Past Caring

by Robert Goddard

  I gave up at lunchtime, tired and dispirited by the fruitless effort, feeling vaguely defiled by the necessity of rooting through Ambrose’s possessions. I took only one thing away – Strafford’s first edition of Hardy’s poetry (Satires of Circumstance), which I found spread open in the front room, with some of its pages bent back as if it had been tossed down – dismissed as being of no account. I was one up on somebody there. It meant a great deal to Strafford and to me, even more now I’d talked to Elizabeth about her last meeting with Edwin and his use of those lines from ‘After a Journey’. Ambrose wouldn’t have minded me taking it as a memento. Nor, I hoped, would his uncle. It was good to rescue it from the chaos and take it away for safekeeping. Yet it wasn’t the Postscript and that was all I really wanted.

  I asked directions to the police house and found Ash’s cottage – whitewash and slate with a green-fingered garden, ivy growing over the blue DEVON & CORNWALL CONSTABULARY sign, a tiny office – of kinds – housed in a modern brick extension to one side. I peered in through the wired-glass door. It was bare and empty – a table, three chairs and a WATCH OUT THERE’S A THIEF ABOUT poster. I rang the bell – several times. It was, in fact, the cottage door which creaked open in answer. Ash emerged, breathing heavily, with an aroma of suet and gravy behind him, dabbing some of his dinner off his uniform tie.

  “Mr Radford, ain’t it?”

  “Yes. Can we talk?”

  “Best come in the office.”

  He opened the door, led me in and plonked himself on one of the chairs, overlapping it uncomfortably.

  “I went up to Lodge Cottage this morning – just to take a look. It’s been broken into.”

  “Broken into?” Ash’s brow furrowed.

  “Yes. A kitchen window forced. As far as I could see, everything turned over.”

  Ash got up and strode to the window. “I left it secure. Vandals, I bet.”

  “Out here?”

  “There’s a load of tearaways round ’ere whose dads work in the quarries down at Trusham. They’m as bad as any townies, believe you me.”

  “It didn’t look like vandalism.”

  “Then what?” Ash shot a glare at me.

  “A break-in, I’d say – a break-in with a purpose.”

  He looked at me with his slow, countryman’s irritation. I knew what he was thinking. This man’s another fantasist like Ambrose. Why can’t he leave me to knock a few heads together in the quarrying community and bury these other, alien notions with the old man who dreamt them up in the first place? “I’ll take a look, Mr Radford, an’ notify the Trust to shut it up proper. I’ll add your … opinion … to my report to the inspector. ’E might want to ’ave a word with you ’imself. That’s all I can do.”

  “I see. Well, thanks for that. I’ll be going.”

  He followed me to the door. “Reckon that’d be for the best, sir … in the long run. Why not stay in Exeter and leave this to us locals?”

  “Maybe I will.” I had no such intention. “Tell me, is there to be an inquest?”

  “Got to be, sir. Openin’ on Thursday. But they’ll adjourn till after the funeral.”

  “When’s that?”

  “Monday.”

  “Will I be required – for the inquest?”

  “That’s up to the Coroner, sir. But I doubt it.” So did I. This case had accidental death written all over it and my inconvenient suggestions of something less straightforward were best ignored. “But don’t worry. Somebody from the Exeter station’ll call round with a fair copy of your statement for you to sign – just to put the Coroner in the picture.” He smiled. It was supposed to be reassuring.

  I got to The Greengage in time for last orders and told Ted all about it. But his reaction was disappointing. He agreed with Ash that it could well have been the work of Trusham rowdies. And the passage of one day had dented his conviction that something was wrong. Ash had been to see him, asked him all about Ambrose – and me – and implied it was an open and shut case. By the time the inquest came round, I doubted if Ted would see it any other way himself. What, after all, was the point? He said as much as I was leaving, long after the other customers.

  “Trouble is, who’s goin’ to believe me if I stands up in court and talks about strangers followin’ Ambrose an’ all that guff? They’ll just think I’m a crank like ’im – an’ there’s my trade to think of.”

  Of course. Ted’s trade. Ash’s reputation for running a quiet patch. Ambrose’s image as a cidery old menace to himself. And me? A cocky young outsider researching the history of the Straffords and looking for mystery where there was none.

  I went back to Exeter angry with all of them, including myself. What was to be done? Nothing, except inflict my mood on the Bennetts and await developments.

  They came in trickles. On Wednesday, a constable from the Exeter force called with Ash’s version of my statement – brief, factual and accurate as far as it went. I signed it, reckoning I’d better bide my time before making any outlandish claims.

  That afternoon, after school, I persuaded Nick to drive me out to Dewford for a look at the cottage. Some National Trust workmen were boarding up the windows. The foreman told me it was a temporary measure. As far as he knew, the contents – along with the cottage – would revert to the Trust. Already, there was talk of opening it next season as an authentically restored crossingkeeper’s cottage. Maybe they’d even lay a strip of track and put up new gates. From function to dereliction to tourist curio – why not? It was a twentieth century sequence which had enveloped the Straffords.

  I didn’t want to go to The Greengage again, so I let Nick drive me to a pub he knew – The Nobody Inn at Doddiscombsleigh, up in the Haldon Hills east of Barrowteign. It was a warm evening, so we sat in the garden – steadily filling with the jean and cheesecloth intelligentsia of Exeter whom Ted would’ve had no time for – and I had less and less.

  “What can I do, Nick? That book was somewhere in Ambrose’s keeping. How do I get it now?”

  “I don’t see how you can. You searched the cottage thoroughly?”

  “All morning. It wasn’t there.”

  “Already stolen?”

  “I doubt it. I bet Ambrose took good care to hide it. But where?”

  “Under the floorboards? In the garden?”

  “Maybe – but I can’t excavate the place, can I?”

  “No. Not now. You’ll just have to wait and see what the inquest turns up.”

  “I think I already know.”

  “Will the Coroner call you – or me?”

  “I haven’t mentioned Ambrose visiting you – and I won’t. All round, I see nothing to be gained from blurting out allegations I can’t back up.”

  It was the truest thing I’d said. The lull since Ambrose’s death and the ransacking of his cottage threatened to unnerve me, but I sensed that, if I just waited, something would happen. It was certainly far likelier to happen if I said as little in public as possible. Only by stealth could I smoke out whatever was hidden – wherever it was hidden.

  That didn’t stop me attending the opening of the inquest in Exeter the following morning. I sat conspicuously alone in the public gallery while Ash briefly stated the circumstances. The Coroner issued a disposal certificate to permit the funeral to go ahead and then adjourned the proceedings for a week.

  Nick and Hester went away for the weekend, ostensibly to visit Hester’s parents in Tewkesbury. I wouldn’t have blamed them for just wanting a rest from me. I drank at the local pub, paced around the house and wrote a further report to Sellick – telling him about Ambrose’s mysterious death but saying nothing, at that stage, about the Postscript. Why build up false hopes? I thought. Besides, since Alec’s visit, I proposed to tell Sellick only what I had to. He would learn of the Postscript if and when I was ready.

  Monday was the day of the funeral. I travelled out early on the bus and waited at the church for the party to arrive. A pallid morning, with thin, grey drifts of cloud across a washed
-out blue sky, an edge to the breeze, an ill-prepared quality to the day and the place.

  The party, if you could call it that, arrived in drabs. A dapper, military-looking man in a tweed suit, who introduced himself as “Knox of the National Trust, i.c. admin up at Barrowteign, you know: showing the flag, what?” I could have done without his good cheer. Then Ted from The Greengage, trying to look solemn but appearing merely puzzled, fidgeting at an unfamiliarly stiff collar. Finally, the Vicar: doughy face, disapproving air, hurrying unnecessarily. That was all – no retinue of retainers, no host of grieving friends and relatives. We were the ill-matched mourning party and only two of us were there from choice.

  The hearse arrived promptly at eleven. Knox insisted on telling me the Trust had footed the bill. The service was brief, even, at times, garbled. Then we filed out into the churchyard behind the coffin. A grave had been dug near Robert and Florence Strafford’s monument of weeping angels. Some of the earth from the pile had tumbled against the small stone marked E.G.S. but nobody seemed to have noticed. With awful swiftness in the fitful sun, the deed was done. We’d thrown our handfuls of Devon soil after Ambrose into the grave, been thanked perfunctorily by the Vicar and made our way out through the lych gate.

  Ted looked quite affected, said he’d have to get back for the lunchtime rush and hurried away. Knox, eager for an audience, offered me a lift wherever I was going and I accepted one to Farrants Cross. As we drove out of the village, he began to talk in the stream which the occasion at the church had reduced to a trickle.

  “Know old Ambrose long?” he asked.

  “Not long. But I liked him.”

  “Bit of a character and no mistake. Touchy, you’ll allow.”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Take the last time I saw him.”

  “When was that?”

  “Must have been the day he … fell off the bridge. A week ago yesterday.”

  “What happened?” I tried to sound casual.

  “Well, it was a Sunday – always our busiest day at the house. I was putting in a weekend to help with the rush. Dashed bad time for the old fellow to choose.”

  “To choose for what?”

  “Showed up in my office in the middle of the afternoon – just when there was a flap on.”

  “And?”

  “Demanded some blessed key. Wanted to visit part of the house not open to the public. Demanded, mark you, not requested.”

  “I suppose he felt he shouldn’t have to ask.”

  Knox looked straight at that. “Probably so. Typical of the man, though – blustering in without consideration. But, when I handed it over, as good as gold. Profuse thanks, that sort of thing. Even tried to tip me, like some blasted servant.” He bridled at the memory, then smiled. “I suggested he donate it to Trust funds.”

  “And did he?”

  “I should say not. Between you and me, I don’t think he was too fond of the Trust. But we were fond of him: a celebrated eccentric.”

  The car pulled up. We were at Farrants Cross. Knox’s last memory of Barrowteign’s resident eccentric was as a Sunday afternoon irritant. “Thanks for the lift,” I said, climbing out. “By the way, what was the key he wanted? What part of the house did he want to visit? I thought he didn’t like going to the place.”

  “That’s true.” He pondered the point for a moment. “The key? Oh, it was to the attics. There’s a lot of storage space there. The old chap probably wanted to root around for something.” I reeled inwardly. “Jolly nice to have met you. Cheerio.”

  “Goodbye.” I waved after Knox’s car as it pulled away. But I wasn’t thinking about his courtesy. Something else was chiming in my mind. At last. I knew why Ambrose would have wanted to climb to the attics of his ancestral home that Sunday afternoon. Not to look for something, but to hide it. The Postscript, lying unsuspected at Barrowteign – waiting for me.

  It was as much as I could do not to run after Knox’s car and shout for him to stop and take me at once to the house. But I couldn’t. Stealth, I reminded myself, was the only course.

  Though I left it as late as I could bear, my arrival at Barrowteign the following morning was still earlier than most visitors’. The drive was empty as I made my way up it, past the gate which led through the lime trees to Lodge Cottage, over the trench marking the line of the old railway and onto the bank beneath Barrowteign’s broad stone frontage.

  The guide in the entrance hall was, I felt sure, the same lady as I’d encountered there before. I claimed to have an appointment with Mr Knox. “Major Knox,” she corrected me. I was directed up the back stairs to the second floor, which housed the administrative offices. The ceilings were lower than below, the corridors narrower, the wallpaper plainer. I walked confidently past a secretary’s office where a typewriter was clacking to a door marked MAJOR L.W. KNOX – ADMINISTRATOR, knocked and went in.

  Whatever he’d been doing, Knox didn’t seem to mind the interruption. He wheeled round from the window, which commanded a fine view of the garden, and smiled. “‘Pon my soul – an unexpected pleasure.” He walked across and shook my hand vigorously. “Mr Radford, isn’t it?”

  “That’s right. We met yesterday.”

  “Do sit down, old fellow. What can I do for you?”

  I sat in a studded leather chair and looked across the fine old desk at Knox. He’d furnished his office pleasingly from sundry contents of the house – a bracket clock on top of a bookcase, a couple of gilt-framed oil paintings of the Flemish school on the wall, an ornate inkstand between us on the desk. Barrowteign was a comfortable billet for Major Knox.

  “Having never seen the house‚” I lied, “I thought I ought to while I was down here.”

  “Fine idea. Let me show you round. Pretty quiet at the moment.” Not like when Ambrose came calling, I thought.

  “That’s very kind. There’s no need. I just thought I’d look in on you.”

  But Knox was already on his feet. “No, no. Least I can do. Happier circumstances than yesterday, what? Come along.” He made for the door. As I followed, I noticed, to the left of the frame, a wooden panel set in the wall carrying a score or so of hooks and, on them, an assortment of keys – some old and little used, others bright with the newness of security consciousness and one of them, I knew, the key I was looking for.

  Knox led me out into the corridor, leaving his office open and unattended with a carelessness I found encouraging. He took me back down the stairs to the hall and commenced his own, superior version of the house tour. I didn’t mind the repetition, in fact played up my role as the impressed novice of history, smiling at his every laboured witticism and trying to look in awe of his erudition.

  The tour over, I insisted on buying him a drink in the restaurant housed in the old servants’ wing. We had some lunch, I stood the wine and several brandies afterwards. Knox was enjoying himself. I began to lead the conversation where I wanted it to go.

  “It’s a fascinating house,” I said.

  “One of our more varied properties and no mistake.”

  “It’s strange, but I’ve always found with these old houses that it’s not really the grand showpiece rooms which attract me.”

  “No?”

  “More the, sort of, curious corners tucked away.”

  “How d’you mean?”

  “Well, the servants’ quarters here – very nicely adapted as a restaurant – the bathrooms with their great, solid tubs you could bath an elephant in. The kitchens with their copper pans and vast, scrubbed tables.”

  “Ah, know what you mean – eye-openers, what?”

  “It’s a pity you can’t open more of the house to show that sort of thing.”

  “We’re thinking of doing something with the stable block next year.”

  “Really?”

  “Apart from that, I don’t think there’s anything we’ve overlooked.”

  “How about the upper floors?”

  “Got to be somewhere for admin, you know.” He smiled.
>
  “Of course. What about further up?”

  “That is the top. Only the attics above us.”

  “Nothing of interest there?”

  “Hardly think so. Full of junk from family days. Incredible hoard of old rubbish. Don’t think we’ve ever been through it properly, but everything worthwhile is on display. Between you and me, now old Ambrose’s gone, we can probably ditch the lot and use the space more effectively.”

  “Sounds a fascinating place.”

  Knox chuckled. “Wouldn’t have said so. Inches thick in dust, you know.”

  “Still, as I said, it’s these curious corners that appeal to me.”

  “Nobody ever goes up there.” I didn’t remind him that Ambrose had, only recently.

  “That seems a shame.”

  “If you really want to take a look, there’s no problem. I could take you up – but you’ll regret it.”

  “Then I won’t say I wasn’t warned.” I touched his glass. “Have another before we go?”

  “Won’t say no.” And, in this pliant mood, he didn’t say no to returning to his office for the attic key. A large, old, brass affair, number twelve on the board, a fact I mentally noted.

  At the far end of the corridor housing his office, Knox unlocked a solid, panelled door and flicked a switch illuminating narrow spiral stairs. He led the way up, stumbling at one point, to another door, opening onto darkness. He groped around somewhere to his left and found another switch which lit up the interior.

  Bare, dusty boards and the sound of a water tank dripping somewhere. Planks of wood piled against one wall, an old map chest, with several drawers broken, against the other. For the rest, tea chests, orange boxes and buckets, dust and cobwebs everywhere.

  There was a path between the debris to another door at the end of the chamber. Through this was the attic proper, thinly lit by daylight from widely spaced windows. It stretched as far as I could see, the length of the house, with thin panel divisions along the way but open doorways in each so that I could see beyond. It was obvious why, to Knox, the contents were just “old rubbish.” They were piled in disorderly heaps, sometimes reaching to the sloping roof, sometimes blocking the path between them. Chairs standing on tables, old chests and cabinets, picture frames, boxes, bathtubs, barrels and bottles. Then more, and more, of the same: broken-backed books in tumbled piles, a huge, freestanding gilt mirror, smashed in one corner, a bundle of old umbrellas and walking sticks, an ancient wind-up gramophone, an upset pot of paint with its contents set years ago in a patch on the floorboards.