The Stranger House (45 page)

He said there was someone he wanted to talk to first, then he’d decide.

And he left.

About ten minutes later the doorbell rang. I opened the door to discover the Gowders. It was like finding the Furies on your doorstep! I must have gone pale as death, but they greeted me as they usually did and said they’d
come for the Bible class but, seeing it was cancelled, wondered if I’d like to come out to play.

If I’d had the slightest suspicion they knew I’d been talking to Sam, I would have slammed the door in their faces. But they seemed so normal, and I thought it would just make them suspicious if I said no, and I didn’t want to be around the house when my father returned and started asking questions about Sam’s reasons for cancelling the Bible class, so I said yes and went with them.

What a mistake! A moment’s thought would have told me they must have encountered Sam on their way to the vicarage, and that he was unlikely not to have taken the chance to try and double-check my tale.

I found out the truth as soon as we were up on the moor, well out of sight and earshot of the village. One of them seized me from behind, the other put his face close to mine and demanded to know what I’d told the curate.

At first, in my fear, I tried to claim ignorance of what they meant. I got punched in the stomach for my pains. I then started telling them some watered-down version, and in the midst of this I took advantage of a weakened grip to break free and make a dash for it up the fell. Over twenty yards I was the quicker, but as I slowed they came on relentlessly. I decided that there was no future in trying to flee uphill so I turned and started racing down the steep slope, leaping from boulder to boulder till inevitably I missed my footing and went crashing to the ground. When I tried to push myself up, I realized I had damaged my wrist and done something very unpleasant to my ankle.

Worse, I was back in the Gowders’ clutches.

With the way I was feeling, further threats were unnecessary. I told them exactly what I had said to the
curate. After which they conferred for a while before telling me I should keep my mouth shut from now on and try to take back as much as I could next time I saw Sam. Failure to keep silent this time would result in further accidents which would make my present pains feel like a French kiss.

And then they helped me back to the vicarage.

The district nurse was summoned. She said I should be got to the hospital instantly for X-rays. They kept me in overnight, and by the time the police got round to talking to me, I knew all about poor Sam’s death.

Now I had even more on my conscience.

It seemed clear to me it was my fault. He must have felt the horror of my story so much that his mind flipped.

When the police talked to me, my father was present. They didn’t stay long. I got very upset. And I said nothing beyond the bare facts that Sam had told me the class was cancelled so I went out to play. How could I say more with my father there and the threat of the Gowders waiting outside?

So began my second silence, which I thought might last forever till I came into the church the other day and saw you standing by the font with water dripping from your hair, like a revenant from a shipwreck.

Which is what you are, Miss Flood. A ghost come back to haunt us. A ghost come back to tell us our crime was even more terrible than we knew. A ghost come back to summon us all to judgment. May God have mercy on our souls.

When he arrived at the Hall, it seemed to Mig Madero that the wolf-head knocker looked keener than ever to bite the hand that touched it, but he was saved from putting it to the test.

As he reached forward, the door swung open. Mrs Collipepper stood there.

“Good morning,” he said, “I have an appointment. With Mr Dunstan.”

“Then you’d better come in,” she said.

She led him into the house and up the stairs. As he followed he found himself observing as on his previous visit the rhythmic rise and fall of her buttocks, and there came into his mind a picture of her naked, on her knees, heavy breasts penduling, as she retrieved the scarlet robe from the floor.

He was delighted to observe it didn’t have the slightest effect on him. Whereas if he let his thoughts slip to a certain skinny figure with less flesh on it than one of the housekeeper’s thighs, it was amazing how quickly his thoughts became very languid indeed …

It was both with relief and reluctance that he found himself hauled back to the here and now by the sound of a savage blow being dealt to the study door by Mrs Collipepper’s fist.

When there was no reply she hammered again.

“He sometimes falls asleep,” she observed over her shoulder, as if feeling some explanation were needed.

“That must be inconvenient,” Mig heard himself responding.

She turned those watchful grey eyes on him, as if in search of innuendo.

“At times,” he added. Which only made things worse.

He found he was storing up the story to tell Sam.

He was saved from further ill-judged attempts at mitigation by a voice crying, “Come in!”

Mrs Collipepper opened the door and announced, “Mr Madero.”

Mig stepped by her, saying as he passed, “Thank you very much.”

“That’s OK. Sorry about your sherry,” she said. Then rather spoilt the apology by adding as she moved away, “Too sour for a trifle anyway.”

There was, he thought, in the history of this woman material for … what? A romance? A comedy? A tragedy? A social history?

Dunstan said, “Have a seat, Madero. I trust I find you well today.”

He was seated at the desk on which lay a scatter of papers. He was fully dressed despite the, for him, early hour. But his face looked rather drawn, as if he had paid a price for this interruption to his usual routine.

“I’m very well,” said Mig.

“And the Australian girl?”

“She is well too.”

“I’m glad to hear it. She stayed at the Stranger, I take it?”

“Yes,” said Mig shortly, keen to get off this subject.

“And did she reveal to you any further details about the cause of her distress?”

“Why should she make a confidant of someone she met only two days ago?” asked Mig with a disingenuousness the Jesuits would have been proud of.

It didn’t seem to work.

“Extreme experience in foreign places often throws strangers together,” said Dunstan, “Thus travellers encountering in the wilderness would huddle close at night for comfort and protection. In view of what you have both discovered since arriving here, it would not be surprising if you and Miss Flood felt an impulse to huddle together. I speak figuratively, of course.”

There was no insinuating note in his voice, but Mig felt his cheeks growing warm under that keen slate-eyed gaze, and suddenly Dunstan smiled as if at a spoken admission.

“Mr Madero, forgive me. I had no thought of embarrassing you. Nor indeed should you be embarrassed. Youth’s the season made for joy, and the Church would be completely out of touch with reality if it didn’t admit and make allowances for that.”

How the devil have we got here? Mig asked himself in amazement. Silence is admission, but denial would feel like treachery!

Dunstan was still talking: “It certainly seems from all reports that Miss Flood has an engaging if original personality, plus, as you indicated last evening, a First in mathematics from some colonial establishment and a placement at Cambridge. Do you happen to know which college?”

“Trinity,” said Mig shortly, wanting to move off this topic.

“Very fitting. The alma mater of Newton. Also, though rather less noteworthy, of myself. I should like very much to make her acquaintance. Perhaps I could call on your good offices to arrange an introduction … ?”

He really is like an old Prince of the Church, thought Mig. Worldly-wise, insinuating in courtesy, evasive in debate, and almost certainly ruthless in decision.

“Mr Woollass,” he said, determined to get away from Sam and back to his own affairs, “I have something for you here.”

From his briefcase he took Father Simeon’s journal and laid it on the table.

Dunstan glanced at it with what looked like token interest and said, “Of course. The journal. I thank you. And I too have something which I feel might interest you.”

He picked a large leather-bound volume off his desk.

“I think I mentioned this to you at our first meeting. My grandfather Anthony’s history of this part of Cumberland. He acted, you will recall, as assistant to Peter Swinebank in the preparation of his
Guide,
sparking a lifelong interest in the highways and byways of the past. You will have read the Reverend Peter’s account in the
Guide
of the waif boy whom Thomas Gowder took into his care, which kindness he repaid by murdering the husband and ravishing the wife? That this youth is the same fugitive whom my ancestors aided in their turn now seems very probable. And after long thought, I find I am happy to accept your intuition that he was your ancestor.”

“Thank you,” said Mig, “And I hope we can both take as given Miguel’s account of what really happened at Foulgate that night.”

“Oh yes. In fact, as I was about to point out, the inhabitants of Skaddale had a deal too much common
sense to take as gospel anything a neighbour like Andrew Gowder asserted. Which brings me to my grandfather. His
History
is more concerned with the broad sweep of events and their philosophical analysis rather than domestic particularities. In the main body of his text, the incident wins no more than a passing reference. He was however one of those scholars who cannot bear that anything, once discovered, should be lost. A large proportion of his book takes the form of footnotes which are generally, I fear, much more engaging than his central argument. There is one such note here in which he says …”

He opened the book at a marked page and, using a magnifying glass, began to read a footnote in minuscule print which Mig could see occupied nearly half of a page.

He finished reading and looked up at Mig.

“It is unfortunate,” he said drily, “that as well as sparking an interest in local history in my grandfather, the Reverend Peter also seems to have passed on his rather ponderous style. I’m sure, however, that you picked up on the significant elements here. Exculpation of your ancestor. And the reference to our mutual friend, Francis Tyrwhitt.”

Mig’s gaze met the old man’s. What a portrait this would make, he thought. The young man eager for knowledge being led forward by the old tutor intent on passing on the torch of learning which he has tended all his long years …

Load of crap, he heard a shrill Australian voice say in his mind. The old bastard’s chasing you up a gum tree. So grab your chance and piss on him!

He said, “I brought along the document this morning because I believe that returning it to its rightful owner is the only honest way to proceed. I hope that you will agree and now do the same with the document that you removed from the Jolley archive.”

Once more, just as he tried to grab the initiative, the old man slid away from him. Instead of the expected indignant denial, Dunstan’s response was a delighted, “Bravo! You’ve worked it out. But do let me hear your exquisite reasoning. I love to follow the workings of a fine mind.”

It was hard not to feel flattered.

Mig said, “It’s been clear from the start that you know a great deal more about everything than the rest of your family. It was this knowledge that made you curious to see me when Gerald was reluctant to let anyone stick their nose into Woollass family business after the visit of Liam Molloy.”