The Snares of Death (32 page)

She'd got on well with the women on the previous day, and it had been comparatively easy to obtain the information she'd sought. But this, she thought, might be a little more difficult. They'd obviously been deliberately concealing their visit to the church on the evening of Dexter's murder. What did they have to hide? Were they protecting someone else, or was it something altogether more sinister?

Lucy had endeared herself to them on her first visit by admiring their handiwork: their lovingly created prayer cards. They were probably working on them now, as they had been yesterday when she came; the curtains in the room to the right of the front door twitched as she pulled up. By the time she got to the back door, they were waiting for her.

‘I'm so sorry to bother you again,' she apologised with her sweetest smile. ‘But there's something else I need to ask you about.'

‘Come in, Miss Kingsley.' Alice beckoned her inside with something only just approaching warmth. She and Gwen had agreed, after Lucy's visit yesterday, that Miss Kingsley really was quite a superior sort of young woman – after all, she'd told them that her father was a priest! – and she seemed quite well suited to that nice Mr Middleton-Brown. But two visits in as many days was perhaps a little excessive. Then Lucy handed Alice a bunch of flowers, and Alice warmed to her.

Babs and Nell sniffed around Lucy's feet; she bent to scratch their ears and murmur a friendly greeting. Alice unbent a bit more. ‘Come into the sitting room. Or would you like to come into the kitchen, perhaps? We were just going to have our morning coffee.'

‘The kitchen would be lovely,' Lucy agreed. It was cosy in the kitchen – much more conducive to the sort of conversation she had in mind than the chilly, sterile sitting room.

Efficiently, Alice made the coffee while Gwen took a stab at arranging the flowers in a vase. Lucy sat down at the table. ‘I was wondering,' she said, ‘if I might buy some of your prayer cards from you, to take back to my church in London. The quality of them is so professional – I think they'd go down a treat at St Anne's.'

Gwen whirled around. ‘Oh! That would be wonderful, wouldn't it, Alice?'

Alice smiled, showing her teeth. ‘I believe that could be arranged, Miss Kingsley.'

‘Do you think that your father's church might like some of them, too?' Gwen suggested somewhat daringly, suddenly envisioning a whole industry developing.

Lucy didn't bother to explain that her father had recently left the parish ministry for a cathedral canonry. ‘Oh, yes, I should think so. That is, if you can spare them. I know how much time goes into them. Surely you can't produce that many.'

‘Well, we
are
retired,' Alice explained. ‘We have a lot of time to devote to them. Especially since . . . well, things may change now, of course, but there wasn't much for us to do at St Mary's when Father Dexter was there.'

That gave Lucy an opening. As Alice handed her a cup of coffee, she said hesitantly, ‘Actually, I need to ask you a question about Father Dexter. You were so kind to talk to me yesterday. But something has come up since I talked to you.'

Alice looked at her sharply. ‘Yes, Miss Kingsley?'

‘You know that I've been helping Mr Middleton-Brown with his case by talking to people,' she began diffidently. Alice nodded with impatience. ‘Well, yesterday afternoon I spoke to . . . someone . . . who'd been near the church on the night of Father Dexter's murder. She said that she'd seen two women come out of the church, and go off on bicycles.' She furrowed her brow, looking puzzled. ‘From the description, they sounded like you. But I don't understand – you didn't go to the church that night, did you?'

Alice made a hissing noise as Gwen gasped; they looked at each other and for a long moment there was silence. Lucy was conscious of the clock ticking.

‘Have you . . . mentioned this to anyone else?' Alice asked at last. ‘The police?'

‘No. Only Mr Middleton-Brown.'

‘Yes,' said Alice firmly, making up her mind. ‘Yes, we were there.' Gwen uttered a strangled sigh.

Lucy looked back and forth between them but said nothing. After a moment Alice continued. ‘We didn't say anything to the police because we didn't think it was important. He was alive when we got there, up on the ladder. He was still alive when we left him, of course.'

‘But . . . why?' Lucy asked. ‘Why did you go there?'

Gwen sighed again. ‘Elayne,' she moaned. ‘Dear Elayne.'

‘Elayne was so upset when she left us,' Alice explained. ‘She'd decided to tell him that she was going to leave him.'

‘Of course,' Gwen exulted, ‘she didn't have to leave him, did she? And now she can go to the National Pilgrimage with us, and –'

‘Don't be so silly, Gwen,' Alice snapped. She turned back to Lucy. ‘We were worried about Elayne. Worried that he'd bully her, make her change her mind. So we decided to go and give her some moral support when she talked to him. When we got to the church, though, she'd already come and gone. She'd taken the short-cut across the fields, walking, and we had to go the long way on our bikes, so we missed her.'

‘What did he say to you?'

‘He just told us to go away. He said that his family affairs were none of our business, and that we were to stay away from Elayne.'

‘So we went,' Gwen added. ‘He was up on the ladder, prying away at the statue with that bar, and he wouldn't even come down to talk to us.'

‘And you went straight home? You didn't go looking for Elayne?' Lucy asked.

‘Yes,' said Gwen.

‘No,' said Alice. They looked at each other. ‘That is,' Alice amplified, ‘yes, we went straight home. No, we didn't go looking for Elayne.' She paused. ‘We thought that she'd probably gone home to talk to Becca about . . . you know. We didn't want to bother her then.'

Lucy frowned as she realised the implications of what Alice had just said. ‘She went home to talk to Becca? Did Elayne know about Becca?'

Again Alice and Gwen exchanged glances. ‘Yes,' said Alice. ‘Yes, Elayne knew. We had to tell her, you see. Because Gwen,' she shot her a venomous look, ‘had told
him
. We didn't know
what
he'd do to Becca. We thought her mother ought to know, in case she had to protect her from
him
.'

‘We didn't approve of what Becca had done, of course,' Gwen added self-righteously. ‘There are no excuses for that kind of wanton behaviour. But her father – well, he'd already proved that he was a violent man, when he hit Elayne that day. The
beast
,' she frowned. ‘The
brute
. We didn't want him to
hurt
Becca.'

‘Then why did you tell him?' Alice rounded on her sharply. Gwen subsided into contrite silence.

‘And how did Elayne take it when you told her about Becca and Father Stephen?' Lucy wanted to know.

‘Elayne thought that it was Toby Gates,' Gwen muttered.

Alice ignored her and gave Lucy a long, appraising look. Once again she made up her mind. ‘Miss Kingsley,' she said slowly, ‘I don't know why you and Mr Middleton-Brown think that it was Father Stephen that Becca . . . lured into the sins of the flesh. That she corrupted on our sofa. We certainly never told you that. We never told anyone who it was – it was far too upsetting.' She sighed. ‘It wasn't Father Stephen, Miss Kingsley. Becca told us. It was our own dear Father Mark.'

It was about time for her to have a little chat with Becca Dexter, Lucy decided when she was finally able to get away from Monkey Puzzle Cottage. She tried to sort out the implications of what she'd learned as she drove to the vicarage. Becca had apparently lied to
everyone
. Why?

Elayne opened the door with a welcoming smile. ‘Lucy! What a nice surprise! Come in. I was just about to make myself a sandwich for lunch. You can join me – Becca's out.'

‘Becca's out?' Lucy tried to conceal her disappointment as she followed Elayne to the kitchen.

‘She went out a short time ago. I don't know when she'll be back.'

Elayne seemed genuinely pleased to see her. She must be a very lonely person, Lucy thought with compassion, and not just since her husband's death. Had she ever really had anyone to confide in? No wonder she'd so appreciated the attentions of the women at Monkey Puzzle Cottage, and had so opened up to Lucy herself.

Getting the bread out of the bin, Elayne asked, ‘You're vegetarian, didn't you say? Is cheese all right? Cheese and pickle?'

‘Fine, thanks,' Lucy smiled, taking a seat. She watched as Elayne efficiently made the sandwiches and brought them to the table.

‘How nice of you to drop by! What are you doing back in South Barsham? Is your solicitor-friend still making enquiries?'

‘I've just been talking to Miss Barnes and Miss Vernon,' Lucy replied carefully; she didn't want to say too much until she'd spoken to Becca. ‘Did you know that they'd followed you to the church . . . that night?' Lucy tried to be delicate when dealing with the subject of her husband's murder; in spite of everything she must have some unresolved feelings about him.

‘The night that Bob died?' Elayne said. ‘No, I didn't know that. How did you find out? Did they tell you?'

‘Not at first. But someone saw them, and now they've admitted it. They wanted to back you up, it seems. In case there was trouble, or you lost your nerve.'

Elayne smiled. ‘They really are dears, those two. They've been so supportive.' She sighed. ‘I don't know what I'd do without them – I've never been very good at coping on my own.'

‘It looks to me like you're doing very well,' Lucy said sincerely.

They both jumped as the front door slammed. ‘Becca?' said Elayne with concern.

In a moment she stood framed in the kitchen door, a tall young woman with cropped blonde hair. She might have been pretty, Lucy surmised, but at the moment it was impossible to tell: her face was blotchy-red and swollen, and her eyes were overflowing with tears and smudged with mascara. She held a soggy tissue over her mouth; from behind it she choked, ‘Oh, Mummy!'

Elayne went to her quickly, leading the unresisting girl to sit at the table. For a moment she stood beside her daughter, stroking her hair comfortingly and making soothing noises while Becca sobbed painfully. Both seemed oblivious to the outsider in the kitchen; Lucy felt that perhaps the least conspicuous thing to do was to remain where she was.

‘What is it, Becca, darling?' her mother said gently. ‘What's the matter?'

The girl raised her tear-stained face. ‘Oh, Mummy, I want to die! He doesn't love me! Mark doesn't love me!'

Elayne hid her surprise quite well. ‘Tell me, darling,' she urged.

Gradually, in a gulping voice interrupted frequently with sobs, the story came out. Lucy, an eavesdropper, an interloper, sat quietly and listened to the whole sad tale. As Lucy related it later to her own lover, the girl had been inexperienced and innocent, kept so deliberately by her over-protective and possessive father. She'd met the young priest at Monkey Puzzle Cottage on her first visit there, right after their move to South Barsham: he always went there for tea on a Monday, it seemed. A romantic at heart, and very vulnerable, she'd fallen desperately in love with the ravishingly handsome young man, so different from her father in his beliefs, yet somehow like him in his strength of character. Their romance, conducted of necessity in secret, had taken the predictable course, from tentative kisses and timid embraces up to the ultimate consummation on the pink dralon sofa in Monkey Puzzle Cottage. The next step, particularly for a conventional girl like Becca Dexter, had to be marriage. Didn't it? But today, when she'd timidly suggested marriage to her lover, he had laughed. Laughed! He'd said, Becca related broken-heartedly, that he'd never marry her. She was a sweet girl, and all that, but that was as far as it went. He didn't love her, never had loved her.

When the tale had been told, and the girl sobbed on in her mother's arms, Lucy found that her fists were clenched in anger. She, too, wanted to reach out and stroke the cropped silver-gilt head, to tell her that it didn't matter, that no man was worth the pain she'd suffered.

Elayne and Becca had both accepted Lucy's presence as somehow natural, sensing perhaps her deep sympathy, and so she stayed on. After the initial storm was over, Elayne put the kettle on, and they sat around the table nursing mugs of strong tea.

‘I just wish you'd told me sooner, Becca,' Elayne said after a while. ‘Not that I could have done anything, but I wish you'd trusted me with the truth. That night when I came back here, after Alice and Gwen had told me – you never said that it was Mark Judd. You let me think that it was . . . someone else.'

Becca squeezed her mother's hand; since Bob Dexter's death they had become much closer than they'd ever been before. ‘I couldn't, Mummy. Surely you see that. Not when I thought . . .' She caught on a sob.

‘There, there, lovey. You thought that I'd tell your father. And he . . .' Elayne stopped at the enormity of the thought. ‘Your father,' she repeated. ‘Who did your father think that it was?'

‘Oh, Mummy, I feel so terrible about this,' she whispered. ‘I lied to Daddy. I told him . . . I told him that it was Stephen Thorncroft! I had to! He would have killed me if I hadn't told him something, and I was so afraid for Mark – so afraid that Daddy would hurt him. I didn't know that Stephen would go to the church that night. I don't know what Daddy said to him, what he said to Daddy. All I know is that Daddy's dead, and somehow it's my fault. Oh, Mummy – I've been so frightened!'

Lucy stared at her, appalled. Without volition, she said, ‘You told your father that Stephen Thorncroft was your lover?'