by Annie Bullen
Well, they met the Old Bill coming back to the bungalow. Fergus chuckled at his recollection of the conversation.
‘Hallo Fergus,’ said Tim Tyson (only a sergeant then, he was). ‘Been out for a walk?’
‘No, I been for a crap actually,’ said Fergus, indicating the spade. The two plain-clothes dicks with Tim sniggered and Tyson had reddened.
‘Drains blocked back home,’ Fergus offered by way of explanation. This happened to be true.
‘I see,’ said Tim. ‘Well, you won’t mind us having a look round ourselves then, will you? We do have a warrant.’
‘Fine. Go ahead,’ said Fergus expansively as he led the way back home. Halfway through the search he noticed that one of the coppers seemed to be missing, but never mind. They did put on the agony though. Every bloody little thing. Cindy hadn’t liked it much, what with all her private stuff gone through. They were just giving up and she was just complaining about the mess they made, when in walked the missing copper with the biscuit tin under his arm and sodding Michael wagging his tail. The bleeding dog had gone and dug it up for them.
‘Bugger me gently,’ said Fergus, but there was no use in denying it.
Well, they’d find nothing like that now if Tommy had done his job properly. Tommy! What the fuck was he doing, keeping so quiet? Had he scarpered? Fergus got up to have a look.
Hugh meanwhile had driven recklessly through the country lanes. He had a map, and Kattie had shown him the location of the farm bungalow, but he had taken more than one wrong turning. He sang as he steered, breaking into an extra loud explosion of joy as the wheels clawed empty air when he drove sideways up steep banks and skidded round corners. The tune was catchy. It was the one he had written for the organ concert and which he hoped his friend Charles Spellman (who had not after all needed to stay last night) would consider as the theme for a new television series.
‘Aha – this must be it.’ A cluster of police cars and a lone constable on duty.
Hugh explained his errand and the constable, who seemed to take him for some sort of eccentric, radioed the swimming pool headquarters.
‘You’re to go on up there, sir. On foot. They’ll meet you at the top of the lane,’ the constable added, eyeing Hugh’s ethnic garb with suspicion.
Hugh decided to arrive unannounced. The extraordinary circumstances of his mission appealed to some tucked-away spirit of clandestine adventure. He parked the enormous Mercedes behind the police cars and, halfway up the lane, ducked into the bushes to find Tim Tyson.
The police preparations were now complete. Tim, tense with repressed fatigue and the extraordinary escalation of the routine enquiry into a full-scale drama, was climbing up the swimming pool steps to meet Fergus. The twitch of the curtain had been spotted through powerful binoculars, as had the picking out of the piece of glass. It seemed likely that young Slack might be armed. Tim could not envisage Fergus firing a gun at anyone, but the police psychologist seemed to think it likely. As he was halfway up the crumbling concrete steps, carrying a loud-hailer in his hand, he was called back.
‘He’s armed, Tyson. PC Marshall has just spotted a shotgun in the occupied room. You’re covered – let him know that. Are you still happy about going out there?’ The Superintendent, who was new at the job, looked anxiously at him.
‘I’m fine sir,’ Tim lied. He was beginning to feel sorry for Fergus. ‘Don’t worry. We’ll get this sorted. He won’t fire.’
‘Good man!’ And Tim was out, sweating and walking one, two, three, four paces, to stand only a few feet away from the broken window and the barrel of a shotgun.
Just at that moment the message about Hugh was relayed to the Superintendent. He tried to call to Tim, but it was too late. Tim had raised the loud-hailer and was talking.
‘Fergus! Can you hear me? It’s Tim Tyson. Will you listen?’
Fergus, on his way to look for Tommy, heard a distant booming sound. He cocked his head to one side, trying to identify it. Tommy on the other hand could hear perfectly. At that distance the loud-hailer was not at all necessary. He grinned at the stupid policeman in the white sweater and pointed the barrel of his gun through the hole in the window.
Hugh, blundering through the bushes, was just in time to see Tim lift the megaphone again for a second try.
‘Fergus! Put that gun down. All we want at this stage is the girl. Release Dorelia. She has nothing to do with all this. Let her go and then we can start talking.’
This was too much for Hugh, who was emerging from a thick clump of bamboo by the side of the old pool. He heard the appeal, saw Tim and, with all the skill of an old rugby Blue, dodged three policemen to run across to deliver his message.
Tommy, chuckling to himself, was lining up his sights on the white sweater of the copper. He had made no definite decision to pull the trigger but was enjoying the feeling of power which came through the barrel of the gun. Just as Tim was about to speak for a third time, Tommy saw a tall scarecrow-like figure sprinting towards him across the narrow strip of grass. His finger tightened on the trigger, still aiming the gun at Tim. But the shot was badly wide and Hugh, arms akimbo, mouth open, fell to the ground. Fergus, hearing the shot, came shambling out of the garage door, his arms up. Immediately three marksmen had him in the centre of their sights. He stood quite still for a couple of seconds, blinking stupidly in the strong light before, characteristically, reaching under his arm for a scratch.
A second shot rang out and Fergus lay dead in the yard.
‘Marjorie, you’ve simply no idea at all how much it hurt. It was like when you stub your toe, really badly, and then having to wait for the pain, only one hundred times worse. But it doesn’t ebb away. It stays and stays. I had no idea that there was a madman with a shotgun in there you know. I thought it was just Fergus.’
‘Poor young man,’ said Marjorie. ‘So unnecessary.’
‘Yes it was. Dorelia is taking it all very badly. Says it’s her fault, so Kattie tells me. I haven’t seen her since I’ve been allowed out of hospital.’
‘She’ll get over it. Girls of that age live in a very self-centred fantasy world, you know. Especially one as spoilt as that. It’s probably the first time in her life that she has been aware of responsibility.’
‘I never find Dorelia spoilt. I think she’s charming.’
‘Her mother tells me that at last her mind is made up on a career. She wants to join the police force.’
‘What! I beg your pardon?’ Hugh, whose skinny upper half was swathed in bandages, put down his tea cup and sat bolt upright on Marjorie Pelham’s sofa. He looked like a startled heron.
‘Did you say Dorelia was becoming a policewoman?’
‘That’s right,’ said Marjorie cheerfully. ‘Do her good, I feel.’
‘Well!’ Hugh sounded scandalized, but already a vision, half-formed, of Dorelia, clouds of hair escaping from a little hat, black stockings and severe uniform, had assembled in his mind and he drifted away into a blissful reverie.
Hugh had been injured, but not dangerously so. Just enough to escape all the unpleasant ceremonies that had to take place. The funeral of Billy. A leave-taking of Anna and little Juanita, both of whom visited him briefly in hospital. The opening of the inquest on Fergus, whose death at the hands of a young police marksman was already attracting calls for a major inquiry.
When he left hospital he seemed to be accepted without question in Marjorie’s small household. He looked affectionately across at her.
‘Marjorie, dear,’ he began. She raised a cynical eyebrow. ‘You are probably one of the very few people I know who understand that an artist needs some sort of basic security. Now Kattie is very good, but …’
Here she interrupted him.
‘Nonsense Hugh. But you are welcome to stay here awhile. I can do with some male company – and help – around the house.’ Hugh hoped that the latter would not entail too much physical and nervous energy. But he reckoned that his shattered shoulder would stand him in good stead f
or several months yet, so he smiled and made a gracious speech of thanks.
‘The theory is that we buy things to wear as we travel. Much more practical and quite exciting really. Anyway, by the time we get to Australia we shall be so fat, at least I will, not Dorelia, nothing will fit anyway. I can’t wait for tomorrow!’
Angela, sitting in the kitchen once more with Kattie, smiled at her friend’s excitement. In front of them was a pile of leaflets and brochures showing the hotels that Kattie, Clem and Dorelia were to stay in during their three-month trip halfway around the world. Kattie was making a list for Angela, noting the dates and places. She had asked Angela to look after Puttnam for them while they were away.
‘I wish you had decided to come with us after all.’ She patted Angela’s hand. ‘It would have done you good. Travel is something I should have done more of. I’m going to now. There’s Russia and America and bits of Europe that no one’s ever heard of. Are you sure you are going to be all right?’
Angela laughed. She was actually looking forward to being on her own. The intensity of Dorelia’s re-established relation with her mother and the emotional scenes after the ‘siege’ had proved wearing in the extreme. She no longer felt like a junior partner in life. Billy’s death and the destruction of everything they had together put her firmly on her own. Although she was officially the deprived person of the household, she was the one they had turned to to organize meals, arrange meetings, ring up Clem’s gallery to let them know what was going on.
Kattie had taken Fergus’ death almost as badly as her daughter. The pair of them went through a long, repetitive litany of blame for what had happened that day. Angela listened patiently and went to order the groceries. It was she who persuaded Kattie that no good would come of visiting Tommy Old, now undergoing psychiatric treatment in the remand wing of the prison hospital as he awaited his trial.
She was sorry for the loss of her possessions in the fire in France, the cause of which was never established. She mourned especially La Grandmère. But it transpired that Billy, who died intestate, had far more money than she realized and as his wife and only living connection, most of it would come to her. What with the insurance money, and now the news from Clem that her work was sought after, she could look forward to ordering her own life.
And suddenly, just as Clem had said she would, she started to paint again. Painting happily and properly, and so easily that she could not imagine what the block had been. Her subjects, her materials, her own emotional involvement married happily. She did not dream about Toby again, or worry about Billy’s death.
‘What will you do while we are away?’ Kattie still could not quite imagine people existing without her. She smiled at Angela as she got up to start the supper which they planned to cook together for this last night before the holiday.
‘Painting and house-hunting,’ Angela said. ‘I might even try a bit of gardening.’ She looked hard at the overgrowth in the borders of the kitchen garden.
Kattie laughed. ‘Maybe you’ll buy Fergus’s farm. Someone’s got to.’
‘Maybe,’ said Angela. But she knew she would not.
She wandered outside in search of some small artichokes which she would cook as a first course for supper. She used to buy them in the market in France. Here they grew freely in the garden.
Maybe life was full of small blessings after all.
… and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
W. B. Yeats
For Roy
This electronic edition published in 2011 by Bloomsbury Reader
Bloomsbury Reader is a division of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 50 Bedford Square, London
WC1B 3DP
Copyright © 1989 Annie Bullen
First published by The Alison Press/Martin Secker & Warburg Limited
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ISBN: 9781448206544
eISBN: 9781448206186
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