The Bungalow-22

Continued from Chapter 21: The Bungalow-21 | ABCtales

Chapter 22

They’d agreed to meet at 11.30 in the woods off Pilgrims Way, the same place where’d they’d had their tryst…weeks, months ago. They’d make their own separate ways, just in case they were followed, he’d said. Hales didn’t demur, didn’t even make fun of him, this time. Actually, he doubted that the Ulstermen would be back, but you never knew. Better safe than sorry.

He arrived at the spot at 11.27. He sat down on a moss-covered log. Hales was late, of course. The soft mulch felt springy under his boots, drier even than that last time, jst like a plush, thick carpet. Hales seemed tense when she arrived, shoulders hunched, though she greeted him with a cherry enough ‘Hiya!’. She took off her black packpack, slowly, and laid it gently on the ground. Then she sat on the log next to him, slowly easing off her white and dark blue trainers. They sat in silence for a good two or three minutes. The sounds of the motorway, the Surrey countryside penetrated, muffled, through the trees.

‘So Budgie, you DO have a bit of a past.’

‘Yeah, suppose I must. But we all have, to some extent.’

‘To the extent of people wanting to kill you?’

‘Not to kill me. To warn me.’

‘Warn you about what?’

‘I know stuff. Not much. But enough for some people not to want it to get out to other people, people who’d be interested.’

‘Like to tell me what it’s all about?’

‘Promise not to go mouthing off to the Old Bill – or anyone?’

‘Scout’s Honour. Well, Girl Guide’s Honour.’

‘You were never in the Girl Guides.’

‘Too right, snotty stuck-ups.’

‘I don’t think they had a badge for home brewing.’

‘Anyway, my lips are sealed, Budgie.’

Hawke sat down on the wobbly garden chair on the short piece of concrete at the back of the bungalow, placing his glass on the small table. It was seven pm, enough of the heat had gone out of the day to make sitting outdoors bearable. The grass in the big meadow looked yellow, sallow from the drought. Even the insects seemed to have given up the ghost, in the heat. A small biplane heading for Redhill Aerodrome phut-phutted across the cloudless blue sky, which was just beginning to take on the slightly darker evening hue. It was what he and Marjorie had wanted, their little dream home, right on the very edge of the big city.

He could hear Auntie Hilda pottering about, the kitchen door opening and closing, the clatter of the kitchen wastebin being emptied. Then the door shut again.

The Police had called to collect his computer that morning. They hadn’t announced it; well, they wouldn’t would they, give him a chance to erase anything incriminating. Not that there was anything, as far as he knew. Though you never did know, these days, the way a Google search you’d done on your computer popped up on your phone. But ever since they’d found the pikey in the field, he’d been scrupulously careful, keeping anything that might be of interest for the library. But what about before then? A few visits to gun websites, to be sure. An above-average interest in Northern Ireland – only natural for someone who’d served there, perhaps. The Police hadn’t returned the envelope to him. So maybe they’d found the one with the guns. But then, if they had, wouldn’t they have charged him with something by now? Illegal gun possession would have been plenty for them to be going on with, while they carried on investigating possible connections with the dead guy and his Northern Ireland activities. But maybe they were biding their time, hoping he’d show his hand. Then again, perhaps they were slow and inefficient…

Continued in Chapter 23: The Bungalow-23 | ABCtales