The Honest and The Brave

by Rebecca King

  With that, everyone set to work.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Bishop peered at him and lifted his brows. “I beg your pardon?”

  “Could you describe the vicar at Bamtree for me, please?” Joshua repeated with more patience than he felt.

  “Well, that is Reverend Clive Mannering. It has been a while since I met him.”

  “Did you send him to Bamtree?”

  “Well, yes, of course. Bamtree is in the region I oversee,” the Bishop relied cautiously.

  “Can you remember what Reverend Mannering looks like?”

  “Well, from what I can remember, he was about five feet five, with sandy hair. He was a quite spoken gentleman with a calm, matter-of-fact manner about him. I can remember being quite assured that he would be most suitable for the position.”

  “When was the last time you spoke to him?”

  “He was supposed to come to the last annual meeting of the clergymen but sent his apologies. He had numerous parish duties to attend to. From what I can gather most of his congregation are rather elderly,” the Bishop replied. “Might I ask what this is all about?”

  “Do you know of a gentleman who is about six feet in height with steel grey hair and dark brown eyes?”

  “Why, no. I don’t believe I have met him.”

  “Where does Reverend Mannering come from?”

  “Well, he undertook his training in Canterbury, and spent many years there before he made a request for a position in a quieter parish. He suffers with his joints you see and felt the fresh air and slower pace of life would help him,” the Bishop replied. “But I only met him the once when he came for an interview. He came most recommended, so it was more of a meeting than anything formal, but I can remember being quite impressed with the fellow. Why? Is there a problem?”

  The Bishop was starting to look alarmed.

  “I am afraid that he has died,” Joshua replied carefully.

  “Oh, dear. Oh, dear me. How? When?”

  Joshua hesitated. “I am afraid that it seems likely that Reverend Mannering was murdered, at least twelve months ago.”

  “Twelve months?” The Bishop whispered. He stared at Joshua in stunned disbelief. “Are you sure?”

  Joshua nodded. “We found a body in the crypt of the church last night. I am afraid that it appears the original Reverend Mannering was murdered.”

  “The original Reverend Mannering?”

  “If you do not know of a clergyman who was about six feet in height with steel grey hair and equally dark eyes then the man who has been living in the Rectory in Bamtree, undertaking the duties of the vicar was an imposter.”

  “Was?” The Bishop gulped.

  “He has been stealing from the congregation. Of late, he has also murdered several of the villagers, and is now on the run.”

  “Oh, dear no.” The Bishop looked ashen.

  “What do you know about Mr Julian? A Robert Julian, the Church Warden?”

  “Mr Julian?” The Bishop gulped and began to shake his head.

  “You knew nothing about Mr Julian being the Warden?”

  “Well, I leave the matter of whoever fills the position of Church Warden to the vicar who oversees the parish. He is the one who has to work with whoever he gives the position to, and has to oversee their work,” the Bishop explained.

  There was a somewhat defensive air about his tone that warned Joshua the man was starting to worry about his position. If word did indeed get out about how long the fraud had taken place, people would be inclined to ask what the Bishop for the area had been doing.

  He hasn’t been helping his clergymen do their job properly, that is for sure.

  “You never had any contact with the man.” It wasn’t really a question. The blank look in the Bishop’s eyes said it all.

  “No, I am afraid not.”

  “Well, we have been left with no alternative but to close the church for the time being. We will put up notices to inform the parishioners that there will be no services for the foreseeable future. This is an ongoing criminal investigation, so the church is not to be used or accessed by any of your staff. Because of recent incidents in the village relating to the vicar, the congregation are going to need time to regain their trust and faith in the church so when you are handed the property back you are going to have to take steps to put someone in charge who is reliable, and someone you can oversee directly.”

  The Bishop nodded his understanding but now faced bigger problems than who was going to be conducting the services in Bamtree on Sundays.

  “We will be in touch,” Joshua promised several moments later. With that, he took his leave and headed straight over to the magistrate’s office.

  Thankfully, the magistrate had returned from London and was more than happy to meet with Joshua.

  “Yes, I know that man,” the magistrate replied when Joshua described the villain.

  Steven Margate was a middle-aged man who had a brisk efficiency about him that was wholly reassuring. After the Bishop’s somewhat bumbling character, it was good to talk to someone who was willing to get straight to the point.

  “If he has a small scar to the right side of his temple, the man you are looking for is a criminal called Edward Lightfoot. He is a known fraudster who had lodgings around Appleby way and has defrauded many locals there,” the magistrate reported.

  “Does he have a record of theft and burglary?”

  Margate moved to a cabinet. After some rummaging, he retrieved a file of papers which he dropped onto his desk.

  “Yes, I know you came to have a look.”

  Joshua lifted his brows and waited.

  “I know how I left them you see. My housekeeper never touches them on account of the fact they contain confidential information. However, unless you know who you are looking for the files would prove useless to you, don’t you think?”

  Joshua had to concede Margate had a point, but neither admitted nor denied he had been there. Instead, he nodded to the file. “What can you tell me about our dear Lightfoot?”

  “He has been arrested for several incidents of theft and has served time in gaol with hard labour for stealing sheep, purses, entering someone’s house and stealing a pouch of coins, and fraud. He pretended to be an aged lady’s distant relation to get some money off her but was caught out when the real relative paid their aged relation a visit and found Lightfoot in her sitting room. There was a considerable sum of money missing but Lightfoot denied everything. Apparently, the woman was too confused about where the money had gone to be a credible witness, so Lightfoot only served time for fraud.”

  “He is a known imposter,” Joshua murmured. “Where does he originate from?”

  “Derby. However, the lodgings he used to call home there have since been destroyed in a fire – nothing to do with Lightfoot. His last known address was in Appleby. That was eighteen months ago. We don’t know his current whereabouts.”

  “You do now,” Joshua replied and then told the magistrate what the man had been doing.

  “It all sounds like something he would do, although he has never murdered before,” Margate reported.

  “As far as you know,” Joshua corrected.

  The magistrate pursed his lips and nodded. “If you can get him to me, I will ensure that his sentence is commensurate with the severity of his crime regardless of whether there are witnesses. By the time he is released, Lightfoot will be too old and decrepit to do anybody any harm.”

  “Good, but it is not going to be easy to catch him seeing as he has disappeared,” Joshua sighed. “Do you have any records of any accomplices?”

  Margate rifled through his papers. “There is one known associate, a man called Barry Garmead. He was caught with Lightfoot in someone’s home, which they were burgling. Garmead is a known burglar. His skill is lock picking, although when he was with Lightfoot they were known for getting in through windows,” Margate said.

  “Where were Garmead’s last known whereabouts?”


  Margate studied his papers once more. “As far as these records show he walked out of gaol and simply vanished. That was over twelve months ago.”

  “Did he have any visitors while in gaol?”

  “The prison records might tell you that. Is it really relevant?”

  “We know that Garmead and Lightfoot went to Bamtree. It appears that Lightfoot murdered the incumbent vicar there and took over his position and pretended to be someone new.”

  “Wait. How is that possible? The parishioners would know that the man wasn’t the original vicar, surely to goodness?”

  “I am afraid not. We have found out so far that the original Church Warden told the villagers that he had to go away to look after his brother, who had suddenly taken ill. He then sent word that he wouldn’t be back. The villagers are adamant that the man is still alive and well. His belongings were sent to him at his brother’s house, apparently. Anyway, he has never been back to Bamtree. The church continued without a Warden for a while. The vicar then mysteriously vanished, and Lightfoot appeared. He told everyone that the old vicar had gone to answer his calling in London, and that he, Lightfoot, had been sent by the Bishop to take over his position. He had been in post for about three weeks when Garmead appeared and became the Church Warden. Garmead took over the Warden’s house, which is a grace and favour house next to the rectory and became a Mr. Bob Julian. Lightfoot took over the rectory as the vicar. The Bishop has assumed that his vicar, a man called Clive Mannering, was still in position. However, each time Lightfoot was called to a clerical meeting, Lightfoot sent his apologies citing one excuse after another, but never actually went.”

  “Because he wasn’t the real vicar,” Margate nodded.

  “Exactly. The ruse has continued for nearly a year. How long Lightfoot intended to carry it on for is anybody’s guess. Anyway, something must have gone wrong, because Lightfoot had a reason to murder Garmead. We found Garmead’s body about a fortnight ago. He had been stabbed in a back, only Lightfoot made it look as if the house had been burgled.”

  “As he would know how to do given the crimes he had committed in the past,” Margate added.

  “Maybe Garmead got greedy, or made a mistake, or wanted to stop and Lightfoot didn’t. Whatever happened, we think, and it is only a possible scenario you understand, but we think that Garmead may have taken to burgling local properties on his own. Several have been broken into and have had a lot of things stolen, which have since appeared in various pawn shops in town. However, the description of the man who has pawned the stolen goods matches Garmead not Lightfoot, and there has only been one set of footprints found at the burgled properties.”

  “Garmead is a known burglar. Lightfoot would be angry at being cut out of the proceeds Garmead made from his stolen goods. That doesn’t explain why Garmead had to die,” Margate muttered.

  “Maybe Garmead wanted out, or Lightfoot killed one of the victims. We think that during one of the burglaries the homeowner interrupted them. There were signs of a struggle, and the homeowner lost his life. Not long after that, Garmead was murdered.”

  “Lightfoot probably took to murder, or Garmead accidentally killed the homeowner and Lightfoot got revenge. Whatever the case, Lightfoot is the killer.”

  “He has to be because Garmead is dead and homeowners have since been murdered,” Joshua reasoned. “Lightfoot is getting more daring. He has targeted two women who live next door to our safe house. Lightfoot, pretending to be the vicar, called at the ladies’ house to try to persuade them to go to church on Sunday. Not long afterwards, someone tried to break into the house only tried to set fire to it by throwing a bottle of lamp oil through the window.”

  “He is getting dangerous, as most criminals of his kind do. You must understand that there are two types of criminal. You have the petty crooks who generally stick to what they know but make a career out of fleecing people one way or another. However, they never change; they don’t stop but they don’t get worse. Then you have the career criminals who do change – for the worse. Their crimes are like an addiction. The more they do and gain from, the more they want to do. They break down social barriers and strictures to commit their crimes and become immune to what they are doing. Once that happens, they become immune from the damage they cause; the criminality of what they do. Then petty theft becomes serious crime, which becomes assault, which becomes murder. It is a downward spiral that the hardened criminal is incapable of stopping by themselves. The only thing that stops them is a very, very, long spell behind bars. Even then, some are still incapable of stopping. They get out of gaol and go straight back to the life they once enjoyed and return to crime. They are generally then in and out of gaol until the gaol master throws away the key and keeps them locked up for good. Lightfoot is one of those types of criminals. Given the multiple murders, he has to be locked up and never allowed out again. He cannot walk amongst decent society any longer.”

  Joshua wholeheartedly agreed. “Whether it is panic, or greed, or insanity, that has driven him to commit murder, the man is taking lives and stealing from people. He has to be put behind bars and considered incredibly dangerous.”

  “Get him to me and I will make sure he finds a cell to stay in for good.”

  In that soft tone was a hint of steel that left Joshua in no doubt that Margate would have no qualms about condemning Lightfoot to a life sentence with hard labour. It didn’t involve working for money. Hard labour often meant that the prisoner spent several hours per day walking off their energies on a treadmill; a giant circle which the prisoner stood in and had to keep moving. It didn’t get him anywhere but he was forced to keep the wheel working. It would break a man’s spirit at the futility of it, but he wouldn’t be allowed to stop. Sometimes, a prisoner would be forced to turn a handle on a box containing two grinding stones through which sand was poured. The wheel was incredibly difficult to move but had to be turned several times a minute to keep the sand grinding, or the harshest of punishments would be issued. It was all deemed as correctional and put into place to teach a prisoner that no crime was worth the sentence; the monotony and futility of hard labour.

  “Give us a day or two and you can lock him up forever,” Joshua promised.

  Later that day, Joshua returned to Bamtree. He was eager to see Annalisa, not least because he wanted to be able to tell her what he had discovered about Lightfoot. Moreover, he wanted to speak to her about their future. Now that he had made his mind up to move permanently to Bamtree, it was important that they took the next step in their relationship.

  I don’t know if what we have is a relationship seeing as we haven’t had a proper courtship, but we are together and that is that.

  Now that he came to think about it, Joshua wasn’t at all sure what a proper courtship should contain. How did one go about romancing a woman?

  “I haven’t got a bloody clue,” he growled.

  “Talking to yourself again?” Daniel teased as he fell into step beside him.

  Joshua frowned at him. “Do you know how to court a woman?”

  Daniel shrugged. “I am the love them and leave them kind.”

  “Now why doesn’t that surprise me?” Joshua grinned.

  Daniel smirked unrepentantly at him. “It’s good that you are staying.”

  Joshua agreed.

  “We have work for you to do.”

  “I know. None of you can track criminals worth a damn.”

  “No, we have found prints at the window of the rectory. It appears that our thief tried to return last night and left great muddy footprints across the grass.”

  Joshua’s brows lifted. He realised then that Daniel hadn’t just fallen into step beside him by chance. He had been waiting for him to return so he could take him to the new discovery. Sure enough, when he reached the vicar’s house, Roger was waiting for them.

  “See how far they go, will you? I want that blackguard found sooner rather than later. We have checked the victims’ empty houses, the barns, outbuildi
ngs, all over the village. I have also got several armed men from the village out looking for him, but the bastard has vanished into thin air. Unless Billy is hiding him, Lightfoot must be holed up around here somewhere. I doubt he would spend a year of his life collecting a stash of the size we retrieved to just walk away and leave it behind.”

  “Where is it now?”

  “Richardson’s house, under armed guard.”

  “You put it with the women?” Joshua was horrified and made no attempt to hide it.

  “We don’t have the manpower to put several men on guard at their house, the safe house, and here. It is easier for two men to guard everything. There is one of him and two men in that house. He is outnumbered and knows it.”

  “Which is why he strikes at night,” Daniel added.

  Joshua looked at the clear imprint of a boot in the soil and sucked in a deep breath. He forced all thoughts out of his head and set to work. He kept his head down and walked in the footsteps of the murderer all the way through the woods, around fields, through the village but eventually stopped – right outside Annalisa’s house.

  “Now, what would he be after in there, do you think?” Joshua murmured thoughtfully.

  “Maybe he doesn’t realise that Annalisa and Yvette have removed anything valuable and that is in the safe house too?” Roger whispered.

  “Do you think he is in there?” Daniel asked.

  “The trail ends at the end of the garden but there isn’t any evidence of it going through the garden to the house. See this broken branch? He has gone through this in the last day. The break is still wet, see?” Joshua held the ends of the twig up for his boss. “That’s been broken recently but is too far up the tree for an animal to have caused the damage. The women are in Mr Richardson’s house. Billy has gone and is probably miles away. Have any patrols come this way?”