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A man lies in a pool of blood at the bishop's house, and the comfortable and uneventful existence of Father Vincent Ross is about to be turned upside down. Ugly secrets are being concealed by the church that he serves, a murderer is on the loose and getting closer by the minute. For years, Vincent has enjoyed the tranquil, celibate life of a small-town parish priest, listening to the sins of others, celebrating the mass and visiting the sick, his main pleasures being found in fine wines, gossip and the friendship of a few clever women. But one foolish act, and a string of drunken words intended for his ears alone, draws him into a dark, corrupt world, opening his eyes and forcing him to question old certainties. Unable to rely upon the police and armed only with his own intelligence, he sets out to stop the killer but, in so doing, the accidental detective finds he is now the prey.
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First published in 2014 by Polygon,an imprint of Birlinn LtdWest Newington House10 Newington RoadEdinburghEH9 1QS
www.polygonbooks.co.uk
Copyright © Gillian Galbraith 2014
ISBN 978 1 84697 279 9eBook ISBN 978 0 85790 785 1
The moral right of Gillian Galbraith to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form without the express written permission of the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Design by Studio Monachinowww.studiomonachino.co.uk
Set in Sabon at Birlinn Ltd
Printed and bound in Great Britain
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Maureen Allison
Colin Browning
Douglas Edington
Lesmoir Edington
Robert Galbraith
Daisy Galbraith
Diana Griffiths
Roger Orr
Aidan O’Neill
Dr David Sadler
An old friend from my childhood
DEDICATION
To my beloved motherwith all my love
CONTENTS
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
PROLOGUE
It did not look like the Book of Judgement. All three men were listed on its faded, blue-lined pages, their names written in an identical hand. Scratched out below each name was a litany of obsolete addresses, multi-coloured biro entries, and with only the current one left intact. Their crimes were described too. Someone had taken the trouble to track their movements for years and years, to follow their progress from county to county, country to country.
The one at the top of page 20 was a retired casino owner with a liking for Cuban cigars. In February 2013 he was murdered in his home, a tree-lined avenue in the prosperous Edinburgh suburb of Colinton. Page 26 recorded an impoverished widower, then living by the foam-flecked shores of the Forth with only his Bichon Frise for company. He met a similar end less than a month later. The third man, described on page 30, a habitué of his local bowling club, bled to death on his bathroom floor to the lush sound of Ella Fitzgerald’s ‘That Old Black Magic’. All of the victims were pensioners, died from knife wounds, and their last words, which sounded like a prayer, incensed their killer. None of them knew each other, or their attacker. Despite their deaths, no one amended their entries, deleted their names from the book.
CHAPTER ONE
This one he would not spit out either. If the man then attempting to focus his blue eyes on the bottle’s label had ever been asked what his passion in life was, he would have replied ‘fine wines’. He might have been tempted to say, ‘fighting injustice’, ‘feeding the starving’ or even ‘wind-surfing’. Any one of those would have sounded, he considered, seemlier, worthier and less sybaritic. But, unfortunately, also untrue. Beekeeping was, genuinely, close to his heart, but hardly deserved to be described as a passion, in his estimation at least.
That evening, he was indulging himself by carrying out a little research into the wines of the Bordeaux region. His cat, Satan, lay on his lap. He sniffed the contents of the next glass, tipped it towards his lips and took a deep draught. What flavours were now swirling upon his tongue? Blackcurrant with a hint of saddle leather, or was it aniseed, perhaps, or liquorice or celery even? Rolling the last drops purposefully around his mouth, he savoured them and held them there for a few seconds, saturating his taste-buds.
Once, he mused, he really had possessed a nose for fine wines, could truthfully have called himself a connoisseur. But the gaining of such erudition was an expensive business, ill-fitted to those, like him, with shallow pockets. Nowadays, he had to make do. In his twenties, in the brief period when he had been a sharp-suited criminal defence lawyer, only the best had passed his tonsils. Of course, in those far-off days his own nose was little more than a button, not the crooked protuberance which now dominated his face and made him blink every time he accidentally caught his own reflection in the mirror. And all thanks to the unexpected rebound of a hammer held in his own careless hand. Worse, of late, the misshapen thing seemed to have found its mission in life, betraying him by periodically flushing fiery-red like a beacon, as if to warn the world of his weakness for drink. But was weakness the right word? Fondness would be more accurate. Less Calvinistic, certainly, and that had to be a good thing. Whichever it was, he need not worry yet, he reassured himself, he had a long way to go before reaching the bottom. After all, neither Blue Nun nor Buckfast Tonic Wine had passed his lips so far.
Catching sight of the TV remote on the floor, he leaned forwards in his armchair to get it, forgetting about the cat and making it mew in surprise as, for a second, it was crushed between his chest and his lap. Stroking it by way of apology, he leaned back again, catching, out of the corner of his eye, sight of his desk. A pile of unanswered correspondence, bills and catalogues lay on top of his computer. They seemed like a rebuke. Deliberately averting his eyes, he pressed the ‘on’ button and the TV sprang to life. At this late hour, QI would probably be showing.
But it was not Stephen Fry’s horse-like face that greeted him. On the screen two scantily clad black women were rotating their hips, shimmying together with their heads thrown back, dancing in unison to some silent beat. Gazing at them, enchanted, he marvelled at their extraordinary beauty. They seemed like fit young panthers, sleek and lithe, each synchronised to the other as perfectly as a shadow. Once their routine had finished and they were taking their bows, he increased the volume and caught the audience’s riotous applause, an occasional wolf-whistle cutting through the excited clapping.
Forgetting all about the quiz, still spellbound by the sight of the pair, he watched as the next contestant trooped shyly onto the stage. Liking the look of her, and to get the best possible view, he put the cat on the sofa beside him, perched on the edge of his seat and hastily clapped on his spectacles. She too appeared to manage without any unnecessary clothing, necessary clothing even, and must, from the look of her, surely be a professional dancer? No shop assistant could move like that. No one behind any of the counters in Kinross or Milnathort, more’s the pity. But, if she truly was an amateur, then this time his vote might genuinely make a difference. It could ‘change her life’ as the commentator observed. No doubt it would cheer up her fiancé, allegedly bedbound at the moment – make him pick up his bed and walk, quite possibly.
Hurriedly, he looked on the nearby table for a pen, determined to note the number for her as soon as it appeared on the screen. As he was busily scribbling it down, his mobile rang, but he continued writing, trying to ignore it. After the first few rings each subsequent one seemed to penetrate his skull like a drill, maddening him and distracting him from his task. Finally, having missed the last two digits, he tossed his pen onto the table in frustration. Ten calls in one evening? Surely to God, everyone, every single person without exception, was entitled to some time off, some time to themselves, to eat their food and digest it, if nothing else? Mobiles were a curse. No one should be perpetually on duty, and he had been on his feet for over fifteen hours already. Feeling drained, exhausted by the efforts of the day and his own anger, he looked back at the screen again, and, at that precise moment, the phone rang once more. This time he snatched it up, clamped it to his good ear and said through gritted teeth: ‘Father Vincent Ross.’
Unable to make out the faint-voiced reply above the thump-thumping beat of the dance music, he added, ‘One second, please.’ So saying, he turned the volume on the set down and started to speak again, already feeling calmer and more collected in the silence.
‘Now, what can I help you with?’
‘It’s me, Father, Mamie.’
He rolled his clear blue eyes heavenwards. She had already called twice earlier, that very evening. But he made an effort to keep the impatience he could feel rising within him from his voice and replied: ‘Good evening, Mamie. What seems to be the trouble now?’
His enquiry was met by an extended silence so, smiling, telling himself to put more warmth into his tone, he repeated the question. After a few further seconds of silence his effort was rewarded and his caller deigned to reply, ‘It’s John, Father.’
‘Yes?’
‘I’m having a problem. He’s pressing for Nevaeh again.’
‘Nevaeh?’
‘Heaven backwards. I ask you, what kind of name is that?’
‘Was it you calling a second ago, Mamie?’
‘Yes.’
‘I see. Well, we’ve spoken about this before, haven’t we? This very evening. About John, I mean.’
‘We have, Father …’ She hesitated, not completely impervious to the suggestion of annoyance that had leaked into his tone despite his best efforts. ‘We have. Yes. But he’ll still not come round.’
‘Well, it could be worse. He could be pushing for Lleh – Hell backwards – or Beyoncé or something. You’ve some weeks to the birth. He might yet settle for Bridget – or Uncumber, which is a saint’s name, as you are wanting …’
‘I know, I know.’ She hesitated. ‘Uncumber? But if you were to speak to him about it, Father?’
‘But I have, Mamie, too many times …’ For a second his attention lapsed, catching his breath at the sight of another dancer. Her boneless body was as sinuous as a snake’s, and she appeared to be simulating some kind of limbo dance. When, finally, the camera panned onto the grinning faces of the judges, the spell was broken and he managed to finish his sentence: ‘… and I’ve failed, I’m afraid. How do you know it’s a girl?’
‘A woman knows these things, Father.’
‘Was there anything else tonight, Mamie?’
This was her cue, and a torrent of words came tumbling out, disclosing the real reason for her call.
‘About the brass candlesticks, I don’t see why I should do them again this Friday, or the big chandelier. I only done them on Tuesday last and then only because Ann-Marie …’
‘I’ll stop you right there,’ said Vincent. ‘The candlesticks have nothing to do with me. You know that, Mamie. Speak to Veronica, she’s in charge of the Light Brigade. Now, if that’s all I’ll say goodnight to you …’
He paused for a split second, murmured ‘Goodnight’, waited for her echo and switched off his mobile. With her on their side the rebel angels would have triumphed, he thought, because she never gave up. He smiled, a vision of the pregnant woman in breastplate and armour brandishing an aerosol, flitting into his mind from nowhere. She would have to change her name though; Mamie did not really inspire awe in the same way as Lucifer, Azazel, Lilith, Moloch and the like did.
Switching channels, he saw the credits for QI scrolling upwards. Muttering to himself in his disappointment, he scooped the Siamese cat up from its nest on the sofa, climbed the stairs to his bedroom and plumped it down on the blue-and-white striped duvet which covered his bed.
There was little other furniture in the room. The only piece in it which actually belonged to him, as opposed to the parish, was the wardrobe. It was a heavy Victorian artefact, made of mahogany. Once it had belonged to his grandparents and, as a child, he had played hide and seek inside it. Now it housed his beekeeping suit with its integral veil, looking, he often thought, like the husk of a dead Cyberman. Every time he opened the heavy double doors the scent of honey billowed deliciously from it. Beside the wardrobe was a chest of drawers, left by a predecessor, which he had painted navy blue. Catching sight of the framed photograph of his mother resting on it, his eyes were drawn to hers. He picked the frame up, murmuring to himself in a tone that he might have used to reassure an anxious spouse: ‘I know, I know. Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten.’
Then, his eyes heavy with exhaustion, he knelt down by the bed and began to read the night prayers from his black, leather-bound copy of The Divine Office regretting, as he was doing so, that he had not said the whole lot first thing in the morning in a oner. His batteries would not have been so flat before breakfast. Once he had finished, he glanced up from his kneeling posture and saw the ivory figure hanging on the cross, pinned halfway up the wall.
The crucifix was no longer perfectly perpendicular. He could not resist getting up to straighten it, shaking his head as he did so, as if Jesus had swung himself squint again, deliberately to annoy him. Dust from the pierced feet coated his fingertips.
Starting to undress, he placed his folded jacket on the back of his little armchair and made a mental note to take it to the cleaners the next morning. Black might not show up the dirt but his nose warned him that he could economise no longer. As he was unbuttoning his clerical shirt, his cigarette packet already extracted from the side pocket, the sound of hymn-singing drifted up through the floorboards of his bedroom and made him pause. He had forgotten all about the collection of ecumenical dafties below. Monday bloody Monday. There would be no sleep for him now with them loose in the hall, with their tambourines, recorders and guitars, all fizzing with evangelical fervour like damp sherbet. Satan had destroyed his earplugs, and he would have to lock up the presbytery once they had vacated it. As he listened an unaccompanied off-key treble started up: ‘Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound …’
Not tonight, he thought, a sour sound tonight. Telling himself to be more charitable and relax, he climbed onto his bed and stretched out his full length, his small, square-toed feet nowhere near the end of it. Sighing loudly, he lit a cigarette and inhaled, watching the smoke curl upwards in the air as he breathed out, trying to force himself to calm down and enjoy their service.
Gradually, as the nicotine worked its way through his system, he began to feel less tense, less agitated. Head wedged in his pillow, he lay still while two further hymns were sung by the group. By the third, he was mouthing the words himself, joining in with the concert below. They were harmless enough, and would go soon. Listening to ‘The Lord of the Dance’ he closed his eyes and his breathing became deeper and more regular. Sleep did not feel too far away.
Suddenly, hearing a distinctive, nasal voice, he sat bolt upright. It was her! That soi-disant actress was up to her tricks again. Performing here! Ignoring his repeated plea that she refrain from such practices in his hall, in his home. And in front of him, to his very face and less than a fortnight ago, the petite charlatan had given him her word. She had had no charism, no special gift from God. She was in complete control of all her faculties, which was more than could now be said of him. How dare she gabble away in tongues, like a thing possessed, and on diocesan premises to boot! In the quiet of his bedroom, he listened intently, concentrating on her voice and making out one or two French words in amongst her babbling. Finally, catching the words ‘Veni, Vidi, Vici’, and laughing out loud at her audacity, he determined to end the charade, tipped Satan off his lap, snatched his trousers from the chair and began to zip up his fly. Came and saw, maybe, conquered, never!
Striding through her rapt audience, he reached the podium where she stood and tapped her lightly on the shoulder. Her eyes remained closed; she brushed her cardigan as if to dislodge a fly that had landed and murmured with renewed intensity something that sounded to his ears suspiciously like ‘Vorsprung durch Technik …’
‘It’s very late, Rhona. So, we’d better close up for the night,’ he said, patting her shoulder again and whispering in her ear, ‘unless you want a full-blown exorcism performed on you.’
Like someone coming to from a trance, she blinked rapidly, shook her head and favoured her followers with a weak but radiant smile which, eventually, she turned on him. Then, apparently drained by her communings with the spirit, she sank into the nearest red plastic seat, clutching her tambourine tight against her breast. While the rest of the chairs were being stacked by the faithful, she remained there, head down and motionless.
‘Well?’ he said, squatting on his haunches down to her level.
‘Well?’ she replied, favouring him with a slightly sheepish, sidelong glance.
‘We’d agreed, hadn’t we? There was to be no more of your phoney glossolalia in this hall,’ he began, but a whisper cut him short.
‘Don’t worry, Father, my work is done. I’m off to Loughborough in two days’ time. I’ve got a job in telesales.’
‘Good luck to you, then,’ he said, unable to resist adding, ‘… and I hope they’re fluent in double-Dutch there.’
Locking the hall door behind them, he returned to his room. Now wide awake, he leaned on one elbow and gazed out of his bedroom window, over the road and across the bowling green. Beyond it, through the bare trees flanking its eastern boundary, moonlight shimmered on Loch Leven and, in the far distance, a dusting of late snow lay on the Lomond hills, highlighting the deep creases etched into them. In the still air, the joyous sounds of a ceilidh drifted from the nearby Green Hotel, clapping interspersed periodically by a whoop as the reels speeded up. Everything about the scene in front of him pleased him. He lit another cigarette, inhaled deeply, and looked down the High Street towards the town centre, tapping the window sill with his fingers in time to the music.
Along it, a couple of giggling pedestrians were returning home from the pub, The Salutation, their arms linked companionably at the elbow, just managing to dodge the lamp posts that punctuated their route and remain, mostly, on the pavement. He knew and liked them both. High above his head, the full, white moon looked down from the sky, illuminating their path, and everything around, including the parklands of Kinross House, the ancient clock tower of the town hall and the glassy waters of the loch. Magically, it had turned the War memorial opposite the county buildings to silver. Some of the names inscribed on it were those of businesses still flourishing in the town: Anderson, Beveridge, Drysdale, Stark and Wilson. Beyond the black-and-white nineteenth-century frontage of the Green Hotel, in The Muirs, the descendants of a few of them lived in substantial stone villas behind high privet or lonicera hedges, as far from the only industry left in the town as they could make it. At the Bottom End, quarter of a mile away, the woollen mill’s high chimneys puffed away, steam from them sometimes drifting lazily across the waters of the loch like an early morning mist.
From his second floor eyrie, Father Vincent was conscious that he could see, at a glance, much of his domain. The prosperous county town of Kinross stretched out in front of him, and its smallness did not trouble him. On the contrary, it comforted him, reassured him, because in the sparsely populated little place, he felt he was someone. No better respected than the local bank manager, doctor or lawyer, perhaps, but a recognisable face nonetheless, a well-kent one even.
Thinking about it, nowadays ‘respect’ might not be the word that first came to mind at the mention of those professions. Bankers and priests were routinely reviled, pariahs both, and any respect for those practising the law, in his experience, bordered too often on fear. There were other differences too. Dr Hume, the only untainted one of the quartet, genuinely did cater for all ages, cradle to grave and everything in between, whereas most of his own flock had lost their teeth. At least three-quarters of them were old enough to remember the words of the Latin Mass and were uneasy eating anything but fish on Fridays. They still thought of him as young, despite his four-plus decades on the earth. His roots in the place went deep, had mingled, become inextricably linked to all those Andersons, Beveridges, Drysdales and the rest of them. Having no close family left apart from a rarely seen brother, they were the nearest thing he had to one.
Hearing the town clock striking eleven, he tossed his cigarette butt out of the window and shut his thick blue curtains. The cat lay occupying the very centre of the duvet, its long, creamy body stretched to its full length as he basked in the warmth of the electric blanket. Its master, now in a T-shirt and striped pyjama trousers, climbed onto the bed, snuggled under the cover and, careful not to disturb the drowsy animal, spooned his body around its tiny form. Taking one hand out from beneath the cover, he stroked its burnt umber-coloured ears, listening to the low rumble of its purr in the silence of the room. As he did so he smiled in the dark, imagining the sneer on his own youthful lips at such a picture, at the thought that any human being could be so reliant on the company of a clawed, whiskered creature. Still less that he should one day turn into such a one.
Yawning, he settled himself more cosily round the cat, adjusting the pillow beneath his head to make himself more comfortable. Tonight, for some reason or none, he felt oddly anxious, ill at ease. Maybe it was the weather, or something he had eaten, like Barbara Duncan’s Stilton and broccoli soup. Or that second black coffee. Or the antics of the fork-tongued actress? She had brought his blood to boiling point. Whatever it was, it had robbed him of his equilibrium and left him instead with some vague feeling of dread. A premonition that some unwelcome change was in the offing, was in the air. Something that he would be powerless to resist, and would be malign in its effect. The feeling reminded him of how he had felt as a young trainee lawyer, waiting to appear before a crusty sheriff, knowing little about the case he had been allocated and praying that decree would be granted with no more than a nod. Yes, dread was not too strong a word to describe it.
As sleep begins to overtake the priest, a young man, quiet as a cat, pushes open the door of a familiar sitting-room and looks inside. The place is lit only by candles. Lying on the sofa, unaware of his presence, is the person he has come to meet. He has his eyes closed, headphones on, and is smiling, not at the Chopin nocturne which is working its usual calming magic, but at the thought of this very visitor. Seeing him, the young man advances on tiptoes across the brown carpet until he is standing inches away from the man’s head, which, as he studies it, suddenly seems fragile as an eggshell. He looks back towards the doorway and signals for his companion to join him. But the only response is an emphatic shake of the head. Unmoved, he shrugs his shoulders and turns his attention back to the figure on the bed. In the silence, he can hear the man breathe: in and out, in and out. As he stands there, transfixed by the steady rise and fall of the man’s chest, he becomes aware, with a strange, unexpected intensity, of his own physicality, his own flesh; his heart seems to have abandoned its customary rhythm, now forcing the blood into his arteries as if to burst them, making his temples throb and his hands tremble. This excitement is better, more energising, than any drug he has ever taken and, in the half-light, he exults in himself, in his power. He could do anything; needs no help from anybody. Clutching the claw-hammer in both hands, he raises it above his head and then smashes it down onto the man’s upright, flexed kneecap.
CHAPTER TWO
The next day at the five o’clock Mass in St John’s, Father Vincent stood facing the congregation in the church, took the host and broke it over the paten, whispering the words of the prayer. As he watched the stream of his own breath in the cold air, he was glad of the warmth provided by his alb and the long red chasuble that reached almost to his feet.
At that moment, a loud wail emanated from the only baby in the building and his attention was caught by the sight of its mother bending over it, trying to coax it to be quiet by donning a monkey glove puppet and playing with it. Unfortunately, the woman’s ploy failed, and for the next few minutes, until it was finally bundled out of the building, the air was filled by the baby’s high-pitched, frightened cries. Smiling broadly at the departing woman, determined to signal to her that he was not upset by the noise, he advanced towards the line of people waiting to be given Communion.
At the head of the queue, tongue extended in readiness, stood Lady Lindsay, the old guard made flesh. She was as well-dressed as ever, with a silk Hermès scarf partially covering her blue-grey helmet of permed hair. Tanned and broken-veined, she looked every inch the countrywoman with her muscled calves and padded waistcoat, dog hairs trapped in the seams. Most, including her husband, were accustomed to obeying her orders, and she only attended St John’s Church as there was nothing grander nearby. On first being introduced to Father Vincent she had explained that she came from an ‘Old Catholic’ family, looked him beadily in the eye as if to subordinate him too and when that had failed, she had flashed her ace. Her uncle, she explained, had been the Provost of the Brompton Oratory in London. ‘Really?’ he had replied evenly, trumping her with his joker: ‘Mine was the Provost of Musselburgh.’ St George killed his dragon; he had tamed his with a combination of charm and steel.
Now, open-mouthed before him, she fixed him in the eye, frowned, and unsubtly inclined her head towards the empty pew from which the child’s crying had emanated. She had let him know many times before that she did not approve of babies in God’s house. ‘Something,’ she had said in her loud, martial voice at their last meeting, ‘must be done.’ Meeting her eyes with his own ones of forget-me-not blue, he ignored her mime and, adopting a beatific expression, shut her up by laying the host on her tongue.
As she moved away, head bowed modestly and unable to berate him, he found himself faced with Elizabeth Templeton and, seeing her, he had to make a conscious effort to stop himself from smiling. It would not be proper to do so here and now, and it would likely disconcert her. But the sight of the librarian invariably made him feel happy, and that feeling was difficult to hide. She usually came only to Sunday Mass. Today, he had not expected to see her.
Over the years he had considered the effect that she had upon him and puzzled over it, but he still could not work out exactly why he was so susceptible to her. It was not as if she was a conventional beauty; on the contrary, she was as big-boned as an ox, big-bosomed too, and stood a good six inches taller than him. Her clothes reflected her personality; large, generous and free-flowing.
But her appearance did have a part to play in the attraction; he recognised that. Whenever he looked at her face he knew that whatever expression it showed would be entirely genuine. Like a young child, she appeared to be incapable of dissembling. Nothing was produced for effect. And while such a trait could, at times, be slightly alarming, it also meant that when she did smile, the warmth of it set the world alight and him with it. Sometimes he would borrow books from the library just to see her.
As she was still unaware of his scrutiny, eyes downcast, he allowed himself the luxury of gazing at her for a moment longer. She had such a generous, upturned mouth and fine, high cheekbones. He knew, with an unshakeable conviction, that his high regard for her was fully reciprocated. Alone in his house, when he was unable to get to sleep, he sometimes amused himself by wondering how his life might have panned out if he had taken a different path. If, instead, he had married her, and become a partner, a Writer of the Signet in some dusty Edinburgh firm. In his mind’s eye he had created a whole life together for the pair of them. It was all too ordinary, too dull for most people, but to him it was exotic beyond compare.
As she opened her hazel eyes in surprise, seconds having passed and finding that nothing was placed in her hands, he said quickly, ‘The body of Christ’, as if by gabbling the words the delay could be made up.
While he was speaking to one of his parishioners after the service, Mamie Bryce edged the startled pensioner out of the way, accosted him and tried to revisit the telephone conversation of the night before.
‘Mamie,’ he said reproachfully, looking at her and at the retreating back of Mr Munro.
‘Veronica’s not answering her phone, Father,’ she said, ignoring his implied rebuke, ‘but it’s not right that I do the brass lamps myself week in week out. Either you or Veronica will have to sort this out, for once and for all.’
Faced with all the woman’s pent-up annoyance he found himself, momentarily, at a loss for words. How could those blessed brasses be so important? Elizabeth must be somewhere nearby, and he did not want to miss her. Maybe he should just give in to Mamie, tell her to leave the matter with him to sort out? No, she would still refuse to move and her demands would multiply, become more strident.
‘I told you last night, Veronica’s in charge,’ he said implacably.
‘And she’s over there, Mamie, talking to Lady Lindsay,’ a low voice interjected. Elizabeth Templeton helpfully pointed at a group near the gate, the square body of the rota-organiser obscuring many of the slimmer frames of her companions.
‘Right. I’ll catch her the now,’ Mamie Bryce exclaimed, moving off and determined to corner her quarry before anyone else did. Past experience suggested that she would be a much softer target than the priest. She had crumbled instantly over the hoovering.
‘Thanks, Elizabeth,’ Father Vincent said, smiling broadly and showing his even white teeth, ‘but she’ll be back, you’ll see.’
Elizabeth simply nodded by way of reply, and he added as an afterthought: ‘How’s Michael doing?’
Michael, her only child, suffered from attention deficit disorder and Tourette’s syndrome, and these had ensured that she had not had a good night’s sleep for many years. The last two decades of her life had been spent explaining the world to him and him to the world. The boy’s father could not cope and had left them both, seeking solace for his loss in other arms.
‘Not as well as I’d like,’ she said. ‘As you know, after that silly incident with the motorbike, his card’s been marked. He still hasn’t found a job. Whenever anything happens here that community policewoman comes straight to my door, determined he’ll be involved.’
‘You mean Effie?’
‘Is that what she’s called? So far it’s been nothing to do with him, and he’s infuriated at the injustice of it, so he argues with her and things go from bad to worse.’
‘Where’s he now?’
‘He’s spending the night with his dad; they’re going together to the rugby at Murrayfield tomorrow afternoon. So I’ve no worries for the moment. I know exactly where he is for the next forty-eight hours. He’ll love it. He needed a man’s hand in his life, but he’s had precious little of it. And you, how’s life with you?’
‘Fine,’ he said, sounding suddenly and uncharacteristically guarded. Mamie was approaching them, and once in range, she slipped in front of Elizabeth and exclaimed loudly, ‘Ronnie says that you’re to sort it out. It’s favouritism. I told her that I’m not putting up with it. She said I’d a brass neck. You’re to decide who’s to do the big vase this week. So, is it to be me or Ann-Marie?’
‘You,’ he shot back, annoyed at the interruption.
Re-entering the empty and echoing church, the squeaking noises made by his new rubber-soled shoes on the parquet flooring sounded shrill, like a gathering of angry mice. So, for the fun of it, he started to take exaggeratedly large strides, placing his feet gingerly on the floor as if it was made of thin ice. Filling the ensuing silence, his tummy let out a loud rumble. With only five minutes to go before the confession hour, there had been no time for the cup of tea and slice of fruit cake that had filled his imagination so recently. Mamie’s furious rant had seen to that. Still, in the face of her barrage he had not relented, and if she resigned from the rota so be it. Catherine Forbes might volunteer, others too; plenty of them had been put off by Mamie’s involvement. No doubt it would prove an empty threat like the last time.
Now seated in the confessional, he leaned back against the wooden panelling, luxuriating in the silence after the woman’s tirade. How wonderfully peaceful it seemed. He tried to stretch out his short legs but was unable to do so, due to a collection of broken vases, brushes and hoovers that had appeared from nowhere. The place now seemed to be being used as an overflow broom cupboard. Perhaps it was part of the vendetta between the various cleaning factions? Some point or other was probably being made by someone about something. Was he simply being caught in the crossfire? Tomorrow, he would convene a summit and, if necessary, knock some heads together.
Without thinking, he nudged one of the vases to one side with his foot, appalled when it toppled over with a loud crash. The noise was quickly replaced by complete silence once more. Sitting back, relishing the quiet, he basked in it until something told him that it was wrong. All wrong. Hell’s bells! Where was the music? Without it, the making of confession became a public act rather than a private one, the penitent’s words easily audible to those in the nearby pews. Others, further away too, if they strained to hear hard enough. The whole thing became more like The Jeremy Kyle Show than one of the blessed sacraments. Peering out of his door, he saw that the church was still empty, and hurried into the sacristy in his squeaking shoes. In seconds the building resonated to a Latin chant intoned by an all-woman Bulgarian choir.
‘You just try and do your homework when your mum tells you, eh?’ he said to the child, yawning silently. The tediousness and predictability of the sins on parade were acting as a soporific on him. So far there had been three mumbled accounts of using swear words, a brace of ‘entertaining’ bad thoughts, their content remaining unspecified despite a little prurient prodding by him, and one young woman’s confession of lying to her spouse about her use of birth control. It was like being pecked to death by ducks. The sharper stab of some more inventive sinner would be almost welcome, wake him up at the very least.
The girl left and was replaced, quickly, by the next penitent. The newcomer was breathing heavily, every inhalation and exhalation audible until, suddenly, he wheezed, gasping for air and making a strange hollow, crackling sound. Instantly, the priest knew who was sitting behind the grille. He sighed wearily, having been expecting just such a visit. His friend, Barbara Duncan, had tipped him the wink that there had been a spate of thefts from washing lines in Sandport. Apparently the thief had been very selective, pilfering only ladies’ pants, bras and tights. Inevitably, given the man’s record, George Lumsden’s name had been on her lips, on most people’s lips. If only, Vincent thought, George had a little more grey matter encased in that strange, bullet-shaped skull of his, he would realise that such a haul could only be taken from the same place once, if he valued his liberty. Everyone in the town knew of his weakness; gossip was, after all, the lifeblood of the place. One missing Wonderbra and he would be the prime suspect. But, unless he was apprehended, that is all there could be, suspicion. But, after this latest confession, Vincent would know. If anyone had their finger on the pulse of the place it was him.
Later that same evening, he looked along the packed supermarket shelf, yearning to pick up a couple of bottles of the Saint-Émilion Grand Cru. But on seeing the price of them, he turned to the Lussac-Saint-Émilion, a poor substitute but drinkable. With over half the month gone, woefully little of his salary remained and there were only a couple more anniversary Masses still to be said. Worse, the McKinnons were notoriously late payers and, unfortunately, the Cockburns had not a bean between them. A baptismal fee was a possibility, but that could not be relied upon nowadays. Half the infants practically walked to the font, and a few could have made their own responses. The Argentinian Cabernet Franc might be a good compromise – it was both on offer and well-rated.
To his disquiet the woman at the till, a Baptist married to one of his flock, gave him a wink as he began stowing the bottles into their carrier bag. Disconcerted, he resolved to avoid her in future. He could feel his cheeks reddening, blushing from the neck upwards. But, he reminded himself, the only vow he had given was one of celibacy, not abstinence from all the other good things of life. So he was not some sort of rogue as no doubt she fondly imagined. Alcohol was not forbidden to him. Trying to get across that he had nothing to hide, he looked her straight in the eye as he opened his wallet. She winked at him again, three times, and he relaxed, realising that she had a facial tic.
‘Will that be all, Father? Of the drink, I mean,’ she said in a whisper, wrong-footing him again, and grinning conspiratorially at him.
‘Well … for tonight at least,’ he replied, joining in with her, smiling too, amused at the thinness of his own skin.
As he was walking up Station Road, humming under his breath, he saw a pack of youths ahead of him in the Sands car park. They were noisy, drinking. Feeling the biting cold for the first time, he zipped up his navy anorak and quickened his step. Some of the group were seated on the low stone perimeter wall that ran along the pavement. A couple more stood immediately below the street light kicking a glass bottle between them, and one sat astride a green plastic rubbish bin, drumming his legs against it. In order to avoid them he would have to cross the road, which had suddenly become unusually busy. Briefly, he closed his eyes It had been a long, tiring day. He was not in the mood to return their quips, deflect their rude, adolescent banter. But somehow he had to get past them.
As he continued onwards, putting one foot resolutely in front of the other, a cider can bounced into the gutter beside him and a girl, an unlit cigarette in her pouting mouth, marched straight up to him. The sound of glass breaking filled the air, followed by a stream of angry swearing. He could feel himself tensing. Just as he was about to collide with her, she jinked to one side, laughing at the near-miss that she had engineered. She had been so close he could smell the alcohol fumes on her breath. Determined to get away and avoid any more of their attention, he hurried on. A missile hit his back. Someone had hurled a full can of Tennent’s lager at him. On impact, he staggered slightly and the carrier bag that he was carrying hit his lower leg. The bottles inside it clinked loudly as if to raise the alarm. Instantly, the boy on the rubbish bin sprang off it and stood in front of him, blocking his path.
‘Aye, aye. Bit of an alky are we, Father?’
‘No,’ he replied, stunned by the blow, rubbing his back with his hand, feeling the bruised muscle below his ribcage through his shirt. He recognised the boy, became aware that he knew his parents. He had buried his great-grandfather less than two months earlier.
‘No. No, Thomas, I’m not,’ he repeated crossly, sidestepping the youth, trying to continue on his way but finding his path blocked by another of the group. This boy, dressed in a hoodie, skinny jeans and trainers, towered over him. His face was unnaturally pale, peering from his hood like a sickly monk. Every time the priest moved to the side he mirrored his movement, making progress impossible.
‘’Cause it’s a sin, eh, Father?’ the boy said, his eyes fixed on the plastic bag and then, as if an idea had struck him, he added: ‘We could help you there, Father. Take your sins off you. Gie us what’s in the bag … they bottles, for the good of your soul, like.’
‘No. I’m on my way home – if you’d just get out of my way.’
‘I said gie us what’s in the bag!’ the boy shouted, shoving him in the chest and trying to snatch the swinging carrier. The rest of the gang clustered around him.