by Anna Legat
‘Shut up!’ Dave, the estate manager-cum-cook’s son, orders the dogs and pulls on the lead. Squealing, the two beasts settle at his foot. He is a large man with a big beer gut and bloated face. He looks like a seasoned drinker with that face and bloodshot eyes. He waves Gillian on when she glances back to check the bloody Dobermans are contained. ‘Yeah, yeah, carry on that way!’ he nods to her, ‘Cross the meadow – there be a path by the sideway, straight into the Wood!’
‘What a pleasant lot they are!’ Erin observes sarcastically as they tread on across the muddy courtyard and towards the wooden gate. They had to leave the car behind. There is no vehicular access to Sexton’s Wood from the direction of the estate. They will have to return the same way. ‘I just hope the bloody dogs are locked in when we come back for the car.’
‘How did the thieves manage to get away with the loot, unnoticed?’ Gillian wonders. ‘Those dogs would’ve had them torn to pieces!’
‘Unless they know them.’
‘Or they had nothing to do with the theft. Probably there was no theft. My bet is his Lordship is putting together a case for eviction of those poor buggers from the woods.’
‘You think?’
Gillian nods. She is sure they are wasting their time. Wasting police time was a crime last time she looked. Nevertheless, here they are shuffling through sheep droppings, on a mission of knee-capping the homeless on his lordship’s orders. She hates it. At least the surroundings are tranquil and relaxing. Sheep graze contentedly and without sparing them a second glance. They look warm in their woolly gear. The path is messy, with muddy water standing in deep puddles that feed the ditch. The air is fresh and pungent with country scents. Further into Brambly Meadow, towards the wood, cows take over the job of trimming the grass from the sheep. On closer inspection, Gillian concludes that they are bullocks, not cows. Wouldn’t the occupants of the nearby Sexton’s Wood prefer beef to lamb? Gillian ponders their preferences. If they intended to steal livestock, aren’t the bulls a bit closer to hand? Why go all the way towards the Weston Estate where those vicious Dobermans guard the stock while you have a perfectly delicious rump steak on your doorstep?
They enter the wood. It’s old – the trees are large, with thick trunks, the undergrowth a plush blanket of autumnal leaves. The air smells musky and wet. All is quiet but for the creaking of branches. Gillian stabs the leaves with her foot – they fly at Erin. She kicks back and they have a short-lived battle of leaves, laughing and flapping their arms.
‘I used to love playing with leaves when I was a kid,’ Erin says.
‘I still do.’
‘ Some things you never grow out of.’
‘Always a child, me...’ Gillian sobers up. ‘You know, I can’t remember when I last brought Tara to the woods. I can’t remember kicking leaves at her, or playing hide and seek. She was a baby one minute and an adult the next – I missed her childhood somewhere along the way.’
‘Nah, you just forget! If you asked her, she’d remember.’
‘The way she is with me these days, she’d struggle to remember my name.’
‘You’re too harsh on her. And on yourself. Ease up! How’s the wedding preparations?’
‘That’s another thing – I don’t know. I’m not in the loop. I have to be there for her. My last chance before she sails into the horizon.’
‘So be there – take some time off, go shopping with her, book a venue, surprise her.’
‘Yeah, I’m thinking of doing just that.’
‘Stop thinking – do it!’
‘I think she’ll resent whatever I do.’
‘You’re doing it again, you see!’ Erin throws her arms
up.
‘Doing what?’
‘Thinking!’
‘Yeah, too much thinking is bad for you unless you’re crime-solving. And crime-solving is what I do.’
‘Don’t hide behind your job, Gillian. You can give it a break for a couple of weeks – the world won’t fall apart without you in the saddle. We can manage, you know, without you.’
‘Well, thanks. I suppose,’ Gillian shrugs her shoulders.
‘You know what I mean,’ Erin looks hard at her.
They have crossed the low-lying stream over a felled tree linking its steep banks. From here it is up a couple of hundred yards before they reach the homeless’ shanty town. The slope is muddy and slippery. Gillian’s wellies are caked in clay and the trek is like dancing on ice. ‘They have great natural defences here, you have to give it to them.’
Erin agrees. ‘I almost wish I had the guts to move in with them: no mortgage, no earthly concerns, just fresh air and camp fires.’
Indeed, a camp fire is in full swing, with a few people gathered around it. Their dwellings are well camouflaged. They are burrows or caves in the side of the hill, wedged under the exposed roots of the trees above. If it wasn’t for the sheets of corrugated iron and scraps of cardboard, you could miss this place altogether.
It looks like they’re having their lunch. Something is being roasted – the aroma of cooking meat pervades the air. From a distance, Gillian can tell it is some sort of an animal impaled on a spit. Game or lamb?
‘It smells good? What is it?’ she shouts towards the hunched figures around the fire. They gape at her and Erin impassively. They don’t seem taken aback or frightened to see the two strangers approach. They’re just impassive and indifferent. They are mostly young, but not adolescent – in their twenties or thirties; skinny, with ashen complexions, emaciated; lanky long hair, wispy beards, shoddy, cheap clothing the colours of which blend into one infinite shade of grey.
‘What business of yours is that? Who are you?’ One woman gets up and starts walking towards them. Wearing a beanie pulled over her eyes and a pair of frayed joggers, she is like the rest of them in appearance, but seems alert and assured in her stride. Her accent and mannerism is not what Gillian would expect from a hobo, as his lordship would have her referred to. She is polished and has class. Why is she here? What brought her here? What unfortunate sequence of misfortunes landed her in a homeless colony? As she approaches, Gillian notes her deep-brown hair and striking blue eyes. She is a good looking woman.
Gillian and Erin flash their ID cards at her.
‘Wow, a detective inspector! That’s a promotion for our humble lot,’ the woman jeers, and Gillian is assured more than ever that the woman is not local, her accent clipped and clear.
‘We received a complaint about theft of stock and supplies from the Weston Estate.’
‘And you immediately thought it had something to do with us, naturally.’
‘We’re exploring all lines of inquiry.’
‘Or is it that his highness pointed you in our direction?’
Gillian doesn’t want to answer that question. She is uncomfortable being here and bothering these people as they, clearly, seem to be no bother to anyone. Erin says, ‘May we have a word with you and your... friends? Perhaps you’ve seen something that may help us with our investigation.’
‘I’m sure your mind is already made up, but come and join us for a bit of game.’ The woman leads them to the camp fire. Others, gathered around it, make room for them. They don’t look hostile.
‘Things gone missin’ on the Estate. The coppers here,’ the woman introduces Gillian and Erin with a non-committal gesture, ‘reckon we can help with their inquiries.’ Chuckles and inarticulate grunts ripple out. A man passes a tin mug to Gillian. Dark-coloured liquid inside it smells like cheap wine. He doesn’t smile at her, but he looks benign.
‘No, thanks, I’m on duty,’ she says, pushing the mug away. Frankly, she would be more inclined to have this wine than the brandy Joshua Weston-Jones offered her. ‘So, would anyone have any information about the theft of livestock and produce on the Weston Estate? Sheep have gone missing...’
‘Sheep?’ another man looks incredulous in a mocking way, ‘A whole fuckin’ sheep gone AWOL? Did you know that, Izzie?’ he looks at the sel
f-appointed spokeswoman. She raises her shoulders and her eyebrows in a mocking gesture. They all laugh.
The man looks at Gillian, ‘We ain’t seen nuffin.’
‘No, you haven’t,’ Gillian agrees. It’s not like they’re going to tell her even if they had. She is gazing at the spit roast. It is some kind of a medium size animal, which, for all she knows, could be a dog. Or a sheep. The well-spoken woman catches her eye and says, ‘Would you like a slice of roasted badger?’
‘Badger?’ Erin is incredulous.
‘Yes, badger. They only get culled, we may as well put them to good use.’
Another pair of people, a man and a woman, stagger out of one of the huts. She is in a state of part undress. He is zipping up his trousers. The woman laughs. It’s a drunken laughter. The man lights a cigarette and throws the match in the fire. ‘What’s that about?’ he points to the two policewomen.
‘Police. Someone’s been stealing from the Estate.’
‘Stealing, my arse!’ the man snorts, and walks away, muttering curses under his breath.
‘No one’s seen anything,’ the woman gets up, ‘so if you aren’t for a slice of badger, you won’t mind if we tuck in?’ The woman is clearly jeering. Another ripple of chuckling travels through the ranks of the homeless innocents.
Gillian takes out her card, ‘If you do remember seeing anything suspicious...’
‘We’ll call you,’ the woman finishes for her and takes the card. ‘We do have a mobile phone. Bought, not stolen, as it happens.’
‘Great. Thank you for your time,’ Erin is keen to leave. She is right – they aren’t going to extract any information out of these people. They are personae non-grata.
‘Your name,’ Gillian fixes the woman with a stern eye, ‘We need your name for the record.’
‘Tracy Beaker, of no fixed abode.’ The woman is smirking.
‘Of course you are. I take it Izzie is your middle name,’ Gillian replies calmly.
‘Izzie to friends. Isabella to everyone else.’
‘And your surname?’
‘Butler.’ The woman isn’t smirking any more.
Back in the office, Gillian runs the name through the computer. She is lucky. There is an Isabella Butler in the system, arrested a couple of times for disorderly behaviour and once for soliciting, a charge that was later dropped. Born in Bath, 20th May 1983, she would now be in her thirties, and that fits. Gillian turns off the computer and stares into space. Suddenly she feels very tired. Her mind is blank. She has no plans. No inventorising goes through her head. Carte blanche. For the first time in her life she is sure she doesn’t want to do this: chasing after a bunch of homeless people who may be guilty of many a petty crime, but overall are harmless and pose no threat to society. They are brazenly being framed to pave the way for his lordship’s bulldozers. Gillian resents being the puppet in his hands and letting him pull the strings. And then there is the suspicious death at Golden Autumn Retreat: that wretched Cherie Hornby and her dead mother. Gillian doesn’t want to bully that poor woman – – she has just lost her mother. Yes, perhaps she had helped her die, but for the noblest of reasons, if mercy was one of them. She is probably in hell of her own making and needs no further punishment. And then back to his lordship’s lost property. A vicious circle... What does it matter? What does it matter who, if anyone, stole the fat man’s sheep?
Her annual leave is well overdue. She may as well take it.
XI
Three days ago he made contact with his guide. They didn’t talk online, just agreed the time and place. Haji arrived three hours earlier and surveyed the piazza with all its archways and narrow alleys, the church and all the shops and cafes. He then sat and watched the people weaving through the piazza. He can tell a tourist from an undercover officer. It’s nothing to do with the uniform; it’s in the posture, in the stride and in the eyes. No soldiers or police were to be seen anywhere in the piazza. If a sniper had been installed somewhere in one of the many top-floor flats in the night, Haji would soon find out. There was nothing he could do about that. He couldn’t anticipate every possibility out there. There is always some risk involved. He is used to taking risks. They are well calculated risks, like who would fire a gun into a street full of people? The busy piazza was Haji’s shield.
His guide, an inconspicuously ordinary man in his mid-forties with black wavy hair and smooth olive skin, arrived on foot, emerging from a corner shop selling souvenirs. Haji hadn’t noticed him get there in the first place so he concluded the man was good at his job. He knew how to blend in better than Haji knew how to pick him out from the crowd. Haji decided he could trust the man as far as the passage to France was concerned, and that’s all he needed him for. They shook hands in the Western way, and spoke English.
‘Had a good trip, Sandman?’
‘As good as it gets, my friend.’
Despite his relaxed smile, the guide who called himself Kamal was nervous: his hand was sweaty. That was good. Haji would be able to read him like a book.
They sat in one of the cafes and had Turkish coffee: black, in small glasses, with a lot of sugar. Kamal told him about the passage to France: they would drive west in Kamal’s pickup van which they would leave in Saluzzo, then they would make the crossing to meet up with their French contact in Embrun.
That was three days ago.
After a steep ascent, they have reached the ridge. The air here is thinner than in the valley below, but Haji is used to altitude. He doesn’t need to acclimatise. The mountains back in Afghanistan are as high and as steep. And they are as beautiful. Haji takes in the beauty of the sheer rock wall rising in front of him and the softer rolling landscape, with yellowing meadows dropping behind. The sky is lapis lazuli blue, perfect and virginal, like back home. Not a cloud to trap the air. Haji inhales through his nose and his mouth – the smell of freedom. It’s colder up here – cleaner, very much like his home in Pandsher Valley at the foot of Shomali Plain. For a split second, Haji wishes to stay here. To live and die here. He does not want to go on. It isn’t like him to stop and leave things undone, though, so he nods and hobbles on behind Kamal when he tells him they must press on and reach the cabin before the sun goes down. He and his mujahedin brothers always try to reach their kishlaks before the sun drowns in the night. The Soviets don’t operate in the night – they wouldn’t risk it. That allows the guerrilla fighters to get a good night’s sleep and be with their families. Haji longs to be with Svetlana. Every day he does; he can’t think of anything else. Others love war. They relish the scent of blood and crave the kill. Not Haji. He isn’t a warrior out of choice. He loves his wife and wants to be with her, grow melons and travel the world. He only kills to save himself and because he remembers his comrades and how they died at Tajbek Presidential Palace. It is his duty to avenge their death.
He joined Masud, the Lion of Pandsher, after escaping from Kabul. As a member of the Presidential Guard he stood no chance. He was a witness to the slaughter. The Russians could not afford to let him live even though he was married to one of them, even though he spoke their language as well as they did, even though he was a Muscovite. Svetlana came with him to hide in his kishlak, lie low and wait for the war to end. And they did just that at first, but soon the surprised faces of his comrades, their screams and their dead eyes got the better of him. He had to seek revenge. He had to kill a Russian man for each one of his butchered comrades, or his mind would find no peace.
He has been killing ever since. He is the king of ambush. With his chemistry degree, he can make an explosive out of cow dung. Today, the mujahedin have another victory to celebrate. They have ambushed a convoy of twenty oil tankers and lorries in the Salang Tunnel. Haji’s strategically distributed mines dealt with the Russian tanks that escorted the convoy. The lorries were trapped in the tunnel, surrounded at both ends, with no escape routes in this hostile terrain. The rest was a stroll in the park. All that is left now is to wade through the bodies, find survivors and finish th
em off. Moans betray those not clever enough to play dead. They get a swift stab and stop wailing. Weapons are being pulled out of the white-knuckled hands of dead Soviets. Haji carries six machine guns slung over his shoulder. Yet he prefers to use his knife on the wounded enemy soldiers – it’s quieter this way, calmer. They look surprised when he reaches for their throats and slashes them, as surprised as his comrades were at the Palace. And then, their eyes become as blissfully dead. He has come to think of them as glass eyes – you can see through them, but not into them. There is nothing there. Death is nothing.
‘Siuda, pamagitje...Here, help me... ’ The call from another dying man draws Haji deeper into the tunnel. He finds him buried under the two bodies of his dead comrades. His chest is squashed, his face flushed red with the effort. A trickle of blood that must have poured out of his nose has dried around his lips like a clown’s mouth. He sees Haji and whispers, blood gurgling out of his throat, ‘Spasiba... Thank you...’ His eyes aren’t glass, not yet. They even smile. They don’t know what’s to come.
Without thinking Haji grabs the boy’s head, but something stops him from slicing the boy’s throat. Despite the blood and the bulging veins, he can see this Russian is just a child. He doesn’t shave yet – there is no stubble on his chin. Haji is no child-killer. He pushes the weight of the two dead soldiers off the boy’s chest to help him breathe. The boy cries in pain. His ribs must be broken. Haji is walking away without looking back. The boy’s comrades will come tomorrow morning. They will find him and take him back home, to Russia.
When the operation is over and every mujahedin emerges from the tunnel and is accounted for, someone sets one of the capsized oil tankers on fire. The flames burst into the tunnel and overwhelm everything and everyone that’s in it.
Including the boy.
Haji wishes he had finished him off in the first place.
The dusk is lit by the fires and a chain reaction of explosions follows. The spectacle must be visible from afar. Black smoke is pumped sky high. The mujahedin have to leave immediately and blend into the mountains – Soviet helicopters will be here in a matter of minutes and the mujahedin have nothing to take them down with. Not yet.