‘Bugger off, bugger off, bugger off!’ Bertie squawked on seeing him enter, then shook himself violently and spat out a couple of sunflower seeds. A stray grey feather drifted to the bottom of his cage.
‘And the same to you!’ the priest said, taking a seat beside the bird.
‘Off the park with him! Off the park with him!’
‘That’s not a very welcoming thing to say to Father,’ Sister Claire said, approaching the cage, staring into the parrot’s unblinking eyes and then relenting sufficiently to poke a quarter of peeled apple through the bars.
‘And that’s not a reward, mind,’ she said, ‘for your vile language!’
‘Really, Claire! Apple is not good for him,’ Sister Jane said sharply. ‘They don’t eat apples in the jungle.’
‘He,’ Sister Claire replied, rolling her eyes heavenwards, ‘has never been near the jungle, dear. He was hatched in Plymouth or Tavistock, somewhere down there. That’s what the brewery man told me. So you need have no fears on that front. Alopecia, maybe … psittacosis, possibly, but apple poisoning, no.’
Woken by the burst of animated chatter, Sister Agnes, slumped in the depths of her over-large chair, opened a single rheumy eye and fixed it on the newcomer.
‘Have you done the milking yet?’ she enquired of Vincent.
Seeing Sister Monica looking hard at him and nodding vigorously, he replied, ‘I have, yes. My fingers are sore with it.’
But by the time he had reached the end of his sentence, the single eyelid had closed and the old lady appeared, once more, to be deeply asleep.
‘It’s better,’ Sister Monica whispered, looking down fondly at the slumbering figure, ‘to go along with it. Otherwise she gets worried, frets that … well, that she’s not altogether with it. This way she doesn’t worry.’
‘I’ve been “Nanny” twice today,’ Sister Jane piped up, dropping her knitting-needle accidentally on to the floor and stooping to recover it, ‘though whether as a person or a goat I’ve no idea.’
‘A goat, dear,’ Sister Monica said sweetly.
‘She’s not eating properly,’ Sister Frances murmured, going over towards Sister Agnes and covering her spindly legs with a tartan rug. Looking at her as she slept, she continued, ‘She’s disappearing before our very eyes.’
‘I am not!’ came a high-pitched rejoinder from the chair.
Startled, the nuns exchanged glances with each other, unsure whether to be pleased or not at this unexpected bout of lucidity.
‘It just comes and goes,’ Sister Monica murmured to Father Vincent, and the other women nodded. Nonetheless, they were rather chastened, each wondering what else untoward they might have said in this apparently not so oblivious presence.
‘Are you still here?’ Sister Agnes said wearily, looking up at the priest with her single, open eye.
‘Stay for supper with us? Go on,’ Sister Claire said, touching his elbow in an attempt to make up for the old lady’s rudeness.
‘No, I’m afraid not. But I’ve got presents for you all,’ Father Vincent said, shaking a half-eaten sunflower seed off his sleeve. ‘I’ve got a cherry tree for the garden. It’s a double-white, so it should be covered in blossoms one day. It’s in the car, I’ll go and get it. And … I’ve a box set of DVDs for you too. Guess what they are?’
‘I know, I know! Is it … is it …’ Sister Frances exclaimed, ‘the lady in the knitted jersey? How wonderful, how clever you are, Father.’
‘I think you’ll like it. It’s very popular – stylish, dramatic,’ he replied.
‘Oh, it’s series three of The Killing, isn’t it?’ Sister Claire squeaked in delight.
As one, the nuns looked at him, smiling broadly, all of them thrilled at the prospect of hours of pleasurable viewing.
‘But,’ he said, sounding disappointed, ‘I thought you all preferred … Downton Abbey!’
‘Oh, how … terrific!’ Sister Monica said, looking round at the dejected faces of the other nuns and willing them to smile. ‘Downton Abbey, that’ll be terrific, won’t it, everyone?’
‘It certainly will, m’lady,’ Sister Claire replied glumly, bowing her head and curtseying simultaneously.
‘Relax. I know your bloodthirsty tastes,’ he laughed, holding out the box set to them. ‘It’s The Bridge, as dark a Scandinavian thriller as anyone could want – including you, Brides of Franken … of Christ.’
Orwell Antiques looked out onto New Road, Milnathort, a broad thoroughfare running east to west with trees on either side of it, and untidily parked cars narrowing it and slowing the traffic to a sluggish crawl. Most of its business depended, certainly during the summer months, upon drivers stopping to buy Italian ice creams from Giacopazzi’s bulging freezer, or plants or sacks of hen-food from Willie Robertson’s Agricultural Store. Opposite it, The Zen Zone attracted those in search of a bikini wax but these clients tended to be blind to the antique shop’s charms. For them it was a repository of old-fashioned, second-hand junk with laughable price tickets attached to it. A blank sandwich-board stood outside the shop, waiting forlornly for someone to place a snappy advertisement on it or at least a boast about the treasures within.
The priest looked in the window, admiring a pedestal writing-table with tarnished brass handles which stood next to a pair of library steps. Peering into the dimly lit interior, it was obvious from the selection on display that the owner of the shop had a weakness for mahogany, marquetry and gilt finials.
He tried the door-handle but it did not turn. Seeing a bell with the name ‘Blackwell’ taped above it, he pressed it. After about thirty seconds, he heard movements inside, footsteps on stairs, and then the main light in the shop was turned on. A man appeared on the other side of the glass door. He was preoccupied and angry-looking and had a phone clamped to his ear. Engrossed in his conversation, he hardly looked at his potential customer as he opened the door. Turning round, he went back into his shop, apparently assuming that his visitor would follow him. Still ranting down the phone, he waved his arm as if to invite the newcomer to inspect his wares. Under the harsh strip light, Vincent recognised the man’s dark features, and felt suddenly alarmed.
‘You’re to be in by eleven at the latest, Kyle, I’m telling you – otherwise you can sleep on the bloody street for all I care!’ the man bellowed, in his anger oblivious to the fact that he had company.
‘I say so. Got it? No, because I say so!’
Still shaking his head in fury, he put his phone back into his pocket and for the first time began to take in the presence of his visitor.
‘Can I help you? Are you browsing, or was there anything you were particularly interested in?’
‘You’re Hal!’ Father Vincent said, amazed. It was not just the face he recognised. In the last few minutes he had heard enough of the man’s voice and accent to know where he had heard it before.
‘I am indeed and, if I am not mistaken, you’ll be …’ The man played for time, scrutinising him and eying his dog-collar, half-covered by the collar of his jacket. ‘… that man I met with Elizabeth, in her house. The local priest?’
‘Yes,’ Father Vincent said, nodding, ‘but you said almost nothing then. Remember, you had a cold?’
‘Did I now?’ the man answered, his tone and expression implying that this seemed a rather odd or trivial observation. ‘Well, it’s gone now. So, my friend, what are you after?’
‘However,’ the priest continued slowly, ‘I know your voice. I recognise it. I heard it long before today – in the confessional. On the night that you attacked James, the Bishop.’
‘Eh?’
‘It was you. I know it was you.’
‘Look, pal, I’m sorry, but I’ve no idea what you’re going on about.’
‘I’d know your voice anywhere.’
‘I’ve really no idea what you’re going on about.’
‘Cut the crap. Don’t waste my time,’ Father Vincent snapped, suddenly enraged by the man and his absurd denials. All he could thin
k about was Elizabeth. Her face had appeared, unbidden, in his mind, her innocent hazel eyes smiling, amused at something. The idea that this scum had, somehow, wormed his way into her heart made him feel physically sick. This man was not worthy to touch the hem of her dress.
At that moment another customer, an elegant blonde woman with a pashmina around her shoulders and a Chihuahua clasped to her breast, came in and began to inspect the stock.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ the man hissed, ‘but come inside – away from the showroom. We can’t talk here.’
He turned on his heel. Detaching a brass-handled poker from a fire-set as he passed it, Vincent followed him through his untidy, furniture-strewn workshop and into his living-room. It was chaotic. Piles of dirty dishes rested on a chintz-covered sofa, and newspapers and greasy plastic cartons littered the floor. A couple of golf clubs, propped against a grandfather clock, clattered to the ground as the man walked by. Muttering angrily to himself he pushed an ironing board out of his way, snatching off a sleeping-bag which was laid across the top of it.
‘Welcome to my lovely home,’ he said, tossing the sleeping-bag onto a nearby chair and facing his visitor. A black-and-white CCTV screen, showing the interior of the shop, was placed incongruously on a three-legged plant stand, and flanked on one side by an empty tomato-ketchup bottle. A large volume bound in green leather lay, unopened, on an embroidered footstool. A gluepot with a broken glue brush rested on top of it. The book looked like some kind of ledger, and had no title or author’s name either on its cover or on its battered spine.
‘So, what exactly do you want, Father?’
‘You’re the man that came into my confessional, half-drunk, and shouting about killing the Bishop.’
‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘You know exactly what I’m talking about.’
‘No!’
While the priest twirled the poker in his hands, another image of Elizabeth, this time with her head turning away from him, blushing, pleased to see Hal, came from nowhere and enraged him anew. Bastards like him depended on, traded on, innocents like her. ‘Love’ she’d called him.
‘Don’t give me that crap. In fact, don’t say another word. I can smell the polish that Jemima Shand gave you, here and now. I smelled it in your workshop. I can smell it on you – just like I could on the night that you made your boast. That’s what it was, really – more of a boast than a confession. I know exactly who you are, Hal or Henry or whatever you call yourself. I know what you’ve done too. I know all about Jemima Shand, I know about Elizabeth – you complete shit!’
‘What the hell’s any of this to do with you? You’re a priest, aren’t you?’
‘Everything. Elizabeth’s … Elizabeth is … one of my oldest friends.’
‘Oh, I get it. You fancy her too, eh? So, are you going to tell her about me and Jemima?’
‘What do you think?’
‘It’ll only hurt her. She won’t like you for it, you know. Be grateful, or anything. And Jemima, are you going to tell her?’
‘I hardly know the woman. No doubt she’ll find out soon enough anyway. You’ll mean nothing to her for sure. It’ll be easy come, easy go, with someone like you. How did you get into the Bishop’s office?’
‘Have you spoken to the police?’
‘How did you get in?’
‘Don’t tell Elizabeth, eh? About Jemima? She’d not understand, like I said. It’d only hurt her and she’s … nice, too nice for her own good, really. I’ll not see her again, if you like, but I don’t want her to know. Promise me that, OK? Getting in was simple – Ray Meehan gave me the key. Before I moved here, he used to clean one of my other shops for me, the one I had in Dundee. He did it for years. I knew about his other jobs. By the way, are you planning to buy that poker?’
‘No.’
‘You might as well put it down, then. You’re giving me the creeps.’
‘Tough. Carry on, please.’
‘Put it down, eh? Ray had a key and I knew he’d lend it to me. He was soft, you know, a bit soft in the head. A bit of a village idiot, really, although you’re not allowed to call them that nowadays, are you? Not PC. Even if they are, and he certainly was. He didn’t even ask why I’d wanted it.’
‘And thanks to you, that “village idiot” killed himself – for handing over that key to you. That’s all that he’d done, given it to you.’
‘It wasn’t my fault.’
‘It was. Why did you want it?’
‘That’s my business.’
‘No. Not any more. Now it’s my business. Tell me why you wanted it. Do you think I’d let everyone go on believing that poor Raymond is guilty?’
‘You can’t tell anyone what I said to you in the confessional …’
‘No, that’s right. But we’re not in the confessional now, are we? You’ve already told me how you got into the diocesan office. The police would be round in a flash to take a DNA sample from you if I told them nothing more than that. I doubt you cleaned up after yourself in the Bishop’s office. They’d easily match the two samples, I reckon. In fact, I’d put money on it.’
‘OK, OK. I wanted in, into the office, to get the record. The one that lists the priests who’ve been interfering with children.’
‘How did you know about it?’
‘Ray told me about it once, he’d seen it. I daresay they hardly thought he could read. They got careless.’
‘But why did you want it? So you could punish them?’
‘Eh? What on earth are you going on about?’ the man asked, sounding appalled, looking for the first time frightened, as if he had a lunatic standing opposite him. A lunatic armed with a poker.
‘Dennis May was a priest, Callum Taylor was a priest. Patrick Yule was a priest. Each one’s listed in that record, the book, and they’re all dead. Dead within the last few months.’
‘Hold on! I’ve no idea who any of them are. I’ve done nothing, I haven’t hurt anybody except your bloody bishop, and that was an accident. Really it was. He came in when I was searching for the file – for the book – and when I tried to leave he tried to stop me. I shoved him out of the way, no more than that, and he fell over and hit his head. I thought I’d killed him, but it was just a dunt. He’s fine, no harm done. I haven’t hurt anybody. I don’t know what you’re going on about.’
‘Really? Have you forgotten Raymond so soon? What did you want the file for, then? Why were you trying to steal it in the first place?’
‘Because,’ Hal said, his tone becoming defiant and angry, ‘I needed it. Father Bell touched up my son, Kyle. A paedophile priest, need I say more? Kyle’s only sixteen, always in trouble. He … after my wife left, I couldn’t control him. I still can’t. He changed then. He puts anything he can find up his nose, down his throat – into his veins, for all I know. I discovered that Kyle, with a friend, I think, had beaten up the pervert, so-called “Father” Bell. I’d no idea that Bell had abused him. I found out at the same time I heard about Kyle attacking him. I knew that if Bell reported it, it would be Kyle’s word against his, and they really, really did the pervert over. A friend who works at the hospital told me how serious it was. I needed to be able to back up what my boy had told me.’
‘In this day and age?’
‘Have you met Kyle? If you had you wouldn’t be asking that question. Who’d believe a wee, unemployed, drunken yob like him? He’d probably giggle, be abusive to the police. They know him, know his baby face. Bell would deny everything, be able to cover up everything. I couldn’t leave that to chance. There was no proof. I knew the Church would have a record of those kind of things. Ray told me as much. I thought if I had it I could shut the man up, or stop him going to the police, or at worst prove that what Kyle had said was true. If he had a past record …’
‘So why haven’t you handed the book to the police?’
‘Because Bell never went to them about Kyle. Jemima told me that he’d said to everyone he’d been i
nvolved in a car crash – the lying shite. So, no one’s come after Kyle, and Bell’s been punished. Anyway, I didn’t dare go to the police after what had happened in the Bishop’s office. I thought, for a while, that I’d killed the man, remember? Raymond … well, that wasn’t my fault. I’m surprised he managed to work out his part in the whole thing. It’s a pity, him topping himself and everything, but … it’s happened. Anyway, the book will have my fingerprints all over it. My DNA probably, and so would the wrapping paper, the stamps, if I’d posted it. They haven’t found me so far, and I’m not doing anything to help them further. Why should I? They’re not looking anyway. Raymond’s dead, the Bishop’s all right and Bell never reported anything.’
‘So, just you and Kyle have looked at the book?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Just the pair of you?’
A telephone began to ring in another room and Hal exclaimed, ‘I’ll be back in a minute – but I’ve just got to answer this. I have to. I’m selling a Regency commode to someone in New York. It’s worth a fortune. I’ll have to answer that.’
Alone in the room, the priest went over to the foot-stool, removed the glue-pot and inspected the green leather-bound book. On the first page he read, ‘Diocese of Inchkeld’.
Without a qualm, or even a thought, he put it under his arm and headed for the showroom. As he left Orwell Antiques, he glanced at the blonde woman and gave her a friendly smile. Hal, low-life that he was, was not the killer of the priests. Kyle had had his chance. Finally, the book could speak for itself.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The woman with the pashmina gravitated, Hal noticed, back to the carved mahogany washstand several times. Each time she felt the wood with the tips of her fingers, trailing them lovingly along its highly polished surface. On the third occasion, she picked up its price-label. As she did so he watched her, surreptitiously scanning her face to see her reaction to the inflated price-tag. Her expression gave nothing away. Her curiosity apparently satisfied, she wandered over to a glass case with a dusty stuffed capercailzie in it and then threw a casual glance at a reproduction breakfast table. Hal didn’t take his eyes off her.
The Good Priest Page 20