Shard at Bay
Philip McCutchan
© Philip McCutchan, 1985
Philip McCutchan has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 1985 by Hodder and Stoughton Ltd.
This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.
Table of Contents
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1
Hedge had been annoyed when Tayside Police had thundered on his door in the exclusive Atholl Palace Hotel in Pitlochry. Thundered was his word, not theirs: they thought they were being discreet. They knew the importance of Hedge; it was because of his standing in the Foreign Office that plain clothes men had been sent to convey the message that couldn’t come by the open telephone line.
“Mr Hedge?” one of them, a chunky man with big ears, said interrogatively.
“Yes, yes, why on earth —”
“May we come in, sir?” A card was palmed: Hedge studied it. CID, and the speaker appeared to be Detective Sergeant MacCrimmon.
“It’s very early,” Hedge said, sounding petulant.
“But a fine, grand morning,” MacCrimmon said. It wasn’t early for the police. “The matter’s urgent, sir. May we come in, please?”
“Oh, very well.” Hedge stood aside. MacCrimmon went in like a great bear. His companion was introduced as Detective Constable Campbell. He looked what he was: very new to the CID, and uncertain of himself in a posh suite. “Well?” Hedge asked peremptorily, tightening the cord of his orange silk dressing-gown. “What’s this all about?”
MacCrimmon told him. “A message to Perth HQ, sir. From London, the Foreign Office.”
“Ah. From whom in particular?”
“The Permanent Under-Secretary of State, sir.”
“I see.” Hedge almost genuflected. His own immediate boss, the Head of Security, was a mere second-grade God. He felt honoured and managed to look gratified.
“The message, sir, is short. You’re required at Faslane on the Gareloch. The Clyde submarine base —”
“Yes, yes, I’m aware of what it is. Why?”
MacCrimmon shrugged. “I don’t know. You just are, sir.”
Hedge gave him a quick look: impertinence, or not? It was unlikely, considering Hedge’s rank. Just Scottish. Scots were a dour lot, often uncouth. MacCrimmon went on, “We have a car. It’s at your disposal, Mr Hedge.”
“Thank you, but no. I have my own and I’ve no intention of leaving it behind. Vandals, you know.” Hedge noted that Detective Constable Campbell appeared to be stifling an involuntary laugh; it was perhaps unusual to speak of vandals entering the grounds of the Atholl Palace but Hedge never took chances if he could avoid them and policemen of all people should know that complacency was wrong, was irresponsible. Hedge had never thought much of the police; an arrogant lot on the whole, not what they had been in his younger days, touching their helmets to their superiors. Hedge was old enough to remember pre-war days, staying with his grandparents in the country where there had been a solid, bicycle-mounted village bobby, slow, ponderous and respectful. When the young Hedge and Betts had met in the village street where Hedge’s grandfather was the squire, a JP and a Deputy Lieutenant, it had been a case of touched helmets and “Good morning, Master Cyril,” to which Hedge’s response had been “Good morning, Betts.” Nicer days; but Hedge was forced back to the present by Detective Sergeant MacCrimmon.
“Take you two, two-and-half hours, Mr Hedge. Twisty roads after Dunkeld. Know the route, do you?”
“Vaguely.”
“I’ll route you,” MacCrimmon said, producing a folded road map.
*
“Stuffed shirt,” Campbell said as they drove away from the Atholl Palace.
“Sassenach.”
“Aye, that’s true, Sarge. All the same, are Sassenachs. Think they’re something special.” Campbell ruminated as they took the M9 south. “Vandals, in the Atholl Palace!”
MacCrimmon nodded and grinned tightly. “Nevertheless, don’t laugh next time, Detective Constable Campbell. They don’t like it. And we have a job we’re reasonably well paid to do … I’d like us to keep it. Mr Hedge ranks as a VIP and he’s said to be a bastard — I told you that, did I not?”
“Sorry, Sarge.”
“Another thing: the job he does is dangerous … God knows what he might catch from the peace women around Faslane!” Campbell glanced sideways. “That a joke, Sarge?”
“Not entirely.”
*
Irritation rather than danger was on the mind of Hedge as he followed MacCrimmon’s route by the A822 from Dunkeld to Kinloch, Amulree and Corrymuckloch to Crieff where he picked up the A85 past Loch Earn and then turned right through Glen Ogle for Glen Dochart and Crianlarich. Never mind that Crianlarich consisted merely of a railway station and siding plus a hotel and a handful of nondescript houses: almost every road in Scotland carried a sign for Crianlarich. A few more miles beyond and Hedge was coming down to the head of Loch Lomond. As that policeman had said, it was a fine morning and the glimpses of Loch Lomond between the trees were certainly beautiful, though they scarcely compensated for an early start after a rushed breakfast and the thought that he might now have to spend longer in Scotland, a country he had visited only by order of the Head of Security (now down with shingles, which could be why the Permanent Under-Secretary himself had sent the message. Security was security and the Head had always had direct access to the top.) In being sent to Scotland Hedge had felt side-tracked: the Head had dreamed up an anxiety concerning the security of the Loch Faskally dam, a vital part, of course, of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric scheme. All sorts of people, the Head had said, could do diabolical things to it — blow it up, poison the waters … probably he had been already sickening for the shingles. Hedge had argued his corner without success: he’d been ordered north and the Secretary of State for Scotland, whose pigeon it surely was, had not even been informed. Now, being already in Scotland, Hedge was being made use of.
He arrived at Tarbet angrily, his mind switching back to policemen. His own senior policeman, Detective Chief Superintendent Shard on secondment from the Yard, was a case in point. Argumentative, stood by his own point of view and seemed to regard the Foreign Office as peopled largely by dunderheads and geriatrics. Shard … he should have done the Loch Faskally job! Hedge didn’t at all like being used as a field man. He preferred the plushness of his office suite and the handiness of his secretary and staff. Damn Shard, who’d been in Wales rather conveniently, liaising with Cardiff police over a man, a foreigner of course, who’d disembarked from a ship in the docks … Hedge turned right for Arrochar, whence he took the road down Loch Long for Garelochhead and, some five twisting miles beyond, after passing a number of what looked like oil storage tanks and a fuelling pier, picked up the right-hand turn for HMS Neptune, the Clyde submarine base on the Gareloch where lived, when not on patrol, the great nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed underwater fleet, NATO’s last hope. Just beyond the turn he saw the caravans and the slogans: SEND BACK THE MISSILES. WOMEN FOR PEACE. MAKE LOVE NOT WAR, how stupid and dated! YANKS OUT and all the rest. Hedge’s lip curled. Vermin. The caravans were filthy: Hedge fancied he caught the stench swirling in through the car’s windows. Sick-looking, apathetic children who ought to have been taken into care by the local council, knickers waving from a makeshift clothes-line, stink of cooking oil lik
e a hamburger stall, a woman squatting unashamedly behind a thin tree that gave no cover at all, toilet paper blowing about and a long-haired so-called man stark naked in a caravan doorway — it was summer and the weather was mild — smoking what was probably a reefer.
It made one quite ill.
Thankfully, Hedge turned down for the base, approached the gates and was stopped by a policeman and a policewoman, a pretty girl, and young. Hedge liked young girls, and the look on his face, as she asked for identification, was almost a smirk.
“Hedge of the Foreign Office.” It sounded important, given added weight by Hedge’s pompous voice and never mind the smirk; but all the WPC saw was a fattish man, soft white hands on the steering wheel, a man not far off being elderly, balding, jowly, and puffy round the eyes. She said, “Your identification, please, sir.”
“I’ve already said.”
She was patient: very often the old didn’t take it in first time. “An identity card …”
The smirk vanished. “I never carry one. You should know that, young woman. Surely you’ve been warned?”
The policeman was coming up, the male one. There was a conference, and a sergeant was called out from a sort of guard room, outside which stood a naval rating on sentry duty, with a gun. They had not been warned; Hedge was shunted into a recess beside the guard room, looking daggers.
“I’ve never been treated like this before. I shall report this to the Commodore of the base. I’m being waited for, I suppose you realise?”
“We’re ringing through —”
“It’s scandalous. Absolutely scandalous! Utter inefficiency and I shall say so in the proper quarter.”
“I’m sorry, sir. Security is —”
“I know all about that, thank you.” Hedge, red-faced, sat stiffly holding his steering-wheel. The WPC went away, rudely Hedge thought. The naval rating watched Hedge, holding his weapon in a more pointed manner in case a spy made a dash for it. The girl was speaking again to the male policeman; Hedge believed he had worried them, and serve them right. Later, they could stew in the juice of a reprimand. In a low voice the WPC was saying, “He doesn’t look all that high powered, Alec.”
“Daft old bastard. All the same, if he’s genuine we should have been told.”
Within half a minute they were and Hedge got a salute and an apology, plus directions as to how to find the Commanding Officer, Commodore Rushcroft. Hedge drove into the base proper, fuming. There was a good deal of activity, a number of busy people, naval personnel plus civilians, and an obvious police presence — Ministry of Defence police patrolling alertly, no doubt as much because of the peace women as because of possible spies or saboteurs. Hedge had never been very impressed with military or naval security — certainly as regards the military there was virtually none: any fool could, get into a barracks and plant bombs and such, the whole thing was wide open. And take Portsmouth: you were supposed to be watched and convoyed when, for instance, you visited the Victory as a tourist, but in fact, once in, the dockyard was wide open to those of ill-intent.
However, it was different here at Faslane. They were taking security seriously and Hedge was relieved to note it. He decided not, after all, to make too much of the attitude of the police on the gate. If he did he could be made to look a fool, since he of all people should be applauding conscientiousness. He would, however, make a strong complaint about his arrival not being notified to the main gate. Really, he should have been met by a senior officer.
*
Rushcroft, who held the appointment of Commodore Clyde, was a small man, thin and bird-like and very sharp in speech, manner and intelligence. He seemed to be summing Hedge up, which Hedge disliked. Hedge had stated his complaint but had received no apology. Rushcroft had waved a hand airily and said, “We’re busy, you know. Busy. Important matters.” That was all.
“But surely —”
“Yes.” Commodore Rushcroft had something in that sharp manner that said he didn’t like civilians, of which there was already another present, a mousy man from the Defence Ministry whom Hedge knew of as a confounded nuisance and didn’t like. He didn’t expect this man to contribute much to the proceedings and he was proved right. The little wretch always reserved his comments for his own bosses. Hedge was introduced without further delay to a vice-admiral — Flag Officer Submarines, who had come up from Fort Blockhouse, the Portsmouth submarine base; and to an American captain named Rubinovitch, who came from the Poseidon base on the Holy Loch and in response to Hedge’s muttered how-d’you-do, said, “Hi.” He was a shambling man and wore gold-rimmed spectacles perched on a broad nose. He was big, bigger even than Detective-Sergeant MacCrimmon, and looked too gross to fit down a submarine’s conning-tower hatch. The introductions made, Rushcroft lost no time in coming to the point.
“There was a penetration during the night, Mr Hedge. I’ve already informed the admiral and Captain Rubinovitch.”
Rubinovitch said, “Sure have,” and looked through his spectacles, enquiringly, at Hedge.
Hedge asked, “Of the base, do you mean?”
“What else?”
“The peace women?” Hedge asked gropingly.
“The intruder was male, and not peaceful. He was armed, and he was shot by a security guard.”
“Oh dear.” Hedge sucked in his cheeks and sat down with a thump: there would be trouble about this. There had been that continuing fuss about the Greenham missile base, the awful possibility that someone might get shot by an American. It was good that it wasn’t a peace woman but it was serious enough even so. “Badly?” Hedge asked.
“Dead.”
Hedge gasped. “Goodness gracious me!”
“I’m not asking for veiled comment, Mr Hedge. I am informing you, that’s all. The thing’s done. Of course, I’d have wished it otherwise — questioning might have been useful had he lived. However, I lay no blame on the man who shot him. That’s what security guards are for. The man did his duty.” Hedge was still gasping. “Has this been released?”
“Certainly not. And won’t be — from this base at all events. In the wider sense, it’s up to the Ministry. And you, I gather.”
“Yes, yes.” Hedge had his handkerchief out and was mopping a sweating face. “I agree with you. The press should be held off, at least until I’ve had a chance to consult with — with my Under-Secretary —”
“Pippin.”
Hedge stared. “What?”
“Pippin.”
“Ah, yes. But in the Foreign Office we don’t call Sir Edmund that. You know him?”
“At Dartmouth with his younger brother.”
Hedge cleared his throat, feeling on unsafe ground. Sir Edmund was known as a capricious man, and now it seemed that Rushcroft had a direct line to him. Rushcroft, however, was not plugging it — yet. He went on, “A thorough search was made of the body but there’s no identification. You’d better take a look at it — what?”
“There’s just a chance —”
“That you might have come across him, have him on file — slim, but can’t be neglected. He’s on ice.”
“Yes, I see. Tell me, how did he get in?”
“Swam,” Rushcroft said. He walked to a window, beckoning Hedge to join him. He pointed across the Gareloch, across placid blue water, almost the blue of the Mediterranean. A heat haze hung over it, but the farther shore was clear enough. Rushcroft said, “Weak point — the road that runs down the other side of the loch, from Garelochhead to Clynder, Rosneath, Kilcreggan. We’re wide open, for one thing, to tourists’ cameras — every Tom, Dick and Harry’s equipped like a film cameraman these days. I’ve no doubt there’s many a blown-up shot of us in the Kremlin.”
“And a swimmer …”
“It’s not all that far. A mile. Of course, he could have gone over from a boat — we don’t know. Anyway, he was wearing a wet suit. And he was wet.”
“He wasn’t seen to — to emerge?”
Rushcroft scowled. “Black mark and I accept it.
No, he wasn’t. But I don’t think it was long before he was spotted or he would have dried out more than he was — the wet suit I mean.”
“There was an exchange of fire?”
“Yes.”
“And the peace women?”
Rushcroft glanced at the Vice-Admiral, then away again. He said shortly, “They began howling. That’s how I’d describe it. Like a lot of banshees — horrible.”
“But they’ve not reacted, apart from that?”
Rushcroft said, “They besieged the gates within minutes of the howling. Both gates. They went on howling, yelling obscenities. The guard was called out … and they dispersed soon after dawn. They could be back.”
“Do you see a connexion, Commodore? I mean, could they have thought one of their number —”
“I can’t say what they thought, they just heard shots and made the most of it. As I said, I’m definite the man was not from the peace camp —”
“Those women!” Hedge said viciously. “Quite appalling, so unfeminine. We should build concentration camps.”
2
Hedge was taken to see the body; Rushcroft went with him, Captain Rubinovitch and the Vice-Admiral remaining behind. Hedge was ruffled: most surprisingly in his view, the remark about concentration camps hadn’t gone down very well with the Vice-Admiral, who held no brief for the peace women but did stress their right to a point of view, their right to express it however confounded a nuisance they might be in the process. They as well as everyone else had to live in Britain. All that had taken the wind from Hedge’s sails. Deflated, he had made vague noises of a non-committal nature until he had been rescued by Commodore Rushcroft, who produced from a drawer in his desk a square of plastic about three millimetres thick with a couple of screw-holes bored through it.
“Found by the body,” he said, handing it to Hedge.
There was black lettering on white. Hedge gaped at it. It read:
Detachment
Ex
Against
Shard at Bay Page 1