“That does seem a rather drastic move on his part?”
“We’ve always had differing styles of leadership, and the man lacks the ability to see the pros and cons of another point of view, so he simply did away with a conflicting opinion.”
“And after that battle Simon, how many prisoners did your battalion send to the rear?”
“Far less than one might expect, and most of those were stretcher cases for the field hospitals.”
Danyella was working the spin in her head as she listened, and formulating a report stating that these wounded soldiers had probably only been spared due to the actions of the medics and stretcher-bearers on the battlefield.
It was just one more piece of evidence that should really have shown the prime minister, when he eventually read it, that he had made a serious error in her appointment. Even he was aware that a battalion provided its own medics, and the stretcher-bearers were the regiment’s musicians in peacetime.
It was also another indication that the new PM was not doing his job by enquiring as to why she was not devoting all of her time to the duties of her office instead of delegating the matter to the proper authority, the Provost Marshal’s office.
Two hours later with the meal completed and further discussion over drinks at a quiet corner table, Danyella Foxten-Billings and Major Manson parted company.
Danyella had arranged for his reassignment to Horse Guards in London, where they would have more access in the days ahead. On return to the secure location near Renwick, she would contact the Director of Public Prosecutions and set the wheels in motion.
During the ninety-minute drive back across the Fells on almost empty roads, DC Singh prattled on about his nice warm surroundings of the evening and the good food he had eaten, rubbing in the fact his colleagues evening had been anything but.
Paddy Singh was a talker, he could talk the hind legs off of donkey and wherever possible he practiced that ability whether the audience bid it or not.
He related the details he had heard about arresting an entire infantry battalion, and how the major’s account had varied to fit the bill according to the views of Foxten-Billings.
Harry Chapman was not greatly interested in the goings-on of his principles, so long as they did not compromise the business of protecting them from harm, however on the return journey Paddy Singh’s account of the couple’s conversation got his attention, especially when he heard which unit had been the subject but he kept his own counsel until Paddy had finished and asked the question.
“Sarge, this battalion they were talking about, did they run away from a fight or something?”
The main worry in Mrs Chapman’s life these days was the safety of her youngest brother, a lance corporal in the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards, so he was about as up to date as any of the citizens of the UK as to how that unit was fairing.
“No Paddy, no one’s done any running away, far from it in fact.”
“Well according to the ice queen she has already ordered the second battalions re-activation. Most of the replacements are already going into it instead of going to the front, and this Manson character will be the CO. She said that it would replace the first battalion in the line once the arrests were made.”
Harry made the decision there and then to break his rule of not remarking on his principles business unless ordered to do so.
After delivering the Ice Queen back into the care of the military police providing security at the ASoG, the Special Branch close protection officers returned to a hotel that had become their billet, but Harry didn’t stay long.
The night manager gave him change for a tenner and Harry left the small hotel. Taking one of the cars he drove south, following the River Derwent along Borrowdale until the B5289 swung west and began to climb Fleetwith Pike.
Harry took a left at that point and followed a narrow country lane to the tiny hamlet of Seathwaite. In happier times it was a stopping place for Fell walkers and climbers, but Harry’s only interest was the public phone box there.
There was no one about at that hour and Harry could see no headlights on the road so he entered the kiosk and placed a stack of coins on top of the coin box. He would use almost all of the coins in the call he made to a private house in Surrey.
Commuters exiting from the Bakerloo Line underground station at the Elephant and Castle who headed on foot towards London Bridge made use of the wide pavement there to avoid the pair of vagrants loitering at the junction with Gaunt Street.
The duo had acquired from somewhere a couple of buckets and cloths, and were now not so much providing an unsolicited service to motorists, as a nuisance value for the purpose of extracting beer money.
They waited on the traffic lights at the junction to change to red and then stepped slightly unsteadily up to the driver’s sides of the cars and began washing the windscreens.
They weren’t entirely successful in their endeavours, but they had an average 40 % success rate each time before returning to the footway where half a dozen cans of Special Brew sat, though five of the cans were lying on their sides, clearly empty already.
Most pedestrians and motorists either avoided looking at them or curled a lip in contempt at their antics, especially when the drunker of the pair had collided with his partner and fallen in the road while heading for his next victim. It was pathetic, his antics in scrambling to retrieve the bucket that had rolled under a car, and then he had almost lost an arm when the lights had changed again and the traffic began moving. A bus had crushed the cheap plastic bucket before its owner could reclaim it, and that caused his partner to begin swearing at him. Some drunken pushing and shoving followed, which spelled the dissolution of their commercial partnership, and both vagrants headed off in opposite directions with the odd abusive comment still being exchanged until they were out of earshot of one another.
The vagrant who still had his bucket staggered along Gaunt Street past The Ministry of Sound nightclub and turned the corner into Southwark Bridge Road. The change in surroundings must have had a sobering effect on him, because his back straightened and his coordination improved too, as he sent the bucket in a graceful arc over the street to where it landed in a refuse skip.
As he neared the junction with Borough Road a Black Cab, otherwise known as a Hackney Carriage drew up alongside him and he got in, taking a seat before removing his stained and grubby overcoat.
The cabbie glanced briefly over his shoulder, apparently unconcerned that this passenger may not possess sufficient coin of the realm to pay the fare.
“Where to, guv?”
“New Kent Road, under the railway bridge.”
The cabbie waited for a gap in the traffic before making a U turn and heading back the way he had come.
The vagrant tapped on the glass screen separating him from the cab driver, and without taking his eyes off the road the cabbie reached around and slid open the glass hatch, before passing a Motorola PR and a box of make-up removal swabs over his shoulder.
Removing his matted wig Detective Inspector MacAverney listened in to the radio traffic on the PR for a few moments before speaking.
“Control, permission?”
“Go, guv.”
The D.I gave the description of the man who had stoically refused to make eye contact, or otherwise acknowledge the presence of the derelict slopping soapy water across his line of vision, with a hand obscuring his view through the wing mirror as he’d gripped it for support in leaning over the cars bonnet.