In for the Kill (17 page)

‘He told me that he and Deeta were very close.’

The old man eyed me sadly. ‘Wishful thinking on Steven’s part. She were no more interested in him than she were in me. Oh, I liked to fool meself just like our Steven did, I mean a pretty girl like her hanging on your every word, looking at you with those big blue eyes, bound to go to your heart and loins. Though the loins bit is beyond me now, more’s the pity.’ He smiled and I saw something of the old Percy bouncing back.

I was glad.

‘She was writing a book about the war, I believe.’

Percy nodded. ‘Yes. She wanted to know what part I played in it. Told her I was a boy runner.

She was very interested in the radar station at Ventnor. Did you know it was the only radar station to be destroyed in the war?’

I did. I’d heard the story so many times I could recite it backwards. I needed to get Percy talking about Steven but I could see there would be no hurrying him.

Percy continued, ‘I saw the pylons go up in 1938, you know. It must have been about the same time your granddad built that folly of his.’

I remembered seeing a diary for 1938 amongst my mother’s possessions. Is that what Deeta wanted
if
she had been the person to have searched my houseboat. But what significance could it have? I recalled her gentle questioning of me in between our lovemaking. She had asked me about my mother’s childhood during the war and I had thought nothing of it. In fact, I couldn’t tell her much, my mother had rarely spoken of it. Was that diary from 1938 still on the houseboat? Though what connection it might have had with Andover, or Steven come to that, I couldn’t even guess.

Percy continued, ‘Your granddad knew a war was coming. Most of us thought he was a bit eccentric. Chamberlain said there was peace. But Edward Hardley was right in the end. Of course we didn’t know the reason for the pylons then, it was all hush hush. By 1939 there were these great big tall steel masts and wooden towers on the Downs. The radar station was bombed in 1940, along with Portsmouth Dockyard. The Spitfires went up. You should have seen them.’

Percy’s eyes were shining at the excitement of the memory. ‘They shot the hell out of them Germans, but the bombs still got through. I was running for the firemen, taking buckets of water up there, but it were like pissing on an inferno.

Bloody useless.’

His eyes swivelled to his right. He couldn’t see St Boniface Down above Ventnor from here, not physically but in his mind I knew he could.

Time to bring him back on track.

‘About Steven, has he –’

‘It was completely destroyed, you know. We were lucky though. Only one soldier got hurt.

Deeta was really interested in the radar station and curious about your grandfather. She wanted to look inside the folly. She asked Steven about that many a time. She was disappointed you’d sold the house. I often wondered why she was so interested.’

Now, come to think of it, I was curious too.

Suddenly I had the strange sensation that someone was watching us. I glanced behind; there was only a woman in one of the bungalows pottering about in her front garden. I felt uneasy.

‘Perhaps it was because her grandfather was here at the start of the war. Now about –’

‘Was he? She never said,’ Percy said surprised.

‘Maybe she didn’t like to. Not to you, Percy.

She was German and her –’

‘She were German?’ Percy cried.

His rheumy eyes were wide and I felt sure he had lost even more of his colour. His hands began to tremble in his lap.

‘You didn’t know?’

He shook his head vigorously. ‘She never said she was a Jerry.’

‘It’s all right, Percy, you didn’t tell her any secrets,’ I said, smiling, ‘The war was a long time ago.’

‘Not to me it isn’t. It’s yesterday. And it was to your mum too and poor old Ruby.’

He looked as if he was about to cry. Hastily, I said, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think. Of course there must be painful memories for you. It’s just that Deeta is… was young.’ I was about to add that she was also a historian, only I was beginning to doubt whether that were true. I said, ‘The war is history to a lot of people.’

‘More’s the pity,’ he replied sharply. ‘As you get older, young man, you tend to live in the past because there’s more of it than the future. Are you sure she was German?’

‘Yes. I think her grandfather must have been too: Maximilian…’

I didn’t think Percy could go any paler but at the mention of that name his skin was almost transparent. Now I was very curious.

‘What is it, Percy?’

He removed his grubby white baseball cap and ran a hand over his silver hair. His eyes shifted from right to left. It would have been comical if it weren’t for the fact that I could see he was genuinely upset.

‘I’d never have told her if I’d known she was German.’ His voice was barely above a whisper.

‘She was so good at listening. Bugger her.’

He startled me. I didn’t think I had ever heard him swear before. He fiddled with his cap in his lap.

‘Don’t upset yourself, Percy. You didn’t do anything wrong.’ I tried to reassure him, but he wasn’t having it.

I reeled back at the intensity of the look he turned on me. Only then did it click that there was more going on here than I had realised.

Despite all my problems I found myself interested, and deep down somewhere inside me a sixth sense was telling me that there was something I should know about. Why and what I could do with the information I had no idea.

‘Percy,’ I began slowly and steadily. ‘Did you
know
Maximilian Weber?’

‘Weber?’

A loud explosion filled the air and sent the Canada geese and seagulls squawking. Percy clutched his chest and almost jumped out of his seat whilst I didn’t do much better. I put my hand on his arm, ‘It’s only the call for the lifeboat.’

Percy knew this but I hoped my touch was reassuring. He took a deep breath and swivelled to look at me.

‘Who was he, Percy?’ I asked quietly. ‘Ruby knew him.’

‘Reckon we should walk for a bit.’

‘OK.’ I rose, curbing my impatience. Before we had gone far I could hear cars screeching into the car park and turned to see men race down to the lifeboat station.

We stood for a moment watching the lifeboat launch, its orange bow thrusting through the blue green sea heading towards the Cardinal Buoy and a container ship, above which hovered a helicopter. Slowly we began walking towards Whitecliff Bay. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hurry Percy. I guessed this tale had been a long time coming.

‘There were three of them, only he weren’t called Weber then. Maximilian Webb was his name, but I guess it was the same man.’

I could see from Percy’s manner that he
knew
it was.

Percy continued, ‘Max, Hugo and your grandfather, Edward.’

Ruby had been right. Nevertheless I wondered why she had mistaken me for Hugo instead of my grandfather.

‘I looked up to them. Thought the sun shone out of their backsides,’ Percy added. ‘I was only a boy, just a bit older than your mother, Olivia, or Livvy as me and Ruby called her. She and Ruby were about thirteen when the war broke out. I was fifteen. We used to lark around on the beach in the summer or in your grandfather’s gardens at Bembridge House. It was a lovely place and me and Ruby thought we were in heaven being special friends of them up at the big house, like.

But Livvy was never stuck up and neither was your grandmother.’ He paused and gazed around fearful.

‘What is it, Percy?’

‘One evening I was behind those rocks over there and the three men were walking along the beach. I weren’t following them or anything, just larking about.’ He hesitated. I could see that wasn’t the truth. He continued. ‘They came round the bend and I ducked out of sight. They stopped about where we are now.’

And we did the same. I gazed out to sea. The lifeboat had almost reached the container ship.

‘I heard Edward say. “It’s got to stop.” Then Hugo said, “We’ve only just started. The situation is getting worse in Germany by the day. There are hundreds of them wanting to get out. We’ve got it all set up.” Your grandfather said, “I don’t think it’s right, taking their money like that.” Hugo laughed. “We’re doing them a favour, and the Nazis a public service. The Nazis want the Jews out and the Jews will pay anything to get out. You just bring the boat across to France. Max and I will do the rest.” Percy paused and took a breath.

‘What year was this?’

‘It was winter. Must have been either late 1938, or early part of 1939.’

I thought of that diary again. ‘My mother was with you, wasn’t she? Here on the beach. She overheard them?’

He looked sheepish and nodded. ‘We weren’t up to nothing, just talking.’

I believed him; times had changed.

‘We didn’t understand what they were talking about. We were just kids. It wasn’t until after the war it all came out what Hitler did to the Jews.’

But my mother had written it in her diary. Was that all she had written? Was it still on the houseboat, or had Deeta found it? Was that why she was killed? Was that why she had searched my houseboat? I couldn’t see how it mattered?

There was nothing wrong with what the three men had been doing, unless of course they had been helping the Jews to emigrate illegally for a fee, which seemed likely. Even then history had shown they had been saving them from a terrible fate. I said as much to Percy.

He turned to stare at me. I could see there was more.

‘After the war had started, and the radar station had been attacked in 1940, I was back here on the beach, walking home. It was dusk. There’d been an attack on the mainland and you could see the sky alight with fire. I remember thinking poor buggers. I stumbled on Edward and Max.

They were arguing. I don’t know what about. I heard Max say, “I’m going to the authorities.” Your grandfather strode off and that was the last anyone saw of him. He disappeared along with his boat. Drowned, though they never found his body.’

That had been a constant concern of my grandmother’s. What Percy was telling me had all happened a long time ago, but the past, as Percy had reminded me, is never very far away.

‘What happened to Max?’

‘No idea. Never saw nor heard of him again.

But if you now say he was German…’

‘I don’t know if he was for sure, but Deeta was and Weber is a German name. Perhaps Max was English, went to Germany after the war, married and settled down there.’

‘Could have done,’ Percy mumbled. I could see he wasn’t convinced, and neither was I.

We turned round and started walking back. The lifeboat had reached the container ship, but we couldn’t see what was happening. It was too far away.

‘He didn’t sound German,’ Percy went on.

‘They all talked nice, you know, posh like.’

Percy fell silent. His wrinkled face was glum.

His eyes troubled. I thought over what he had told me. Had they really been helping to rescue Jews from Hitler’s clutches, not only in 1939, but later, after Hitler had closed the borders?

Percy was talking about overhearing this second conversation after the radar station was bombed, which was after Dunkirk. Northern France would have been occupied. It would have been highly dangerous. What did Max mean about going to the authorities? As I had said to Percy, it was a long time ago. I brought my mind back to the present. What I had to ask Percy was delicate, and I didn’t want to cause the old man any further distress, but I had to know.

‘Percy, did you see how Deeta was killed?’ I asked gently.

Percy shuddered. ‘Strangled with bare hands by the looks of it.’

Like Westnam. So someone had been facing her. Had it been someone she knew? Or had it been a stranger who had struck up a casual acquaintance with her and then attacked her?

‘Was her rucksack beside her?’ She’d been carrying it when she had left my houseboat.

Percy frowned in thought. ‘Yes. It was open and some of her things had spilled out onto the beach.’

‘Did you see a small maroon book, like a diary?’

I didn’t hold out much hope of him remembering in the shock of discovering Deeta’s body.

‘Can’t say that I did.’

I would need to return to the houseboat and check if it was still there. We had reached the car park. I was worried about Percy. He was very pale and shaky.

‘Would you like me to see you home?’ I volunteered, but he refused my offer.

‘I’ll be all right,’ he replied sadly and began to shuffle away. He had only gone a few paces when I hailed him.

‘You mentioned the three men: Max, Edward and Hugo. My grandfather was drowned. Max disappeared. What happened to Hugo?’

Percy turned to face me; his lined old face was drawn and fearful. ‘Hugo Wildern was hanged, for being a German spy.’

Percy’s words gnawed away at me. It would have made more sense if Max had been arrested for treason, not Hugo though I was viewing this with the benefit of hindsight. Max, I guessed from Percy’s conversation, had betrayed Hugo to the authorities, but for what?

Telling the Germans about the radar station? It was possible. Had Max been the spy and not Hugo, which seemed more likely. In that case Hugo had been falsely betrayed. But what did this have to do with me? Nothing I told myself but still I headed for the library.

Before I reached it I glanced across the road at the village hall. The doors were open and a policeman and policewoman stood at the entrance talking to a couple of middle-aged men.

Opposite, outside the bakery, a small crowd had gathered, they were gossiping and glancing across at the police officers. The little coffee shop in the bakery was doing a roaring trade, as was Bembridge itself. Far from putting people off coming to the village the murder had attracted more visitors.

I could find no record of Hugo on the Internet for having been tried and hanged for treason.

Four people had been convicted under the High Treason Act: William Joyce, commonly known as Lord Haw Haw, John Amery, Walter Purdy and Thomas Cooper. Theodore Schurch was convicted under the Treachery Act of 1940. Of these men Purdy and Cooper had their sentence commuted and were eventually released. Amery was executed on 19 December 1945, Joyce on 3