‘Down there,’ said Inspector Bottomley suddenly passing the glasses to Luff. ‘Coming down from behind Broadcourt.’
‘Could be.’
‘Right, look sharp, Sergeant.’
Mrs Lemming, sitting under the mulberry tree in the garden of the guest-house in the middle of the afternoon, stringing beans for supper, leaned forwards towards Mrs Clutton Brock and said confidentially, ‘I hear they’ve released Tom Bough without charging him.’
Mrs Clutton Brock continued to peel potatoes. ‘They couldn’t have had much of a case against him.’
‘I thought your husband said he saw him leave the garden about a quarter to five and move off towards the pool?’
‘We were busy practising at the time. He may have been mistaken.’
‘Wouldn’t it have been better to have said so to the police when they questioned you the first time round?’
‘I rather feel it’s for the police to sort these things out.’
Mrs Lemming was scandalised by such casualness. ‘But if Tom didn’t kill Ruth Swallow, who did?’
Mrs Clutton Brock raised her head from her potato-peeling, looked Mrs Lemming full in the eye and said, ‘Your guess is as good as mine.’
Mrs Lemming felt her efforts were not producing the effect she wanted. ‘I also hear,’ she upped her stake, ‘that Canon Tussock’s money will come to Guy Tussock and Angus hopes he will donate a bit to the foundation to keep it going instead of becoming a heritage centre. I heard Miss Braithwaite tell Angus.’
‘They’ll have to find him first.’ Mrs Clutton Brock was curt. ‘Then he’ll have to prove he didn’t kill Ruth.’
‘You don’t think he’s been murdered too, do you?’
Mrs Clutton Brock had had enough. She took her peeler and went into the kitchen. For a moment she stood irresolute and then turned towards the dining-room where she expected to find Theodora laying the table. She felt the time had come. She put her head round the door. The room was empty. Reluctantly she began to mount the stairs to where she knew her husband would be waiting.
The track was steeper than Theodora remembered it. At one point it divided and she hesitated. Then she noticed the trail of oil in the grass and flattened turf. Further on she saw a couple of empty lager cans of recent date and thus encouraged pressed on. She was sweating with the effort. She’d missed lunch and swung off down to the village to the phone booth.
It had taken time. A large woman with two infants in a pushchair was making a long relaxed call which involved much laughter and many a false hope raised before she relinquished the instrument. Theodora had got hold of Broadbent and Helliwell and after much toing and froing (‘the senior partner is out to lunch’), she’d elicited the fact that as far as they knew, no one had made any inquiries about the content of the Tussock will except the grandson Guy. Theodora didn’t know whether she was glad or sorry at the information. If Clutton Brock didn’t know about Ruth’s parentage did this mean that he had no motive for murder? If he had known, it was just conceivable he was mad enough to want to destroy a descendant of Tussock as the enemy of his friend Bellaire. Or else perhaps he felt so strongly about the need to keep St Sylvan’s going that financing it through the killing of the main legatee was a feasible option for him. But if neither of these held, then it was difficult to see why Clutton Brock should want to kill Ruth Swallow. So, Theodora admitted reluctantly, that left Guy.
In the far distance she could hear every now and then a burst of music or the cries of children and animals. Then the trees closed in again and the sound disappeared. She looked at her watch. It was six p.m. She really ought to be at St Sylvan’s in the kitchen helping with the supper preparations. Angus had once more expressed his thanks to the ‘women folk’ (his words) for helping out in the kitchen. But his promise to get help from the village had come to nothing. The women’s retreat was therefore one of perpetual meal provision. For the gargantuan preparations necessary to feed the guests on Friday after the festal Eucharist for St Sylvan’s Day, however, he had secured Mrs Turk, he assured them triumphantly. ‘She’s a considerable woman,’ he said in Scottish. It seemed, thought Theodora, to be the locally agreed description of Mrs T.
Theodora had embarked on her hunt for Guy, weighed down with guilt at proper work neglected in order to chase chimeras. Why had she not been content to let Inspector Bottomley do the hunting? She did rather fear that something very like professional rivalry might be her motive, which was ridiculous. She was a deacon not a sleuth. But then, she had to admit, she liked Guy. She desperately did not want him to be schizophrenic or deranged in some way enough to have been responsible for killing a fellow human being. These had been the impulses which had driven her up and down the lanes of St Sylvan’s all afternoon inquiring for ‘A young man with a yellow mountain bike.’ She’d met much civility and genuine interest. ‘Lost your lover, dearie?’ was the worst she had had to cope with. But no one had any news of him. Finally she’d had a brainwave.
She pressed on up the track. The trees thinned and parted. She rounded the bend and there before her in the clearing was Bob Bough’s singular cottage. Parked beside it was a large dignifiedlooking ambulance with a dragon painted on its back doors. Grouped round it she could see Bob Bough talking to a man in a brown gaberdine, his hair gathered in the nape of his neck in a neat queue. Sitting on the back step of the vehicle was Guy, eating a sandwich and stroking an interested-looking Jack Russell.
‘Guy.’
Guy did his imitation of a vole, jumped visibly and looked as though he might bolt back into the van. Then he recognised Theodora.
‘Hi. Nice to see you. Have a sandwich.’
Theodora looked at it but in spite of her lack of lunch decided against it.
‘Guy, you really need to see the …’
Even as she spoke there was a clamour of dogs barking, horns blaring, children screaming, engines revving and amongst it all the alien, unmistakable sound of a police siren. Damn, thought Theodora, damn, damn, damn.
Inspector Bottomley’s figure could be seen standing beside one of the three (how on earth had they got three into the forest?) police cars. Theodora swam through the sea of children and dogs. ‘Couldn’t we …?’ she began.
Frederika Bottomley turned a sisterly face towards her. ‘Sorry, love,’ she said with genuine regret. ‘We have our rule book, just like you’ve got yours. Got to have this lot for questioning and it’s really much more sensible to do that somewhere quiet like Wormald police station.’
There was practically no one for supper. Angus had sent his apologies. He had a sermon to prepare for tomorrow. Guy was, of course, otherwise engaged. Neither of the Clutton Brocks put in an appearance. Canon Beagle said grace and Theodora and Mrs Lemming avoided each other’s eye across the table during the silent meal. Never had Theodora found silence so little comfort. She badly wanted to discuss matters with someone sane and rational. For the first time for three days she thought of Geoffrey. She was almost minded to try and ring him this evening. But the idea of making another trek to the phone booth was too much for her, and then, she reflected, having lasted out this far it would be a pity to give way to temptation. She planned instead to give herself the pleasure of an evening meditation by the well.
As soon as Canon Beagle had said the concluding grace she cleared the table as fast as only an ex-English girls’ boarding school prefect could and washed up in the empty kitchen. Mrs Lemming did not mind preparing meals, Theodora noticed, but she was less persevering at finishing things afterwards. The clock’s ticking was her only company. As she worked equanimity returned. Her thinking became more orderly and she felt impatience slipping away.
It was just a matter of getting things in the right order, she told herself as she stepped out into the garden and followed the path towards the well. The sun was beginning to set and the smells of evening were making themselves felt. There was a watery smell of moss on boulders and the dry incense of leaves rec
ently fallen to the ground and crushed underfoot. It was possible for a moment to feel autumn and the end of summer, Theodora reflected. The weather too was beginning to change. It was cooler with a light breeze and an accumulation of clouds on the horizon. The last few steps up to the edge of the terrace round the well were wet and slippery. She negotiated them with care. Once on the terrace she stopped to take off her sandals and walked slowly and barefooted towards the deer plaque. The shadow of the ilex enclosed her.
She tried to give herself entirely to the moment, to empty her mind of everything except the beauty of the place and its consoling silence. But thoughts darted in and out of her mind like unruly fish. Of course, if the money from Tussock were to go to Guy in the event of Ruth’s death, then the case for Guy having a powerful motive for wanting Ruth dead was, as Canon Beagle implied, a perfectly reasonable one. And Guy was an oddity, he was jokey, and unpredictable. He had known about and indeed pointed her in the direction of the will. Why had he done that, if he were guilty?
Theodora paced slowly round the edge of the well. The shadows of clouds scudded across the surface of the water. She watched the reflection of the ilex darken. It would be so easy to be hypnotised by the play of light and dark. The water rippled and mantled in a sudden breeze. What did it taste like? she wondered idly. She’d never got round to finding out. She knelt down and cupped her hands. The sound of the rock descending from a height caught her ear even as she felt the blow on the back of her head. In the far distance, as it seemed, she heard a man’s voice shouting. The words she heard were ‘Women pollute the sanctuary.’
‘It was really very fortunate the police let Tom Bough go,’ said Miss Broad to Mrs Lemming as she sliced and buttered scones on the kitchen table, in one fluent movement, ‘Otherwise Theodora would have undoubtedly been killed.’
‘How did Tom know to be there?’ enquired Mrs Lemming.
‘The police let out that it was Clutton Brock who’d said he’d seen him going up to the pool. Well, Tom knew he hadn’t been so he might be lying in other matters. So he thought he’d just come back and prowl round a bit.’
‘Did he know Clutton Brock was barking mad, do you suppose?’
‘Well,’ Miss Broad’s voice was hushed, ‘we none of us knew that. After all, to feel so strongly about women or place.’
‘But they do, they do. Or some of them do. My own husband talks about “man being the head of woman” and it not being appropriate for women to do anything very much, as far as I can make out.’
‘It goes very deep,’ Miss Broad agreed. ‘We are,’ she held up her bread knife, ‘we are a sort of pollution, a walking blasphemy. Women in the wrong place. It must have been torture for him to watch Theodora serving in the chapel at the Eucharist day after day.’
‘Well, at least we’re in the right place now. I don’t notice anyone queuing up to usurp this ministry.’ Mrs Lemming transferred her skills to cutting and arranging potted-meat sandwiches.
‘And he really thought Ruth was Theodora?’
‘I think the mentally deranged really do not physically see as clearly as the rest of us. It impairs all the faculties. It’s both cause and result of their disease.’ Mrs Lemming was knowledgeable.
‘They are quite like each other. Same age and colouring. Same height. And, of course, this habit the young have of dressing in denim all the time. It would be hard to tell t’other from which from behind in the shade of the ilex,’ Miss Broad agreed.
‘I do feel for Lavinia,’ Mrs Lemming murmured, changing from potted meat to tomato.
‘Well, she married him,’ said Miss Broad from her comfortable spinsterhood.
‘We don’t always know how it will turn out,’ said Mrs Lemming, married to Norman in Tunbridge Wells.
‘Can I keep the skull?’ Guy asked Angus as he helped him to polish the brass alter candlesticks in readiness for the morrow. Guy had turned up for luncheon and showed every sign of a healthy appetite. The insulting windows of the chapel allowed the afternoon light to fall on the two of them as they sat in a pew in the choir and swapped Brasso and rags.
Angus felt he had had quite enough of Guy. Then he remembered the will and his real gratitude. ‘Aye. If it’d please you.’
‘Whose is it?’ Guy enquired.
‘It’s no real. It’s plastic. It used to be in Augustine’s study. Augustine had a theatrical liking for such memento mori. Later it went into the vestry where, I expect, Mrs Clutton Brock picked it up.’
‘But the nail’s real.’ Guy was anxious for reality.
‘Oh aye, real enough.’
‘And she put it there to warn her husband?’
‘He was one of Augustine’s young men.’ Angus was dour.
‘And she really thought the appalling Victor had designs on me?’
‘She feared the atmosphere, the ghosts of the place. It was a shot across the bows.’
‘I don’t think I’m that way inclined,’ Guy giggled nervously. ‘I haven’t really found out yet.’
‘Ye’d do well to fast and pray,’ said Angus severely. ‘It’s no a matter for joking. I hope you dinna want to keep the cope?’
‘It’s pretty sumptuous, isn’t it? I wouldn’t mind.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
St Sylvan’s Day
‘The end of the pilgrimage is the end of life,’ said Angus. He glanced along the faces in the front row. They were mostly very senior clergy not in their first youth. Not a collection of alert intelligences, he would have to admit, and drowsy after the exertions of the previous couple of hours. They’d be wanting their tea no doubt.
Bishop Peake was centre stage, his face set and angry from his encounter with Guy Tussock. He couldn’t remember when he’d had so unsatisfactory a conversation with anyone. The youth simply didn’t seem to realise how very senior he was. He’d told the boy, ‘It is not the wish of the senior clergy of this diocese that St Sylvan’s should continue in its present form. We have agreed to sell to Modern Heritage—’ Guy hadn’t bothered to wait for him to finish his sentence. ‘Grandad’s millions are going to St Sylvan’s Trust. If they’ve got the dosh, you can’t sell them up. The lawyers say so. Grandad liked the place. I like the place. Nothing on earth would make me turn parson. Actually,’ he’d leaned close to the Bishop and said confidentially, ‘actually I think Buddhism has it over Christianity every time. I’m practising like mad. You should see my lotus.’ The Bishop had blanched. ‘We shall have to see about that,’ he’d said. Those who knew Francis Peake well could have told Guy that the Bishop only used that form of words when he knew he was beaten.
Guy looked round the assembly. Angus was preaching from below the deer plaque. They’d had their Eucharist in the chapel and then processed to the well, swinging their incense, the cross guiding them. They were beautifully turned out, he had to admit. Angus’s own church choir had made a good noise. The Bishop had celebrated clad in Augustine’s cope. The white silk hounds leaped up his back ever stretching for the golden head of the deer. Guy wondered what they’d got for tea. Religion always made him hungry.
Mrs Turk, in the back row, thought of Ruth. The girl hadn’t done much in her life but she had been someone. She’d shown quality. She was a proper offspring of the Turks. Someone to be proud of. They’d not always seen eye to eye, she and her niece, but they’d known each other’s worth. Let’s hope it won’t all be for nothing, Mrs Turk thought. She cast her eye over the assembly, counted heads and mentally calculated sausage roll numbers. Just enough, she reckoned, and first-class too. Quite like old times. She enjoyed a get together, all sorts mixing and eating companionably. She wondered what Inspector Bottomley, three places to her left, made of it all. Not a local family, the Bottomleys. Still, she was very welcome for the festival.
‘If our pilgrimage does not change us,’ Angus was saying, ‘if we do not learn to want to be different and learn how to be different, then that pilgrimage has been in vain.’
Mrs Lemmi
ng in the second row, thought, I’m bad for Norman. I make myself a victim and so I make him a bully. In future he will have to do with less of me. I shall enrol at Tunbridge Wells Tech for an art course. I’ve always fancied ceramics. And next year I’ll bring Norman along here too and see if he can’t change a bit as well. The resolution pleased her so much that she turned and smiled at Canon Beagle parked next to her in his wheelchair.
Canon Beagle turned his head stiffly towards her and smiled back. She wasn’t a bad-looking woman when she smiled. He felt the joints in his shoulders twinge at the strain. The arthritis was gaining, no doubt about that. Soon he’d be, he had to admit it, completely dependent on others. Well, it was as good a preparation for death as possible. It was a pity he was leaving the church in such a messy state. But he was sure he’d done his bit. He was sure that Providence would prosper the work of his hand. It wouldn’t, it couldn’t all be in vain.
‘It seems to be a paradox of Christian pilgrimage that those who stand still go furthest in their journey,’ Angus was saying. ‘“Qui restitit ei pax datur” is written above us.’ Angus was winding up for his peroration. ‘It is self-knowledge which we seek and self-knowledge which, if we courageously allow it, will lead us on from truth to truth until we reach the last Truth of all, God, the fountain of all peace.’
He’s going above their heads, thought Martha Broad. She was well back in the body of the congregation. The chapel in which they had worshipped was on land the gift of her family. She, though newly in priests’ orders, had not been invited to concelebrate. She lifted her eyes to the hills. On each one, there could be seen the blue smoke of fires kindled by the travellers encamped like the Pictish hordes of St Sylvan’s own day. The smell of chickens and rabbits mixed with that of nut roast. They had come, as she had seen them do year after year since she was a girl, driving their goats and chickens in front of them, with their scrawny horses unused to the bit and their large women sunk in their pregnancies. Why on earth do they come? What had Christianity to say to them? Martha Broad wondered. Every now and again a burst of shouting or music or dogs barking would puncture the air and remind the pious assembly below that theirs was not the only society. There were other possibilities. Fewer possessions, less oppression, less hierarchy, less struggle, less unkindness, the Reverend the Honourable Martha Broad thought, and for a moment was almost tempted. She looked across at Theodora, sitting further down the same row, her head swathed in bandages. Her pilgrimage will be longer than mine, she thought. Will it get any better for her?
Every Deadly Sin Page 16