‘He hasn’t got time to write to me – he’s got a girl, didn’t you know?’
‘No. He dropped in before they left, but he didn’t say anything.’
‘Well, he’s a dark horse,’ said Monica, easily. ‘Bit like you, Dad.’
Stratton raised his eyebrows, but decided not to pursue that.
‘Actually,’ he said, ‘I was wondering about that this morning. Pete, I mean. He told you about her, did he?’
‘Not very much. He telephoned a couple of weeks ago, from Catterick – said he was coming to see you – but I couldn’t get much out of him. By the time he’d told me her name, we’d had our three minutes and he didn’t have any more money. Or so he said.’
‘So what is her name?’
‘Alison. He met her at a dance, and he sounded quite soppy about her – well, soppy for Pete, anyway. He’s probably scribbling away to her right now.’
‘Did he say anything else?’
‘No. I told you, we ran out of time.’ Monica bent down and started picking up the bamboo sticks. ‘Are we going to do any gardening or not? If we stand still much longer, I should think we’ll go mouldy, like your old cabbages.’
Stratton grinned at her. ‘That’s enough cheek from you and your funny trousers. Let’s go home, shall we? I’ll take one of these mouldy old cabbages, as you call them, and we’ll have it for lunch.’
‘All right, then.’
‘How’s Marion?’ he asked, as they walked back, arm in arm.
Monica looked up at him, surprised. ‘She’s fine. Why?’
‘Just wondered … You didn’t bring her with you.’
‘Well, no. I didn’t think … I mean, I always come by myself.’
Stratton looked down at his daughter. Was it his imagination, or were her cheeks a bit redder than before? Deciding that this was the time to say something – if he were ever to say anything – he squeezed her arm against him with his elbow. ‘She’s always welcome, you know. Be nice to get to know her a bit better, that’s all. Because you’re quite fond of her, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, I am.’ Monica’s reply was quiet but firm, almost defiant.
Ignoring the hint of challenge, Stratton said, ‘I can see that you’re very happy. That’s all that concerns me, you know. I am aware …’ he knew he sounded pompous, but it was the best he could do, ‘that we’re not all alike.’
‘No,’ said Monica, thoughtfully. ‘We’re not, are we?’
‘On balance,’ said Stratton, carefully, ‘I’d say it’s probably just as well. Now, I was hoping you might volunteer to cook lunch. I know we’ve got some potatoes, and Doris has left something under a cloth in the scullery, but I’ve got no idea what it is, so …’
‘Don’t worry, Dad. I’ll make sure it doesn’t bite you back.’
‘Good.’ Giving her arm another squeeze, he added, ‘What would I do without you, eh?’
CHAPTER SEVENTY
When Stratton had been to see him the previous Thursday, DCI Lamb had been remarkably sanguine about all the news from Suffolk – including that Mary/Ananda might never be compos mentis enough to be interviewed about Michael or Billy or anything else – and he was suprisingly composed about Stratton’s car, too. After a lot of guff about it being highly irregular, he’d admitted that not only had he discussed it with his opposite number in Suffolk, but that they’d agreed that the money for the extensive repairs should come out of their joint budgets. When, after this news, Lamb had produced a packet of Players and offered him one, Stratton was so astonished that he’d practically swallowed the thing.
Looking at the chaos on his desk, he decided he’d better sort out the mess before he read any more, and, having scraped all the papers into a rough heap, began weeding out the ones that weren’t witness statements. Burglary in furrier’s shop … Report of someone selling liquor in unlicensed premises … Stabbing after fight in club …
A new witness had come forward for that last one, which was unusual. It was the type of thing where everyone in the place suddenly came over all vague and short-sighted, or said things and then retracted them twenty-four hours later. Stratton was looking over the statement when a call was put through from Ballard.
‘Just had the pathologist’s report on Roth. There’s a copy on its way to you, but I thought you’d like to know – it seems he isn’t Jewish after all.’
‘Not circumcised, you mean?’
‘Not according to Trickett.’
‘Well, he should know … He certainly looked it, and Roth’s a Jewish name, isn’t it? Sounds a bit as if it’s been shortened from something longer – German or Russian or something like that. Assuming Roth was his real name, of course.’
‘We haven’t found anything at the Foundation to prove that it isn’t, but if he came over here as a refugee—’
‘Which was what the chap at the Psychical Research Society seemed to think …’
‘There were thousands of those buggers, so if he entered the country with one name – which might not have been his own, either – and then started calling himself something else, we don’t have a hope of finding out who he really was.’
‘Did you speak to Tynan about it?’
‘Yes – insisted he was called Roth when he met him and he’d never heard of him being called anything else. Tynan’s still pretty shaken up, and I think he’d tell us if he knew anything. In fact, I’m sure of it. He’s not the type to stay down for long – I get the impression that he’s attempting to recast himself as the man who blew the whistle on an evil organisation that was threatening the fabric of society with occult practices and so on … Suit him down to the ground if Roth turned out to be a Nazi.’
‘I suppose it’s possible,’ said Stratton. ‘When Roth told me he was in Berlin at the end of the war, I did wonder. That accent wasn’t German, though …’
‘Doesn’t mean he wasn’t a Nazi.’
‘Doesn’t mean he was, either. But if he was, all he had to do was get hold of some new clothes, adopt a Jewish name, get his hands on some papers – easy to do, I should think, if you had a bit of money – and he already looked the part, so …’
‘Bob’s your uncle.’
‘Well, not quite – I mean, he’d probably have had to walk across half of Europe – but certainly not impossible. If it’s true, that is.’
‘If it is,’ said Ballard, thoughtfully, ‘then no wonder he was so keen on telling people that the past wasn’t important.’
‘Well, quite. I don’t suppose we’ll ever know for sure, but – for whatever reason – he was dead keen to start again …’ Remembering the conversation they’d had in the pub, Stratton added, ‘I hope it didn’t come as too much of a shock to Pauline. She was rather keen on the Foundation lot, wasn’t she?’
‘She was a bit. I think she was kicking herself rather – you know, for being taken in. Anyway, all’s well.’
This wasn’t just a put-on, thought Stratton, Ballard really did sound contented. ‘I’m glad,’ he said.
‘And your business?’ said Ballard. ‘That went off all right, did it, whatever it was?’
‘Business?’ echoed Stratton. Then, realising that Ballard hadn’t believed a word of his explanation about forgetting where he’d parked his car the night he’d been with Diana, he said, hastily, ‘Oh, yes. I see what you mean. Fine, thanks – nothing to worry about.’
‘Jolly good. Oh, and I saw Miss Kirkland’s sister, too. Quite sad, really. Apparently they were very close as children …’
Listening with half an ear, Stratton thought about Diana. Whether she actually wanted to see him again or not, he wasn’t sure. And, more confusing, he wasn’t sure what he wanted, either, at least, not for the long-term future. If they weren’t so far apart in just about every way imaginable, it would be different. But they were, and there was no point in pretending otherwise. And what he felt for her wasn’t love – at least, if it was, it wasn’t the kind of love he’d felt for Jenny. Years before – just before he�
�d left the farm, in fact – his father, who’d rarely talked about anything except farming, and then only when absolutely necessary, had made his one and only (to Stratton, anyway) pronouncement about marriage. Pointing at their horses, Blackie and Dora, standing side by side between the shafts of the great farm cart, he’d said, ‘You’ve got to pull together.’ Stratton could not now remember – and he certainly couldn’t imagine – what had given rise to this observation, or what he’d said in response, but he knew his dad had been right. If you were a lord or a millionaire or something, with a lot of servants to do things for you, then it probably wouldn’t matter so much if you were pulling in different directions, but for people like him … And he couldn’t imagine it with Diana. Apart from anything else, if the pair of them were horses, they’d each be pulling a different sort of carriage – probably, in his case, a cart. And, surprise him as she might with her common sense, Diana was too flighty, somehow. Too insubstantial. But despite all this he did want to see her again – and in any case, he ought to contact her, if only to thank her for what she’d said about Monica, for which he was genuinely and profoundly grateful.
‘… Anyway, there it is,’ Ballard concluded. ‘I’ll let you know if we turn up anything at the Foundation.’
Stratton replaced the receiver in the cradle and went to collect his coat and hat from the stand. It was three o’clock, and, as this was Diana’s half-day, she’d probably have reached home by now. No time like the present, he thought. He’d nip out now and give her a call from one of booths in the tube at Piccadilly Circus.
He’d got halfway down the corridor to the foyer when Feather, the desk sergeant, came hurrying towards him, a huge and horrible grin on his big pink face. ‘It’s your friend Mr Heddon again.’
‘Heddon?’
‘You know. Just stepped out of his own personal flying saucer.’
‘Bloody hell. What does he want?’
‘Another urgent message from the Interplanetary Parliament, I would imagine. That’s why he wants to see you – far too important for the likes of li’l old me.’
‘You could have told him I was out.’
‘No point. He’d only have waited. I know the type.’
‘I suppose so,’ said Stratton, with bad grace.
Heddon, small and dapper as ever, was sitting on a bench between an earnest-looking youth with a row of pens and pencils in his top pocket and a fat woman carrying a bulging handbag, so misshapen that she might have been carrying a dozen pounds of walnuts. Seeing Stratton, Heddon leapt to his feet, shiny-eyed and nose twitching slightly, as if he hoped to be thrown a biscuit.
‘I have a communiqué,’ he said, ‘from Venus. They wish you to know that Condition Green is currently in operation.’
‘Condition Green?’ Stratton repeated the words loudly in the hope of masking Feather’s sniggering.
‘Yes. The threat of war has passed. Human life has been declared safe.’ Feather snorted loudly and Stratton flapped a discreet hand in the direction of the desk in an effort to shut him up. ‘Your agencies,’ continued Heddon, ‘may stand down. There may, of course, be other occasions – it is, I fear, an unstable time – but, for the time being, we may consider ourselves in the clear.’
‘I’m very pleased to hear it,’ said Stratton.
‘I thought I should let you know immediately. After all, we don’t want resources diverted with these other crises going on.’
‘No, indeed,’ said Stratton faintly. ‘I’m most grateful.’
The little man acknowledged this with a brisk nod of his head, then, snapping into a salute, barked ‘Over and out,’ and, turning smartly, marched across the lobby and out of the door. The young man with the pens and the woman with the bulbous handbag stared after him, mouths agape. Stopping in front of Feather just long enough to mutter, ‘Thanks a bunch, pal,’ Stratton followed, turning left down Vigo Street on his way to Piccadilly Circus. There weren’t many people about at this hour – businessmen and shoppers, mostly, not pausing to look in the windows but hurrying under the sullen sky with their packages, seeking tea or buses or taxis before the next lot of rain fell. Stratton descended to the underground and, finding an empty telephone kiosk, squeezed himself in and closed the door.
The receiver was waxy against his ear, the mouthpiece rank with the ghost breaths of a thousand conversations. The operator’s voice came on the line, followed by a jumble of whirrs and clicks, and then, rising out of it, Diana’s voice, crisp and clear, ‘… 653?’
Stratton pressed button A. ‘It’s Edward,’ he said. ‘I just thought you’d like to know that the world isn’t going to end after all.’
A BRIEF NOTE ON HISTORICAL AND PERSONAL BACKGROUND
The roots of many of the doctrines of the ‘alternative religions’ that comprise what we now tend to refer to as ‘New Age’ beliefs can be traced back to the Theosophy Movement begun by Madame Helena Blavatsky (1831–1891) which, in turn, spawned various spiritual leaders, the best known being Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925), G.I. Gurdjieff (1866?–1949), P.D Ouspensky (1878–1947) and J. Krishnamurti (1895–1986). However, the mid-fifties saw both the end of Britain as a world power (in Suez) and the alarming intensification of the Cold War (in Hungary) with the attendant prospect of nuclear holocaust, and this, together with the postwar decline in adherence to established religions, seems to have provided fertile ground for a bumper crop of all sorts of gurus.
The societies and organisations founded at this time took inspiration either from Eastern religious traditions and practices (meditation, yoga and the like), or from science fiction, then growing in popularity, with their leaders claiming to have received visitations from extra-terrestrial beings. All, however, represented a rebellion against spiritual orthodoxy, and, for those attracted to them, provided answers to the questions that we all, at some point, ask ourselves, such as, ‘Why I am here? What is the point of it all? What happens when I die?’, and so forth. Responses from outsiders ranged then, as they do now, from baffled incredulity to trepidation about whether their friends and relatives are being brainwashed, but for those within, there is only one mystery: why doesn’t everybody else see the light and join up as they did?
My parents found answers to their questions – and later, each other – when they joined such an organisation (independently, for they had yet to meet) in the late fifties. The organisation’s name is immaterial, but, in common with many others of its type, it was founded by a charismatic egotist who formed a connection with an Indian guru; it spiritualised the trivial and mundane; it had very strict rules governing everything from day-to-day conduct to gender roles, and it took up a hell of a lot of everybody’s time and practically all of their mental space.
I, unavoidably, also became a member, and remained so until my early twenties. As Alexander Waugh remarked when discussing his famously Catholic grandfather, the great novelist Evelyn Waugh, ‘the zeal of the convert is seldom passed down on the hereditary principle’. It certainly didn’t get passed down to me. In the case of my parents – intelligent, kind, conscientious and wholly delightful people – their enthusiasm and commitment knew no bounds. My father remained a member of the organisation until his death in 2010, and my mother still attends. For me, it was different. I was constantly told, from an early age, how fortunate I was to be in contact with the teachings of a man who was in a higher state of consciousness, with the implication that I must have done something quite wonderful in a previous life to have been accorded such a privilege in this one. I spent half my time wondering if there hadn’t been some hideous cosmic mistake, and the other half feeling like an undeserving fraud. We were also told that those who had been wicked in previous lives were born disabled or disadvantaged. I never heard any of the adults question this pronouncement, or others like it, and the resulting atmosphere of serene, intolerant complacency was one that I grew to find unbearable. One thing I learnt quite early on was that people are never more dangerous, or – at least 99 percent of the time – wr
ong, than when they ‘know’ they are right, especially if the ‘knowledge’ has a spiritual underpinning. (Oddly, my experience didn’t turn me into an atheist. I suppose it should have done but, like DI Stratton, I feel that God seems somehow more ‘factual’ than logical explanations for faith allow).
Although I wasn’t around in the 1950s, I have drawn extensively on my memories of how people in the organisation looked, behaved and spoke in the writing of A Willing Victim. I’ve left out a lot of the dottier stuff on the grounds of implausibility – there are still some things I can hardly believe myself, even though I was witness to them – but I’ve tried to give an accurate and, I hope, entertaining account of the sorts of things that go on in such organisations.
I have taken a small liberty with the dates of Billy Graham’s ‘London Crusade’. The American evangelist (b. 1918) made his first visit to London in March 1954, preaching to thousands of people at north London’s Haringey Arena (in use as a sporting and events venue until 1958). Billy Graham has visited the UK many times since, although not in 1956.
The book begins on the 31st October 1956, which was in fact a Wednesday, not a Tuesday. I have altered the days of the week in order to fit the time scheme.
Lastly, cinema buffs may have noticed a reference to a film about an alligator. This is based on an anecdote told by the actor Donald Sinden about a film in which he starred with Jeanie Carson, Diana Dors, James Robertson Justice and Stanley Holloway. It was called An Alligator Named Daisy – hence the consternation when the creature proved, in a way which left no room for doubt, that it was male. It was directed by J. Lee Thompson for the J. Arthur Rank Organisation, and went on release in the UK in December 1955.
L.W.
January 2012
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am very grateful to Tim Donnelly, Claire Foster-Gilbert, Stephanie Glencross, Nicholas Green, Jane Gregory, George Harding, Liz Hatherell, Maya Jacobs, Claire Morris, Lucy Ramsey, Anna Webb, June Wilson, Jane Wood and Florence Mabel Basset Hound for their enthusiasm, advice and support during the writing of this book.
A Willing Victim Page 38