The
historical German town of Celle is
situated on the River Aller, on the
southern edge of the Lüneburger Heath,
40 km north of Hanover. Local
facilities include shopping, bars and
restaurants, sports clubs and centres,
concert venues, cinemas and a theatre. The
old town, or Aldstadt, is a picturesque
and popular tourist centre with gardens,
churches, museums and other places of
interest. Festivals and markets
are held in the town throughout the year
and are an excellent way of experiencing
the local culture at first hand.
Les
WHO KILLED BABY
GEORGE? 
Margaret
Les Hooper gave his wife a brief peck on
the cheek. She was about to speak when he
stopped her with a quick, ‘I know . .
.’ He smiled. ‘. . . it’s Gerald’s
birthday.’ Gerald, their youngest son
was a year old. Margaret intended to buy a
small cake and a bottle of wine so they
could celebrate, even if the baby knew
nothing about it. He clambered into his
Ford Consul. ‘I’ll try to be home
early,’ he called as he noisily engaged
first gear. Damn silly steering column
gear levers.
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‘What’s on for today?’ Henry Colmann
stood in front of the desk, his hands
thrust deep in his pockets. He was young,
smooth-faced and an eager smile hovered on
his lips. He could’ve been a sixth
former asking a schoolmaster what’s next
on the curriculum. He had the appearance
of a student. But he wasn’t a schoolboy.
He was a 24-year-old British army officer.
He wore a grey pin-striped Saville Row
suit, blue silk shirt, red tie and black
polished Oxford brogues. His trousers were
immaculately pressed. He could've been a
dummy in Harrod's shop window.
Les lifted his dark head, a slight
frown on his long face. He scratched his
pointed nose even though it wasn’t
itching. He wore a crumpled brown suit
with a shiny seat from Burton’s, white
shirt with a soft collar and a patterned
blue tie with a small Windsor knot. He
never dressed to impress. He was more
comfortable in the stock room than the
window. He bent over and retrieved a
scuffed leather briefcase from the floor.
He laid it on the desk and tapped it with
a forefinger. ‘It’s all in here . .
.’ He lifted a china mug bearing a faded
picture of King George VI. ‘. . .but
first we finish our tea.’
The lieutenant was playing games, taking
over the role of leader. He knew full well
they had a dead baby to look into . . .
or, to be precise, the reason why the baby
was dead. They'd already discussed it
before Colmann was called into Captain
Lambert's end office for a secret meeting.
Or had it been a pep talk?
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Colmann had been inducted into the Special
Investigation Branch, completed a basic
course and sent out into the field, posted
to Celle, West Germany, as the country
still was in the 'sixties before the
Berlin Wall came down.
Captain Lambert, the egregious
commanding officer, had asked Les to
nursemaid the new recruit and when he made
requests you jumped to obey on pain of
execution. Cancer had destroyed his
stomach. He existed on soup and bread and
milk. The strongest drink he could manage
was a sip of gin and bitters. ‘You happy
with that?’ he said with a smile like a
striking cobra. No wonder he had less
friends than Attila the Hun.
Les smiled back to prove he was
happy. The
captain, it must be said, was clever
fellow and an exceptional detective. Les
knew this because the captain had told him
a thousand times.
‘Shouldn’t we get on with
it?’ Colmann asked, back in the shared
office. That was the trouble with
youngsters. Eager to show their prowess
like foals first time out of the stable.
They prance but can’t gallop. Experience
wasn’t bestowed automatically when two
pips were pinned on your shoulder. Not
long before he’d been at Cambridge
drinking lager in the Fort St George pub
alongside the River Cam and chasing girls
with his undergraduate chums. He was too
young to establish true ambition, although
such a drawback didn’t prevent him from
picturing himself as a brilliant leader.
‘I suppose we ought to,’ Les
said, for although reluctant to hold
Colmann's hand, he knew fighting the
system was like trying to bottle common
sense . He did rebel sometimes, and where
did hostility get him . . . ? One thing he
stubbornly refused to do was call the
junior officer sir.
He stood up and shrugged into his
overcoat before tucking the battered
briefcase under his arm. The stitching
round the handle was coming loose. He must
get it fixed. ‘Come on then . . .
forward into battle.’ The words sounded
silly. Errol Flynn said something like it
in The Charge of the Light Brigade.
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They levered themselves into a
green Volkswagen and Les started the
engine and it fired first time. A miracle
in itself. The misshapen little cars
objected to mid-winter temperatures. They
would prefer to be rich and shove off to
the French Riviera at the first sign of
frost. They turned left out of Himmelsburg
barracks and left again, down the hill to
the junction with the main B3 road to
Soltau, a small garrison town nearly 30
miles to the north. They passed gaunt
barrack blocks occupied by Gordon
Highlanders. A kilted piper stood frozen
at the gate, with knees like boiled
lobsters. His red face looked like a
puffer fish and the tune he was grinding
out was drowned by the rattling car
engine. The only Scottish tune Les knew
was “On the Bonny, Bonny Banks,” which
he’d been forced to learn at school by a
fiery music teacher from Edinburgh.
He drove with a velvet touch. It
was cold, Arctic cold. Heavy frost painted
shiny patches on the road surface and
beetles were adept at avoiding the path
the steering wheel requested. The harsh
January sun reflected sharply from the
surface, bouncing blinding rays onto the
windscreen. Les screwed up his eyes.
Colmann shifted uncomfortably in
his narrow seat. A VW lacked somewhat the
luxury of daddy’s Bentley. He said,
hesitantly, ‘I hope you won’t bend too
many rules today.’
Les momentarily took his eyes off
the road to glance at his passenger. A
wide smile creased his face. ‘You’re
thinking about yesterday. Case solved,
wasn’t it?’ He didn’t wait for an
answer. ‘You don’t see much with your
nose in the book.’ He shivered.
‘I’ll be glad when the engine warms
up.’
‘I don’t know how you get away
with it.’
Les nodded sagely, refusing to be
needled. ‘I don't get
away with anything. I simply do my
job.’
‘You push your luck.’ He spoke
as if Les’s comments fell on deaf ears.
Les felt like a don at Trinity,
which Colmann kept reminding him was the
oldest college in Cambridge, established
by Henry VIII in 1546. ‘You can’t
always stick rigidly to rules. God! . . .
there are thousands of ‘em. When
investigating, jump in, sort it out and
look up the law afterwards.’ He waggled
his head as if to imply the accuracy of
his statement. ‘They don’t teach that
on courses.’
‘I think I follow you,’ Colmann
murmured.
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He guessed the lieutenant didn’t
follow him at all. ‘Do you? Remember,
when you find a thief, nick him, sling him
in a cell and then look for the
evidence.’ He spread it on like a
brickie trowelling mortar.
‘I’ll have to think about
that.’
The young man obviously intended
doing a lot of thinking. He seemed
shell-shocked at Les’s revelations, like
a man who’s discovered his wife is
sharing her favours. He would soon need to
decide whether to be an acolyte or follow
an independent path. ‘Don’t suffer a
migraine,’ Les said.
The VW’s narrow tyres hissed over
the icy surface. Tall elms lining the
roadside were festooned with frost and
looking like Christmas trees. Colmann
plucked at the knees of his trousers and
announced. ‘I had bockwurst the other
day. When I bit it, water poured out.’
‘Must’ve had a puncture when it
was boiled,’ Les said curtly. He had no
inclination to discuss the quality of
German sausage.
A flock of rooks like flying undertakers
wheeled and swooped over Belsen, site of
the Nazi concentration camp where 50,000
Jewish prisoners, including Anne Frank,
died from disease, starvation and
brutality in World War II. Adolf Eichman,
the Nazi architect of the murder of
millions of Jews, had recently been
sentenced to death by an Israeli court in
Jerusalem. They said no birds now flew
over the mass graves. Another myth
shattered.
Myths! . . . Captain Lambert wore
RAF wings and he told Les he flew over
Dunkirk in May 1940 during the evacuation
of the British army from France. His
Hawker Hurricane fighter ran out of
ammunition and suddenly a German
Messerschmitt 109 fighter appeared
alongside him. He said his final prayers
before he realised the German was also out
of ammunition. The pilot saluted him and
he saluted back. Fifteen years later he
went to a RAF reunion dinner in Hamburg
and found himself drinking schnapps with
that same German pilot. Did he really
expect Les to swallow that hoary old yarn?
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They drove through Hohne, base of a
British armoured regiment now, a Nazi SS
barracks for Belsen staff during World War
II. Ugly barracks with pink walls
surrounded a large grey square where crews
and mechanics swarmed over a line of
tracked steel monsters like aardvarks on
ant hills. The low winter sunshine cast
blocks of illumination between the
buildings and created pools of deep
shadow.
The previous day a report came in
from the regiment to say a trooper had a
wallet containing 500 marks lifted.
Captain Lambert sent Les and the
lieutenant to investigate. ‘Be good
experience,’ he said in his usual tone
which threatened fifty lashes of the
cat-o-nine-tails if ignored. It wasn’t
quite as easy as falling off a log. There
were twelve men in the barrack room where
the money vanished. Narrowing down the
list - some were working, some away
training - left three with opportunity.
‘We’ll search them,’ said
Les.
Colmann fingered his tie as if drawing
Les’s attention to the pre-eminence of
silk. ‘The deutchmarks will be gone.’
‘Delve into the mind of a petty thief.
He’ll keep the money all right but think
twice about destroying someone else’s
property. The wallet will still be in his
kit . . .’ Pause. ‘. . . or stuffed in
a lavatory cistern . . .’ Les shrugged.
‘. . . and we’ll find it.’ He
permitted himself a modest smile.
‘Don’t you need permission to
search personal belongings?’
Les thought if he was going to
spend his time answering questions he
might apply to appear on the BBC’s
Brains Trust. He concealed mild irritation
behind a bland smile. ‘I’ve got
permission . . . gave it to myself. No
soldier is going to object because he
believes if he does resistance will make
him suspect. We’re certainly not going
to ask him nicely if we may search his
stuff . . .’ His smile blossomed. ‘. .
. he might say no.’
‘It’s risky.’
Les filled his lungs with air and
slowly released it. ‘If your conscience
bothers you, wait in the car. Then if it
goes haywire you can bury your head in the
sand and honestly say you weren’t
involved.’
Colmann said quickly, ‘Okay!
I’m not worried.’ When someone insists
they’re not worried, it usually means
they are.
The wallet surfaced in the kitbag
of the first soldier searched. Colmann’s
relief was clearly etched on his face and
Les, amused at his reaction, said bluntly,
‘Please don’t preach “the means
doesn’t justify the end” crap at
me.’ The lieutenant wisely didn’t.
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Traffic was fairly light and
despite the conditions they were making
good time. A little farther on, after a
period of silence, Colmann said, trying to
make his words sound casual, ‘I didn’t
hear you caution him that he didn’t have
to say anything.’ The devil on his
shoulder wasn’t giving him an easy ride.
Instead of the sharp retort on his
tongue, Les said, ‘You couldn’t have
been paying close attention.’
‘Does the captain approve of your
methods?’
Les spoke firmly, like a tolerant
parent explaining why a child shouldn’t
pick its nose. ‘The captain knows
nothing about my methods,
as you call it. The major hasn’t a clue
about my methods. The colonel’s
completely ignorant of my methods. And I
can assure you without fear of
contradiction, the Queen, herself, is
blind to them.’ Les paused briefly to
let his words sink in. ‘What’s more,
none of them care about my methods . . .
provided nothing dodgy is exposed which it
might blight their careers . . . Her
Majesty excluded, of course.’ A
suspicion niggling at the back of his mind
lurched into the open. ‘Did the captain
order you to report back on me?’
‘Of course not.’ He answered
much too quickly. Les turned in his seat
to look at him. The guilt on his face read
like a Daily Mirror banner headline.
‘It's comforting to hear that . .
. but I don't care,’ he said,
suppressing his mirth. Moses, a stray
moggy Sergeant Jim Cutler found
half-drowned near the river and adopted by
the Section, wielded more influence than a
rookie lieutenant. But Les wasn't being
honest. He did care what Colmann might
say. He knew the most innocuous comment
was liable to be exaggerated, repeated and
twisted often enough to become a dagger in
the back. He cared all right. He relegated
the thought to the back of his mind; it
was easy to get paranoid over trifles.
Les could feel the other man’s
eyes on him as he digested his words. A
green and white German police Opel
machine, martin horn blaring like a
demented banshee, raced past, risking life
and limb on the glacier of a road.
Colmann suddenly switched his angle
of attack like a general who realises the
enemy has sneaked round behind him. ‘I
suppose you drink on duty, too.’
Les’s lips curled. ‘Yes, I
drink, smoke and . . . well, never mind.
Back in Trieste I carried a signed piece
of paper allowing me to drink on duty . .
. and drink whilst driving.’
There was a long pause.
‘Blimey,’ was all Henry could say
before deciding that line of questioning
wasn’t going to win any prizes. He
switched to, 'How did you wangle that?'
'Wangle? . . . You know how to hurt
a man.' Les wondered how much he should
tell him. Hell, it didn't matter really.
It was all a long time ago. Too long.
Nostalgia washed over him as memory took
him back. 'I used to booze with heavies of
MI6.' (See
www.leshooper.co.uk/italy2)
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'MI6!' The awe in Colmann's
voice was genuine. 'Gosh! . . . Did you?'
Les's reputation had suddenly risen like a
thermometer in the tropics. He was like a
small boy with his nose pressed against a
sweet shop window. 'What were they up to?'
Les thought about milking the
situation, seeing how impressed his
companion was. It was the sort of mocking
behaviour which appealed to him. But he
vetoed the idea as soon as it was born. It
would be too easy to assume importance he
didn't have. He said, 'The trickiest job
at the time was trying to ascertain which
make of marmalade Marshal Tito spread on
his morning toast¾Robertson's
or Deurr's.' He tried to compose a serious
expression. 'Our balance of payments was
in a muddle and the British government
wanted Yugoslavia to buy our marmalade to
increase exports.'
'Very funny . . . I don't think,'
he snapped. ‘What about this baby?’
Les’s sardonic remarks apparently flew
over his head like a footballer’s rising
shot at goal.
Les explained, ‘When I succeed, I
get a pat on the head, just like a clever
poodle that sits up and begs. Sometimes I
have to lie down and play dead. You’ll
quickly discover, in the SIB, you stand
and fall by your own deeds. The Lone
Ranger had Tonto. We don’t have Tontos.’
When Colmann remained silent he said,
‘The baby?’
‘I mean, how do we go about it.
It’s a cot death.’
‘Also, what works in one case
doesn’t necessarily work in another. The
cleverer the villain, the more subtle the
approach. One breaks down under threats,
another confesses when flattered.’ Les
knew by the intake of breath that Colmann
found it difficult to accept this precept.
Les wondered whether the young recruit
would remain steadfast or snap like a
sapling in a gale.
‘This cot death . . .?’
The conversation was leaping about
like a ball bearing in a pinball machine.
Les punched the tilt button. ‘Is it?
Just because a mother finds her baby dead
it doesn’t mean the baby just up and
died. That’s where we come in.’ He
shook his head. ‘You know that, of
course.’
‘I meant, how are we going to
play it?’
‘We’re going to question the
parents unless you have a brighter
idea.’
The Lieutenant glossed over the
sarcasm. ‘What about the post mortem?’
‘That's Rodney Thorpe’s
pigeon,’ Les told him. ‘As I explained
earlier, Rod’s the cameraman so he’ll
photograph the body and collect the result
for us. Meanwhile, we’ll delve into the
mystery, Doctor Watson.’ He smiled at
his own weak humour and was rewarded with
a returned grin. Perhaps the barriers were
crumbling.
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As they rounded a bend the accident scene
spread out before them. A coach had run
off the road and was stuck on its side in
a gully like a ditched whale. A black
Mercedes with a smashed bonnet was slewed
across the road. The police car which
passed them earlier was halted broadside
on and barring movement while ambulance
crews wrapped victims in blankets. A
police van and two ambulances were parked
on the other side of the scene. They must
have arrived from Soltau. Several cops
were strolling around like they do,
shouting down walkie-talkies, waving arms
and acting in that pseudo efficient manner
which German officials think makes them
hotshots. The line of stationary cars
lengthened.
‘All we can do is wait,’ Les
said. ‘Obvious, really.’
‘I hate delays,’ Colmann added.
He reached for the door handle. ‘I’ll
demand they allow us through.’
Les grabbed the sleeve of his
expensive jacket. ‘Don’t waste your
breath.’
Henry Colmann snatched his arm away
as if Les had defaced the Turin Shroud.
One cop, hatless, stared at them. He had
cropped hair and a flabby chin. Under his
unbuttoned leather coat his belly
protruded over his pistol belt like a
cliff overhang. Les killed any temptation
to suggest the copper was an ideal
protagonist for a debate on drowned
bockwursts. He said, 'It won't affect us.
The baby's in the morgue at the British
Military Hospital, Hannover, and the
parents at home. However much we drag our
feet, nothing can change the outcome.' He
blew silently between his lips before
asking, 'What did Lambert have to say in
your little private tete-a-tete?'
Colmann’s jaw sagged in surprise.
‘Do you really want to know?’ He
sounded pained, as if someone had applied
thumbscrews to drag out details of his
love life. He took out a packet of
cigarettes, extracted one and offered
them. Les stuck a cigarette in his mouth.
Colmann produced a shiny gold Ronson
lighter, flicked it into life and lit both
cigarettes. The VW filled with blue smoke.
‘Nope . . . just curious.’
'He said if I accompanied you,
I’d learn a lot.’
‘Did he mention exactly what
you’d learn?’
Colmann screwed up his aquiline
nose. ‘He said the experience would work
wonders.’
‘Like the Double Diamond beer
advert!’
‘You’re a cynic. He said you
have the makings of a good chess player.
He said he thrashes your arse most
times.’
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One of Captain Lambert’s less
ghoulish pastimes was playing chess and he
firmly believed he could’ve been a Grand
Master. When he discovered Les could play
the game he often called him into his
office at the end of the corridor to
battle while they drank morning coffee.
Les couldn’t resist sneering.
‘Did he tell you I let him win to keep
him sweet?’
Colmann said, ‘No,’ before
Les’s words sunk in. Then he laughed.
‘It’s not the sort of thing he’d
admit.’
‘The lads don’t know the
sacrifices I make on their behalf.’
The cops heaved the battered
Mercedes closer to the side of the road.
They shifted their vehicles back to leave
enough space for single line traffic. Les
manoeuvred the beetle through the gap and
accelerated away from the scene as fast as
the slippery road permitted. He wound down
a window to let fumes out. ‘Smoking in
these silly little cars makes me feel like
a kipper,’ he said.
‘You don’t have much time for
your commanding officer,’ Colmann said.
Les weighed up the comment. Did
Colmann care? ‘I’m not forced to like
him.’ He blew out smoke. ‘I have some
provenance.’
‘You mean I lick his backside
while you shuffle pieces of ivory around
on a chequered board?’ Colmann sounded
aggrieved. The barrier between them
hadn’t completely collapsed.
Les sniffed. He could sympathise
with the lieutenant's observation. He
said, 'I've got a captain who thinks he's
Dick Tracy, and a warrant officer -
Douglas Hateley - who acts like Coco the
clown.' He hesitated. 'I'm supposed to
take orders from those bloody idiots but I
don't have to creep up their arses.'
'Idiots?' Colmann sounded appalled.
‘A bit strong for the captain,
maybe . .
. but I won’t compromise on that
clod Coco.’
Colmann released one of his
sniggers. ‘That came straight from the
heart.’
Les tossed his cigarette end out of
the car. ‘You’re still bottle-fed.’
‘And you’re an antique.’
Les smiled kindly. ‘You know what
I mean.’ His mouth looked like a broken
zip. ‘By the way, d’you know what’s
said about Hateley . . .?’ He continued
immediately. ‘. . . He’s got a direct
line to the Almighty . . . every time
someone asks how he managed the rank of
warrant officer, the answer’s always,
“God knows!”’
Lieutenant Colmann didn’t curl up
with laughter. He’d probably heard the
joke a million times. He hitched at the
legs of his smart trousers yet again. His
knees were up round his chin in the
cramped car. He said, ‘Do you have a
theory about cot deaths?’
‘They don’t do much for the
babies.’
‘I’m interested.’
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Les gathered his thoughts. ‘Enquiries
into them seldom end up to my satisfaction
. . . but there, who am I?’ He ushered
the words in his mind. ‘One baby was
fourteen months, could just about haul
himself to his feet. His mother left him
sleeping in his cot. When she later
returned the baby - she said - was slumped
with the neck of his pyjama jacket caught
on the cot rail . . . dead.’ His
companion drew on his cigarette in
silence. ‘He was taken to the local
German hospital at Hildesheim and when I
got there he had a deep red weal round his
little neck. Obviously strangled with some
kind of ligament.’
‘How did it happen?’ The
lieutenant spoke in a whisper as if he was
in the presence of the dead baby.
‘The cot was one of those where
the sliding side is fixed to metal rods.
You know the tops of the rods have
retaining buttons which stick up above the
rail. The poor kid’s collar was caught
on a metal button.’
‘How awful!’
‘Perhaps his legs were either too
weak or he wasn’t old enough to know he
could’ve saved himself by standing on
his feet.’
There was a long silence. They were
entering the outskirts of Soltau and
traffic thickened. 7th Armoured
Brigade, descendents of the famous Desert
Rats in World War II, was stationed in the
town. Les needed to concentrate more on
his driving. Icy surfaces melted from tyre
friction and slushy water kept splashing
against the windscreen. Fur-clad
pedestrians kept clear of the kerb to
avoid muddy spray. A
large party of British squaddies emerged
from the railway station, laden with packs
and kitbags. They looked lost and their
eyes darted everywhere in the way
newcomers exhibit curiosity in foreign
countries. The station was also the
terminus for British military trains which
started at the Hook of Holland. They
trudged over to a waiting line of blue
civilian buses which would convey them to
their various destinations in Lower
Saxony.
‘The mother killed her own
baby?’
Les switched on the screen washer.
It was pretty useless and left brown
half-moon streaks on the glass. He
squeezed his eyes to peer through the
muck.
‘A baby shouldn’t die like
that. But I don't know what really
happened. I wasn't allowed to question the
mother properly. The whole nasty business
was written off as a cot death . . .’
Les paused and filled his lungs. '. .
.which it wasn't, except the baby died in
a cot, presumably.'
‘Not very satisfactory.’
‘Can’t blame the SIB,’ Les
told him. ‘Not our fault. These weighty
decisions rest on the aching shoulders of
army brass and legal eagles after
discussions over cocktails. They have the
final say as to whether anyone's charged
with a crime. We have to lump it.’
‘You didn’t protest.’ It
wasn’t a question.
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Les cursed and wrenched the steering wheel
to avoid a Humber armoured scout car
bearing the jerboa Desert Rat emblem,
which slid across the centre of the road.
He managed to remain on an even keel and a
few minutes later braked gingerly to turn
into an estate of gloomy army married
quarters which even the sharp sunlight
couldn't improve. The houses were terraced
with cream walls, green window frames and
steep slate roofs. He pulled up outside
No. 34 and they both alighted and
stretched stiff legs. The lieutenant tried
to brush wrinkles out of his suit. A forty
minute journey had taken over an hour. Les
knocked on the green-painted door which,
like the wall, was streaked with mud where
kids had thrown snowballs after last
week's blizzard. The rooms of the house
were painted white and green, like German
police cars. When it came to colours the
British army never consulted Dulux.
‘I'm only a sergeant. Would you
try to fight anonymous paper shufflers in
army headquarters who shelter behind their
titles like Whitehall mandarins?’ Les
didn’t wait for an answer. ‘You’d be
on the tip before the rubbish cart’s
engine cooled.’ He gave a bleak smile.
Two hours later they were easing
themselves back into the VW like a pair of
sardines. ‘What d’you think?’ Les
asked.
Colmann pursed his lips as if
he was about to kiss his grandmother.
‘We have to go along with her . . .
don’t we?’
Les admired the adroit way in which
the ball was volleyed back into his court.
‘We’ll call on the medical officer who
attended and find out what he’s got to
say. We’re guided by medical people and
hope they know what they’re talking
about.’
Colmann lit another cigarette with
his flashy lighter. ‘I smoke too much
and, as I said, you’re a cynic.’
‘Maybe righteous, God-fearing
Irma Freeman got bored with George and
decided to shut him up for ever and say he
died naturally.’
‘We don’t know how he died.’
'Right
now she’s feels secure because she
thinks she’s led us up the garden path
with her incredible story. In my view it's
akin to devil worship . . . and as
dangerous.’
‘She’s no murderer.’ Colmann
drew smoke deep into his lungs. Les
thought if police forces adopted Colmann's
attitude prisons would become museums;
there would be no convictions to fill
them.
‘Killers don’t take out adverts
in the local Tagezeitung.’
Colmann stroked the tip of his large
hooter to assure himself it was still
there. ‘How can we prove it?’
‘We’ll get the cot linen
forensically examined. We’ll speak to
neighbours. Discover her relationship with
her husband. And interrogate her properly,
not the mamby-pamby treatment we handed
out.’ Les blew through his lips. His
eyes began to water from cigarette smoke.
‘We daren't press her now . . . but
softly, softly, catchee monkey.’
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Irma Freeman, wife of Corporal Freeman,
Queen’s Own Dragoon Guards, was a
Lutheran from a remote village near
Bremenhaven in Northern Germany. They had
been married six years. Her lounge was as
warm as a tropical flower greenhouse. She
was a heavy-breasted woman with braided
hair wound round her head like coils of
rope. She wore a long, voluminous skirt
that could be used for a boy scout’s
bivouac, a high-necked blouse with lace
facings and heavy leather shoes with thick
soles. She had a wide mouth and her top
teeth were on permanent display, giving
her a vague sort of Japanese appearance.
Her story was one of mother love and old
wives’ tales¾a
deadly combination, as it turned out to
be.
Around six o’clock the previous
evening – her husband was on duty –
she put her only child, five-month-old
George, to bed in his cot in his own room
on the ground floor of the home. The
weather outside was bitterly cold and she
ensured the baby was well wrapped and warm
before leaving him settled and asleep.
She looked in on him now and again
but there was a long gap between visits
from seven to eight, mainly because she
dozed off in the heated lounge. Just after
eight when she next went in the baby’s
room he seemed uncannily still. She
explained all this in a flat, unemotional
voice and dry-eyed. In many cases of
tragedy the unthinkable takes time to
become reality. When she picked her baby
up he was limp in her arms and no sign of
breathing. To her horror she knew
he was dead. Died without cause or reason.
What should she do next? Fetching a doctor
was an obvious course but first she must
make sure innocent little George was given
a proper farewell as he winged his way to
paradise. She did not want him to suffer
in afterlife.
Accordingly, she pulled the cot
bedding up over the baby’s face. She
remembered bodies are always covered.
She’d seen enough movies to know that.
Next she flung the windows open as wide as
possible. Remember, it was one of the
coldest nights on record; frost dropping
like snow. Over thirty degrees below zero.
Irma went out of the room, closed the door
and fell to her knees, beseeching God to
take her baby’s soul to heaven. She left
the windows open so the angels could get
in and out easily. Eventually she called a
doctor.
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Captain Horace Newell of the Royal Army
Medical Corps was young, blond with the
scrubbed clean look sported by operation
theatre orderlies who look as if they’ve
polished their bodies with Brasso. ‘When
I got there the baby had gone,’ he
explained as if speaking to a parish
priest.
‘How long?’
'How long what?'
'Dead,' Les said patiently.
The MO looked at him as if he
needed psychiatric help. ‘I estimated
two or three hours or more. The body was
stone cold, you know.’
‘That doesn’t quite fit in with
the mother’s timing.' Les scratched his
nose. 'The baby could've been alive
shortly before you arrived.’
‘I can’t vouch for her,’ he
said huffily. ‘I’m the doctor. I
pronounced the baby dead.’
‘I’m only trying to get things
straight in my mind,’ Les placated him.
‘What was the cause of death?’
‘Haven’t the foggiest. No marks
on the body. Clean as a whistle. You’ll
have to wait for the autopsy.’
Les nodded disappointment. ‘Looks
like it.’
‘What did you expect me to
say?’
Les kept quiet and hoped he’d
never go to Horace Newell for treatment. .
. .
‘. . . We didn’t get things
straight,’ Colmann repeated back in the
car. ‘. . . and the MO got stroppy.’
‘He’s only just out of medical
school. Laymen shouldn’t question his
judgment.’
ª
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The sky remained deep blue and cloudless.
The weather pattern began far to the east
on the Russian steppes, a sure sign of
another freezing night to come. Moscow
never arranged anything for the comfort of
the West. The accident scene hadn’t yet
been cleared. The Mercedes had vanished
but the coach remained in the ditch
waiting for heavy lifting gear to arrive.
The injured had been whisked away. Traffic
cops still milled around trying to appear
busy but doing nothing, although the fat
one with the shaven head who enjoyed food
was gone. His absence must have jogged
Colmann’s stomach pangs.
‘Ich
habe Hunger. My tummy thinks my
throat’s cut,’ he said.
Les’s insides were rumbling like
a pregnant earthquake, too. He said,
‘You’re learning the lingo then.
There’s a small caff just along here. We
can get a bag of fritten
with a dollop of mayonnaise.’
‘Chips!’ Colmann uttered the
word as if Les should be burnt at the
stake for treason. Obviously chips don’t
go with a Saville Row Huddersfield worsted
suit and silk tie whose combined cost
would feed a starving African city for a
week.
Les realised his error. He
should've have said French fries.
‘It’s what we peasants enjoy,’ he
said sarcastically. ‘Sorry it’s not
the Savoy.’
Colmann sniggered, like he would if
he sat on a whoopee cushion. ‘If it’s
good enough for the proletariat it’s
good enough for me.’ Did Les detect
humour rising from the abyss?
Les parked on frozen gravel behind a
German army staff car. The cafe was not
much more than a wooden shack furnished
with a few battered tables and rickety
chairs. But it was cheap and cheerful and,
as were most German food establishments,
spotless as a Boots pharmacy counter. Two
junior officers – Bundeswehr
Unteroffiziers
- were halfway through bowls of
soup - Grunkohlsuppe - at one of the
tables, otherwise the place was empty.
They decided not to risk the chairs and
remained standing. The presence of other
officers probably raised the tone of the
place for Colmann.
ª
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Man Mountain behind the scarred counter
had graying hair, black eyebrows like
large furry caterpillars and a wicked
smile that looked permanent. As he dished
up their order in conical paper bags he
sang softly off-tune.
* "Die Fahne hoch Die Reihen
fest geschlossen,
S.A. marschiert Mit ruhig festern
Schritt . . ."
The German officers smiled. 'He's
singing the Horst Wessel,' Colmann
exclaimed in a rising voice as if the
words or the flat tune offended him. (Note:
The background song is the Horst Wessel)
Les nodded. 'Take it easy. Wolfgang
always does when Brits come in. He was a
Feldwebel - sergeant 
- in the Waffen-SS, “Das Reich”
division, and enjoys trying to badger us.
He can sing “Deutchland
Uber Alles”
as far as I’m concerned, provided his
chips are fresh.'
Earlier,
Colmann told him he had dined at the
historic Ratskeller in Celle's Old Town
the previous evening, and how his
companions - friends of a German
acquaintance at Cambridge - were so jolly
hospitable. Les thought his amiable hosts
probably included at least one former Nazi
official, SS officer, Gestapo agent or
even a concentration camp guard. Yet he
got hot under the collar because one
harmless old soldier badly rendered a once
popular army song. Prejudice is based on
flimsy values.
Les blew on a chip and scooped up
mayonnaise. Wolfgang's ample waistline
sported a wide leather belt and clipped on
it was small badge bearing a swastika.
Displaying swastika emblems could invite a
prison sentence but it obviously didn't
cause the tough Wehrmacht veteran any lack
of sleep. There are plenty of closetted
Hitler sympathisers free in the world.
As they stood chewing, Les saw the
café owner flinch as aircraft roared low
overhead. Through the window he saw they
were West German Air Force F104
Starfighters. Wolfgang once told him of
the fighting in Normandy in 1944, when his
tank, a Panzer Mk. IV, was destroyed by a
rocket-firing Hawker Typhoon near Caen. He
survived with a small shrapnel wound in
his back. The zooming Starfighters aroused
painful memories.
Closer scrutiny suggested the
"badge" was a small button of
the kind once found on German military
caps. It was probably an innocent
souvenir. By the expression of horror on
Colmann's face he had also noticed the
swastika. But he said nothing; it was only
a small swastika and he harboured no
desire to rummage around in the cesspit of
neo Nazism. Or even old Nazism for that
matter. On that point they were in silent
mutual agreement.
ª
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The hot chips were followed by an equally
hot cup of dark coffee -Colmann paid -
before they squeezed back into the VW.
Colmann lit another cigarette. Les
declined. Smoke was stinging his eyes and
his throat a Sahara wadi. He wished
Wolfgang sold beer. Although drinking on
duty would've made Colmann wet his silken
knickers. Rooks continued to circle high
above the Belsen memorial. Perhaps they
were disturbed by the spirits of the dead,
like Irma Freeman. Or were the jet black
birds themselves the spirits?
‘Those chips were quite tasty,’
said Colmann, which confirms how craving
can overcome the most ingrained beliefs.
Les said, 'I half expected you to
leap over the counter and thump old
Wolfgang when you saw his swastika badge.'
Colmann looked as if he was about
to kiss his granny again. 'An aunty was
gassed in Auschwitz,' he replied in a firm
voice which told Les he didn't want to
discuss it further.
I'm sorry,' Les said.
'She was a very distant aunt. I
never even knew her . . .' Colmann added,
'. . . and, yes, I have some Jewish
blood.' He must have felt he needed to
explain.
Les slammed the gear lever into
first and accelerated slowly away. He
shivered. The car had soon got cold while
they ate. 'For one moment back there I
thought you were moonlighting for Simon
Wiesenthal.'
'Simon who?'
'You know . . . Simon Wiesenthal,
the Nazi-hunter who's in Vienna.'
'Oh yes, of course I do.’ He
sucked in his breath. ‘It would suit you
better.' He looked at Les carefully.
'You've got the ruthlessness required for
that line of work.'
Les grunted in disbelief. 'Me?
Ruthless? Where did that silly idea spring
from?'
'Remember, I saw you at work
yesterday. I even began to feel sorry for
that squaddie who stole the wallet.'
Colmann took a long drag on his cigarette,
looked at it and decided a couple of
lungfuls remained. 'You don't accept even
the idea of failure. You barge through all
obstacles . . . man, law and regulation,
to achieve a result.'
'Come off it.' Les said,
remaining very calm, ‘Flattery won’t
win you a coconut. And bear in mind that
corny old truism . . . you can't make an
omelet without breaking eggs.'
'I know what I've seen,' said
Colmann. 'You try to give an impression of
an easy-going, harmless country yokel, a
little dense and slow on the uptake.' He
took a last puff at his fag and flicked it
through the window. 'But it's all part of
your battle plan. People open their hearts
to you because they feel sorry for someone
so obviously ill at ease.' He hesitated.
'You called Lambert "Dick Tracy"
. . . you're “Yogi Bear!”'
Les pressed harder on the pedal.
'You've lost me. I don't understand. Let's
get back and sort out baby George . . .
Boo-boo.'
Colmann's chewed his lips, his
shoulders rose and fell. 'You've just
proved my point.'
ª
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On their return Derek Creasey, the Section
lunatic but remarkably sane for once, told
Les that Captain Lambert wanted to see him
as soon as he got in. Les hurried along
the corridor, quickly skipping past
Hateley’s office. The regimental
sergeant major was liable to drag him in
and ask moronic questions. He lived on
Mars and never listened to others. And he
was afflicted with perfect twenty-twenty
hindsight. He’s the buffoon who told Les
in all seriousness that Hildesheim was
just a five-minute drive away because it
was only an inch on the map.
Rod Thorpe buttonholed Les first, a
serious expression on his square face. His
hair was cropped crew-cut style, which was
strange when Les recalled he first met him
as an Educational Corps sergeant in Japan.
Teachers are supposed to look like
hippies, aren’t they?
‘Bad news¾and
there’s no good news.’
‘Go on,’ Les said.
‘The Freeman baby suffocated.’
There’s a whole string of
meanings behind such a simple statement,
none of which was lost on Les. ‘You’re
obviously certain.’
‘Unmistakable blemishes on the
chest . . . and the pathologist is
unequivocal¾the
baby suffocated.’
‘Any pressure marks like someone
holding something over the head?’
‘Nope. Suffocation.’
Les jerked a thumb towards the end door.
'What sort of mood is he in?'
'Foul.'
'Normal then,' Les said.
ª
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As he entered the office, Frau Geisler,
Lambert’s remarkably tall, blond Dutch
secretary swayed her way out, carrying
notebook and pencil, awarding Les a warm
smile. Her legs were rather slender and
they added to her imperial poise. Her
well-filled white cotton blouse bounced
with eye-catching splendour and the
odds-on betting amongst the lads was she
never wore a bra. A rumour circulated she
had dumped her German husband and was on
the prowl. Les always tried to dodge
her; he knew what happens to mates of
black widow spiders.
In the captain’s presence, Les
sensed the same foreboding - of unknown
troubles - as he experienced every time.
He didn't know why. After all, the captain
was a wretched, sick man, clinging to
false hopes, buoyed only by a belief in
his own infallibility . . . behind a desk
if not in health. Les stood. He was only
permitted to sit down when playing chess.
Even then it was a tremendous privilege.
Captain Lambert was leaning back in
an ornate leather chair behind his desk.
No one knew where he scrounged the chair;
the army didn't run to such classy
furniture for mere captains. It had
probably passed through many hands since
being liberated from some German schloss
at the end of the war. He wore a light
blue suit and handmade shirt with a blue
and red striped tie, knotted untidily. Had
he worn a suit from Bond Street's most
expensive outfitters he would've still
looked like a scarecrow. His stooped,
narrow shoulders were a poor hanger for
quality. He appeared more shattered than
usual. He was having a bad day or Brigitte
Geisler was becoming a handful. He advised
Les to, 'Relax.' Not because he genuinely
wanted Les to be comfortable, he said it
because he believed it sounded as if he
cared for his men. For his part, if Les
relaxed any more he'd be curled up
alongside Moses in the window.
Les strained to hear Lambert’s
next words. The trouble was the
captain’s voice sometimes sounded
muffled, as if he was speaking while
wearing a gasmask. Les had come to
associate it with stress. As expected, the
welfare mode didn't survive very long.
Lambert demanded, ‘How did you get on
with the new lieutenant today?’ Les
stiffened. The bloody devious swine.
He’d set him and Colmann to spy on each
other. He would have made a perfect SS
Hauptman - captain. One day somebody was
going to slip strychnine into his coffee
pot. Les decided he would let him win
every chess match in future. He would tire
of easy victories and end the tournaments,
then Les wouldn’t be drinking poisoned
coffee on the fatal day.
ª
ª
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Moses arched his back and engaged in a
wash and brush-up. He stopped and yawned,
showing off his fierce white teeth. The
captain spent most of his nine-to-five
days hibernating in his office like a sick
bear, drinking thin Nescafe, chain smoking
and vomiting out of a window on a patch of
rough grass at the rear of the building .
. . and day-dreaming of being world chess
champion to take his mind off his meeting
with his Maker, which he sensed was
rushing towards him like an express train.
And Moses passed his days watching and
licking his sleek black fur.
Les dragged his imagination back to
the present. He had no intention of
arguing Colmann’s peccadilloes. He
reached out and stroked Moses, who halted
his ablutions and purred his pleasure.
‘He’s bright. Should do well,’ he
said. ‘. . . The lieutenant, I mean.’
Mimicking a school report wouldn’t
tickle Lambert’s morbid sense of humour.
But he didn’t seem to notice the
fatuousness of it.
‘Good. He believes that bull
about there being a field marshal’s
baton in every soldier’s knapsack!’
Lambert rubbed his bony hands together
briskly. ‘Why don’t they turn up the
heating? . . . And . . .?’
He listened carefully to what Les
told him and his head wobbled as if he
wished the death hadn’t happened or he
was in Timbuktu. ‘You’re now going to
say the MO decided the baby was dead
because the body was so cold . . . ‘
‘No, sir, I’m going to tell you
the MO did check the baby was dead and I
believe him. What he didn’t do was test
the body temperature. If he’d taken an
internal reading he might’ve known the
baby died just before he got there. He
didn’t even consider the infant may have
froze to death, although he must've
noticed the room was like an igloo.’
The captain lit a fag from the end
of one he was smoking and puffed on it in
contemplation. He looked like one of the
living dead from an old Flash Gordon
serial. For a man so ill, smoking would
not boost his chances of survival but
perhaps he’d already accepted he might
as well enjoy it while he still breathed.
He said, ‘The mother killed her own
baby?’ His face screwed up like a
Halloween mask. Les couldn’t tell
whether he was scowling or his ravaged
intestines were giving him gyp.
He recovered quickly and mused over
his own conclusion for several long
minutes. His cigarette smouldered in his
fingers. He was in mental turmoil. Had the
mother confessed to murder he would have
been ringing his superiors to acclaim
success before he lit his next fag. Now
his tangled mind was full of self-doubt
and he was worried about screwing up and
becoming an underlined entry in
someone’s black book.
ª
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‘It’s messy, sir.’
‘It’s not cluedo, sergeant. Of
course it’s messy . . . bloody messy.'
His sunken eyes flicked across to the
chessmen lined up for conflict on the
coffee table. 'I have to decide the next
move.’
Les wondered if the officer thought
inquiring into a baby’s death equated to
a pathetic struggle against Boris Spassky,
world chess champion, in Moscow . . . or
even Les, himself. He almost reached a
frenzy with the captain’s dithering.
‘With all due respect, what the hell’s
the problem?’ he cried. ‘. . . She
killed her son for Christ’s sake! . .
.’ His voice tailed off. Weariness
suddenly overtook over him. Concentration
on the case, Colmann’s nagging and
Lambert’s negative attitude combined to
fuel his frustration.
Moses inspected his claws, whose
sharpness carried more weight than
listening to a worthless argument. The
captain’s grey face tightened to the
point it could’ve been a very old skull
fossil. Well, in 1856 Neanderthal man was
discovered in the Feldhofer Cave in
Germany. Les lifted sagging shoulders and
chuckled to himself. Lambert dropped his
burning cigarette in the desk ashtray.
Next to it was a square brown medicine
bottle containing tablets. He picked up
the bottle and shook it to satisfy himself
the contents hadn't disappeared. He
climbed wearily to his feet and walked to
the window. The need to make a decision
ate at him like a new cancer. He seemed to
be staring at the patch of yellow grass
where he regularly vomited. His skin lost
colour until it became transparent. 'I
know you,' he said, by which he meant he
didn't trust Les. 'I hope you didn't upset
Mrs Freeman.'
He had no clear idea what made Les
tick. He even believed he won their chess
matches due to superior skill. But you're
not supposed to say “Get stuffed” to
your seniors, so Les employed the
euphemism, 'Of course not.'
Lambert turned back from the
window, head bowed as if he were
inspecting his smooth black shoes. He kept
his head down and raised his eyes until he
was looking at Les through his eyebrows.
He thought the gesture was one of intense
speculation. 'You didn't give her a hard
time?
Les's mouth twisted. 'I've stopped beating
women. Some of them seem to like it too
much.'
'You can cut the cheek, Hooper.'
'I've already explained . . .' Les spoke
clearly enough to give a casual listener
the impression he was explaining a
difficult project to a foreign student.
His Hampshire accent was all but
unperceivable. '. . . all I did was listen
to her version of how the baby died.' His
legs were tired; he wanted to sit down.
‘When she was supposed to be praying for
his soul – or whatever – the poor kid
was still alive.’
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The captain straightened and
returned to his desk, sat down and fixed
his gaze on the bare surface as if trying
to decide which type of wood it was made
from. He lifted his head and smiled
coldly, ignoring Les’s words. 'I hope
that's true . . . for your sake.' He
picked up the brown bottle again and
peered myopically at it in the forlorn
hope it contained the answers he wanted
instead of stomach pills.
Les knew full well Lambert’s
thinking was always instinctively geared
towards his own interests. He took a
breath and said, trying to be
light-hearted, 'You're beginning to sound
like my wife when she's in an inquisitive
mood.' He lifted a hand to show it was a
joke. 'I didn't know the baby was
smothered then, did I? I've only just
learnt that from Sergeant Thorpe.'
Lambert gave him a long, hard stare
and shook his head violently as if Les was
past all help. Had he not been so thin,
his cheeks would have trembled. ‘One of
these days your tenacity will rebound on
you and my hands will be tied.’
Les almost choked as he tried to
stop himself from doubling up with
hilarity. Lambert help? . . . That would
be the day! It would be like despatching a
rowing boat to tow the Queen Elizabeth. He
said, ‘I’ll need to speak with her
again now we know the cause of death.’
Experience told him all along the
interview with Irma Freeman should have
waited until after the post mortem result,
but at the time “foul play”, as the
tabloids liked to call it, was not on the
agenda.
The captain’s bloodless lips quivered.
Perhaps it was an attempt at a confident
smile which was stillborn. He growled,
‘No, you won't' His thin chest heaved.
'What are we going to do?’ The question
was rhetorical.
Les was insistent ‘We can prove
the mother killed her baby okay. Whether
it was intentional or not . . . well, it
remains to be seen.’
‘I’ll think about it and let
you know in due course. I’m glad we
agree. Meanwhile, I want an interim
report.’
He had been wrong to label Lambert an
idiot. Lambert was no idiot; he was smart
enough to know how the land lies. Self
preservation makes cowards of us all, but
it can also stir the brain into fiendish
activity. Perhaps his tale of the German
pilot over Dunkirk was meant to be a joke.
Les’s brow furrowed as he tried to
recall what exactly he’d agreed to. He
gave up and turned away. Moses swished his
tail and watched Les leave with casual
indifference.
Les groaned. The British army
doesn't march on its stomach, it marches
on a premise that higher intellect comes
with higher rank. He left the captain
looking like he would be more at home in a
mausoleum than behind a precarious desk
from which he could be ousted quicker than
an agnostic drunk at a church fete if he
made the wrong move. His papyrus skin
would be at home in the Egyptology room of
the British museum.
ª
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Back in the main office, Les said with a
hopeless gesture of his hands, ‘You
see?’ without explaining what could be
seen.
‘Can I?’ Colmann asked.
‘Even when I stick closely to the
chosen path, I still get criticised.’
Colmann nodded. ‘My old
headmaster used to say only the
industrious can do wrong.’
‘In that case I should be
lilywhite,’ Les said. ‘The captain’s
worried.’
‘It’s not so serious, is it?’
Les inclined his head. ‘It’s
always serious where dependents are
involved.’ His eyes swept round the
office as if seeking inspiration.
‘Especially if you start accusing a
soldier’s wife of killing her child.’
‘That can be tricky, I
suppose.’
‘The captain’s looking at his
head on a spike outside Headquarters in
Rheindahlen.’ Les's mouth was straight
line. ‘Unless he can give them mine
instead.’
'What's he doing about it?' Colmann looked
at Les as if he felt the deepest sympathy.
'Right now he's waiting for the undertaker
. . . no, I lie . . . He'll be on the
phone speedier than the Bonny Boat got to
Skye, at the same time shovelling aspirin
down his gullet.
'Who's he ringing?'
'Not his wife to tell her he'd like a
large juicy steak for dinner.' Les eyes
danced with humour. 'Any senior officer
who's foolish enough to make a decision
for him.'
Colmann perched himself side-saddle
on the desk and said matter-of-factedly,
'No reward for discovering a mother killed
. . . I almost said murdered . . . her own
baby.'
Les leaned back in his chair. He
found a packet of Senior Service and
offered one to Colmann. The Ronson
appeared and they lit up. His desk was
clear except for an ashtray. He didn't
approve of file trays. Rubbish collectors.
His dictum was: do whatever has to be done
immediately and then you always have
nothing to do. Convoluted but he invented
the adage and he liked it. As far as he
was aware, Shakespeare hadn't said it
either, although no doubt one day some
smart arse would prove him wrong. He blew
smoke at the ceiling whose original white
was now stained a light brown colour. He
was beginning to think he’d misjudged
Henry Colmann. It wasn't his fault he was
born with a silver spoon in his mouth and
perhaps his vapid comments were only the
meanderings of youth.
‘Got it in one. Dodos will fly
again before you get praise'. He grinned
now and streamers of smoke drifted from
his mouth. He rocked forward and tapped
his cigarette in the ashtray as if making
a final gesture. He cupped his hands
together on the desk top and peered at
them. 'My crystal ball can't see a
knighthood for you.’
'I hope my career's not on the
line,' Colmann agonised. His name might
disappear from the Army List before the
ink was dry.
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ª
Les hid his scorn behind a veneer of calm.
Every time he warmed to Colmann the
officer put his foot in it. The British
army seemed to attract a large proportion
of self-centred officers. And Colmann
hadn't yet realised that if he wanted to
climb the steep and precarious promotion
ladder he'd be better off transferred out
of the military police. Redcaps had no
generals. But Les didn't intend to massage
Colmann's fears and said without rancour,
'You lay yourself wide open every time you
pick up a case file . . . as sure as God
made little apples.'
Colmann stood up and clasped his
hands behind his head. ‘You’re not
only cynical. You’re also bitter.’
Les coughed. Damn fags! 'And you
only get reward for effort in this world
if you've got blue eyes or you toss in a
sweetener.'
'God, you suck a lot of lemons!'
Les’s face split like a cracked
coconut. He climbed to his feet and
insubordinately slapped Colmann on the
shoulder as if greeting an old friend.
‘Never mind, Henry, I'll mention your
name to the Queen at the next Buckingham
palace garden party.'
Captain Lambert’s “due
course” as he sat on the fence ended up
a blank wall. Les's private fears and
predictions flew swiftly home to roost.
Baby George’s final moments were entered
in official records as another mysterious
cot death. The enquiry ground to an
ignominious halt. Again top brass decided
the mother’s actions were more pitiful
than criminal. Out of endless meetings
came the instruction that no purpose would
be served in causing more grief by
charging her with smothering little
helpless George, even though his death was
caused by her placing bed clothes over his
face.
Was it ignorance? . . . One person
knew the real truth.
ª
ª
ª
Downstairs an empty Deinhard Piesporter
bottle and cake debris with one candle
remained on the dining-room table. Les
slipped his arms round Margaret as they
stood by the cot. He kissed her. The
baby’s eyes were closed and the quilt
moved gently in time with his breathing.
‘We’re very lucky,’ she said
softly.
Les answered quietly, ‘I know.’
END
*
"Raise
high the flag, The ranks are closed and
tight,
Storm Troopers march, With firm and
steady step."
Note:
"More than a third of cases classed
as sudden infant death syndrome - SIDS or
cot death - could in fact be down to other
potentially more sinister causes of death,
researchers have said.
SIDS is given as the cause of death
when doctors can find no cause for a
baby's unexpected death but do not suspect
foul play. A study suggests doctors could
be able to determine whether such deaths
require more investigation by measuring
the amount of blood in the infant's lungs
more carefully. This way they can tell
whether the death was caused by accidental
or intentional smothering - which would
require an inquest - or
"genuine" SIDS, which would
not."
Extract
from findings in the Journal of Clinical
Pathology
