A Finer End (25 page)

Nick nodded. “She said Faith wasn’t there, but I didn’t believe her. I searched the house.”

“And then?”

He bridled. “And then I kept looking. I even went to Street and had a look at her parents’ house, just in case she’d been desperate enough to go back, and to the Vicarage, in case she’d gone there.”

“If you left Ms. Todd alive and well, why not tell the truth?” Kincaid asked him.

Nick shrugged. “When I heard Garnet was dead, I started to think … you know, it looked bad. And how was anyone else to know I’d been there? Pretty stupid of me, I suppose.”

“Quite,” Kincaid agreed drily. “You’ll have to talk to the police, and I’d recommend you do it before they come looking for you. You do realize you may have been the last person to see Ms. Todd alive?”

Color stained Nick’s face. “No. I hadn’t.…”

“How did you leave things with her?”

“I’ll sound a right prat.…” When Kincaid merely raised an eyebrow, Nick stumbled on. “I told her that if anything had happened to Faith, she’d be sorry. But I didn’t mean—you can’t think—Good Lord, I never wished her
dead!”

“No one’s saying you did,” interposed Gemma. “Did you see anything to indicate she was expecting someone? Or that she meant to go out?”

“No, I can’t say that I did. But … there was something … she seemed different. I was surprised that she actually let me in the house, for one thing. And she seemed really worried about Faith. I think that’s what convinced me that she hadn’t done something horrible to her.”

“You didn’t see anyone hanging about the place?”

“No. I suppose it would be better for me if I could say I had.”

“And you didn’t know what had happened to Faith until you heard from Jack?”

“He rang me at the shop first thing this morning. As soon as I could get away, I went looking for Garnet. And I did go back to the farmhouse, to see if she’d come home.”

“Did you go inside?”

Nick nodded uneasily. “The door was unlocked. I didn’t search the house, though. Just stood in the kitchen and called out.”

“Had anything changed since the previous afternoon?”

“Not that I could see.”

Kincaid stood. “Well, if you want my advice, Nick, the sooner you talk to DI Greely, the better for you.” He handed him Greely’s card. “Why don’t you take this number down.”

While Nick rummaged for pen and paper, Gemma had a chance to examine some of the books he had moved to make room for them. There was a preponderance of volumes on Druids, Goddess worship, and ancient magic. Lifting one, she said, “Nick, what did you mean when you said Garnet might have done something worse than hypnotize Faith?”

“Did I say that? Must have been talking off the top of my head. I’ve no idea.” Nick scooped up an armload of books and dumped them on the far side of the table.

“Garnet Todd seems to have been quite knowledgeable about such things.” Gemma gestured at the books. “Did she see Faith as a disciple?”

“If she did, she wouldn’t have confided in me,” Nick said bitterly.

“There’s something I’m not sure I understand, here. Why was Garnet so determined to shut you out of Faith’s life? Surely as the baby’s father—”

“I’m not the baby’s father!”

“But I thought—”

“No. Faith was pregnant when I met her.”

“But then who—”

“Faith won’t tell. No one has a clue. Unless …” Nick frowned.

“Unless Garnet knew,” Gemma finished for him. “It would make sense, if Faith confided in anyone, it would have been Garnet. I wonder … What if someone made sure Garnet wouldn’t reveal the father’s secret?”

“W
HAT
?”
KINCAID DEMANDED
. “Have I got jam on my face?”

“No.” Gemma smiled. “Crumbs. You look quite fetching.”

He set down his croissant, used his napkin, then poured them both another cup of coffee. They were lingering over a Continental breakfast in the B & B’s dining room. The room was elegant and comfortable, the food delicious, and he had refused to rush. They were, after all, at least nominally on holiday.

Gemma looked more relaxed than he had seen her in months, dressed for a casual day in russet-colored linen trousers, a pale yellow jumper, and boots.

Nevertheless, he was convinced something was worrying her. She had tossed and turned in the night, mumbling in her sleep, and lately he had been catching her watching him—as he had just then—with a pensive expression he couldn’t fathom. Each time he’d asked her what was wrong, she’d brushed his inquiry off with an inconsequential reply.

“What’s first on the agenda?” Gemma leaned back in her chair. “I’d like to know how Faith’s doing this morning.”

“I’ll give Jack a ring, see if I can catch him at home before he leaves for hospital.” He had just pulled the phone from his pocket when it rang, earning him a dirty look from the couple at the next table. “I should keep the damned thing on vibrate,” he muttered as he answered.

“Duncan?”

“Speak of the—”

“The police have taken Nick in for questioning this morning,” his cousin interrupted. “ ‘Helping them with their inquiries,’ Greely called it. You said all Nick had to do was tell the truth.” He sounded as though he felt betrayed.

“Jack, there’s never anything to gain from lying to the police. Look, I don’t imagine they have enough to keep
him more than a few hours, but I’ll give Greely a ring. I’ll call you back.”

“They’ve picked up Nick,” Gemma guessed as he disconnected.

“And Jack thinks I’ve led them both up the garden path.” Kincaid grimaced. “Bloody hell. I suppose I’d better find out if Greely knows something we don’t.”

He dialed the mobile number Greely had given him, identifying himself when the detective answered. “I hear you’ve pulled in Nick Carlisle.”

“I thought Mr. Montfort would be speaking to you,” Greely answered, sounding amused. “The boy’s prints are on record, and we also found them all over the farmhouse when we dusted it yesterday.”

“Well, they would be if he did what he claims,” Kincaid observed mildly. “Any luck with the van?”

“No prints except Todd’s and the girl’s.”

“Anything wiped?”

“No. Our killer must have worn gloves. There are quite a few smudged places on the steering wheel and door handles.”

“Somehow our lad doesn’t strike me as the calculating type.”

“Maybe not,” said Greely, “but he’s the best thing we’ve got at the moment.”

“You don’t have enough to charge him.”

“No. But it never hurts to shake the bottle a bit. We’ll send him on his way this afternoon if nothing else turns up, keep an eye on him. Maybe the girl helped him, and she’s the one that thought to wear gloves.”

Not a bad hypothesis, Kincaid thought, and of course in Greely’s position he’d think—and do—exactly the same. “How’d the lad get himself a record?”

“Some university fracas in Durham. Too much beer ending in a punch-up, is my guess. Oh, and thanks, by the way, for having Carlisle deliver himself. Saved us a bit of work.” Greely sounded quite pleased with himself.

Glancing up, Kincaid saw that the couple at the next table was now listening to him with undisguised curiosity.

“You’ll keep me posted?” he asked Greely, reluctant to say more.

“Right. Oh. One more thing. We begged and bullied the pathologist into performing the postmortem this morning. You’re going to like this one.” Greely plainly relished keeping Kincaid in suspense.

“And?”

“It seems as though Todd drowned. Fresh water, untreated. So it didn’t come from a tap.” With that, Greely rang off.

“What’s he—” began Gemma, when Kincaid jerked his head towards their eavesdropping neighbors. She fell silent, toying with the flakes of pastry on her plate, while Kincaid sipped at his coffee, his mind busy with speculation.

After a few unrewarding minutes, the couple gave up and left the room. Kincaid grinned. “Short attention spans.” He then repeated Greely’s side of the conversation.

“I don’t believe Faith helped murder Garnet, or that she’s calculating,” Gemma said stubbornly when he’d finished. “For heaven’s sake, she’s still a child.”

“You know all too well that’s no guarantee. And she did show up in hysterics at Jack’s around the time Garnet was killed, with no real explanation for where she’d been.”

“I still don’t buy it. Greely says Garnet drowned? What are Nick and Faith supposed to have done—held her under in the tub? That’s ridiculous. And I don’t think it’s any more likely that they enticed her to go someplace where they could do it more conveniently.”

“If it’s any comfort, Greely wouldn’t dare charge Nick at this point unless he had a confession, and he says Todd drowned in fresh water.”

“Did the pathologist estimate time of death?”

“I didn’t have a chance to ask. But if Nick’s telling the truth, it has to have been later than five o’clock.”

“That gives Jack a fairly watertight alibi, I should think.”

Kincaid stared at her. It had not even occurred to him that the local coppers might consider his cousin a suspect in Garnet’s murder. And it was obvious—if Jack had thought Garnet responsible for Winnie’s brush with death, who would have had better motive?

“That’s if you consider Faith a reliable witness from the time Jack reached Glastonbury,” he mused, thinking it through.

Gemma pushed aside her coffee cup with decision. “So what do we do now?”

“I’d say we give Greely another suspect.”

Written sources connected the “island” of Beckery with Glastonbury Abbey from 670, when a charter of dubious authenticity granted it to Abbot Berthwald. But oral tradition cited Beckery as a religious community as far back as 488, when it was supposed to have been visited by the Irish saint Bridget.

Andrew had never been inclined to accept such stories at face value, but excavations did indicate that the community had been occupied at least since early Saxon times.

Between Beckery and the mass of Wirral Hill, less than a kilometer to the south, lay what had once been Wirral Park; the ancient deer preserve of the abbots of Glastonbury—now home to a hideous complex of supermarkets and car parks.

Standing atop the mound at Beckery, Andrew surveyed this modern encroachment with a disgust that bordered on hatred. They ruined everything, money-grubbing fools with no foresight and no appreciation of the past.

He had walked from Hillhead with his spaniel, along what was left of the sluggish river. It was one of their frequent Saturday-morning excursions, and he was usually
able to put aside his anger as he poked about the excavations. But on this day his rage seemed uncontainable, seeping like bile into every nook and cranny of his mind.

He didn’t know which was worse—the developers or the crackpots. Even here at Beckery, which had never been more than an unassuming community, the crackpots had been at work. There had been a spring, most likely one of the main reasons for the founding of the monastery on that spot. By the middle of the nineteenth century it had degenerated into little more than a muddy pool, known thereabouts as Bride’s Well, after St. Bridget. Then, in 1885, a doctor named Goodchild had brought home a bowl he’d found in a shop in Italy and, instructed by a vision, placed it in Bride’s Well.

Goodchild then cast hints in appropriate ears, and eventually two young and virginal ladies—also instructed by visions—had chanced to recover the dish. There followed much intense debate in exalted circles as to whether this bowl was the Holy Grail, although Goodchild later insisted that he had never claimed so.

This incident had, in Andrew’s view, precipitated the entire business of the Glastonbury Revival—including the absurd claims of that charlatan, Frederick Bligh Bond.

Andrew struck violently at a tussock with his walking stick, startling Phoebe, who looked up at him reproachfully.

“Sorry, girl,” he muttered, yet swung at the next with equal force. Dead monks, for Christ’s sake! Who could possibly have believed such nonsense? And now Montfort had perpetuated it. And worse, had dragged his sister into it.

It must have been the clever references to music that had hooked Winnie so easily. Music was a love they had shared since childhood, one of the bonds that had sustained them after their parents’ deaths. Now that, too, had been stolen from him.

Had he brought this disaster upon himself by his own actions, a ludicrous parody of some hero in a Greek tragedy?

Brooding, Andrew continued his circuit of the excavation site, Phoebe at his heels. Over the centuries, three successive chapels dedicated to St. Bridget had been built at Beckery, each around the confines of the previous, at the highest point on the peninsula. According to medieval references, a hole had existed in the south wall of the earliest chapel, and all who passed through it had obtained forgiveness for their sins. How unfortunate for him, Andrew thought bitterly, that no such option now existed.

Or would he have been buried facedown in the cemetery on the north side of the chapel, the fate of six out of the sixty-three bodies found there? It was the position the pagans had used to bury criminals and evildoers, and the custom had most likely been adopted by the early Christian settlement. It certainly left no question as to who—or what—a man had been in life.

Andrew looked back to the east, past the town with the Abbey at its heart, to the Tor rising into a gray bank of cloud. Could he face such exposure? Ruin? The loss of everything he valued? He had never wanted to do anything but teach, and that would no longer be possible.

Worse, his sister would despise him, and that above all he could not bear.

Since Jack’s visit the previous afternoon, Simon had combed minutely through copies of the Abbey accounts. A record of the produce from the Abbey’s many estates had been an important part of Abbey life, and information noted for a particular year included such notations as “7,000 eels from the fisheries at Martinsey,” “honey from the mead-maker at Northload,” or “30 salmon from the cellarer for the monks’ feast.”