Song of the Damned

by Sarah Rayne

  He seized the knife they had used to cut Sister Cecilia free moments earlier and dug it into the mortar between the bricks.

  ‘No use,’ he said, angrily after a moment. ‘Chimaera – find me something to break these bricks down. Hammer – axe – anything.’ Leaning his face against the wall, he shouted, ‘Gina? Gina, can you hear me? It’s Dan. I’m here and so is Chimaera, and we’ll get you out as quickly as we can.’

  At first Chimaera thought there was not going to be a reply, and he beat against the bricks with his fists.

  ‘Gina? Can you hear? I am here with Dan. We are going to get hammers and axes to break down the wall. It will not take very long.’

  They waited, and then, faintly, but blessedly, the cry came again.

  ‘Help me … Get me out … Oh, please …’

  ‘We’ll get you out,’ said Dan. ‘I promise we will.’

  ‘Dan …?’

  ‘Yes. I’m here. It’s all right.’ He laid the flat of both hands against the bricks; almost, thought Chimaera, as if he might be trying to touch the person trapped on the other side. He had the unnerving feeling that Gina Chandos had done the same thing at the exact same moment. Like two people pressing their hands together. Handfast, it was called in some places. It did not matter for the moment, and he snatched up the oil lamp and plunged up the stairs again, taking them two at a time, and then frantically ransacked the cupboards for the second time. He had no idea where people kept such things as hammers and he was not entirely sure what a pickaxe looked like, but he would find something – anything – that would enable them to reach Gina. Eventually, in a noisome building adjoining the cottage, which might be a washhouse, he found a large hammer with one section shaped to a point, an axe with a stout wooden stave, and two thin-edged chisels. He scooped them up, and ran pantingly back across the cobbled yard and into the house. The light from the oil lamp flickered wildly as he went, and shadows leapt up and ran with him.

  Back in the cellar, Dan snatched the hammer and began to attack the bricks and, as Chimaera joined him, Cecilia said, ‘You will be able to reach her, won’t you?’ She was sitting on the ground, wrapped in Dan’s jacket, massaging her wrists and ankles, but her eyes were watching their efforts to break into the bricks. Chimaera thought he had never seen such anguish in anyone’s face.

  ‘Yes, we’ll reach her,’ said Dan. ‘Can you still hear me, Gina? Are you still all right?’

  ‘Yes.’ The word came weakly as if it hurt her to speak, but then she said, ‘Oh – I can see … tiny threads of light—’

  ‘That’s us. That means we’re nearly with you. This mortar hasn’t fully set, so … Oh, here it goes now! Try to keep clear of it if you can.’

  With the words a large section of the brickwork gave way, and bricks began to tumble out – at first in ones and twos, then showering onto the ground, some of them smashing as they fell. Brick-dust and the cellar’s own grey dust billowed out, and both Dan and Chimaera recoiled, flinging up their hands to shield their eyes.

  ‘But we’ve done it,’ said Dan, exultantly. ‘Gina, where are you? Chimaera, for Christ’s sake tilt the light so I can see … Oh, God, I’m sorry, Sister, I’m doing nothing but swear and blaspheme.’

  ‘I feel like swearing and blaspheming with you,’ said Cecilia, and Chimaera realized she had come to stand with them. Her eyes were on the gaping, jagged-edged hole that Dan had made and that they were now widening by chiselling at the bricks.

  As Dan knocked out more bricks, the dust swirled up again, gritty and dry, but this time there was a movement from within the clouded alcove.

  ‘Gina?’ Dan seized the lamp and held it aloft, reaching out with his other hand.

  As the light fell across the enclosed space, showing what was within it, there was a dreadful moment when Chimaera thought they had got it completely wrong – that the sounds of Gina’s voice had been some kind of trick – something within their own imaginations. Because what they were seeing could not be Gina, his Gina, his bella porcelain doll.

  This was a wild-eyed, tousled little creature, with hair that streamed in tangles, and whose cheeks were smeared with dust and tears. Then the moment of shock passed, and of course this was Gina, and of course she would look wild-eyed and the porcelain skin would be grimed and marked with terror and despair. Dan had grasped her hand, but before Chimaera could take her other hand, Sister Cecilia stepped forward, and as Gina half fell out, she caught her and held her in her arms, her head bent over the tousled hair, her eyes half shut. She clung to her as if she would never let her go, and then she released her and stepped back, almost with an air of submission.

  Dan took one of Gina’s hands and Chimaera took the other, and Gina said, in a voice that sounded as if it might be drawing on the last reserves of strength, ‘Please – he’s still in there … You must get him out.’

  Dan started to say, ‘Who …?’ and Chimaera said, ‘What do you mean …?’ and then they both stopped, because the light fell more strongly into the alcove now and they could see that crammed into the alcove was a second figure. The space was so narrow that he and Gina must have been standing in a macabre embrace.

  John Chandos. His eyes were wide and staring – dead eyes – and his lips were drawn back in the rictus of death.

  Sister Cecilia gasped, and her hand came down on Chimaera’s arm, as if to stop herself from falling. Before he could steady her, she fell forward in a swoon.

  Gina was not sure if she would ever be able to shut out the memory of herself and her father together in that cramped space. Certainly she would never manage to shut out the feel of his hand clinging to hers as he died. It was important to hold on to the thought that he had not been alone when he died, though. As I nearly was, thought Gina. No, I won’t think that. I’ll only remember that Dan and Chimaera got me out.

  Dan and Chimaera.

  Chimaera had picked her up in his arms and carried her out of Infanger Cottage, through the trees and into the convent. Gina had been fighting to remain conscious by that time, but she had heard the door knocker fall on the massive old door, echoing inside the building, and then there had been running feet and cries of shock, and shouted orders for the lighting of ranges and the boiling of kettles and heating of soup. A scared-faced Anne-Marie had brought a novice’s robe for Gina to put on after she had washed away the dust and dirt of the cellar. It had been too big, but it was clean and it held a comforting scent of lavender from the sprigs that Sister Gabrielle liked to place in the cupboards.

  And now she was in a deep chair in a corner of Mother Superior’s study. A rug was over her knees, and there was a blazing fire at her feet. A small table held four bowls of hot soup, together with a large pot of coffee and some wedges of bread and butter. There was also a small flagon of brandy – Gina could not imagine where that had come from.

  The soup, which was Sister Agnes’s best chicken broth, was wonderfully reviving, and Mother Superior poured coffee for Gina and Sister Cecilia, and for Chimaera and Dan. Before she handed them their cups, she added a dash of brandy to each one, observing that brandy was warming and also good for shock.

  Sister Cecilia said, ‘And we should remember that St Paul believed in a little wine for the stomach’s sake.’

  Hearing the light, ironic voice, Gina was suddenly glad to have Cecilia there. She said, ‘Sister Cecilia, when did he – Father Joachim – bring you into the cellar?’

  ‘About an hour before Dan and Signor Chimaera rescued us, I think,’ said Cecilia. ‘I lost all real sense of time, but my ordeal did not last very long.’

  ‘I lost all sense of time as well,’ said Gina, instantly understanding.

  ‘Joachim simply walked into my room here, and used … I believe it was laudanum.’

  ‘He used laudanum for me, too,’ said Gina. ‘And he took me to the cottage in a handcart.’

  A faint smile showed. ‘It was very undignified, wasn’t it?’ said Cecilia. ‘Although all I really remember is discovering that I wa
s in that loathsome cellar, with Joachim tying me up, and telling me I would be immured there. And then he began the chant. Mother Superior, I am deeply sorry I brought that music with me when I entered the Order.’

  ‘None of us can be held to account for the sins of others – and it’s even verging on the sin of pride to do so. You are not accountable for Joachim Bouton’s actions,’ said Mother Superior, crisply. ‘For now, there are other matters to discuss. I would have preferred to wait until you’re both recovered, but we can’t do so.’ She frowned, then said, ‘Put bluntly, we have two bodies on our hands – a murderer and his victim. In the ordinary way we would call the local justice of the peace, but—’

  ‘But the local justice of the peace is Sir John Chandos himself,’ said Dan.

  ‘Yes.’

  Chimaera said, ‘You also have a second murderer on your hands, Mother Superior, and he is here in this room now.’ He made an expressive gesture with both hands. ‘I am guilty of the death of Father Joachim,’ he said. ‘I do not seek to hide the fact. It is the truth and I am devastated and distraught at the knowledge of what I have done.’ He paused to pinch the bridge of his nose with his forefinger and thumb. Gina tried not to think he had deliberately imported a trace of a sob into his voice at this point. Then he sat up a little straighter, and, squaring his shoulders, said, ‘If I must face justice for my action, I shall do so.’ He looked at Gina. ‘I shall walk bravely to the gallows with my head high,’ he said. ‘There will be no breath of scandal, for I shall not allow your name to pass my lips, Gina.’

  ‘Gina must be kept out of it at all costs,’ said Sister Cecilia at once. ‘For her name to be linked with the murder of a priest is unthinkable.’

  ‘She would not come under suspicion,’ said Chimaera. ‘Because I should confess.’

  ‘But then the whole story would come out,’ said Mother Superior. ‘And for it to become known that Joachim Bouton committed a murder and would have committed two more if Dan and Chimaera had not stopped him, would cause a great scandal.’

  ‘In Cresacre?’ asked Dan.

  ‘Oh, far wider than Cresacre. Priest turned murderer. That priest chanting an ancient barbaric ritual while killing.’

  ‘Dio mio, that would send shock waves through the churches of the land and probably as far as the Vatican.’

  ‘It would,’ said Dan. He looked at Mother Superior. ‘I think you’re trying to think of a way to cover it all up,’ he said. ‘Am I right?’

  ‘Regrettably, Dan, you are.’

  ‘I daresay your Church has covered up worse things over the centuries, Mother Superior?’

  ‘Is that a criticism?’

  ‘An observation. A question. Because I believe that there might be a way of covering this up.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  Speaking as if he was thinking aloud, Dan said, ‘There’s a saying that the best way to hide a leaf is in a forest. You’d agree with that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then, working on that premise, the best way to hide a scandal and a mystery would be to hide it beneath another scandal and mystery,’ said Dan.

  Sister Cecilia said, ‘Dan, you are the most unusual gardener I have ever met.’

  ‘Am I? Good. My thought is that we create another scandal and a mystery – something that will push into second place any speculation about John Chandos’s sudden death and about Joachim’s disappearance. A scandal – a mystery – that would cause such an upheaval in Cresacre that no one would talk about – or think about – anything else for weeks. Months. No one would ask any awkward questions. Gina would be safe, and you would all be safe,’ said Dan. ‘And the Catholic Church could continue unscathed.’

  ‘What kind of scandal and mystery did you have in mind?’ asked Chimaera, sounding suspicious.

  ‘It’s a very large proposition, but supposing the nuns – all of you – were to disappear from Cresacre,’ said Dan. ‘To vanish in the dead of night, quietly and secretly, the convent abandoned – empty – and no one knowing why it had happened. That would be such a massive event hereabouts that no one would have any interest in very much else for a very long time. “Dear me, Sir John Chandos has died suddenly,” they’d say. “How sad.” They’d attend a memorial service for him, of course, and they’d be genuinely sorrowful. But afterwards they’d repair to the Black Boar and return to their speculation about this convent. That would be of far more interest to them. After a while, perhaps, it would even get about that the convent was becoming haunted. Strange stories usually do grow up around buildings that remain empty for a long time.’

  ‘Especially,’ said Chimaera, ‘if there is someone to carefully start those stories.’

  ‘Exactly. And with all of that happening, Sir John and his family would take second place in people’s minds. As for Father Joachim’s disappearance—’

  Sister Cecilia said, slowly, ‘If this entire community here had vanished, it would be assumed Joachim had accompanied us to … to wherever people thought we had gone. But where would we have gone? Unless …’ She stopped, staring at him.

  ‘You’re keeping pace with me, Sister, aren’t you,’ said Dan. ‘In fact I think you’re ahead of me.’

  Cecilia said, ‘Unless we let it be believed that we had travelled to France.’

  ‘But why would we do that—? Oh!’ said Mother Superior. ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘To give support to the imprisoned Carmelites in Compiègne, of course,’ said Cecilia. ‘We’d go to our mother house, which is only a few miles outside Compiègne. We would be welcome there, wouldn’t we, Mother?’

  ‘Unquestionably. And I believe this is a fiction that could be made fact, because we might indeed be able to help those imprisoned nuns.’

  Sister Cecilia said, eagerly, ‘I’m fairly fluent in French. I could shepherd us through quite a lot of the practicalities of the journey. But I am not at all an experienced traveller. There were holidays with my French grandmother when I was a child, but my parents always took charge of everything then. I would be nervous of arranging the Channel crossing and the journey across France.’

  Chimaera said, eagerly, ‘But I … I have travelled. And such a journey would serve all our purposes – mine, also. I will be honest about that, because if I came with you and escorted you—’

  ‘You’d be out of reach of the law if the truth about Joachim’s death were discovered,’ said Dan, dryly.

  ‘It is a consideration. I admit it.’

  ‘But there are ten of us, signor,’ said Mother Superior, and Gina saw that, to his credit, Chimaera did not flinch.

  He said, ‘That is a good, round number. To escort ten ladies – twenty ladies, even – would be my privilege.’

  From her corner, Sister Cecilia said, ‘And what shall we do about Sir John’s death?’ She looked at Gina as she said this, and Gina stared at her, the pain of her father’s death clawing into her mind all over again.

  Dan said slowly, ‘Could his body simply be found near Chandos House? As if he had suffered a … a heart seizure or something of the kind while walking his land. Would that be credible? Would his injuries be visible?’

  ‘We could conceal them. They were inward injuries, anyway. We could let it be thought that a physician had examined him – as Dan said, people will be too interested in our own disappearance to ask many questions,’ said Cecilia. ‘Chimaera, you’re frowning.’

  ‘We are smudging over too many important facts,’ said Chimaera. ‘The question of a physician, for instance. Would the church accept him for burial without a physician being involved? I do not know the laws here, you see, but …’ He frowned, then said, ‘I am trying to think of a better solution to that.’

  ‘There’s Lady Chandos to be thought of as well,’ said Mother Superior. ‘Gina, I don’t see how we could hide the truth from her.’

  Gina said, carefully, ‘My mother isn’t at Chandos House at present. She’s staying with cousins. But I don’t think she would ask many questions – I think
she would leave everything to the family solicitors.’ It was impossible to say that her mother would probably be more concerned with knowing the details of her father’s will, and with choosing becoming mourning garments. She would almost certainly sell Chandos House and go to live with the prim-and-proper cousins; she had always spent a lot of time with them. Gina had been born in their house, in fact, and had been brought back to Cresacre when she was very tiny.

  She came out of these thoughts to hear Mother Superior saying, ‘If we were to take up the idea of leaving, the entire convent would have to be part of the lie. I don’t think I can ask that of them.’

  ‘Could you tell them the official version – that the journey is to help the imprisoned nuns at Compiègne?’ said Dan.

  ‘That would still be lying to them. I’m not sure if I could do that.’

  ‘I could,’ said Sister Cecilia, promptly. ‘If it meant hiding the secrets, protecting people who need protecting …’ She glanced involuntarily at Mother Superior. ‘We would be leaving old secrets behind, which perhaps is a good thing,’ she said.

  ‘And taking the community to France to make a new start,’ said Mother Superior, thoughtfully. ‘That’s true. And God can be served anywhere, of course.’

  ‘But there’s Gina,’ said Cecilia. ‘Do we take her with us?’

  ‘No,’ said Dan, at once. ‘There’s too much danger in that country. For a group of nuns it would be safe, I think. But for a girl from an English manor house—’

  Gina said, ‘I’m hardly a member of the aristocracy. They’re not going to drag me to the nearest lamp-post and hang me from it.’

  ‘Even so.’

  ‘Dan’s right,’ said Sister Cecilia. ‘We can’t take you into all that, Gina. But nor can we leave you on your own to cope with all the subterfuge and deceit.’

  ‘I could manage it,’ said Gina, although she was not at all sure if she could.