by P. D. James
He was sitting in the armchair, a book in his lap, and made to get up with awkward stiffness as she entered. She said: 'Please don't get up. I wonder if I could talk to you privately for a few minutes.'
She saw at once the flare of anxiety in the faded blue eyes and thought, He's afraid I'm going to give notice. She added quickly but with gentle firmness: 'As a priest. I wish to consult you as a priest.'
He laid down his book. She saw that it was one he and his wife had chosen the previous Friday from the travelling library, the newest H. R. F. Keating. Both he and Dorothy Copley enjoyed detective stories and she was always slightly irritated that husband and wife took it for granted that he should always have first read. This inopportune reminder of his mild domestic selfishness assumed for a moment a disproportionate importance and she wondered why she had ever thought he could be of help. Yet was it right to criticize him for the marital priorities which Dorothy Copley had herself laid down and gently enforced over fifty-three years? She told herself, I am consulting the priest not the man. I wouldn't ask a plumber how he treated his wife and children before letting him loose on the leaking tank.
He gestured towards a second easy chair and she drew it up opposite him. He marked his page with his leather bookmark with careful deliberation and laid down the novel as reverently as if it were a book of devotions, folding both hands over it. It seemed to her that he had drawn himself together and was leaning slightly forward, head to one side, as if he were in the confessional. She had nothing to confess to him, only a question which in its stark simplicity seemed to her to go to the very heart of her orthodox, self-affirming but not unquestioning Christian faith. She said: 'If we are faced with a decision, a dilemma, how do we know what is right?'
She thought she detected in his gentle face an easing of tension as if grateful that the question was less onerous than he had feared. But he took his time before he replied.
'Our conscience will tell us if we will listen.'
'The still, small voice, like the voice of God?'
'Not like, Meg. Conscience is the voice of God, of the indwelling Holy Spirit. In the collect for Whit Sunday we do indeed pray that we may have a right judgement in all things.'
She said with gentle persistence: 'But how can we be sure that what we're hearing isn't our own voice, our own subconscious desires? The message we listen for so carefully must be mediated through our own experience, our personality, our heredity, our inner needs. Can we ever break free of the devices and desires of our own hearts? Might not our conscience be telling us what we most want to hear?'
'I haven't found it so. Conscience has usually directed me against my own desires.'
'Or what at the time you thought were your own desires.'
But this was pressing him too hard. He sat quietly, blinking rapidly as if seeking inspiration in old sermons, old homilies, familiar texts. There was a moment's pause and then he said: 'I have found it helpful to think of conscience as an instrument, a stringed instrument perhaps. The message is in the music, but if we don't keep it in repair and use it constantly in regular and disciplined practice we get only an imperfect response.'
She remembered that he had been an amateur violinist. His hands were too rheumatic now to hold the instrument, but it still lay in its case on top of the bureau in the corner. The metaphor might mean something to him but for her it was meaningless.
She said: 'But even if my conscience tells me what is right, I mean right according to the moral law or even the law of the country, that doesn't necessarily mean the end of responsibility. Suppose if I obey it, do what conscience tells me, I cause harm, even danger to someone else.'
'We must do what we know is right and leave the .consequences to God.'
'But any human decision has to take account of the probable consequences; that is surely what decision means. How can we separate cause from effect?'
He said: 'Would it be helpful if you told me what is troubling you, that is if you feel you can?'
'It isn't my secret to tell, but I can give an example. Suppose I know that someone is regularly stealing, from his employer. If I expose him he'll be sacked, his marriage will be at risk, his wife and children injured. I might feel that the shop or firm could afford to lose a few pounds each week rather than cause all that hurt to innocent people.'
He was silent for a moment, then said: 'Conscience might tell you to speak to the thief rather than to his employer. Explain that you know, persuade him to stop. Of course the money would have to be returned. I can see that that might present a practical difficulty.'
She watched as he wrestled with the difficulty for a moment, brow creased, conjuring up the mythical thieving husband and father, clothing the moral problem in living flesh. She said: 'But what if he won't or can't stop his stealing?'
'Can't? If stealing is an irresistible compulsion then, of course, he needs medical help. Yes, certainly, that would have to be tried, although I'm never very sanguine about the success of psychotherapy.'
'Won't, then, or promises to stop and then goes on stealing.'
'You must still do what your conscience tells you is right. We cannot always judge the consequences. In the case you have postulated, to let the stealing go on unchecked is to connive at dishonesty. Once you have discovered what is happening you can't pretend not to know, you can't abdicate responsibility. Knowledge always brings responsibility; that is as true for Alex Mair at Larksoken Power Station as it is in this study. You said that the children would be injured if you told; they are being injured already by their father's dishonesty and so is the wife who benefits from it. Then there are the other staff to consider: perhaps they might be wrongly suspected. The dishonesty, if undetected, could well get worse so that at the end the wife and children would be in deeper trouble than if it were stopped now. That is why it is safer if we concentrate on doing what is right and leave the consequences to God.'
She wanted to say, 'Even if we're not sure any longer if He exists? Even if that seems only another way of evading the personal responsibility which you have just told me we can't and shouldn't evade?' But she saw with compunction that he was suddenly looking tired and she didn't miss the quick glance down at his book.
He wanted to get back to Inspector Ghote, Keating's gentle Indian detective who, despite his uncertainties, would get there in the end because this was fiction; problems could be solved, evil overcome, justice vindicated, and death itself only a mystery which would be solved in the final chapter. He was a very old man. It was unfair to bother him. She wanted to put her hand on his sleeve and tell him that it was all right, he mustn't worry. Instead she got up and, using for the first time the name that came naturally to her, spoke the comforting lie.
'Thank you, Father, you have been very helpful. It's plainer to me now. I shall know what to do.'
Every turn and hazard of the overgrown garden path leading to the gate which gave access to the headland was so familiar to Meg that she hardly needed to follow the jerking moon of her torch's beam and the wind, always capricious at Larksoken, seemed to have abated the worst of its fury. But when she reached a slight ridge and the light at the door of Martyr's Cottage came in sight, it renewed its strength and came swooping down on her as if it would pluck her from the earth and send her whirling back to the shelter and peace of the rectory. She didn't give battle but leaned against it, her head bent, her shoulder bag bumping at her side, clutching her scarf to her head with both hands until the fury passed and she could again stand upright. The sky, too, was turbulent, the stars bright but very high, the moon reeling frantically between the shredded clouds like a blown lantern of frail paper. Fighting her way towards Martyr's Cottage, Meg felt as if the whole headland was whirling in chaos about her so that she could no longer tell whether the roaring in her ears was the wind, her blood or the crashing sea. When at last, breathless, she reached the oak door she thought for the first time about Alex Mair and wondered what she would do if he were at home. It struck her as strange
that the possibility hadn't previously occurred to her. And she knew that she couldn't face him, not now, not yet. But it was Alice who answered her ring. Meg asked: 'Are you alone?'
'Yes, I'm alone. Alex is at Larksoken. Come in, Meg.'
Meg took off and hung up her coat and headscarf in the hall and followed Alice to the kitchen. She had obviously been occupied in correcting her proofs. Now she reseated herself at her desk, swivelled round and looked gravely at Meg as she took her usual fireside chair. For a few moments neither spoke. Alice was wearing a long brown skirt of fine wool with a blouse high-buttoned to the chin and over it a sleeveless, pleated shift in narrow stripes of brown and fawn which reached almost to the floor. It gave her a hieratic dignity, an almost sacerdotal look of composed authority which was yet one of total comfort and ease. A small fire of logs was burning in the hearth, filling the room with a pungent autumnal smell, and the wind, muted by thick sixteenth-century walls, sighed and moaned companionably in the chimney. From time to time it gushed down and the logs flared into hissing life. The clothes, the firelight, the smell of burning wood overlaying the subtler smell of herbs and warm bread were familiar to Meg from their many quiet evenings together and they were dear to her. But tonight was dreadfully different. After tonight the kitchen might never be home to her again.
She asked: 'Am I interrupting?'
'Obviously, but that doesn't mean that I don't welcome interruption.'
Meg bent to extract a large brown envelope from her shoulder bag.
'I've brought back the first fifty pages of proofs. I've done what you asked, read the text and checked for printing errors only.'
Alice took the envelope and, without glancing at it, placed it on the desk. She said: 'That's what I wanted. I'm so obsessed with the accuracy of the recipes that errors in the text sometimes slip through. I hope it wasn't too much of a chore.'
'No, I enjoyed it, Alice. It reminded me of Elizabeth David.'
'Not too much, I hope. She's so marvellous that I'm always afraid of being over-influenced by her.'
There was a silence. Meg thought: We're talking as if the dialogue has been scripted for us, not as strangers exactly, but as people who are careful of their words because the space between them is loaded with dangerous thoughts. How well do I really know her? What has she ever told me about herself? Just a few details of her life with her father, snatches of information, a few phrases dropped into our conversations like a falling match, briefly illuminating the contours of a vast unexplored terrain. I've confided almost everything about myself, my childhood, the racial trouble at the school, Martin's death. But has it ever been an equal friendship? She knows more about me than any other living creature. All I really know about Alice is that she's a good cook.
She was aware of her friend's steady, almost quizzical look. Alice said: 'But you didn't fight your way in this wind just to bring back fifty pages of proofs.'
'I have to talk to you.'
'You are talking to me.'
Meg held Alice's own unflinching gaze. She said: 'Those two girls, Caroline and Amy, people are saying that they killed Hilary Robarts. Is that what you believe?'
'No. Why do you ask?'
'Nor do I believe it. Do you suppose the police will try to pin it on them?'
Alice's voice was cool. 'I shouldn't think so. Isn't that rather a dramatic idea? And why should they? Chief Inspector Rickards strikes me as an honest and conscientious officer, if not particularly intelligent.'
'Well, it's convenient for them, isn't it? Two suspects dead. The case closed. No more deaths.'
'Were they suspects? You seem to be more in Rickards's confidence than I am.'
'They didn't have alibis. The man at Larksoken Caroline was supposed to be engaged to - Jonathan Reeves, isn't it? - apparently he's confessed that they weren't together that night. Caroline forced him to lie. Most of the staff at Larksoken know that now. And it's all over the village, of course. George Jago rang to tell me.'
'So they didn't have alibis. Nor did other people - you, for example. Not having an alibi isn't proof of guilt. Nor did I, incidentally. I was at home all that evening but I doubt whether I could prove it.'
And this at last was the moment which had filled Meg's thoughts since the murder, the moment of truth which she had dreaded. She said through dry unyielding lips: 'But you weren't at home, were you? You told Chief Inspector Rickards that you were when I was here sitting in this kitchen on the Monday morning, but it wasn't true.'
There was a moment's silence. Then Alice said calmly: 'Is that what you've come to say?'
'I know that it can be explained. It's ridiculous even to ask. It's just that I've had it on my mind for so long. And you are my friend. A friend should be able to ask. There should be honesty, confidence, trust.'
'Ask what? Do you have to talk like a marriage guidance counsellor?'
'Ask why you told the police you were here at nine. You weren't. I was. After the Copleys left I had a sudden need to see you. I tried the telephone but got only the answer-phone. I didn't leave a message; there was no point. I walked down. The cottage was empty. The light was on in the sitting room and the kitchen and the door was locked. I called out for you. The record player was on, very loud. The cottage was filled with triumphant music. But there was no one here.'
Alice sat in silence for a moment. Then she said calmly: 'I went for a walk to enjoy the moonlight. I didn't expect a casual caller. There are never casual callers except you, and I thought that you were in Norwich. But I took the obvious precaution against an intruder, I locked the door. How did you get in?'
'With your key. You can't have forgotten, Alice. You gave me a key a year ago. I've had it ever since.'
Alice looked at her and Meg saw in her face the dawning of memory, chagrin, even, before she turned briefly away, the beginning of a rueful smile. She said: 'But I had forgotten; completely. How extraordinary! It might not have worried me, even if I had remembered. After all, I thought you were in Norwich. But I didn't remember. We've got so many keys to the cottage, some here, some in London. But you never reminded me that you had one.'
'I did once, early on, and you told me to keep it. Like a fool I thought that the key meant something: trust, friendship, a sign that Martyr's Cottage was always open to me. You told me that I might one day need to use it.'
And now Alice did laugh aloud. She said: 'And you did need to use it. How ironic. But it isn't like you to come in uninvited, not while I wasn't here. You never have before.'
'But I didn't know you weren't here. The lights were on and I rang and I could hear the music. When I rang the third time and you still didn't come I was afraid that you might be ill, unable to summon help. So I unlocked the door. I walked into a surge of wonderful sound. I recognized it, Mozart's Symphony in G minor. It was Martin's favourite. What an extraordinary tape to choose.'
'I didn't choose it. I just turned on the player. What do you think I should have chosen? A requiem mass to mark the passing of a soul I don't believe in?'
Meg went on as if she hadn't heard: 'I walked through to the kitchen. The light was on here too. It was the first time I'd been in this room on my own. And suddenly I felt like a stranger. I felt that nothing in it had anything to do with me. I felt that I had no right here. That's why I went away without leaving you any message.'
Alice said sadly: 'You were quite right. You had no right here. And you needed to see me so badly that you walked alone over the headland before you knew that the Whistler was dead?'
'I didn't walk in fear. The headland is so deserted. There's nowhere anyone can lurk, and I knew when I reached Martyr's Cottage I'd be with you.'
'No, you're not easily frightened are you? Are you frightened now?'
'Not of you but of myself. I'm frightened of what I'm thinking.'