Skiddlethorpe and other stories

in case you are getting any ideas – “ (at least she smiled at this) – “I should tell you that I too have a reputation for always saying no.”

  At that point Lisl returned with an apology for interrupting. “We generally serve dinner at seven. Would that suit you? If you like I could bring you the menu with some coffee and torte now.”

  Olga was quite happy with that, and Martin agreed. Lisl went off to make arrangements. Martin thought about his next move.

  “Where were we? Oh, yes. I must be careful, then. But you don’t seem unsociable yourself; you wouldn’t want me to eat alone, would you?”

  Olga laughed. “I see. Well, to be consistent, I have to say no, don’t I?”

  She proved a congenial dining companion and Martin felt cautiously optimistic, despite her declared reputation, as they returned to the fireside for coffee afterwards. While they were talking, Lisl approached in some agitation. “Excuse me, Herr Barratt, but I have just heard part of a news item about a serious accident apparently involving an English businessman, Charles Weston. Could that be your friend?”

  “It’s possible. Was there anything else about it?”

  “No, that was all I caught. Maybe there will be something in a later bulletin.”

  At that, Olga finished topping up Martin’s coffee and excused herself to make a telephone call, and on returning said that she must speak to Martin in private. “Where?”

  “It will be best in your room.”

  That suited him well enough, although he had some difficulty with the key and wondered if perhaps he had taken too much of the wine with the meal. He felt surprisingly drowsy and had to apologise for yawning, hoping that the rest of the evening was not going to be a dreadful anticlimax. “Now, what’s this about?”

  “Not what you may think, I’m afraid. You’d better sit down. I’ve just been speaking to friends who might know something about this accident.”

  “Yes?”

  “It is your Charles Weston who was involved.”

  “Is he all right?”

  “He had enemies, you know. He’s dead, with all his known associates, except one.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “You, Martin.”

  “Well, that lets me off the hook. I can’t say I’m particularly sorry.”

  “Oh. So perhaps our meeting might not have been necessary.”

  “You mean it was arranged?

  “Yes. I am sorry; I have enjoyed your company. But don’t worry about it.”

  He yawned again. “Sorry. What are you talking about?”

  She gently stroked his forehead. “Relax, Martin. You are feeling sleepy. Relax ... relax ... That’s better. Are you comfortable now?”

  “Yes, very, thank you.” He was rapidly drifting off.

  “Good. Sleep, now. In the morning you will not awake – something in your coffee, but it will look like natural causes. So ‘Sweet dreams’, isn’t that the wish? Good night, Martin.”

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  THE ROAD TAKEN

  Where did that road lead to? Bob had always taken the newer carriageway cutting diagonally across the hillside, with a bridge over the gully where a minor stream plunged in a cascade of waterfalls towards the patchwork of fields on the level plain, but the old road was still there, snaking away to the left before the start of the climb and into a wooded area where it was not visible from above. Maybe it just petered out, very probably in fact since there was no direction sign at the junction and no visible continuation beyond the wood, although at one time it must have gone on to reach the higher ground by a completely different route. Nevertheless, Bob this time felt an almost irresistible urge to investigate.

  Always before, at the start of his two weeks’ leave, he had hurried on to be with his family as quickly as possible. But now Marjorie was dead, the children taken into care with unknown foster parents, and there was nothing but the empty house awaiting him. There was no reason why he should resist that urge. Almost automatically, as he reached the junction, the car veered on to the older route.

  The first bend in it, not by any means severe, told him that he had to slow down. It was followed by several more even gentler, but he reminded himself that there was no need to hurry and stuck to his calmer pace. For the first mile or so the road wound through the haphazard pattern of fields bounded by rather untidy hedges as he had often noted from the hillside. There was nothing desperately wrong with them, just a general air of slight neglect that he found depressing. Then, rounding a bend sharper than usual, he felt there was something different. What it might be escaped him for a while, but then he realised that the hedge on the left was properly laid. He stopped for a moment to examine it.

  It was years since he had seen anything of the sort, and the discovery lifted his spirits sharply. The work had evidently been done years before, but a little further on there was a much newer stretch and he wondered hopefully if the craft might still be practised here. Sure enough, after a few more twists in the road, he came across a couple of farm hands busily engaged in it. The start of a track on the right widened to a space where he could park without causing obstruction.

  “Mind if I watch?” he called to the men.

  “Nay, tha’ll not bother us,” the elder replied, a wiry, weather-beaten character with ill-kempt grey hair; Bob guessed him to be about seventy. He carried on notching the pleachers while the other, possibly his son, wove them together to make a strong barrier.

  Bob strolled across and admired the work. “This really brings back memories. I haven’t seen hedge-laying since I was a child,” he remarked, and the man nodded.

  “Aye, there’s none but us still doing it round here. Other folks are in too much of a rush.”

  Bob made some comment about being glad to see the tradition being handed on. That memory of childhood suddenly came into sharp focus: a broad path between a hawthorn hedge on the left and a tiny stream to the right, never more than a foot wide; often he had tried to dam it with pebbles, always breached and washed away before the water rose more than an inch or two. Curiously he had no recollection, if he had ever known, of where it came from or where it went. Beyond the hedge a series of fields rose more and more steeply towards a crest along which a tarmac road was laid years later. The hedge ended at the start of the last field before a worked-out clay pit where he often played around the limestone outcrops. On his way from school he might strike diagonally across that field or, depending on what the cows were doing, continue to the rickety fence along the edge of the quarry and climb the steep, narrow path there.

  On just one occasion Bob had come across a hedging job in progress and been fascinated by it. Thinking back, he suddenly wondered when that experience could have been. There were only two or three years when it might have been possible, between his family’s moving to the house on the ridge and his own going on from primary to grammar school on the other side of the town.

  It was there that he had met Marjorie. They had not been friends at first, far from it; however, years later when they were leading opposing sides in a school debate, Marjorie made a point that Bob tried to rubbish but later felt deserved discussing privately with her. One thing led to another and in their early twenties they married.

  After the usual ups and downs things seemed to be going pretty well until the arrival of a second child, inconveniently soon after the first, put a strain on their finances. Bob very reluctantly took a new job, much more lucrative than before but requiring him to work abroad between spells of home leave. It was a dreadful strain, only made bearable by necessity and the thought that the three-year contract should set them up for the foreseeable future.

  At a necessary stop on his way home for the last spell of leave, he had bumped into an old friend who insisted on dragging him along to a stag-night party. Bob was a conscientiously moderate drinker and confined himself, as he thought, to a couple of halves before leaving as soon as he decently could, but some fool had heavily spiked them and he landed home very much
worse for wear. There he found Marjorie in what his confused mind mistook to be a compromising situation with a neighbour, and went berserk. The flash of the hedger’s billhook brought back the terrible mental image of Marjorie lying bleeding on the floor and the neighbour trying frantically to wrest a heavy kitchen knife from his hand.

  The hedger’s “Are you all right?” shook him from his reverie. He came to himself shaking like a leaf and very clearly not all right, but he assured the man that it was just a passing moment and he would be fit enough in a couple of minutes. The two helped him back to the car and into the driving seat. As an afterthought the older man took the ignition key from the switch and put it on the passenger seat; it wasn’t much of a precaution, but Bob would at least need enough physical coordination to replace it before he could drive.

  In fact the emotional turmoil had tired him and he dozed. When he awoke about an hour later, the hedgers had finished their job and departed. He noticed with appreciation of their forethought where the key had been put, but felt rather stiff and decided to take a walk before driving on; it was painful at first, but a few dozen paces cleared the worst of it. Round the next bend he found the farmhouse and considered calling in with his thanks, but decided it might add to the inconvenience he had already caused and instead carried on. Beyond it the tarmac had ceased to be maintained, as he had