The Cure of Souls (19 page)

‘You can’t say that. Now it’s out in the open, I’m going to have to find out about this ouija-board stuff. If that’s not part of the Deliverance agenda, what is?’

‘What this whole business is, my girl, is a pretty firm pointer to why we need a Deliverance support group, without delay. Jobs like this, it’s like the damned police – you need to go out in pairs to give yourself a witness. Have you even provided me with a list of possibles yet?’

‘Well, at least I’ve eliminated Dennis.’ She took out her cigarettes. ‘Would you mind?’

Sophie frowned, but Bernie Dunmore waved a hand. ‘Go ahead, if it’ll make you think clearer.’

‘Suppose I have a word with the headmaster at Moorfield?’

‘Do you
know
the headmaster?’

‘Bernie, Jane goes there.’

He coughed. ‘Yes. What’s his name?’

‘Robert Morrell.’

‘I don’t think I’ve met him yet.’

‘You probably won’t.’ Merrily lit a cigarette. ‘He’s an atheist.’

‘Aren’t they all? But, sure, go and see him, by all means. Go and see him in your capacity as a concerned parent – if he isn’t already in the Algarve or somewhere.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I’ll call him for you,’ Sophie said.

‘In a moment, Sophie. Merrily, there’s something else we need to look at, on the other side of the county, as it happens. Sophie, could you get that e-mail? You’ll be glad to know, Merrily, that you’re not the only minister in this diocese facing, ah, flak.’

‘I know.’ Merrily took one more puff on the cigarette and then stubbed it out in the empty powder compact she used as a portable ashtray. ‘That was all I needed, thanks. This would be the vicar of Knight’s Frome?’

‘You’ve read the Sunday paper, then.’

‘I was quoted in it, Bernie.’

‘Yes. Of course you were.’ He wiped a hand across his forehead. ‘I think I need a holiday.’

‘And Sunday wouldn’t be Sunday, at Ledwardine Vicarage, without the
People
and the
News of the World
. Anyway, I thought I ought to ring him. He certainly didn’t seem over-worried, and he didn’t ask for any help. I’ve also spoken to the guy who – well, let’s just say a journalist. The inference is that the story was engineered by Mr Stock, for reasons of his own. So my feeling is that Simon St John probably knew exactly what he was doing when he said no.’

Bernie Dunmore’s dog collar disappeared under his chins. ‘Just as
you
did when you said no to Mrs Shelbone on that first occasion?’

Merrily was silent.

When the Bishop had gone, she stood up to let Sophie repossess her desk.

‘He obviously just wants to keep me well away from Dilwyn.’

‘Oh, more than that, I think.’ Sophie scoured her blotter for traces of ash. ‘If it was anyone other than the Reverend St John, he might have let it go. But I don’t think
any
of us are entirely sure about Mr St John.’

‘Tell me.’ Merrily sat in the chair vacated by the Bishop.

‘And it’s
not
simply that he used to be in some sort of rock-and-roll group in the eighties, if that’s what you were thinking.’

‘I wasn’t aware of that. Would it be a band I’ve heard of?’

‘You probably would, but I don’t even recall the name. Nor is it the fact that St John isn’t known for his diplomacy… or the delicacy of his language.’ Sophie’s eyes narrowed under her compact coiffure. ‘Even more profane than you, Merrily, by all accounts.’

‘A Quentin Tarantino priest?’

‘Certainly a troubled priest. Or was. I believe he’s come very close to leaving the Church more than once. He seems to have
what you might call an attitude problem. Came to us from Gwent, newly married. His wife’s quite seriously disabled. The vicarage at Knight’s Frome had to be considerably modified before they could move in.’

‘How does that affect his ministry?’

‘Not at all – except by eliciting sympathy from the parishioners. Not that Mrs St John appears to welcome sympathy. I think, in the end, it probably does mainly come back to that question of diplomacy. He tends to be volatile and arbitrary. For instance – and this is the instance the Bishop’s no doubt recalling – he once refused to marry a member of a very well-established local farming family, someone with family graves in the churchyard going back at least two centuries, because he said it was a marriage of convenience and the couple clearly didn’t love one another. He told them to… “Eff off to a registry office”.’

Merrily rolled her eyes. ‘The times I’ve wanted to say
that
.’

‘But you didn’t, did you?’

‘Only because
a
, I didn’t have the bottle and
b
, Uncle Ted the churchwarden would’ve had me on toast. Come to think of it, that comes down to bottle, too, doesn’t it?’

‘It’s simply a matter of tempering one’s responses,’ Sophie said. ‘The Reverend St John tends to form personal opinions about people and act on them. Which is why the Bishop feels it might be advisable in this instance to have a second opinion. There’s also this message – probably the first serious response to your Deliverance website.’

Sophie laid in front of her an e-mail printout.

‘Note where it indicates copies,’ Sophie said.

Merrily read:

Copies: Bishop of Hereford, C of E Press Office, The People, BBC Midlands Today, BBC Radio Hereford and Worcester
.

‘That explains everything. So, it’s on TV tonight, is it?’

‘They haven’t approached us yet, but I suppose they will. What do you want me to say?’

‘Better say we’ll be talking to Mr Stock. What choice have we got?’

‘You want me to reply to him, too?’

‘I’ll do that.’

‘I don’t envy you any of this.’ Sophie began to put the cups and saucers back on a tray. ‘Your biggest problem’s always going to be sorting out what’s genuine from what’s—’

‘Complete bollocks,’ Merrily said, unsmiling.

‘One can only hope you don’t get on
too
well with the Reverend St John.’ Sophie started to carry the tray to the sink in the corner opposite the door and then she put the tray down again. ‘If you don’t mind me saying… you seem different.’

‘I do?’

‘This is none of my business, but has something happened in your personal life?’

‘I don’t have much of a personal life, Sophie.’ Merrily looked out of the window, over Broad Street. The rain had stopped, but the sky was still mainly overcast, layer upon layer of cloud, fading to amber rather than blue. ‘Actually, something odd did happen, but you wouldn’t thank me for pouring it out right now.’

Sophie nodded and picked up the tray. ‘Whenever you want to talk, I’m here.’

‘Thanks. Really.’

She picked up the e-mail, went into the Deliverance office and switched on the computer to reply to Mr Stock, whose copies list alone revealed his media know-how. Was it still conceivable this man could have a genuine psychic problem?

She wondered if Simon St John had tossed a coin.

T
HE HEADMASTER SAID
it had to be considered heartening to hear of any fourteen-year-old girl who was communicating at all with a parent. Even if the parent was dead.

‘Well, there we are.’ Merrily smiled warmly. ‘Everyone was saying what a complete unbeliever and a rationalist you were. But I had faith – I just knew you’d take it seriously.’

The staffroom had been updated to resemble a kind of scaled-down airport lounge with fitted recliner seats around the walls. There were two computers, a TV set and a video – maybe the teachers played stress-management tapes in their lunch hour. Robert Morrell looked health-club fit in his polo shirt and sweatpants. He’d reacted to hair loss by shaving what was left to within a millimetre of his skull.

‘Put it this way…’ There was a faint smile on his face, but she could tell he was annoyed by her attitude. ‘I’d rate it considerably lower down the scale of antisocial behaviour than marketing drugs in the cloakrooms.’

Morrell was going on holiday with his family tomorrow, which was why the meeting had been arranged for this afternoon, before Merrily would’ve had a chance to talk to Jane. It was clear he would also rather have put it off – probably until next term, when it all might have blown over – but Sophie had enviable ways of dealing with authority figures.

‘However,’ he said, ‘to forestall any accusations of being
anti-Christian, I took the liberty of inviting our chairman of governors to sit in. A regular churchgoer, Mrs Watkins.’ He inclined his head to her, patronizing bastard. ‘And, as it happens, a golfing companion of your Bishop’s.’

‘Listen.’ She must have looked pained; like everybody else, he was covering his back. ‘I’m not here to make a big deal out of it, Mr Morrell, I’m just trying to find out what’s happening, who’s involved and if any other kids have been damaged by it.’

‘Damaged?’ A corner of his mouth twisted up; not quite a sneer. ‘Damaged
how
? Physically? Emotionally? Psychologically?’

She shrugged, reluctant to use a word he
would
sneer at. Jane despised him for teaching maths, playing electronic Krautrock in his car and joining the older boys for rugby training – his way, the kid reckoned, of getting around the ban on corporal punishment.

Thoughts of Jane made Merrily tense. Maybe she’d still been high from the time-lapse experience, or lack of sleep, but so far she’d managed not to think too hard about the kid’s possible involvement. Now, in this deserted school, with its hostile head teacher, she felt insecure and it seemed altogether less unlikely that Jane had been into some psychic scam.

‘And do
you
accept the idea of communication with the dead?’ Morrell asked, as heavy footsteps echoed in the corridor outside, like the dead themselves walking in, on cue. Merrily jumped, but Morrell looked relieved. ‘We’re in here, Charlie!’

‘Rob, so sorry I’m—’ The chairman of governors came into the room like someone used to having people wait for him. ‘Oh.’ A leathery face registered unexpected pleasure. ‘I was expecting old Dennis – whatshisname?’

‘This is Mrs Watkins, Charlie. She’s—’

‘I
know
who she is. She’s the reason Bernie Dunmore spends so much time in Hereford these days instead of walking off some of that weight on the golf course.’ His right hand flashed. ‘Charlie Howe.’

‘Hullo.’ Merrily was letting him squeeze her fingers when she suddenly realized who he was. ‘I think I… may have encountered your daughter.’

‘Yes indeed!’ He beamed. ‘We’re all very proud of Anne.’ His local accent was as mellow as old cider. He wore a light suit and a broad, loose tie. He was in his sixties, had wide shoulders and strong, stiff, white hair in what, in his young days, would have been called a crew-cut.

Charlie Howe: one-time head of Hereford CID, father of its current chief, DCI Annie Howe, the steel angel. Icy blonde with a serious humour deficiency. Merrily searched for family resemblance, could find none at all.

‘She’s done well, Mr Howe.’

‘Youngest head of CID we’ve ever had. She’ll have outranked her old man before she’s finished. Can’t hold you girls down, these days.’ Charlie Howe took a step back to have a proper look at Merrily. ‘My Lord, when I think of your predecessor, old Tommy Dobbs, what a—well, God rest his poor old soul, but what a bloody
improvement!
’

And she had to smile, not least because this was the kind of sexist remark guaranteed to turn Annie Howe white.

Morrell said, ‘Mrs Watkins believes there’s reason to suspect the school’s become infested with the Powers of Darkness, Charlie.’

Merrily sighed.

They sat at a circular table from which Morrell had discreetly removed a pack of playing cards. ‘You must know,’ he said, ‘that even as the chief executive of this establishment, there isn’t much I can do without knowing the name of either the victim or the instigator.’

Merrily hadn’t felt empowered to name Amy, had revealed only that it involved a girl with a dead mother. She didn’t think Morrell would be able to narrow it down, especially with no staff to consult.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘You asked how the child had been damaged.
What you had here was a well-behaved, considerate, hardworking, honest and possibly slightly dull kid who’s turned into someone who is secretive, remote, resentful… and seems to have rejected God while embracing what some people like to call the spirit world. In effect, it seems the dead mother’s become her private support mechanism, to the exclusion of… anyone else.’

‘The way children sometimes find an imaginary friend,’ Morrell said smoothly. ‘To fill a gap in their lonely lives.’

Merrily shook her head. ‘Not really.’

Charlie Howe leaned back on an elbow. ‘Can
you
believe this young girl might
actually
be in contact with her mother, Merrily?’

‘I
could
believe it. But I think it’s more likely to be a contact with… something else.’

‘Like
what
?’ Morrell’s chair jerked back with a squeak that amplified his outrage.

‘Poor Rob,’ said Charlie Howe, ‘this en’t your world at all, is it?’

Merrily said, ‘When a group of people get together, in a circle – like we are now – with a particular objective in mind, then perhaps that focus of group consciousness could result in – well, it could be like a radio picking up signals. Or maybe like a computer network, and one of the group goes home with a virus attached.’

‘That’s based on science, is it?’ said Robert Morrell.

Merrily shrugged. ‘I’m just telling you it can have harmful effects.’