Into the Blue

by Robert Goddard

  ‘Am I glad to see you back, Mrs Dysart.’ Nancy was out of breath. She had to take several gulps of air before she could continue. ‘I bin proper spooked, I can tell ’ee.’

  ‘Spooked?’ Virginia sounded more irritated than concerned. ‘By what, girl?’

  ‘Well, I were in the kitchen doin’ the washin’-up when it ’appened. I looked up from the sink and I sees this bloke standin’ in the yard, lookin’ in at me like ’e’d bin there a long time, just starin’ in. ’E weren’t a delivery man or nothin’. ’E weren’t dressed right for that. And ’e weren’t doin’ nothin’ either, just starin’. Made me shiver all over. Anyway, I looked away just long enough to put down the pot that I were ’oldin’ and when I looked back – no more ’n ’alf a second later – ’e were gone. Vanished into thin air. I rushed outside, but ’e were nowhere to be seen.’

  ‘Perhaps he’d driven away,’ said Virginia testily.

  ‘No. There weren’t time. Nor the noise of an engine either. I came out ’ere and looked down the drive and there were nothin’. Not a sign. I walked down to the stable-block and there were nothin’ there either.’

  ‘A hiker, then.’

  ‘ ’E were no ’iker. Weren’t dressed for walkin’. Looked more of a townie.’

  ‘Whatever, he’s gone now?’

  ‘Must ’ave. But I dunno where or ’ow. I looked everywhere abouts. There weren’t a trace. That’s when I thought ’e might be ’idin’ somewhere. Back o’ one o’ the barns or somethin’. And that got me well and truly worried.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘ ’bout quarter of an hour ago, I s’pose.’

  ‘I expect he’s gone now, but I’ll check the horses anyway.’ With that, Virginia strode away towards the stables.

  ‘She won’t find nothin’,’ Nancy said to Harry with a dismal shake of her head.

  ‘Can you describe the fellow?’ Harry asked, trying to sound sympathetic.

  ‘Thin. Middle-aged. Somewhere in ’is fifties, I s’pose. Bald. Well, black ’air goin’ grey scraped across ’is ’ead that is. Yellowy skin. Sickly-lookin’. With these two little rat-like eyes. Wearin’ a raincoat ’e was, though—’ She broke off. ‘Are you all right, Mr Barnett? You’ve gone proper pale all of a sudden.’

  46

  SILENCE AND SOLITUDE enveloped the house. It was two hours since Nancy had been sent home to calm down, one since Virginia had set off on her regular afternoon ride. Resisting a powerful desire to leap into his car and drive away, Harry had searched the stables and barns one last time and had found, as expected, nothing. Returning to the house and starting violently at every creak in its elderly beams, he had concluded that Dysart’s malt whisky was probably the best hope of avoiding outright panic. Now, as its reassuring warmth seeped into him between anxious sips, he scanned the fields through the study window, seeing nothing but cattle, sheep, trees, grass, hedges and a vague reflection of his own face.

  Who was he, this silent observer, glimpsed only when he chose? How had he been able to follow Harry to Strete Barton? How had he been able to anticipate his every move? Whose bidding was he doing – Kingdom’s or his own? Another gulp of whisky. And still nothing moved.

  Harry turned away from the window. Dysart’s study, comfortably yet clinically furnished, was a strangely empty place, the desk cleared, the books neatly aligned. No half-finished letter lay on the blotter, no note or scrap or jotting to betray its owner’s character.

  Side by side on the wall facing the desk hung three group photographs of Naval personnel. Harry walked across and inspected each in turn.

  Dartmouth cadets, September 1968, Seaman Class. There was Dysart, third row back, composed and unsmiling, neither arrogant nor humble but what he had always seemed to Harry: supremely self-possessed. Next came the crew of HMS Atropos, April 1971, with Commander C.V. Mallender seated centre front, shoulders braced and jaw jutting. Lieutenant A.J. Dysart was an anonymous figure four to the left. Nothing in the pose or expression of either man hinted at what they would later mean to each other – and to Harry. Finally, HMS Electra, July 1982, the frigate Dysart had captained in the Falklands War. Scarcely any older, it seemed, or outwardly changed in any particular, the perfect blend of daring and discipline, Commander Dysart sat at ease amongst his men.

  Harry moved slowly back towards the window, running his eye along a row of books on the nearest shelf as he went. Politics, literature, the sea: the themes one might expect of such a man. Then he stopped and re-examined one leather-cased spine, reciting under his breath the gold-blocked title. The Reign of William Rufus. He pulled it down and opened it at the title page. The Reign of William Rufus and the Accession of Henry the First, by Edward A. Freeman, Honorary Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford. Published 1882. Its condition was excellent, without so much as a frayed page to reveal its age. Harry turned back to the fly leaf and started with surprise at the inscription. ‘To Dysart, in commemoration of his inception of the Tyrrell Society, Breakspear College, Oxford, 23rd April 1968.’ Five surnames were appended, each in a different handwriting. Cornelius. Cunningham. Everett. Morpurgo. Ockleton. So St George’s Day 1968 had seen a presentation as well as a defenestration, an act of recognition as well as an act of betrayal. But whose recognition? And whose betrayal? Six men had known the answers. One was dead, another as good as. And the other four were not telling.

  The telephone on the desk went off like a claxon. Harry slammed the book down beside it and snatched up the receiver.

  ‘B-Blackawton 753?’

  ‘Harry! It’s Alan Dysart. Virginia not there?’

  ‘No. She’s gone riding. Where are you?’

  ‘Weymouth.’

  ‘With … with the M-Mallenders?’

  ‘Are you all right, Harry? You sound upset. And no, I’m not with the Mallenders.’

  ‘It’s nothing. I’m quite all right.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Very well.’ A pause, then: ‘The Mallenders are as much in the dark as we are, Harry. Whatever their other misdeeds, it’s clear to me they aren’t conspiring with Kingdom to have Heather confined anonymously in Switzerland.’

  Heather and Dr Kingdom. Of course. Why could Harry not concentrate on what was important? ‘You’re certain?’ he said numbly.

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘So where does that leave us?’

  ‘Charlie and I have agreed we should meet Kingdom as soon as possible. Not to accuse him, just to try and get his measure. It’s vital we know what sort of a man we’re dealing with.’

  ‘How will that be arranged?’

  ‘It already has been. Charlie telephoned Kingdom and asked him to meet us here tomorrow. He agreed. He’s due at Sabre Rise at eleven o’clock.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’ Harry wanted to protest at the speed with which events were moving. He wanted to call a halt, a truce, a breathing space. But all he could say was: ‘It’s settled?’

  ‘Yes. You’ll join us, of course?’

  ‘Well … Yes.’

  ‘Good. I’ll stay here overnight. Tell Virginia I’m detained on business. She won’t query it.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Until tomorrow then, Harry.’

  Until tomorrow. As Dysart replaced the receiver and a burr of disconnection intruded, Harry sensed the doubt as well as the silence waiting in the room around him. He put down the telephone. It rang again instantly.

  ‘Blackawaton 753.’ No answer. ‘Hello?’ Still no answer. ‘Is there anyone there?’

  A click, a faint change of tone, then an answer, of a kind. ‘Parakalo?’

  A Greek voice, on a telephone line in Devon. Harry could not speak.

  ‘Parakalo?’

  Had the same voice wished him goodnight on a tube train in London? He could not say. He could not be certain.

  ‘Parakalo?’

  Who was behind this? Who of all the men and women he had met was doing this to him?

  ‘Parakalo?’<
br />
  There could be no reaction, no response, no rising to the bait. He would not give them so much satisfaction.

  ‘Parakalo?’

  He put the telephone down. And silence followed, like a soothing hand on his forehead. Silence that spared him an answer. Until tomorrow.

  47

  THEY MADE A curious tableau, Harry would have been the first to concede. The lounge at Sabre Rise, though expensively furnished, was as comfortless as a station waiting-room. Amidst its carpeted wilderness, the interrogation of Peter Kingdom proceeded with the courtesy and restraint of a charity board meeting. Charlie Mallender, blunt of speech yet cautious of meaning, posed gruff questions about his daughter’s state of mind from an armchair by the fire. In the chair opposite him, Dr Kingdom assumed an expression of stifled impatience and reiterated his diagnosis. By the window, Alan Dysart walked back and forth, frowning in concentration, requesting clarifications here and speculations there in a tone of polite but probing enquiry. Beside Harry on the settee, Marjorie Mallender trembled perpetually and said nothing. And at the very centre of their uneasy gathering, the coffee-table photograph of Marjorie with Clare, Heather, Roy and Jonathan Minter on Clare’s twenty-first birthday stared silently back at every glance.

  ‘None of this differs from what I told you when Heather left Challenbrooke. I’m surprised you need me to go over it again.’ There was a strain of irritated protest in Kingdom’s voice. He spoke like a learned tutor exasperated by his pupils’ obtuseness. ‘A complete recovery from mental illness can never be guaranteed. Many months of normality may precede a sudden relapse. For that reason, my assessment of Heather’s state of mind on the eleventh of October is next to useless in terms of establishing her motivations on the eleventh of November. Surely that’s clear to you?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Charlie. ‘But we thought there might have been some contact after the eleventh of October. A letter, perhaps, or a phone call. Anything that could—’

  ‘There was no contact of any kind.’ Kingdom had been and remained inflexible on the point. But what did his lie conceal? What purpose did it serve? ‘Her disappearance came as a total surprise to me.’ So he said, yet he allowed a cynical curl to remain too long on his lips. Harry knew he could trust this man in nothing.

  ‘If you will forgive such a question,’ Dysart put in, ‘might I ask what limit you would apply to your obligation of confidentiality towards a patient?’

  ‘What exactly do you mean?’

  ‘Simply this. Let us suppose – purely suppose – that you had agreed to a patient’s request that certain aspects of his or her illness, and details of its treatment, should be withheld from their next of kin, whatever the circumstances—’

  ‘It would be highly irregular!’

  ‘But not inconceivable?’

  ‘Perhaps not, but—’

  ‘Then the question remains: what would release you from such a commitment?’

  ‘How can I possibly say?’ Kingdom glared at Charlie. ‘Mr Mallender, I came here to offer any help and advice I could in attempting to discover what’s become of Heather. Shouldn’t that be your prime consideration?’

  ‘It is.’ Charlie reddened. His voice had a strangled quality, as if he were playing a part alien to his character. Which indeed he was, as Harry could testify. ‘We’re grateful for your cooperation, Dr Kingdom.’

  ‘What significance is there in your son’s absence today, may I ask?’

  The significance, as Harry well knew, was that Roy could not have been relied upon to maintain the pretence to which they were all party: the pretence that Kingdom was merely being asked to assist in the search for Heather rather than tested for signs of his guilt. ‘My son could not be with us,’ Charlie said slowly. ‘The fact has no significance whatsoever.’

  ‘I wondered if it might be related to Mr Barnett’s presence.’ Kingdom nodded in Harry’s direction and smiled faintly.

  ‘Not at all,’ said Charlie. ‘Roy accepts like the rest of us that Mr Barnett had nothing to do with Heather’s disappearance.’ Only years of conditioning could have given him the talent for sham, Harry suspected. He would be proclaiming him next as a family friend.

  ‘In that case,’ said Kingdom, ‘I suggest you persuade him to take up my recommendation of hypnosis. It’s the only hope I can hold out of making progress in this case.’

  ‘Harry’s aware of that,’ said Dysart. ‘He wants to be satisfied that we’ve exhausted every alternative before pursuing what he considers a desperate course. His attitude seems very reasonable to me.’

  ‘We have exhausted every alternative.’

  ‘Well, perhaps you’re right.’ Dysart turned towards Harry, no flicker of his gaze revealing their complicity. ‘What do you say, Harry?’

  It was time to speak his lines. ‘I suppose I’m bound to agree,’ he said, with a sigh of assumed reluctance.

  ‘Really?’ Kingdom was evidently surprised. ‘You’ll undertake a trial session?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Kingdom stared at him intently. ‘I’m delighted you’ve seen reason,’ he said in a tone devoid of all delight. ‘When would be convenient?’

  ‘Next week?’

  ‘No sooner?’

  ‘I’d rather not.’

  ‘Very well.’ Kingdom pulled out a pocket diary. ‘Shall we say Tuesday?’

  ‘Yes. Let’s say that. The afternoon.’

  ‘All right. Two-thirty, at my consulting rooms in Marylebone?’

  ‘Suits me.’

  Kingdom pencilled the time in the diary, then slipped it back into his jacket. ‘The exercise may yield nothing, of course,’ he said. ‘That is clearly understood, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Dysart. ‘Clearly understood.’

  ‘It’s kind of you to take it on at all,’ Charlie added, still in his script-reading monotone. ‘Not your usual line of country, I imagine.’

  ‘No,’ Kingdom replied. ‘Not exactly. But if there’s any chance it might give us a clue to what happened, it’s worth trying.’ His gaze moved round the room and came to rest on Harry. ‘I’m relieved you’ve been converted to my point of view, Mr Barnett.’ His eyes seemed to scan Harry’s face in search of clues as to what lay behind his change of heart. ‘Let’s hope the exercise proves worthwhile.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Harry. ‘Let’s hope so.’ To open his mind to Dr Kingdom would be, he knew, an act of folly. But it was easy to imply he was prepared to commit such an act, easy when he knew, as did everyone in the room except Kingdom, that two-thirty next Tuesday would find him a very long way from Marylebone.

  Ten minutes had passed. Dr Kingdom had taken his leave, assuring the Mallenders that he would inform them promptly of anything material gleaned from Harry’s ‘trial session’. Marjorie had escorted him to his car, with Dysart watching through the window. At the sound of an engine starting, he turned back to Charlie and Harry.

  ‘Do we agree?’ he said quietly.

  ‘The fellow’s hiding something,’ Charlie muttered. ‘That’s plain.’

  It occurred to Harry that they were all hiding something, concealing past differences behind a pretence of united action, appeasing their consciences with an overdue pursuit of the truth. Less than a month ago, Charlie had thrown him out of the house and set the police on him. Now, cowed and compromised by the record of his own misconduct, he had glumly conferred upon Harry something which previously would have been inconceivable: his trust.

  ‘If what he’s hiding is Heather’s presence at the Versorelli Institute,’ said Dysart, ‘we need to prove she’s there beyond question as soon as possible.’

  ‘Agreed,’ growled Charlie.

  ‘And you think Miss Labrooy would be willing to help you do so, Harry?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So she could produce a plausible version of what we’ve drafted?’

  Harry took the folded sheet of paper from his pocket and looked at it again. Beneath the heading ‘To the Director of the Versorelli Instit
ute’ was the rough wording of a letter in Dysart’s handwriting. ‘This is to introduce Mr Harold Barnett, who has reason to believe a missing relative of his may be among my patients at the Institute. I should be most obliged if you would afford him every assistance. Yours etc. P.R.K.’ ‘Yes,’ said Harry. ‘She could do it.’

  ‘And I rather think that if you presented yourself there, armed with such a letter, they’d feel obliged to let you see Kingdom’s patients. Don’t you?’

  ‘They might check with him first.’

  ‘That’s the beauty of it. Miss Labrooy takes all his calls. She could tell them he was unobtainable. On holiday. Gone away. It doesn’t really matter what.’

  There was a certain beauty in it, Harry had to admit. Whilst Kingdom was sitting in Marylebone, eagerly awaiting his opportunity to learn just how much Harry knew, he would be in Geneva, running his secret to earth. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It might work.’

  ‘It will work,’ said Dysart with sudden enthusiasm. ‘I can’t believe the Versorelli Institute are party to any malpractice. They’ll have believed whatever explanation Kingdom’s given them. Therefore they’ll also believe that letter – and do as it asks.’

  ‘I suppose they will.’

  ‘We can’t force you to try this, Harry. We wouldn’t attempt to. But what alternative is there? If we went through official channels, Kingdom would be forewarned.’

  ‘Do you want me to crawl?’ put in Charlie. ‘Is that it, Barnett?’ His colour was altering, his reserve of self-control dwindling fast. ‘Do you want me to beg you to help us? I’ve done a lot of things in my life I’m not proud of, including threatening Heather with return to that bloody hospital. But I never meant her any harm. I never meant anything like this to happen.’ The door clicked shut behind Marjorie as she returned to the room. Charlie’s tone instantly softened. ‘I’m loyal to those close to me, Barnett, whatever their faults. I don’t happen to think it’s such a bad trait.’

  Marjorie moved to her husband’s side and laid her hand on his shoulder. Harry could see her fingers trembling, could see a tic working in Charlie’s flushed cheek. ‘We’ve no right to ask this of you, Mr Barnett,’ she said softly. ‘You certainly owe us nothing.’