She pushed him away. ‘You are leaving me, aren’t you?’
‘No, I’m not, but I want you and the kids to go and stay with Mum in Spain.’
‘What?’
‘Don’t start with the “what” again, you heard me. Get the kids out of school. I’ve arranged for you and them to go and stay with Mum.’
Again Mike put his arms round her and she fought against him but he wouldn’t let her go. She broke down and started to cry.
‘Don’t, please don’t. You got to trust me, Sue, you have to. It’s for all of us. I’m going to get a job, I mean it, but I’ll just need a bit of time before I can join you in Spain. I swear on my life, I’m not lying. I love you and I love my kids.’
Dolly stood ten yards down the road from Mike’s house. She could hear every word they said and when she heard Susan agree to go to Spain, sobbing her heart out, she removed the small earpiece and slipped it into her pocket. She reckoned she could trust Mike but he had still not got her the Semtex. The conversation he’d had with his wife and his having left the police were good, and he had already implied that he would be willing to be more than just blackmailed into helping her. Now she had him exactly where she wanted him – and she needed him. Dolly had calculated that without him there weren’t enough of them to do it, but until he brought the explosives, she would not be a hundred per cent sure. Cautious as ever, she was not allowing herself to move ahead until she had had a further discussion with Mike as to exactly what part he would be prepared to play.
Dolly was in a very good mood at dinner that evening. She opened a bottle of cheap wine and they all accepted a glass. She made no mention of Mike or her visit to London. It was obvious something had gone down because of Dolly’s good mood, but it didn’t spread to them. Instead it bothered them.
Angela served the dinner, the children having eaten earlier, and after the meal Dolly went up to read them a story. The little girls had become much more open and smiled freely now. In fact their presence made the entire house more relaxed. No one ever spoke about their plans in front of them and, apart from Ester, the women had become genuinely fond of them, especially Angela, whom little Sheena doted on. They had new frocks and shoes and socks, a big room full of toys and they began to use the word ‘home’ for the manor. Having so many rooms to run free and play in, and so many adults caring and making sure they were happy, had had the desired effect: the little girls were happy and loved.
Angela peeped in to see Dolly tucking them up. Sheena had so many teddy bears lined up there was hardly room in the bed for her. ‘I got everything you told me to get so I’ll be in my room if you want me,’ Angela whispered.
Dolly turned off the nightlight – the girls were no longer afraid to sleep in the dark – and went into Angela’s room. She sat on the neatly made bed and checked all the passports. It touched her to know she really was their legal guardian.
Angela pointed to hers. ‘Me photo’s terrible. I look like I’m scared stiff.’
Dolly put them back into the envelope. ‘I’ll keep these safe, love, and not a word to anyone or they’ll all want to come on holiday with us.’
‘If anything happens to me, Angela, I want you to promise me you’ll take care of the girls. There’ll be money provided for you, I’ll see to that.’
Angela slipped her arms around Dolly. ‘Have you forgiven me?’
Dolly seemed to cringe from her embrace and Angela quickly released her. ‘Just go about your business here, love. Don’t ask me to say things I don’t mean. You’ll know when I’ve forgiven you. I need you to make up for a lot of trust you destroyed. That’s hard to forgive.’ She opened the bedroom door. ‘Put your TV on, there’s a good film. Don’t come downstairs. I’ll see to the dishes. Goodnight, love.’
Angela had never known anyone like Dolly before: she seemed so lonely and yet there was something about her that made you frightened of trying to get through that barrier, as if it would break a dam of feelings that she covered so well. And Angela began to understand how she had hurt Dolly, hurt her more than she could have imagined, because she had shown Angela a genuine affection not shown to any of the other women. She was glad they would be going away together and she would in no way jeopardize that by telling any of the others about the proposed holiday and the passports.
In turn, Dolly had kept the robbery plans secret from Angela. Forever looking ahead and pre-planning, she was already preparing for the time when she had the money and would leave England with Kathleen’s kids. It would be a long holiday, maybe Geneva or some other place in luxury, and the less Angela knew about what was going on the better. Dolly might be unforgiving but Angela was useful, and she could not help liking her, as she had from the beginning. But as well as being useful for taking care of the kids and keeping them out of the way, Angela was a good cover, and a useful weapon against Mike, should she need it.
Ester was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. ‘You’d better come in and listen to this. It’s got us all anxious.’
Dolly switched on the speaker so that they could all hear the tapes from the signal box. There was a series of phone calls from the station master to Jim. The mail train was never mentioned but something referred to as the ‘special’, due the following Thursday, was being rescheduled due to a fault with the engine. The ‘special’ would not be arriving as prearranged but at a later time and, as Jim’s second already had a previous arrangement, the station master wanted to know if Jim could do the late shift. Jim was heard to moan about his hours on and off duty, and then came the big worrying line.
‘Well, we won’t have this bloody problem for much longer. After Thursday it’ll be rerouted to another station, thank Christ.’
‘So what time is it due?’
‘Be late, Jim. Around midnight.’
Dolly replayed the last line a few times and then switched off the machine. ‘Shit. I hope that’s not what I think it is.’
Ester’s hands were on her hips. ‘You hope? Jesus Christ, what do you think we all feel? If next Thursday is the last mail train through here we’re fucked.’
Dolly was waiting for Mike at the end of the lane, sitting in the Mini estate, smoking. She saw his headlights flash once, twice, as he drew up and parked a few yards ahead of her.
The women were tired of discussing the taped phone call from the signal box. They sat wondering why Dolly had suddenly upped and left them at eleven o’clock without a word to a single one of them.
‘I’m getting sick of this,’ Ester said.
Julia yawned and stretched her arms above her head. ‘Well, she’s a secretive cow, and we all know it, but maybe it’s a good thing. We’ll never be ready by Thursday, so my guess is it’s all off and the question is what do we do next?’
‘Oh, shut up.’ Ester turned on Julia, who laughed. ‘It’s not funny, we’ve been working our butts off and for what?’
Gloria looked at her chipped nails, felt the rough skin on her hands from the horse’s reins. ‘I don’t believe it, after all we done.’
Connie pursed her lips. ‘I never believed it anyway. I mean, I’ve gone along with it, like everyone, but in my heart I never really believed we’d do it. Did you? Honestly?’
Ester glared at her. ‘For forty million quid, sweetheart, I was more than fucking thinking of it.’
‘I’m just repeating what Colin said, Mrs Rawlins. That next Thursday he’s got to be on duty so he couldn’t make dinner with me, something about having problems with the engine, so instead of being back in London he was having to do a late-night drop. He never said the time.’
‘Midnight,’ Dolly said softly and Mike stared. Dolly rolled down the window. ‘Did he say it would be the last train coming this way? Anything about rerouting it?’
Mike bit his lip, shaking his head. He then leaned over to the back seat. ‘You won’t need this, then, will you?’ He unzipped the bag. ‘Mate from Aldershot, owed me a favour.’
Dolly looked into the bag and then into his face.
‘You fancy a walk, do you? Maybe a nice quiet row across the lake? Show you where I plan to blow up the train.’
Mike thought she must be joking, but she wasn’t. He felt his bladder about to explode but he nodded and she sat back.
‘Drive to the end of the lane, we’ll walk via the woods.’
Mike explained in detail how dangerous Semtex was and gave her a diagram as to how it should be used. Dolly listened attentively, making Mike repeat himself a few times, then quietly talked herself through the procedures. He stressed over and over again that only a small amount was needed.
They walked on in silence until they came to the lakeside and gazed into the black water.
‘You’ll need money now you got no job. I might be able to get a few grand to you.’
Dolly stood still as he slowly turned to face her. ‘Can I ask you, and I want the truth, Mrs Rawlins, did you have anything to do with that diamond robbery? Did you set it up?’
She looked into his eyes and lied. ‘No, love, it was nothing to do with me. I admit I was after the diamonds but, then, who wouldn’t have been? Even your mother was after them. It was nothing to do with me.’ Mike kept staring into her face and she held his gaze. ‘I never would have put Shirley at risk. I know I’ve said things to you in the past and said things about her I shouldn’t have but, believe me, I never knew she was on that raid. It was all down to my husband. It was Harry’s doing. You think I’d have let her take the risks?’
Mike shrugged. ‘Just from what you said before, it sounded like you set it up.’
‘No, love, it was my husband. All I ever done was kill him. But that was a personal matter.’ She could feel him hesitating, and she gestured to the bridge. ‘You know how much is on that train, love, don’t you? Now do you want just a few grand in your pocket or a couple of million? Take those kids and that pretty wife of yours to live in Spain. Sunshine, sea and sand, good for kids.’
He was half in shadow, his face caught in the moonlight. ‘What would I have to do?’
It was after two o’clock in the morning when Dolly eventually got home. She opened the front door quietly and didn’t switch on the lights, but they were not asleep and, slowly, in their dressing gowns, they all appeared on the stairs and landing.
Dolly took off her coat and hung it up, picked up the kit-bag Mike had given her and walked over to the bottom stair. She leaned on the newel post.
‘We do it Thursday. In some ways it’s probably better for all of us so late at night. If they change the route then it’ll be our only chance.’
Not one of them said a word, but Dolly could feel their fear rising. She spoke softly and yet they were so silent they could hear every word clearly. ‘We’ve got two days.’ She looked at the frightened faces, one by one. ‘Now we’ll see who’s got the bottle. Are you up for it?’
Ester was the first to say yes, the others took their time but one by one they hesitantly agreed.
‘Good.’ Dolly said it like a school-teacher and then smiled. ‘Goodnight, then.’
No one could sleep that night as it dawned on them that The Job was for real and they had only two days to go. Toilets could be heard flushing throughout the night as their nerves hit their bladders. Only Dolly’s room remained silent and dark as she slept a deep, dreamless sleep, knowing the last piece of the jigsaw was in place. Her only worry was that it might have come too late.
Angela dished up breakfast, aware of the uneasy silence round the table. She put it down to them having argued or something, but none of them felt like talking or finished their eggs and bacon apart from Dolly. She had cut up soldiers for the little girls to dip in their eggs and reprimanded Sheena for using her sleeve instead of the napkin to wipe her mouth. The others could hardly wait for the children and Angela to go on their morning ramble, eager to be left alone to discuss the robbery, but Dolly seemed more intent on making sure they had on their wellington boots, thick scarves round their necks and hats before she waved them out of the back door.
As it closed, they all started talking at once, asking one question after another, but Dolly moved past them and into the hall. ‘I need Gloria and Connie this morning.’
Ester threw down a half-eaten piece of toast. ‘That’s it? Don’t you think we should fucking talk about this?’
Dolly returned and stood, granite-faced, in the doorway. ‘We’ve talked, Ester, and we’ve been talking for months. If I still have to talk any one of you round then it’s off. You know what is to be done, each of you. Now we have to finalize the last stages.’
‘That’s what I want to frigging talk about,’ shouted Ester.
‘No, love. You’ve got your jobs. The last part is to do with Connie and Gloria, nothing to do with you. When that’s done, we’ll have a meet later this afternoon after the ride.’ Dolly left the room.
Ester glowered at Julia. ‘Christ, I’d like to throttle her.’
‘Feeling’s mutual,’ came the reply from Dolly in the hall.
Gloria looked at the sports bag as Dolly unzipped it. ‘Now, I’ve got the instructions written down. You need very little and the most important thing is to know the exact place where it’s got to go. You’ll have to have it in place on the bridge and …’
Connie felt her knees go and she slumped on the sofa. Her mouth was dry. ‘I think it’s just the time of the month. I come over a bit faint.’
Gloria paid her no attention. She was studying the diagrams and then the sports bag. ‘I never handled nothin’ like this you know, Dolly.’
‘Well, you’ll have to practise, so start doing it.’ Gloria goggled. ‘Where do I do it, for chrissakes?’ Dolly wafted her hands. ‘We got enough acres, Gloria. Just go outside and start practising. But remember you need only a small amount. It’s all written down there.’
‘Who gave you this?’ Gloria asked.
‘Mind your own business.’
‘Well, it is my fucking business because we’re dependent on him or her knowing what they’re doing for starters. I’m not playing with Lego here, you know. This is high explosives.’
Connie had tried to stand up but then fell back again. If she’d felt faint before, now she virtually passed out.
Dolly felt her head. ‘You’re not runnin’ a temperature, are you?’
Gloria picked up the bag and looked at Connie. ‘I know what it is. It’s called shittin’ yourself with nerves. You watch her, Doll, she’s a liability.’
Connie struggled up. ‘I’m not, you leave me alone, it’s my period, I always feel like this.’
Dolly gestured for Connie to join her. She had a small, high-voltage generator on the floor. ‘Right, love. You get this over to the little landing-stage on the lake. I’ll get one of the others to carry it with you and then we got to get the light fixed up and hidden.’
Connie’s legs went again and her face was ashen. ‘But do you think it’s a good i-i-idea for us to be lit up? Anyone will be able to see it for miles around and—’
‘We’re not gonna be doing a cabaret act, Connie, we want it on for no more than three minutes at the most. Then we’re out of there. It won’t last much longer – batteries’ll run down.’
Ester moved closer to Julia as they stacked the cladding bags for the horses’ hooves. She pulled away bales of straw to reveal big leather saddle-bags to be strung across the animals’ flanks. She tested one. ‘I hope these’ll hold the weight.’
There was a loud boom! And the sound of breaking glass. Both women froze and Ester peered out of the stable door. ‘What the fuck was that?’
A second boom shook the stables and Ester rushed out. Julia strode after her in a fury, almost knocking her aside. ‘I told her not to do it close to the bloody stables.’
Ester looked back at Helen of Troy. She hadn’t flinched – unlike the pair of them.
Gloria picked herself up. An old greenhouse was devastated, a gaping hole in the ground. She was covered in soil and debris and shakily holding the dustbin lid she had used as a shield.
‘I got to fucking practise, haven’t I?’
‘Not inside a greenhouse, you idiot. Look at the glass it’s showered everywhere. You stupid bitch! You could have made the horse bolt – and you could have killed yourself.’
Gloria dusted herself down and smirked. ‘I know what I’m doing.’
‘You could have fooled me,’ Ester shouted, keeping her distance. ‘Just go further away from the house.’
Gloria yelled back that she was only doing what Dolly had told her and began to check the instructions. ‘I used too much, that’s all. It’s not like dynamite, you know.’
Dolly steamed towards them, passing them without a word. She stood with Gloria, inspecting the damage. ‘How much did you use?’
‘Not a lot,’ said Gloria. She looked ruefully at Dolly. ‘Sorry.’
Dolly opened her notebook. ‘Julia reckons we’ll need it at this point of the bridge, here and here.’
Gloria looked at Dolly’s tight, neat writing. ‘Yeah. We been over it day in day out. That’s the best spot, train still moving very slowly so it’ll get the impact.’
‘Just don’t blow the carriage up, Gloria. You do that, the money will be blown to smithereens. More important, there are three guards inside that carriage, and I don’t want anyone getting hurt.’
Gloria nodded. ‘I’ll have another go.’
Connie and Julia rowed across the lake, the boat low in the water with the weight of the lamp, the cables and the battery-operated generator. Julia did most of the rowing as Connie felt faint and couldn’t stop shaking. They dragged the boat alongside the jetty and then began to move the equipment, constantly keeping an eye open for anyone either side of the shore who might spot them. Julia wore leather gloves and told Connie off because she hadn’t put hers on. They then dusted the lamp down just in case she had left her fingerprints on it. The gear was stashed in bushes, alongside the petrol, and they headed back to the shore, Julia rowing again as Connie trained the binoculars towards the bridge.
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