A VOW OF POVERTY an utterly gripping crime mystery

by Veronica Black

  It was fruitless, of course. He staggered for a moment, then recovered his balance, his hands reaching to fasten on her throat where the scarf protected her. There was a drumming in her ears, a roaring noise that came from somewhere beyond the rain and the sound of a siren, at that instant more blessed than bells. He had dragged her sideways, and his cowl had fallen from his black head where the hair was plastered by the rain to his temples. The world tilted and blurred and then she was flung violently aside and, as she gasped for breath, the van began to move.

  ‘Look out!’ She thought she had yelled and then realized her voice had emerged as a whisper.

  The van struck him in the back, gained speed as it ran down a slope between the deep puddles and tipped sideways. She had a glimpse of his back arched against the weight and then he went down under the wheels and there was silence again.

  ‘Sister, are you all right?’

  Constable Petrie ran to her, helping her to her feet.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said shiveringly.

  ‘Sister Perpetua telephoned the station. You’d said something about stopping off to chat to Brother Cuthbert and she recalled that he was down at the Presbytery recovering from a cold. Father Malone didn’t tell us that so we didn’t search the school.’

  ‘Grant Tarquin—’

  ‘Won’t be killing anyone else,’ Constable Petrie said grimly.

  ‘I know I put the brake on. I know I did.’

  ‘That’s an old van, Sister. He threw you hard against the side and the vibration probably set something off. The ground’s pretty treacherous just here too. Sister Joan’s all right, sir.’

  He broke off to address Detective Sergeant Mill who strode up.

  ‘Sister Joan has ninety-nine lives,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said. ‘It only bothers me that she’s using them up so fast.’

  ‘It was—’

  ‘A freak accident, Sister. You can’t blame yourself. A blessing in a way. He’d have been declared insane. Come on!’

  She allowed herself to be guided towards the police car.

  ‘Killing was becoming a habit with him.’ He leaned to fasten her seat belt. ‘Take a few deep breaths and put your veil down. We’ll be overrun with reporters and photographers before you know it.’

  ‘Lord forbid!’ She tugged at her veil.

  ‘I’ll run you back to the convent and explain the whole affair to Mother Prioress. At least this way there won’t be a trial.’

  ‘There’ll have to be a funeral.’

  ‘And this time he’ll stay buried,’ the detective said. ‘Don’t waste any pity on him, Sister. He was bad — genes, I daresay.’

  But that excused everybody from personal responsibility, she thought. Tendencies were implicit in everybody but there were other things like conscience and duty and — she’d argue about it later. All she wanted to do now was lean her head against the back of the seat, close her eyes and allow herself to be driven unresistingly home.

  Fourteen

  ‘At least the reporters have gone,’ Mother Dorothy said with some satisfaction in her tone. ‘No doubt the headlines will inform the public that the murderer cheated justice, and I am very pleased that we don’t have to read them. It will be a nine day wonder.

  ‘He was a very wicked man,’ Sister Gabrielle said, ‘and I for one am delighted that he was the last of his line.’

  ‘Old families are often inbred,’ Sister Mary Concepta murmured in her gentle way.

  ‘You’d find excuses for the Devil himself,’ Sister Perpetua said.

  ‘Rather less talk of the Devil ought to be our resolution from now on,’ Mother Dorothy said severely. ‘I’ve asked Father Malone to come in and hold a short service of consecration in the storerooms and the sooner we return to normality the better.’

  ‘Meaning poor,’ Sister Perpetua remarked darkly.

  ‘There was nothing of great value amid all the rubbish.’ Mother Dorothy’s voice held a shade of regret. ‘We shall make a couple of hundred from the Victorian artefacts that Sister Joan brought down, but that’s it, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Then what are we going to do, Mother?’ Sister Katherine looked up anxiously from her needlework.

  ‘We generally contrive to manage,’ Mother Dorothy said. ‘We are after all vowed to poverty. Perhaps we require to be reminded of that from time to time. However there are many others worse off than we are. Neither is the news all bad. Sister Katherine has just received an order for lace for first communion veils which will bring in a nice little sum. Sister Joan will be glad to help her with it.’

  ‘Making lace?’ Sister Joan looked alarmed. ‘I never—’

  ‘Hemming and a little embroidery to put the finishing touches,’ the Prioress said. ‘And your own talent for painting can be utilized. We can sell calendars and Mass cards. Easter cards too. We’re too near Christmas to get cards for that festival out in time, but we might make quite a decent amount by and by. However that’s for next year. We must redouble our prayers and increase our economies and trust all will be well. We can certainly economize a little more. The diet has become positively gourmet recently. Soup and sandwiches at lunchtime are quite unnecessary. Soup with a slice of bread and a piece of fruit will keep us all beautifully slim. We shall be in the fashion. Oh, it will be necessary to ride Lilith into town from now on. Detective Sergeant Mill kindly offered to sell the van for us since I doubt if anyone will wish to drive it again. Too potent a reminder of a most unfortunate accident.’

  ‘Not so unfortunate!’ Sister Gabrielle protested. ‘That wretch meant to kill Sister Joan. It’s my belief that it was the Blessed Michael himself who jerked those brakes into action.’

  ‘Well, that’s a matter of opinion.’ Mother Dorothy looked as if she refrained from argument with an effort. ‘We shall go to our work now, Sisters, with renewed zeal. Sister Joan, yesterday’s events must have shaken you considerably, so you must take things easily.’

  ‘Thank you, Mother, but I feel perfectly all right,’ Sister Joan said. ‘I’ve one or two small jobs to do and they’ll take my mind off recent happenings.’

  Actually now that the storerooms had been cleared and swept by the police there was a feeling of time hanging heavily on her hands.

  She wandered out into the yard with some notion of grooming Lilith and almost walked into Constable Petrie who was coming round the corner with Alice leaping at his heels.

  ‘I’m surprised to see you up and about, Sister,’ he said. ‘You ought to be putting your feet up after such a nasty experience, you know. Oh, the boss sends regards. He’s busy with all the paperwork so we can get this whole business finished with for good. I came over to flush out the last of the reporters and give Alice a bit of training.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you, Sergeant.’

  ‘Constable, Sister.’ His pink complexion had flushed. ‘Sergeant would be nice.’

  ‘As far as I’m concerned you’re already promoted,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘That’s very kind of you, Sister. Well, I’d best get on.’ He saluted smartly. ‘All right and tight! But you ought to think about getting a few extra locks round this place. On the stable, for example.’

  ‘Locks.’ She repeated the word and favoured him with a sudden broad and brilliant smile. ‘Thank you! I’ve just remembered a task I simply can’t postpone any longer.’

  ‘I’ll leave you to it then, Sister.’ He saluted again, said, ‘My, Sergeant Petrie’ as if he were practising for promotion and went off jauntily.

  The box of tools and odd bits of metal was still in the stable. She pulled it out and found the rusted bolt. Sister David would be pleased to be able to lock up her precious books. It was a pity none of them had been revealed as a valuable first edition.

  One of the curtain rings leapt up and fell back as the remaining objects in the box settled. She reached in and picked it up, slipping in on to her finger. It was very small for a curtain ring. Very thick too. She hesitated, then burrowed for its fellow
which was of equal size and weight.

  ‘I’ll get these cleaned up.’ She rose and went indoors again.

  An hour later she wiped the last trace of encrusted dirt from the second ring and held them up to the feeble sunlight that filtered through the window. Her heart was beating rapidly.

  ‘Are you all right, Sister?’ Mother Dorothy, doing her afternoon rounds, had paused at the kitchen door.

  ‘Mother, do we have a magnifying glass?’ Sister Joan asked.

  ‘I have one in the parlour. You’d better come and use it.’ Without asking for further clarification the prioress led the way down the kitchen passage.

  ‘Dominus vobiscum.’ She took a round magnifying glass from her desk drawer and motioned to Sister Joan to take a seat.

  ‘Et cum spiritu tuo. Mother Dorothy, do you believe in miracles?’

  ‘Of all the foolish questions you’ve ever asked that one must take the palm,’ Mother Dorothy said, amused. ‘What have you there?’

  ‘I thought they were curtain rings, but they’re finger rings,’ Sister Joan said. ‘Gold too. But it’s more than that! Mother, look at the inscriptions on the outer rims. You can feel them with the tip of your finger but you need the glass to read them.’

  Mother Dorothy took one of the rings, fixed the glass at a suitable distance from it and peered closely.

  ‘IESU,’ she spelled slowly. ‘Jesu in modern Latin.’

  ‘And on the other is MARIA,’ Sister Joan said eagerly. ‘Don’t you see?’

  ‘No.’ Mother Dorothy laid down the rings and the magnifying glass and looked at her.

  ‘In fourteen hundred and thirty-one Sir Richard Tarquine who wasn’t yet a “sir” because he hadn’t been knighted served in France during the Hundred Years’ War. He served under the Earl of Warwick who knighted him during that campaign, “for services rendered”. Warwick was in charge of the English garrisons when Jeanne d’Arc was imprisoned at Rouen. Her rings were taken away from her — the two rings her family had given her — one inscribed with the name of Jesu and the other with the name of Maria. She used to touch the rings before she went into battle and some people thought they had magical powers.’

  ‘You surely don’t imagine — my dear girl, that’s simply not—’ Mother Dorothy broke off, staring at her.

  ‘She was guarded by five soldiers turn and turn about. They teased and harassed her but they never did her physical injury. They feared her because they thought she was a witch, a child of the Devil. Suppose one of them took her rings away, hoping to use their magical powers for his own ends? Suppose his name was Richard Tarquine? Mother Dorothy, think of that ancient motto of the Tarquin family! “We have a secret, the Devil and I”. Could this be it? Everything she was — her ashes and her heart — everything she owned was said to have been broken up and thrown into the river. There are no relics of Jeanne d’Arc.’

  ‘And these rings could be the ones she loved because her family had given them to her? There would be no way of telling.’

  ‘But we know Richard Tarquine served the Earl of Warwick at the right time and was knighted and given the motto for unspecified services. For guarding Jeanne d’Arc, perhaps? Warwick wouldn’t have known where the rings had gone. Nobody seems to have known.’

  ‘The only known relics of Jeanne d’Arc?’ Mother Dorothy picked up the magnifying glass and studied the rings again. ‘That would certainly increase vocations.’

  ‘Would we be allowed to keep them?’

  ‘I have no idea.’ Mother Dorothy sighed. ‘The bishop might know. Since they were stolen from her in the first place then they could be regarded as the spoils of war. Surely there’d be a tradition in the family.’

  ‘The Tarquins changed their religion according to the political climate of the times,’ Sister Joan argued. ‘The old Catholicism was laid aside during the sixteenth century when the Tudor Elizabeth came to the throne. The rings were put away, lost, forgotten. Only the motto and some vague story of pacts with the Devil remained. Maybe the original Richard Tarquine vowed his soul to the Devil on the rings in return for riches and prosperity.’

  ‘And six hundred years later the Devil came to claim his forfeit? You have a romantic imagination, Sister!’

  ‘Mother, haven’t we been praying for extra income for ages?’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘And if these rings do date back to the fifteenth century then the possibility of their being genuine is vastly increased,’ her superior nodded. ‘Vocations would increase; visitors would come to look at them on display; the media would photograph them, feature them in some arts programme on television — it would create a great stir.’

  Her voice and face were suddenly sombre.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ Sister Joan asked.

  ‘Weigh everything up,’ Mother Dorothy said slowly, ‘then do what your heart bids. You’ve a good heart and you’re not completely devoid of common sense either. Do what your heart tells you. Take them with you, and think. Try thinking, Sister. Dominus vobiscum.’

  ‘Et cum spiritu sancto.’ Sister Joan picked up the hollow, shining circles and bent her knee.

  In the garden the ground was still wet, the bare bushes spangled with raindrops. The moor beyond the open gates was deserted, cameras and prying questions swept away. Behind her the peaceful façade of the old house belied the quiet activity of its occupants.

  Soup and no sandwiches for lunch. Sewing hems for Sister Katherine. Painting sentimental little pictures to be sold as cards and calendars. Poverty freely chosen and embraced with love. She sighed and shook her head.

  * * *

  Detective Sergeant Mill drew up and opened the car door. He was taking a roundabout way to the convent and ought to be stepping on the gas if he planned to arrive before the sisters filed into chapel but a few minutes’ pause wouldn’t hurt. It was refreshing after the long hours filling out forms, poring over coroners’ reports, to steal a few minutes for himself, to contemplate with pleasure the high, wild ground, interrupted by deep pools and long, meandering streams swollen by the recent rains that met and merged and headed for the river and thence to the sea.

  The rest of the lads at the station had contributed generously to the whip-round. There was sufficient to buy the neat little second-hand van he’d had his eye on for some time. He’d had a word with the garage owner and the sisters’d be getting their petrol half price in future. He could easily scrape up the extra out of his salary.

  He stretched his long legs, leaned against the side of the car and lit one of the occasional cigarettes he allowed himself. On the horizon a cloaked figure rode into view, heading towards the river. Anyone else would be taking it easy, he thought with impatient tenderness but no! there she went, exercising that old pony. Not even turning her head in his direction! He lifted an arm, then lowered it again. Their official business together was done and he had Mother Dorothy to see.

  The moor sloped down to where three streams conjoined to flow down to the river. Sister Joan dismounted and stood, Lilith’s rein loose in her hand. Everything Jeanne had ever owned had been seen, fingered, investigated and stolen. Even her bones had been pounded into ashes. It could all happen again — the experts arguing, the reporters and the cameramen with their questions, the young girls flocking to the postulancy for the wrong reasons.

  She walked slowly to the deep hollow where the three streams gushed together and ran swiftly down to the river curving through the valley far below. The two rings in her hand felt warm and heavy.

  ‘Have them back now, Jeanne love,’ she said softly and let them fall and be carried downriver, flashing briefly on the surface of the bubbling water before they vanished from sight.

  Time to get that lock fixed and then see what Sister Katherine needed doing. She remounted, gathered up the reins and decided as she turned the pony’s head homeward that the religious life was for the terminally eccentric.

  ‘Never mind!’ she said aloud, leaning to give Lilith a pat. ‘When I’m allowed pock
et money again I’ll buy a lottery ticket. There’s no rule against that and you never know your luck, old girl! You never know your luck!’

  THE END

  ALSO BY VERONICA BLACK

  SISTER JOAN MYSTERY SERIES

  Book 1: A Vow of Silence

  Book 2: A Vow of Chastity

  Book 3: A Vow of Sanctity

  Book 4: A Vow of Obedience

  Book 5: A Vow of Devotion

  Book 6: A Vow of Penance

  Book 7: A Vow of Fidelity

  Book 8: A Vow of Poverty

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