All Things Undying

SEVENTEEN

‘The UK government annual statistics 2007 reveal that over 3.2 million animals suffer and die in British laboratories in experiments that “may cause pain, suffering, distress and lasting harm”. An estimated additional 8 million animals are bred and then destroyed as surplus to requirements.’www.Uncaged.co.uk

Another drink later, we left Jon, after extracting from him a promise that he’d have a heart-to-heart with Alison at the earliest possible opportunity.

Rather than return immediately to the B &B, Paul and I decided to hike to the medieval Castle that guarded the mouth of the Dart, hoping the spectacular scenery might lift our spirits. We were nearly there when my iPhone began to vibrate. I fished it out of the pocket of my jeans. I didn’t recognize the number. ‘Hello?’ I said a bit breathlessly. Paul has long legs, and I have to work to keep up.

‘Hannah, it’s Olivia Sandman. I would have called you sooner, but I had trouble dialing the US number, and my calls didn’t go through. Just got this weird buzzing. I’m at the Orange shop now, and they helped me out.’

I rested against the railing that separated me from a twenty-five-foot drop into the sea, and watched my husband’s back disappear around a bend. ‘I’m glad you called, Olivia. How can I help?’

‘It’s complicated,’ she said.

‘I’m listening.’

‘Remember when you asked me about Alf and where he was the day that medium got herself killed? And I said we was in Glastonbury?’

‘Yes.’ My heart did a flop as I suspected (hoped!) I knew where Olivia was going.

‘Well, we was, but he wasn’t.’

‘Where was he, then, Olivia?’

She waited a beat. ‘Look, I can’t talk now, but if you meet me, I can show you something.’

‘Where will you be, Olivia?’

‘Down in Kingsbridge. Today is when we picket the Biozencorp animal testing labs. We’ll be just outside the gates. Like they’d let us in! Hah hah. You can tell Alf you’re interested in joining us or something.’

I thought about Olivia’s plan for less than half a second before realizing I’d have to come up with a Plan B. No way I wanted to look at, let alone carry, a picket sign with a photo of a rheumy-eyed rabbit, or a cat with electrodes screwed into its tiny skull, or a crippled dog. My stomach lurched.

‘I’ll think of something, Olivia.’

‘OK. But be cool. And don’t say much.’

‘Why?’

‘You know. Vancouver.’

Right. I was a Canadian.

I’d already hung up the phone when it occurred to me: I didn’t have a car.

There was certainly a bus that went to Kingsbridge, but when I got back to the B &B and checked out Biozencorp on the Internet, I learned two things: it was a scientific research company claiming every major pharmaceutical company among its clients, and it was a good distance from the town center, on the Tacket Wood side.

Suddenly, like the Grinch, I got a wonderful, awful idea.

I told Paul what I was up to and invited him along. From his spot on the chaise lounge, he fanned the page proofs with his thumb and screwed up his face. ‘I’m not even halfway there, Hannah, and now my damn fool editor wants to change the title.’

‘To what?’

‘From Euclid to Riemann. Idiot! You’ve got to throw CGI into the equation if you want to grab the attention of high-school students.’

‘Of course you do, sweetheart.’ Euclid was the ancient Greek who invented geometry, so I figured Riemann was some modern dude, but otherwise I had no idea what Paul was talking about. Checking equations and formulas requires intense concentration and an eagle eye, I knew, so I gave my husband a swift kiss on the cheek, waved my iPhone under his nose so he’d know we would be tethered by AT &T and zipped out the door.

It took me less than five minutes to reach the car park at the Visitors’ Center where – Hallelujah, there is a God! – Cathy’s rental car was parked exactly where I’d left it.

I opened the back door, located the ignition key under the floor mat where I had been instructed to leave it, and climbed into the driver’s seat. If Europcar hadn’t picked the car up by now, I reasoned as I started the engine and pulled out on to The Quay, the little Corsa couldn’t be an all-important cog in their enormous fleet. It would be rotten luck if Europcar decided to collect the car that day, of course. What if they reported it stolen? What if my image was captured on one of the CCTV cameras scattered about town, following my every move?

A light went on in the vast, empty attic of my brain. CCTV!

In true Big Brother style, the UK has one CCTV camera for every fourteen persons, or so they say. Did the police have a videotape of the vehicle that ran Susan down? If so, they were keeping mum. I hadn’t noticed any cameras on the Embankment or in the Gardens, but that didn’t mean they weren’t there. As I turned south on the familiar road toward Torcross, I adjusted my sunglasses, pulled my ball cap a bit further down over my eyes, and made a mental note to look into it.

At Torcross, I turned west, heading inland toward Kingsbridge. I had entered Biozencorp’s address into Cathy’s GPS, and followed the voice she’d chosen – John Cleese. Does a GPS get any more trustworthy than that? On the outskirts of Kingsbridge, ‘John’ directed me with confidence down a narrow paved road that ended at a compound of concrete block buildings surrounded by a ten-foot-high chain-link fence, topped by coils of barbed wire. A sentry box stood to the left of a sliding electric gate, which was closed. Two private security guards wearing brown uniforms, arm patches, and humorless expressions appeared to be on duty.

I pulled to the verge behind a passenger van and several other cars, parked, and climbed out. Keeping the cars between me and the road, I strolled along the narrow verge, casually checking each one of them for damage.

Alf’s much-decorated car was at the head of the line. As old as the car was, it seemed to have all its parts, and there appeared to be no damage to the left front fender. The finish, once a metallic blue, was now so bleached that any repair would have stood out like the proverbial sore thumb. It would have taken a body shop mechanic with the skills of Michelangelo to match that weather-worn, sandblasted blue.

Olivia, the youngest of the picketers by far, was easy to spot. Her red headband had been replaced by one in blue, which matched a tailored blouse tucked into a pair of white jeans. She stood to one side of the gates along with the usual WTL suspects, their number augmented that day by half a dozen representatives – according to their picket signs – of organizations called Uncaged and the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection.

I needed to draw Olivia away from the pack.

I leaned against the bonnet of Alf’s car, warm against my bum, and thought. Did Kingsbridge have a newspaper? I pulled out my iPhone, opened the Google app and tapped in a search. Yes! The Kingsbridge and Salcombe Gazette came out weekly, and was owned by the same family that published the Dartmouth Chronicle.

I would be a reporter, then, but what would I do about my accent? I’m lousy with accents. The price one pays, I suppose, for being born in Ohio where our accents are about as nondescript and boring as we are. If I tried on a fake one, I’d be no more successful than those British actors who play Americans on TV and seem to suffer from the delusion that all Americans drawl and come from Texas.

I should begin with the tall guy, I thought, the one with the rasta braids, the one waving the sign declaring ‘To Animals, All People Are Nazis’. Definitely the Alpha Dog. Excuse me, sir - work the eyelashes overtime, Hannah – but I’m wondering if you have a moment to answer a few questions for the Kingsbridge Gazette?

I was rehearsing the dialog in my head when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Olivia shift her picket sign nervously from one hand to the other. No Bible chapter and verse for Olivia today. This time the message she carried was unambiguous – a picture of a sad-eyed, brown and white spotted dog bearing the caption, in red letters dripping blood, ‘Born To Die’. By the rigid set of her jaw, I knew Olivia was clenching her teeth, probably fretting that I’d blow her cover.

I was scrabbling in the depths of my handbag for the little notebook and ballpoint pen I keep in there somewhere, when I heard Olivia shout, ‘Oh my God, if it isn’t Mrs Wingate! What the heck are you doing here, Mrs W?’

My head snapped up in time to see Olivia prop her picket sign against the chain-link fence. She turned to Alf, who was standing next to her holding a sign that said, ‘Stop EU Chemical Tests’, and said something to him. Alf shrugged, then went back to waving his sign. Olivia retrieved her handbag from the ground and hurried over to join me.

‘Quick, let’s get out of here.’ She kept her voice low, husky. ‘I told him you were my sixth-form science teacher. L-O-L.’

‘Don’t you think he’ll wonder what a former teacher was doing way out here?’ I asked as I hustled Olivia back in the direction of Cathy’s rental car.

‘That’s why I said science,’ she explained.

‘Olivia,’ I said, keeping my voice steady. ‘I checked Alf’s car just now. There’s not a sign of any damage.’

Olivia reached for the car door and wrenched it open. ‘Not that one, Hannah. Alf drives a BMW. Keeps it in a garage, like. Doesn’t let nobody drive it but him.’

‘Have you seen the BMW recently?’

‘No.’

‘Where does Alf keep the car?’

‘That’s what I want to show you.’

Now that I had a real live girl to issue driving instructions, I turned ‘John’ off via the GPS. Olivia directed me west through Kingsbridge for what she said would be a twenty-, thirty-minute drive, max, to Totnes. At the Palegate Cross Roundabout, we headed north on the A381 and when I got to the main road I asked, ‘What reason could Alf have had to run Susan Parker down?’

‘Well, they had words.’

‘Words?’

‘You know. Shouting, like.’

‘It’s hard for me to imagine Susan Parker shouting,’ I commented as I slowed to let the car that was tailgating me pass.

Olivia colored. ‘It’s Alf doing the shouting, I guess you’d say.’

‘What were they arguing about, Olivia?’

‘She said one shouldn’t take what it said in the Bible literal like.’ Olivia swiveled in her seat to face me. ‘I know the Bible isn’t saying to stone girls what aren’t virgins, or it’s OK to keep slaves. But Alf? He don’t like to be contradicted. Couldn’t talk no sense into him, neither. Miss Parker, she buggers off to the theater, but he won’t stop yelling about witches and harlots, the lot, and almost straight away, the police show up and charge him with breach of peace, pack him up and take him off. He comes home the next day spitting mad.’

Olivia folded her arms and pouted. ‘Now Alf won’t go back to London.’ A wistful sigh escaped her lips. ‘I so fancy London. Used to skive off and look at the shops. Not like I had the money to buy more than a cuppa.’

‘Do you live with Alf, Olivia?’

‘No, never done. I share a flat in Brixham with some girls from school. Kayleigh, she works at night as a barmaid, and I’m thinking there’s more money in drawing pints than working for Alf and holding up his bleeding signs.’

On the outskirts of Totnes, Olivia directed me to a quiet neighborhood of red brick, semi-detached homes built sometime at the beginning of the last century during the reign of Edward VI. Rather than park out front, she instructed me to proceed to the end of the street, turn left, and drive down an alley. ‘Alf keeps the car in a garage in back.’

I drove slowly, watching walled-off back gardens crawl by to my left and a row of wooden garages, painted white, to my right, each marked with a number.

‘It’s this one,’ Olivia said, pointing.

I parked the car and we got out.

There was a small, high window in the garage door. I stood on tip-toe and peeked in, but couldn’t see much through the grime. I huffed on the window and cleaned a small spot with my sleeve, but all I got for my efforts was a dirty sleeve. It was still as dark as the inside of a Goth’s closet on the other side of the door.

‘I don’t suppose you have a key, Olivia?’

‘I’m just an employee. Full stop.’

‘Is there a Missus Alf?’ I asked.

Olivia laughed out loud. ‘Used to be, but she ran off with some bloke from Australia round fifteen years back. Alf didn’t seem too upset about it, though. He has a char do the cooking and the washing-up, but Alf, he’s good about hoovering.’

‘Sounds like you know him well.’

She shrugged. ‘Since I was twelve, but if Alf had anything to do with running Susan Parker down, I’m finished with him.’

I considered the stout padlock that secured the door against intruders like Olivia and me. ‘Must have left my picklocks at home in my other pair of pants,’ I told her.

‘You’re pulling my leg.’

I grinned. ‘Well, yes, I am.’

Olivia shrugged. ‘So what do we do now?’

‘I used to be good at picking locks, but I need a bobby pin.’ I grabbed the lock and yanked it in frustration. To my amazement, it came open in my hands.

I scarcely had time to pat myself on the back before Olivia gasped, ‘That’s amazing! How did you do it?’

‘I’d like you to think it was my talented fingers, but I’m afraid Alf slipped up. He must not have pushed the shank all the way in.’ I removed the lock, and with Olivia’s help, raised the door about halfway so the two of us could slip inside. I closed the door behind us.

The BMW was clearly Alf’s pride and joy. Even though it was garaged, he’d protected the vehicle with a canvas cover. ‘Is there a light?’ I asked, squinting into the darkness and seeing nothing but a car-shaped hunk of fabric.

Olivia disappeared into the dark. ‘There’s a switch over here somewhere.’ She found the switch and a bank of overhead lights blazed on, nearly blinding me.

When my eyes got adjusted, I called Olivia over. ‘Here, help me get this off.’

Soon the cover lay in a heap on the concrete floor, and we were staring at a late model BMW sedan. ‘Blue or black, do you think?’

‘Blue. Leastwise that’s how it looks in the daytime. Looks perfect, too,’ she added, sounding disappointed.

I ran my hand slowly over the left front fender, bending to study the finish as closely as I could, looking for imperfections. ‘Wish I had a flashlight… torch,’ I corrected.

‘There’s a torch on the workbench. I’ll get it.’

When Olivia handed me the torch, I shone it on the fender, angling the beam, looking for tape lines, overspray, anything that might indicate the car had been repainted.

I opened the passenger door wide, inspected the inside of the door and the frame of the chassis. Was that overspray on the manufacturer’s information plate? Or a figment of my imagination?

When I straightened up, slightly dizzy, I noticed that Olivia had circled around the car and climbed into the driver’s seat. The center console stood open, and she was sorting through papers she had obviously found inside. ‘Olivia, what are you doing?’ I asked, although it was perfectly obvious what she was doing.

‘I’m looking for evidence, like.’

‘Evidence of what, pray tell?’

She shrugged. ‘Will know when I find it, won’t I?’

I was beginning to suspect that Olivia had it in for Alf, and was anxious to pin something, anything, on the old fellow, when her next move confirmed it. ‘Lookit this!’ she whooped. Olivia was holding a thin leather portfolio and, as I watched, she began sorting through its contents, which appeared to be a series of receipts. ‘Petrol, petrol, petrol, insurance, oil change…’ She paused, unfolded a piece of A4 paper that looked like a computer printout. ‘This here’s a ticket reservation for the Eurotunnel!’ Her jaw dropped. ‘God’s knickers! It’s for the day Susan Parker snuffed it.’

I slid into the passenger seat and held out a hand. ‘Let me see.’

According to the contents of Alf’s chronologically arranged portfolio, he’d visited the continent six times over the past several months, once on the very morning that Susan Parker was run down. The Eurotunnel reservation was for one p.m. Forty-four pounds. A two-day return. Susan had been struck and killed shortly after eight in the morning.

I stared at Olivia. ‘It’s at least a five-hour drive from Dartmouth to Folkestone. Could Alf run Susan down and still make it to Folkestone in time to make the train?’

Olivia’s eyes did a slow roll. ‘In this car, he could.’

‘What would he be doing in France?’ I wondered aloud.

‘Hell if I know. Alf don’t drink wine.’

I was still puzzling over that, putting the receipts back in order, when Olivia reached out, punched a button on the dash, and hopped out of the car. ‘Let’s see what the old goat’s got in the boot!’

Before I could tuck the portfolio back into the center console where she’d found it, Olivia disappeared. Like a two-year-old, she was everywhere all at once. After half a minute I heard her say, ‘Bloody, bloody hell!’

I returned the portfolio to the console, slammed it shut, slid out of the car, and went around to the boot to see what all the fuss was about. I expected to see cartons of WTL Guardian literature like Alf carried in his everyday vehicle. Instead, Olivia was leaning over a gray-green carpet bag, its mouth yawning open, and running her hands through what looked like hundreds and hundreds of ten, twenty and fifty pound notes.

‘Beautiful, beautiful money!’ She picked up a fistful of bills, put them to her nose and inhaled deeply. ‘There must be millions here!’

‘Not millions, but tens of thousands, that’s for sure.’

‘Well, the lying old sod. Said he couldn’t afford to give me a rise in salary.’ Pouting, Olivia helped me stuff the money back into the bag. As we did so, I noticed that the loot consisted mostly of pounds, but there were several fat bundles of Euros, and an envelope of currency with Arabic writing on it from Da Afghanistan Bank. Was Alf being paid to convert Muslims to Christianity? If so, Osama bin Laden might have a thing or two to say about that. The idea of anyone issuing a fatwa on Alf Freeman almost made me smile.

‘Where did Alf get all this money?’ Olivia’s eyes were wide.

‘Are they contributions?’ I asked.

‘Nobody ever gave us that much money. Never!’

Alf was a flake, his theology even flakier, so that I could believe. ‘Could Alf have collected it over a long period of time? Saving it up?’

‘What we collect in the can? What comes in the mail? I take to the bank. There’s five, maybe six hundred pounds in the bank right now.’

‘Where do you think the money came from, then, Olivia?’

‘How should I know?’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘Not legal, and that’s a fact.’

I closed the lid to the boot, resisting the urge to wipe off my fingerprints. ‘I think we better clear off before Alf comes home.’

Olivia checked her watch. ‘He won’t be home for hours. Won’t leave till Derrick leaves, and Derrick won’t miss the workers heading home.’

‘Derrick the tall bloke?’ I asked as Olivia helped me ease the cover back over the BMW and tie it down.

‘Right. Ah-maze-ing. Got arrested once for breaking into this lab up in Essex and letting all the animals out of the cages.’

‘My kind of guy,’ I said as I closed the garage door, replaced the lock and shoved the U-shaped shackle home.

I drove Olivia to the nearby bus station where she could catch a coach directly to Brixham. There was time to spare, so we sat in the car park with the windows open, enjoying a pleasant afternoon breeze.

Olivia stopped gnawing on her thumbnail long enough to ask, ‘What do you think I should do about Alf?’

‘Well, as much as I’d like to pin Susan’s accident on somebody, the fact that his car isn’t obviously damaged, and he has receipts that show he was probably on his way to the Chunnel at the time…’ I let my voice trail off.

‘But the money?’

‘I don’t know about the money, Olivia. There could be a perfectly reasonable explanation for why Alf keeps a big bag of money in his car. He’s no spring chicken. He could have been saving it up for years.’

Olivia climbed out of the car, closed the door. She leaned through the open window, resting her elbows on the sill. ‘If you believe that, Hannah, then I have a bridge that I can sell you real cheap.’

I had to laugh. ‘Well, take care, Olivia. You still have my phone number, right?’

She patted her handbag. ‘Know what?’

‘What?’

‘I think I can wait to start being a barmaid. Alf wants watching, don’t you think?’