Pagan Spring: A Mystery (A Max Tudor Novel)

by Malliet, G. M.

  Coombebridge shook his head in the negative.

  “How about the name Crew? This would be from some years back.”

  Again, no reaction.

  “Do you remember selling a painting to anyone named Cuthbert?”

  “I’m not a car salesman. I let other people handle the selling for me.” Coombebridge stepped back to eye the painting from several feet away. Then resuming his stance, he made several more dabs at the canvas.

  “It’s just that—I’m not sure what is going on yet, but perhaps you should take extra care,” said Max. “My concern may have nothing to do with your paintings, but one of them sparked a very strange reaction in one of the villagers of Nether Monkslip. I can’t help but think it’s tied to the murder, which occurred the next night. The police are keeping an eye out for any peculiar activity in the area, but you’re so isolated here, and the police are so few. So it will be up to you, you see, to take care of yourself. Certainly any strangers out here would be noticed.”

  “Strangers like yourself?” asked Coombebridge, smiling. “You needn’t have worried. I always look out for myself.”

  If the rumors he’d heard were halfway to being true, Max knew that was the case. Even at Coombebridge’s age, the stories of simultaneous affairs and discarded friends and mistresses swirled. Taking care of Coombebridge would always be his number-one priority.

  “Which painting of mine was it?” This was Coombebridge’s only concern.

  Max told him, although he soon realized that describing a seascape in words made it sound awfully like another seascape.

  Coombebridge made a stab at remembrance, casting those unusually colored eyes to the ceiling, as if making a mental survey of his creations, before shaking his head. A local reporter had had a try at explaining the artist’s personal appeal, which Max was experiencing for himself, despite the fact Coombebridge did have a gift for turning a blind eye to anything and anyone who wasn’t directly concerned with his art. The reporter had interviewed various people who had known the artist in his youth, and the fewer who knew him now, since in some ways he was a reclusive man. Most of them were former lovers, so any chance of a balanced assessment, one would have thought, was slight. Still, most people, even though they had been suddenly left in the dust by the painter, were generous—thrilled, even, at having had the chance to bask in the man’s greatness. Such was the power of charm, Max reflected. “He was selfish,” said one, a young woman more than half Coombebridge’s age at the time. “But he was up front about it, he made no apology for it, and he was absolutely no hypocrite about taking what he wanted. The art was what mattered to him. You had to respect his genius, and his single-minded devotion to his art—which was, as he was first to say, far more important to him than people.”

  Without stopping his work, Coombebridge said, “I don’t suppose you approve of me, Padre. It’s true, I’ve left some broken hearts behind, and more than a few children born on the wrong side of the blanket.”

  Max paused, as if considering. “I don’t suppose it would be worth my while to try to change you.”

  This was greeted with a bark of laughter. “That hasn’t prevented many people, mostly women, from trying.” Coombebridge returned his attention to the sworls of colors on his painter’s palette. A bit of paint splashed onto the floor. Max resisted the urge to inspect the soles of his shoes—too late now; he’d already stepped into whatever wet paint there was to step in. Pictures of incalculable value were stacked everywhere, against walls, waiting to be tripped over. Max supposed the preferred word was paintings. He thought of the Picts of Scotland, so-called by the Romans, from the Latin word for “painted” or “tattooed,” a train of thought perhaps inspired by being around all these canvases with their infinite shades of blue. The warriors had used some sort of a plant dye mixed with animal fat for their blue body paint.

  Coombebridge suddenly astonished Max by turning, running his eyes over him as if measuring him for a suit, and asking Max if he would pose for him.

  “Me? I thought you did only land- and seascapes?”

  “I sell only land- and seascapes. Portraits go into my private collection. They are mine; they are never for sale. They are seldom for public viewing, either.” He scrabbled around in a stack of paintings and turned to Max’s gaze one of a slender young man standing at the water’s edge. Gold gleamed from the sea and on the golden curls at the boy’s neck, and on an earring created by a single stroke of white paint. The boy’s pensive expression was caught in profile, his face half-turned to look at the painter. Max wondered if the boy might be one of Coombebridge’s sons.

  Max remembered now that someone at the dinner party—Lucie—had said this was true, that the artist kept the portraits to himself. Something about the possessiveness in Coombebridge’s voice and words made Max hesitate. There was something off-putting about being part of anyone’s private collection.

  “That is too bad,” Max said. “That you won’t sell the portraits. There is a friend of mine I would love to have a portrait of.”

  “Depends who it is. I don’t take commissions. I paint who and what I like.”

  “You would like her.”

  Coombebridge, who was nothing if not perceptive, gave Max a sharp glance. And then he smiled.

  “Depends,” he repeated. “Maybe I could make an exception in your case, Father Max.”

  * * *

  It was some time later, and Max was making moves as if to leave. Coombebridge invited him to help himself to instant coffee if he wanted it. Max declined.

  “I never,” said Coombebridge, “was able to drink coffee in the afternoon. It doesn’t pick me up; it makes me irritable.” Max wondered briefly how he could tell the difference. Coombebridge added that he thought the whole afternoon coffee routine was a plot by French invaders from across the English Channel. “However, I guess we won that particular war; otherwise, we would have to call it the French Channel.”

  “That probably is what they call it, among themselves, as they sip wine or coffee in their cafés, not la Manche.”

  Suddenly, he was struck by Coombebridge’s words: “French invaders.” Now, what did that remind him of? He recalled Thaddeus saying something to Lucie Cuthbert, something about the proof of a craftsman being in the work he produced—something pompous and self-referential like that. Later, Max had heard them murmuring together in French, and Lucie laughing at Thaddeus’s joke, a joke that seemed to involve just the two of them. Max’s French was just good enough for him to have understood what was said. Gabby must have understood, as well, if she’d overheard, although she had left the nuns in France behind long ago. A language learned as a child tended to stayed with one.

  Melinda had said and Cotton had confirmed that Thaddeus was adopted. Had he possibly been adopted by a French family? Or had he been born into one?

  And why did he, Max, think it mattered?

  Melinda had said Thaddeus’s accent stayed. He could hear her high, childish voice now, saying that Thaddeus’s French accent had stayed in such good form. Because of his first wife, the suicide.

  There was some old wallpaper, peeling and splattered with paint, covering one wall of Coombebridge’s studio. It had once been white, with red roses and blue geraniums; now the design was almost indistinguishable from the bright splashes of paint, the white background nearly obliterated. Coombebridge had hung several paintings against this wall—not the best background for display, but the strength of the work, the strong lines, overrode these aesthetic considerations. Still, there was no avoiding the fact that the Coombebridge that hung in Lucie and Frank Cuthbert’s dining room had looked much more striking against their black-and-white-striped wallpaper.

  Somewhere behind Max’s eyes, a sensation grew—a queasiness of mind, as it seemed to him. He watched the paintbrush as Coomebridge dabbed it against the canvas, filling in the blank white spaces with color. The blue water stood out against the striated cliffs, carved into shadows of black and white, and the white
clouds. Black and white.

  Max quickly turned away. “What I just said—you can forget all that.”

  “Which part?”

  Max was already headed for the door. “The part about taking care. It’s nothing to do with your paintings. You’re quite safe. Safe as houses.”

  “Of course I am.”

  And Max flung himself out the door, to be met by a heavy shower of rain. He jumped into the Land Rover, starting the engine before the door was quite closed.

  Coombebridge stood at the door of his cottage, mystified.

  “Well, adios, Padre,” he said to the rapidly retreating, blurred vision of the Rover’s back window.

  * * *

  A theory was forming in Max’s mind—hazy and disconnected. But through the mist he could glimpse a shape—then hundreds of shapes, thousands, multiplied and floating eternally above the earth. They served as a caution or a warning, perhaps—or did they come seeking retribution?

  Max had left his mobile in the Land Rover. He used it now to call Awena’s mobile.

  She answered on the first ring.

  “I’m glad you called, Max. Melinda’s been taken ill.”

  “Melinda?” said Max. “But … how are you? Where are you?”

  “I’m fine, Max. I’m at Melinda’s house—she started feeling unwell while we were having tea at Gabby’s place. Some sort of stomach bug. Or the mushroom quiche disagreed with her. We brought her home, and when she seemed to be getting worse, Gabby called for an ambulance. But Gabby isn’t well, either. She’s just leaving to go back home.”

  Oh God. It’s moving faster than I thought. Everything was slipping out of control—his control, and the killer’s. In which case it was hard to know how to prevent the worst, except—“You must get out of there,” he said in an intense, quiet voice, so as not to be overheard. “Wait until Gabby leaves; then you leave.” He was now frantic with fear, willing himself at Awena’s side, and unsure of how best to protect her apart from keeping her isolated. “Wait for the ambulance outside,” he said. “You feel all right, don’t you?”

  “Yes, I’m fine; I only drank a little tea. But I can’t leave her. She’s—”

  “Don’t talk,” Max said. “Don’t say another word. Just say good-bye to me, like nothing’s wrong, and ring off. If Gabby doesn’t leave, you leave right away. Say you’ve gone to look for the ambulance. Call 999 once you’re safely outside and once you can’t be overheard. Make sure everyone understands poison is involved.”

  “Poison!”

  But Max had already rung off. Putting the vehicle in gear, he tore off as fast as the narrow, winding roads would allow.

  Awena, at the other end of the satellite beam, was left staring at the mobile screen.

  The mist in Max’s mind cleared some more. He searched his memory, and the many odd things he had noted began to make more sense. He felt certain he was right, but … Suddenly, he pulled off the road, raising a spray of mud.

  He woke his mobile from sleep and put in a direct call to DCI Cotton. He got him on the first ring.

  He filled him in, adding, “So there’s something you need to check on.”

  Cotton listened, then said, “On it.”

  “But first make sure Awena’s okay. Make sure they’re all okay.”

  He turned on the engine and gunned it, only to find the left side of the Rover was sunk in mud up to its hubcaps. It was the kind of stuck that meant the only hope was finding a piece of wood—a tree branch, or something to create traction for the wheel. Even the four-wheel drive was going to be useless in this situation, although he did try, rocking the Rover back and forth, and quickly reaching the point of making things worse.

  Meanwhile, water from the heavens continued to pour down. Max uttered a rare curse—quite a loud curse—and, pulling his jacket tightly about him, ran back to Coombebridge’s cottage.

  CHAPTER 23

  French Connection

  Max and a surprisingly helpful Coombebridge got the Land Rover unstuck after about twenty minutes of trial and error and a great deal of grunting and swearing, wedging firewood and the floor mats under the front wheels for traction. Max had driven off at last at a more cautious pace, arriving in Nether Monkslip within the hour and heading first to King’s Rest—the Bottles’ house.

  Where he found both Awena and Melinda gone, the house locked. He headed toward the flat over La Maison Bleue. But inside the shop, Lucie told him Gabby had left, saying she was going to Hawk Crest.

  “I saw the ambulance go by,” she told him. “Gabby said Melinda had been taken ill, but Gabby was sure she’d be fine. Awena went with Melinda in the ambulance.”

  “Where on the Crest?” demanded Max.

  “Gabby? She is probably in Nunswood,” Lucie told him. “She likes it there, by the spring. She says it’s a sacred place, and she goes there to pray for her mother.” Lucie paused. “I didn’t like the way she looked, Father Max. But she made it clear she wanted to be alone.”

  But Max was already headed out the door. Over his shoulder he said, “Her mother—she is ill perhaps?”

  There was such a weighted silence, he turned to see Lucie looking at him, a puzzled expression on her face. “Her mother is long dead,” she said flatly. “She died in the war.”

  * * *

  He found Gabby sitting quietly by the spring, on one of the stones that had once been part of the ancient ring of menhirs, most of them now tumbled over in disarray. He had the idea she had indeed been praying, an idea confirmed by the desolate, unfocused look in her eyes as she turned to him. It was almost as if she were willing herself back into the present. Otherwise, she looked much the same as ever: the excellent proud posture, the immaculate white hair.

  She sighed, making an evident effort to focus her attention.

  “‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked,’” she quoted. It was of course a phrase from the Bible. “No pleasure left at all, in fact. Will you hear my confession, Father?”

  “Of course I will.” It was a request no priest could refuse. The Rite of Reconciliation, the new name for what was commonly called Confession, was a healing ritual that was intended to return the penitent to a merciful God. To reconcile anyone who had strayed. He had been asked only a few times in his ministry to perform the rite, but on each occasion the person confessing had spoken afterward of being overcome by a sense of healing, of renewal. “Reassembled,” as one man had put it.

  “Of course,” Max repeated, and he sat near her on another of the fallen stones, waiting quietly for her to begin to speak. She opened her palm and he saw that the medallion she always wore around her neck had been clutched tightly in her hand. Her flesh was red and torn where the nails had dug in. He was not surprised to see she was wearing the same earrings he’d seen in the photo of the restaurant, the earrings that had been worn by Melinda.

  “Your first question, Father Max, will be: How did I come to find him?”

  Max nodded. That wasn’t, in fact, his first question—as always, he wanted first to confirm his suspicions as to the “why.” But he let her tell the story in her own way.

  “But perhaps you have guessed that already,” she went on. “How this all came to be. For that is the wonderful, the miraculous part of my story. Full of wonder. Now, those are words someone of your profession should understand. I found him via a pair of earrings. Earrings I’d seen in a magazine photo.” And she reached up to touch the jewelry at her ears. The jewelry that had so recently adorned Melinda.

  “I was leafing through a magazine at the place where I was working, in Bradford. I had gone there with my husband, planning one last stop before we retired for good, or so I thought. We had so many plans. We would travel. Most of all, we would travel. Maybe I would write a book, perhaps about my life as a child growing up in a convent. He would paint. Harold always looked forward to having that sort of time to explore.

  “And then within a few months, he was gone. The heart and soul of me was just gone one day. In
the mornings as I sat reading the paper, trying to read, I would turn to say something to him—I would forget, you see. That was how we always started the day: I would read, and he would do the crossword puzzle. Sometimes I would read aloud to him some bit of outrage from the news.

  “But then I would remember he was gone now. I had no illusion he was hovering about the room somehow, like a ghost. He just wasn’t there. It was unbearable, Father. I’m not making excuses, but pain like that, a loss like that, after a lifetime together … my friend and soul mate…”

  Max nodded, remembering how he had missed Awena in much the same way during her very brief absence. The thought of its being more than a temporary separation was unbearable to him.

  She swiped at a tear that trembled at the corner of her eye. “I didn’t know what else to do with myself, so I kept working. And one day, I saw the magazine. It was one of those ‘lifestyle’ publications that flourish in good times and bad—magazines that permit one at least to dream during the bad times. I came to a page with a photo showing a crowded dining room at a new restaurant in Nether Monkslip. The White Bean, of course; you know it. Several of the people in the forefront of this photo were shown from behind or in somewhat blurry profile. Then there were many more people sitting in the far distance, their features indistinguishable. In these days, when everyone worries so about invasion of their privacy, their precious privacy—surely a modern construct—no photographer would dare publish a photo too exact of such a crowd. It looked, in fact, as if the photographer had deliberately blurred certain areas of the photo. What, after all, if a man were there, sitting on a banquette with a woman not his wife?

  “So all that could be seen of the woman closest to the camera was the back of her head; she had her face turned away from the camera, presumably in conversation with the man beside her.

  “But what caught the eye—what caught my eyes anyway, and instantly—was the earring, which could be seen, quite clearly, dangling from the woman’s right ear.

  “There could be no doubt, so large and distinctive was that earring. The photographer had artfully captured its golden glimmer in the candlelight, so that it stood out like a sign. A sign to me.