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  ‘You mistake my motive, my dear sir. In a sense it is my business. I may be an elderly observer but I still have the use of my ears and eyes. Again, I am indigenous. But for the accident of education—and I can assure you that it was an accident—I am the basic man of the estuary.’

  This at least is true, Morty admitted to himself. He is a local at heart. Even that unnaturally cultured voice has echoes of the coast. Perhaps that is what saves him from being offensively theatrical here in this unlikely wilderness.

  As a gesture of reconciliation he fumbled through his memory of the man’s work and found the phrase he was seeking.

  ‘Let us respect the saltings and the wind.’

  ‘That is a subtle flattery. Few people recall anything of mine beyond a single line written forty odd years ago. I had supposed Dixie to be the last soul on earth interested in my withered laurels. Yet you say your subject is history and you profess to conduct your researches here?’

  ‘That’s certainly true. You are leaning on all that is left of a Saxon fort, if my guess is right. These stones were brought here before the quarry at Nine Ash had been discovered and St Polycarp’s, which did come from there, is early Norman. Why did you follow me?’

  It was some time before Wishart replied. Finally he threw the end of a cigarette so that it travelled for several yards like a shooting star before it vanished into the water below the bank.

  ‘You do me an injustice. I could argue that it was I who led and you who followed, but that would not be strictly true, I came here because I wanted to talk to you and because it seemed very probable that you would come this way. There is not much that you can do in Mob’s Bowl without being remarked. I came to tell you of a letter bearing no signature which I have received and have now destroyed, though some of it is committed to memory. You could also say, perhaps, that I came to offer you a lesson in history.’

  A chill caught at Morty’s heart and he shivered involuntarily, his resentment shifting reluctantly from his companion.

  ‘Not another of those infernal things?’

  ‘Ah, so there have been others? You don’t altogether surprise me for I have heard a whisper of them in the wind. I think I should tell you the burden of the writer’s plaint. It was posted, by the way, in Saltey two days ago and was written in block capitals by an elderly person, probably a woman. Not wholly literate but with quite a gift of invective. A woman, almost certainly one who was born in this place.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘I am building with very trifling straws, but they make a brick or two. I say a woman, since there was a brand of malice in the missive which I believe to be typically female. I say elderly because the hand was not steady as yours would be if you inscribed the same essay. And I say local because it has a peculiar hallmark which no stranger would recognise.’

  In the darkness Morty could visualise Wishart’s secret smile, the satisfaction of a lonely man who normally finds no audience for private jokes.

  ‘All of us in Saltey who are nearing seventy betray ourselves by it. It was the snobbery of the time, the idiosyncracy taught to us by Miss Jessica Croft our village schoolmistress, the Greek E in handwriting. I use it myself, and it derives from my childhood here and not from my frail knowledge of the classics. Dame Croft went out with the tide when this century was very young and no child has used it since. My correspondent, ergo, is of her vintage.’

  ‘O.K. So you had a letter from some anonymous old harridan. What did she say?’

  ‘You will not care for the contents. I may be an indifferent Boniface but I am equipped to be your mentor in some respects. It said that I should not accept a Jezebel as a guest, a “Whore of Babylon” was the phrase. It stated that the delectable Dr Jones had been conducting a liaison with the late Hector Askew, in order to inherit Miss Kytie’s property. This suggestion was colourfully supplemented and in some detail. The writer added that since Askew had been struck, rightly, by the vengeance which Jehovah wreaks upon the sinners of this world, the doctor was now casting libidinous eyes upon the body of Mortimer Kelsey and that he too stood in danger of receiving a retributive thunderbolt from the servants of Nemesis now resident here on earth. Not a particularly Christian document but it struck a religious note.’

  Morty snorted. ‘There’s nothing new in it. Dr Jones tells me she’s given hers to the police. You ought to have done the same.’

  ‘A little beyond our local Dogberry, I fear. As for the amiable Throstle, his hands are full elsewhere. The two happenings—the death of Askew and these letters—have only the remotest of basic connections in my arrogant opinion. You don’t understand us in Saltey, Mr Kelsey, and there are long odds that you never will.’

  ‘I can see that a group of evil minded jealous and greedy old witches are trying to frighten Dido out of her wits—trying to scare her off by a pack of lies and slanders.’

  ‘Just so. The question is, will they succeed?’

  Morty considered. The picture of Dido, angry, cool and determined, came vividly to him.

  ‘I’d say no. She’s a hell of a girl. Spooks and mumbo jumbo, wisecracks from old Rip Van Winkle in your bar and all the broken glass in creation wouldn’t keep her out if she gave her mind to it. If you want my bet I’d say that the bigger the opposition the more determined she’d be to fight it.’

  ‘I thought you might form that impression.’ Wishart pulled a pipe from his pocket and filled it. When it was satisfactorily alight he spoke again.

  ‘You call yourself a historian, Mr Kelsey. Have you come to any conclusion about our Demon? My impression was that you came here originally because you were attracted by that significant piece of mythology.’

  ‘It’s largely true—that and my thesis. I’ve read your book of course. Why do you ask?’

  ‘Because it has a bearing on your problem. If you can read that riddle you can touch the fringe of knowledge. Understand the Demon and you have the clue to our psychology. My pamphlet is a bait for the tripper trade, written at the insistence of my dear wife. Those who can read between the lines will find some amusement at what are called “in-jokes” today. It is an experiment in the forgery of folk lore. Yet the story has an origin, a basis in fact. Have you no idea what it could be?’

  ‘According to your fairy tale,’ said Morty, giving his mind to the subject with an effort, ‘on June 7th 1895 the village of Saltey, or rather the Mob’s Bowl end of it, was visited by a Demon who rushed down the road, smashed gates and windows, broke moorings, took tiles off roofs, destroyed crops and generally had himself such a ball that the place took years to recover. The story has been handed down from those who saw him to their children’s children as if they were the warriors of Bunkers Hill or Agincourt. A lot of embroidery has been added on the way, of course—the baby found in the middle of a haystack, the two headed calf, the plague of bats, the cloven hoof marks in the churchyard and the remarkable cakes cooking in the bakehouse oven. I rather go for the bats myself and I should say they were your contribution. But do I believe any of it? No, sir.’

  ‘Yet something undoubtedly happened. What is your suggestion?’

  Morty considered. ‘Oh, something set the tongues wagging sure enough. Almost certainly a freak storm, purely local. It probably raised a small whirlwind, the sort we call a Dust Devil in the States. They can cause quite a bit of damage and certainly look kind of strange if you haven’t seen one before. That would be my reading of it. But you’ve got nothing to worry about. I’d hate to spoil a good story by supplying a simple corny explanation.’

  ‘You’d be wrong to do so. Doubly wrong, because although there was no whirlwind there was a great deal of damage to property.’

  Wishart settled his elbows more comfortably on the rock and Morty was again aware of the man’s hunger for more sophisticated conversation than his patrons at the inn could provide.

  ‘The truth about the Saltey Demon,’ he said at last, ‘is better than fiction—funnier, if you like. It would be a pity
to spoil a good legend for the sake of a poor joke but this is a risk I am going to take. It is for your researching mind alone, so you must respect my confidence.

  ‘June 7th 1895 was the day of the Royal review of the troops and militia in the grounds of Sparrows Manor at Nine Ash. It was a sort of a local Field of the Cloth of Gold, with bands, marquees, pageantry, the flags of all nations and of course a royal Prince and Princess. No one in the district had talked about anything else for weeks and nearly every able bodied man, woman and child was determined to be there. Charabancs—horse drawn wagonettes in those days—were hired, dog carts were polished, brakes repainted and those who couldn’t afford to ride went on foot. By eight o’clock in the morning, with a few notable exceptions, Mob’s Bowl and Forty Angels were as deserted as the central Sahara.

  ‘It was a very hot day, the middle of a heat wave in point of fact, and what is more important it was a Wednesday.’

  ‘I don’t get the significance of that.’

  ‘You will, my friend, you will. Wednesday was always a baking day in the village and every housewife made her own cakes, but few had the right ovens for the operation. The mixtures in their pans were brought by the ladies every Wednesday morning to the baker, whose name by the way was Septimus Kytie, a relation of the old lady up the road. His custom was to bake the cakes during the day and have them ready for collection in the evening, thus saving a great deal of valuable fuel. This practice continued here until the advent of the mass produced rubbish which is called bread today. Mr Kytie was therefore excluded from the exodus.

  ‘Now there was a second absentee and he was a predecessor of mine, the landlord of what was then The Foliage, a henpecked and unhappy individual called Waters. I picture an idyllic scene, the sunshine, the deserted village, only the call of the gulls to underline this unique peace. I am improvising a trifle here, but the deduction is inescapable. Mr Waters called on his friend Mr Kytie to comment on the beauty of a world without women and to give an additional quality to the occasion he brought with him a couple of bottles of brandy, probably from a private reserve. We sometimes have such trifles in these parts.

  ‘One thing led to another, most agreeably, and by mid-afternoon they were both fast asleep. The oven and the precious cakes were forgotten. Then the terrible moment arrived when the smell of burning aroused them. They were faced with disaster and inevitable exposure. Fifty potential Furies were about to descend on them and they had perhaps half an hour to save their skins. It was a situation which could well ruin both men for life.

  ‘But one of them, and I suspect that this was Septimus Kytie, had an idea. There was a wretched child hanging about the place, a miscreant who had been denied the treat. The old men seized on him, bribed him and gave him very precise instructions. He was to go and hide in a ditch between here and Forty Angels, get himself covered with mud and reappear when the wagons returned. On his way he was to do as much damage as any small fiend could lay his hands to. His story was to be that he had been knocked off his feet by a Demon. Kytie had spent some time at sea and had probably seen a whirlwind in action. His briefing was colourful and he had a willing pupil.

  ‘At this point a genuine minor miracle came to their aid. The weather broke and there was a sudden sharp storm, the sort of summer drencher which ends a great heat, accompanied by a good deal of thunder. Kytie and Waters added to the confusion by every piece of wanton destruction they could imagine. Mares in season were let out of stables, dogs unchained from yards, cattle loosed, hens driven into the street, doors were flung open, windows broken and boats turned adrift by the quay. There is no doubt of their success and they probably had the time of their lives. The wagonettes returned to a scene of utter chaos.

  ‘In the face of this major disaster and the convincing evidence of a demoniac visit the blackened ashes of the cakes were a minor detail, though a very useful one from my point of view.’

  Wishart paused to tap out his pipe.

  ‘Now mark the frailty of human nature. Within an hour of the return of the populace it appeared that a Mrs Woodrose who was bed-ridden and lived at the back of her cottage had also seen the Demon, and this made her both interesting and important. Next day ten witnesses came forward from Forty Angels who had observed him as he sped over the saltings. The legend was established within a matter of weeks. By midsummer you weren’t worth talking to unless you had your own Demon story—something you’d seen, or something strange that had happened to your house. Before the year was out every single man, woman and child firmly believed in their own reminiscences. Except, of course, for the original conspirators. And two of them are dead long since.’

  ‘And the third?’

  ‘The third is old Mossy. He was the delinquent boy. You should have guessed that.’

  Morty was delighted. ‘It has the ring of truth. As an historian I’d lay odds that half the unexplained phenomena of the ages started in pretty much the same way—the devils of Loudun, for example. Thanks a lot for your confidence. I promise I’ll respect it. Your legend is safe with me.’

  He straightened himself up, prepared to move. Wishart took hold of his arm and gripped it tightly.

  ‘The story has a moral for you. You should be wise to consider it. If you do not, I have wasted your time and mine and I become an idle gossip who has betrayed a secret to no purpose.’

  ‘The only moral I can see,’ said Morty, shifting his elbow uneasily, ‘is the one any historian learns very early in his career, if he is going to make the grade. Never take anything on trust. There’s a logical explanation for every accepted mystery and it’s up to the new man to discover whatever has been suppressed for the sake of a good story. Is that what you’re driving at? I learned that one in Constance, New Jersey before my old grandma taught me how to make two holes in an egg.’

  Wishart renewed his grip. ‘You mistake my meaning, but I intend to persist. You have referred to the strange happenings at Loudun, so vividly described by Huxley, and there is of course a common factor. What do you suppose it to be?’

  ‘Mass hysteria? Undernourishment breeding superstition in an ignorant, priest-ridden community?’

  Wishart wagged his head. ‘You are missing the point. The common factor, my friend, is mischief. The basic human delight in doing evil if the opportunity to do so undetected occurs. That is why I have taken all this trouble with you this evening, for I am far too vain to be an ancient mariner by accident. If you take my advice, you will persuade your young doctor to keep away from Saltey. Neither you nor she belong here. I mean it, Mr Kelsey, even if I enjoy hearing educated voices. Mischief, mischief, mischief. Get away, the pair of you.’

  The older man was speaking intensely, his voice down to a whisper and his head close. Morty’s reaction was violent. So far as Saltey was concerned, Dido was his property, his to protect, his to advise. He shook himself free of the restraining arm.

  ‘Don’t shoot me that sort of line, mister. I may be a sucker for tales of Demons but I can spot a simple piece of phonus bolonus when I see it. Plenty of people here think they’re entitled to The Hollies—hence all these letters to frighten Dido off. They’d like to see her pack it all in, to sell the place cheaply and vanish. Well, my guess is, they’re going the wrong way about it. If you know or suspect who’s at the back of it you’d better tell them so. Spread the word around. Otherwise you are wasting your time.’

  Wishart shrugged his shoulders. Against the stars his head had a massive dignity which was undeniable. When he spoke again his voice had returned to its normal depth. He had taken no offence at the young man’s outburst but he was measuring his words with care.

  ‘As you wish, Mr Kelsey. I am only an onlooker, too old for active adventures, even if I was attracted by the thought. But I draw your attention to a matter which you appear to have overlooked in your fine dramatic outburst.’

  ‘You do?’

  ‘The matter of Hector Askew. He was killed and killed by intent. This is not a question of superstition or
mass hysteria or old wives’ tales, but of what I will call mischief. Evil, if you prefer the term. Envy, hatred, malice and all uncharitableness as the prayer book says. It would be a thousand pities if your delectable Dido—or you yourself come to that—were to get yourselves hurt. Good night, Mr Kelsey. Perhaps you would be kind enough to lock and bolt the door as you come in.’

  He took a couple of steps and had almost faded from sight when he turned his head.,

  ‘By the way, if you should hear a pebble strike the weathercock on the sail loft, don’t go down to investigate. Just lock your own door as well.’

  7

  The Mark of Teague

  MORTY AWOKE UNEASILY on the following morning. His mind struggled to consciousness through mists of sound and scent compounded of the mew of gulls, the grumble of men’s voices in the room beneath him, car engines growing louder and suddenly ceasing, a burst of laughter which was not intended kindly and the reassuring hospitable smell of scrambled eggs and bacon.

  Dixie Wishart, her blue hair escaping rakishly from the scarf which partially enclosed it, was bustling about the room, pulling curtains, stacking books on the one table the room contained and rattling china on a tray. As he opened his eyes she crossed to the foot of the bed and surveyed him, her hands on her hips. He had the impression that she was not entirely at ease.

  ‘Time to rise and shine, Mr Kelsey dear,’ she said. ‘My word, but you were late last night. No wonder you overslept. Anyone would think you were courting.’

  Morty heaved himself on to an elbow and scratched his tousled head. He was, she thought, a proper man, too clever perhaps but if she were twenty years younger . . .

  The murmur from the room below rose and stopped abruptly as someone banged a hand on a table.

  ‘What on earth’s happening? The place sounds as if it were full of people.’

  ‘Plenty,’ said Dixie and clicked her tongue. ‘We’ve been taken over by the police. That’s why I’ve brought your breakfast up here. I’ve been up since I don’t know when and it’s nearly ten o’clock now. The boiler is sulking, so there’s no hot water for you. And Sergeant Throstle said to give you his compliments and he’d care to see you downstairs in the dining-room in half an hour.’