Skeleton Key

by Robert Richardson

  Architecturally it was marred only by an external folly, the hundred and forty foot tower at the west end whose height had been increased in 1620 to make it theoretically visible throughout the diocese. The additional weight thus imposed had caused dramatic but inelegant flying buttresses to become necessary at its base. The whole enterprise had suffered an unfortunate start when the aging Bishop who was to dedicate the extension collapsed and died while climbing the additional stairs. He had been granted the post mortem compensation of having the entire tower named after him and in distant parts of the diocese the rhyming couplet, When Talbot’s Tower’s by morning seen/ Then rain will come before the e’en had formed part of local weather lore ever since with its alternative, When Talbot’s Tower you cannot see/ It’s raining cats and dogs on thee completing the inevitable meteorological logic of such phenomena.

  Maltravers turned left out of the house, away from the main road at the opposite end of Punt Yard, and followed the silhouette of his shadow towards the south transept door. He was a tall, angular man whose movements fell just short of clumsiness. Beneath erratic brown hair was a long face which seemed to have lived only the summers of his thirty-four years; what had been irritatingly youthful features ten years earlier were becoming increasingly advantageous with the passage of time. He was in Vercaster for the city’s resurrected Arts Festival, an event originally started to celebrate Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee but which had gone into a marked decline and eventual death after being left during the 1930s in the care of an elderly citizen whose exclusive passion for pastoral dance had first limited, then totally suffocated, its appeal. It had now been reborn to mark the 400th anniversary of a visit by Elizabeth I to grant the city’s charter. The cost of feeding her camp-followers had regrettably bankrupted the first Earl of Verta; happily for the family his great-grandson had restored their fortunes after the Restoration by prudently supplying his sister as a mistress to Charles II.

  Arrangements augured well for the reborn festival. A respectable string quartet, symphony orchestra and jazz composer of whom even the Bishop had heard, were to perform; a poet with some claim to rival Larkin was to give a reading; the not unaccomplished Vercaster Players’ amateur dramatic society had dusted off and adapted the city’s ancient Mystery Plays cycle, which had lain dormant for more than a century, and other sundry local artistic talents were to add to a fortnight of general activity. The climax was to be a Medieval fair on the long green slope that ran down from the cathedral to the river, with the final Mystery Plays being performed in the evening and fireworks to bring the whole affair to what it was hoped would be a satisfactory conclusion.

  Maltravers was involved that first Saturday evening, following a request from his sister who was on the organising committee. About a year previously he had had a trilogy of plays called Success City put on by Channel 4 with a hitherto unknown actress called Diana Porter in the lead. While critically successful, the plays had not posed any threat to the audience figures enjoyed by endless narratives of life in the North of England or South of Texas, and Diana had been quite happy to accept an invitation to put on a one-woman show in Vercaster. Thereafter things took an unexpected turn when she appeared in an iconoclastic production of Hedda Gabler, including a full-frontal nude scene which Ibsen had inexplicably overlooked. This experimental and obscure theatrical event might have passed unnoticed had not a Fleet Street paper of flimsy content but ludicrously high sales obtained a picture of the scene and published it under the words “Hedda Liner!” in the size of type one would have anticipated them reserving for an elopement from the Vatican.

  Several million readers, previously unaware of Mrs Gabler, Mr Ibsen and even the general location of Norway, were briefly titillated and Diana became the legitimate target for gossip columnists and news editors looking for a new personality to pursue in the interests of a free Press. She accepted the benefits of such abundant publicity with cynical amusement and exploited them to some considerable financial advantage; she could rely on her acting talent to carry her through once the silliness had passed.

  The Vercaster Times, while acting with restraint as a local paper in a polite cathedral city and not actually publishing the notorious photograph, drew attention to Diana’s proposed appearance at the festival, causing murmurs of discontent in civic and clerical circles. Matters were redeemed, however, when she appeared in a Sunday evening religious television programme, reading extracts from the works of Julian of Norwich with intelligence and impeccable taste, wearing a demure and becoming dress not dissimilar to one owned by the Bishop’s wife. A further performance in a “traditional” — Old Vic circa 1936 — production of Macbeth attracted critical approval in papers with smaller circulations but of the quality to be found in clergymen’s households. Having established there would be no repetition of the Gabler incident in Vercaster, the popular press went off to be a nuisance somewhere else and the festival was able to benefit from a more acceptable level of publicity. Melissa, originally appalled, was delighted and awarded Maltravers the ultimate household accolade of a hero biscuit.

  As Maltravers approached the south transept he observed a new addition to the local scenery in the shape of a uniformed policeman standing outside the door. The presence of the constabulary, or their fellow conspirators the traffic wardens, was not uncommon in Punt Yard where the love of God took second place to the carved tablets of parking restrictions, but clearly this representative of law and order was performing some manner of guard duty.

  “Good morning,” Maltravers said cheerfully as he reached him.

  “Good morning, sir. I’m afraid that if you have business in the cathedral you can’t go in.”

  Maltravers raised an eyebrow. “My business might be going in to pray.”

  Clearly uncertain as to the powers of secular authority with regard to the obstruction of such a blameless activity, the officer was caught off balance and looked uncomfortable.

  “Yes, sir. Well…I’m afraid there’s been a bit of trouble,” he said.

  “Trouble? What sort? Human sacrifice? Black Mass at the High Altar? Surely not naked nuns?”

  The policeman felt he was being mocked in the course of his duty which, while falling short of actual interference, was still to be deplored.

  “I’m very sorry, but I can’t allow you to go in,” he said stiffly, having noticeably dropped the “sir” from his address.

  “But I do have a rather important appointment with Canon Cowan,” said Maltravers. “It’s in connection with the festival.” This was totally untrue but his curiosity had been aroused and he was determined to gain entry. “Is it just this door that’s cut off?” He had correctly assumed that it was unlikely that all the entrances to the cathedral would have their own separate uniformed guardians.

  “Canon Cowan is with Detective Sergeant Jackson,” the policeman replied, with the obvious feeling that he had played an untrumpable ace of argument.

  “Then he’ll certainly want to see me. I’m his solicitor.” Having started lying Maltravers could see no reason for not carrying mendacity as far as necessary.

  “I don’t think it’s a matter that…” began the policeman but Maltravers became unnervingly authoritative.

  “I must be the judge of that,” he snapped and walked swiftly round the obstacle and straight through the door reflecting that when the young constable later discovered that he had been outmanoeuvred he could use the experience to future benefit.

  He strode through the transept, past the tourists’ shop and bookstall, without having any idea where Michael and the law might be. Almost immediately he saw them standing to his left by the north wall of the nave, in front of a small display case with a flat glass top which stood near the organ. The Detective Sergeant, broad shouldered and with a thick brown moustache, was writing in a notebook as Maltravers reached them.

  “What exactly was it called, sir?” he was asking.

  “The Latimer Mercy,” Michael replied. Maltravers looked at the e
mpty display case.

  “The Latimer Mercy?” he echoed. “What’s happened to it?”

  “It’s been stolen,” said Michael.

  “That,” said Maltravers, “is offensive.”

  “We call it criminal, sir,” said the detective. “I’m sorry, I don’t know who this gentleman is.”

  “Oh, it’s my brother-in-law, Mr Maltravers,” explained Michael. “The writer. He’s here for the festival.”

  “I see, sir,” said Jackson. “Now, you were saying, sir, that it’s the Latimer Mercy. What exactly is that?”

  “Well, it’s…you must be new to Vercaster.”

  “I joined this force from Lincolnshire a month ago,” Jackson replied patiently. “I assume that if I’d been here longer I would know all about the Latimer Mercy.”

  “Well, it’s a considerable treasure of the cathedral. How can I explain? Have you heard of the Merry Bibles?”

  “No, sir. Is that something else I should know?”

  “No, but you probably would know if…” Michael, who was excellent at addressing the captive audience of a congregation with a prepared sermon, found question and answer situations trying. “Augustus, perhaps you…?”

  “The Merry Bibles were a misprinted version of 1546,” Maltravers explained briskly. “They were printed in Vercaster and many were destroyed after the error was noticed. It was in Psalm 25, verse 10, where it read ‘All the paths of the Lord are merry and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies’. Frankly, I think it gains something through the mistake.”

  “And so this was a Merry Bible?” said Jackson, indicating the empty case.

  “Yes, but a very special one. In this edition the misprint had been corrected with the word ‘merry’ crossed out and ‘mercy’ written in the margin with the initials ‘HL’ alongside it. The legend is that the correction was made by Bishop Hugh Latimer, hence the Latimer Mercy.”

  Jackson’s next question was surprising. “When was it done?” he asked.

  “That’s difficult to say,” Michael put in. “It was presumably here last night and the theft was…”

  “No, I don’t mean that. When was the correction made?”

  Michael looked confused both by the nature of the question and the fact that it was made. “I don’t think anybody knows. Augustus?”

  “I couldn’t even guess.” Maltravers looked keenly at Jackson. “But I’m interested in why you should ask.”

  “It’s just that Latimer preached in my home town of Stamford in 1550 — November, I think — and he could obviously have passed through here on his way.” Jackson smiled slyly at Maltravers before speaking to Michael. “I imagine I’ll learn things like that about Vercaster when I’ve been here a little longer.”

  Michael, who found criticism, however subtly put, disquieting, looked slightly annoyed, but Maltravers returned Jackson’s smile with a grin of admiration.

  “Touché, sergeant,” he said. “And your theory’s interesting as well. However, this is a very disturbing affair for the cathedral.”

  “Of course,” Jackson replied, recognising he could communicate better with Maltravers. “What would be the value of the Bible?”

  Maltravers pulled a face. “I’m no great expert, but any Bible before about 1580 would fetch a fair price. A Coverdale of 1535 brought thirty thousand dollars in New York a couple of years ago, although a Matthews Bible of 1537 brought only six thousand the same year. The Latimer Mercy was rebound in the last century, which would greatly diminish its worth.”

  “What effect would the misprint have?” Jackson asked.

  “On its value not a great deal,” said Maltravers. “People think they’re going to retire when they come across a Breeches Bible, but that was published, with one or more editions a year, over thirty years. On the other hand, the correction makes the Latimer Mercy unique. It’s not just going to crop up at Sotheby’s or Christie’s.”

  Jackson nodded then lifted the lid of the case, which Maltravers could see had been forced open with a screwdriver or similar instrument.

  “You didn’t protect it very well, sir,” he commented.

  Michael looked uncomfortable. “We have a somewhat radical Dean who feels excessive security has no place in the church,” he explained. “If he had his way, I imagine he would leave the entire building unlocked day and night.”

  “I think you’d find we’d disapprove of that. The average villain isn’t noted for his piety.” Jackson sniffed and closed the lid. “Very well. On the face of it, we may assume it was taken for, or by, a specific person. When did you discover it was missing?”

  “About ten o’clock this morning. One of the ladies who serves in the tourists’ shop noticed it. As far as we know, it was there last night.”

  “And the cathedral was locked overnight?”

  “Certainly,” said Michael, making it clear he did not approve of the Dean’s open-house preferences.

  “No sign of a break-in to the building?”

  “Not as far as I’m aware.”

  “An inside job,” put in Maltravers adding an unnecessary note of drama to his voice. Jackson smiled seriously.

  “Possibly,” he said in the tone of a professional being patient with an amateur. “What time does the cathedral close in the evening?”

  “About eight o’clock at this time of year.”

  Jackson’s next questions were thoughts spoken aloud. “So, possibly late in the evening…nobody would have specifically checked? No…or this morning after the cathedral opened…or during the night.” He paused for a moment, thinking silently. “Very well. We’ll need to talk to everyone who has a key for any of the doors.”

  Michael looked horrified. “But some of them are very senior clergy,” he protested. “You’re surely not suggesting…”

  “Everyone who has a key,” said Jackson impassively. “Perhaps one has been stolen,” he added, to defuse Michael’s indignation. “We’ll also want to talk to all the staff who work in the cathedral. They might have seen something suspicious. You have guides?”

  “There are no guided tours as such, except for parties who make their own arrangements,” said Michael. “But there are a number of people who walk around the building and explain things to visitors.”

  “Are they told to keep an eye out for anything untoward?”

  “They’re not formally told, but I’m sure they understand that they should.”

  “Right,” Jackson closed his notebook and slipped it into his pocket. “You have a rota showing who was on duty yesterday afternoon and this morning?”

  “Yes,” said Michael. “It’s on a notice-board in the shop. I’ll show you.” All three of them turned back towards the south transept.

  “Of course,” said Maltravers. “Any suggestion as to the motive would be a great help.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Jackson. “But lacking any definite evidence, that’s a matter for speculation. In the meantime, we’ll have to follow the usual channels of inquiry.”

  Jackson collected the constable who was still standing guard at the transept door and told him to take the names from the guides’ rota list. A small, slightly globular man carrying a small case walked in and joined them.

  “Morning,” he said. “Higson. Fingerprints. Where?” Long sentences were clearly not his habit.

  “Just round that corner,” said Jackson, pointing. “Wooden case on the left. You can’t miss it.” Higson, without further expenditure of words, walked briskly on.

  “I would have thought that case would have been smothered in fingerprints,” said Maltravers helpfully. “People have a habit of poking at such things.”

  “Procedures,” Jackson said briefly. “We’ll need a statement from you as well, Canon Cowan. Perhaps you could come to the station later today?”

  “Well, yes, although I don’t know that I can…”

  “And of course the person who first discovered the theft,” Jackson interrupted. “Is she still here?”


  “No, she was rather upset by the incident and I sent her home.”

  “Well, we don’t need to trouble her immediately, but perhaps you could bring her down when you come later.”

  “Yes, of course,” agreed Michael, as legal authority overcame ecclesiastical dignity. “After lunch?”

  “Thank you, sir, that will be fine. Just ask to see me when you arrive. Mr Maltravers.” With a brief nod Jackson departed.

  “I must go and tell the Dean what has happened,” said Michael. “What did you want anyway?”

  “Nothing, I was just passing the time,” Maltravers replied. “Diana and Tess are due in about an hour and I’m going to collect them.”

  “Oh. Yes, of course.” The imminent arrival of expected guests seemed to take on the proportions of great misfortune for Michael with common larceny breaking out on hallowed ground. “I’ll see you all at lunch.”

  After he left, Maltravers walked back to where the taciturn Higson was performing the mysteries of his art on the empty display case and watched him thoughtfully. His instant reaction of feeling offended was still with him; while he quite regularly disputed accepted religious beliefs, he respected anything enriched by antiquity and found the traditions of the church in language, architecture, ceremony and behaviour, attractive. The Latimer Mercy had been printed in Henry VIII’s final infected years and corrected — if Jackson’s interesting theory was correct — before Spenser, Marlowe or Shakespeare were born, and possibly by the man whose ringing words of certainty as the flames ate his body five years later, were a clarion call of faith triumphant which Maltravers could not share but did respect. It belonged to no man because it belonged to all men and its removal dismayed him; putting aside all other considerations, it was a book and to Maltravers a book was a holy thing. But why, he reflected, had it been taken? He had an uneasy feeling that the motive was sinister.

  The same thought, but this time as only one among several possibilities, was going through the mind of David Jackson as he drove the short distance back to Vercaster’s main police station, his mind revolving about what had happened and what had to be done. Check with county headquarters to see if the theft fitted an established pattern of crimes; extend inquiries to other police forces for the same thing. But this was a very specific theft, probably with a customer waiting. All air and sea ports would have to be alerted and Customs told to watch for it. On balance, it was probably going out of the country so Interpol would need to be informed. It was an odd one. Petty theft and major bank robberies shared common factors of recognisable greed, following obvious patterns which made up nearly all of police work. Anything that would not fit the norm had its own unique reasons behind it, and there lay difficulties. Jackson’s great virtue as a detective was that he kept his mind open; the wealthy secret collector was one obvious theory but was there something else? Strange crimes, he reflected, were done by or for strange people for unknown and very personal motives. How strange and how personal was impossible to fathom and in such darkness anything might lie.