Free The Black Mile by Mark Dawson Page A

“The fellow
from the government. The geezer who makes the aeroplanes. In the papers last
week. You know him?”
      “Viscount
Asquith?”
      “That’s the
fellow.”
      “What about
him?”
      “I’ve got
pictures of him.”
      Henry sighed
impatiently. “Doing what?”
      “Having
intimate relations with a brass.”
      Henry’s
attention had been wandering; now it bore down on the conversation.
      “What do you
say to that? The story behind it all, too, everything. I’m telling you, Mr.
Drake, it’s big. A scandal.”
      Henry
pressed the receiver to his ear. “Where would you like to meet?”
      “Come to the
Top Hat. Ask for me at the bar. We’ll talk then. Bring cash. It won’t be
cheap.”

MONDAY, 2nd SEPTEMBER 1940
      16
    CHARLIE SAT WITH HIS BACK TO THE EMBANKMENT,
staring out over the mottled surface of the river. He chewed his cheese
sandwich and poured out the last of the tea from his Thermos. He had an hour
for lunch but he never took more than half; he was permanently busy and there
was never time. Take this morning: a telephone call had come in, a local face
had been collared for a breaking and he wanted to arrange some preferential
treatment by spilling his guts about a bent bobby. Odds-on it was mud-slinging:
chummy flinging as much dirt as he could, hoping some stuck, hoping he could
get a few months shaved off his lagging in exchange for “co-operating with the
police.” A typical assignment on C1.
      The military
were everywhere. Part of the road was blocked by vehicles from the Royal
Engineers Corps and barrage balloons hovered overhead, tugging against their
hawsers, fat and silver against the thick grey clouds. The road itself had been
fortified: pillboxes constructed and tangles of barbed wire arranged on the
edges of the thoroughfare. Emergency pontoons were being constructed on the
River, floating segments roped to the bank to prevent them being stolen away by
the current. Twenty-five years ago: it would all have been the same. Progress?
That was a bloody laugh. Nearly thirty years and they’d learned sod all.
      A young
squaddie came past and Charlie remembered Frank at the garden gate, fresh khaki
and a kit bag over his shoulder––seventeen years old and off to the front. He
remembered the letters––letters sent home from his barracks during training,
letters from Paschendaele, two a week from the hospital on while he recovered
from his injuries. He remembered the letters from Ypres the best, the pride
he’d felt, Frank giving the Hun what for. He’d shown them to the other boys at
school; every time he read them they fanned the desire to be there with him.
      He’d only
lasted six months before the gassing, but that was enough for him to make his
mark. Commendations for bravery, mentions in Dispatches, the Military Medal.
He’d spoken about it once and never again, one time when he was morose and full
of drink. It was spare and unfinished the way he told it, but Charlie could
paint in the details: the mud, the sewage, the blood, the death. Three men owed
Frank their lives; three trips into a gas-filled trench burned his sacrifice
deeper and deeper on his face and back.
      War hero.
      Charlie had
gone to enlist on his eighteenth birthday but the Board of Doctors disqualified
him. Asthma. A soldier who couldn’t run was no good to them. They could afford
to be picky now the war was over. He’d been disconsolate for weeks. Felt like a
blasted conchie.
      White
Feather Johnny.
      He finished
the tea and shook out his cup over the water. No sense thinking about Frank, it
just made him angry. A tram clattered by noisily, cars buzzing alongside. It
was a cold, crisp day, a stiff wind blowing in off the water. New Scotland Yard
was a hundred feet further on. Three buildings on the corner of the Embankment
and Northumberland Avenue. The Commissioner’s Office and the Receiver’s Office
were made of old red and white brick and linked by a curving bridge,