Colonel Butler's Wolf

Dan's eyes switched to Butler's face. 'Do I get alpha for that, Colonel?'

There could be no lingering doubts about Sir Geoffrey Hobson's assessment of Dan McLachlan. He was inconveniently bright.

'But Dan, why?' Polly bit a knuckle. 'And how do you know it wasn't some yob shooting at the first car to come by?'

'I don't know why, Polly. But I'm damn sure it wasn't some yob.' McLachlan pounced on the word

'Why not?'

'Because when he knew it was a shot, not an accident—' McLachlan stabbed a finger at Butler—'he wasn't one bit surprised, not one bit.'

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Not by that second shot, thought Butler hotly, that was true. But by that first shot he'd been surprised, almost shocked.

'But not to worry,' McLachlan went on coolly. 'The Colonel's going to tell us what it's all about.'

Butler raised an eyebrow. 'Indeed?'

'Indeed.' McLachlan nodded to the girl. 'Remember how he told us not to say anything when we caught the bus—about the shooting? Soon as I sat down it really hit me how topsyturvy things were getting—

positively mind-bending.'

'How do you mean, Dan?'

'Why, when somebody shoots at me I get mad. But he doesn't get mad. And when somebody shoots at me twice I get the feeling I ought to be dialling 999 and shouting for a policeman. But he just wants us to keep quiet. And that means one of two things, Polly dear—' he swung accusingly towards Butler '—

either he's the wrong side of the law—or he is the law.'

Polly shook her head suddenly, as though she was at last coming awake. 'The Lone Ranger!' she murmured.

'The lone—?' McLachlan frowned.

'He is the law, Dan. Or something like it.'

'Well—maybe. But he's still got a hell of a lot of explaining to do if he wants me to stop dialling 999.'

Polly shook her head again, only more vigorously. 'No, Dan—leave it. He's a friend, honestly he is.'

'A damn dangerous one, if he is!' The young man eyed Butler more obstinately and aggressively than he had done before. 'You've thought of something, haven't you, Polly? I've got nothing against the cops, or the Special Branch, like our dim-witted lefties, but—'

He stopped dead, and Butler knew instantly that he had made the final connection. It had been a wise move to let him run on, working things out for himself as he went, instead of reading the riot act over him and then relying on his political caution and his ambition for a Civil Service career to stop his mouth thereafter.

'Well?' Butler growled. 'So you've got nothing against me?'

Wiser too because even bright, pragmatic young men might under pressure lapse into half-baked dummy2.htm

idealism, and he would have enough to contend with at Castleshields without that.

'I'm the dim-witted one.' McLachlan nodded at him slowly. 'The whole thing's too similar, isn't it... too much of a coincidence?'

'What is?' Polly cut in.

'The tragic accident, Polly. That's what we said about Boozy.'

But wisest of all, reflected Butler, because only age and experience gave him the edge over this boy, who probably far surpassed him in intelligence. And experience told him that it was desirable to know just how much intelligence could make of this situation.

'About Neil?' Polly's voice strengthened as the implication of the words clarified itself in her mind. 'Do you mean Neil's crash wasn't an accident?'

She looked at Butler appealingly, as though hoping for a denial. And for once he could allow his face to show his feelings, to speak of the regret and sympathy he felt, just as though she had been one of his girls.

Then he saw the opportunity, the damnable, dirty little trick that would do the work of persuasion for him. It was working for him even as he looked at her, without a word being said.

'Oh, God!' she whispered. 'They—killed—him!'

It was as easy as that. Butler raised his chin. Duty absolved him, nevertheless—duty and need: he needed the information these children might have, and then their silence. And possibly even a measure of their help. In an earlier age he could have called on patriotism to supply all that, but that age was dead and gone. All he could rely on now was outrage and anger.

'We can't be absolutely sure, Miss Epton,' he said soberly. 'Until now we've only had our suspicions.

But after what has just happened—well, it's too much of a coincidence.'

The girl stared at him, paler now but also more composed. 'Why?' she asked simply.

'Why should anyone want to kill you?'

'Not me. Why Neil?'