"What's Nayler got to do with Charlie Ratcliffe's gold, Matthew?"
"Why—everything, dear man. The blighter's going to do a programme of some sort on it. A sort of on-the-spot re-enactment, complete with young Charlie dressed up as his revolting ancestor. ... So if you go crawling cap in hand to the great man himself he'll surely help you."
"I should very much doubt it. We never got on with each other."
"Got on? Dear man, he hated your guts —you were the ghastly rugger-playing hearty who nearly pipped him for the senior scholarship. And that's precisely why he'll help you, if you abase yourself suitably. Where's your psychology?"
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Matthew Fattorini clucked to himself. "No, he won't be your problem. . . . It's young Charlie you want to watch out for."
"Indeed?" If Matthew was fishing, this was one time he'd find nothing on the hook.
"Indeed and indeed." Fattorini gave a grunt. "Oh, yes—I know what you're thinking: you play with the big rough boys, and he's just a juvenile revolutionary. But I mean it all the same, David."
"You know him?"
"Never met him in my life. But I know he's a man with a lot of gold."
"Gold—meaning power?"
"Not just power. Gold changes people, believe me."
"You should know, Matthew."
"I do." Fattorini's voice was serious. "But my gold is all on paper. Ratcliffe's is the real thing, and it's all his. And what's even more to the point is he's handled it —a lot of it. They say you're never the same after that, it turns little pussycats into tigers. Remember Bogart in 'Sierra Madre'? Don't you forget that, David...."
Audley picked up the remains of his money and walked back to collect the beer and the pie, his reward for being right about Matthew Fattorini's usefulness.
He sat on the grass, swigged the beer, munched the pie and dummy5
thought about how much Matthew must dislike the anonymous source of Charlie's present credit. That in itself was interesting.
But Nayler was something different. All he could remember was a spotty face, uncombed hair and a long, lanky body.
Plus, of course, the voice which had driven Matthew and himself from the breakfast table all those years ago. But if he'd got that senior scholarship he could hardly be stupid, anyway.
He swallowed the last fragment of pie, washing it down with the last draught of beer, and sighed deeply. It had been a bonus that Matthew had known as much as he did, confirming the Brigadier's information about the fund-raising. And Matthew had even produced the right reaction at his interest in the subject. But in the meantime, here and now and in the sacred name of duty, he was going to have to undertake some cap-in-hand crawling.
He retraced his steps unwillingly to the phone box, piled up his coins again, and obtained Nayler's college number from directory inquiries.
There was always hope that the man was out. Or even that he wasn't up at all, since term had nowhere near started, and every self-respecting don would be away from college until it did. Or even that he was happily and fruitfully married, and was taking his wife and his seven ugly and precocious daughters to Bournemouth for a prolonged summer holiday.
Then he could honourably get someone else to do this job.
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But he knew even before the Porter's Lodge answered that it wouldn't be so. All the laws of chance decreed that anything anyone didn't want to happen as much as that had to happen, no matter what the mathematical odds against.
"What name shall I give, sir?" inquired the Porter politely.
"Audley. David Audley." Audley closed his eyes. "We were ...
up ... together many years ago, you might remind him."
And there wasn't the slightest possibility that Nayler wouldn't help him. Plus not the smallest fraction of that slightest possibility that he wouldn't settle a few old scores in doing so.
"Hullo?" The voice set Audley's teeth on edge. "Hullo there?"
"Professor Nayler?" Audley opened his eyes to glare at the dying elms. "This is David Audley. Do you remember me?"
"But of course! How are you, my dear fellow? Flourishing, I hope."
The machine asked for more money.
"Well enough." Audley swallowed.
"Jolly good." The words were qualified with an audible sniff.
"What is it that you're doing now—teaching is it?" Nayler managed to make teaching sound like sewing mailbags.
"No." That was all he could manage. But he had to do better than that, for the Minister's sake if not for his own.
"No? But you did publish a little book not so long ago, didn't you? I seem to recall seeing it mentioned somewhere."
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The scale of the insult had a steadying effect. It was on a par with reading The Times aloud at breakfast.
"Yes. But I work for the Treasury now." That was safe. But more to the point, it was also sufficiently impressive.
"The Treasury?" Nayler sounded disappointed. "Jolly good. ... So what can I do for you, then?"
"We're working on the Standingham Castle gold hoard—you may have read about it in the press?"
"The Standingham Castle hoard?" Nayler was elaborately casual. If Matthew was right he must have all the facts to hand by now, but he wasn't going to admit prior knowledge of the question.
Audley felt better now, even a little ashamed that he had ever let his temper rise; in such circumstances as these flattery did not belittle the flatterer, only the flattered.
"We're looking for an expert to confirm some of the historical facts. Naturally, your name was the first one to come up, Professor."
Nayler bowed to him over the phone. "What is it you want to know?"
"Just the broad details. Did the Spaniards really lose a major shipment of gold at that time?"
"Yes, they did. There's a newsletter from the Fuggers'
Antwerp agent reporting it overdue."
"All that gold in one ship?"
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"Yes . . . well, that was due to a series of unfortunate accidents. The treasure fleet put into Havana en route from the mainland ports—Nombre de Dios and Porto Bello and so on. But two of them had been damaged in a storm, and they transhipped their gold into the Concepcion and the San Salvador. And then, during the second storm in the Atlantic, when the fleet was scattered, the San Salvador sprang a bad leak and they transhipped again when the weather moderated. So the Concepcion was carrying a quite exceptional cargo when the third storm broke."
"And then they were scattered again?"
"That's correct. But the San Salvador made port and the Concepcion didn't— that was how the first news of the loss reached Europe."
"I see. Whereas in fact old man Parrott scooped it up for himself?"
"That was the legend in North Devon, certainly. It was never substantiated, of course."
"You mean, they took a treasure ship with a ton of gold—and nobody blabbed?"
"Ah—no, Audley. It wasn't quite like that. The story was that Edward Parrott landed the gold secretly at Shipload Bay, because England was at peace with Spain and what he'd done was the blackest piracy and couldn't possibly be publicly admitted. And then he stood out to sea again and made for Bideford—the Elizabeth of Bideford was his ship. But then dummy5
the storm caught him—"
"Another storm?"
"They called that year 'the Year of Storms', Audley. The fourth one that summer took six ships between Padstow and Hartland Point—including the Elizabeth of Bideford on the rocks of Morwenstow. Only three of her crew made the shore and lived."
"Including Edward Parrott, I take it?"
"Including Edward Parrott. And none of them talked."
"Then how did the legend start?"
"I said three got ashore and lived. There was a fourth who came ashore farther down the coast, a very young boy. The local story was that he babbled of a great treasure of Spanish gold before he died."