Alan Hunter: Gently Down the Stream

Thatcher rested on his oars. The point really seemed to worry him. His grizzled brows contracted as he wrestled with the problem.

‘But are yew pos’tive that was stolen?’ he asked at last, ‘ha yew foun’ out where that come from?’

‘W’no, ole partna — but it’s a hundred to one it was stolen from Mr Lammas.’

‘Well, there y’are, then!’ A hundred to one was nothing to Thatcher. ‘Dew yew aren’t pos’tive, why not give them little kiddoes the benefit o’ th’ doubt?’

‘To be honest, I wish I could… but it isn’t in my power.’

Thatcher studied him seriously before dipping his oars again. There was a penetration in his hazel eyes surprising in its calm power. ‘Yew got yourself mixed up with a rum lot, bor, I’m buggered if yew ha’nt!’ he observed sadly.

Gently gave an almost imperceptible shrug. ‘We’re all a rum lot, bor… there i’nt much t’chewse atween us,’ he replied.

They had rounded the bend which cut off Upper Wrackstead and entered the long, reed-lined Mill Reach. At the other end was a bend which would bring Wrackstead Bridge and village into view, but the Reach itself gave no premonition of these nearby haunts of men. From a boat, its solitude was complete. One saw nothing but the tall reeds and scrub marsh trees above them. The majestic, rusty brick tower of a ruined drainage-mill pointed, if possible, the sense of remoteness and desolation. Even under a June sun, even in the presence of some passing holiday craft.

‘Yew aren’t a-goin’ to tell me yew don’t know who done that job, jus’ when yew’re going to lay hands on him.’

Thatcher was still puzzling about it. The police worked in mysterious ways!

‘I know who did it.’ Gently was talking softly, as though to himself. ‘Only nobody would believe me… unless I produced the man.’

‘Then how dew your bloke know who he’s arrestin’, dew yew han’t told him?’

‘I’ve told him where he’ll find him. There won’t be any room for mistake.’

Thatcher brooded on it for a moment.

‘Don’t that put yew in a rum position?’

‘It could do, I suppose… if I were inclined to let it.’

Their eyes came together, Gently’s mild ones, Thatcher’s questioning.

‘Dew he knew what yew’ve told me, yew might not have so long to go, ole partna.’

‘Yes… he’s handy with a gun.’

‘Ah, an’ don’t care if he use it.’

‘They get handier all the time… that’s the reason one has to stop them.’

Thatcher slewed round in his seat to bawl out a speeding motor-cruiser. The offending helmsman was completely silenced by such a barrage of pungent English.

‘But what sort of blokes d’yew reckon they are, who go about killin’ other people?’

Now they were getting near the mill and one could see the low, square doorway.

‘They’re all a bit twisted… they’ve had a left-handed deal.’ There was a dyke and a sluice-gate, and a sunken houseboat in the dyke.

‘Yew mean they’re ordinara people?’

‘Yes… ordinara people.’

‘Onla suffns pushed’m into’t.’

‘Suffns pushed, and they’ve pushed back.’

Thatcher turned the dinghy with his oar and it floated gently into the mill-dyke. Above the sluice-gate, grotesque, sun-bleached, rose the ruined paddle-wheel, like a symbol from a lost world.

‘So yew aren’t realla agin’m…?’

‘No… I just want to stop them.’

‘Yew’re goin t’give’m another push.’

‘It isn’t me who does the pushing.’

The dinghy touched on the bank. Thatcher shipped his oars with a quick, suddenly irritable movement. Gently continued to sit trailing his fingers. About the mill there was an air of unnatural quietness.

‘W’here she is, dew yew want to see her.’

Thatcher’s voice had taken on a roughness. Gently nodded, but didn’t stir.

‘Would there be any works left in her?’

Thatcher silently tied the painter.

Reluctantly, Gently climbed out on to the bank. In front of the mill it was firm and clear. Behind and beside it a thick growth of bush willow hid the surrounding marshes, but just here it was rough, hummocky turf.

‘Tha’s the door dew yew’re goin in.’

Thatcher had climbed out too and was standing close behind him.

‘Mind y’head as yew go through… they dint build it t’take six-footers.’

Gently went forward towards the gap and Thatcher followed a pace in the rear.

But before they could enter there was an interruption. The smart, uniformed figure of Superintendent Walker emerged from the mill. And along with him, ducking their heads, came five other people — Mrs Lammas, Paul, Pauline, Hansom and Dutt.

An assembly of eight, they stood staring at each other on the hummocky turf in front of the mill.

‘Gently, I’d like to know what the devil you’re playing at!’

The super began angrily and then broke off, aware of an undefinable tension which had somehow sprung up.

What was it? What had happened?

Everyone was standing there like statues!

‘Gently, I might as well tell you…’

Gently wasn’t listening to him. Nobody was listening to him. Pauline Lammas had covered her face, Paul was staring frantically in front of him, his mother’s eyes were ferocious burning coals. But why? What was causing it? Nobody had as much as spoken a syllable!

‘Gently…’

The super glared from one to another, desperately trying to comprehend the unbearable strain. It couldn’t last, this! Something would have to give somewhere. They stood as though rooted by a frightful supernatural power — Gently too, poised on his toes, and Thatcher, looking as though he had seen the devil.

And still it went on!

Sweat began beading on the super’s brow.

He wanted to say something, to take charge somehow. But his throat had gone dry and his brain seemed paralysed. He looked at Hansom. Hansom’s mouth was open to its fullest extent. He looked at Dutt. The sergeant had a sort of grinning frown on his face. Had they all gone mad? Was it the super who was mad?

‘Someone… somebody!’

He couldn’t recognize that croak as his own.

‘I’m asking you…!’

It might have been a scene from another planet.

And then, very, very slowly, something did begin to happen. At first it was little gasping coughs, almost as though somebody were muttering to himself, but then it increased both in volume and pitch.

Paul was laughing. But what laughter!

With his lips drawn tight across his teeth, he was sending out great rippling screams of laughter, laughter that iced the blood in the super’s veins.

‘Stop it — stop that row!’

Paul only shrieked the louder.

‘Slap his face… we’ve got to stop him!’

It didn’t occur to the super to slap Paul’s face himself. He daren’t move either… now! He was petrified like the others. Instinctively he knew that a movement would trigger off something.

‘Ha, ha, ha, ha!’

From bank to bank the crazy laughter echoed.

In the hot afternoon sun the super shivered and sweated at the same time. Was nothing going to break it? Would it go on for ever?

If only one understood… if one knew who…!

When the end came, it was almost an anti-climax. The enormous tension snapped as inexplicably as it had begun. There was a cry from Dutt, a sudden flurry of movement. A heavy body went one way and a silenced. 22 Beretta the other.

At the same moment, as though part of the same mechanism, Mrs Lammas struck her son a blow on the face, a blow that well nigh felled him to the ground.

‘Get the cuffs on him, Dutt!’

‘Yessir. You bet, sir!’

Gently had not been tender and Thatcher was in no condition to resist. Over by herself Pauline Lammas was sobbing brokenly, Paul was gasping and holding his face. Mrs Lammas stood exactly as she had stood during the whole incident. Her eyes were fixed on Thatcher as though she would turn him into stone.