Crime in the Convent

by Catherine Moloney

  ‘Someone could’ve been hiding in one of these cubbyhole jobbies … waiting for him,’ Noakes murmured. ‘Whoever it was could have made a grab … whisked him off his feet.’

  Markham nodded slowly.

  ‘Yes, I think that may well be what happened, Noakes. He was slight … easily overpowered if taken by surprise. Father Reynolds wouldn’t have noticed a thing.’ The DI’s voice was taut and hard. ‘It was the ideal place for an ambush. Too big a risk to take him down in his room – if there was a struggle, someone might have heard. But this way …’

  ‘But where did our man put him? I mean, you couldn’t just go trundling around the place with a body …’

  ‘Look here, Noakes.’ Markham drew the DS across to a neat chrome door beside Father Calvert’s room. ‘Tell me what you see.’

  ‘Bloody Nora. A lift.’

  ‘Yes, Sergeant. And we’re going to see where it goes.’

  He raised his hand in a gesture of such peremptory authority, that none of the three men at the other end of the corridor made any attempt to follow, standing stock still in the same attitude as before. Indeed, they might have been turned to stone for all the animation they displayed. But even at a distance, Markham could sense the rector’s mouth drawn in pain and the haunted eyes of a man in torment.

  The little service elevator worked perfectly, taking Markham and Noakes down to a cool basement area where a door led into the garden.

  Again, the smell of wood-smoke came to the DI’s nostrils.

  But it was acrid, thick and sulphurous, not sweet and tangy as he remembered from his first visit. It made him gag.

  Suddenly, his mind leaped without any goading. The bonfire in the garden.

  Afterwards, all he remembered was a sight which by-passed his eyes and lodged deep in his chest, pitching him forwards into a nightmare of unimaginable horror.

  The bonfire was still smouldering and, half-hidden by a log, was what had once been a man.

  There could be no mistake.

  It lay arched on its back like a charcoaled boomerang, arms and legs flexed in the awful pugilist pose characteristic of such a holocaust. The shrivelled blackened head was unrecognizable, but Markham knew instinctively he was looking at all that remained of gentle, sorrowful Father Austin Calvert.

  12

  Revelations

  ‘“DEATH IS MAN’S SHEPHERD. He will fall headlong into the grave, his face eaten away, and the underworld will be his dwelling place.”’

  Doug ‘Dimples’ Davidson, the police pathologist, turned from his examination of the blackened remains on the bonfire, looking askance at the cassock-clad figure circling the bonfire’s embers.

  Brother Malachy, the lay brother who acted as St Cecilia’s caretaker, was oblivious to everything but the Office of the Dead.

  ‘Get him out of here can you, Sergeant. I know they’ve got their own way of doing things but …’ An eloquent shrug of the shoulders. ‘Where’d he pop up from anyway?’

  ‘He’s the monastery handyman … Whatchamacallit … Must have been in the garden somewhere and smelt it.’

  Gently, by a combination of arm and shoulder, Noakes endeavoured to steer Brother Malachy away from the gruesome spectacle.

  ‘C’mon, mate, er, Brother … you can’t do anything for him now and you’re only going to upset yourself.’

  But for all his frail appearance – skinny and bespectacled, with tufts of white hair dotting his scalp like a ragged crest – Brother Malachy proved surprisingly difficult to shift. Tripping over his long cassock, he continued to mutter biblical incantations.

  Suddenly, to the DS’s horror, the old man broke away and tried to fling himself on the charred remains.

  ‘Can’t you give him a shot, doc?’ Noakes panted, pinioning the old man. ‘You must have summat in your bag of tricks.’

  The pathologist moved surprisingly quickly for such a stocky man.

  In a matter of seconds, the contents of a syringe had been emptied into Brother Malachy who promptly slumped forward in Noakes’s arms.

  Thank fuck for that, Noakes thought, primed to dive into what looked like a sluice room adjoining the basement area next to which the bonfire was smouldering. Little more than a cobwebby cubbyhole, with mops and buckets askew next to drug packaging and pharmacy-labelled boxes; two stainless steel sinks suggested it functioned as an extension of the infirmary.

  At that moment, Markham appeared around the corner, followed by the infirmarian and a gangling tow-headed novice. Brother Christopher seized up the situation in a glance. Without a word, he nodded to the younger man who moved up on one side of Brother Malachy while he took the other. Between them, they half walked half carried the sparrow-like figure away.

  Noakes gave a convulsive shudder, his eyes glassy.

  ‘God,’ he said at last, rivulets of sweat making grubby tracks down his face. ‘That was terrible. I thought he was going to kiss it.’

  ‘I imagine the poor fellow had some idea of anointing Father Calvert, Noakes.’

  Dr Davidson looked across at the tall aloof figure with the all-seeing gaze. Reverence for murder victims was ingrained in Markham, a characteristic which set him apart from his colleagues in CID with their gallows humour and off-colour jokes. Watching as the DI stood contemplating the smouldering embers, Davidson knew that his calm eyes saw not the ruined shell of the dead man but Father Austin Calvert as he had been in life.

  Noakes didn’t want to see what the flames had done. But he had to ask. ‘Was he … was he alive when he went into the fire?’

  Dimples looked at him kindly, squatting down next to the grotesquely calcified bones and detritus.

  ‘It’s my belief he was deeply unconscious from a heavy blow to the back of the head, Sergeant.’

  ‘But that … that …’ Noakes struggled to get the words out.

  ‘The heat made the muscles contract, that’s why the body’s bent back and splayed. Like those corpses from Pompeii.’

  The DS was not an imaginative man, but he couldn’t banish the image of the priest – sightless, eyeless, the head a blackened blob and flesh dropping off decomposing fingers – capering through the flames like some demon in hell … smelling his flesh as it cooked … an odour not of bubbling pork but something far more horrible.

  The doctor read Noakes’s thoughts. Bluff, brisk and ruddycheeked, more farmer than sawbones, his no-nonsense tones were those of a man accustomed to dismissing flights of fancy.

  ‘He won’t have felt a thing, Sergeant. There’s enough of the skull left to see that he took a massive blow to the back of his head. He was well and truly out of it when dumped here.’

  Noakes swallowed hard, thinking of wafer-thin Father Austin Calvert with his air of gentle unworldliness. He was surprised by the strength of his relief that death had come to the priest in friendly guise instead of a grisly phantom.

  Markham wheeled round.

  ‘So, the assailant would have assumed he was already dead?’

  ‘Don’t quote me, but yes, I’d say that’s how it happened.’

  The two men looked at each other for a long moment. Then the pathologist got to his feet.

  ‘Right, Markham, we can move him now unless …’ He paused, with a look of delicate enquiry towards the monastery.

  The DI hesitated. He knew the community would want to say prayers over the body – perform the last rites for a departed soul. But he strongly suspected something evil was at work in St Cecilia’s, something that would make it a profanation to gather Father Calvert’s confrères about his ravaged corpse.

  ‘No, Doc,’ he replied. ‘In the circumstances, I think it’s better if we just get on with it. Can you do the necessary?’

  Davidson already had his mobile out. ‘Go and take a turn round the garden. Clear your heads. I’ll see to things here.’

  Noakes’s face was putty-coloured as he and the DI directed their steps towards the alley of chestnut trees at the far end of the garden. Midway along the alley,
a break in the trees gave access to a low wicket leading to the rear cloister garth. Gratefully, they seated themselves on an oak bench at the farthest end of the cool unroofed passage. Through arched quatrefoils they could see the garden, but mercifully not the bonfire which was hidden from sight round a bend at the far end of the lawn.

  An intoxicating fragrance of gillyflowers, jasmine and climbing roses floated up towards them from a flowerbed beneath the red brick wall, although it could not completely mask the pyre’s reeking stench. The canopy of chestnuts glowed vivid as fire against the gently unfurling day.

  Morning has broken, like the first morning. Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird.

  But the silence in Father Calvert’s ear was never more to be broken.

  ‘That stink,’ Noakes stuttered eventually, the big paws clenching and unclenching on his lap. ‘How come they didn’t notice it?’

  ‘Oh, they did, Sergeant, but at first they just thought it was Brother Malachy disposing of wildlife.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Apparently, he’s been known to dispose of the odd fox and other vermin on occasion. Likes a good blaze, according to Brother Christopher.’

  Noakes looked sick.

  ‘And he’s the caretaker. Jesus, Mary and Joseph.’

  ‘Does a good job most of the time. But he has … well … phases.’

  ‘He’s a fucking menace, that’s what he is.’ The DS spoke with feeling.

  ‘They only noticed he’d gone wandering around the same time Brother Christopher raised the alarm about Father Calvert. The rector decided they should stay together until we arrived, so at least that way he knew where everyone was.’

  ‘Thank God one of ’em’s got his head screwed on.’

  Noakes’s eyes returned, as though drawn by a magnet, to the far end of the garden.

  ‘I don’t think I’ll ever get the sight out of my head … I mean, Guv … how are they going to get it into a coffin?’

  ‘Dimples’ll deal with it, Noakes,’ the DI replied, not without an inward tremor at the thought of the doctor breaking the skeleton’s rigor.

  Oddly enough, Markham did not share Noakes’s repugnance. Father Calvert’s outflung corpse had somehow reminded him of the statue of St Cecilia in the church’s shrine, as poignant in its death throes as the figure of the little recumbent martyr. His lips barely moving, the DI dredged up a long-forgotten prayer from the recesses of his subconscious.

  In the hour of your death, may Christ and his saints lead you into paradise, Amen.

  It was the best he could do.

  ‘Eh up. We’ve got company.’ The DS’s voice interrupted Markham’s reflections.

  Watching the youthful figure in clerical collar walking lightly towards them, Markham had a shrewd idea of the newcomer’s identity.

  ‘Mr Lightwood, I presume,’ he said cordially, his hand extended. ‘Curate at St Peter and St Paul,’ he added by way of explanation to Noakes, whose posture suggested he was ready to repel intruders.

  ‘Please forgive my barging in on you like this, Inspector.’ The other’s manner was diffident as though he was unsure of his reception. ‘The constable on duty at the front gate let me through.’

  ‘How did you hear?’

  ‘Oh, the vicar’s wife Mrs Crane has an infallible bush telegraph. News spreads like wildfire in our neck of the woods.’

  Abruptly realizing what he had said, Lightwood flushed to the roots of his blond hair. ‘I’m sorry … poor choice of words.’

  ‘Think nothing of it.’ There was something frank and open about the man. Markham could see immediately why Olivia had liked him.

  He gestured to the bench. ‘Have a seat, Mr Lightwood.’

  Noakes, meanwhile, remained standing, as though they had the young curate in custody and he feared the clergyman might make a bolt for it.

  Markham eyed him closely.

  ‘You didn’t come here just to bring spiritual comfort, though. Something’s troubling you, isn’t it? Care to tell us what?’

  A look of relief washed over Lightwood’s face.

  In a cultured, melodious voice – only a faint Northern underlay beneath the Oxford accent – he began to pour out the whole story.

  Batty McDermott. A conversation overheard in St Cecilia’s. Confession to murder. Rumours of fraud.

  The DI listened attentively. Noakes’s shaggy eyebrows shot up as high as they could go, his eyes riveted to the young man’s face. There was summat about the lad reminded him of Olivia Mullen. Dreamy looking and the same arty-farty way of talking. But he seemed respectable enough, and a clergyman to boot. You could trust C of E padres to be gentlemen, he reckoned. The chaplain from his army days had been a decent sort. Nothing nambypamby or peculiar. Not like that lot in the monastery … though, of course, he was hardly seeing them at their best what with the recent tragedies. Any road, this curate chap looked a decent type. Noakes reckoned he could spot a phoney at a hundred paces and this young fella wasn’t it.

  ‘How did the community react when you visited?’

  The young curate had come calling, and the next thing Father Calvert was dead. Was there something in that encounter which sealed the priest’s fate?

  Lightwood ruminated.

  ‘I just met the rector and Father Calvert. All pretty innocuous, though it got a bit frosty when I gave them my spiel about Batty,’ he said. ‘Though, hold on a moment … There was something else, now that I remember … Father Calvert had a bit of turn just before we went over to the shrine. Was staring at me like he’d seen a ghost.’ He looked anxiously at Markham. ‘I put it down to the heat, Inspector … d’you think it could be significant?’

  ‘I’m not sure how.’ Markham looked thoughtfully at the other’s expressive profile. ‘What were you doing when Father Calvert had this dizzy spell or whatever it was?’

  ‘Nothing … we were just waiting for Father Hassett to find his keys. I heard Father Calvert gasp. He clutched at his chest as though he was short of breath. His eyes sort of widened, then looked from me to the wall and back again.’

  Noakes leaned forward curiously. ‘What was so special about the wall?’

  ‘Well, nothing at all.’ Lightwood sounded baffled. ‘It was just the usual … you know, dodgy holy pictures, group photographs.’ He pulled a face. ‘Typical presbytery décor. We’re equally downmarket at the vicarage, so I’m in no position to gloat.’

  ‘Did the rector notice whatever it was?’ the DS persisted stubbornly.

  ‘I think he was just concerned about Father Calvert. Gave me a hard stare …’ Lightwood grimaced. ‘Probably trying to signal that I’d outstayed my welcome.’

  ‘What happened after that, Mr Lightwood?’

  There was a missing piece of the puzzle, but for the life of him Markham couldn’t think what.

  ‘We just went over to the church so I could have a peek at the vaults under the shrine.’ The curate looked shamefaced. ‘I’d built it up a bit in my mind,’ he said. ‘Thought it would be spooky and gothic … all Fall of the House of Usher. But it was quite ordinary … just your average crypt.’

  The DI’s eyes never left his face.

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘No, it was only a whistle-stop tour. They didn’t open the grille to the second vault – the one where all the valuables are stored. And I felt awkward about asking … didn’t want to act nosy and suspicious like I thought the rector was some sort of Abanazar.’

  The wicked uncle in Aladdin. An intriguing figure of speech, thought Markham.

  Noakes was a beat behind but catching up fast.

  ‘Hey, you mean the magician guy from the panto. The one who does the dirty on Aladdin.’

  Lightwood smiled assent.

  ‘The missus and I went with our Natalie last Christmas,’ Noakes continued complacently. ‘It wasn’t half bad. That bloke from Brookside played the baddie. Jimmy Corkhill.’ At a look from Markham, he came abruptly to the point. ‘You thought the priests might be u
p to some jiggery-pokery … fencing stuff from the shrine?’

  Lightwood’s air of constraint deepened.

  ‘I didn’t know what to think, to be honest.’ His transparent complexion flushed painfully. ‘The subject came up at the vicarage, I can’t remember how … about the priests being hard up and having to flog the parish silver.’

  Markham liked him all the better for his embarrassment. No doubt this was Mrs Crane with her finger on the parish pulse.

  ‘Look, Inspector, I hate mud-slinging.’ Despite the warmth of the day, Lightwood was suddenly chilly, his hands like ice. ‘But I’m guessing this wasn’t a natural death …’

  Markham gave an infinitesimal nod.

  ‘And that it’s somehow connected to what happened to that poor nun and the organist.’

  The DI’s eyes confirmed it.

  ‘I don’t know if what I’ve told you will help find whoever did this,’ the curate said earnestly. ‘But I hope so.’ The candid eyes very sad, he added, ‘I’m sorry I didn’t have the chance to get to know Father Calvert. By all accounts he was a good man.’

  Markham got to his feet, signalling that the interview was over.

  Slowly, the trio made their way back through the garden, its carefully tended lawns smiling broadly in the sunshine like some old hunting print which mocked them with its beauty.

  Eden before the Fall.

  Dimples Davidson had been as good as his word. There was no sign left of the spavined remains. Only the embers, smelling evilly, were left to mark the tragedy.

  Lightwood spoke impulsively.

  ‘I don’t understand it,’ he blurted out, ‘but I felt a real connection to this place … almost as if I’d been here before in another life.’

  Here we go, thought Noakes reproachfully. Romantic mumbo jumbo alert. And after the lad had been quite helpful….

  But the curate said nothing further. Shaking hands firmly, he strode round to the front of the house without looking back.