“If she did — if she did — then I could not tell you or anybody else what she might have said. I rather assumed you’d realise that.”
“Of course I do, but that’s not what I’m asking. All I want to know is if she made a confession, not what it was.”
“I don’t think I could even confirm that. The fact that someone is seen entering the confessional does not automatically mean they wish to make confession. They may be seeking a blessing, or even just want to chat to the priest. These days it’s as much to do with counselling as admission of sin and its forgiveness.”
Maltravers’s chair creaked protestingly as he leaned back. “Could we talk about that? Absolution of sin? Purely hypothetically.”
During the next hour Martha Shaw’s name was not mentioned as Cassell discussed the beliefs and practices of his church, Maltravers constantly questioning him. At one point the priest smiled.
“For an agnostic, you know a lot about religious faith,” he said. “You argue theology very well.”
“You don’t have to go to church to think about or even believe in God,” Maltravers replied. “Tell me more about the Catholic view of repentance.”
Neither seriously disturbed the other’s beliefs, but at the end both were left with things to think about. Cassell had clearly enjoyed the conversation as much as Maltravers.
“You should meet my bishop,” the priest remarked. “He’d have made some points much better than I have, but you’d have still argued with him, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course. You should examine your reasons for being an agnostic as much as you should ask yourself why you’re a churchgoer. If you can’t defend it, you can’t claim it as a faith.”
“Agnosticism as a faith?” Cassell shook his head. “An interesting thought. I’ll be quite honest, Mr Maltravers. There are many practising Catholics who could not justify their belief as well as you defend what they would see as a total lack of it.”
“Thank you. And now that we understand each other a little better, can I ask that question again? Did you take Martha Shaw’s confession?”
“I knew you’d come back to that.” The priest sighed. “I could suspect you of being very clever, but I rather think you’re sincere. All right. Yes, she did … but you’ll get no more out of me.”
“I don’t need any more, Father. I’ll tell you what she confessed.”
Cassell’s face remained totally impassive as he listened, then he looked at his watch and stood up.
“I can make no further comment, Mr Maltravers. I wish you well in your investigations, but I cannot help you any more than I have. Perhaps I’ve even gone too far as it is. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m due at one of our schools shortly.”
“Thank you for your time.” Maltravers smiled. “You know, if you hadn’t been a priest, you’d have made a great poker player.”
“I’ll accept that as a compliment,” Cassell said, and accompanied him outside to his car.
“There is one other thing,” Maltravers added as he was leaving. “If I get to the bottom of all this, I’ll come back and tell you the full story, unless you’d rather I didn’t.”
The priest shook his head firmly. “I’d rather you didn’t. I think it might … trouble me. I think it might trouble you, Mr Maltravers.”
“You could be right.”
Maltravers drove out of Wenlock and on to the open wildness of Bodmin Moor; there was no immediate urgency to return to Porthennis and he wanted time to think. He parked on a high bare hill and walked to where a group of huge rugged rocks capped its peak and climbed the jagged face of the biggest. Sitting on the top, he stared across interlocking folds of smooth green moorland, washed with sunshine blotted by wind-driven shadows of cloud. He now knew why Martha Shaw had made the journey to St Thomas’s, which Lacey had traced with his strange abilities. Cassell had in no way acknowledged that what Maltravers claimed she had confessed was correct, but it had to be. And it was understandable she would have wanted to tell a stranger anonymously, not the Penzance parish priest who knew her. From his conversation with Cassell, it appeared he would have been able to grant her absolution of the sin within the laws of the church, but would also have advised her to talk to the police. Was that what she had decided to do? And had she told someone of her intention? And had that person murdered her?
Maltravers stubbed out his cigarette, grinding black ash on the rock’s surface. He now had enough to go in direct pursuit, trying to disentangle the identity of a murderer from a swarm of suspects. Deliberately he stopped himself trying to guess which one it was, because there were now no innocents. For a long time he had clung to the possibility that the statue that killed Martha Shaw could have fallen accidentally and Lacey suffered from hyper-imagination. That way normality lay and Maltravers had wanted to believe it; but now he could not and was left with something malignant. And a murderer who could eventually kill again? It was a dreadful possibility, but, presented with nothing more than Lacey’s psychic powers and Cassell’s unbreakable vow of silence, what action could the police take? At this stage it was impossible to name the killer and Maltravers had to continue probing until he knew. Then he might have to go to the police, but was increasingly convinced that he would prefer not to.
*
Mortimer Lacey came out of the front door of his cottage as Maltravers walked down the path outside Lifeboat Row and met him at Helen’s gate.
“Well?” he asked.
“The priest was discreet, but told me enough,” Maltravers replied. “You were right. Martha did go there. She went to make confession.”
“I presume he didn’t tell you what it was.”
“No, and he gave nothing away when I told him what I’m positive she must have said. But I’ve got to be right.” Maltravers looked at Lacey unhappily. “It doesn’t happen in places like this.”
“It’s troubling you, isn’t it?”
“Cassell said it would and I agreed with him. I just didn’t realise how much.”
Lacey touched his arm reassuringly. “I’m afraid that any powers I have are woefully limited and I don’t see any way I can help at the moment.”
Maltravers sighed. “You’ve got me into this, Mortimer. If it hadn’t been for you, I’d have accepted like everybody else that Martha died accidentally. Where are you now I need you?”
“You don’t need me,” Lacey contradicted. “At least not at the moment.”
“You’re a very present help in time of trouble,” Maltravers told him sourly. “Incidentally, I’ve learned something else as well. On the way back I called in at the offices of the Comishman in Penzance and had a chat with the editor.”
“Do you know him?”
“No, but I still do occasional freelance work and journalists will always talk to each other. I wanted to know when Martha Shaw’s inquest was being held. It’s in a couple of days, but he also told me the police are satisfied it was an accident. Nobody gains from her death, nobody had any motive.”
“Not that they can see,” Lacey observed.
“No,” Maltravers agreed. “You don’t expect people to be murdered because they have found God. Anyway, the final step is talking to Ruth. She’s the only one who knows who can also be ruled out as a suspect.”
“But which of the others was it?” asked Lacey.
“I’ve got one name in the frame, but it’s no more than an educated guess,” Maltravers told him. “It could have been almost any of them.”
“Plus Nick Charlton,” Lacey added. “He’s in there somewhere.”
“I’m not absolutely sure of that any more.”
“Well I am, and he’s the one you should be very careful with. There’s your evil.”
“There’s part of the evil,” Maltravers corrected.
*
Maltravers walked up Fern Hill, unlatched the cottage gate and walked up the path. He rapped on the brass knocker cast like a leaping dolphin and waited for a few moments, looking across the garden at the studio,
wooden walls blotched with huge sun-baked blisters of paint, cracked open and gaping like leprous white blossoms. He heard the door open behind him and turned round to face Ruth Harvey; she looked like the walking dead.
“Hello,” he said gently. “We’ve met before. By Agnes Thorpe’s statue at the Botallack the other night. Augustus Maltravers.”
“Pardon?” She seemed confused. “At the … ? Oh, yes, I remember. There was a young lady with you.”
“That’s right. Tess Davy. We were talking about Martha. That’s why I’m here.”
The grief on her face turned to fear and her voice pleaded in terror as she backed away from him.
“No. Please go away. I don’t want to … Not you as well. Who are you?”
“A friend of Helen Finch’s,” he replied, projecting reassurance and comfort into his reply. “You know Helen. Don’t worry, I’m not going to harm you. In fact I think I may be able to help.”
Red-rimmed eyes blinked in dazed bewilderment as he stepped through the doorway and took her arm. She made the slightest movement of pulling away, then allowed him to lead her into the front room. He made her sit by the window then pulled up another chair and sat very close to her, holding her hand.
“It doesn’t matter how I’ve found out what I know,” he said. “I just need you to tell me certain things. I can’t promise to solve everything, but I rather think you’re more a victim of all this than anyone. Let me tell you what I know then I have just a few questions.”
At first she would not speak, slender, exhausted face unreadable as he gently explained what he had first guessed at, then investigated. Only when she began to grasp that he knew a great deal, did she begin to respond, tears slipping down her cheeks. Then came the anguished replies and small corrections of fact made in tiny whispers. As it all came out, he could feel the relief pouring from the little woman that at last she could talk about it.
“There’s just one final question,” he said at the end. “I’ve been told that a man called Jonathan Bright was a member of the Porthennis School, but I don’t know anything about him. What do you remember?”
“Jonathan?” Ruth frowned as though puzzled. “I don’t know very much. He was Polish and changed his name when he was sent here as a refugee in 1939. He went back after the war, but his family had disappeared so he returned to Britain. He came here because Frank Morgan invited him. I couldn’t understand why, because he was a very poor artist.”
“How did Frank Morgan know him?”
“They both belonged to some debating society in London. Frank used to go up every month for their meetings.”
“Do you know what sort of debating society?” Maltravers asked. Ruth shook her head.
“I never took much interest. It was called … oh, it’s so long ago … the Fourth International or something like that. But why do you want to know about Jonathan? He died years ago.”
“It was just an odd loose end in my mind.” Maltravers reached across from his seat and took her hand. “Thank you. I’m sorry I had to come here, but I knew you were the only one who would tell me.”
“What are you going to do?” She did not look at him as she put the inevitable question.
“Everything I can to help you” he assured her. “It depends on other people of course, but I think I can sort it all out … well as much as it can be sorted out now.”
“And what about Nick Charlton?”
Maltravers had been so involved in unravelling the last strands of the mystery, that he had failed to realise that Charlton’s name had never come up.
“What about him?” he asked.
“You see, you don’t know everything,” she said sadly. “He’s been threatening me.”
Maltravers sat upright and looked at her closely. “What have you told him?”
“Nothing … well no details,” she replied. “I’ve managed to put him off so far. But he knows things and has threatened to come back and make me …”
Soft tears were suddenly overtaken by a shudder of wracking emotion; she clasped her hands to her face and her little body shook as she wailed under the weight of insufferable terror. Maltravers waited for her to recover; dealing with Charlton had suddenly become a matter of urgency, but he had to reassure her he would do it before leaving.
“I didn’t know what Nick Charlton was doing,” he said as she dropped her hands back into her lap and looked at him beseechingly. “But you have my word that I’ll sort him out. Just tell me what he knows.”
“He’s only guessing really,” she replied. “But he came here and …”
When Maltravers left the cottage he was seething with anger; his immediate desire was to find Charlton and hit him with any available blunt instrument. But that would solve nothing. As he walked back down Fern Hill, he began to calm down as he worked out what he had to do. Ruth had given him the address and he made his way past holidaymakers strolling through the streets of Porthennis, children’s laughter in another world, towards the street behind the harbour. He reached the front door and stood on the step for a moment controlling himself.
“Don’t lose your temper, find it,” he muttered, then deliberately held down the bell push, thumb tip white with pressure.
“All right, all right!” Charlton’s voice called from inside the cottage in irritation. “I’m bloody coming!”
He half opened the door and looked at Maltravers aggressively. “What the hell’s the matter? What do you want?”
“To talk to you,” Maltravers pushed him aside as he kicked the door open and stepped inside. Caught off balance, Charlton staggered backwards and stumbled, swearing as his head caught the skirting board. Maltravers slammed the door shut and looked down at him. There was apprehension in the dwarfs mean, cunning eyes.
“Get up,” Maltravers ordered and walked across the room, grubby wallpaper, paintwork seamed with dust, steaks of dried dirt on the windows and a smell of mustiness like rotting fungus. Charlton cautiously rose to his feet, watching him warily.
“I know you,” he said. “You were in the Steamer the other night. With Helen Finch and that puff Lacey. Who the hell do you think you are, barging in here and —”
Maltravers sensed the gathering of animosity to mask fear and instantly stamped on it.
“That doesn’t matter,” he snapped. “I know who you are and I know what you are, and either I’m going to sort you out or the police will.”
He picked up a wooden dining chair and hurled it across the room. It hit the wall and fell at Charlton’s feet.
“Now sit down on there you little shit!”
When Charlton did not immediately obey, Maltravers grabbed a heavy slate clock off the mantelpiece and menacingly took half a step forward.
“On the chair, or I’ll bloody brain you!”
Charlton’s token resistance collapsed as he scrabbled for the chair, eyes never leaving Maltravers, and sat in it like a mechanical doll whose spring has suddenly broken.
“That’s better.” Maltravers weighed the clock in his hand for a moment. “I’ve been talking to Ruth Harvey and she’s told me things about you that I don’t like. I presume you know that blackmail is a very serious crime.”
“I’ve not been blackmailing anyone,” Charlton muttered defiantly.
He yelped and ducked in terror as the clock crashed against the wall inches from his right ear, gouging a deep, jagged hole in wallpaper and plaster. There was a tinkle of shattering glass as the brass front swung open on its hinge. Before he could move, Maltravers had leapt forward and retrieved the clock and was back where he had been standing.
“Don’t kid yourself I missed,” he warned. “I could have hit either one of your balls at this range. Any more stupid lies like that and this thing takes your goddamned head off.”
For a moment Charlton stared at him then managed to give the impression that he had shrunk even smaller than nature had made him.
“What do you want?” The question held the right level of fear.
&nb
sp; “You’re going to tell me everything you know. And don’t leave anything out because, believe me, I’ll know if you do.” Maltravers was satisfied he had scared Charlton enough to bluff him.
“I don’t know that much … No!” Charlton stiffened and held up both hands defensively as Maltravers raised the clock again threateningly. “OK, I picked up a few things here and there and realised there was something they wanted to keep quiet.”
“What was it?”
“I couldn’t find out. Then Martha died and I know Ruth thinks she was murdered. It had to be tied up with the others somehow.”
“So instead of going straight to the police, you decided to threaten Ruth and force it out of her,” Maltravers observed caustically. “Bloody charming. Good at pushing old ladies around aren’t you? Don’t like it when it happens to you though, do you? What else did you find out?”
“That’s all. Honest. I know nothing more than what I’ve told Ruth and if you’ve talked to her … She said she’d tell me more later. When she’d had time to think.”
“Ruth’s told me about that,” Maltravers agreed. “I had the feeling you hadn’t got all that much, otherwise you’d have been even nastier than you have been. Christ, you’re disgusting.”
Charlton turned away as Maltravers looked at him in distaste. “Anyway, you’ve got it round your neck. I know the full story and there’s nothing for any of them to worry about. But they’re old and they get confused. Ruth’s distressed about Martha and went haywire when you started poking your filthy nose in.”
“But there’s something,” Charlton insisted. “There has to be.”
“Of course there’s something,” Maltravers acknowledged. “But nothing really important. Certainly not Martha being murdered. That’s crap. All the police are going to be interested in is the fact that you’ve been blackmailing Ruth Harvey. I’ll enjoy being a witness at your trial. It should take you out of circulation for a while. Your best bet will be pleading guilty and hope the judge takes it into consideration. But there’s some big lads in the Scrubs or wherever they send you. Very fond of old ladies and don’t like little turds who molest them.”
The Dying of the Light Page 18