by Frank Tayell
“Sir! A footprint! Someone came this way recently.”
Mitchell paused, bent, and peered at it. “Size ten. A shoe rather than a boot. Do you see the intricate pattern of waves in the tread? I think I can name the cobbler who made that shoe. She has a shop in Pokesdown. Each pair is made to measure, and appears to have a plain style, but each tread has a unique pattern. You’d only know that someone was wearing them if you looked for the prints on a wet day. It’s precisely the kind of footgear a pretentious butler might buy. Do you have your handcuffs?”
“Of course.”
“Cuff me. I’ll play a chicken-rustling tramp who graduated to stealing seed. I thought it was flour, and stashed it out in the woods. You caught me, and I’m now leading you to where I left my haul.”
Ruth took out the cuffs, and looped them loosely over Mitchell’s wrists. She didn’t lock them. “I don’t know that will buy us much time,” she said.
“A few seconds is all we need,” Mitchell said. “We want the man to come out of his lair with curiosity in his heart, not a gun in his hands. Speaking of which, keep yours holstered. He’ll see us before we see him, so let’s not look like a threat.”
“Not much chance of that,” Ruth said. “Adamovitch will recognise me as quickly as I will him.”
“I don’t think so,” Mitchell said. “He’ll just see a copper in uniform. Pull your cap low, and keep your head down.”
If it hadn’t been for the occasional ivy-covered sign, Ruth would have thought they were walking along a forester’s track rather than what had once been a main road. After another two hundred yards, as the scent of wood smoke grew stronger, they came to a shallow stream that cut a five-foot-wide path straight across the road. On the far side, angling into the woods, were another three footprints, all with the same intricate tread.
“We’re close,” Mitchell said, though it took another five minutes before they reached the fire.
It had been set outside a house that was partially thatched and two-thirds ruined. The neat-packed straw covering the eastern third of the one-storey dwelling was the only part of the main building still standing. The rest, a newer extension, had collapsed along with the chimney. The fire had been set outside a double-garage. The imitation-wood doors had been raised. It appeared that was where the criminals lived. It was where they now sat, and there were three of them.
One was a massive man with a shaved head left bare on this cold autumn day. The second was small, wiry with a gymnast’s frame. He wore a tight-fitting but threadbare jacket of faded red, and almost-matching hat and gloves. He looked like he was feeling the cold, and alternated his hands from the fire to under his armpits. The third man Ruth recognised immediately. It was Adamovitch. He wore the long, black overcoat that was a butler’s winter-wear with a grey fedora pulled low over his ears.
A steaming saucepan hung over the fire, filling the air with a mixed aroma of rich game and bay leaves. More important was the assault rifle propped against the wall of the garage, ten feet from the skinny man.
“There might be more people inside the house. We’ve got to flush them out. Get ready to take cover,” Mitchell whispered. Then, in a wild yell, he added “There! The seeds are under the fire. They’re burning ’em!” Mitchell staggered into the clearing, his cuffed hands waving vigorously.
The three men stood.
“Sorry about this,” Ruth said cheerfully, as she followed Mitchell into the clearing. “I’m pretty sure he’s lying. I’m absolutely certain he’s mad, but procedures have to be followed. You don’t recognise him, do you?”
“Who are you?” the skinny man asked. His accent was English, from the north.
“Sorry,” Ruth said again. “This man’s a thief. He stole some seed stock that had been set aside for next year’s planting. I think he ate it, but he says he stashed it around here.”
“The fire!” Mitchell barked, angling towards the garage and the assault rifle. “It’s under the fire!”
“Seed?” Adamovitch asked, he sounded suspicious. “No one plants anything around here. Who are you? Wait, are—”
Before he could finish, Mitchell let the handcuffs fall from his wrists.
“You’re under arrest, Adamovitch,” the captain said, drawing a pistol from under his coat.
The skinny man dived for the rifle, grabbed it, rolled, and was bringing it up before Ruth’s weapon was free from the holster. Mitchell fired before Ruth could bring her weapon to bear. The skinny man crumpled. The large man grabbed the spit from the fire, and swung it around his head.
“Put it down!” Mitchell yelled.
The large man roared, and Adamovitch ran.
“Stop him!” Mitchell barked, but Ruth was already sprinting after the butler.
The large man threw the spit towards her, but Ruth jumped over it.
“I meant shoot him!” Mitchell said.
Ruth didn’t, and she didn’t turn around or reply.
Adamovitch ran into the ruin of the old cottage. Ruth knew better than to follow him inside. He wasn’t going to ground. She ran around the edge of the building, reaching its rear in time to see the butler pulling himself through a broken window.
“Stop!” she barked, levelling her revolver.
He ducked inside, and out of sight.
Gun held tight in her hand, the barrel unwavering, Ruth edged towards the window. She passed a door filled with rubble, then a wide hole, then a broken trellis. The window was five feet away.
She heard bricks scrape against one another, but the sound came from behind. Ruth spun as Adamovitch launched himself through the wide hole, knocking her to the ground. She lost hold of the revolver, so punched and kicked at the butler until she could roll herself free. The revolver was on the ground, two feet away. Adamovitch was reaching for it. She dived forward, aiming her elbow at his side. She landed hard, and he winced, reflexively curling into a ball as she rolled to her feet, and grabbed her weapon.
She backed up a step, levelling her gun at the fallen man.
“I’ll shoot you,” she said. “I really will.”
Adamovitch opened his mouth, then his expression changed. “I thought it was you,” he said.
“You’re under arrest,” Ruth said.
“You were friends with Simon,” he said. “You’re the copper, aren’t you?”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“You’re Simon’s pet police officer,” he said. “Oh yes, I know all about you.”
“Like what?” she asked. She’d been in the academy with Simon Longfield. She’d thought he was a friend. In truth, he had spied on her for his mother, and so for Emmitt. Simon had been responsible for her abduction. In the end, they’d caught and confronted him, but they hadn’t charged him. They’d handed him to Isaac. Ruth still wasn’t sure what had happened to Simon. Sometimes she hoped he was alive, other times that he was dead. What she really wanted to know, what she’d not asked him, what she doubted Simon could answer, was how he could have betrayed her.
“What do you know?” she asked the butler.
Adamovitch smiled. “I’ll tell you, but there’s a price.”
“Ruth?” Mitchell called.
“I’ve got him,” she said. She stared into Adamovitch’s eyes. “No,” she said. “No deals. No bargains. There’s no price I’m willing to pay, not for you.”
Chapter 9 - Victory Pie
12th November, Dover to Twynham
“Here you go, victory pie,” Mitchell said, handing Ruth a greaseproof-paper packet.
“It looks like a Cornish pasty,” she said.
“It’s both,” Mitchell said. The train juddered as it reached the top of an incline. “It was something my father and I did after a game. We’d go out for a slice of pie. If we couldn’t find pie, we’d get a hot dog, or ice cream. Once it was just root beer drunk in the parking lot of a gas station. It didn’t matter what we had, we always called it victory pie.”
“Oh.” She unwrapped a corner and to
ok a bite. “It’s mostly meat. That’s good. What sport did you play?”
“Baseball,” Mitchell said. “But the games were my father’s. He— He really knew how to pitch a ball.” He smiled. “And this is a victory in every sense of the word. You arrested Adamovitch.”
Ruth glanced back down the train towards the next carriage where Adamovitch and his large accomplice were under guard by officers of the railway police.
The previous day, leaving Mitchell to guard Adamovitch, his large accomplice, and the corpse of the skinny man, Ruth had run back to Dover. The Marines had been called out. The prisoners were escorted to the cells while the corpse was sent to the coroner. Mitchell and Ruth had conducted a preliminary examination of the scene, but night had come, and they’d left it under guard by a company of Marines. From the bandages and recent scars, most were walking-wounded from Calais now on light duties while they recovered. The investigation would be continued by officers from the Naval Intelligence Unit, with Sergeant Kettering observing as a representative of the civilian authority. Mitchell had insisted on taking the prisoners back to Twynham, but had had to send a telegram to Prime Minister Atherton before the admiral acquiesced.
“Yes, well done,” Mitchell said. “You caught the last conspirator.”
“It’s your arrest, sir,” Ruth said. “You should get the credit.”
“They were your cuffs, so it’s your collar,” he said. “Your name will be on the report, and in the supporting documents. The paper will love it. With little change in Calais, this arrest represents news. Good news, too. They’ll want a statement from you.”
“They will?”
“Well, you got a mention in that article about Emmitt,” he said. “They’ll enjoy making you the hero, and I’d rather it was you than me. I’d like some anonymity in my retirement.”
“You’re retiring?” she asked.
“In a sense,” Mitchell said. “Adamovitch was the last of the conspirators. Well, more or less. There are a few thugs and hired hands, but Weaver can find them.”
“So you’ll leave? And do what, go where?” The victory suddenly tasted bittersweet.
“The world is changing,” Mitchell said. “Weaver was right about one thing, I’m not suited to the type of policing Britain needs. Once Calais is liberated, the real work will begin, and it won’t be over nearly as quickly. We’ll need to establish fortified settlements across the continent. We’ll need farmers to till the soil, soldiers to protect them, and trains to connect them, but who will govern them? Are they to be enclaves of a new British Empire? Not if I can help it. We’ll bring back democracy, we’ll bring back civilisation. We’ll do it properly this time. I only returned to the police to keep an eye on you. Perhaps I didn’t do as good a job as I should have, but you don’t need me watching your back anymore. No, it’s good that your name goes in the paper. You deserve it.”
“I’d rather stay anonymous, too,” Ruth said.
“That’s impossible,” Mitchell said. “It’s not just that it’s important for people to know the civil power are busy keeping them safe while the military are engaged overseas; it’s the paintings. When the newspapers report Mr Wilson’s death and how that led us to Adamovitch, they’ll mention his paintings. The journalists will see the picture we’ve taken into evidence, and they’ll want to see those paintings you found in Mr Wilson’s room. We haven’t had much time to create art in the last two decades. When people read about Mr Wilson’s paintings, they’ll demand to see them. The newspaper might risk printing high quality pictures, though I’m not too sure they will with the British election coming up in May. What’s most likely is that those pictures will go on tour around the country.”
“Really?”
“After Adamovitch’s trial is over,” Mitchell said. “People will want to see the pictures, particularly Mr Wilson’s last piece. After all, it’s a very good painting.”
They’d found the picture in the garage in which Adamovitch and the other two had been sleeping. It was indisputably Mr Wilson’s work, and almost certainly the picture he’d been working on when he’d been murdered. The painting was unfinished, but it depicted a sweeping section of chalky cliffs near where Ruth had found the droplets of paints. In the shallows was a crashed plane. On the cliffs was the pencilled outline of a steam train. In real life, there was no crashed plane on that section of beach, nor did the railway come that close to the coast, but that, she thought, was the point of the painting. Floundering a few hundred yards from the shore, Mr Wilson had drawn a wrecked car-ferry. Pulled up onto the beach was a battered lifeboat. Next to it, standing among the chalk boulders, were a woman and two children. Where the ferry was still a charcoal outline, the three people had been completed, including their faces. They were obviously Mr Wilson’s family.
“Do you think that the picture meant Mr Wilson had accepted that his family were dead?” Ruth asked.
“It’s hard to say. That trip he made to Hastings would suggest he hadn’t,” Mitchell said. “You know what I think the story should be? That the trip to Hastings made him finally accept they were gone. That he wasn’t originally going to include his family in the picture, but when he returned he added them. That’s why their faces are clearly visible. He’d finally come to peace with their fate.”
“That’s a good story,” Ruth said, “but one with such a sad end.”
She stared out of the window at the trees rolling by. There seemed to be a lot of trees in Kent. Or perhaps they had crossed the border and were now in Sussex. From what she understood, the old county boundaries hadn’t meant much in the old world, and meant even less now.
“The ammunition is strange, isn’t it?” Ruth said. “I mean how they had so much, but only one rifle.”
“About two thousand rounds, all the calibre for an AK-47. Those are common enough weapons, at least in Europe. The ammo looked like it had come straight out of some old-world storehouse. But yes, it’s odd there were was only one rifle.”
“Then the revolver with which Mr Wilson was shot was the skinny-man’s only weapon?”
“I guess so,” Mitchell said. “Which only begs more questions than it answers.”
Though they finally did have some answers to Mr Wilson’s murder. Two of the gate-sentries had recognised the skinny man, or at least they’d recognised his red jacket, hat, and gloves. He’d gone into Dover at least once a day. Confirming he’d followed Mr Wilson to his small flat was a task for Sergeant Kettering.
“Do you think they’re smugglers?” Ruth asked.
“Almost certainly,” Mitchell said. “But was Adamovitch there because he wanted to be smuggled out of Britain, or because the ammunition was being smuggled in? Longfield’s, and Emmitt’s, original plan was elaborate, but can be summarised as a bid to cause chaos. Perhaps Adamovitch thought to bring that plan to final fruition.”
“Without rifles?” Ruth asked. “I don’t like all the questions. I want to know why they murdered Mr Wilson.”
“We’ll get the answers when we’re back in Twynham,” Mitchell said. “After all, murder is a capital crime. I’m sure that one of the two prisoners will happily confess in order to save their neck. Anyway, that’s not a problem for you. Enjoy a day off. Spend some time with your mother.”
“Hmm,” Ruth murmured, and took a bite out of the pasty to avoid saying anything else.
Just before they’d caught Emmitt, Ruth had learned that her mother, with Isaac’s help, had been the person who’d created the first artificial consciousness. It was that creation that had precipitated the apocalypse, though it was caused by digital viruses unleashed by some unknown hand. Ruth didn’t understand the difference, and hadn’t asked for details. In fact, she hadn’t really discussed it with her mother at all. She hadn’t exactly run away from Twynham, but her departure had been deliberately rushed. Ruth had written letters while she was away, and her mother had replied with apologetic swiftness, but neither had mentioned anything of substance. They had avoided the past, bot
h recent and distant, and talked about the weather, the food, the opening of a radio station in Twynham, and a cinema in Dover. Ruth had been dreading returning to Twynham for Christmas, but that return had come sooner than she’d expected, and now she wasn’t at all sure she was ready for it.
“You look thoughtful,” Mitchell said.
“You look odd,” she said in return.
“You mean without the beard?” he asked, rubbing his recently shaved face.
“I meant without the uniform,” she said. “When you were dressed as a tramp, I could accept that as a disguise. That suit, though, it’s… well, it’s weird.”
“I thought I looked rather dapper,” Mitchell said. With the Dover constabulary consisting entirely of women, Mitchell had gone to the nearest tailor for a new set of clothes. His dark charcoal suit had come off-the-rack, and was of the new-world design with more pockets than was common in pre-Blackout wear. “I thought I’d take advantage of the government picking up the bill,” he said. “Besides, I needed a new suit. There’s a carol concert at the American Embassy that I can’t avoid attending. You won’t be in town for that, I’m afraid. I think we can leave the evidence collection to the Royal Navy, but it’s unfair leaving Sergeant Kettering with all of the paperwork. You’ll have to catch the night train back to Dover tomorrow.”
One night with her mother? Ruth thought she could manage that. She nibbled at the pasty. The wild woodland abruptly turned to fields. Then a paddock. Then a herd of cows that turned to watch the train pass.
“You sent me to Dover because you thought it would be safe,” Ruth said.
“Yes.”
“But there are other military towns.”
“True.”
“But you sent me to Dover because of its proximity to the refugee camp in which Maggie found me?”
“Yes. Yes, I did,” Mitchell said.
“You knew I’d go?” she asked.
“I knew you’d want to visit it sooner not later, so I thought this would be an ideal opportunity for you to get it out of the way. You can start the new year as a new person, having made a clean break with the past.”