The Water Clock

21

Humph nosed the cab into the northern gale. For five miles the road ran beside the main river. The ice was breaking up and the wind was making waves, piling the frozen shards against the banks. The water was a foot, maybe eighteen inches, from the top of the banks. Even now, as the floods rose inland, the Fens could be saved if the water could escape quickly to the sea. But the north wind was holding up the tide and bottling up the water in the rivers. The cloudscape was being ripped apart by the gale, leaving gaping holes of winter blue between the shreds of lead-grey nimbus. Seagulls were torn across the sky, screeching southwards.

The night came from the north too. As they drove, dusk killed the colours in the landscape and replaced them with sepia. There was little traffic and they were soon on the outskirts of King’s Lynn. Around them stretched the sink estates of the 1950s and 1960s. Grey rain fell on thousands of identical roofs. Dryden heard ‘Little Boxes’ playing in his head.

The centre of the old port city, medieval and stately, had been evacuated in anticipation of the gale which was now bellowing in off the Wash. They parked on the wide quayside which had been ruined by some largely unsuccessful attempts to introduce trendy waterside flat developments into the old warehousing district. Out in the wide estuary several coasters had taken refuge to ride out the storm. The horizon at sea was clear and jagged, with white horses crisp and high more than ten miles to the north.

The press conference was in a converted spice warehouse, a glorious eccentric pile in golden brick with Victorian mock-Indian turrets. The presser, predictably, was in an airless, windowless, overheated room on the ground floor. The nationals had made the trip north, or at least their local stringers had, from Norwich, Cambridge and Peterborough, and the local TV stations had set up a camera, which was bad news for the print journalists who would now get second-class treatment as a result.

It was 3.15 and the impressive array of officials the press had been promised had yet to appear. Dryden felt a tap on the shoulder, and turned to find Detective Sergeant Andy Stubbs.

‘Short straw?’ asked Dryden.

Stubbs fiddled with the knot of his tie. ‘County heard the TV was coming and we’re one of the threatened areas. They wanted a copper on the press conference panel. Just what I need…’

‘Tribunal?’

Stubbs couldn’t help but wince. ‘Unpleasant.’

‘Story in The Express didn’t help?’

‘Oh, it helped. God knows what they would have done otherwise. But it didn’t help enough.’

Dryden looked sympathetic. Sometimes he hated himself.

‘I don’t want this in the paper, Dryden.’

‘Would I?’ This was one of his favourite replies to any plea to keep things out of print. The answer was: ‘Yes. He would.’ What did people think he did for a living?

‘They’re considering demotion. I’m not suspended from duty in the interim. Final decision tomorrow’

Dryden decided Stubbs was looking for sympathy and playing for time. And there was still no sign of the file on the Harrimere Drain accident.

Dryden checked his watch. ‘I presume you want to know where the Lark victim died?’

A muscle twitched above Stubbs’s eye. ‘I’ve told…’

But the TV crew called for silence. A long line of the usual suspects trailed in from a room to one side of the dais. The silver-haired chairman of the water authority confidently took the central seat, flanked by officials from the emergency services, army and county councils. Dryden couldn’t resist a parting shot as Stubbs scurried unhappily forward. And I know why he died.’

Sir John Vermujden, chairman of the water authority, was silky smooth and about as trustworthy as the company’s share price. As maps were handed out, showing those areas already under water and those areas likely to come under threat, Vermujden read from a prepared statement. The maps were colour-coded at various heights, or rather depths. These ranged from 20 feet above sea level to 6 feet below. If the river banks and, or, sea defences failed all the area under sea level would flood. The chances of that happening were now about evens.

Sir John flashed an orthodontic smile at the cameras. ‘But we are doing everything in our power to make sure this does not happen.’

The rest of the panel shifted in their plastic bucket seats. In Dryden’s experience they always started these things with the good news in the hope that the journalists would lose interest by the time they got to the bad. If Vermujden’s fifty-fifty chance was the good news then the Fens were heading for disaster.

Next up was a scientist from the Met Office. Desperate attempts had been made to make him presentable for the cameras. His hair had been lacquered flat to his light-bulb-shaped head but now, as he moved in front of a large Playschool weather map, the adhesive gave way just above one ear and a spike of hair popped out like the indicator on a Morris Minor.

The cameras closed in. The scientist betrayed a slight twitch.

‘The temperature is rising fast, the first danger signal. If twenty per cent of the snow still held on the land within the vast catchment area of the Ouse, Welland, and the Nene melts by dusk the river banks will not hold. There will be some respite overnight, and at dusk tomorrow, when the temperature drops below freezing again. But it will be shortlived.’

There was a buzz of excitement in the room and the cameras edged closer.

‘The second danger signal,’ said the weatherman, ‘is rain. In the last twenty-four hours 1.7 inches has fallen. It does not sound very much.’ Here he paused for a winning smile. ‘But sometimes the Fens gets just ten inches in an entire year. The problem is that the catchment areas are so large, rain is falling much harder in the Midlands where the rivers rise. The combined effect will add several feet – several feet– to the water levels in the rivers.

‘Danger signal number three: the tide. Tomorrow evening, at about 10 p.m., it will be at its highest point this year. This restricts the ability of the rivers to discharge the water into the sea. This would be bad enough but…’ Here the weatherman tore off the map showing rainfall to reveal underneath a new map, crowded with the black arrowheads denoting windspeed.

‘Danger signal number four. The current gale is forecast to reach storm force 8 by dusk. It could hold that speed for twenty-four hours. The wind direction – north-north-east – is precisely that which we would wish to avoid at this stage. It is blowing directly behind the tide, pushing the seawater towards the land and effectively damming the rainwater into the rivers. It is also driving more rainclouds towards us from the Arctic. Normally this would be good news – as it would bring a drop in temperature and freeze the water. But, as we have seen, the cyclone over the North Sea is dragging its air from the south of Ireland, where it has been warmed by the Gulf Stream, and turning it in a vast circle north of Scotland and out towards the pole before bringing it south. So, we have warm air from the north.’

The weatherman sat down abruptly with a self-satisfied smile.

Dryden got the first question in before the TV reporter had a chance. ‘Sir John said there was an even chance the banks would hold… what do you think?’

The weatherman had a degree in meteorology and a doctorate in natural hazards – but no idea about public relations, which is why Dryden had asked the question.

He considered it. ‘Oh. Er. Frankly, I don’t think there’s any chance at all, the question is where the banks will fail.’

Several of the print journalists started making mobile telephone calls. The cameras closed in on Sir John, who was now running a beautifully manicured hand through his silver hair. The smile was beginning to slide to one side.

The TV reporter recovered quickly. ‘The last floods in 1977 covered sixty thousand acres of agricultural land – how could this compare?’

Sir John cut the weatherman dead. ‘I think that’s a question for John Thoday – chairman of the joint county councils’ civil planning unit. John…’

John looked like he’d just been offered a plateful of shite pie. The sheen of sweat on his forehead indicated that he was well out of his depth, a dangerous inadequacy in the circumstances.

‘We already have some ten thousand acres under fresh water flooding in southern Cambridgeshire,’ he said. ‘That’s due to the dykes and drains being unable to take the melt water – the river banks are holding but we must prepare for the worst.’

At which point he tried a smile of reassurance. A big mistake which would get a prime spot on that night’s local TV news.

‘We can expect, I think, a hundred thousand acres to flood over the next forty-eight hours. Possibly half a million. None of you are old enough to remember but in 1947, three million acres went under. It was a national disaster.’

The BBC’s East of England correspondent got to his feet. ‘Is that possible this time?’

Thoday avoided the question: ‘The banks of the main rivers are under great pressure here, south of the Isle of Ely. But that’s not really the problem we face. It’s sea water that is the greatest threat. The bottling up of the rivers just south of Lynn could breach the sea walls, then salt water could flow back across the already flooded fields; that would be an environmental disaster and could ruin the fertility of the fields for years. That’s why we are taking the measures we are today…’ Thoday sat, having effectively passed the pie back to Sir John.

The chairman tried to say thank you but it stuck in his throat. ‘Today I’ve asked the Department of the Environment to enact emergency legislation by statutory order to allow the armed forces to assist us in reinforcing the sea defences on the upper Ouse and in ferrying livestock and people from the inland areas threatened with flooding. Just prior to this press conference I received notification that a state of emergency has been declared for the region. These are draconian measures but I, and the other representatives of the emergency services, feel they are entirely justified.’

One of the Fleet Street tabloid boys was first in with the boot. ‘Could the privatized water authority not have spent more money on flood defences rather than paying its executives so-called “fat cat” salaries?’

There was a brief flap as various press relations officers indulged in a frenzy of semaphore messages to their respective bosses.

‘Perhaps I can help with that question,’ said a silky voice from the back of the room. There was a collective groan from the print journalists who began to talk among themselves, while the camera team eagerly rearranged itself to light a man in a steel-grey suit and fake tan. This was the water authority chief PR, Christopher Slater-Thompson, known without a trace of affection as ‘Mr Flannel’.

Dryden slipped out on to the quayside to a concrete and glass shelter with its back to the wind. Seagulls blew past, screeching, and heading inland.

The mobile signal was poor so Dryden kept it brief. He got Bill. ‘It’s the real thing. State of emergency declared. Time to go over the top. We should have the full story by deadline for The Crow tomorrow afternoon with plenty left for The Express next week as the water goes down. I’ll work my way back through some of the danger spots. Woggle better start worrying about how he’s going to get the paper out.’ As he spoke the coasters bobbed in the tide like paper boats. He reckoned it would take Stubbs less than five minutes to find him. The detective did it in two.

‘The file,’ said Dryden. ‘Then the information.’

Stubbs straightened his back. ‘Look. I’ve told you with-holding evidence is an offence. Not a great time for you to spend a day in the cells either, is it?’

‘Friday’s edition of The Crow remember. I’ll make it clear the police had made no progress. Oh – and there’s the forensic evidence at Stretham Engine. Evidence your men overlooked.’

Stubbs buckled. ‘I got the call this morning. The file is ready to pick up – although I have to give a written reason for taking it away. It’s categorized.’

‘Why’s it categorized? How?’

‘It could contain sensitive information, or it could denote that the inquiry is still active, or that information in it was used, or may be used, as evidence in another inquiry. It doesn’t have to be sinister.’

‘Get it. Quick. I’ll phone later – leave your mobile on.’

‘And the written reason. What exactly would you suggest? I have a friend on the local newspaper with a personal interest? Don’t think that…’

Dryden stood, bent down from the waist, and put his face close enough to Stubbs to smell the faintest trace of sweat. It was like eye-balling a dummy at Madame Tussaud’s.

‘I’ve had a remarkable return of memory about the night of the accident. I’ve come to you with fresh evidence about the identity of the driver of the other car involved, the one driven by the man who saved my life but left Laura behind. The man who dumped me in the sub-zero temperature in a wheelchair outside the hospital and then drove off. You’ve decided to re-open the case and want to see the original file. Try that. Try it fast.’

Stubbs tried a sneer: ‘Anything else?’

‘Yup. The Tower. I’m worried about Laura. You don’t need to know the details. She’s been threatened, possibly by the murderer. The aim is to encourage me to concentrate on other stories. Over the next twenty-four hours it is going to become increasingly obvious that this is advice that I have declined to take.’

Stubbs pulled out his mobile and hit a pre-set number. ‘I’ll get a car to drop by. Put a man outside after dark.’

Humph pulled up in the cab. Dryden had some last-minute information for Stubbs. It wasn’t much but it would whet his appetite.

‘Stretham Engine. The rope ends are still in place, see the curator. I’d get it closed quickly, most of the forensic evidence should still be in place. He died in the pulley loft. The killer shot Camm there I think, then dropped the body down by rope, hence the neck injuries.’

Dryden slapped the dashboard and Humph produced a creditable skid as they pulled off They got round the corner before they realized they had nowhere to go. It was too dark to work their way through the danger points on the way back to Ely. Planning a return trip in the morning was out as the roads could well be closed by then. Dawn would give them their first chance to head south.

They bought fish and chips and Humph headed north to Hunstanton, a bleak seaside resort on the coast of the Wash ten miles to the north.

‘Honeymoon,’ said Humph, by way of explanation. He seemed to enjoy revisiting bitter memories.

The sea was attacking what was left of the pier, a Victorian cast-iron structure largely destroyed by a wayward trawler a decade earlier. The cab reverberated with a deep thump as each new set of waves dropped on the promenade. They worked their way through some more of Humph’s collection of miniature spirit bottles while happily watching the wind build towards storm force. Humph finally let his seat down and was instantly asleep. Dryden waited for dawn.