The Advent of Murder (A Faith Morgan Mystery) Read online

  “Nothing’s straightforward. Lucas dropped out of school – never came back after the Easter break; not that anyone thought to report it since he was about to turn seventeen. So nothing there. A couple of teachers had him on their lists, but they didn’t really remember him. His uncle’s sitting on something – don’t know what yet. Lucas didn’t have a job that we can find. He had a bike we haven’t been able to locate yet…” He spoke wearily.

  “So all in all, day three of the investigation isn’t going that well,” she said.

  “Thanks for stating the obvious.”

  “Did Oliver Markham check out?” Ben met her enquiry with his sphinx-like look. She held her breath. Did her pageant still have a Joseph? He lifted his dark eyebrows. He was teasing her. “He told you that he drove his family down on Friday night,” she prompted, “and stayed over with them in their hotel through the weekend?”

  “Right.” His lips were pressed together at the corners. Was he flirting with her? “We’re still checking,” he said.

  The clock reminded her that time was running short. She needed to be front of house in half an hour. She got up, taking her mug to the sink. He still nursed his.

  “I’ve got to change and have something to eat. I have to be back at the church in twenty minutes,” she said, surprised to catch a wistful note in her voice.

  “Then go change. I’ll put something together for you.” He got up and opened her fridge. She watched him, baffled. He seemed to think nothing of the intrusion. “Omelette OK? You don’t have much in.”

  She was hungry. What with changing and everything, she’d be lucky if she had time to grab an oatcake and some cheese. Ben’s omelettes were OK, as she remembered. The minute hand moved on the clock. She gave up with a mental shrug. This was just a weird day. She headed to the door.

  “Thanks,” she said. “There’s cheese in the butter drawer.”

  CHAPTER

  9

  Ben hadn’t stayed more than a couple of minutes after she reappeared in her clerical clothes. He hated to see her like that. As she left the vicarage she saw her phone flashing. Another text from Ruth. Well, not really a text – just a question mark sent from her sister’s number. The reproach itched under her skin. She stopped for a moment in her ice-bound garden and sucked up a lungful of freezing air. It burned the inside of her nose and made her head ache. Priorities. Focus on priorities. The civic carol service. Get back to the rest later.

  She needed another moment to compose herself. She passed the vestry door and walked round to the front of the church. The musicians were arriving with their instruments and Pat was hovering like an irritated goose. She homed in on Faith.

  “They won’t stop to wipe their boots!” Muddy trails of melting ice marked the stone floor of the porch.

  “Pat – don’t worry.” Faith attempted her most soothing voice; the one she used for distressed persons and unsettled beasts. “This church has stood for over nine hundred years. It can weather a bit of ice and mud.”

  Pat tossed her head. She was on edge too. What was it about this day?

  “And who do you suppose is going to have to clean it all up?” Pat muttered.

  Faith squeezed her arm.

  “We’ll do it together.” Pat shot her a look of irritated affection. That was unexpected. They were in this together.

  “Fred.” Pat nodded a greeting at her fellow churchwarden and hurried off into the church.

  Fred Partridge beamed at Faith. Her other churchwarden was a substantial man, but he had an inner peacefulness about him that meant that you didn’t always become aware of him until he stood right beside you.

  “She’s in a fuss over that WI business,” he said. “Wants to give a good impression. Mrs President herself is coming tonight.”

  Mrs Mavis Granger. Faith felt a slight chill run over her. She hardly relished another encounter with the imperious local dame. Fred smiled benignly at her and swept out his arm in a courtly gesture.

  “After you, vicar.”

  The church was lit up with candles and movement. It looked cherished. The pew decorations were just right. Faith felt Fred’s hand detain her. He drew her aside in the shadow of the gallery, away from the others.

  “Just a word.” He cleared his throat. His round eyes fringed by their stubby lashes were on Pat. “I don’t know whether you know, but Pat’s having a bit of a time.”

  “Her nephew?”

  Fred looked relieved. “So you do know. It’s not been easy on her. She’s a bit…” Fred floundered. Faith touched his chest, feeling the fabric of his wax jacket with the flat of her hand.

  “I know. We’ll keep an eye on her.”

  Mavis Granger had already arrived. She must have come in from the vestry side. She stood in the midst of a group of women wearing blue sashes. Pat faced them. To Faith’s eye the Scotswoman looked outnumbered. A wave of protective instinct rose in her.

  “It’s a small church,” Mavis addressed Pat directly. The others stood in a crescent around her – her pack. Their leader’s tone was condescending. “Only serving WI officers, otherwise we’d be parading all night. I would love to have you join us, Pat, of course, but I know you understand. This isn’t the cathedral; there just isn’t the space to have all the local WI members parade.”

  How mean! thought Faith. She could see Pat holding her shoulders back against the rebuff. She really shouldn’t get involved, but…

  She stepped forward. “Pat – I am sorry, ladies. I need my fellow host. Pat, the VIPs will start arriving soon. Can you help me do a final check to make sure the place cards on the seats are still right? You know how they can get mysteriously moved once the public starts arriving. We need to be at the door with Fred to start the greetings in five minutes or so.” She smiled benignly at Mavis and her colleagues and swept away with her churchwarden.

  “Mavis Granger thinks too much of herself,” Pat muttered at her side. “The cathedral indeed! As if anyone sees her there except on high days and holidays.”

  Faith suppressed a grin. “Some people just feel the need to be seen parading,” she consoled. She knew it was uncharitable but no one had the right to make Pat feel small in her own church. “We all know your importance to the WI. This is a night for hospitality. If that’s what she needs, we can give her this.”

  The MP texted to say she was caught in traffic. Everyone else had arrived. Faith looked back at the full seats from the door. The atmosphere was cheerful – people chatting and catching up with friends. It’s going to be all right, she assured herself.

  “Vicar!” Mavis Granger sailed toward her with her hand outstretched. “I just wanted to pass on apologies from Neil – my husband. He did mean to come tonight, but he’s been delayed in Stockholm. Plane trouble.”

  “How annoying,” Faith said, taking her hand and shaking it since she wasn’t sure what else to do. Mavis blinked. “I look forward to meeting him another time,” she added hurriedly. A tall youth dressed in a black suit reminiscent of the sixties had followed Mrs Granger up the aisle. Something Mavis had said seemed to have irritated him. He was standing stiffly, staring detachedly over their heads. At first Faith didn’t see it, then he turned his head to respond to a friend who called out a greeting. His curly brown hair was slicked back with gel. When she had seen him at the cathedral interviews, it had been trapped under a woolly hat.

  “This is my son, Vernon,” Mavis introduced him. “He’s coming to sing at your church at Midnight Mass. He’s in that choir.”

  Vernon – V. Mavis Granger’s son, who goes out with the girl she employs in her shop. V and the Dot.

  Faith reached out her hand. Vernon Granger made no move to reciprocate, his expression hostile. She opened her hand toward him instead.

  “Welcome to St James’s. I understand you were a close of friend of Lucas Bagshaw’s – I am very sorry for your loss.”

  “Who told you that?” he said belligerently – or maybe he was just startled. He glanced at his mother. Fait
h could feel the tension between them.

  “Vernon!” His mother’s voice wasn’t loud, but the energy she gave the word, combined with her expression, recalled the way she’d controlled her dogs down by the river. Her son seemed to shrink an inch.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled.

  “Make yourself useful.” His mother nodded toward Sue, who was talking to a couple of young volunteers. “Go and ask if there is anything you can help with,” she dismissed him.

  The proud mother from Monday night didn’t seem very loving, thought Faith. What’s going on with them?

  “He’s a good-looking boy,” she said out loud to Mavis, as V moved out of earshot.

  “My pride and joy.” The words were curiously dispassionate. Faith’s curiosity grew.

  Mavis Granger turned her eyes on Faith, her head tilted slightly back. What now?

  “You are close to the police, aren’t you?” The angle of Mavis’s mouth and her tone implied something disreputable. For one foolish, guilty moment Faith imagined that Mrs Granger had spied on her talking to Ben in her kitchen. “I hear that the sergeant who spoke to me down at the river is a member of your congregation. I don’t see him here tonight… I suppose they’re still busy with the Bagshaw thing.”

  Faith pinned a diplomatic smile to her lips. “No. I don’t think the Grays were able to join us tonight,” she replied. “As for the police investigation – at this stage, I imagine, they will still be establishing a timeline, trying to pin down how the victim spent his last hours, looking for witnesses, that sort of thing.” She paused. “Your son, Vernon, was in the choir with Lucas, wasn’t he? The police must have spoken to him?”

  “He’s upset. We all are…” Mavis said quickly.

  “Of course. He was Lucas’s best friend, wasn’t he?” Faith pressed.

  “I wouldn’t say that. Vernon’s always been popular himself. The Bagshaw boy was underdeveloped. Not the sort to make friends easily. Vernon took pity on him.”

  “Your son couldn’t help the police?”

  “Vernon will have told them everything he knows.” She fixed her eyes on Faith and spoke with some emphasis. “He was with me the day Lucas died.”

  “Of course,” said Faith. “I’m sure no one was suggesting…”

  “Well, you know how people gossip,” said Mavis.

  Faith offered a wry smile and glanced at her watch. If the MP didn’t arrive soon they would just have to start without her. The children from Green Lane Primary were getting restive, clamouring to light their lanterns. Mavis was still standing there. What was she waiting for?

  “Your son’s girlfriend, she’s in the choir that is coming to sing Midnight Mass with us too, isn’t she?” Faith asked. “She and your son were both friends of Lucas Bagshaw’s. She works for you, I think you said?”

  “Anna works in my florist shop, yes.”

  “Anna…?”

  “Hope. Anna Hope.”

  Mavis Granger’s eyes searched out her son. Sue had found him a seat with her family. It was probably a trick of the light, but Faith thought she saw yearning in Mrs Granger’s perfectly made-up face.

  “Her mother moved away with a new man after she and Anna’s father divorced.” Mavis Granger’s tone expressed what she thought of women who discarded their husbands. “Anna’s father’s in the army. Anna is just eighteen, but she is keeping herself, living in a rented room.” It sounded as if Mavis Granger respected the girl for that. “This is where she grew up; she wanted to stay.”

  “So you’ve taken her under your wing,” Faith said with warmth. She had misjudged Mavis Granger. Who would have thought such an unappealing manner could conceal generosity? That’ll teach you to make snap judgments, her better self scolded. Mrs Granger looked embarrassed by her approval.

  “Anna’s a good worker,” she said brusquely. Pat had come up behind them.

  “The MP’s car has just drawn up – vicar…?”

  The Civic Service was a success, despite a minor incident when two of the Green Lane Primary’s Santa Claus lanterns clashed. Only Clari’s quick reflexes and a bucket of sand contained the potential conflagration. The MP sounded sincere in her congratulations to Faith and, more importantly, had agreed to bring the local press to the Salvation Army Christmas lunch. According to Fred, the collection had raised nearly £400 for the women’s refuge. The last stragglers didn’t leave until past 10:30 p.m., when Faith had the church to herself again.

  She shuffled the box down the pews between her feet, unhooking the glossy purple decorations one by one, folding them back tidily into their cardboard resting place, on autopilot, her thoughts drifting. It was nearly midnight by the time she finished. She looked up at the loft in its shadows. She really ought to complete the task, but she just couldn’t face heaving the box up the ladder. Do it tomorrow. She left the box in the vestry, in a corner of the space that had been occupied by her Toy Service collection that morning. One task done and the next already reproaching.

  The darkest hour comes before the dawn, and this is Advent: Prepare the way for the Lord.

  Faith unlocked her kitchen door feeling bone tired. Her eyes fell on the washing-up from Ben’s cooking congealing in the sink. She double-locked the door and left the hall light burning. At last she crawled gratefully into her bed.

  CHAPTER

  10

  Faith stood on the pavement, arms full of artwork, looking at Mavis Granger’s florist shop. Thursday began gently after yesterday’s stresses and strains. She started virtuously, ringing her sister first thing. Ruth didn’t pick up, but at least Faith had returned her call at last and left an apologetic message. She spent a pleasant couple of hours with the old people’s home residents singing carols and show-tunes and discussing the most cheerful colours for a Christmas cardigan. After that, a quick dip into Green Lane Primary to collect a batch of Christmas-themed artwork for display in St James’s, and that brought her here: across the road from Mavis Granger’s small, exclusive florist shop.

  Copper-banded tubs flanked the door, each containing a miniature tree with dense foliage clipped into a perfect sphere, lollipops of leaf. In the plate-glass window fronting the shop, sheaves of pussy willow with their delicate silver fur-buds stood in buckets next to evergreen confections where gold-sprayed pinecones mingled with red berries and crystal beads. The effect was very chic. Impeccable and perfectly conceived, with no rough edges or unsightly variations – a fitting expression of Mavis Granger herself.

  Faith watched the girl behind the counter serving a customer – the girl with golden curls. Anna Hope. The Dot. Perhaps one of the people who knew Lucas Bagshaw best. There was no sign of Mrs Granger.

  The bell over the door hung from a loop of iron lending a Dickensian charm. It jingled tunefully but not too loudly over her head. Faith examined a stand of tree shapes fashioned from crystal beads and reindeer made out of strips of twisted bark as she waited for Anna to finish serving her customer.

  Standing poised to assist behind the counter, the Dot seemed taller than Faith remembered. The marble surface in front of her was stacked with understated wreaths decorated with gold and silver touches, the perfect complement to Anna Hope’s hazel eyes, rosy lips and tumble of blonde-caramel curls. Right now in the glow of youth, she looked as delectable as a foil-wrapped toffee. Faith could see how she must enchant boys of her own age.

  Anna waited for the door to close behind her departing customer. She looked Faith up and down, taking in the dog collar and the artwork.

  “I saw you at the cathedral, didn’t I?” she said. “What are you? Someone the police send in to offer witnesses comforting words and snoop for them?”

  The accent was local, and the tone shockingly unpleasant issuing from such a sweet face.

  “I am not with the police,” said Faith. “I am the vicar at St James’s. Your choir is coming to sing for us at Midnight Mass.”

  “So you’re introducing yourself to every choir member?” The question was derisive.

&nb
sp; “Lucas Bagshaw’s body was found in my parish,” said Faith.

  Anna’s posture stilled, shifting from belligerent to watchful. “So?”

  This wasn’t going as smoothly as Faith had hoped. Kids were more guarded than grown-ups, and in some ways more savvy – less likely to disguise their distrust with diplomatic words. Faith decided to reply in kind.

  “So I think Lucas deserves justice. I want to find out what happened to him.”

  Anna dropped her head. She measured out a length of red ribbon, cut it in an economical movement and began weaving it around a half-made wreath.

  “I met your boyfriend last night – V?” Anna cocked her head slightly at the use of Vernon Granger’s nickname, but she kept her head down, blocking Faith out. “I have been talking to Jim – your choirmaster? He told me that you and V were Lucas’s best friends.”

  “We were friends.” Anna’s voice was tight. She brushed a tear away with an angry hand, and kept on twisting the ribbon through the wire and spiky evergreens.

  Faith asked her gently, “What was Lucas like, Anna?”

  Anna’s busy hands stilled. For a moment, Faith thought she wasn’t going to reply, then she answered in a softer voice.

  “He didn’t say much but he had a wicked sense of humour. Dry, you know? He’d come out with just a single line and he’d crease you up.”

  “Did he have many friends?”

  “Didn’t need them. He had us. Didn’t have time, anyway. He had to take care of things…”

  “Take care of things?”

  “There was just him and his mum; she was always working.”

  Faith nodded. “How did Lucas feel about that?”

  “He worshipped his mum.”

  “What about his uncle?”

  Anna snorted. “Waste of space! He was more of a kid than Lucas. Always having to look out for him; drag him home when he had too much. Did that a lot.”

  “It sounds like Lucas had it tough.”