The Empty House (6 page)

“Then you know that the Doones really existed and used to live in a lair in the heart of Bagworthy Forest and ride out in a gang and help themselves to whatever they wanted. Don’t you think it’s romantic?”

“More romantic now than it must have seemed to their neighbours at the time.”

“I imagine they thought about them the way we think about tax inspectors. People you had to put up with as the price of existence. Anyway, I’d rather be robbed by a handsome young man on a horse than by a nasty little creature in a bowler hat.”

Peter laughed, and said, “How far has he got with identifying the different places?”

“The great difficulty is to find Plover’s Barrows Farm, where the Ridds lived. All it says in the book is that it’s two miles above the place where Bagworthy Water runs into the Lynn. The trouble is that there are half a dozen little streams which could call themselves Bagworthy Water.”

“That’s right,” said Kevin, abandoning the crossword puzzle. “And we’ve been up to our axles in most of them. Do you know what a goyal is?”

Peter thought hard. He was fairly well acquainted with Blackmore’s masterpiece. “Isn’t it a little valley? Not as deep as a ravine, but with steep sides?”

“Right. And I can tell you something about goyals that Blackmore never knew. If you get into one with a motor car, they’re damned difficult to get out of.”

The rest of the evening was a delight. The Manserghs were good talkers, and good listeners. It was eleven o’clock when Peter opened his window, climbed into bed, and turned his light out. The rain had stopped, and a full moon was riding in a clear sky. In the distance a nightjar was giving tongue.

Peter lay for a time, thinking about the different theories which had been expressed to him about Dr. Wolfe’s death: that it was deliberate, that it was the result of a blackout, that the car had skidded. He ought to have been devoting his full attention to an analysis of these possibilities. Instead, his mind kept jerking back, like the image on a faulty television screen, to a girl with lively blue eyes and hair that was black one moment and golden the next.

It was an exciting idea that she was in bed two rooms away. What did she wear in bed? Pyjamas or an old-fashioned nightgown? He believed that some girls, when the weather was warm, wore only a short pyjama top. Or even nothing at all.

Did she sleep on her back or on her side? He wondered.

Accident? Blackout? Suicide?

Professor Petros clearly believed in taking things easily. He had suggested a rendezvous at eleven o’clock at Key’s Garage. This gave Peter time for a visit to the scene of the accident.

The rain had been blown out of the sky, and it was a bright, fresh morning. He drove north toward the coast, crossed the Cryde-Huntercombe road, and started up the rough road which led to the caravan site. On his left he could see a bypath leading down to the river and a huddle of new roofs on the far bank which he guessed must be the farm where Colonel Hay and his Army friend were staying.

The road swung up past the line of parked caravans and started to climb. It had degenerated by now into a flint-and-chalk track, and Peter concentrated on his driving. He stopped well short of the cliff edge, climbed out, and walked forward.

The place where the accident had happened was clear enough. The broken paling which marked the cliff edge had been patched, but more as a warning than a protection. The slightest force would send it toppling again.

Peter peered cautiously over.

The tide was almost at low, and fangs of black rock were showing. Between them the sea lipped and gulped, throwing up bursts of spray, white against the bottle green of the water. There was no sign of shelving. The cliff at that point was slightly overhung, and the deep water seemed to run right up to the cliff foot.

Peter found that he was gripping the upright of the fence so tightly that it was an effort to unclasp his hand and step back. His legs felt unsteady, and he sat down on the other side of the path to recover.

He had come to a conclusion – a conclusion from which he never subsequently departed. No one in possession of his senses could deliberately have driven his car over that fearsome drop. There were things which were possible, if improbable. And there were things which were impossible. This was impossible.

From where he sat, his view inland was blocked, first by an unusually large and thick clump of trees which filled the hollow immediately below him, and then by one of those rounded and shapely knolls which were characteristic of the chalk cliff. He could see a track which skirted the side of this knoll and evidently formed a shortcut back to the road.

He looked back at the track. From the point where the car must have left it, the ground ran downhill in two directions: fairly sharply toward the cliff edge, and rather more gradually down the track itself. The shape of what must have happened was beginning to form in his mind, wanting in detail but clear in outline. He drove back slowly to the hotel.

At Key’s Garage the exchange of cars was quickly effected; documents were exchanged and the deposits which they had paid were adjusted in the Professor’s favour. The Savoia sixteen, with its driving seat pushed back to the very last notch, accommodated Peter’s length. He said, “I’d better go and make my mark with the military. Tomorrow I thought I’d cast round a bit. If your invitation still holds good, I’d like to run out tomorrow morning and have a look at what you’re doing.”

“Excellent,” said the Professor. “The site is not easy to find. We will go together.” He drove off, and Peter stood for a few moments watching him go.

Bill Key said, “He’s a real old character, isn’t he? It’s easy to imagine
him
scratching up fossils. But you ought to see his assistants.”

“Long-haired students of both sexes, I imagine.”

“Nothing like it. They came in last Saturday for a drink at the hotel. They looked like recruits on a battle course. Young, athletic, and polite. You could have fitted any three of them into the front row of the England Scrum.”

“Did they explain how they came to be recruited for the dig?”

“They didn’t have a lot to say for themselves. As I said, polite but not really communicative. If you’re making for the Research Station, it’s a small road, second on the left, about two miles down. There used to be a signpost, but they took it down after they had all that trouble with the protesters. You’ll spot the turning easily enough, though. It’s opposite a piggery. If you don’t see it, you’ll smell it.”

The perimeter of the Research Station was guarded by a double line of wire fence ten feet high, the outer line angled outward at the top, the inner line angled inward. There were overhead lights at twenty-yard intervals. A notice beside the gate said, “Army Property. Out of Bounds to All Unauthorised Personnel.” Apart from the fact that it was neat and functional, it bore little resemblance to a traditional Army establishment. As much as it looked like anything, it looked like one of those up-to-date secondary schools where the pupils concentrate on painting, dressmaking, and having a good time. The buildings, solid red-brick-and-glass constructions, all of one storey, were spread around in a carefully unorganised manner, hugging the contours of the ground as though to escape attention from hostile aircraft. There was a lot of lawn, and the paths between the buildings were neatly rolled gravel. The only prominent objects were a bulbous construction which looked like a steel egg in a giant eggcup and a mast with two saucer-shaped attachments on the top.

Peter stood in the sunshine staring through the latticework of the gate. It seemed an innocent enough place. He noticed that someone had cultivated a strip of flowerbeds along the front of the nearest building. There were marigolds and pinks in it, and a fioribunda rosebush flourishing in the chalk soil. In the silence he could hear larks singing.

A door in the guard hut beside the gate opened and a military policeman came out. He walked across and studied Peter without speaking. Peter took out the letter which Mr. Troyte had armed him with and pushed it through the latticework. The redcap took it, read the name on the envelope, turned it over to make sure there was nothing written on the other side, then stepped back, wheeled around, and made for the large building on the right of the entrance which Peter assumed must be the reception office. The letter, as he knew, was addressed personally to the officer in charge of the Station and was from a senior official in the Ministry of Defence. One of the secrets of Arthur Troyte’s success was knowing useful people in every walk of life.

Five slow minutes passed. The soldier reappeared, unlocked and opened the gate, ushered Peter inside, locked and shut the gate, and led the way into the building, where he handed him over to a gray-haired lady who sat enthroned behind at a desk inside the door. He conducted him to all of this without speaking a word. Perhaps he was dumb? Peter remembered a story he had once read about a mad scientist who was served by slaves all of whom had had their tongues cut out to prevent them revealing his secrets. Was it possible—?

No, the gray-haired lady still had her tongue. She said, “Colonel Hollingum may have to keep you waiting a few minutes, sir. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Peter said he thought this would be a very good idea. The gray-haired lady spoke down the telephone. But when the door at the far end of the hall opened a few minutes later, it wasn’t the coffee. It was a small Indian in a long white coat. He came up to Peter, placing one neatly shod foot in front of the other as softly and precisely as though he were practicing a new dance step. He said, “You must be Dr. Vinograd. I am so pleased to meet you.”

“Well, no,” said Peter. “My name is Manciple.”

“You are not Dr. Vinograd? I had a feeling he would be somewhat older. Do not take that as a reflection on you. Youth is a priceless asset. Not something you need apologise for. What is to be your function here?”

“It isn’t exactly a function. I’m here in connection with the death of Dr. Wolfe.”

“Dr. Wolfe? Oh. Yes. I have not introduced myself. I am Dr. Bishwas. Dr. Wolfe was my colleague. It was very sad.”

There was something behind this which Peter found it hard to fathom; a feeling of more meant than was said. He wondered whether perhaps it was because the conversation was taking place within earshot of the gray-haired woman.

“If you knew Dr. Wolfe well,” he said, “perhaps there is somewhere we could talk in private.”

“I am afraid – I am very much afraid – that there is nothing private I could tell you. Will you be with us for long?”

“As long as I have to.”

“I see, yes. You are staying locally? In Bridgetown perhaps? You are in the good hands of Mr. Brewer. An interesting example of Dravidian survival.”

At this point the coffee arrived in a plastic cup carried by a sergeant. Dr. Bishwas smiled apologetically and departed as softly as he had come. As Peter was finishing the coffee, a bell sounded. The gray-haired lady said, “That is Colonel Hollingum. He can see you now. The last door on the left.”

Colonel Hollingum, who rose from behind his desk to greet Peter, looked more like a doctor than an Army officer and more like a civil servant than a doctor. The long white overall which he was wearing could equally have concealed service dress or a black coat and striped trousers. He said, “I hope we shall be able to deal with this matter fairly quickly, Mr.—um—Manciple. This is one of our busy days.”

“I hope so too, sir,” said Peter.

“I am not clear from this—um—communication exactly what it is I am expected to tell you.”

“We wanted to see if we could get any sort of lead as to how – or why – this very odd accident should have happened.”

“An unhappy accident. But I do not understand quite why you describe it as odd. Dr. Wolfe’s car ran off the track and went over the cliff.”

“Well, there were one or two odd things about it. The fact that there were no skid marks, which would seem to indicate that he made no attempt to brake after going off the path.””That would be quite consistent with his having had a blackout.”

“Yes, I suppose so. I was hoping that you might be able to fill in the background for me.”

“You realise that I cannot discuss the work he was doing here.”

“I do realise that. What I meant was the factual background. How long he had been here. What sort of life he lived.”

“He joined us nearly six years ago.”

“I suppose he worked very much on his own?”

“Almost entirely.”

“So that until you got his report every two years, you really had little idea what point his researches had reached?”

Colonel Hollingum stared at him. Then he said, “Has some member of my staff been speaking to you?”

“Nothing like that. I happened to be talking to his sister.”

“It was indiscreet of Dr. Wolfe to discuss his work with his sister. And if he did choose to tell her anything; she should not have passed it on to you.”

Peter saw that they were getting off on the wrong foot. He said, “She didn’t know anything about his work. I doubt if she’d have understood it if he had described it, and I’m quite certain I shouldn’t. The last science I did was making gunpowder at my prep school. It wasn’t even very good gunpowder. It didn’t explode.”

“I see. Then what—?”

“The sort of things I wanted to know were whether Dr. Wolfe was in normal health and spirits last week. Was he worried or upset about anything.”

“You must appreciate that I had very little to do with Dr. Wolfe personally. He went his own way. I had categorical instructions not to interfere with him.”

“He was wellknown in his own line?”

“He was the most distinguished genetic biologist we have ever had in this establishment. My job was to see that he had the best possible working conditions and total lack of interference.”

“Did he go outside the camp much?”

“When he was working here, very little. Sometimes he went out fishing. And he went occasionally into Bridgetown in the evenings for a glass of beer at the Doone Valley Hotel.”

“And one of your men went with him.”