Ritual in the Dark (16 page)

The priest said:

You don’t seriously think that Austin might be involved in these murders?

Good lord, no! Of course not. But the police wouldn’t leave any stone unturned, would they? And the clothes belong to a woman. What do you think?

It is possible. . . it is possible. But that would not explain Austin’s secrecy.

Why not? It might. Anyway, perhaps he is in some sort of trouble. After all, a man with perversions can land in trouble pretty easily. Perhaps it isn’t the police he’s worried about. It could be that someone’s blackmailing him. . .

He stopped, with a sense that such speculation was futile. The priest’s eyes nicked up to his face and were lowered again.

You may be right, but the best way to find out is to wait until Austin comes back, and ask him. It is not at all improbable that the police might question him in connection with the Whitechapel murders—if he is known to them as a sexual invert. In cases of sadistic murder they spread their net very wide. They have to, since there is no other way.

How do you mean, father?

In the average murder, someone has a motive, and it is simply a matter of finding it. In a sexual crime—unless the criminal is caught in the act—the police have nothing to go on. I was in Düsseldorf at the time of the Kürten murders. The number of suspects the police interviewed over three years ran into hundreds of thousands. So it is not at all impossible that Austin may be one of those questioned.

Sorme said, smiling:

Or me. . . or anybody else?

Quite.

Sorme stood up. He said:

Look, father, I’m not going to keep you any longer. I know you’re supposed to be resting. Thanks for listening to me. I had to talk to somebody about it or bust.

You were right to come to me. But some time you must come here to talk about yourself.

Thank you, father.

One more thing. I have a friend—a German doctor—who is working with Scotland Yard. When you have talked to Austin—if you think he needs help—get him to contact me. Dr Stein might be able to save some trouble.

Thanks, father. I’ll do that.

He picked up his coat, and opened the door. As he did so, he remembered a question he had forgotten to ask:

By the way, father, do you know a painter named Glasp?

Yes.

Austin has some paintings by him on his walls. How old is he?

I . . . I’m not sure. About twenty-six or so.

Twenty-six? He must be very talented. Two of the paintings are dated nineteen forty-eight. That means he’d be about seventeen when he did them.

He is very talented—or he was. He is also very poor, and he’s been in a mental home twice. Perhaps Austin will introduce you to him.

Do you know where he lives, by any chance?

I’m afraid not. I haven’t seen him for some years. Father Rakosi may have his address. Austin is sure to.

He’s a Catholic?

Yes.

The door opened as he stood with his hand on the knob. It was the Scotswoman.

Time for your rest, father.

Sorme said:

I’ll come again soon, if I may, father. Goodbye.

Goodbye.

In the hall, he encountered the Hungarian priest. He said:

Pardon me, Father Carruthers said you might know the address of a painter called Glasp.

Yes. Do you want it?

If it’s no trouble, please.

Wait just a moment. I can get it for you.

He went into a room next to the waiting-room; a moment later, he reappeared with a notebook:

It is number twelve Durward Street.

Sorme wrote it down in his own address book. He asked:

Where is it?

East one, Whitechapel.

Do you know his Christian name?

The priest looked surprised:

You do not know him?

No. I’ve seen some of his paintings. I thought I might go and see him some time.

I see. You will not find him sociable. His name is Oliver. He is not easy to talk to.

Sorme slipped his address book into his pocket.

Thank you, father. Maybe I’ll write him a letter. Good afternoon.

Outside, he looked around automatically for his bicycle, until he remembered he had travelled by Underground. He walked towards Chancery Lane station, swinging the leather grip. Glasp’s Christian name had confirmed his suspicion that the obscene drawings had been sketched by him: they were initialled O.G. But this in itself meant nothing. It was only another fragment of the jigsaw puzzle that fitted around Nunne.

He had thought so much about Nunne that Nunne’s reality was becoming shadowy. He thought: I am negative. That’s the trouble. I am negative, and I am interested in Nunne because he is positive. I am like a stagnant pond. And Nunne is a stone that has disturbed the scum.

He walked towards Kingsway, and the mood of gloom and self-irritation deepened. He was aware that, to some extent, this was because he had not eaten since breakfast. The faint intoxication induced by the liqueurs was beginning to wear off too.

In the Underground he came close to falling asleep. He wiped the tears out of his eyes with his handkerchief, and immediately yawned again.

Tired. That’s the trouble. I’ll eat and sleep when I. . . oh, damnation.

He remembered Caroline, and that he was due to meet her in two hours. The thought depressed him. He considered phoning her and telling her that he couldn’t make it, but the idea troubled him even more than the thought of being at Leicester Square by six o’clock. Finally, he left the tram at Camden Town, and went to a ready-made tailors to buy trousers.

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Before he had been with her for a quarter of an hour he realised he liked her, that he was going to enjoy the evening. There was no kind of constraint between them. He observed that this was because she took him for granted, as if it was the tenth time he had taken her out and not the first. She treated him casually, like an intimate of long standing. It was something he had noticed also in Austin’s manner.

The restaurant was in a basement in the King’s Road: it was entered through a coffee bar. Half a dozen voices called her name as soon as they came in, and a bearded youth, wearing a duffle-coat, flung his arms around her and kissed her, crying:

Alloa, me luv, it’s grand ter see yer!

She introduced him to Sorme, saying: This is Frank. He’s playing Verlaine in the play we’re doing.

The young man had a plump, immature face; his beard was scanty and silky. Sorme found it hard to imagine anyone less like Verlaine. The youth said:

Howdy, pardner? Ah hope you ain’t a fightin’ man, ‘cause ah ain’t brought ma six shooters. Coffee for both of you?

We’re having a meal downstairs, Caroline said. We may see you afterwards.

Come to the party. It’s on the bomb site opposite the art school. Bring a bottle of wine.

We might do that, she said. They pushed their way through the crowd of youths and girls who lined the counter and the high stools along the walls. Sorme heard someone say:

There’s Miss Beddable for Nineteen Fifty-eight.

The downstairs was divided into two halves by a lattice screen, and lit by table lamps made from Chianti bottles. When an olive-skinned waiter hurried towards them, he expected him to address Caroline by her Christian name. But he only said:

Table for two, sir?

The menu cards were enormous, almost as large as a sheet of newspaper.

Some of this stuff’s rather expensive.

Don’t worry. I robbed my money box this morning.

She surveyed the menu, and asked finally:

Do you like escargots?

He admitted that he had never tried them.

Let’s both have some. Do you like garlic?

Love it.

Good. Shall we be pigs and have a dozen each?

When the snails arrived, she instructed him in the use of the small tongs, and insisted that he drink the melted butter from the shell, after the soft, black body had been extracted and eaten. They had another gin and lime, followed by a bottle of hock. He began to feel relaxed and slightly irresponsible. He admitted to her:

I wasn’t looking forward to this evening at all.

No. Why not?

I was a little nervous that we wouldn’t get along. Do you know something? I haven’t taken a girl out for the past five years.

Good Heavens! What did you do? Take a monastic vow?

No. Just stayed in my room, mostly. Or in the British Museum Reading Room.

But why? You’re not shy. . .

No. I was looking for something. . . if you see what I mean.

She asked, smiling: For what?

The roast chicken arrived, and gave him time to consider his answer. He said finally:

The same thing Rimbaud was looking for. A vision.

She said immediately: I’ve been trying to read a book about him, but it’s full of French quotations. He wanted to derange his senses or something, didn’t he?

Yes.

Did you try that?

No. I tried some disciplines. But nothing happened.

And what do you intend to try now?

Funnily enough, I’m closer to it now than ever before. Do you know what a catalyst is?

No.

It’s a thing that causes a chemical reaction without getting altered itself. You make sulphuric acid gas by heating oxygen and sulphur dioxide. But you have to heat them over platinised asbestos. Otherwise nothing happens. But the platinised asbestos doesn’t change. Well, Austin has been like platinised asbestos for me. I had a lot of elements inside me that didn’t mix. I had a lot of knowledge that didn’t mean anything to me. Since I met him last Friday, I’ve started feeling alive for the first time in years.

She asked, pouting:

Don’t I come in anywhere?

Of course you do. If it hadn’t been for Austin, I wouldn’t have met you, would I?

How did you meet Austin?

He told her while he ate. He was still telling her after the meal, when they went upstairs for coffee. Half way up the stairs, she stopped and turned her head towards him, whispering:

You know, I’m a little tipsy.

She swayed backwards slightly, and he put both hands around her waist to steady her. She gripped them in hers for a moment and pulled them tight, then released them. He was feeling too well-fed and somnolent to be excited by the gesture, but it increased the sense of comfort and certainty he felt with her. As they drank coffee, she asked suddenly:

Do you think Gertrude’s attractive?

He stared hard at his cup, and said critically:

Yes. . . she’s attractive.

But not your type? she prompted him.

No. . . It’s not that. It’s the simplicity of the way she sees things. She puzzles me.

Puzzles you? Why on earth should she puzzle you?

She’s either brilliantly dishonest or so primitively simple-minded that I can’t even conceive of it. Mind, I can understand people being simple Bible Christians, and thinking the Bible’s the beginning and end of everything. But she doesn’t strike me as having that type of mind. You’d think she’d read Virginia Woolf, and patronise the local young writers.

She does!

Yes. . . I suppose she does. Do you know anything about her life before she came to live in Hampstead?

No. Mummy’s never talked about her. But she did drop something once when I wasn’t supposed to be listening. There mas a man once.

And what happened?

I don’t know, really. Why are you so interested? Have you got designs on her?

You brought the subject up!

I expect I did. Anyway, I think she’s got designs on you.

On my salvation, you mean.

Well. . . She’s rather lonely up there. That’s why I go up to stay some nights. I think she’d like it if you went up there more often.

Hasn’t she any other close friends?

No. She used to see rather a lot of a painter once. But that stopped. . .

You mean she had an affair?

Oh no. He was half her age. A man named Glasp.

Oliver Glasp?

Yes, why?

I’ve heard of him. A friend of Austin’s, I think.

Yes. I think Austin took him there for the first time.

Why did he stop going there? Do you know?

Yes. He had some kind of a breakdown and went into a mental home. She never talked about it much, but I think they quarrelled as well.

They had both finished their coffee. He asked her:

Shall we go?

She slipped down off the stool, and picked up her gloves. He asked:

Where would you like to go now? Back into Soho for a drink?

I don’t mind. Where would you?

Let’s walk anyway. I’ve had too much to eat.

The night was cold and windless; there were no stars.

She asked:

Would you like to visit a couple of girl friends of mine? They live on a boat on Chelsea reach.

How do we get there?

It’s a ten-minute walk.

Shall we buy some wine to take?

That’s a good idea. I don’t suppose they’ll have anything to drink. They’re both actresses, but they’re out of work at the moment.

They bought a bottle of hock at a wine shop, and walked on past the town hall. A hundred yards further on they could see the glow of a bonfire.

That’d be the party Frankie mentioned. We don’t want to go, do we?

I don’t.

The fire had been built on a piece of waste ground that was divided from the road by a low wall. The land itself was about ten feet below street level; it was reached through an entrance in the side street. The site was crowded with students, most of them holding bottles or glasses. A crowd of them were dragging a tree trunk across the fire. It was too big to lie flat; it formed a kind of bridge across the centre of the fire, supported at its far end by branches.

Let’s go down for just a moment, Gerard?

Sorme trailed reluctantly behind her as she walked to the side street. There the ground sloped naturally on to the site. He asked with misgiving:

Do you know many of them?

A few. But we don’t want to get involved. Let’s just have a warm and then go.

Somewhere, a portable radio was playing dance music, but no one was attempting to dance. In the shadows, towards the wall, couples were stretched out on the grass. Most of the crowd stood around the fire in a wide circle. It was too hot to stand close. In the blaze, Sorme could distinguish an old sofa and the remains of a door. As they stood there, someone leapt over the tree trunk where it lay across the centre of the fire, and landed clumsily on the far side, sending up a shower of red sparks. A few students began to cheer spasmodically. The youth turned round and leapt back the other way, flinging his arms in the air and shrieking as he jumped. Sorme said, disgustedly: Bloody fool.