‘Becca,’ said her husband with a frown.
‘Oh, I know,’ she said, lowering her voice slightly, ‘but what does it matter? Everyone knows, and these people will never see him again anyway. His wife is … well, in the old days we’d have said she was mad. Nowadays it’s tarted up. Mentally disturbed, emotionally unstable. Pretty words for the same thing: barking.’
‘Really, Becca, that’s not nice. She has reasons for her illness.’
‘I didn’t say she didn’t, did I?’ The voice fell still further. ‘Their son died, when he was just a boy at school. Now, no one could say that wasn’t a dreadful thing, but it was years ago. She should have pulled up her socks and got on with life. Instead, she’s made life miserable for herself and everyone else, ever since. Had to be put in a home, you know. It costs the earth. And how that man puts up with it, I do not know. If you ask me, he’s headed for—’
‘That’s enough, Becca,’ said her husband firmly. ‘Brian Rawles is a good man, doing the best he can in a difficult situation. I’ll not have you saying such things about him.’
‘Oh, well.’ She smiled, and for a moment her eyes lost their restless, searching look. ‘I talk too much, as you’ve always told me, Jack, but I’m too old to change. Anyway, I’m glad you came to visit, but don’t you dare take our rector away!’
TEN
‘I hope you won’t think too badly of Becca Bradley,’ said the rector. We were sitting around his fire with after-dinner drinks. The room was cosy and rather shabby. And our supper had consisted of a good thick soup, to keep out the suddenly chilly spring evening, and homemade bread. I was feeling comfortable and very much at home. ‘Becca’s a gossip, of course,’ he went on, ‘but her heart is in the right place, though you wouldn’t guess it.’
‘Now, Bill, you’re too kind about her.’ Mrs Robinson sat on a squashy old sofa with her legs tucked up under her, lithe as a thirty-year-old, a mark she’d passed at least twenty years before. ‘You always want to think the best of everyone, but there’s such a thing as too much Christian charity.’
‘There can never be too much charity, Jenny, love. Only misdirected, sometimes. I admit that Becca can be a sore trial, but look at all she does in the parish. There’s not a supper she’s ever missed, not a volunteer job she hasn’t undertaken. She’s invaluable.’
Mrs Robinson shook her head with a smile. ‘You’re too good to live, darling. She’ll never miss an opportunity to pick up more gossip. That’s why she has her finger in so many pies. Of course, she also worships at your shrine.’
Mr Robinson laughed that one off. ‘It’s one of the hazards of the priesthood, though it’s more often elderly spinsters who fall for their priests, and more often unmarried clergy who are the victims.’
I thought of one of my favourite classic mysteries. ‘Have you ever read Overture to Death, by Ngaio Marsh?’
‘Oh, yes!’ Mrs Robinson chuckled. ‘The two church hens vying for the attentions of their supremely good-looking rector. You have that in common, Bill, with – what was his name?’
‘Copeland,’ I said. ‘I re-read the book just the other day. He was a different type, but yes, your husband is certainly right up there in the Mr England lists.’
Mr Robinson rapidly changed the subject. ‘Mr Nesbitt, I know that you’re a retired chief constable, so I assume you still have associates in the police force. Has any progress been made, do you know, towards solving Dean Brading’s murder? That was a dreadful thing – a priest murdered in his own church. At least, I suppose it was murder? I’ve seen very little in the papers or on the telly since it happened.’
‘It’s possible that it was an accident. I know very little, actually, except what everyone knows. He was found with a frightful wound in his head, which was not inconsistent with it having struck a solid object, such as a bit of carving, in the cathedral. He might have slipped and fallen.’
‘But you don’t think he did? All right, I understand you can’t say a great deal. The police came to talk to us about it, to question me about my whereabouts at the relevant time, I imagine. It’s a bit ironic, that. They seem to believe that I’d do murder to get the job, when I don’t particularly want it. At any rate, I have an unimpeachable alibi, as there was a conference of the diocesan clergy that day, all day.’
‘That is fortunate,’ said Alan blandly. But Mr Robinson didn’t miss much.
‘That sounds as though your alibi isn’t quite so good.’
‘Bill!’ said his wife indignantly.
‘It’s all right. Yes, I am also under some suspicion, as is everyone on the commission. This is going to be a difficult case to solve, I’m afraid. But we were talking about your parishioners.’
‘Yes, well, I do boast that I have an extraordinarily devoted, and devout, congregation, and together we have accomplished a great deal in this little corner of England. Poverty is down, employment is up, and not all of it at slave wages, though there’s still much to be done in that area. Best of all, people are helping each other, looking out for one another in a way one usually doesn’t find outside a village, and not even always there, nowadays. And they’re learning to put their trust in God, which, after all, is task number one in my job description.’
‘In ours for Sherebury, too,’ said Alan. ‘Are you quite sure you wouldn’t take the job if offered, Mr Robinson?’
‘Please call me Bill. Mr Robinson is my father.’ He fiddled with the stem of his glass. ‘No, I’m not sure. I’d rather stay here. Jenny wants to stay here. The kids live nearby, and our first grandchild is due soon. The question is, does God want me to stay here? I’d have a broader scope as bishop, could help set policy, perhaps change some things that badly need changing. But I’d lose the ability for hands-on pastoral care. Oh, I know, I would be pastor to the clergy in the diocese. But it’s not the same.’ He put his glass down and let his hands fall to his lap with a little sigh. ‘You see, I know my people. There’s Brian, with all his troubles. There’s young Susan, who keeps on having babies she can’t support. The old man you saw today in the coffee shop, who needs a hip replacement and stubbornly refuses to have the operation. The Chinese couple struggling to make ends meet. The two young Sikh men who face constant persecution from their neighbours who don’t understand they’re not Muslim.’
‘They’re not Christian, either,’ I pointed out.
‘What does that matter? They’re a part of my parish. They need help. If I were a bishop, I might not even know they existed, and if I did, serving them wouldn’t be a part of my job, nor would I have time.’
‘I understand,’ said Alan. ‘But I’m sorry. I may say that when I saw you in church this afternoon I admired you, but I was quite sure you were wrong for Sherebury. I’ve changed my mind. If you change yours, you’ll let us know, won’t you?’
‘I will. And I might. God moves in mysterious ways.’
‘A praise band,’ I murmured, just before I turned over and went to sleep. ‘Never thought I’d live to say I liked a praise band.’
This time we had a few days before our next call to duty. When we were having our coffee and buns after church on Sunday, the dean came up to us. ‘I would have phoned you yesterday, except that I didn’t get home until quite late, and I do hate to disturb you on a Sunday, but as you’re here …’ He paused, and Alan gestured for him to sit down and continue. ‘I won’t stay, but I needed to tell you that I got a letter yesterday from the Secretary.’ The capital S was apparent in his speech. ‘The extraordinary meeting of the commission is scheduled for Monday week. Did you receive the letter?’
‘Not yet. Our postman is new and sometimes makes mistakes.’
‘I’ll make a copy of mine, in case your postman never gets it straight. You can be there?’
‘Certainly.’
‘I have one more assignment for you before then. You and I have both visited two of the candidates, and we’ve discussed them. Now I’d like you to visit the third, as soon as possible. I wish you could be t
here on a Sunday, as they have a very fine choir, but that’s cutting it rather fine, what with the meeting on Monday.’
‘Perhaps we can get to a Choral Evensong. We’ll manage, Kenneth. Don’t worry.’
So we phoned Rotherford Cathedral to check the service schedule and make an appointment with the dean, booked a B and B, and, on Tuesday morning, drove to Sherebury station to catch the first of two trains to take us to Rotherford, not too far from Oxford. I was looking forward to this one. I had looked it up on the internet while searching for B and Bs and found it delightful, its charm reflecting its history and landscape. It seemed to be a real place, not a pseudo-Disneyland of a town.
This time we were taking Watson with us. He was getting very tired of being left out of things, even though Jane took excellent care of him. The cats, of course, scarcely noticed when we were gone, though they scolded us roundly when we returned. The purpose of humans is to serve cats, and we were falling down on the job, they informed us. Watson simply missed us.
‘He won’t be any trouble,’ Alan had said persuasively. ‘Our B and B allows well-behaved visiting dogs, and our little chap behaves himself. Don’t you, mutt?’
It’s amazing how much my large, solid husband can sound like a doting mother.
We had chosen to travel by rail, since both the cathedral and our B and B were in the centre of town, and since most of our way by car would have lain on the motorways, which I detest. Our journey did involve changing trains, and that in London is never fun, especially with luggage and a dog. But we got from Victoria to Paddington without great delay, and from there it was a quick run to Rotherford.
From the first, the town took my breath away. We were near enough to the Cotswolds that much of the building stone was of that lovely honey colour that makes Cotswold villages so warm and inviting. The building style was much the same, too, or so at least it appeared to my untutored eye. Shops and houses were small and unpretentious, but with fine proportions. Flowers were everywhere – not the lush draperies of wisteria and climbing roses that would appear in summer over walls and porches, but bright swathes of daffodils in the sun and carpets of bluebells wherever there was a wood.
‘It’s almost blinding,’ I said in awe. ‘I don’t quite believe they’re real. Nothing could be so perfect.’
We found our room for the night, left our luggage, and took Watson for a long leisurely walk down the High Street, which meandered, following the River Roth that gave the town its name. There were ducks. Watson was disappointed that he was not allowed to chase them. There were cats sunning themselves on doorsteps and walls. Watson stayed a discreet distance away from them, having had an unfortunate experience with an extremely intimidating cat a few months before. There were children who wanted to pet him, which he enjoyed thoroughly.
As for us, we simply looked and listened. The shops were interesting, particularly since they weren’t aimed obviously at the tourist trade. I was, as usual, stopped by a display of hats in a window. ‘I don’t have one that colour,’ I said innocently, pointing to a bright chartreuse creation.
‘And a jolly good thing, too,’ said Alan. ‘That is not your colour, my dear.’
‘Nor anyone else’s, I wouldn’t think. That navy straw, on the other hand …’
We went in the store, of course, though we had to leave Watson outside. The navy straw turned out to be a peculiar shape, not at all flattering, but a peach-coloured one was obviously designed with me in mind. Alan is not a man easily intimidated by a milliner, and he actually rather enjoys shopping with me, at least for a while. He agreed that the hat had my name on it, so we walked out with it to greet a bereft dog, abandoned by his people and plainly unloved.
‘You,’ I told him, ‘are almost as good a liar as the cats.’
And then I clutched Alan’s arm and turned toward him a delighted face. ‘Bells!’
They were practicing a peal, from the sound of it, and they had a good set of ringers. The bells sounded out clear and true in joyous order. I know almost nothing about change-ringing save what I gleaned from Dorothy L. Sayers’ marvellous novel The Nine Tailors, so I had no idea what ‘method’ they were ringing, but it didn’t matter. ‘This is a proper cathedral town,’ I said happily.
We stood and listened for a while, but Watson began to get restless, so we strolled back to our B and B to put my new hat safely away, and then left him in the back garden, with the consent of our hostess, and went to seek lunch. Predictably, we ended up at a pub.
‘Just a half for me, and I think a ploughman’s, if they do them here. A salad, if not.’ I was feeling fat. The mirror at the hat shop had revealed puffier cheeks than I liked to think I had.
Alan fetched our beer and ordered our food, and when he had sat down I said, ‘Tell me about the cathedral. I understand it’s one of the new ones?’
‘New as a cathedral, though quite old as a parish church. Fourteenth century, I believe. Decorated.’
The term referred, I realized, to a particular style of English Gothic, not to the work of a painter or interior design artist. ‘And big, I think Christopher said?’
‘Huge, for a parish church. As you can plainly tell, there’s a very nice bell tower with a high steeple. Shall we go take a look after lunch?’
Well, that was one of the less necessary questions. I was dying to see the church, so I polished off most of my ploughman’s lunch in short order, virtuously leaving some of the bread and a minute fragment of cheese, and we headed off in the direction of the bells.
There’s no point in describing Rotherford Cathedral. Any guide to fine English cathedrals will have pictures. I will just say that it is glorious. Not as beautiful as Sherebury, of course, but almost no church can live up to my own beloved Cathedral. Rotherford is smaller, but quite big enough, and, unlike Sherebury, it’s all of a piece. My Cathedral has one transept from a much earlier period than the rest of the structure, but Rotherford never suffered from a devastating fire like that which destroyed most of Sherebury in its early days, requiring rebuilding of all but the one transept. Rotherford, I saw, was also spared the Cromwellian destruction.
‘Look, Alan, the statues all still have their heads. Why is that?’
‘Ah. Therein lies a tale. Come in and sit, and I’ll tell you about it.’
We found chairs near the back that were isolated by some trick of acoustics from the clamour of the bells, and Alan tented his fingers in what I’ve come to think of as his lecturing position.
‘It started with a turn of fate that seemed a disaster at the time. When Henry dissolved the monasteries – this was one, you know.’
I nodded.
‘Well, when that happened, most of the abbeys were either sold to private buyers, or given as gifts to those owed favours by the Crown, or simply destroyed. Some were left to decay, some despoiled by locals looking for building materials. Rotherford, however, didn’t appeal to any buyers or gift recipients because it was prone to flooding. The river was very much higher then, apparently, or else it’s more effectively contained now. At any rate, there was a major flood at just about the time Henry was wanting to get rid of the abbey, and although the buildings weren’t touched, the whole place was isolated by the waters. So the place was simply closed and locked up, and looked like decaying slowly.
‘But then the people living in the surrounding town and countryside stepped in. They had greatly loved their abbey, it seems, and were determined to save it from devastation, until such time as, in their eyes, sanity was restored to the country.’
‘So how did they protect it?’
‘By sheer cunning, aided considerably by good fortune. It was one of the last foundations to be dissolved, and by that time the king’s attentions were engaged elsewhere. This was not one of the wealthy abbeys, so the pickings weren’t as good as elsewhere, and, as I say, nobody really wanted it. Henry more or less forgot about it, in part because the councillor who should have reminded him was from Rotherford, and had a sneaking affection
for the place. So, with the tacit cooperation of the councillor, the locals built a high wall around it and then planted the fastest-growing trees and vines they could find up against both sides of the wall. By the time any of the king’s men came looking for spoils, all that could be seen was a dense copse.’
‘Good heavens! Sleeping Beauty’s castle. But surely the tower was visible.’
‘The tower and the bells were added much later – late seventeenth century, I believe. So, yes, the place looked exactly like something out of Sleeping Beauty. The secret was kept for years, and then decades, and then over a century. Local men and women passed along to future generations the secret of the way through the wall, so repairs could be made, but so devoted were they to their abbey that no one ever told. Cromwell’s men had no idea it was there.’
‘You’re not making this up, are you? It sounds like a fairy tale.’
‘It does, I agree, but no, I’m not making it up. It’s true, one of the famous “hidden” tales of English history.’
‘But it’s so romantic. Why haven’t I ever heard it before?’
‘The people here still aren’t eager for it to get about. You know the English have long memories. I learned about it from a chap I worked with years ago, when he’d had a few over the eight. We’d been talking about secret passages and he said I’d be surprised where one was, right in little Rotherford, where he had lived as a boy. He became dimly aware then that he’d said too much and shut up, but I was intrigued and did a bit of research, and it took some real digging, I can tell you. The outline of the story is mentioned in a local history or two, but with no details, and apparently no one to this day has ever revealed where the entry is – or was. Of course, the wall is long gone, and the concealing vegetation. I don’t know when they decided it was safe to start using the church again, but certainly not until the Protectorate was over and the monarchy restored.’
Day of Vengeance Page 9