet. Don’t let him know you’re following him. I want to know what he does, where he goes, and who he talks to and when. Do you think you can do that?’

  ‘Yes, sir. N-now?’

  ‘Of course. Off with you!’

  He smiled as McColl nodded determinedly and dashed out the room. Maybe they’d make a policeman of him yet.

  *

  Daley wasn’t surprised to see Harris the next morning, waiting for him at the entrance to Kinloch Police Office. He escorted the MOD man to his office, and fished around in his bag. He was about to hand over Urquhart’s journal when he hesitated.

  ‘What if I chose to make something of this?’

  ‘Your choice,’ replied Harris, looking relaxed as he sat back in the chair opposite Daley.

  ‘Okay. Well, in that case, maybe I’ll just hold on to it for now. You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘Me? I don’t really care, DCI Daley. Though the question will be asked: how did it come into your possession in the first place?’

  ‘I found it.’

  ‘Yet you didn’t include it in the productions uncovered at the farmhouse?’

  ‘Oversight. You know what it’s like for us overworked cops. And, as you know, I’ve had a lot of personal issues to deal with.’

  Harris chuckled. ‘You know what, you keep it. But the approach won’t be as softly-softly when my superiors get their teeth into it.’

  ‘What is it about Urquhart? This diary appears to be too hot to handle, and his file is redacted beyond anything I’ve ever seen. I’m missing something, but don’t think I’ll miss it for ever. That’s the thing about us lower-level law enforcement guys – chips on the shoulder breed a determination to succeed.’ He slid Urquhart’s journal across the desk.

  ‘Thank you, DCI Daley. Oh, by the way, I know about Feldstein.’

  ‘Know what?’

  ‘More than you, I think. Instead of worrying about Inspector Urquhart, I’d delve into the present, if I were you.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning that the past is the past, in every way. But people like Feldstein, though they operate in the present, are an unpleasant echo of things that would best be left alone.’

  ‘Unpleasant, how? He seemed quite friendly to me. More helpful than those who are supposed to be on my side, in fact.’

  Harris stood up, tucking the journal under his arm. ‘Ask yourself why the Bremners disappeared with such apparent haste, Jim.’ He turned to walk away. ‘And take another look at Mrs Bremner’s face – what was left of it – and ask yourself why she ended up dead where she did.’

  ‘So, you think Feldstein had something to do with this?’

  ‘You and me aren’t kids any more, Jim. We both know the game and how it’s played. As far as I’m concerned, there’s enough to worry about in the present without harking back to the past. All sorts of nutters trying to blow us all to kingdom come.’

  ‘Everything has its starting point though.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s right, but remember, Jim, I’m on your side, no matter what you think.’

  ‘Well, good luck on Gairsay.’

  ‘Thanks. I enjoyed our chat last night.’

  Daley watched the door closing behind the Welshman. He drummed his fingers on his desk, reflecting upon what had just passed between them. Urquhart, the Bremner family, Feldstein, and now the Security Service. Whatever Harris said about ignoring the past, there appeared to be a lot of interest in it. Too much interest for it to be laid to rest. And he’d laid enough to rest in the past few months. He was glad he’d copied every page of Urquhart’s journal.

  Kinloch, 1945

  The preparations for Kinloch’s celebrations were now well advanced. The podium, soon to be supporting the great and the good, stood solidly in front of the town hall, flanked by two limp Union Jacks. The bunting was stretched across the road all the way down Main Street.

  Urquhart looked at the town’s notice board bearing the details of the event. It was due to start at seven that evening. KINLOCH WELCOMES THE DEATH OF THE FÜHRER was scribbled in bold white chalk. He raised his eyebrows, still concerned that people were being lulled into a false sense of security by the death of the German leader.

  He waited for a horse pulling a cartload of beer to pass before crossing the road. A man in a brown dustcoat waved to him from the ironmongers, smiling broadly from a gap in the heavily taped windows – protection against the unlikely event that a German bomb should shatter them. A military lorry chugged past, a knot of kilted soldiers leaning out of the back, waving and shouting at passers-by.

  Urquhart turned down a back street, past a church, a
nd then into a leafy square where he found himself facing a large sandstone building fronted by a neatly trimmed hedge. The garden was surrounded by the rusting stumps of railings – a testament to the war effort and the need for iron. He’d been told that most of this recovered metal lay in huge warehouses across the country, and had only been collected to show that things were being done. In the early days of the war, when it looked as though invasion was imminent, those small gestures had meant a great deal.

  Straightening his tie, he walked up to the door and knocked three times. An elderly woman in a checked blue apron, her hair scraped back in a severe bun, soon answered the door.

  ‘I’d like to speak to Colonel Blair, please. Inspector Urquhart from Kinloch Police . . . He knows me,’ he added, noting her grim expression.

  The woman looked him up and down, then shrugged her shoulders. ‘He’s having his afternoon nap, Inspector. Could you no’ come back later?’

  ‘It is rather urgent, if you don’t mind.’

  He was led down a dark hallway and into a room stuffed with dust-covered aspidistras in brass pots, redolent of the Victorian age.

  ‘Take a seat. I’ll let the colonel know he has a visitor.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I’m no’ saying he’ll speak tae you, mind. He’s regimental aboot his naps. Says that’s why he’s lived tae such a great age.’

  Urquhart took a seat in a high-backed winged armchair. On the walls were many paintings and photographs, mostly military scenes. In one old sepia photograph, he recognised a young soldier, dressed in desert fatigues and a pith helmet, standing beside an Indian orderly. Though the face was fresh and unlined, Hector Blair’s features were easily recognisable.

  After a few minutes he heard a noise from behind the door. The familiar voice, though not issuing the booming commands he was used to, made him smile.

  ‘Break out the cake, Mrs McKay, and the Darjeeling. Heaven knows we get precious few visitors here. Number one rations, what?’

  A stooped old man with mutton-chop whiskers and an impressive moustache entered the room. Over red-and-white striped pyjamas, he wore a silk smoking jacket, piped with gold braid, that afforded him a somewhat eccentric air. The cane he was leaning heavily upon was ebony, with a silver handle. At the sight of Urquhart, he waved it in the air, a wide smile becoming apparent under his fulsome facial hair.

  ‘Bless my soul, young subaltern Urquhart, as I live and breathe. Thought you’d never find the way to this house. How long have you been in Kinloch now? Too long not to have paid court to your old major, I bloody well warrant.’

  Urquhart stood to shake his old commanding officer by the hand. Here was the man who had taught him the ways of the army and the leadership of men. Here was the man who had saved his life – more than once.

  ‘Sorry, sir. Not been here that long, actually. Just getting embedded, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Embedded with this lot in Kinloch? I doubt anyone who hasn’t been born here has ever done that. Fortunately, I have that dubious privilege.’ He grimaced as he sat down on a chaise longue opposite his guest. ‘Sit yourself back down, man. We’re not in the old regiment now, more’s the pity. That housekeeper of mine will lavish some of her magnificent fruitcake on us shortly. She’s a dismal old bint, but she bakes like a dream. Now, what can I do for you?’

  ‘Well, of course this is mainly a social call—’

  ‘Social call! You forget I know you of old, William. You’re one of the least sociable men I have had under my command. Always had your nose to the grindstone. Your brothers-in-arms would be happily whooping it up in some bloody dive, while you’d be head down writing to the families of the fallen. And no shortage of them in the last dust-up, sadly.’

  ‘No shortage this time around, either, sir.’

  ‘No, indeed. Could all have been so easily nipped in the bud, too. Adolf Hitler would have been found dead on the streets of Munich, where he bloody well belonged. No more a military man than I’m a painter and decorator.’

  ‘He’s gone now, of course, sir.’

  ‘Gone? What do you mean, gone?’

  Urquhart cleared his throat. He’d been impressed by the mental acuity of his old commanding officer, but now wondered if that had been an entirely accurate appraisal. ‘Killed himself, sir.’

  Colonel Blair twiddled one of his whiskers impatiently. ‘Hmm. I met Schicklgruber once, you know,’ he said, using the unflattering nickname Hitler had been given by Churchill. ‘A coward and a madman.’

  ‘You were the military attaché in Berlin for a while, weren’t you, sir?’

  ‘Over ten years. Met them all. Nazi High Command. Opportunists, bloody civilians dressed as soldiers. Dangerous bunch, though, like any fantasists.’

  Urquhart listened to the old man rant about the Nazis. Very few people in Kinloch knew that in their midst lived a man who had met not only Hitler, but just about every senior member of the Nazi Party, and on numerous occasions. Indeed, when Deputy Führer Rudolph Hess had made his doomed trip to Britain in 1941, eventually crash-landing in a Scottish field in Eaglesham, Blair had been taken to Buchanan Castle in Stirlingshire to verify that the man was indeed who he said he was. By all accounts, Hess had welcomed him like an old friend, much to the consternation of the senior army officers present.

  Even Prime Minister Winston Churchill at times sought the advice of the man who had seen Germany fall under the spell of the Nazis. Feeling his age and fearing the worst, Blair had taken his leave of Germany in 1936, to settle down to retirement in Kinloch. Few had listened to the old soldier who warned anyone who would listen about the charismatic German chancellor and his ambition to dominate the world.

  ‘The thing that still gets me is all those fine, brave men lost their lives in the trenches, and that charlatan escaped to heap misery on the world again. Sometimes there is no justice, Urquhart.’

  A tap on the door announced the arrival of Mrs McKay, bearing a tray on which sat a silver teapot, two china cups and saucers, a sugar bowl and tongs, and a tiny milk jug, alongside several portions of fruitcake. She placed it on the table between the two men.

  ‘Will I be mother, or do you gentlemen want tae pour yourselves?’

  ‘I’m sure we’ll manage, Mrs McKay,’ said Blair. ‘Thank you. Another magnificent fruitcake, I see.’

  She smiled, despite herself, and left the room. As he listened to her footsteps padding back down the hall, Colonel Blair reached into his pocket and produced a silver hip flask.

  ‘She’s a fine housekeeper, but she’s Wee Free. Frowns at a decent dram. Do the honours, would you, Urquhart?’ He handed the inspector the flask. ‘One of those French philosophers, I think, said, “A day without wine’s like a day without sunshine.” Well, I feel the same about the fruit of the barley.’

  Reclining comfortably with his cup of Darjeeling tea, complete with a large splash of whisky, Blair looked at the policeman. ‘So, tell me why you’re really here?’

  ‘I’d like you to look at something, sir.’ Urquhart dug into his trouser pocket and handed the silver cigarette lighter to the colonel.

  Blair produced an ancient pair of half-moon spectacles from his smoking jacket and peered at the object with rheumy eyes, the bottom lids of which sagged like the pockets of an old, well-worn jacket.

  ‘I’ll be damned. Where did you lay your hands on this, William?’

  ‘I have two in my possession: one from the crew of the U-boat we found in the loch; another one, this one, I found on the body of a dead German merchant sailor.’

  ‘I’ve seen something like it before. Not the same, mark you, but similar. The senior members of the party used to be given them – badge of honour or something. Expensive, too, made by some excellent German silversmiths. Very fond of their cigarettes, those Germans. Can’t smoke a civilised pipe or cigar. But then, what would you expect from such beasts?’

  ‘So, in the possession only of those and such as those, you reckon?’

 
; ‘Certainly the case in my time, Urquhart. Changed days over in Berlin now, mind you.’

  The old man returned the lighter. ‘Think I’ll help myself to another bumper. Care for one?’

  Urquhart declined politely, citing being on duty. The two men chatted companionably about old times and old faces for a while. Urquhart began to feel guilty that he hadn’t paid a visit before now to the man to whom he owed so much. But, as Blair had remarked, he wasn’t the most naturally sociable of men.

  During their conversation, a small part of Urquhart’s mind kept sparking, returning to the distinctive cigarette lighters and what he’d just been told. He tried to keep the thoughts at bay, but knew he’d have to let them surface soon, to analyse them and draw some kind of conclusion as to why they were now in his possession and not in the hands of some senior member of the Nazi Party.

  Probably sooner than was courteous, Urquhart made his excuses.

  Colonel Blair, somewhat unsteadily, showed Urquhart to the door. ‘Are you officiating at these celebrations?’

  ‘Oh, I’ll probably have to show face, sir. Are you coming to cheer the death of Hitler?’

  ‘Not a chance. Seen too many flags waving and heard too many pipes skirling in celebration over the years. You know damn well some poor bugger is getting a bullet in the head at this very moment. It’s not over yet, not by a long chalk. We’ll have the Russian bear at the bloody door next.’ He took Urquhart’s hand for a moment. ‘Do you still miss her, William?’

  ‘Sorry, sir?’ replied Urquhart, playing for time, knowing full well who the colonel meant.

  ‘I thought so.’ Blair smiled. ‘We were lucky to make it out of the trenches, my boy. Only normal to have regrets. If you want my advice, you’ll find yourself someone to keep you warm when you get to my age. Bloody well wish I had.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Urquhart. He had only two things on his mind as he strode purposefully back into town: the lighter he could feel in his trouser pocket and the dark-eyed girl standing beside a river in Normandy.

  27