The Burry Man's Day (39 page)

‘It makes sense, I know,’ I said. ‘But I can hardly believe that he just marched into the Rosebery Hall in broad daylight and put it in the flask. What if someone had seen him?’

‘He cannae have been in his senses,’ said Mrs Dudgeon. ‘He’s no’ been the man he wis since he lost his laddie. Nivver been the same.’ I began to lead her towards the living room hoping to comfort her, but Alec stopped me.

‘No time,’ he said. ‘Mrs Dudgeon, I’m sorry, but we have to go. Stay here and lock your door.’

Back in the Austin, we crept forward through the gathering gloom of the woods; I sent a prayer of thanks for the careful owner of the little motor car with its smooth, quiet running.

‘Why didn’t you take the top off and sniff it yourself, Dandy?’ said Alec. ‘When she first showed it to you.’

‘I did,’ I told him. ‘I just thought it was that particularly dreadful whisky one comes across that smells of apples.’

‘No whisky in the world smells of apples,’ he said.

Aware that my ignorance had let us down again, I should have hung my head in shame but I was still stubbornly sure that I had smelled exactly that sickly apple smell before.

‘God,’ I groaned, remembering. ‘When I knelt at his side at the bottom of the greasy pole, I remember thinking that he couldn’t be dead because he smelled so alive. Of sweat, you know, and flour dust and of the fairground itself. I thought he had eaten a toffee apple – that sweet fruity smell. And then how many times did we tell ourselves afterwards – a ham sandwich and too much whisky. A ham sandwich and too much whisky . . . and I never made the connection, or rather noticed that there wasn’t one. If I had mentioned the apply smell right there and then . . .’

‘Yes,’ said Alec, not even trying to comfort me.

‘But I was
sure
that whisky could smell like that too.’

‘Look!’ said Alec. ‘What’s that?’ He paused, the little motor car trembling as his foot attempted to hold the balance of the clutch. ‘No,’ he said at last, ‘I thought I saw a light shining, but it’s the tin roof on the den, I think.’

‘Yes, it could be,’ I said. ‘We ’re near the rascals’ stamping grounds here.’

‘And don’t berate yourself about the whisky, Dan,’ said Alec. ‘We both know it’s not your strong point.’

‘Wait though,’ I said, for thoughts were stirring in me, of glinting things in the woods and the smell of apples from a bottle of whisky, and then it fell into place with a click.

‘Oh,
bloody
hell,’ I said. ‘Alec, you’re going to kill me. Turn round. We need to go back.’

Alec did so and drove in silence, waiting for me to explain.

‘I know how Brown happened to have poison to hand,’ I said. ‘And I know why I thought that whisky could smell that way. I even know what Joey Brown was doing hanging round here after the death.’

Again he waited and at last I plucked up the courage to lay out how blind I had been.

‘It was the bottle of Royal Highlander,’ I said. ‘The special bottle of whisky for Billy Brown’s return.’

‘Of course,’ said Alec. ‘The Royal Highlanders.’

‘Otherwise known as the Black Watch. Billy’s regiment. Bobby’s too.’

‘So the special bottle wasn’t whisky at all,’ said Alec. ‘It was methanol. It was poison.’

‘And so it wasn’t exactly
for
Billy. But it was in his honour. To be used exactly as Brown tried to use it. And when Joey told her father that it was Bobby Dudgeon in the burry suit he didn’t hesitate.’

‘So it was never Robert Dudgeon that he meant to kill.’

‘I’m not so sure,’ I told him. ‘Out in the street, it was certainly Bobby he had in his sights. When he went to the Rosebery Hall to poison the flask . . . he might have thought that “the Burry Man” – meaning Bobby – would be the one to drink it. But when he brought the bottle here he must have meant it for Robert. To punish him for harbouring his son.’

‘Here?’
said Alec looking around the dark woods.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘He brought it to the cottage and left it there on Burry Man’s day. Of course, once Robert Dudgeon dropped dead at the greasy pole Brown knew that he had drunk the flask and the bottle here wasn’t needed; more than that, he knew it would be dangerous to leave it here in case the police mounted an investigation. So he packed Joey off to get rid of it. That’s why she was dug in like a dog in a foxhole. That’s why she was so very unnerved when the sisters started offering Cad a drink of whisky and saying that they’d seen a bottle of malt, and
that
was what she’d been doing round the back of the cottage when I happened upon her.’

‘What do you mean?’ said Alec. ‘What had she been doing?’

‘She’d been pouring the poison away and putting the bottle on Donald’s rubbish heap,’ I said. ‘I met her coming back.’

‘So do you think it’ll still be there?’ said Alec, pressing down on the pedal and making the little motor car surge forward.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I know it’s not. It’s buried in some undergrowth between the cottages and the castle. I know it is because I put it there myself. But Brown doesn’t know that and, unless I’m mistaken, he’ll be out the back at the cottages, searching for it, or waiting until everyone has gone to bed so that he can search for it then. Stop here, darling, and let’s walk.’

We stepped down and made our way silently along the verge of the lane, slower and slower until we were only edging forward. In the dusk, the kitchen lights of the cottages were winking at us through the tree trunks and the outlines of the sheds and midden heaps at the bottom of the gardens stood out against the glow. We stopped as soon as we had a decent view of the whole scene.

‘I don’t think he’s here,’ said Alec. ‘Where
is
he? If he didn’t come to Mrs Dudgeon’s and he’s not at the castle what’s he doing here at all?’

Before I could answer, there came a drumming of running footsteps, getting louder all the time, twigs snapping. I spun around on my heels, my heart hammering. It sounded like an army approaching us and both Alec and I took a couple of hesitant steps towards the lights of the cottages. Then we began to make out shapes, low and scurrying, and to hear the ragged panting and the high pitch of the hissing voices as they rushed towards us.

‘We’re nearly hame, Lila, come on!’ ‘We’ll get Daddy tae go and catch ‘im.’ And above the voices came Lila’s whimpering and deep, revolting sniffs.

‘Oh, God in heaven,’ I said, stepping towards them, ‘if he’s hurt one of them . . . Donald? Randall? Can you see me?’

When they heard my voice they changed direction towards it like a flock of starlings on the wing and began shouting their news.

‘He’s back, missus. He’s goin’ to the holes.’ ‘The demon’s back and he seen us and –’ ‘Hush now, hush now,’ I said as they drew near. ‘Is anyone hurt? Did he touch you?’ They barely paused in their clamouring but amongst the shouts I could make out ‘Naeb’dy got catched’ and ‘We’re a’ grand but –’

‘Very well,’ I said. ‘Now listen. Where is he?’

‘In the woods, missus.’

‘He’s goin’ to the ghostie holes.’

I raised my voice to be heard above them. ‘Randall,’ I said to the tallest boy, ‘can you find your way there and show us?’ Randall’s eyes flared with fear, but he nodded even before I had had the chance to reassure him: ‘We’ll both be with you. We won’t let him lay a finger upon you. You other children go inside. Donald, tell your mummy and daddy –’

‘I’ll come with you, missus,’ said Tommy.

‘No!’ I told him. ‘Absolutely not. Donald, you are responsible for getting all these little ones safely inside, do you hear me?’

‘Aye,’ said Donald. ‘Will I tell my daddy that the demon –’

‘Tell him that Willie Brown killed your uncle Robert and he’s trying to run away.’ Donald nodded, already shepherding the smallest brothers and Lila before him.

‘Come on then,’ I said and, taking Randall’s hand firmly in my own, I led him and Alec back into the trees.

‘You’re telling the truth about this?’ said Alec to Randall.

‘They always were,’ I said. ‘A demon, Randall, wasn’t it? A bad man with a bottle of the demon drink went into Auntie Chrissie’s house when no one was there?’ Randall’s head was nodding furiously.

‘He shouted that he’d come back and kill us in oor beds if we telt on him,’ said Randall in a voice struggling with the bravado of a ten-year-old boy who fears nothing and the horror of a small boy, only ten years old, who wants to run to his mother’s knee. ‘But Lila telt Daddy and Daddy said he was
real.’
I tightened my grip on his sweaty little hand.

‘Monster,’ Alec whispered.

‘And the ghost of the soldier who was living in the den until Lila’s accident there?’ I said to Randall. ‘He was real too.’

‘Aye,’ said Randall. ‘But he wid nivver hurt us.’ There was a pause. ‘He’s like a ghostie doon the shell holes.’

I felt a shiver run through me from head to toe and I was aware of Alec moving in a little closer towards me. If the demon and the soldier were flesh and blood, then what were we to make of these holes that we were heading straight towards, not to mention the ghosties that lived in them? We hurried on, silent except for the quick thump of our steps on the soft forest floor.

It almost beggars belief, but so intent were we on our progress, threading our way as quickly and quietly as possible through the trees, that we heard nothing and one can only assume that the same was true for him, for the first we knew of Shinie Brown was the sudden flash as he flitted across our path not twenty feet in front. Randall and I both shrieked and at that Brown broke into a run and began crashing forward, all thoughts of stealth abandoned. Alec took off after him like a hound. I hesitated for a second and looked at Randall, who looked back at me, then of one mind we plunged into the trees.

Covering the ground more rapidly than I could have believed – Randall was, of course, as fit as a flea and there was no way I could hold him back and no way on
earth
that I would let him go – we were at Alec’s heels in an instant, Shinie Brown ten yards ahead of us and going strong. We were gaining on him all the time, though;
he
was struggling through thickets of bramble leaving it clear for us behind him.
He
was darting and twisting looking for a path and we could save seconds following. And as well, most curiously, he was not only running, but was also shrugging himself out of his jacket, ripping off his shirt, as he raced on. At first I thought he was caught on thorns and would leave the things behind him, but he held on to them as he ran, and with his shirt off he began to struggle out of his braces too.

‘What’s he doing?’ I panted.

Shinie threw a desperate glance over his shoulder at us. He stopped running. Then, just as suddenly, he was off again. He had changed direction. Now he was making his way to the right, to the west, out of the woods. We surged after him. It was easier going now, heading out of the trees, but all that meant was that Shinie started to pull away. We passed his coat on the ground and then his shirt and, unencumbered, arms pumping like pistons, he sprinted ahead. By the time we gained the edge of the park he was across the ha-ha and well on his way to the castle rise. I kicked off my shoes and, ignoring my burning lungs, trusting that the jellied muscles in my legs would keep working even though I could no longer feel them, I let Randall pull me along, concentrating hard on Alec’s back and refusing to think. We saw Shinie Brown scale the slope, digging his hobnailed boots into the glossy grass, and then unbelievably we saw him wrench the door open and disappear.

‘They didn’t,’ I managed to pant on one breath. I could not believe it, even of Buttercup and Cad. They had a door of oak so thick I could hardly move the thing on its hinges and yet, knowing there was a murderer on the loose, they had not locked it. And now he was in there with them.

Reaching the start of the slope, Alec dug into Brown’s footsteps and, slipping a little in his light shoes, he scrambled up. Randall and I dropped to our hands and knees and crawled after him. At the top, Alec tugged on the iron handle of the door but could not budge it.

‘He’s locked them in with him,’ I wailed and began to pound on the door. ‘Buttercup! Buttercup, can you hear me?’

From deep inside the castle there was a shuddering clang. I clutched Alec’s arm and pulled Randall in close behind me.

‘Was that a shot?’ Alec said, thundering his fists on the door.

At that moment, the sound of a police klaxon came clearly across the park from the woods and, as we turned to look for it, the iron bar scraped and the door swung open behind us. We reeled round again and gaped.

There was Cad, beaming from ear to ear, and twirling an enormous sword like a showman with a silver-topped cane.

‘We got him,’ he said. Alec and I rushed inside with Randall at our heels and made for the staircase.

‘This way,’ said Cad, at the kitchen doorway. ‘In here, of course.’

In the kitchen, Buttercup and Mrs Murdoch stood arm-in-arm and panting, leaning on two more swords as though they were rolled umbrellas. From the doorway in the corner we could hear the faint scrabbling sounds of Shinie Brown trying in vain to climb the slick walls of the oubliette.

‘We saw him coming,’ said Cad. ‘We were watching for him. Only he didn’t see us through the arrow slits, of course.’

‘And Mrs Murdoch was waiting in here,’ said Buttercup. ‘In there, you know, at the back, in the dark, with the grille open.’

‘And when he got too close to see,’ went on Cad, ‘we stood in the Great Hall doorway and watched him through the murder hole.’

‘To see if he would come up the stairs or go straight to the kitchen.’

‘And he came up the stairs. So we hid.’

‘In the fireplace, behind the fire. He couldn’t see us, standing behind the light.’

‘And we waited and waited and waited.’

‘And then, when he went back downstairs at last . . .’

‘We followed him, with our swords.’

‘And he went into the kitchen and Mrs Murdoch made a little whimpering noise as we had agreed she would.’

‘And he come right over like a salmon on hook,’ said Mrs Murdoch. ‘He lookit in and saw me, but he didnae look down. Well, you dinnae, dae ye?’