A Very Big Bang

by Philip McCutchan

  There was only the one thing to do, and Shard did it, fast.

  *

  When safely away, he explained to Hedge: not — since he was officially dead — in his own office, or within the stately halls of the Foreign Office; but sitting on a pigeon-spotted bench on the Embankment, not far from the four old ships composing London’s river navy.

  “No alternative, Hedge. Absolutely none. What, I ask you, would have been the point of staying long enough to get killed?”

  “I take your point,” Hedge answered, sounding stiff and unfriendly, “but really —!”

  “But really what, Hedge?”

  Hedge’s eyes slanted sideways. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You sound displeased,” Shard said. “I suppose — in the Foreign Office — deadness is a virtue, but —”

  “My dear Shard —”

  “All right, all right! Just don’t go on wishing me dead, that’s all. I did what I could. I have addresses, I have faces.”

  “What else have you?”

  Shard expelled breath. “Damn all.”

  “Quite!” Hedge smiled, and it was sheer ice. “ Damn all! Names? No?”

  “One,” Shard said, “for sure. Larger, up in York, newsagent — I told you. And almost certainly Nazarrazeen.”

  “But no others?”

  “First names apart — no!”

  Hedge smirked. “And the addresses — oh, a fat lot of use! Evacuation, obliteration — that will be the order of the day as of now … won’t it, Shard?”

  “I forbear to answer questions you know the answers to, Hedge.”

  “I call that impertinence, Shard.”

  “So do I, Hedge. It was meant to be. How long does this go on?”

  Hedge stared. “How long does what go on?”

  “The slanging match — Foreign Office style, of course, we’re not common coppers. I think we’re wasting precious time. You realise there’s just five days to go now? Maybe less — since this time they’ll know for sure something’s leaked!” Shard cocked an eye at Hedge, looking sardonic. “You did take it in, I suppose, when I said it’s nuclear?”

  “Of course I did!”

  “I’m glad. I’ve found it galvanic news.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It’s galvanised me back to life, Hedge —”

  “Oh, no, it hasn’t! You’re dead. Dead you stay! I’ve gone to immense trouble —”

  “I’m sorry, Hedge, trouble or not, I’m coming alive again as of this very minute —”

  “But damn it all, Shard, the funeral’s tomorrow!” Hedge fumed, eyes starting from a face of deepest pink, umbrella waving like a regimental colour, the Whitehall regimental colour. “The whole thing’s been arranged —”

  “Then disarrange. Look I wasn’t going physically into that coffin in any case, was I? You have a body, and I’m sorry to say it, very sorry. That DC won’t be sailing under false colours after all, and that’s all there is to it. Me, I’m back in circulation, all ready to co-ordinate again, but first I’m going home to see my wife —”

  “But a dead man —”

  Shard swivelled on the bench, thrust his face into that of Hedge and spoke with quietly insistent belligerence. “Listen, Hedge. I’m back alive. My death’s been overtaken by events and isn’t necessary any more. The other side, the villains — they know we’re on to them now. I agree that’s bloody unfortunate, but it’s also a bloody fact. In the meantime, there may be some news from Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine.”

  “Why Hesseltine?”

  Shard said, “I made contact soonest possible after I got away. Too late for the villains to be netted, of course, but there could be traces left.”

  Hedge looked apoplectic. “You contacted Hesseltine — before myself, Shard?”

  “Yes. Case of speed. There’s something about the Yard … they tick over faster when a dead man comes on the blower, Hedge. Faster than the FO. By the way, I’d suggest you put wheels in motion about that DC from York — he’ll have parents, Hedge. If you’re half-way human, you’ll postpone the funeral till they’ve adjusted.”

  *

  When Shard reached his home in Ealing, he was met by the half-expected though unhoped-for: Mrs Micklam, short, thick and fussy. She made him feel what he was supposed to be: death. He managed a smile and said, “Hullo, mother-in-law, you needn’t look so … surprised.” He had been about to say, so disappointed; but had realised the cruelty to Beth. “After all, I am a policeman.”

  Mrs Micklam, for once wordless, had fallen back against the wall, just inside the front door, shaking her head from side to side and staring. She might have been looking at a ghost: in case she thought she was, Shard reached out, laid a hand on her arm, gently.

  “Beth?” he asked. “Where is she?”

  Mrs Micklam cried, tears coursing down pale yellow cheeks. “Simon, you might have phoned first.”

  “I did. There was no reply.”

  “Oh … yes. We’ve been out. I thought it better for my poor child … than just sitting.”

  He nodded. “Where is she?”

  “The drawing-room.”

  He removed his hand from her arm. “Leave us alone, mother-in-law.” He moved down the hall, opened the door, looked in: she was sitting on the floor in front of the gas fire, face white and far away, clothes looking as if they’d been dragged on, an old jersey and a skirt that should have gone to a jumble sale years ago. She had the photograph albums out, crucifying herself. He coughed. He said, “Beth,” and held out his arms to her.

  She looked up, eyes wide.

  “Darling, it’s all right. It’s me. I’m back, safe and sound. They couldn’t tell you. I’m so desperately sorry, but it’s all over now.”

  *

  Shard headed later for Grosvenor Square and the US Embassy, where he had good contacts; certain items he had read in recent months, not all of them especially classified, led him to suppose that Embassy files on the American nuclear programme might be worth study: he found they were. Leaving the Embassy for Seddon’s Way via underground from Bond Street, he automatically watched the evening crowds on the platform and in the train with half his attention: while there was nothing very specific to watch out for, other than known faces who were unlikely to show themselves, there was always the chance and no copper could neglect it. But his thoughts were seething around un-policemanlike matters: the job was a bastard, was destructive of home life, of domestic happiness. Beth, in the grip of a wicked reaction, had thrown it all in his face: Hedge, the constant late hours, the separations, the uncertainties, the impossibilities of making any sort of off-duty arrangements when off-duty virtually did not exist. The constant worrying over the years as to what might have happened to him … culminating in preparations for his funeral. Flowers, graves … the Yard — not, of course, Hedge’s outfit — had been making all the actual committal arrangements, but naturally she had been involved. She had not — and now she knew why — been permitted to see the body: there had been hints of terrible injuries, left mostly in the air by Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine whom never, but never, would she have inside the house again. Mrs Micklam, later, had summed it all up concisely: diabolical cruelty, she said, wicked and incredible. If he had any feeling at all for his wife, he would resign at once. At that, he had merely shrugged and turned away. Mrs Micklam’s voice had rattled around him, beating off the walls till he had turned again and in a voice of cold steel told her to shut up or be thrown out. She had shut up in mid sentence, yellow skin shrivelling, face crumpling. His words had brought quiet but no peace: a row with Beth had followed, and he had left for the US Embassy with the row unresolved, to hang around him in the air, something to be faced again later, something that could so easily fester under the voluble tongue of Mrs Micklam.

  He rose from the tube’s depths at Leicester Square and walked through to Seddon’s Way off the Charing Cross Road, thoughts of mother-in-law still beating non-angelic wings in his h
ead. A bus, as he crossed the road, avoided the reinstatement of funeral proceedings by a wheel’s breadth, thus forcing his thoughts self-preservatively away from Mrs Micklam as he endured a stream of cutting comment from the scared bus driver. If mother-in-law only knew, she might be one of the thousands of victims inside the next five days, nuclearised into gas — talking gas? — as she went about her daily occasions with her shopping-basket. Hot air and Mrs Micklam: Shard made a huge effort and thought, without much benefit, of Hedge instead. In Seddon’s Way he climbed the rickety, sleazy, threadbare stairs to his second floor office, which was immediately and often noisily and creakily below an establishment used for the nefarious purposes of prostitution, a wholly laughable crime in Shard’s eyes and one that the police should not be expected to waste valuable time on when there was real danger elsewhere. He let himself into his office and his eyes met stamps: old stamps, new stamps on neatly mapping-penned squared sheets, British, Colonial, Foreign … commemoratives, ordinary issues, Postage Dues, you name it, Shard had it or would get it for you at a price. When a man worked for Hedge, that man, like Hedge himself, had to have cover, and Shard officially was a commercial philatelist. In fact, good cover, papering over a multitude of activities and journeys long and short, and absences from Seddon’s Way that did not have otherwise to be explained to inquisitively-matey fellow-tenants. Shard slammed the door behind him, crossed the room and brought a bottle of Scotch from a wall cupboard. He poured himself a stiff one, shot some soda in, and drank, listening to a rhythmic creak from the room above. The creak gave him bitter ideas about Mrs Micklam: a pity the White Slave trade was so fastidious! If she could be flogged off as an ancillary to the harem of some impecunious Arab who couldn’t afford better … the thought of Arabs jerked his mind back to work, and at that moment, as if in sympathy, the security line burred at him, softly, insidiously. There was no peace anywhere.

  He took up the handset. “Shard.”

  It was Hesseltine. “Blank, blank and blank.”

  “Are you swearing euphemistically, or —”

  “Don’t make silly jokes, Simon. Twickenham, Stalling Busk, the Dormobile — all blank, not a sausage of evidence and no leads visible —”

  “You’ve found the Dormobile?”

  “No. That’s a blank blank — no sign, vanished into the mists. Never fear — we’ll run it to ground somewhere, sometime.”

  “Be fast, sir.”

  “For what it’s worth, we will be.”

  “Terry and Nigel — anything on them?”

  “CRO reports another blank. First names are not much to go on anyway, and we find no link between a Terry and a Nigel.” The voice of Hesseltine paused. “One credit: we have Larger — that is, York police have —”

  “Great!”

  “Don’t celebrate too soon. York says he doesn’t appear likely to cough. Do you want to confront him yourself, or do we leave it up to York?”

  Shard hesitated. “For the moment, sir, York. I may go up later or I may not. What about his premises?”

  A laugh: “Filthy — but clean in a Hedge sense. No evidence. As a matter of fact, he was caught whilst trying to clean the other filth — by burning. He’d been tipped off by phone from Twickenham, of course, but he was just too late.”

  “So York can hold him for a while?”

  “They can. There was enough hard porn, when pulped, to keep the Inland Revenue in forms for half a century. Which leads me to this: York’s being nicely cagey with him. So far, the grill’s along the lines of porn. So far as Larger knows, there’s coincidence around and the police haven’t necessarily latched on to the other in connexion with him. Query: do we leave it that way for the moment, or do we go in for the big stuff? Want to consult Hedge?”

  Shard looked at his wrist-watch. “Hedge, as I happen to know, is currently attending a dinner at the Netherlands Embassy. I’d sooner not disturb him — too many ears and eyes.”

  “Understood, but there’s a need for decision, Simon. Can you — ?”

  “Yes, I can! Hang Hedge. Keep it at porn for now, sir. We may as well tie their minds in such knots as we’re left with.” He cut the call, sat for a moment thinking. He was about to reach out for the telephone to put through another call when he heard the sound from outside, very faint: a mere scratch, a scrape … the scrape, it sounded like, of clothing or a button against woodwork. Grinning tightly, he got to his feet, dead quiet, and moved for the door.

  Nine

  The door, when jerked open, revealed only flight: a somewhat willowy male form, back view, beating it down the stairs, fast. Could be a client of Elsie’s, the lady of the next floor up, but Elsie’s clients didn’t normally pause outside Shard’s door for a button-scratch, nor did they descend quite so precipitously. Anyway, the man had rather more than a head start and Shard knew a chase would be useless. Going to the banisters, he looked down the well of the staircase, keeping in shadow himself: as he had hoped and expected, the running man couldn’t resist an upward glance before vanishing out into Seddon’s Way and its dustbins.

  *

  “One of my interrogators, name of Terry, from York and Stalling Busk,” Shard said next morning.

  “So you were tailed.” Hedge’s voice was disparaging.

  “I have to admit the likelihood. Not from the Twickenham house, though. Anybody who got away from there in time to watch me streak, Hedge, would have been worrying not so much about a tail as making sure I didn’t get the chance to talk.”

  “It doesn’t follow.” Hedge jabbed angrily with his umbrella at a discarded and obscene rubber object: this time, the rendezvous had been St James’s Park. “Really, it’s quite disgusting. As I was saying … there he was — the man! Wasn’t he? Where did he pick you up?”

  Shard said, “I don’t know. I wish I did. I’ve been getting around and it could have been anywhere, pure chance.”

  “They’ll link you with Pearson now, your alias. They’ll know who Pearson was.”

  “No loss. They’d ceased to believe in Pearson anyway! They suspected a cop involvement. And another thing: my philatelic hideout hasn’t got my job blazoned over the doorway. Nothing’s necessarily blown. It’s all grown a shade more confusing for them — that’s all!”

  Hedge wiped his face. “That man. I gather he didn’t try to get you.”

  “No. He listened.”

  Hedge gave him a sharp look, sideways. “What did he hear, Shard?”

  “Better ask him. I’m not his ears.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Shard sighed. “Yes, I do. I was on the blower to Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine —”

  “That man again!”

  “The very same. I doubt if the brilliance of our conversation would have been all that obvious to chummy, though. Except for one thing, which I hate to confess. You’re not going to like this, Hedge.”

  The small mouth had tightened already. “Go on, Shard.”

  “I spoke your name.”

  “Oh God. My name?”

  “Hedge. Just Hedge.”

  Hedge brought out a handkerchief and dabbed at sweat on his forehead. “Jesus Christ. In what connexion?”

  “The Netherlands Embassy. I’m sorry, Hedge.”

  “Sorry!” Hedge looked as though he were about to cry with one side of his pink face, commit murder with the other: it was a curious sight. “Oh, my God. Words fail me. They can work out my name now. Two and two … me, the Netherlands Embassy, last night’s reception, the guest list —”

  “That’s four.”

  “What?”

  Shard waved a hand, dismissingly. “Sorry again, Hedge. Look, it’s not the end of the world. Nothing important’s been blown … oh. Do I apologise a third time?”

  Hedge shook like a high fever. “I sometimes think this job’s beyond you after all, Shard. Yard material — no more.”

  “I’d say that to Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine if I were you.”

  Hedge hissed, spluttered,
scrambled to his feet. “You — you — oh, shut up!” He turned and made off, simmering, legs twinkling along past spring flowers. Shard grinned with a touch of malevolence, hating Hedge for the continuing rift with Beth. Hedge was a bastard … following his progress in high dudgeon along the path, Shard gave a hoot of delighted laughter: Hedge had the french letter dangling from the ferrule of his umbrella.

  *

  Cloak-and-dagger was all very well: Shard acknowledged its uses gratefully on occasions — late last night, after the episode of the listening man, he’d indulged in some himself, making a contact down Stepney way. In his job, you couldn’t avoid it — but Hedge made it into a fetish, cloaking and daggering his way around town, in and out of the FO and the ministries like a pantomime bad man. He was clever enough in the execution of his tricks but Shard thought it all bloody silly half the time. Like this morning: they both knew the score, both knew they would be meeting anyway inside a couple of hours, but Hedge had been pettish on the phone, notwithstanding the security line, and never mind the urgency of the overall situation either. Protocol had to be kept to; Hedge had to be kept privily informed. Hedge graced the Foreign Office, not one of the common departments: in his own estimation, he ranked as a diplomat, and in point of fact he did have the equivalent rank of Minister of Legation. With men like Hedge obtruding into the system, it was a wonder England survived; but, somehow, she did. Maybe it was simply because of the protocol: the downhill progress would have to proceed by precedent and since there wasn’t any the process was precluded from taking place …