The Woman In Blue: The Dr Ruth Galloway Mysteries 8 (24 page)

‘Let’s get this straight,’ says Nelson. ‘Mr Fitzroy-Jones, you wrote a series of malicious letters to Doctor Smithson.’

‘I met her when she came to a talk at the museum,’ says Justin. ‘She seemed to represent everything that I deplore about women priests.’

Ruth thinks that Hilary looks rather proud to hear this. She takes a thoughtful sip of water.

‘So you sent her threatening letters?’ says Nelson.

‘They weren’t threatening,’ says Justin, ‘they were meant to point out the error of her ways.’

‘I’ve read them,’ says Nelson. ‘They sounded pretty threatening to me. You also sent her a letter asking her to meet you today. In that letter you said you’d explain why Chloe and Paula had to die.’

Hilary looks reproachfully at Ruth. ‘You told him about the letter.’

‘I told him,’ said Cathbad. He is sitting on the window seat. As Ruth watches, the cat comes up to him and rubs against his legs.

‘What did you mean by saying you’d explain about the murders of Chloe and Paula?’ says Nelson.

‘I know why they died,’ says Justin, ‘but I didn’t kill them.’

‘You don’t have an alibi for either murder,’ says Nelson. ‘I’d start talking if I were you.’

‘He has an alibi for Chloe’s murder,’ says Cathbad. ‘He was in Ireland.’

‘No, Cathbad,’ says Nelson. ‘Justin lied to you. He was in Walsingham that night. We’ve got CCTV footage of him at the Slipper Chapel. He belongs to a secret society called the Brotherhood of the Madonna Lactans. They meet at the chapel.’

Lactans, thinks Ruth, that’s breastfeeding isn’t it? Is it possible that her hunch about the glass phial was correct?

Justin is looking apologetically at Cathbad. ‘I’m sorry for lying to you,’ he says.

Cathbad says nothing. He looks very shocked. The cat is still purring against his legs, and he strokes it mechanically.

‘What did you mean by saying that you knew why the women had been murdered?’ says Nelson again.

‘I can’t tell you.’

‘You’d better,’ says Nelson, ‘if you don’t want me to arrest you for the murder of two women.’

There’s a silence, and then Justin says, looking out of the window, ‘They were murdered because they were sinful. The first woman was a drug addict, the second was an actress.’

He says ‘actress’ like it is the most wicked profession imaginable. Ruth sees Clough stir angrily. She thinks about Freya, ascetic, severe Freya, with her dark clothing and hatred of ritual.

‘Why did you write to Freya too?’ she asks.

‘She was like Doctor Smithson,’ says Justin. ‘She thought herself worthy to be a priest. The two of them came to the rehearsal yesterday, wanting to play apostles. Sacrilege. There were no female apostles.’

‘What about Mary Magdalene?’ cuts in Hilary. ‘Most theologians concede that she was an apostle. She stood with the Virgin Mary at the foot of the cross. She was the first to see the risen Christ. And she was a prostitute. Jesus loves the outcasts of society. The drug addicts, the prostitutes.’

Ruth glances at Nelson, expecting him to break into this theological debate. Instead she is surprised to see that he is looking out of the window, towards the graveyard. His face has a look of frowning concentration that Ruth knows well.

‘Boss?’ says Clough at last.

Nelson turns. ‘Tim, do you know where Doreen Westmondham was a dinner-lady?’

‘I can’t remember,’ says Tim. ‘But I think I made a note.’ He gets out his phone. ‘Yes, it was a boarding school in Sheringham.’

‘Come on,’ says Nelson to Clough. ‘You come with me. Heathfield, you stay here. Ruth and Cathbad, go home.’

Ruth is still trying to find the words to protest at being spoken to in such a way when the door slams behind Nelson.

Chapter 28

Daisy hears the field gate open and shut. Lulu turns and barks loudly. ‘Come on,’ says Daisy pulling at her lead. Now is not the time for Lulu to develop bravery. Daisy keeps moving. Samuel’s head lolls as the pushchair rattles along. Could she take a short cut across the field? But the rapeseed grows high on either side, almost shoulder-height in places. She’d never get the pushchair through. She must just keep on the track. Keep right on till the end of the road. She contemplates singing, but, when she opens her mouth, only a croak comes out. She met Larry when she was singing in the choir at the church in Croydon where he was a deacon. On his days off they used to get a bus to the South Downs or the Pilgrims Way. They’d take a picnic and they’d walk for miles. Sometimes they’d sing as they walked, harmonising naturally, pop songs and favourite hymns. ‘O lord my God, when I in awesome wonder consider all the works Thy hand has made.’ In those days the countryside had seemed like heaven.

Daisy starts to jog. She always claims that walking everywhere has made her fit, but now she’s out of breath in seconds, a stitch like a knife wound in her side. One of the soldiers plunged his spear into Jesus’s side and at once blood and water poured out. The Passion Play seems years away. She stops. Silence, just a bird singing somewhere very high up. Blue sky, yellow flowers, like one of Victoria’s paintings. Has her pursuer taken another path? Is she safe? Or have they stopped too? This last is somehow the most terrifying thought of all. She wants to look round, but finds she can’t turn her head. She starts to run, faster than before, oblivious to the pain in her ribs. And, behind her, the footsteps start to run too.

*

For a few minutes Hilary, Cathbad, Ruth and Justin all stare at each other. In some ways, thinks Ruth, there is so much to say; in other ways, nothing at all. It is Tim who says, slightly apologetically, ‘I expect you’ll all be wanting to get on your way.’

Ruth looks at her watch. It’s twenty past three. She has to collect Kate at four.

‘I’d better be going,’ she says. ‘Cathbad?’

Cathbad is looking at his friend. ‘How could you lie to me?’ he says.

‘I’m sorry,’ says Justin. ‘I didn’t think you’d understand about the Madonna Lactans.’

‘Don’t I usually understand things like that? I’m a druid, remember. I understand the mystical.’

‘You say you do,’ says Justin, ‘but underneath I think you’re pretty hard-nosed, Cathbad. You’re more like your friend Nelson than you think.’

Cathbad looks deeply hurt and doesn’t reply.

‘Goodbye, Justin,’ says Hilary serenely, standing up. ‘I hope we meet again.’

Justin stands too. As the two of them are still in biblical dress, it gives the moment a strange solemnity.

‘I’m sorry if the letters frightened you,’ says Justin.

‘I wasn’t frightened,’ says Hilary. ‘“The Lord is my strength.”’

And, with that, the three of them file out of the door.

Outside, they stand, uncertain, in the lane. People are streaming out of the abbey grounds, returning to cars and lodgings. The mood seems oddly cheerful, considering the drama that has just been re-enacted. Hilary too seems almost elated, humming under her breath. Ruth can’t be absolutely sure that it isn’t ‘Onward, Christian Soldiers’. Cathbad, on the other hand, seems extremely depressed. For the first time since Ruth has known him, he looks too slight for his druid’s robes, as if he’s merely dressing up.

‘I should have known,’ he says. ‘The cat’s called Chesterton, after all.’

‘You couldn’t have known,’ says Ruth. ‘We can never know what people are really like.’ She’s thinking of Michelle and Tim, of Father Hennessey and Hilary. Of everyone, really.

‘I’d better get home,’ says Cathbad. ‘Can I have a lift, Ruth?’

‘Of course,’ says Ruth. She notices that he brightens up at the thought of home. ‘Let’s fight our way through the pilgrims.’

*

Nelson and Clough are caught up in the crush at the main gates. ‘Police,’ shouts Nelson. ‘Let us through.’ This causes consternation as people try to get out of their way and end up creating more of a bottleneck.

‘Call Fuller,’ Nelson tells Clough. ‘Find out where she is.’

Nelson pushes his way through and finds that the grounds are almost empty. The grass has been trampled into mud, and men in overalls are picking up litter. Clough is still trapped at the gate. Where the hell is Tanya? As he stabs impatiently at his phone he sees a familiar figure in brown coming towards him. It’s Larry Westmondham, bald head gleaming, holding a girl of about ten – presumably his daughter – by the hand.

‘There, you see,’ he says to Nelson. ‘I didn’t forget her.’

‘Yes, you did, Dad,’ says the girl. ‘Miss Lewis had to remind you.’

‘Larry,’ says Nelson. ‘Have you seen Robin Rainsford?’

‘Robin who? Oh, the teacher. Wasn’t he one of the apostles?’

Thank God. Tanya is on the phone.

‘Fuller. Where’s Rainsford? Remember, I told you to keep an eye on him.’

Tanya sounds flustered. ‘He left just before the end.’

‘Didn’t you follow him?’

‘You told me not to leave the grounds.’

‘Jesus.’ Nelson turns back to the rather shocked Larry. ‘Have you heard from your wife?’

‘Daisy?’ Larry’s forehead crinkles. ‘No. But she’ll be collecting Lizzie and Victoria.’

‘They’re at the Hendersons’,’ says his daughter. ‘Lucky things. They have ice pops in their freezer.’

‘Do you know which way she will have gone?’

‘She had the pushchair so she probably went by the road.’

‘No,’ says the daughter. ‘She had Lulu, so she would have gone over the fields behind the farm. It’s quicker that way too.’

‘Can you show me?’

‘Of course.’ She skips forward happily, followed by her father, Nelson and, seconds later, a red-faced Tanya.

*

Tim is left alone with Justin. Of the two of them, Tim feels that he is the most embarrassed. Justin just sits there on the sofa. The cat jumps up and sits next to him. Tim finds the animal rather creepy, with its jet-black fur and green eyes. He is sure that his mother would say that a pure black cat was bad luck.

Tim looks out of the window, at the strange view of the graveyard with its tilting stones. St Simeon’s is in the background, a solid grey shape surrounded by blossoming trees. It all seems a million miles away from the abbey grounds, where a killer might still be at large. Why did the boss go charging off like that? And why did he tell Tim to wait at the cottage? Was it just to keep Tim out of the action or to make sure that Ruth and Hilary got away safely? Tim looks at Justin, still sitting serenely on the sofa, stroking the demonic cat. It’s hard to see this man as dangerous. Weird, certainly, with some pretty nasty views about women. But not dangerous.

‘I’m going now,’ says Tim. Justin doesn’t look up, and Tim feels an urge to jolt him.

‘You’ll be hearing from us,’ he says. ‘About the letters.’ He doesn’t know if this is true. Hilary may well not want to press charges now that she has succeeded in half-strangling the perpetrator. In fact, Justin might want to bring charges of actual bodily harm against Hilary. But he suspects that neither of these things will happen. The letters will be forgotten, especially as it seems they weren’t written by the murderer.

Justin turns his head towards Tim. ‘I meant what I said in the letters, you know.’

‘Which bit in particular?’ asks Tim.

‘About DCI Nelson being an adulterer. He’s had an affair outside wedlock.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Cathbad. In confidence.’

‘Well, you don’t seem to have respected the confidence,’ says Tim. One way or another he’s not really in the mood to talk about Nelson’s marriage.

‘Those girls were killed because they were sinful too,’ says Justin. ‘That’s what I think.’

‘They were killed because there’s a murderer out there,’ says Tim, moving towards the door. ‘You’ll be hearing from us again.’

Justin stays sitting on the sofa, the cat at his side.

Outside Tim takes off his robe, folds it neatly and leaves it by Justin’s front door. Then he walks quickly towards the abbey grounds, hoping to catch up with Nelson and Clough. If there’s a race to find the killer, he wants to be involved. He wonders where Ruth and Hilary have got to. With any luck, they will have gone home.

But, when he reaches the grounds, he finds that almost everyone has gone home. It seems amazing that a place that was so full only ten minutes ago is now almost deserted. Discarded prayer sheets litter the grounds and two men with black sacks are picking them up. Someone else is loading music stands onto a trolley. The Stations of the Cross remain in place: the stage where Pilate (a.k.a. Justin Fitzroy-Jones) sentenced Jesus to death, the tomb where His body was laid and, towering above the rest, the cross on its raised platform. As Tim looks towards the platform, he sees something hanging from one of the arms of the cross. Is it a discarded costume? No, it looks too bulky for that. Tim starts to run across the grass. One of the litter-collectors shouts at him, but he keeps on running.

When he gets closer he sees what is hanging from the cross. A man’s body, dressed in pink robes. Something in the way it twists and turns tells Tim that it’s too late, but he calls the ambulance anyway, shouting into his phone as he gets closer. The litter-collectors look in his direction and soon they are running too. Tim climbs onto the stage and fumbles with the rope around the man’s neck.

‘Here, use this.’ One of the litter-collectors is proffering a dangerous-looking knife. Tim must remember to question him about it afterwards.

The knife does the trick, though. The rope gives way and the body sags into Tim’s arms. He lays it on the platform. The man is clearly dead. Despite the distorted features, Tim recognises him immediately as the handsome actor who had played John, the disciple Jesus loved.

‘Who is it?’ says one of the litter-men. ‘He’s dead all right. Poor bastard.’

‘One of the actors,’ says the other. ‘Do you know his name?’ he asks Tim.

Tim shakes his head but, in his heart, he is certain of the dead man’s identity. He thinks that he has found Thom Novak.

*

The hymn is still echoing in Daisy’s head as she runs. ‘When through the woods and forest glades I wander, And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees . . .’ She can see the houses now, the white gate leading to the Hendersons’ garden, that paradise of treehouse and swings. She’s nearly there – in a few seconds she’ll be with her darling daughters. She’ll tell the Hendersons about her fears and they’ll laugh together, they’ll give her tea and biscuits and offer her a lift home.

The next minute she is on the ground. There’s a heavy weight pressing her into the mud and hot breath on the back of her neck. She has let go of the pushchair and she hears Samuel give a startled shout as it topples over. Lulu is barking. Protect Samuel, she sends a thought message to the dog. Protect Samuel, don’t worry about me. She struggles, but her assailant is too strong for her. Now his hands are round her neck. Lulu’s barking seems to be coming from a long way away. She tries to pray, to say an act of contrition, but all she can think is how unfair this is, she’s only thirty-five, she has four children, how will Larry ever be able to cope on his own?

Darkness. Is this it, the promised land?

*

Led by Becky, Nelson, Clough and Tanya take the path behind the farm buildings. Becky sets a good pace, obviously a child used to walking. It’s Larry who stumbles, hampered by his long robe, and almost falls several times. Nelson thinks of the Stations of the Cross, ‘Jesus Falls for the Third Time’. He has already telephoned the station asking for back-up and circulating a description of Robin Rainsford.

‘Why do you think he’s our man?’ asks Clough, as they approach the gate to the rapeseed field. At least Clough has discarded his costume. Nelson doesn’t think he could cope with two people in fancy dress.

‘Something Stanley Greenway said,’ says Nelson. ‘It all fell into place back in the cottage. I think that Robin was befriended by Doreen when she was a dinner-lady at his school. It made him pathologically jealous of her foster children – and her actual children. That was the link between Chloe and Paula. Not that they looked alike, it was because they were Doreen’s children.’

‘But, even if that’s true,’ pants Larry. ‘Why would he go after my wife?’

‘It’s a hunch,’ says Nelson. ‘And I hope I’m wrong. It was when you said how like your mum Daisy was. I think Rainsford’s jealousy might be at work again. He met Daisy when she made supper for the delegates. Daisy seems like such a perfect wife and mother. She’s Doreen’s daughter-in-law. And killing her, of course, would be the perfect way to get at you.’

‘Dear God,’ says Larry. ‘I hope you’re wrong.’

They see the pushchair first. It’s lying on its side, wheels spinning. Samuel is still strapped inside and he’s crying in an exhausted way, as if he’s been doing so for a long time.

‘Daisy!’ Suddenly Larry gets a burst of energy and he runs along the path, Clough close behind. But it’s Tanya, who never misses a day at the gym, who sprints past them both. Nelson suddenly grabs Becky’s hand, unwilling to let her see what might be ahead.

‘She’s here,’ shouts Tanya.

Nelson lets go of Becky and runs forward. Daisy is lying in the yellow flowers just off the track. Tanya and Clough are leaning over her. Larry has fallen to his knees and is crying.

‘Look after your daughter,’ Nelson shouts at him.

Plant stalks are flattened all around as if a struggle has taken place; the scent of the flowers is acrid and unpleasant. Nelson fully expects to see a dead body but, instead, Clough is phoning an ambulance and Tanya is briskly turning Daisy into the recovery position.

‘She’s alive, boss.’

Nelson goes back to the pushchair and frees Samuel, lifting him up into his arms. Larry is sitting on the ground with tall Becky in his lap and Nelson doesn’t think he could cope with the baby as well.

‘Daisy’s alive,’ he says. ‘The ambulance is on its way.’

Larry looks at him blankly. ‘Where’s Lulu?’ he says.

Who the hell’s Lulu? Oh, the dog. Still holding the baby, Nelson sets off through the flowers. A few yards away he finds Robin Rainsford lying on the ground, with Lulu growling on his chest.