Unholy Dying (9 page)

She was expecting a few choice epithets to follow her. So were all the newsroom. They were disappointed. Cosmo continued gazing in front of him, his contentment with the universe and its ordering apparently undented. He reminded Terry Beale of a cat purring because its prey is near.

 • • • 

“So what did he do?” asked Miss Daltrey—Cassie to her friends. It was the end of the school day, and she had just finished history with the sixth form, and was walking through the playground with her favorite pupil.

“Nothing much,” said Samantha Horrocks. “When he came up in the midafternoon to go to his study he just stood in my bedroom doorway, fixing me with his gaze. I think he'd been reading about snakes transfixing rats or something.”

“Hmm. Well, I'm glad it was nothing worse than that.”

“What can he do now I'm seventeen but try to terrify me? It
would
have terrified me two or three years ago. Now I can just shrug and turn away.”

Cassie wondered whether to ask what Cosmo might have done to Samantha when she was younger, but decided there was no point in raking over unpleasant memories. Instead she said, “Good. You're growing up.”

“Oh, I'm a big girl now. He knows I could kick up a tremendous fuss if he lays a finger on me. I owe it all to you.”

“You owe me nothing. It was all there, in you, to start with.” They stopped by Cassie's car. “Coming for a cup of tea?”

“Better not. I've got a mountain of reading for my English essay.”

“Shall I drive you home?”

“Definitely better not. You never know when the Mean Monster may be around.” Samantha saw a look in her teacher's eye and said quickly, “I'm just thinking of you. He's right, you know. He could cause an awful stink. It's what he enjoys most.”

“Of course. See you tomorrow.”

But as she drove off, her expression was thoughtful. Maybe Samantha had not come as far as she had thought. Maybe she was still living in a degree of fear of that man. On the other hand, she was right that he could make one hell of a stink. It was his job.

As she drove off, Cassie said to herself: I've been unwise. After all the resolutions I made, to fall at the first real temptation. And she'd been sure that the girl had enjoyed herself, that it had been what she wanted. Now she wondered. She was perfectly right about what her horrible father might do, yet somehow, looking at her face and body language, she wondered whether Samantha wasn't having second thoughts.

 • • • 

“So what was Cosmo up to today?” Carol Barr asked Terry at lunchtime in the Ne Plus Ultra, a wine bar in the Headrow that made nods in the direction of Leeds's dubious Roman heritage.

“Making an assignation,” said Terry, before opening his mouth to get it around a gargantuan ciabatta roll with the usual overgenerous filling of iceberg lettuce.

“With a woman?” Carol asked. She had to wait while he chewed and swallowed, and added: “Some people have all the bad luck.”

“I wouldn't think it was a woman. Doesn't sound like Cosmo.”

“Why not? He has a wife and daughters.”

“Poor buggers.”

“Not to mention rumors of his past down south. Who with, then?”

“Could be a woman, of course. It sounded like it was someone he wanted information from.”

Patrick De'ath, arriving with a plate and a pint, said, “Does he pay for information? A pittance, I would guess.”

“How did you know who we were talking about?”

“I saw you eavesdropping.”

“Anyway, it was a hundred pounds.”

Patrick whistled.

“That sounds like more than par for the course.”

“Depends on the story, doesn't it?”

“Do you think it's still this vicar one?” Carol asked.

“Priest. Yes, I wouldn't mind betting. I expect he has a hope of selling it to the tabloids.”

“Could be. What's your interest?”

“What do you mean?”

“What I say. Why do you find Cosmo and his doings so fascinating?”

Terry shifted in his seat.

“I don't. I think he's repellent. He's the sort of reporter who gives journalism a bad name. The original sewer rat. I'd love to see him stopped.”

Patrick and Carol looked at him, then down at their food. There was something there they didn't understand.

“There's no journalistic equivalent to the Hippocratic oath,” said Patrick. “You can't have him struck off for muckraking.”

 • • • 

Julie told herself she would not be intimidated by her unaccustomed surroundings. Nor were the offices just by the cathedral in Great George Street intimidating in themselves. But they were unusual for Julie, because the only comparable building in her limited experience since school was the Benefits office. Here in the little outer room, the woman behind the desk looked at her with a well-prepared neutral expression that just concealed one of disapproval.

“If you'll just take a seat. I don't think they'll be long. If you'll leave the little boy with me when—”

“No, I'll take him in,” said Julie quickly. “He's not used to being with strangers.”

“But—”

“I'm with him all the time, you see. He'll be as good as gold in there. Oh, and could I have the ten pounds for the fare now, please?”

“Oh, but—”

“It's money I can't do without. Every little item tells, when you've nothing to fall back on. And I don't want to feel under any pressure to tell the people in there what they want to hear.”

“Oh, but of
course
they only want to hear the truth—”

“I would like it now, please.”

Pursing her lips, the woman dived into a drawer and came up with a ten-pound note. With an excess of kindliness, perhaps even a reluctant respect for the girl, she said, “They won't try to trick you, you know, or make you say anything you don't want to say.”

“I hope
not
,” said Julie. “I'm not going to tell them anything except what really happened.”

“If Miss Norris would come in now,” said a sandy little head appearing around the inner door. As Julie got up he slipped farther into the office and held the door almost shut until she and Gary got to it, then opened it just enough to let them through. It was rather like going into a scary ride at a fun fair. The sandy man ushered her almost apologetically to a seat, then scurried around to sit on the other side of the table, with two others. Once she had grown accustomed to the dim amount of daylight allowed into the room, Julie sized up all three with an expert eye. Two priests, plus one ineffectual layman. In the Benefits office, she was used to summing up the officials behind the grilles and organizing things so she got the one she wanted, the one with the sympathetic face. This sometimes involved pinching Gary so that he yelled and she could let others go first while she quieted him. This time she chose the priest on the left, not the one in the center, who seemed to be the chairman, as the person she was mostly going to talk to. He was younger, less set in his expression.

“Thank you for coming, Julie,” said the more forbidding of the priests, trying to bend to her level. “That's a fine little boy.”

“Yes, he is.”

“I think you know we're investigating allegations made about Father Pardoe?”

“Is that rumors?” He nodded, but looked none too pleased.

“Yes, I do,” she said.

“Could you tell us how long you've known him?”

Julie thought back carefully.

“It seems like all my life. He told me once he'd been at St. Catherine's about eleven years, so I'd be eight when he came. I have a vague memory of another priest, an old bl— an old man, but me mam and dad didn't go that often to church, so I only knew Father Pardoe to raise my hand and say hello to all the time I was at school.”

“And when did you get to know him better?”

That was easy. She smiled with pleasure at the memory.

“Not long after this little fellow was born. He saw me wheeling him through the market, and stopped to talk. More than a lot of the congregation at St. Cath's have done, I can tell you.”

She chucked her boy under the chin, as if to emphasize that she couldn't have cared less for herself, but she did like Gary to be admired.

“So you were pleased when he stopped. Glad he took an interest?” asked the chairman.

“Yes. Yes, I was. You get to welcome any sort of contact, but he was really nice. He didn't preach or anything. It was all practical things—how much I got from the Social, whether the flat had everything I needed—that was a laugh!—whether I had any friends on the estate, that kind of thing. It was like he was taking a fatherly interest, which was more than my real father had ever done.”

“I don't know your father so I can't comment,” said the chairman stiffly.

“But we do understand about families,” said the other, younger priest. “We know they don't always function ideally. So tell us how your friendship with Father Pardoe developed.”

Julie took the opportunity to turn toward the more sympathetic priest and tell her story to him.

“Well, like I said, he asked about the estate, and whether I knew people there, and I said it got lonely sometimes, because I needed people to talk to—partly worries, being a new mother with no experience, but partly just needing other interests, something outside Gary and me and our needs. He understood that. He asked if it would help if he dropped by now and then, and I said it would. There was no harm in it. I knew that was what priests do.”

“Of course. So he came to see you, did he?”

“Oh, yes. About a fortnight later. And we had a good chat. And he could see that—well—things were pretty basic in the flat, and there wasn't much likelihood of things getting better. You see, I told him that even if I could get a job, I didn't want one until Gary was two or three. I thought he needed me, not having a father. And like I told the woman outside, he's no good with strangers, because he's so used to me.”

“That's not such a bad thing, is it?”

“I don't think so,” said Julie stoutly. “Though there may be problems when he goes to school. Anyway, Father Pardoe saw I'd got no washing machine, and my stove was so old it was a fire hazard, and he said there was this fund—”

“The Father Riley Fund?”

“That's right. Left to the parish by some rich priest, to help members of the congregation in difficulties. He said there was a chance I might get some of the things that would make life
easier from the Fund. And it was a great help. You wouldn't think my flat was much if you saw it, but you should have seen it before I got the basics. Anyway, that's really all there is. He became like a friend, an old family friend, it felt like.”

“Did you become fond of him?” asked the chairman.

That Julie felt she was prepared for.

“Fond? Could you tell me what you mean by ‘fond'?”

“I'm sure you know what the word means.”

Julie thought.

“Yes, I do. But I also know that things people say can be twisted. If you mean did I like him, respect him, value his interest, find him warm and friendly, yes. But if you're trying to suggest—”

“I'm not trying to suggest anything. I accept that you were fond of him in the ways you've detailed.” But something in the old priest's voice suggested he had suffered a small defeat. “Go on.”

“Well, he dropped by when he could, and I was always pleased to see him. He tried to get me to go to the youth club he'd started up, and I tried it once, but—they all seemed so
young
. Having Gary has cut me off from kids like that.”

“I think we understand,” said the younger priest.

“Julie, this is going to be difficult,” said the chairman, just as she was trying to turn away from him. She disliked him because he never lost his look of gravity, even of judgment. “It's been reported to us that when Father Pardoe came to visit you, very often the curtains in your bedroom would then be drawn.”

She looked him straight in the eye, her own eyes blazing.

“Well, who told you that, then? I bet I know. It has to be that old Mother Crabtree, down the back. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, believing a foul-minded old gossip like her.”

“We don't necessarily
believe
, Julie, but we have to listen.”

“Do you? To every little scrap of nasty gossip that comes your way? When Father Pardoe has been a wonderful priest for years and years? I'd have thought he might have been given the benefit of the doubt, even by a priest. Would you like to know why the curtains were drawn?”

“We would, very much,” said the younger priest.

“Father Pardoe knew I preferred him to call when Gary had his afternoon nap. By the early afternoon I've had him since he's woken up, and he's tired and whiny and I'm in need of a breather—something to break the day up. So if he could juggle his other things, commitments, I suppose you'd call them, that's when he'd come. I'd put Gary to sleep in the bedroom—there's just the one—and draw the curtains, and then we could settle in for a talk in the other room or the kitchen. It made my day if we could chat about something other than diapers and baby food.”

“Well, you've certainly explained that well,” said the younger priest. However, the older one was still looking at her in a judgelike manner that Julie found offensive. He obviously didn't believe her. She turned back to him.

“Look, it's pretty clear I need to spell it out. We never had sex. I'm not interested in older men. Perhaps I'd have fewer problems if I was, but I'm not. It never even occurred to me to think of him in that way. We never went to bed together, we never kissed, he never touched me like that—
nothing happened
. Is that clear?”