‘I’m obliged to you,’ I said.
‘I’m more surprising than I am helpful,’ he said as he made off, ‘so look out.’
The man in field boots was walking amid the cawing of rooks towards the two lanes on the opposite side of the green from the one leading to The Angel. Of this pair, he was aiming towards the lane furthest away from the station, which was bounded by two towering hedges. I made after him, but lagging back a little way.
The hedges made two high walls of green with brambles and flowers entangled within. A ladder stood propped against one of the hedges, and it looked tiny — only went half-way up. But it was a good-sized ladder in fact. The only sounds in the hedge-tunnel were our footfalls and the birdsong, and I thought: It must be very obvious to this bloke that he’s being followed. But he did not appear to have noticed by the time we came into the open again.
Here was a clearing, and another triangular green, this one better kept than the first and with — for all the heat — greener grass. A market cross stood in the centre of it. A terrace of cottages ran along one edge of the green. They looked pretty in the sunshine, and quite deserted. Their owners were having a holiday from them, and they were having a holiday from their owners. A row of three shops ran along another side: a baker’s, a saddle- maker’s and a tobacconist and confectioner’s, this last with the sun kept off by window posters for Rowntrees Cocoa and Player’s Navy Cut that looked as though they belonged in York and not out here in the wilds. Only the baker’s looked to be open, and there was a good smell coming out of it: hot and sweet, to go with the dizzying smell of the hundreds of flowers blooming all around.
The shops stood opposite to me, the terrace to the left. On the right was Adenwold parish church, which was contained within the half-ruined skeleton of a much larger church, and covered over with ivy. In the graveyard were little enclosures made of thick hedges, like natural rooms, and inside these were clusters of graves — whole families of the dead. Alongside the graveyard was a grand pink house. This must be the vicarage, and I was sure it had claimed the vicar who’d just left the station.
The lately-arrived man in field boots was now examining a finger-post that pointed towards a narrow road running away to the left of the baker’s. I came up behind him and read: ‘TO THE HALL’.
‘You’re for the Hall?’ I asked the man.
He wheeled about, but he hardly looked at me. Rather, he seemed to be looking into the far distance, and I had the idea that he might have learnt that gaze in Africa. But he also had London written all over him — expensive education and five hundred pounds a year. He gave the shortest of nods. He was for the Hall. At this, I gave him my name but again kept back my profession. The man put down his bags and shook my hand, but didn’t introduce himself. His eyes were exactly the same colour as the sky.
He was a tough-looking bloke, and if one of those bags of his held a gun — which seemed to me more than likely — and if he was on his way to shoot John Lambert, I would not be able to stop him by force. All I could do was try to put him off by saying what I knew.
‘There’s a man staying at the gardener’s cottage which is connected to the Hall,’ I said. ‘His name’s John Lambert and I believe him to be in danger of…’
‘Of what?’ asked the man, and it was not sharp, but in the manner of a polite enquiry.
‘In mortal danger,’ I said.
There was a silence. Or rather the air was filled with the sound of bees.
‘How do you know?’ the man eventually asked.
‘He said as much. I spoke to him yesterday.’
The man put down his bags.
‘Did you seek him out, or just come upon him?’
‘I’m here on holiday,’ I said. ‘I was out strolling with my wife, and I just came upon him.’
The man put his hands behind his back, and placed his legs wider apart.
‘Did you not recommend that he summon the police?’
He’d forced my hand.
‘I am the police,’ I said, and I showed him my warrant card, saying, ‘Do you mind my asking your business at the Hall?’
But, still with his hands behind his back, he put a question of his own:
‘You’re here on holiday, you say?’
‘I am.’
‘Who’s your officer commanding?’
And that was sharp.
‘That don’t signify,’ I said, feeling like a lout. ‘I’ve asked about your business at the Hall.’
‘I have an association with John Lambert,’ said the man. ‘I am… a confidant of his. The poor fellow is considerably agitated at present.’
It struck me as I spoke that John Lambert might be a mental case, and that this might be his doctor. He picked up his bags, and said, ‘You can be assured that my visit is in Mr Lambert’s own best interests.’
‘Then you’re not here to do him in?’
By way of answer to this stab, the blue-eyed man merely changed the angle of his head.
‘I’m going to have to ask for your name,’ I said.
‘That’s confidential,’ he said, and he looked at me levelly. ‘Do you mean to arrest me?’
I had never yet arrested a man of a markedly superior class. Anyhow, I had no reasonable cause to suspect him of any crime.
‘Arrest?’ I said. ‘Not a bit of it’ — and I added, by way of a touch of humour, ‘I’m for easy going.’
‘Good day to you, Detective Stringer,’ he said, and I watched him walk off, my head seething with the word ‘ass’ directed at my low-class self.
Chapter Sixteen
I needed more authority. I would summon the Chief from York.
But how?
A girl in a very white pinafore with black-stockinged legs that looked too thin, making her seem somehow spider-like, came out of one of the houses. And I’d thought they all stood empty. She skirted the green and walked over to the baker’s.
I pictured Hugh Lambert in Durham gaol. He had forty-seven hours left to live. Did he wish it was more, or less? A condemned cell was bigger than the common run of cells, and was a kind of open house. There was always a warder looking on; the governor would come and go; the priest, too. Lambert was about to die, but was not yet dying, and this was an odd notion: as though time itself had been meddled with.
I followed the girl into the baker’s. The interior was dark and unbearably hot. There were twelve loaves on the shelves behind the baker, I counted them as I waited for the girl to buy her loaf — only she didn’t buy it but was given it gratis. I bought the smallest one remaining, and said to the baker: ‘You’re about the only person left in this village?’
He grinned. He looked a decent sort, gave his name as Moffat.
‘Only two of us here on the East Green,’ he said. ‘My daughter and myself.’
‘Was she the one in just now?’
‘She was.’
‘Hardly any point baking today, I’d have thought.’
‘I’ve just done a few,’ he said. ‘We generally have a couple of trippers by.’
‘There was a murder here, I believe?’
‘I believe so,’ he said, and that rather threw me. ‘Before my time,’ he ran on. ‘We’ve only been here three months.’
I decided to rule him out of account. He could have no interest in stopping John Lambert from speaking out about the murder of Sir George.
I asked him: ‘Do you know if the village carter’s about?’
‘That’s Will Hamer. He should be coming by here in just a minute.’
