Black Light

by Bedford, K. A.

  “Yes,” Carmody said, nodding and stroking his moustache. “Driving around all night long must be very tiring. Yes, I can see that.”

  “It’s only natural,” Sills agreed.

  Checking with each other, they prepared to leave.

  As they reached the door, however, Carmody turned back to face me, and he said, “Can you think of any reason why someone might murder Father William Dennis?”

  27

  Carmody turned back to face me. I struggled up; my legs did not want to support my weight; then I managed, leaning against the back of the sofa.

  Carmody and Sills watched me as I tried to right myself. Sills seemed to have his thin face tilted over to one side slightly. The inspector said, quietly, “It’s like I said, ma’am. Father William Dennis — he’s dead, too.”

  “That’s … that can’t be right,” I said.

  “Why would you say that, ma’am?” Carmody looked very awake, very perceptive — quite the opposite of how I felt.

  “I don’t know, entirely. It simply seems wrong. It makes no sense.”

  Carmody said, “I quite agree. From what we’ve gathered so far from his housekeeper … ”

  “Mrs Rioli,” Sergeant Sills supplied.

  “Thank you, Sills. Yes, Mrs Rioli. She found the body. She says he was a quiet, humble sort of fellow. Devout, of course. Pious as the day is long.”

  “Pillar of the community,” Sills added. “No enemies, nothing like that.”

  I stared at them. I remembered my recent business with him. His “suggestion” that I make a generous donation towards the church repair fund by way of atoning for hitting the swine all those years ago. Yes, I remembered only too well.

  I felt dizzy.

  “Where were you and Mr Duncombe last night, Mrs Black?” Carmody was studying me.

  “Why don’t you tell us what’s really going on here?” This from Sills, who looked impatient.

  Carmody added, “The sooner you tell us, the sooner we can all get some sleep.”

  “You’re looking a bit ordinary there, Mrs Black,” Sills said. “Why, if you’ll pardon my asking, have you got … is that spiderweb on your clothes, and dust?”

  Carmody smiled. “Driving around inside haunted houses?”

  “It’s all through your hair, too, look,” Sills said, pointing.

  I reached up and felt my hair, and he was right. The Cahill house had left its mark on me.

  “What the hell were you two doing all night, ma’am?”

  “Nothing!” I said, and knew as soon as I said it that it was both the wrong thing to say and the wrong way to say it. The way I looked — all in black, thick gloves, boots, and of course covered in spiderwebs, dust, and God only knew what else I’d picked up in the course of my adventures — wasn’t helping my case.

  Carmody and Sills exchanged looks. They were not quite sure what I had done, but they were sure I had been up to no good.

  Then Carmody said, “You wrote to Father William … ”

  Sills said, “On the twenty-seventh of this month. Last Sunday.”

  “He’s very good, isn’t he?” Carmody said to me, smiling. “Never forgets a thing. Not a thing.”

  I said, “Yes. Yes, I wrote to him last Sunday. I wanted to apologise to him.”

  “Mrs Rioli says you and the Father have been at odds over the years.”

  I stared at Carmody, feeling sicker by the moment. “You think I … ?”

  Carmody laughed. “Oh no, oh no, Mrs Black. I’m sorry. Did we give you that impression? I’m so sorry. No. As I said about this bizarre business involving your aunt, we’re only trying to sort through what’s been quite the unusual evening in this very small town. You do understand. We’re only trying to find the truth. That’s all. We’re not the enemy.” He did his best to appear unthreatening, and essayed a bit of a laugh. Sergeant Sills tried to do the same; on him it looked like he had a dirty secret that he found amusing.

  “In that case, gentlemen, as entertaining, and even disturbing, as this has been … ”

  “Father William wrote back to you, didn’t he? Just this week?”

  Sills said, “We found a carbon copy of a letter he wrote to you on Monday.”

  “Good,” I said, feeling growing anger. “That’s marvellous.” Then, after a moment, frowning, I said, “Wait a moment.” Monday did not sound right. Wasn’t it just the other morning that I …? I was too tired to think straight. Could it have been Monday? Now I wasn’t sure. Whereas I was certain that the police were trying to catch me in a lie or inconsistency — there was Sills with his notebook, jotting everything down. That boy was so observant he should take up a side-career as a novelist. Deciding to change tack, I said, “All right. You’ve seen my correspondence with him, and his with me. You’ll know that he and I, we have a history going back some years. I even hit him — ”

  “You hit a priest, Mrs Black?” Carmody said, pretending to be surprised, and sharing a glance with Sills, who was still jotting. “Surely that’s some sort of bad luck, wouldn’t you say?”

  I pressed on. “Yes, he impugned my late husband’s honour. So yes, more than ten years ago, I did in fact hit him. But I did not kill him last night.”

  “Yes, of course, Mrs Black. Quite, yes,” Carmody said, walking around me as he talked.

  “He solicited a bribe from me.”

  “Is that right, Mrs Black?”

  Sills said, “That’s a very serious charge, ma’am.”

  “I still have his letter. You’re welcome to see it.”

  The two policemen, however, looked confused. Sergeant Sills was checking through his notebook, and showing entries to Inspector Carmody, who raised his eyebrows and stroked his moustache. “Is that right, ma’am?” he said, still looking at the notebook.

  I was losing my patience again. “Gentlemen, please. Can’t this wait until after I’ve had a little sleep? I would be only too happy to entertain any number of alarming questions and improbable hypotheses you might assemble, perhaps this afternoon. Right now, however, I … ”

  They were still staring at me.

  “Sergeant?”

  Sills consulted his notes. “We found a carbon of Father William’s reply, ma’am. He most emphatically refused to accept your apology. He denounced you, and threatened to have you excommunicated from the Church, and said you were a moral threat to the good men and women of this town. More or less. He went on a fair bit.”

  I stared, and then, feeling giddy now, I laughed a little. “Now that’s just silly. Look. I have Father William’s letter here. Or, at least, it would be upstairs in my study, where you found those notes. Please, feel free to go and have a look, or, if you like, I’ll go. I shan’t be a moment.”

  “Sergeant? Your stair-climbing legs feel up to another challenge?”

  “Raring to go, sir.”

  Carmody smiled, and Sills set off up the stairs with a speed and vigour that was to be envied, particularly at this hour.

  “Do you mind if I sit down again, Inspector? I feel quite … ”

  He looked embarrassed, momentarily, “Oh, I’m sorry. Yes, of course. Please. I understand completely. I’m feeling a little that way myself.” We sat. He said, to fill the silence, “It’s been a hell of a night, ma’am, if you’ll pardon my French … ”

  By now I was holding my head up. “Oh?”

  “Oh yes. Very odd. Strange. You see, what appears to have happened here is this: your Aunt Julia fell asleep last night and left her room light on. She’d been up late, reading, but she’d nodded off. Happens to me often enough,” he said, smiling, doing his trick again, trying to make me like him, or at least find him unthreatening.

  “One of your servants, I believe it was Miss Tool, I’m pretty sure, anyway, Sergeant Sills’ll know, nothing escapes that boy, mark my words. Anyway, she was up late, and noticed the light under Miss Templesmith’s room door. She went to see if Miss Templesmith was all right. This must have been about half past twelve or so. Pretty
late. So Miss Tool knocks on the door, gets no response, and she eases the door open, just to make sure your aunt’s all right. But … ”

  “You need not dwell on the details, Inspector.”

  “Ah, but listen. I’m trying to tell you why we’re not trying to fit you up for your aunt’s murder, Mrs Black. See, Miss Tool opened the door, peeked in, and she saw that, well … The deed had been done. The victim had been strangled as she slept. She would have had no opportunity to … ”

  “Inspector, please … ”

  “What I’m getting around to telling you, Mrs Black, is that the marks left on the victim’s neck — the killer’s hands, the killer’s hands were immense! Much bigger than yours — bigger than mine!”

  I thought of Variel, labouring to use his tiny pencil on the pages of his notebook. His giant hands seemed to swallow the pencil stub.

  I wondered what was keeping Sergeant Sills. The inspector went on. “So Miss Tool alerts the rest of your staff. Your butler, Mr Rutherford, calls the local boys. They come out and have a gander, and they reckon it’s a job for the d’s, up in Perth, and they get on the horn. By the time I hear about it, it’s after one in the morning. It takes us until after four o’clock just to get here, going flat-out, mind you. And then we get here, and the local boys show us the body, and we see the marks on Miss Templesmith’s throat. It’s these gigantic hands, as I said. We asked your servants: ‘Could someone break in to this house and come upstairs and do this without being heard or spotted?’ and they all said they didn’t see how that could happen. Someone like that would have made a lot of noise. So we were puzzled. How did this bastard get in without disturbing everyone? Bit of a mystery. But then the local boys get the call about Father William. His housekeeper found him at five. He likes to get up early and go for a long walk by the water, she says, get some thinking done, plan his sermons, things like that. So she goes to wake him up, and he’s not in bed. He’s in his office, and he’s been knifed, with a letter-opener. Big mess everywhere, place really torn up. We look around, take notes, and we call the forensics boys up in the city to get down here. Quiet little fishing town suddenly turns interesting. Still, at least what happened to the poor bloody priest looks like a straightforward murder. Back here is where things are a bit on the funny side, so we come back. The Rockingham coroner’s boys have turned up, and they need us to tell them they can take the body off … ”

  Rutherford appeared, a most welcome sight. He looked like he knew I needed rescuing. He also looked better than he had earlier. “Inspector? Could I interest you in a fresh cup of tea or coffee?”

  He looked surprised. I was thinking that a good hostess maintains her poise no matter what. No matter what. Very English thinking. Carmody asked for coffee, no sugar, black — just as I have it. I asked for a cup, too. Rutherford swept out to the kitchen.

  What could I say at this point? He did not think I had killed Julia, but he suspected I knew something about it. He suspected these notes from my secret correspondent — the enemy whose name Variel gave me — had something to do with it, and I knew now why he thought so. I also knew who the large-handed brute was, of course, but how to explain how I knew it?

  Then there was this bizarre business with Father William. The inspector knew I was involved in that, too — and this peculiar letter business only implicated me further. That Father William should have a copy of a different letter to the one that I had received seemed odd. That the “new” letter was a profoundly angry and serious rebuff of my apology seemed doubly odd. Why was there this other letter? I was not too worried. I knew his reply letter, the one I had received, was upstairs in my desk drawer, where I had left it.

  Inspector Carmody called up to Sills, “Any luck, Sergeant?”

  “Not yet, sir. There’s a lot of correspondence to sort through.”

  We were still awaiting Rutherford with our coffee. I offered to show the inspector up to my office, so that I could find the letter. Carmody agreed. Feeling a peculiar sense of second wind which no doubt had to do with a sensation that things could not get much worse, I led the inspector upstairs. In my study I found the sergeant sorting through my filing cabinet, and going through piles of papers, bound manuscripts, official documents pertaining to the house, my insurance policies, bank records, car registration forms, and so forth. I said, “Did you look in the drawer?”

  Sills muttered, “Couldn’t find anything in the drawer.”

  I opened the drawer in question. The letter was right there, tucked in its envelope.

  “I believe this is the letter, gentlemen,” I said, offering it to the inspector, who took it. Sergeant Sills, surprised, said, “I looked there, I’m sure I bloody well looked there!”

  Carmody read, nodding. “This is it, ma’am,” he said, and showed it to me.

  I snatched it from his hands, and read.

  This wasn’t right.

  This wasn’t right at all.

  No!

  “There’s some mistake,” I said, looking at the letter and then at the policemen. “It’s … ”

  They had been right. This was not the letter I had received. In this version, Father William was vehement in his outrage, scornful of my apologetic words, furious at me in general. And he did threaten to have me excommunicated.

  “This isn’t right,” I said, shaken afresh. “This isn’t the letter I received.”

  “You recognised the envelope,” Carmody said, pointing.

  “Well, yes, I did, yes … It’s just … ” My hands shook.

  “Mrs Black,” Carmody said, “I think it would be best if you popped around to the station later, and gave us a bit of a statement about your movements last night, and about your business with Father William Dennis. At that time we will also be asking for your fingerprints. The forensics people are going over the house as we speak, as I said. Do you have any questions?”

  Questions? I had questions!

  After experiencing what had felt like every other known emotion during the course of this endless night, all I had left was numbness. The damning letter, the letter that supposedly inspired me to murder a man, dropped from my fingers.

  “I’d like to contact my lawyers,” I said, hardly making a sound. It was only too easy to see how it would play out. Everyone knew about my very public feud with Father William. Now I was on record seeking to bury the hatchet. And Father William now was on record, telling me to burn in Hell! How dare he refuse my apology? The bastard! I would show him! I, the strange, eccentric rich woman with her strange ideas.

  Carmody said, “That’s your right, of course, Mrs Black.”

  They took both the copy of my initial apology letter, as well as Father William’s letter, with them when they left, sealed in large yellow envelopes.

  I slid to the floor of my study. I was surrounded by piles and piles of paper.

  Blocks of brass-coloured dawn light shone on my walls.

  Even in this state I could see what must have happened. When Variel came to kill Julia, he had also swapped the letter I had actually received with this new letter. He would have had a shadow glamour much like the one Gordon and I had used.

  Father William’s new letter was different, though, in more ways than one, I had noticed. It had a certain faint aroma about it; no doubt it had rubbed off from the demon, the source of that odour. And Father William Dennis, who I had learned last night was the one who had sent me those notes, would carry that odour around with him because of his time spent communing with his tame demon. Father William, a bitter old man, passed over for promotion, stuck out here in the boondocks of Pelican River, seeing his congregation decline over time, unable to raise sufficient funds to repair his run-down church. How had it gone with him, I wondered, thinking in the dreamy, cold fog of fatigue. How had such a devout, such a pious, old man reached a point of such desperation that he turned to those books forbidden by his church for answers? What had it cost him?

  I did not know. But I did know the forensics people would be
finding my fingerprints all over his house, and all over the murder weapon. Father William Dennis hated me so much that he would use black arts and a tame demon to frame me for his “murder”. But why now, after all these years?

  And how could he do it? I could not imagine a situation in which it would be better to have myself killed in such a way as to implicate some bitter enemy than to kill that enemy myself. But who knows how different people make their decisions? I was a writer of novels. My bailiwick was character motivation. It was my task to unravel the tangle of motivations that lead a person to do extraordinary things, to make the contrived and manipulated seem plausible, natural — even inevitable.

  I did not know, at that moment, at that bitter hour, sitting, feeling defeated, in the shambles of my office, how on Earth I could fight the priest’s scheme.

  28

  I woke later on, not noticeably refreshed. Washed, dressed, coffee consumed, I came downstairs. The police and their forensic people were gone. The Yellow Room, Julia’s room, was sealed off. I remembered the sight of Julia this morning, her remains, on that stretcher. I could hardly breathe.

  Sitting in the drawing room, I asked Rutherford to contact Gordon for me, but he came back shortly and said he was unable to get through. The poor man. He must be still fast asleep. I thought of his beautiful dogs, and what Gordon did — and would have to do — for me the previous night.

  “His dogs … ”

  He had made his choice, I told myself, and he had chosen not to take my offered arm.

  I heard Murray quietly telling Ryan off about dropping some expensive plates. I could also hear Sally or Vicky out the back, beating rugs into submission. The repetitive whacking was starting to sound like the headache forming in my head.

  I tried the telephone myself. June interrupted me, “Sorry, Mrs Black, but Gordon’s asked me not to put through any calls from you. I’m really sorry.”

  “But that’s — All right. All right. I am sorry to bother you, June. Good afternoon.”