Death of a Chancellor lfp-4

by David Dickinson

  Powerscourt stopped for a moment to see if there would be a nod from the medical department. Eventually there was a slow, but definite inclination of Dr Blackstaff’s head. It was undoubtedly a nod. Inwardly Powerscourt rejoiced.

  ‘The murder,’ Powerscourt went on, remembering he was speaking to John Eustace’s closest friend, ‘was truly horrible. I think his head had been cut off. I think the intention of the murderer was to stick the head on a pole. Maybe he stuck it as a temporary measure on one of the posts on that great four-poster bed. The butler was terrified of scandal. You wished to be loyal to your friend and to his memory. You feared, above all, what damage might be done if the circumstances surrounding John Eustace’s demise became public. So you rushed the body off to the mortuary as fast as you could. You also made sure that only the undertaker knew what must have happened to the corpse. Nobody else in his business saw anything other than a closed coffin.’

  Dr Blackstaff looked as if he might speak. But he did not. Instead he nodded a weary nod.

  ‘Thank you once again,’ said Powerscourt. ‘Let me tell you how your acceptance changes the position. We can leave the body where it is. The police will take no action. I am assuming the man who murdered John Eustace is the same man who murdered the man on the spit and the dismembered corpse. You cannot be hanged more than once, no matter how many people you may have slaughtered. The killer can hang for those two murders. It should not be necessary to bring a third charge. The body and the memory of John Eustace can be left in peace. I am sure that is what you would have wished, Dr Blackstaff.’

  At last the doctor spoke. ‘Do you know who the killer is, Lord Powerscourt?’

  Now it was Powerscourt’s turn to shake his head. ‘I do not,’ he said sadly.

  ‘Do you think you will find him?’

  ‘Yes, if he does not kill me first.’ Powerscourt told the doctor about the attempt on his life in the cathedral, the falling masonry, his hours alone with the dead of Compton’s past.

  ‘One last request, if I may trouble you still further.’ Powerscourt’s eye was drawn to another of the doctor’s grisly collection of medical prints on the wall opposite. It showed a long line of wounded men who snaked out of the picture into the fields beyond. Snow was falling. The head of the queue was in front of a barn which must have served as a temporary medical station, Dr Blackstaff’s predecessors working furiously inside. It must have been a terrible battle, Powerscourt thought, Inkerman perhaps or Balaclava. Heaps of amputated limbs were stacked neatly against the side of the building. An orderly was bringing a bundle of the latest arms and legs to add to the charnel house. They were arranged separately, Powerscourt saw to his horror, arms in one pile, legs in another.

  ‘We are still, I would suggest,’ he went on, ‘operating under the same rules as before. All you have to do is nod. I want to test out on you what I think must have been troubling John Eustace in the last weeks and months of his life. You see, I think we are in the middle, no, not the middle, I think we are very close to the end of a very daring conspiracy, a most ingenious conspiracy, a conspiracy that could have repercussions far beyond the boundaries of Compton Minster.’

  Powerscourt spoke for about five minutes. He paused every now and then to collect his thoughts. He had never tried to put all the pieces together in conversation before, only in his mind, and then usually in the middle of the night. He left out a lot of the details. He did not mention the Archdeacon’s pilgrimages to Melbury Clinton or the Canon’s expeditions to Ledbury St John in case the doctor did not know of these. He spoke at length about the thousand year celebrations in the cathedral.

  When he stopped he felt like an undergraduate who has just read a controversial, possibly heretical, essay to his tutor. He wondered what the verdict would be. Dr Blackstaff looked at Powerscourt in astonishment. Powerscourt wondered if he was going to be declared insane. He was not. Dr Blackstaff did not speak. He continued to stare at Powerscourt for what must have been almost a minute. Then he nodded. He nodded very vigorously indeed.

  20

  Ever since their engagement in the storm on the summit of Glastonbury Tor Patrick Butler had taken to dropping in on his fiancee at all hours of the day. Their earlier trysts over afternoon tea had been broadened into coffee in the mornings, chocolate in the early evenings and occasional suppers with the boys. But it was a perplexed Patrick Butler who joined his fiancee the morning after Powerscourt’s conversations with Dr Blackstaff.

  ‘I don’t understand it, Anne,’ he said. ‘Weeks ago the Bishop more or less told me we could get married in the cathedral. I asked him for the date we discussed, a month or so after Easter Monday, as I am sure you remember.’

  Anne Herbert nodded.

  ‘Now he’s saying,’ Patrick Butler went on, ‘that it will be impossible for us to be married that day in the minster.’ Bishop Ruins Wedding, was running through his mind. Happy Couple Distraught. ‘He says we could have the service in St Peter under the Arches instead.’

  ‘But that’s impossible, absolutely impossible, Patrick,’ said Anne Herbert with unusual vehemence. Her late husband had been rector of St Peter’s. ‘He can’t possibly think I’m going to marry again at the very altar where my dead first husband held his services. It would make a mockery of the service. Just think of what the congregation would say.’

  ‘Maybe he’s made a mistake,’ said Patrick. ‘But why the cathedral should be out of bounds beats me. All the commemoration services will be over by then.’

  ‘This should cheer you up, Patrick,’ said Anne. ‘We’ve been asked out to dinner this evening. Lady Powerscourt dropped the invitation in on her way to rehearsals for the Messiah.’

  ‘Is it going to be a very grand affair, Anne? Do I have to dress up?’ Patrick Butler was the proud owner of two perfectly respectable suits. But they betrayed, here and there, the marks of his profession, ink spilt in unfortunate places, a permanent air of wear and tear. They always looked in need of cleaning. He had promised Anne he would buy a new one after they were married.

  ‘I think it’s only us and Johnny Fitzgerald,’ said Anne.

  ‘I say,’ Patrick Butler was back to his normal excitable self, ‘do you think he’s solved the murder? Is he going to tell us who the villain is?’ The headlines raced through his mind once more. Sleuth Solves Mystery Over Salmon Mousse. Compton Killer Unveiled Over Veal Viennoise.

  The last course had been cleared away in the dining room at Fairfield Park. Powerscourt had given instructions to Andrew McKenna that they were not to be disturbed. Patrick Butler had chatted happily with Lady Lucy, telling her outrageous stories about the misbehaviour of journalists. Johnny Fitzgerald had discovered a common interest in birds with Anne Herbert and they had ended up discussing the different varieties of binoculars. Powerscourt himself said little during the meal. He had told Lady Lucy the upshot of his conversation with the doctor before she rushed off to choir practice. Lady Lucy had turned white. She was so shocked that she sang the wrong note in three different places during ‘Unto Us a child is Born’ and received a number of stern looks from the choirmaster.

  Three different riddles, he said to himself, surveying his guests. One to do with the death of John Eustace. One to do with the cathedral. One to do with the murderer. He thought he could answer the second, but not the third. He looked down his table, Lady Lucy smiling at him from the opposite end. She knew what was coming. He tapped a fork on the side of his glass.

  ‘Lucy, Anne, if I may be permitted to call you that,’ he smiled broadly at Mrs Herbert, soon to be Mrs Butler, ‘Patrick, Johnny. I would like to tell you what I think has been going on here. And to ask your advice about what we should do next. For the time being, Patrick, this must remain private, however difficult you may find it.’

  Patrick Butler bowed his head in acknowledgement. Anne felt rather proud of him.

  ‘I was called here originally, as you will recall, to investigate the death of John Eustace. I want to leave that to one side for
the present. I want to concentrate on one thing only, on what has been and is going on in the cathedral. I’m afraid I should warn you before I start that my conclusions may seem incredible. I found them so myself in the beginning. Let me try to bring the evidence forward in chronological order.’

  Patrick Butler had a notebook and pen in his pocket. He found it difficult to resist the temptation to start scribbling straight away. Johnny Fitzgerald was drawing imaginary pictures of birds on the tablecloth.

  ‘Let us begin with the mystery of the Archdeacon and his visits to celebrate Mass in the private chapel in Melbury Clinton. He is either an Anglican pretending to be a Roman Catholic or a Roman Catholic masquerading as an Anglican. I think the truth lies with the latter proposition, that he is a Catholic pretending to be an Anglican. He is joined by the Canon of the cathedral found by Johnny also celebrating Mass in the outlying village of Ledbury St John. In my opinion, we can be virtually certain that two members of the Chapter are Catholic. There is a third, the young man Augustine Ferrers from Bristol, come to sing in the choir. His parish priest told his mother, even as the reports of the Compton Cathedral murders were filling the newspapers, that he would be perfectly safe coming to Compton if he was a Catholic. The implication of that, of course, was that he might not be so safe if he were a Protestant.’

  Powerscourt paused and took a sip of water. Anne Herbert was looking alarmed, Johnny Fitzgerald seemed to be working on the outline of some enormous bird, maybe an eagle. Patrick Butler could not take his eyes off Powerscourt’s face.

  ‘And then there is the mysterious visitor to the Archdeacon who is a regular guest in the Archdeaconry. I now know that he too is a Catholic priest called Father Dominic Barberi, who often stays with the Jesuits in Farm Street in London. He is also a member of a mysterious and secretive body called Civitas Dei, dedicated to the greater glory and success of the Roman Catholic Church in this world rather than the next. I was told of a rumour that circulated in Rome by our previous Ambassador, Sir Roderick Lewis, a rumour that he discounted but which I suspect might be true.’

  ‘What was the rumour, Lord Powerscourt?’ Patrick Butler was unable to stop himself asking questions.

  ‘I’m coming to that, Patrick.’ Powerscourt smiled at the young man. ‘The substance of the rumour was that Civitas Dei were mounting a great operation in England which would cause a sensation when it was revealed. And there’s more to the Compton Catholic connection, as your newspaper might like to headline it, Patrick. There is another piece of evidence, flimsy in itself perhaps, but significant I believe in this context. Twenty years ago John Henry Newman, the most famous defector to Rome of the last century, was invited back to a special dinner or feast in his old Oxford college, Trinity. All those present signed the menu. One of the signatories is now the Dean of this cathedral. The other, who spent a lot of time talking to Newman, is the Bishop.’

  Powerscourt took another sip of his water. He was saving his port till the end. Patrick Butler stared at Powerscourt open-mouthed. Anne Herbert had turned pale. Johnny Fitzgerald had suddenly abandoned his imaginary bird drawings on the Fairfield linen. He was working on an enormous crucifix. Lady Lucy kept her eyes fixed on her husband’s face, trying to send whatever encouragement she could from one end of the table to another.

  ‘So there we have some of the pieces of the puzzle,’ Powerscourt went on. ‘Ever since I have been here I have felt that there is a secret right at the heart of the minster. And the key to it, I would suggest, lies with the celebrations for the thousandth anniversary of the cathedral as a place of Christian worship. All along I have wondered about the secrecy. Why has the Archdeacon gone on his solitary communions to Melbury Clinton? Why does the other man ride out at the crack of dawn to Ledbury St John? Why don’t they just come out in their true colours? I think they are waiting for something. I think they are waiting for the same thing as the members of Civitas Dei in Rome who are looking forward to a sensation that will shock England.’

  Powerscourt stopped. His hand moved from the tumbler of water to the glass of port, a rich ruby red in front of him.

  ‘What is it, Francis?’ Johnny Fitzgerald whispered. ‘For God’s sake, what is it?’

  Powerscourt looked directly at Lady Lucy as he spoke.

  ‘On Easter Sunday, I believe,’ he said, speaking very quietly, ‘the Bishop and the Dean and the Chapter are going to rededicate the cathedral to the Catholic faith. The minster will be restored to its old religion before the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Compton will be made Catholic once again. It’s not just a question of the Archdeacon and the Canon and the young man from Bristol, you see. They’re all Catholics now, every single last one of them. Even the mice and the rats have probably taken their vows by this stage.’

  Patrick Butler had turned pale. Anne Herbert stared at Powerscourt open-mouthed. Lady Lucy was feeling rather proud of her Francis. Only Johnny Fitzgerald did not seem very surprised. But then he had been working with Powerscourt for years.

  ‘Where does this fit in with the murders, Francis?’ Johnny asked.

  Powerscourt took a sip of his port. ‘I would guess, and it’s only a guess, that the victims were all signed up for the enterprise. Then they changed their minds. Maybe they threatened to go public about the whole scheme. Maybe they said they would go and have a cosy little chat with Patrick here. In any event, they were all killed. The secret had to be kept until Easter Sunday. I think it all ties in with John Eustace’s wills. The first one, dated 1898, left almost all his money to the cathedral. The second one, from early last year, left it all to his sister Mrs Cockburn, but I’ve always suspected Mrs Cockburn herself was responsible for that will. And the third, from last December, left everything, more or less, to the Salvation Army. But the Dean was very persuasive that Eustace intended to leave his money to the cathedral, that he had talked to various people about how he wanted it spent. The point is that he intended to leave it to a Protestant cathedral, not one that was about to turn Catholic. Once he knew about that he changed his mind.’

  ‘Do you know who the murderer is now, Lord Powerscourt?’ said Patrick Butler, looking at his host as if he were a miracle worker.

  ‘No, I do not,’ said Powerscourt. ‘I have no more idea about the identity of the murderer than I did the first day I set foot in Compton. And there’s one enormous problem with this theory.’

  Powerscourt stopped as if he expected that everyone present would know the answer. The one man who could support his theory, Dr Blackstaff, would never speak in public out of loyalty to his dead friend.

  ‘What’s that, Francis?’ said Lady Lucy, coming to his rescue.

  ‘It’s very simple,’ Powerscourt replied. ‘It’s incredibly simple when you think about it rationally. You see, I can make theories, join things together, a piece of damaged string here, a frayed rope there, maybe make two and two add up to eighteen. But I can’t prove a bloody word of it.’

  ‘Why do you have to be able to prove it, Lord Powerscourt?’ Patrick Butler was already thinking about how he would tell the story in his newspaper, if he was ever able to tell it.

  ‘Forgive me, Patrick, I’m not making myself clear. It seems to me that I have a responsibility to try to prevent this thing happening if I can. Compton going back to the Catholic faith will cause a sensation, not just here but all over the country. The newspapers will be full of it for days. There will be questions in Parliament. Nobody, least of all, I suspect, the Anglican Church, will have any idea what to do about it. I think the Bishop and his friends may be able to pull this thing off for a couple of days, but then some form of authority will have to intervene. Whether it’s the Church or the State I don’t know. Perhaps in these circumstances they are one and the same, I’m not sure. But what can I do? I can write to the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Bishop of Exeter, being the nearest see to Compton. I can write to the Prime Minister in Downing Street or the Lord Lieutenant of the county here. And what will they do? They may talk to the B
ishop or the Dean. What nonsense, they will say. Powerscourt has gone mad. Pity really, he was quite a good investigator when he was younger. Ought to be locked up now, mind you. Poor Lady Powerscourt and the little Powerscourts, having a madman for a husband and a father. And then they will carry on with their plans.’

  Lady Lucy smiled up at the maniac at the other end of the table. ‘Surely, Francis, there is some evidence. There’s the Archdeacon going to Melbury Clinton for a start. And the Canon celebrating Mass in Ledbury. And all these dreadful murders.’

  ‘Of course there is some evidence, Lucy,’ said Powerscourt, taking a further sip of his port, ‘otherwise we wouldn’t have got as far as this. But I’m sure the Archdeacon and the Canon could cook up some perfectly reasonable explanation. They’ve got all those Jesuits in Farm Street at their beck and call, not to mention the Civitas Dei people in Rome. Something would be concocted. But the scheme could still go on.’

  ‘What about John Eustace, Francis, where do you think he fits into all of this?’ Johnny Fitzgerald had finished doodling his crucifix on the tablecloth. He seemed now to be working on a cathedral spire.

  Powerscourt sighed. ‘I didn’t want to go into the murders at this stage, but I think I’d better. There have been three of them.’

  His little audience stared at him. Two, surely, not three. Perhaps he was losing his wits after all.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Powerscourt, ‘I only learnt very recently – please don’t ask me how – that John Eustace, last owner of this house where we sit, was also murdered. His head was cut off and placed on one of the posts in his great four-poster bed. Then there was Arthur Rudd, murdered and roasted on the spit in the Vicars Hall. Third but not least was Edward Gillespie, his body hacked to pieces and left lying all over the county. There is a connection, of course. I should have seen it sooner. I must have been blind.’