Evil Angels Among Them (22 page)

Encouraged by this, Becca decided to make her own confession, cushioned by the presence of her friends. Catching Lucy's eye, she began, ‘I have something to say as well. Stephen, I just haven't known how to tell you this, but perhaps it will be easier with everyone else here.'

‘What is it?' he asked bravely, fearing the answer.

She reached across the table and gave his hand a squeeze, looked briefly into his eyes, then stared down at the table as she related, amidst tears, the substance of the telephone calls and their impact on her. ‘I should have told you, Stephen,' she finished softly, ‘but I just couldn't. Can you forgive me?'

‘Forgive you!' He'd been motionless with shock; now he rose, went round the table, and took her in his arms. ‘Becca, love!' Words failed him as his heart overflowed with strong yet conflicting emotions: anger, sorrow, relief, and above all love. ‘Let's go upstairs, love,' he urged, oblivious to the others around his table. ‘I think we need to be alone.'

‘Wait just a minute,' David interjected reluctantly, unwilling to intrude on this private moment. ‘Something has to be done about this. You'll have to report it to the police. File a complaint.'

‘No!' Becca turned panic-filled eyes to him. ‘Then everyone would know!'

‘But it's the only way he'll ever be caught,' he pointed out. ‘The only way he'll be stopped.'

‘David is right,' agreed Stephen. ‘The monster must be caught. I know it's difficult, love, but it's the only way.'

‘Don't forget,' Lucy added gently, ‘what you said yourself. It probably has something to do with Flora's murder. The man may be something worse than a nasty phone caller.'

Becca bit her lip, fighting back more tears. ‘Do I have to go myself? Do I have to tell the police in person? It's just too awful.'

David gave her an encouraging smile. ‘I'm quite happy to represent you,' he said. ‘If you'll allow me to take a statement, I can file it for you. I'm sure the police will want to ask you some questions, but that can wait.'

She sighed, relieved. ‘All right, then.'

After an intensive session with pen and paper, they dispersed: Becca and Stephen went upstairs to make their private reparations while David accompanied Gill and Lou to the police station. Lucy, happy to be useful, took Bryony back to Foxglove Cottage and read to her from her favourite book of fairy stories.

CHAPTER 17

    
For thou hast maintained my right and my cause: thou art set in the throne that judgest right.

Psalm 9.4

The trip to the police station was accomplished without incident; David handed over Gill and Lou's carefully prepared statements and had a word with the officer on duty regarding Becca's complaint. ‘I'd appreciate it if you could send a WPC to interview her,' he suggested, anxious to avoid the nightmare of John Spring or someone of his ilk salivating over Becca and the lurid details of the phone calls. ‘It's a fairly delicate matter, as you'll appreciate, and I think that a woman is called for.' The officer nodded. ‘And perhaps she might come in plain clothes,' David added. ‘Judging from the timing of the calls, it seems fairly evident that the house is being watched. We don't want to alert the caller that the police have been involved.'

Later he dropped Gill and Lou off at Foxglove Cottage, refusing the offer of refreshment but going in to collect Lucy. Gill saw them off at the door. ‘Thanks for everything,' she said with a rueful smile. ‘You've made it all comparatively painless.'

David returned her smile, raising his eyebrows. ‘Sounds like a tooth extraction.'

‘Something like that.'

‘But it's not over yet, you know,' he reminded her. ‘Just beginning, I'd say.'

Gill sighed. ‘Where do we go from here, then?'

He thought for a moment. ‘That depends on the police, to a great extent. But we have a lot more talking to do, you and I.'

‘Come back tonight,' Gill invited. ‘Both of you. Come for some supper and we'll talk.'

At the Rectory, Stephen and Becca were waiting for them in the kitchen, his arm protectively and tenderly around her shoulders.

‘How did it go?' Stephen demanded. ‘Tell us what happened.'

David interpreted correctly that he was referring not to Gill and Lou but to Becca's statement. ‘There was no problem,' he assured them. ‘They'll be sending someone along to talk to Becca – a woman, I asked for. And it won't be until tomorrow.'

Becca nodded bravely, drawing on her husband's strength. ‘All right. I can cope.' She looked at the clock. ‘I was beginning to worry that you wouldn't be back in time.'

They looked at her blankly.

‘Tea at Walston Hall, Lucy. Remember? We're meant to be there at four. We'll have to leave in a few minutes.'

Going to tea at Walston Hall wasn't exactly what either Becca or Lucy wanted to do at that moment, but as they traversed the footpath between the Rectory and the Hall they agreed that it was perhaps a useful way to take their minds off everything else.

Diana Mansfield welcomed them warmly and ushered them into a drawing room which was cosy and liveable but at the same time large enough not to be dominated by the massive grand piano in the corner. The decor and furnishings reflected the availability of a great deal of money and a corresponding quantity of good taste – if not on the part of Diana herself, at least that of some expensive interior designer. The genius of it, though, was in its managing to look as though it had always been that way, from time immemorial, or at least since the time of the first Lovelidges: everything just a bit faded, with nothing raw and obviously new to mar the mellow beauty of the sixteenth-century linenfold oak panelling and the leaded glass windows. Lucy's admiration of the room was unfeigned. ‘It's absolutely beautiful,' she said with spontaneous enthusiasm.

‘You like it?' Diana's smile of pleasure lit up her face in an extraordinary way, just as the late afternoon sun, slanting through the ancient diamond-shaped panes of glass, bathed the room in a quality of light that was almost palpable.

‘I love it,' Lucy assured her hostess. ‘You won't think me rude if I look at your pictures?'

‘Oh, please do.'

The walls were covered with time-darkened oil paintings, a mixture of landscapes, still lifes and portraits. ‘It's the people I like,' Lucy admitted, examining a portrait of a woman in a stiff brocade bodice, every thread distinctly rendered and the pearls of her brooch so creamily luminous that it looked as though they could be plucked from the canvas. The woman's face, heart-shaped and dark-eyed, framed by wings of centre-parted auburn hair, had a look of sad nobility, with an unsmiling mouth conveying endurance and a quality of strength. ‘Who was she, do you know? She has a marvellous face, hasn't she?'

Diana shook her head with a small smile. ‘I don't know who she was. They're not my ancestors, I'm afraid. Not even Quentin's ancestors. Our instant forebears, he calls them – bought and paid for.' She joined Lucy in front of the portrait. ‘But she's one I especially like. There's something about her face that I find quite haunting. I sometimes sit here looking at her, wondering why she was so sad. Did all her children die in infancy, or did her husband spend all his time wenching with the village maidens?' She gave an apologetic laugh, as if embarrassed by her fancifulness, and moved around the room almost restlessly. ‘And this one,' she said, standing in front of a swashbuckling cavalier, dressed in blue satin and striking a pose with a sword. His luxuriant dark hair tumbled to his shoulders, his eyes stared out boldly and the extravagant drooping moustache did nothing to conceal a mouth that was frankly sensual, lips parted slightly in a confident smirk. ‘I wonder how many hearts he broke,' Diana mused, almost to herself.

‘He was certainly aware of his own attractions,' Lucy agreed. ‘Probably not what you'd describe as unduly modest. Some women find that appealing.' She thought of her own David, modest and self-deprecating almost to a fault. And what, she wondered, was Quentin Mansfield like? She'd formed no great impression of him during their brief meeting at Foxglove Cottage, other than that of a man who knew his own mind, and most probably his own worth: not one to hold an inflated opinion of his own importance, but not one for false modesty either. She looked again at the proud cavalier, moving closer. There was something about his flashing eyes that reminded her of someone, but she couldn't quite think who it might be. Certainly not the solid if not stolid Quentin Mansfield; of that much she could be sure.

With an involuntary sigh, Diana seemed to make an effort to recall herself, turning towards Lucy. ‘But you've come for tea, haven't you? And here I am wittering on about portraits while the two of you are gasping.'

The tea, when it came, was everything that it should be: a proper afternoon tea, with delicate sandwiches of thinly cut bread, crumbly scones and jam, and slices of rich fruit cake, all accompanied by fragrant China tea poured from a Georgian silver teapot into delicate antique bone-china cups. But Lucy found conversation difficult; their hostess seemed distracted and Becca proved to be no help in keeping things moving.

Casting about for a suitable topic of conversation, Lucy looked round the room. ‘That's a lovely piano,' she said. ‘Do you play?'

Diana flushed. ‘A bit,' she confessed, almost reluctantly. ‘It's something I've always wanted to do, and recently I've been taking lessons. I'm not very good yet. But I enjoy it.'

‘I think that's splendid,' Lucy enthused. ‘Your husband must be proud of you.'

‘Yes, well.' Diana lifted the teapot. ‘This seems to be almost empty. Shall I make another pot?'

It wasn't until they were well into the next pot of tea that Diana got round to the subject that seemed to Lucy to have been the reason for the invitation to tea – and perhaps the reason for her nervousness as well – though Lucy couldn't quite understand why. ‘I understand that you're a famous artist,' Diana began.

‘Well, I don't know about the famous bit.' Lucy smiled, twisting a curl round her finger. ‘But I do make my living as an artist, yes. Watercolours, but not very traditional ones.'

‘Yes, I know.' Diana looked into her teacup, embarrassed. ‘I've checked up on you a bit, you see. I saw some of your paintings at a gallery in Norwich.'

‘That would be the Bridewell Gallery,' Lucy guessed. ‘I had an exhibition there last year, and they usually have a few of my things.'

‘Yes. And I liked them very much. But I wondered – do you ever undertake special commissions?'

‘Yes, of course.' Lucy leaned forward and put her teacup on the table. ‘I love doing commission work – I find it very satisfying. What did you have in mind?'

‘Something . . . special. For a gift.' Diana twisted her fingers together in her lap. ‘For . . . a friend.' She looked up at Lucy, suddenly imploring. ‘But you won't mention anything to Quentin, will you?'

While the women were away, Stephen made a pot of strong tea which he and David consumed at the kitchen table along with a packet of shop-bought shortbread biscuits. David found the young priest distracted and upset, not surprisingly, and his efforts to draw him out were not very successful. ‘I know you haven't had much time to think about it,' he said, ‘but do you have any ideas at all about who might be making the phone calls?'

Stephen looked at him blankly. ‘No. I can't think.'

‘No one in the parish?' David prompted. ‘No one who has a grudge against you, for instance?'

‘No. None of my parishioners are . . . like that. Some of them may be a bit difficult, but not . . . sick.' He looked into the depths of his mug of tea, then turned a tortured face to David. ‘How could anyone do it?' he said, his voice husky with pain. ‘Whoever he is, he's almost destroyed her. He's taken away her lovely innocence, and almost managed to kill our marriage. We had so much. And now . . .' He shook his head. ‘I don't know how long it will take to put the pieces back together. If we ever can. Becca was right – nothing will ever really be the same between us again. I just don't understand why someone would want to do that.'

At a loss for words, David shook his head, then watched helplessly as the tears trickled from the corners of Stephen's eyes.

‘I love her,' Stephen said softly. ‘So much.' His voice caught on a sob, and for a few minutes he wept into his hands while David patted his shoulder in an awkward display of sympathy. Coping with women's tears was difficult enough; David found this situation completely beyond his control.

‘Sorry,' Stephen muttered, pulling himself together with visible effort; he removed his gold-rimmed glasses and polished them on his sleeve. ‘Not fair to burden you, David. But I've got to be strong with Becca – I can't let her see how much this is tearing me apart.'

‘That's what I'm here for,' David assured him.

Walking back to the Rectory from Walston Hall, Lucy took the opportunity to ask Becca a question which had been on her mind for some time; it was the same question that David had asked Stephen. ‘Surely,' she said, ‘you must have some idea who it is? The man who's making the phone calls?'

‘No.' Becca spoke abruptly, with a brusqueness that was not characteristic. She softened it by adding, ‘Actually, Lucy, I've tried not to think about it. In some ways I don't
want
to know. The thought that it's someone here in the village, someone I know, whom I see every day . . .' She shuddered. ‘It just doesn't bear thinking about. Can't you understand that?'

‘Yes, of course, I can,' Lucy assured her, giving her arm a sympathetic squeeze. ‘But you realise that the police will ask you. They'll need all the help they can get to catch him. He's sick, Becca love. He's got to be caught, so that he won't ever do it again.'