The Advent of Murder (A Faith Morgan Mystery) Page 22

  “He knew about me?” Neil’s question was pathetic.

  “Yes. But he hated you,” his wife answered with a certain satisfaction. “He told me on the bridge.”

  “What happened at the bridge?” Faith asked. She wanted to get this over with.

  “I only wanted to talk to him. He was confusing Vernon – asking questions, snooping about. Saying things about Vernon’s father. They got in a fight at the pub. He gave Vernon a black eye! At first I thought it was to do with Anna. You know – jealousy? But it was because Lucas was putting together the pieces. I wanted him to stop – to leave us alone. I had to use Anna’s phone. The boy would never have come otherwise.”

  “Why didn’t you just talk?” Neil protested. Mavis flashed a venomous look at her crushed husband.

  “He’d worked it out. It wasn’t hard, with all the gifts you lavished on her, was it? He said he deserved more money because his mother had suffered, and he needed it to take care of some relative.”

  “So what happened?” Ben prompted.

  “I had the boys with me. They didn’t like the little oaf. Jam nipped at him and that wretched charwoman’s lout kicked him. So I gave him a jolly good whack.” Mavis’s arm sketched a backhanded swing with something gripped in her right hand. “It certainly took him by surprise.” She stopped for a moment, contemplating her words. “I didn’t mean to kill him,” she said thoughtfully. “But his head bled.” She said the words as if she could taste them. “He fell back against the rail. It all seemed to take a very long time. He put up his hand in front of his face and it was covered with blood. He swore at me.”

  Faith saw in her mind’s eye that bridge and the broken rail and the blood and poor Lucas, just a boy caught up in the complications of others’ lives.

  “Is that why you hit him again?” She was amazed to hear her voice sound so composed.

  “He swore at me,” she repeated. “And he was staring! As if it were my fault! He was the one who destroyed everything! I hit him again so hard the stick broke.” She motioned to the metal collar with a dismissive wave of her hand. “I thought I’d scooped up all the pieces, but I didn’t realize until later that the collar was missing.”

  “What did you do with the rest?” asked Ben.

  “Burned it,” she said.

  “Mavis?” said Neil, as if just waking up. “What have you done?”

  Galvanized, Mavis Granger lunged toward her husband. “You lied to me for seventeen years. You carried on with that woman while I kept your house.” She pointed at Neil’s wrists where the globular silver cufflinks glinted. “I remember when you bought those.” She met Faith’s eyes. She suddenly looked young and vulnerable, a scarred shell of the hopeful young woman in the photograph. “He brought me a gift too that time – a daisy pendant.” She stared at the people sitting around the table as if everything she’d done was perfectly rational. “A daisy,” she repeated bitterly. “Those are his favourite cufflinks – an infinity symbol! He gave the matching pendant to her. She wore it in our house.”

  “Mrs Mavis Granger, I am arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Lucas Bagshaw…” Peter was gentle as he got to her feet and put the cuffs on. Mavis hardly noticed. Her eyes were fixed on Faith as if only she understood.

  “I only wanted my family back,” she said.

  CHAPTER

  20

  The police, the Grangers, the carol singers, everyone had gone. Even Pat had taken her leave, informing Faith that she had invited Adam Bagshaw to join them for lunch at the vicarage, for the poor man shouldn’t be alone at Christmas and the gospel of love is for all our neighbours. Faith couldn’t help but smile. Ruth would panic at having another guest to feed, but knowing her sister, she’d rise to the challenge with aplomb.

  She should be thinking about Midnight Mass. They would have to make do without Jim’s choir. In light of the past few hours, that seemed such a trivial concern. They would manage. Ruth and Sean and Mother were all waiting for her back at the vicarage. Her sister had texted to say that there was macaroni cheese in the oven – especially selected comfort food; fuel for the long evening ahead. But they would have seen the police cars, and Faith just couldn’t face explaining yet.

  She kneeled at the altar rail alone in the light of the tree, and prayed. She prayed for Trisha Bagshaw and her beloved son Lucas, and for tortured Mavis Granger and her bewildered son, Vernon, and for Neil Granger, and for Anna too.

  After a while, she felt more at ease. She got up and lit a candle for Trisha, and for Lucas. As she did so, she saw, vivid in her memory, the photograph of the loving Trisha between her two boys on the whatnot in the Bagshaws’ living room. Adam will be all right, she promised. We’ll look out for him.

  On a whim she went out through west door beneath the bell tower, so she could look back at the sparkling tree illuminating the nativity scene with its glow. Outside, the snow glimmered in the dark, and all around the Green the houses were lit as the inhabitants of Little Worthy ate their suppers. As she pulled the door shut, she heard a motorbike draw up on the road. She walked down the path toward the lychgate and there, on the other side, was Jim Postlethwaite wrapped up in his peacoat, an Arab keffiyeh swathed around his neck.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey, you.” It was cold out here. She wrapped her arms around herself and shuffled her feet. “I was so sorry to hear about your resignation. You didn’t have to do that, you know.”

  “But you know why I did?”

  “Because you were a heroin addict and you served a sentence for it.”

  “More than that…”

  “Your daughter.” She had heard the phrase “etched with sorrow”, but she’d never seen its application until now, looking at Jim in the light of the street lamp.

  “Before that moment, I didn’t know the depth of misery you could feel for something you did. I woke up too late. I’ve tried to become a better person – but there are some things that just can’t be mended.”

  “Mended,” she repeated. “Maybe not quite like that, but…” She glanced back at the ancient Saxon church behind them. “This church was built for the God who offers us the chance to begin again. People have worshipped here for nine hundred years, so I think there must be something in it.”

  He gave her his old crooked smile. “I wanted to see you,” he said, “to explain… I was trying to look out for the kids. Lucas and his friends, they invited me for a drink from time to time at the Lion’s Heart. I couldn’t believe it when I ran into Keepie. I did my best to keep him away from them. I am sorry if I misled you.”

  “I appreciate the value of discretion…” she echoed. For a second he looked appalled, and then he smiled ruefully. “I was just teasing,” she said.

  “I’m a bit fragile for that,” he said.

  “Oh, Jim – I’m sorry.”

  “By the way, some of the choir will still be here to sing tonight – seven or eight of them, I think. I told them to be here for 10:45. They know the order of service.”

  “That’s wonderful!” She was so touched. “Thank you so much. Will you stay?”

  He shook his head. “I’m on my way up to Manchester.”

  “Tonight?”

  “I phoned my wife. She and my daughter, they’re staying up there with friends. Ellie says we can spend Christmas together. I want to be there by morning.”

  “I am so very pleased for you,” she said.

  “It’s a beginning.”

  “Yes, it is. One day at a time, huh?”

  “One day at a time.” He looked down at his gloved hands gripping the handlebars. “I wanted to thank you…”

  “What for?”

  “For seeing the best in me.”

  “I’m not naive, you know,” she grinned. “I am a good judge of character.”

  He expelled a breath through his nose, and gave a small, self-deprecating smile. He started up his bike.

  “Goodbye, Faith Morgan.”

  “God bless you, Jim Post
lethwaite.”

  Jim’s soloist had a clear, golden voice. She sang like an angel from the choir loft in the darkness, heralding the glow of the procession as they carried their candles down the aisle toward the altar and the tree blossomed into light.

  Once in royal David’s city,

  Stood a lowly cattle shed,

  Where a mother laid her baby,

  In a manger for his bed.

  It was a promise of hope that made the hairs stand up on her arms and expanded her heart. Faith looked around at the faces before her: Fred and Pat, the Grays and the Markhams, Sue and her family, Clari and Timothy with theirs, and even her own family – her mum, with Ruth and Sean. It was her first Christmas in St James’s, Little Worthy. They’d made it and soon she could sleep.

  They had a full house. Everyone was in good voice. And the best Christmas present of all came from Fred, who offered Adam Bagshaw a job at his agricultural supply business. Pat was genial, with Adam by her side holding Mr Marchbanks in his kitty carrier.

  “A good attendance for your first Christmas at Little Worthy,” she complimented Faith graciously. “I don’t think I remember a better turnout, even in Reverend Alistair’s day.”

  Back at the vicarage, Ruth was in her element, rejoicing in the Aga and in having people to cook for and to admire her table settings. Pat got on well with their mother, Marianne, both old ladies fussing over Adam Bagshaw and exclaiming at his skill in fixing Marianne’s broken reading glasses.

  At four o’clock, and an hour later than planned, they served lunch. Their guests waited in the dining room while Faith and her mother served up side by side in the kitchen. Faith had just filled a dish of roast parsnips when she noticed her mother’s anxious expression.

  “Your father’s late,” her mother said. Faith felt the chill spread from the top of her head down her spine. She swallowed.

  “Dad’s dead, Mum,” she said gently. “He’s been gone for five years.” The confusion in her mother’s eyes squeezed Faith’s heart. She watched her pull herself together.

  “Of course he is, dear. It’s this time of year… I don’t know what I was thinking. I’d better get these on the table.” Her mother made a slightly wobbly turn and carried the dish out of the room. Faith realized she was being watched and turned to see Ruth in the doorway, watching her with an expression of unsettling compassion.

  “You’ve got a visitor, Faith,” said her sister. “He won’t come in.”

  “Thanks.”

  Ben stood at the threshold. She was so pleased to see him she threw her arms around him and hugged him, burying her face in the warm, solid oblivion of his black coat. His strong arms enfolded her. She felt his chin on the top of her head. He was a wall around her, keeping her safe, just for an instant.

  Ben moved his head. She felt his lips tickle her ear.

  “What’s up?”

  “Nothing. I’m fine.” She stepped away, smiling up at him. Maybe he wouldn’t notice the tears in her eyes. “Just pleased to see you. Happy Christmas.”

  “Right.” His eyes began their forensic examination, but then he let it go.

  “Will you join us for lunch?”

  He lifted his eyebrows in his most saturnine look. “What do you think?”

  “No,” she said with regret. He fetched a small cardboard box out of his pocket.

  “Didn’t have time to wrap it, but this is for you. Thanks for the help with the confession. I guess you always had it in you, this priest stuff.”

  She opened the box. There in a nest of tissue paper was a delicate Christmas tree decoration. She put it on the flat of her palm – a tiny metal boat with bronze foil sails and a little ruby pennant unfurled in the breeze. She could feel the ridiculous grin spread across her face.

  He cleared his throat. “Just nonsense, of course.”

  Faith looked up at him, eyes glowing. Ben shrugged. “Reminded me of that tatty old centrepiece your mother always brought out this time of year.”

  “I love it.” They stood there with time suspended for a moment, just the two of them.

  “Got to go,” he said at last.

  “You’re on duty,” she finished for him. “Volunteered again?”

  “You know me – not my time of year.”

  She watched him go, hoping that he might at least look back and give her a smile. He didn’t.

  A CD of Christmas carols was playing in the front room. The sweet melancholy of the melody carried to her above the chatter and laughter of her guests in the dining room.

  She crossed the hall to join her family.

  If you enjoyed The Advent of Murder delve into another of Martha Ockley’s Faith Morgan Mysteries in…

  THE RELUCTANT DETECTIVE

  “COULDN’T RESIST TOUCHING THE BODY, EH?” OBSERVED BEN.

  FAITH WAS DEFIANT. “I HAD TO CHECK FOR A PULSE.”

  Faith Morgan may have quit the world of crime, but crime won’t let her go. The ex-policewoman has retrained as a priest, disillusioned with a tough police culture and convinced that she can do more good this way.

  But now her worlds collide. Searching for the first posting of her new career, she witnesses a sudden and shocking death in a quiet Hampshire village. And of all people, Detective Inspector Ben Shorter, her former colleague and boyfriend, shows up to investigate the crime.

  Persuaded to stay on in Little Worthy, she learns surprising details about the victim and starts to piece together a motive for his death. But is she now in danger herself? And what should she do about Ben?

  Then a further horrifying event deepens the mystery…