Unholy Writ

by David Williams

  ‘How super,’ said Miss Goodbody – and then wished she hadn’t.

  ‘But there must be some contemporary references of interest to us today.’ This was Treasure.

  ‘Yes, and I had the idea we might edit the thing down to one volume for publishing – but it’ll be damn slim when the smut’s cut out.’

  ‘That reminds me, Arthur,’ Elizabeth Moonlight broke in ‘since we were an odd number tonight I invited that nice Mr Dankton to join us for dinner. He’ll be a little late because he’s been working and involved in the … er … goings on. Poor man, Scarbuck appears to drive him so hard, and he was pathetically grateful when I rang.’ She turned to Treasure. ‘He was here a good deal some months ago helping Arthur go through the diaries, but we’ve hardly seen him since he came to stay at the Hall.’

  Treasure watched Moonlight carefully during this announcement, which was received with a stony expression and no audible comment.

  ‘Oh, what a treat,’ cried Miss Goodbody with genuine enthusiasm. ‘He’s really quite famous, you know, but I haven’t found him very approachable. This’ll be a marvellous opportunity to pick his brains.’

  ‘Arthur brought him in on the diaries because he’d just discovered a diary kept by Sarah’s father in a house they were knocking down in Northampton – didn’t you, darling?’ Elizabeth realized that her invitation to Dankton had somehow upset her husband. ‘Sarah probably got her diary-keeping habit from her father.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Moonlight grudgingly, ‘I lent Dankton the first few volumes, which seemed to interest him, but the editing I was talking about is being done by a Fellow of Hertford College.’

  ‘And was Sarah really the great patroness of the arts her father said she was?’ enquired Miss Goodbody, who was mildly surprised and a little disappointed that Moonlight had never mentioned the existence of the diaries to her.

  ‘In a social-climbing sort of way, yes,’ replied Moonlight, filling her glass from the sherry decanter in his hand. ‘But as for your Shakespeare business, I’m afraid you’ll get no joy from the diaries. All that was well before Sarah’s time.’

  ‘But does she mention any play-acting here?’

  ‘Yes, there’s a bit about some masques that Sarah performed in herself; it appears she liked dressing up.’

  ‘And undressing too … hee, hee, hee,’ squeaked the Bishop. ‘You really ought to read these diaries, Timothy, they’re hot stuff.’

  ‘I imagine one needs a certain familiarity with the script and the English of the time truly to benefit from the work,’ boomed Mrs Wringle in an evident effort to discourage the Vicar of Mitchell Stoke from attempting such clearly corrupting literature.

  ‘You’d think so, but one gets into the swing of it quite well after a day or two,’ Moonlight replied. ‘Sarah was pretty basic in her language.’

  ‘And in her habits too,’ put in the Bishop, whose following peal of laughter was cut short by a stern glance from the dominant Mrs Wringle.

  ‘Ah, Mr Dankton,’ cried Elizabeth Moonlight, looking towards the door of the drawing-room. She crossed the room, and taking the arm of the last guest to arrive introduced him around the assembled party.

  It occurred to Trapp and to Treasure simultaneously that Dankton looked much more the learned bibliographer and ascetic scholar when free of his artisan’s clothing. He was dressed in a neat black suit, cut in the most current style, which accentuated both his slimness and his pallor. The formalities over, he turned to his hostess. ‘I do apologize for being late. I was detained … er … as it were, by the police. This ghastly business of the gravedigger – very upsetting.’ He stroked his forehead. ‘I’m so sensitive in such matters.’ The rest of the company looked suitably grave – except for Moonlight who handed Dankton a glass of sherry with every appearance of regretting this elementary gesture of hospitality. ‘It was, in any event, most kind of you, yes, most kind to have invited me. There’s a dinner – a kind of jamboree, at the Hall this evening. I was not included for reasons best known to Mr Scarbuck. I am not, of course, a member of his group, or organization, or whatever he calls it.’

  Dankton did not add that Scarbuck had positively commanded him to accept Lady Moonlight’s invitation.

  Treasure was anxious for up-to-date news on the police investigation. ‘I gather the police have opened the grave,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, and closed it again,’ replied Dankton without emotion. ‘They are now satisfied that the … er … tragedy could not have taken place there. Their theory is that Mr Worple, whose home is this side of the church, scaled the wall – not the one to the Hall garden –’ he glanced at Trapp – ‘but the one to the road, which is lower. They think he fell off it into the road where he was run over by some kind of vehicle.’

  ‘Well, if they believe that they’ll believe anything,’ said Trapp firmly. ‘I mean, why should Worple have climbed the church wall?’

  ‘Unfortunately, in former times he’d have used the Hall gate,’ explained Dankton, ‘but now, of course, it’s locked. The police think he was popping home for a cup of tea – in fact his daughter was expecting him to do so.’

  ‘So he breaks his neck, a car runs over him, the driver thinks he’s killed someone, pops the body in the boot, drives to Old Windsor, puts Worple in a boat, and sets fire to him – preposterous!’ exclaimed Trapp.

  ‘Put that way, I agree,’ said Treasure slowly, ‘but that may be something near what actually happened.’

  ‘Only if the driver was potty and perhaps owned that boathouse,’ added Miss Goodbody innocently. ‘But that wasn’t the case because the owner’s abroad – the Inspector said so. His name is Colonel Can – something – Wright.’

  ‘Not Freddy Canwath-Wright?’ Elizabeth glanced quickly at her husband and then back to Dankton. ‘But, Mr Dankton, he’s a friend of yours and my husband’s as well. What an absolutely incredible coincidence.’ She turned to Treasure. ‘It was Freddy who put Mr Dankton in touch with Arthur over the Northampton diary we were talking about.’

  ‘Well, coincidences do happen, Elizabeth,’ answered Treasure, inwardly wishing he could believe that one had manifested itself on this occasion.

  ‘Do you know the boat-house, Mr Dankton?’ asked Treasure.

  Dankton hesitated. ‘I was there once – last summer some time. I remember it very vaguely. It is a rather embarrassing coincidence.’ He turned to Moonlight. ‘Do you know it yourself, Sir Arthur?’ His voice did not register the hope he felt.

  ‘Didn’t even know Freddy kept a boat there; his home’s on the other side of Camberley.’ Treasure breathed a sigh of relief.

  ‘Anyway, the police seem to be transferring their main investigation from here to Old Windsor,’ said Dankton, ‘so they should be leaving us alone for the evening.’

  ‘I wonder if they’ve found the yellow Volkswagen,’ commented the Bishop looking from side to side brightly. ‘Constable Humble came to ask us if we’d seen one just before we left the cottage this evening.’

  Treasure looked across at Dankton who stared straight back at him steadily before saying, ‘They asked me about that too – that’s why I was late. Did anyone here see the car?’

  Treasure decided to volunteer nothing, but Miss Goodbody offered, ‘I saw it this afternoon. The policeman who came to the vicarage asked if I’d noted the number – I wish I had.’

  Both the Bishop and his wife were about to add something but were forestalled by their hostess.

  Elizabeth Moonlight had had enough of her currently least favourite subject. ‘Mr Dankton,’ she said, ‘we were talking about Sarah Moonlight’s diaries just before you came in. Was she really such a scarlet woman?’

  ‘I’m afraid she was, Lady Moonlight – though she managed to conceal the fact from both her husband and her father. She left here in some haste during the summer of 1644 to stay with her parents at Corbie Manor in Northampton, ostensibly because it was safer, actually because her current and wealthy lover lived nearby. She left there with h
im for France in August of that year, and if the lover hadn’t died of smallpox within a month I doubt she would ever have returned to England.’

  ‘Was he very rich?’ enquired Miss Goodbody, who was enjoying the story.

  ‘I could answer that if I knew who he was,’ replied Dankton. ‘Sarah had an exasperating habit of referring to many of her boy-friends only by their Christian names – this one was called Edward, which offers a wide field for speculation. I’m narrowing it down, though – in between digging swimming pools. He was unmarried and somewhat younger than Sarah.’

  ‘So was Charles the Second,’ put in the Bishop. ‘Cradle-snatching seems to have been Sarah’s speciality.’

  ‘Yes, just as his was married women. She met Charles at The Hague in ’48 by which time she was a bit tight for cash,’ continued Dankton. ‘After that he keeps popping up in the diaries – or rather, she keeps popping up at Court, wherever Charles was running it. It’s unfortunate that there are no diaries covering the last two years of the exile. One would like to have known whether she came back in the King’s baggage like La Castlemaine.’

  ‘You mean Barbara Palmer, later Lady Castlemaine,’ chipped in the Bishop, whose knowledge of the royal intrigues appeared exhaustive. ‘After the official junketings on the evening of the Restoration the King slipped over the river to Lambeth and spent the night with her. I’ve always thought that excessively daring.’

  ‘And curiously irresponsible,’ added Mrs Wringle with evident disdain.

  ‘We do know, from the diaries, that Sarah was back here at Mitchell Stoke soon after,’ Dankton went on, ‘and here she stayed, with money simply pouring in from the King – though it hardly seems likely he was getting value for it at that stage. Sarah adapted pretty quickly.’ He turned to Elizabeth. ‘This house was built on what you might call pleasure money, and pleasure was what Sarah encouraged in it for a surprising number of years.’

  ‘Do you suppose the King owed her more than a return for supplying home comforts abroad?’ asked Treasure lightly.

  ‘Unlikely, I should have thought,’ commented Moonlight. ‘As Mr Dankton has explained, she was pretty broke when she met him so it’s difficult to imagine how she could have lent or given him money in exile.’

  ‘The missing diaries might explain,’ said Elizabeth.

  ‘They aren’t necessarily missing, my dear,’ said Moonlight. ‘It’s more than possible they never existed.’ Then with hardly a pause he looked across to Trapp and abruptly changed the subject. ‘Timothy, I picked up the new lock for the crypt door on my way into Oxford. It fits all right – I started fixing it on when I got back, but I didn’t have time to finish. I’ll do it tomorrow.’

  ‘That really is kind of you,’ replied the Vicar. He turned to Treasure. ‘The old latch is broken, and when the door swings open, apart from the eerie creaks, I get wafts of positively refrigerated air in the sanctuary … much better to lock the place permanently. Oh, perhaps you’d like to hang on to the key yourself, Sir Arthur?’ he added hastily.

  ‘Is the crypt ever used?’ asked Treasure.

  ‘No; it’s not heated for one thing,’ explained Trapp, ‘and when the church was wired for electricity they conveniently forgot the crypt. In any case, the place is very small. Children enjoy visiting it, of course …’

  ‘And breaking their necks on the stairs,’ put in Elizabeth unthinkingly.

  ‘I recall when my father was Vicar …’ began the Bishop, but before he could begin what Miss Goodbody confidently expected would be a tale of immoral goings-on in the subterranean regions of St John’s, Mitchell Stoke, the double doors to the drawing-room were flung wide to reveal Aggie, plump and short, resplendent in starched white cap and apron but swaying slightly from the effort involved in effecting such a dramatic entrance.

  ‘Dinner is served, m’lady,’ she cried at the top of her voice, ‘but them potatoes ’as gone black.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  ‘A crime entirely without motive is very rare indeed … in my experience,’ observed Chief Inspector Bantree sagely. ‘Even vandalism has its motives in rebellion against society … Pass the chocolate, there’s a good chap.’

  Sergeant Wadkin opened the glove box in front of the passenger seat and with difficulty extracted a crumpled chocolate package from behind two fishing reels, a blue rubber bone, several tape cassettes, and a broken breathalyser.

  ‘Help yourself, and break me off a bit,’ continued Bantree as he turned the car left on to the main Reading road. ‘That’s as close to dinner as we’ll get tonight. And major crime – murder – has to have a motive behind it.’

  ‘Or a madman?’ Wadkin suggested tentatively.

  ‘All right, nut cases excepted,’ Bantree agreed. ‘But I doubt even a criminally insane person would develop an obsession for knocking off gravediggers. No, there simply has to be a motive; that is, if we’re dealing with murder … The two-accident theory is perfectly tenable depending on who was involved. If the chap broke his neck falling off the wall into the road, and whoever ran over him panicked because he thought he’d killed Worple, then irrational action might have followed.’

  ‘But hardly on quite such an elaborate scale, surely?’

  ‘You mean carting the body all the way to Old Windsor? Well, it seems unlikely, but dumping a corpse on the roadside before lunch on a Saturday between here and Staines wouldn’t be all that easy to do unobserved. It’d be like looking for a good picnic spot – you know, the place is never just right. I agree, though, the boat-house bit – and the fire – seem a bit excessive. But again, it depends who was involved. A drunken High Court Judge might take enormous pains to cover up an accident.’ Since a recent acquittal, High Court Judges came high on Bantree’s list of undesirables, which was why the example he had given was the first to come to mind. On private reflection he concluded that he had never actually encountered a drunken judge, and would certainly not have expected to do so in charge of a car during the forenoon on a public road. He took the last piece of chocolate proffered by Wadkin. ‘All sorts of important people behave out of character if they find themselves on the wrong side of the law – politicians, actors, diplomats – even policemen,’ he added to prove his lack of prejudice.

  ‘But if the chap ran over Worple without anyone seeing – and nobody seems to have – why did he trouble to stop and pick up the body? Why didn’t he just drive on?’

  ‘Ah, that rather makes my point. If the driver was a normally responsible person he’d stop to see if the victim was dead …’

  ‘And having discovered he was dead, wouldn’t he just get back in the car and drive like hell – assuming there were still no witnesses?’

  ‘The theory just doesn’t stand up, does it?’ said Bantree, whose theory it had been in the first place. ‘But if Worple didn’t fall off the wall, where did he die? If he fell into the grave he’d dug, he wouldn’t have been so badly injured – and who fished him out? And if someone did, and then carted the body across the churchyard to the main gate –’ he paused – ‘or to the vicarage, all unseen … The Vicar was at the Dower House, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, sir, but Banquet’s wife – the Vicar’s housekeeper – says she was cleaning the windows at the front of the house between ten-thirty and twelve – so she’d have seen a car or van if one had been in the drive.’

  ‘The gate to the Hall was locked, so unless Mr Eustace Dankton is lying in his teeth, and risking being given away when we get that interpreter, nobody trundled a body out that way. Incidentally, we’ve learned something today – Filipinos from Mindanao don’t speak Filipino; they speak Sulu. Remember that, Sergeant, it may prove to be of inestimable value to you in the future.’

  ‘I should think that depends on whether the Home Office allows Mr Scarbuck to import any more tourists,’ Wadkin replied with a grin.

  ‘I can tell you, Mr Griffith Speke-Jones, MP, backpedalled on that one pretty swiftly. He has no business connection with Scarbuck whatsoever – or so
he says. The only interest he’s shown so far was in finding out whether there’s been a Press release on the murder. I told him we’re instructed to treat it as an accident until the morning – he nearly collapsed with relief. He’ll be off tonight or at the crack of dawn, well ahead of the gentlemen from the Press – you see. Anyway, we can do without politicians in this or any other case. They always behave like Chief Constables – even the guilty ones.’

  ‘The rain was now falling more heavily. Bantree leant forward in the driving seat as they drove through a huge pool of water on the road. He switched on the windscreen wipers to double speed.

  ‘I must let you try some of my last year’s Liebfraumilch-type wine, Sergeant. Like wine, do you?’

  ‘Oh yes, sir; thank you very much.’ Wadkin tried to sound enthusiastic.

  ‘This home-brewed stuff is an acquired taste, of course. My wife says it’s all right if you don’t smell it – if you don’t breathe in while you’re drinking … As a matter of fact, she’s right.’ The car hit another large puddle at speed.

  ‘If this keeps up, Mr Scarbuck’s swimming pool will be ready for use in the morning.’ The Inspector was concentrating on the driving and made no reply. ‘I haven’t met the banker yet, sir; is he all right?’

  ‘Merchant banker – very special breed; effortless superiority. He’s switched on, though; been playing games with me all day, but only because he thought his noble relation might be involved in the murder … which is curious when you think about it. Why should Treasure think Sir Arthur Moonlight’s been doing in a gravedigger? That’s why he didn’t tell me this story about the pugnacious pansy earlier. At first I thought he’d made it up – bloody cat.’ Bantree swerved to avoid the animal. ‘He’s straight, of course – just prudent about taking policemen into his confidence until he’s ready … and careful to keep his friends out of trouble.’