A Vow Of Chastity

by Veronica Black

  Yesterday morning I awoke the community and prepared breakfast as I always do. After breakfast I loaded the water cans in the back of the car and drove over to the presbytery where I filled the cans and had them blessed by Father Malone — such a kindly priest and never out of temper. I then drove home and prepared the midday meal. Mother Dorothy told me that Sister Joan was to have the use of the car in order to drive Sister Hilaria to the dentist so I went out and gave the vehicle a bit of a polish. During the afternoon I wrote out the recipes that Mrs Holt had kindly given me and put them into my cooking file; then I cleared up the kitchen and made some herb tea for Sister Mary Concepta who is permitted it as a remedy for the severe rheumatism that quite incapacitates her at times. I then went to my cell for the religious study period. I am reading the published journals of His Holiness Pope John the Twenty-Third — most interesting and giving great food for thought. Oh, I forgot to mention that just before that Sister Hilaria came home in Padraic Lee’s lorry. I gave her a cup of tea and Mother Dorothy agreed with me that she should lie down for a couple of hours. Later Sister Joan returned, having accomplished the journey without mishap, thanks be to Our Dear Lord. After supper I washed up the dishes and joined the community at recreation.

  She hadn’t mentioned losing her rosary. Sister Joan wondered whether to mention it herself. She would wait, she decided, since it was possible that Petroc had his own. If not, then it was obvious he had found Sister Margaret’s and that meant he had been wherever she had dropped it. Not, surely, in the Romany camp else she would have discovered its loss sooner. That left the Penglows, the Wesleys (since they had alighted from the car to make enquiries of the neighbours), the Holts and the Olives. She put the statement back on the file, added her own brief account, and looked up as Mother Dorothy came in with Detective Sergeant Mill.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Mill wishes you to go with him to the Romany camp,’ she said without preamble. ‘He feels they might talk more freely if you are present. I have told him that we will, of course, co-operate fully in the police investigation.’

  ‘What about school?’ Sister Joan enquired.

  ‘Sister David is perfectly able to cope, Sister. You may go now with the officer.’

  ‘Yes, Mother Dorothy.’ She knelt briefly, aware of a flicker of amusement crossing the detective’s face as he picked up the statements. Probably he considered the convent courtesies impossibly medieval.

  He had driven himself since the car was empty. At a little distance two policemen and a policewoman were unloading photographic and fingerprinting equipment from a van.

  ‘We’ve got your prints already, Sister.’ He held open the door for her. ‘I take it that you’ve read through the statements and there isn’t much in them to throw any light on the matter.’

  ‘Nothing tangible.’

  ‘Can you give me a rundown of a typical day in your order? I haven’t a clue how nuns actually spend their time.’ He thrust the pile of statements under the dashboard and positioned himself neatly behind the wheel. Early forties, she reckoned, and thinner than the popular image of the police with grey streaks in brown hair and disconcertingly shrewd brown eyes.

  ‘Easily. We lead very regulated lives. We rise at five and go to the chapel as soon as we have washed our faces and cleaned our teeth — you want details?’

  ‘If you please, Sister?’

  ‘In chapel we have our individual private devotions until 6.30 when either Father Malone or his curate, Father Stephen, comes to offer mass. Then we go up to the refectory for breakfast — cereal, a piece of fruit, and coffee. We eat it standing. After that we sweep and clean our cells and then go to our respective duties. I teach in the local school, Sister David does translation work — she is a Latin scholar — Sister Katherine sells her embroidery and Sister Martha some of her garden produce, and Sister Margaret bottles fruit which she sells in the local market. We are all in our cells again by five when we pursue religious studies. We discuss what topic we wish to concentrate on with the Prioress who supervises the progress of our work and sets essays and meditation reports from time to time. At six we go into chapel for further devotions and Benediction; then at 7.30 there is supper—’

  ‘What happened to lunch?’

  ‘Oh, a meal of soup and bread and fruit is served at midday. As I am still at the school I take an apple and a cheese roll. Sometimes I make hot soup for myself and the children when the weather is cold. At supper we have soup or a salad, then a main course of fish or cheese or something on toast and a pudding — steamed or milk. I can’t see how all this is going to be the slightest help to you.’

  ‘I’m building up a picture.’ He curved the car on to the moorland track.

  ‘Well, during the meal one of the community reads aloud from a book about one of the saints or something of that nature. She eats her meal later and we take turns at reading. After supper we have an hour’s recreation when we sit round with our work — knitting and mending and talk. Mother Prioress sometimes joins us, also Sister Hilaria. At 9.00 we go down to the chapel again for evening prayers and then we receive the blessing and after that there is the grand silence.’

  ‘Do you,’ he enquired, ‘get time off at the weekend?’

  ‘On Saturdays I help Sister Martha in the garden and prepare lessons for the coming week. On Saturdays we have general confession over which Mother Dorothy presides, and we make our private confessions to Father Malone or Father Stephen on Wednesdays. On Sundays we have an extra hour of recreation during the afternoon. If it’s a nice day we walk in the garden. We also borrow books from the library which is extensive or write letters home.’

  ‘Absolute regularity, obedience, sexlessness — how do you stand it?’ he enquired.

  ‘We all chose it,’ Sister Joan said, flushing slightly.

  ‘A pretty woman like you ought to be happily married with children.’ He sounded angry as if her choice of the religious life were a reflection on his masculinity.

  ‘Marriage is a vocation too,’ she argued. ‘I just didn’t happen to choose it.’

  ‘You didn’t mention flagellation.’ His voice challenged her.

  ‘These days that particular penance is merely symbolic. Oh, and we don’t wear hair shirts or stick pins into ourselves either. And I’m terribly sorry to disappoint you but there isn’t a lesbian, a transvestite or a child molester in our entire community.’

  ‘Temper, temper, Sister Joan.’ He shot her a glance too teasing for her peace of mind.

  ‘I beg your pardon. It’s only that I get a bit weary of the misconceptions we come up against sometimes,’ she said stiffly.

  ‘Fed up,’ he substituted.

  ‘Exceedingly fed up, Detective Sergeant Mill.’

  ‘Here’s the camp. He slowed the car and stopped. ‘The pathologist’s report is in. The boy died of a massive overdose of LSD, taken by mouth in what seems to have been a bottle of wine. Have you any ideas about that? Your pupils aren’t junkies by any chance?’

  ‘No, of course not. The notion is absolutely ridiculous. Drugs? It seems — bizarre.’

  ‘In this rural district apart from the odd spot of glue sniffing and a few hopefuls who think they can get away with growing marijuana in their back gardens we haven’t had much trouble in that area,’ he said. ‘Of course the Romanies may deal in drugs.’

  ‘They deal mainly in scrap metal. Even if one or two of them are — they’d never give it to a child, especially one of their own.’

  ‘He might have got hold of it by accident.’

  ‘Then how did he come to be in the chapel?’

  ‘You’re right, of course. He was carried in, probably through that damned unlocked side door, and arranged neatly while the rest of you were at your recreation. From now on I’m going to insist that the entire building is locked at night. Anyone in need of spiritual comfort can ring the bell like ordinary people. Shall we get out here and walk?’

  ‘I hope my being with a member of the police force isn
’t going to ruin my reputation,’ she said, getting out of the car.

  ‘Don’t worry, Sister. I’ll make it clear you’re not under arrest.’

  ‘They are more likely to mistake me for a copper’s nark,’ she countered.

  They were approaching the semicircle of wagons, passing the willow trees through which the dull gleam of water could be seen. Petroc had swum and splashed here in the cool evening, unaware that he had only another day to live. Her eyes filled with tears and she blinked them rapidly away, swallowing hard.

  The men were still sorting scrap; washing hung on the lines; a baby was crying in one of the wagons; a dog barked. Everything seemed as usual but she sensed a darkness over the camp. The school would only be half full, she realized, seeing her four pupils in a neat and unnaturally silent group on the steps of the Smith wagon. Tabitha and Edith, wearing black cotton pinafores over their jeans and sweaters, sat together on the bottom step. Above them Hagar and Conrad occupied separate steps, the boy having a black band round his arm, Hagar’s long hair tightly plaited and looped under a black headsquare.

  ‘Good morning, children.’ She heard the false brightness of her own voice and winced. ‘Sister David went into school this morning and I came over with Detective Sergeant Mill to see how you all were. This must be a sad day for you, so we must try to help by trying to remember anything useful to the police.’

  ‘We don’t know noth— anything,’ Conrad said.

  ‘Hagar? You saw Petroc the evening before last, didn’t you?’ She squatted down near the steps. ‘You spoke with him and he said he was going somewhere. Can you remember exactly what was said? It might help.’

  Hagar closed her eyes briefly, screwing up her forehead, then opened her eyes and said flatly, ‘No.’

  ‘You had had an argument with your brother—’

  ‘I told her she ought to help out more now that Dad’s done a bunk — run off,’ Conrad said.

  ‘I went off in a temper,’ Hagar said, evidently deciding to open up. ‘I went down to the pool. Sometimes Petroc and I like — liked to swim there and fool about. It was coming on to rain. Petroc was there, throwing pebbles into the water. I told him it looked like rain and he said, “Well, I’ll soon be under cover,” and then he ran off.’

  ‘But not towards his wagon?’

  ‘Out towards the moor.’ Hagar gestured vaguely. From under their slanting lids her black eyes conducted a close survey of the detective who stood a few feet away.

  ‘Children, has anyone offered you any grass, hash, that kind of thing recently?’ he asked.

  They looked at one another and shook their heads, only Edith piping up, ‘I’ve been making a basket out of grass for the project, Sister.’

  ‘Not that kind of grass, pet,’ Sister Joan said. ‘Well, if you do remember anything at all you’ll tell me or Detective Sergeant Mill, won’t you? We want to find out what happened to Petroc. Where is Mr Lee — your daddy, Tabitha?’

  ‘He went into Bodmin to see about the funeral.’ It was Conrad who answered. ‘He’s swearing to kill anyone responsible.’

  ‘Sometimes we all say things we don’t mean when we’re very shocked or grieved,’ Sister Joan began.

  ‘He means it,’ Conrad said. ‘We won’t be coming to school until after the funeral on Saturday. Is that all right, Sister?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I’ll see you on Monday then. Try not to be too sad.’ Her voice trailed unhappily away. Glib words of reassurance would have splintered on the air.

  ‘We didn’t make much headway there,’ the detective commented as they walked away. ‘Well, it was worth a try.’

  ‘If Petroc was going to meet someone — someone he considered a friend — then he would have drunk a glass of wine unsuspectingly, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘The wine had been heavily sugared according to the pathologist. Probably it was too sour for his taste.’

  ‘And then in a little while the drug would have worked and he’d have gone tripping off into some fantasy world and died there.’ She shuddered.

  ‘He had what’s known as a good trip at any rate,’ Detective Sergeant Mill told her. ‘His expression and attitude were both serene.’

  ‘Because there were no devils in his subconscious. Do you want to speak to anyone else?’

  ‘We can call in at the school. One of the others might have recalled something.’

  Assenting, she walked back to the car. The rhythm of the camp had not altered but she knew their visit had been noted.

  ‘The boy was baptised a Catholic by the way,’ her escort said, opening the car door for her. ‘Seems he didn’t keep it up, but he’ll be buried as a Catholic.’

  ‘I forgot to ask.’ She bit her lip in annoyance.

  ‘Ask what?’

  ‘The rosary that was in his pocket. What was it like?’

  ‘Just beads strung together. The chain joining them was snapped.’

  ‘Beads like this?’ She held up her own rosary.

  ‘Exactly like that. Perfectly ordinary beads.’

  ‘No, Sergeant. Most people have crucifixes on their beads that are made of silver or gold, sometimes rolled gold. The Daughters of Compassion have copper crucifixes. And one of our community lost her own rosary quite recently.’

  ‘Which sister?’ He had set the car in motion.

  ‘Our lay sister, Sister Margaret. She drove me round when I was visiting the parents. She only discovered its loss yesterday. She had a lot of work to do, going to fetch the holy water from the presbytery. We don’t tell our beads until the evening.’

  ‘Does she mention it in her statement?’

  ‘No, I don’t suppose she thought it had any bearing on the matter. She mentioned it to me. She must have lost it the previous evening or she would have discovered the loss. Oh wait. That isn’t right. It can’t be. At the final evening prayers we say the rosary so she would have realized that the rosary wasn’t there on the night before last. She might have lost it yesterday morning. At the presbytery.’

  ‘By which time Petroc Lee was already dead. So how did it come to be in his pocket?’

  ‘I don’t know. You’ll have to ask Sister Margaret. She may have remembered by now.’

  ‘Wouldn’t it have made a tinkling noise as it fell?’

  ‘Not necessarily; not if she were standing on carpet or grass. Sergeant, it really is no use asking me about it. Ask Sister Margaret.’

  ‘I intend to,’ he said grimly.

  ‘And don’t go frightening her to death,’ she added. ‘Sister Margaret is a good, simple soul who won’t tread on an insect if she can avoid it. If you start — grilling her she’ll just get vaguer and vaguer and more and more confused.’

  ‘You paint me as a dreadful bully, Sister,’ he commented.

  ‘I just think that you don’t understand how religious women function.’

  ‘But I’m fairly experienced where women are concerned. Ask my wife.’

  ‘Your private life,’ she said stonily, ‘is none of my concern. Why do you keep trying to muddle me?’

  ‘Maybe I want a spontaneous reaction and not the expected one drummed into you by the convent training, Sister. But don’t fret about Sister Margaret. I’ll handle her with kid gloves. Here’s the school. You can ask the other children about the rosary.’

  Sister David’s rather pretty singing voice stopped in mid-chord as they entered. The five pupils present stood up, their expressions sharpening as they saw the detective with Sister Joan.

  ‘Good morning, Sister. I was just trying to get a little singsong going — nothing disrespectful,’ Sister David began nervously, her rabbit nose twitching furiously.

  ‘You sound splendid, Sister,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said genially. ‘Sister Joan is giving me a bit of a helping hand this morning. Sit down, children. Sister and I are trying to find out how Petroc met his death. You’ve already been told about that?’

  ‘I broke the news to them,’ Sister David said. ‘Mother Dorothy advised it.�
��

  ‘Well, now — where shall we start?’ He looked round. ‘Did anyone see Petroc the night before last? Between eight o’clock and midnight?’

  There was a general shaking of heads.

  ‘Why eight?’ Sister Joan enquired in an undertone.

  ‘That was roughly the time that Hagar Smith saw the lad,’ he replied. ‘Now I want you all to think very carefully. Has Petroc talked to you about any special friends he’d made recently? Anyone he’d arranged to meet?’

  Again there was a bewildered shaking of heads.

  ‘Did Petroc mention having found something? A rosary?’ Sister Joan interposed.

  ‘He didn’t say anything to me,’ Timothy Holt said.

  ‘So none of you knows anything?’ The detective’s smile was disappointed.

  ‘The farm children and the Romanies don’t mix very well together,’ Sister Joan murmured. ‘There’s a deep-seated prejudice that divides the two communities. I do my best but children often reflect the attitudes of their parents.’

  ‘And you all know where you were the evening before last?’ Detective Sergeant Mill pursued.

  ‘Madelyn and I were at home watching the television,’ David Penglow said. ‘You saw us, Sister.’

  ‘You didn’t go out after the sisters visited?’

  ‘It still gets dark quick,’ Madelyn said virtuously. ‘We’re not allowed out after dark.’

  ‘I was helping Dad muck out when Sister Joan came with Sister — Margaret?’ At Sister Joan’s nod he continued, ‘When they left I went back into the barn — we’ve got a new calf there. I went to bed quite early.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ Billy Wesley informed them. ‘I stayed up late and had fish and chips. We all went to the pictures earlier on — the whole family. Mum says she’s sorry she missed you, Sister.’