David Dickinson - Death of a Chancellor

McKenzie whipped a small notebook out of his pocket and began making notes.

‘Today,’ said Powerscourt, ‘is Wednesday. Tomorrow therefore is Thursday. And on Thursdays the Archdeacon of Compton, man by the name of Beaumont, Nicholas Beaumont, goes on a mysterious journey very early in the morning from the railway station in the town. He always comes back the same day. You can recognize the Archdeacon quite easily, William. He is well over six foot tall and about as thin as a well-fed skeleton. He normally carries a large black bag on these journeys. Nobody knows where he goes on these Thursday expeditions. I think it’s time we found out.’

‘Do the locals have any theories about his destination, my lord? Locals usually do, in my experience.’

‘I think the most popular theories have to do with women, William. The Archdeacon, like almost his brothers in Christ up at the minster, is not married. The respectable view is that he keeps a wife somewhere. The less respectable view is that he goes to visit the prostitutes of Exeter.’

In his youth McKenzie had belonged to a rather extreme Presbyterian sect in his native Scotland. Powerscourt saw an embarrassed look cross his colleague’s face as he wrote that down in his book.

‘Francis! Francis! Where the hell are you? I’ve got news!’ Johnny Fitzgerald was clutching a bottle of Fairfield Park’s finest armagnac and an enormous tumbler.

‘William,’ said Johnny, ‘I needn’t ask if you’ll be joining me in a glass of this nectar but I’m well pleased to see you.’ With that, he sat down beside the teetotal McKenzie and poured himself a very large tumbler of Auch’s finest.

‘What news, Johnny?’ Powerscourt smiled at his friend. It was almost like being back in the North-West Frontier with the two of them here.

‘Wednesday is half-day in Compton,’ he began, ‘so the two gentlemen who work for Wallace the undertaker repair to the Stonemason’s Arms rather earlier than usual. And it so happened that the landlord has this very day taken delivery of a new beer from just outside the county border. Not only new, but strong, almost lethal, in fact.’

‘Did you by any chance know that this fresh draught of ale was coming, Johnny?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘Funny you should ask that, Francis. I did, as a matter of fact. You see, I had recommended this ferocious brew to the landlord a week before. I said I would recompense him personally if it didn’t sell well.’

‘Is it selling well, Johnny?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘Just hold your horses there, Francis. The reason I advanced the cause of Fox’s Extra Strong was this. Willie Dodds and George Chandler, old man Wallace the undertaker’s two assistants, always drink five or six pints of beer in a session. By that stage they’re almost ready to be indiscreet but they remember to clam up. After five or six pints they plod off to their homes or their burrows or wherever they live. I reckoned I could have poured the normal stuff in the Stonemason’s Arms down them until the last trump sounded and they still wouldn’t say anything. Hence the magic ingredient, the Fox’s Extra Strong.’

‘And would I be right in assuming, Johnny, that the vulpine concoction did the trick?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘Francis, it was wonderful, just wonderful to watch the stuff in action. After three pints they were more drunk than they usually were after five or six of the other brew. I struck at the beginning of pint five because I wasn’t sure they’d be able to speak at all if they managed to get to the end of number six.’

Fitzgerald refilled his tumbler with another generous helping of armagnac. ‘This is the story, Francis. I’ll spare you their means of telling it as that grew increasingly incoherent. The two of them never had any dealings with the body of John Eustace. Normally they do all the lifting, all the carrying around, that sort of thing. They thought old man Wallace must have had somebody to help him, probably the doctor. They say Wallace is so old now he could hardly lift a copy of The Times. The only time they had any dealings with the body was after it was sealed inside its coffin. That is almost unheard of, but there’s worse to come. At some point when the coffin was being put on the bier, I think, my informants were pretty groggy by this stage, almost at the end of pint five, it slipped. When they picked it up again they heard something rattling about inside.’

There was a pause, eventually broken by Powerscourt asking if the two men had any idea what it was.

‘I think they knew perfectly well,’ said Johnny, ‘but this was the one thing they weren’t prepared to tell me, even after a barrel of Fox’s Extra Strong.’

‘What do you think it was, Johnny?’ said Powerscourt.

‘Well, he was a sort of holy man,’ said Johnny. ‘He might have had one of those great big bibles buried with him. Something to read in there until the second coming.’

Powerscourt looked doubtful. ‘I don’t think it was a bible, Johnny,’ he said with a slight shudder even though the room was warm from the fire.

‘What do you think it was, Francis?’ said Johnny.

‘God forgive me if I’m wrong,’ said Powerscourt sadly. ‘I think it may have been his head.’

The police called for Powerscourt just after six the next morning. Chief Inspector Yates, the young constable informed him, wished to see Powerscourt in the Compton police station at once. Johnny Fitzgerald was muttering to himself as he mounted his horse about the lack of civilization in country parts, and how the police force should be prohibited by law from calling people out before they had eaten their breakfast. Powerscourt was trying to remember the names of all the inhabitants of the Cathedral Close from his black book as he rode along the silent lanes. He managed to reach fifty-three, suspecting there were a whole lot of people whose names began with M he had left out. He thought they were at the top of the fourth page on the left.

It was a clear night with an hour or more to go before the dawn. There was a cold wind blowing from the west.

‘Francis,’ said Johnny, ‘what do you think is waiting for us at the police station? Apart from the Chief Inspector, that is.’

‘Very good of you to turn out at this hour, Johnny,’ said Powerscourt. ‘I thought you’d be asleep for hours yet.’

Johnny Fitzgerald did not say, although he felt certain his friend knew, that Lady Lucy had made him promise to stick to Powerscourt like a limpet after the attempt on his life.

‘Well,’ said Powerscourt, ‘look on the bright side. They may have apprehended the murderer. The police have been keeping a very close watch all over the Cathedral Close since Arthur Rudd was found.’

‘You don’t believe that, Francis, do you? If they had, the police boy up ahead would have told us.’

Chief Inspector Yates was waiting for them in a room at the back of the police station. There was a large table in the centre with a blanket covering a cylindrical object in the middle. Chief Inspector Yates despatched his young constable to bring some fresh tea.

‘Not sure I would like the lad to see this, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I used to play cricket with his father.’ He pulled back the blanket to reveal a human leg, much bloodied at the top, wearing what must have once been dark grey trousers and a single black boot. Powerscourt inspected the break carefully, wondering what sort of instrument must have been used to cut it off from the body.

‘We found this less than an hour ago,’ he said, covering the leg up once more. ‘A railway worker on his way to the station alerted his next-door neighbour who is a sergeant here in this police station. Dr Williams is on his way.’

‘This is terrible, Chief Inspector,’ said Powerscourt. ‘I presume there are as yet no sightings of the rest of the body?’