“Hallo,” said Colin, “where’ve you been?”
“Just for a breath. Do you know what Andy and Sam are doing?”
“They’re in the playroom, I think. At least Sam was. He was starting to write a letter to Terry to cheer him up in the hospital. All right, coming, Dottie.”
Colin sighed, as though the impatience of elderly adults was a burden to be borne with resignation, shrugged, raised his eyes to heaven and wandered into the kitchen after Ben like an old man of ninety. At least he knows nothing, thought Emma, he could never have kept it to himself. She went into the library. Her grandmother was watching the news.
“If only that man wouldn’t wear that appalling spotted tie,” she exclaimed. “Somebody ought to tell him it clashes with his hair. They’re making the most of the explosions, I knew they would. Turn it off, Em. I can’t take anymore.” She threw herself back in her chair and removed her glasses. Then she stared at Emma. “Anything wrong, darling?”
“No…” Her voice wasn’t right, though. Unconvincing.
“Oh, yes, there is. You’re not feeling faint again, are you?”
“Of course not. Just a bit tired.”
Joe would soon be at the farm. What if Mr. Trembath wasn’t there, had gone to Poldrea, and Myrtle answered the door?
“There is something wrong,” said Mad, leaning forward. “Emma, what is it?”
Very well, then. Take it, cope with it, you are responsible, Andy’s future is in your hands. Am I my adopted brother’s keeper? No…
“Something terrible has happened,” said Emma. “Joe and I have just found a body in the field outside the wall. It’s the body of Corporal Wagg. He’s been shot between the eyes with one of the arrows. The arrow is still there, so is the body. Joe has gone down to the farm to tell Mr. Trembath.”
She realized she was trembling all over, but her voice was steady. Speaking had brought relief from tension. Mad looked puzzled. The expression of someone slightly deaf, who hasn’t heard distinctly. But this time it was not an assumed expression, it was genuine.
“Corporal Wagg?” she repeated. “That marine who was over in the stables when they were all here. Do you mean he is dead?”
“Yes,” said Emma. This time she spoke more slowly. “He is lying dead out there in the field, shot by one of the arrows you gave Andy.”
This time the message got through. Perplexity gave way to wonder, wonder to realization. But not to horror. That was the frightful thing.
“Then Andy obviously did it,” said Mad. “How careless of him not to bring back the arrow, and why didn’t he come and tell me?”
Emma looked at her grandmother incredulously. Had the shock been too much for her? Was this the beginning of senile decay?
“Mad,” she said, “that corporal has been murdered, and by a child of barely twelve years old. Do you realize what this means?”
Mad gestured impatiently, spread her hands. “Of course I do, what do you take me for? Don’t be so melodramatic. We have to keep our heads, and thank heaven Joe has kept his. He couldn’t have done anything more sensible than to go down to the farm and get hold of Jack Trembath.”
“That,” Emma told her, “was my idea.”
“Good for you. A pity it couldn’t have happened when Bevil was here, then he could have coped. He and the beachcomber between them. We can always call Taffy in if Jack Trembath wants extra help, which he well might do. It’s not so easy to dispose of a body.” She got up and began to walk up and down the room. “No use just dumping it over the cliff as if he had fallen, because of the wound from the arrow—shot between the eyes, did you say? Was there an awful mess?”
Emma did not answer. She just went on staring at her grandmother.
“Darling Em…” The hand on her head, the caress, the warmth in the voice was loving, sympathetic, yet curiously detached. “Why not have a stiff drink? There’s some brandy on the sideboard in the dining room. I may need it later, but not yet.”
Emma walked like an automaton into the dining room and poured herself a brandy in a sherry-glass, neat. The taste was revolting. She hated brandy. It gave her a sensation of strength all the same. She went back to the library.
“What now?” she asked.
“Go and call Andy,” said her grandmother. “The little ones should be in the bath by now.”
The brandy had brought courage as well as strength. If Andy was to be cross-questioned, wouldn’t he break down, cry, possibly deny all knowledge of what had happened? Wouldn’t it be better, perhaps, if nothing was said, if everyone, she, Joe, Mad, all pretended ignorance, and then in the morning, when the body was no longer there, mightn’t Andy think it had been a dream, that he had imagined it all? They were not geared to such a situation. Neither she nor her grandmother. Maybe they should get in touch with the doctor after all.
“Mad,” she said, “you must be terribly careful what you say. I know he’s not sensitive, like Sam, but on the other hand he may be absolutely terrified of being found out. He might try and run away, he might…”
“Oh darling, do get a move on, time is all-important.”
Emma went through to the boys’ quarters, but she did not trust herself to penetrate the middle boys’ bedroom.
“Andy?” she called.
“Yes?”
“Come through to the library, will you? Just you, not Sam. Mad wants a word with you.”
Coward-like, she did not wait for him. She went on ahead, and returning to the library sat down on the sofa, pretending to look at the Radio Times. She glanced up furtively as Andy came into the room. He did not look any different. His hair was more rumpled than usual, perhaps.
“Did you want me for something?” he asked.
“Yes, darling,” said Mad. “You’ve given poor Em an awful fright. She went out for a breath of air by the lookout and saw Corporal Wagg lying dead in the field with one of your arrows stuck in him. She came in to tell me and I had to give her some brandy.”
Andy turned to Emma in consternation. “Oh, Emma, I am sorry. I didn’t want you to see. I was going to wait until Joe came up to the playroom and then explain to him what had happened.”
Emma did not say anything. There was still some of the brandy left in the sherry glass. She reached out for it and drank it down.
“Why didn’t you come and tell me?” asked Mad.
“I couldn’t very well,” explained Andy. “Colin and Ben were just coming through to you here, and I didn’t want them to know any more than Emma. So I told Sam, as we couldn’t find Joe. We tried to pull the arrow out but it was stuck hard. I got him in one shot, and it must have killed him at once, because he didn’t seem to be breathing.”
“I see,” said Mad. She waited a moment, and then she asked, “How did it happen? Did you mean to hit him?”
“Oh yes,” replied Andy. “I was crouching by the pile of wood at the lookout, and he came walking up the field. I knew it was Corporal Wagg, the marine who had been fighting Terry, and I guessed he was on his way to look for him, not knowing Terry was in hospital. So I thought, ‘I’ll settle you, my man,’ and I took aim and got him. He didn’t even cry out, he just fell.”
“H’m,” said Mad. She began to whistle softly under her breath. “The trouble is,” she went on after a moment, “the marines will realize he’s missing and may come and look for him, seeing that he knew his way about here.”
“Yes,” said Andy, “Sam and I thought of that. We’ve hidden the bow and the rest of the arrows up my hiding place in the chimney, so they’ll never find the weapon. It’s the body that’s the difficulty. We can’t just let it lie there.”
“I know,” Mad agreed. “Well, Em discussed it with Joe, who’s gone down to tell Mr. Trembath. We can trust him. They’ll think something out between them.”
“Oh, what a relief,” Andy sighed. “I was really rather worried. Of course, when one of the sheep dies Mr. Trembath digs a pit and buries it. I’ve watched him do it. He might do the same for the cor
poral.”
“He might,” said Mad, “we shall have to see what he says. Anyway, the little boys mustn’t know about it, and of course not Dottie.”
“Of course not.”
“And tell Sam not to say anything either… What did he do when you told him?”
“Sam? He said it was a very good shot, but a shame I couldn’t have got the marine who killed Spry, then it would have been real justice.”
“Yes… Well, darling, I’ll let you know in the morning what Joe and Mr. Trembath fix up. Oh, by the way, Dr. Summers rang up earlier to say Terry was all right and comfortable in hospital.”
“Oh, super. Poor old Terry, he’ll hate being stuck away there, out of everything. Still, he’s had his revenge. Goodnight, Madam, goodnight, Em.”
Andy went out of the room. There was silence. Granddaughter stared at grandmother.
“Do you realize,” said Emma slowly, “he doesn’t even know he’s done wrong?”
Mad picked up Emma’s glass, saw it was empty, then put it down again. “I do,” she replied, “and if you think this is the moment to impress the fact upon him then you don’t understand much about Andy.” She got up and walked over to the electric fire and switched it off. “If,” she said, “as a small child you are sole survivor of an air crash, and are found lying unhurt shielded by your father’s body, it has a traumatic effect. Some day you hit back. Unfortunately for the corporal, the opportunity came tonight.”
“But, Mad…” Emma stood up as well, the session was evidently over, “do you mean to say Andy would have killed someone anyway, that—well, he’s some sort of psychopath?”
Her grandmother looked at her compassionately. “Darling, of course not. Andy’s a perfectly ordinary child with a wound deep down that won’t easily heal. Normally he wouldn’t hurt a fly. What you forget is that these are not normal times. He looked upon that marine as an enemy, an invader, who had tried to beat up Terry. To be brutally frank, I agree with his point of view.”
She walked into the hall and through to the cloakroom, and began dragging on her boots.
“Where are you going?” asked Emma.
“To find out what Joe and Jack Trembath have decided. Do you want to come?”
They went out together to the lookout. The dark hump of the Land Rover was parked near to the hedge a little higher up the field. The two figures, the farmer and Joe, were standing beneath the wall, close to the ditch. Jack Trembath was bending down. They couldn’t see what he was doing, but Emma knew. He was trying to extract the arrow from its embedded position between the eyes. She wondered why she felt neither sick nor faint, yet earlier in the day, when Bevil Summers had given Terry the injection, she couldn’t take it. She supposed the reason was obvious. Terry was family. Corporal Wagg was not. Corporal Wagg was one of an invading force, as Mad had tried to insist, and by ill chance Corporal Wagg was dead. He might have a wife back in America, he might have children, parents, he had been coming to the house in all honesty to shake hands with Terry; instead, Andy had killed him. I don’t seem to mind anymore, she thought, I’m not shocked or even sickened. Perhaps I’m being trained for something… but for what?
“Ah! Got it…” Jack Trembath, with a grunt of satisfaction, had succeeded in pulling out the arrow. “Not broken neither,” he said to Joe. “Lucky job.” He reached out for a tussock of grass from the overhanging bank and wiped the barb and the shaft, letting the tussock fall to the ground afterwards.
“I wouldn’t do that,” Mad called softly. “There’ll be blood on it, won’t there?”
The farmer looked up and saw them both watching him from beyond the wall. “You’re right,” he said, “it won’t do to be careless.” He picked up the tussock, and going to the Land Rover came back with a sack, and put the tussock and arrow into it. “Easy enough to get rid of that. The body’s more of a problem. Don’t you think you and Emma had best go back to the house and leave us to it?”
“No,” said Mad, “I want to know what you decide.”
Jack Trembath looked over his shoulder and stared out to sea. “No use just heaving him to the cliff and letting them think he’s slipped over the edge. There’s this damned great wound between the eyes. You wouldn’t get that from falling.”
“We could carry him to the beach,” suggested Joe, “and let the tide get him.”
“What’s the tide doing, then?” asked the farmer. “It must have gone high water about an hour ago. Top of springs was yesterday, I believe. The tides will be taking off again tonight. No good just carrying him down and leaving him on the beach, it wouldn’t fool anyone.”
“There’s another thing,” put in Joe. “If they should trace the corporal as far as this—Emma suggested earlier, you never know, they might even bring tracker dogs—it would look odd if the scent suddenly stopped, and then the marks of your tires were just above. We can’t put him in the Land Rover. They could trace him to that, too, if they were doing a thorough job.”
Silence fell. Jack Trembath stroked his chin and stared down at the body. The wind began to freshen once more, and clouds scudded across the sky. A spot of rain fell.
“Watch out,” said Emma, “someone’s coming up the field.”
Joe and the farmer backed against the hedge. Instinctively Emma dragged her grandmother behind the shelter of an ilex tree nearby.
“Wait,” said Mad, “isn’t it the beachcomber?”
The figure plodded slowly up the plowed field. He was coming from the direction of the wood.
“Yes,” said Joe, “it’s Mr. Willis.”
Jack Trembath cursed under his breath. “Don’t worry. I’ll get rid of him somehow.”
Mad stood out from behind the ilex. “No,” she said, “he’s all right. He’s already helped us today, and if I’m any judge of character he’ll help us again.”
She climbed down into the field, assisted by the farmer, and then as the beachcomber approached, for he lifted his head and obviously perceived the little party beneath the wall, she raised her hand and beckoned.
“He’s a queer old cuss and gives no trouble,” murmured Jack Trembath, “but with the fix we’re in now… are you sure?”
Mad did not answer. She waited for the Welshman to close up on them, and allowed him to speak first. He was carrying Terry’s pullover.
“The boyo left this behind in all the excitement,” he said. “I thought he might need it in the hospital. I didn’t mean to intrude, just to drop it in at your back entrance. Evening, mister.” He nodded to the farmer. “One of your sheep strayed?” He glanced across at the Land Rover.
“No,” said Mad, “I’m afraid we’re in trouble again. Bad trouble, this time.”
She took the Welshman by the arm and led him to the body lying in the ditch. He stared down at it. Then gave a low whistle under his breath.
“Trouble it is,” he said. “How’d he come by the gash, then?”
“It was Andy,” said Mad. “He was up behind the wall here with his bow and a particularly deadly arrow, as the marine was coming down the field from the farm. He took aim, and the arrow found its mark.”
“It did that all right,” said the Welshman. “What became of the arrow?”
“I have it in a sack,” replied Jack Trembath. “No problem there. It’s the body, isn’t it?”
Mr. Willis did not answer. He walked round the dark form lying on the ground as though he wanted to view it from every angle, then bent down for a closer inspection.
“The blood’s caked,” he said. “Some of it on the soil, though. We can turn that in. What was he doing here anyway?” The events of the preceding hours were explained to him. He nodded, and did not interrupt. “No one knows of his visit to the farm excepting your daughter?” he asked Jack Trembath.
“Not as far as I know,” answered the farmer. “Mick and I were milking at the time. My wife was home. She never mentioned the corporal. I take it Myrtle saw him off pretty quick. She knew how we felt.”
“The difficulty i
s,” said Joe, “we don’t know if the corporal told his mates where he was going. He was off duty, you see. Myrtle knew that.”
“We have to make it seem as if the fellow came up here and altered his mind,” Mr. Willis said. “Turned off down the path in the center of the field, and then down to the cliffs and the beach. If they came looking for footprints they wouldn’t find them on the path anyway, the ground’s too hard despite the rain. There’d be scent, though.”
Jack Trembath was listening attentively, but he seemed puzzled all the same.
“I don’t follow your drift, mister,” he said.
The Welshman looked once again toward the Land Rover. “How many sacks have you got in there?”
“About half a dozen, could be more.”
“Very well then, fetch them, also some twine and a length of rope, if you have it.”
Mad moved back towards the wall and held up her hands to Emma, who leaned forward and pulled her up from the field.
“What did I tell you?” Mad whispered. “I knew he’d take charge.”
Jack Trembath came back from the Land Rover with the sacks, and some twine and rope. Mr. Willis knelt down and began wrapping the head, shoulders and trunk of the corporal’s body in the sacks, tying each part in turn with the twine. When he came to the feet he did not hesitate; he removed the boots from the dead man, and taking off his own seaboots, which he strung round his neck, he placed the corporal’s boots on his own feet.
He glanced up, winking at the farmer. “It’s not that I fancy them, but the scent will be on the ground, like the fellow was walking himself. Better be sure than sorry.”
The corporal’s body now looked like a package, and Mr. Willis looped the length of rope about it and hoisted it over his shoulders. His own boots were hanging in front of him, the long trussed package, from which protruded a pair of stockinged feet, was slung across his back. Then he looked up at the group watching him so intently.
“Last night,” he said, “I brought a living boy up from the shore on my back. Tonight I’ll take a dead boy down to it. Easier altogether, I shan’t have to worry about breaking bones.” He paused a moment, glancing from one to the other. “You get in the Land Rover,” he said to the farmer. “Circuit the field, I’ll see you presently.” Then he smiled at Mad standing beside Emma above the wall. “I’ve done many odd jobs in my time more unpleasant than this one. If a man can’t help his neighbor, and she a female, life wouldn’t be worth living, would it?”