by Andrew Garve
Now, he supposed, he would have to do something about Anstey. He would have to report the accident to the police. His mind shied away from all the complications—it would mean answering a lot of questions, perhaps even taking them down that horrible hole. Somehow he felt he couldn’t face the police yet—he wasn’t ready for them. He still had to face himself. Anstey was dead, so there was no hurry.
Anstey was dead! He slumped back in his chair and gave full rein to his recollection, hating himself. Once again, he had failed utterly in a crisis. He’d done about the most despicable thing that any man could do—to save his own skin, he’d fled and left a companion to die, when ordinary guts and decency might have saved him. Might have—there could be no certainty. Heaven alone knew what had actually happened to Anstey. But Quilter attempted no gloss. Here, in the bright safe daylight, he hadn’t much doubt that if he’d moved quickly at that first call for help he might have reached him and might have saved him. Instead he’d just stood, cursing the man for his folly, watching the waters rise, letting him drown. That was the hideous, ineffaceable truth. And this time he could do nothing to redeem himself, to wipe out the shame. This time it was no good bracing himself for a solitary effort later, no good facing up to danger and death and mastering his fears. Panic and cowardice had done their work—the man was dead.
As the full realisation of what he had done swept over him, Quilter buried his face in his hands and groaned in anguish. How could he ever survive with this memory? It would have been better if he’d been drowned too and his worthless life ended.
His worthless, wasted life! Self-pity engulfed him as he; looked back on the long unhappy struggle against his own inadequacy. Failure, that was what he had to acknowledge, failure all along the line, from the very beginning. Failure to assert himself against his doting, managing mother. Failure to do anything effective about his deepest beliefs. Failure to achieve the power and influence that his gifts entitled him to. Failure, most of all, to establish himself in his own estimation, to silence his own doubts. Failure even with Julie. She loved him, but with open eyes. She knew his weakness, his inner conflict; she saw his feet of clay. Everyone knew, everyone saw. That was probably why he hadn’t been given a job; that was why his real allegiance had never been put to the test. No one trusted him, because he didn’t trust himself. He was unstable, a neurotic, a man obsessed by his ego and tortured by his shortcomings, a man who craved for respect and admiration and a niche in the halls of fame, and deserved none of them. Once he had hated his brother for being all the things that he himself wanted to be and couldn’t—fearless and self-possessed and inwardly tranquil. Now he envied him for having died honourably, bravely, for the cause he’d chosen.
In an hour of merciless introspection, Quilter touched a depth of misery and self-abasement that he had never known before. He whipped himself with remorse and shame and rose to some extent purged. He had painted himself in his mind with over-heightened colours, allowing himself no virtue. In fact he knew he was not as bad as that. It wasn’t even true that he was a coward—not put like that, without qualification. If he could have been given another chance now, he would have proved it. Some people sprang to heroism, barely knowing what they were doing. Some people were instinctively courageous. He wasn’t—he was instinctively afraid. That made it the harder, and the slower, to be brave. If only he’d been given time! If he could have gone down now and rescued Anstey, he wouldn’t have counted the cost.
Still, it was idle to dwell on that. If there were to be amends of conduct—and some day, he swore to himself, there would be a reinstatement—they would have to take some other form. Meanwhile, there were practical matters to attend to—the problem of the police, first and foremost. What was he going to tell them? Not, certainly, the whole truth. He would sooner end his life than face that shame.
With a feeling of repugnance—for to be forced to lie was itself a humiliation—he settled down to frame a plausible story, a story without too much detail. Most of it, of course, would be true enough. They had gone exploring together; Anstey, the younger and more experienced man, had continued alone when Quilter tired. That was all right. Quilter had dozed, and had wakened to the sound of rushing water. Then what? He had gone in search of Anstey, but had been overcome by the force of the stream and had only just managed to save himself. His injuries had been suffered during his rescue attempt. That sounded quite creditable and should suffice.
But suppose it didn’t? Quilter tried to put himself in the position of the police and the coroner, and he knew that if he were they he would want to probe deeper. For one thing, the circumstances were so unusual. They would be interested in the pothole and in everything that had happened there. Their interest alone would lead to questions, and Quilter could imagine some of them. “Would you mind drawing us a little sketch, Mr. Quilter, just to make things clear?”
“Ah, yes, and the water was rushing in here—was it very deep when you first saw it?” “you heard Anstey call out, you say, but you didn’t actually gather what the trouble was?” “How far did you go into the passage?” “How far away from him were you?” “How deep was the water when you left?” “Was his light still showing at that time?” “Was the tunnel submerged for very long?” “You don’t know—you mean you didn’t stay?” “Were you in any danger yourself at that time?” “Did you actually know that Anstey had been drowned?” “Wouldn’t it have been possible to make sure when the waters subsided?” And so oh and so on and so on! Quilter felt the perspiration break on his forehead.
Of course, it mightn’t be like that at all. It probably wouldn’t be. Quilter knew that he was a respected figure in the district—there would certainly be no suspicion of him, not to start with. The coroner might hesitate to ask searching questions of the Member for West Cumbria. Probably he’d be most sympathetic. It was conscience that was building up all these difficulties and dangers—guilty imagination. But suppose it did happen? Suppose he muffed an answer, became confused. Suppose someone put a question that he hadn’t foreseen? Suppose he contradicted himself.
The fact was—and the coroner and jury would know it—that any ordinary man, forced back by the water, would have waited, and gone in again at the first opportunity if only to make sure there was nothing he could do. Then he would have been able to give the coroner a complete picture. Quilter could give no picture. The police would recover Anstey’s body and they would know more than he did. They would find out all about the stream and what it could do and couldn’t do, and they wouldn‘t be satisfied with Quilter’s story. Even if nothing were said openly, no strictures voiced, the gaps in his account would be noticed and he might leave the court an object of public gossip and contempt. In the whole world, nothing could be more unbearable or personally disastrous than that. It was a risk he simply couldn’t take.
But was there any alternative? For a long while Quilter brooded, and in the end he decided that there was. It was just possible that he could keep the whole matter dark. Anstey hadn’t told anyone about the pothole—indeed, he’d probably given the impression that he was going to Yorkshire if he’d said anything at all. He wasn’t known in this district, and it was unlikely that anyone would have taken note of his passage up the lane. No one had been around at any time when he and Quilter had been together, either at the cottage or up on the hill. His motor-bike had been tucked away in the barn all the time. Altogether, it was most improbable that anyone would know of their brief association. Even if, by chance, some tradesman had spotted him and—less likely still—the identity of the visitor were established, Quilter could always say that Anstey had dropped in about some political matter on his way to Yorkshire. He clasped his aching head. Whether he spoke up or kept. silent, there were dangers. If he decided to say nothing he’d have to do some very thorough clearing up. He’d have to remove all traces of Anstey from the house because of Julie, and of his own activities in the pothole in case it were ever discovered. There were some of his tools still down there
and various oddments that might give him away if they were found. He’d have to close up the pothole and act as though it had never existed. He’d have to get rid of the motor bike. It was a big programme. Still, there should be time enough to get through it. Julie was not due back for another three days.
He took no firm decision just then. All through the evening he continued to weigh the matter in his mind. That night, with arrears of rest still to make up, he slept deep and long. In the morning, Anstey’s death had already begun to seem remote, and the decision to suppress the facts had been reached by default. If he went to the police now, it would be difficult to explain why he had delayed so long. They would say that he could at least have telephoned.
Once the choice was made, Quilter lost no time in carrying out his plan. The first and most urgent job was to put the cover back over the pothole entrance, before someone noticed it. He walked up to the Pikes and fixed the loft lid and covered it with scree. Then he returned quickly to the cottage and began systematically to remove every sign of Anstey’s visit. There wasn’t a great deal to do, for they hadn’t spent a lot of time in the house. Apart from a slept-in bed and a few cigarette-stubs of a brand which Quilter didn’t smoke and Anstey’s telephone number scribbled on the pad, the only thing of importance was the notebook in which Anstey had jotted down his survey measurements and his completed plan of the pothole. Quilter burned the notebook in the boiler, but the plan itself intrigued him. He stood looking at it for a long while, and finally he locked it away in a drawer of his desk. There was nothing to associate it with Anstey and it wouldn’t mean very much to anyone who found it. He could destroy it later.
As soon as he had cleared up inside the house, he set to work to mend the puncture in the front wheel of Anstey’s motor cycle, keeping the doors of the barn shut and using artificial light. He would know no peace until he’d got rid of the bike. It was a long time since he’d done a repair job on a tube but there was a full kit of tools in the saddlebag and he had little difficulty. When he had finished he filled up the petrol tank, siphoning fuel out of the Riley, and checked the oil. In a pocket in the sidecar he found a one-inch map of part of the West Riding, much thumbed and marked with pencilled circles which he guessed might represent potholes: He went indoors and studied it carefully, waiting for dusk.
By the time darkness had fallen he had made all his pre-parafions for an arduous night’s work and was ready for the road. It was nearly twenty years since he’d driven a motor cycle combination and it took him a little while to get the feel of it again, but by the time he’d got through Blean he was quite at ease. He drove slowly and carefully—an accident, or even an incident, would be disastrous. He circled the Lakes, keeping to the main roads, and finally turned south through Kirkby Lonsdale and Settle. The bike was behaving beautifully. Just before eleven o’clock he ran through the almost deserted town of Ingleton, stopped to consult his map, and turned left along a tertiary road that led up into the high limestone country and the Ingleborough fells. The night had become overcast and very dark and in this wild remote district he could see no sign of any living soul or habitation. Stones shot from under the wheels as the rough mountain road curved and climbed. The engine began to feel hot and to labour a little. He couldn’t be far short of the two thousand foot contour now, he decided, and began to look for a suitable place to stop. A limestone quarry gleamed invitingly in the headlights, but men might be working there to-morrow and he didn’t want the bike to be found too soon or in a place where the time of its arrival could be fixed. Presently he saw a promising-looking track and turned along it. The ground on either side was like a desert, dotted with slabs of rock and bare of trees, but with convenient hollows that would give temporary cover. He chose one of them and swung the bike into it. The ground was wet after the recent rain but he had no anxiety about leaving footprints—his nailed boots were not dissimilar to Anstey’s, and Anstey’s would never be seen again, so there could be no check. He switched off the fights and the petrol, stuffed the map back into the sidecar, and stood for a moment making sure that he had overlooked nothing. Then he set off back towards Ingleton.
He didn’t hurry—his legs and shoulders were still painfully surf and he had lots of time to kill. Up on the tops there had been a strong, cold wind but as he left the bleak moors behind him it lost most of its force and walking was quite pleasant. A mile or two down the road he stopped under a sheltered bank to eat the sandwiches and drink the coffee that he had brought with him. He smoked a cigarette and then resumed his slow, meditative walk, thinking of all the things that were still to be done. The hours dragged. He knew that he mustn’t be seen walking at a time when all respectable people were asleep, and that meant keeping away from places where the odd policeman might be patrolling.
Towards dawn he found a quiet haystack and snugged down on its drier side for an hour or two. His mind was too alert for sleep, but at least be could rest. As soon as it seemed safe to move again he dropped down into the valley and walked briskly through Ingleton, an early anonymous biker with a rucksack. An hour or two later, when he was well away from the district, he took a bus into Settle and a train from there. By the early afternoon he was back at the cottage.
He felt safer now, but time was getting short. In forty-eight hours Julie would be back, and he had still much to do. The worst, indeed, still lay ahead. The thought of going down the pothole again was so repellent that he made a great effort to persuade himself that it wasn’t necessary. The possibility of anyone finding the place was really quite negligible—a secret that had been kept for a hundred years might easily be kept for another hundred. However, he failed to convince himself, as he had failed to convince himself that the coroner would ask no troublesome questions. There was always the risk, particularly now that the pothole had been opened. For the sake of his own peace of mind, he must remove all the evidence.
He slept badly that night in spite of his exertions, for the face of Anstey haunted him. At first light he made a parcel of his potholing clothes, threw it into the station wagon, and drove up the track, parking the car some distance from the Pikes. Then he walked back to the hole with the parcel under his arm, made sure that no one was in sight, and climbed down, drawing the loft door over the opening as far as he could from the inside. As soon as he was underground he changed into the boiler suit and helmet, stowing his own clothes just inside the first passage. Then he started the long descent. He had been afraid that some of the old terror might come back once he was in the pothole, but Anstey’s death had left him in a reckless mood, and he felt inoculated against fear. Even the swinging of the ladders no longer upset him and he went down hand over hand without a pause. An hour after leaving the surface he was standing once more at the entrance to the fatal tunnel. The stream was hardly more than a trickle again, utterly without menace, and it was difficult to believe that the passage could have filled up so quickly. Difficult, too, to believe that he had fied as though pursued by demons, when for him there had no longer been the slightest danger. He saw now that there was a water mark in this cave, a high point, and that it was only an inch or two above the floor!
Now that he was here, he knew that he must find out what had happened in the tunnel. It wouldn’t restore his self-respect even if he could prove to himself that he couldn’t have been of any use, but it would dull the edge of remorse. The spectacle would be repugnant, but he had faced it in his imagination and would not shirk it now.
It didn’t take him long to reach the spot. A dozen yards, perhaps, beyond the point where he had stood, a dozen crouching yards, and there was Anstey. An ugly, swollen figure, lying on the floor of the tunnel in a strange, awkward attitude. Horribly accessible—a dozen yards.
Sick with self-reproach, Quilter crept forward and knelt beside the body of the man who had been his companion. One glance, and the cause of the tragedy became plain. A deep crack ran down the centre of the rock floor and Anstey’s right boot, his strong nailed boot, was jammed tight in th
e cleft. He must have struggled fearfully to free himself in those last agonising moments, for one side of the boot was cut through by the rock. No doubt the lowness of the roof had impeded his efforts. His helmet lay beside him, with a broken strap, and the contents of his overall pocket were scattered pathetically around;
With set face, Quilter took his clasp knife and cut the lacing of the boot. Then he placed his hands round the ankle and heaved with all his strength. If only it would stay jammed! But little by little, as he strained, the foot began to come away from the boot, and in a moment it was free.
So he could have saved him! Twenty seconds to reach him, a moment’s fumbling under the water, a joint pull, and they would both have been out and safe.
Quilter turned and stumbled back to the chamber. Well, that was that. Anstey was beyond aid now, and regrets were useless. Now he had to think of himself. He had to make absolutely sure that the body would never be found. The best way, obviously, was to pile all the excavated debris back into the tunnel. The shovel was still lying beside the mound, and at once he began the long, laborious task of replacing the choke. Putting it all back was easier and safer than removing it, but when he surveyed the results nearly two hours later he wasn’t satisfied. The passage might be considered closed to any but a determined explorer, but it was only too plain that there was a passage, and explorers underground were determined. He stood back, sweating. No, it wasn’t good enough. It would always be on his mind. He would be forever imagining someone coming down here and forcing the choke.
Suddenly he remembered what Anstey had said about opening up passages with explosive. If passages could be opened by explosive, they could be closed in the same way. Surely that was the answer—to blow up the mouth of the tunnel and bring down such a mass of rock that the evidence would be sealed up for ever? He didn’t know much about the use of explosives, but he could find out. At least it was worth considering. He couldn’t, in any case, do anything about it immediately with Julie coming back so soon, but later on there might be an opportunity.