The Good Priest

by Gillian Galbraith

  ‘And he’ll see straight through her,’ she interjected, her head now in the cupboard below the sink as she searched in it for a duster and a jar of furniture polish. Upright once more and standing beside him, she sneezed twice, then tried to unscrew the lid, using first her strong right hand and then, having failed, trying her left.

  ‘Maybe, but the lawyer, McClaverty, is not much more than a boy.’

  ‘It’s no good. Could you give it a go?’ she asked, passing the jar of polish to him.

  ‘If you failed with this there’s not much hope for me,’ he replied. He applied all the torque that he could muster, his face reddening with the effort. Unable to budge it, he went to the sink and ran water from the hot tap over the lid. Taking a deep breath, he tried again, and failed to move it even a millimetre. Flexing his hand to ease the pain in his fingers, he shook his head.

  ‘Shall I try it in the door hinge?’ he said.

  ‘Weak as I am, I’ll have another go first. You’ll just chip the paint,’ she said, raising her arms and flexing her biceps like a Victorian muscle man.

  As she wrestled with it, bending double and groaning with the effort, a man entered the kitchen as if it was his own. He was dark-haired and dark-skinned, with a sleek, overfed look about him. But his red nose and rheumy eyes, and the paper hankie in his hand, signalled his heavy cold. Seeing him she blushed slightly, straightened up and handed the jar to him.

  ‘You’ve caught it too? Have a go, see if you can unscrew this,’ she ordered.

  ‘OK,’ he answered, in a hoarse, high-pitched squeak, clearing his throat noisily as if the sound he had made embarrassed him. Then, smiling at her as if pleased to have been asked, he unscrewed the lid in a second and handed the jar back to her. Shrugging his shoulders as if to say what was the problem, he grinned and swung himself onto a tall stool.

  ‘I must have loosened it for you,’ Father Vincent said, and grinned.

  Looking at him, amused by his cheek, Elizabeth dabbed some of the contents of the jar onto a duster. As she did so, a distinctive smell spread through the room. It was one Vincent had encountered only once before, a strange mix of raspberry, Dettol and paraffin.

  ‘Where did you get that stuff from?’ he asked her sharply.

  ‘You saw where – from the cupboard.’

  ‘No, no, that’s not what I meant. What sort of polish is it? What’s it for? Did you get it at the supermarket, or the hardware place, or where?’

  ‘Let me see …’ She held out her hand for the jar, and then, addressing the newcomer, she added, ‘Hello, Hal. I wasn’t expecting you. You’re early.’

  Having her full attention at last, the man rose and unselfconsciously kissed her on the cheek.

  ‘Father Vincent, Hal. Hal, Father Vincent,’ Elizabeth said, putting the jar down on the table and bringing another mug over. Always, the priest noticed, her eyes returned to the stranger.

  ‘Hal’s just moved to Milnathort. Like some tea, Hal? Heavens, I forgot all about Mike. He’ll want some too.’

  ‘Mike?’ the priest said. Hal was already one other man too many.

  ‘He works for Millers, the plumbers. He’s outside in the cold. He’s been clearing the gutters for me. He’ll want tea, if it’s being made. Would you see if he wants some for me, love?’

  At her words, both the priest and the newcomer began to move towards the door until Vincent, realising his error, halted.

  On Hal’s return, she handed a steaming mug to each of the men.

  ‘Where are we going for dinner?’ Hal croaked, cradling his drink in his hands before taking a sip.

  ‘Is that your meeting?’ Vincent asked, deliberately catching the woman’s eye, trying to smile but, feeling as heavy as lead, unable to do so. It was none of his business. She was none of his business. The question had left his mouth before he could stop it, and it sounded rude and intrusive.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Fine.’

  A prolonged silence followed, a deep, uneasy one which chilled them all like a cold bath. Eventually, the plumber broke it, putting his empty mug on the kitchen table and murmuring as he left, ‘No rest for the wicked, eh?’

  Hal resumed his place on the stool, crossed his arms and looked at the priest, raising his eyebrows as if waiting for him to say something. His ploy worked.

  ‘I’ll not hold you up then,’ Vincent said, rising from his chair, ‘but going back to the polish for a second, Elizabeth, can you tell me anything about it?’

  Before she could reply, Hal ostentatiously lifted up his wrist to look at his watch, wordlessly indicating that there was no time for any further conversation.

  ‘Hal!’

  Meekly accepting her rebuke, he blew her a kiss and mouthed ‘Sorry’ to her. Vincent glanced at him, incapable of masking his instinctive dislike.

  ‘It’s furniture polish. Dougie gave it to me. He got it from his work,’ she said.

  ‘Dougie?’ Hal enquired sharply, before beginning to cough uncontrollably with the effort of speaking.

  ‘Douglas Templeton, my ex-husband,’ she said, blushing. ‘I told you about him. He lives in Kinnesswood, on the other side of the loch. It was a sample or something, Vincent. You’d have to ask him about it.’

  ‘I will,’ the priest said, watching ruefully as the man, holding his gaze, slid a proprietary arm around her shoulder.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The next morning, stopping in mid-stride, Vincent looked at the sky around him and drank in its beauty. It was black, heavy with rain, except for a band of light along the horizon as if the sun had risen late that day and its weak early rays had not yet the strength to penetrate any higher. A flock of seagulls passed overhead, the lazy rhythm of their wing beats making him feel as if time itself had slowed down, and the world come to a standstill. To the west, a single shaft of light, as if from the heavens themselves, emerged through the otherwise impenetrable cloud, illuminating three of the nearest peaks and turning them to molten gold.

  He had been walking for over an hour, trudging onwards with his head down, his mind full to bursting and blind to everything around him. All that he had seen had been the tarmac below his feet. The noise made by his boots provided a sort of comfort, rhythmical and regular, reminding him that he was still on the move. Now, standing motionless for the first time since he’d left the retreat, he allowed his eyes to wander over the landscape spread out in front of him. Its early spring colours were as muted as the wools spun into a Harris tweed; an expanse of yellowish-grey marking out the rain-soaked stubble, burnt umber where the plough had been and a haze of fresh green where the spring barley had broken through the hard earth to greet the new year. Roundels of dark conifers, standing in rust-brown patches of dead bracken, were joined one to the other by hedgerows of hawthorn, beech and elder. The loveliness of the scene suddenly hit him, acted as balm for his troubled soul.

  Throughout the night, twin anxieties had plagued him, eating into his sleep and making him glad to hear the shrill ringing of the alarm clock. Why hadn’t that bloody policeman phoned him? A madman was on the loose. Perhaps their investigations had already uncovered the connection between the victims, knew even of their vile predilections? Fingerprints might have linked the killings, have alerted them to some common thread. If so, the sod could at least have told him. But whatever they had found out, he agonised, they had not listened to that confession, heard the drunkard confess to a murder and boast about the theft of the book. And he could not help them there. If it was a matter of excommunication for himself, that could be borne; but in the wider context, how could any penitent disburden himself of his sins and find absolution, without the sure and certain knowledge that whatever he said would go no further?

  Thoughts of Elizabeth Templeton had been eating away at him too. In her kitchen he had noted Hal’s ease, his assurance, and had experienced the hot scald of jealousy for the first time in years, in decades more likely. It might have been Hal’s bloody kitchen, the way the creep had beha
ved in it. His house! He knew where the sugar was kept, where to find the biscuit tin. How long did that take, how many visits?

  Of course, he told himself, she would have friends, male friends, of which he was unaware. A woman like her was bound to. A lover, quite possibly, quite probably. But saying the word, even silently in his head, pained him. Intellectually, he had long ago acknowledged such a theoretical probability, but actually meeting it, meeting him, for the first time in the flesh, had almost floored him, proved harder to bear than he had imagined. And she, usually so wonderfully straightforward, had been coy, describing what was clearly a date as a ‘meeting’. Not that she had anything to hide, or of which to be ashamed. Why should she be lonely? He had made a vow of celibacy, not her. And what had he to offer? The occasional visit, small, insignificant and largely communal outings, interspersed with warm chats. No more than the illusion of intimacy. It was pitiful. They were no substitute for a proper flesh and blood relationship. If ever he had imagined that they could be, he must have been living on Mars. Unworldly did not begin to describe him.

  And now, on top of everything else, she seemed to be connected in some, please God, peripheral way to that awful night. But hunting out Dougie Templeton might well be a complete waste of time for all concerned. Households all over the country likely used that polish; factories too, for all he knew. It could be a top-selling brand. He was no policeman, had no forensic tools, no laboratories or white-coated assistants at his disposal. Had he a proper job, had he been as busy as usual, celebrating Masses, visiting the sick, baptising squalling infants, performing all the multifarious duties of a parish priest, then he would have had no truck with this … this nonsense, this preposterous adventure. But, but … the missing book, three dead priests, all with a hideous past, and the Bishop’s assailant still at liberty? Somehow he had blundered into hell. Where was Donald Keegan when he was needed most?

  In the distance, a single shot rang out, disturbing a gaggle of Canada geese in a nearby stubble field, and they rose as one, honking their indignation as they took to the air. In amongst their deafening cries his phone went, and he knew before a word had been spoken who his caller was.

  ‘Donald,’ he said, pressing his mobile to his ear, trying to block out the sound of the birds.

  ‘Vincent, did you say Donald?’ the Monsignor’s disembodied voice replied, sounding taken aback. ‘It’s Dominic. Perhaps that’s what you said? Haven’t you one of those phones that tell you the number that’s calling – doesn’t yours give you the number?’

  ‘No, it’s an old cheap phone,’ Vincent said, watching as the skein took shape, the stragglers at the ends of the V-shape weaving from side to side as they endeavoured to keep formation. He did not feel like talking to the Monsignor.

  ‘You should get one, they’re very useful – oh, the wonders of modern technology! I thought I should let you know that James is back on his feet, at last. I’ve been dealing with things in his absence as you know. Our lawyer, that McClaverty fellow, spoke to Mrs Houston last night, after he’d seen you. I said it was now urgent, you see, and he’s quite convinced that there’s nothing in the woman’s allegations.’

  ‘Is he now?’ Father Vincent said evenly.

  ‘He is. Apparently, she’s quite changed her story – only now, after the damage is done, I’m afraid. With her husband still in the room with her she said … well, that she’d been the chaser not the chased. Not the chaste! Women are indeed clothed serpents, Vincent, as they used to tell us in the college. They’re graveyards – tended and flowery above and corrupt below. But that’s not the modern way of thinking, is it? Of course, times have changed. We all know that, don’t we? But human nature doesn’t change, it can’t, and that’s not taken into account unfortunately. The point is, you’re in the clear whatever that woman said to the papers. I’ve spoken to Father Roderick and he’s happy, more than happy in fact, to vacate the parish today.’

  ‘I can go back?’

  ‘You can go back.’

  ‘Today?’

  ‘This actual and glorious morning. But Vincent …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Go cannily, eh? Go cannily. You’ve already been burnt once.’

  ‘Do me a favour, Dominic?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Tell Mamie Bryce about the result of the investigation, would you? You could dress it up – make it something to do with sorting out the cleaning for the handover between me and Roderick. I don’t mind how – just let her know that I’ve been cleared.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘In the Beginning was the Word – and Twitter’s got nothing on Mamie.’

  The presbytery, Father Vincent discovered as he walked through his own front door, no longer smelled like home. Its appearance was the same in every respect; Father Roderick had moved no furniture, added no pictures and he, or someone on his behalf, had dutifully waved a duster about the place. The walls had not been repainted, and the carpets were of the same muted hue. To the eye it was unchanged. But an odour of age seemed, now, to permeate it; a dank, fungal smell, redolent of basements, incontinent tomcats and damp bath towels. The unfamiliar smell, disconcertingly, made the whole place feel alien.

  An old-fashioned, misshapen canvas grip was in the middle of the sitting-room floor, secured with twine, and on top of it was a teddy bear-shaped hot-water bottle with a flat cap resting on it. The old man was seated in an armchair nearby, sipping tea from a cup, and his ebony walking stick rested across his shrunken thighs.

  ‘This’ll be my last,’ he said mournfully, looking up at Vincent, dunking a digestive biscuit in his tea and then explaining. ‘My days as a parish priest are over – even as a locum. I can’t manage your stairs, you know. No pensioner could. They’re lethal. I didn’t dare take a bath the whole time I was here. You’ve got no rubber mat, no handle on the wall. Who’d get me out? At home I have a shower with a wee plastic seat in it. Social services provided me with the seat … Glad you’re in the clear, by the way.’

  ‘You’ve looked after everything wonderfully well – in the parish, I mean. Everyone says so. After you’ve had a rest you’ll feel quite different. It’s an arduous business running a place like this.’

  ‘It is. And I’m well over seventy, you know. Nearer to eighty since January.’

  Like an aged tortoise, the old man blinked slowly, and with a trembling hand lowered his empty cup, rattling noisily against its saucer, to the carpet.

  ‘Look at these,’ he added, rolling up one of the legs of his black trousers to reveal a pale, hairless shank terminating in an elephantine ankle. The top of his grey sock had an uneven slit in it as if it had recently been hacked with scissors to accommodate the ankle’s unnatural girth.

  ‘It’s blown up again. The other one’s just the same,’ he explained, looking up, an unexpected note of pride in his voice, ‘if anything, worse.’

  ‘Can’t they do anything about it – reduce the swelling or whatever? It looks sore, maybe jaundiced.’

  ‘It is sore,’ he replied, rolling down his trouser leg, ‘but I’m old. When you’re old they expect things to fail – limbs, eyes, ears and so on. The lot, actually. Conventional medicine, doctors and nurses, NHS people, they’ve quite given up on me. I’m like an old vessel, a hulk, consigned to the scrapheap. Returning the compliment, I’ve given up on them. Chinese medicine, that’s the thing nowadays, that’s the way ahead. They’re capitalists too, like us. In all their thousands of years they’ve learned a thing or two about circulation. About the tides, ebbs and flows, currents and so on. Meanwhile we were running around naked, painted blue and clad in furs.’

  ‘What do they recommend?’

  ‘Apparently, my kidney, spleen and lung yang isn’t working properly. So then the yin accumulates and that’s why there’s all that water under my skin, waterlogging it. That’s my problem.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘I’m taking something, some herby pills that Joe from the Chinese takeaway got for me over the i
nternet. A type of water pill, he says. But I’ve found bathing the ankle helps too. You’re supposed to use herbs, onion-skins and the like, boil them up and let them cool down and then stick your feet in it. I just go on using the same old infusion, time after time, it’s easier. I’ve dyed my legs in the process – yellow, like a Chinaman’s. That’s the stuff, over there,’ he said, pointing at a basin in the corner of the sitting-room.

  Vincent wandered over to look at it, realising as he drew close to it why it was that the house now smelled so odd. A dead moth floated on top of the cold dark fluid.

  ‘You made it yourself?’

  ‘I did. You have to be open-minded nowadays, Vincent,’ the old man said, getting to his feet. ‘Other cultures, other civilisations, other religions even. But for the aborigines, you know, we’d not have the wheel. Now, parish matters. Tomorrow, you’ll need to take Jean Fleming’s funeral service.’

  ‘She’s died, has she?’ Vincent said, saddened on hearing the news although he had been expecting it. The only surprise was that she had lasted so long.

  ‘Well, put it this way, it’ll not be a pet hamster in the coffin, Vincent,’ the old man chuckled, shaking his head at the stupidity of the question. ‘She’s to be interred in the Kirkgate. The service is scheduled for two-thirty tomorrow. I’ll be glad not to have to be the one standing at the grave in this weather. My balance is so bad I’d be in danger of falling in.’

  Kinnesswood is a small village clinging on to the very skirts of the Lomond Hills, perched precariously on the high ground, with the flat, turf-bearing fields of the plain below and the calm waters of the loch less than a mile away. The main road to Leslie snakes its narrow way between the jumble of stone cottages, crow-stepped and pantiled houses scattered along and overshadowing it. Wherever one looks the hills loom large, simplifying everything, dwarfing the cottages and making them seem like the abodes of hobbits.

  Having waited patiently for the red fish van from Pittenweem to move on and unblock the street, the priest turned left opposite Drummond Place and found himself in a narrow yard which terminated in the premises of the Barr Chemical Company. This business was housed in a run-down brick building with dusty, opaque windows and an elm seedling growing out of its cracked, leaf-filled guttering. Its asbestos roof had large cracks in places, and one corner appeared to have been chipped off.