Cargo of Eagles Page 10

  ‘Silly of me,’ she continued, twisting her yellow headgear by its strings. ‘Ought to explain if you don’t know the term. I’m a journalist, don’t you know. Write for the Gazette at Nine Ash and keep a watching brief for the Globe in town. It’s called stringing. Quite well paid if you can find a good story. No bylines of course, but then crime reporting’s not really my cuppa tea. Country life, nature in the raw, ancient local history, these are my subjects. You shoot a bit yourself over those converts they tell me. Brought along something to show you, in fact, in case I ran you to earth. But it can wait. First things first. I’ll just file my copy and we’ll have a nice natter. Did you see anything of last night’s little rumpus?’

  ‘Nary a thing, lady.’ said Morty. ‘I’ve just been grilled by experts but I’ve stuck to my story and they’re making no charges.’

  ‘Humph! That’s a fat lot of help. Can’t you do better than that? I got most of the gen up at Forty Angels.’

  Morty considered. His new acquaintance was disarming and he found himself anxious to help.

  ‘As far as I know a plain clothes policeman called Sibling was beaten up last night by a couple of men who probably mistook him for somebody else—a trespasser, perhaps. I doubt if it will make headlines.’

  ‘Maybe not, but that’s the editor’s pidgin and he can work it out as he pleases. Saltey is bursting with policemen and they’re all as mum as oysters, so they think there’s something in the wind. Now just hang on half a jiffy whilst I get this on the wire. Thanks for the name, by the way. Hope it’s spelt in the proper way.’

  She turned and scuttled into the box, her large sensible shoes making the pebbles leap from her path.

  Her methods with the telephone had the same touch of forthright amateurishness which characterised her treatment of transport. She made two short calls and preceded each with a sharp blow to the side of the instrument which appeared to produce instant results. She emerged wiping her hands on a large bandana handkerchief.

  ‘Filthy places. Not enough grooming done to keep them tickety-boo. Still, this one works which is more than can be said of the one up the road. Now, Mr Kelsey—you are Mortimer Kelsey, I suppose?—I think we ought to have a chinwag. Too early for a snifter but do you suppose your landlady could rustle up a coffee?’

  Morty supposed that she could and suggested the four ale bar known as The Snug, a small highly varnished nook which was completely private and away from the main saloon. Before she joined him his guest strode back to her charger, opened a container beside the saddle and produced a battered black briefcase, which she tucked under her arm.

  ‘In here, I think, Miss Weatherby.’

  ‘Oh, it’s Mrs Weatherby. But not to worry. I’m still Monica Sparrow to most people, even if poor old Hugo’s been dead these thirty years. Sparrow, you know, of Sparrow’s Manor, or used to be. This area is still Sparrow’s Hundred though I don’t own an acre of it.’

  ‘My respects, ma’am,’ said Morty. ‘Twenty square miles to the Hundred down here and twenty seven in Yorkshire where they call it a Wapentake. I’ve done my homework, you see, even if it’s not my period.’

  ‘Good man.’ Mrs Weatherby slammed her case on to the scrubbed table and planted herself firmly on the bench behind it. ‘I know it’s not. I’ve done some research on you myself, which is not difficult for a nosey old woman like me. I always tell ’em “I only ask because I want to know” and that’s how I earn my living. And by the way—no jokes about sparrows. I know them all and I know my face is like a dilapidated barn owl. My friends call me Mon and the rest of ’em, behind my back, refer to me as the Sparrowhawk. Very little goes on between here and Nine Ash that I don’t know about, and what I don’t know I can piece together better than a dozen policemen.’

  ‘I can believe that.’ Morty warmed to her. ‘That’s fine and dandy because a little solid information is just what I’m looking for. You know about Dr Jones and her correspondents, for example?’

  ‘Ha! Your young woman. A fine gal by the look of her. Hook her up whilst the going is good and don’t waste your time doing the odd spot of knight errantry just to prove that you’re worth your salt. Take her away, raise a family and let that derelict property down the road go to perdition which is where it belongs.’

  Morty blushed. The thought that his feelings were so patent to any outside observer shook him and he reacted defensively.

  ‘I . . . I hardly know her, to tell you the truth. But she is the victim of a conspiracy and I’m darn well going to get to the bottom of it.’ He outlined the history of the letters.

  ‘Conspiracy, eh?’ Mrs Weatherby sipped her coffee meditatively and it seemed to Morty that she was sifting through a forest of family trees, sorting evidence from hearsay and diagnosing by innate instinct.

  ‘Conspiracy,’ she repeated. ‘Well, I suppose it could be. I haven’t seen any of them—the letters, I mean—myself, more’s the pity, or I might have put paid to it months ago. You think several different hands are at work? Are they written with a pen, typed or put together out of bits of newspaper?’

  Morty explained as best he could. When he came to think of it, his knowledge was very incomplete, but he made a good witness and he recited all that the landlord of The Demon had told him of the latest arrival. Mrs Weatherby listened in silence but she checked the points on the long bony fingers of one hand, tapping each digit sharply down on the table as she did so.

  ‘Four different groups, eh? You could call the first of them Catty and Arch—that would be a woman of course, possibly one of old Mossy Ling’s cousins and there are three of those, all as like as turkey cocks. Next, Smug. I’d say that means Jonah Woodrose, for a ducat. Then you say Informed but with Malice and Professional Know-how? There is only one man hereabouts in that category who fits the bill and he’s Alan Sullivan, a retired insurance agent who does tax work and knows everybody’s business. An acid little runt with duck’s disease. Finally, Wicked Religious—a pretty wide field, what? An elderly female on the Kytie side of the fence without a doubt. Choice of three there. Ethel Wishart, a distant cousin of H.O.’s, old Mrs Waters who’s practically ga-ga and Bob Felgate’s wife Norah, a toothy vixen and a pillar of Nonconformity with a mind like a cesspool. Not a nice collection and just about what I’d guessed all along. Pick ’em by the heels, shake ’em all out, see what drops on to the ground and you’ll have the answer.’

  ‘Isn’t that a job for the police?’

  ‘Fiddle faddle!’ Mrs Weatherby was contemptuous. ‘They’ll never get near it in a month of Sundays. Only thing to do is to frighten the ringleader if you can locate him or her. I’ll have a word with Jonah and see if I can put a pinch of ginger under his tail. He knows more than is good for him and always did. He’s not a Woodrose for nothing. You can say I’m an interfering old witch if you like but this place has a bad enough name already without adding poison pens.’ She chuckled reminiscently. ‘Yes, it would be quite a kick to stop Jonah’s earth for once. The Woodroses, don’t you know, still talk about “their people”, meaning anyone who once worked for them or their descendants. They are not feudal—they’re tribal. The Kyties were just the same in their time—playing Montagues and Capulets over less than half a dozen farms and a little bit of coastal business. That’s why both factions were so angry when old Kitty Kytie left her house to a stranger.’

  ‘Angry enough to kill Hector Askew, simply because he drew up the will?’

  ‘Bless my soul, no. Use your loaf, boy. Think. Think. The thing is done, Kitty is dead and buried, your beautiful filly has inherited. Nothing to be gained by bumping off young Askew. No, not on your Uncle Sam. That young blackguard was killed for his sins, and he committed ’em mostly in London or abroad, I’m told. Jealous husband, girl in the family way, that’s the shape of things and you can bet your boots on it. Even the man Gravesend spotted that, which explains why he went scuttling back to town leaving it to a C.I.D. sergeant and the local lot to ferret out the answer. He likes quick result
s, does Mr Gravesend, and this is a waiting game.’

  ‘The guy is coming back this afternoon according to Throstle,’ said Morty. ‘I forgot to tell you that.’

  ‘Is he now? That rather looks like business.’ Mrs Weatherby switched rapidly from the last lady of the Sparrows to string man for the Globe. She made some mental calculations with the aid of an outsize wrist watch. ‘I’d better get that on the blower right away.’ She stood up and pulled a handful of change from a pocket. ‘It’s just on opening time. Here, take my case and if the coast’s clear in the dining room, we’ll finish the natter there. Get me a Harry pinkers—a large one.’

  She strode out of the room, her head forward and her shoulders swaying as she moved. Morty had the impression that she was carrying an invisible hockey stick. He gathered the briefcase and did as he had been bidden. Throstle and his aides had departed but it was still too early at the inn for normal business.

  On her return the string man seemed pleased with herself. ‘Small scoop there, I think. Now let’s get down to brass tacks.’

  She pulled up a chair, opened her briefcase, drew out a dog-eared photograph which had been folded unkindly in half and spread it out on the table, scooping side plates and cutlery out of her way to clear a space.

  ‘You won’t have seen this, even if you’ve been to the Record Office,’ she said, ‘because the original doesn’t exist any longer. Belonged to our lot and was destroyed in the fire, forty years back. This is all that’s left of a survey map of the Saltey area made in 1758 for Sir Thomas Sparrow. It’s a Timothy Skynner and must have been quite a peach in its day, what? Take a good dekko at it and I’ll show you what I’m getting at. Ten inches to the mile. I remember it as a girl hanging in the old man’s library. About two foot by three when it was alive.’

  Even in its tattered state the print was a delight to any researching mind. It revealed an extremely accurate piece of cartography, made decorative by an ornamental compass and a baroquely framed title. The lower left hand corner had been squared off to list ‘The Parcels’, the farms and the holdings of the time, given in acres, roods and perches, together with the tenants. Very little had changed it seemed in the course of two hundred and more years, except for the coastline where erosion had redrawn the outlines and a new sea wall had smoothed away the more erratic indentations. To Morty the discovery was a treasure and he pored over it for several minutes in silence.

  ‘This is just great,’ he said at last. ‘Quite new on me. I’ll make a copy print, if you’ll allow me. It fits into my thesis like a glove. May I borrow it for a couple of days?’

  ‘Help yourself,’ said Mrs Weatherby heartily, ‘but don’t miss the real point of the whole caboodle.’ She pointed a bony finger to emphasise her words. ‘All this coastal area is Woodrose country and always has been, since the dawn of time. Every foot of access to the water in both directions. The Kyties—they were there already you see—owned or rented anything that could be really farmed. Very few of them took to the sea. Jonah Woodrose’s grandfather started moving inland in the 90s of the last century, but he kept as much of the saltings as he could. One or two names have changed and families have died out, but the principle’s much the same today. Now a modern Ordnance Survey map shows only one way out of Saltey except by water. Correct? Well, look at this, young man, and you’ll see that there are half a dozen, or used to be. Wide ditches, little private tracks, footpaths through coppices—most of them have gone, but two or three are left. The police, God bless ’em, think that by watching one corner they can keep tabs on who goes in and out of this place and they always did, or pretended to. They couldn’t be more wrong. The area isn’t a box, it’s a sieve. Get what I’m driving at?’

  ‘Smuggling, I’d say.’

  ‘You’re bang on. Everything came through the Bowl and went on to London by the back lanes. Even up to the war you could bet your sweet life that half the families in this place dabbled in it, whatever else they worked at officially. And who do you suppose were the leading lights in the enterprise?’

  ‘I could guess.’

  Mrs Weatherby snorted. ‘I daresay you could. But I know, because I enjoy poking my nose into things. The answer is all your girl friend’s correspondents, or their menfolk. Most of them are past it now, but their ringleader still seems to be interested in keeping Saltey to itself. Damitall, I’ll beat the truth out of Jonah if I swing for it.’

  Morty took a gulp of his second gin: his companion had presented him with a mixture too strong for his taste and he grimaced involuntarily.

  ‘You know,’ he said at last, ‘there’s one thing I don’t understand. You’re a kind of a local character and in a way I’d say you’re being disloyal to your own people. Yet you’re taking my side and I couldn’t be more of a stranger. Hell, I’m grateful to you and your help is just the greatest but unless you’re scouting around for a Sunday tabloid story—and I want no part of that, lady—I don’t get your angle.’

  Mrs Weatherby rose to her feet, looked towards and beyond the bar to make certain they were alone and returned to the table before she answered. Her voice was lowered.

  ‘Smuggling,’ she said. ‘has a fine romantic ring about it—once aboard the lugger, yo heave ho and all that kind of malarky. I’ve had a bottle or two myself I wouldn’t care to explain about and my father’s taste in brandy and cigars was always ahead of his income. No particular harm in that, so far as I can see. In the old days the gentry were inclined to regard it as a sport and we minded our own business if the others went in for it more professionally. That’s why strangers aren’t encouraged here, a fact you’ve already had your nose rubbed in. Bless my soul, boy, I’d no more think of running a story about that than I would of pinching the Crown Jewels. That’s why I dislike those letters of yours, because they puzzle me and I hate mysteries.’

  ‘How so? I thought you’d just solved the whole problem, bar the shouting?’

  His companion held her head on one side like a cogitating terrier.

  ‘Because they don’t fit into the pattern,’ she said at last. ‘Different as chalk from cheese. The more I think about it the less I like it. I haven’t the slightest doubt that these naughty old things have had a hand in it, but just why, I ask myself. Their day has been over for twenty years. They’re all as old as God, apart from Jonah Woodrose and he doesn’t fit the bill as a modern smuggler. He’s an uncouth brute but he’s doing very nicely thank you and he was never one to risk his neck. So somebody must be behind it all. Someone is still interested in keeping Saltey to itself.’

  She took a sip of gin, breathed heavily through her nose and continued speaking, more to herself than to Morty.

  ‘Apart from the fun of paying a quid or two less for your liquor there was never much to be gained from the old fashioned game—not in terms of big money, anyhow. But today it’s a dirty business—nothing sporting about it. Different people, different goods and bigger profits. Watches are worth while, of course, but as far as I know they mostly come by air, in big consignments. In this part of the world I’m afraid it’s dope, which is quite a new department for us. And that I simply will not have.’

  She rapped the table sharply and Morty was vividly reminded of his first schoolmistress.

  ‘I won’t have it,’ she repeated. ‘Morphia, heroin, the reefer cigarette things—what d’you call it, marijuana—and so on, they’re all works of the devil. I’ve seen the effect on kids even in Nine Ash Hospital and they’re quite terrifying. It’s got to be stopped.’

  Morty applauded. ‘Quite right, ma’am. Just what do you propose doing about it?’

  ‘Do?’ Mrs Weatherby switched two penetrating eyes on her companion. ‘Do? Get to the bottom of it, of course. Blow the whole thing sky high. Sink ’em without trace.’

  She emptied her glass.

  ‘Now what have we got to go on? First Jonah Woodrose and his gaggle of old women. Unlikely material, I grant you, but the roots of sin are there as Kipling said. Jonah’s no master
mind, so there must be somebody with brains in the background who’s making use of him. Probably not a local, but then Jonah spends quite a bit of time in London. Jonah wouldn’t risk running drugs. Jonah is rich. Jonah is a coward. And Jonah is mischievous, like all the Woodroses. I’ll start with him. And you—’ she tapped sharply on the table again, ‘you will take the other end.’

  He turned to her in surprise. There was something in her autocratic but slap-happy approach which was both endearing and convincing. If she was determined to be a one woman avenging army it would be as well to become an ally.

  ‘Me, lady? Just what do you think I can do?’

  ‘Keep an eye on the children—the tearaways, of course. Mods or rockers or whatever they call themselves. How do you suppose this racket is conducted? Who else goes roaring over the countryside day in and day out? Apply your mind, my dear man. As far as most people are concerned they’re all as alike as peas in a pod—tight trousers. long hair and dirty fingernails—and I don’t suppose there are more than two or three of them who are real little crooks. Pump your friend Throstle and see if you can dig up what he knows about them. If he is as obstinate as a mule—and he can be—find out which of them he really grilled this morning. They’d be the ones with something known against them, as the policemen say. Find who owns the expensive machines and what they do for a living, if anything. Chat ’em up. Make friends.’

  Morty squared his shoulders.

  ‘A large order. They’re just as clannish as the rest of the population.’

  ‘Nonsense.’ Mrs Weatherby was emphatic. ‘You’re thirty years nearer their age group than I am. Learn the language, study the customs of the people. History is your subject, what? Well, here’s social history of a very uncivilised kind right under your nose. And if you can find anything out just give me a tinkle. Remember, I only ask because I want to know.’