They were frozen and blocked, but he used one. Washing his hands in the kitchen, he turned to Fred. ‘Get all of them to safety. I don’t care how you do it.’
‘I hope you know what you’re up to.’
‘Another few yards, and then we’ll be safe.’
He went with head lowered towards the van, the blizzard come to life again and trying to beat him back.
Eileen waved. ‘Love you!’ she called, joy in her heart.
THIRTY-FIVE
‘We should have landed at Portsmouth,’ Charlie said, ‘and cut up through Oxford, then we wouldn’t have been two hours tangling with the Blackwall Tunnel. And if that CB radio hadn’t packed in we wouldn’t have copped all this and driven round in circles till we got stuck. So give that wireless a fucking good kick and call international rescue.’
Bill, never lucky at cards, threw his hand in. ‘I was trying all the way out. The gremlins must have crawled in it for a rave-up.’
Light came from two windows in the back doors and directly parallel with his sight, the changing badge of a new day that Daniel hadn’t expected to see. They had manhandled him up the ladder and onto his mattress above the driver’s cabin because of the smell and his disturbing groans, neither of which he was aware of.
The men ceaselessly playing cards and making tea below looked like bandits in a cave whose ceiling he had levitated to, instead of the decent-minded trio who had lifted him out of the claws of the blizzard. He had heard them say they couldn’t be bothered with him any more because he was dying, though he felt a long way from it except that the pain made him so tired he wanted to sleep for ever.
‘Our job might be easier,’ Charlie said, ‘when the Channel Tunnel opens.’
Paul stretched out on his mattress. ‘There’ll be a queue as far back as York to get on in summer.’ He nodded upwards. ‘If he goes on like this we’ll have to tip him outside. It’s making my guts heave. No wonder I lose every game.’
‘We don’t want to dump him while he’s alive,’ Bill said, ‘but we could be here for another week. Some people take a bloody age to snuff it, even if they’ve got gangrene all over like he has. It might be a kindness to all parties concerned if we chuck him out to die in the snow. In the meantime, let’s have some char. I’m as dry as the top end of a bulrush.’
Daniel didn’t know whether he was dreaming their talk, or redreaming their dreams. The drift of their unmusical voices made yesterday seem so long ago he could never have been there.
‘I envy that couple near Montpellier,’ Paul said. ‘They’ve finished sorting their few sticks out by now, and are on that lovely terrace with a bottle of Martini and a basin of olives.’
‘They’ve worked all their lives for it,’ Charlie said.
Bill’s laugh was dry. ‘Maybe they’re train robbers.’
‘What? That nice grey-haired woman, and that old gent in his fancy waistcoat? They gave us a hundred francs each to get a meal with.’
‘We could sweat two lifetimes and not retire to France.’ Charlie handed fags around. ‘Who’d want to die among strangers, though?’
‘If I could pull off a good job and get hold of half a million quid I wouldn’t mind,’ said Paul. ‘A few palm trees and a rooftop swimming pool would do me. Do you remember that geezer in Morocco, when we was watching them belly dancers?’
Bill choked on half a laugh. ‘Them belly dancers was boys, you stupid fucking berk.’
‘Well, whatever they was they looked all right in them yeller frocks.’
‘Christ, wait till I tell his missis.’
‘He wanted to fit the van up with packets of white powder, didn’t he?’
‘I nearly pushed my fist into his fat chops,’ Bill said. ‘They throw away the key for things like that.’
‘They’d never have found it,’ Paul said. ‘Not the way I’d have hidden ’em. I’ve been thinking up a scheme that can’t go wrong.’ His thin face was raddled by a greed which his ambition had never been able to satisfy, the reason being that bad luck had always made things go wrong, or people he dealt with had a secret grudge against him which he couldn’t have known about because he thought he had never done anyone harm. Or it hadn’t been people at all, but a timetable he had not read properly, or a list not fully taken in, an inventory not rightly assessed, or a page of instructions his sight slid over, thinking he understood everything when he hadn’t by any means, and even half knowing he hadn’t because he wasn’t that stupid but with more pertinacity and attention to detail he could have been much cleverer — and yet, after all, assuming it would be all right ‘on the day’ with someone as finally sharp as himself. And neither had he ever called on anyone to be his partner in business, because he hadn’t known who could be trusted, not so easy when nobody trusted you. The present scheme, unlike others, would be different, however, would net such a big sum that he wouldn’t either have to pit his brains against the world again or work with these two deadbeats any more. ‘Thinking about that couple whose furniture we just took to Montpellier …’
‘Whose mattresses we’re lying on,’ Bill laughed. ‘And I’ll be wearing their wellies to dig my garden from now on. So what about ’em?’
‘Sometime or other, they’re going to die.’ Paul’s eyes were almost as bright as the gas lamp standing on a box. ‘There must be thousands who’ll want to get shipped back to dear old Great Britain and have a proper Christian burial.’
‘I follow you,’ Bill said impatiently, ‘but I’m lost. Anyway, they have nice refrigeration trains for that journey.’
‘I know,’ Paul said impatiently, ‘but it would be cheaper for them to use the nice refrigerated van that our set-up would have.’
‘If we cut it so cheap, where would the profits be?’
‘Now you’re talking. Listen, what if the stiffs was filled with them neat little bags of white powder that the bloke in Tangiers talked about? We wouldn’t get it there, though, because I know somebody in Marseilles. We’d run the bodies to his warehouse, and a few medical students in need of a bob or two would be standing around trestle tables in white coats, with lots of buckets and hosepipes. They would make enough space in each body to pack a dozen little plastic bags, and when our black van rolled off the ferry and went through the Nothing to Declare slot, HM Customs’ boys and girls would stand to attention with hats under their arms and respectfully salute.’
‘This pretty scheme merits more thought.’ Bill scratched his head, then put his cap back on as if to get started. ‘Methinks the corpses would be dancing a fucking jig with all that head-banging stuff inside ’em when we came off the ro-ro at Dover.’
‘You’re not with me,’ Paul complained.
‘Too fucking right I’m not. What bad dream did you get that stunt from? I’m glad it’s getting light at last, that’s all I can say.’ He let out a particularly fruity belch. ‘We’ll have another fry-up soon.’
‘It’s foolproof,’ Paul resumed, though well knowing that if the plan failed they would blame him to the death, and that if it came out right their lips would be too solidly glued to the brandy bottle to spare a common thank you. ‘I’ve worked it all out. We place an advert in the International Herald Tribune.’ He pulled a stub of pencil and a piece of scruffy paper from the ticket pocket of his suit. ‘“Does it worry you what will happen when you’re dead? We would not be surprised. So why not go back to Blighty by refrigerated lorry? Our competitive rates will be right up your street.” Well, something like that. You two see if you can do any better. There’ll be so many enquiries we’ll need a secretary and an office to deal with ’em. We’ll do it for half of what the railways charge, and then …’