The Snares of Death (34 page)

‘Not if her mother was prepared to lie for her. And I'm not so sure that she wouldn't.' She frowned. ‘How about Mark Judd?'

David looked through the stack of police reports. ‘No indication that he was anywhere in the vicinity that evening, apparently.'

‘But is there any proof that he wasn't? Does he have an alibi?'

‘Slow down, Lucy love. Mark Judd doesn't need an alibi – he didn't have any motive, if he was expecting Dexter to help him get a plum job in London. Especially since Dexter didn't have a clue about him and Becca.'

‘Too bad,' said Lucy. ‘After what he did to Becca, it would have been nice . . .'

David laughed. ‘I agree that he's a bastard, Lucy, but that doesn't make him a murderer!'

‘No, I suppose not,' she admitted with regret. ‘But who . . . unless one of the BARC people went into the church.' She grabbed David's arm in mounting excitement. ‘Listen! We only have Fiona's word that they didn't go in!'

‘Well, we know that she and Rhys didn't. They weren't even at the church.'

‘No, they can give each other a perfect alibi,' she smiled. ‘But what about Maggie? She might have left the men. She might have gone in on her own, as soon as Stephen left. If she saw Dexter lying there, the man who'd hurt Bleddyn, and the iron bar right to hand . . .'

‘Possible,' David admitted. ‘We could certainly look into that.'

‘Or,' Lucy mused, twisting a curl around her finger, ‘or, we could be on completely the wrong track. It could be someone else altogether. Someone we don't even know about. Someone . . .' A name nagged at the corner of her mind, a name mentioned by someone within the last day or two. An unfamiliar name, but a name with some significance . . . If only she could remember.

She sat up suddenly. ‘Walsingham!' she said.

‘Walsingham?'

‘Next Monday is the National Pilgrimage!'

‘Is it?' David asked. ‘Yes, I suppose you're right – it's the bank holiday, isn't it?'

‘I think,' she said, ‘that the answer lies at Walsingham. They'll all be there, don't you see?'

‘What do you mean?'

She ticked them off on her fingers with excitement. ‘Elayne is going with Miss Barnes and Miss Vernon. And all of the BARC people – Fiona told me that they were going, presumably to hand out their information. So that's Rhys, Fiona, Maggie, Karen, Nicholas, and the hippy bloke. And Mark Judd, certainly.'

‘Becca?'

‘Probably not,' she admitted. ‘Although she's gone in other years, with the protesters. That's another group – all of Bob Dexter's Evangelical friends. They'll all be there.'

‘Without Bob Dexter.'

‘ Yes. And there's one other person who won't be there.'

‘Stephen Thorncroft,' David supplied.

Lucy nodded thoughtfully. ‘If there's one thing that's clear in my mind, David, it's that Walsingham is the place to be this weekend. And I intend to be there!'

CHAPTER 43

    
Lord, remember David: and all his trouble . . .

Psalm 132.1

David sat in the corner of the pub on Friday evening, staring glumly into his drink. John Spring was late, very late – David was already on his second whisky.

He was thinking miserably about Lucy, and about their discussion on Wednesday night. In vain he'd tried to persuade her that Walsingham was absolutely the last place on earth that any sane person would want to be on National Pilgrimage weekend. He personally tried to avoid Walsingham whenever possible, but to go this weekend would be insanity. Lucy, though, was convinced that only at Walsingham would they learn who had killed Bob Dexter, and she'd been unshakably determined to go. Worse yet, she wanted to go for the whole weekend. Wasting no time, that very evening she'd rung up Owen Osborne, who was in some way involved in the administration of the Shrine. Needless to say, the pilgrim hospice was completely booked for the weekend – David had, of course, told her that it would be. But that blasted Osborne had been kindly disposed towards her, in spite of the fact that she was a woman, and had managed to pull a few strings and book her into the unused half of a twin room; she would be sharing with a single lady from a parish pilgrimage party. There would be no room for David, even if he'd been inclined to go. What's more, she had left for London early the next morning, to get herself sorted out before the weekend, she said. She'd been away from home for more than a week already, and needed to see to a few things.

So on this Friday night David was alone, without much more than a trace of his usual self-deprecating good humour, and feeling extremely sorry for himself. He took a sip of his drink and sighed. Why was she being so stubborn? Why wouldn't she listen to him?

John Spring bounded in with a grin on his face. ‘Sorry I'm late, mate! I got detained, if you know what I mean!' he winked broadly; David was very much afraid that he knew exactly what he meant, and hoped that he'd be spared the details.

‘Can I get you a drink?' he asked quickly.

‘Ta. A pint of the usual.' Spring craned his neck with interest as David went to the bar for the beer, but to his disappointment the pretty, compliant barmaid was nowhere in sight. In her place, pulling his pint, was a thick-set, muscular man with a tattoo. Bad luck. Still, he thought, ever philosophical about such things, he couldn't complain, not after what had just happened to detain him.

David returned with the beer and they chatted inconsequentially for a while. He was, after all, not spared the details of Spring's latest amorous adventure, or indeed of several others within what seemed to David an astonishingly short space of time. When did the man find time to work, he wondered? How had he ever made sergeant?

After a while he switched off, merely making appropriate noises at what he judged were the proper points in the narrative. He couldn't bear to think about sex. Not with Lucy in London, and him here. He looked at his watch surreptitiously. Nearly half past nine. On an ordinary Friday night, he thought, they'd be finished eating by now. Maybe even finished with the washing-up. Maybe even in bed. Damn Walsingham, he thought. Damn and blast it.

For a moment he wasn't sure whether he'd imagined it, whether it were a reflection of his own thoughts. Through the fog of his lugubrious musings, he thought that John Spring had mentioned Walsingham. ‘What did you say?'

‘I said that it was going to be a bad weekend, with all that lot at Walsingham.' Spring made a rueful face. ‘Just my luck to pull duty.'

‘Duty?' David asked, his interest caught at last. ‘What sort of duty?'

‘You know,' Spring explained patiently. ‘It's this National Pilgrimage lark. Happens every year, this time. But the last few years it's been nasty, with all those protesters getting hot under the collar.'

‘Nasty?'

‘They shout around a lot, and wave their Bibles. We're out in force, of course, to keep it from getting any worse.' He lowered his voice. ‘This year we've had a tip that it might get violent. As I said, just my luck to be on duty this weekend. I'll be there all three days, just to keep an eye on things.' Spring laughed, looking at his nearly empty glass. ‘Not that there's much to keep an eye on, mind you, Dave,' he added. ‘Not as far as women go, anyway. The Anglo-Catholics are all damned ugly, and the Evangelicals are even worse – all those miserable holy women! I tell you, Dave, a pretty woman would stand out a mile in that crowd!'

Yes, thought David, wending his way to the bar for another round of drinks. Lucy, his lovely Lucy, would indeed stand out a mile, and John Spring would find her. He tried to tell himself that Lucy wouldn't be interested in John Spring – after all, Nan had found him entirely resistable, and she, like Lucy, was a sensible woman. But in his current frame of mind his imagination was running riot, and he was prepared to believe that the very worst could and would happen. What did he know about women, after all? How well did he understand Lucy, and what made her tick? He didn't even know what Lucy saw in
him
, he told himself. If she really loved him, as she said she did, wouldn't she marry him? Perhaps John Spring would be the man of her dreams. He sighed as he paid for the drinks; it was going to be a long night.

CHAPTER 44

    
Thy statutes have been my songs: in the house of my pilgrimage.

Psalm 119.54

It was nearly two hours from Liverpool Street to Norwich by train, so Lucy must have had quite an early start from home to be arriving at 11.25, David thought as he waited for her on the platform. When he'd been so upset about her going to Walsingham, on the Wednesday night, she'd declared her intention to get there, if necessary, without his help – she was perfectly capable, she'd said, of taking a bus from Norwich to Walsingham. But that was out of the question, as far as he was concerned; he would collect her at the station and drive her to Walsingham, he'd insisted. After all, this would be his only opportunity to see her this weekend. For he was most assuredly not going to Walsingham for the National Pilgrimage on Monday. He'd been to the National Pilgrimage once in his life, just to see what it was like, and that was one time too many.

He was so glad to see her, looking spring-like in a primrose-yellow flowered dress, that he smiled in spite of himself, greeting her with a decidedly unplatonic kiss. Then he took her case and steered her towards the exit. ‘Good trip?'

‘All right.'

‘I missed you, Lucy.'

‘So I gathered.' The corners of her mouth turned up.

‘Did you miss me?' he fished.

‘Of course.' But he was not reassured.

They got to the car and, once inside, he kissed her again. Someone who was prowling the short-term car park looking for a space honked his horn impatiently. ‘Oh, all right,' David muttered, putting on his seat-belt and turning the ignition key. ‘You're sure about this, Lucy?' he asked. ‘You're still determined to go to Walsingham? You won't come home with me instead?'

She shook her head with regret. ‘Darling, you know I'd love to. But this is frightfully important. I'm sure that the answer is there, and this may be the only way to find it.'

‘Won't you even come home for a coffee?'

Lucy laughed. ‘You know as well as I do where we'd end up if we did that. I'd like a coffee, but I think it would be safer to stop somewhere along the way, don't you?'

They arrived in Walsingham some time after twelve. Already, though the National Pilgrimage was two days away, the narrow streets were congested with cars and people. ‘We should have had lunch before we got here,' David said, threading the car through the bunches of pilgrims. ‘Everywhere is bound to be crowded.'

‘I'm sure we'll manage,' Lucy assured him. And indeed, the tiny village was well provided with tea shops and pubs, all for the convenience of the pilgrims. They had a sandwich at a little café across from the Shrine church before getting Lucy checked into her room at the hospice.

To David's undisguised amusement, all of the rooms in the hospice were identified not only by number but by name; each of the names referred to some attribute of Our Lady. He was even more amused to discover that Lucy had been booked into ‘Our Lady of Purity', and that it was situated next to the communal loo.

The room was strictly utilitarian, with two narrow beds, each with a small bedside table and lamp, one chest of drawers, and a washbasin. On the wall above the chest was a garishly coloured print of the Sacred Heart of Mary, and crucifixes hung over the beds. The window overlooked the Shrine gardens. David shook his head in mock despair. ‘So this,' he said dramatically, ‘is what you prefer to sleeping with me this weekend?'

Lucy put her case down on the nearest bed, smilingly ignoring the jibe. ‘Thank you for bringing me, David. Will you come to fetch me on Monday evening, or should I make other arrangements?'

‘Of course I'll come.'

‘See you then, darling.' She kissed him goodbye, and he was dismissed. But as he turned to leave, the door flew open and a young woman nearly ran into him as she bounced into the room, laden down with a quantity of distinctive red-white-and-blue Tesco plastic carrier bags, each stuffed to the brim.

‘Oh, sorry!' she gasped. ‘I didn't know there was anyone here. Am I in the right place?' She looked at the two beds and the two people already in the room.

‘I'm sure you are,' Lucy assured her.

‘I was just leaving,' David said. ‘I'll see you on Monday, Lucy.' He nodded to the young woman as he edged around her, and closed the door behind him.

‘Bye, darling,' Lucy called after him. She turned to the other inhabitant of the room with a smile. The girl seemed to fill the room with her bulk; she was not only overweight but quite oversized as well, and dressed in clothes that did little to counteract that image. Her brown hair, frizzed out around her head in an uncultured afro, added to the impression of volume. She had a rather flat, broad face, plagued with residual spots but redeemed by an open and friendly smile; Lucy judged her age to be about twenty. ‘I'm Lucy Kingsley,' she said.

‘I'm Monica Cooper,' the girl announced, dropping the carrier bags and thrusting out her hand. ‘I suppose we're going to be room-mates.'

‘It looks that way,' Lucy agreed. ‘I hope you don't mind.'

‘No, not at all! I'm glad of the company! I always like to have someone to talk to.'

‘But you're on your own?'

‘Well, I'm part of a parish pilgrimage,' the girl explained. ‘St Wulstan, Basingstoke. But I was the odd one out. Mrs Phillips is sharing with Miss Whittaker, thank goodness. And of course Father Clive is in with the other priests. We only brought one car-load this year.'