Death on Allhallowe’en (6 page)

'All the same, I thought you came near getting somewhere once or twice. Did you get anything at all, Carolus?'

‘More than I hoped. Now you tell me, John, what you see as possible explanations for that shot.'

‘I'll try. Not my own opinion, you mean, just possibilities on paper, as it were. First, it could have been an attempt to kill Alice Murrain, who was up in her bedroom. Then it might have been an attempt to scare her. Or to scare Horseman. Or to kill Horseman if the one who fired the shot slipped as he was firing. Or it might have been an accident—guns do get fired by accident. Or a shot at something else high up which missed its mark. I suppose it could have been a signal to be heard at some distance.'

‘All possibilities as we are using the term. Who do you think fired it?'

‘Almost anyone. Drummer probably had something to do with it, from the way in which his younger brother was protecting him. But there seems to me to be another possibility. What about Murrain himself? There might have been time for him to enter the churchyard by the lower gate and come back to face his own house. Horseman said, “I stood there for a few moments. The torch was invisible now and there was silence. Then, just as I was passing Chimneys, there was a shot.” Murrain could have fired it, couldn't he?'

‘The thought occurred to me. But I need to know an awful lot more before I even have a guess.'

A storm rose in the night and woke Carolus from his heavy sleep. His window was wide open and the curtains were blowing into the room. When he went to half-close it he almost slipped on the rainwater which had blown in and lay in a puddle on the parquet. But there seemed to be no rain now, and when he had mopped up the water he stood for a moment looking out.

Yes, on a night like this he could understand how in this place older generations, more superstitious than today, had managed to frighten themselves with things that go bump in the night, and ghouls and ghosties, how in villages like this some faith in such demonry persisted. A white rag of moon seemed to be torn this way and that by the black boughs dancing in the wind, and there was the perpetually changing noise of a gusty night in a place of trees. It was not only nervous old people or children who kept away from churchyards or gibbets at night in this weather but quite intelligent adults. Carolus had always smiled at old rustic bogies, but he did not underrate their power over the credulous.

Then suddenly he ceased to muse philosophically and became alert, for a sound rose, seemingly from the shrubbery at the end of the garden, which was no part of the natural clamour of the night. He had never heard the howl of a wolf, but imagined it to be something like this, though he did not doubt that it came from a human throat. Someone was giving a signal.

He watched the shrubbery from which it seemed to come
and heard it repeated. Then a light showed among the bushes, swinging from side to side.

The Larks slept on the other side of the house, so the signal could only be intended for him or John Stainer, whose window was beside his. Speculation on this was quickly answered because John's light was switched on, then off again, then on, to remain lighted for several minutes and finally extinguished. A few moments more and the front door opened and shut and he saw John Stainer, wrapped in his heavy black overcoat, crossing the lawn towards the shrubbery.

Carolus wondered whether he should follow and decided against it. If John had secrets from him they had nothing to do with what he was investigating and were thus no concern of his. Besides, he was chilled and the windswept rain had started again. He almost closed the window and went back to bed. If these events had any relevant significance he would hear about them in the morning.

He did, though the information came rather unwillingly, he thought, from John. Over breakfast—'soss, bake and kid,' Mrs Lark called the kind of mixed grill she presented—John asked him if he had slept well.

‘I had to get up in the night and close the window,' said Carolus. ‘The rain was coming in. How about you?'

‘Not well. I had a summons in the night.'

‘Sick parishioner?'

‘No. I forgot to tell you, Carolus, that I have an informant in the village. One of my choirboys whom I find absolutely reliable. He often hears things and passes them on to me, but doesn't like anyone to know it.'

‘What did he have to tell you?'

‘Something rather interesting. A relief in a way. It was about the Beacon.'

‘That's the place you said had a bad name? Near where the little boy was found?'

‘That's it. But there's rather more to it than that. The Beacon is a sort of archaeological monument. There are several
great slabs of stone there, once part of a circle of stones, I believe. There is a piece about it in
Archaeologia Cantiana,
but it never seems to have attracted much research. I only know that down to the eighteenth century some kind of party was held there on Allhallowe'en. One of my predecessors at the beginning of the last century was quite worried about this and recorded it in his diary. It was not anything to do with the occult which troubled him, but the fact that it was the occasion for an annual booze-up and what he called lewd merrymaking. He attacked it and the squire at that time supported him, so the custom lapsed. But in recent years there have been rumours that something takes place at the Beacon on Allhallowe'en. No one seems to know what, and no one cares to investigate. It may all be local invention. And, anyway, what I was told last night was that nothing would happen this year.'

‘You never told me about this.'

‘I was really ashamed to tell you any more of these old wives' tales. The point is, nothing is going to happen this year.'

‘No, John. The point is that it happened
last
year. And other years.'

‘May
have happened. But Billy Mason seemed quite convinced that it would be given a miss this time.'

‘You
hope
.'

‘Oh, I can trust Billy Mason. He was quite definite about it.'

‘But how would he know?'

‘He's the publican's son, and hears most things. I suppose the word has gone round.'

‘By Mrs Murrain's grapevine, I suppose. The one the little foxes spoil.'

‘You're getting very sarcastic about this, Carolus. The information came as a great relief to me.'

‘But why did he have to bring it at night, howling like a wolf?'

‘Billy likes that sort of thing. Reads that kind of fiction, I suppose.'

'I see. Did you tell the Gunnings I am going to call this morning?'

‘Yes. They'll be very glad to see you.'

‘Then I think I'll go at once. After all, that is the heart of the matter—the little boy's death a year ago.'

He found Albert Gunning at his petrol station.

‘The wife's expecting you,' he told Carolus.

He was a heavy man with old-fashioned spectacles having thick lenses. He spoke civilly enough but seemed preoccupied.

As Carolus approached the bungalow Cicely Gunning came to the door. Carolus was surprised that she had been described as so much younger than her husband—he judged her to be well into her forties. She might have been described as a typical English housewife, if such a creature existed, down to her chintzy house-jacket and expression of good-humoured alertness as though she were for ever on the look-out for bargains in a supermarket. As Carolus soon discovered, she had rather more than the garrulity natural to her type.

‘Yes, the Rector said you would be round, Mr Deene, and I told him I'd tell you all I could. There's some of them afraid to open their mouths, but Albert and I always say if you can help anyone by speaking out it's best to speak out. So when Mr Stainer said you wanted to know all about it, I told him we were only too willing. Besides that, he's a real friend as far as we're concerned and I won't hear any different. We've always been C of E, though there's some of them go to the Roman Catholic church over at Redcorn since the Rector's come.'

‘Why? Isn't he so popular?' Carolus managed to ask.

Cicely had been leading while talking towards the sitting-room and he found himself now amid a wealth of plastics and fibres interspersed with wrought iron, a most unpleasing combination, Carolus thought.

‘This is all my husband's work,' Cicely said. ‘All the wrought iron, I mean. He's ever so clever with anything like that. Of course, his father was the village blacksmith, but he couldn't have done anything like the work Albert does. Look at that
fern-stand! Did you ever see such lovely ironwork? And it doesn't matter what it is. He mended my silver teapot the other day and you couldn't see where it had been broken. Sit down, Mr Deene.'

Carolus found himself on a wrought-iron chair with an inadequate cushion.

‘You were asking about the Rector. It's not so much that he's not popular,' Cicely continued. ‘But there's some say that, if he's going to carry on with all these processions and images of the Virgin Mary, they might as well have the real thing. Then again you'd be surprised at how many have taken to Ebby Smith lately, which is right-down ignorance as I see it, because he does nothing more than shout hell and damnation at them on Sundays. Still, the Rector gets a decent few who don't like to chop and change every five minutes.'

She paused for a moment and Carolus leapt into the breach.

‘Mr Stainer tells me you asked him to perform the rite of exorcism…'

‘That's right, I did. Well, I'd read about it in the papers being done in Essex somewhere, and I didn't know but what it might be some good as things were. It never came off though, because Mr Stainer couldn't get hold of the right words, and it seems the Bishop was abroad. The doctor told me afterwards it couldn't have saved Cyril, who get pneumonia that bad that all the iron lungs and penicillin and that which they have nowadays didn't make a bit of difference, poor little chap. But what I want to know is what had he been up to that night? Well, it's only natural, isn't it? He was a strong, healthy little boy before it happened. There's a lot goes on in this village, I know that, and there's some of them wouldn't think twice about doing anyone a mischief.'

‘You think some evil influence was brought to bear on Cyril?'

‘I don't know about influence—if you ask me it was more than that. The way he talked while he was in delirium. Things you'd never believe he came out with, which could never have passed his lips if they hadn't been put into his mind. It's
always been said that things go on up at the Beacon on Allhallowe'en, but I'd never believed it. Me and Albert don't take much notice of stories like that.'

‘What sort of things?'

‘I don't understand much about it, but it's to do with the devil and that. You don't need to believe it if you don't want, but it used to be said they'd offer sacrifices, like you read in the Bible.'

‘Who do?' interrupted Carolus firmly.

‘Ah. Now you're asking. If I could tell you that we'd know what to do, wouldn't we? And I'd do it, whatever it cost, with my little boy dying on account of it.'

‘You think that?'

‘What else could it have been? If you heard the things he said! I told the police, but they said they had evidence that nothing of the sort had happened that night. And the doctor said people
do
say extraordinary things when they're in delirium without anyone knowing how they got hold of them, and it seems Cyril's death was natural enough. He'd caught pneumonia and there it was. They didn't want to believe all this about the Beacon but I've never been satisfied, and never shall be for that matter.'

‘I hope you're going to tell me what Cyril said that night, Mrs Gunning.'

‘Oh, I couldn't possibly repeat a lot of it. Not to anyone.'

‘You didn't make a note of it at the time?'

‘I didn't need to. I shall never forget what he said, only it wouldn't be nice to use such words. I haven't even told his father some of it. Four-letter words and that, which I'm sure he'd never heard even at school, where some of the boys are from very rough homes.'

‘Couldn't you explain it without embarrassment, Mrs Gunning? Do try.'

‘Well, first it wasn't so bad, before he went right off, as it were. The first thing I thought was funny was him saying, “They all had animal heads, Mum,” just as he might be telling
me about one of these horror pictures. But I never let him go to any of those and we'd always been very careful what he saw on the telly. Well, you have to be, don't you? It's no wonder what you read about children in the papers when they're always showing them murders and that.'

‘Please go on.'

‘Then he started to cry something pitiful. He was shaking all over and didn't really talk sensible again. And all of a sudden he came out with a four-letter word. Worse than that, he said it with Our Lord's name. “——Jesus Christ,” he said. Then he repeated it again and again. It was horrible. It made my flesh creep. Fancy that coming from a little boy who'd never said a wrong thing in his life!'

‘What else?'

‘He kept saying “Blood!” At first I thought he was trying to swear and hadn't got it right, then I realised it was blood he meant. He'd seen blood somewhere because he tried to wash his hands, like.'

‘I understand there was some blood on him when his father found him.'

Cicely did not seem to want to dwell on this.

‘I soon washed that off,' she said. ‘But what was to me the worst thing of all, he began to make a noise like a sheep.'

‘Or goat?'

‘Goat it could have been. He didn't seem able to stop, but went on Ma-a-a-a for a long time. I asked him whatever he meant, but he couldn't hear me. There were one or two other words he said I could scarcely catch. “Black!” he said two or three times, and “knife” and “home”. Then he called out a name, a horrid name I'll write down for you because it doesn't sound at all nice.'