Buffet for Unwelcome Guests(120)

‘It was chance them two being there to witness it, Bill. You couldn’t judge what time they’d come out.’

‘I didn’t have to judge it,’ he said. ‘I arranged it.’

‘Now, come on, Bill!’

‘I’m the copper around here,’ he said, ‘aren’t I? I know what goes on. I know old Sam works night shifts—on duty ten o’clock. I know he calls in at The Pig on his way to work. I know what time he leaves to get to the job.’

‘You couldn’t know he’d have a stranger with him?’

‘I knew all right, don’t you worry. I arranged it.’

‘All right, old clever chops,’ she said with mock resignation. ‘You arranged for old Sam to come out of the pub just at the minute that Jellinks would reel out in front of your car, bringing a stranger with him for—what do they call it?’

‘Unbiased witness.’

‘You arranged it?’

‘This is my manor,’ he said again. ‘I know what goes on. I knew that Sam’s mate, Jamie, was off duty for a week—’

‘You arranged that too, I daresay?’

‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘Poor old Jamie—brought him in at last for poaching.’

‘Bill, you never!’

‘He had it coming to him. Lucky to get away with it for so long.’

‘Till you needed him.’

‘Till I didn’t need him on the night shift with Sam. They’d have to bring in a temporary. And like I say, I know. I knew he was being sent in from the other factory, I knew he was coming in by the eight forty, stopping outside The Pig. I knew Jim was meeting him there and having a pint with him before they went off to work. It was just a matter of waiting till the time coincided exactly, them following Jellinks out immediately. And that night it did, as I knew very soon it must. That wasn’t chance, Gran, that wasn’t luck. That was good judgment.’

‘Yes, good judgment.’ But wasn’t that for God, really? Was it for mere man to hand out judgment—to hold trial, to find guilty, to sentence, to execute? She said, following her own line of thought, ‘After all, Bill, this was not murder. He didn’t intend to kill them.’

‘He didn’t care whether he did or not,’ said Bill. ‘That was good enough for me.’

‘Well…’ she said doubtfully. ‘But you’re not God, are you, love? The Hand of God, they’re calling it.’ She mused over it. ‘The Hand of God. Mind you, I’ll say not another word about it, not even to you. But… wouldn’t some people say you should have left it, Bill? Just left it to Him, put your hand into the Hand of God?’

‘And so I did, my old dear,’ he said, leaning across to unwrap the warm rug from about her ancient legs and then lead her into the cottage. ‘So I did. But just to make certain, I gave it a bit of a tug.’