Man from the South ee-3 Read online

  Five minutes later we were there. The path ran right up to the wood itself and then went round the edge of it for about three hundred metres, with only a few bushes in between. Claud slipped through the bushes on his hands and knees and I followed.

  It was cool and dark inside the wood. No sunlight came in at all.

  'This is frightening,' I said.

  'Sh-h-h!'

  Claud was very nervous. He was walking just ahead of me. He kept his head moving all the time and his eyes were looking from side to side, searching for danger. I tried doing the same, but I soon began to imagine a keeper behind every tree, so I gave it up.

  Then a patch of sky appeared ahead of us in the roof of the forest, and I knew this must be the feeding grounds.

  We were now advancing quickly, running from tree to tree and stopping and waiting and listening and running on again, and then at last we knelt safely behind a big tree, right on the edge of the feeding grounds, and Claud smiled and pointed through the branches at the pheasants.

  The place was absolutely full of birds. There must have been two hundred of them at least.

  'Do you see what I mean?' Claud whispered.

  It was an amazing sight - a poacher's dream. And how close they were! Some of them were not more than ten steps from where we were kneeling. They were brown and so fat that their feathers almost brushed the ground as they walked. I glanced at Claud. His big cow-like face showed his pleasure. The mouth was slightly open, and there was a kind of dream-like look in his eyes as he stared at the pheasants.

  There was a long pause. The birds made a strange noise as they moved about among the dead leaves.

  'Ah-ha,' Claud said softly a minute later. 'Do you see the keeper?'

  'Where?'

  'Over on the other side, standing by that big tree. Look carefully.'

  'Good heavens!'

  'It's all right. He can't see us.'

  We knelt close to the ground, watching the keeper. He was a small man with a cap on his head and a gun under his arm. He never moved. He was like a little post standing there.

  'Let's go,' I whispered.

  The keeper's face was shadowed by his cap, but it seemed to me that he was looking directly at us.

  'I'm not staying here,' I said.

  'Sh-h-h!' Claud said.

  Slowly, never taking his eyes off the keeper, he reached into his pocket and brought out a single raisin. He placed it in his right hand and then quickly threw it high into the air. I watched it as it went over the bushes, and I saw it land within a metre of two birds standing together beside an old tree. Both birds turned their heads at the drop of the raisin. Then one of them jumped over and ate it quickly.

  I glanced up at the keeper. He hadn't moved.

  Claud threw a second raisin; then a third, and a fourth and a fifth. At this point I saw the keeper turn his head away to look at the woods behind him. Quickly, Claud pulled the paper bag out of his pocket. With a great movement of the arm he threw the whole handful high over the bushes. They fell softly like raindrops on dry leaves. Every pheasant in the place must have heard them fall. There was a noise of wings and a rush to find the raisins. The birds were eating all of them madly.

  'Follow me,' Claud whispered. 'And keep down.' He started moving away quickly on his hands and knees, under cover of the bushes.

  I went after him, and we went along like this for about a hundred metres.

  'Now run!' Claud said.

  We got to our feet and ran, and a few minutes later we came out through the bushes into the open safety of the path.

  'It went wonderfully,' Claud said, breathing heavily. 'Didn't it go absolutely wonderfully?' His big face was red. 'In another five minutes, it'll be completely dark inside the woods, and that keeper will be going off home to his supper.'

  'I think I'll go, too,' I said.

  'You're a great poacher,' Claud said. He sat down on the grass bank and lit a cigarette.

  The sun had set now and the sky was a pale blue, faintly coloured with yellow. In the wood behind us, the shadows and the spaces between the trees were turning from grey to black.

  'How long does a sleeping pill take to work?' Claud asked.

  'Look out!' I said. 'There's someone coming.'

  The man had appeared silently and suddenly out of the half-darkness, and he was only thirty metres away when I saw him.

  'Another keeper,' Claud said.

  We both looked at the keeper as he came down the road towards us. He had a gun under his arm, and there was a black dog walking at his feet. He stopped when he was a few steps away, and the dog stopped with him and stayed behind him, watching us through the keeper's legs.

  'Good evening,' Claud said in a nice friendly way.

  This one was a tall man of about forty with quick eyes and hard, dangerous hands.

  'I know you,' he said softly, coming closer. 'I know both of you.'

  Claud did not answer this.

  'You're from the petrol station, right?' His lips were thin and dry. 'You're Cubbage and Hawes and you're from the petrol station on the main road. Right? Get out.'

  Claud sat on the bank, smoking his cigarette and looking at the keeper's feet.

  'Go on,' the man said. 'Get out.'

  'This is a public road,' Claud said. 'Please go away.'

  The keeper moved the gun from his left arm to his right. 'You're waiting,' he said, 'to commit a criminal act. I could have you arrested for that.'

  'No, you couldn't,' Claud said.

  All this made me rather nervous.

  'I've been watching you for some time,' the keeper said, looking at Claud.

  'It's getting late,' I said. 'Shall we go on?'

  Claud threw away his cigarette and got slowly to his feet. 'All right,' he said. Let's go.'

  We wandered off down the road, the way we had come, leaving him standing there, and soon the man was out of sight in the half-darkness behind us.

  'That's the head keeper,' said Claud. 'His name is Rabbetts.'

  'Let's get out of here,' I said.

  'Come in here,' Claud said.

  There was a gate on our left leading into a field, and we climbed over it and sat down behind the bushes.

  'Mr Rabbetts is also due for his supper,' Claud said. 'You mustn't worry about him.'

  We sat quietly behind the bushes, waiting for the keeper to walk past us on his way home.

  'Here he is,' Claud whispered. 'Don't move.'

  The keeper came softly along the road with the dog walking beside him, and we watched them through the bushes as they went by.

  'He won't be coming back tonight,' Claud said.

  'How do you know that?'

  'A keeper never waits for you in a wood if he knows where you live. He goes to your house, hides and watches for you to come back.'

  'That's worse.'

  'No, it isn't. Not if you put what you've poached somewhere else before you go home. He can't do anything then.'

  'What about the other one - the one in the feeding grounds?'

  'He's gone, too.'

  'You can't be sure of that.'

  'I've been watching these men for months, Gordon. Honestly, I know all their habits. There's no danger.'

  A few minutes later, I followed Claud back into the wood. It was dark in there now, and very silent, and we moved cautiously forward.

  'Here's where we threw the raisins,' Claud said.

  I looked through the bushes. The area was illuminated by the moonlight.

  'You're quite sure the keeper's gone?'

  'I know he's gone.'

  I could just see Claud's face under his cap, the pale lips, and the large eyes with excitement dancing in each of them.

  'Are they asleep?' I asked.

  'Yes. In the branches.'

  'Where?'

  'All around. They don't go far.'

  'What do we do next?'

  'We stay here and wait. I brought you a light,' he added, and he handed me one of those small pocket