Under World

by Reginald Hill

  The prone man was pushing at the earth like an ageing athlete trying for his fiftieth press-up.

  The young man stooped and ran his hands over the ground in search of something. He seemed to take the sunlight with him and the prone man was revealed as Arthur Downey. Sergeant Swift took advantage of Farr’s distraction to move forward saying, ‘It’s all right, son. We know it wasn’t you. It’s all right, believe me. You know me, don’t you? It’s Sergeant Swift.’

  He was almost on top of the crouching man. It was going to be all right, thought Pascoe. Back down the hill, apologies all round, drinks in the club, back home for supper.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Colin Farr. ‘I know you, Sergeant Swift. You’re very handy with your stick.’

  And in one lithe movement he uncoiled. In his hand he grasped a rubber-covered torch. Swift ducked away but his reflexes were no match for the young man’s speed; and the torch crashed against the side of his neck with a noise like a mallet on meat. The sergeant staggered sideways, collided with Downey who was still trying to push himself off the ground, and the two of them went over in a blackly comic tangle of limbs.

  Pascoe found he couldn’t move but Dalziel was rushing forward now yelling, ‘Farr, you bastard!’ For a moment the young man looked as if he might stand his ground. Then he smiled, turned and, with an easy unhurried grace which nevertheless left Dalziel lumbering like a man in a morass, he loped away into the trees.

  Now Pascoe’s strength returned. He rushed forward. Dalziel was stooping over Swift. ‘Get after the bastard!’ he shouted at Pascoe more in frustration than expectation, or so the Inspector decided as he helped Arthur Downey to sit up. The man looked at him without any recognition.

  His face was bleeding and there was some bruising round the throat. A broad-bladed knife lay on the turf between his feet, but the visible damage seemed to have come from blows rather than stabs.

  ‘It’s me, Mr Downey. Inspector Pascoe. We met at Mrs Farr’s. What happened here?’

  ‘Nothing. I don’t know.’ He was clearly still confused. Pascoe said, ‘Take it easy for a second,’ and turned to Dalziel who was kneeling by Swift.

  ‘Is he OK?’ he said anxiously.

  ‘He’ll live,’ said Dalziel. ‘But he’s going to have a stiffer neck than a fossilized giraffe!’

  The sergeant tried to say something, only managed a grunt, then reached into his tunic and plucked out his personal radio.

  ‘Good thinking, lad,’ said Dalziel. ‘How’s your patient, Peter?’

  Downey answered for himself.

  ‘What are you lot doing here? Did that foreign woman tell you?’

  Ellie. That foreign woman. Would there be a time when he could tell her this and laugh? Pascoe said, ‘She had to. Colin Farr’s off the hook, you see. We know he didn’t kill Satterthwaite, so there’s no reason for him to be running around up here.’

  ‘Was off the hook,’ Dalziel corrected grimly. ‘All we had on him earlier was suspicion of topping a deputy which rates at slightly less than a misdemeanour round here. Now it’s assaulting a police officer and that’s really serious.’

  He switched the radio to ‘transmit’.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ asked Pascoe.

  ‘What I should have done before. Whistle up some reinforcements. I’ve tried it soft, and even if I felt inclined to try it soft again, we can’t. This time we don’t know where he is.’

  ‘I know where he’ll be,’ said Downey unexpectedly.

  Once again Dalziel lowered the radio.

  ‘You do?’ he said.

  ‘Pretty certain,’ said Downey. ‘It’s the obvious place he’ll hide.’

  Suddenly Pascoe felt himself converted to Dalziel’s previous viewpoint.

  ‘Why’d he attack you, Mr Downey?’ he said in an attempt at diversion.

  ‘God knows,’ said Downey. ‘Why’s that mad bugger ever do anything?’

  ‘He likely backtracked you a bit to be on the safe side,’ said Dalziel. ‘When he spotted us back along the path, he must have thought you’d brought us with you. Can you take us to this hiding place, Mr Downey? I mean, are you fit enough?’

  ‘Aye, I’m fit.’

  ‘But what about the sergeant?’ said Pascoe.

  To his dismay Swift had a fit of nobility and croaked, ‘OK. Go down by self.’

  ‘No way,’ said Dalziel to Pascoe’s relief.

  But it was short-lived. The fat man started bellowing into the radio till he got a startled response.

  ‘Superintendent Dalziel,’ he said. ‘Send a bit of support up to the White Rock in Gratterley Wood, would you? Sergeant Swift’s got himself slightly injured. Nothing serious but I don’t want him walking around here by himself. Send a couple of strong lads to see him safely home. Inspector Pascoe and I are continuing our search for Mr Colin Farr. Chief Inspector Wishart has all details. Out.’

  He returned the radio to Swift.

  ‘There you are, lad. See if you can get Luxembourg while you’re waiting. And take that knife down with you for Forensic to check out.’

  ‘Sir,’ said Pascoe. ‘It’s getting very dark. Shouldn’t we perhaps ask for some lights and a tannoy?’

  ‘What are you planning, lad? To hold a dance? You’ve got your torch, I’ve got mine. And Mr Downey here can probably see in the dark. Lead on, Macduff. The sooner we find this madman, the sooner we can all get home to our beds.’

  Pascoe’s reluctance was more than compensated by Downey’s eagerness. He was away so quickly that Dalziel cried, ‘Hold on!’ and said to Pascoe, ‘Move your arse, lad, or we’re going to lose ourselves another miner!’

  Pascoe whose night eyes were never particularly good soon felt himself completely out of touch with their guide, but Dalziel ploughed ahead with apparent confidence. The pale gleam from the torches showed no path beneath their feet, the trees seemed to be pressing together, and the thickening mist to have a strong odour of decay. At last Downey came to a stop and let them catch up.

  ‘All right,’ said Dalziel. ‘I’m getting too old for this kind of sport. Where the hell are you taking us?’

  ‘Nowhere,’ said Downey.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘We’re here.’

  The two policemen looked round. The little there was to see was indistinguishable from what there had been to see for the last ten minutes. Trees and mist and undergrowth.

  ‘Where?’ said Dalziel.

  ‘Here,’ said Downey impatiently.

  He stopped and started to pull at a clump of gorse bushes. They parted easily and he said with satisfaction, ‘I knew it. He’s been through here.’

  ‘Where the fuck’s here?’ roared Dalziel.

  But Pascoe staring into the even darker darkness revealed beyond the bushes was having his worst suspicions confirmed.

  ‘It’s a drift,’ said Downey. ‘Well, it leads into a drift. Original entry got filled in donkey’s years ago. They all did eventually, but there’s still ways. This ridge is riddled with workings. First mining in Burrthorpe were all done this side of the valley …’

  ‘I’ve had the history lesson,’ growled Dalziel. ‘What makes you think Farr’s gone in here and not in some other hole?’

  ‘Look, this is where he’ll be,’ said Downey impatiently. ‘I’ve seen him coming out of here. And I can tell someone’s been through here recently. Give us one of your torches and I’ll go in after him and try to talk some sense into him.’

  ‘Hold on! Just how far does this drift go?’

  ‘Far as you like,’ said Downey. ‘God knows what it links up with. But not much over a furlong on the level.’

  ‘You mean that? Level?’

  ‘More or less,’ said Downey.

  Pascoe did not like the way this discussion was going. He had an ingrained dislike of dark confined places which he suspected could readily develop into a full-blown hysterical phobia, given encouragement. He could have embraced Downey when the man argued, ‘Look, I’m used to being underground
. Besides, Colin’s more likely to take notice of me alone. You two wait here till I get back.’

  ‘He didn’t seem inclined to take much notice of you at the White Rock,’ said Dalziel.

  Oh God. Let this be token resistance, prayed Pascoe.

  But God was deaf behind the drifting mist.

  ‘No,’ said Dalziel, making up his mind. ‘Can’t let you go in there alone, Mr Downey. More than my job’s worth. And as long as it’s level, a bit of blackness won’t hurt us, will it, Peter? Lead on, Mr Downey and let’s see what we can find.’

  He handed Downey his torch. The man shrugged but didn’t argue. Stooping, he stepped forward into the dark cavern. Dalziel followed close behind.

  Pascoe still hesitated on the threshold. It was stupid to let some absurd police machismo prevent him from confessing his fear.

  ‘Come on, lad! Hurry up with that torch o’ thine, will you?’

  He took a deep breath, glanced up at the sky. God might be deaf but he wasn’t humourless. Even as he looked the mist was drawn up as though by a sharp intake of breath prior to a good belly laugh, and the sky scintillated with a million stars.

  ‘Oh shit,’ said Pascoe. And stepped into the dark.

  Chapter 7

  It wasn’t as bad as he’d feared, he assured himself. A man could walk almost upright in here and there was the occasional draught of cold air like a lifeline with the outside world. Nor was there much chance of getting lost. After the initial narrow squeeze, they’d found themselves in a tunnel which took them straight forward with no sign of any side passage in the torch’s bright cone, though it did seem to be descending rather more sharply than Downey had promised.

  Dalziel was just ahead. At least he assumed that hunching hulk was still Dalziel and not some time-travelled troglodyte luring him to its bone-strewn lair.

  ‘Sir,’ he whispered. ‘Sir!’

  ‘What the hell are you muttering about, lad?’ said Dalziel irritatedly over his shoulder.

  ‘You shouldn’t make too much noise in places like this,’ said Pascoe defensively.

  ‘Oh aye. You an expert or something?’

  No, but I’ve seen a lot of movies where people made too much noise, was Pascoe’s proper reply.

  He said, ‘Shouldn’t we try to make contact? I mean, we’re never going to actually catch up with him, not unless this all comes to a dead end, are we?’

  ‘You mean you want to start shouting to the lad? I thought you were worried about making too much noise just now?’

  ‘I just think we ought to do something,’ said Pascoe desperately. Though he couldn’t be absolutely certain, he thought he sensed a slight curve developing in the tunnel. Also those comforting draughts of fresh air seemed less frequent here.

  ‘What do you suggest?’ said Dalziel.

  Pascoe examined his thoughts, tried to separate proper procedure from personal terror, came to an identical conclusion in both cases, and said, ‘I think one of us ought to go back and get this thing properly organized.’

  Ahead, Dalziel halted, sighed deeply, turned with difficulty, the better, Pascoe guessed, to administer a rebuke.

  Instead the fat man said, ‘You’re right …’ and Pascoe’s heart soared ‘… I’ll go.’ And great was the fall thereof.

  But before he could find a method of contradiction short of outright refusal, Downey who’d got some way ahead during this discussion returned.

  ‘He’s not there,’ he said, causing Pascoe’s heart to raise its head hopefully.

  ‘Not where?’ said Dalziel, who always seemed to have trouble with Downey’s locative adverbs.

  ‘At the end of the drift,’ said Downey.

  ‘You mean he didn’t come in here after all?’ said Pascoe, torn between relief and indignation.

  ‘He must have turned off,’ said Downey.

  ‘Turned off?’ Pascoe echoed derisively. ‘Into solid rock?’

  Downey didn’t reply but retreated a few paces and did just that.

  ‘Oh God,’ said Pascoe.

  But Dalziel went forward and said impatiently, ‘Bring that bloody torch!’

  There was a side passage here. It looked as if a natural fault had been widened by a pick. A draught of air blew through it, not fresh night air, but slightly warmer and with something slightly fetid on its breath.

  ‘Downey!’ called Dalziel.

  There was no reply and no sign of the miner’s torch.

  ‘Come on,’ said Dalziel.

  ‘But what about getting help?’ demanded Pascoe.

  ‘The bugger who’ll need help is that half-wit Downey if he catches up with Farr and we’re not there,’ retorted Dalziel. ‘Come on.’

  There seemed to be no way the fat man was going to get through the gap but somehow he seemed to mould his bulk to fit the contours, and like a squid squeezing into a crevasse he vanished from sight.

  Pascoe followed. Why not? It had been a day for new and deteriorating experiences. Now the drift seemed to him like a well-lit road. It was his fate, it seemed, to search for the tunnel at the end of the light.

  His torch showed he was in a new world now; long stretches were wholly natural as if some ancient movement of the earth had prised these rocks apart. In places he had to duck beneath the atrophied roots of distant trees, sent deep-probing in search of fresh layers of earth and water which they never found. He glimpsed fossils in the walls of rock, leaves and ferns and ammonites, and his imagination turned other ridges and hollows into bones and skulls. And finally he knew that he was quite alone and this was that old nightmare come true in which he went further and further along a tunnel till it grew so narrow that he became wedged in it, unable either to retreat or advance.

  Dalziel got through here, he assured himself. Dalziel got through here. Oh God! What he would give to hear a few comforting words from that deep certain voice.

  ‘Look at the state of this fucking suit! Hurry up, lad and shine that torch on it. It’s bloody ruined. Look at it. Best tailor in Yorkshire made this, back when they knew how to cut cloth. It’ll be three years before I can get him to do another one.’

  ‘Why three years?’ asked Pascoe, trying to control the joy in his voice at this summons back to a real world even if it were still subterranean.

  ‘That’s how long he’s still got to do. I put the sod away for receiving stolen cloth, don’t you remember? He blamed it on the government allowing unfair competition from the Far East. I reckon the trouble were a bit nearer east than that. Scarborough. That’s where he set his fancy woman up. Expensive tastes, that one. Where’s that daft bugger gone now? Downey!’

  They were through the fissure and back in a tunnel which the timbered roof showed to be man-made. Up ahead a torch beam appeared and flashed urgently at them. They went forward and found Arthur Downey waiting for them.

  ‘What now?’ demanded Dalziel.

  ‘Not so loud,’ whispered Downey. ‘The roof’s a bit dicey here.’

  Pascoe shot a triumphant glance at Dalziel, who said, ‘Then let’s not hang around under it. Mr Downey, if I can’t communicate with young Farr by shouting, what’re the odds of us getting within whispering distance of him?’

  For the first time since this lunatic chase began, Downey seemed to have run out of certainties. He stared around as if surprised to be where he was. Pascoe knew the feeling, hated to know it was shared.

  ‘Mr Downey,’ he said gently, ‘is there any point in going on?’

  ‘What?’ Downey looked at him as if taking this as a general philosophical inquiry and feeling inclined to answer no. Then he shook his head and said, ‘A little further. He might be … a little further.’

  He set off once more. Dalziel looked at Pascoe and shrugged his shoulders before following. Pascoe once more found himself bringing up the rear. He walked slowly, letting his torch beam run up and down the walls in an effort to memorize their features. Of course, as long as there was no choice of route there was no chance of getting lost but he still felt
as if he should be dropping white pebbles, or leaving a clue of thread to guide him back. But as he had neither thread nor pebbles, he’d have to make do with memory.

  Of course he could always unravel his pullover, but Ellie wouldn’t like that. Her mother had knitted it for him and though Ellie herself would rather do hard labour on the Gulag than practise such a female submissive craft, she was fearsomely defensive of her mother’s artefacts.

  Ellie. He wished he hadn’t thought of Ellie for now this thought turned naturally to Colin Farr and the relationship between them. What it was, he didn’t know. That it was intense he’d had plenty of evidence. It might not be sexual but that didn’t matter all that much. There are other kinds of jealousy just as corrosive.

  He’d stopped walking. His mind might go wandering in search of mental escape routes but his stay-at-home eyes, directed perhaps by his roaming thoughts, had spotted something on the wall. He beamed his torch sideways. It was unmistakable. A rough arrowhead scratched on the crumbling wall behind the line of wooden props. And another. Someone else had recently been this way, beset by fears of unreturning.

  He let his torch beam move onward and upward. The unknown trailblazer had been wise to carve his traffic signs on wall rather than wood. The roof must have been particularly troublesome along this stretch. Props of warped and rotting timber bowed like the ribs of an ancient wreck under sagging cross beams. If Dali had painted the aisle of some ancient cathedral it might have come out looking like this.

  We’re mad to be down here! thought Pascoe. Yet it had a strange fascination. A man could get used even to this. He had to breathe deep now to remind himself of just how rotten the atmosphere stank! God, it must be like this in a charnel house. Bones and blood and decaying flesh …

  He flashed his torch ahead, fearful that he’d lost contact with the others, but there they were. They’d stopped still and he hurried to catch up with them.

  He saw the reason for their hesitation. There was another side passage. Dalziel was peering into it but Downey was shaking his head.