Mr. Calder & Mr. Behrens (7 page)

In the end she said, with a well-contrived yawn, “Do I understand that this is all leading up to something? That you have some proposal to put to me? If so, please put it, so that I can get back to sleep.”

“Our proposal,” said Mr. Calder, “is this. If you will make a written statement, naming your employers, and your contacts, giving full details which can be verified in forty-eight hours, we’ll give you the same length of time to get out of the country.”

“We feel certain,” said Mr. Behrens, “that you have all
your
arrangements made.”

“More efficient, if less drastic, than the ones you made for Michael.”

All expression had gone out of Lady Lefroy’s face. It was a mask – a meticulously constructed mask behind which a quick brain weighed the advantages and disadvantages of the proposal. When she smiled, Mr. Behrens knew that they had lost.

“You’re bluffing,” she said. “I call your bluff. Go away.”

“A pity,” said Mr. Behrens.

“Very disappointing,” said Mr. Calder. “We shall have to use Plan Number Two.”

“You do understand,” said Mr. Behrens earnestly, “that you’ve brought this on yourself. We have no alternative.”

Lady Lefroy said nothing. There was something here she found disturbing.

Mr. Calder said, “It’s this gang of burglars, you see. Armed burglars. They’ve been breaking into houses round here. Tonight they turned their attention to this house. You woke up and caught one of them rifling your jewel case.”

“And what happened then?”

“Then,” said Mr. Calder, “he shot you.”

Three things happened together: a scream from Marcia Lefroy, cut short; the resonant twang of the silenced automatic pistol; and a snarl of fury as the dog went for Mr. Calder’s throat.

Mr. Behrens moved almost as quickly as the dog. He caught up the two corners of the blanket on which the dog had been lying and enveloped him in it, a growling, writhing, murderous bundle. Mr. Calder dropped his gun, grabbed the other two corners of the blanket, knotted them together.

“It was unpardonable,” said Mr. Fortescue.

“I know,” said Mr. Calder. “But—”

“There are no ‘buts’ about it. It was an unnecessary complication, and a quite unjustifiable risk. Suppose he is recognised.”

“All Persian deerhounds have a strong family resemblance. Once he’s fully grown there’ll be no risk at all. I’ll rename him of course. I thought that Rasselas might be the appropriate name for an Eastern prince—”

“I can’t approve.”

“He’s beautifully bred. And he’s got all the courage in the world. You should have seen the way he came for me. Straight as an arrow. If Behrens hadn’t got the blanket over him, he’d have had my throat for sure. What were we to do?”

“You should have immobilised him.”

“You can’t immobilise a partly grown deerhound.” “Then you should have shot him.”

“Shoot a dog like that,” said Mr. Calder. “You must be joking.”

The notice, in firm black letters on a big white board, said, “War Department Property. Keep to made tracks. If you find anything leave it alone. It may explode.” The last three words were in capital letters. Beside it a much smaller, older, faded green board said, “Hurley Bottom Farm – one mile.”

Mr. Calder read out both notices to Rasselas, and added, “You’d better keep to heel and leave the rabbits alone.” Rasselas grinned at him. He thought that Salisbury Plain was a promising sort of place.

Man and dog set off down the path. After half a mile it forked. There was nothing to indicate which fork to take. Mr. Calder decided that the right-hand one, which went uphill, looked more attractive.

It was a windless autumn day. As they reached the top of the rise they could see the Plain spread round them in a broad arc, wave behind wave, all soft greens and browns, running away to the horizon, meeting and melting into the grey of the sky. Two pigeons got up from a clump of trees and circled at a safe distance from the man and the dog. A big flock of fieldfares swung across the sky, thick as black smoke, forming and reforming and vanishing as mysteriously as they had come.

Mr. Calder unslung his field glasses and made a slow traverse of the area. Rasselas sat beside him, a tip of pink tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth.

When the voice spoke, it was unexpectedly harsh, magnified by the loud-hailer. “You there, with the dog.”

Mr. Calder turned slowIt was an army truck, and a blond subaltern in battle dress with the red and blue flashes of the Artillery, was standing beside the driver.

“If you go much farther you’ll be in the target area.”

Mr. Calder said, “Well, thanks very much for telling me.” By this time he had got close enough to the truck to see the unit signs. “I’m too old to be shot at. Don’t you think your people might have put up some sort of warning?”

“The red flags are all flying.”

“I must have missed them. I was looking for Hurley Bottom Farm.”

“You should have forked left a good quarter of a mile back. We ought to put up a notice there, I suppose. All the locals know it, of course. I take it you’re a stranger?”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Calder. “I’m a stranger, and if it’s crossed your mind that I might be a Chinese spy, I could refer you to Colonel Crofter at Porton. He’ll give you some sort of a character, I dare say.”

The boy smiled and said, “I didn’t think you were a spy. But I thought you might be going to get your head blown off. It causes a lot of trouble when it happens. Courts of Enquiry and goodness knows what. That’s a lovely dog. What sort is he?”

“He’s a Persian deerhound. They used them to hunt wolves, actually.”

“He looks as if he could deal with a wolf, too. Are you a friend of Mrs. King-Bassett? Or perhaps you were just going to ride?”

Mr. Calder looked blank.

“She owns Hurley Bottom Farm. The place you said you were going to. And runs a riding stable. A lot of our chaps go there.”

“To ride?”

“That’s right.” The boy, who seemed to think he had said too much, added abruptly, “You’ll find the turning’s back there.”

Mr. Calder thanked him and trudged off. As he did so, the battery, tucked into a valley to his right, opened up and a salvo of shells came whistling lazily over and landed with a familiar
crump-crump
in the dip to his left.

The path to Hurley Bottom took him away from the ranges and into farmland. The soil was Wiltshire chalk with a thin crust of loam. It would not be very productive, he imagined. At a point where the path ran between two thorn hedges he heard a sudden thundering of hooves behind him and, removing himself with undignified haste to one side, he tripped and landed on all fours.

“What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?” enquired a magnificent female figure, encased in riding breeches, riding boots, a canary yellow polo-necked sweater and a hard hat, and mounted on what appeared to Mr. Calder, from his worm’s-eye view, to be about thirty foot superficial of chestnut horse.

He climbed to his feet, removed a handful of leafmould from his right ear and said, “This is a public footpath, isn’t it?”

“It also happens to be a bridle path,” said the lady.

Mr. Calder had had time to look at her now. He saw a brick-red but not unhandsome face. Sulky eyes, a gash of red mouth, and a firm chin.

“When you come round a corner as fast as that,” he said, “you ought to sound your horn. I take it you’re Mrs. King-Bassett?”

“Correct. And if you’re looking for a ride, I’m afraid all my horses are booked just now.”

“Oddly enough, I was simply going for a walk.”

“Then let me give you a word of warning. Don’t bring your dog too near the farm. I’ve got an Alsatian called Prince. He’s a killer.”

“We will both bear it in mind,” said Mr. Calder. Rasselas grinned amiably.

The cathedral clock sent out its sixteen warning notes into the still, bonfire-scented air and then started to strike nine times.

The wireless set in Canon Trumpington’s drawing room said, “This is the nine o’clock news. Here are the headlines. In Chinese Turkestan, an earthquake has destroyed sixteen villages. After a football match in Rio de Janeiro the crowd invaded the pitch and was dispersed by tear gas. A subsequent bayonet charge resulted in twenty-five casualties. There has been an unexpected rise of twenty-seven per cent in the price of copper. The death toll from the as-yet-unexplained outbreak of cholera at the Al-Maza Military Research Station near Cairo has now risen to seven, and includes a number of Egypt’s leading scientific experts. Professor Fawazi, head of the establishment, who was seriously ill, is now off the danger list. . .”

“For heaven’s sake,” said Mrs. Trumpington. “Turn that machine off, Herbert.”

Canon Trumpington stretched out a hand, and peace was restored to the pleasant room in the South Canonry. In the garden outside an owl was serenading the full moon.

“Is it my imagination, or does the news get worse and worse?”

“There wasn’t much to cheer anyone up tonight, I agree. What do you say, Behrens? Is the world running down? Are we all on our way out, in a maelstrom of violence and silliness?”

Mr. Behrens said, “Is it the world that’s getting old? Or is it us? The older we get, the more we value calm and peace, and a settled routine. Our nerves aren’t as strong as they were. Things which look like a desperate threat to us – if we were forty years younger, they might look like an adventure.”

“I may be old,” said Mrs. Trumpington with spirit, “and I may be nervous, but I can’t see how anyone, whatever their age or state of health, could regard a thousand people being wiped out in an earthquake as an adventure.”

“Certainly not. But the first reaction of a young man might not be one of horror. It might be a desire to go out and help.”

Mrs. Trumpington snorted. The canon said, “He’s quite right, you know.” He made a mental note for his next sermon.

“And what about those poor Egyptian scientists?”

“There,” said Mr. Behrens, “I must confess that my own reaction was one of incredulity. Cholera nowadays is controllable by quite simple forms of immunisation. If the outbreak had been in some primitive community, where serum was unobtainable – but in a scientific institution . . .”

“It said an
unexplained
outbreak. Might it be a new and more virulent type?”

“It’s possible. I remember when I was in Albania before the war a particularly unpleasant form of skin disease, akin to lupus. . .”

“If you go on like this,” said Mrs. Trumpington, “I’m going to bed.”

Mr. Behrens apologised, and said, “Tell us what you’ve got planned for tomorrow.”

“We’re going to take coffee at the Deanery. There’s a bring-and-buy sale in the afternoon. I’ll let you off that. And we’re having tea with Marjorie and Albert Rivers. Although I don’t expect he’ll be there. They have that cottage just outside Harnham Gate. He’s one of the top scientists, out at Porton. She’s a bridge fanatic.”

“Not a fanatic, my dear. An expert. That’s something quite different.”

“They’re both very good, anyway. No-one round here will take them on any more.”

“When people say that,” said Mr. Behrens, “it usually means they think they’re a bit sharp.”

“No. Nothing like that. They’re simply above our standard. They’re both county players. Indeed I’m told that if Marjorie Rivers had the time to devote to it, she might be an international.”

“A scientist and a bridge international,” said Mr. Behrens. “They sound an interesting couple.”

“If there’s one thing I can’t abide,” said Mrs. Wort, “it’s rabbits. Rabbits and rats. They’re both vermin. And as for
eating
them . . .”

“I’m not very fond of them myself,” admitted Mr. Calder. “It was Rasselas who insisted on catching them. I should bury them and forget about it.”

The great dog was stretched out in front of the fire, his amber eyes half shut, the tip of his tail twitching.

“I declare,” said Mrs. Wort, “I think he understands every word you say. And isn’t he enjoying his holiday! The Plain was a grand place for dogs, before the army messed it up. I remember the time, when I was a girl, there wasn’t a soldier in sight. Just a few airmen, in what they called the Balloon School. Now you can’t move for ‘em.”

“You can’t indeed,” said Mr. Calder. He was as relaxed as Rasselas, full-length in an armchair as old and faded and comfortable as everything in the farmhouse kitchen. “I ran into them myself this afternoon. And
I
nearly got run into by a high-spirited female on a horse.”

“Swore at you, did she?”

“That’s right.”

“Then it’d be Missus King-Bassett. Keeps a riding stable out at Hurley Bottom, and a kennels, and runs the farm. You know what they all call her up at the camp, don’t you? The merry widow.”

“Then Mr. King-Bassett is dead?”

“If
he ever existed.”

“I see,” said Mr. Calder.
“If
he ever existed. That sort of widow. How long’s she been here?”

“She bought the place—oh—three, four years ago. When old man Rudd died. She’s pulled it up, too. She’s a good farmer, they say.”

“It’s a lonely sort of spot.”

Mrs. Wort sniffed, and said,
“She’s
not lonely. Not if half the stories you hear are true. There was a major from Larkhill, made a perfect fool of himself over her. Married too. Now he’s been sent abroad. So it’s off with the old and on with the new.”

“And who’s the new?”

“I wouldn’t know, and I wouldn’t care. There’s a lot of men to choose from round here. Soldiers and airmen, and all the scientists at Porton. They say the scientists are the worst of the lot. Would you be wanting anything more?”

“Not a thing,” said Mr. Calder sleepily. “As soon as I can bring myself to stir from this beautiful fire, I’ll be toddling up to bed.”

When Mrs. Wort had departed on her nightly round of locking up, he sat for a long time, staring into the red heart of the fire and wondering why an attractive and capable woman should want to hide herself away in the wilds of Salisbury Plain.