Mystical Paths (49 page)

V

When Rachel demanded an explanation I summoned my creative powers and gave her a version of the truth so bowdlerised that it was almost unrecognisable. Omitting all mention of the séance I said that Katie had suspected her husband had committed suicide; I had made some enquiries for her and had mistakenly thought I’d seen Christian at Grantchester, where I had happened to meet Lewis; acting on his advice I had approached Perry, who had made a fatal slip during the interview and revealed that a murder might have taken place, but Lewis had said that without proof we could take the case no further.

‘But why are you so convinced that Perry now wants to liquidate you?’

‘Why else would he come all the way from London to meet me at a secluded spot? Quick, get dressed and we’ll go to Starrington.’

Rachel, who had only got as far as applying her make-up, disappeared upstairs again but returned ten minutes later in a new pair of flowered slacks and a burnt-orange sweater. ‘I’ve left Daddy a note,’ she said. ‘I always have to do that or he thinks I’ve been abducted and there’s a big scene.’

‘Funny old Lewis ...’

Can I make excuses for myself? No, I can’t. I was young but old enough to know better. I was spiritually sick but still capable of understanding that I was moving deep into fantasy as I fled from a reality too complex to master. I was also, I think, childishly determined to prove to Lewis that I wasn’t quite the psychic baby he thought I was. I was aware of saying to myself: I know I can fix Perry, I
know,
it’s ‘gnosis’. But as I felt the confidence surge through me I knew that what I wanted most of all was not to confound Lewis but to prove beyond dispute to Rachel that I was a tough, courageous hero.

Horrific. As Lewis had already said, I was a menace. And as I myself had already proved, I was a disaster-carrier wreaking havoc wherever I went, an untrained psychic at the mercy ofhis pride and his random impulses. It’s strange how the media strive to package the paranormal as something which could be described as entertainment. The efforts resemble an attempt to convert a man-eating tiger into a domestic pet, an outsize cat whose only hobby is playing with a ball of wool.

‘Poor Katie will get better now, won’t she?’ said Rachel as we drove to Starrington in my Mini-Cooper.

‘Of course. Once she knows about the murder she can no longer blame herself for Christian’s death;’ I said, and as I spoke I thought of the séance when Christian’s spirit had erupted, hooking on to Katie’s guilt and igniting it in that searing psychic explosion. Tormented Christian, ‘unhousel’d and unanel’d’, not at peace with God despite all the prayers which had been said for him, but surviving in the guilt and grief and pain of the living, his memory moving incessantly through the inaccessible levels of so many unconscious minds to create the ghost which had haunted the bereaved.

‘What are you thinking about?’ said Rachel. ‘You’re being fabulously strong and silent.’

But of course I couldn’t tell her about the séance. She would have thought it abnormal, as indeed it was. ‘I was thinking about you,’ I said, ‘and how normal you are.’ And then I clearly saw that my father had never married a Rosalind, someone whom he had known all his life and who perhaps knew him a little too well. He had married the strangers who had enchanted him with their normality, first the tobacconist’s daughter, then the country lady, neither of them with a paranormal thought in their heads.

‘I wish you could have met my mother,’ I heard myself say to Rachel, and the next moment I was busy imagining my mother drawing me apart from my father, stepping into the space she had created between us and saying briskly: ‘Now, Nicholas, no more talk of Siamese twins joined at the psyche. It’s not only medically impossible, it’s morbid. And Jon, no more nonsense about a replica – you’re being very naughty.’ And I could see her kissing the top of his head as he sat at the dining-room table and she left the room on her way to work.

At once in my head I cried: come back,
come back!
But the door had closed and she was lost beyond recall.

Rachel had been speaking but I had to ask her to repeat what she had said.

‘I was asking if your mother was pretty.’

‘No, but she was attractive. She was tall and curvy with marvellous legs.’

‘Super! My mother’s beautiful, which is such a handicap because it means she has to devote almost all her free time to making sure she stays that way. Thank God I’ve been educated and have other things to think about – although of course, not being beautiful, I don’t have poor Mummy’s problems.’

‘I think you’re the sexiest girl I’ve ever met.’

‘Sexier than the flower-arrangement? Who was this flower-arrangement anyway?’

‘Just someone I’d known all my life.’

‘Sort of comfy and familiar, like an old boot?’

‘Sort of. But if your mother’s so beautiful, why has she never remarried?’

‘She tries too hard. I used to think it was because she was still secretly in love with Daddy. My God, the hours I spent as a child praying for him to forgive her! Of course I got it all wrong. She was the one who couldn’t forgive him for paying more attention to God than to her.’

‘Why didn’t she marry that man who triggered the divorce?’

‘Oh, he ditched her before she could lure him to the altar. Daddy then offered to have her back, but she wouldn’t go and I don’t think he really wanted her back anyway.’

‘How old were you when all this was going on?’

‘Six. I don’t remember much about it. I stayed with Granny most of the time.’

‘And how do your parents get on nowadays?’

‘Oh, they never meet, they’re so sensible. If they meet they have a row. Daddy never complains to me about her, but she’s always going on about him, I get so tired of it. "I can’t stand that temper of his," she says, but she always takes care to rub him up the wrong way. "I can’t stand all that psychic business,"she says, but why shouldn’t he make the study of the paranormal his hobby? "All he ever wanted from me was sex and regular meals," she says, but all men want sex and regular meals, they’re abnormal if they don’t, and anyway, what else did she have to offer him? She never took any interest in his work. Sometimes I think all she ever wanted from him was sex and success. Poor Mummy, I know she’s only bitchy because she’s unhappy, but she shouldn’t be so beastly about Daddy – who’s really rather wonderful whenever he’s not being bossy and pigheaded and old-fashioned and driving me round the bend.’ Then as I swung the car into the drive of my home she exclaimed: ‘Oh, what a
beautiful
house!’ And I could hear her thinking: poor old flower-arrangement, poor old boot, missing out on all this, of course she wasn’t sexy enough, bored him to tears, no idea how to play her cards, poor thing, very sad.

I was hoping we could avoid the Community but Rowena was lurking in the hall and I knew straight away that she disapproved of Rachel’s skin-tight, burnt-orange sweater. I mumbled the necessary introductions and whisked Rachel upstairs. I could tell Rowena’s disapproval then doubled, so acting on the principle that one might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb I removed my glasses, grabbed Rachel as soon as we entered my sitting-room and allowed myself the luxury of a hot smooch. However this was a bad idea as I soon began to lose sight of the Holy Grail so after ten incinerating seconds I tore myself away with the comment: ‘Too bad we didn’t come here just to romp in the hay.’

‘A major tragedy! But the funny thing is I can’t quite work out why you’re so more-ish. Those glasses make you look like an owl.’

‘“The Owl and the Pussy-Cat went to sea in a beautiful pea-green boat ..."‘ Replacing my glasses on my nose I extracted the portable tape-recorder from my old toy-cupboard and inserted the batteries I had bought that morning in Starbridge. By the time I tested the new tape seconds later we were reciting Edward Lear’s poem in unison.

‘
^“
‘..
^.
oh lovely Pussy, oh Pussy my love, what a beautiful Pussy you are!” our voices proclaimed fervently as I played back the tape.

‘Okay,’ I said, pressing the rewind button and glancing at my watch. By this time it was eleven o’clock. ‘This is what we do: we go to the chapel; we set up this little toy underneath the altar which, as you’ll see, is a rectangular table covered on all sides by a heavy embroidered cloth; then you’ll sit under the table with the toy and turn it on when the conversation begins – we’ll have the microphone at the edge of the cloth but it’ll be invisible except at floor-level. My job will be to get Perry close to the altar for the big dénouement.’

‘Supposing he takes a peep under the cloth?’

‘Why should he?’

‘James Bond always checks to see if a room’s bugged!’

‘Perry’s not James Bond – he’s just a paper-shuffler at the FO, and he’s long since written me off as a mere kid. He’ll underestimate me.’

‘But what do I do if he tries to kill you?’

‘Nothing. I’d knock him out. No old man over forty could hope to win a fight with a fit man of twenty-five.’

‘But if he’s coming down here to kill you, wouldn’t he have a gun?’

‘No, much too dangerous – it could be traced to him. He might have a blunt instrument tucked into his waistband,’ I conceded, ‘but I’ll be on the watch for that, and anyway he won’t try to kill me immediately because he’ll want to find out exactly what I know. My way of ultimately controlling the situation, of course, is to say that Lewis knows everything and that if I disappear he’ll go straight to the police. Then I’m sure Perry will crack and confess everything – if he hasn’t confessed everything already.’

‘
You
’
re
the one who’s James Bond!’ exclaimed Rachel enthralled. ‘This is a James Bond book come to life!’ ‘Just what I was thinking! Okay, Pussy Galore, let’s transfer to the chapel for the big climax ...’

Insane. Criminally insane. Off we went, two overgrown children bouncing along to toss their lighted matches into the keg of dynamite, and never,
never once
did it occur to me to say those saving words: I CAN BE WRONG.

VI

We reached the dell where the chapel stood glowing in the sunshine. Rachel voiced all the right words of admiration, and as she spoke I noticed with relief that the blinds on the windows of my father’s cottage were drawn; I knew how important it was that he should be out of the way while I completed my James Bond mission.

I passed Rachel the tape-recorder and the microphone. ‘You go into the chapel and have a look around,’ I said. ‘I just want to run down the track to the boundary wall to make sure the door’s unlocked. Since my father’s unwell the Community may have left the door locked to make sure no one disturbs him.’ ‘I thought he never saw visitors?’

‘There are just a handful of people, like the Bishop, who are authorised to drop in at any time.’ Leaving her I jogged down the track to the wall but the door opened as soon as I turned the handle. Without bothering to glance out into the main road I pushed the door shut again and jogged back to the chapel. The nearest entrance, when one approached from this direction, was at the back of the building where a door led into the vestry. Walking in I called out: It’s only me!’ and moved out of the vestry into the chancel.

Those were the last carefree words I spoke that morning. A second later I had stopped dead.

Rachel was standing white with terror by the altar, and facing her was Perry with a small black gun in his hand.

VII

It was strange how the chapel looked exactly as usual, clean and well-ordered despite my father’s numerous Anglo-Catholic ornaments; the altar-cloth was carefully draped with every fold in place, and the plain oak cross stood in polished splendour between the ornate silver candlesticks.

It was strange too how my mind fastened on an irrelevant fact as I stood paralysed by horror and fear. As I looked at Perry’s gun I could think only of my father making that beautiful cross in a monastery long before I’d been born.

‘Oh hullo, Nick,’ Perry was saying casually. ‘Sorry to commit the social sin of arriving early but I wanted to case the joint - and check for bugs, of course.’ He looked pityingly at the little tape-recorder, now abandoned on the altar-table.

I had by this time grasped that I could no longer keep reality at bay with thoughts about my father’s cross, and I knew that whatever happened I had to keep Perry talking. I managed to say: ‘How could you possibly have got down from London so quickly?’ and I found it all too easy to sound not only incredulous but appalled.

‘I made one of my early starts. When I phoned you I was already in Starbridge.’ He beckoned me forward with his free hand but he appeared to be both unrushed and untroubled. ‘I hardly need add that as soon as you left last night I started to plan what to do.’

Rachel, who had been standing transfixed by the table, gave a convulsive shudder, but I couldn’t allow myself to be diverted by her. I knew I had to focus the whole weight of my psyche on Perry and try to hypnotise him into an error, but my psyche was in tatters, shattered and shredded by shock, and my powers, those ‘glamorous’ powers which had got me into so much trouble in the past, had now deserted me so that I was defenceless.

‘I think I should tell you straight away,’ I said as panic engulfed me, ‘that Lewis knows I’m meeting you here.’ ‘I’d be very surprised if he did,’ said Perry mildly. ‘If he knewabout the meeting he’d be here too - or alternatively, bearing in mind that he’s older and wiser than you are, he’d have made damned sure you never kept the appointment.’

‘But he does know exactly what happened to Christian, and -’

‘Lewis can have no proof. There’ll only be the statements you’ve made to him, and that sort of hearsay evidence is inadmissible in a court of law.’

‘But if you killed me, Lewis will make sure the police suspect you - and once they find out you own a gun, they’ll -’ The gun’s unregistered. I picked it up in Berlin. And who’s to know you’ve been murdered? Plenty of scope for unmarked graves around this corner of the world.’

‘But if I disappear into the blue -’

‘Kids disappear into the blue all the time these days and everyone’s always known you were a bit odd. If you disappear they’ll just think that you and this quite extraordinarily attractive girl have dropped out and run off to California to smoke pot or found a new religion or, quite possibly, both. But why are we talking of murder? It seems a trifle wild and uncivilised.’

Well, since you’re standing there with a gun -’

‘Oh, that just seemed a sensible precaution to take, since I’m an elderly forty-one and you’re an active twenty-five, but I assure you I don’t make a habit of shooting people and it’s possible that you don’t in fact have any hard evidence that would inconvenience me. But I’ve got to be sure. Who or what put you on to the coal-cellar?’

‘It was a psychic hunch.’

‘Oh, come on, Nick! You don’t really expect me to believe that, do you?’

‘But it really was a psychic hunch! You made me suspicious when you talked about the cold spot in the kitchen!’ ‘I never said the cold spot was in the kitchen.’

‘Oh God, no, that’s right, you didn’t -’

‘Look, forget the psychic nonsense and tell me the truth. It was Dinkie who made you suspicious of the coal-cellar, wasn’t it?’

By this time I couldn’t think straight at all. ‘But why would Dinkie believe you’d buried Christian in the coal-cellar?’

‘So you do know Christian’s there! Thanks for confirming my worst suspicions!’

With horror I realised I had made a catastrophic error and that he now had no alternative but to kill me. Then a second later I realised that he had already been convinced I knew the truth and had planned to kill me from the start; his hint a moment ago that he might let me live had been no more than a manoeuvre to soften me up and gain the essential information more quickly. But what was the essential information? It seemed he thought Dinkie had provided me with some kind of hard evidence. Obviously he wanted to know whether he had to kill her too.

‘Sorry, Perry, I’m sort of confused and I can’t quite see where to begin. If you could give me a helping hand to start me off–’

‘Okay, I suppose I must make allowances for shock. Christian, as I learnt for the first time last night, had double-crossed me with Dinkie. If he was carrying on with her right up to the time he died, he could have told her he was planning to reject me as ruthlessly as he’d rejected Martin. And if she’d told you that –’

‘I’d see you had a motive for murder.’

‘Well done – that peculiar brain of yours is finally starting to unscramble itself!’

‘And if I’d realised Christian had been planning to ditch you, I’d wonder if in fact the two of you ever got as far as Bosham that weekend –’

‘Excellent! Keep going!’

‘– and then I’d suspect that Christian ditched you soon after his arrival at Albany with the result that you killed him at the flat.’

‘And of course once I’d killed him at Albany –’

‘– you had the problem of getting rid of the body –’

‘– and since I’ve never fancied being a surgeon I soon abandoned the idea of cutting the body into small pieces on the kitchen table. After that it was only a matter of time before Iworked out that the one place where I could bury the body was the coal-cellar ... But Nick, tell me this: if Dinkie knew Christian had no intention of going to Bosham with me that weekend why on earth didn’t she say so after I’d staged the drowning? Was it because she couldn’t bear the thought of Marina knowing about her affair with him?’

‘Oh no!’ I said, saving Dinkie’s life. ‘You’ve misread Dinkie’s role altogether – you’re forgetting how dumb she is. When she heard Christian had drowned she just assumed he’d changed his mind and decided to keep the sailing weekends going for a while after all. And on that last day of his life he didn’t actually say he was going to ditch you. He just said he was getting fed up with the sailing, but of course as soon as I heard that I put two and two together and realised –’

‘So he did see her on that final day!’

‘Yes, but she knows nothing – there’s no "hard evidence" at all –’

‘
He saw her on that final day.
’

‘
Yes, but it doesn’t matter, can’t you see? And Perry, it was Lewis who worked out about the coal-cellar. If you kill me you’ll still have to deal with him –’

But Perry was now moving beyond rational argument. ‘He swore to me he’d given her up – Christ, what a swine he was, how could he have turned into such a –’

I abandoned rational argument. Instinctively I knew I had to damp down that soaring emotional temperature. ‘He treated you very badly,’ I said, attempting to calm him with a lavish uisplay of sympathy. ‘I can quite see how you must have hated him.’

‘Hated him?’ said Perry blankly.

‘Well, if you were lovers and he ditched you –’

‘We were never lovers. But I loved him. I loved him right up to the end.’

‘Then why did you kill him?’

Perry said vaguely: ‘They shoot mad dogs, don’t they?’ Then he said: ‘It wasn’t Christian I killed. Christian had gone away and this – this
creature
had taken his place. "Kill me, Perry!" it said. "Kill me so that I can escape into you — the ultimate identity switch!" Well, of course, I knew then he was incurably mad and that my therapy had been worse than useless, so I killed him. I grabbed the poker from the fire-irons by the kitchen range, and as he turned his back on me I ... well, it was the only thing to do. He couldn’t have gone on, could he? He’d become such a monster, destroying everyone who cared, that it was really a kindness to kill him. In fact looking back,’ said Perry, now speaking quickly, far more quickly than he normally spoke, ‘I regard the killing not as murder but as euthanasia.’ And as he stumbled very slightly over the ‘th’ in that final word he smiled at me and I saw Christian shining behind his eyes.

‘Just a minute, Perry,’ I said. ‘I think I’m beginning to understand this —’

‘I’m afraid it doesn’t matter whether you understand it or not, old chap, because now I’m going to have to kill you too — Which is rather a shame because I always thought we got on so well, but there we are, terrible things happen in life, and if one wants to survive one can’t afford to be sentimental.’

‘But Perry, can you just tell me —’

‘No, old chap, sorry, but it’s only in books that the hero keeps the villain talking while he waits for the police to arrive on the final page.’

‘Okay,’ I said, and in my head my voice was shouting: FATHER, FATHER, SAVE ME! as I finally faced annihilation by the Dark. ‘Okay, I accept that you can’t tell me any more, but you’ll allow me a moment to pray, won’t you, Perry, I know you’re an atheist but after all you’re a civilised man and you surely wouldn’t want to be so uncivilised as to deprive a believer of the chance to put himself right with God before he dies. Just one moment, Perry — it’ll only take a moment — just let me take off my cross so that I can hold it in my hand —’

I had a fleeting glimpse of Rachel, shivering from head to toe, eyes black with terror, but I couldn’t allow myself to look at her for more than a second because I was risking everything on this one last desperate manoeuvre. We were now standingin a triangle based on the altar-table. Rachel was at one end, I was at the other and Perry was facing us with his back to the pews.

I took off the small cross which Lewis had lent me at Grant-chester. I thrust the cross high in the air. And I drew breath to yell with all my strength: IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST —’

But then I froze.

I had seen the figure at the back of the chapel.

He had slipped in soundlessly through the main door, a tall man dressed formally in a clerical suit with a black stock — a very tall man he was, six foot three, taller than I was, taller than Christian, taller than that crucial branch on the peach-tree —
so
tall
he was, that priest who had once been a monk at Grant-chester long ago before I was born, and that priest, that monk, was of course my father — yes, MY FATHER had now appeared in response to my shout for help, but he was not the father who lived in 1968. The father before me now was the father who lived in my earliest memories, straight-backed, swift-moving, radiating authority, the father who had been Principal of the Theological College long ago in the 1940s.

‘Father!’ I shouted in panic, because he was so real —
so real
he was —
that even though I could see he was not in my time I still feared he could die if Perry fired at him. ‘Father, get back — get out — he’s got a gun!’

Perry knew at once that I could never have faked such terror. He swung round to face the intruder, and the moment he turned his back on us Rachel lunged forward, grabbed the wooden cross from the altar and slammed it with all her strength into Perry’s skull.