Dead Man's Bluff Read online

  Dead Man’s Bluff

  Roderic Jeffries

  © Roderic Jeffries 1970

  Roderic Jeffries has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1970 by Collins Clear Type Press.

  This edition published in 2015 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 1

  It was a warm, sunny July, good enough to restore an Englishman’s faith in the existence of summer. Daniel Knott walked up the pitted farm drive to the complex of brick-built, tile-roofed farm buildings which had once been the last word in modernization, but which in fifty years had become almost unworkable. He entered the dairy and propped open the lid of the bulk tank. Even before he read the dipstick, he knew the quantity of milk was down because it reached less than half-way up the central paddle. The dipstick gave a reading of one hundred and fourteen and he checked this reading on the wall chart. One hundred and seventy-six gallons. There should have been at least two hundred and fifty.

  ‘Bloody old fool,’ he said angrily.

  He went through from the dairy into the herringbone parlour and stared with dislike at the two days’ accumulation of slurry. When he’d inherited the farm and decided to become a farmer, he’d never considered he might have to deal with the muck himself: he’d never consciously connected muck with farming. He stared angrily at the control panel of the slurry disposal unit: that little lot had cost him over a thousand pounds and he could still remember how enthusiastic the farm manager had been about it until it was installed. It had never worked properly because too much straw became mixed up with the slurry. The manufacturers had told him that they could cure the problem for another two thousand pounds. He’d sacked the farm manager. Probably the man had had a rake-off from the manufacturers: most of the men who’d worked for him had proved to be crooked.

  He looked at his watch and saw the time was eleven o’clock so the slurry would have to wait. If the cows didn’t like it, that was their bad luck: when they gave as much milk as they ought to, he’d start to bother about their conditions. In any case, why hadn’t the fool Browland cleared up? Browland ought to be sacked, but with him gone there’d be no one to milk the cows. Knott was quite certain he wasn’t going to muck around doing that.

  He left the buildings and walked back down the drive. Across the road, the cows were grazing the fourth paddock. Two of the paddocks should have been fertilized a couple of days back. He’d get around to them some time.

  He went round the house to the back door and as the three dogs barked a greeting, he shouted at them to shut up. They quietened and flopped down on the concrete run with the listlessness of dogs who were never let out of their run.

  The kitchen, an addition to the house which had originally been two cottages, had a flat roof which was always leaking. Months ago, Phyllis had asked him to get the builders to repair it. He went in to find she was trying to rake the Aga into life. She stood up and sweat rolled down her face. ‘This won’t work again,’ she said, with angry resentment. ‘The flue’s all blocked up. I asked you to clear it.’

  ‘And I told you I was too busy.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  He shrugged his shoulders and went from the kitchen into the smaller of the two sitting-rooms and through that to the hall and the steep stairs, which he climbed to his bedroom. He and Phyllis had slept in different rooms for a couple of years now. For some time after that arrangement had started he’d gone to her room at nights when his physical needs became great, but for all the pleasure she’d ever offered him he might as well have stayed in his own bed. He took off his overalls and carefully dropped them on to the floor. She would hate to find such untidiness.

  He changed into a lightweight check suit. It was ironic to remember, he thought with angry bitterness, that when he’d first met her he’d found her coolness attractive. He’d been taken for a sucker: contrary to popular mythology, her coolness wasn’t hiding anything other than large chunks of ice.

  The dogs in the kennels began to bark once more. He leaned out of the open window and shouted at them to shut up. They looked up at him, then sank back on to the concrete that so badly needed washing down. They’d made a right Charlie out of him when he’d last been invited out shooting. The other guns were ignorant and didn’t know a German Shorthaired Pointer from a Dalmatian: he’d told the guns how useless their fat old Labradors were when compared to his GSPs, which were faster, more obedient, had keener noses, and softer mouths. At the first stand a hare had come through ahead of the beaters. His three dogs had taken off after it. The hare doubled back through the line and the dogs followed, scattering the pheasants in all directions and ruining that drive. Eventually by a fluke, and in full sight of the head keeper, they’d cornered the hare, killed it, and eaten it. When he’d caught the dogs he’d thrashed them as hard as he could. One of the other guns, a pompous fool of a colonel, had told him to stop or he’d be reported to the RSPCA.

  He crossed the room and looked in the mirror. Hazel was quite right, he didn’t really look a day over thirty-five. Perhaps his hair was a little thin on top, but that meant nothing. When he was with Hazel, he didn’t feel a day over twenty-five. By God, she knew why she was a woman! If Phyllis was an iceberg, Hazel was a volcano. It wasn’t, he thought complacently, every man who could capture the love and affection of a woman almost half his age. Even to think of her was to excite his mind and trigger off memories.

  He went down the stairs, carefully holding on to the rope rail because of their steepness. As the two cottages had once been for farm workers, safety demands or those of convenience had been ignored.

  Phyllis was now washing up, as she so often was. Cleanliness and tidiness had become fetishes with her.

  She turned and saw he had changed into a suit. Her mouth twisted into sullen lines. ‘Are you going out again?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I thought the vet was coming?’

  ‘He is. The cow’s in the collecting yard.’

  ‘What happens if he wants help?’

  ‘You’re here.’

  Her face suddenly crumpled and the sullen hate became pathetic defencelessness. ‘Daniel … can’t we do something?’

  ‘About what?’

  She flapped her hands. ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘I wouldn’t ask if I did.’

  She washed a cup, so slowly and carefully it might have been a piece of Spode rather than chipped Woolworth. ‘You’re going to see that woman,’ she said dully.

  ‘I’m not going to see any woman.’

  ‘Who is she?’ Her voice rose. ‘Why are you going out with her?’

  ‘I’m not going out with any woman.’

  ‘Is it the same one you were with at the restaurant?’

  ‘How many times do I have to tell you that she … ’

  ‘She’s only a girl, Daniel, she’s only a girl.’

  ‘She’s the daughter of an old friend. But if she were what you keep saying she is, she’d at least have some red blood in her veins, not ice-cold water.’

  ‘I can’t help it if I … if I … ’

  ‘If you’re a bloody sight colder than charity
.’ He was irrationally annoyed by the tears that began to well out of her eyes and he hurried outside, slamming the door shut behind himself. He went out of the garden and along to the tumbledown wooden garage. Inside was his Bentley.

  Bought second-hand, five years ago, the body was now rusting in places and the oil consumption was high enough to show that something was pretty worn out in the engine, but it remained a Bentley and a man in a Bentley was a man of importance.

  He backed the car out, turned, and drove down to the road. A small Austin went by and he recognized Mrs Mellish. Her father had been a war profiteer, yet she always referred to him as Knott the parvenu. It was a pity he’d never told the old bitch that there’d been Knotts at Knott Hall long before the days when her ancestors had swung from the gallows at Tyburn.

  *

  Phyllis Knott looked round the kitchen and reluctantly decided there was nothing left to clean or tidy. She went upstairs and into Daniel’s room and found the filthy overalls which had been dumped on the floor. She knew they’d been left there deliberately, yet she still allowed them to infuriate her. Why didn’t she take Elizabeth’s advice and leave Daniel to go and live with Elizabeth?

  She sat down on the edge of the bed. More and more she was drawn to the tragedy of looking back in time and remembering what things had been like when Daniel proposed to her. Life had been so wonderful. The Knotts were a county family, going back to the year dot and for her to marry one was, as her mother had said, a real feather in her cap. Some bedraggled feather! Not even a raving lunatic would call the home they lived in now one of England’s historic country houses or describe her life as one of elegance and ease.

  She stood up and crossed to the mirror over the dressing-table. She looked at her reflection. In a mood of bitter honesty, she saw a woman who was ageing fast, who had lost the attractiveness that had been hers when young, whose mouth suggested only discontent, bitterness, and a pathetic yearning for the unobtainable.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a hearty knock on the kitchen door. She went downstairs. It was the vet, a man whom she thoroughly disliked because of his unfailing familiarity.

  ‘Morning, Mrs Knott,’ he said, ‘how’s tricks with you this lovely day?’

  ‘The cow’s in the collecting yard,’ she answered coldly.

  ‘Okeydokey. Is someone round to give me a hand?’

  ‘My husband had to leave a short time ago on business so there’s no one.’

  ‘Then if there’s no one available, I’ll just have to try to do things on my own, won’t I?’

  He looked at the Aga in a way that suggested he would be open to an offer to drink a cup of coffee. She ignored him. He was so ignorant that he never dreamed of knocking on the front door, but he always came round to the back one — the first time he’d called, he’d caught her in curlers.

  ‘How’s the farm making out?’ he asked, ignoring her cold hostility.

  ‘Very well,’ she lied.

  ‘Churning out the milk, what? Except it all goes into the bulk tank.’ He laughed immoderately.

  ‘I must get on with my work.’

  ‘I’ve just come from old Ampton’s place — I suppose you’ve heard he’s putting up another hundred and fifty kow kennels — expanding to five hundred cows. There’s a go-ahead bloke for you and no mistake, but just think of the capital that that calls for!’ He pursed his lips in a silent whistle.

  She was convinced he was only telling her this in order to belittle the smallness of Knott Farm.

  ‘Still,’ he said, with brash loudness, ‘he’s a clever old boy — knows his farming from A to Z.’ He ran a hand through his tight curly black hair. ‘Right, Mrs Knott. I’ll have a stab at the sick cow — with a hypodermic needle.’ He left.

  She went from the kitchen into the small sitting-room, then through that into the larger sitting-room. When she saw how tattered and stained the carpet was, she felt like weeping. When they’d first come to the farm, Daniel had been all optimism. ‘I know it’s not a palace, but we’ll soon knock it into shape. Those two sitting-rooms can be turned into one and we’ll have a cocktail-bar — just a small one — over there … ’ Nothing had ever been done.

  She sat down on the settee and lit a cigarette. They’d been at the farm for five years. For the first year, Daniel had oozed confidence. Farming was just like any other business and all the old hayseeds of local farmers, who spent their lives leaning on five-barred gates, were so stupid and bound by tradition that they couldn’t hope to succeed in the modern age. On the other hand, a man who had vision, was clever, and possessed keen business acumen, must succeed. Some of Daniel’s confidence, but none of his brash boasting, had disappeared during the second year. Now, by the fifth year, he was for ever blaming those same hayseeds of farmers for ruining him — without ever enumerating how they could be doing this.

  He must have gone to see that tart of a girl again. Phyllis suffered both bitter anger and intense pain. How could he so lower himself and forget his heritage as to chase a slut half his age? How many of their acquaintances knew what he was doing?

  *

  Tom Browland cycled up the farm drive to the buildings and propped the bike against the outside wall of the dairy.

  The cows were still out in the paddock, not in their lie-back field where they should be. He was not surprised. If Knott was anything of a farmer, he was a genius — and he knew himself to be generally considered simple.

  He walked back down the farm drive with his feet, as always, splayed out. The village lads often imitated his walk, but that never worried him.

  The Ayrshire cows were reluctant to leave the paddock, but he had an endless patience that was not even upset when the large old white cow for the third time turned back and circled round behind him. He just plodded back to the end of the paddock and swore at the cow and she, as if worn down by his bovine patience, finally did what he wanted.

  He took them up the drive and penned them in the collecting yard, then went into the dairy, checked the bulk tank plug was home, and started up the vacuum pump. He loved all this machinery, which had cost more money than he could ever really comprehend. He gained a great sense of importance from being in charge of it.

  The bulk tank entry pipe needed a new filter and he fitted one. Then he left the dairy and went through to the parlour and down into the pit. He filled a bucket with warm water from the tap in the pit, opened the left-hand door and five cows came through into their standings, rumps towards him. He washed down their udders with warm water and disinfectant. He climbed out of the pit to feed them with crushed barley. On his return to the pit, he attached the five clusters. The milk began to spurt into the glass jars that were at head height. The rhythmic clicking of the pulsator, working off the vacuum line, gave him a conscious feeling of well-being.

  Chapter 2

  August was a month of much sunshine and some of the local weather pundits began to prophesy a really hard winter — presumably on the grounds that bad must follow good. Tom Browland was unworried by past or future: his only concern was the present. He lived in a four-roomed cottage at the Cregiton end of the road which passed Knott Farm. There was only cold water in the kitchen and sanitation was at its most primitive — an outside privy — yet he was perfectly content. The tenants of the council houses in Cregiton had hot running water and indoor flush lavatories, but their rent was almost three pounds a week whilst his was just over eight shillings.

  He was a happy man. He was married, he had a kitchen garden in which he grew vegetables that invariably won prizes at the village flower shows, and beyond his garden and the rough field was Parson’s Wood in which were quite a few pheasants.

  Meg Browland was small and sharp and no one managed to pull the wool over her eyes. She hadn’t, however, always been so sharp. When she was seventeen, one of the village lads had whispered so many sweet words to her that she’d offered up her virginity in a hay field with the greatest of pleasure. The pleasure continued for four months, at
which time she became pregnant. On hearing the news, the father-to-be swore he’d never desert her. He then hurriedly left the village to go to work in London. She had a miscarriage. The other girls in the village — who somehow managed to escape pregnancy — scorned her and the boys reckoned she was fair game. One day she’d been almost raped in Parson’s Wood and only Tom Browland’s sudden appearance, on a poaching expedition, had saved her. A fortnight later, Browland offered her his largest cauliflower and a month after that he mumbled a proposal of marriage. She accepted him. She was sick and tired of being chased and although Browland was in many ways simple, she could be certain he would give her his unstinted love and affection.

  On the twenty-first, eleven years but for a day after their marriage, Meg, who was clearing up the luncheon crockery, said: ‘We ain’t much to eat for tomorrow, Tom. D’you recollect it’s our anniversary tomorrow?’

  He grinned, his round face becoming creased.

  ‘Can you find us something, Tom? It ain’t right to sit down to nothing special on our anniversary.’

  He fiddled with his large and bulbous nose, as he so often did when moved by some emotion.

  ‘Fancy, eleven years!’ She crossed the small kitchen and picked up her knitting — she was an expert knitter and sold her work to a shop in Gertfinden — and sat down on a chair by the table. ‘Things’ave changed a lot, Tom,’aven’t they?’ She didn’t wait for an answer. He was not a great talker and she had long since fallen into the habit of chatting on and on. ‘Did you’ear that Mary, from number four down the road,’as been took to’ospital? Collapsed, all of a sudden. I wonder what’ll become of her kids if she goes — Alf won’t look after’em, that’s for sure.’

  He rubbed his nose again, looked through the window, and checked on the time. ‘Ten past,’ he said. He grinned slyly. ‘I’ve time for a walk afore I goes back to milk.’

  After leaving the house, he checked on the cabbage plants in the kitchen garden, then opened the small wooden gate and went into the field. This was part of Knott Farm, but being an outlying field it was totally neglected and the weed grasses, nettles, and thistles were so rampant that the dairy cows put out on it found little to graze. At the edge of the field, and separating it from Parson’s Wood, was a dried-up stream and he scrambled across this and under the barbed-wire fence. He repositioned the low-lying branch of an ash-tree so that there should be no mark of his passage — no keeper was employed on the estate now, but old habits died hard.