Mr Cadmus, page 10
‘Oh no. That was not possible. The Germans …’
‘I see. Keep the Jerry guessing. But now, after all these years, you can meet in perfect harmony.’
‘That is one of the reasons I came to Little Camborne. To be reunited with old comrades! It is time to look up old friends, don’t you think? Lest old remembrance be forgot?’
‘Would you like a general reunion? In the village hall?’
‘No, no. Something discreet. Like me, these older men have strong emotions of the past.’
‘Of course. I will leave it to you.’
‘I think it best that I introduce myself. So that they may recognise me more easily.’ He did not come to commiserate with his brother’s killers. ‘You said that Wesley was poorly. Do you know his ailment?’
‘Circulation. Sluggish circulation.’
‘Oh dear me, I know it all. My island is very hot and very still. We have herbs.’
He was seen by Millicent the next morning carrying a wicker basket of foxgloves and buttercups with which he proceeded into his kitchen. Maud heard the sounds of pounding and scraping, with an occasional muttered phrase. She went to his kitchen door. ‘Can I help?’
‘Dear Miss Finch, this is an old recipe. Here. Taste it. It is perfectly harmless.’ Reluctantly she sipped the brown liquor with a teaspoon. It must have been the weather, she said later, but she felt giddy in what she described as ‘a pleasant sort of way’. ‘Oh, I must get some,’ she said.
‘No, dear Miss Finch. This is only for special cases.’
‘Your country medicines seem far superior to our own.’
‘Let us see.’
After Theodore Cadmus paid him a visit, John Wesley did seem to revive for a day or so, but then with no apparent warning slipped into a deep slumber that preceded death. Mr Cadmus held deep discussions with the country doctor, who agreed with his diagnosis of sluggish blood. It was not unknown even in Little Camborne, but the talk of consulting a specialist in Dorchester was considered to be unnecessary.
‘I must visit Lieutenant Cunningham,’ Mr Cadmus said after the funeral. ‘An old colleague may comfort him.’
The next day, he tapped on the lieutenant’s door. ‘May I come in?’
‘Who the hell are you?’ Cunningham snapped. He had not seen Cadmus at the funeral.
‘I am an old friend.’
‘I don’t have any old friends.’
‘All dead?’
‘What business is it of yours?’
‘More than you may imagine, Lieutenant Cunningham.’
‘Come into the light.’
‘If you do not recognise me, perhaps you will know this.’ He held up the piece of paper which the German had confided to him before the soldier’s death. It was the map which Cadmus had not been able to decipher.
Cunningham peered at it, and was puzzled.
‘It is the paper stolen from one of your men who was killed in the forest,’ said Cadmus.
‘Bianco. He was the map-reader.’
‘You believed in treasure to be found here.’
‘So you are a thief!’ Cunningham barked.
‘And you treated me like one. Do you remember shooting my brother? Do you remember burning down our farmhouse? And raping me? Oh yes, you have a lot to remember.’
‘How dare you question me? How dare you?’
‘I dare. And I dare to tell this quaint little village what you did to me.’
Cunningham stood up in his chair but then slumped backwards with a sigh; his tongue protruded from his mouth with a life all its own and his face was contorted.
Cadmus ran to the house next door and asked for the doctor. ‘Our brave lieutenant is having a stroke. Please be as quick as you can.’
The doctor knew the signs. ‘A conniption fit. Common among old soldiers. Make him comfortable with some blankets.’
‘Will he survive?’ Theo asked the doctor impatiently.
‘At his age it is not likely. The conniption fit is the most fatal. The consequences of war can linger for several years.’
‘What could have caused it?’ the neighbour asked.
‘A sudden shock is most likely.’
‘But he and I,’ Cadmus said, ‘were talking of old times and happy memories. He was very cheerful.’’
‘Then he has a blessed death. But the sudden memory of old times may cause something like a brainstorm.’
There was no need for the presence of Mr Cadmus for this simple death, and he went back to the Coppice in a cheerful mood.
He adopted a more severe expression when Millicent Swallow rushed out of the door. ‘Three deaths, is it?’ she asked him in her excitement. ‘Denny, Deacon and now Cunningham.’
‘I am afraid so.’
‘Are we cursed?’
‘Only with old age, Millicent.’
‘And did you know them?’
‘No. On our island we did not mix with any of the soldiers. But I told you ladies in London that I had a secret, did I not?’
‘I can’t wait.’
‘No, we must wait for Maud. She went to Dorchester for her magazines.’
‘She cannot exist without Woman’s Own,’ said Millicent. ‘Or the horoscopes.’
‘She should not read them. On our island they are scorned.’
‘But Eileen Watson swears by them. Won’t go an inch without them.’
‘What nonsense, Millicent. Ah, here is Maud with all the news.’
‘And now you can tell us your secret.’ Millicent looked expectantly at Cadmus.
‘Let us go inside.’ He led them into his front parlour where Isolde was grooming her feathers. She stopped as soon as she saw the ladies. ‘Knees up, Mother Brown,’ she crooned, ‘Knees up, Mother Brown. Under the table you must go, ee-aye, ee-aye, ee-aye oh.’
‘At least her vocabulary is less appalling,’ Maud said. The parrot gave her a baleful glance.
Chapter 13
Green Fingers
‘Now,’ Theo said. ‘I have something secret to show you. It is a very secret thing. Carlo does not think it wise to display it. But I trust you ladies with my life.’ He went into the kitchen and came back with a piece of paper that he carefully laid down on the dining room table. It was the map he had shown to Cunningham.
‘There is nothing secret about it,’ Maud said. ‘It’s a map of North Devon.’ She peered at it for a few seconds. ‘There’s Little Camborne. Just a dot.’
‘Do you see the pencil marks leading from it?’
‘To the “X” sign? Of course. I don’t know what it means. At a guess, it marks a piece of somebody’s land.’
‘I have been there,’ Theo said. ‘Just a field of grass only.’
‘What do you expect? The Taj Mahal?’
‘Wait, ladies. I have another piece of paper.’ He took a folded sheet from his top pocket, and smoothed it out on the table. ‘What to make of this?’
‘I make nothing of it,’ Maud replied.
‘It looks like someone has drawn a hill,’ Millicent said. ‘With a tree on top of it. That jagged thing next to it might be a rock.’
‘And the round thing?’ he asked her.
‘A pond?’
‘It looks,’ Maud said, ‘as if it has been drawn by a child. No, it is not a pond. It is in a singular shape.’
‘A good friend gave it to me. He says it is somewhere close to our village.’
‘Your good friend was mistaken,’ Maud told him.
‘He was very sick. Feverish. He died on Caldera before I could question him.’
Maud studied the scrawled hill and tree. ‘Well, there is no such area.’
‘Just wait a minute.’ They looked at Millicent. ‘You will think I’m mad.’ They still waited. ‘What about Burrow Hill?’
‘Oh that old chestnut.’ Maud was unimpressed.
‘Chestnut?’ Theo asked them. ‘What is this?’
‘An old story,’ Maud told him.
‘Not that old. I heard it from my hairdresser. You know, Mrs Killigew from Hairspace who preceded dear Maurice.’
‘Please to go on, dear Millicent.’
‘Well, Maud is right in one sense. It is an old story. There is a hill, with a tree and a rock. And there is a pond, although it must have dried up by now. But it’s nowhere near this.’ She pointed at the pencil marks. ‘It is in Little Molton?’
‘It doesn’t fit, Millicent.’
‘But, Maud, the drawing does look like the little rock.’ She looked at Theo. ‘That rock goes back millions of years.’
‘Oh don’t be ridiculous, Milly. Nothing here goes back millions of years. Except the ice cream.’
‘It is very nice ice cream,’ Millicent replied.
‘My ladies, please tell me about the hill.’
‘As I said, there is a story.’
‘But what is it?’ Theo was becoming impatient.
‘We all know here of the black stone of Burrow Hill. No one could move it. They tried everything. I’m talking about the Fifties. Drills. Spades. Pitchforks. Cranes. Claw hammers. Nothing worked on the black stone. Not even dynamite, about which the villagers were very annoyed. It seemed like sacrilege.’
‘And so?’ Theo asked.
‘All sorts of stories started up. We have a mine of supernatural legends, as you know, Mr Cadmus.’
‘Yes, I have heard of your hobs and ghosts and dobies. It is the same on Caldera.’
‘But this is the unbelievable part.’
‘I thought so,’ Maud said, who distrusted Mrs Killigrew from Hairspace.
Millicent ignored her and continued: ‘One of those German rockets hit the stone square on. A doodlebug, was it called?’
‘V-1?’ Cadmus suggested.
‘V-something,’ Millicent replied. ‘What a racket it made! But that isn’t the end of the story. On the following day the black stone was nowhere to be seen. And there in its place was an amethyst! As large as a golf ball.’
So here, Cadmus thought, is the story of the treasure.
‘What happened to the miraculous jewel?’ he asked Millicent.
‘The soldiers took it. They said that they were the lawful authority. It vanished. Or got stolen. But everyone still talks of the missing amethyst.’
Mr Cadmus, ever more mysterious, took out another paper from his wallet. ‘My friend caught sight of it once and recalled it instantly. He was a trained observer. And this is it.’ He turned the paper over and on the other side of a small map there was a drawing which might have been a rough approximation to a precious stone, with its striated patches and jagged edges.
‘Why did your friend draw the jewel?’ Maud asked Theo.
‘Perhaps he wanted to tell the story. He was very sick.’
‘He might have wanted you to find it.’
‘Yes,’ Theo said. ‘He dearly wanted that. It is my greatest wish to follow his path. I know that he would have wished to donate the jewel to our local church.’ Maud looked horrified. ‘Under different auspices, of course, than the present St Leonard’s.’
‘Would you like us to go with you?’ Millicent had amethysts in her eyes.
‘It will be dirty and messy, dear lady.’
‘But exciting,’ Millicent said. ‘Like a treasure hunt.’
‘Except,’ Maud replied, ‘there is generally treasure in a treasure hunt.’
‘I doubt there will be treasure,’ Theo said.
‘So what’s the point?’ Maud asked him.
‘No point for the ladies. No point at all. I go there in memory of my distressed friend. That is all. I go to shed a tear. What is it your poet says? A piece of field. For ever England. A tear for ever.’
‘I think it is a wonderful idea,’ Millicent said. ‘To mark the spot where a bomb created a beautiful stone.’ Millicent was more interested in the beautiful stone than the bomb. ‘It could have been buried there as bad luck, to prevent robbers. We often read of explorers putting their discoveries back before dying.’
Mr Cadmus looked steadily at her. ‘That was precisely my theory, dear Miss Swallow. Why else would it disappear so completely on the very spot it appeared? Just a few ignorant soldiers who would not know emeralds from green glass.’ He took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead. ‘Well, ladies, shall we say goodnight? We must be early birds who catch the worms.’
They caught the early morning train from Barnstaple, and on the first part of the journey to their destination at Little Molton, Theo Cadmus remained deep in the solution of a crossword that seemed to be causing him much irritation. ‘Who,’ he asked aloud, ‘is Lord Peter Wimsey?’
‘He is a very brilliant detective,’ Millicent told him. ‘He specialises in murders. Especially of old women.’
‘He is a real person?’
‘Oh Lord, no. He is made up. Like Sherlock Holmes. The fictional detectives are always the best. Like fictional murders. Much more satisfying.’
‘What am I supposed to do with this clue? “Lord Peter Wimsey cannot measure the dose. Eight letters.”’
‘Well,’ Maud said, ‘it’s obviously a poison. Did you say eight letters? Laudanum.’
‘But I must get there from here.’ He tapped the page of the newspaper. ‘It is a leap I cannot make. There are two “M”s which do not fit. I can’t get to a poison.’
‘What about good old morphine?’ Maud asked him.
‘Only one “M”.’
‘I know,’ Millicent said. ‘Methomyl. Doesn’t leave a trace.’
‘How do you know that?’ Maud asked her.
‘Nursing training.’
‘But it has nothing to do with our clue,’ Theo said. ‘Or with Lord Peter Wimsey.’
‘He was in a book called Five Red Herrings.’ Millicent looked out of the window, as if certain of her solution. ‘And that was to do with a poisoning.’
Theo flung the newspaper to the other side of the compartment. ‘You ladies have your heads filled with poisons.’
On the second part of their journey fom Swinderbury to Little Molton, he looked keenly out of the window of the slow local train, scrutinising the landscape as if it were hostile territory. ‘There’s a hill,’ he said. ‘And there’s another one.’ He leaned forward in his seat. ‘There’s a tree.’
‘You will not find Burrow Hill here,’ Maud told him. ‘It is in another county.’
‘But I can never be sure. My friend may have meant some other place. Look at that! A hill with a forest across it!’
‘Your friend drew a single tree, not a wood.’
‘But so much is similar.’
‘Trees are very similar en masse.’
‘Theo, it is no good. You will have to allow us to drive you there. In your lovely car which reminds us of a banana.’ Maud tapped him on the knee. ‘Otherwise you will never find it.’
‘Perhaps …’
‘We are not going to steal your treasure.’
‘But careless talk …’
‘And who, precisely, are we going to tell?’
‘Little Camborne is all ears, Maud,’ Theo replied.
In the summer twilight the cattle cast long shadows over the grass. The sun was setting as they arrived at Little Camborne station and both ladies were looking forward to a cup of tea before bedtime. They parted company by the gates of the cottages; Millicent unlocked the door and walked into her hallway with relief, where she was profusely welcomed by Timothy. The cat purred and rubbed itself against her left leg.
About an hour later she saw Theo tapping on the window. ‘I have come to a decision,’ he said as he entered her kitchen. ‘I need your feminine intuition. Your je ne sais quoi.’
‘You want us to lead you to Burrow Hill. Is that it?’
‘Exactly.’
He knocked on Maud’s door a few minutes later. ‘May I borrow you for a moment, Maud?’ She came into the front garden. ‘May I suggest a journey?’
‘But we have just arrived home.’
‘Indeed. But this is to somewhere much closer, Maud. Closer to to my heart.’
‘Oh dear.’ She tucked away a piece of hair that was threatening to come loose.
‘To Burrow Hill.’
‘I might have guessed,’ she said.
‘Frankly there was a time when I intended to keep everything to myself.’
‘Keep what to yourself?’ Maud asked him.
‘The secret.’
On this note they prepared for the journey to Burrow Hill.
Chapter 14
The Line
The small yellow car made its way through the deep-set hedges on the border of Devon and Dorset. ‘Napoleonic,’ Maud said. No one paid any attention. ‘They were built by prisoners-of-war.’
‘I was a prisoner-of-war,’ Theo told her. ‘As a boy.’
‘On that lovely little island?’
‘Only for a short time. But the English taught me electrical engineering. It was invaluable.’
‘I’m glad we were of some use,’ Maud murmured.
‘Look. There is the soldiers’ castle.’ Millicent was pointing to a large hill with a circle of flattened grass around its base. ‘Iron Age, I think. But all those periods run into one another, don’t they? At least they do for me.’
‘Many of them,’ Maud said, ‘would have existed at the same time. Time is not linear. Now you take a right, Theo, as if you were going to Madely. Then take this next right sign to Rivercorn.’ She had an Ordnance Survey on her lap, but looked up as they passed a pond fringed by yew trees. ‘That looks like a magic circle.’
‘I wonder,’ Millicent asked, ‘if I dived into the water, would I disappear?’
‘What would we do without you?’ Cadmus asked her.
‘Oh, you would both manage, I dare say.’
There was a silence inside the car.
‘I think,’ Maud said, ‘that we are almost there. We just passed a Burrow Hill Farm.’
‘Let our eyes be peeled.’ Theo leaned against the steering wheel and began to drive more slowly, turning right and left as the lane followed its route through the fields. Yet they seemed to get nowhere. ‘I’m sure we passed that horse before,’ Maud said. ‘Or was it that one over there? Horses are not my strong point.’
