Crime in the Choir Read online

  Nat delivered the pièce de résistance. ‘Pilgrims kept cutting bits off it to keep as relics. Then one day when someone was cutting the neck, the head made a kind of whistling noise like a warning. After that, they kept the skull locked away.’

  ‘Quite right too!’ declared Olivia firmly. ‘Blessed be the man that spares these stones, And cursed be he that moves my bones.’

  ‘That’s what it says on Shakespeare’s grave!’ exclaimed Julian delightedly.

  Olivia smiled at him. ‘Indeed. To dig or not to dig, that is the question!’ The sudden transformation in his appearance intrigued her, as the sad-eyed mask shivered and she detected a gleam of exuberant merriment.

  Nat clearly didn’t share their enthusiasm for the Bard. Tugging at Olivia’s sleeve, he led her over to two wall-mounted rosewood reliquaries. Triptych-like, each had hinged shutters and an elaborate pediment, intricately engraved with what she took to be ecclesiastical insignia. The shutters were left open to display an interior luxuriously lined with crimson silk and studded with numerous little pouches, lockets, and pendants. Beneath each item was a tiny scroll inscribed with the most exquisite calligraphy. Olivia’s mind flew to the painting in the visitors’ parlour. Strange to connect those serene Beati with this lepidopterist’s cache!

  ‘There’s a saint’s tooth in that necklace, Miss Mullen. An’ we’ve got heaps of holy hair!’

  Nat scanned Olivia’s face intently to see the effect produced by this revelation. Satisfied that she was suitably impressed, he embarked with lip-smacking relish on a catalogue of the tortures inflicted by authority on treasonous priests and their acolytes, interrupted by Julian only when his whistle-stop account occasionally strained the bounds of credulity.

  Olivia was happy to indulge them. She sensed that this interlude in the stuffy little basement which housed St Mary’s relics was, as O’Keefe had no doubt intended, a useful distraction from whatever was preying on their minds; also, that it gave them a chance to scrutinize her before she joined the teaching staff.

  It appeared that the boys’ preliminary inspection of Olivia was satisfactory. Some invisible signal seemed to pass between them, for Nat suddenly asked, ‘Have they found something bad down there in the grottoes, Miss Mullen?’

  To Olivia’s ears, his words seemed charged with a mysterious intensity – as though the apparently casual question held some vital import. She noticed uneasily that Julian’s face had turned greenish-white and he looked as though he was about to faint.

  Very gently, she put an arm round each of them and kept her voice light.

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine, Nat. Archaeological digs often throw up weird and wonderful secrets from the past. We’ll have to wait and see what the folk who deal with bones and fossils say about it. Hey, maybe you’ve got another Stonehenge here, with druids sacrificing to the Sun God!’

  She had struck the right note. Tension seemed to flow out of the two figures at her words. She steered them across to the front row of pews which gave the room the air of a chapel. Sitting in a cosy huddle, she was relieved to see some colour slowly return to Julian’s face.

  ‘P’raps the Night Watchman got them.’

  Julian stiffened at Nat’s observation. He shot the younger boy a distinctly unfriendly look.

  This was it.

  Olivia waited. She felt an urgency in Nat that would not be repressed.

  ‘He’s the one who comes at night wearing a sort of hood. His shadow goes by on the wall, but we pretend to be asleep and don’t move. He bends down to check.’

  Looking nervously at Julian, who seemed almost turned to stone, Nat continued. ‘Mr Woodcourt told us not to worry and just say a little prayer. So we wouldn’t have nightmares.’

  ‘Mr Woodcourt?’ Olivia prompted.

  ‘He’s the chaplain,’ Julian explained with quiet reserve. ‘Takes us for divinity too.’

  ‘He’s great,’ Nat piped up. ‘Going to coach me for cricket next year. Thinks I can make the First Eleven. An’ he said I’ve got a voice like a nightingale.’

  The oppressive atmosphere lifted momentarily as Nat claimed top spot in Mr Woodcourt’s good books. Then a shadow fell across his face.

  ‘I don’t think he believes it, though, Miss Mullen. He told us to stop bolting our food and not to eat cheese for supper…’

  Nat’s voice tailed away uncertainly. He sat silently, clenching and unclenching his fists as though nerving himself to take a step into the unknown. Meanwhile a tranquillity gathered round the little group, Olivia creating a stillness where Nat could feel safe.

  Finally, Nat spoke.

  ‘We didn’t imagine the Night Watchman, Miss Mullen. Honestly, we didn’t. He came so close one night, I could feel his breath hot on my face.’

  Olivia felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.

  A predator in the school. Prowling at night. Intent on God knows what.

  Nat’s voice was small but steady.

  ‘There was scuffling sometimes. And a scream once which woke me up.’ He looked to Julian for confirmation. The other boy was silent, but something in his expression gave Nat permission to continue.

  ‘It was a high-pitched scream, as though someone was petrified. Then it just stopped and everything went quiet. It was really scary.’

  Stuttering over the last word, Nat clutched Olivia’s hand convulsively.

  One thing was clear. He had been very badly frightened.

  Julian shot Olivia a sidelong glance. It held such a desperate plea, that her heart turned over.

  She tried to remember the background information O’Keefe had vouchsafed about the older boy. Julian Forsythe’s parents were divorced. Mother re-married with step-children. Julian very much a cuckoo in the nest. Not wanted on voyage. Breaking through the assumed indifference was an ill-concealed hunger which went straight to her heart. Like Nat, it was obvious that he was labouring under a great weight of anxiety. More than anything else, Olivia wanted him to be able to set it down.

  Anyone who tried to hurt these children, she told herself grimly, would do so over her dead body. Shivering as she recalled the grisly discovery in St Mary’s Grottoes, she fervently prayed that it would not come to that.

  ‘You believe us don’t you, Miss Mullen?’

  Nat’s voice was timid.

  The eyes of both boys were riveted to her face.

  ‘Yes, I do,’ Olivia answered simply.

  Suddenly she badly wanted to be away from the stifling little chamber which seemed to be suffocating under the weight of centuries. A sense of ineffable sadness emanated from the relics in their wooden tabernacles: a poignant parade of death which made her think of the broken skeletons in St Mary’s Grottoes. Of your charity, pray for our souls.

  Olivia shook herself. It wouldn’t do to be getting morbid. She needed her wits about her if she was to be of any use to these boys.

  She was a new face, but with the reassurance which came from being a friend of Cynthia and trusted by Dr O’Keefe. This had helped to breach the floodgates and unlock their tongues.

  But where to go from here?

  Something was undoubtedly wrong at St Mary’s. As yet, however, she couldn’t make any sense of the jigsaw. There were too many pieces. Murder victims disinterred from the sludge of the grottoes. Pupils absconding. A missing matron. Desecration in the cemetery. Sir Philip’s enigmatic orientalism.

  It made her head spin.

  Weirdly enough, both Nat and Julian seemed perfectly at home in St Mary’s Shrine amidst the sinister paraphernalia of torture and death. Scraps of flesh and bone. Droplets of bodily fluids. Fragments of blood-stained linen. The foul rag and bone shop of the heart.

  As though the patchwork of physical remains somehow symbolized the corruption lurking beneath St Mary’s outwardly perfect exterior…

  Heavy footsteps descending to the basement interrupted Olivia’s reflections.

  Alex Sharpe appeared in the doorway.

  Both boys quailed before his ev
ident exasperation.

  ‘Sorry to break up the party,’ he said sarcastically, ‘but these two are late for piano practice.’

  Nat and Julian scuttled away, waving shyly to Olivia when they reached the doorway. She gave them a thumbs-up and a cheery ‘See you next week!’

  ‘I do hope, Miss Mullen, you aren’t going to encourage those two in any attention-seeking behaviour.’

  Olivia assumed an expression of innocent surprise.

  ‘They seem perfectly delightful and well-balanced to me. Very keen to tell me all about the history of the relics.’

  For some reason, this answer disarmed the Director of Music. He was almost amiable as he shepherded her out of the basement, making politely inconsequential chat and proposing a visit to the cathedral. The boys would be free after that from tea until Prep and could show her round the school.

  The shrine was left in darkness. One might have imagined the holy objects breathing softly from the reliquaries on the wall. If only they could have spoken, they would have whispered a warning. Take care, Olivia. Take care!

  4

  Brothers in Arms

  ‘What’s it like inside St Mary’s, then?’ asked Markham that night as he and Olivia lingered over supper. ‘I’m taking Noakesy along for a recce tomorrow afternoon. We’ll be out of our comfort zone tomorrow, but you can give me a flavour of the place. C’mon, Mata Hari, I just need some idea of what to expect.’

  Seeing that he had won the day, he settled back into his chair expectantly.

  ‘Well,’ said Olivia thoughtfully, ‘as you go in, there’s the visitors’ parlour on one side and the school chapel behind it with a little sacristy next door. The chapel’s standard fare … statues, cherubs, gilt communion rail, votive lamps, incense boats – very High Church, if you know what I mean.’

  Markham nodded encouragingly.

  ‘There’s an unusual painting of “The Forty Martyrs” in the visitors’ parlour. Strange but uplifting. It shows a prie-dieu beneath the gallows, with all the martyrs gathered round in full fig – doublets, ruffs, coifs … one aristo even has his hunting dog with him.’

  ‘I know the one you mean,’ said Markham. ‘Casts quite a spell, as I recall. Soft vernal tints, with the Tower of London in the background and all the saints wearing a sort of half-smile, as though they’re sharing some private joke. Very appropriate for seditious Jesuits!’

  Olivia smiled at her lover, always so perfectly attuned to her sensibilities.

  ‘I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it,’ she admitted. ‘There was another painting – one of those awful moon-faced Madonnas showing the whites of her eyes, complete with puffy baby – but the martyrs were in a different league. I found myself envying their untouchability. Above and beyond us all…’

  Looking at Olivia’s dreamy expression, Markham felt they were straying into dangerous waters.

  ‘So, where’s the school building?’ he asked hastily.

  ‘Two quadrangles with classrooms and refectory constructed round cloisters.’ Observing the quizzical expression on Markham’s face, Olivia gave a rueful laugh. ‘I guess it is quite monastic in its way. The boys’ dormitories are on the floors above, with a little infirmary tucked away at the end of the corridor. All pretty spartan. Wooden shutters, brown drugget, whitewashed walls with inscriptions in bold black letters over the doors. Perfect Truth is in Silence Alone—’

  ‘Rather an odd motto for a choir school,’ observed Markham.

  ‘Yes, that’s what I thought. All Flesh is Grass was another. Not very cheerful, but I suppose the boys are used to it.’

  ‘And where do the famous grottoes fit in?’

  ‘Oh, they’re beyond the school and the outbuildings at the back. Before you get to the grottoes there’s a meadow with a few hermitages round the side—’

  ‘Hermitages?’

  ‘Little stone altars. The boys told me they’re dedicated to various saints.’

  ‘Hmm. I wonder if we can fit in some catechesis for Noakes before tomorrow’s visit,’ opined Markham with a mock tragic expression. ‘Otherwise we risk a virulent outbreak of No-Popery.’

  Olivia chuckled. ‘I’m sure Noakes will be fine. The worst High-Anglican flourishes are in the cathedral.’

  ‘Ah yes, I’d forgotten about the jewel in Bromgrove’s Crown,’ sighed Markham.

  ‘Actually, it’s more restrained than you’d expect from the outside. Huge terracotta pieta and stations of the Cross.’ Olivia grimaced. ‘I’m not too keen on this modernist stuff, though there’s an interesting side chapel to The Forty Martyrs and an amazing chandelier. The altar crucifix is gruesome. Christ looks like the Wicker Man. How that’s meant to help worshippers “raise their hearts and minds to God” is beyond me.’ She paused before adding, ‘There are a few dark little alcoves dotted about – totally bare except for some weird inscriptions. Seek the secret gateway that opens inward only and closes behind the searcher for evermore, that was one. Then there was something about the Unnamed Power at the timeless centre of the earth.’

  ‘The Marabar Caves come to Bromgrove! Methinks I detect the hand of Sir Philip.’ Markham’s voice was dry.

  ‘Of course! I thought the orientalism was a bit odd, but it fits with the theosophy and he’d have the clout to commission something like that.’

  ‘Did you get as far as the cathedral crypt?’ Markham enquired.

  ‘It had closed for the day.’ Olivia sounded wistful. ‘The Forty Martyrs Chapel connects with a glassed-in spiral staircase which leads down to what the guide book calls the Undercroft. It says this houses four small chapels dedicated to various martyrs – two each side of a central vestibule, with the bishops’ chapel at the far end.’

  ‘Ah yes,’ said Markham ruminatively. ‘The last resting place for former bishops of Bromgrove. It’s got a sliding circular gate in limestone … to mimic the stone which sealed Christ’s tomb. Out of bounds to the hoi polloi, I believe.’ He grinned mischievously. ‘Though I expect they’d make an exception for CID.’

  Suddenly he was all business again, continuing with his mental footprint. ‘Do you know if the school is linked to the cathedral?’

  ‘There’s a passageway which connects the room with the relics to the cathedral. Nat and Julian showed me the door. It’s usually locked.’

  ‘You were disappointed in the shrine.’ Markham had detected that Olivia was underwhelmed by her tour.

  ‘Well, you know me, I guess I’d built it up in my mind – a sort of gothic chamber of horrors.’ Olivia sounded embarrassed. ‘Mind you, according to local lore there are secret spaces and hiding places down there dating back to the dissolution of the monasteries and persecution in Tudor times.’

  Markham regarded his girlfriend fondly. He never ceased to be amused by her soaring flights of fancy and regretted seeing her romantic preconceptions so rudely punctured.

  ‘And yet,’ Olivia added musingly, ‘perhaps on reflection, the very ordinariness of that little room throws the heroism of the martyrs into sharper relief. Torture and death all in a day’s work for the true believer, or something like that.’

  Markham gave a melodramatic grimace. ‘I hope not,’ he snorted. ‘Personally, I consider heroic virtue to be distinctly overrated.’

  Olivia burst out laughing and the tension that had imperceptibly clouded their conversation lifted.

  ‘Do the school staff live in?’ enquired Markham, pouring himself a cup of coffee.

  Olivia thought for a moment. ‘One of the cathedral canons, Dick Woodcourt, has an apartment on the first floor of the main building, above the visitors’ parlour. Alex Sharpe, the Director of Music, is on the other side. I think the second floor houses offices and the admin side of things. Above that, it’s just attics.’

  ‘What about the principal?’

  ‘He lives in a cottage called the Chaplain’s House. You can’t see it from the front. It’s tucked in behind the second quad just before you get to the meadow – very picturesque, with a poc
ket handkerchief lawn enclosed by a box hedge.’

  Markham wondered about recreation. ‘Where do the boys run about?’

  ‘Well, each quad looks onto a little formal garden. But there are sports grounds on the far side of the grottoes.’

  ‘Good to know they’re not neglecting the more muscular pursuits,’ commented Markham sardonically. ‘Remember, “Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton” and all that.’

  There was certainly nothing of the aesthete about Nat, Olivia thought, smiling as she recalled the way he had boasted about making the First Eleven.

  Markham spoke with decision. ‘After Noakes and I have given the place the once-over tomorrow, I’ll find a way to have him meet those two boys without generating undue suspicion. Oddly enough, he’s very good with youngsters – gets right down to their level and makes them open up … leaves them feeling that he understands what they’re going through.’

  Olivia nodded her approval then added, ‘Gil, it all looked pleasant enough. Just your typical minor public school with the cathedral as gilt on the gingerbread, but…’

  ‘But what? You felt something wasn’t right?’ Markham scrutinized her closely.

  ‘I couldn’t put my finger on it. Call it something in the air … something off key. Exorcists talk about a ‘cold spot’ in haunted buildings, don’t they? Well, I felt like that at St Mary’s in one of the dormitories. As if there was something evil alongside us. I could almost feel it breathing down the back of my neck.’

  Markham’s eyes never left her face. ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘I could have sworn I saw a shadow move out of the corner of my eye. But then it whisked around a corner and disappeared. I didn’t say anything to Nat and Julian because they were so excited about doing the honours of the school and I didn’t want to scare them.’ Her brow furrowed. ‘But there was a moment in the cemetery when Julian became very quiet.’

  ‘Cemetery?’

  ‘Yes, there’s a tiny cemetery at the back of the meadow, just next to the grottoes, by an old wash house. It’s a forlorn little spot. There are eight or nine graves there, crosses in a little row – ex-teachers apparently. It was customary to bury them in the grounds until someone decided this contravened municipal regulations, leading to future interments taking place in the cathedral cemetery. Anyway, it was quite misty and dank down by the graves. Julian suddenly became very uneasy and subdued, jumping at the slightest cracking of twigs and looking around in such an odd, sly manner. Almost furtive.’ She shivered.