‘Well, that was something else Jimmy was mad keen on – Shirley Outram.’ Massey sighed. ‘It could get pretty tedious on a long exercise. We took radios down, cards, dominoes. But a lot of the time, we just sat around and chatted. You found out a lot about people, sitting down there all night. When you’re frozen solid at two o’clock in the morning on an all-night exercise, on the graveyard shift, it makes a difference who you’re stuck down there with.’

‘You had Jimmy. And you had Leslie Clay.’

He nodded. ‘Les Clay worked in the engine shed at Rowsley until it shut in ’66. He was made redundant in October, transferred to Bakewell as a porter and got made redundant again five months later, when the line closed. Dr Beeching – there’s a man whose name lives on.’

Cooper recalled that there was a little woodland station not far from here, at Great Longstone. The last stop before the crossing of Monsal Dale viaduct. Now the station was passed only by walkers and cyclists.

‘What age are you?’ asked Massey. ‘I suppose you think this was all a different century?’

‘Well, strictly speaking, sir . . .’

Massey laughed sourly. ‘Yes, all right. The twentieth century, damn it. Consigned to the history books now.’

‘I heard about the closures,’ said Cooper.

‘The 1968 reorganization came as a jolt. We thought the ROC was safe. It ought to have gone on for ever. But we were called to a special meeting at Group HQ in Coventry, and we went like lambs to the slaughter. The commandant got up and read out a list of posts that would close. Alpha One, Bravo Two . . . we were devastated. There was a lot of antagonism and bad feeling. They asked the older ones to retire, said they couldn’t go up and down the shaft any more. Some they wanted to transfer to other posts miles away, but that wasn’t the same at all.’

Cooper was glad to see they were walking back towards the house now. His hair was sticking to his head, and the water was running down his neck.

‘Do you know Michael Clay, Mr Massey?’ he asked.

‘Who?’

‘Les Clay’s son.’

Massey shook his head. ‘I’ve heard his name mentioned. I never met him.’

Cooper watched him for a moment. It sounded like the truth. And Peter Massey just didn’t seem like a man who could tell a lie so convincingly.

‘What about Patrick Rawson? Do you know him?’

‘Who’s he?’

‘Michael Clay’s business partner.’

‘Wasn’t that the man who died up the way there? You asked me about him before.’

‘So I did.’

Cooper showed him the photograph of Rawson. But Massey shook his head. ‘I’ve never seen him.’

‘You’ve never done anything with the old bunker.’

‘It was lucky there was no aircraft recognition post here. Some of them were snapped up by mobile telephone people, so they could put masts up. This one wasn’t of interest to anybody, so they just gave the site back to the landowner.’