Ferney

by James Long

  ‘You thought you’d find me and instead you found the sea?’

  ‘I suppose I knew, really, but if I’d let myself believe that, I might never have started. There was a watch on the coast. Soldiers everywhere, boats patrolling, all the harbours controlled. I asked everyone about England and they all said the same – bloodthirsty pirates, who’d skin you as soon as look at you.’

  ‘But you got here?’

  ‘I had to find a boat that wasn’t guarded. I remember I just walked and walked along the coast. I found a place, east of Saint-Pol, where there were mussels everywhere on the rocks so I stopped there and gorged on them for a day or two. Oh, it was a strange place, that – the seashore was slate, all up on edge, slanting, and in the middle of it there was a great lump, heaved up like a cathedral. I was standing there staring out to sea. I even wondered about swimming, I was a good swimmer – had to be at Carnac with the boats – but I didn’t know how far I’d have to go and it was just as well I didn’t try. The second night there I had a bit of luck. A small warship sailed into the bay and dropped anchor. It lowered a boat and sent an officer ashore and I watched when it sailed back again. They didn’t hoist it back on board – just set it riding on a line from the stern, so when it was dark I swam out and climbed in. I had to be very quiet because I was pretty sure there’d be a watch up on deck so I slipped the line and let it drift off on the tide until I judged I was a good long way away before I dared risk trying to get the sails sorted out.’

  ‘How did you know where to go?’

  ‘Simple. Easiest sailing I ever did. The wind was behind me all the way and I just headed for you. The nearer I got, the more the English came back to me. ’Course I didn’t dare land, not in the boat – not with all that was going on – so I chose a bit of a beach with no houses and I jumped off and swam in.’

  ‘Do you know where it was?’

  ‘You couldn’t mistake it. Never been there again, but I’ve heard it described and I’ve seen all the maps and the photographs now. It was the Chesil Beach by Portland Bill and I know I walked through Dorchester not daring to talk to a soul in case they spotted I was French. They would have strung me up in no time.’

  ‘And we met here?’

  ‘We did. Right here.’

  ‘There’s a bit of me that doesn’t like this place but it’s not all bad, not like Kenny Wilkins’ Castle.’

  ‘Does Kenny Wilkins’ Castle still feel bad?’

  ‘No,’ she said in surprise. ‘Not since we talked it through.’

  ‘Nor will this place when you know what happened here. Anyway, it has joy in it too. We were together every day from then and I had nothing to fear because you told everyone I was from Wales and they’d never heard a Welshman’s voice. In any case in only a few weeks I was speaking just like you. We married as soon as we could, you know – as soon as we were old enough – and we put it all behind us.’

  ‘And the lesson of all that is?’ She asked because she knew there was a purpose to it.

  ‘That we have to be careful not to risk anything like that again.’

  ‘How? It’s outside our control.’

  ‘That’s what I mean, about the cars and everything. We have to be much more deliberate than we used to.’

  A stranger appeared out of the wood opposite, a stranger who took the path towards them, a stranger who turned into Mike but remained disconcertingly a stranger. He wasn’t looking in their direction and Ferney pulled himself up to his feet. ‘I’ll be off. I’d better not intrude.’

  She didn’t try to stop him, needing time to readjust. When Mike reached the far side of the meadow and stood for a moment, undecided which way to go, she got to her feet as well and waved. He walked up to her, stared at her and spoke softly.

  ‘I’ve seen something very odd,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what’s going on but I’m frightened for you . . . for us. I think something terrible could be coming.’

  ‘No,’ she said with certainty, but in that she was wrong and he was almost right.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  ‘He dug up something.’

  ‘What sort of something?’

  ‘It looked like a box – wrapped in some sort of thick cloth. He took it away.’

  ‘Where were you then?’

  Mike looked uncomfortable. ‘I happened to see him so I watched.’

  ‘And he didn’t see you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So you were hiding.’

  ‘Look, I saw him doing something funny and I just stood and watched, that’s all. It would have been very embarrassing if he’d seen me, wouldn’t it? I didn’t go out of my way to advertise myself.’

  ‘Okay, so he dug up a box. What does that prove?’

  They had been walking, but the argument had taken over even the automatic movements so they were now standing in the pathway, facing each other.

  ‘Well, don’t you think it’s a bit odd? It can’t be anything above-board – not if he’s sneaking about in the woods like that.’

  ‘Sneaking? How can you say that? You were sneaking too, weren’t you?’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Gally, listen to me. They’ve been talking to him about a murder down at the road and now he’s up here digging where he thought no one could see him. Don’t go for me like that. Use your brain. It’s not normal behaviour, is it?’

  He was using his hands in agitation and she reached out abruptly, caught him by one wrist and stared at his fingers. Earth was lined darkly into the creases of their joints and under his nails. ‘What have you been doing? You’ve been digging with your hands, haven’t you?’

  ‘I had to find out what was going on.’

  ‘After he’d gone?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But you said he took the box away.’

  ‘You sound like a policeman. Lighten up. I’m on your side, remember?’

  ‘I’m not sure what that means. Why were you digging, Mike?’

  Mike looked up and down the track and sighed. ‘He buried something, too. I had to find out what it was. Don’t look at me like that. I really need to sort out what’s going on here.’

  ‘Well? What was it?’

  ‘Just a plastic box. That’s all.’

  ‘Come on. You didn’t go to all that trouble then not open it.’

  ‘No, of course I opened it.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘There wasn’t much in it.’ She just stared at him until he was forced to go uncomfortably on. ‘Just some . . . some crazy stuff.’

  ‘What exactly?’

  He looked a little uncomfortable. ‘All kinds of things.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Well . . . not the sort of things a normal person would bury, a whole lot of old phonecards and stamps and stuff like that.’

  Like a waking dreamer, Gally had the form and feeling of an idea but not its substance. ‘Was that all?’

  ‘No that wasn’t all.’ Mike would sometimes lean his bony form forwards when he was getting cross, as if to inspect his opponent more closely. Gally had seen him do it to others, but this was the first time he’d ever done it to her. It was a shock, not just because it revealed the depth of his disquiet but also because it showed her how little she had been aware of him physically in recent weeks – as if, until this moment, he had been little more than a name and an idea.

  ‘If you must know there were also a couple of toy cars, about a dozen plastic carrier bags, a whole lot of china ornaments and a small carriage clock.’

  Gally couldn’t help laughing and it only reinforced his discomfort.

  ‘Well, Sherlock,’ she said, ‘not exactly a revolver or a bottle of cyanide, is it?’

  It had come, in her relief, as humour but, already feeling misunderstood and unfairly treated, he took it for sarcasm and flushed. In her suddenly heightened perception of him she noticed how tight the skin was over his cheeks so that the cheekbones made white crescents across the pink.

  ‘Look, Gally. It’s a sig
n that the man’s deranged. No one who was right in the head would go around burying stuff like that.’

  ‘People bury time capsules all the time.’

  ‘Schoolchildren bury time capsules. Schoolchildren and lady mayoresses laying foundations, and they put in notes saying “this is a letter from the past” or some crap like that. This was not a time capsule.’ He considered. ‘There’s something else. Something I didn’t say earlier.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘John – the builder – he told me something else.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘We’re not supposed to know this.’

  ‘Okay, don’t tell me then.’

  There was a short silence.

  ‘I think I’d better,’ Mike said.

  Gally said nothing.

  ‘John’s dad told him when they got out the old files about Ferney’s wife. You know, after they found the bones?’

  Still silence.

  ‘They found a bit more. A query later on. Some time in the fifties there was another killing. A blacksmith. Ferney blamed him for his wife’s death, then someone killed the blacksmith, some local simpleton. They thought maybe Ferney had put him up to it.’

  She’d been looking away. Now she snapped round, glaring.

  ‘What the hell gives you the right to start poking into things like that?’

  ‘Everything, I’d say. I’m trying to look after you and you’re not helping.’ His voice was rising. ‘You may be the founder member of the Ferney fan club but I think he’s got some big problems and I don’t want him polluting you with all his mad ideas.’

  ‘All because of some ancient gossip?’

  ‘It’s more than gossip,’ he said defensively, ‘it matters.’

  ‘Does it? Have they done anything about it?’

  ‘There wasn’t any proof.’

  ‘So it was just rumour, right?’

  ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Well, you don’t for one.’

  They walked on then in a renewed and noisy silence of teeming minds until they came to a crossroads that was both mental and physical. Ahead lay the lane back towards the cottage. To the right was the way to Ferney’s house. There was a decision waiting there for Gally. Her nature was always to tackle grievances, to get them out into the open air before they began to fester. One way, the way home, led to compromise, to papering it over. The other way led to something much less safe. It was a way that she knew Ferney would not want her to take at this moment, with this man, in this mood, but she couldn’t help it.

  ‘All right, Mike, come with me. We’ll go and sort it out now. Let’s go and see him.’

  ‘Oh, what? How can I do that? You want me to breeze in and say I saw him in the wood?’

  ‘More or less. I certainly can’t go on like this.’ She began to walk away.

  ‘Just stop a minute,’ he said and when she showed no sign of listening he caught her by the arm. It brought her up short, jerked her shoulder painfully. It was the only time he had ever treated her roughly and the shock of it took her breath away, but, perhaps in the need to justify his force, it gave Mike the chance to say what was in his mind. Usually he was succinct, clipped. Now the words tumbled out.

  ‘You can bloody well listen to me first,’ he said, forgetting to look round to see if they were alone. ‘We came down here because I wanted to make you happy. I know how hard it was to lose the baby. I lost it too, you know. I’ve gone along with it all the way you wanted. I never thought you’d bury yourself down here. Do you think I’m going to like being up in London by myself? We were going to do all this together. If you think for a moment I’m going to let some crazy old bugger take you away from me and fill your head with complete crap, you can think again. I’ve had it up to here and it’s time it stopped, right now.’

  ‘He’s not crazy.’

  ‘He is or I am, or . . .’ he was going to say ‘. . . or maybe you are,’ but that was something he had never said in all Gally’s agonies because it was too close to his fears.

  ‘There’ll be an explanation.’ She was breathing hard, Spitting the words.

  ‘I’d like to hear it.’

  ‘Good, let’s go then.’

  She towed him in her wake to Ferney’s house, caution overruled by the pressing need to be out of the jaws of this human nutcracker. Mike followed because there was nothing else for him to do. Her mind seethed with warnings of dangerous outcomes, but they could not overcome her visceral resolve. It never occurred to her that Ferney might not be home, that he might have gone somewhere else. She knew he was there. On the way to the front door Mike’s anger was barely enough to overcome his enormous reluctance. For a second he lagged behind her, but he felt conspicuous standing out in the gaze of the blank windows of the other bungalows and, caught between two evils, came slowly to join her at the door. There was just a moment as Ferney’s indistinct shape, broken into impressionistic strips by the front door’s fluted glass, moved to undo the latch when she knew that what she was doing was probably a huge mistake, then it was too late. The door was open and he was standing there looking at her and past her to Mike with an expression that passed through surprise and apprehension to finish in a calmness that touched Gally and quietened her too.

  ‘Come in,’ was all he said, and they followed him into the front room. Mike took refuge in looking at the books again. Ferney walked slowly to the fireplace, half-turned to look quizzically at Mike, then back at Gally with a raised eyebrow. She was quite sure she knew what that look meant. Why are you taking this risk? Why can’t we keep it all separate?

  ‘I think we should all talk,’ she said by way of reply to the silent questions. ‘We have to talk. Mike is very concerned, aren’t you, Mike?’

  Mike looked embarrassed, but was forced to turn away from the books. ‘Well, in a way.’

  He seemed so childlike, eclipsed by Ferney. I can fit them both in, she thought – surely that can’t be so wrong.

  ‘Mike happened to see you in the woods just now, digging up a box,’ she said, speaking in a calm, paced way that showed she was just an intermediary, that there was no accusation from her. ‘He heard that the police had been talking to you down by the road and he’s worried for my sake.’

  Mike looked as if he wanted to disappear into the carpet.

  ‘He thinks you might be dangerous in some way to me, Ferney. I know you’re not, but we all know I’ve told him what you’ve said about you and me and the past,’ to her acute surprise her voice started to choke on her, ‘and I’ve just got . . . got to the point where I can’t keep on . . . pretending everything’s . . .’

  Both the men took a step towards her and each man, seeing the other move, instantly stopped so that they were frozen in a triangle, watching her as she breathed heavily and struggled for control. Mike stayed where he was, but Ferney took another step and touched her gently on the shoulder. She got her balance back.

  ‘What do we do?’ she said.

  ‘We all sit down,’ said Ferney calmly, ‘at least you two do, and I’ll make a pot of tea.’

  Mike looked glumly at the carpet after he’d gone out and Gally looked at Mike with a sudden depth of understanding.

  ‘I’m sorry to be putting you through this,’ she said quietly, but he looked blankly up at her then down again.

  Ferney came back with a tray and put it down on the table. ‘How do you like it?’ he said to Mike.

  ‘Just milk . . . please.’

  Ferney passed it to him, put milk and one sugar in Gally’s without asking and gave it to her. That was not lost on Mike. Gally, supersensitive to all that passed, almost said, ‘You’ve got a good memory’, but realized how absurd that would sound, so she just took it and smiled.

  ‘Now tell me,’ said Ferney. ‘What exactly did you think you saw?’

  ‘I wasn’t following you or anything – but I was walking along and I saw you dig up some sort of box. I stopped and then it all got a bit difficult because I didn’t want you to think I
was spying so I had to sort of keep still after that.’

  Ferney just waited for him to go on and Mike, hanging on the hook of silence, had no real choice. ‘Look, it was only because of the police.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I saw you bury another box, so after you went I dug it up and had a look.’

  Ferney nodded, considering, then held up a placating hand.

  ‘All right. I understand. I know you’ve got Gally to think of. I’ll tell you about the boxes. I’m sure you’ll keep it to yourself?’

  Mike nodded.

  ‘I put things aside – stuff that’s of no account now and likely to be worth a bit later. It’s a bit of fun, you could say. I just dug up an old one to have a look and maybe to sell a thing or two and I put another one in its place. I do quite a lot of that.’

  Mike wrestled with that. ‘But that stuff in it. I saw it . . .’

  ‘I hope you put it back properly.’

  ‘Phonecards? What’s the point of that?’

  ‘I suppose you undid the tape? I’d better get it up again and seal it, otherwise the damp gets in.’

  ‘The phonecards?’

  ‘I chose them carefully. People leave them in the boxes when they’ve run out. They’ve got all sorts of designs on some of them. They’ll be collected when their times come.’

  ‘Yes, but not in your lifeti . . .’ Mike choked himself off. ‘Sorry, but you know what I mean. They’ll just be so much rubbish for years, surely.’

  There it was, brought out into the open, the central issue flying under the false colours of a bunch of phonecards. The three of them all focused their gaze on the carpet at the centre of their triangle for a long, silent moment.

  ‘Well, she’s told you, hasn’t she?’ said Ferney in the end. ‘I wasn’t planning on digging them up this time round.’

  ‘Oh so that’s it. It’s that business again is it? These lives of yours.’

  ‘I can’t hope that you can understand and it’s better just kept to those who can.’

  ‘Meaning you and Gally. That does shut me out a bit, doesn’t it? I mean if it’s always been the two of you, as you say.’

  ‘That’s just the way it is,’ said Ferney slowly. ‘We didn’t choose for it to be that way, but until now that is the way it’s always been.’