The Janus Stone (6 page)

CHAPTER 9

'So you were resident at the Sacred Heart Children's Home for how long?'

'Three years. I came when I was thirteen. I left when I was sixteen. Father Hennessey got me an apprenticeship. I owe him everything really.'

The speaker, a mild-looking man in his forties, looks at Nelson and smiles. Nelson forces himself to smile back. This is the third ex-resident of the children's home who has offered an unsolicited testimonial to the kindness of Father Hennessey. As Clough put it, half an hour ago, 'perhaps the buggers have been brainwashed.'

While Nelson and Clough are interviewing former residents of the children's home, Detective Constable Judy Johnson, another of Nelson's team, is on her way to interview Sister Immaculata, a nun who used to work at the home and is now in a Southport old people's home. As Nelson hates Southport and Clough hates nuns, it was considered that this visit needed 'a woman's touch'.

'Mr Davies,' Nelson leans forward, 'during your time at the home was there any ill-treatment of inmates ... sorry, residents.'

'No, never,' Davies answers. Too quickly? wonders Nelson.

'No corporal punishment?' asks Clough. 'Quite common in the seventies.'

'No,' says Davies quietly, 'Father Hennessey believed in kindness.'

'What about the nuns? The sisters. Could they be strict?'

Davies considers. 'They could be strict, yes. No physical violence but some of them had sharp tongues. A few were kind. Sister James. Sister Immaculata. But some of the others ... they were good women but not kindly women, if you know what I mean.'

'So what were the punishments for bad behaviour?' persists Nelson.

Davies smiles. 'Well, for really bad behaviour you got sent to Father Hennessey but that usually turned out to be more of a treat than anything else. He'd get you to help clear out his cupboards or weed the kitchen garden. Some of my happiest memories of SHCH are of working on that garden.'

Nelson sighs and changes tack. 'Did you know two children called Black? Martin and Elizabeth Black.'

Davies frowns. He has an anxious, squashed-looking face at the best of times. Now his face is positively pleated in thought. 'Yes,' he says at last, 'they went missing. It was just after I came to SHCH. Martin was about a year younger than me. He was very clever, I remember.'

'Do you remember anything about their disappearance?'

'Well, there was a big to-do at the time. We used to have a free hour at the end of the day and I remember that I'd actually been talking to Martin. There was a craze for collecting football cards and we were filling in our scrapbooks. Elizabeth was there too, playing with some stuffed animal. A dog, I think it was. She took it everywhere with her. After a while she wandered off and Martin went to find her. That was the last I saw of him. Then one of the sisters rang the bell for bedtime and they were nowhere to be seen.'

'What happened next?'

'Father Hennessey went out to search. Then he must have called the police. I remember being interviewed, being asked when I last saw Martin and Elizabeth. The police were around for a few weeks, asking everyone questions. I remember Sister Immaculata being angry because they interrupted us when we were saying the rosary. Then everything went back to normal. We still prayed for Martin and Elizabeth but we didn't really talk about them. We forgot. You know what kids are like.'

'When the police were at SHCH, do you remember them searching the grounds? Digging?'

'No,' says Davies slowly, 'I don't remember them digging.' He looks up suddenly. 'Is that what all this is about? Have you found a body?'

'I'm not at liberty to say,' says Nelson.

'They're knocking it down, aren't they?' says Davies. 'I walked past the site the other day.'

'They're developing it, yes.'

'It's a shame. It was a lovely house. Like a mansion, I always thought.'

'Yes.' Nelson looks at Clough. 'Mr Davies, would you be prepared to come to the site and look around? You might be able to tell us where things were. Which rooms were which, that sort of thing.'

'Yes,' says Davies, 'I'd be happy to.'

He gets up to leave, shaking hands with both policemen. At the door, Clough asks, 'You say Father Hennessey got you an apprenticeship. What trade was that?'

Kevin Davies smiles, the creases in his face turning upwards. 'Oh, I thought you knew. I'm an undertaker.'

Judy Johnson is pushing a wheelchair along Southport seafront. The tide is out and the sand stretches into the far distance, bands of gold and white and silver, dotted with tiny figures carrying nets and buckets. As she watches, three racehorses canter into view, their necks arching as they fight their bits, the sand flying up behind them. Judy stops for a second and Sister Immaculata turns and says, 'Red Rum was trained here. Did you know that?'

'No.'

'I had a bet on him in 1976. That was the year he came second. Typical.'

'Was it each way?' asks Judy, a bookie's daughter.

'No, on the nose. Typical.'

The horses are galloping now, stretching out joyfully across the sand, manes and tails flying. The jockeys hover over their necks, seemingly balanced in mid-air. Judy had wanted to be a jockey once. Before she got interested in boys.

The old people's home turns out to be a convent that looks after aging nuns. The sister in charge suggested that Judy take Sister Immaculata out 'for a walk'.

'That way she'll get fresh air and you can have some privacy.' A mixture of kindness and absolute authority that Judy remembers from her own (convent) schooldays.

Judy stops by a bench, puts the brakes on the wheelchair and goes to sit beside the elderly nun. She knows from the police records that Sister Immaculata (real name: Orla McKinley) is seventy-five but the veil covering her hair and her high-necked habit serve to mask the most obvious signs of age. Her face is curiously unlined, the blue eyes still sharp. Only the hand, pointing now at Southport Pier, betrays its owner's age. It's a mummy's hand, skeletal and misshapen.

'Sister Immaculata,' begins Judy, 'you worked at the Sacred Heart Children's Home from 1960 to 1980.'

'It wasn't work, it was a vocation,' says the nun sharply.

'I'm sorry. But you were resident at the home?'

'Yes.'

'What sort of a place was it?'

Sister Immaculata is silent, looking out over the miles of pale sand. But Judy notes that her hands are shaking slightly. Age? Infirmity? Or fear?

'It was a beautiful house. Lovely grounds. The sort of place where you can't imagine bad things happening.'

Judy holds her breath. She mustn't mess this up. The boss expects her to get results. That's why she has been sent instead of Clough, who'd probably have accused the nun of satanic abuse by now and be on his way for an early lunch.

'What sort of bad things?' she asks gently.

The nun looks at her sharply, eyes narrowed.

'Two children vanished. Isn't that bad enough for you?'

'Martin and Elizabeth Black?'

'Yes. They disappeared. Vanished. Into thin air.'

Judy shivers. It sounds a little like a fairy tale and she has always found these particularly terrifying. Two children go into the woods and bang! they are eaten by a wolf or enticed into a gingerbread house or given a poisoned apple by a close female relation. Vanished. Into thin air.

She struggles to make her voice sound businesslike. 'How well did you know Martin and Elizabeth?'

Sister Immaculata seems to have recovered her poise. 'I taught Martin,' she says, 'didn't have much to do with the younger children. That was Sister James, God rest her soul. But I remember Martin. Father Hennessey thought the world of him but he was always trouble, in my opinion.'

'In what way?'

'He was clever. Very interested in history. Gladiators, dinosaurs, that sort of thing. Science too. He was always trying some far-fetched experiment. Father Hennessey encouraged him, even made a laboratory for him in the basement. Gave him books to read. But he was the sort of boy who used his intelligence to make trouble. Always asking questions in class. Sacrilegious questions about the Holy Ghost and the Blessed Virgin.' She nods her head in pious reflex.

'What did Father Hennessey think about that?'

'He made excuses for him. The children had a tragic start in life. Their mother died. The only other relative was a drunken father in Ireland. Martin was always talking about his father, making him out to be some sort of hero. That's why, when they disappeared, we thought they might have gone to Ireland.'

'Did it come out of the blue, their disappearance?'

'Well, we thought Martin might have been plotting something. He'd been stealing food for weeks. Father Hennessey knew but he didn't want to confront the boy, not until he knew what was in his mind. I think he regretted that later.'

'What did
you
think?' In Judy's experience, everyone likes to be asked their opinion and it seems nuns are no exception to this rule.

'I thought he needed a good hiding. But Father Hennessey wasn't having any of that. No physical punishment, that was the rule. Not even a clip round the ear for cheekiness. Not like it was when I was at school.' She broods for a minute, lower lip stuck out.

'I told Father Hennessey that Martin Black was trouble but he wouldn't have it. Just said the boy needed love and attention. Love and attention! Look where that got him. He ran off, taking his poor innocent sister with him. Probably got themselves killed.'

'Is that what you think happened?' asks Judy.

Sister Immaculata is silent for a moment and Judy sees now that she has a rosary in her hands. She is twisting the beads between her arthritic fingers. 'Yes, I think that's what happened. The world is a dangerous place for children.'

'What did Father Hennessey think?'

Sister Immaculata looks her full in the face, the blue eyes slightly amused. 'Haven't you worked it out yet, girl? Father Hennessey is a saint. And saints cause a lot of trouble for the rest of us.'

CHAPTER 10

Ruth is excavating the bones. The skeleton has been completely exposed, has been drawn and photographed from all angles. Now, it is Ruth's job to remove the bones themselves so that they can go to the post-mortem. She moves calmly, placing each bone in a labelled bag and then checking it against what she calls her 'skeleton sheet', recording the measurement and appearance of each fragment. Respect and care, that's what she tells her pupils. Human bones, however old, should be treated with all the respect that you would give to a body. Excavation should take place over one day so that no fragments are lost or stolen. Every bone should be saved, recorded and preserved. Ruth has worked on sites, like the war graves in Bosnia, where many skeletons are mixed together. Then, the process of trying to separate and record is an arduous one. But this is just one skeleton, one little body. Ruth handles the bones with tenderness, reverence even.

Irish Ted has already bagged the bones of the cat. She will take them to the lab on her way home. Neither cat nor human skull has been found.

'Good day.' The voice is so close that Ruth jumps. She looks up and sees a good-looking man of about her age, immaculately dressed in a cotton shirt and linen trousers. With him is an older man in a panama hat. Ruth straightens up, shielding her eyes with her hand.

The younger man squats down as if he is about to jump into the trench. Ruth is horrified. Like most archaeologists, she likes to keep her trench immaculate. Standing in someone's trench is like walking uninvited into their house.

'Stop!' she says sharply.

The man looks at her quizzically.

'You can't come into the trench,' says Ruth, struggling to keep her voice polite, 'you'll contaminate it.'

The man straightens up. 'We haven't been introduced,' he says, as if the introduction will make all the difference. 'I'm Edward Spens.'

That figures. The famous Edward Spens no doubt considers that Ruth's trench, like the rest of the site, belongs to him.

'Ruth Galloway.' Ruth forces herself to smile up at him. She feels at a disadvantage being so low down.

'So these are the fateful bones.'

Fateful, thinks Ruth. It's a funny way of describing the find but somehow appropriate. She sees Spens' intelligent eyes fixed on her face. She must be careful not to give too much away.

'This is the skeleton, yes.'

'And have you any idea how old it is?'

'Not yet. We might find some clues in the fill.'

'The fill?'

'The grave,' says Ruth, thinking how emotive the word is. But that is what they have found: a grave, where a body is buried. 'We might find bricks or pottery,' she explains. 'I thought I saw a shard from a bottle. That can be dated. And we'll do radiocarbon dating, though that's less useful when dealing with a modern skeleton.'

'What exactly does radiocarbon dating involve?' Edward Spens smiles down charmingly.

'It tests the amount of carbon in the bones. When we're alive, we take in carbon fourteen. When we die, we stop. By estimating when these bones stopped taking in carbon fourteen, we'll be able to estimate the age of the skeleton.'

'Fascinating. How accurate is it?'

'To about plus or minus five per cent.' Then, relenting slightly, 'Other factors affect the carbon dating but we can be accurate to about a hundred years.'

'A hundred years! That's not very accurate.'

'There are other indicators,' says Ruth, slightly irritated. 'Recent bones still contain blood pigment and amino acids, for example. We'll be able to tell if these remains are medieval or relatively modern.'

The older man, who has been looking around him with every appearance of pleasure, now says, 'You know this used to be a church?'

'My father, Sir Roderick Spens,' introduces Edward. 'He's very interested in history.' He says this in a resigned way, as if ferrying his elderly father to sites of archaeological interest is not his preferred way of passing the time.

Roderick Spens doffs his hat with a flourish. 'Delighted to meet you.'

Ruth smiles. She thinks she prefers Sir Roderick's interest to Edward's barely concealed impatience.

'They say that a church used to stand here,' Roderick Spens explains. 'Probably destroyed during the dissolution of the monasteries, gravestones broken up, stained glass smashed, gold and silver melted down.'

Ruth thinks of the workman smashing the windows in the conservatory and the momentary regret she had felt for those coloured pieces of glass, for the destruction of anything that was once prized. 'We found a chalice yesterday,' she says, 'probably 1400s or thereabouts. Some beautiful work on it.'

Sir Roderick's eyes gleam. 'Now that I'd like to see.'

'It's back at the university,' says Ruth, 'but I'm sure we could arrange—'

'Now, Dad,' says Edward warningly, 'we don't want to bother Miss Galloway.'

'Dr Galloway,' corrects Ruth mildly, 'and it's no bother.'

'Strange to think, Dr Galloway,' the older man leans forward, deliberately, it seems, excluding his son, 'that this church was destroyed by Henry the Eighth yet later became a Catholic children's home.'

'Yes.' Ruth is not particularly interested in the age-old struggle between Catholic and Protestant. To her, all religions are as bad as each other. Though at least Catholicism has nicer pictures.

'Do the police think these bones are linked to the home?' asks Edward.

'As far as I know they're keeping an open mind,' says Ruth. 'Now if you'll excuse me...'

She turns back to the bones and, after a second or two, Edward Spens takes his father by the arm and leads him away.

Nelson does not arrive until late afternoon, by which time Ruth has finished cataloguing the bones and is helping Trace in one of the trenches at the back of the house. They have found some Roman pottery and what looks like a signet ring. So this site, like the one on the hills, was also once Roman. Hardly surprising, thinks Ruth, and yet the link disturbs her slightly.

Nelson is accompanied by Clough and a sandy-haired man with a furrowed brow under his hard hat. Clough, Ruth is interested to note, peels off immediately to talk to Trace. Nelson and the other man approach Ruth.

'Dr Ruth Galloway,' Nelson's introductions are always brusque, 'Kevin Davies. Mr Davies was once resident at the Sacred Heart Children's Home.'

'I'm afraid there's not much left of the original building,' says Ruth. And there will soon be less, if Edward Spens has his way.

Davies has a misty, far-away look about him. 'This was the conservatory,' he says, 'and over there we had a swing and a tree house. There was a wishing well too. We used to play football on the lawn. Father Hennessey was a really good player. He could have been a professional.'

Nelson rolls his eyes. The last thing he needs is to be told that Father Hennessey, on top of all his other virtues, was Norfolk's answer to Pelé.

'Do you remember a pet cemetery?' ask Ruth. 'Or anywhere where pets might have been buried.'

Davies looks at her with mild blue eyes. 'No. Sister James was allergic to animals so we couldn't even have a cat. We had a canary though. Lovely cheerful little thing.'

'Why don't you have a look round, Mr Davies,' says Nelson. 'Refresh your memory.'

Davies wanders off and Ruth climbs out of the trench. She sees Nelson looking at her strangely and realises that she must, by now, be both sweaty and mud-stained. Well, there's not much she can do about it. Her back is killing her too.

'If I have to hear once more that Father Hennessey is a saint who walks on water in his spare time, I'm going to go mad,' says Nelson as they walk away from the trench.

'Bit of a fan, is he?' asks Ruth, indicating Davies, who is staring at the ruins of the kitchen garden with a rather shell-shocked look on his face.

'A fan! According to him Father Hennessey is a combination of Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela and Winnie-the-bloody-Pooh.'

Ruth laughs. 'Have you met him, this Father Hennessey?'

'Yes.'

'What's he like?'

Nelson hesitates. 'Seems a nice enough chap. Big, strong man he must have been when he was young. Strong character too, I think. Razor sharp.'

'So, any suspicious deaths at the children's home?' asks Ruth lightly. To her surprise, Nelson answers soberly, 'Yes.'

'Really?'

'Well, a disappearance. Two children. Martin and Elizabeth Black. Vanished without a trace in 1973.'

'How old?'

'Twelve and five.'

They look at each other, thinking of the little skeleton under the door.

'Do you think it's her?' asks Ruth.

'It's possible, isn't it?'

Ruth thinks of the size of the bones. 'Yes. But that would mean...'

'That she was killed by someone at the home? Yes.'

'Do you really think that might have happened?'

'Well, we won't know until you've done your dating but ... I don't know, Ruth. There's something funny about this place. Something's not right. Something smells funny. And what was all that about a pet cemetery?'

'We found the skeleton of a cat buried by the back wall.'

'Probably just the final resting place of some old moggy.'

'Its head was cut off. No sign of the skull.'

Nelson whistles soundlessly. 'Bloody hell. Do you think there's any connection?'

'Probably not but I'll have a look at the bones back at the lab.'

'This case gets wackier and wackier.'

'Well,' says Ruth, not wanting to be drawn, remembering her ridiculous fears yesterday, 'there could be all sorts of explanations for the bones. In fact, considering that there was supposed to be a churchyard somewhere around here, it's surprising we haven't found more.'

'But a decapitated cat,' Nelson raises his eyebrows, 'that doesn't strike you as odd?'

'There's sure to be a logical explanation,' persists Ruth. Nelson is still looking at her oddly. She can feel herself going red. Ruth has always had trouble with blushing and it seems to have got worse during the last few weeks. Feeling the blood pumping into her cheeks, she ducks her head. 'Edward Spens was here earlier,' she says. 'With his dad.'

At least this diverts Nelson's attention away from her. He kicks viciously at an upended paving stone.

'Interfering bastard,' he says. 'What did he want?'

'To interfere, I suspect. His dad was sweet though. Very interested in history. He was talking about the church that was meant to have been here.'

'Father Hennessey mentioned it too. Said it used to cure lepers.'

Ruth thinks of St Hugh's decapitated skull, performing miracles on its own, of St Bridget's cross, holy fires and sacred wells. Fairy tales all of them but, like fairy tales, curiously compelling.

'They're Catholics, you know,' says Nelson suddenly, 'the Spens family. Edward Spens was telling me. His grandfather converted sometime in the fifties.'

'I thought there was something odd about him,' says Ruth.

They are walking back towards the archway, where Kevin Davies is now standing, looking sadly at the devastation all around him. Ruth stops and takes a gulp from her water bottle.

Nelson puts his hand on her arm. 'Are you all right?' The sudden kindness in his voice makes the blood rush to her head again.

'Fine,' she snaps, 'just hot.'

'Hot?' says Nelson. 'It's never hot in Norfolk.' And he bounds away across the rubble.

11th June: Day sacred to Fortuna Virgo

I suppose I have always known that I am special. Even before all this happened and the curse fell upon us, I always knew that the Gods had something special in store for me. It's not just that I am clever (though my Intelligence Quotient is in excess of 140), it is more that I
understand.
When I read Pliny or Catullus the gods are not just names to me, they are real. Their power and might overshadows all that comes after—the puny love-feast of Christianity, the ridiculous modern gods of horoscopes and hypnotism and the moving pictures. The Roman gods are
logical
and that is why I like them. If you kill, you must make amends in blood, a life for a life. Blood can be cancelled out but only by blood. The gods demand their sacrifices but, unlike modern gods, they do not demand more than their due. If you sacrifice correctly, the past is wiped out, made clean.

Soon I will be alone in the house (well, apart from the women and children who do not count) and then maybe I will have the chance to do what must be done. In the meantime I must keep my strength up, eat healthily, more meat and less potato. Caesar himself would not have been able to function on the diet I eat. Must speak to Cook about this.