A Demon Summer (10 page)

“
If
they were,” he added.

“If?” asked Max.

“I don't see any signs of construction or groundbreaking, do you? Still, it's not completely a waste of time. As I've said, I am enamored of old ruins.” Wisely, this time he did not even glance in Paloma's direction. “But it's … rather quiet here.”

“Ah,” said Max neutrally.

“It's not what we'd expected, to be sure,” Paloma offered.

And you were expecting—what? Max wondered.
Cirque du Soleil?

“But you've been here before?” Max asked.

“I have,” said Paloma. “But how did you—?”

“It's
really
quiet here,” Piers elaborated, yawning. “I have just returned from a two-week trip driving alone around Leeds, on commission, looking at sites some building magnate wanted photographed. That was a lawless riot by comparison.”

Paloma had apparently forgotten her question to Max. Again batting her eyes, she said, “If things don't pick up, we'll probably leave tomorrow. I can't even get a signal on my mobile out here. I left my gallery in the charge of an imbecile, and it's the busy season.”

“Uhm,” said Max. “Well, each to his own. Personally, I'm looking forward to a little down time away from the World Wide Web.” He added politely, “Where is your gallery?”

“In Monkslip-super-Mare.” She mentioned the name of an art gallery on the High Street in the popular seaside resort. It was one of many galleries, but one serving the upper end of the tourist trade.

The penny dropped. Max knew where he must have seen her before.

“You carry Coombebridge's work!” he exclaimed. Lucas Coombebridge was an artist living in secluded Monkslip Curry who had nonetheless achieved a global renown for his seascapes. Max owned several of his smaller works, bought at a time when they were still within reach of the salary of a country parson. Max happened to know the woman before him had been granted exclusive rights by the artist to display and sell his works. Max also knew, as it was an open secret, that she was one of many former lovers of the infamous painter.

“Yes,” she said, pleased at the recognition.

“I've bought several paintings from you,” Max told her, “but that was long ago. And I'm sorry to say that while you look familiar somehow I don't think I remember you from the gallery.” The more he thought about it, the more he was sure he'd not met her in person. “I'm certain I would have remembered,” he added gallantly.

She expanded visibly. The over-the-top costuming surely was intended to make the biggest impression possible, and she was pleased it had succeeded. “I'm not often there,” she said. “You probably saw my photo in the promotional literature for the gallery. Coombebridge was a right—ahem … he was a right stinker, but his commissions set me up so well I soon didn't have to be in the shop much. I travel abroad a lot.” She held out one arm and jangled the attached bracelets, as if to show what could be bought if one went abroad.

“His work is
so
overrated,” scoffed Piers.

“Not a match for
your
work,” she exclaimed loyally. But the wink, not meant to be seen by Piers, was aimed at Max.

“Well, it's been a pleasure, I'm sure, Mr.…?” Piers began. Max remembered he was not wearing his collar. He'd thrown on a jumper and jeans and trainers, not really expecting to meet anyone this early.

“It's Father Max Tudor, actually.”

“Ah!” They both looked taken aback, as though a priest were the last thing they'd expect to meet in a nunnery.

“Well, I guess
you're
here on retreat,” said Paloma.

Max smiled. “Sort of,” he said. He thought he might quiz them some more later on their reasons for being there, not that he expected to hear the truth.

But for right now, he was hungry.

 

Chapter 8

THE VISITORS: II

Be tolerant of the young and the old.

—The Rule of the Order of the Handmaids of St. Lucy

Once Paloma and Piers had left, she trailing scarves and he creeping after, a model without a runway, Max resumed assembling his breakfast.

He was just slicing peaches for his granola when the door swung open to admit a young woman of indeterminate years—she could have been sixteen or thirty, but her costume, like that of a child playing dress up, suggested the lower end of the age scale. She wore a black leather jacket over a full skirt of tie-died fabric, and beneath it showed several layers of petticoats, also of rainbow hues. Her black boots matched the jacket; purple-and-black striped socks, worn over white lace stockings, peeped from the tops of the boots. Her hair was a thatch of white-blond, randomly tipped in pink at the ends. Max saw that her fingertips were indeed painted blue, as had been reported by Dame Tabitha. He took a wild guess that this was Xanda, daughter of the American family, the Goreys. She was short and slightly pear-shaped, and with the hair she looked like a baby chick that had come out the worse for wear in an Easter egg decorating competition. On entering the room she had the preoccupied look of adolescence, but on seeing him she switched on a cheery smile:
Here, at last—something new!
She had a gap between her front teeth that added to her charm.

“Don't tell me you're in with this bunch,” is what she actually said, looking him up and down. She had a high-pitched, girlish voice with what he recognized as an American Valley girl accent. “You don't look like a religious maniac.” Then she hesitated. “Wait. You're the priest sent to look into all the, like, stuff going on here, aren't you?” She waggled her blue-tipped fingers on the word “stuff” to indicate the fluidity of the situation. Max wondered how she had deduced his calling, a question she answered by saying: “My mom said there was ‘
such
a nice-looking priest' sent to sort things out.”

This place must rival Nether Monkslip for jungle-drum communiques, thought Max. Her mother must have seen him arrive last night, when he was wearing his collar, but how she had known his mission …

“And if mom notices,” Xanda went on gaily, “it must be one hot-looking dude. You don't mind my saying that, do you? You are hot, you know, for an old guy. It's not like you're a
priest
-priest, with vows of celebrity and all.” Max nodded his agreement, biting back a smile at her gaffe. “Anyway, there's no one else here who fits the bill. I mean, that cop Cotton is good-looking, but I know who he is—he grilled me for simply
hours,
you know; it was wonderful! So much like
Law and Order
—do you get that here? Yes? And God knows Piers thinks he's a gift sent to women from above. But for sure I know what Piers looks like. That's ‘Piers Montague, Artist.' Everyone always refers to him this way, you will notice. ‘Piers Montague Comma Artist.' What a berk. If you hear a lot of commotion at night around here, it's probably him, meeting up with Paloma Green. Who they think they're kidding, I do not know. And anyone can hear the bolt to the women's side of the guesthouse open—it's like Grand Central. Now, that DCI Cotton is a different story. Hubba, as they say, hubba.”

“I've been wondering exactly why he's here,” said Max. “Piers.” He looked hopefully at his new source of information. She was hardly a reluctant witness, although how unbiased a one he couldn't be sure. She seemed to share his withering assessment of Piers, which moved her up several notches in Max's estimation.

“‘Piers Montague, Artist,' you mean? He was part of the fund-raising effort. The idea was that famous
artistes
would be invited to donate paintings and photographs they'd made of the abbey and religious stuff like that. He's also studying some paintings in the church—he says. He's a restor … restorative…”

“Restorer,” finished Max for her.

“Yah,” she agreed. “But me, I wonder what qualifies you to be sorting things out at the abbey? I mean,” she added, “no offense, but this can't be in your usual line of work. Shouldn't you be baptizing babies or healing the sick or something?”

“DCI Cotton asked me to be here,” Max said mildly. It seemed best to leave it at that. She struck him as the sort of precocious woman-child who would pepper him with questions given half a chance. He decided to turn the tables.

“You must be Xanda,” he said. “What an unusual name. Very pretty.”

“They had to name me something to balance out the last name Gorey. Always makes me think of a horror flick about an alien creature from the planet Zicon or something. And it is not short for Alexandra. For once in their turgid, stuck-in-the-mud lives, my parents anticipated a trend. You know:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
.”

“It's a very pretty name,” he insisted, thinking her parents couldn't be all that stodgy or they surely would have put a clamp on her hair and costume choices. Although, when did parents have any real say in those departments? “You are here with your parents, I take it?”

“As if I had a choice. You don't seriously think I'd be here without them, do you? It's summer vacation time back home. I just finished my freshman year in college. I'm studying medieval literature. Not my choice, believe me. Some days I could just die.
Die!
I'm trying to talk the folks into letting me switch. My mother says he who pays the piper names the tune. But I don't even know what they're talking about in class most days. Complete waste of money. I threatened to drop out. They practically commanded me to come on this trip with them. They think it will change my mind. My father especially is a real Anglephile.” Whatever they were teaching her in college, it was not vocabulary. “My parents both love everything about England, beginning with the Queen and that naff son of hers. I could just
gag
I'm so bored. Harry looks like he could be fun, though.” Max assumed she was talking about HRH Prince Harry. Max still had connections in SO14 who reported that guarding Harry was an exercise in burlesque comedy intermixed with moments of sheer terror. Xanda twirled the end of one blond-pink lock, evaluating Max's own potential for livening things up.

“When do you leave?” he asked.

“Whenever my father's convinced himself he isn't being ripped off,” she replied. “Or when he's satisfied he has been and decides what to do about it. What ‘legal recourse' he has, as he puts it. But he's taking his sweet time about it. I mean, they're nuns, after all. It's a bit hard to go around accusing them without a lot of evidence, wouldn't you say?”

“Ripped off?” Max asked casually, pouring a cup of coffee for himself and offering her one.

“Yeah. It's something to do with money,” she said, lowering her voice and leaning in confidingly. “Money that should have gone into replacing electricity and plumbing and things here in the guesthouse can't be accounted for. There was supposed to be an addition to the building, too, and there's no sign of it.” She examined one blue nail and began smoothing back the cuticle with her thumb. “My father is furious and ‘demands an accounting.' I think he brought Piers Montague, Artist, and that art gallery owner woman on board to back up his protest. That's just a guess, but my father is good at getting people in his corner.”

Turning away, she started rooting around in various cupboards, opening the small fridge to pull out a milk bottle. She proceeded to pour half the contents into a large glass and took a sip, eyeing him over the top.

“You didn't know all this?” she asked. “I would bet you did.”

“I know there is some question in your father's mind, and presumably in your mother's, about the dispersal of various funds he's provided the abbey.”

“Big question, yep. Mucho problemo with the missing dinero, yessiree. He's rich, you know, my father. He actually believes God wants him to be rich, which probably helps, don't you think?”

“I suppose it does, rather,” said Max.

“He's an investor. Meaning, he invests other people's money. In what, I don't know. Just stocks and stuff like that. But he's pretty good at guessing how the market will move. And just because he's rich doesn't mean he is okay with being ripped off. He hasn't half been torqued since we got here. ‘Where are the earth-movers?' he wants to know. She lowered her voice to a basso boom, in what Max was to learn was a fair imitation of her father. “‘Men with shovels? Pitchforks?
Some
thing?'”

“He came here to investigate, did he?” Max prodded. “To determine whether his money was in good hands?”

“Yah. But he and my mom come here at least every summer, anyway. Have for years. It's their idea of fun, this sort of religious fandango. Just imagine. Well, I guess you can imagine, but.… They used to leave me with my aunt in Boston, thinking that was safer somehow. They had no idea—my aunt is forty but she
rocks
. I mean really—she sings in a band. But this year, as I say, my father decided it was time to ‘expand my horizons.' Ugh.
Shrink
them, is more like it. No computer, no cell phone, no television.
Jesus
. Oops, sorry, Father. No disrespect intended. But I am just about reaching my limit, you know? The animals are not as much fun as I was led to believe.”

“Animals?”

“Sure. It's a working farm. They have goats, and the nuns make cheese and things. The goats creep me out. Those
eyes
!” Hunching her shoulders around her ears, she shivered with distaste. “Even the little ones.”

Max was sympathetic. It had not been all that long since he himself had been a teenager. He could imagine that Monkbury Abbey held little scope for someone her age.

“
And
they barely have electricity,” she went on. “The lights went out the other night. The hamster or whatever turns the wheels that make the generator go must have escaped.”