3 Inspector Hobbes and the Gold Diggers by Wilkie Martin Page A

sensation, an odd vibration, passing through my feet, up my body into my head. Though I couldn’t have explained why, I decided it was coming from some distance, but as I left the tent, it stopped. In the distance, I could see Hobbes jogging towards us. Dregs rushed to greet him.
    ‘Did you feel that?’ I asked when they were back.
    Hobbes nodded.
    ‘What was it?’
    ‘I don’t know, but I remember something like it when I was a boy.’
    I had never envisaged Hobbes as a boy. He gave the impression of having arrived fully formed, although he had made occasional remarks about his childhood, particularly about Auntie Elsie and Uncle Jack, who’d adopted him and guided him through his troubled youth. From what I’d gathered, he’d caused much of the trouble.
    ‘It felt,’ he said, ‘like machinery in the mines.’
    ‘Does that mean someone’s mining?’
    ‘Possibly,’ he said, ‘but I’d expect to see some signs.’
    ‘Back when we left the road, you reckoned a heavy vehicle had been along before us.’
    ‘That is true,’ he said, ‘but it seems unlikely they’d restart mining. They were all closed in the nineteenth century.’
    ‘Then it’s a mystery,’ I said, with masterful insight.
    ‘It is,’ said Hobbes with a laugh, ‘but it’s nothing to do with us. All the land round here is private and what the owner does on it is his business.’
    ‘What do you mean private land? We’re not trespassing are we?’
    ‘Only in the legal sense,’ said Hobbes.
    ‘What other sense is there?’
    ‘Moral, or ethical. This whole area used to be common land, land that many families depended on. Then Sir Rodney Payne enclosed it and took it for himself, but his right to do so is debatable. What is not debatable is that Sir Rodney used considerable force and the enclosure was, in effect, robbery with violence.’
    ‘How do you know all this?’
    ‘Uncle Jack told me. His father used to have a small farm, grazing sheep on Blacker Knob, until Sir Rodney threw him and his family out.’
    ‘So, if he hadn’t, would the farm have come to you eventually?’
    ‘No. Uncle Jack was a younger son and, back then, inherited property went to the eldest.’
    ‘When was that?’
    ‘Late in the eighteenth century. Sir Rodney was widely regarded as the most odious man in the county and the same family still owns it. Most of them are no better than Sir Rodney, if the stories are to be believed. The point is, I have no compunction in being here. The Payne family may have the law on its side, but it does not have justice and, besides, we won’t be doing any harm; there’s nothing we could damage. Furthermore, we have the legal right to roam these days.’
    ‘Good,’ I said. ‘Umm … when is supper?’
    He laughed. ‘You have a talent for getting back to what is really important. Supper’s ready as soon as you’ve made tea and I’ve got the pie out.’
    I filled the kettle and set it to heat on the stove, worried that there only appeared to be one gas cylinder, but hoping he had a plan for when it was used up; although he might not have had a problem with raw stoat, I certainly did and even Dregs preferred cooked meals. Still, that was a worry for later and the sight of the huge meat pie set my mouth watering. I made tea, Hobbes said grace and sliced the pie into generous chunks. We sat at a long, smooth rock that made a useful table, stuffing ourselves. Afterwards, he produced a bag of apples and, munching one, I began to feel comfortable and confident. The sun had long ago dipped beneath the Beacon, the temperature was dropping and night was falling fast. Hobbes lit a candle lantern, our only light.
    ‘What are we going to do tonight?’ I asked, hoping there’d be a cosy pub within easy walking distance, but fearing the appearance of being in the middle of nowhere was no illusion.
    ‘We’re going to wash up,’ said Hobbes, ‘and then I’m going to turn in. You can do what you like.’
    ‘I hoped we might