The Wood Beyond (50 page)

He waited a moment then followed. She had gone into the apartment block when he reached the roadway. He paused, contemplated, then turned and went back down the alley. Bright eyes watched him hopefully from the darkness.

He raised two huge fingers, not to them but at the skies.

'Think on,' he said.
'That's
a nice gesture.
This
is nigh on two and a half gills.'

And picking up the bottle of whisky, he strode off to his car.

EPILOGUE

The sheep from George Creed's flock at Enscombe were taken in the transporter to the Haig depot where they remained in more or less comfortable conditions for twenty-four hours. Then they were reloaded into another unmarked transporter and driven south. Since the decision of most of the major ferry companies not to transport live animals to the continent, other arrangements had to be made, and a container ship with surplus space had contracted to move the Haig consignment from Grimsby to Dunkirk. Severe weather conditions delayed the sailing and it was Friday morning before the ship docked in France. Dead or alive, British meat was never welcome in that country except in circumstances of dire emergency, and a group of French farmers, tipped off by a sympathetic customs official, ambushed the transporter a few miles inland. The driver was dumped in a ditch and the sheep, which by now had not been fed or watered for three days, were released. Some were shot or beaten to death by the ambushers, some savaged by their dogs, a few managed to escape. Twenty-four hours of high-level and high-sounding diplomatic exchange ensued. The usual track of indignation, exculpation, and compensation was trodden. By Saturday evening honour was declared satisfied at all levels on both sides. Meanwhile the surviving sheep had been rounded up and a less provocative route to the ultimate destination of the great Federal Republic of Germany worked out. And on Sunday morning, which also happened to be Armistice Day, as the bugles sounded the Last Post over the cenotaphs of western Europe, the transporter bound for that distant slaughterhouse crossed over the border into Flanders.