The Seventh Link Page 12

  ‘I’ve still no idea.’

  ‘Well, the Air Vice-Marshal enlightened me after the memorial service. It was the term used by Bomber Command when crews dropped their bombs increasingly short of a target during a long raid – unintentionally, of course. But Don Wilson said his crew decided that’s what they’d do – deliberately – so they could turn back sooner. They also decided that if they were given a particularly tough target they’d claim something was wrong with the plane and head for home early, gambling on an easier op the next time round. Sometimes they just dumped their bombs in the sea.’

  ‘I don’t believe a word of it, Hugh. Not a word.’

  ‘It is hard to believe, I agree.’

  ‘I grant you that there may have been the odd bomber crew not quite up to scratch, but the men we had staying here with us this weekend were first-class types. They’d never have done such a thing. It’s unthinkable.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re right.’

  ‘You saw what they were like.’

  ‘Yes, indeed. Very impressive.’

  ‘And you saw what the Aussie was like. Not at all impressive. I suppose it was his idea of a joke, and one in pretty poor taste, I might add. Did the rest of the crew know he was saying that sort of thing about them?’

  ‘Well, I gather he was speaking out loud and clear. Perhaps that was the reason they took him away from the dinner.’

  ‘Just as well they did. Somebody might have taken him seriously.’

  The Colonel looked across the cornfield towards the old control tower, sentinel to the grim struggle. Death for so many. Survival only for the very lucky ones.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘They might.’

  THIRTEEN

  It took some time for Mrs Moffat to answer his ring at the door of Cat Heaven. Time enough for the Colonel to picture what might await him. An emaciated and pitiful Thursday who had abandoned all hope of rescue? Who had turned his face to the wall and lost the will to live? A guilty prospect.

  ‘There you are, Colonel … right on time.’

  Actually, he was early. He had driven straight to the cattery before going to Pond Cottage.

  ‘How is Thursday?’

  ‘Oh, he’s tip-top. He’s been a perfect guest. Like I told you, we’ve formed quite a bond. Come and see for yourself.’

  She unlocked the gate at the side of the house and they walked down the path to the cattery outbuilding. Mrs Moffat was in something emerald green and flowing, with the blonde beehive in such perfect order that he wondered if it was a wig. She looked totally unsuited to the daily grind of coping with other people’s cats and yet she clearly was – chattering on gaily about the little talks and the brushing and combings. Another door was unlocked and he passed down the long row of cages and cats. A Siamese clawed desperately at the wire mesh emitting blood-curdling yowls.

  ‘Here he is, bless him.’

  Thursday was curled up asleep in a cushioned basket. Far from emaciated and sad, he looked perfectly content, well fed and certainly well brushed. The Colonel could not remember ever seeing his coat look so glossy.

  ‘Hallo, old chap.’

  Thursday lifted his head and stretched his front paws, unsheathing long, curved claws. He ignored the Colonel.

  ‘I’ll put him in his carrier for you, shall I? Then you can take him straight home.’

  He waited humbly while Mrs Moffat scooped Thursday deftly into the carrier and fastened the door. She waggled her fingertips through the grille.

  ‘I’m going to miss you, sweetheart … come and stay with me again soon.’

  The Colonel put the carrier on the front passenger seat of the Riley. On the drive home, all he could see was Thursday’s back turned towards him. No movement, no sign of recognition let alone rapprochement.

  ‘I’m back, Naomi.’

  ‘Jolly good!’ Her voice barked at him down the wire.

  ‘Thanks for keeping an eye on things.’

  ‘Any time. I threw a bit of water over the terrace pots, that’s all. Everything else has looked after itself. We had a jolly good downpour the other night.’

  ‘I’ve just collected Thursday from Cat Heaven.’

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘Extraordinarily well. He seems to have got on with Mrs Moffat like a house on fire. They’re bosom friends, apparently.’

  ‘Well, cats aren’t fools, Hugh. They know how to look after number one. They’re cunning devils.’

  ‘I’m in the doghouse, of course. He’s gone off somewhere in a huff.’

  ‘You would be. Don’t worry, he’ll come back all in good time.’

  ‘How about a drink on the terrace, if it’s not too late for you?’

  ‘It’s never too late, Hugh. I’ll be round in twenty minutes.’

  The phone rang as soon as he had replaced the receiver. It was his daughter-in-law, Susan, checking on his return.

  ‘Are you all right, Father?’

  ‘Perfectly, thank you.’

  ‘It’s always bit of a worry for us, when you go off.’

  He knew that he should have been grateful that there was anyone to worry about him at all.

  ‘How are you?’

  ‘Eric’s gone down with another cold and it’s gone straight to his chest, of course.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  ‘Edith hasn’t caught it yet, but I expect she will.’

  ‘Marcus all right?’

  ‘He’s very stressed at the moment.’

  Stress was the new thing, he realized, though he couldn’t quite see how working for a pasta company could cause it. Perhaps the stress lay more at home? Coping with very young children was never easy, as far as he remembered, though Laura had taken the brunt of it. These days far more was expected of fathers, which was fair enough.

  ‘When are you coming to stay with us, Father?’

  The question he had dreaded.

  ‘That’s very kind of you, Susan. I’d like to very much.’

  Diary pages rustled importantly.

  ‘What about the weekend after next? We’re free then. And the bungalow down the road that I told you about is still up for sale. You really should view it. It would be perfect for you.’

  Dogs with meaty bones could learn a thing or two from his daughter-in-law.

  ‘I’ll certainly bear it in mind.’

  ‘Are you still taking those vitamin pills, Father?’

  ‘Of course.’ He’d thrown them out long ago.

  ‘You have to take special care of yourself at your age.’

  ‘I do, I assure you.’

  ‘Regular exercise is very important.’

  ‘Yes, I’m aware of that.’

  Walking was about the only exercise that he took these days.

  ‘There’s a very good Pilates class near us. I go on a Saturday morning while Marcus takes care of the children. You could come with me and have a go.’

  In his day, he had been reasonably competent at unarmed combat.

  ‘I think it might be too much for me.’

  ‘Oh, no. We do a lot of floor work lying on a mat, with tiny movements up and down. Nothing vigorous. It’s all about inner corps strength, you see, and getting a strong supple body. It improves flexibility and agility and prevents injury. Ballet dancers use it a lot. And we have a very nice lady teacher.’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘You’ll think about it, then? It would do you a lot of good.’

  He promised to think and was hoping that the conversation might be drawing to a close when Susan suddenly said, ‘Eric wants a word with you.’

  ‘Hallo, Grandfather.’

  ‘Hallo there, Eric. How are you?’

  ‘All right. Are you coming to stay with us soon?’

  ‘That’s the general idea.’

  ‘Can we go somewhere? Just you and me?’

  With luck, they might be able to slip the leash. ‘Where would you like to go?’

  ‘You choose.’

  Bovi
ngton Tank Museum had been a big success on Eric’s visit to Pond Cottage. Something similar was called for now in Norfolk. Manly stuff. Somewhere no woman would want to tread.

  He said, ‘I’ll think about it. See if I can come up with an idea.’

  He hung up and did some thinking, though not about the Pilates class, or the bungalow. He thought about entertaining Eric. An old wartime airfield similar to Buckby was a possibility. Norfolk was riddled with them, after all. He and Eric could track one down together, go into the abandoned control tower, walk down the old runway, explore the ruined buildings. Look for clues to imagine how it had once been. It was definitely a good idea.

  He went out into the garden and inspected the border where there were already blowsy signs of autumn. It needed a good tidy-up, he reckoned. Dead flowers snipped off, plants cut back or taken out, plans made for replacements and for next year. He’d ask Naomi if she had any suggestions.

  There was no sign of Thursday who would sometimes make a casual appearance and shadow him at a distance. The huff was likely to take some time to get over.

  He progressed to the pond where the pet shop fish rose up to greet him. When he sprinkled some of the fish food he had brought with him they darted about, but without the greedy frenzy in The Grange lake, and the water was clear and clean.

  There had been something very unpleasant about that blanket weed and he didn’t envy Geoffrey the problem. It was horrible to think of Don Wilson floundering and choking in its clutches. He wondered if the ghost carp had been circling, waiting to move in? A totally unnecessary death. Sober he would surely have survived. But, as the police inspector had pointed out, it was very easy to drown when drunk.

  He thought about the Australian telling his unbelievable tale of his crew’s survival pact: how they’d deliberately tipped the odds in their favour. And he thought about the rest of the crew hustling him away from the dinner. Miss Warner had described the noise made as they had manhandled him up the stairs past her bedroom as quite unnecessary. They had been swearing loudly at their mid-upper gunner, she had said. Not surprising since he had spoilt their evening, but he would not have put them down as men likely to make an unruly commotion in someone else’s home. Nor had Miss Warner.

  He took the shed key from his pocket and unlocked the door. Inside, it was undisturbed. Everything was reassuringly in its place. The parts of the Matilda tank were lying on the workbench exactly as he had placed them. He was looking forward to resuming Step Nine where he had left off and assembling the turret. He opened up the Naomi-proof sacking curtains and unfolded the instruction sheet.

  And then, for no particular reason, he found himself thinking about Don Wilson again. Drunks, in his experience, usually slept it off. They didn’t wake up, get up and go out. They stayed put until they eventually came to, hours later. It was nature’s infallible recovery programme.

  He remembered that the crew had said that the Australian did crazy things when he was drunk but getting up and going out boating seemed not so much crazy as highly unlikely. There was no question that he had been drinking heavily at the dinner, not to mention previously at the lunch. Enough to require his removal back to The Grange and hauling up the stairs to bed. His tie had been loosened, his watch and shoes taken off, a cover put over him. The crew had done the same for him many times in the past. They had said so.

  But what if on this occasion, things had gone differently? What if when they had arrived back at the house, Wilson had insisted on blundering off on his bomber’s moon jaunt on the lake and that his crew had run out of patience at that point and left him to it? Washed their hands of him? Abandoned him to his fate? The man had, after all, been telling outrageous and slanderous tales at their expense, even if intended as a joke. They had every reason to be angry and fed up with him. But, in that case, why go through a noisy pretence of taking him upstairs to bed? Of rumpling the bedclothes and denting the pillow? And what was the Australian’s watch doing on the bedside table, not on his wrist, and why were his shoes in the bedroom and not on his feet? None of it made sense.

  ‘Hallooo there, Hugh! What are you up to in here?’

  Idiot that he was, he had left the shed door slightly ajar. It was now flung open wide and Naomi’s bulk, draped in the purple kaftan he remembered from before (but without the panama hat) filled the gap. Before he could block her way she had advanced further, looking around.

  ‘This reminds me of Cecil’s hideaway. Full of tools and things he never used.’

  It was not the first time he had felt a certain rapport with Naomi’s late husband. Nor would it be the last.

  ‘I’m sure he used them.’

  ‘No, I don’t think he actually did anything. I see you’re busy, though.’

  She picked up the model box lid from the workbench, examining the picture on the front.

  ‘I used to know someone who served in tanks. He was in the desert in the war with the Eighth. Said it was hell on earth. Unbelievable heat, flies, sandstorms … he told some horrific stories.’

  He’d heard a few himself – enough to have convinced him that tank crews, like bomber crews, were made up of pretty special men. He removed the lid firmly from Naomi’s grasp.

  ‘Time for a drink.’

  But she stayed where she was, not to be hurried, examining the pieces on the workbench, fingering them in turn, putting them back in the wrong places.

  ‘I didn’t know you were a model maker, Hugh.’

  ‘I’m not. I’m just following instructions. Gluing things together.’

  ‘Well, it all looks very complicated.’

  ‘It isn’t, really.’

  ‘What’s this piece?’

  ‘Part of the turret.’ He returned it to its correct spot. ‘Let’s go and have that drink.’

  Once more, she ignored the suggestion.

  ‘Of course, they’re a man thing, aren’t they?’

  ‘What are?’

  ‘Sheds. No sane woman would go and lurk all day in a damp old hut at the bottom of the garden, but men love them. I suppose it’s to escape.’

  She might have a point, he thought grimly.

  ‘Escape?’

  ‘I once read in the newspaper about a man who lived in his shed for a whole year to avoid his creditors.’

  ‘I’m not avoiding creditors, Naomi.’

  ‘Of course you aren’t, Hugh. You’re not the type at all. You’re making models. If you weren’t doing that you’d be tinkering with a bike, or something perfectly harmless. Sheds can be quite sinister places, you know. Remember the bit in that famous book about a farm with something nasty in the woodshed? I bet men get up to all sorts of things.’

  ‘I can assure you, Naomi, that I don’t get up to anything. The only vice in here is the one screwed on to the end of this workbench.’

  She cackled loudly at that. ‘Oh, Hugh, I was only joking.’

  ‘I’m relieved to hear it.’

  It still took some time to manoeuvre her out of the shed and on to the terrace where he fetched the prepared tray and set it on the table. There was no need to enquire about her drink which was always the same – a three-finger slug of neat Chivas Regal with a splash of plain tap water and no ice. His was the same but without the water. He raised his glass.

  ‘Good health, Naomi.’

  ‘Same to you, Hugh.’

  The terrace was bathed in warm evening sunlight and it would stay that way for at least another hour or more. He acknowledged his debt to Naomi for insisting that building a sundowner terrace was a good idea, but he would make very sure that in future she stayed out of his shed.

  ‘So, what’s been happening while I’ve been away?’

  ‘Well, the big news is that Ruth is definitely expecting. Next April. She let the cat out of the bag herself.’

  ‘That’s very happy news.’

  ‘Yes, isn’t it? An heir to the Manor. Someone to keep it in the family and away from all those hedgehog managers.’

  ‘Hedge f
und.’

  ‘Whatever they call themselves. Hog suits them better. Can you imagine how they’d wreck it? Swimming pools, jacuzzis and all the rest, with the house done up like in the photos you see in those dreadful interior decorating magazines. They never seem to have anywhere comfortable to sit, have you noticed? And the fireplaces are always miles away.’

  There was some truth in that, he thought. The difference between a home and a showcase. You lived in one and showed off in the other.

  He watched a blackbird hopping across the grass before it flew up into the lilac tree.

  He said, ‘Speaking of cats, Thursday’s still off somewhere.’

  ‘Don’t worry, he’ll be back when he thinks you’ve suffered enough guilt.’

  There was probably truth in that as well.

  ‘Well, the fish in the pond are doing all right and the water’s stayed clear. Where I was staying they had a bad problem with blanket weed and it was a lake, not a small pond.’

  ‘Dreadful stuff. Almost impossible to get rid of, though I did read about some kind of straw you can float on the water that can do the trick. I’ll see if I can find out more for your friend, if you like.’

  ‘He’d be very grateful. What other local news?’

  ‘Well, you know Steve at the garage?’

  The burly and tattoo-armed mechanic had done some excellent work on the Riley.

  ‘Yes, what about him?’

  ‘He’s let it be known that in future he’d like to be known as Steph.’

  ‘Steph?’

  ‘Short for Stephanie. Apparently it’s been brewing up for years. He’s not taken to wearing frocks, or anything like that, just a sort of shiny jump suit with earrings and his hair is in a pony tail. Otherwise you wouldn’t notice much difference. Marjorie is hoping that the Major won’t notice anything at all when he takes their Escort in.’

  It was amazing, the Colonel thought, the life that lay beneath the surface of an apparently stagnant pond. He must be sure to remember to address Steve as Steph from now on.

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Well, I ought to warn you that plans are already afoot with the Amateur Dramatic Society for this year’s Christmas pantomime.’