Rachel thought it best not to comment on her colleague’s shortcomings. ‘I’ve been to the hospital, sir. I tried to have another
word with Angela but she still won’t say anything
about what happened. ‘It’s funny, she still seems upset about Jonny Shellmer – I don’t understand it. And she can’t or won’t
say who attacked her in the shop. She just says she can’t remember.’
‘It could have been some robber after her angels. On second thoughts …’ Heffernan sighed. ‘We’ll just have to wait. There’s
always a chance that our man’s cocky enough to think we don’t suspect him. In which case he’ll turn up to do his bit at the
church history evening tonight as arranged. And if he does we’ll all be there and we’ll pick him up afterwards and bring him
in for questioning.’
‘Is that an order, sir?’ Rachel didn’t share Wesley’s enthusiasm for things historical.
Heffernan stroked his chin and thought for a while. ‘Yes, it is. It’s about time you were made to hear me sing.’
Rachel thought it best to say nothing.
It was 5.45 when Lewis Hoxworthy returned from Tradmouth, where he had met up with Yossa.
As he cycled back through Derenham, he stopped for a few moments to stare at the house, wondering whether its occupant had
received his note. It wouldn’t be long now, he thought, a wave of fear rising in his stomach. He’d soon have his hands on
two thousand pounds.
Yossa and his mates had egged him on, saying that it was just a matter of business; buying silence like any other commodity.
Easy money was easy money.
Lewis had been careful not to let them know he was scared: one hint of weakness and he knew the torments and mockery would
start again.
As he cycled uphill he had the sudden, unsettling thought that the man he had sent the note to had killed once, and that thought
brought on a fresh wave of cowardice. But Yossa had pointed out that the murderer wouldn’t know who the note was from and
would be gone by the time Lewis picked up the money. He couldn’t lose. So why did he feel so frightened?
He’d asked for the cash to be left at the old barn at midnight. He had liked that touch. It reminded him of the adventure
stories he used to read long ago … when he was a kid.
Lewis heard a car engine behind him and steered his bicycle to one side to allow the vehicle to pass him on the narrow lane.
But it stayed there at his back. He dismounted and pressed his body against the hedgerow. But the car remained there, a great
black bulk, creeping after him like a stalking cat.
He felt uneasy and quickened his pace. But as he speeded up, so did the vehicle behind him. He glanced round and saw that
the windows were tinted black. It was like a car without a driver. A ghost car.
He wasn’t far from the farm gate now. But the engine suddenly revved and a second later a door was flung open.
Then the car turned into the gate and set off down the drive at a sedate pace.
Gerry Heffernan arrived at Derenham church at 6.30, having begged a lift from one of his fellow singers.
A final rehearsal of the more difficult pieces, then they would put on their robes and assemble in the room beneath the bell-tower,
ready for their big entrance at eight.
As they straggled up the aisle from the choirstalls after the rehearsal, Heffernan found himself walking next to Nicola Tarnley.
She smiled at him shyly.
‘How are you, love? Got another job yet?’
‘I’m still working for Heygarth and Proudfoot. Jim Flowers asked me to come back. He said that in view of the situation they
needed someone experienced to run the office.’
‘What situation?’ Gerry Heffernan had been talking for the sake of politeness and only half listening to Nicola’s answers.
But now he gave her his full attention.
‘Paul and Jim have had a big row. They used to be friends as well as partners, but Jim found out that Paul’s
been doing some crooked deals behind his back; one of Jim’s friends lost a house because Paul had someone else lined up for
it who gave him a backhander. They had a big falling out and Paul’s moved over to our Neston branch, so I don’t see much of
him now. In fact I’ve been made assistant branch manager at Tradmouth,’ she added with a modest blush.
‘Congratulations.’
Nicola hesitated, wondering whether it was the right time to say what was really on her mind, to ask the question that had
been causing her sleepless nights. ‘Look, er, Gerry, I’ve been really worried about whether I’m going to be prosecuted about
helping Paul …’
‘Not up to me, I’m afraid, love. Heygarth will definitely get done for it but …’ He looked at the young woman’s face and felt
sorry for her. She’d done something really stupid for a man she was besotted with; made a daft mistake. But it was out of
his hands now, and it wasn’t impossible that Nicola Tarnley would be the owner of a criminal record. There was nothing he
could say that would make her feel better. ‘Sorry love,’ he muttered.
To Heffernan’s relief they became separated in the tower-room crush and he had far too much to occupy him to think about what
Nicola had told him. But he filed it away at the back of his mind for future reference.
The church was in darkness when the plainchant, redolent of ancient cloisters, drifted through the tower-room door. Wesley
shuddered. He hadn’t expected Derenham’s history evening to be quite so atmospheric. Pam reached for his hand and squeezed
it. He hadn’t told her that he was on duty, and didn’t intend to until it was absolutely necessary.
A sudden shaft of light illuminated the lectern at the front of the church. Jeremy Sedley was standing there looking over
the audience, glasses perched on the end of his nose: Sedley was playing a new role, that of the learned historian,
and the performance was every bit as convincing as his numerous TV roles.
He began, reading from the script but sounding as though he were an expert on church history, outlining how the church had
been built in the eleventh century on the site of an earlier Saxon structure of which nothing remained. There was no record
of the date of the tower, he said regretfully, but the majority of the towers in Devon churches were built as strongholds
and places of safety in the reigns of Richard the Lionheart and his weaselly brother, King John. Then the church had been
reconstructed in the fourteenth century – bigger and better and a real status symbol for the village of Derenham.
Wesley listened, impressed, and craned his neck to look at the front pew, where various readers were sitting, ready to do
their bit. A fair smattering of celebrities had volunteered. Another actor whose face was familiar from the television, a
tall, thin weatherman and a well-known author whose face Wesley recognised from TV arts programmes. All doing their bit for
the village hall. Wesley wondered whether Jonny Shellmer would have been among their number if he had lived. Probably not,
he thought.
The lights dimmed again and the tower-room doors swung open. Two lines of flickering candles emerged, heading slowly for the
church’s east end. Sedley announced that at Candlemas each year the medieval villagers of Derenham would have processed around
the church, carrying candles and singing. Taking their cue, the choir burst into the catchy little medieval number Gerry Heffernan
had been singing around the office. Pam started tapping her feet. The tune was infectious, and Wesley suspected that it would
be going around their heads that night, keeping them awake.
Then, as the choir shuffled to their seats in the chancel, a figure flitted down the aisle, scurrying to the front of the
church and sitting down in the front pew, where the other readers shifted up to make room for him. Wesley turned
round. Steve was seated in a pew near the main door; Rachel, Trish and Paul Johnson sat beside him. Rachel caught Wesley’s
eye. They were ready as soon as he gave the signal.
The story of the Merrivales was next on the agenda. To Wesley’s surprise, it was Neil Watson, dressed in clean sweatshirt
and jeans, who replaced Sedley at the front of the church. Pam gave Wesley a hefty nudge and both leaned forward, fascinated
to see how Neil would tackle the job. As far as Wesley was aware, he didn’t know one end of a church from the other – unless
he was digging it up.
Neil took a deep breath and began. ‘At the time of the Wars of the Roses in the fifteenth century, when England was split
by civil war between the supporters of the House of York and those of the House of Lancaster, the Merrivales were lords of
the manor of Derenham. A family of minor Devon gentry, they were supporters of the powerful Courtenays, the Earls of Devon,
who in turn were great supporters of the House of Lancaster.’ He paused, looking at his audience. ‘My team have discovered
what we believe to be the Merrivales’ manor house in a field just two hundred yards from this very spot. The new village hall
is to be built on the site as soon as we have finished our excavation.’
‘Get on with it,’ thought Wesley, watching his quarry. Interesting though he found Neil’s musings on medieval life, he wanted
to get this over with.
All of a sudden a spotlight flashed on in the north aisle, bathing the Doom, which up to now had been in darkness, in brilliant
light. There was a shuffling in the pews as the audience craned to see it. Some gasped. Most just stared.
‘This Doom, discovered in a nearby barn, was painted for the church on the orders of Richard Merrivale, who is buried in his
family’s chapel. When I first investigated the story behind this strange commission, and its link to a grisly find we made
during our dig, I concluded that the decapitated skeleton we found was none other than John,
Richard’s elder son, who was accused of raping his half-sister, Elizabeth.’
There were a few mutters from the older members of the audience, who thought that incest and rape were hardly suitable topics
to be discussed at such an event.
But Neil had no such inhibitions. He carried on regardless. ‘The skeleton we found had been beheaded and buried in what was
probably the manor house garden. When Richard died without heirs, he ordered that his house be destroyed, and indeed we found
evidence that it had been burned to the ground. According to Richard’s letters, Elizabeth was sent to a convent, where she
died giving birth to John’s child. Or at least, that is what I thought until I found the last piece of the jigsaw puzzle that
completed our picture of the fall of the house of Merrivale.’
Wesley glanced at Pam, who was watching Neil with admiration. He was doing a good job. But he focused his eyes on the great
eagle lectern, where the appointed readers, famous and not so famous, were taking it in turns to read out various interesting
snippets and documents concerning the church’s history.
The next reader approached the lectern, climbed the single step then looked down at the sheet of paper set out by the previous
reader. His performance would be unrehearsed, but the reader hadn’t anticipated that this would be a problem.
‘The Last Will and Testament of Richard Merrivale.’ The reader spoke confidently at first, then began to hesitate. Then, obviously
deciding it was better to get the thing over and done with, he rushed to the end, as if he hoped that nobody would be listening
very carefully to what was being read.
But Wesley Peterson was listening. He watched the reader’s face, noting every nuance, every stumble, every mumble of the painful
words. Then he turned round and caught Rachel’s eye. She gave him an imperceptible smile which said it all. Guilt confronted
by guilt. The oldest trick in the book.
He looked at Pam and felt a sudden pang of conscience. He’d have to leave her to drive home alone. He would be otherwise engaged
after the history evening was ended.
Wesley sat quite still as the story of Derenham church moved on through the centuries, but he was only half listening to the
narrative and the accompanying music. He was watching and waiting, impatient to get the arrest over with and haul his quarry
off to Tradmouth for questioning.
The choir sang their last piece and the audience burst into polite applause, which was only interrupted when Maggie Flowers
stood up to thank all those involved and to say that the evening had raised over five hundred pounds for the village hall
fund. Neil Watson lurked near the pulpit, looking as if he would be first off the starting blocks in any dash down the aisle
and into the Red Bull.
Wesley noticed that Maggie Flowers had gravitated to the front pews to chat with the assembled readers, but Jim Flowers was
pointedly ignoring his wife while she sucked up to the village celebrities. He was a man with other things on his mind.
Gerry Heffernan lumbered down the chancel steps to join the rest of his team, who were standing near the door, watching as
people began to drift out of the church towards home or the inviting open fires of the Red Bull.
Wesley noticed that Jim Flowers was staring at Heffernan and he nudged his boss, who turned round. ‘Leave him.’ Heffernan
mumbled, turning back. ‘Is that door the only way out?’
‘There’s another door in the bell-tower but I think it’s locked.’
‘He’s started to move.’
They heard a new piece of music, a jaunty electronic rendition of the ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ – Gerry Heffernan’s mobile phone.
He flushed red and answered it. After a brief conversation he turned to Wesley.
‘Lewis Hoxworthy’s gone walkabout again. He promised his parents he’d be back home by six, and when he hadn’t
got back at eight-thirty they reported him missing. They’ve spoken to Yossa, who said he left him in Tradmouth at five – Lewis
said he was going straight home.’
‘So what shall we do about it?’ Wesley asked. With their suspect on the move, they hardly had time to concern themselves with
wayward teenagers.
‘The lad’s probably got a taste for travel – he’ll have taken off again. We’ll catch up with him. But first things first,
eh?’
They turned and watched as their quarry began to stroll down the aisle. The will had unsettled him for a while, but now he
had regained his composure. His eyes were on the doorway as he walked.