A VOW OF PENANCE an utterly gripping crime mystery

by Black, Veronica

  He had obviously come in by way of the outer door and he departed the same way, not stopping to introduce himself to the community over a cup of coffee. Even Father Stephens came up to the refectory, she thought, and wondered if the new priest considered such small courtesies unnecessary.

  At least it wasn’t raining. She finished her early chores, took the shopping list that Sister Perpetua had written, and went out to the garage. One day they’d have to buy a new car since it was highly doubtful that this one would pass another MOT test. Settling herself behind the wheel, Sister Joan knew a short moment of regret. The old car had done good service.

  It was past ten by the time she had completed her purchases, stowed them in the boot, and set off briskly for the café where Sister Hilaria had once been persuaded into a cup of coffee. At this hour and on such a cold, grey day it was almost deserted. Certainly there was no sign yet of Mrs Fairly. Sister Joan ordered tea for two and poured herself a cup, keeping an eye out through the plate glass window where the street was filling with morning shoppers. One of them, a tall, dark man with a rugged aspect, paused as he caught sight of her, hesitated, then came in.

  ‘Good morning, Sister Joan. I thought they didn’t let you out during Lent.’

  ‘Detective Sergeant Mill, how nice to see you!’ She responded cordially to his firm handshake.

  ‘Busy as ever. Are you playing truant, Sister?’

  ‘Not guilty, Detective Sergeant Mill. I’m waiting for Mrs Fairly. She asked me to meet her here.’

  ‘When?’ His glance was suddenly keen.

  ‘At ten this morning but she’s a little late — oh, she telephoned the convent yesterday afternoon. Why?’

  ‘May I join you, Sister?’ He sat down and reached for the extra cup. ‘Was Mrs Fairly a particular friend of yours?’

  ‘We don’t have particular — you said “was”. Has something happened?’

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve just come from the presbytery,’ he said, pouring tea carefully. ‘Mrs Fairly was found this morning by Father Stephens. Suicide, I’m afraid. No doubt about it at all.’

  Five

  ‘Dead?’ Sister Joan’s hand rose automatically to bless herself as she uttered the word.

  ‘I’m afraid so, Sister. We were called in at seven this morning.’

  ‘Not the medical authorities?’ She sipped her tea trying to take in what had happened along with the soothingly hot liquid.

  ‘Father Stephens rang the station. He had dialled 999 and when the operator asked if he wanted Fire, Police or Ambulance he blurted out the latter two. I was on early call so I went along to the presbytery.’

  ‘And she was dead?’

  ‘Had been for several hours according to the doctor. Apparently she gets up around five-thirty every morning and gets everything ready for Father Malone and Father Stephens.’

  ‘One of them comes up to the convent to offer Mass at six-thirty in our chapel while the other offers a later Mass at seven-fifteen in the parish church,’ Sister Joan nodded. ‘The new priest, Father Timothy, was at the convent this morning.’

  ‘Father Stephens became anxious when six o’clock came and there was no sign of Mrs Fairly but he left it a further half-hour before he tried to rouse her. By then Father Timothy had already left for the convent. Father Stephens rang at once and we got there a couple of minutes ahead of the ambulance.’

  ‘You said — suicide?’ Sister Joan set down her cup and pressed her hands together tightly.

  ‘There was an empty bottle of Valium,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said. ‘It was on her bedside table. Apparently she was prescribed the drug about six years ago after her husband died to help her through the trauma. She went on taking it — no more than a couple of tablets a day but even that amount can become addictive.’

  ‘Then it could have been an accident,’ Sister Joan said eagerly. ‘It’s possible that continual use of a drug can cause it to pile up in the system, perhaps?’

  ‘Not Valium,’ he said. ‘Anyway she’d had her prescription renewed only a couple of days ago. There were forty tablets in the bottle. Father Stephens recalled her taking it out of her shopping bag when she brought in some groceries. She’d evidently crushed the lot into a paste and drunk them with tea and a splash of whisky.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘She was in the habit of adding a splash of whisky to her last cup of tea at night. She used to brew it in the kitchen and take it up to drink when she was in bed.’

  ‘Whisky and Valium aren’t very safe partners.’

  ‘She took two mild-strength tablets in the mornings and she had her tipple last thing at night by which time the drug would have passed through her system anyway. No, there were traces of the powdered tablets in the dregs of the tea and whisky. Nobody could have drunk that by accident.’

  ‘There wasn’t any note?’

  ‘Nothing at all. People don’t always leave notes behind, you know. Father Stephens said that she’d seemed distraite last evening. He got the impression that there was something she wanted to say to him but he was busy all evening telling the new priest about his parish duties so the opportunity didn’t arise.’

  ‘She wanted to speak to me,’ Sister Joan said. ‘She rang the convent and asked me if I was coming into town for any groceries this morning and, if so, would I meet her here for a chat.’

  ‘She didn’t mention what it was she wished to talk about?’

  ‘Something she’d remembered—’ Sister Joan hesitated. ‘Then the line started to crackle and she rang off. I asked Mother Dorothy for leave to meet her here and came along this morning.’

  ‘You said that you don’t have particular friends,’ Detective Sergeant Mill said, ‘but you know as well as I do that even nuns like some people more than others.’

  ‘I hardly knew Mrs Fairly at all,’ Sister Joan said. ‘Yesterday, after Father Malone’s send-off, I showed Father Timothy to the presbytery and she asked me in for a cup of tea before I went back to the convent. She seemed a nice, ordinary woman, rather proud of being housekeeper for the priests — not in a nasty way but being in that job does confer a certain status in the parish.’

  ‘Was she upset about Father Malone going away for a year?’

  ‘Well, naturally she was going to miss him — oh no!’ Sister Joan broke off, her dark blue eyes twinkling despite her distress at the news she had just heard. ‘If you’re thinking she had a crush on Father Malone, forget it. Contrary to popular myth housekeepers don’t fall in love with their priests, and Father Malone is scarcely likely to inspire an unrequited passion. No, she was sure that she was going to miss him but she was looking forward to having a newcomer to do things for and boss about. Fuss over, I ought to say. In a maternal sort of way. Certainly she wasn’t in any deep depression when I saw her yesterday.’

  ‘But she was — distraite when she spoke to you over the telephone?’

  ‘It was merely an impression I had. She sounded — uncertain, puzzled about something or other. Anyway we agreed to meet and then I had to go and ask for leave from Mother Dorothy.’

  ‘Make your arrangements and then ask for permission?’ His voice teased her.

  ‘It was an oversight,’ she said, her mouth quirking. ‘Anyway Mother Dorothy decided it was better to allow me to have my meeting rather than waste money on a phone call cancelling it, and there was always the possibility that I might have been able to help out in some way.’

  ‘Don’t blame yourself in this affair,’ he said quickly. ‘It isn’t your fault that she decided to put an end to herself.’

  ‘She couldn’t have committed suicide,’ Sister Joan said flatly. ‘I’m sorry, but I cannot possibly believe that for one moment.’

  ‘Because she was a Catholic? Sister, Catholics do sometimes commit suicide.’

  ‘Not Mrs Fairly.’ She spoke flatly and with conviction. ‘She wasn’t the type.’

  ‘How many suicides have you known personally, Sister?’

  ‘Non
e really. That makes no difference. Mrs Fairly didn’t commit suicide. She may have taken mild doses of Valium and she was certainly troubled about something but she wanted to talk about it with me. And she was fond of Father Malone; she’d not have been so selfish as to kill herself the instant his back was turned.’

  ‘Then you’re saying she was murdered?’

  He spoke mildly enough but the word made an ugly pattern in the air.

  ‘No, of course not! That’s completely ridiculous!’ she said sharply.

  ‘As you say.’ He finished his tea and rose, bringing out a handful of change.

  ‘I was the one ordered the tea,’ she began.

  ‘And I helped you to drink it. I’ll put it on the expense account. How are they up at the convent?’

  ‘Very well, thank you. We have a new lay sister. Sister Jerome.’

  ‘And what job are you doing at the moment?’

  ‘General dogsbody,’ she said lightly. ‘I help out where I’m needed.’

  ‘I’m almost sorry that I won’t be needing your help in this affair,’ he said.

  ‘You make it sound as if I was permanently attached to the local police force.’

  ‘Not at all,’ he said easily. ‘You’re a religious with no criminal expertise at all, but when there’s something to be discovered you do seem to be in the right place at the right time.’

  ‘Mother Dorothy would call it the wrong place at the wrong time.’

  ‘And what would you call it?’ he challenged.

  ‘An interruption to my spiritual progress,’ she said firmly.

  And excitement to lift her spirits when the day-to-day routine became too tedious to endure. The incisive conversation of a man instead of the bland chatter of the daily recreation. The opportunity to re-enter, however obliquely, the world she had renounced.

  ‘It was nice seeing you again,’ she said, denying the thoughts bubbling up in her. ‘I’m very sorry to learn about Mrs Fairly. I will tell Mother Dorothy though I expect Father Stephens will have already telephoned her. Do you know if she had any family?’

  ‘A niece. Father Stephens said he would inform her of her aunt’s death. The body has been taken to the mortuary by the way.’

  ‘For an autopsy? Then you do think—?’

  ‘As a matter of routine. Attempts were made to revive her in the ambulance but she’d been dead for several hours. It was straightforward suicide, Sister. The inquest will be a routine matter. “Suicide while the balance of the mind was disturbed” probably.’

  ‘Very neat and tidy,’ Sister Joan said. ‘Thank you for the tea, Sergeant.’ She went out ahead of him, turning briefly to smile before she walked swiftly back to her car.

  Detective Sergeant Mill was an irritant in her existence. She liked him, respected his professionalism, had helped him out more than once, but the rigid line she drew between them, though of her own making, only served to remind her that she was not free to respond to any overture of affection no matter how innocent. He had mentioned once that he had two boys and that his marriage was unhappy but she hadn’t invited any further confidences and he had offered none. She hoped he had sorted out his marital difficulties but knew she would never enquire.

  Driving back across the moor, automatically changing gears, swerving to avoid a reckless young rabbit, she found her thoughts occupied with Mrs Fairly. Twenty-four hours before the housekeeper had been a living, breathing, human being and now she was bone and flesh laid on a mortuary slab, the tag of ‘Suicide’ already being applied to her. A middle-aged, respectable, Catholic woman whose small faults had been as nothing set against the wickedness of the world had suddenly and unaccountably become agitated and depressed and killed herself with a huge overdose of Valium crushed into a paste and mixed with tea and whisky. Such things did sometimes happen. But not this time. Not this time! Her every instinct told her that this suicide was too neat, too — convenient for somebody? What was it that Mrs Fairly had said exactly over that crackling telephone line? Something about the new lay—? New lay sister? Sister Jerome? She banged her fist on the rim of the driving wheel as the words that Mrs Fairly had used, not over the telephone, but as she was seeing her out of the presbytery returned to her. Mrs Fairly said she’d read about Sister Jerome somewhere, but couldn’t recall exactly where. If she didn’t think too hard about it the answer would come to her. And then it had apparently come and she’d wanted to discuss the matter with someone.

  ‘Only she didn’t get the chance,’ Sister Joan said aloud.

  And she wasn’t going to get the chance to pursue the subject. There were no suspicious circumstances accompanying the death, no chance of it having been an accident, no way she could think of in which a healthy, vigorous woman could have been forced to swallow such a concoction.

  An unwelcome thought struck her as she drove through the gates. Was it possible that she craved the excitement of a possible murder? The notion was disquieting in the extreme since it clashed with all her longings for a peaceful, uncluttered life.

  ‘Your first loyalty must be to God, the second to the rule of our order, the third to the rest of your community, the rest to those, whether lay or religious, who seek your help or would profit from your prayers.’

  She could hear the beautifully modulated tones of Mother Agnes, visualize her former superior’s grave, Gothic features. That had been when she herself had been a postulant and what one learned as a postulant formed the kernel of the whole fruit of one’s future religious life. Edging the car round into the garage Sister Joan wished she had a simpler, less cluttered personality. For the other sisters priorities seemed clear. For herself there was always the inner conflict.

  ‘You were a very long time, Sister,’ Mother Dorothy said, coming out of the back door as Sister Joan lugged in the groceries.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mother. I waited for Mrs Fairly but Detective Sergeant Mill was passing by the café and came in to tell me what had happened.’ ‘Father Stephens was good enough to telephone me about twenty minutes ago,’ Mother Dorothy said. Behind her gold-coloured spectacles her eyes were troubled. ‘I only knew Mrs Fairly very slightly but the news shocked me greatly. Do you think her request for a meeting with you this morning was linked with whatever was preying on her mind?’

  I’ve no idea, Mother. It’s possible, but she didn’t seem to me to have something so serious on her mind that it would lead her to do such a thing.’

  ‘Let me help you with the bags, Sister.’ The Prioress relieved her of a large one and looked at it critically. ‘Plastic has its detractors, I understand,’ she said, ‘but these make excellent growbags for Sister Martha’s vegetables and fruit bushes. Let Sister Jerome put the groceries away and come through to the parlour.’

  Sister Jerome who was on her knees, cleaning the oven as vigorously as if she were punishing it, rose silently and took the bags, lifting them without apparent effort on to the kitchen table. Sister Joan lingered to take off her cloak and her overshoes before following the Prioress.

  ‘Sit down, Sister.’ Mother Dorothy indicated a stool and herself took the high-backed chair reserved for the Prioress. She had held the post now for nearly two years and in three more would be replaced by whichever one of her sisters was voted for by the others.

  ‘Since you have already learned from Detective Sergeant Mill of the recent sad and shocking event there is no need for me to discuss the details with you,’ Mother Dorothy was continuing. ‘I’m sure if you had any information bearing on the matter you would have passed it on to Detective Sergeant Mill. I shall merely inform the rest of the community that Mrs Fairly, whom few of them even knew by sight, has died suddenly and we will, of course, offer the customary prayers. I must say that I was exceedingly shocked when Father Stephens told me what had happened. I feel particularly sorry for Father Malone.’

  ‘Is he to be told?’ Sister Joan looked up sharply.

  ‘Father Stephens feels and I agree with him that it would serve no good purpose to spoil Fa
ther’s pleasure in his trip by telling him yet especially as there is nothing he can do that cannot be done equally well by others. In a month or two, by which time he may well have begun to wonder why he hasn’t heard anything from Mrs Fairly, Father Stephens will write and tell him what has occurred. If it were a death as the result of a sudden illness, an accident even, then one might not mind for him so much, but he will blame himself for not having realized the poor woman was so near desperation. It must have been a brainstorm surely.’

  ‘I don’t think Mrs Fairly did kill herself,’ Sister Joan said.

  There was a little silence. Mother Dorothy took off her spectacles, wiped them carefully, replaced them on her snub nose, and folded her hands on the flat-topped desk before her.

  ‘I assume you have a good reason for asserting that?’ she said.

  ‘Not really, Mother.’ Sister Joan flushed slightly. ‘I hadn’t exchanged more than a brief greeting with Mrs Fairly until yesterday morning and even then we only had a few words. She gave me a cup of tea while she was putting on some extra breakfast for Father Timothy, but she was so — so ordinary, and stolid, and cheerful. Even when she rang me up she didn’t sound in the least desperate, merely a little puzzled and perturbed—’

  ‘About what?’

  Sister Joan’s rosy cheeks grew rosier. To have told Mother Dorothy that Mrs Fairly believed she knew where she had seen Sister Jerome’s name before would be to focus attention on the newcomer which might be quite unjustified since what Mrs Fairly had remembered might have no bearing on her death.

  ‘She wasn’t very clear,’ she said at last, substituting the essence of truth for its literal meaning. ‘The line was crackling and so I said I would meet her if possible and she rang off.’

  ‘What makes you so certain that she didn’t take the drug overdose deliberately then?’ Mother Dorothy asked.

  ‘I don’t know, Mother.’ Sister Joan spread her hands helplessly. ‘I suppose that, like you, I find it painful to contemplate that someone could reach such a pitch of despair that they would throw away the life God gave them, but there’s something else. Mrs Fairly was a splendidly caring housekeeper — Father Malone used to joke that she fussed over him and Father Stephens too much, but he did appreciate her good qualities and — well, I just can’t believe that she would wait until Father Malone had just embarked upon a wonderful series of pilgrimages, and then run the risk of spoiling it all for him by killing herself. She wasn’t so selfish!’