No Enemy but Time (43 page)

His appointments had been cut down, leaving only the most important business. It had helped him to work. But that was in the morning. As the hours passed, and he calculated mentally that Harvey had arrived, and still there was no news, he began to fear. It was a strange feeling, because he couldn't remember ever being frightened in that way before.

This was not an ordinary fear. It crept, like a paralysis, until he couldn't think coherently. It churned his stomach, until he could have vomited. He had been a target for assassination. The threat of a bomb that would blow him to bits or leave him maimed had been very real. The lurking killer in the grounds of his home, or on the street, had threatened him. He had been worried by it, even nervous, but never the prey of this sick fear. He kept seeing his wife helpless, hooded, captive. Memories of other terrorist victims all over the world tormented him with images of Claire, terrified, being mistreated. Or dead. He couldn't bear the silence and he rang through to his secretary.

‘Any calls?'

She knew what he meant. ‘I'm sorry, sir. Nothing yet. Is there anything you want? Some coffee – tea?'

‘No thanks. No, wait a minute. I think there's some whiskey in Bertie's office. I think he keeps a bottle for visiting firemen. Could you bring it in if there is some?'

He'd never had a drink in his office in his career. He'd never admitted to such a human weakness, but suddenly he didn't care. He wanted a drink. He wanted something to help him pass the time until he heard his wife was safe.

When his secretary buzzed, he snapped down the intercom button. His hand shook so much that he slopped a little whiskey out of the glass on to his desk.

‘Jean, yes?'

‘Mr Brownlow is here, sir. He wondered if you were busy or if he could see you for a few minutes. It's nothing urgent, he says. He was just in the vicinity.'

He wasn't coming with any news. No news, either good or bad.

‘Ask him to come through,' Neil said.

He shook hands with Brownlow.

‘You're sure I'm not disturbing you, Minister? I was on my way to the office and I thought I'd look in.'

Brownlow thought, the man's a wreck. He's aged twenty years in the last few hours. He felt sorry for him for the first time. He sat down, and refused a drink; he was surprised to see Fraser with whiskey on the desk. It just proved you couldn't rely on first impressions.

‘There's been no news so far,' he said. ‘That's not a bad sign. Of course the trouble is we've so little to go on.' He paused. Brownlow had never dropped in on anyone like Neil Fraser in his life. It was his way of trying to get more information out of him.

‘Yes,' Neil said, because he couldn't think of anything else to say. ‘Are you sure you won't join me? I felt it was excusable under the circumstances.' He lifted the glass and sipped a little.

Brownlow decided it might make Fraser relax if he accepted. ‘Well, why not? Just a small one, thanks.'

Jean had to come in with a glass. Neil smiled, unaware that it was more of a grimace.

‘I've got a junior chap here who keeps a sort of cocktail cabinet in his room. He gets all the visiting firemen to look after …' He repeated the cliché for the second time. ‘I must say, it's come in handy today. Brownlow, when are we going to get some news?'

‘I wish I could predict,' was the answer. ‘If we'd any idea where your brother-in-law might be hiding, we'd know where Major Harvey had gone. He seemed to think he had a clue, but he wasn't giving any details away. You've no idea, have you?' He watched the Minister, looking for some sign of reticence. Politicians were masters of evading the issue.

‘I wish to God I had,' was the reply.

Brownlow cleared his throat, signalling a sensitive question. ‘Is it possible your wife would have confided in Major Harvey? Were they … er, close in any way?'

Neil Fraser understood the meaning of the question that Brownlow hadn't asked.

‘The answer's no. Harvey was more of a friend and confidant to me than he ever was to my wife. They did talk about Ireland quite a lot. Which I didn't, because, to be honest, I couldn't stand the place.'

He finished his drink, and poured a second. He leaned forward and Brownlow thought, ‘He's going to talk to me. He's desperate to talk to someone and all I've got to do is sit here and listen and look sympathetic.'

‘Bloody awful climate,' Neil went on. ‘Always raining. So depressing. The flies in the summer reminded me of the Australian outback. Well,' he shrugged, admitting that he'd exaggerated. ‘Maybe not quite so bad, but you couldn't sit out by the river or go for a walk … They didn't seem to notice. It's because of the cattle, or the horses. I found the pace was so slow. Nobody hurried about anything. Some English people love the life over there for that reason. I couldn't stand it.' He sighed. ‘Trouble is, I like the rat race, Brownlow. It's what makes me tick.'

‘That's true of most of us.'

Neil didn't notice any interruption. ‘That's what got on my wife's nerves about living over here,' he went on. ‘She used to say, I've been brought up where there's time to breathe. No wonder everyone's on pills and dope and Yoga classes. It annoyed me quite a lot. But she wasn't critical in the beginning.'

Brownlow prompted gently. ‘She was very young, wasn't she? It must have been quite a change marrying you, sir. Going straight into being an MP's wife.'

Neil dismissed the idea. ‘Oh, she didn't mind that. She was wonderful with people, and she wanted me to be a success. We were very happy together.' He stopped suddenly and Brownlow didn't break the silence. ‘I thought I'd be enough to make her happy,' Neil said slowly. ‘Everything went so well to start with. We had our first boy, and I got promoted off the back benches. We had a lovely house, and she had a free hand to do whatever she liked. You don't mind me talking like this, I hope? I know it's confidential.'

‘You can be quite sure of that,' Brownlow said. ‘Please say anything you feel might help. Anything at all.'

‘There isn't anything to put your finger on why it went wrong,' he said. ‘We used to go to Ireland twice a year; I went to please her, but it was a relief when I was advised not to go after I got a Junior Minister's job. I think she knew I found the whole Irish scene a bore. And then her father died, and I thought maybe her mother might come over here to live … she was born in England, actually. But she wouldn't hear of it. And then my brother-in-law broke cover, so to speak. That's what started it going haywire for us.'

‘How do you mean, broke cover?'

Neil frowned. He looked angry as he remembered. ‘He came out in open support of the IRA. After Bloody Sunday.'

‘That did have quite an effect on people in the Republic,' Brownlow said.

‘That's what everyone thought,' Neil said. ‘But I never believed it. My father-in-law cut him out of his will. That's what tipped the balance. He went to America and addressed Noraid rallies. Nice publicity for me, at this point in my career. Just when I was made Minister of Agriculture. It could have ruined me.'

‘But it didn't,' Brownlow pointed out. ‘Seeing the job you have today.'

‘My wife didn't seem to realize what it meant to me,' he went on. ‘I thought she'd got that brother and his crackpot ideas out of her system. We had two lovely children and for God's sake, I was being talked about as a possible Prime Minister in a few years … She wouldn't hear a word against him. He used to come over to London to see her. By that time I was a target and she couldn't risk going to Ireland any more. Can you imagine what the press would have made of those meetings if they'd ever found out?'

‘You couldn't stop her?' Brownlow asked.

Neil Fraser said bitterly, ‘He came first with her always. I was second best, if you want the truth. Sometimes, I used to wonder about the children even …'

‘I see,' Brownlow said. ‘Everything you say reinforces my original view that Arbuthnot's disappearance is part of an IRA plot to seize your wife. If they're as close as you say, it would be widely known. It looks to me as if he's still alive and being held where she'll be sure to look for him.' And that close-mouthed soldier has a bloody good idea where that might be, he said to himself. He took off a damned sight too confidently for someone going into a shot-in-the-dark situation …

‘Tell me something,' Neil Fraser said. ‘What happens if Major Harvey finds Arbuthnot and my wife together?'

Brownlow's expression didn't alter. ‘He's only instructed to bring out your wife.'

He had got up to go, when the buzzer sounded. There was a call for Chief Superintendent Brownlow.

Neil said, ‘Put it through. At once.'

It was impossible to judge what was being said. He watched the policeman's impassive face register nothing, while he said only, ‘Yes … Right … I'll tell him … Right.' He turned and Neil saw a flicker in his eye that was more telling than words.

He said, ‘She's been found? She's dead?'

‘No, nothing like that,' Brownlow answered. ‘No news of Mrs Fraser at all. But the old gardener at her home was found murdered. A set of UK number plates was hidden in his garage and the plates from his own car had been taken off. His dogs were shot dead and the poor devil had been beaten up and then shot. It's an IRA execution job, according to the local Gardai. Your mother-in-law found him. She got on to your home to tell Mrs Fraser. She spoke to one of our chaps up there. She's no idea her daughter's missing and nobody let on. Apparently she's very distressed and a bit hysterical. I think it might be a good idea to telephone her and calm her down. Say your wife'll call back later.'

‘What does it mean?' Neil demanded. ‘Why would they kill old Billy Gorman?'

‘Because he's obviously sheltered your wife,' Brownlow answered. ‘The number plates matched those on the car she hired to drive over. Obviously they tried to beat him into saying where she'd gone. Either he didn't know or he wouldn't tell them, so they killed him. From that point of view it's good news. The chances are they haven't found her, and that's in Major Harvey's favour. I'll get back to my office now.'

Neil said, ‘How long are you going to give Harvey?'

‘Until nine o'clock tonight,' Brownlow replied. ‘He said if he wasn't back by then, he was in trouble.'

‘Now just a minute,' Neil confronted him. ‘This murder has brought the thing into the open. Why not enlist Dublin now? How can one man hope to cope in a situation like this?'

‘He's coped before. If you insist, I'll release the news and ask for help. But I'll tell you this, Minister. It'll be a sentence of death for Major Harvey and your wife. Take my advice. Give it till nine o'clock tonight.' He decided to be brutal. ‘If they're not out of there by then, the chances are it won't matter what we do.'

The doctor had been sent for and he was sitting with Mrs Arbuthnot in the little study. The maid, Sheena, had been called from her home in Sallins and come hurrying up on her bicycle, agog with horror and excitement at the terrible news. Old Billy murdered, and herself coming home unexpected and going down to see him and finding him dead as a doornail in a pool of his own blood. Sheena was followed post haste by Molly, who'd come on from being a dim-witted parlourmaid to a plump middle-aged widow who cooked for the missus.

They'd lit a fire in the study and made tea, and rung up Doctor Simons at the Garda's suggestion. The missus looked white as a winding sheet and shaking all over. Molly laced the tea with whiskey for her, and hovered round with Sheena trying to listen while she made a statement. Old Joe Burns' son, looking a picture in his uniform, in Sheena's eye at least, sat in the kitchen while the senior officers talked to herself. He kept saying what a terrible thing it was for poor old Billy to be murdered like that … and him a poor old fella that never did anyone any harm. He looked grey-faced himself, the women thought, but then he was only a bit of a lad, and this was his first sight of a murdered man. No word of Miss Claire, he asked them, wouldn't she be dead with the shock of it when she heard? They shook their heads and said, not a word yet, but the missus had been on the telephone to England and she was waiting for a call.

Young Burns drank his tea and handed round his cigarettes. The old mother hadn't seen her, that was sure. She knew nothing. He could report that back. He'd been on duty in the station since he'd left the others at the house on the airport road. He'd no way of knowing if they'd any news till he could get to a phone. He said to Molly might he make a quick call home and tell his mother he'd be late for his tea … If he got back for any tea at all! The phone was outside in the main hall. He slipped through and paused, listening to the deep men's voices and the faint woman's tones coming from behind the study door, as he dialled. The woman Dempster answered. He didn't like the way she spoke to him. Cold and brisk, like he was the dirt under her feet. Mixing too long with Arbuthnot, that was her trouble. Giving herself airs. He spoke low and fast.

‘Gorman's been found. The old missus came back early. She's been trying to get the daughter in England. No, she doesn't know. Tell the doctor. They have? Jesus …'

She'd rung off in her peremptory way, leaving him with his stale news. The car had been sighted over at Cloncarrig, and the lads were on their way. He felt a flush of pride. They'd strike a blow at the enemy's heart when they got that woman. He thought of Gorman without a qualm of pity. Dirty old scut, he said to himself. Arse-crawling to the end, when decent Irishmen were fighting and dying for their liberty across the border. He'd do it again, if he had to … He went back to the kitchen and sat down to another cup of tea and a cigarette. His hand was quite steady and he'd lost the grey look. He'd nothing to fear. He'd never be found out.