‘That’s all right,’ he said. ‘I owe you a few hundred anyway. As long as you didn’t get greedy and take too many. Money like that costs fingers.’
He hung up. So did I. The steam and chill went on mixing. I was glad to get out into summer drizzle. The bargain was made, in a fifteen-minute phone call which felt like a week. I drove to Upper Mayhem in a state of profound contemplation, as Blaskin (on a good day) might have said in one of his novels. What is treachery except a desire for revenge? Explain it if you can, yet mine in this case was more than that, though it was the last thing I preferred to admit. If Moggerhanger hadn’t got me put in prison I would have followed a different kind of life than the ten year stint at Upper Mayhem. It took that long to get over the shock, and my present troubles stemmed from it, though I suppose I had deserved to go to jail for gold smuggling. So did plenty of others, but I was the chosen one.
Gold smuggling was one thing, however, and to flood the country with drugs, as Moggerhanger was doing, was another, and the desire to get my own back fused well with putting a stop to such dirty work as the reason for what I intended doing. It was a close-run thing within me, all the same. In some films I saw as a kid the hero decided that crime did not pay and he was going to go straight, a sign that there would be no more excitement from then on. My interest died. I much preferred him to be unrepentant to the end and, after yo-yoing between the pits of vileness and the peaks of generosity, get shot dead on the steps of a bank he was trying to get out of. I now knew, though, that repentance had just as much excitement, especially when it was coming out of yourself and not being seen on a film.
Fun-life was over. Moggerhanger was going into action, already ordering Cottapilly, Toffeebottle and Jericho Jim, and maybe Kenny Dukes as well, to close in on the Upper Mayhem area at twelve o’clock. My wrist watch said half past nine, so I had half an hour to pack if I was to catch the boat for Holland.
Clegg put on his optimistic smile as I went through the gate. ‘How did you get on?’
‘Pretty good.’ I pushed Dismal away, who asked the same question with muddy paws and his give-me-a-Mars-Bar eyes. ‘You see that old Ford banger over there?’
‘What about it?’
‘Start it up for me. I’m off to Holland in a bit.’
‘Holland?’
‘Just for a week or two. Then I’ll be back. But while I’m away I want you to look after the place. Keep an eye on Dismal as well. Can you do that for me?’
He seemed dubious.
‘You won’t be alone. Bill and Maria will be back at twelve. You can live together as long as you like. With Dismal, you’ll be four. There’ll soon be five, because Maria’s pregnant. When I get back it’ll make six. If a certain Miss Malham comes to stay there’ll be lucky seven. My mother will make it eight, if she drops in. She might have a girlfriend, so make it nine. Or a boyfriend, or Gilbert Blaskin. If it’s a tight squeeze I can open the ticket office and renovate the signal box. This place has extensive possibilities. There’s even an old carriage on a siding up the line that’s mine. It’s a residence after my own heart, so I know you’ll look after it.’
‘It’ll be safe with me. Are you all right, though?’
‘Never felt better.’
He made a pot of coffee, and we ate scones he had bought in the village while I was at the phone box. I handed him another bundle of notes from Moggerhanger’s pile. ‘Here’s money for food. I wouldn’t like to see you go short.’
The Ford started a treat. Dismal got an eyeful of exhaust that made him drunk, though happy, for the next few minutes, so that he found our parting less tragic than it might have been. My guns and belongings in the Rolls-Royce went to their usual hiding place in the house. Then I plastered the key where Moggerhanger’s lads would find it. I packed my briefcase with money, passport, car logbook and driving licence, as well as Matthew Coppice’s bulging envelope and Frances Malham’s letter. Clegg laid two suitcases of my best clothes in the back seat of the Ford. Dismal sloped around, lost at such activity, and I was sorry I couldn’t take him with me. I ran to the Rolls-Royce for the umbrella without which it seemed impossible to go abroad, even to Holland. Having walked away with it so easily, it was now part of my travelling equipment. In any case, an umbrella made me look halfway eccentric, and therefore respectable.
Whatever I was, while being so busy I did not feel like my old self to such an extent that I began to feel myself again, proving, perhaps, that things had changed, I said to Clegg.
‘Changed? I’ll believe that when I see it. In my view, you’re unchangeable — or should I say incorrigible?’
Maybe he was right. A sense of freedom and adventure was coming back. I was going away, and didn’t know where, which was the only satisfactory condition in which to set out for a foreign place. Without a return date, I’d get a single ticket to the Hook, but wouldn’t visit Bridgitte because I didn’t want to disturb her new-found idyll, no more than I would want her to crock up mine if she came back to Upper Mayhem to see whether or not it had burned down. ‘Look after yourself.’
We embraced. ‘Have a good holiday.’
‘Just give me a fortnight,’ I told him. ‘After a week, read the papers. Things will start to happen. At half past eleven, take Dismal for a walk, and stay away for a couple of hours. Then you’ll be all right.’
‘I’ll do that. And as for you — don’t get into trouble.’
‘I’ll try not to,’ I said. ‘But life goes on.’
‘It generally does.’
At a minute to ten I kissed Dismal on the nose, and backed the car onto the road.
Twenty-Nine
I joined the A45 for Bury St Edmunds. At one point I felt an urge to return to Upper Mayhem, come what may, without hemming or whoring. I was no longer attracted by adventures that might lie ahead. My mind was more up and down than the road, and I was even bored with driving. Did I want to live at all? I was either no longer among the numbered, or I had a dose of shellshock. I let the car crawl at thirty.
A Toyota van had a sticker in the window saying ‘Darwin Was Right’. Maybe he was but, unconsciously speeding up, I overtook a Mini with four golden oldies inside. I watched my hands shaking at the wheel. Perhaps I’d gone to bits because it seemed I’d settled Moggerhanger’s hash. The opposition had fizzled out, and there was nothing left to fight. Take away the wall and the shoe pinches, my grandmother said.
Stop this wishful thinking. Pull yourself together. I was playing a con trick on myself, always the first sign of a conman’s downfall. To avoid the trap, I told myself that the unknown in front was more unknown than any unknown had ever been before, even more unknown than prison which, given my character, should have struck me as being less of an unknown than many places in the wide world.
I pressed my foot on the accelerator, otherwise my timetable would shake to bits. If I missed the morning boat from Harwich I would have to hang about, and that might be dangerous. I had told Moggerhanger I would leave from Harwich, knowing he wouldn’t believe me, and would not in that case send the lads up on a right hook from London to stop me getting on the boat. His jampot manner on the phone had not deceived me. He would get me if he could. Maybe a car was reconnoitring the environs of Dover in the hope of spotting me.
I arranged it so that I would get to Harwich with minutes to spare. A traffic holdup in Ipswich would do for me, but I had to take the chance. Buying my ticket, going through passport control and customs, would delay me, though I hoped not for long. If there was no car space on the boat, I would leave it parked and run on as a foot passenger. The car wasn’t worth a hundred quid, and if it got me to Harwich I’d be lucky. I almost wished it wouldn’t, but was surprised at its performance as I picked up speed out of Bury.