L'Aimant – Chapter 46
Summary:
A group outing to the flickers proves to be a revelation—in more than one sense.
Set after "Broken Souls". November 1944 onwards.
Chapter 46: Events begin to run away with everyone.
Disclaimer:
The creative rights to the characters and plotlines in "Foyle's War" belong to Anthony Horowitz. This story is a not-for-profit homage to the television series, to the talented actors who bring its characters to life, and to a fascinating era.
Author's Notes:
The Stade is a shingle beach in Hastings Old Town. Since time immemorial it has been the home of Hastings' beach-launched fishing fleet.
Warning: For non-erotic reasons, this chapter is for mature readers.
…
Thanks to dancesabove for her invaluable beta-work, eagle eye and support.
Previously, in "L'Aimant"
As his sergeant spoke, Foyle's eyes focussed on the inkwell on his desk. He nodded slowly. "And... more recently?"
"There was a nine-month gap between that girl and Helen Richards, Sir. But the day she died, in June last year, a tree branch brought an overhead line down at Manston, just northwest of Ramsgate."
"And that leaves...?" Foyle's eyes rose to meet his sergeant's.
"It leaves the girl we lifted off the beach in January. Eileen Vernon. The day before we found her, calls from Crowhurst weren't reaching the main exchange. An engineer was sent to diagnose the problem, and the log says it was fixed the same day."
"Which... brings us up to date," acknowledged Foyle. "Good work."
"Thank you, Sir. Once I've got his name, I'll pull him in for questioning."
"If we do that," Foyle cautioned him, "there'd better be more evidence than circumstantial. You've got his blood type from the victim's nails?"
"From two of 'em, Sir. It's the same in both cases, yes."
"Then I want to know if this chap ever submitted himself for a medical fitness test... for army service. He might not have done so, but if he did, the GPO would know. They would've had to agree, in principle, to release him from reserved occupation status..."
Milner rose. "...which would give us his blood type. Quite, Sir. I'll get onto that next. Well, in the morning, anyway. There'll be no one there now."
"And when we've got his name, I also want him tailed."
Milner's brows contracted. Suddenly his boss was talking like a spy. "Sir?"
"Never mind. Just... when we've got his name... I'm calling in a favour." In advance, he added to himself. This one would cost him yet another promise to Miss Pierce.
Chapter 46
Wednesday morning, 21st February, 1945
Wednesday dawned to weather miserable enough to dissuade the urban sparrows from their usual tuneless chirping, so the only sound that reached Foyle's ears as he woke was the spattering of rain against the bedroom window.
He'd been lying half-aware for some time, sleep never being easy on a night when Sam was absent, but this particular morning he had surfaced to an extra pang of separation. Today dawned as the 13th anniversary of Rosalind's death. There was no question but that he would mark the day in usual fashion, with an early visit to the grave. On three occasions since they'd known each other, all of them working days, Sam had stood and waited for him quietly inside the churchyard, but for the first time, today—at his suggestion—Sam would be accompanying him to the graveside.
Foyle reached across between the sheets, imagining Sam's hand. The vigil this time, certainly, would be affecting for the sad loss that it represented, but her presence at his side would make it palpably less painful than in previous years.
He roused himself—this self-indulgence wouldn't do—and drawing on his dressing gown, he peered over the balcony down at the pavement, gauging the amount of water flowing downhill in the gutter opposite. He noted with a pulse of satisfaction for Samantha's sake that the rain was slackening off, the sky behind it clearing from the east. An errant sheet of newsprint had blown up against the railings, and was clinging there untidily. Foyle made a mental note to step outside and deal with the disorder once he'd shaved and dressed.
He glanced across to read the clock: a little before seven. There'd be no competition for the bathroom from Georgina at this hour. She generally didn't stir till seven-thirty. Married less than two days, this morning was the first time that his daughter-in-law would wake at Steep Lane as a member of the family. The night before, she'd seemed emotionally exhausted over dinner, subdued from seeing Andrew leave that day. Foyle felt a pang of guilt over his preference for solitude with Sam, and resolved, today, to let Georgie lie until she woke, or he and Sam were back from visiting Rosalind's grave; whichever happened sooner.
A little later, downstairs in the entrance hall and uncertain what the outside weather was providing, Foyle pulled a rolled umbrella from the stand, intending to address his litter problem. The bottom of the brolly's stick snagged on a neighbouring umbrella, and when he freed it, he could see that the brass tip had detached itself, exposing the bare dowel beneath. Bending, he reached into the bottom of the stand, and sure enough, the metal cap lay in the base-tray. His hand brushed against a foreign object, which he took to be a sheet of paper. A moment later, he was holding an envelope—in fact, a letter. And unopened.
Foyle turned the missive in his fingers, wondering how long it might have lain there. The postmark was no help, the printing being indistinct, but the letter was, he saw, addressed to him. He frowned, forgetting the untidy newsprint flapping round his railings, and bore the envelope away into the sitting room, where he opened it with the haste appropriate to its neglected contents. He settled down to read:
Dear Mr Foyle,
Glad to have met you the other day. I took the liberty of calling DS Milner to inquire after your home address. Perhaps he's mentioned this to you?
No, thought Foyle. He hasn't. Giving out my home address? Who the devil was this from? He turned the sheet of paper over, skipping to the end.
Sincerely yours,
Patricia Dale
Ah. Hythe Police. That was all right, then. And it explained the blurred 'H' on the postmark. Pressing on...
This isn't police business. I'm writing because you were a personal friend of DCS Fielding. Just to explain: the other day, I was sorting through some papers in Mr Fielding's office and came across this old photograph pressed inside a dictionary. Don't think it's ever been out on display—don't recall seeing it. But he used the dictionary a lot, and the photograph's quite well-preserved for being kept out of the light, as you can see...
Well, actually, Foyle couldn't see. Apart from the note he was now reading, the outer envelope had also held a slightly smaller plain envelope which he presumed contained the picture Sergeant Dale was referring to. But her written note was short, so he resolved to finish reading first, then examine the photograph. At least, he observed inwardly, this letter hadn't been an urgent matter.
Mrs Dale continued:
I know I ought to send it to his son, but Alick Fielding didn't come across as somebody who'd care one way or the other. When he turned up for his father's effects, he had a face on him that said it was a chore.
DCS Fielding cared about this picture, and that's what's made me loath to pass it to a man who wouldn't. So I wondered whether you might like to have it to remember him by? Or then again, you might still choose to send it on to Alick Fielding.
Well, either way, I'll leave things up to you.
Yours sincerely,
Patricia Dale
Foyle frowned, absorbing the sincerity of sentiment behind the letter. Women in the job added an unusual dimension. He considered Sam's contributions to their work. Her theories might have a tendency to fall wide of the mark, but her observations were always differently angled from his own, and her perspective on a situation often, whether accidentally or by design, illuminated matters in a way least expected. Furthermore, she had a knack with people. Often they'd respond to Sam more readily than to him.
He flipped the envelope over. It would be good to have a photograph of David Fielding, in memory of all the years that they had served together. Fielding had always been a cup-half-empty sort of chap. Foyle's recent findings on the personal tragedy that had blighted the man's marriage went some way towards explaining why he'd been so difficult in later years. But even in his younger days, David Fielding's gallows humour had sustained them through a few near-misses in the trenches.
One vivid reminiscence still brought a grim smile to Foyle's lips. Assailed by shell-fire, they had thrown themselves flat, face-down in a section of the trench. Or rather, Fielding had propelled him forwards by the neck, with a cry of, "Get down, lad!" The water-rotted duck-boards had summarily collapsed and landed them together in a fetid pool of filthy water, Fielding's hand still on his head. Foyle had fought him off, spluttering, "Christ's sake, Sergeant, if it gets into my mouth...!" And Fielding yelled back, "If it gets into your mouth, lad, better swallow. Take it like a medicine. Worst disease round here is bloody optimism, and a slug or two of this vile brew'll cure it fast enough. Drink long and deep, lad! Gargle with the bloody stuff! Might get you out of here."
Foyle pulled the photograph with care from its protective envelope. The reverse side was uppermost. Affixed to it was a lock of blonde hair, held in place by a small collage of perfume bottle labels, painstakingly removed, then re-glued to the back of the photograph. One label read, in golden letters, April Violets by Yardley. The other instantly was recognisable as the fragrance common to his Rosalind and Samantha: L'Aimant de Coty.
He swallowed. This was difficult to witness: his gruff curmudgeon-of-a-colleague's sentimental side, laid bare. And for a woman who had—what?—what had his wife done? Foyle chewed his lip, revisiting the little that he knew. Fielding's wife had stayed with him, after all. As to how she might have conducted herself in pursuit of physical appeasement, Foyle had only the unvarnished, alcohol-fuelled account from Alick Fielding. But was that version fair? And from Alick's own account, Fielding had flatly refused to tolerate recriminations from his son— to the extent that it had sundered their relationship.
Foyle turned the picture over. David Fielding faced him. Not with the doleful, rheumy eyes that he remembered from their last encounter, but bright-eyed, youthful, proud, straight-faced and stiffer than the celluloid that kept his collar rigid beneath the firm lines of his chin. Dark-suited and moustachioed, luxuriant dark hair centre-parted, and a spray of unidentifiable flowers pinned to his left lapel, under a hand draped over his left shoulder. A hand belonging to the figure next to him.
Behind her husband to the right stood Constance Fielding—"Connie" was the way she'd always been referred to in Foyle's presence. Standing majestically, the better for her high-necked pouch-bodiced wedding dress to be admired, and partly, Foyle presumed, due to the unforgiving nature of her stays.
Fielding's young wife gazed out from the photograph, chin raised, her blonde hair padded, rolled and curved back from her face in what was then the fashion, and surmounted by a high-crowned veil extending past her hips beyond the limits of the wedding portrait.
Foyle caught his breath. Constance Fielding's face. The image gazing back at him could easily have been that of Samantha from another age. He stared down at the picture in disquiet. This explained much. Not least of all, the look that Fielding had bestowed on Sam the day they'd driven out to Hythe, and found him at the woodland murder scene of a young prostitute. Fielding had immediately sidelined Milner with a dismissive look, and removed Foyle to the Wolseley so that they could talk in private.
As they'd approached the car and Fielding caught sight of Sam standing at ease next to the driver's door, the older man had stopped dead in his tracks. Turning on this heel he'd croaked, "Send her away. Don't want a bloody audience!" Then he had mumbled desperately, "Stupid bloody waste of life," and spent their conversation swigging from a hip flask.
What had passed at the time for normal Fielding rudeness, now assumed in retrospect a far more personal significance. The sight of Sam that day had clearly brought back memories, not only of his wife, but also of the murder victim from the previous year. The one who, Foyle now realised, must have resembled Connie in her youth. A death that had been poignantly fresh in Fielding's mind, after discovering yet another young girl's body.
Foyle's mouth ran dry as the more chilling meaning of his new discovery took shape. His mind began to race. He needed information fast, and, what's more, he thanked God Sam was due in through the door at any minute.
...
Samantha Foyle neatened her hair and dug into her handbag for the perfume bottle. She upended it to coat the stopper, which she then withdrew and dabbed behind each ear.
"A dab for you as well, Ellen?" Sam turned to her companion, who was folding up the blanket on the bed across from hers.
Ellen wondered at the need for perfume at the end of the work "day", but chalked it up to a newlywed's enthusiasm.
"Oh… no, Sam. Thank you all the same. You save it for yourself... Oh well, go on then... a little dab. But on the wrist. I'll smell it there more easily."
The two women exchanged a smile as Sam applied a little of her precious fragrance to Ellen's pulse point. Ellen brought the wrist up to her nose, inhaled, and closed her eyes.
"Rosalind used to wear this perfume."
"Mmm." Sam nodded abstractedly as she gave the stopper a firm twist in order to secure it. "I think a lot of women wear it, though."
The sudden tactlessness of her remark then hit her. "Oh. I'm sorry, Ellen. It must remind you of your friend. It's different, for me… I didn't actually know her."
Ellen turned away and busied herself stacking pillows. "If Christopher can cope with it, then so can I."
Sam shot an inquiring look at Ellen's back, one that masked a deeper question to herself. "I hadn't really... um... he bought this perfume for me, knowing that I liked to wear it, so it never once occurred to me that he found the memory painful in any way..."
Her observation met with no response, nor had she honestly expected one, but she resolved to tackle Christopher about it when they were alone. Whatever memories were tied up with the perfume were now tolerable, surely, otherwise he never would have made that present to her in the first place. Well, unless of course...
A momentary barb of self-doubt struck Samantha. Had Christopher given her the perfume so that...? No, surely not to remind him of his late wife? A hand flew to her lips, the other reached out for the metal-framed chair next to the bed so she could steady herself.
"Oh, Lord, I feel a little..." Sam sat down sharply on the bed, and Ellen rushed across to her, concerned.
"My dear, are you all right?"
After a short time, Sam nodded uncertainly. "A little dizzy, for a moment there. I'll be fine."
"No cycling this morning, Sam. We'll walk home steadily together. All right?"
"All right," she answered weakly. "Silly me. I must have turned too sharply there. I imagine it's the baby."
"Or it might be altitude," joked Ellen, wrapping one arm round Sam's shoulders with a squeeze. "We're an awfully long way off the ground, up here."
When they set out to walk back, the rain had shifted firmly westwards and the clear skies promised quite a cheerful day. Halfway in their walk along Marine Parade, the sun begun to shine. Although it somewhat annoyingly shone straight in their eyes, they nonetheless enjoyed the way its weak warmth staved off the February chill.
By mutual consent, when they reached Pelham Place, they remained on the seafront road and continued pushing their bicycles towards the Old Town.
"Hardly a soul about," remarked Sam, at which point, as if deliberately to give her words the lie, the figure of a man emerged from an illuminated doorway some way ahead of them on East Parade. Crossing to the pavement next to the sea, he set off eastwards at a steady run.
Ellen nudged Sam. "That one's got some energy. Unless he's late for something."
"Do you ever worry, walking out alone?" asked Sam. "Of course, you know there was a murder?"
"PelhamBeach. Yes. Read about it. Well, I keep my wits about me, but try not to live in fear," answered Ellen. "Carry my insurance with me, don't I?"
"Your... what?" Sam shot her a puzzled glance.
"Insurance. This." Ellen's hand slid into her coat pocket and withdrew a tin of Selsa ground white pepper.
"What on earth?" laughed Sam.
"Oh, yes," the older woman's face was serious. "I've only ever had to use it once. On some inebriate who tried his luck when I was shutting shop late on a Friday. I seriously doubt he got his vision back before the following Monday."
"Didn't you call the police?" asked Sam, astounded.
"The police, Dear, aren't renowned for taking women's accusations seriously."
"Christopher would always lis—" began Sam, reflexively defending both her husband and the proud profession she still nostalgically considered to have nurtured her.
"Well, no doubt," conceded Ellen with a frown. "Perhaps I am unfair. More accurately, I didn't want to go to the police."
Sam searched her face. "Ellen, you mean you didn't want to risk bumping into Christopher, don't you?"
The older woman winced. "It... was too soon after Rosalind."
"Oh... my..." Sam gasped. "I think you loved her, Ellen, didn't you? The way that Christopher loved her."
Ellen gave her a sharp look. "I loved her in my own way. Don't imagine that I need a man as my example!"
Seeing the colour drain from Sam's face, she added kindly, "Look, Sam... it's all done and dusted; Rosalind was devoted to him. Which was my tough luck and his good fortune."
Ellen pressed the tin of pepper into Sam's hand. "Here. I've plenty more at home."
Distractedly, Sam dropped it in her pocket. "We can have it in our stew," she mumbled.
Ellen gazed at her companion and felt a sudden pang of regret. "Whatever seems appropriate," she offered quietly. "Want me to walk you to your door?"
"No, Ellen. Thank you, you've been very kind, but really, I feel so much better now."
Well, that was only partly true. Sam desperately felt the need to be alone, and free of memories of Rosalind, her lovers past and would-be, and quite suddenly, her perfume, too.
Ellen patted Sam's arm. "Just mind how you go, now."
They parted at the High Street, Ellen peeling off down George Street to her milliner's. Sam's eyes followed her for a while. Then on a whim, she turned and bent her steps back to the seafront.
Air. Sam wanted air. And solitude.
Melancholy thoughts pulled her along Rock-a-Nore and past the public house towards the fishing huts, where she was moved to prop her bicycle against an upturned skiff and wander in between the larch-lap panelled wooden buildings on the shingle beach. The fishing boats were out at sea, which meant the Stade was quite deserted but for some nets laid out to dry, discarded rope-lengths, and imposing-looking maritime detritus Sam could not identify.
Her gaze turned eastwards towards the cliffs. A distant figure loped away from her along their base. At some point in her mind the thought of Christopher at home and waiting anxiously transformed itself into a solipsistic Christopher can wait.
Sam lowered herself onto an upturned wooden barrel between two tarred and weatherboarded sheds, and gazed across the beach, the dark timber walls affording her eyes some respite from the watery, low-angled sunlight. Behind her rose the cliffs, before her lay the sea, a pale, cold grey that glinted icily.
Close to this spot was where she'd laid out Keegan. Was the bin still there? she wondered idly. Christopher had noticed her, then. Really noticed her. The simple thrill of it suffused her still, as she recalled him, wide-eyed, plucking at his tie, his neck shifting awkwardly inside his collar as if his head had come loose. Sam?—Yes, Sir? She'd had his full attention then. And very often after that. But what had brought him to the next stage? Sam wrapped her arms around herself and looked down at her feet. The scent she wore reminded him of Rosalind? Was that it? Everyone loved Rosalind, it seemed. Could anyone replace her, ever?
A cacophony of seagulls overhead broke through her introversion. Sam gasped, head snapping back to catch sight of the birds. An involuntary shiver of alarm shot down her spine. The next instant brought a rapid blur before her eyes and something cord-like bit into her throat, pulling her backwards and unbalancing the barrel. Her hands flew to her neck. There was a sudden pressure in her ears from the constriction, and she couldn't breathe, but most of all the surging fullness in her head rendered her dizzy. And then the stab inside her chest as the adrenaline coursed through her body, sending shocks of pain down both her legs. There was no time to cry out.
...
Foyle gathered up the manila folder from the dining table and drew out the carbon copy of Milner's list of incidents that coincided with the murders. At the head of the list was an identity number, underlined in red ink.
He glanced at his watch. Uniform always started early. Not only had Patricia Dale seen Alick Fielding's GPO identity card, she must also have made a note of his engineer's number in order to check his credentials. Did that number match the one on Milner's list? Foyle snatched up the phone in the hall and dialled 0 for the operator.
"Miss Plaistow? DCS Foyle, here. Get me the Hythe police, would you? Quick as you can."
One hurried conversation later, Foyle was in possession of the information he most feared, but even as the sweat broke on his brow, the phone rang next to him again, and it was Milner this time, breathless.
"Sir, a message came back from the DTN HQ last night, after I left. You won't believe it, but the engineer is Alick Fielding. I've just rung them back, and they tell me he's been in the vicinity of Hastings overnight. Pebsham Aerodrome."
Foyle felt his knees go weak. He shot a hand out to support himself against the wall.
"Fffind Sam," he hissed. A quick glimpse of his watch confirmed she was now, officially, late. "She'll be somewhere between the public library and here. I want the other car out now, and men patrolling till she's found."
"Oh, God, Sir—d'you really think...?"
"Jjjust. Do it. Get a car along the seafront. Now." Foyle rang off in abrupt omission of the niceties and reached out blindly for his coat. It all fitted, raced his brain, all slotted into place: the blondes, the bitter hatred, the splayed footprints, the opportunity, the motive, the twisted flex—telephone flex. Christ! Even the perfume.
"GEORGIE!" Foyle blanched at his own tone. His voice was recognisable neither by its harshness nor its volume as he strode along the hallway to the stairs.
A startled face, its owner dishevelled and in night attire, peered down at him.
"Georgie. Absolutely urgent! Nnnever mind the makeup. Meet me on the seafront with the car. And in the next two minutes! Go!"
Foyle rushed out of the house, glimpsing but ignoring the key to the Wolseley on the hall stand. He knew full well the car was facing uphill and immobilised. No time to waste. He hurtled down the front steps, hatless, heading full-tilt down Steep Lane, his door wide open and forgotten.
It took several seconds for an open-mouthed Georgina to realise that Christopher had actually left the house without even closing the door behind him. It was only then that the true urgency of his instruction hit her. She fled from the landing back into her bedroom, tearing off her dressing gown and pulling on her uniform skirt over her nightie, which, as an irritated afterthought, she then hitched up over the waistband so that it ballooned out like a blouse. She ran one hand through her dark curls to impose some order, then hopped into her shoes, tucking the laces down the sides. Then she threw herself downstairs into the hallway, where she grabbed her greatcoat from the peg, and gathering the car-key and distributor cap from the table, rushed down the front steps, slamming the door behind her.
A gust of wind dislodged one flapping page of newsprint from the railings and sent it skittering across the road to try its luck against a household that might actually care enough to bin it.
...
By the time that Georgie caught up with Foyle, he was already at the bottom of the hill and disappearing into George Street at a canter, overcoat flapping behind him. She drew up at his back as he was banging on the glass-paned shop door of Sayer's Milliners.
"Ellen! Open up! Where did you leave her this morning?"
What seemed like minutes later, but could only have been seconds, the roller blind flew up and Ellen Chance's startled face appeared behind the glass. A second later, she was pulling back the bolts.
"Ellen, where... did you... leave her?" he pleaded, bending at the waist to catch his breath, hands gripping knees. "She hasn't... come... home..."
The breathless person in her shopfront vestibule was not, thought Ellen, even slightly reminiscent of the measured, suave, sure-footed figure she was used to seeing sweeping confidently past her shop. Nor was he the sane, controlled man she had met only a week or two before. Red-faced, gasping, clearly in acute distress, his chest was heaving, and his brows had risen to a peak of supplication.
Pity for him flooded her, but even with her knowledge of the recent murder, Ellen somehow couldn't yet bring herself to be concerned for Sam in daylight.
"I left her in the High Street, Christopher. Just there." She pointed up the street, as if towards some reasonable proof of his wife's safety. "Sam only had to walk a short way up the hill..." Ellen took in his obvious distress, and tried to offer consolation. "Perhaps she changed her mind and took a stroll back to the seafront, though. Why suddenly so worried?"
"No time now." Foyle drew himself up painfully, and turning, registered the Wolseley behind him. He hurried gratefully around the bonnet and half-climbed, half-leapt into the passenger seat. "Let's go," he uttered curtly. "Sam is missing. Seafront. Then... I don't know."
Georgie bit her lip and threw the vehicle into gear. "Yes, Sir," she answered grimly.
"Georgie?" managed Foyle, his voice now fractured. "Sorry. Thanks."
...
The barrel toppled sideways. Sam went with it, and a momentary slackening of the abrasive cord around her neck allowed a sharp cry to escape her. In the next instant, the ligature was tight again; a rough arm crushed her upper torso, dragging her heels back over the shingle, and she lost a shoe.
"You shut it, or I'll break your neck." The stench of day-old beer and stale tobacco met her nostrils as the voice rang in her ear. Fear gripped her like a vice—not from his threat—a broken neck was luxury compared to suffocation. No. The terror taking hold of Sam now told her that she wouldn't see her baby born, or Christopher again. And all the while the seagulls banked and screamed above, now in her line of sight, but fading rapidly as she grew increasingly light-headed and more blind from lack of circulation to her retina. Her panicked fingers scratched for purchase on the cord, and desperately struggled to dislodge the arm that held her pinned against the solid figure at her back.
She grappled with the hand across her mouth and dug the nails of her left hand into the back of it.
"Bitch! Ow! You'll pay for that!" the voice hissed with malevolent promise. "Going to break those fingers for you, as an extra."
The ligature had slackened yet again as she had hit the ground, but Sam was pinned down on the shingle now, the knees of her assailant grinding painfully into her shoulders from behind, and she could smell the sour aroma of unlaundered clothing as his dark groin loomed above her head.
"Open, bitch!" came the command.
As the hand loosened on her mouth, Sam opened. Yes, she opened, all right, jerking her neck up and biting at the fleshy mound below his thumb until she tasted blood.
Her attacker tore his hand away with a loud yelp of agony, only to return it in the next second with a fist-blow to her temple. The last sensation Sam experienced was a heavy boot descending on her left hand; then she blacked out from the pain.
...
The Wolseley came to an abrupt halt at the junction between East Beach Street and East Parade. Georgie sent her boss an urgent pleading look for guidance.
"Which way, Sir?"
Foyle craned his neck around her, squinting westwards. In the distance he could see—and actually now hear the bell of—a police car racing towards them from the west.
"Turn east. Left. Turn up Rock-a-Nore. She might have walked towards the East Hill cliffs. Drive up there slowly. Need to look between the huts."
"Sir." Georgie swung the car expertly left and raced the shortish distance up to All Saints' Street. At that point, clustered wooden buildings started on their right, and it was difficult to see between them. Georgie slowed the Wolseley to a crawl, wound down the driver's window, and began calling "Sam! Please answer! Sam! Samantha Foyle!"
...
Above her now-unconscious body, a looming figure bent to push Sam's lolling chin to one side with his fisted knuckles.
"Feisty one." The man sucked irritably at his other, bitten, hand. "The others didn't have the fight in them, like you."
A booted foot planted itself between Sam's legs, and kicked them apart roughly.
"I'm going to enjoy you."
He crawled between her knees and pushed his face into her neck.
"Oh this scent takes me back. I knew a tart that wore it once. And several that've worn it since."
He laughed, and as he reached down to release his flies, it was his last laugh, and his final living memory, for in the next moment, Alick Fielding felt a foreign pressure at his nape before firm fingers grasped his chin, and wrenching his head sharply sideways, snapped his neck.
...
Anselm yanked the body back and tossed it like a rag doll on the shingle to one side. It landed several feet away and in a crumpled heap. A quick, disdainful glance, to satisfy himself he'd done the job, and Anselm's mode of operation switched from combat to concern as his attention focussed on the woman lying at his feet.
His eyelids narrowed. This was not a stranger. Recognition of her features in repose did challenge him, but only momentarily. The same, now slackened, facial contours were familiar from an earlier, more animated meeting—and on more than one occasion. This, he realised with growing disquiet, was his former boss's wife. The smiling honey blonde. Samantha Foyle.
The bile rose in his mouth. He stooped and slid an arm under her shoulders, feeling for a neck pulse with his other hand. And, thankfully—he let go of an indrawn breath—he found the reassuring beat that he'd been seeking.
Gently, Anselm lowered her again, and tilted her so that she lay propped on her side. He carefully crooked her uppermost knee to give stability to the posture, then pulled his jumper off in haste, rolling it to place under her head, and leant back on his haunches to assess the situation.
His steely eyes took inventory: one dead piece of human filth; one injured victim—breathing, but unconscious. Loath to leave her unattended, Anselm debated briefly whether he should run for help, or carry her the short distance to the nearby tavern, where there'd be a telephone.
He'd just decided for the latter option when he heard a woman's frantic voice calling, "Sam! Please answer! Sam! Samantha Foyle!"
"Over here!" he bellowed back, and in the next few seconds Foyle himself came racing into view around the shed, coat flying, with a dark-haired cherub of a woman—whom Anselm recognised as Georgie Rose—stumbling across the shingle in his wake.
The older man's face, which by rights should have been flushed with the exertion, wore a corpse-like pallor as he sank into the shingle at his wife's side.
"Sam! Oh, Christ! My darling! Sam!" his voice broke as he tried to lift and fold her to him.
Anselm's hand reached out to brace Foyle's shoulder.
"Sir. Best leave her. Looks bad, but she's breathing. Bastard knocked her out."
Foyle raised uncomprehending, grief-fogged eyes to meet Anselm's.
"Anselm? John? What happened here?"
"He's dead, Sir. Not to worry." Anselm's head jerked sideways to the crumpled form some feet away. "I'll go and get the pub to call an ambulance."
As Anselm rose; the bell of a police car he had registered a moment earlier ceased, and was replaced with the loud crunch of footfalls over shingle as three men hove into view. John recognised them as the desk sergeant from the Hastings nick, a taller man a few years older than himself with a slight limp (detective, he supposed), and a fresh-faced constable in uniform who looked familiar too, though rather more alert than at their first encounter.
Georgina turned her face into the sergeant's uniformed chest and collapsed in sobs. The tall man stared in stricken silence at the scene. Which left the kid.
"You!" yelled Anselm. "Run to the pub and call an ambulance. Quick sharp."
Davis blanched. He recognised the bloke who'd barked the order. Last time he'd clapped his eyes on that, its fist had laid him out, and next thing he remembered, Sarge had slapped a wet towel round his chops and said, "Wake up, you dopey bugger, here's some tea".
His jaw took on a stubborn set.
"There ain't that many ambulances to be had in Hastings, mate. We'll have to take her in the police car, but I'll run and fetch a doctor. Right?"
"Right. Get going," Anselm shot back.
Davis turned on his heel, and ran. He'd run in competitions as a boy, and he could cover ground like lightning if he knew where he was heading. This was something he could do. And do it right.
"I need," grieved Foyle helplessly, beside Sam on the shingle, "need to hold her."
Anselm knelt behind him, shielding him from view. "I know, Sir. Know you do," he told him softly. "Here, I'll help you lift her on your lap. Just be careful that you keep her head supported. There."
And thus it was that, on the anniversary of his first wife's death, Foyle clutched the limp form of his second wife against him—in the very place she'd won his heart—and faced the likelihood of losing her, his child, and, not impossibly, his sanity.
****** TBC ******
More soon.
GiuC