Unbecoming Habits (The Simon Bognor Mysteries Book 1) Page 13

  ‘One guess,’ said Xavier, when he’d taken the first gulp. ‘You’ve discovered Aldhelm’s guilty secret.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Father Xavier gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘Oh, all right,’ he said. ‘You’re not a policeman, no one’s dead, God’s in his heaven and I’m the Virgin Mary.’ He ordered a second Scotch. ‘You still look ropey,’ he said, sizing Bognor up, ‘so I’ll forgive you and for absolutely nothing, free, gratis and no strings attached or punches pulled, I will tell you that this afternoon you followed Brother Aldhelm to the house of the wife of Mr. B. Strudwick, M.P. You don’t have to tell me. I know.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Because you asked our jovial host here about Mr. Strudwick’s car, because I observed you from my artist’s chair earlier today belting off to the Land Rover like a demented cat, and because I know that the Strudwick woman has got her sexual claws into the unfortunate Aldhelm. Satisfied?’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Observation. Chatter. Intuition.’

  ‘Who else knows?’

  ‘Who else cares?’ Xavier grinned. ‘A few of us. Not many. Not that bitch Anselm, thank God. And…’ He was serious. ‘For God’s sake don’t let him guess. There’s nothing wrong with Aldhelm. Just for now one person getting the push is quite enough.’

  They drank on in silence. Then Bognor asked him about his drinking companion. For a moment he thought Xavier seemed flustered, but it was only a moment and he was feeling absurdly light-headed.

  ‘Brother Hey talks too much,’ said Xavier. ‘It’s true that… from time to time I regale a young friend with a pint of shandy and a round of Mr. Hey’s succulent sandwiches. But where, I ask myself, is the harm in that?’

  ‘Who?’

  Father Xavier smiled. ‘At times,’ he said, ‘I feel you are a remarkably poor detective. Be more oblique. More stealthy. I’ll leave you to find out for yourself. There’s no point in making things too easy for you. You must work for your living.’

  ‘I am,’ said Bognor, with feeling. ‘Believe me, I am.’ Xavier claimed a sermon to prepare, and Bognor, who wanted to make another attempt on the mystery of the secret cupboard, needed more sleep. They left together.

  ‘Retreat tomorrow,’ said Xavier, as they strode through the dusk.

  ‘All going ahead as planned?’

  ‘So I believe. Vivian picked some up from the station late this afternoon. The appalling old Bishop arrives at crack of dawn tomorrow.’

  ‘How many people?’

  ‘About fifteen or sixteen. You’d have to ask Barnabas for the exact number. Anselm’s in a terrible state because he’s quite sure the News of the World are going to try and sneak one of their reporters in dressed as a retreating visitor. Not a bad idea at that. How much do you think they’d pay for my story?’

  ‘Quite a bit for the whole story.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Xavier, ‘I suppose they would. For the whole story.’ They said good night.

  This time he woke when he’d intended, at midnight precisely. He switched on the light and read the text on the wall, ‘He that loveth his life loseth it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.’ It depressed him. His head nagged and he felt hung-over. He’d also been dreaming. What about? He forced himself to concentrate and remembered with a slight shame that he had been dining expensively and to excess with a naked Mrs. Strudwick. If he was becoming the victim of his frustrations already, what could it have been like for poor Collingdale?

  He got up and washed, then walked carefully out of the hut. It was quite unlike the night before. There was no need for a torch because the moon was bright and shone from a cloudless sky illuminating the silhouettes of the buildings and the line of the hills to the south. He could clearly see each one of the Pleiades and the Milky Way for once lived up to its name. There were no lights from any of the rooms and no noise. From the middle distance of the hillside a fox barked raspingly, to be echoed away on his left by an answering dry animal cough. He waited with his breath held for an owl to hoot, and was rewarded. That meant good luck.

  This time he was not going to be caught. He slid almost professionally along the side of the buildings, pausing as before at every corner and in every doorway, to look about him. Whereas before the exercise had been futile, tonight it was easy to see for yards. If anything had moved he would have spotted it. Besides, there was an incentive. Last night he had not expected trouble—certainly not physical assault. Tonight nothing would surprise him.

  One door short of the honey-store he paused for a last look round and slipped the metal rule from his pocket. He peered about him for a full minute. A sudden movement made him swing round, and he clearly saw a large rat freeze for a second, staring at him before squeezing into a hole behind a drain-pipe. With almost exaggerated stealth he moved to the honey-door itself, waited a moment as before, and pushed. To his surprise it again gave under his pressure. He opened it gently and stepped inside closing it after him, then stood inside the room, pressed hard against the wall to get his bearings. It took him a second to get accustomed to the new light; but it was not as difficult as it might have been because there was a thin light coming from all round the cupboard door, as there had been the night before. The room was unchanged. Just honey and trestles. He peered anxiously for the sight of a potential assailant waiting in a shadow, but satisfied himself that there was no one there.

  To be doubly sure he moved round the room rather than across the middle, still hugging the wall. It took him several minutes to get to the cupboard door this way, but the pain in his head reminded him that caution was worth while. Once there, he put his ear to the crack and listened. There was noise.

  Oddly, perhaps, he relaxed. Although he was increasingly aware of the sinister or at least debauched undercurrents of the place he was still conditioned to think of the brothers as harmless, extrovert, God-fearing souls from whom he had nothing to fear. At that moment he should by rights have had a clear picture of Collingdale face down among the potato plants and of Batty Thomas lying wet, cold and bloody by the well-side. Instead he felt at ease because he knew what he was going to meet: smiling homely religious men who wished no harm to any man. Despite this unwarranted complacence, he took one final look behind him and round the room. There was no one there. He bent down once more and heard again the low murmur of human conversation and found the sound oddly reassuring. He put his left hand round the handle, his left shoulder to the door, drew a breath, turned and pushed. The door swung open and he found himself in a small room illuminated by a single swinging naked bulb.

  Four faces looked up at him, blankly, surprised, resigned. Immediately opposite him at the far end of the table was Father John, staring at him myopically, mouth half open with incomprehension. On either side of him sat Brother Barnabas, his misty thick glasses turned to him in a similar expression of surprise and disbelief, and Father Simon, his sparrow-like features twitching mildly as he tried to grapple with the implications of the intrusion.

  The fourth man sat with his back to Bognor, but as he had entered he had spun round to face him. Bognor recognised the swarthy, unintelligent, countryman’s face of Brother Vivian.

  In his hands each man clasped a number of playing cards. In front of each was a glass and a number of matchsticks. In the middle of the table were two bottles, one unopened, the other almost empty. Against the walls were two buckets, a length of hose, a large blue packet, some bags of sugar and a wine rack containing several dozen more bottles. Bognor assimilated these details and turned back to the four faces.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said, and then, because he could think of nothing appropriate to ask, he added fatuously: ‘Are you playing poker or whist?’

  Father John was the first to regain some semblance of composure. ‘Since you ask,’ he said, ‘we are playing a form of poker known in this instance as “Chicago”. Usually we play stud. I’m afraid,’ and here he indicated the matches, ‘that the stakes
are not as high as those to which you are most probably used. Otherwise we would ask you to join us.’

  Father Simon was less urbane. ‘Oh dear,’ he said. ‘How very embarrassing. I don’t think, John, that that sort of thing makes anything better.’

  Barnabas went scarlet but managed to say ‘Hello’. Only Vivian remained totally silent.

  Bognor continued to stare. John and Simon sat on wooden chairs with backs, Barnabas and Vivian had to make do with orange boxes. The table was rotting slowly and covered in peeling lino, the walls, once whitewashed, were grey with grime and cobwebs, the atmosphere was as damp as the Boot’s. He leant over Vivian’s shoulder and took the almost-empty bottle in his left band, drew it back and held the neck to his nose. It was disgusting. One quick inhalation was enough. He wrinkled his nose and returned it to the table. ‘So that’s where the honey goes.’

  ‘Very perceptive of you,’ said Father John. ‘Why are you here?’

  Bognor found this disingenuous. ‘You can surely answer that,’ he said petulantly.

  ‘Yesterday,’ said Father John, ‘you assured me that you were no longer pursuing professional inquiries.’

  ‘I did admit to a lively personal curiosity,’ countered Bognor, ‘and when you were so reluctant to let me in on the innermost secrets of your honey store, I came back to have another look. And that was when someone—one of you I presume—hit me hard on the head. That, of course, was you, Brother Vivian. How do you do. We haven’t met formally. Now what on earth made you do an anti-social thing like that?’ He suddenly felt in a strong position, and his diffidence diminished.

  Brother Vivian glowered.

  ‘He didn’t mean it,’ said Brother Barnabas. ‘It was a mistake. I mean he was late that night and he came in and he found you listening at the door and he was carrying his spanner from the van and, well, he hit you. You can’t blame him. It might have been anyone.’

  ‘We did try to make amends,’ said Father Simon. ‘I know it was the most distressing accident, but I bathed your wound myself, and we put you to bed, and we washed your clothes and got them dried out. I assure you there was absolutely no personal malice involved. It was purely accidental.’

  ‘If you hadn’t been so nosy,’ said Father John, ‘you wouldn’t have got hurt. It’s your own fault. If you choose to prowl around private property at the dead of night you’ve only yourself to blame if you get hit on the head. Anyway. Now you’re here sit down and have a glass of mead.’

  Bognor accepted the proffered orange box and, more reluctantly, the mead.

  ‘It’s a new one this year,’ said Father Simon. ‘There’s an infusion of tarragon. Rather special.’ He was silenced by Father John, who clearly wished to retain the chairmanship of this meeting.

  ‘Let us assume for the sake of argument,’ he said, ‘that you are still genuinely and professionally concerned about some aspect of recent events here at Beaubridge. Let us further assume that for reasons best known to yourself you wish to conceal this concern from members of the Community. Ergo…’ he paused, ‘ergo, you are compelled to adopt unorthodox methods, and to follow any suspicions which may present themselves. By so doing you stumble upon circumstances which have no bearing whatever on the events with which we are all familiar.’ He sipped with an old man’s gentility at his mead, and Bognor suddenly realised that he, and probably all four of them, were at least slightly tipsy. He took a sip himself. It was unbearably sticky and sweet and the tarragon gave it no bite or edge, but it was still a strong drink.

  ‘How long do you let this stuff ferment?’ he asked.

  ‘Whole business takes about nine months,’ said Brother Barnabas. ‘Not bad, eh?’ He laughed nervously.

  Father John continued: ‘And so we find ourselves in such embarrassing circumstances as this. It is at least arguable that you were compelled to investigate the matter of the locked door. It is surely not in dispute that our nightly rendezvous are of no relevance to the deaths of our friends and colleagues.’

  ‘I don’t see why not,’ said Bognor, trying to look knowing. ‘One deceit can easily lead to another. It’s an ideal place for plotting. And since on your own admission one of you attacked me viciously last night you are clearly prepared to stop at nothing to protect your secret. Or very little.’ Bognor pondered inwardly: One or other of them might have committed murder; might have connived at the passing on of secrets; but in itself he feared that this bromide Hell Fire Club was a self-contained irrelevance. Like the Strudwick-Aldhelm liaison it was an end in itself. A dead end. Or maybe not. He wished he could be certain.

  ‘That doesn’t follow,’ said Father John. ‘If as you seem to suggest there were two murders then they were both done in cold blood. In your case the attack was unpremeditated and justifiable. And when we found out who you were we went to considerable trouble to alleviate the extent of the injuries.’ He opened the second bottle of mead.

  ‘Rosemary,’ whispered Father Simon. ‘A tried favourite. You’ll like it.’

  ‘How long has this been going on?’ asked Bognor, for the second time that day.

  ‘I’ve been making it for over twelve years now,’ said John. ‘And Simon and I have been drinking it for almost as long. Our brothers here entered later. It was they who suggested the cards.’ He looked censorious, and quickly became even more prim. ‘There’s nothing against it, you know. Nothing in the rule. Our Lord drank. If I didn’t think that Anselm would be very upset by the idea I would press it on him more fervently. I did suggest to him years ago that it would be more desirable and more lucrative to export our own individual brands of mead rather than just honey, but he insisted that it was sacrilege. And I’m afraid that when the Abbot convinces himself of an idea there is no changing him.’ Bognor tried the rosemary mead. It was an improvement. Still too sweet, but not as sweet.

  ‘If,’ he said, ‘I were to tell Father Anselm what I have seen here tonight, all four of you would have to leave the Community.’ There was a silence. The four men stared morosely at the table and the bottles. Brother Vivian spoke for the first time.

  ‘Doesn’t follow,’ he said.

  ‘No,’ said John. ‘It doesn’t follow at all. I agree that it’s perhaps irregular. But we don’t gamble for money and everything else is entirely above board and would scarcely be noticed in a less strait-laced community. Considering that we are a modern foundation the rule here is extremely strict.’

  ‘Father Anselm,’ said Bognor, ‘would demand your resignation.’

  ‘He could demand away,’ said Barnabas. ‘He wouldn’t have mine.’

  ‘They’re entirely right,’ said John. ‘In the last resort, of course, we would appeal to the Visitor or conceivably to Convocation. I don’t happen to believe that Father Anselm would choose to make such an issue of it. Particularly in view of the rather parlous situation Beaubridge finds itself in at this moment. Nevertheless…’ He smiled at Bognor in a pathetic attempt at ingratiation. ‘It would be preferable if nothing were said to Father Anselm. Particularly as it would seem to serve no useful purpose.’

  Bognor looked from one to the other. He would like them to have pleaded a little more. His head had ached desperately for over twenty-four hours now and he wanted some comfort.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Apart from any infringement of your rule, which I admit is an internal affair, I could have been killed last night.’

  ‘Well, I for one,’ said Simon, ‘am very sorry about that. I think we all owe you an apology.’ The others chorussed agreement, Barnabas with enthusiasm, John and Vivian with markedly less.

  ‘I accept that.’ Bognor was happy to appear magnanimous. ‘But I just can’t promise. At the very least I want a lot more co-operation from you than I’ve been getting in the past.’

  Vivian looked particularly surly. ‘Should have finished the job,’ he muttered. ‘One more bang would have done it.’

  Father John resumed his chairmanship. ‘Don’t be infantile, Vivian. Apart from being unne
cessarily vindictive and totally impractical, it’s not getting us anywhere. Everyone’s cards,’ he gestured stagily at the remains of the night’s poker, ‘are on the table. Mr. Bognor here is threatening us with exposure unless we collaborate. Correct?’

  ‘Co-operate, not collaborate,’ said Bognor. This was more satisfactory.

  ‘A nice point,’ said John. ‘What do you want from us?’

  ‘For a start,’ said Bognor, with a flash of inspiration, ‘I want a list of every person who has been on a retreat here during the last eleven years. And I want it by breakfast tomorrow.’

  There was an almost tangible sigh of surprise and relief. ‘Is that all?’ asked John.

  ‘I don’t know yet. I might want more. I’ll tell you in the morning. In any case I shall certainly want a great deal more helpfulness than I’ve had so far.’ He drained his mead, and coughed, then scraped back his orange box. ‘Well, thank you, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘That’s been most enlightening. And now I’ll leave you to your game.’

  Outside in the moonlit courtyard he could have cried with frustration. Yesterday he had had two mysteries and with them the prospect of some meaningful discoveries. At the end of today he had solved both and in doing so solved nothing. And then there was the maddening way Erris Beg had told Camberley everything he had wanted to conceal from him. That was bad enough. But for Camberley to go and tell Anselm…

  Tomorrow he would embark on a different tack. He was not going to be deflected. He would stick rigidly to his brief and disregard the most suspicious behaviour unless it related specifically to murder or espionage. He groaned. How could one know?

  He reached his room and undressed. Somewhere along the passage a man was snoring. It didn’t worry him. Nothing could disturb his sleep even if he was still left with the same eight suspects that he’d had when he arrived. Tomorrow, he resolved, as he drifted into unconsciousness, he would start to discover the link in the chain. If he couldn’t find the guilty friar he could surely discover the guilty retreater. Then after the weekend he would confront Brother Bede. Dimly, as his conscious mind yielded to a confusion of naked monks playing poker by the banks of the River Cherwell, he remembered that Brother Bede was the only man who could have spied for all that time and done both murders. The memory brought a smile to his lips as he too began to snore.