Still, what isn’t all right is poor old F.O. The policeman Samson, the puny one, has really messed things up again and I’m worried that this time the vicar’s luck will run out – and then we shall all be in the cart. And apart from anything else, I shan’t get my GRUB! I’ll be skinny like Maurice and waste away. Maybe I should start stocking up in case of a siege – perhaps make a midnight raid on Mavis Briggs’s dustbin … or on second thoughts, perhaps not. She’s got a mind like a hamster and eats like one too: the last time I had a nose round there were only mangy lettuce leaves – no good for a growing fellow like me. Have to think of somewhere else. I’ll ask Maurice, he’s bound to have an opinion.
But I’m feeling sleepy now. Could do with a lie-down in my basket next to the boiler in the kitchen, but F.O.’s in there cooking … well, if you call hammering away at tins and throwing soup and jelly all over the shop ‘cooking’. So maybe I’ll just slip down to the crypt instead and give the spiders a nasty turn. They won’t like that but I will. Can’t let them have it all their own way!
4
The Vicar’s Version
The day after Samson’s visit I had to go into Guildford to negotiate terms with the parish magazine’s new printer. I am not very good at negotiating, and although I think I managed a fair deal, I had found the whole process wearying. The Angel and its cream cakes beckoned, and I spent a restful hour ensconced on one of the capacious leather sofas with newspapers and coffee éclairs. However, all good things come to an end, and reluctantly I paid the bill and made a move.
Emerging from the hotel, I encountered Theodore Pick, rector of St Hilda’s in the neighbouring parish. He was meandering along draped in his usual pall of gloom, but greeted me cheerfully enough and offered congratulations on my recent appointment as canon.
‘Well, yes, it did come as rather a surprise,’ I acknowledged, ‘and of course it’s non-stipendiary so it doesn’t exactly swell the coffers. Still, at least that means they won’t foist further jobs on me. Bit of a sinecure really: modest status without responsibility!’ And I gave a jovial laugh.
‘Huh,’ he observed darkly, ‘they’ll find something for you. They always do.’ (Typical of Pick, I thought, casts a cloud over everything!) ‘Besides,’ he added, ‘you’ll still be required to deliver the annual Canonical Address at the cathedral in front of the Lord Lieutenant and his satellites, and there’s bound to be the usual three-line whip for us all to attend.’
‘Oh, that!’ I exclaimed blithely. ‘That’s months away yet …’
‘Ah,’ he replied, ‘but it will hang over you, you’ll see: finding a theme, researching the stuff, polishing your delivery. It’s a big occasion – not just a common or garden sermon, you know. Nearly drove Dewlap to a breakdown the first time he did his. But daresay you’ll survive … Still, must be on my way now. Nice talking to you, Oughterard. Always a tonic!’ And so saying, he loped off in the direction of the undertakers.
I stared after him irritably. Trust Pick to enliven things! And then I thought bitterly that if surviving the lecture were the only thing I had to worry about I should be a happy man. There were other matters pending of a rather more crucial nature … A police car glided by and I scuttled into a shop doorway like a startled rabbit.
Back in the refuge of the vicarage, I first sought solace at the piano and then ease with a gin on the sofa. Maurice and Bouncer were together in front of the fire, the one toying with his woollen mouse, the other sprawled on the carpet, chin resting on the beloved rubber ring. He seemed unusually still and I wondered what was going on behind the fronds of fringe and between those shaggy ears.
However, the cerebral processes of my dog were soon displaced by other thoughts. How, for example, should I prepare myself for the inevitable visit from March and Samson? Their previous investigations had been irksome enough: this time it would be far worse and I quailed at the prospect. How would they proceed? What line would they take? Which aspects of my story would they require ‘clarifying’? I brooded.
Eventually I reluctantly concluded that I should have to contact Nicholas Ingaza. The police were bound to rake up the matter of the binoculars, and it was imperative that my corroborator stuck to his story: any deviation in that area would be pounced upon immediately. But Nicholas’s reliability was problematic and he would need to be primed and courted. Gloomily I went to the telephone and dialled.
On the few occasions that I had previously rung Nicholas I had been greeted by the rasping tones of his cockney companion Eric, and in preparation for the blast I positioned the receiver accordingly, i.e. a few inches away from my ear. But rather to my surprise it was Nicholas himself who answered, and I adjusted the phone to catch the faint tones of his nasal drawl.
‘What brings you to the blower, dear boy? Changed your mind about coming down to Brighton? Lindisfarne lost its charm to the lure of the bright lights?’
‘Er, no, not really,’ I muttered. ‘It’s to do with that little matter of last year … the, er, binoculars …’
There was a pause. ‘Oh yes?’
‘Yes. You see, for some peculiar reason the police are raking things up again about that unfortunate murder case, and there’s a remote possibility that they might want to interview me again – along with everyone else of course,’ I added hastily.
‘Of course.’
‘So I thought I’d just, uhm …’
‘Get me to go over my story with you? To ensure no loose ends are hanging about, that sort of thing?’ He sounded smoothly affable, but long experience of Ingaza told me that this was not necessarily a comfort.
‘Yes, that’s it … well, more or less. I mean, you know how obsessive the police can get about things and then go off at absurd tangents. Ridiculous really!’
‘I remember,’ he said drily.
Yes, he would remember. Doing time for the Jermyn Street Turkish bath episode would have honed his memory to perfection – just as my unfortunate incident in Foxford Wood had filed mine …
I cleared my throat. ‘So perhaps it might be an idea if you were to come up here again – stay the night of course, like last time – and we could sort of go over things. I’ll get some drink in,’ I added enticingly.
‘Fine by me, old chap. But I take it this time your Mavis friend won’t be paying us a visit – don’t think my nerves could stand a second performance!’
I winced at the recollection. Mavis Briggs – every parish’s genteel nightmare – had indeed paid us a visit; and under the impression that Ingaza was a passing archdeacon (as recounted in my previous volume), and despite assuring us that she was a stranger to the grape, had proceeded to imbibe the greater part of Nicholas’s best brandy at the rate of knots. In their sedate way the results had been spectacular, and clearly still rankled with the owner of the lost cognac.
Thus I assured him that no such interruption was likely, and that in any case the said lady was currently laid up with a bad leg. (Mavis is frequently laid up with something or other, but the leg business seemed more protracted than usual and I could thus speak with confidence.)
There was a gap in the parish diary; and grasping this lull in my schedule, I hastily pencilled in his arrival for two days hence. This was a relief, for although Ingaza’s proximity is a dubious pleasure, it at least meant that I could fully rehearse him for the inevitable enquiries. Second time around, precision was vital!
He arrived a little before six o’clock, his svelte frame clad in its usual passé chalk-stripe, and right hand sporting an even flashier signet ring than usual. I was glad to note that this time the vintage Citroën was parked neatly at the kerb and not, as on the previous visit, spreadeagled halfway across the pavement impeding everyone – not least Mavis Briggs whose ineffectual efforts to get round it had lent additional woe to an already fraught evening.
The preliminaries over and his things deposited in the spare room, my guest returned downstairs and I offered him whisky. At first neither of us said a word about the purpose of his visi
t, and we talked in generalities – his journey up from Brighton, runners for the National, the weather and the price of coal. Gradually, however, as the whisky did its work, the mood relaxed and Nicholas embarked on a series of anecdotes involving what I took to be the more legitimate end of his art-dealing business. He tactfully made no mention of the recent Spendler fiasco from which I was still smarting,* and I was soothed and amused by some of his more bizarre (and probably embroidered) tales. He had always been a diverting raconteur, and glancing at the clock I was surprised to see how late it was getting.
‘Goodness, past supper time and I haven’t even opened the wine!’
I went into the kitchen, hastily heated up the stew and tried to draw the cork from the Fleurie. It was not what you would call a deft movement, but after much wrenching and gouging I finally managed to pull it out, and put the bottle on the table. Preoccupied with the cork I hadn’t noticed Nicholas enter, and when I looked up he was lounging in the doorway, whisky in hand and grinning sardonically.
‘Cack-handed as ever, Francis! Don’t know how you manage to play the piano so well. One of life’s little mysteries, I suppose … And talking of which, when are you going to tell me more about this police business? It all strikes me as pretty fishy – in fact it’s been fishy right from the start when you asked me to perjure myself over those field glasses. Never could really grasp what was going on.’ And taking a chair at the table he reached for the bottle and poured himself a liberal glass.
‘Nothing fishy at all,’ I protested, doling out the stew and mash. ‘I told you at the time it was all just a stupid misunderstanding. And besides, I did not ask you to perjure yourself, merely to support me when the police started their absurd snoopings.’
‘And now they’re at it again and you’re shit scared.’
‘I am not sh … I am not scared! Merely anxious to avoid further involvement in this ridiculous affair. I have a parish to run and it wouldn’t look good should it ever be thought that the newly promoted canon was among the key witnesses in a murder case, let alone on the list of possible suspects! Unfair to the Church, you know.’
‘Oh, absolutely,’ he agreed solemnly.
I poured us both some more wine, heaped up his plate, and began to recapitulate the details of the binoculars and his particular part in the tale.
When I had finished, he said, ‘Oh, don’t you worry, dear boy, I shan’t mess up my version. Went very smoothly last time, wouldn’t you say? You can always rely on Old Nick!’
I was not exactly reassured, but those in tight corners must perforce trust what is on offer. So after a final run-through of the ‘script’, we finished supper, and at Nicholas’s behest opened another bottle (which I had been foolishly hoping to keep for a later occasion). We took it with us into the sitting room where we smoked his Sobranies and reminisced a little about St Bede’s. And then feeling suddenly expansive, I treated him to a brief display of my uncack-handed piano playing: a bit of Ellington, some blues, a dash of Ivor Novello – and remembering his particular penchant at St Bede’s, concluded with Coward’s ‘Mad About the Boy’.
‘Just occasionally, Francis, you can deliver the goods,’ he murmured appreciatively. And sleeking his hair in that characteristic way, he gave what I can only describe as a wistful smirk.
And then it happened: the drink, I suppose – we had consumed quantities – and of course I had been under a dreadful strain for months, and in the end it must have taken its toll.
Anyway, I told him. The whole damn lot. I sat there smoking my head off and staring at the ceiling while the words just came pouring out. I didn’t seem able to stop them … funny really. On and on I went, every detail and mannerism: her voice, her absurdities, that awful ruthless sweetness, the deluge of invitations and coy innuendoes, the gurgling laugh and simpering affectation – and above all the remorseless, inescapable intrusion of privacy. I told him about my walk in the woods and the blissful solitude, the sense of sanctuary and blessed repose … the silence, the rabbits hopping among the bluebells, the soft cooing of the wood pigeon, and the scent of moss. And then her – suddenly rearing up out of God knows where, clutching my arm, giggling, jabbering, braying; putting the doves to flight, scattering the rabbits … And then I told him everything else.
The moment the words ceased I was paralysed with shock, aghast at what had been said. The drink, which must have prompted my outburst, had entirely evaporated and I was suddenly appallingly sober.
There was a long silence, while I continued to stare fixedly at the ceiling. And then he said thoughtfully, ‘Bit rash of you, if you don’t mind my saying. I mean, a pretty wild gamble, if you ask me. Didn’t think, I suppose.’ He sighed.
‘No,’ I agreed faintly, ‘I don’t suppose I did –’
‘That’s your trouble,’ he cut in severely, ‘always was. I remember watching you play chess at St Bede’s. Hadn’t a clue how to cope! Painful to behold!’ And he winced as if in recollection. ‘No forward planning, that’s your problem. Far too easily rattled. It was just the same with those paintings – a right pig’s ear you made of it all!’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said meekly, still too stunned by what had been revealed to think of anything more pertinent.
‘Oh, don’t apologize!’ he exclaimed magnanimously. ‘Daresay you’ve got rather more on your mind than the paintings fiasco – especially now that they’ve reopened the case. Quite a little facer, that one!’
‘Yes, quite,’ I replied, beginning to feel very tired.
‘Still, shouldn’t worry too much. It’ll probably be all right in the end – you never know what’s round the corner!’
‘I know exactly what is round the corner,’ I cried, the numbness fading, ‘Albert Pierrepoint and his noose!’
‘Shouldn’t bank on it, old cock. Many a slip ’twixt rope and neck etc., etc.’
‘For Christ’s sake, Nicholas, stop being so sodding cheerful! I’m in one hell of a mess and all you can do is spout gross platitudes. Why are you taking it so lightly!’
‘Because, Francis,’ he enunciated slowly, ‘one of us needs to keep a cool head and it clearly won’t be you. Really, dear boy – haven’t heard such language since I last took Aunt Lil to the dog track at Kemp Town. Raised the roof, she did, and now you’re at it as well. Most unseemly for a parson!’ And he gave one of his nasal titters.
‘So’s murder,’ I muttered.
He was silent for a moment, and then pouring himself the dregs of the wine said musingly, ‘Yes, you do rather surprise me there. Would never have thought you had it in you … after all, anyone less like an assassin it would be hard to imagine. Better watch my back, hadn’t I!’ And he gave a crack of laughter.
I was hardly able to share his mirth; and in any case, thought the remark in rather poor taste but didn’t like to say so, being relieved that he hadn’t made a drama of it all. There was enough drama as it was without Ingaza adding his pennyworth.
‘Anyway,’ he continued blandly, ‘I’m for bed. It’s been a most interesting day, Francis, most interesting. In fact,’ he added, ‘I haven’t had such an interesting day for a long, long time.’ With a mocking grin he got up from the chair and moved towards the door where he paused and, giving a slow wink, drawled, ‘Well, well, what d’you know! What do you know!’ And so saying he disappeared up the stairs.
It was a dreadful night. I slept for perhaps twenty minutes, and for the rest of the time tossed from back to front and left to right, trying vainly to achieve some repose, some oblivion. Neither was forthcoming and I replayed endlessly the words of that incontinent confession. What on earth had possessed me to pour it out like that, babbling into Ingaza’s sharp and predatory ears? For eighteen months I had nursed the secret: kept it safe and hidden, hugged to my chest, securely zipped and fastened. And now, unprompted, uncued, in a matter of a mere ten minutes, I had divulged the whole damn lot. And of all people, to Nicholas Ingaza! What idiocy, what ineptitude! And echoing down the years I could hear m
y father’s scathing tones as yet again I missed a trick at the family card table – ‘Buffoon, boy, buffoon!’
The buffoon got out of bed, lit a cigarette, and standing at the open window gazed across at the churchyard’s dark and looming trees. One thing was a blessing at any rate: at least she wasn’t buried out there! St Elspeth’s at Guildford had had that privilege; and for a brief moment I gave thanks for the ghastly daughter, Violet Pond, who, having a rooted dislike of Molehill, had been so insistent that her mother’s remains be interred in the adjacent parish.
The next morning breakfast began neutrally. It ended less so. Surprisingly, given the previous night’s intake of alcohol, neither of us had a hangover; and my guest talked fulsomely of how well he had slept (unlike the host), the comfort of the bed, and the pleasures of waking to the sound of birdsong. I was a little sceptical of that last comment, feeling that Ingaza’s sensibilities, such as they were, were unlikely to be stirred by the fluting of birds. Presumably he was trying to be tactful after my intemperate revelation. I was grateful for that, and thus relieved busied myself with boiling the eggs while he parleyed with the cat and then applied himself to the coffee and newspapers.
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