Heberden's Seat

by Douglas Clark

  “When I had recovered from my surprise at seeing the bizarre progress of the two who were approaching me and,” Canning said somewhat shamefacedly, “being a parson and, therefore, being parsonical in my conversation, I greeted them with a reference that I hope will not escape you. A modern version of ‘that’s no burden, that’s my brother’, was what sprang to my lips. In reply, the man laughed aloud and said: ‘She’s not my brother, she’s my common-law wife’.”

  Masters nodded to show he had understood. “Then what, vicar?”

  “Another surprise for me. The man addressed the woman as Happy. ‘Here, Happy, get down girl.’ And he bent to allow her down. I immediately said, ‘Happy? I don’t believe I have encountered Happy as a Christian name before.’ Then she started to pull my leg. She pushed the glasses back on her nose and asked: ‘No, father? You’ve heard of Joy?’

  “‘I always took that to be a shortened form of Joyce.’

  “‘And Glad?’

  “‘Short for Gladys? Yes. You’re joking with me.’

  “‘You think so, father?’

  “‘What is your real name? May I know it? Because you have given me an idea for a talk I am to give to the Young Wives’ Guild in a few days’ time.’

  “‘Ness,’ she said, very solemnly.” As he said this, Canning gave what appeared to his listeners as a fair imitation of a solemn young woman.

  “‘Her mother was frightened by a monster.’ The man found his own joke very funny and laughed aloud.

  “‘Ness? That’s a diminutive of Vanessa?’

  “‘You’re on the wrong track, father,’ she corrected me. ‘My daddy liked a poet called Lowell.’

  “‘I’ve heard of him. One of the quotations from his work is quite widely used in the church. Maybe you remember it? “Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, himself, his hungering neighbour and Me.” The Me has a capital M and refers, of course, to our Lord.’

  “‘Yes, well! Our quotation went like this: “Cleverness and contentedness and all the other good nesses.”’ She peered at me very shrewdly. ‘When I was born my daddy thought I was clever and contented and had all the other good nesses, so he called me Ness—as there was only one of me.’

  “‘But surely you mean goodnesses, not good nesses.’

  “‘Read your Lowell,’ she said.

  “‘I shall certainly try to obtain a copy of his works. But I am still unenlightened.’

  “‘Her mother, padre,’ said the man, ‘decided she couldn’t call her baby, Ness. So she chose just one of the nesses for her.’

  “‘Happiness? Of course. Happy! What a delightful little vignette! I shall be able to make good use of our little chat. This has been a really fortunate encounter for me. My name is Canning and I’m the vicar of this parish.’

  “This information seemed to amuse the man greatly. He laughed immoderately and then said: ‘You already know Happy. I am John Melada.’ And that, gentlemen, is how I came to meet John Melada. The experience stands out very well in my mind, probably because of what followed.”

  Masters filled his pipe slowly. “You know, vicar, you have not only an eye for a scene, but an ear, too. Your reconstruction of your conversation with Happy and Melada was extremely vivid.”

  “I don’t think I strayed very much from the actual dialogue,” said Canning, slightly on the defensive, as though he imagined Masters might be accusing him of exaggeration. “Certainly I have conveyed to you the exact sense of the meeting.”

  “I’m sure you have, vicar. And I’m not only grateful for your information, but impressed by your performance. Do you think you can go on to tell us what happened after that? You have whetted our appetites by saying that what followed helped to write the details of the encounter indelibly in your mind, so we can’t help but feel that what is yet to come will be the best—from our point of view.”

  Canning smiled. “You know your Browning, Mr Masters. One never thinks of policemen as larding their conversation with aptly turned quotations from the poets.”

  “We’re a queer lot,” said Reed, as though such a general remark explained all the various quirks and idiosyncrasies to be met with throughout the whole of the national police force.

  Canning took a sip from the third whisky and continued his story.

  “I asked the couple if they were visiting Oakby, but they didn’t even know where they were. I explained that they were in the parish of Oakby-cum-Beckby and they told me that their motor car had broken down a few hundred yards away. . . .”

  “Ah!” said Masters. “Now there’s a thing. We broke down near here yesterday. We visited the church to while away the time until help came, and that is when we found the first body.”

  “I see. I wondered how you had happened on St John the Divine’s. . . . But Melada explained they had decided to walk to the village for help. Unfortunately, he was a big man and Happy was a small woman, so she couldn’t keep pace with him unless he dawdled. And that is why he picked her up and gave her a ride on his back. It seemed to be a nice gesture—a harmless bit of fun. However, I explained that there was no garage in Oakby, and scarcely a phone. That dismayed them momentarily, because Melada told me—and he was laughing as he said it—that he had hoped to ring a friend of his, somebody called Rex, to come and pick them up.”

  “Rex?” asked Masters quietly. “Rex who?”

  “He didn’t say, and naturally I didn’t ask.”

  “Quite. Please go on, Mr Canning.”

  “As they were in need, I naturally felt I should help and so I said that as I had my car in the village I would be pleased to give them a lift to the nearest garage—almost as some measure of return for our entertaining conversation. Melada laughed at my offer, and for a moment I thought he had turned it down, but such was not the case. He said, ‘Let’s go, padre.’ He seemed always to call me padre, as though he might have been a former member of the armed forces.”

  “Or he’d perhaps been in jail,” said Webb. “The chaplains—like army chaplains—are called padres.”

  “Surely not? However, I was not in a position to take them to a garage at that precise moment, so I said there was just one little difficulty and that was that I had a call to make in Oakby that would take me some time. I explained that this would mean they would be left hanging about in Oakby with very little of interest to entertain them. Melada immediately said that they would spend their time looking round my church. When I said that, strictly speaking, it was not my church, he asked if I meant I was a visitor.

  “I spent a moment or two telling them that I am the incumbent of Oakby-cum-Beckby, but that the parish church is in Beckby, and so is the vicarage. You see, Mr Masters, St John’s was a chapel-at-ease until five or six years ago. Services were held there regularly until that time. But the congregation had dwindled and there was no longer a curate in the parish, besides which, my predecessor was also given the neighbouring parish of Trackwell to look after. So St John’s became a redundant church.

  “Melada asked me if that meant—and I use his words—that the church had been put up for grabs. I replied that it was for sale as it stands. The Church Commissioners wish to dispose of it, as they do so many fine old churches. But, as I explained to Melada, few people would wish to take on a building such as St John’s. Certainly it is of no use for commercial purposes in such an out of the way spot.

  “Happy asked me why I was there if it was no longer my church and I told her I had walked up because I was a little early for my call. Melada broke in and asked me if I’d got there before time for tea and suggested I was hanging about because I did not want to miss my cup of tea and slice of fruit cake. He was so near the mark that I admitted the impeachment which amused him greatly. Happy, however, insisted on knowing why I had visited the church. I couldn’t confess to nostalgia, because I never conducted a service there. It was closed just before my time in the parish, so when she suggested I had come to study what might have been I corrected her. What was, would be nearer
the mark. You see, gentlemen, for me churches—especially old ones—are history books. Accurate ones, not text books fudged up by historians who, in trying to paint a broad picture, so often disregard the details to be had from such places as St John’s.

  “I told that young woman that I was making it my business to study, in depth, the history of my parish. By studying the records, tombstones, memorials, gifts and all the other relics of the parish, I am getting a picture of the forebears of my present flock. As I told Melada and Happy, it is inspiring to me to know that a male ancestor of the woman with whom I was to take tea that afternoon was a pillar of St John’s over four hundred years ago. It is on record that he attended the Bishop of Lincoln of the day—who made a pilgrimage on foot round his see—as baggage man, supplying two cobs of his own for the purpose for a period which included three sabbaths. I told Happy that and she replied that she expected I was there, at the church, just to soak up atmosphere. Melada, who seemed to be either extremely perspicacious or a cynic, said he guessed I was there to snooze on a warm tombstone, soaking up the sun.”

  “Which is more or less what you confessed to us,” said Reed.

  Canning nodded. “I can’t deny it. Nor did I deny it to them. But I was quite unprepared for Melada’s next request. He asked if they couldn’t see over the church, despite the fact that it was redundant. I replied that I hadn’t got the key, but he said, quite logically, that if the property was for sale, the key had to be kept close by for the convenience of prospective buyers. To that I had no option but to reply that such was the case, and to say that to the best of my knowledge no prospective buyer had come forward.

  “His reply took me aback. He said, quite simply: ‘Well, there has now.’ I suppose I sounded a little stupid when I asked: ‘You?’ And then Melada said yes and Happy said no at the same time. At this direct divergence of views I turned from one to the other, seeking an explanation. Happy said Melada wanted to go inside the church, but not as a prospective buyer. She refused to say why she had said this, but Melada was quite adamant that he was serious in considering the purchase of the church and demanded to be told where the key was kept. When I told him that it was kept here, by Tom, he said he would walk down with me to collect it, and I could vouch for him. The girl said it was too hot to walk and decided she would wait in the churchyard until Melada returned with the key.

  “And that was that, for the moment, Mr Masters.”

  “You mean you had no conversation with Melada on the way into the village?”

  “We did not walk in silence, but all we discussed was the amount the Commissioners might accept for the property. I told him I had heard of one isolated church being sold for as little as two thousand pounds. I suggested he should visit the diocesan office in Lincoln and by that time we had arrived here. I got the key from Tom and handed it over to Melada.”

  “You were going to help them to get to a garage, remember.”

  “Oh yes, we made arrangements for that, too. Melada was to return on foot to the church and I would motor up there to collect them after my parish visit.”

  “Which you did?”

  “Of course. I cut short my call in order not to keep them waiting.”

  “A short time ago you said your meeting with Melada was in two parts. Was the second part when you went to pick them up?”

  “Yes.”

  “They were in the church at the time?”

  “Yes.” Canning took another sip of his whisky. “At the altar. I went in by the south door, which they had left open. The inner door of the porch made no noise as I entered, and as you see, I wear rubber-soled shoes, so they did not notice my coming. But I was able to overhear something of what they said.”

  “Was their conversation interesting?”

  “By that do you mean was it out of the ordinary?”

  “Yes.”

  “No. But it gave me a chance—a lead rather—for airing my local knowledge, and as you have probably guessed, I like the sound of my own voice, particularly on my own subjects.”

  “Would you care to listen to your own voice telling us what you told Melada and Happy? It is quite important that you do so.”

  “I will take your word for it, Mr Masters, but please remember you have given me no reason for so prolonged a discussion, except that Melada was one of those who once borrowed the church key recently.”

  “Twice, at least.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “You borrowed it once and handed it to him. Tom Goodall said you brought him here the first time. Meaning there was a second time, at least.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Check with Goodall, would you, please, Reed.”

  Reed got up to call the landlord through from the public bar and ask his question, while Masters turned again to Canning. “Vicar, I said we would withhold the names of those bodies in the churchyard until we have positive identifications. But I will tell you now, in all secrecy, of course, that we believe one of them to be John Melada.”

  The vicar stared in horror.

  Masters continued: “So you see now why I must know everything about your meeting with him.”

  “That poor girl!” murmured Canning. “Poor Happy! She will be so dreadfully unhappy now. I feel I should call on her, even though I imagine she is a Roman Catholic.”

  “She told you so?”

  “No. But just as Melada called me padre, Happy called me father throughout our conversation. The usual mode of address in our persuasion is vicar or rector, whereas those of the Roman faith address their priests as father.”

  “You must wait until we are sure Melada is dead. We know he is missing from home. Perhaps you would be so kind as to offer to accompany Happy to the mortuary.”

  Canning inclined his head. “Anything I can do. . . .”

  “Thank you.”

  Reed returned. “Melada came again a second time to borrow the key. He had another man of his own age with him.”

  “Thank you, Reed. Mr Canning is just about to tell us of the second half of his meeting with Melada.”

  Canning looked up, his face showing the shock the news of Melada’s death had caused him.

  “The altar table in St John’s is of stone,” he said quietly. “It was built at a time when, I suppose, the altar frontals and cloths we know today were not in common use. And so the altar is, itself, intrinsically decorative. The top is a slab of stone supported by three pointed arches in the front and one at each end. No doubt you can imagine it?”

  “I can,” said Webb. “There’s a deal of that greyish limestone round here in buildings.”

  Canning acknowledged the correctness of that observation with a lift of the hand that was toying with the whisky glass. “Melada and Happy were standing looking at the altar. The empty church was like a sounding board. I could hear their words distinctly as I came up the centre aisle. I think Happy was feeling less than pleased at Melada’s interest in the church—or at least where it was leading. At any rate he had his arm round her. ‘What’s up, Hap?’ he asked. ‘Look I’ll tell you what. You don’t like this place, but I think it’s got possibilities. Big possibilities. And I reckon I could make a packet out of it.’ At that point I can remember her looking up at him and pushing her glasses back up her nose. They always seemed to be slipping down. Then she asked the one-word question: ‘So?’ His reply was: ‘We’ll do a deal. I want it, you don’t. I’ll let you fix the price I offer for it. Any reasonable figure you like. And that’s the maximum I’ll go to. If I get it for whatever amount you say, fair enough. If I don’t get it, that’s that.’”

  “Did that mollify her?”

  “I actually stopped to listen for her reply. It seemed important to do so. She asked: ‘That’s a promise, Johnny?’ and he replied: ‘It’s a promise, Hap.’ She seemed to accept that, and he bent down to examine the underneath of the altar table.

  “Immediately he got down, he said, ‘Here, Hap, there’s a space under here.’ She joined him,
and he pointed out that one of the floor slabs had been moved. I think I should explain that below the table were four slabs, just like paving stones. Three were fitted perfectly, the fourth had been lifted and set slightly askew so that it rested on its neighbour, leaving a small triangular hole through which Melada was peering. They were too taken up with their discovery to notice me behind them.”

  “What happened next, vicar? Did you speak?”

  “No. Melada grasped the slab and raised it. They’re not too heavy, particularly as he pivoted it on its back ledge. What they saw was a regular hole, a couple of feet deep, stone-lined and the same size as the altar. I was quite amused by the conversation which followed. She asked what it was and he replied that it was what he’d always wanted—a sunken bath.

  “But Happy demanded to know what it was for and Melada, of course, could not tell her. So then I had to make known to them the fact that I was present. I said: ‘It was intended as a tomb.’

  “Happy was startled, but Melada laughed and said there was no skeleton in it. So I had to explain that when I said intended I meant intended and not used. The first vicar of the parish had it prepared for his own. He wanted to be buried under his own altar.”

  “What stopped him?” asked Reed.

  “He died of an epidemic in London.”

  “The plague?”

  “I think not. But definitely something catching. It is referred to in the records very simply as the fever, but his family could not find anybody willing to carry his corpse from London to Oakby for burial, so I imagine there was fear of contagion. My research suggests that it was either typhoid or anthrax or at any rate one of the enteric diseases.”

  “Nasty.”

  “The clothes as well as the person would be infected, you see, so that anybody in close contact with either would have been in danger.”

  “So he never made it to his tomb?”

  “Sadly, no. I explained all this to Melada and Happy. All Melada was concerned to establish was that nobody had ever used it as a tomb, so that he could persuade the girl that, being untainted by death, it would make an ideal sunken bath if tiled out in colours of her choice. Happy, however, wanted to know why it had never been used.”