The Shadows in the Street (8 page)

It was as she crossed over to the road that ran alongside the Hill that Marie heard something behind her. She looked round quickly, thought she saw something, a shadow or a movement, but when she stood still, there was nothing. Moonlight and an empty road. Someone went by on a scooter, buzzing like a gnat.

She walked on fast. But then it was a definite sound, footsteps, someone running to catch her up, and as she glanced over her shoulder again and saw a figure, she remembered where she was. The Hill. People had been caught and murdered on the Hill, a serial killer had made it a place of danger for months until he was tracked down, and then he had come to the Hill and found a tree on which to hang himself. It had all happened before she came to Lafferton but she’d heard about it often enough and now the thought of it made her blood freeze. She didn’t know why. She told herself it was not only ages ago but the man was dead – not even in jail and alive somewhere, stone-cold dead. He couldn’t hurt her or anyone else.

But the person following her could. He had not overtaken her, he was not someone making quickly for home, with no interest in her. He was there, keeping behind, and nobody else was in sight or earshot. To her left reared up the dark outline of the Hill; to her right, the railings of the park. Houses were on the far side of that – she could not even see any lights, people had gone to bed by now.

She prayed for someone to drive by, for the gnat whine of the scooter, a late-night van, even a police patrol, even just one person walking a dog last thing.

But there was no one, except whoever was now a couple of yards behind her and closing in. She could hear breathing, a soft pant, in and out, in and out. Quiet footsteps. Marie broke into a run. The footsteps behind her quickened too.

But then a car came, from the opposite direction, its headlights picking her up in a wide and welcoming arc of brightness.

In the caravan, Jonty Lewis found a single can of cider, drank it standing up, then smashed the can against the wall. He felt strung up, he was sweating and his stomach churned. The television picture changed from a row of faces to fizzing snow again. He thumped it and the snow went black. There was no food, nothing left in the milk carton, no coffee in the jar.

He lay down on the bench but he didn’t sleep, there was too much going on inside his head and jangling in all the nerves of his body. He ached and sweated and sweated and ached his way through what felt like a lifetime of darkness until the moon swung in through the window above the sink.

Marie should be here and she wasn’t. When she did turn up, he was going to kill her. He lay, seething, waiting, being leered at by the moon with mould and pockmarks all over its face.

Twelve

‘Just to recap, then, before we close. The next meeting is on Thursday 24th of October, and we’ll be here again because the building work on the Deanery still won’t be finished.’

‘If you’d rather not host two book club meetings in a row, I’m happy to do it next time.’

‘Thanks, but it’s fine. I’m in New Zealand during November anyway, so it’ll be you to host it then. Our book for October is
Learning to Dance
by Michael Mayne and I have two copies so if anyone would like this spare … ? Cat?’ Ilona held out the paperback.

‘So – that’s it.’

‘And I propose the thanks to you, Ilona, from all of us.’

‘Seconded,’ Cat said. ‘The best coffee and cake in the Cathedral Close.’

‘And the best sofas.’

‘Ah, no, you haven’t visited my brother’s flat. He has two white leather sofas to die for.’

‘Your brother?’ Ruth Webber, the wife of the new Dean, said sharply. ‘Why does he live in the Close?’

Ilona, wife of the cathedral Precentor, caught Cat’s eye before turning quickly away.

‘A few houses are rented privately,’ Cat said.

‘I thought all those were used as offices.’

‘They are, mainly. Simon lives on the top floor – there are three offices below him.’

‘So what’s his cathedral connection then?’

‘He doesn’t have one. He’s a policeman.’

Ruth raised her eyebrows. ‘I’d have thought everything available in the close was needed for clergy. Miles Hurley is looking for somewhere better than that bungalow at the end of the Precentor’s garden.’

‘I think it’s a rather nice bungalow.’

Cat bent down in a gesture of clearing coffee cups and plates from the low table to avoid continuing with this interrogation, but brief acquaintance with the wife of the new Dean had taught her that Ruth Webber was nothing if not persistent.

‘Is your brother married?’

Cat shook her head and picked up the tray of crockery.

‘Aren’t there police flats?’

Ruth was hard on her heels out of the room, carrying a plate with a single biscuit on it towards the kitchen.

‘Though I suppose it helps us with security. Don’t you find it odd having a policeman for a brother?’

‘Why on earth should I find it odd?’

Ruth shrugged. She was looking around her. ‘Did you ever see the old kitchen in the Deanery? I mean, I’m not much of a cook but honestly, it came out of the ark, how on earth they managed … I’ll be hosting the book group the minute all the work’s done – not in the kitchen, obviously. Which service do you and your family come to, Cat?’

She was a tall bony woman and it was difficult to tell her age, though Cat guessed at early forties. The previous Dean had retired only three months ago, and Stephen Webber had already started making major changes, not all of which met with the approval either of the rest of the chapter or of the congregation. St Michael’s Cathedral people were not, Cat thought, backward-looking or, as Ruth might have put it, out of the ark, but if there were to be changes they needed to be made over time, with tact and care. So far, they were being made at speed and without much consultation. There was a new canon residentiary in Miles Hurley – someone else Cat had not yet got the measure of.

‘Nice garden,’ Ruth said, looking out, ‘though the Deanery’s is nicer. Where do you live, Cat?’

‘Out of Lafferton. A farmhouse.’ She could hear Ilona talking at the front door and willed her to come to the kitchen.

‘You didn’t say which service you come to?’

‘No. I didn’t. It varies.’

‘In what way?’

‘I sometimes come on my own to the early Communion.’

‘Why?’

Good God, this was an inquisition.

‘I like the 1662 order, I like the quietness.’

Ruth snorted. ‘I’m not sure how long 1662 is going to last here, so you’d better make the most of it. We can’t be doing with it at all. You have a family, don’t you? The ten thirty is a big family service now of course.’

‘It always was.’

‘Yes, but Stephen is putting much more emphasis on being family-friendly. And then evensong is going to be very much for the young, the students and so on. We’ve got some great preachers lined up. Quite a few of Stephen’s old colleagues of course, and some very exciting rising stars. Have you done the Alpha Course?’

She has a very wide mouth, Cat thought, and I wish she would shut it. And a rather large nose and I wish she would keep it out of my business. She felt uncharitable and unrepentant. Ruth Webber wore jeans with Mary Jane shoes.

Ilona came into the room, and said brightly, ‘So sorry, we had to talk about the dreaded flower rota.’

‘Isn’t that utterly typical,’ Ruth said, taking the remaining biscuit and crunching it. ‘Flower rotas! That says it all about the Church of England.’

‘Well, as I’m sure you’ll have seen, the cathedral has very talented flower arrangers and the job takes some doing – just look at the size of those stands and the stone vases. It’s a great skill – some would call it an art. It isn’t just a case of bunging things in. Don’t you like flowers, Ruth?’

‘Oh, I don’t mind flowers, I know they brighten up the place – just don’t ask me to join a flower rota.’

‘We wouldn’t,’ Ilona said, not catching Cat’s eye, ‘dream of it.’

‘Help, look at the time, I’m supposed to be somewhere else. Thanks for the coffee and so on.’

She went clattering out on her Mary Janes, but spun round in the doorway.

‘I’ve forgotten the book we’re supposed to be reading.’

‘
Learning to Dance
. Michael Mayne. He was Dean of Westminster Abbey. I’m sure Stephen will know his work.’

‘Oh, I doubt it,’ Ruth said, waving her hand in Cat’s direction. ‘By the way, do we get to discuss novels and things or is it all religious? If it’s novels, you’ll lose me, never read them, but I’d like to have a hand in choosing the Christian literature.’

Not wanting to leave at the same time as Ruth and risk further questioning, Cat carried on clearing up, putting cups in the dishwasher and emptying the coffee dregs, until Ilona came back from seeing Ruth out, counting aloud.

‘… Nine, ten. Cat, will you give your lovely brother a message from me?’

‘He’s away, but when I’m next in touch, yes of course.’

‘Tell him if that woman is found with her neck wrung I’ll have done it.’

‘I doubt it, Ilona, because I’ll have got there first. God, I’ll never be the Dean’s best friend and I hate some of the things he’s doing here, but I can sort of bear him, only …’

‘Only
not
Mrs Dean. Now, Cat dear, Duncan’s in London at the RSCM so I’m entirely alone. Stay and have a cheese salad with me, I need you.’

Cat glanced at her watch. She had made herself come to the St Michael’s book group, as she made herself do a number of things she had felt like ducking since Chris’s death. She liked the people – or had until Ruth had arrived – she read a lot and enjoyed discussing her reading and she knew it was important to make a social effort when it would be easier to curl back into her shell and never emerge again, other than to work and for the domestic round. The club had been set up to discuss books which were in some way, however loosely, related to faith, not to chatter about the latest fashionable fiction. There were, as Ilona said, plenty of other book groups which did that. They had roamed widely and tackled some difficult titles, not always with success, but Cat would come away feeling that her mind and sometimes her beliefs and principles had been challenged, as well as having enjoyed the company of the others. It had also helped her through bad patches by giving her something to address outside her own unhappiness.

‘I only have to call in to Imogen House, then pick up Hannah and Felix. If you’re sure …’

‘Thank God. I think I might explode.’ Ilona held up a bottle of sherry but Cat shook her head. ‘Pity. You’re quite right though, it might loosen our tongues.’ She started setting out plates.

‘Oh, mine doesn’t need any help.’

‘No. You don’t mind eating in here, do you? Even if our kitchen hasn’t been done up and has come out of the ark. Cat, stop me, stop me. She is a woman I am never going to like, and OK, that’s my problem, but what he is doing is far more serious. How they could have appointed him I can’t think. He doesn’t fit in, he isn’t right, he’s hell-bent on destroying everything that’s been built up over years, he has no sense of what is fine, what is excellent, of tradition, of … It’s making Duncan ill you know. And as for David Lester – I really fear he will leave. Apparently he was talking about other cathedral organist posts that might be coming up.’

‘He can’t! We can’t lose David. We need them both to stay put and fight.’

Ilona shook a plastic colander of salad so angrily that drops of water sprayed onto the wall behind her. ‘Are we stuck in the past, are we out of touch, does the cathedral need a shake-up? In some areas, yes, it does – we have to accept that. Not everything can just go on as it always has, there are some cobwebs, and we should welcome a new broom to help us sweep them away. But not to destroy the liturgy, the music, the high standards of the choir and the organ, the great services of the church. Yes, add to those, and do look at attracting more young people – the students for instance – but to vandalise what there is, to kick out 1662 altogether, dumb down the choral services, to have the lowest common denominator of modern hymns sung to an electronic keyboard, to … Oh, Cat, stop me. But it’s breaking my heart.’

‘I know,’ Cat said, taking the colander from her and shaking the salad into a bowl. ‘And mine and those of most of the congregation. Vandalise is the right word.’

‘And when madam talks about the flower rota in that patronising, supercilious way, I … I think I will kill her.’

‘No, Ilona, you won’t. Let me grate that cheese – you slice the tomatoes. And nor will I. But she is going to try our tolerance and forgiveness to breaking point.’

‘I don’t think I have any tolerance and forgiveness left,’ Ilona said sadly.

‘I do wonder what sort of books she’d choose for us.’

‘I can imagine.’

‘Are there happy-clappy books?’

‘Of course there are. They’re all about what Lewis Carroll called “writhing and fainting in coils”. Did you know she speaks in tongues? They go to some huge evangelical holiday camp and do it there apparently. And of course we all have to learn how to arm-wave properly.’ Ilona sat down. ‘Am I going to laugh hysterically or cry?’

Cat looked at her. ‘You have first go, laugh or cry. I’ll do the other. Shall I get some bread?’

‘Please … and let’s talk about something else or we’ll get indigestion from all that bile. Only just before we do, have you had a message about this new bee Webber has in his bonnet? The Magdalene Group?’

‘Yes. The first meeting’s on Friday the third. I think I ought to go. You?’

Ilona sighed. ‘I don’t know. I feel like just steering clear of everything, to be honest. Who else got that email from Aisling?’

She took a carton of apple juice from the fridge and started to pour it absently into a jug until she caught Cat’s eye and dumped it as it was onto the table.

‘Miles Hurley obviously, Sally from St Hugh’s, me, I think someone from the police as well but I’ve no idea who … Miles ought to invite the Baptists because they run the Reachout van.’

‘What’s on the Dean’s mind, do you suppose? Why is this a cathedral thing?’

‘Well, there are girls working in the Lanes round here, you know.’