Death in Holy Orders (49 page)

Dalgliesh said, “It depends on your scale of values. Why did you want it?”

“I don’t see what that has to do with your present inquiry, but I don’t mind telling you. I’m a freelance journalist and I’m writing an article on the Black Mass. It’s been commissioned, by the way, and I’ve done most of the research. The people I’ve succeeded in infiltrating need a consecrated wafer and I promised to get one. And don’t say that I could have bought a whole box of unconsecrated wafers for a quid or two. That was Eric’s argument. This is genuine research and I needed the genuine article. You may not respect my job, but I take it as seriously as you take yours. I’d promised to provide a consecrated wafer and that was what I was going to do. The research would have been a waste of time otherwise.”

“So you persuaded your half-brother to steal it for you.”

“Well, Father Sebastian wasn’t going to give me one if I asked nicely, was he?”

“Your brother went alone?”

“Of course. No sense in my tagging along and adding to the risk. At a pinch he could justify being in the college. I couldn’t.”

“But you did wait up for him?”

“It wasn’t a question of waiting up. We’d never actually been to bed, at least not to sleep.”

“So you heard his account of what happened immediately he got back, not next morning?”

“He told me as soon as he got back. I was waiting and he told me.”

“Miss Surtees, this is very important. Please think back and try to remember exactly what you were told and in your brother’s words.”

“I don’t think I can remember the exact words but the sense was plain enough. He told me he’d had no problem in getting the key. He opened the sacristy door by the light of his torch, and then the door leading into the church. It was then he saw the light over that oil painting opposite the main door, the
Doom
, isn’t it? And a figure standing close to it wearing a cloak and hood. Then the main door opened and someone else came in. I asked him if he recognized either figure and he said he didn’t. The one in the cloak had the hood up and his back to him and he only had a brief glimpse of the second man. He thought that the second figure called out ‘Where are you?’ or something like that. The impression he got was that it could have been the Archdeacon.”

“And he didn’t suggest to you at all who the other figure might have been?”

“No, but he wouldn’t, would he? I mean, he didn’t think there was anything sinister about seeing a cloaked figure in the church. It mucked things up for us and it was odd at that time of night, but he naturally assumed that it was one of the priests or one of the students. I assumed the same. God knows what they were doing there after midnight. They could have been having their own Black Mass, for all we cared. Obviously if Eric had known the Archdeacon was going to be murdered he’d have taken more notice. At least I suppose he would. What do you think you’d have done, Eric, faced with a murderer with a knife?”

Surtees looked at Dalgliesh as he replied. “Run away, I suppose. I’d have raised the alarm, of course. The guest sets aren’t locked, so I’d probably have rushed into Jerome for your help. At the time I was just disappointed that I’d managed to get the key without being seen and it was beginning to seem so easy and now I’d have to go back and say I’d failed.”

There was nothing more to be learned from him at present and Dalgliesh told him that he could go, first warning them both that the information they had given must be kept absolutely secret. They had clearly put themselves in danger of the charge of obstructing the police, if not something more serious. Sergeant Robbins would now go with Surtees to recover the keys, which would be kept in police possession. Both gave
the assurance demanded, Eric Surtees with as much formality as if taking a solemn oath, his sister ungraciously.

As Surtees finally got up to go, his half-sister got up too, but Dalgliesh said, “I’d like you to stay if you would, Miss Surtees. I’ve one or two further questions.”

As the door closed behind her half-brother, Dalgliesh said, “When I first began talking to your brother, he said that you wanted him to get you another wafer. So this wasn’t the first time. An earlier attempt had been made. What happened on the first occasion?”

She sat very still, but her voice was composed when she answered. “Eric made a slip of the tongue. There was only this once.”

“I don’t think so. Of course, I could get him back and ask him, and indeed I shall ask him. But it would be simpler if you explained to me now what happened on the previous occasion.”

She said defensively, “It had nothing to do with this murder. It happened last term.”

“I must be the judge of what relates to this murder. Who stole the wafer for you the time before?”

“It wasn’t stolen that time, not precisely. It was handed over to me.”

“Was it by Ronald Treeves?”

“Yes, it was, if you must know. Some of the wafers are consecrated and taken to churches round about where temporarily there isn’t a priest and where there’s to be Holy Communion. The wafers are consecrated and taken to the church by whoever is going to take or help with the service. That was Ronald’s job that week, and he took out one wafer for me. One wafer out of so many. It was a small thing to ask.”

Kate suddenly intervened. “You must have known that it wasn’t a small thing for him to do. How did you pay him? The obvious way?”

The girl flushed, but with anger, not embarrassment. For a moment Dalgliesh thought she would flare into open antagonism; it would, he thought, have been justified. He said quietly, “I’m sorry if you found that offensive. I’ll rephrase it. How did you manage to persuade him?”

Her momentary outrage was over. Now she looked at him
from narrowed, calculating eyes, then visibly relaxed. He could identify the second when she realized that candour would be more prudent and perhaps more satisfying.

She said, “All right, I persuaded him in the obvious way, and if you’re thinking of handing out moral judgement you can forget it. Anyway, it’s none of your business.” She glanced over at Kate, and the look was frankly hostile. “Or hers. And I don’t see what relevance all this has to the Archdeacon’s murder. They can’t possibly be related.”

Dalgliesh said, “The truth is that I can’t be sure. They could be. If they aren’t, none of this will be used. I’m not asking about the theft of the wafer out of prurient curiosity about your private life.”

She said, “Look, I rather liked Ronald. OK, maybe it was more that I felt sorry for him. He wasn’t exactly popular here. Papa too rich, too powerful, wrong business too. In armaments, isn’t he? Anyway, Ronald didn’t really fit in. When I came down to stay with Eric we’d meet occasionally and walk along the cliffs to the mere. We’d talk. He told me things you wouldn’t be able to get out of him in a million years, and nor would these priests, confession or no confession. And I did him a favour. He was twenty-three and a virgin. Look, he was desperate for sex—dying for it.”

Perhaps, thought Dalgliesh, he had died for it. He heard the continuing voice: “Seducing him wasn’t exactly a chore. Men make a fuss about seducing female virgins. God knows why, exhausting and unrewarding I’d have thought, but the other way has its excitements. And if you want to know how we kept it from Eric, we didn’t go to bed in the cottage, we made love in the bracken on the cliffs. He was a damn sight luckier to have me initiating him than going with a whore—which he’d tried once and then got so disgusted he couldn’t see it through.” She paused, and as Dalgliesh didn’t speak, went on more defensively. “He was training to be a priest, wasn’t he? What use would he be to other people if he hadn’t lived? He used to go on about the grace of celibacy, and I suppose celibacy is all right if that’s your thing. But, believe me, it wasn’t his. He was lucky to find me.”

Dalgliesh said, “What happened to the wafer?”

“Oh God, that was bad luck! You’ll hardly believe this. I lost it. I put it into a plain envelope and pushed it into my briefcase with other papers. That’s the last I saw of it. It probably fell into the waste-paper basket when I pulled the papers out of the briefcase. Anyway, I haven’t found it.”

“So you wanted him to get you another and this time he was less compliant.”

“You could put it like that. He must have been thinking things over in the vacation. You’d think I’d ruined his life instead of contributing to his sexual education.”

Dalgliesh said, “And within a week he was dead.”

“Well, I’m not responsible for that. I didn’t want him dead.”

“So you think it could have been murder?”

This time she gazed at him appalled, and he saw both surprise and terror in her eyes.

“Murder? Of course it wasn’t murder! Who the hell would want to murder him? It was accidental death. He started poking around in the cliffs and brought the sand down on himself. There was an inquest. You know what the verdict was.”

“When he refused to hand over a second consecrated wafer, did you attempt blackmail?”

“Of course not!”

“Did you even by implication suggest that he was now in your power, that you had information that could get him expelled from the college, ruining his chances of ever being ordained?”

“No!” she said vehemently. “No, I didn’t. What the hell would be the use? It would compromise Eric, for one thing, and, for another, those priests would believe him, not me. I wasn’t in a position to blackmail him.”

“You think he realized that?”

“How the hell do I know what he thought? He was half crazy, that’s all I know. Look, you’re supposed to be investigating the murder of Crampton. Ronald’s death had nothing to do with this case. How could it have?”

“I suggest you leave me to decide what has or has not to do with this case. What happened when Ronald Treeves came to St. John’s Cottage on the night before he died?”

She sat there in sullen silence. Dalgliesh said, “You and your
brother have already withheld information vital to this investigation. If we’d been told on Sunday morning what we’ve now learned, someone might have been under arrest. If neither you nor your brother had anything to do with Archdeacon Crampton’s death, I suggest you answer my questions honestly and truthfully. What happened when Ronald Treeves came to St. John’s Cottage on that Friday night?”

“I was there already. I’d come down from London for the weekend. I didn’t know he was going to call. And he had absolutely no right to walk into the cottage like he did. OK, we’ve got used to leaving doors open, but the cottage is supposed to be Eric’s home. He came barging upstairs and, if you must know, found Eric and me in bed. He just stood in the doorway and stared. He looked crazy, absolutely crazy. And then he started spitting out ridiculous accusations. I can’t really remember what he said. I suppose it could have been funny, but actually it was rather frightening. It was like being ranted at by a lunatic. No, that’s the wrong word. It wasn’t a rant. He didn’t shout or scream, he hardly raised his voice. That’s what made it rather terrifying. Eric and I were naked, which put us at a bit of a disadvantage. We just sat up in bed and stared at him while that high voice went on and on. God, it was weird. D’you know, he’d actually thought I was going to marry him. Me, a parson’s wife! He was mad. He looked crazy and he was crazy.”

She told it with a puzzled incredulity, as if confiding to a friend over a drink in a bar.

Dalgliesh said, “You seduced him and he thought you loved him. He gave you a consecrated wafer because you asked and he could refuse you nothing. He knew precisely what it was he had done. And then he saw that there never had been love, that he had been used. The next day he killed himself. Miss Surtees, do you in any way feel responsible for that death?”

She cried vehemently, “No I don’t! I never told him I loved him. It wasn’t my fault if he thought I did. And I don’t believe he killed himself. It was an accident. That’s what the jury found and that’s what I believe.”

Dalgliesh said quietly, “I don’t think it is, you know. I think you know very well what drove Ronald Treeves to his death.”

“Even if I do that doesn’t make me responsible. And what the hell did he think he was doing, barging in like that and rushing upstairs as if he owned the place. And now I suppose you’ll tell Father Sebastian and get Eric thrown out of the cottage.”

Dalgliesh said, “No, I shall not tell Father Sebastian. You and your brother have put yourselves in considerable peril. I can’t impress on you too strongly that what you’ve told me must remain secret. All of it.”

She said ungraciously, “All right. We’re not going to speak, why should we? And I don’t see why I should feel guilty about Ronald or about the Archdeacon. We didn’t kill him. But we thought you’d be ready enough to think we did if you got a chance. Those priests are sacrosanct, aren’t they? I suggest you start looking at their motives instead of picking on us. And I didn’t think it would matter, not telling you about Eric going to the church. I thought one of the students had killed the Archdeacon and he’d confess anyway. That’s what they go in for, isn’t it, confessions? I’m not going to be made to feel guilty. I’m not cruel and I’m not callous. I was sorry for Ronald. I didn’t bully him into giving me that wafer. I asked him, and in the end he agreed. And I didn’t have sex with him to get the wafer. OK, that was part of it, but it wasn’t the whole. I did it because I was sorry for him and because I was bored, and maybe for other reasons which you wouldn’t understand and would disapprove of if you did.”

There was nothing else to be said. She was frightened but she was not ashamed. Nothing he could have said would have made her feel responsible for Ronald Treeves’s death. He thought now of the desperation which had driven Treeves to that appalling end. He had been faced with the stark choice of staying on at St. Anselm’s with the constant threat of betrayal and the tormenting knowledge of what he’d done, or confessing to Father Sebastian with the almost certainty that he would have to return home to his father as a failure. Dalgliesh wondered what Father Sebastian would have said and done. Father Martin would, he thought, have shown mercy. He was less sure about Father Sebastian. But even if mercy had been shown, how could Treeves have stayed on with the humiliating knowledge that he was there on probation?