Tom Sharpe - The Throwback

At four thousand yards to the south the men of the Royal Artillery were equally determined not to miss their target. They couldn't see it but the range was right and having bracketed it they prepared to fire a salvo. Ahead of them Mrs Flawse found the last coin and sat on the ground with the gold gathered in her skirt and began to count, 'One, two, three, four, five…' She got no further. The Royal Artillery had lived up to their reputation and the six-gun salvo had scored a direct hit. Where Mrs Flawse had been sitting there was a large crater around whose perimeter lay scattered, like golden confetti from some extravagant wedding, one thousand sovereigns. But then Mrs Flawse had always married money. Or, as she had been told as a child by her avaricious mother, 'Don't marry money, my dear, go where money is.' And Mrs Flawse had gone.

Mr Dodd had too but in a much more lively manner. He went with a clear conscience. He had put his own life at risk to be rid of the auld bitch and as the poet had it 'Liberty's in every blow! Let us do or die!' and Mr Dodd had done for liberty what he could and was still alive. As he strode back to Flawse Hall he was whistling 'Gin a body meet a body, Coming through the rye. Gin a body kill a body, Need a body cry?' Aye, old Robbie Burns knew what he was talking about, he thought, even with a little amendment to his meaning. And when he reached the Hall he lit a fire in the old man's study and fetching his pipes sat on the settle in the kitchen and played 'Twa Corbies' in elegiac recognition that o'er Mrs Flawse's white bones already bare the wind shall blaw for evermair He was still playing when the sound of a horn blown from the locked gate on the bridge sent him running down the drive to welcome Lockhart and his wife.

'The Flawses are back at the Hall,' he said as he opened the gate. 'It's a grand day.' 'Aye, it's good to be back for good,' said Lockhart.

That evening Lockhart dined in his grandfather's place at the oval mahogany table with Jessica sitting opposite him. By candlelight she looked more innocent and lovely than ever and Lockhart lifted his glass to her. He had come into his gift again as the gipsy had foretold and the knowledge that he was now truly head of the Flawse family freed him from the imposed chasteness of the past. Later while Bouncer and the collie eyed one another warily in the kitchen and Mr Dodd played a gay tune of his own composing to celebrate the occasion, Lockhart and Jessica lay not only in one another's arms but something more.

Such was their happiness that it was not until after a late breakfast that any mention was made of Mrs Flawse's absence.

'I havena seen her since yesterday,' said Mr Dodd. 'She was away across the fell in rather better spirits than of late.'

Lockhart investigated her bedroom and found the bed had not been slept in.

'Aye, there's a discrepancy there,' Mr Dodd agreed, 'but I have a notion she's taking her rest all the same.'

But Jessica was too enchanted by the house to miss her mother. She went from room to room looking at the portraits and the fine old furniture and making plans for the future.

'I think we'll have the nursery in grandfather's old dressing-room,' she told Lockhart, 'don't you think that would be a good idea? Then we'll have baby near us.'

Lockhart agreed with everything she suggested. His mind was on other things than babies. He and Mr Dodd conferred in the study,

'You've put the money in the whisky wall with the man?' he

asked.

'Aye, the trunk and the suitcases are well hidden,' said Mr Dodd, 'but you said that no one will come looking.'

'But I cannot be certain,' said Lockhart, 'and it's necessary to prepare for contingencies and I dinna intend to be dispossessed of my gains. If they cannot find the money they can seize the house and everything in it. I have mind to prepare for that eventuality in advance.'

'It would be a hard place to take by force,' said Mr Dodd, 'but perhaps you have other intentions.'

Lockhart said nothing. His pen doodled on the pad in front of him and drew a moss trooper pendant.

'I would rather avoid that necessity,' he said after a long silence. 'I'll have a word with Mr Bullstrode first. He always dealt with my grandfather's tax problems. You'll go to the telephone in Pockrington and send for him.'

Next day Mr Bullstrode arrived to find Lockhart sitting at the desk in the study and it seemed to the solicitor that a more than subtle change had come over the young man he had known as the bastard.

'I would have ye know, Bullstrode," said Lockhart when they had exchanged preliminaries, 'that I have no intention of paying Death Duties on the estate.'

Mr Bullstrode cleared his throat.

'I think we can find a way to avoid any large assessment,' he said. 'The estate has always been run at a loss. Your grandfather tended to deal only in cash without receipt and besides I have a certain influence with Wyman as his solicitor.' 'Why, man?' said Lockhart brusquely. 'Well, to be frank because I handled his divorce for him and I doubt he would want some of the details of, shall we say, his sexual propensities whispered abroad,' Mr Bullstrode explained misinterpreting the question.

'I dinna care a fig what the bloodsucker does abed,' said Lockhart, 'his name is Wyman?'

'As a matter of fact you've more or less put your finger on what he does abed. Substitute for blood a certain appendage and…'

'The name Wyman, Bullstrode, not the proclivity attendant on the appendage.'

'Oh, the name,' said Mr Bullstrode, brought back from those fantasies Mr Wyman so frequently fostered in his imagination. 'The name is Mr William Wyman. He is Her Majesty's Collector of Taxes for the Middle Marches. You need have no fear he'll trouble you overmuch.'

'He'll not trouble me at all. 'Twill be t'other way round if he so much as sets foot on Flawse Fell. Ye'll tell him that.'

Mr Bullstrode said he would but he said it uncertainly. The change in Lockhart had extended to his language which before had been that educated accent acquired from old Mr Flawse but had now broadened into something more akin to Mr Dodd's way of speech. Lockhart's next statement was stranger still. He stood up and glared at the solicitor. There was a wild look about his face and his voice had a dreadful lilt.

'So gan ye back to Hexham and tell the taxmen there that should they want to die abed and not the open air, they'd best steer clear of old Flawse Hall and gan anither route or else they'll not a-hunting go but be themselves the shoot. I will not have an ane of them come peering through my door or speiring after money that I had made afore. I'll pay my way and gie my due to them as has the need but let a taxman show his face I'll show it how to bleed. Aye, they can sweat and they can stew and they can gan to court but I'll hie here and I'll lie there and niver I'll be caught. So warn them, Bullstrode, heed my words. I dinna wish to kill but if they come a searching me so help me God I will.'

Mr Bullstrode had every reason to believe it. Whatever – and there was now no doubt in his mind that Lockhart was no contemporary but some congenital disaster – whatever stood before him and threatened so much in rhyme meant every syllable he uttered. And a man who could have his own grandfather stu… Mr Bullstrode sought a diversionary word and found it in preserved, was made of sterner stuff than the society in which he was living.

Further proof of this supposition came later when, having been prevailed upon to follow his former custom and stay for dinner and the night, he lay in bed. From the kitchen there came the sound of Mr Dodd's Northumbrian pipes and with it a singing voice. Mr Bullstrode got out of bed and tiptoed to the head of the stairs and listened. It was Lockhart singing, but although Mr Bullstrode prided himself on his knowledge of Border Ballads, the one he heard that night was none he knew.