A VOW OF DEVOTION an utterly gripping crime mystery

by Veronica Black

  A rose before summer had unfolded all its blossoms? Stooping to pick it up she held it for a moment, its heady perfume reaching her through the cool damp of dawn.

  It certainly hadn’t come from the convent garden. Sister Martha had mentioned only the other day that she guessed her roses would be slow this year. Sister Teresa’s white rosebuds would have to come from a local florist. This was a hothouse flower, one most carefully chosen to bloom a day or two after it had been received.

  She took it back into the chapel and put it into the vase on the Lady-altar with the soft mass of grey-green catkins already there. At least the rose had solved one problem for her. Burglars didn’t arrive bearing the gift of a flower. There was no need as yet to alarm the community with her story. She would make sure the outer door of the chapel was locked and double check the window fastenings every night from now on. It would be easy enough to unbolt the door first thing in the mornings without any of the community being the wiser. And she would do her utmost to gain Magdalen’s confidence and find out what that enigmatic young woman could tell her about any of this.

  Moving briskly and feeling more herself again now that she had some plan of action she picked up the bell and went up the main staircase, ringing the clapper, and raising her voice in the morning greeting, ‘Christ is risen!’

  ‘Thanks be to God!’

  One by one came the answering voices. The normal routine of the day had begun. Now there was the morning meditation from which she was excused early in order to get the bread cut and the coffee ready for the simple breakfast that came after Mass. It was Father Malone who would offer Mass this morning. No doubt he’d bring another batch of photographs with him. Her lips curved as she hurried downstairs to let Alice out.

  ‘And some guard dog you are!’ she scolded affectionately. ‘Not a peep out of you all night long!’

  Alice wriggled joyously, wagging her tail with delight, as she was patted, then bounding out with a series of barks designed to convey her opinion of the morning. She really ought to start her training soon, Sister Joan thought. Nobody in the convent had sufficient experience or time to see about it. She would ask Detective Sergeant Mill how to go about it the next time she saw him. And that, she decided, would be as soon as possible.

  Magdalen, wearing a neat grey dress, a white scarf hiding her hair, came into chapel as if she belonged there. Her clothes were almost indistinguishable from the grey habits and white veils all around her. From the back she looked exactly like a member of the community. Sister Joan preferred Bernadette’s bright red sweater and pleated skirt.

  There was no time to speculate. Sister Joan, slipping out to complete the preparations for breakfast, wondered wryly how many lay people imagined that nuns did nothing but pray all day. They ought to see Sister Martha lugging a sack of potatoes or Sister Katharine struggling with the laundry.

  Breakfast was eaten standing, the last of the stored apples being added to the dry bread and coffee that comprised the meal. Father Malone had joined them as usual, shaking hands cordially with the visitors and clearly anxious to display the sheaf of photographs he just happened to have in his pocket. This morning they were of Knock, a place of pilgrimage dear to his Irish heart.

  ‘Mother Dorothy, may I have leave to go into town again?’ she asked. ‘There are a few things I forgot to get yesterday.’

  ‘If you wish.’ Thankfully the Prioress didn’t ask what things were needed.

  ‘I’ll ride Lilith in,’ Sister Joan said.

  There were still the dishes to be washed and the passages swept before she was free to leave. Rather to her relief she saw Bernadette and Magdalen going off with Sister Perpetua, very likely to chat with the old ladies.

  Lilith, saddled and led out, twisted round her head and gave a look of astonishment as if the prospect of a ride two days in succession was altogether too much for her pony brain to assimilate.

  It was a lovely morning, the pearl of dawn warmed into gold by the rising sun. Perhaps it was a trifle too warm for the season. When the temperature rose in late spring it often betokened a wet summer.

  ‘Enjoy what’s here,’ she admonished herself, mounting up. ‘Rain can be very refreshing too.’

  Riding down the track with the moor billowing around her she had leisure at last to reflect on the events of the previous night. Someone had been hanging around the convent. Later after the community had retired for the night that same person (for there surely hadn’t been two trespassers?) had entered the chapel and, finding the inner door locked, had mounted to the storey above in the hope of finding an entrance there. And when they had left, alerted no doubt by the consciousness that someone else had arrived, they had left behind that exquisite rose. Men who left roses didn’t usually require to be fended off with flick knives, she thought frowningly. On the other hand a lover might well feel desperate if his girl announced her intention of going into a convent.

  She had neared the schoolhouse and, from force of habit, glanced in that direction. To her surprise the door was open and, alarmed and curious, she dismounted and went over to look inside just as Father Stephens emerged, a pile of blankets over his arm.

  ‘Good morning, Father. What on earth’s going on?’ she demanded.

  ‘Good morning, Sister Joan. We’re getting the schoolhouse ready,’ he returned.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Mother Dorothy has rented it to us — to Father Malone that is,’ he explained.

  ‘You’re going to open the school again?’ Pleasure brightened her voice.

  ‘We are to have a lodger here for a year,’ Father Stephens said. ‘A hermit.’

  ‘I didn’t know there were any these days.’

  ‘Oh, occasionally a particular soul needs solitude and silence,’ Father Stephens said with that little smile of conscious learning that was the most irritating thing about him.

  ‘Mother Dorothy never said.’

  ‘It was all arranged rather hastily by telephone,’ he said. ‘Last evening. When we received word that someone wished for a small place suitable for an anchorage we were quite at a loss until Father Malone remembered the schoolhouse. Mother Dorothy agreed to the rental at a very modest fee and I’m here to fix it up a little.’

  Behind the building Sister Joan noticed the presbytery car for the first time.

  ‘Do you need any help?’ she enquired.

  ‘Not at the moment, thank you. I have a list of necessities here and if our lodger requires anything else he has only to ask. I daresay that Reverend Mother Prioress will be announcing the arrival some time today, since he will probably be attending Mass at the convent chapel. It is rather exciting to have the prospect of a hermit on the doorstep, don’t you think?’

  Sister Joan could have listed more exciting events but she nodded politely.

  ‘I’d better get on. If you do need anything, Father, you know where to come.’

  ‘Indeed I do. Thank you, Sister.’ He went back inside.

  So another newcomer was arriving unexpectedly, she mused, as she climbed back on to Lilith’s broad back. The district was becoming quite crowded. Father Malone hadn’t mentioned the matter at breakfast but then he had been wrapped up in his pictures of Knock.

  She rode on, wondering suddenly if the hermit had a fancy for red roses. One thing was certain. She would take a very close look at him at the first opportunity.

  When she reached the main street she dismounted, led the pony into the alley and tethered her there. Lilith looked round vainly for a patch of grass on which to graze and, finding only paving stones, sent her a look of hurt reproach.

  ‘I won’t be too long, girl.’ Sister Joan patted her and turned back into the street, slowing her pace as she walked up it.

  Where did one buy personal alarms? It wasn’t something she had ever needed to purchase. There was a small electrical shop on one corner but she doubted very much if they stocked what she wanted.

  ‘If we don’t stop meeting like this, Sister, people w
ill begin to talk,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said at her shoulder.

  ‘Good morning, Detective Sergeant Mill. How nice to see you!’

  ‘Opportune certainly,’ he said. ‘I was very insensitive in my remarks yesterday, and it’s bothered me since. I might not see much point in becoming — what do you call it? — a bride of Christ? but that’s no excuse for being sarcastic. I hope you’ll accept my apology.’

  ‘Accepted.’ She held out her hand with a smile. ‘Your own situation had cast a cloud over your thinking, that’s all. I hope things improve for you.’

  ‘There’s no law against hoping,’ he said with a slight shrug. ‘What brings you into town again so soon?’

  ‘I want to buy a personal alarm,’ she said.

  ‘For your own protection?’ His dark eyebrows had risen slightly. ‘I never set you down as the nervous type — or is it the prospect of the new-age travellers?’

  ‘It’s not for me,’ Sister Joan said. ‘It’s for a — an acquaintance of mine. She would feel much safer if she had one of those alarms. The sort that screams when you press it.’

  ‘They’re not very likely to stock them here,’ he said. ‘We might have a couple down at the station. The manufacturers often send us a model to check that as a deterrent it lies within the law. Come along and we’ll see.’

  Providence might be fickle but she generally produced Detective Sergeant Mill when he was needed. Sister Joan trotted along at his side, feeling more cheerful than before.

  ‘Come in, Sister.’ He ushered her past the desk sergeant into his office. It was an office that gave no clue about the personality of the man who occupied it. There were a few posters on the buff-coloured walls, a nondescript carpet, a flat-topped desk with a swivel chair behind it, papers piled high on the tops of the filing cabinets, a small coffee-maker in one corner, two straight-backed chairs placed at an angle to the desk.

  The only personal item in the room was the photograph of two smiling little boys on the desk. Sister Joan glanced at them. His sons must be about twelve and ten by now. The photograph was about five years old. Perhaps he kept it as a memento of the time when he and their mother had still been in love.

  ‘Take a seat, Sister. Coffee?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ She seated herself neatly on the chair.

  He pressed the bell at the side of the desk and a constable came in.

  ‘Do we have any of those personal rape alarms left?’ Detective Sergeant Mill asked.

  ‘Yes, sir. We have one left from the free samples.’ The constable had a poker face that betrayed nothing. He merely nodded, said, ‘Right, sir,’ and went out again without seeming to notice Sister Joan.

  ‘I didn’t know that any alarms were outside the law,’ she said.

  ‘Canisters of C.S. gas are,’ he informed her. ‘In France they’re legal but not here. Sometimes I think the dice are loaded in the criminal’s favour. Ah! thank you, Grant.’

  The constable put the small box on the desk, saluted and went out.

  ‘This is quite neat.’ Detective Sergeant Mill opened the box. ‘It runs on battery, and can be carried easily in the palm of the hand. There’s a wrist strap so nobody can knock it away, and when you squeeze on the red spot here — try it.’

  Sister Joan did so and hastily removed her finger as an ear-piercing scream rent the air.

  ‘It certainly works,’ she said, seeing with amusement that a couple of helmeted heads had come into view behind the glazed upper half of the door.

  ‘It’s not infallible,’ he said. ‘The noise stops when you remove the pressure but by the time an attacker has figured out where the din is coming from the neighbours will certainly have been alerted. If you feel safer carrying it then have it by all means.’

  ‘It’s not for me,’ Sister Joan said, and saw from the slight twitch of his lips that he didn’t believe it for a moment. ‘And, of course, I’ll pay.’

  ‘It was a free sample. Compliments of the Force. Can I get you anything else while you’re here? A shot-gun perhaps?’

  ‘This will do very nicely,’ she said, suppressing a grin. ‘Anyway I doubt if I could shoot straight. Thank you.’

  ‘Are you really worried about these new-age travellers?’ he enquired, rising as she rose. ‘Most of them are fairly harmless, you know.’

  ‘They just mess up the countryside from what I’ve heard. No, I’m not scared of them. Thank you again.’

  ‘I’ll see you out.’ He moved to the door. ‘There’s nothing wrong up at the convent, I hope?’

  ‘Nothing that can’t be handled,’ Sister Joan said, hoping that it was true. ‘Oh, one thing, if you please! If one wished to buy a red rose here in town where would one go? Our regular florist would have to send away for out of season blooms if we required something that wasn’t growing in the enclosure garden.’

  Detective Sergeant Mill had stopped to give her a long thoughtful look. After a moment he said, ‘So there’s nothing you can’t handle going on at the convent? Rape alarms and an unseasonable red rose. You’re piquing my curiosity, Sister.’

  ‘And it isn’t really up to me to satisfy it yet,’ she said. ‘I will if and when I can, of course.’

  ‘Of course.’ His mouth twitched again. ‘If you’re enquiring after red roses, Sister, there’s a specialist rose grower a few miles up the line. They show at Chelsea and other important events. Name of Tregarron.’

  ‘Thank you, Detective Sergeant Mill. You’ve been very helpful.’

  She went off aware that he had paused on the steps of the station to look after her. It would, of course, have been possible to tell him about the flick knife and the intruder, but there was no point in getting Magdalen into trouble if her knife could be coaxed away from her, and if she mentioned an intruder he would insist on sending a couple of policemen up to keep an eye on the place. Sister Joan guessed that the man who had left a red rose might come again and preferred not to have the local constabulary barring the way.

  The streets seemed suddenly more crowded. Untying Lilith she heard an impatient voice.

  ‘Move on and stop cluttering up the place! Oh, beg pardon, Sister, I didn’t realize it was you!’

  Constable Petrie, blinking sun glare out of his eyes, had blushed hotly as she drew nearer.

  ‘I won’t be cluttering up the place for long,’ she said, mounting up.

  ‘Oh, it’s not you, Sister,’ he said hastily. ‘We’ve a queue of vans, cars, lorries and the Lord knows what else stretching back for nearly a mile, holding up all the regular traffic.’

  ‘The new-age travellers are here.’

  ‘And I wish they’d move on or go back where they came from,’ he said in heartfelt tones. ‘Not that I’d wish them on anyone else but they have to go somewhere, I suppose. Before we know where we are they’ll be selling crack and holding rave ups outside the Town Hall.’

  ‘I’m sure you’ll cope with it all,’ she said, raising her hand in salute as she walked Lilith off, holding the reins tightly since the pony showed a tendency to dash off.

  There were a couple of extra policemen out, chivvying on the traffic which was threatening to create a bottleneck. Sister Joan weaved a way between them, trying not to look shocked at the condition of some of the vehicles. In comparison the convent car looked in pristine state.

  Some of the vans had garish pictures and slogans painted over them. There seemed to be a horde of shaggy-haired children hanging out of the window and the barking of dogs followed her as she gained a clear space and rode Lilith at a faster pace on to the moorland track.

  Perhaps she was getting middle-aged and narrow-minded. There was no law that said people had to go on living in the same place for ever, and many of those who roamed in their vans were, she was certain, decent people. Some of them were probably Catholics which meant Father Malone would have his hands full.

  ‘Sister Joan!’ A man whose ear-ring and red neckerchief betokened the old-style Romany was hailing her.

  ‘Padra
ic Lee! How good to see you!’ She reined Lilith in with alacrity. ‘Sister Perpetua was saying the other day that she hadn’t seen you for weeks.’

  ‘She’ll be missing her supplies of fresh fish, I daresay.’ He pushed his cap to the back of his head and grinned up at her. ‘I’ve been away for a bit.’

  ‘What was the charge?’

  ‘No charge at all, Sister! You talk as if I was a criminal,’ he said in injured innocence. ‘No, my good wife went into hospital for a while, and since I wanted to be near her I took myself and the kids up to Birmingham to stay with her brother and his wife for a bit. He’s doing a nice line in second-hand cars so I helped him out there while we waited. Got back yesterday.’

  ‘How is your wife?’ she enquired.

  ‘A new woman!’ he declared. ‘Or rather the old one come again. She was a rare pretty bird when we first met. Now she’s looking trim as a bluebell again.’

  ‘I’m very pleased for you,’ Sister Joan said warmly.

  There was no point in reminding him that his wife had taken the ‘cure’ before and lapsed after a shorter or longer time into her drinking. Padraic was devoted to his ‘pretty bird’ and fiercely protective of her reputation, though her alcoholism meant that he was forced to carry on his scrap-metal business and rear his twin daughters practically singlehanded. Yet his caravan was always clean, his little girls neat and polite. She would remind herself that appearances weren’t always what they seemed the next time she saw a gaudy car with the side hanging off and the sweetish scent of ‘grass’ drifting in heavy white clouds through the windows.

  ‘I’ll be over with some nice fresh trout tomorrow, Sister,’ he said, standing back.