Firefly Gadroon (17 page)

‘Er . . . for what, exactly?’

‘For . . . well, giving a safe, er, desirable service to the, er, community . . .’ I halted lamely. Maslow was grinning now.

‘Book them both, Constable.’

‘I’m nothing to do with this,’ Liz cut in, backing off. ‘I was just, er, helping . . .’ She merged with the crowd, giving me a mute glance of apology.

‘Thank you, miss.’

I saw Helen and waved urgently but she avoided my eyes. You couldn’t blame them.

‘All right, Maslow,’ I said softly. ‘Do what you want. But I’ll kill Devlin if it’s the last frigging thing I do.’

‘I’m going to have you certified, Lovejoy,’ he said, just as softly. ‘And I’ll see they stuff you away for a thousand years.’

‘There you are!’ a voice cooed, and Dolly, beautiful loyal Dolly, all dressed up with a flowered hat, slipped between me and the Old Bill. She took my arm. ‘Now it’s really time we moved on, Lovejoy—’ She broke off, noticing the bobby. ‘Oh
dear
! There hasn’t been an accident, has there?’

‘Er, no,’ I said, bewildered, wondering what the hell she was up to.

‘Thank heavens!’ Dolly said. ‘Is this your friend?’ She reached out a gloved hand which Maslow shook mechanically.

‘I’m police, lady,’ he managed. ‘Lovejoy’s under arrest.’

‘What?’ Dolly went all aghast. ‘But . . . not for giving donkey rides, surely? In that case, you’ll have to arrest me. I own the donkey and the cart, and it was at my instigation that Lovejoy kindly agreed—’ I listened, stunned.

‘You can only do this for a registered charity,’ Maslow snapped.

‘Here’s our charity number,’ she said sweetly, pulling a card from her handbag. ‘Lady’s Guild for Church Maintenance and Structure. Would you like to contribute?’

‘Is there any trouble?’ The vicar showed, bless him. And his fiancée Viv with him. My allies had pluralled.

‘None, Reverend,’ Dolly gushed. ‘Lovejoy here has done a perfectly delightful thing, collecting for our church funds. Isn’t that marvellous?’

‘I’m deeply moved,’ the padre said. I entered into the spirit of the thing and hauled out my ill-gotten gains. I even felt all choked up as I passed it over.

‘That’s that, then,’ I told Maslow, smiling to nark him. ‘Look, pals,’ I said to the children. ‘Look after Germoline. One ride every time the church clock strikes a quarter hour, in turn. And feed her in thirty minutes, all right?’

Having successfully swindled the shrieking mob of volunteers into serving Germoline’s interests, I took Dolly’s arm, leaving Maslow and his soldiery.

Dolly was really great, keeping up a meaningless chatter all the way. We flopped down exhausted as soon as we were in the shade of the tea tent.

‘What was all that, Lovejoy?’ she asked faintly. ‘Did I do right?’

‘Thanks, love. You were superb.’ I kissed her feebly. At least I wasn’t arrested. ‘I was trying to get some money to get a boat.’

‘How soon?’

‘Tonight.’ I saw from her face it would be hopeless. To make matters worse the tannoy croaked my name. ‘Plough teams please check in,’ it squawked. There was nothing for it. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘I’ve a field to plough.’ I was shaking.

The improvised paddock was crowded with men and shire horses. They looked bigger than ever, and one or two seemed decidedly bad-tempered. A lot of good-natured ribbing was going on from the onlookers as I pushed my nervous way through to the ropes. Mrs Hepplestone was sitting with Squire Wainwright. Both gave me a wave. I waved back with an arm that suddenly felt rubber. Dolly was pushing my arm.

‘You can’t, darling,’ she was saying, aghast. ‘They’re like in
Gulliver
’s
Travels
.’

‘Don’t remind me,’ I said, shaking her off. ‘I’ve got to try.’ Then I stopped, gazing quizzically back at Dolly. ‘What is it, dear?’

‘Gulliver.’ That name. ‘Wait, wait!’ Wainwright’s men had said there was this old bloke called Gulliver, the best ploughman in the business . . . who used to win all the competitions. I struggled to remember. That day in the burning fields. Claude was best
except for Gulliver
, who was now a drunken bum round town, a useless gambler, decrepit. It couldn’t be.
Lemuel
Gulliver in Swift’s famous tale. And who else knew to an ounce what a donkey ate?
Old Lemuel was the ploughing champion!

I grabbed Dolly. ‘Love, for Christ’s sake,’ I babbled. ‘Get on the phone. Do anything – you understand,
anything
– to phone the White Hart and find Tinker. Tell him to get Lemuel here
now.
Got it?’

Her eyes were wide and alarmed. ‘What if I can’t?’

‘Do it. Tell them to pinch a car, anything.’

She ran off towards the marquees while I swallowed
hard and climbed the rope. There seemed to be a lot of chains and iron things about on the ground. People cheered raggedly as the horses were walked about in front of the stand. A group of some five men were there, Claude among them. We shook hands like wrestlers do.

‘All right, Lovejoy?’ he asked kindly.

‘Fine, thanks.’

I was to go third. I got in the way, risking life and limb. I talked incessantly. I mislaid people’s harness and lost my entry papers twice and finished up waiting while the judge irritably wrote my entry out longhand. I was frantic, struggling to spin the minutes out. You take turns, I was pleased to hear, one team going at a time.

The game consists in driving these monsters into a field and ploughing a stetch – that’s a strip a few yards wide, all furrows parallel. Judges sit and watch your skills. The trouble is you have only the old-fashioned plough to do it with, one furrow every trip. For God’s
sake.

Claude had drawn first. I refused to go into the paddock to be with my team of horses, though the other drivers did. I sat with the crowd glumly watching Claude do his stuff on the sloping field. Even Jethro Tull, the great ploughing modernist of two centuries back, would have been proud of him. Half an hour and he came off his stetch sweating like a bull and sank near me like a small earthquake. I passed him my brown ale which he drained.

‘You’re next after this, Lovejoy,’ he gasped. ‘Watch the field. There’s a dip midway over.’

‘Thanks, Claude.’ I rose miserably as the tannoy called. If I didn’t go now I’d be disqualified. I had to have my team strapped together, God knows how, by the time the second team came off.

I went over to the paddock sick to my soul. The shire horses looked at me with disbelief as if asking if this was
the goon they were landed with. ‘I know how you feel,’ I told them bitterly. I swear they almost laughed.

‘Second team, now entering,’ the tannoy squawked, ‘is the Ashwood-Pentney team driven by Harris. Spectators please make way.’

I was stepping over the rope when a miraculous croaking cough froze me in mid-straddle. Tinker and Lemuel were pushing through the crowd beind me. Lemuel could hardly stand and Tinker looked knackered. Dolly was with them, sickly pale but pleased.

‘Tinker!’ I rushed at them, babbling. ‘Lemuel! Is your last name Gulliver? Are you the Gulliver who—?’

‘Give us a drink, Lovejoy,’ he whispered, trying hard to open his eyes.

‘With sugar?’ Dolly asked. I love her, but Jesus.

‘A drink!’ I screamed. ‘
Beer!
Listen, Lemuel.’ I grabbed him and pulled him to one side. ‘Can you do this? We’ve got to enter and win it.’

‘Fall down,’ he wheezed blearily.

‘Eh?’ I thought I hadn’t heard right.

‘Fall down, you thick berk,’ Tinker rasped.

I fell spectacularly, groaning. Tinker was quicker than me for all his hangover. He was already waving to the judges. They started impatiently across the paddock. I groaned, holding my belly.

‘Here, sir,’ Tinker was calling when Dolly trotted back with two bottles of brown ale and a cup of tea, the innocent. ‘Lovejoy’s got his appendix again. He’s entering a substitute.’

‘This is a nuisance,’ the head judge said coldly, a testy old colonel who’d hanged men for less. Charming, I thought indignantly, doing my stricken act. I really could have been dying. ‘Lovejoy’s done nothing but procrastinate. Who’s the sub?’

‘Him.’ Tinker pointed to Lemuel who was busily soaking the ale back while Dolly, ever the optimist, held the cup and saucer.

‘Gulliver?’

Even in mid-act I couldn’t help hearing how the judge’s tone changed. His impatience became respect. I let myself recover enough to see Tinker push the tottering Lemuel under the rope into the paddock. Please God, I prayed fervently. Let Lemuel get among the prizes so I can hire a boat to kill Devlin tonight. I admit it wasn’t much of a prayer.

There’s a saying, isn’t there, horses for courses. It applied to Lemuel like nobody else I’d ever seen before. Three parts sloshed as he was and probably never having handled a nag for some years, what he did was quite uncanny. He sort of shook himself and just walked – swaying unevenly a bit, but definitely casual – into this massive shifting mass of horses and said, ‘Come here, you buggers. Let’s have a gander at the lot of you.’ And the horses looked round and simply did as they were told. I swear they nudged each other, pleased at having swapped a nerk like me for an acknowledged master. The crowd stilled reverently and silently paid attention to the shapeless heap called Lemuel.

He must have been some champion in his time because word shot round. Farmers poured from the beer marquee to the ploughing field. A murmur of approval rolled round the crowd as Lemuel did the oddest things, like squeezing the shire horses’ knees and smacking their chests, really giving them a clout. Whereas I’d kept out of their way when they showed the slightest hint of friendliness, Lemuel just mauled them about. Like gigantic infants, they tolerated him happily as he prodded and thumped and strapped them. I noticed the judges didn’t shout at him like they had at me when I’d taken my time. That’s discrimination, I thought irritably.

‘Ready, sir,’ Lemuel called at last. He took up some straps and flicked, and the whole ponderous team thundered slowly from the ring towards the field, hooves thudding in time and great heads nodding together. It was a magnificent sight, almost beautiful. Before that I’d always thought horses really mediocre but Lemuel, shuffling along behind and swearing abuse, made them almost dance. I had a lump in my throat as the spectators rippled applause.

‘See that, one-handed out of the paddock, first time?’ a farm man exclaimed near me.

‘Better, Lovejoy?’ Claude was by me, all eighteen stone of him smiling in a hurt kind of way.

I was in no fit state for a scrap so I instantly showed I was still unwell by doubling up again and groaning. Dolly believed the act and helped me off to sit on an exposed mound where we could see Lemuel in the distance.

‘Go for some more ale, love,’ I told her, making sure Claude could see my face screwed up in pain.

‘I don’t think you should. They may want to operate, dear.’

I looked at her. She was serious, actually believing my act. ‘It’s for Lemuel,’ I explained, making sure Claude had gone to see our champ. ‘I’m only pretending, love.’

‘Thank heavens for that, Lovejoy!’

I watched her go, marvelling. Well, it had taken me some years to link the drunken figure of Lemuel with the mighty champion ploughman of the Eastern Hundreds, so who was I to criticize. Smiling, I lay back peacefully, the roar of the distant crowd music in my ears.

At two o’clock the delighted Mrs Hepplestone was presented with the rose bowl for her team’s success at the ploughing championships. Lemuel got the keys of his new car. I made Tinker tell him of a certain important matter
of murder which I had in mind, and that his prize was required as deposit. We drove grandly down to the estuary and hired a motor launch from Terry’s boatyard. Terry showed me the controls and I signed the papers with a flourish. Lemuel’s new car went as security and deposit combined. Dolly drove us back to town, and then took me home to the cottage for a quiet rest before tonight’s action. I promised I’d make a meal for us both when I got a minute.

Dolly promised to stay at home all evening and all the following day in case I had to phone urgently for anything. She was white and worried, but I was beginning to think that was par for her course. We had a long snogging farewell at my gate before she drove off and I invited Germoline to crack on.

I boxed clever choosing my route. I had more sense than to go along the main roads, and selected one of the old cart tracks between the farmlands. Only three miles out of our village there’s a turning through the woods where the American War Cemetery stands, which saved me and Germoline miles. The wind was fairly whistling across as Germoline plodded between the rows and rows of sad heroic crucifixes. We made fair speed and reached the estuary a few furlongs below the staithe about dusk. The big Yank’s posh boat was there again, I saw in the lessening light. Mended.

The place looked as peaceful as any holiday cove, with a few noisy families packing up for the day into cars ready for home. Two yachts were riding in, just starting to show lights. An inverted cone was hoisted from Joe’s station, meaning I supposed some sort of weather. The radio’s always on about them, onshore winds near Dogger Bank and all that.

We went to Drummer’s old hut. Germoline’s ears pricked and she stared around at me as if asking what the hell. I explained as I undid her cart and stuffed her manger full of some granular material Lemuel had got her.

‘It’s this way, Germoline,’ I told her. ‘I’m going to the old fort. There’s a load of nicked antiques out there, in the fort’s lowest concealed room. I happen to know that because Mrs Hepplestone’s old man made a model as a clue. Maybe he was in on it too; I don’t know. You saw them doing the ferrying bit, didn’t you, cock?’ I went on. ‘It’s reprisal time, Germoline.’ She snickered approvingly at this. She was bright for a donkey – just how bright I was yet to find out, and in the most horrible way possible, but at the time I was so full of myself I thought I was in command. ‘See?’ I said, patting her neck. ‘Devvo will come to ship his stuff out to the continental buyers tonight, the deadline. I learned that from Mannie. And
I’ll
have pinched it all!’ She snickered again, over the moon at my plan. In my innocence I scratched her shoulder and added, ‘Of course, he’ll come for me, but I’ll ram the bastard in the dark. It’ll be an accident. I’m not sure if Devvo can swim, but let’s hope, eh?’