A Darker God

by Barbara Cleverly

  “You forget, Montacute, that as far as the world was concerned, Andrew’s estate went to his widow and, inevitably, after her death, to the nominees of her will. Go and arrest Maud’s six cousins!”

  “I’ve got one of them under lock and key … just give me time!”

  Letty was saved from hearing more skirmishing by the shrilling of the telephone.

  Montacute answered. “Markos! Oh, really?… I hope you sent … Philippos … good. Put him on, will you?

  “No, no! Stay!” he told them, grinning, as they prepared to withdraw. “You’ll want to hear this! Miss Templeton has had a visitor. She spent a compassionate five minutes with Geoffrey Melton.

  “Ah, Sergeant! Tell me all that passed …” He began to frown. “You’re sure that’s all? Just quoting lines from the play at each other? Well, I suppose it saves you having to think up conversation … And he told her to stay out of trouble with the law … she was needed onstage next week. And her release was imminent. Just being the Embassy’s mouthpiece, then. No more? How did they interact? He kicked a stool at her? Well, one can’t be surprised. Is she all right?… He called her what? A fowl without a head, did you say? Are you sure of that? Give it to me in the English he used … Ah, ‘as undisciplined as a headless chicken.’… Oh, it’s just a saying …”

  He signed off and put the receiver down.

  “Well, the news of her release has been broken. I’m wondering why Melton should have been chosen as the Bringer of Jollity. They’re not particularly friendly.”

  “That’s wonderful!” Letty said. “When may we expect to see her come home … back …?”

  “I’ve decided to leave her there for another night and get her out in the morning. Perhaps you’d come with me to spring her from jail, Miss Laetitia? She can help you with the arrangements for the funerals and the rescheduling of the performance from here. Can you get along with her in the circumstances?” he asked awkwardly. “She can be a bit difficult.”

  “Of course I can. There’s a mountain of work to be done and not much time. It’ll take two. And Thetis has established some good connections in the city. That will help. There’s no rivalry between us, you know, Inspector. No bad blood. No one’s going to have hysterics or the vapours or show their claws.”

  “I’m sincerely glad of that,” said Montacute. “Wouldn’t know where to place my money.”

  “But why leave her there overnight? If the papers are in order, you could let her out straightaway, couldn’t you? If I’m required to stay in this sorrowful house I’d be glad of company. I’d rather not be here by myself after dark.”

  “Oh, of course.” The inspector rubbed his forehead and for a moment his exhaustion showed through. His face was looking increasingly unshaven as the five o’clock shadow crept over it, darkening the hollows, and his eye had taken on a sinister depth of colour. “Sorry, I wasn’t thinking. Could be alarming, I suppose, rattling around in this great barn. I’m leaving you a constable, but I understand that while he can fight off flesh-and-blood villains, he mightn’t be much use against an attack of the heebie-jeebies and the collywobbles.”

  “And the blue funk—don’t forget that!” Letty advised kindly. “All conditions to which we females are woefully prone,” she explained to Gunning.

  The inspector looked at Gunning. “Well, that settles it. Gunning must move in. Hardly right for him to do that if you’re here by yourself, Miss Laetitia—all alone with your nyctophobia—but if Miss Templeton were here as well, you could all chaperone one another. It would be just about acceptable in the circumstances. Very well. We’ll go and get her out. While Gunning goes up the hill to fetch his kit.”

  He blinked and groaned wearily. He ran a hand through his springing black hair and touched the skin below his eye with exploratory fingers. “Lord knows what she’ll say when I arrive at the jail looking like this! Sporting all the colours of Van Gogh’s unwashed palette.”

  “Oh, if you turn up rattling a bunch of keys in your hand, I don’t think she’ll even notice,” said Letty comfortably. “And if she does—well, she’s a lady! Far too polite to draw attention to a temporary facial blemish honourably acquired in the pursuit of your professional duties.”

  “Gracious, Percy!” Thetis exclaimed cheerfully. “I could stick a frame round your head and call it ‘Sunset Over Sounion.’ What a shiner! Come inside and tell me about the exciting day you must have had. Letty! Good to see you! I say-it wasn’t yours, was it? The fist that put the inspector’s lights out?”

  Montacute sighed and ignored her. He indicated that Letty should occupy the chaperone’s chair outside the cell door and went inside, leaving the door ostentatiously open. Thetis settled down on the bed, feet together and hands folded on lap, and left him standing in the middle of the floor. She looked up eagerly. “Do you want me to sign something before you let me go? Are we off, then? May I go back to Kolonaki? Have you worked out what really happened to Maud?”

  Puzzled by the inspector’s silence, she turned to Letty. “You didn’t crush his windpipe as well, did you?”

  “We’ve all had a taxing day, one way or another, Thetis. Bear with the inspector, will you? He’s tired and trying to find words to discuss a bad situation without giving too much offence. I think.”

  “Exactly so.” Montacute nodded at Laetitia, and turned from her, effectively cutting off further contributions to the interview. Letty took a book from her bag and pretended to study it with absorption.

  She stifled a yawn as Montacute fumbled his way through the formalities of release and bail conditions. She listened with greater attention when he embarked on a summary of the lawyer’s information regarding the contents of the two wills, her eyes on Thetis’s face. Astonishment and—yes—she was quite certain—guilt in swift succession were what she detected. Thetis had been unaware. No one was that good an actress.

  “Stop!” said Thetis. “Will you repeat what you’ve just said, Percy? Forgive me—it’s a lot to take in when you announce it baldly, just like that. But perhaps it was your intention to startle?

  “So,” she said slowly, when he’d gone over the ground once more, “I’m to have a ridiculously large amount of Andrew’s money? To invest? Sorry. I’m rather shocked to hear this.”

  “So will be many people,” said the inspector. “They will ask why. What could possibly be the reason for such generosity? Why so much to a girl he’d known for so short a time? A girl not related to him by ties of blood? They may begin to speculate as to the very particular ties that linked Sir Andrew with the recipient. A passing and illicit amour? That will be the first thought. Those who have been close to the professor will reject it. There have been many such in his life, and they are not remembered in his will. What can be so special …? Their thoughts may circle back to their original consideration: a blood tie—”

  “Oh, Letty! You told him! How could you?”

  “No. Miss Laetitia did not reveal your guilty secret, Miss Templeton. I’m a detective. You seem to forget that. I detect. I’m not guessing, I’m deducing that you had told Sir Andrew that you were expecting to present him at some time in the next few months with an offspring. And by your words just now, you confirm it. Gentleman that he is, he took the appropriate steps to provide for you. Am I right in my conclusions?”

  Thetis nodded miserably. “I shouldn’t have told him. He shouldn’t have done that. I can manage. I couldn’t have known that he’d die …”

  Strange mutterings, Letty thought, were coming from Thetis. She seemed to be taking no pleasure, not even experiencing any relief, at the thought of her financial security. In her situation, with no reliable income and a child in the offing, Letty would have grabbed the money with both hands and made a run for it to somewhere congenial. The south of France was a good place for a war widow with child to live a full and pleasant life undisturbed by public opprobrium. Everyone you met down there had something to hide. Letty decided to draw a few survivors of disaster into the conversation to en
courage Thetis, when she had her by herself again. And she wondered, not for the first time, why the inspector had dragged her along to witness this disturbing scene.

  “I shall give it back … No, no, it would revert to Maud and my appalling cousins, wouldn’t it? I shall give it to charity. Such a sum would fund the new gynaecology unit at the hospital for ten years. Seems appropriate in the circumstances.” Thetis was muttering to herself and Letty had to concentrate to work out what she was saying.

  She was relieved to hear Montacute voice her own opinion: “You’re not to say that! Remember the source of the money—Merriman’s—not yours. It should be spent exactly as he wished, which is clearly in the support of his unborn child. The child, Miss Templeton! This should be your only consideration. Even knowing the man as slightly as I did, I’m ready to say he would have delighted in its existence, would have become the father that every new soul deserves.”

  Letty wriggled in her seat. The passion was rising in Montacute’s voice in what she considered an unseemly and puzzling way. He was a police officer after all, not the girl’s confessor.

  “Nonsense, Inspector! Where have you been living? Cloud-cuckoo-land? Andrew would have considered his financial contribution sufficient to expunge his guilt and responsibility and would have erased the whole affair from his mind … The man was still in love with Letty, you know—You hadn’t guessed? After all these years! Maud was certainly aware … I think even Letty suspects. No, he wasn’t thrilled when I gave him the news. He would never have mentioned the other possibility, of course … far too principled—though that is the path I decided on when I encountered his lack of enthusiasm.”

  “‘Possibility’?” Montacute seized on the word. “What do you mean? Speak plainly, woman!” His voice crackled with anger.

  Letty suddenly realised why she had been dragged along. She was the safety chain in the express train. He had known how the interview would go; in fact, he had been resolved on pushing it in a direction he had decided on and away from official witnesses and police note-takers. He had been aware that this unprofessional head-to-head confrontation, stoked as it was by unguessed-at passions, might speed madly out of hand. A timely tug on the alarm handle available to passengers in every carriage was the only gesture that could stop the express if it seemed to be running away.

  “It is by no means uncommon in these enlightened days, Inspector, for women to take matters into their own hands in such circumstances and bring them to a satisfactory conclusion.”

  With these words Thetis had lit his blue touch paper, evidently. “Satisfactory?” he bellowed. “For whom? For the poor little mite, losing its life on a backstreet abortionist’s table? The mothers lose their own lives, too, as often as not! I’ve closed down dozens of these butchers’ shops! I’ve seen the results of their activities. I forbid you to contemplate such a double murder. For such it would be.”

  “I had in mind something a little more civilised,” retorted Thetis, refusing to respond to his rage. “A Swiss clinic … something of that nature.”

  “The same butcher’s shop but with white uniforms and ether instead of sacking and brandy,” he growled. “Have you no regard for new life? The child is there. It exists. It will grow into a person worth having. It is a gift and you might one day, if you can curb your scything tongue and learn a few pleasant ways, find a father to share it with you. A good man who would love it as his own—”

  “Fat chance!” Thetis rolled her eyes and sighed. “There are no such saints in this world.”

  “Bloody well are!” Montacute snarled shockingly. “I’ve known one! The best!”

  As he seemed about to take hold of Thetis and shake her—or worse—Letty pulled the handle.

  The two women listened as Percy stomped away down the corridor. He had calmed himself at once at the pressure of Letty’s hand on his arm and, mumbling an apology for his ill-considered language, granted them a few minutes’ private conversation. Letty settled down next to Thetis on the bed.

  “Thetis, are you going to tell me why you were lying to the inspector? And to me? I rather expect to be lied to, but I’m amazed that you should try it on with old Eagle-Eye.”

  “Lying, Letty? I’m not sure—”

  “Come off it! It doesn’t exist, does it? You’re not pregnant—not the slightest bit! Were you deceiving poor Andrew in order to—what’s the word?—shake him down? Bet that’s it! He was halfway to divorcing Maud anyway … he just needed a bit of a push. Maud was the stick. And you provided the carrot.”

  Thetis looked at her in surprise. She gulped. Tears began to trickle down her pale cheeks. Letty did not look away. Actresses, she understood, were adept at this sort of thing.

  “How did you guess?” Thetis whispered faintly.

  “Not difficult. Had I been desperate and in your position, it’s just the sort of underhand trick I can see myself playing. I’d have told myself, if conscience had troubled me, that I would be giving Andrew exactly what he had always wanted and a much happier situation. I might even have believed it. It might even have been true.”

  “No. You mistake me. I meant—how did you guess I wasn’t pregnant?”

  “What? Don’t be so thick, Thetis! Crikey, I’d thought you an effective conspirator and woman of the world, but I begin to change my mind. You’re really nothing but an amateur. You invite me to hunt through your undies in the bag in which you’ve packed your contraceptive device. Latest model! Well, that gave me pause for thought, after your revelations the night before. And then you come down to breakfast and tuck into scrambled eggs, goat’s milk, bread and honey … coffee … and Lord knows what else you mightn’t have put away if the inspector hadn’t interrupted. You don’t behave like any other woman I’ve ever seen a few weeks into a pregnancy!”

  “Ah! I couldn’t resist the scrambled eggs!” Thetis smiled and dabbed at her tears. “I should have accepted a small crust of dry bread and a cup of herb tea. The device, as you call it—I’d forgotten it was in there. Hadn’t used it in ages. They’re jolly messy and notoriously fallible anyway. I decided to become pregnant. And, Letty—all the signs were there! For a time. But, perhaps I willed it so. If there was deceit, I was myself deceived before anyone.”

  “It’s the power of the mind,” Letty said with a rush of pity. “I’m constantly told. It can harm or heal without our consciously willing it. Even women—perhaps especially women, it’s asserted—fall unwitting victim to unseen mental forces. But you have a much deeper medical knowledge than I … you must know this?”

  Thetis admitted as much with a wry smile. “It’s called ‘amenorrhoea.’ You’ll find it in any medical textbook. You’ll find it amongst battlefield nurses. The stress, of course. It can come as an astonishing but blessed relief. But it never occurred to me that this phantasma was presenting itself to me. Why would it? No bombs. No shells. No screams. No blood.”

  “No physical stress, I agree, but I say again: The mind exerts its own powerful control over our bodies. As does guilt,” she thought it right to add.

  “I wanted it to be so,” Thetis whispered. She shuddered. “All that rubbish I had to listen to from Montacute! The even worse rubbish I had to repeat to him! Trapped by my own lies. Regret that! Now he thinks I’m a monster. When … the reverse is true … I’d give my own life to save a baby’s … any baby’s … Truth is, Letty, I’m rather desperate to have a child.” She turned eyes dark with pain on Letty’s shocked face. “You’ve no idea how heart-wrenching it is to work every day with the newborn scraps! I can save them, cuddle them, love them, but they aren’t mine. I desperately want to hold one of my own. Can’t explain it. It’s a feeling that takes you over, consumes you. Nothing you can do to fight back.”

  “Have you spoken of this to anyone?”

  “I’m alarming you, aren’t I? I’m sorry! A blurted confession to a passing acquaintance in a prison cell—it’s not exactly the right way of going about things these days, is it? I should be reclining on a tapest
ried chaise longue whispering my thoughts to a cigar-smoking, bewhiskered old gent who’ll say, ‘There, there … You’re suffering from a touch of hysteria, my dear.’” Thetis gave a snort of derision. “Who would understand? No one would be prepared even to listen, Letty. You clearly don’t want to hear this but at least you’re not hurrying away in disgust.”

  “I hope you’ll think of me as a friend, Thetis, and allow me to say: Wouldn’t it be a good idea to distance yourself from daily reminders of what you long for?”

  “No!” The exclamation was shocking in its intensity. “I won’t give up my hospital work … It’s what I’m good at. I do believe I’m achieving something. I’m not just meddling—do-gooding—standing by with the jug of hot water, you know, Letty! I observe, I reason, I record. I’m going to write a book to challenge the whole ethos of the so-called experts. You can’t understand! The ignorance! The unconcern! The waste of life!”

  Uneasy and not perfectly comprehending such violent emotions, Letty asked calmly: “So, you chose Andrew to complete your schemes?”

  “It didn’t feel like scheming, if that’s what you’re suggesting. But, yes—Andrew, I’m sure I don’t need to spell it out for you, would have been the most enchanting of fathers. And, I had thought, a wonderful husband.” Thetis looked away, hiding any glimpse of a sudden self-awareness from Letty, but Letty’s sharp ears picked up the slight overemphasis in her tone as she struggled on: “I was very fond of him. Truly. But how can I begin to tell that Puritan out there that my sinning was not the result of overwhelming temptation—it was committed with malice aforethought? And then the fruits of it lied about? He’ll assume I fabricated the whole thing to avoid a murder charge. He’d be counting the Commandments I’ve broken on the fingers of two hands! I’d be consumed in an outpouring of fire and brimstone.”