The Salisbury Manuscript (7 page)

West Walk

Tom woke with a thick head the morning after his arrival in Salisbury. He’d had a restless night in the four-poster in The Side of Beef, with a dream of struggling to gather up scattered sheets of paper from a railway line that stretched across a bare plain. He was acutely aware that the longer his task took the more likely was a train to thunder down on him. He could hear a kind of rattling along the rails.

Then, in time with the rattling, came a series of knocks at the door of his room and a woman entered with a jug of warm water for him to shave and asked if she should draw the curtains. Tom recognized her nasal voice and visualized her mournful eyes. He muttered to her to leave the curtains and tried to get back to sleep. But he abandoned the attempt after a few moments, got up and went across to the window.

The fog had lifted and it was a bright, hard morning, with frost on the panes and sun glinting on the roofs opposite. The street below was bustling with people and carts and carriages. Tom washed and dressed rapidly and went down to breakfast. It was later than he thought and he was the only diner. The motherly woman who’d served him at supper the previous evening clucked around him, offering him more coffee and asking whether he was sure he’d had enough porridge and sausage and kidney and toast and marmalade. She seemed to have taken a shine to him. Making conversation, he asked the way to the cathedral close and she told him to ‘follow the spire and it would be difficult get lost, sir,’ and he thought, of course, stupid question.

Conscious that he had an early appointment with Canon Slater, Tom refused second helpings of breakfast. He returned to his room to get his coat and a small despatch case, suitable for holding documents. When he was going through the lobby he saw the landlord standing on the porch. Jenkins was turning his head from side to side in a proprietorial fashion, as if he owned not merely The Side of Beef but the entire street it was situated in.

‘Ah, Mr Ansell of Messrs Scott, Lye & Mackenzie. You are well rested, I hope, sir?’

‘Comfortably enough, thank you.’

‘And well fed?’

‘That too.’

‘Have you a moment, sir?’

‘No more than a moment, I am on my way to meet someone.’

‘It is only that I took a liberty last night and I thought I ought to tell you of it.’

Tom hesitated between annoyance and curiosity. He said nothing but stood opposite Jenkins on the porch. The landlord stroked his blackened moustache while his breath frosted in the cold air.

‘You may have observed last night, sir, at supper that I was talking to some ladies and gentlemen. One of them was asking about you. He wanted to know your name.’

Tom recalled the stouut individual leaning back in his chair and tapping the side of his nose, together with the frequent glances he’d cast in his direction. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’m not a spy with his secrets. You are welcome to give him my name if you like. But if he can ask about me, I can ask about him. Who was it?’

‘Mr Cathcart, Mr Henry Cathcart. He is one of the leading citizens of our town.’

‘And why did Mr Henry Cathcart want to know the name of one of your guests?’

‘He didn’t say, sir.’

‘Well then, there’s an end of it,’ said Tom, making to move off the porch. But the landlord hadn’t finished.

‘All he did say, was that he thought he knew you from somewhere.’

‘Not from here, Mr Jenkins. I’ve never visited Salisbury before in my life.’

With that, Tom strode down the street, without giving Jenkins another word or look. His irritation with the proprietor of The Side of Beef was sharp enough that he didn’t give much thought as to why one of last night’s diners should have been enquiring after his name. Damn Jenkins! He was obviously one of those hotel-keepers who liked to insinuate himself into his guests’ lives and pry out their business. Well, the man would get no more out of him, not even the time of day.

As the woman serving breakfast had said, it would be difficult to get lost on the way to Salisbury Cathedral. Wherever he turned a corner and had an uninterrupted vista down a street, the spire rose up like a needle into the clear light of the November morning. Tom pushed his way through a market and passed an elaborately crowned and buttressed landmark that he assumed was the Poultry Cross, before turning into a High Street which was lined with ancient-looking inns. It struck him that for hundreds of years people had been coming to this place, to carry on their business, to do penance, to visit one of the finest churches in the land.

There was an arched entrance at the end of the High Street, beyond which lay the close and the wide grounds of the cathedral. Once inside, the houses became both grander and somehow more sedate. There were stretches of lawn and walks overshadowed by elms and beeches. Beyond and to his left, effortlessly dominant, rose the vast bulk of the church. The little knots of visitors were easy to distinguish not just by their clothes but by their ambling gait even on this cold sunny morning. Tom was searching for Venn House, Canon Slater’s dwelling, and he might have asked directions from one of the dark-garbed clerics moving as purposefully as crows among the sightseers. But he was oddly reluctant to reveal where he was going, especially after the encounter with Jenkins.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed one of the clerical figures making for him.

It was Canon Eric Selby. As last night at the railway station, he was wearing a coat and muffler and his shovel-hat. The coldness of the morning had brought a hectic colour to the cleric’s smooth-shaven cheeks. Tom was pleased to see him and said as much. By the light of day Tom saw how blue the old man’s eyes were, a blinking blue. He looked like an owl caught by daylight.

‘Didn’t I predict we’d meet again?’ said the Canon. ‘Salisbury is a small place. How did you find The Side of Beef and that chatterer Jenkins?’

‘The landlord is certainly too curious for comfort,’ said Tom. ‘But the food is good and the bed isn’t hard and it will more than do.’

‘Good, good. Now, Mr Ansell, can I direct you somewhere?’

‘How did you know I was looking?’

‘For sure, you are not one of our visitors come to gawk at the spire. And you are carrying a little case which suggests that you are in the close on business, yet I noticed just now that you were pausing in your progress as if not quite certain where to go next. So ask away.’

‘I am searching for Venn House. It’s about here some-where, I believe.’

Tom gestured towards the ranks of fine houses which lay to the north and west of the cathedral. When he turned back to look at Eric Selby he observed the Canon grimacing as though he had bitten into a sour apple. There was a change in his voice when he answered too. The friendly tone was replaced by something more guarded.

‘You are going to see the Slaters, Mr Ansell? Yes, well, obviously you must be if you are searching for Venn House. It’s on the south-west corner of the close, near the end of West Walk. Look out for a fine wall of red brick.’

Tom thanked him and hesitated as if to give Eric Selby the chance to say more. But the Canon seemed disinclined for further conversation and merely nodded before resuming his own progress towards the north transept of the cathedral. Wondering what it was about the Slaters – about Felix Slater presumably – which caused Selby to look displeased, Tom followed the path that led to to his right. Then he turned into a tree-lined road which he took for the West Walk. There were fewer people about here, it was quieter and seemed more like a country village than a town. A carriage was waiting outside the iron gates of one of the larger mansions. The coachman was huddled up against the sharpness of the morning. A workman passed Tom, pushing an empty hand-barrow. The roadway and the grass verges were speckled with frost in places where the sun hadn’t reached.

Then Tom saw someone standing outside the entrance to another of the houses, someone whose presence gave him a slight start. It wasn’t that he knew the person. But his uniform showed that he was a police constable. The man was gazing right and left, but with no sense of urgency. He acknowledged Tom with a nod. Had this been his own street or town, Tom might have stopped and asked the constable what was going on. (Not that anything appeared to be going on.) But he was a stranger here. Any crime or wrongdoing was no concern of his.

Tom went a few paces further then glanced back, conscious of someone walking quickly behind him on the road in the same direction. It was a woman. The policeman was looking at her. Tom turned his head back and felt his face grow warmer. He was fairly sure it was the woman he’d met the previous evening outside The Side of Beef. The same large hat and, he thought, a flash of the same yellow skirt beneath her coat. He recalled that he’d seen her for a second time yesterday, staring up at his room through the fog.

Now the idea that she had been following him, perhaps since he’d left the inn this morning, seized his imagination. If so, to what purpose? But it was all nonsense. Why should she be following him? She could hardly be intending to proposition him in the cathedral precinct, not on a cold and frosty morning. Not with the presence of a policeman outside a neighbouring gate. He debated for a moment slowing down and allowing her to pass . . . or letting her speak to him, if that was what she wanted. But instead he quickened his pace, on the lookout for the wall which fronted Venn House. When he reached it he would allow himself one quick look behind, to check on the woman’s identity.

And here, towards the end of the West Walk, was a fine red-brick wall as described by Canon Selby and, behind it, the house which belonged to Canon Slater.
Venn House
was inscribed on a plaque next to a large wooden gate set into an arch in the wall. Hearing footsteps coming closer, Tom looked over his shoulder. It
was
the same woman! She seemed to be making for him, still with the slightly mocking smile which he recalled from their last meeting. No question that she recognized him as well for she said, ‘See, no nosegay now. It has withered.’

She indicated the bare collar of her coat. There was the remembered trace of foreignness in her accent (‘withered’ drawn out almost to three syllables).

Tom felt renewed warmth come into his face. He inclined his head slightly and said, ‘Good morning, madam. A cold morning too.’

‘You are coming to this house.’

It was not a question so much as a statement. Tom wondered at the intrusive curiosity of the inhabitants of Salisbury. Did they all assume that what was his business was also theirs? He nodded with a slight impatience, expecting the woman to continue on her way. But she remained standing by the gate in the wall. All at once, Tom understood that she must be calling at Venn House like him, and was waiting for him to open the gate to let her go through first. There was no bell to announce visitors. He reached forward and twisted the iron latch, indicating with his eyes that she should enter before him if that was what she wanted. Through the arch of the gate he saw a path leading to a substantial house.

The woman took a pace forward then halted as if struck by a sudden thought. She put a gloved hand on Tom’s arm and looked him full in the face, not smiling now.

‘You will say nothing?’

‘I . . . I’m sorry, madam, I don’t understand what you mean.’

‘I mean, say nothing about how we have seen each other before this cold morning,’ she said in the same low, slightly accented voice. When he didn’t respond she showed a touch of impatience as though Tom was a slow boy who needed matters spelled out. ‘I mean, last night in the town in the fog. You do remember?’

‘Yes, I do remember, madam. Say nothing to who? Who am I not supposed to tell?’

The woman shivered as if from the cold and said, ‘Tell nobody. Do you agree to this?’

All this time she was holding fast to Tom’s arm. Her grasp was hard. He could feel her fingers through the sleeve of his coat.

‘Very well,’ he said, ‘I will not tell anyone although I can’t imagine who would be interested.’

He almost had to wrench his arm from her grip. The good humour returned to her face and she rewarded him with another smile before turning to go through the gate. Yet, once again, she paused as she was entering. ‘You must wait here,’ she said. ‘It is best that we do not arrive together. I will send someone out. I will say that I saw a gentleman outside. Yes, I saw a gentleman searching outside.’

After passing through the arch in the wall she gave a push to the gate. She pushed at it with a flick of her heel, and some quality about the movement, something careless and unladylike, established her right to go first into Venn House and to leave Tom where he was. The gate creaked half shut, blocking off the view of the house and garden.

Tom Ansell stood outside Venn House, confused and obscurely angry, with himself rather than the woman. Her actions were incomprehensible. What right did she have to tell him to wait outside? He no longer believed that she was a woman of the town, and the fact that he had ever thought so gave him a moment’s discomfort. He looked for other explanations for her arrival here. If she was a servant in the Slater household, then she was behaving in a fashion that was peculiar – and somehow improper. Tom wasn’t a vindictive or sneaking individual. But had he been, he told himself, he would have made some comment to Canon Slater or Mrs Slater about the strange attitude of their servants. The trouble was that the woman had bound him into a sort of conspiracy of silence, which he could not break now. And she had given to that chance meeting outside The Side of Beef, that accidental collision, a significance which it hadn’t possessed until this moment.

A different idea came to Tom as he stood, alternately watching his breath plume up in the air or looking at the sunlit spire through the bare branches of the trees without really seeing either of them. Perhaps the woman wasn’t a servant in Venn House after all but a . . . a fortune-teller or gypsy clairvoyante . . . or a medium. He didn’t know what had provoked these notions. The woman’s faintly flamboyant appearance, maybe, that touch of foreignness about her. Even the way she had grasped at his arm. However, if she actually did follow one of these exotic trades, he didn’t ask himself what she was doing calling on a cleric’s house in a cathedral precinct.