by Robert Innes
“He’s got a point, Granddad,” Callum replied, grinning again.
“And, out of all those billions of people, I find it hard to believe that He would specifically choose three in Harmschapel to rain His wrath upon. The people in this village have enough difficulty getting their bins collected, I doubt God is that interested. No offence.”
The sound of a telephone ringing interrupted Timothy’s response. “Excuse me.” He glanced irritably at Blake for a moment, then strode towards the vestry.
Callum watched his granddad enter the vestry and close the door sharply behind him. “Don’t worry about him. He gets a little sensitive at other people’s ideas about God and The Church. For what it’s worth, I agree with you.” He leant against the door of the confessions booth and looked up at Blake. Despite the long black cassock, Blake couldn’t ignore the fact that he was incredibly good looking. He had dark moss green eyes that had a distinct mischievous twinkle about them. “And, don’t tell my granddad, but I’m on the same boat as you.”
“And which boat would that be?” Blake asked. Half an hour ago, the last place he had expected to find himself was stood in the middle of the village church being flirted with by the verger, but that appeared to be exactly what was happening.
“The atheist boat. I don’t believe in any of it. Not really.”
Blake was surprised. “Seems a strange career choice for you then. Spending all your time in the church.”
Callum shrugged. “The parishioners don’t pay any attention to me. I’m just in the background. An extra in the grand scheme of things. It’s my granddad they all come to see and listen to – when he’s stood at that lectern delivering the word of God, they don’t need to know anything about the guy who helps out, holding the crucifix, giving them their bread and wine at communion. They don’t need to know that I think it’s all a load of crap. I fell on tough times, I lost my last job and things were looking a bit bleak. Granddad helped me out, gave me a position here, and a roof over my head till I find something I’m better suited for. For the time being, this suits me alright. It’s all in the performance at the end of the day.”
Blake nodded. “And does your granddad know you don’t share his views on religion?”
“I think so, but it’s sort of an unspoken topic between us,” Callum replied. “And while he’s saving my bacon like this, I’m happy for it to stay that way.”
“So, if you don’t buy into the whole word of God thing, then what do you think has been going on here?”
Callum shrugged. “I don’t know really. I won’t lie, it is weird. I mean, I hope that it’s just a really strange coincidence that two people suffered a fatal heart attack in the way they did. As long as Imelda Atkins doesn’t-”
The sound of the vestry door opening and closing cut him off. Timothy walked out, looking pale.
“Are you okay, Granddad?”
“I’m extremely sorry to tell you this, Detective,” Timothy said quietly, walking back towards them, his head slightly bowed. “The number has now risen to three. That was John, one of our parishioners on the telephone. Imelda died shortly after they put her in the ambulance. There was nothing they could do for her.”
Callum sighed, then looked across at Blake, his eyebrows raised expectantly. “Well, Detective?”
Blake stared at Timothy, his eyes wide. Two people dying in exactly the same way he could accept; three seemed more than suspicious.
“I think it might be time to speak to my boss.” Blake murmured.
When Harrison got home, he found carnage awaiting him. His goat, Betty, had been busy while he had been at work. She had managed to get into a drawer containing a lot of papers and documents from when Harrison had sold the farm and moved into the cottage. She had promptly gone about chewing and tearing them up, so that by the time Harrison had arrived home, the whole cottage looked like a blizzard had blown through it, with Betty sat in the middle of it looking extremely pleased with herself. After a few minutes attempting to salvage some of the documents, Harrison had decided that enough was enough and left her chewing on a bank statement while he walked to The Dog’s Tail.
Now, he was sat on his own, nursing a half drunk pint of beer, in some feeble form of celebration for his birthday. He looked around at the small gathering of people in the corner who looked to be having a much better time than he was. It looked like a stag night. The groom to be was downing his fourth pint since Harrison had arrived, cheered on by his friends. He turned away from the noisy group of men and sighed, pushing his pint to the side and resting his head in his hands. This officially was the worst birthday ever.
“You alright, Harrison?”
His thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice. Mini Patil, one of the officers from the police station was standing behind him, a warm smile on her face.
Harrison sat up straight, attempting to return her friendly expression. “Yeah, I’m alright. Long day. How are you?”
“Oh, I’m alright.” Patil said. Harrison glanced at the outfit she was wearing. It was a dark red dress, complete with black tights and matching high heels.
“You look nice,” Harrison noted. “Are you going out?”
Patil pulled the bottom of her dress down in a futile attempt to cover her legs
“Oh! Thanks. I wouldn’t call it going out, more just…” She hesitated, apparently looking for the right word.
Harrison grinned. “Are you on a date?”
Patil grimaced and then sat down opposite him, leaning in. “Look, I don’t know if I’d call it a date. Can you keep a secret?”
Harrison nodded. He liked Patil – she had been just as supportive as Blake during everything that happened at Halfmile Farm, and if he could somehow repay her for her kindness during that difficult time, then he was all too happy to be her confidant.
“You know Matti? Billy Mattison?” Patil said.
“Yeah.”
“Well, I’m meeting him here for a drink.”
“Are you two an item now, then?”
“No, no, no,” Patil said hastily. “I mean, well I think – well, no. I know that he probably wants us to be.”
“Do you fancy him or not?” Harrison pressed, delighted of the distraction he was now getting from his own problems.
Patil bit her lip and shrugged. “I have absolutely no idea. He’s good looking, sweet, funny and we’ve always got on, but I dunno. I don’t know if he’s my type, do you know what I mean? I don’t want to make some big mistake.”
Harrison nodded wistfully. He knew all too well what it was like to be attracted to the wrong people.
“I mean, you know, don’t get me wrong, he’s a lovely guy,” Patil said, carelessly removing a now dead fly that had landed in Harrison’s pint. “But, I don’t want to get his hopes up if I don’t feel the same way. I mean, he’s been like a little brother to me at the station, but outside of work…” She shrugged, sighing. “I just don’t know.
“But you think he definitely fancies you?” Harrison asked her.
“Oh, you must be kidding,” Patil laughed. “You should have seen him when he asked me for this drink. All nervous and not able to look me in the eye. It was quite adorable really. You on your own tonight?”
Harrison nodded. “Yeah, as per usual.”
Patil gave him a sympathetic look. Harrison knew she meant well, but he had had enough sympathy off people in Harmschapel the past few months to last him a lifetime.
“You’ll find someone.” She smiled. “Good looking lad like you, the men will be fighting to get to you once you put yourself out there.”
Harrison gave a nonchalant shrug,then took a sip of his pint.
“And, if all else fails, there’s always Sergeant Harte.”
Despite trying very hard not to, Harrison swallowed far too much of his drink at the mention of Blake’s name and started coughing.
“You alright?” Patil laughed.
Harrison recovered and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “Yeah. Ju
st went down the wrong way. What did you say about Bla- erm, Sergeant Harte?”
“Oh, I was only joking. I mean, come on. You and Harte? I know you don’t know him that well, but if he’s anything like he is at work when he’s at home, he’s probably got all his CD’s filed away alphabetically, and all his underwear ironed and folded in his drawer.”
Harrison smiled weakly at her. The thought of anything to do with Blake in underwear made his stomach flip.
“Oh, God,” Patil murmured quietly. “He’s here.”
For a heart stopping moment Harrison thought she meant that Blake had just walked in, but quickly realised by the expression on her face that she meant Mattison. The smell of aftershave had carried all the way to Harrison from the door to the pub before he had even turned round.
“Wow,” Harrison said.
Mattison was wearing a dark green shirt that looked like it had been pressed to within an inch of its life. His jeans, similarly, looked absolutely pristine, but Harrison was slightly amused to see that he was wearing completely different shoes. They were the same colour but a closer look betrayed the fact that they had their laces styled in totally opposite ways.
“He’s made the effort,” Harrison said to Patil, grinning as he watched her bemusement as her eyes travelled down to his odd shoes.
“Hi, Mini,” Mattison said nervously as he spotted her. “You look nice.”
“Matti,” Patil said, tearing her eyes away from his shoes. “So do you. Do you want a drink?”
“No, no. I mean, I -yeah I-I do,” Mattison stammered. “But, sit down, I’ll get them. No worries. What do you want?”
Harrison glanced up at a dark patch that had already started to appear under Mattison’s arms. It was almost comforting to witness somebody who was even worse on dates than he was.
“I’ll just have a J20, thanks.” Patil smiled.
Mattison nodded, obviously trying to work out whether it was alright for him to have alcohol or not. He pulled his wallet out of his pocket and walked to the bar without saying another word.
“Right, I’ll leave you to it,” Harrison said, pulling his coat on. “Good luck. Bless him, he really wants to make this a good night for you. Let him down gently if you think it’s not working.”
“I will, don’t worry. Have a safe journey home.”
Harrison downed the rest of his pint and made his way towards the door of the pub, glancing back at Mattison as he left, who seemed to be receiving some sort of pep talk from Robin, the landlord of the pub. The last thing he saw was Mattison being passed a discreet shot of something as the door closed behind him.
As Harrison made his way home, he thought about what Patil had said to him about getting himself out there to find someone to be with. Living alone for the past few months had felt like some sort of recovery period after the upheaval his life had taken, and he was slowly starting to move on with his life. He wouldn’t have the first clue about actually dating anybody though. The idea made him feel almost as anxious as Mattison had looked in the pub. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and loaded up the dating app he had downloaded a few days beforehand. None of the men he saw on there filled him with any particular wanton desire. That was, until, he was suddenly faced with a picture of Blake. He had never seen Blake out of his work clothes before and, though it didn’t feel possible, the sight of the man he had thought so much of recently made him feel stronger feelings than ever. These pictures were presumably Blake at his best, and his wavy, mousey coloured hair, his tall physique, and chiselled cheekbones looked better than ever.
He stopped in the street and stared at his phone, which was waiting for him to swipe either left or right on Blake’s picture. If Blake wasn’t interested, then he would surely never find out which way Harrison had swiped. Especially if, as Harrison presumed, Blake had told the app he wasn’t interested. After all, it only notified of mutual attraction.
He swiped ‘Yes’ on the app, and was disappointed, but not in the slightest bit surprised to see nothing other than the next set of pictures of someone come up. He glanced distastefully for a few moments at the profile picture of ‘Teddy Bear’ before closing his app down, thrusting his hands back into his pocket and continuing his journey home.
“Three deaths? In the space of a few months?”
Blake nodded. It was the next morning and he was standing in the doorway of the office of Inspector Royale, his boss at Harmschapel police station, who looked up at him from his desk and scratched his chin, his bushy moustache quivering beneath his nose.
“They all happened in exactly the same way, in the confessions booth of the church. The claim is that all three of them were sat, giving confession, when they seemed to just keel over and die.”
“Of heart attacks?” Royale clarified.
“Well, it certainly looks that way, Sir,” Blake replied. “I’ve requested for a post mortem to be performed on Imelda Atkins, but even if it comes back and all seems normal for a woman of her age, I still think it’s bloody bizarre.”
“Hmm,” grunted Royale, clasping his hands together. “Problem is, if forensics don’t notice anything suspicious, what do we have to work on? No evidence apart from two clergymen who say that three of their parishioners just died in front of them? It’s hardly grounds to warrant opening a murder enquiry, is it?”
“I know,” Blake agreed. “And I’d be saying the same if it was just that the three of them had happened to die in the church, I dunno, during a service or something. But Timothy Croydon specifically said that the three of them died while in that confessions booth.” Blake looked at his boss seriously. “It just seems like too much of a coincidence. And I don’t know about you, Sir, but I’ve always found that in our line of work, there are very rarely such things as coincidences.”
“So, what do you suggest we do then?” said Gardiner, who was sat at his own desk, in the adjourning meeting room, listening to the conversation. “Investigate the church? Follow the nine hundred year old vicar around to make sure he’s not working for some sort of gang that targets religious pensioners?”
Blake glared at him. “If you’re not going to offer anything helpful, Michael, get on with your work.” He turned back to Royale and walked into the office, closing the door behind him. “I don’t think I need to tell you this, Sir, but if all of these deaths were murders, and they were all committed by the same person, that could mean we’re looking at a serial killer.”
Royale turned slightly pale.
“Trust me,” Blake continued. “I hope I’m wrong. I really do. But I think it’s something we need to consider. The situation is too suspicious for us not to, at the very least, look in to.”
Royale sighed, then nodded. “Alright. I’m trusting you on this one, Blake.”
“Thank you, Sir.”
“Get as much information as you can find on the three –victims-,” he hesitated and took a breath. “Then see if there is possibly any connection between them. In the meantime, interview Timothy Croydon and any other witnesses to any of the deaths.”
Blake didn’t really need to be told any of that, but he politely nodded. “Yes, Sir.”
“Carry on,” Royale said.
Blake walked out of the office and towards Gardiner’s desk. “Right, Michael. Come with me.”
Gardiner glanced up at Blake disdainfully. “Why?”
Blake was in no mood for his bolshie attitude. “Because I’ve asked you to. That should be all you need to hear. If you’ve got any problems with that, Inspector Royale’s office is just there. If not, can you get the keys to one of the cars and meet me outside? Thank you.”
He didn’t wait for a response, instead picking up his jacket from his own desk and striding outside.
Blake and Gardiner had had a somewhat strained working relationship ever since Blake had arrived in Harmschapel. It had become clear to Blake very quickly that Gardiner had been hoping to be promoted to the position that Blake now held, and as a result, Gardiner was often not
hing short of awkward and antagonistic to work with. While they had once had a brief moment of reconciliation, where Gardiner had confessed to Blake that he was going through a messy divorce on account of his wife having an affair with his brother, he still seemed to be just a naturally prickly person. More recently, Blake had heard on the grapevine that Gardiner’s wife was trying to get as much money out of the divorce as possible, leading to Gardiner becoming more hostile to all around him than ever.
Blake was a firm believer that once any officer crossed the threshold to the station that their personal problems were left at the door. Gardiner didn’t seem to agree, and he would be damned before he would let a much younger officer, his superior or not, tell him otherwise.
By the time Gardiner had stormed outside with the keys to one of the cars, Blake had had a few sucks on his ecig, which he had fortunately remembered to charge before work that morning, and was in a more reasonable frame of mind.
“So, where are we going?” Gardiner asked him as they climbed into the car.
“To the church,” Blake replied. “We’re going to talk to anybody who works there and see if they can shed any light on what’s been happening.”
Gardiner pulled the car out of the station car park and said, “I’m sorry but I really don’t see how three elderly people dying from a heart attack warrants any form of police investigation. So their tickers gave out when they were getting themselves worked up about any sins they think they committed – why does that need us to get involved?”
“Well, we’ll soon find out, won’t we?” Blake replied bluntly.
They travelled in silence for a few more minutes, with the only sound in the car coming from the radio, which was in the middle of a weather report, warning of thunder and lightning coming from the south. Blake switched it off and crossed his arms.
“Any chance of me getting any co-operation from you with this?”
“I’m allowed an opinion, aren’t I?” Gardiner grunted in reply
“Yes, but you’re my sergeant. Second in command. That’s what I need, not somebody acting like a hormonal teenager.”
