A VOW OF COMPASSION an utterly gripping crime mystery

by Black, Veronica

  ‘I’ve not been near the old chapel,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘That’s the only place where that particular genus of holly grows,’ Sister David said. ‘I was reading about the flora and fauna of this area and I recall reading that and meaning to mention it to you.’

  ‘I didn’t pick the holly,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘Oh, sorry!’ Sister David looked confused. ‘Seeing it there by your feet I assumed that you’d picked it for some reason.’

  ‘Sister David, did anyone ever tell you that you’re a genius?’ Sister Joan bent and picked up the green, prickly bunch, her blue eyes suddenly sparkling.

  ‘Not recently,’ Sister David said, with an unexpected flash of humour.

  ‘Well, you are! You’ve just set me back on track! I’ll see you later.’

  ‘I’m glad I could be of some help,’ Sister David said blankly, as her fellow religious hastened out of the library and down the narrow stairs.

  The main telephone was in the passage outside the infirmary. Sister Joan glanced into the room and saw that both Sister Gabrielle and Sister Mary Concepta were absent. Through the open window she could hear Sister Marie’s cheerful, ‘I really do feel quite fit again, Sisters, but if you wish to sit in the garden for a little while I’ll gladly keep you company.’

  She lifted the receiver and dialled the police station.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Mill just stepped out,’ Constable Petrie informed her. ‘Do you want me to find him?’

  ‘Ask him to meet me in about three-quarters of an hour by the old Presbyterian chapel near the Peter house,’ Sister Joan said crisply.

  Then she was hurrying out to the stable to saddle Lilith.

  The moorland track ran past the Romany camp and the stone hermitage, curved round the walls of the convent enclosure, joined up again to run in a fairly straight line towards what was still called the ‘new estate’ though it had stood for years and been extended considerably since Sister Joan’s own arrival in Cornwall. A narrower track, too rough and stony for the van rayed out on to the heights of the moor. On the heights stood the house owned by the local antique dealer and the side road that took one down into the town arrowing from the far side of the building, but the ground before the house was a medley of tiny fields with crumbling drystone walls and great billowing stretches of purple heather.

  The chapel was crumbling into decay along with the walls, its roof half gone, its windows retaining only shards of broken glass. The door hung on its hinges and ivy and bramble fought for supremacy.

  Sister Joan reined in Lilith who, eager for a gallop had carried her like Pegasus over the uneven ground, and dismounted, pausing only to loop the reins over the stump of a nearby tree. She had tied the holly to the saddle-bag and now untied it, holding it with care as she approached the tumbledown chapel.

  Inside dust and bird droppings lay thickly on the cracked stone floor. The few remaining pews were starred and chipped by time, swollen with damp in many places. There was no sense of worship here, only a pervading atmosphere of neglect and despondency.

  Not looking to left or right, she walked up the aisle and laid the holly on what had once been a communion table but was now cracked and stained.

  ‘I received your message,’ she said clearly. ‘I think that it’s time we talked, don’t you?’

  The last syllables of her words echoed back queerly. The back of her neck prickled as if she had just stroked it with the holly as she heard a harsh grating sound.

  In the corner a mesh of iron was being slowly raised. She heard footsteps on iron rungs and then a long drawn out breath of relief.

  ‘It was very clever of you to send me the holly, Luther,’ she said, half turning. ‘How did you know where I knelt?’

  ‘I come into the chapel now and then,’ Luther said, stepping closer to her. ‘I like to watch.’

  ‘From where?’ Sister Joan asked in surprise.

  ‘I go up the stairs behind the statue of Our Lady Mary and sit there,’ Luther said. ‘Sister David knows I sit there but God can’t see me.’

  ‘You brought the holly over during the night?’

  He nodded solemnly.

  ‘This holly only grows in this spot,’ he said. ‘I knew you’d know that, being so clever as you are, and come here.’

  ‘Sister David was the clever one,’ Sister Joan admitted. ‘Did you put a bunch of wild flowers on the coffin in the church too?’

  ‘Madge was there but they’d closed the lid,’ Luther said. ‘I put the flowers with the others after dark. I didn’t touch nothing.’

  ‘I’m sure you didn’t,’ Sister Joan said. ‘It was you who dropped the wild flowers at the garden in the hospital, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I picked ’em for Sister Marie,’ he said proudly. ‘She’s very nice is Sister Marie. Not as nice as Sister Martha but getting that way. I took the flowers to the hospital, but I got confused. I get a bit confused near hospitals. I was scared to go in the big door and ask where Sister Marie was so I went round the backs of all those buildings and had a look round.’

  ‘Luther, I’ve asked Detective Sergeant Mill to meet me here,’ Sister Joan said. ‘You know Detective Sergeant Mill, don’t you? Luther, what did you do with Amy?’

  ‘The little girl was crying,’ Luther said. ‘All by herself and crying. I leaned down and pulled her up over the wall, but she scraped her knee on the stone and she cried more. I was going to give her a flower but I dropped them over the wall and then I heard someone coming out into the garden so I ran.’

  ‘Where’s Amy now?’ Sister Joan repeated.

  ‘The little girl’s cold,’ Luther said. ‘It’s cold down in the old crypt. I got into the big house there and took a couple of blankets. Only for a lend of them! And I took some milk and some biscuits but the little girl’s getting hungry. I don’t know what to do now, Sister.’

  ‘Go down and get Amy.’ Sister Joan kept her tone calm and conversational. ‘That sounds like Detective Sergeant Mill now.’

  She gave him what she trusted looked like a reassuring smile and went out to the open again just as the police car parked on the slope above and two figures scrambled out.

  ‘What’s happened, Sister?’ Detective Sergeant Mill was first to reach her with Shirley Fleetwood not far behind. ‘I was discussing Amy’s disappearance with Miss Fleetwood when Petrie relayed your message so she came along too. Have you found Amy? This chapel was searched.’

  ‘Not well enough apparently. There’s a crypt underneath and Luther took her down there.’

  ‘Is she all right?’

  It was Shirley Fleetwood who spoke, her professional façade momentarily submerged by a more compassionate, caring person.

  ‘Here they are,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said.

  Luther came slowly out of the old chapel, a small and decidedly grubby little girl held against his shoulder.

  ‘You won’t go hitting her again, will you?’ he said.

  ‘Nobody’s going to hurt anyone,’ Shirley Fleetwood said. ‘I promise you.’

  Amy was passed over rather like a limp little parcel, but as Luther stepped back she lifted her head, waved her hand vigorously and called in a piercing treble, ‘’Bye, Luther! Thank you!’

  ‘That’s all right, little girl!’ Luther’s face split into a wide grin. ‘You be good now and Luther will come and see you one day.’

  ‘This is the first time I’ve ever heard her speak,’ Shirley Fleetwood said in a low voice.

  ‘What happens now? You’re not going to charge Luther with anything, are you?’ Sister Joan said anxiously.

  ‘She seems unharmed if a trifle smelly.’ Shirley Fleetwood wrinkled up her nose.

  ‘If you’re satisfied then I see no reason to press charges,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said. ‘I’ll have a good long talk with Luther though. In today’s climate of political correctness his actions could be misinterpreted.’

  ‘You said something about hitting her again.’ Shirley Fleetwood look
ed at Luther. ‘I’ve never struck a child in my life.’

  ‘Not you,’ Luther said. ‘The other one.’

  ‘Which other one?’ Sister Joan said quickly.

  ‘In the garden.’ Luther grimaced in an effort to remember. ‘She hit the little girl.’

  ‘Amy’s been hitting herself,’ Sister Joan said quickly.

  ‘Not in the garden.’ Luther looked obstinate. ‘In the garden the other one bent down and hit her. I looked over the wall and I saw but the other one didn’t see me. She went away again. I ducked down quickly behind the wall and shut my eyes tight until she’d gone. Then I leaned over and picked up the little girl and I dropped the flowers I’d picked for Sister Marie.’

  ‘The other one, the one who hit her,’ Sister Joan spoke tensely, ‘did you know her?’

  ‘No. Not her name.’ Luther shook his head.

  ‘Had you seen her before?’

  ‘She gave me a sweet,’ Luther said. ‘She had red hair.’

  ELEVEN

  ‘I have to get Amy back,’ Shirley Fleetwood said. She spoke automatically as if she was pulling the warm cloak of her own authority about her shoulders to challenge the cold wind of shock.

  ‘Wait a moment!’ Detective Sergeant Mill checked her as she turned to the police car.

  ‘Look, you can’t take her to St Keyne’s, not now we know that someone was actually hitting the child, making out that she’d done it herself.’

  ‘The woman with red hair.’ Shirley Fleetwood nodded, then shook her head. ‘The woman you were telling me about who wore a red wig and was giving drugs to Luther and Mrs Lee? It really is rather a lot to take in at one gulp!’

  ‘Someone at the hospital has been quietly shortening a few lives,’ he said. ‘We don’t know why or even how any proof will now come to light, but from what Luther just told us I’d lay odds that Amy is the next intended accident. A child who abuses herself can become a child who falls out of a window or swallows some noxious substance.’

  ‘But why would anyone want to do that to a little girl?’ Shirley Fleetwood began, then made a wry grimace. ‘That was stupid!’ she said frankly. ‘God knows there are plenty of people willing to hurt children. But would someone who hurts a child also do harm to a variety of older people, none of whom has anything in common?’

  ‘They were all patients at St Keyne’s,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘I’ll take Amy home with me,’ Shirley Fleetwood said after a moment’s thought, ‘but I shall require official sanction for that.’

  ‘You have it.’ Detective Sergeant Mill spoke briskly. ‘Miss Fleetwood, are you due for a couple of days off?’

  ‘As a matter of fact yes, but I wasn’t going to take them until we had word about Amy.’

  ‘Were you planning on going away when you did take time off?’

  ‘Only to my mother’s in Plymouth,’ Shirley Fleetwood said.

  ‘I suggest that you take Amy there for a couple of days.’ He was making rapid notes in a small notebook. ‘Sister Joan, may we drive over to the convent for an hour or two?’

  ‘Yes, of course, but I don’t—’ Sister Joan stopped, feeling for once completely at a loss.

  ‘Luther, there won’t be any charges brought against you,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said, his tone one of quiet reassurance. ‘You’d better go and set your cousin’s mind at rest. Padraic’s worried about you.’

  ‘I’m scared to show myself,’ Luther confided, ‘in case the red-haired woman finds me.’

  ‘I doubt if she has any interest in you,’ Shirley Fleetwood said.

  ‘She gave him an LSD tablet, didn’t she? Outside the pub. She gave one to Luther and one to Madge Lee,’ Sister Joan said suddenly.

  ‘One LSD tablet never killed anybody,’ Shirley Fleetwood said.

  ‘Not directly, but if someone had a bad trip they might well injure themselves in some way. Madge Lee cut her hand on the broken glass and was taken to the hospital. The next morning she was dead. Even one tablet might send someone like Luther into a state that requires hospitalization,’ Detective Sergeant Mill picked up her thought.

  ‘And in hospital you’re so vulnerable,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘Go on over to Brother Cuthbert and ask him if you can stay at his place for a couple of nights. Wait! I’ll give you a note for him.’

  The detective was writing busily again. Shirley Fleetwood said, ‘This child needs a change of clothing and a hot meal!’

  ‘Off you go, Luther!’ Detective Sergeant Mill passed him the note. ‘Brother Cuthbert won’t mind, will he? I merely asked him to let Luther stay out of sight for a day or two. Let’s get to the convent.’

  ‘You start and I’ll follow on Lilith,’ Sister Joan said.

  The pony, hearing her name, whickered and pricked up her ears.

  ‘I’ll give you a hand up,’ Detective Sergeant Mill offered, unlooping the rein.

  Using his cupped hands as leverage, Sister Joan swung herself into the saddle.

  ‘Nice legs!’ Detective Sergeant Mill said sotto voce, a schoolboy grin curving his mouth.

  ‘I forgot to put on my jeans under my habit.’ Sister Joan’s rosy cheeks were scarlet.

  ‘Well, don’t let it worry you,’ he said dryly. ‘Greater sins have been committed. See you later, Sister!’

  He slapped Lilith lightly on the rump and went back to the car where Shirley Fleetwood was settling Amy. Luther had already taken off, his long legs covering the rough ground at speed.

  Even so, by the time she trotted round to the stable, Sister Perpetua was already waiting in the yard.

  ‘Sister Joan, what in the world is going on?’ she exclaimed. ‘That missing child has turned up here with a social worker and Mother Dorothy is declaring that we are now a place of safety for those in danger of — I don’t know what!’

  ‘Miss Fleetwood and Amy will be leaving quietly as soon as it gets dark if I read Detective Sergeant Mill’s intentions correctly,’ Sister Joan said. ‘I believe he has it in mind to trap a killer.’

  ‘Whatever happened to silent contemplation?’ Sister Perpetua, looking hugely pleased at the prospect of an extra couple of souls to feed and fuss over, vanished kitchenwards.

  ‘Mother Dorothy wants you in the parlour,’ Sister Marie said, coming out. ‘I’ll stable Lilith and give her a rubdown for you.’

  ‘Thank you, Sister.’ Sister Joan delayed only just long enough to rinse her hands at the sink and hastened to the parlour where she found the Prioress dispensing coffee to Detective Sergeant Mill and Shirley Fleetwood.

  ‘Dominus vobiscum.’ Mother Dorothy indicated a stool.

  ‘Et cum spiritu sancto.’ Kneeling briefly and then seating herself Sister Joan discerned a faint elevation of Miss Fleetwood’s eyebrows. No doubt she was amused at the medieval quality of the greeting.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Mill has explained briefly what seems to have been happening,’ Mother Dorothy said in her precise fashion. ‘We must give thanks to Our Blessed Lord that no harm came to the little girl.’

  ‘Luther was the one who hid her away,’ Shirley Fleetwood said.

  ‘Luther was the instrument,’ Mother Dorothy said. Her faint smile stated that she was distinctly unfazed by free-thinking social workers.

  ‘Where is Amy?’ Sister Joan enquired.

  ‘Upstairs, getting a bath and lots of mothering from Sister Teresa,’ Mother Dorothy said. ‘We shall keep her here until after dark and then Constable Petrie will drive her and Miss Fleetwood over to Miss Fleetwood’s mother in Plymouth.’

  ‘You want to give the impression they’re still here,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘I wish there was some other way to do this,’ Mother Dorothy said. ‘Deceit is not a tool one cares to use.’

  ‘The end justifies the means,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said. ‘Isn’t that what the Jesuits say?’

  ‘It’s a constant source of amazement to me,’ Mother Dorothy said, ‘how among numerous exceedingly wise precepts formulated by
St Ignatius Loyola that phrase has become a kind of sixteenth-century soundbite, capable of manifold misinterpretation. And we are not Jesuit nuns, Detective Sergeant Mill. Our watchword is Compassion.’

  ‘Compassion.’ Sister Joan echoed the word, her body suddenly tensing.

  An old tramp suffering from diabetes, an old lady waiting for a hip-replacement operation, an alcoholic gypsy woman, a young woman expecting an illegitimate baby, a child who was already traumatized by previous abuse, a simple-minded man — all objects of compassion. A deadly compassion.

  ‘Sister?’ Mother Dorothy was looking at her.

  ‘Nothing, Mother Dorothy. You were saying the end justifies the means, Detective Sergeant Mill. Meaning?’

  ‘So far we have four deaths.’ He ticked them off briskly. ‘Old John Doe whose death might well have been an accident since Sister Tracy Collet apparently had no idea he was a diabetic. Louisa Cummings who might have died of a heart attack while Sister Collet was in the toilet. Madge Lee who smuggled in or was given sufficient alcohol to finally kill her while Sister Collet was over in the children’s unit. So far Sister Collet seems to be the chief suspect.’

  ‘Her death might’ve been a suicide,’ Shirley Fleetwood said.

  ‘Possible but unlikely. She was a compassionate young woman, not terribly efficient and obviously susceptible to some man or other but not the type to harm anyone else or to harm herself when she was carrying a healthy child. Someone was hoping we’d tie her in to the previous deaths and draw the obvious conclusions, but the red wig was a touch too spectacular. Whoever hung it on the wardrobe door must’ve done so after Sister Collet had died. It strikes me as highly unlikely that someone would come in, hang up the wig without explanation and go away again leaving Tracy Collet to commit suicide. The fact is that whoever put the wig there failed to check whether or not it would’ve fitted Sister Collet’s head. Instead of pinning all the peculiar incidents on Tracy Collet and giving us every reason to conclude she had killed herself under the stress of conscience or fear of being found out that wig merely proved that somebody else was involved. The trouble is that we have a great many suspects.’