Golden Eights

by Nigel Seed

  “Well, I’ll try. But he has been telling me that story since I was a little girl. I think it was the most important event in his life. And the details have never varied, as far as I can recall.”

  “That’s what makes me wonder. He may have told the tale so often that, even if he has forgotten details, the telling and retelling have made it accurate in his mind.”

  “Alright, I’ll give it a whirl. Now, how are you going to entertain me until my train tomorrow?”

  He stepped closer. “I’m sure we can think of something.”

  Chapter 41

  Jim took Helen to Victoria Station to catch the Brighton train. He stood like the forlorn star of an old black and white movie, watching her pass through the ticket barrier and on to the train. She looked back as she stepped aboard and gave him a small wave before disappearing inside the carriage. He turned away and wandered through the milling crowd to the underground station to catch the Circle Line train back to Westminster and his team.

  He arrived in the office in time for the second coffee of the day and called his two men across to the conference area for a catch up. They sat in the red plastic chairs and sipped at the scalding brew before Jim spoke.

  “Our next clue is that there was something up by Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain. But that seems to be all we have. Any ideas?”

  “I’ve got nothing,” said Geordie, slowly shaking his head.

  “Ivan? How about you?”

  “I have a few thoughts. We all know from military training exercises on the plain that it’s mostly rolling grassland with virtually no streams and just a few small woodland areas. Very few villages and those are quite small, so everybody would know everyone else’s business. There are no caves, or rocky outcrops that could conceal one and any digging to make a bunker would probably get seen and commented on. So how about hiding in plain sight?”

  “What are you thinking of?”

  “The Barrows.”

  Geordie looked puzzled. “Wheelbarrows?”

  “No. The burial mounds scattered across the plain. You must remember them. It was a major offense if any military personnel strayed onto one for any reason. They were all surrounded by barbed wire and had warning notices around them. The proper name for them is a Barrow.”

  Jim nodded thoughtfully. “Any idea how old they are?”

  “Last time I was down there one of the guides at the Stonehenge visitors’ center told me there are a number of different types and they can be between 2000 and 4000 years old. Does that help?”

  “It might. The Ordnance Survey has been mapping Britain since some time just after the Jacobite rebellion in the 1700s. By the 1930s they had had detailed maps of the country for years and were keeping them up to date. Now, since the Ordnance Survey belonged to the War Office for most of its life, military areas would be especially well mapped and so the maps for Salisbury Plain should be pretty good.”

  “Sorry, boss. Being a bit slow today. How does that help and what has it got to do with 4000 year old graves?”

  “Aha! Now that’s the good bit. As Ivan said, the Army has always been careful not to damage the barrows so it would need to make sure they were properly marked. So if we compare a map from the late thirties with one from, say, the fifties we might be able to spot any barrows that appear on one and not the other.”

  Geordie blew on his coffee and thought about it for a moment.

  “It can’t be that easy, surely?”

  Ivan smiled. “It’s a start and we don’t have anything else at the moment. Oh and by the way…”

  “What?”

  “Don’t call me Shirley.”

  Geordie groaned at the old joke.

  Within the hour the two soldiers were back with armfuls of maps which they proceeded to spread on the empty desks and tables.

  “That was fast. Where did you get all these?” said Jim.

  “We took a chance that they had a map store in the MoD Main Building down by the river and here we are. We have maps of the area around Stonehenge from 1937, 1946 and 1960.”

  “Right then, grab a coffee and we can make a start. If I take the 1960 maps I can call out the grid reference of each barrow around Stonehenge and you two can tell me if it is on one your maps from the previous years.”

  Geordie and Ivan looked at each other and both sighed.

  “Right you are, boss,” said Ivan, “that sounds like a ruddy slow day ahead of us but I can’t think of a better way with old maps.”

  After three hours of this tedium they had found nothing amiss. The field of red crosses on Jim’s map was growing outwards from Stonehenge covering every barrow they had tried. So far every one on the 1960 map had been there in 1937 and 1946. Thoroughly fed up they took a break for lunch in the staff restaurant. Conversation was desultory. Their lead was taking them nowhere and they had nothing else to go on.

  They walked back to the lift and stood in silence as it carried them up to the fourth floor. They walked past the taxation staff to the narrow staircase up to their overlarge office and stood looking at the field of red crosses on Jim’s map.

  “How far have we got?”

  “We are at least ten miles from Stonehenge in all directions with no anomalies that might be worth following. It can’t be further away than that, can it?”

  Geordie wandered to the large board they had set up at the end of the office. Stuck to the top left hand corner was a copy of the doggerel they had found in the hide on the shores of Morecambe Bay.

  “Can you come and look at this a minute?”

  They walked over and stood next to him looking at the board.

  “What have you seen, Geordie?”

  “Well, if you look at that rhyme it tells us where the hides are, or at least it fits for the two we have found, right?”

  “Right, so what’s your point?”

  “Look again, boss, it doesn’t say anything about barrows or ancient burials.”

  Ivan and Jim looked at the rhyme.

  In a Barn by the Bonniest Bay

  We hide our treasure away

  Near the deepest Hole

  We live by the Bowl

  By the Standing Stones

  Where there are no Bones

  Another Cave no?

  Where the rich folk go

  “That’s true but it doesn’t say anything about anything else, either.”

  “Boss, you said something about hiding in plain sight and you also said you could not dig on the open plain without some nosey beggar seeing you, right?”

  “Right, but where are you going?”

  “Did either of you ever watch the film Raise the Titanic?”

  “A long time ago, yes, but what are you talking about?”

  “I watched it over the weekend while Sam was rehearsing. She has a hell of a lot of films on disc. Anyway, do you remember the quote ‘Thank God for Southby’?”

  “Vaguely, but I still don’t see it. What about you, Ivan?”

  Ivan smiled. “I think he might have something, boss. There was some stuff they wanted to hide and instead of taking it on the Titanic they buried it in a grave in a country churchyard.”

  “That’s it, boss. Where can you dig a hole that will not attract attention? A graveyard. Especially in war time when there might be more customers.”

  “Back to the maps gents. Find me a graveyard.”

  Chapter 42

  As they climbed out of the car the rain sliced horizontally across the plain in a way familiar to generations of British soldiers who had slogged across it time and again. The flat, gently rolling plain offered no resistance to a cold wind from the northeast and the rain reduced visibility as they looked around.

  “Oh yes. I remember this place alright. Baking hot in the summer and like this the rest of the year. Except, of course, when it gets really cold and your sleeping bag freezes to the ground.”

  “Never mind, Geordie, you have all this to look forward to when you get back to the Army properly.” Jim said,
raising the collar of his Barbour jacket and retrieving the cap from his pocket. “Alright, it’s your theory so where do we start to look?”

  The three of them looked around the grey stones of the cemetery. Here and there they saw slightly bigger tombs, but the majority were just head markers, many with the inscription faded by the years of harsh weather.

  “My vote is to find a nice warm vicarage and to ask the vicar if we can see his parish records,” said Ivan. “We might even score a nice cup of tea and a few chocolate biscuits.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me. Geordie, lead the way. That building behind you looks like a vicarage.”

  They trudged through the grave markers along neatly trimmed gravel paths. The stones might be sacred to the memory of any number of once loved people, but now they just looked sad, wet, and cold. As they approached the vicarage, the door swung open and the round smiling face of a country woman appeared.

  “It must be someone very close for you to come on a day like this, my dears?”

  “Good morning, ma’am. I’m Major Jim Wilson and I wonder if we could speak to the vicar?”

  “You just did, I’m Sarah Mansfield, vicar of this parish. Come you in out of the rain and let me close the door before the dog gets out.”

  The old Labrador behind her wagged its tail gently, but showed no sign of wanting to quit its place by the fire for the joys of running around in the storm. It watched as the three men came in and shrugged out of their coats.

  “Come in and warm yourself,” said the vicar, “the kettle has just boiled so there’s tea if you would like some and I should be able to find some biscuits for you.”

  Jim introduced the other two. Ivan smiled broadly and lowered himself into the overstuffed armchair to one side of the fireplace. He leaned forward and tickled the old dog behind the ear.

  “If you have any chocolate biscuits I may have to consider converting away from the chapel.”

  “Oh don’t do that, they need a big broad chest like yours for those amazing choirs. The choccy biscuits come free, if only to stop me eating them and putting on even more weight.”

  She bustled away into the kitchen and the three men looked around the neat sitting room with its pictures of local scenes on the wall and family photographs on the sideboard. Over the fireplace hung a larger photograph of a handsome, young man in army dress uniform. Geordie got up to have a closer look and was surprised when the dog growled at him.

  “Don’t mind Corby,” said the vicar as she entered the room carrying her tray of tea and biscuits. “He was my son’s dog and he doesn’t like people going near that picture. Strange really, you don’t expect a dog to understand what a picture is, do you?”

  She set the tray down and looked up at the young man above the fireplace.

  “He was so proud of that uniform. He had wanted to be a soldier all his life. I thought going away from here to university might change that, but it never did.”

  “Where is he now?” asked Jim.

  “Outside with the rest of the family. They brought him home from Afghanistan in a sealed coffin. It was one of those roadside bombs. Some of his troop came to see me after their tour of duty. They tell me he never knew what hit him, so he didn’t suffer. I think they thought that might be some comfort. Nice of them to try.” She sniffed a little, then turned to Ivan with the plate in her hand. “Your chocolate biscuits, we don’t want to let them go to waste.”

  The vicar sat in the armchair on the opposite side of the fireplace to Ivan and picked up a biscuit.

  “Now then, how can I help you gentlemen?”

  “Well ma’am we would really like to get a look at some of your old parish records. The ones from 1940, to be specific.”

  “And why would you want those, Major?”

  “This is going to sound churlish, so I apologize up front, but I would rather not tell you.”

  The vicar sat back in her chair and steepled her fingers in front of her face. “So why would I let you rummage through my parish registers if you won’t tell me why?”

  Geordie sat forward. “Ma’am, before Corby decided not to like me, I was looking at your son’s photograph. I noticed from his collar badges he was a Royal Engineer.”

  “And?”

  “And because we are all Royal Engineers too, I thought you might just trust us. The boss here would tell you if he could, but it really might be very important and it is a secret that we have to protect.”

  Jim leaned forward. “Unless of course the word ‘Cromwell’ means something significant to you?”

  “The only significant Cromwell I know is the Lord Protector from the 1600s. I take it that is not who you mean?”

  “No ma’am, ‘Cromwell’ is a sort of password for something we are searching for and if it doesn’t mean anything to you, with regret, I really can’t say any more.”

  The vicar contemplated the three of them for a long minute of silence. She looked across at Ivan who was tickling Corby behind the ears again.

  “Corby seems to have taken to you, Ivan, and he is generally a good judge of character. Finish your tea and follow me to the study. All the parish records are in there, we should be able to find the 1940 volume without much difficulty.”

  They gulped down the last of their tea and followed the vicar along the wood panelled passage to the study, the old wooden floors creaking beneath their feet. She led them into the room with a desk to one side and packed bookshelves on three walls. The fourth wall had a large bay window looking out onto the cemetery and the church beyond. The vicar stood, in the bay, looking out into the rain as they gazed around them.

  “My son and his father, plus all the rest of the family are just here outside the window. I sometimes practice my sermons for them when searching for the right phrase. On a dry day Corby goes and lies out there to be near his old master. It’s nice to see them together again.”

  She turned from the window with watery eyes and walked to one of the bookshelves lined with blue books. She ran her finger along it until she reached the halfway point.

  “Here you are. The Register of Births, Marriages and Deaths for this parish in 1940.” She pulled the large heavy book off the shelf and handed it to Ivan. “I hope you find what you’re looking for. I’ll have our lunch ready at about one o’clock if that suits you? If you need any help with the entries just give me a call.”

  She left the room and Ivan went to the window. The grey stone of the head markers contrasted with the white stone of the military marker for her son. The badge of the Royal Engineers was clearly marked with his name, rank and serial number, plus the date and location of his death. He sighed and turned back into the room, there were way too many of those headstones nowadays.

  Jim was leafing through the pages that were yellowed with age. The carefully inscribed information was still clear.

  “Seems to me, gents, that we need to find any recorded deaths after the gold was picked up, for about three or four months. We then need to see if they exist in the register of births or marriages. If they have a history here they are almost certainly genuine and of no real interest to us.”

  He turned to the relevant pages and they found that there had been only five burials during the target time. Birthdates were recorded in one of the columns so it was the work of only a few minutes to check the Marriage Register for the relevant years to eliminate each of the five in turn. Having drawn a blank, they carefully placed the registers in the right order on the bookshelves.

  “Well, it seems we are going out in the rain again. I suppose it was too much to hope that we would stumble across something on the first try. We’d better make a move to our next cemetery.”

  “Hang on, boss. I don’t know what the vicar has planned for lunch, but it smells wonderful and it would be rude to leave after we have been invited, eh?”

  “Fair enough, Ivan. I suppose you are due a home cooked meal, but no hanging about afterwards, even if you get offered more biscuits.”

  “Would
I do a thing like that? I’m hurt you would even think it of me.”

  Chapter 43

  They pulled into the entrance of the next cemetery on their list and were looking at the dreary headstones and sodden grass through the misty car windows when Geordie’s phone rang. He stepped out of the car to take the call. He climbed back in again to the back seat moments later and leaned between the two front seats.

  “Fancy a break from graveyards in the rain?”

  “I wouldn’t mind if you have a better offer. What’s up?”

  “That was Sam on the phone. Her granddad wants to speak to you, but he won’t tell her what about. I guess they really bought into the security training back in the day.”

  “Can we phone him?”

  “We could, but he only lives in Salisbury. That’s about a twenty minute drive from here and if we time it right, we should be in time for afternoon tea.”

  “That should suit you, Ivan.”

  Ivan nodded slightly. “But I think I would prefer my tea next to that big fire in the vicarage if I was to have a choice.”

  “I think we bothered the vicar quite enough last time. Let’s go and see granddad. Do you know where he lives, Geordie?”

  “Not far from the hotel we are booked into for tonight. So we could drop the car off and walk round if you wanted.”

  “Let’s see what the weather is like when we get there before we decide.”

  Ivan put the car in gear and turned out of the graveyard heading for the road to Salisbury. The journey took more than the promised twenty minutes with the rain sluicing down the windscreen faster than the wipers could deal with it. The streets were quiet as they drove into the city, with few cars venturing out and even fewer pedestrians braving the downpour.

  “There’s a really good curry house just up here on the left,” said Geordie, “if anybody fancies it. I make a point of coming here every time I get a break from an exercise on the plain.”