Dutch Courage (28 page)

Their undivided attention was on the house, and Tom's heartbeat quickened when he saw the subject of their anger appear at the smashed window. Clarkson's head was bleeding and he swayed unsteadily as he gazed blankly at the scene in his garden. An almost feral shriek arose as the female tide surged forward.

Christ, they'll batter him senseless, breathed Tom, scrambling from his car where the radio was still pounding out pop music full blast. Instinct overruled all else as he ran forward to fight a way through the pressing bodies. The ‘weaker sex' when roused were a match for any man, even one as big and muscular as Tom.

As he struggled to reach the house, the sound of their raised chanting voices against the amplified music, and the bright lights piercing the darkness of night, combined to revive memories of the chase through a packed Christmas market for the obsessed woman who then attacked him with a weighted traffic cone and split his head open.

That mental revival caused him to renew his efforts to prevent further persecution of this innocent man. In the midst of the shifting mob he could smell the sweat of their hostility, the sourness of their breath as they yelled demands to kick him where it would ensure children would be safe from him.

He felt he was losing the battle when he grew aware of commanding male voices ordering the women to fall back. It was suddenly easy to break through the front rank and cross the grass to the window where Clarkson still stood as if mesmerized. Taking up a protective position before the window, he did not see the large stone pulled from the border of the flower bed and meant for the besieged doctor. It hit Tom's left temple exactly where the traffic cone had caught him four months ago. As he dropped to the ground, the high excited voices, the raucous music piercing the night, the surging bodies all suggested he had travelled back in time.

Arriving back at the base, Max drove directly to the Medical Centre to interview Sam Collier. Throughout a delightful lunch hour, extended to two because Livya had deemed she was entitled to compensation for working halfway into last night, and during his return flight, that goose had continued to flap its wings regardless of Max's reasoning that geese did not come a lot wilder than this one. A few words with Collier would either set it in full flight or kill it.

Three hours before midnight and night medical staff had little to do with only a single patient to tend. The light in Collier's room had been dimmed to allow him to settle for sleep, but the pilot was sitting wide-eyed against supersoft pillows when Max entered quietly.

‘Sorry to bother you this late,' Max said with a smile. ‘I've just flown back from the UK and need to check a few things with you. It won't take long.'

Collier simply made a weary gesture with his arm to signify assent. He still wore a defeated look.

When the orderly withdrew, Max sat facing the bed wondering how to approach the questioning that could possibly bring a solution to why this man had been treated so brutally.

‘Is the back healing satisfactorily?' he asked.

‘So they say.'

‘Good.' The niceties dealt with, Max embarked on the vital inquisition. ‘This morning I unexpectedly encountered your father-in-law while investigating an unrelated case.'

Collier's heavily bruised face became an expressionless purple and yellow mask. He made no comment so, after a moment or two, Max continued.

‘During your stint in Kandahar, General Phipps spent a day or two there while undertaking a fact-finding tour of Afghanistan. Correct?'

Sam nodded.

‘His aim was to assess the situation and list what, in his opinion, was needed to accelerate stability and the withdrawal of our forces?'

‘Aye.'

‘He was swamped on all sides with requests for equipment, weapons and additional manpower?'

Sam said nothing, but his body had tensed and those dark eyes grew flinty.

‘Six Seven Eight Squadron badly needed the latest updated night vision goggles and vital spares for aircraft servicing?'

Sam nodded again.

‘So you had a word with the General during a private family get-together and persuaded him to prioritize the Squadron's needs above all the others?'

A short silence. ‘A private family get-together? Where the hell did that fantasy come from?'

‘You didn't have a short personal session with your wife's father?' Max asked sharply.

‘Oh, aye, he took me aside to remind me of my obligations to her and the family; said I had every opportunity out there to make my mark and erase the disgrace of Sierra Leone.' It burst from him with surprising heat. The first time Max had witnessed any vitality in this man.

Having been told of Preston Phipps' attitude towards the hostage crisis in Sierra Leone, Max had no need to question that statement, but it threw him, nevertheless.

‘So you didn't use your marital link to pressurize the General into obtaining much needed equipment for you and your fellows?'

‘I've just said.' Sam waved his arm in the familiar gesture Max recognized as one of futility. ‘Look, the only personal sessions I ever have with my father-in-law are brief and to the point, with him doing all the talking.' Suddenly roused up, he added, ‘If you have some idea that I use our relationship for my own ends, you don't know me. I didn't ask for commissioned rank; it was bestowed without reference to my wishes. I don't want anything from him. I'm my own man. Something he refuses to acknowledge. And he's not the only one, I've just discovered,' he added, the fire in him dying.

Any sympathy Max might have felt had to be smothered beneath the demand of flapping wings that had not been stilled by Sam's words.

‘But you got your spares and the NVGs shortly after his visit.'

Adjusting to this return to the original subject, Sam nodded. ‘John Fraeme must have put forward a strong enough case, I guess. Made life easier for us. Caused some aggro, naturally.'

Max sat forward. ‘Who from?'

‘The Infantry. We understood, but everyone out there has to fight their own battles.'

‘Aside from the one against the enemy?'

After a moment of tense silence, Sam said quietly, ‘Once you know who your enemy is.'

John Fraeme was watching a DVD with his wife when Max called on them. There were obvious signs of small children; toys neatly stacked in a box, playpen in the corner, the faint smell of baby powder and warm milk. Apologizing for arriving without telephoning first, Max said he needed only five minutes of Fraeme's time to get confirmation of several vital facts.

‘I've just flown back from the UK and want to progress tonight some new evidence regarding the assault on Sam Collier.'

Once more Max was struck by the aura of controlled command Fraeme radiated, even dressed casually in jeans and a polo shirt. Asking his wife to freeze the DVD, he led Max to the dining room where there was a computer on a desk in the alcove. The large pile of documents and manuals gave an indication of why this pilot was so self-assured; why he was in command of A Flight. Fraeme was a real career soldier.

He turned now to Max with interest lighting his eyes. ‘New evidence garnered in the UK? How come?'

‘My source is unimportant, and this might lead nowhere, but we've exhausted all other possibilities so I must follow it up.'

‘Shoot,' he invited, folding his arms in a typical listening pose.

‘Simple answers to a few simple questions,' cautioned Max with a faint smile. ‘While you were in Kandahar, General Phipps paid a flying visit on a fact-finding tour.'

‘Yes.'

‘He was bombarded with complaints and requests for those essentials the troops felt they needed in order to do the jobs they were sent out there to do.'

‘Yes.' Fraeme was resolutely giving simple answers.

‘Your REME engineers and mechanics were short of spares to keep A Flight fully operational, and your aircrew still had not been issued with updated NVGs.'

‘That's right.'

‘After the General's visit, they were supplied?'

‘They were.'

‘To the dissatisfaction of those who didn't get what they believed they'd been promised?'

‘That's an understatement.'

‘Real aggro?'

Fraeme nodded. ‘Foot soldiers tend to mouth-off at us at the best of times. It simply became more personal. One more goad to put up with along with the heat, the spartan conditions, the fear, the separation from family and the feeling that we weren't fully appreciated by the great British public.' He gave an apologetic smile. ‘Forgot for a moment you wanted simple answers.'

‘How was it more personal?' asked Max cautiously.

‘There was the usual crap about Sam having a word with his dad-in-law to swing it for us.'

‘And had he?'

A short derisive laugh. ‘I like to think I did that. I used some pretty strong language to the General. All Sam got from him was another bollocking. The interchange was short, and so far from sweet Sam disappeared until his temper calmed.' He gave Max a frank look. ‘He takes so much stick from that man, any suggestion that he rides on his back for favours makes Sam so angry he has to absent himself until he manages to cool it. God knows what the outcome of this affair will be. It's sure to be regarded as another sign of weakness; allowing it to happen.'

‘I think your friend will have more to worry about than his father-in-law's approval when he gets back on his feet,' Max said. ‘Why didn't you mention all this when I asked three days ago if anything specific concerning Collier had happened in Kandahar?'

‘A few exaggerated accusations? Normal for dealings with RCR personnel who know his background. Anyway, as I recall, you concentrated on the compatability of crew members, and on the depth of my friendship with Sam. Nothing else.' Fraeme looked bemused. ‘You surely don't believe . . .?'

‘There's no limit to what I believe after eight years in this job.' Moving towards the hall, Max acknowledged the truth of the man's words. At first, they had concentrated on relationships within 678 Squadron, because Margot had implanted the belief that their persecutor was a member of it. He should have picked up earlier on the possible connection between the flogging and the RCR casualty with his back aflame.

Back in his car, Max made a quick call to the Royal Cumberland Rifles Officers' Mess, to discover the lively Ben Steele was Duty Officer.

‘Twice in three days, Ben? Overdoing it somewhat, isn't it?'

The young lieutenant laughed. ‘I'm not after brownie points. I've a hot date over Easter, so I changed duties with Jason who has a hot date tonight.'

‘Not with the same girl, I hope.'

Ben laughed again. ‘The Easter Bunny won't be calling on her with chocs and flowers if it is.' A short pause. ‘From your tone I guess there's no problem for me to sort out.'

‘No, just a little info about your regiment.'

‘I'm no encyclopaedia on the subject. You'd do better to consult Colonel Trelawney.'

‘I will when I've got everything straight. Ben, you had two companies in Kandahar over Christmas.'

‘They came back last weekend.'

The goose wings flapped faster. ‘Thanks.'

‘That's it?'

‘I hope so. I really bloody hope so.'

Max disconnected and checked the time. Ten o'clock. No, it would not wait until morning. He turned the car and headed for the main gate and the house Tom shared with his family. Twenty minutes to reach the short cul-du-sac. Lights were on in every room, which was a good sign. When Nora answered his knock, Max reversed that thought. Her tone and expression as she invited him in told him something was badly wrong.

Thirteen

T
om opened his eyes to sunlight beyond the drawn curtains, and an antiseptic smell in his nostrils. He rolled his head on the pillow to check the clock, then groaned. There was a swelling on his skull that he believed had gone down weeks ago, and it was as painful as ever. He put up a hand to touch it cautiously. His fingers encountered a large padded dressing. He thought that had been dispensed with weeks ago, too. What the hell was going on?

He grew aware of being watched. On the far side of the room the door was standing ajar and three young faces, one on top of the other, were peering at him. They swiftly vanished, and high voices cried, ‘He's awake, Mum.'

Then Nora was beside the bed with his three lovely daughters. They all smiled at him, that concerned, loving smile. It made him uneasy. Whole family clustered around the bed. Surely he wasn't on his way out.

‘Feel like any breakfast?' Nora asked in her normal manner.

Good. Everything must be all right. You don't ask a dying man about breakfast. ‘Cup of tea?'

‘And a bacon sandwich?'

The thought of bacon made his mouth water. ‘Great.'

‘I'll make it,' chorused the girls, and they rushed away squabbling over the privilege.

Nora sat on the bed still wearing the loving smile. ‘The Doc said he'd come by this morning just to check all's well.'

It was as if a switch had been tripped by that word ‘Doc'. He knew why he was lying in bed when everyone else was up and dressed. ‘How's Major Clarkson?'

‘About the same as you, I imagine. They stuck a plaster on him the same time as they did yours. He'd been hit by a brick shied through his window. Jim Lewis and Pete Stevenson took him off somewhere for the night. Said he'd stay there until the investigation was over. Connie Bush hinted to me it wouldn't be too long.'

He took in the significance of that. ‘Good. The sooner he goes off to join his family the better.'

Nora regarded him thoughtfully. ‘Whatever made you take on single-handed a mob of incensed mothers?'

‘It comes with the job, love. Even if he had done what those girls fabricated, he was entitled to a defence in a court of law. We don't allow mob rule in this country.' She was still giving him a quizzical scrutiny. ‘He appeared at the smashed window bleeding from the head, and stood there swaying, clearly confused about what was happening. I was afraid they'd do him further harm.'