Two Cows and a Vanful of Smoke (9 page)

I didn’t believe what he’d just said. “That would have been a first.”

“But I didn’t realize, I didn’t think it would end up like this.”

“You never do think, Spike.”

He shook his head. “OK, El. Tell me. Tell me what I’ve got to do.”

“Only if you listen. And only if you do as I say. No arguments. Can you manage that?”

“I’ll try.”

“You’ll have to do better than that, Spike. A lot better.”

“I’ll try.”

“Try?”

“I’ll do whatever you say.”

“Good. And you’ll have to trust me.”

“Trust you?” He scrabbled in his pocket, pulled out a packet of fags, put one in his mouth and took half a shaking minute to light it. He inhaled deeply, blew the smoke at the windscreen and said, “OK.”

“And do everything I say.”

“OK.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

“Good.”

“To start with, we have to hide the smoke. OK?”

“OK.”

“So get this fucking van started and follow me.”

“Where are we going?”

“My place.”

“But…”

“I said no arguments, Spike…”

“But…”

“Spike!”

He put his hands up. “OK.”

He followed me. It only took ten minutes to get to the farm, but it was a long ten minutes. They could have been anywhere, waiting in a gateway, behind a wall, in a barn or at a crossroads. They didn’t take a day off. It was obvious. They could be spying from a hedge or the top of a tall tree. They could be in that car or that van, or waiting on bikes in a lay-by. Behind the curtains of a rented cottage, through a crack in a fence, or watching from a shepherd’s hut in the middle of a small field. Hiding like a vole in a hole, whiskers twitching and nose going, tongue licking its little lips at the thought of a fat worm. So when we reached the farmyard we parked by the caravan and I told him to stay in the van. He nodded and sat with his hands on the steering wheel, looking this way and that, licking his lips. Mr Evans was in the house, watching the television. I knocked on the front door, and when he answered I told him that a mate had turned up. I thumbed towards the van. Spike nodded and tried a smile. I knew Mr Evans didn’t like strangers on his land, so I said, “I didn’t want you to worry.”

“Worry? Me?” he said. “What have I got to worry about?” and he went back to his programme.

We stepped into the caravan, sat down for half an hour and drank a beer. We tried to talk about things that wouldn’t panic us, things we’d done when we were kids, places we’d been, scrapes we’d avoided, but whenever there was a silence I knew what he was thinking, and he knew what I was thinking, and we’d lock eyes and I’d shake my head and I’d think he was about to cry. I opened another couple of beers, another half-hour passed, and then I saw Mr Evans’s downstairs light go out. I checked the time. It was ten. He was going to bed. “Give him twenty minutes,” I said, “and then we’ll get going.”

Another beer, a couple of cigarettes for Spike, an upstairs light went out and then the house was dark. When I thought it was safe, I said, “OK. Do exactly as I say.”

I went back to the yard, sat in the driver’s seat with the handbrake off and the gears in neutral and told Spike to push. Once we had it out of the front yard, it was easy freewheeling past the hay barn and into the sunken lane that skirted the top meadows and the field where Mr Evans grew winter kale. An old barn stood in the bottom corner of this field, a place where we kept an old trailer, a set of harrows and some other broken bits of machinery. It was hidden by a high hedge and surrounded by clumps of old coppice. I got Spike to open the field gate, started the van, gunned it up the track, swung it round and stopped by the barn doors.

We spent half an hour making a space for the van, pushing the trailer to one side and pulling the harrows into the field. Then we pushed the van inside, covered it with an old tarpaulin, and rolled the trailer back inside. The harrows stacked beside the trailer, and we tossed a few old hay bales on top of the tarp. When we stood back, the van was invisible. I closed the doors, slid the bolt, and while Spike wasn’t looking I tucked a stick of straw behind the bolt.

“Job done,” I said.

“Thanks El…”

I faced him. “You’ve got to promise me something, Spike.”

“What?”

“You won’t come up here. If I see you snooping around, this is the last help you get from me.”

“I promise.”

“Swear. Swear you’ll keep away.”

“I swear, El. I don’t want to see that stuff again.”

I stared into his eyes, and I thought he was telling the truth. He had to be, otherwise he was lost to me. “OK,” I said, “where are you going to stay?”

“Well, I was wondering, seeing like you’ve got a spare bed and…”

I put my hand up. “Not a chance. I’ll drop you somewhere, but after that you’re on your own…”

“OK. Maybe my sister’s.”

“I don’t think so. I went to see her when I was looking for you. She said she wouldn’t have you there if you paid her. What did you do to piss her off?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re such a fucking liar, Spike. And your mates in Milverton weren’t that pleased to hear your name either.”

“You saw them too?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck.”

“I suppose I could try someone in Wiveliscombe. I’m owed a favour.”

“OK. Wivey it is,” and when we got back to the farm, I got him on the back of the bike and we left. I rode carefully and slowly, let the panic settle in my stomach, and avoided a fox in the road at Bathealton. I felt his heart thumping against my back, and for a few minutes I thought that this was how friends should be: joined, attached, travelling through a night for a reason that had something to do with anything but running away from fright. We should have been able to ride slowly and not have to look around every corner, and we should have been able to laugh. The lanes should have held no threat, the fields should have been gold and hedged and voled. But we didn’t laugh, and we didn’t talk, and when we reached Wivey he directed me to a place on Golden Hill. It was a quiet street. No people, no dogs, no cats. A few pieces of paper blown in air, but that was all. I said, “What are you going to do?”

“Keep my head down.”

“I think that’s a good plan.”

“I might read a book.”

I couldn’t remember Spike ever reading a book, but the idea that he was going to try was a good one. I said, “Have you got one?”

“Jim’s got plenty.”

“Jim?”

“My mate. He lives here.” He thumbed at the front door of a cottage.

“OK. Well, choose a long one.”

“I might do that.”

He held out his hand. Another thing I couldn’t remember Spike doing before. Shaking hands. We shook. “OK,” I said. “You take care. I’ll come and see you in a day or two.”

“Will you?”

“Of course.”

“Thanks,” he said.

“Take care, Spike,” I said, and I watched him until he was in the house and I thought he was safe, and then I turned back the way we’d come, home to some sort of peace and shelter.

In the morning I milked, did my chores, and after breakfast I walked down the sunken lane to the kale field, and checked the barn. The stick of straw was still tucked behind the bolt, and when I put my eye to the crack between the doors I could see the trailer, the harrows, the tarpaulin and the hay bales, but the van was hidden well. I couldn’t see any part of it, or smell the smoke. I tapped the doors for luck. Back at the farm, Mr Evans fetched some creosote from the store, and I helped him to paint the yard fence.

He was in a talkative mood, and when I told him where I’d been with Spike he told me that in the old days he used to walk to Wivey to go to the Saturday dances. “Those were the days…” He’d meet up with friends along the way, and by the time they reached the town there’d be five or six of them. “We could be terrors,” he said, “but the girls liked us.”

“I bet they did.”

“Oh yes,” he said, and he let the words kindle something in his head, something stronger than a quiet and simple memory. Sometimes he could look smaller than he was, and weaker. His eyes went misty and he wiped his nose with his sleeve, and he said, “Oh yes,” again.

I knew what I wanted to ask him. Maybe he sensed the question, because he said, “I met a lovely girl. Mary. She worked in the school. I don’t think her parents approved of me, rough farm-hand, dirt in his turn-ups, all that. Not that they made any difference…”

“What do you mean?”

“The War did for it.”

“The War?”

“Yes lad, the War.”

“Why?”

“I was called up. 1941. I’d never been further than Taunton, but suddenly I was on a train to God knows where. Spent the next year and a half square-bashing, rifle-training, cleaning kit. They used to move us from camp to camp, and we never knew if the next day we’d be off to do some proper fighting. I’d write to her, but I don’t know if she ever got my letters. Maybe the censors got hold of them. Or her parents. I don’t know.”

“Did you fight?”

“Did I fight?”

“Yes.”

He was holding a paint brush. Creosote dripped off its end. “Oh I fought. I fought like a demon.”

“Where?”

The creosote dripped on, black tears into the dust.

“Sicily,” he said. “Sicily. That’s where it started. Then the mainland. Italy. The Germans, they were tough. The Italians usually ran.”

“Did you kill anyone?” I said, but as the words came out I knew it was a question too far.

He looked at me and shook his head. “Why would you want to know that?”

“I don’t know. I just wondered.”

He snapped at me. “Well you can keep wondering, Elliot. You can keep wondering and not ask me those sort of questions again.” He was getting angry, but then I couldn’t be sure. I hadn’t seen him angry, so didn’t know what to look for. Maybe he was just irritated. “There are some questions you don’t ask.”

I wanted to say I was sorry, that I hadn’t meant to ask the question, but the way he looked at me told me that I should shut up. Not say another word. His face had hardened, and his eyes were distant, and when he slapped the creosote on the fence now he did it quickly, carelessly. We had work to do, and there would always be work to do. Work was more important than bad memories, more important than questions or answers. Get on with it. So I did.

When it was time for lunch, he dropped his brush in the pot and went inside without a word. I rode to the phone box at Appley. It was time to call Pollock again. Someone else answered, so I did as I’d been told and hung up. I walked down the lane to The Globe, sat outside and ate a sandwich with a glass of Coke. I was edgy, I jumped every time a car pulled up at the turning beside the pub, but the sandwich was fresh and filled me up.

Before I went back to work, I tried Pollock again. This time he answered. I told him I’d found the smoke and hidden it where no one could find it, and Spike was staying somewhere which was as safe as it could be.

“Good man,” he said, and he cleared his throat. “We’ve been thinking.”

“We?”

“Yes, Elliot, we. You know the expression ‘it takes a thief to catch a thief’?”

“Yes.”

“Well…” and he lowered his voice to a whisper, “it takes more than one copper to catch another copper.”

“OK.”

“So you and I have to meet again. I’ve got a few loose ends to tidy up here, but I’ll be out by seven.”

“Seven it is,” I said. “Same place?”

“Never the same place twice, Elliot. I’ll come to Wellington. You know The Dolphin?”

“Yes.”

“Be there,” he said, and he hung up.

I was mechanical for the rest of day. I painted the rest of the yard fence, stacked a delivery of cattle cake in the store beside the parlour, dug some potatoes from the vegetable garden and milked the herd. A couple of times my brain even forgot about the smoke and Spike and the hung man, and when my head came back to thinking about these things, for a moment they felt like part of a dream I’d had, or a dream I was having.

I got to The Dolphin early, and settled in a corner with a pint and a packet of crisps. A few regulars were sitting at the bar, men who looked as though they lived there and had been drinking since breakfast. When Pollock arrived, he walked straight to where I was sitting, bent down, said, “Finish your drink and then come and find me in the car park,” and he left before I could reply.

What could I do? One second I thought this might be a normal thing to do, the sort of way policemen worked. The next second I thought this is a trap, this is what was always going to happen, this is the last pint I’ll ever drink. But what could I do? What else could I think? Where else could I go? I drained the glass, took it to the bar, thanked the barman and left.

As I turned into the car park, Pollock was waiting for me. “OK?” he said.

“I think so.”

“Good. Then follow me.”

I followed, and when we reached the car, he opened the back door and said, “In you go.” I climbed in and found myself sitting next to another man, a plain-looking man with cropped hair and small ears. He was wearing a suit and tie and sat with his hands on his knees. He looked calm and quiet, like a priest at an altar. Pollock said, “This is Inspector Smith.”

I said, “Hello.”

Inspector Smith nodded, but didn’t say anything to me. He carried on looking straight ahead. “OK Pollock. Drive.”

“Sir.”

We drove, and as we headed out of Wellington I said, “Where are we going?”, but when neither of them answered I sat back and stared out of the window at the houses and the people and the cars. And when we crossed the bypass and started to climb the road towards the Blackdown hills, I counted sheep and cows.

The Blackdowns are hidden and secret, a place where lanes disappear into ancient hill forts and don’t come out again, and where women on bicycles smile gappy smiles and leave the smell of chicken shit in the air. Broken machinery stands in hidden fields, cars rock with illicit lovers, kestrels hover over knowing rabbits. The wind whistles across damp marshes, and the ghosts of pilots and soldiers stalk the remains of World War Two airfields. Cows are thin and sheep look nervous, more nervous than sheep usually do, though I wouldn’t know why. It’s difficult to know what’s going on in a sheep’s head, or to understand why they do the things they do. Like leap four feet vertically for no reason, or follow each other over cliffs. There were no cliffs on the Blackdowns, just tiny fields and dark woods, deep ditches and high hedges.

We drove for twenty minutes, and when we reached the top road we turned onto a bumpy track that led through beech woods. The trees were tall and full, and when we stopped and the engine settled, I wound the window down and listened to the leaves in the breeze. Birds sang for a moment, stopped singing, started again, watched us. I knew they were watching us, because I could feel their beaky little heads pointing in my direction, and sense their black little eyes boring into me. Maybe they thought I had some seeds for them, or bread, or maybe they didn’t think at all. I suppose the average bird has a brain the size of a peanut, so thought might not have anything to do with what birds do, and instinct is the only thing that makes them do what they do. We sat in silence, and for a moment I thought about asking Pollock if he had any idea how a bird’s brain works, but then Smith turned to me and said, “So. Elliot.”

“Yes?”

“I work in Bristol.”

“Do you?” I said. I’d been to Bristol a few times. I’d driven across the suspension bridge and looked down at the river, and I’d walked across the downs and wondered why people throw rubbish in bushes.

“Yes. I work for a team that investigates corruption. Police corruption. You understand what I mean?”

“I’m not stupid.”

“Of course you’re not.”

“And you’re investigating Dickens.”

“Very good.”

“Has he been a bad policeman?”

Smith’s expression didn’t change. He had eyes and a nose and a mouth, but his face was a blank and featureless nothing. It was a wall and there was nothing behind it. No garden, no sea, no road, no milling crowds. I suppose it was the ideal face for his type of work. “Yes,” he said. “He’s been a very bad policeman. And he’s been a very bad policeman for a long time now, and we want to do something about it.”

“Why haven’t you done anything before?”

“You ask a lot of questions, Elliot.”

“Do I?”

“Yes. Too many. I think you should think about asking less and doing more.”

“Maybe I could say the same thing to you,” I said.

For a moment, Smith’s expression did change. A hint of annoyance crept onto the corner of his mouth, and he blinked. But then the blankness was back. It slapped his forehead. “You’ll say nothing of the sort,” he said. He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

“OK,” I said. There was no point arguing and no point fucking around. “So what do you want from me?”

“The truth. From the beginning.”

“I already told Pollock. He knows everything.”

“And he tells me that every time you do, the story changes a bit. So this time I’d like you to be careful. Think before you say anything.”

“OK,” I said, and I started at the beginning again. Spike. The Globe. Meeting Spike at The Globe. Listening to Spike at The Globe. Following Spike to the hoop house. Hiding in the undergrowth. Seeing the men. Seeing Dickens. Going round to Spike’s and seeing the plants hanging in his garage. And on and on, the hung man, the bald man, Spike’s house burning down. Hiding the van and the smoke.

“And where have you hidden it?”

“Somewhere safe,” I said.

“How safe?”

“Very,” I said.

“You can tell us.”

“I’d rather not.”

“We’d rather you did, Elliot. We really would.”

I shook my head.

“Elliot?”

“Yes?”

“When I say we’d rather you did, I mean it. If we’re going to help you, you’ve got to help us.”

“But I thought it was the other way round. I thought I was helping you.”

“We’re helping each other, Elliot.”

“Good,” I said.

There was silence in the car for a moment and then Smith said, “Sergeant Pollock and I are going for a little walk and talk. We won’t be long, and we’ll keep you in sight, so don’t think about doing anything silly.”

“What do you mean, ‘silly’?”

“We don’t want you doing a runner.”

“Would I?”

“No. I don’t think you would. But if the thought occurred, you wouldn’t be doing yourself any favours. You know that, don’t you?”

“You think I want to walk back to Wellington?”

“No.”

“I’ll be here.”

“Good lad,” he said, and they climbed out of the car.

They didn’t go far. I watched them walk and heard their feet crunching on the dry leaves of the forest floor, and I heard them talking – low voices mixing with the rustling trees and the calling birds. I sat still and quiet. I was starting to get a faint buzz in my ears. I tried to distract myself by counting. I reached fifty, but got bored, so I started to think about what I was going to do when I was out of this. A holiday would be good. Two weeks in a place where no one knows who I am. Somewhere warm where I could wear shorts and sandals and drink without getting drunk. Somewhere quiet where I could sit on a wall and learn to play a musical instrument. I was listing the places I’d like to visit – Italy, Spain, Greece, Turkey – when they came back to the car. “OK,” said Pollock, “We’ve had a little chat, and we’re going to trust you, Elliot.”

“You’re going to trust me?” I snorted.

“Yes.”

“But can I trust you?”

“Why ask?”

“If one of your lot is bent, then why can’t all of you be bent?”

“Good question. Not one I can answer.”

“I can,” said Smith. “Some of us believe in truth. Decency. Serving the public. Keeping the world safe for good people. And some of us know that if those ideas are lost, then the world is lost. Then we might as well close up the shop, go home and wait for the balloon to go up.”

“What balloon?” I said.

“
The
balloon,” said Smith. “The one with the skull and crossbones on it,” and then he sat back, folded his arms and said, “Drive.”

Pollock started the car. “We’re going to take you back to The Dolphin now, but when we’re ready to move, we’re going to ask you to do something for us. It might be a bit dangerous, but I think you’re up for it.”

“How dangerous?”

“Well, put it this way,” he said, and he pulled off, bumping down the track towards the road, “we won’t be asking you to fight a badger’s dad.”

“Thanks.”

“And we might even pay you for your trouble. A little something out of petty cash…”

“Pay me?”

“You never know.”

“And what about Spike?”

“What about him?”

“Are you going to need him?”

“Need him? For what?”

“To help?”

“Well, if what you say about him is true, he’s not that reliable. Is that true?”

“Probably.”

“The sort of person you couldn’t trust in a crisis.”

“Well, I don’t know about that.”

“No,” said Smith. “We’ll leave him out. Let him stew in his own juice.”