Robin's Way 08

Macduff was convinced that there was no point in monitoring the beaches.

"Olena will have told them she told you, Robin, they are not going to be stupid enough to bring the girls in now."

"I have more faith in her. You said that she had been tortured and that the medics said she had a weak heart and that was what caused her death. What if she held out? What on earth have you to lose?"

"Sorry, Robin, I can't justify the manpower and the expense given the low probability. We shall get another chance."

"No," I thought to myself, no we wouldn't. But there is no persuading a man in power when all you have to go on is what they would call "women's instinct."

I doubt that I would have slept well anyway, but after that exchange I felt that it would be a betrayal of the sacrifice which I believed Olena had made to have slept. I gathered a few hours of fitful sleep, and as the sky began to lighten, about five o'clock, I donned my leggings, tracksuit top and running shoes, packing my phone carefully. I had Macduff on speed dial.

The cool mid-September air had in it more than a foretaste of the autumn that was coming. The horizon was dark still, a thin streak of yellow light hidden behind the clouds of night. The only sound was the lapping of the waves as they pushed up the shore, clawing back the sand and shingle.

What was I doing? I had no idea whether they were coming, and none as to where. I had not even considered the matter of what to do if I was right. But all I could do was to follow my instinct. If the capsized boat was a trial run, then, I reasoned, they'd try the same route. The weather was calmer.

I took myself down to the beach and nestled in the lee of one of the fishing boats. I could hide safely there.

It was a time for prayer, so I went through the office of morning prayer, which I knew by heart.

"Blessed are you, creator of all,

to you be praise and glory for ever.

As your dawn renews the face of the earth

bringing light and life to all creation..."

But even as I offered thanks for a new day, I saw on the misty horizon two light flash. I was wondering if I had imagined it, the lights flashed again. I turned and looked behind me. I could see the reflection of a light. I was in the right place at the right time; but what on earth could I do?

I started, there was a sound behind me.

"You took a risk, what the hell do you think you are doing?"

It was Elena, who ducked in by my side.

"Macduff refused to believe me, but I was sure that Olena had not told them. But what are you doing here?"

"Look, I know you saw me snogging Dimitri, but it's the price you pay for being a double agent."

"Double agent?"

"Yes, Dimitri's mob get information from me, the information that we want them to have. In return, I get stuff we can use. But I could see that you thought something was going on, so I followed you."

It was a clever excuse, if it was an excuse, but my heart had always doubted that Elena was really a traitor, and so I went with my heart.

"What should we do?"

"Watch and wait. I can find out where they are being taken. Let me capture this on my phone to prove we were not making it up."

"Wouldn't it be better for me to do so? If it is needed in evidence and comes from you, you'll be compromised."

Elena smiled.

"We'll make a policewoman of you yet, Robin."

So, as the sun broke across the wide horizon, we watched as the boat came closer. Three men waded into the water and between them helped a dozen women to shore, one of them telling the man in the boat to "get out of here."

The women were shivering, whichever idiot thought that short dresses and bare legs were ideal wear for an early morning boat ride, ought to have tried it himself.

I was grateful that Elena was there; there was comfort in numbers.

How capricious fate was. These women were as much casualties of war as were the men who were killed fighting on the front line, but what sort of Government allowed its soldiers to rape women and then sell them into prostitution? But had that not, historically, always been the case - look what happened to Adromache, the widow of Hector of Troy, who was enslaved as a concubine to the man who killed her son. Women suffered in ways that even male soldiers could not be expected to comprehend. Civilisation was a thin veneer covering the surface of a seething pit of primal emotion. We had always been men's prizes, at the mercy of those with most power.

Elena and I watched as the girls were loaded into a van.

"I will give you the pleasure of telling Macduff, I must be off. You'll protect my cover?"

"I shall, but you must tell me where they are being held, in return," I promised.

She hugged me.

"Thanks. It's important this remains secret. As soon as I know, I will tell you."

I watched her go, wondering why she had been there at all. She had not interfered with my observation, but how had she helped? Either way, I needed to phone Macduff.

The sun was now up, and the early dog walkers were on the beach where, only a few minutes earlier, the women had been rounded up.

"What the fuck!" Macduff sounded cross. "You do know it is only five thirty?"

"I do, and I also know that ten minutes ago those women you were so sure were not going to be landed, were landed here. I captured it on my phone. Let me send you a picture or two."

"Fuck, fuck! Where did they go?"

"I think I know, but let me check," I said, playing for time. "I could hardly tackle them myself."

"I know, I know," he said, before falling back on more expletives. He had made a judgement call, but it had been the wrong one.

I waited, and as I had expected, within fifteen minutes a police car had arrived. I motioned to them.

"You're Robin, yes?"

"I am," I said, "and you can still see the footprints where the women were landed."

As they sealed off the beach, I could not but wonder at the folly of it all. If they had trusted Olena then they could have been there, they could have intercepted the women, and they could have achieved something. Now? Well, now they were "doing their job," trying the examine the stable door after the horse had bolted.

The next car dropped Macduff off.

He looked flustered.

"Robin, can you come with me to the station to make a statement?"

"I can, but that might delay my investigating where the women are being held. Can you give me an hour?"

"Okay, but can you let me have the footage you said you had?"

"Sure," I said, sending it to him.

The presence of the police had brought a small crowd of onlookers, and, of course, the inevitable journalist from the local press.

"Miss Topham," the journalist said, "no swimming this time? What's going on?"

"As you can see, I still have my top on, and the police will have to tell you the rest."

"Can I try to catch you later," she said.

"Okay, I'll be at the Retreat, so why not come by, you could even do something on what we are doing to help the women."

"Yes," she said, with, I thought, less than full enthusiasm. Doing good was nowhere near as newsworthy as doing wrong.

I trotted back to the Rectory, trying to get at least a modicum of exercise. My phone buzzed. It was Elena.

"They are in the old seaman's mission at the back of the quay. You've got about half an hour."

"Thanks," I said, reversing my run and just catching Macduff. I told him the news.

"How do you know?"

"I just do," I said, "either believe me or not."

He gave me one of his sideways looks, but reported back to base.

"Would you be willing to talk with the girls, if we can retrieve them?"

Part of me wanted to tell him not to refer to them as "girls." It was bad enough that they were denied agency without being stripped of their adulthood."

"Of course," I said, as usual, taking the "polite route."

"Well, hop in and we'll give you a ride."

He gave me what I took to be a flirtatious look, and it hit me for the first time that Macduff was attracted to me; that was all I needed.

I thought it perhaps unwise for the police to have their sirens blaring as we approached the Mission, and I stood and watched Macduff and his officers approach. In response to a hard rap on the door, it was opened by a young woman. I could not hear what was being said, but it was clear that she was denying whatever Macduff was saying to her. He pushed past her, and the other men went in.

He came out a few minute later and beckoned me over.

"What's up?" I said.

"You'll see," he said.

I went into the hall where there were trestle tables on which breakfast plates were laid, and around which a dozen or so women were sitting. An amused looking Dimitri was talking with a policeman. When he saw me, he came over.

"Robin, good to see you, I was going to get in touch. As I was telling the Sergeant, these women are fleeing from Ukraine and will be applying for asylum. We found them on the beach after a tip off from an informant."

"Well," said Macduff, they are illegals and should not be here."

"That is up to you, Sergeant, my understanding is that your Government is sympathetic to the plight of refugees from Ukraine."

"These are not bloody refugees, you are trafficking them!"

"Sergeant, I am shocked. I am simply trying to help women fleeing persecution. I am hurt by your allegations. Feel free to ask any of the women."

The look Macduff gave him would have burnt the paint off the walls.

"Oh, we shall. But in the meantime, you are under arrest on suspicion of trafficking."

"Anticipating you might be this narrow-minded, Sergeant, my lawyer will be meeting us at the station. But what are you going to do with all these women, deny them breakfast after their ordeal?"

Macduff was furious. I stepped in.

"Sergeant, why don't you leave me here with the women and a couple of your policewomen, and I can try to fix up somewhere for them to stay locally?"

"Good idea!"

"Bless you, Robin," Dimitri smiled, "we can have a hostel arranged for them, but I am sure that I am happy to go with what the ladies want."

To look at him, butter would not have melted in his mouth. Did he really expect anyone to believe him? But then that did not matter, he had his story worked out, and unless Macduff could tie him to the trafficking, the most he was guilty of was finding a group of refugees on the beach and providing them with accommodation."

Realising, suddenly, that I had not had breakfast, I asked the cook whether there was some coffee and toast, smiling she gave me some, and I sat with the women, who looked nervous.

I made small talk with them, but it was clear that they were scared and not likely to do anything which brought the wrath of Dimitri down on them.

Back at the Rectory, I showered and dressed. Had Olena died for nothing? We had caught Dimitri, and yet there seemed nothing that he could be charged for. I had told Macduff that I would be happy to talk to the women one by one, and so I went down to the station.

The first woman was one I had sat next to in the hall. She looked startled by my appearance.

"You are not police? You are priest?"

"Yes," I smiled, "and yes."

"You hear confession? You not say what I tell you?"

"Yes, and yes again."

"Okay, I am Anna and I sinned. I have done bad things, and I seek forgiveness. You will not tell police?"

"Anna, the confessional is inviolable, what you tell me you tell God, and in return I am his instrument of absolution."

"It nice to have woman priest. You shall understand."

"I shall listen," I promised.

For the next twenty minutes she poured out a story as old as time.

Her village had been captured by the Russians. She had been raped and brutalised many times, before being sold on by her captors. She, and other women, had been transported here and they knew what fate awaited them.

"So, why do you not tell our police and seek their protection?"

"I have sisters back there, and they will be harmed if I not work. If I betray them, they will kill me, you not know how brutal these men are."

Judging by the fear in her eyes, I could guess.

I gave her a suitable penance and absolution.

"So, you will go to the hostel they are providing?"

"I have no alternative."

"Will you do one thing for me?"

"If I can?"

"Will you tell the other women that if they wish to confess, I will hear them?"

She agreed, and was as good as her word.

Those confessions were the hardest ones I had ever heard. I wept with some of them, comforted where I could, and absolved them of sins which they had not committed of their own volition. Everyone had her own horror story. Each woman made the same choice as Anna for much the same reason. It was clear that months of brutalisation had left these women scared.

Macduff offered me lunch, as it was nearly one o'clock before I finished. I had texted Miriam, so she could cancel my appointments.

Lunch turned out to be a sandwich with a bottle of water.

"Last of the big spenders," I joked.

"Sorry, we have so much on with this, it's lunch at the desk."

"A thoroughly uncivilised habit Mac, and I hope you won't repeat it."

He laughed.

"All we got from them was the same story as Dimitri told us. How about you?"

"Well as they talked under the rule of the confessional, I can't tell you specifics, but you are right if you think they are too terrified to speak out and you think they have been trafficked. For the rest, to be honest, you can guess, but it won't be as bad as the reality."

"So there is nothing we can do to Dimitri, his smart London lawyer was clear that the most we could charge him with was not reporting the landing, and that would go nowhere."

"You can't do anything to him. But perhaps we are thinking about this in the wrong way?"

He looked at me.

"Go on then, Einstein."

Ignoring the sarcasm, I replied:

"What options to we have in terms of the women while they are applying for asylum?"

"Dimitri says he has a hostel for them."

"Oh I am sure, but I am guessing it would need to be approved by the authorities. What would happen if it was found to be unsuitable"

"We'd have to... hey, are you planning something?"

"We can't nail Dimitri, but we can jinx his hostel, and my Retreat is losing a dozen women this week who are being moved on. And, of course, I already have permission to house asylum seekers."

He whistled.

"You're not just a pretty face, are you?"

"Well, I got a degree in theology and a doctorate, so no!"

"That's bloody brilliant. If they are staying with you and there is a curfew, he can't prostitute them."

"Glad you like the idea."

"I do, let me get onto making sure that the dive he wants to keep them in is not approved?"

I was tired when I left the station, still dressed for my early morning rendezvous with the boat, but I felt satisfied.

Miriam was full of curiosity about what I'd been up to, but reassured me that she had rescheduled my few appointments, adding that a journalist had been very persistent.

After a shower and a change of clothes, I phoned Jane, having established a suitable time by text.

"Darling Robin, I heard from my source at the Home Office. They will not allow the traffickers to host the women. You can look after them at the Retreat?"

"Yes, my love, I can."

I told her most of what had happened, leaving out the detail about Elena. I told her about Irina.

"Ah, your former lover, she is back?"

"Yes, working undercover with the traffickers."

Her voice had hardened.

"Well I am sure it is nice for you to be with her again."

There are times when the only word that will do to describe me is "stupid." It hit me that Jane thought that this might have an effect on us, whatever "us" was.

"Jane, my love, it was a fling, and no more. We need time together."

Her voice softened.

"We do, darling, and I promise you we shall get it soon. I think a pastoral visit up your way is needed."

"Now that is one visitation to which I shall be looking forward."

I got down to some work, having rather neglected the upcoming Deanery Synod. I'd never make a church bureaucrat, there was something about an agenda and a meeting that made me realise I needed to file my nails or watch paint dry, anything rather than attend to item eight. But it was a good penitential discipline, so I did it, feeling a sense of relief when I had put it all to bed.

Just as I had done that there was a ring at the door. When I answered it, Macduff was there.

"Can I come in?"

"Yes, of course, I was about to grab a coffee, care to join me?"

"Sure."

I made us both a coffee and joined him in the small sitting room.

"I wanted to thank you for your help this morning, and the idea about the residences. Their premises have been declared unsuitable, and I am told that you have the space. Can we move them in tomorrow?"

"Sure, of course. I will see each one of them and make sure they know that they will be protected, as far as possible."

"Good. Look, I was a bit of an idiot earlier, can I buy you dinner one night to make up for it?"

"That would be nice," I said, thinking to myself that the last man who had bought me dinner was Ryan Surtees just before he tried to betray me to the Russian traffickers. This might be a chance to erase that memory.

We arranged a time for the women to come over to the Retreat, and Macduff left. I'd half hoped he'd suggest this evening for dinner, but I was tired after the day's events. I decided to take myself down to the local pub, which did a decent evening meal.

"Hi, Rev, good to see you again. Your usual?"

When the barmaid knows you by sight and by your "usual," it is a sign that you are a regular. I quite liked that. Too many priests stood aside from their communities, but I did not think that the shepherd should be avoiding her sheep.

I ordered the calamari salad and a glass of Chablis, and took myself to a table in the corner to indulge in some people watching.

Tabetha, the waitress, brought me my food and wished me bon appétit. I enjoyed spoiling myself, and was just about to signal for another Chablis when a familiar figure came over to me - it was Dimitri.

"Might I get you a drink, Robin?" He said, all smiles.

"How kind," I said, all sweetness and light. There was no point being hostile, I'd find out precisely nothing that way.

He went to the bar and came back with another Chablis, and a pint of lager for himself.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I am told that the women we rescued this morning are to be housed with you?"

Smiling sweetly, I replied:

"Oddly, that was not how the police described your role. They seemed to think you were trafficking them."

"Robin," he said, with a tone of something masquerading as regret in his voice, "how cynical your police are. I want to help those women."

"The way you have helped the others?"

"Did any of them say that they were not happy to be helped by me?"

"Should they have?" I parried his thrust.

"I would have thought not, but only you can know that."

"None accused you of anything, Dimitri, but you know the police,"

"I do, Robin, and I hope that I can be of assistance with the women."

"I should appreciate that. What had you in mind?"

"Well, I have a new associate, a Ukrainian woman called Irina, she would like to be able to talk to the women and act as liaison between you and me. A nice, what is your English phrase, 'threesome,' is it not?"

I must have coloured up.

"Was that what they call inappropriate, Robin? You must excuse me, a man in my line of business sometimes forgets himself, especially in the presence of a pretty lady like yourself."

Okay, I thought to myself, this is a record, in the last forty-eight hours, Elena, Irina, Jane, Macduff and now Dimitri, had all indicated some level of desire for me. Was it hormonal? Or was it simply that Jane Austen had got it wrong? Maybe it was a universally accepted fact that a single woman in possession of a modest fortune and good looks was in need of a partner?