6. Transport of Delight

Ostrava, Moravia – staying in a castle !!! Guests of the Countess Kateřina von Ehrmantraut. Dear K, we were such close friends at finishing school. D helping some chaps making steel??!! Where does he get it from? A huge hug, Mumsy.

(3g6t2dgp St.Petersburg)

The sun was not yet up but there was a glow on the horizon as the last of the stars were going out and the dark blueness of the sky gradually lightened. Dunstable Downes stood on the platform at Asbury-Dukes waiting for the 6:14 to Paddington; surveying the rooftops and trees silhouetted against the horizon; and relishing the prospect of breakfast on board. A treat he allowed himself if ever he caught the early train into town.

Bacon, egg, sausage, black pudding, beans and mushrooms – he’d never really got fried tomato but he ate it out of a sense of duty – black coffee, toast and marmalade. He always felt like he needed a shower when he had finished but it was a feeling worth putting up with for the remainder of the journey.

Here he was among the journalists, lawyers, high court judges, senior civil servants and junior ministers –sensing he did not fit with these Cotswold commuters shuffling their feet and clicking their heels to keep the circulation going in the chilly morning  air.

The breakfast usually absorbed his interest until Reading beyond which there was little joy to be gained from peering out of the windows – other than the sweep across Brunel’s beautiful bridge over the Thames at Maidenhead. He would bury his face in a book for the rest of the journey through the suburbs.

He had secured an appointment with an official at the Ministry of Transport – one Baldock - to discuss the Duchess of Membury’s request and to see if they could bring any pressure to bear on the Parks to release her unused piece of land.

At Paddington DD bobbed along on the tide of travellers as the mainline station drained into the underground. He paddled his way across the current and was sucked into the Bakerloo line. He loved the warm brown and cream glazed tiles which felt staid and reassuring like toad in the hole or the skin on a well done rice pudding. He disembarked at Embankment enjoying a short stroll along the river side before turning up into Whitehall to find the MOT building.

Not one of the great ministries of state, the MOT was housed in an imposing but non-descript building. The foyer was dull and brown, like the Bakerloo line with all the flavour washed out of it. DD gave his name at reception and was instructed to make his way to the waiting area on the second floor. Mr Baldock’s secretary would call him when Mr Baldock was ready to see him.

DD climbed the stairs and found the waiting area, a broadening  out of a corridor that seemed to run the length of the building with, what he assumed, were offices on either side. There was no natural light other than the little which seeped through the yellowing frosted glass panels in the office partitions. The dull pallor of the walls which appeared to be sweating and the grey thermoplastic tiled floor was slightly illuminated by a row of lamps with metal shades that were suspended every 15 feet or so along the length of the corridor.

DD joined a sorry group of fellow travellers in the waiting area.

No one came. No one came. No one came and no one came. And then, rather aptly, 4 secretaries appeared simultaneously from various points along the corridor. They came and invited the passengers to their respective rendezvous. DD was ushered into a square office where a brown and cream cadaverous man, Baldock, sat motionless behind a wide grey metal desk. The desk was covered with piles of manila folders which were all dusty and dog eared and bulging and bursting with papers. Each pile was weighted down under some random object – a rock, a staple gun, a model aeroplane, an ice axe, a cigar box, a pistol (which DD assumed was a lighter); a particularly high pile with a curling stone. All of this was shrouded in a pall of smoke emanating from the briar pipe protruding from Baldock’s lips. As his eyes grew used to the fog DD could see Baldock was breathing – or at least his chest was rising and falling like bellows in rhythm with the emissions of smoke from the side of his mouth.

A longer and much wider desk ran the length of the wall to DD’s right and was covered in charts and maps and tea cups. There was a nest of shallow map drawers beneath it. On the wall above it was a faded print of an oil painting of the Tay Bridge, the first one. On the wall opposite was one of those pictures of a steam trains school boys get on birthday cards from ancient aunts.

DD felt at a disadvantage. Baldock was silhouetted against the window. With that and the smoke it was hard to see his face let alone read his expression. However, his tone and attitude soon became quite apparent. He spoke to DD as an irate headteacher to a naughty boy on a field trip. The Duchess of Membury’s problem was none of his concern, he didn’t know why DD had been granted a meeting, some people might be impressed by a title but he wasn’t, he really had better things to do with his time and he was very sorry that Mr Downes had had a wasted trip.

Any hope DD had held of charming some assistance or insights from this uncivil servant quickly dissipated. Baldock was charmless and charm resistant as he stuck to his script like glue. The MOT had been the original requisitioning authority. During the war responsibility for this land along with many similarly requisitioned hereditaments considered of strategic significance had been transferred to the Department for Internal Communications Systems (DICS) for their special purposes. Regulations proscribed any interference from the MOT though they may be called upon for technical assistance in certain circumstances. 

DD asked if Mr Baldock had a contact at DICS to whom he could write. Baldock guffawed. DICS was a quasi military department with no public facing arm – all boffins and spooks over there – and quite right too, they were responsible for the country’s infrastructure which was strategically critical for defence as well as economic purposes. They didn’t have time to entertain schoolboys so he needn’t bother trying to get an audience with them or their agents and contractors, whatever these Parks people were. He leant forward and with a condescending smile cracking his face said that the Duchess could be sure if the DICS were holding on to the land it was because they had good reason. The original requisitioning order gave them the appropriate vires to hold the land as long as was deemed necessary to the nation’s security. He and the Duchess should not be worrying them or their own pretty little heads about it.

As he said this he flipped shut the folder in front of him with a flourish, as if to say that’s that and this interview is over. DD, sharp eyed as ever and practised in the auditor’s art of reading things upside down from the opposite side of a desk, remarked the words “Camino Real” in manuscript on the cover of the folder.  Curious. Quick as a flash he asked “And what can you tell me about Camino Real?”

Baldock’s smug composure was momentarily shattered. But he made an excellent recovery pretending to notice the legend himself as if for the first time and, brushing his hand across the front of the folder as if swatting away a fly, he said “oh these folders, they’re all recycled you know. Probably some old, defunct project.” 

DD was unconvinced. It was too much of a coincidence. Why was the name of the variety strawberries the Duke had grown on the very land in question written on that folder? And why had Baldock been discomposed by the mention of it? DD was still ruminating on this many hours later as he walked into the hall at Cahuenga feeling despondent and dejected when he spotted the latest postcard from his mother lying on the table.