Convent on Styx (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  Mrs. Polkinghorne looked dubious and then shook her silver-streaked black-haired head.

  “Not the same thing,” she stated decidedly. “Is one true Church.”

  “Refuse all worthless imitations, you think? Tell me, Mrs. Polkinghorne—”

  “I like you should call me Maria. I am named Maria Pilar Mercedes. Maria Mercedes is by my parents and Pilar I take at my first Communion.”

  “Very well, Maria. My own baptismal names are Beatrice Adela.”

  “Nice names. I call you Adela. What are you wanting me to tell you?”

  “Which, if any, of the nuns, was Mrs. Wilks most fond of when she was here? Had she a special favourite?”

  “Oh, I think yes. I think she like Sister Elphege and Sister Leo. Most like herself. Sad.”

  “That coincides with an opinion I had formed.”

  “Yes? But why? How should you know?”

  “Because of those letters.”

  Mrs. Polkinghorne’s brow darkened.

  “Bad, those letters.”

  “Very bad. Unkind. Untrue. And so far as the nuns were concerned—can you keep a secret?”

  “But certainly. Is not my son sacerdote? Is not my daughter religiosa?”

  Dame Beatrice could not see that this was any sort of reassurance, but she accepted it as such and went on, “All the letters but three, possibly four, were written by the same person.”

  “That Miss Lipscombe, who is now in purgatory to be cleansed of her sins. Why three?”

  “Because the parents of the child who was knocked down by the convent car have confessed to writing two of them, a third was written by Miss Lipscombe’s murderer, and a fourth letter is of doubtful authorship and, in any case, may be disregarded.”

  “But your secret?”

  “You know that all the nuns except Sister Ignatius and Sister Marcellus received letters? Well, the most hurtful letters, because the information in them could be neither proved nor disproved, were sent to Sisters Leo and Elphege.”

  “What did they say?”

  “Things I shall not repeat, even to you, Maria.”

  “Then where is the secret?”

  “That two of the nuns received such scurrilous and unfair accusations.”

  “Sister Elphege told us she had parents of the Resistance. They died in concentration camps after bad treatment. That is why she is not pleasant no more.”

  “Then the letter she received must have been hurtful.”

  “The letter accuse them of being en colaboración with the Germans?”

  “You have guessed it. I deduced, therefore, that Miss Lipscombe had singled out Mrs. Wilks’s favourites among the nuns for her particular and special spite simply because she hated Mrs. Wilks.”

  “That march with my thoughts. It is a way of saying by her about the big horse.”

  “The big horse? Oh, yes, I see what you mean. ‘Caballo grande, ande o no ande.’ You have some fine proverbs in your language.”

  “Si. So what are you wanting with Sister Leo and Sister Elphege?”

  “I want to persuade one of them to invite Mrs. Wilks to the convent. I take it that the nuns may have visitors?”

  “Ask Sister Elphege. She is not happy, that one, like I say. She will be pleased you ask her to do something for you.”

  “Good. And the secret, I know, is safe with you.”

  “I lay it upon my soul,” said Mrs. Polkinghorne, crossing herself, “although not much of a secret, do you think?”

  “It is nearly eight o’clock,” said Dame Beatrice. “I will lurk outside the Community Room and waylay Sister Elphege as she goes there for Recreation.”

  “And am I to wait upon Mrs. Wilks?” grumbled Sister Marcellus, “as well as fulfilling all my other duties? Ah, well, no doubt I shall be adding to my credit in heaven.”

  “Either, that, or I will get tea for Mrs. Wilks and myself,” said Dame Beatrice equably. “We shall have it together and with Mrs. Polkinghorne, no doubt; and I am quite capable of cutting bread and butter and putting on a plate the small cakes so excellently made by Sister Elphege, whose guest Mrs. Wilks will be.”

  Tactfully approached by Dame Beatrice after school Assembly on the following morning, Sister Hilary made no difficulty about freeing Sister Elphege from her afternoon duties so that Dame Beatrice’s chauffeur could drive her into Bristington to the address supplied by Sister St. Elmo. They came back to the convent at half past three and Mrs. Polkinghorne, displaying the customary courtesy of the Spaniard, left the two of them alone in the parlour, as did Dame Beatrice, who then found Mrs. Polkinghorne traipsing forlornly round the autumnal convent garden.

  “Dear me, Maria,” she said, “you must come indoors. It is far too chilly for you out here.”

  “Where to go?” sighed Mrs. Polkinghorne. “My room, I sicken myself of her”—(Alcóba, Dame Beatrice remembered, is a feminine noun)—“and I do not intrude upon Sister Elphege and her guest, although much I like to speak with Mrs. Wilks.”

  “You will be able to do so at teatime. Come up to my room if you are tired of your own, and we will pass half an hour in cosy chat.”

  Mrs. Wilks, at teatime, surprised them both. She declared, almost with passion, that she wished she had never left the convent and that, if Sister St. Elmo would take her back, nothing should stand in the way of her return.

  “They are not good to you, these relatives?” asked Mrs. Polkinghorne, amazed. “But they are your family. It is right you live with them. In Espania we all live together—abuelo, abuela, el padre, la madre, los niños, yes, also tío, tía—los todos, all the damn lot. If I never come to England, I live with them, too.”

  “I was tempted,” said Mrs. Wilks, “by the big car which came to fetch me and by the expensive clothes my nephew was wearing, but I don’t believe he is my nephew. To the best of my knowledge I have only one niece and this man is not her husband, neither do he and his wife allow me to write to her. I am not allowed to write any letters at all. I don’t know why they let me come here today. They often have visitors, but I am never invited to meet them. Ever since Lilian’s death I have wondered whether there was some reason for getting me out of the convent. I told them this morning that I wanted to come back here if Sister St. Elmo would have me and my nephew (I call him that, because that is what he claims to be) said that, if I felt that way, the best thing would be for me to return, if only I would keep his wife company for another week while he has to be away from home on business. Oh, Dame Beatrice, would you speak to Sister for me? I hardly like to approach her myself after the cool way I walked out on her, though not owing her any money, you understand.”

  “This nephew of yours,” said Dame Beatrice, “is he an Englishman?”

  “No, he is Irish, I think, though he hasn’t much of an Irish accent. I was a Miss McCann, you know, before I married, but I was born and brought up over here, so I might have Irish relatives of whom I know nothing.”

  “And he treat you well?” Mrs. Polkinghorne enquired for the second time.

  “Oh, as to that, I can’t complain. I have a very comfortable room and the food is good, but I never go out alone. His wife always goes with me to the shops and to the pictures. Not that I mind. It’s nice to have company and she is a good-tempered woman, not in the least like poor Lilian, who was always quarrelling and finding fault.”

  “They made no objection to your attending the inquest and giving evidence, I suppose?” asked Dame Beatrice.

  “Far from it. My nephew said it was my duty to go along and tell what I knew.”

  “With the result that Miss Lipscombe’s death was treated as accidental.”

  Mrs. Wilks’s prominent eyes widened.

  “Don’t you think it was accidental, then?” she enquired.

  “The coroner’s jury thought so, and it was for them to judge.”

  “Of course she can come back,” said Sister St. Elmo. “If for no other reason, she will be company for Mrs. Polkinghorne, who will be desolated whe
n you go. She tells me that you are sumamente que congenia. But why this change of heart by Mrs. Wilks?”

  “She seems to be a kind of prisoner in her nephew’s house. Moreover, she does not believe that he is her nephew. She thinks there was some reason for getting her out of the convent in the first place and, of course, there is no doubt that she is right. Some persons wanted access to your cellars by means of her room with its removable window bars. I think we may expect developments shortly. Meanwhile I have taken matters into my own hands to a certain extent. Mrs. Wilks thinks that my chauffeur is taking her back to her so-called nephew’s house, whereas in fact she is bound for my own home in Hampshire, with a police escort who will be responsible for her safety until this business is cleared up and over. I had reasons for bringing her here, and that is one of them.”

  “Good gracious me, Dame Beatrice! But what will happen when the nephew realises that Mrs. Wilks is not going to return?”

  “That remains to be seen. At any rate, he can make no effective move tonight.”

  “But why have you sent her away? Was she in any danger from him?”

  “That I am unable to say, but I decided that precautionary measures should be taken. Mrs. Wilks, like the unfortunate and foolish Miss Lipscombe, is probably curious and enquiring by nature, the more so as she senses that her present circumstances—I mean those that obtained before she was allowed to come here today—are, to say the least, suspicious and unusual. She seems to have been little other than a prisoner in that house, unable even to write letters and never allowed out alone. She must have realised, weeks ago, that something was wrong and that the ‘nephew’ had an ulterior motive in persuading her to leave the convent.”

  “I wonder she was permitted to give evidence at the inquest on Miss Lipscombe, then.”

  “Not at all. That evidence was most valuable to the murderer, since it helped to bring in a verdict of accidental death. She may have been primed beforehand.”

  “I see. You say that she has not been allowed out alone while she has been staying with these people. Why, then, did they let her come here to visit us?”

  “I imagine they realised she was becoming suspicious; so when Sister Elphege’s invitation arrived it must have seemed better to them to allow her to accept it.”

  “I am surprised that we were allowed to know her address if they are engaged upon the wicked work you have specified.”

  “There are two answers to that. It would have aroused your own suspicions, would it not, if she had refused to tell you where she was going when she left the convent? After all, she did not leave under a cloud or as the result of a disagreement with the Sisters or yourself. Also, we would do well to remember that when Mrs. Wilks left this house there could have been no intention to kill Miss Lipscombe. The conspirators’ only object at that time, I am perfectly certain, was to obtain access to your cellars by way of that very convenient window in the room which Mrs. Wilks occupied.”

  “Yes, I see, but they must also have agreed that she should ask to return here and take up residence with us again. Was that also to allay her suspicions?”

  “Partly, I suppose, but also, I think, because, once their work was over and they had cleared your cellars of the detonators and other material they have stored there ready for shipment, it was to their advantage to rid themselves of her. There would be no point in keeping her any longer.”

  “But supposing they had needed to use our cellars again? You see, Dame Beatrice, had it not been for you, we should never have suspected that anybody was storing all this dreadful stuff in the convent.”

  “For that you have to thank chiefly the two Cartwright children.”

  “Oh, no! It was you who suspected that poor Miss Lipscombe had been murdered.”

  “If the activities in the cellar had continued after the present consignment of explosives had been sent away, I think the next occupant of Mrs. Wilks’s room might have met the same fate as Miss Lipscombe,” went on Dame Beatrice. “Once murder has been committed, there is little to deter the murderer from repeating himself if the need arises.”

  “How horrible it all is!”

  “Yes, indeed.”

  “When all this is cleared up, I shall have our cellars sealed off and shall see that the fact is widely publicised. That will be the best plan, don’t you think?”

  “Undoubtedly.”

  “I have been wondering how anybody outside our own ranks could have known of the existence of the cellars. Have you any theories about that?”

  “I have two and both are viable. One is that any house, particularly one of any size, that is built on the slope of a hill, is almost bound to have cellars.”

  “And the other?” asked the prioress, looking anxiously and enquiringly at Dame Beatrice.

  “The other is that you have somewhere among your company a traitor or perhaps I should say, in the language of our time, a double agent.”

  “You do not—you cannot—suspect one of our Sisters!”

  “Several of them are Irishwomen,” said Dame Beatrice, with an eldritch cackle that hardly suggested mirth.

  “Ah, you are teasing me,” said the prioress with relief. “That leaves the servants, but I am sure they are to be trusted and as for Tom Quince, I would as soon suspect myself as that excellent fellow.”

  Dame Beatrice forebore to point out that there were others besides the nuns and the servants who were connected to some extent with the convent, but she saw that the thought had already occurred to Sister St. Elmo, who then said, “No! I will not entertain the thought that the school harbours a criminal.”

  “There will be proof enough in time,” said Dame Beatrice. “Meanwhile I hope you will listen to the suggestions of those who have the Sisters’ welfare at heart and will carry out official orders. Some of these orders may occasion the Sisters some surprise and some inconvenience, but I think they had better be told to imitate the three wise monkeys.”

  “I will put them upon their obedience, but are you sure that they are not in actual danger?”

  “I am sure of nothing, but I hope for the best.”

  “You have great faith.”

  “In the police? Yes, I have. I also believe that Miss Lipscombe’s murderer will soon be brought to book, though it was nothing but her own foolish greed that caused her death.”

  “Do you mean that she actually knew the men who have been making such dangerous and wicked use of our cellars?”

  “I am sure she knew one of them. Anyway, a close watch will be kept and we may expect a dénouement at any time now. It may come under cover of the night or—more likely, in my opinion—next Sunday afternoon when, as is your custom, the convent will be left empty.”

  “I am not easily alarmed, but the thought of living above a cellar containing a considerable quantity of high explosive causes me very great uneasiness.”

  “I know, but I think we must be guided by the police, and they have their plans fully prepared.”

  “I will pray for the safety of us all. One thing puzzles me greatly. Where does the explosive material come from? Have they robbed an arsenal?”

  “Have you quarries in the neighbourhood?”

  “Yes, there are the stone quarries at Plinth, about twenty miles away.”

  “That, then, is the answer. Commercial high explosives and detonators are stored at quarries and these stores are often left unattended, a practice that ought to result in prosecution, but does not seem to. Usually the thieves are criminals in the legal sense of the word—safe-blowers, you know. Unfortunately it is not unknown for a quarry storekeeper to be bribed into falsifying his records so that the gradual leaking away of explosives goes unnoticed. Had there been no quarries in your neighbourhood, the police would have made enquiries about the blasting out of tree-roots on woodland estates. Another source of supply could be farmland. Nitrogenous fertilisers are in use on every farm in England.”

  “Dear me! I had no idea that such dangerous materials were so readily avail
able to the criminal classes.”

  “It is also criminal that it should be so. There is police supervision over the Irish quarries, but nothing of the sort over here.”

  “You think these explosives in our cellars are intended for export to Ireland?”

  “Unless some subversive organisation has plans to use them over here. We are living during a reign of terror, I fear, Sister.”

  “I shall not give way to it.”

  “It is the work of a minority. Armageddon is not yet.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Farewell to the Nuns

  “. . . they display the remarkable and confessedly surprising status of their citizenship. They live in countries of their own, but as sojourners. They share all things as citizens; they suffer all things as foreigners. Every foreign land is their native place, every native place is foreign . . . They pass their life on earth; but they are citizens in heaven.”

  The Epistle to Diognetus

  “Well!” said Sister Marcellus, setting down the tea tray on a table in the convent parlour. “Did ever you hear the like of that! If the blessed saints themselves would have been telling the truth of it, I would not have trusted my ears! Sure, it’s dreaming I am!”

  “It’s Irish you are,” said Dame Beatrice. She gazed at the ex-lay sister in mingled admiration and surprise. “And to think I never suspected it until now!”

  “English is the language of this country and English I’ll be speaking as the usual thing,” said Sister Marcellus with dignity, “but it is no secret that I had my education, such as it was, from the good Sisters in County Cork.”

  “So what has surprised you into this lapse into a syntax which, I take it, is based upon a Gaidhelic dialect dating back to the days of your youth?”

  “Policemen,” replied Marcellus, reverting to the pronunciation and intonation she habitually employed. “Policemen using my kitchen. Policemen here, there, and everywhere. Policemen all over the house! I don’t know what things are coming to, really I don’t! And not a word to be breathed to anybody outside these walls! A policeman using Sister St. Elmo’s office; yes, and her telephone, too. And another policeman in Sister Wolstan’s room over at the school and he to be in charge of her telephone! It’s as bad as the French Revolution, I declare it is!”