The Devil's Piper

by Sarah Rayne

  As Ahasuerus stared at the lapping waters and the waiting boat fear clutched at his throat. Where am I being taken? What are they going to do to me? And what happened to Susannah?

  The two guards led him down into the boat, and clambered in after him. As they rowed out into the expanse of dark water the mist shrouded them, muffling everything, so that the only sound was the rhythmic dip of the oars. Ahasuerus shivered and pulled his cloak more closely about him. A cold place, this. Lavish and splendid on the surface, but corrupt and selfish and grasping underneath. He thought that his first impression had not been far wrong: it was a little like Cremona had been, but it was a Cremona grown grander, grown greedier and shriller.

  The river mist clung to them with dank, clammy fingers, making it difficult to see more than a yard or two ahead, but one of the guards had hung a horn lantern from the boat’s prow and a smeary light showed their way. Ahasuerus made out tall, very splendid houses on their left and saw that almost all of them had flights of stone steps leading down to small landing stages where boats were tethered. Under any other circumstances he would have been interested in this custom of building houses on to a river so that you could use it for travelling, but he was chilled to the bone and more apprehensive than he had ever been in his life.

  The two guards were peering through the mist, occasionally glancing furtively over their shoulders as if fearful of pursuit, once or twice exchanging low-voiced remarks. As the river curved to the left one of them nudged his companion and pointed to something ahead and fear closed about Ahasuerus’s heart. Looming up out of the swirling fog was a huge dark fortress, a great brutish hulk of a building, so immense that for a moment sheer awe drove out the fear.

  The dipping of the oars was muffled by the mist and a brooding silence seemed to lie over the river. As they drew nearer, Ahasuerus saw that the fortress was built of dark, rough stone, with jagged towers silhouetted menacingly against the night sky, and with mean slitted windows set high up in the turrets. Here and there flaring torches burned in twisted wall brackets, casting a wavering, reddish glow over the stones. An icy hand gripped his entrails. Whatever this place was it was grim and fearsome; it was soaked in human agonies and human despair. And I am being taken inside.

  The walls were so close that Ahasuerus could see where the black stone was crumbling in places, and how there was a crusting of moss and lichen in the cracks. He shuddered, wondering what lay within this dark river prison. Ever since they had taken him from the cellar he had been trying to plan an escape, but this was not a place he could possibly escape from: this was a place so far removed from anything he had ever encountered that he could not even begin to assimilate any kind of plan. As they drew closer he could smell the stench of death and torment and fear.

  The two men were rowing through a high stone entrance now, gouged out of the thick harsh stone and lit by flaring twists of wood thrust into iron wall brackets above the water. Where the light fell it cast hundreds of tiny dancing lights on the river’s surface.

  There was the fearsome sound of immense machinery over their heads, and in front of them a huge portcullis began to rise, with a screeching, clanking sound that made Ahasuerus think of snapping teeth and the gobbling jaws of leviathans. So their arrival had been expected, and someone had been watching out for them. As they passed under the yawning grille he looked up and saw the dozens of pointed iron teeth that guarded the entrance. Would they bite down after the boat had passed through?

  The open stretches of river were behind them now and they were rowing along a narrow inlet, bounded on both sides by the ancient walls. The lantern cast a dull glow on the walls, and several times the boat bumped against them. From somewhere nearby was the steady drip of water, the sound magnified and echoing sinisterly.

  The shadow of St Thomas’s Tower fell across them as they entered the Tower of London through the legend-drenched Traitors’ Gate.

  Behind them there was the deafening clang of iron machinery as the terrible portcullis descended once more.

  Chapter Thirty

  The Greenwich monastery that Ciaran had referred to was much nearer to the Tower of London than Isarel had been expecting.

  ‘In the shadow of old Henry the Eighth’s butchery,’ observed Ciaran, spreading out the A to Z to direct Isarel through the night streets. ‘You can almost see Traitors’ Gate from Father Abbot’s study, I believe.’

  To their left was the muted hum of London’s never-still night traffic, but to the right was the unmistakable lapping of the Thames, muffled and subtle. Isarel had the sudden feeling that he was straddling two worlds: one the rushing importantly busy twentieth century, and the other a long-ago world where people had different fears and different stresses. Where you did not have to worry about nuclear wars and Third World starvation, or unemployment and inflation, but where, if you were caught practising the wrong religion at the wrong time, you could lose your head and your entrails in a grisly form of legalised murder. Were terrorist bombs preferable to being hanged, drawn and quartered? Isarel frowned and shook his head to clear the nightmare images. Perhaps it was the closeness of the Thames that was making him feel like this. Hadn’t Tudor London – Henry VIII’s London – used the Thames in the way people today used the M25? I wonder if it got as congested, he thought. Tudor rush hour. Tailbacks of barges for five miles.

  The river had seen centuries of history and some of it had been very dark and very bloody history indeed. All those people who had been rowed by night to the Tower, and flung into some wretched, windowless dungeon to die of cold and hunger. A riverboat carrying prisoners intended for St Thomas’s Tower shed its load earlier today, and passengers are advised to use alternative routes because the floating corpses are blocking two lanes . . .

  He scowled and with a vague association of ideas, but also with the intention of bringing himself back into the present, reached for the switch of the car’s radio.

  ‘Do you mind, Ciaran? Just to keep me awake for the last stretch?’ Just to keep me in the twentieth century, said his mind.

  ‘Yes, sure.’

  It was just after midnight, and as Isarel swung the car in the direction of Greenwich Observatory, the midnight news headlines were ending. The Economy, somebody’s speech in the House of Commons, a plane crash somewhere . . .

  And then the announcer said, ‘The Metropolitan Police reported earlier that there is still no news of Kate Kendal who vanished from her North London home yesterday and that they have not ruled out the possibility of kidnapping. Kate Kendal has a music promotions agency in Central London, and is married to the anthropologist, Dr Richard Kendal, who published several books on his subject, before a severe injury three years ago forced him to live in semi-retirement.’

  Isarel jerked the car to the side of the road and switched off the ignition. He and Ciaran sat in stunned silence, staring at the radio.

  And then Isarel said, ‘Ahasuerus. He’s got Kate. It must be that; it’s too much of a coincidence to be anything else.’ He glanced at Ciaran, silent and still at his side. ‘If Kate took Ahasuerus to her house,’ said Isarel, ‘which is a reasonable assumption, and if Ahasuerus broke out, God alone knows what might have happened. They mention a husband – did we know she had a husband?’

  ‘No, but it doesn’t matter.’ Ciaran’s eyes were shadowed, but after a moment he said, ‘I think you’re right about Ahasuerus being involved. But I can’t begin to think where he’d have taken Kate—’

  ‘Or more to the point, why.’

  ‘No, but we’ve got to find out.’ He broke off, and Isarel said,

  ‘You know, it’s probably wholly illogical, but I haven’t been seeing Ahasuerus as a killer.’

  ‘According to the legends, he never was.’

  ‘But you’re no longer sure about it.’

  ‘No. I believe he was appallingly mutilated by Henry the Eighth’s men and it’s possible that because of it he’s no longer entirely sane—’ He made an angry gesture. ‘I hear what
I’m saying, but I hardly believe I’m saying it. I’m talking as if he’s an ordinary sentient being—’

  ‘We’re both doing that.’

  ‘Yes. But God help me, Isarel,’ said Ciaran, his voice filled with angry bitterness, ‘I don’t know what we do next. I don’t even know where we start. I’ve been out of the world for too long. Twelve years of the cloister—I can’t cope with practicalities any more—’ He hit the dashboard angrily. ‘Sod being in Curran Glen, it’s equipped me for fuck-all—’

  He broke off, and Isarel thought: it’s not so much to do with the monastery as the girl – Kate. She’s stirred up something in you that you thought you had under control, only I don’t think you ever did have it under control, not properly. And I think you’re in the wrong job, my friend.

  After a moment, he said, ‘When you let down the barriers you do it with a vengeance.’ And without giving Ciaran time to reply, ‘One thing at a time. First off, we’ll find Kate’s address.’

  ‘That ought to be easy enough.’ Ciaran’s tone was non-committal.

  ‘And after that,’ said Isarel, starting up the car again, ‘we’ll try to talk to people who knew her. We might get a lead there. Neighbours, or her business associates. His business associates, even.’

  ‘Won’t the police have done all that?’

  Isarel said thoughtfully, ‘They might. But I’d guess they aren’t treating it too seriously yet. Unless there was any evidence of violence or force – or something unmistakable like a ransom note – they’re probably being pretty perfunctory about it. “Your wife’s vanished, has she, sir? Dear me, very worrying for you, but these things happen.” The police are probably making mental reservations about lovers – yes, and remembering that this is a lady with a husband who’s disabled in some way.’

  ‘The radio said a severe injury that forced him into semi-retirement—’

  ‘I’ll bet,’ said Isarel, ‘that the only reason Kate’s disappearance got into that news bulletin at all was because of her husband’s tragedy, whatever it was. It’s exactly the kind of thing today’s press would pounce on. Journalists are ghouls and cannibals, although I’ll admit there was probably some news value in Kendal’s reputation. It sounded as if he was quite well known in his own circles. I wonder what happened to him three years ago? That might be another line of enquiry we could pursue.’

  ‘I wonder,’ said Ciaran, ‘if it was anything to do with the music.’

  ‘Now that I hadn’t thought of.’ Isarel put the car in gear and let out the clutch. ‘Did you mean that about Curran Glen, by the way?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. I think we turn left along there for Greenwich.’

  The guest master welcomed them at the Greenwich Monastery, waved aside any suggestion that their extremely late arrival might have caused inconvenience, hunted out a telephone directory at Isarel’s request, and padded off to make them a pot of tea.

  Isarel drank the hot tea gratefully, and turned the pages of the directory.

  ‘You’ve found her?’

  ‘Yes. There’s no private number, but there’s a business one in Central London.’ He passed the phone book over.

  ‘Kate Kendal & Associates,’ said Ciaran, reading the entry. ‘And an address in Old Compton Street. “Music Promotions: publicity for all Orchestral and Sinfonia Concerts. National Trust Concerts arranged. Specialists in late baroque and chamber music.”’

  Ciaran looked across at Isarel, who said softly, ‘I’m on home ground with the lady.’ He set down his teacup and stood up, stretching to ease the stiffness of the long drive. ‘It’s one o’clock in the morning,’ he said. ‘Lead me to the cells before I fall asleep at this table. If there’s a hair shirt laid out on my bed I shall tear it up and throw it out of the window.

  ‘But in the morning we’ll phone Kate Kendal’s office.’

  Kendal & Associates were housed in one of the old redbrick buildings near the Charing Cross Road end of Old Compton Street.

  ‘Bang in the centre of Soho,’ said Isarel, sending Ciaran a malicious grin. ‘You’re falling among the thieves and robbers and the whores with a vengeance now, Brother Ciaran.’

  ‘Christ rubbed shoulders with them all,’ observed Ciaran.

  ‘Well, so long as you don’t start overturning the Money Lenders’ Tables in the Temple.’

  A bistro took up the entire ground floor of the building, and there were three or four floors above.

  ‘And police and paparazzi everywhere,’ said Isarel, surveying the crowds disgustedly. ‘No wonder the bistro was suggested as the meeting place. Didn’t I say that reporters were vultures? Let’s go straight in, shall we? Those two females in black leather look as if they’re staking us out.’

  ‘What did he sound like?’ asked Ciaran as they found a corner table of the smoky, garlic-scented bistro. ‘The partner?’

  ‘She. American. Energetic. And a kind of brusque efficiency mixed with unconventionality. She asked for a couple of phone numbers so that she could check our credentials beforehand.’

  ‘What did you give her?’

  ‘The Greenwich Monastery and Curran Glen Abbey,’ said Isarel. ‘What did you expect me to give her? The nearest hell fire club or a strip joint? Pass the wine list, for heaven’s sake. I’ll need at least half a bottle if I’ve got to cope with American dynamism.’

  ‘Greenwich and Curran Glen will undoubtedly vouch for us,’ said Ciaran. He sounded abstracted and Isarel looked up from the wine list.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ He met Ciaran’s eyes, and comprehension dawned. ‘God, yes of course, it’s all this, isn’t it? You’re out in the world again – I mean really out. As you said last night, twelve years in a monastery didn’t equip you for—’

  ‘—you’re bowdlerising what I actually said—’

  ‘—didn’t equip you for any of this,’ said Isarel, ignoring the interruption. ‘The journey here – motorways, the ferry – they didn’t make much impact, because they were transitional things, and Greenwich Monastery’s like an extension of Curran Glen. But this is different. Not just this bistro, but London, Soho, everything. People and shops and the tube and the rush hour. This is the real world again, and you’ve been rocketed back into it, and it’s happened so abruptly that it must feel like a – a series of violent blows.’ He looked at the crowded restaurant. In one corner, three men in their twenties wearing sharply-tailored suits discussed finance and answered mobile phones that rang intrusively. At another table, some kind of interview was clearly being given, and the table was strewn with a notebook and pens and a small portable recorder. Elsewhere people swapped office scandal or rehearsed sales presentations, or post-mortemed meetings.

  Ciaran said quietly, ‘I’d forgotten how loud the world was.’ He gestured briefly about him. ‘At first sight you’d think they were doing it to impress. Talking loudly, answering those mobile phones to show everyone how busy and important they are. It’s hype – have I the right word?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘But they don’t know they’re doing it, do they? Even if they did it for effect at the beginning, they aren’t now. They’re like rats going round and round on a treadmill, but they’re no longer aware of the treadmill.’ His eyes went from one table to another. ‘I thought I’d put it all behind me,’ he said, half to himself. ‘All that worldly allure. All those temptations.’

  ‘But,’ said Isarel softly, ‘they’re still there? The temptations?’

  ‘Yes, they’re still there.’ Ciaran’s eyes flickered over the crowded bistro, and then he made an impatient gesture and said in a much sharper voice, ‘Well, one thing I do remember about temptation is that the only thing to do with it is yield to it. Have we a decent Hock on the wine list?’

  Lauren Mayhew sat opposite to them and ate poached trout and salad niçoise with the brisk attention of one intent on nothing other than re-fuelling. She was a small, energetic lady of about thirty-five, with short fair hair cut in a glossy cap, and huge tinted spectacles whic
h emphasised very striking blue eyes. The American accent was not as marked as it had been on the phone.

  She talked in short, sharp bursts between mouthfuls, punctuating her story about Kate Kendal with frequent draughts of the sharp frosty Traminer which Isarel had ordered, and which she drank as if it was tap water.

  ‘That’s pretty much all I know about this crazy business,’ she said, laying down her knife and fork and reaching for cigarettes. ‘And it’s not a whole lot more than you know. Do you mind if I smoke? Kate hated it in the office, but it helps me to think.’ She arranged her cigarette packet squarely in line with the lighter. ‘Kate was meeting the guy from the Hampstead Concert for lunch on the day she disappeared: and then Richard and Moira saw him break into the house and take the thing out of the coffin later the same day – around five.’

  Ciaran leaned forward abruptly. ‘You did say Moira Mahoney?’ he said, and Isarel glanced at him.

  ‘Yes. I guess you’d know her, of course. Kate picked her up in Curran Glen, or maybe she picked Kate up, I’m not sure which. I don’t know too much about her yet.’

  ‘Red hair and huge smoky eyes?’

  ‘And a complexion I’d give my virtue to have,’ agreed Lauren. ‘Oh, and some kind of slightly damaged foot or twisted leg or something, although it’s the last thing you notice about her.’ She reached for her wine glass again. ‘It’s my bet she’s run away from a man,’ she said, shrewdly.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘With those eyes and that hair there’d be bound to be a man around somewhere.’

  Ciaran said, ‘There was, but not in the way you think.’ And then, with a sudden pleased grin, ‘So she finally got away, did she? Good for Moira.’ He looked back at Lauren. ‘She’s at Kate’s house now?’

  ‘She sure is. She and Richard chased Conrad Vogel half across London, but they lost him in the end.’ She sipped her wine. ‘We didn’t tell the police any of that part – the chase and Ahasuerus – they were sceptical enough as it was – and we figured that if we started to hold forth about undead creatures from beyond the grave we’d get even less co-operation. They were polite but—’