Paul Moorcraft - The Anchoress of Shere

But when Templeton arrived at the monastery, a message from the Surrey police, relayed by the abbot, forced him to turn the car round and drive back to Guildford immediately. He had not been indulgent; he had inadvertently succoured a mass murderer. The bishop’s life and career were in ruins.

Little did Duval know it, but the bishop’s absence had bought him the extra time he needed.

From his vantange point overlooking the old rectory he watched as an ambulance took away Denise’s remains; various senior officers came and went, and for a while the place was a brightly lit circus. By three o’clock in the morning, however, just one panda car remained outside his house. If he was lucky, it would be occupied by the senile PC McGregor, probably asleep.

Duval was right: it was McGregor in the car, but the deeply superstitious officer was too frightened to sleep. Having locked all his doors to keep the devil-priest away, he was sitting rigid, with the police radio on and a truncheon on his lap. A tartan-patterned thermos flask lay empty on the front passenger seat.

Duval knew he would have to take his chance. He had to get back into the house, and he had wasted too much time already.

Duval would have liked to have taken his dog; that was now impossible, but there was one thing without which he would not leave Britain: his only typescript of the “Anchoress of Shere.” He had almost completed it, but not quite. Busybodies had interrupted him when he was on the eve of finalising this all-consuming life project. His experiments on twentieth century women had not worked out as he had hoped, but his spiritual insights, the comparative work which linked the fourteenth and twentieth centuries, had to be recorded for posterity. Yes, despite Gould’s lies, there were hundreds of years of mystical insight encapsulated in his work as well as twenty years of his own humble endeavours to add to this long sweep of history. He must finish it, and he had to take it with him. He was incensed with himself for not arranging a copy earlier, but events had crowded in on him.

Duval once more dismissed Gould’s work as fraud, sloppy research or crass ignorance. The shock of reading the American’s work had been overwhelming, but now he’d had time to think it through. He would cross-check Gould’s findings, reveal the professor to be a cheat. He was the better historian, and he would be proven right in the end.

Frenzied thoughts hammered away in Duval’s brain as he cautiously penetrated the dank copse at the rear of his garden. He scaled the wall by the big laburnum tree and peered over the top. No one was there…except a roe buck grazing near the wall. The animal stared at him before bolting back into the Hurtwood. There were no lights on, and as he crept through the garden he almost fell again into his recent excavations.

A yellow notice had been pasted on the back door: “No Entry-Police Investigation.” Duval looked at the repaired window and prided himself on his handiwork, necessitated by the failed rescuer’s vandalism. Ah, that was when he’d had time, and peace, before they all disrupted his sacred mission.

He rummaged in the flowerpot near the window to find the hidden doorkey. Opening the door slowly, despite the gloom he realised that everything in his kitchen had been moved. He was very indignant at the intrusion into his home. And everything was so damp, as though the interfering morons had hosed down his kitchen.

Moving into the hall very carefully, he felt that the carpet underfoot was soggy, and a cold, wet, musty smell pervaded the house. Perplexed, he made his way into the study. All the curtains were closed, and no outside observer could see him. He could not put on the lights, so he felt his way to the desk.

The book was not where it should be. “They must have moved it,” he said aloud. He fumbled through the drawers of his desk and around the rest of the room. “They can’t have taken it, not yet! Why would those interfering bureaucratic clods be interested in my historical work? Perhaps it’s somewhere else in the house?”

He went upstairs for his small case and some clothes, and rummaged some more in search of his precious typescript.

“Maybe they’ve taken my passport,” he said to himself, “but they wouldn’t have taken my book. It can’t be possible!”

He went back to the kitchen and lifted up the trapdoor, then leaned down to turn on the light-switch. No one outside would notice the light in the cellar, but it wouldn’t work. He got his torch from the kitchen, descended the stairs, and was shocked to find two feet of water in the corridor. He had no idea why it was flooded.

All the cell doors were open. He looked into the sodden mess of Marda’s room, searching for his final chapter, even looking in the air vent. It was hopeless. He hardly gave a thought to his former charges, simply assuming the police had taken the brother and sister away, alive or dead. But Gould; perhaps he had the book? The American was jealous enough to steal it, or perhaps the police had asked his advice on the meaning of the text. “Find Gould, maybe find my book,” he said aloud.

He stared up and down the cellar corridor and his eyes alighted on the large crucifix. And then he knew what had to be done.

He tore at the crucifix with furious strength, but it was fixed firmly on the wall. He went back up to the kitchen for tools, and returned to loosen the fixtures and drag it off the wall. The cross was heavy, but he could just about pull it, dripping, up to the steps. His manic strength enabled him to stagger up the stairs with his load. He stopped for a moment, to draw breath and to think.

Frantically assembling the things he would need, he put them in a small hold-all that he hoisted over one shoulder. Over the other he dragged the cross to the front door. It was too heavy to carry very far, and he saw that the police had removed his old Morris from the drive. His rage was mounting to fever pitch.

Constable McGregor, dozing in the front seat of his police car parked on the road outside, awoke to the sound of a hammer smashing through the driver’s window. He did not have the time to raise his hands to protect his face as the hammer smashed twice into his skull. The third blow blinded him. He gurgled blood as his left hand reached out and fell lifeless on the tartan thermos flask. Duval wrenched the door open and, in frustrated rage, battered the policeman’s head until it was a shapeless crimson pulp.

It was less than a mile to St. James’s church from Hillside. Duval drove the police car with the rear doors open, the spar of the cross protruding. It was very dangerous. But Duval didn’t really care any more about anything, except how to tease out a little more time. He needed just a short breathing space to complete what he had to do. The journey along the winding lane between the dark hedges took just over a minute.

One hundred yards in front of the church, the village square was silent and deserted; the rear of St. James’s, shrouded in trees, was in total darkness. Shere was unusual in having no street lighting; the local council had decided that it would spoil the medieval ambience of the village.

Leaving the car and the crucifix in the lane behind the church, he crept through the shadows to the edge of the square.

The White Horse was in darkness, as was the lane beside it. No lights were on in the upper floor. Duval used the hammer to force the rear door of the pub open, and carefully ascended the stairs to the residents’ floor. He knocked gently on the door to room number three, Gould’s room. There was no answer. One heave of his shoulders broke the flimsy lock. Cautiously switching on the light, he entered the room; it was unoccupied. He could see a manuscript on the coffee table. It was his work, his life’s work. He seized it with both hands, and left quietly and quickly.