Magnus Mills: All Quiet on the Orient Express

Still, now I was here I could see no point in going back to the pub for another pint, so once I’d recovered sufficiently I relaunched the boat and continued my rowing. I suppose I must have passed the time in this manner for another hour or so before the novelty wore off. By then I’d worked my way right along the far shore of the lake to a point more or less opposite Mr Parker’s place. I decided that this was enough for one day, so I returned to the mooring, tied up and rowed ashore in the tender. I shoved it into the reeds as he’d directed, leaving the oars tucked under the seat. This time I did get my feet wet. The water looked shallow but there was a lot of mud, and my boots sank in while I was getting out of the boat. Despite this it had been an enjoyable couple of hours. I strolled back to the tent, changed my socks and had a cup of tea. My motorbike had been waiting there neglected for a couple of days, so I spent the afternoon giving it the clean I’d promised yesterday.

When I went to the pub that night it struck me that there was a distinct shortage of women in the area now that the tourists had left. The previous week the place had been full of attractive girls, all looking especially healthy after a few days in the outdoors. Now they seemed to have gone. The only exception was a young woman who appeared up in the top bar at about ten o’clock. I’d seen her once before. On that occasion she spent a lot of time talking to Tony, and I’d more or less assumed she was his girlfriend. Tonight, however, Gordon was on duty and she seemed to be giving him the same amount of attention. Which made me think she could be unattached. I quite liked the look of her, and would probably have tried to get acquainted if I hadn’t been leaving at the end of the week. As it was, I had to content myself with the occasional glance she gave in my direction.

Meanwhile, in the bottom bar, the dartboard remained the centre of attention. The supply of Topham’s Excelsior Bitter seemed to be holding out alright, and I spent another evening with the locals. One darts game followed another, followed by a further round of drinks and another one after that. I wondered if it was like this every night during the winter. They set a very fast pace for their drinking and once again I seemed to get swept along with it. As usual the man in the cardboard crown was present, and he made sure I didn’t miss out. I stayed as long as possible to see if the young woman in the top bar left with anybody, but she suddenly disappeared while my back was turned. It was time to leave, so I wandered back to the campsite and went straight to bed.

I didn’t sleep well. In the middle of the night a girl in a gym slip kept turning the water on and off. I came slowly awake and realized someone was shaking my tent pole.

A moment later I heard a voice outside. It was Mr Parker.

“Could you give us a hand here?” he said. “The rowing boats seem to have got away.”

Icould hear an engine running in the darkness.

“Just a sec,” I said, searching for my boots and pulling them on quickly.

When I came out I saw the pick-up truck parked nearby, headlights blazing. Mr Parker had already returned to the driving seat, so I went over and he spoke through the window.

“I’ve just been down to the lake and there’s no sign of them. We’ll have to conduct a search.”

I got in beside him and we headed off towards the lower field, where the gate was unchained and wide open. Shortly afterwards we arrived at the water’s edge. With some relief I found the tender amongst the reeds where I’d left it. I could just make out its dark shape in the moonlight. The string of boats on the mooring, however, had gone.

“Could you row out and have a look for them?” said Mr Parker.

“Er…yeah,” I replied. “Can if you like.”

This didn’t sound like a very good idea to me. After all, the chance of finding seven boats on a lake this size, in the dark, seemed quite small. However, I wanted to appear to be helping in any way I could, so I went along with it. I got my feet wet again as I cast off, but this didn’t seem very important under the circumstances. As I rowed slowly away from the shore I could see Mr Parker’s figure standing on the jetty, looking in my direction. I got to where the mooring buoy should have been and noticed that it, too, had vanished.

“Can you see them?” called Mr Parker.

“Afraid not,” I called back. “Looks like the whole mooring’s gone.”

“Well, could you search further out?”

This whole exercise was beginning to seem very pointless, as I could hardly see where I was going, let alone catch a glimpse of the escaped boats. To make it worse, the water sounded much noisier tonight that it had done during the day. I could hear it bashing against the tender, and I began to wonder how far it would be safe to go. Still, I carried on plodding along for the time being, in order to satisfy Mr Parker that I’d had a good look. As I did so I wondered what he’d been doing down here at this time of night to notice that the boats had gone. I had no idea what time it was, but it must have been well into the small hours. After a while he called me again.

“Can you come in now, please?”

His way of giving orders in the form of a polite request was very effective, and I suddenly realized I’d inadvertently become his servant. Here I was floating about in the darkness at his beck and call, with wet feet, when I should have been fast asleep. I wasn’t unduly bothered about the inconvenience, but all the same I was pleased that he’d at last decided to abandon our search. Now I could go back to bed.

So it was a bit disappointing when I came ashore and he said, “We’ll have to drive round the lake road and see where they’ve gone.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to wait until morning?” I asked.

“Might be too late by then,” he replied. “And I should hate to lose them.”

We got in the pick-up truck and spent the next two hours on a fruitless search. We went first to Millfold, then over the stone bridge and onto the road that ran south along the far side of the lake. Every time we passed anywhere near the shore Mr Parker stopped and I had to jump out and stand at the water’s edge peering into the gloom.

Then I’d get back in and he’d say, “No sign of them?”

“Sorry, no,” I’d reply, and we’d press on.

There was little other conversation. Occasionally we would pass some property and he’d slow down and look in through the gateway, as if expecting to see his boats hidden somewhere within. Finally, we came to the southernmost tip of the lake and he turned back. I thought that would be enough charging about for one night, but when we arrived at the campsite Mr Parker drove down to the jetty again. For a moment I thought he was hoping the boats had come home of their own accord. Instead it seemed that he’d decided to put the tender back in the hut for safekeeping, so we spent another few minutes struggling to get it locked away. Only then did we rest. Mr Parker had certainly taken the loss of his boats seriously, but there didn’t seem to be any suggestion that it was my fault. As far as I could make out the whole mooring must have come adrift from the bed of the lake, and obviously that had nothing to do with me. All the same, I couldn’t help wondering if I was somehow ‘suspected’.

For his part, Mr Parker was being quite friendly. After he’d locked the hut he turned to me and said, “You’d better come up to the house for some breakfast.”

By this time several streaks of light had appeared in the eastern sky, so I guessed it was about six o’clock. I was ready for bed, but a bit of breakfast in a proper kitchen sounded very attractive, so I accepted the offer.