chapter Eleven
Swallowing hard, she retraced her steps up to him and bent to examine what he'd spotted. It was a very small piece of fabric, no more than a few threads caught in a splinter of the wood. At first she thought how odd it was that the dog had noticed it; then she saw the smear of blood. It wasn't much darker than the coal-smudged steps themselves, but when she licked her finger and touched it, it came away red. Was this where the vicar had stumbled, and then gone on down the rest of the way to the bottom? How could she find out?
She held the lantern so she could see the steps closely. They were dark with years of trodden-in coal dust, each bit dropped from a bucket or scuttle carried up full. No matter how closely she looked, all she could distinguish were the most recent marks, a heel dent, and the smear of a sole. They could have been anybody's: Dominic's, the doctor's, even Mrs. Wellbeloved's.
She went to the bottom and looked again, not expecting to find anything or knowing what it would mean even if she did.
Then she saw it: a small, neat pattern of marks she understood very easily-cat prints. Etta had been this way. She walked after the marks, for no real reason except that they led to the second cellar. They were easy to read because they were on plain ground, as if someone had swept all the old marks away with a broom. Why would anybody sweep just a single track, no more than eighteen or twenty inches wide? It was not even clean, just brushed once. Several times it was disturbed at the sides by footprints.
Then she understood. It was not swept-these were drag marks. Someone had pulled something heavy, covered in cloth, from the bottom of the stairs over into the second cellar.
Could the Reverend Wynter have fallen, struck his head and become confused, mistaken where he was and dragged himself in the wrong direction?
No. That was idiotic. There were no handprints in the dust. And his hands would have been filthy when they found him. They weren't: only smudges here and there-the backs as much as the palms.
She was in the second cellar now. When she had found him, he had been lying on his back. But his nose had been scraped, as if he had fallen forward. And there was coal dust on his front as well as his back. The hard, deep wound was on the back of his head.
"Somebody killed him, Harry," she said softly, putting her hand out to touch the dog's soft fur. "Somebody hit him on the head and dragged him in here, and then left him. Why would they do that? He was an old man whom almost everyone loved."
The dog whined and leaned his weight against her leg.
"I don't suppose you know, and even if you do, you can't tell me." She was talking to him because it was so much better not to feel alone. "I'll have to find out without you. We'll have to," she corrected. "I'll tell Dominic when he comes back. Right now, in case anybody calls, I think we should pretend that we don't know anything at all. Come on. It's cold down here, and we shouldn't stay anyway. It isn't safe."
***
When Dominic returned from his visits, tired and cold, she had no alternative but to tell him immediately. It was already midafternoon; there would be little more than an hour before the light began to fade and the ground froze even harder.
"What?" he said incredulously, sitting at the kitchen table, his hands thawing as he held the cup of tea she had made. "Are you sure?"
"Yes, I am sure," she said looking at him steadily. "I'm not being overimaginative, Dominic. Remember the marks on his face and head? Remember how little coal dust there was on his hands? Or on his knees? But there was a tear on the shin of his trousers, and dust where he had been dragged. Go down to the cellar and look. It's still there."
He hesitated.
"Please," she urged. "I don't want to be the only one who saw it. Anyway, I don't think the doctor is going to listen to me."
***
She was perfectly correct-Dr. Fitzpatrick did not believe either of them.
"That suggestion is preposterous," he said irritably, pulling on his mustache. "It is a perfectly ordinary domestic tragedy. An elderly man had a heart attack and fell down the cellar stairs. Or perhaps he simply tripped and then the shock of the fall brought on an attack. He was confused, naturally, perhaps hurt, and he mistakenly crawled in the wrong direction. You are trying to make a horror out of something that is merely sad. And if I may say so, that is a completely irresponsible thing to do."
Clarice took a deep breath, facing his anger. "What did he go into the cellar for?" she asked.
"My dear Mrs. Corde, surely that is perfectly obvious?" Fitzpatrick snapped. "Exactly the same reason as you did yourself! For coal!"
She met his gaze steadily. "I took a lantern and a coal bucket, and I left the door open at the top," she replied.
"Then perhaps he went for some other reason," Fitzpatrick said. "Didn't you say something about the dog? He must have gone to look for it."
"Why would you go to look for anything in a cellar without a lantern?" Dominic pressed. "It doesn't make sense."
"He probably stood at the top and called." Fitzpatrick was becoming more and more annoyed. His face was tight, lips thin. "Reverend, you are a guest here. In view of poor Wynter's death, it will possibly be for far longer than you had originally intended. You are now required to guide the village through a sad and very trying time. As shepherd of the people, it is your calling to sustain, comfort, and uplift them, not indulge in what, I have to say, is idle and vicious speculation on the death of a deeply loved man. I am sorry that it falls to my lot to remind you of this. Don't make it necessary for me to take it further."
Dominic's face flamed, but he turned and left without retaliation. He could not afford it, as the doctor had reminded him.
Clarice went with him, not daring to meet Fitzpatrick's eyes in case he saw in hers the rage she also felt toward him. He had humiliated Dominic, and that she had no idea how to heal, so she could not forgive him for it. As she went out into the snow, she remembered her father telling her that if you sought wealth or fame, other people might dislike you for it, but if you sought only to do good, no one would be your enemy. How wrong he was! Good held a mirror to other people's hearts, and the reflection was too often unflattering. People could hate you for that more than for almost anything else.
She caught up with Dominic and linked her arm through his, holding on to him when he tried to pull back. He was ashamed because he had not found a way to stand up for the truth. She struggled for something to say that would make it better, not worse. If she were to sound superficial it would be worse than silence; it would be patronizing, as if she thought him not strong enough to face their failure. Yet she ached to comfort him. If she could not at least do that, what use was she?
"I'm sorry," she said a trifle abruptly. "I shouldn't have urged you to speak to him so quickly. Perhaps if we had waited until tomorrow, and thought harder, we might have persuaded him."
"No, we wouldn't," he said grimly. "He doesn't want to think that anyone would kill the Reverend Wynter."
"I don't want to, either!" she said hotly. "I hate thinking it. But I have to follow what my sense tells me. And I don't believe one goes into the cellar alone in the dark to fetch coal, to look for a cat or dog, or anything else. If he'd fallen down, then Mrs. Wellbeloved would have found him. The door would have been open-"
"Maybe when she came in the front door, the wind slammed the cellar door shut?" he suggested.
"It faces the other way," she pointed out. "It would have blown it wider open."
"Well, what do you think did happen?" he asked. They were walking side by side along the road, their feet making the only tracks in the new snow. In the east the sky was darkening.
"I think someone came in and said or did something to make him go into the cellar, then pushed him," she answered. "When he was at the bottom, perhaps crumpled over, stunned, they hit him on the back of the head, hard enough to kill him, whether they meant that or not. Although I can't see why they would do it unless they intended him to die. They could hardly explain it away." Her mind was racing. The rising wind was edged with ice, and she blinked against it. "Then they dragged him into the other cellar, so he wouldn't be found too soon-"
"Why?" he interrupted. "What difference would it make?"
"So nobody would know when it happened, of course." The ideas came to her as she spoke. "That way nobody could have been proved to be here at the right time. Then they closed the door, and probably took his cases away, so people would think he had already gone on his holiday. Only they forgot about his painting things...and his favorite Bible."
He was frowning. "Do you really think so? Why? That doesn't sound like a quarrel in the heat of some...some dispute. It's perfectly deliberate and cold-blooded."
"Yes, it is," she agreed reluctantly. "I suppose he must have known something about one of the people here that was so terrible to them, they couldn't afford to trust that he would never tell anyone."
"He couldn't tell," Dominic argued. "They would know that. Not if it was confessed to him. No priest would."
"Then maybe it wasn't confessed to him." She would not let go of the idea. "Perhaps he found it out some other way. He knew lots of things about all sorts of people. He would have to. He's been here in Cottisham for ages. He must have seen a great deal."
"What could possibly be worth killing over?" He was putting up a last fight against believing.
"I don't know," she admitted.
"But he wrote to the bishop saying he was going on holiday," he pointed out. "So he obviously intended to. Is that coincidence?"
"Did he?" she asked. "Or did someone else write, copying his hand? It wouldn't be too difficult, and if the bishop didn't look closely, or compare it with other letters, it would be easy enough. And plenty of people in the village could have letters or notes the Reverend Wynter had written at one time or another."
Dominic said nothing, trudging steadily through the snow. The light was fading rapidly; the shadows under the trees were already impenetrable.
"That's what we have to find out," she insisted quietly, her voice heavy with the burden of what she was thinking. She would very much rather have been able to say they should let it go, pretend they had never known, but it would be a lie that would grow sharper all the time, like a blister on the tender skin of one's feet. "Christ was kind; He forgave," she went on. "But He never moderated the truth to make people like Him, or pretended that something was all right when it wasn't, because that would be easier. I think the Reverend Wynter was killed for something he knew. What do you think, really?" She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I'll do whatever you decide." That was so difficult for her to say.
He gave an almost jerky little laugh. "You can't do that, Clarice. You'd grow to hate me. I think he was probably killed. Either way, I can't pretend I don't know. The Reverend Wynter deserves better; and if someone did kill him, then they deserve better, too. They need justice more than he does. Justice heals in the end, if you allow it to." He walked a few more yards in silence. "I suppose we need to find out what he knew, and about whom."
A wave of relief swept over her. "We'll begin in the village," she said. "We can't get out of it now anyway."
"Whom do we trust?" he asked, glancing at her quickly.
"No one," she said simply. "We can't afford to. We have no idea who it was."
They spent a long, quiet evening by the fire. Neither of them talked very much, but it was one of the most companionable times she could remember, despite the ugly task that awaited them the following days. The fire crackled and the coals grew yellow hot in the heart of it. The snow deepened in blanketing silence outside, except for the occasional whoosh as it grew too heavy on the steep roof and slid off to the ground. There was nothing to discuss-they were in agreement.
***
Sunday morning was awful. Dominic was so anxious, he barely spoke to her as he ate breakfast before church. He picked up books and put them down again, found quotes, then discarded them. One minute he wanted to be daring, challenge people to new thought; the next to be gentle, to reassure them in all the old beliefs, comfort the wounds of loneliness and misunderstanding, and say nothing that might awaken troubling ideas or demand any change.
A dozen times Clarice drew in her breath to say that he had no time, in three short weeks, to stay within safe bounds. No one would listen; certainly no one would remember anything about it afterward.
She nearly said so. Then she saw his slender hand on the back of the chair, and realized that the knuckles were white. This was not the right time. But she was afraid there never would be a right time. The next sermon would be for Christmas. One pedestrian sermon now, safe and colorless, might be all it would take to lose the congregation's sympathy, and their hope.
"Don't quote," she said suddenly. "Don't use other people's words. Whatever they are, they'll have heard them before."
"People like repetition," he said with a bleak smile, his eyes dark with anxiety and the crushing weight of doubt Spindlewood had laid on him.
In that moment Clarice hated Spindlewood for what he had done with his mealy mouth and grudging, time-serving spirit. "Do you remember how terrible it was when Unity Bellwood was murdered, and how the police suspected all of us?" she said quietly.
"Of course!"
"Tell them what you said to me about courage then, and how it's the one virtue without which all others may be lost," she urged him. "You meant it! Say it to them."
He did so, passionately, eloquently, without repeating himself. She had no idea whether the congregants were impressed or not. They spoke politely to him afterward, even with warmth, but there was no ease among them. She and Dominic walked home through the snow in silence.
***
On Monday, the wind sliced in from the east like a whetted knife. Straight after breakfast Dominic set out to make his calls.
Clarice started where she had traditionally been told lay the root of all evil, although actually she thought it was far more likely to find its roots in selfishness-and perhaps self-righteousness, which was not such a different thing when one thought about it. Still, money was easier to measure, and she had ready access to the vicar's ledgers both from the church and from the household.
She had barely begun examining them when she was interrupted by the arrival of Mrs. Wellbeloved carrying two hard white cabbages and a string of very large onions. She looked extremely pleased with herself, stamping her feet and shedding snow everywhere.
"Said as it would be cold. Tree fell over with the weight of it an' the road south's blocked." She announced it as a personal victory. "'Less you want to go all 'round Abingdon an' the like. An' there's no saying you can get through that, either. Could all be closed."
"Then we are very fortunate to have coal and food," Clarice replied warmly.
"Onions." Mrs. Wellbeloved put them on the table. Not that anyone could have mistaken them for something else.
"Thank you." Clarice smiled at her. She already knew from the brief glance at the accounts she had taken that Mrs. Wellbeloved had done all the shopping for the vicar. She wanted to tell her of their discovery of the body in the cellar, but Fitzpatrick had asked them not to, and his implication had been clear enough. Still, Clarice felt guilty saying nothing. "That's very kind of you," she added.
Mrs. Wellbeloved smiled, her face pink. She began to take off her overcoat and prepare to scrub the floor.
It was half past eleven before Clarice could return to the ledger and read through it carefully. She had gone through it twice before she noticed the tiny anomalies. They were sometimes of a shilling or two, but more often just pennies. The mistakes seemed to be in the Reverend Wynter's own money, which he accounted very carefully, as anyone on a church stipend had to. Clarice herself knew where every farthing went. The expression poor as a church mouse was not an idle one.
The church accounts, including the donations signed for by John Boscombe until a few months ago, and more recently by a man named William Frazer, were accurate, then inaccurate, then accurate again. The final sum was always as it should be.
Clarice could understand how people ended up chewing pencils. It made no sense. Why on earth would anyone steal tuppence, or even less? She was convinced it was not carelessness, because the same figures kept recurring in what she realized was a sequence. She placed them side by side, according to date, and then she saw the pattern. The few pence went missing from the church accounts, then from the Reverend Wynter's personal account. Finally the church accounts were correct again. Someone was taking tiny amounts from the collection for the poor box, irregular and always very small. The Reverend Wynter was replacing them from his own money.
But why? Would it not have been the right thing to do to find out who was the thief-if that was not too serious a word for such petty amounts? Might it be a child? Perhaps he did not want to have such an accusation made if it could become uglier than a simple question of family discipline.
Whom could she ask? Perhaps William Frazer, who had taken over the bookkeeping, would know, or have an idea? He lived next to the village store, and even in this weather she could walk there quite easily. Of course she would not go across the green. One could barely see where the pond was, never mind avoid treading on the ice beneath the snow, and perhaps falling in.
But Frazer had no idea. "I'm so sorry, Mrs. Corde," he said earnestly as she sat in the small, crowded room by his parlor fire, still shivering from her journey in the snow. The wind seemed to find its way through even the thickest cloak, and a hat was useless to protect the neck or ears. Now she was almost singeing at the front, and her back was still cold from the draft behind her.
"Your records are immaculate," she said as flatteringly as she could. "At the end of the day the money is always correct, but somewhere along the way a few pennies disappear, and then turn up again. It looks as if the Reverend Wynter made up the difference himself."
Frazer looked startled, his thin, bony face pale with anxiety. "Why on earth would he do such a thing?" he demanded. "John Boscombe never said anything to me, and he's as honest as the day. Ask anyone. If there'd been any irregularities, he'd have told me."
"Perhaps if the Reverend Wynter knew who it was, he might have asked Mr. Boscombe not to say anything," she suggested, puzzled herself.
"Why would he do that?" Frazer's voice was sharp, his big hands were clenched in his lap. "More like the old gentleman lost a few pence here and there." He nodded. "Can happen to anyone. Got the wrong change by mistake, p'raps. Or dropped it in the street and couldn't find it. Done that myself. Only pennies, you said?"
"Yes."
"Don't worry about it. Daresay you'll keep better books yourself, being younger and seeing a good bit clearer. Should have had spectacles, maybe."
"Perhaps." But she did not agree. She thanked him and went out into the bitter wind to walk all the way to John Boscombe's house. In the summer there was a shortcut through the woods, when the stream was low and the stepping-stones clear. But the current was strong and deep now, and would pull a person under its dark surface like greedy hands.
It was a long walk, but she found the man at home, kept from his work in the fields by the smothering snow.
"Come in, come in!" he said warmly as he almost pulled her into the hallway and slammed the door against the wind behind her. "What a day! It's going to be a hard Christmas if it goes on like this. You must be frozen. Let's dust the snow off you before it thaws and gets you wet." He suited the action to the word without waiting for her to agree, sending snow flying all over the hallway. Fortunately the floor was polished stone, so it would mop up well enough. "Come into the kitchen," he invited, satisfied with his work and turning to lead the way. "Have some soup. Always keep a stockpot on the simmer this time of year. The children are out playing. They've built a snowman bigger than I am. Genny! New vicar's wife is here!"
Genevieve Boscombe stood in the middle of the kitchen with her hands in a big bowl of flour and pastry. She was smiling, but she did not make any move to stop what she was doing. "Welcome," she said cheerfully. "I'll not shake your hand or I'll have you covered. John'll get you a dish of soup. It's just barley and bones, but it's hot." There was a faint flush of defiance in her cheeks, from more than just the exertion of rolling the pastry.
One was not defensive unless one was vulnerable. Clarice knew that from experience. She was conscious of her own clumsiness, where her sisters and her mother had been graceful. The comparison, even made in what was intended as humor, had sometimes hurt her sharply. Once or twice when she had fancied herself in love, she had felt it even more.
She smiled at Mrs. Boscombe, deliberately avoiding looking around the kitchen, though she had noticed that the good linen sheets over the airing rail had been carefully cut down the worn-out middle then turned to be joined at the sides-to give them longer life. The china on the dresser was good, but a few pieces were chipped, one or two even broken and glued very carefully together. They had had money and were now making do and mending. Even Genevieve's dress indicated the same thing. It was of good quality but had been up-to-date ten years ago.
"Thank you. I would like that very much." She thought of adding something about barley being very light and pleasing, and decided not to; it would so easily sound patronizing. "Actually I called because I hoped Mr. Boscombe might be able to help me with a little of the church bookkeeping," she said hastily. "I do so much wish to be accurate. I tried Mr. Frazer, but he was unable to offer any assistance."
"What is the difficulty, Mrs. Corde?" Boscombe said with concern.
Boscombe served the barley soup into a blue-and-white bowl and set it on the table in front of Clarice, who thanked him. Suddenly she realized how difficult it was to explain her problem without lying, at least by implication.
Boscombe was waiting, eyes wide.
She must speak. "I...I was going through the Reverend Wynter's account books and I found certain..."
He was staring at her, something in his look darkening.
She could think of nothing to excuse what she had done, except the truth. Fitzpatrick had no authority to order her silence. Everyone would have to know at some time, perhaps even by tomorrow. She plunged in. "The Reverend Wynter is dead," she said very quietly, sadness overwhelming her. "We found his body quite by chance...in the second cellar. I went for coal and the cat followed me down. I..." She looked at him and saw the shock in his face, followed immediately by a terrible regret. He turned to look at Genevieve, then back at Clarice.
"I'm so sorry," he said a little huskily. "What happened? I...I hadn't heard."
"No one has," she said quietly. "Dr. Fitzpatrick asked us not to tell anyone until the bishop has been informed, but..." This was the difficult part. "But we disagree upon what happened. However, I would be grateful if you would not let people know that I told you, at least not yet."
"Of course not," he agreed. "That is why you were going through the account books?" He still seemed puzzled, but there was an inexplicable sense of relief in him, as if this wasn't what he had feared.
"Yes." She knew she had not yet said enough for him to understand. It was unavoidable now. "You see..." What she had planned sounded ridiculous.
"Yes?"
Genevieve also had stopped her work and was listening.
Clarice felt the heat burn up her face. "You see, I don't believe he died by accident," she said. She hated the sound of her voice. It was wobbly and absurd. She cleared her throat. "I think someone hit him. He had injuries both on his face and on the back of his head. They may not have meant to kill him, but..." She was telling them too much. "...but there was someone else there, and they didn't tell anyone." She turned from Boscombe to Genevieve. "He was lying all by himself in the second cellar, but he had no lantern," she went on. "Who'd go into a cellar without a lantern?"
"No one," Genevieve said quietly. "But why would anyone quarrel with the Reverend Wynter? He was the nicest man..." She stopped.
For a moment they all were silent: Clarice and Boscombe at the kitchen table, Genevieve standing with the bowl still in her arms.
"Do you think it's the money in the church accounts?" Boscombe asked finally, his face smooth, his eyes avoiding Genevieve's. "Surely there's hardly enough there to provoke a quarrel?"
"No," Clarice agreed. "It's only pennies missing, a shilling or two at the most. But it happened a lot of times, over six months or more."
Genevieve was looking at Boscombe; staring at him.
Boscombe sat still, his back stiff.