‘You think you’re pretty hot at pulling girls?’
‘There’s no think about it,’ Hodges said.
Yes, I can see it, Higgins thought. To me he might seem a snivelling little shit whose face I’d take the greatest pleasure in rearranging, but a lot of young girls might well find him attractive.
‘So you pretty much let the girls have their own way until they give you what you want. Isn’t that what you said?’ he asked.
‘That’s right.’
‘And did Mary give you what you wanted?’
‘No.’
‘No, she didn’t, did she? We know you didn’t get what you wanted, because she died a virgin. Was it when she told you she wasn’t going to spread her legs for you that you lost your temper and killed her!’
‘No,’ Hodges said, ‘I didn’t kill her. Apart from her pressing up against me on the bike, and the odd necking session, I never even touched her.’
‘Tell me what happened that day, then,’ Higgins suggested.
‘We went to the hall. It cost eight pounds to get in, and I paid it all, because she never had any money. We went to the woods.’ Barry paused. ‘There’s something I should tell you about what had happened before.’
‘Go on.’
‘The Sunday before last Sunday, I’d told her that I was going to break up with her.’
‘Because she’d been taking too long to start being nice to you?’
‘Yes.’
‘So what happened?’
‘She cried a bit, then she said if that was really what I wanted, she’d go along with it the next Sunday.’
‘That’s last Sunday, the Sunday on which she died, that we’re talking about now?’
‘Yes.’
‘So when you went into the woods last Sunday, you really thought you were about to get your end away?’
‘Yes.’
‘And what actually happened?’
‘She said she’d been talking it through with this man – a trustee, I think she said he was …’
‘A trustee of what?’
‘I don’t know. She didn’t explain. I think he was the feller who the family went to for advice.’
‘And what did this trustee say?’
‘He told her she couldn’t do it with me.’
‘So what happened then?’
‘I said that if that was how things were, she could bloody well find her own way home.’
‘You said it all quite calmly?’
‘Yes.’
‘You didn’t lose your temper at any point?’
‘No. Why would I? So what if she wouldn’t come across. There are plenty of other fish in the sea.’
‘I see,’ Higgins said. ‘Well, thank you for explaining that to me. Would you mind if I asked one personal question, just for my own satisfaction?’
‘Err … yes,’ Hodges said cautiously.
‘I can understand you strangling her …’
‘I didn’t …’
‘Just let me finish, lad. I can understand you strangling her – in my opinion, there was plenty of provocation, and I might have done the same in your shoes – but what I don’t understand is why, after that, you should flush out her vagina with hot tea.’
‘What?’ Hodges asked, his complexion turning a light shade of green.
‘I don’t see why you should want to give her pussy a scalding hot PG Tips shampoo,’ Higgins said calmly.
Hodges rose shakily to his feet, and staggered towards the door. He was only halfway there when his body suddenly jack-knifed, and he was violently sick all over the floor.
The solicitor looked at DS Higgins over the top of his half-moon glasses.
‘Either my client is the greatest actor since the young Olivier first trod the boards,’ he drawled, ‘or what you’ve just said is complete news to him.’
George Oppenheimer looked cautiously around the public bar of the Drum and Monkey.
‘Do you guys really use this place?’ he asked, dubiously, as if he thought this was no more than an elaborate practical joke.
‘Yes, we use it all the time,’ Beresford assured him.
‘What would you like to drink, George?’ Crane asked.
‘A sarsaparilla would be good,’ Oppenheimer said.
‘In the Drum, a sarsaparilla would be more than good – it would be a bloody miracle,’ Beresford said. ‘Would you settle for a glass of lemonade?’
‘I guess,’ Oppenheimer said, though he did not sound totally convinced of the wisdom of agreeing.
‘So tell us about the Hidden,’ Colin Beresford said, once the drinks had arrived.
‘Sure,’ Oppenheimer agreed, ‘but first I have to put things into context.’ He took a sip of his lemonade, and pulled a face. ‘It’s kinda like 7UP, but only kinda, if you know what I mean,’ he said to Crane, as if he had come to regard the detective constable as his protector in the hostile universe which seemed to exist beyond the bounds of Oxford. ‘Are you sure it’s all right to drink it?’
‘It’s all right,’ Crane said.
‘OK,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘I assume that you’re all familiar with the Book of Job?’
‘I am,’ Crane said.
‘I thought you were an atheist, Jack,’ Kate Meadows said, her amusement obvious. ‘Or do you just say you are because you think it gives you a certain intellectual air?’
‘I am an atheist,’ Crane said, ‘but once, in the golden days before I immersed myself in this sewer we affectionately call the Mid Lancs police force, I was also a student of literature. And that is what the Book of Job is – great literature which is used to convey great nonsense.’
‘So, since we all know everything there is to know about the book—’ Oppenheimer said.
‘We don’t,’ Beresford interrupted him. ‘Sergeant Meadows and I know sod all about it.’
‘Really?’ Oppenheimer asked.
‘Really,’ Beresford confirmed.
‘OK, so the Book of Job opens with Job himself. Believe me, the guy has got it made – he’s got a fine strong family, and is as rich as Rockefeller.’ He paused. ‘That’s an American millionaire.’
‘We know who Rockefeller is,’ Beresford said.
‘And yet you don’t know the Book of Job,’ Oppenheimer mused. ‘How weird is that?’ He took another sip of his lemonade. He seemed to be getting used to it. ‘Anyway, the scene shifts, and we’re on God’s front porch up in heaven, where God is talking to Satan. “He’s got a pretty high opinion of me, this guy Job, don’t you think?” God says. “Oh sure, give a guy everything he wants, and he’ll be real pious when he’s talking about his god,” Satan says. “Drop him in the shit, and it’ll be quite a different matter”.’ He paused. ‘I’m deliberately using the modern parlance to make it easier for you to follow.’
‘We appreciate that, and we’re very grateful,’ Meadows said.
‘I just don’t see how it fits in with these Hidden people of yours,’ Beresford said.
‘You will, if you’re patient,’ Oppenheimer promised him. ‘Now, where was I?’
‘God and Satan are on God’s front porch,’ Crane prompted.
‘Oh, yeah. They agree to carry out what you might call a social experiment. God gives Satan permission to kill Job’s kids, strip him of his wealth and cover him with boils. Job does lose his faith for a while, but then he gets it back stronger than ever, and everything that’s been taken from him is restored. Job’s happy because he’s got it all back, God’s happy because he’s won his bet, and the only one who’s really pissed off is Satan.’
‘The Hidden?’ Beresford prodded.
‘Their story is in some ways the same as Job’s, but in some ways very different,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘It begins with another dialogue between God and Satan. God says that His people love Him, and Satan says, sure they do, because you’re all-powerful, and who wants to cross someone who’s all-powerful. But give up the power yourself – and let them have it instead – and it’s a whole differen
t story. “You want me to make them gods?” God asks. “Are you some kind of crazy man?” “No,” Satan says, “I don’t want you to make them gods, I just want you to give them the power to stop you from being God, if that’s what they want to do”.’
‘This is getting stranger and stranger,’ Meadows said.
‘It’s no stranger than believing that a wafer can be turned into the body of Christ,’ Oppenheimer said mildly. ‘Anyway, the Hidden see themselves as people with that power. And the source of that power is that when there are enough of them in one small geographical area – say, a few city blocks – the inner light of purity which each of them has combines with the light of all the others to make a beacon bright enough to lead God to earth.’
‘God couldn’t get here without the light?’ Beresford asked.
‘Indeed, that’s the whole point – that’s the way in which, after His discussion with the devil, God handed the power over to them. But it’s maintaining that hidden light – that purity – which is the problem.’
‘I’m beginning to see how this explains their behaviour,’ Crane said, excitedly.
‘That must be your university education, then, because I’m still completely in the dark,’ Beresford said, dourly.
‘The Hidden are not allowed to live anywhere isolated, like a commune in backwoods Oregon,’ Oppenheimer said, ‘because it would be too easy for Satan’s agents to locate them there.’
‘And Satan’s agents are looking for them?’
‘Of course! They are constantly searching them out, because if they can destroy the inner light, they leave God totally powerless. And in order to avoid detection, the bearers of the light have chosen to be hidden in plain sight – but there’s one big drawback to that.’
‘How many of them are there in total?’ Beresford interrupted.
Meadows rolled her eyes, as if to say, ‘There goes Shagger, off at a tangent again.’
‘I have absolutely no idea how many of them there are out there,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘Until I heard what John Green had to say, I didn’t know if they even still existed.’
DS Higgins checked over both shoulders, then broke the police seal on the Greens’ front door, opened the door, and stepped quickly inside.
If, later, someone involved in the investigation raised the issue of the broken seal, he could always suggest it was the work of vandals, he thought.
In fact, if anybody on the street had seen him entering the house, and reported him, he could actually use the broken seal as an alibi.
‘What business had you entering the house, DS Higgins?’
‘I was walking past when I noticed the seal was broken, sir, and it occurred to me that someone – maybe even the person who killed Mary Green – might be inside.’
Ignoring the ground floor, he went straight up the stairs, slipping on gloves as he did so. Three bedrooms led off the tiny landing. It should have been easy to work out which one was Mary’s bedroom, because most girls – especially most seventeen-year-old girls – stamped their emerging personalities on their rooms with a determination which bordered on adolescent hysteria.
But it wasn’t like that here – all three bedrooms were decorated and furnished in the same bland manner as the rest of the house, and it was not until he had checked the dressing table drawers in the middle one that he was sure that was where Mary had slept.
Two minutes later, he was back on the street, walking briskly away from the crime scene.
Well, that was phase one completed successfully, he told himself. Now it was time for phase two.
‘Virtually everything we ever learned about the Hidden is a result of a civil suit, filed in Philadelphia at the end of the last century,’ George Oppenheimer said. ‘The guy who founded the Hidden was a robber baron called William McGregor, who’d made a fortune in steel and railways, you see. When he died, he left most of his money to the Hidden. His family contested the will, and it went to court, and, of course, all the details of its beliefs came out during cross examination.’
‘How did the court rule?’ Crane asked.
‘It ruled in favour of the Hidden,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘Anyway, as I was saying earlier …’
‘Before you were so rudely interrupted by our esteemed leader,’ Meadows said – almost under her breath.
‘… there’s one big drawback to being hidden in plain sight.’
‘And what’s that?’ Beresford wondered.
‘For their combined inner lights to shine brightly enough on what I like to think of as God’s landing strip, they have to be very virtuous,’ George Oppenheimer said, ‘but it is hard to maintain your virtue when you are surrounded by so much corruption.’
‘So while they’re in society in a physical sense, they try not to be affected by it in any emotional or spiritual sense,’ Crane said.
‘Exactly! The children go to school, because if they didn’t, it would attract the interest of the authorities – and hence the ever vigilant interest of Satan’s angels. But they are instructed to learn just enough to get by. If you like, it’s a bit like taking a slow poison – restrict your intake, and you’ll probably survive, swallow too much and you’re dead.’
‘But the adults aren’t in danger of being poisoned at work – because they don’t work!’ Beresford said.
‘Just so! They didn’t work in William McGregor’s time, and from what you’ve discovered, DS Meadows, it would seem that they still don’t. Of course, in the interest of not arousing suspicion, they pretend that they work.’
Meadows remembered Mr Green’s boiler suit, which, unlike most boiler suits, didn’t have a company logo.
‘But how can they get by if they don’t work?’ she asked. ‘Everybody needs money.’
‘The Hidden will have plenty of money,’ Oppenheimer told her. ‘McGregor left them millions, and that must have grown into billions by now. I don’t know how the trust in Philadelphia gets the money to them, but you can be certain that there’ll be a way.’
‘Why did Roger Smith have a television set in his front room?’ Meadows asked, out of the blue.
‘What do you mean?’ Oppenheimer asked.
‘The Greens and Mrs Brown didn’t have television sets. I assume that’s to isolate them from the outside world?’
‘Yes, it probably is. There were no televisions in William McGregor’s time, so, of course, there were no rules against them, but members of the Hidden were not allowed to read newspapers or magazines, nor go to the theatre, which is pretty much the same thing.’
‘So why did Roger Smith have a television set in his front room?’ Meadows repeated.
‘That’s probably because he’s one of the Trusted Ones.’
‘You’ve used that term before. Would you like to explain what it means?’ Crane asked.
‘The Hidden try to isolate themselves from the outside world as much as possible, but they must have some dealings with it – or rather, some of them must have some dealings with it. The ones who do this are called the Trusted Ones, because they are the strong ones – the ones who can be trusted to immerse themselves in the corruption without it polluting them. In fact, it’s not only their job to come into contact with the outside world – they also have to understand it, so they can predict how it will react, and thus know how to guide their people.’
‘And in order to understand the world as it is, it’s necessary for them to watch television,’ Meadows said.
‘Exactly. It’s a job of the Trusted Ones to get the Hidden to act as if they were normal, without, of course, them actually being normal.’
But because the Trusted Ones weren’t fully part of the real world either, they didn’t get it quite right, thought Meadows, picturing the front parlours which looked more like film sets than rooms in normal houses.
‘To sum up, I wouldn’t exactly call the Trusted Ones robot masters – but they come pretty damn close to it,’ Oppenheimer said.
Meadows remembered breaking the news of Mary Green’s dea
th to her parents, and how they had seemed totally incapable of dealing with it. But was that surprising, when they had been trained to take no decisions of their own?
‘John Green told me he wasn’t a Trusted One,’ she said to Oppenheimer. ‘Was he lying to me?’
‘No, it was stupid of me even to suggest that he was – though it seems to have worked out well in the end,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘What I’d forgotten, you see, is that you can’t be a Trusted One until you turn twenty-one. But though he doesn’t hold that post, I have absolutely no doubt that he was training for it.’
And that was where all his confidence came from, Meadows thought. In a way, it was understandable – if you were plucked from the crowd and told by everyone that you were special, it was hard not to start to believe it yourself.
‘If I remember rightly, you told me that he and two other boys were playing some kind of game with Roger Smith the day Mary Green was killed,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘That was almost certainly a way of camouflaging a training session.’
‘Let’s cut to the chase,’ said Beresford, who had decided there’d been far too much airy-fairy discussion. ‘It doesn’t sound to me like the kind of cult that would practice ritual sacrifice. Is that right?’
‘Anything’s possible,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘It’s eighty years since we’ve had a clear picture of them, and in that time, a lot of things could have changed. But given their founding rules and principles, I doubt the Hidden would ever have got to the point where they considered the spilling of blood in a ritualistic way to be a good thing.’
‘Whoever killed Mary Green washed her vagina out with tea,’ Beresford said. ‘Could that be part of a ritual?’
‘If it is, it’s not a ritual I’ve heard of. In fact, the Hidden don’t really have rituals, because rituals tend to be practiced when a group is gathered together – and their whole point, because they are the Hidden, is to have as little direct contact with each other as possible.’
‘But they wouldn’t have liked Mary Green seeing someone who wasn’t a member of the group, would they?’
‘It’s a tad stronger than “wouldn’t like”,’ Oppenheimer said. ‘They would have seen it as a definite threat to their survival – and that means, of course, to God’s survival.’
The Hidden Page 19