Anne Perry - A Christmas Secret

He reached across the table and touched her fingertips gently. “I agree,” he answered. “And I am beginning to think that Sir Peter Connaught also has something about which he is less than honest.”

She was startled. “Sir Peter? Are you sure? You don’t think he’s just…grieved? He seemed to be very fond of the Reverend Wynter, and they never made up their quarrel before he died. That makes people feel very guilty, you know.”

He fiddled with his knife. “I thought of that, but it’s more a matter of little things that don’t fit: discrepancies in his stories about his parents. Perhaps they don’t even matter, but I noticed them.” He seemed about to add something further, then changed his mind. He looked unhappy.

“What is it?” she asked. “What are you thinking?”

He gave a slight shrug. “I don’t know. People do boast sometimes, exaggerate their abilities, or money, all sorts of things. But Sir Peter doesn’t seem in any need to do that. He is obviously a man of great wealth, or he could not maintain a place like the manor house. And it is superbly kept. He gives generously to the village; I know that from the Reverend Wynter’s remarks in the notes to his accounts. And the whole Connaught family is above reproach. Their history is pretty well public.”

“They could still have secrets,” Clarice pointed out. “Almost every family does.” She bit her lip. “We certainly do, for heaven’s sake. I would go to great lengths to prevent anyone in Cottisham knowing about my mother.” She felt hot with shame even saying it to Dominic, who already knew everything about it. She understood what secrets could cost and what lengths people could be driven to by love, and fear. “Dominic, it is possible the Connaughts also have something they would pay a great deal to keep unknown,” she went on. “It is very hard to live with people prying through one’s affairs. Perhaps that was at the root of his quarrel with the Reverend Wynter. They used to be close; we know they played chess every week.”

He looked at her unhappily. “The Reverend Wynter quarreled with Peter Connaught, and with John Boscombe. Are you saying that he was behind some kind of extortion or threat of exposure?”

“I don’t know. Sometimes ‘the wicked flee where no man pursueth.’ Maybe just his knowledge was enough.”

He said what they were both thinking. “Or he used his special knowledge in the most appalling betrayal imaginable: to blackmail those who had trusted him, and even turned to him for help and forgiveness?”

She gripped his hand across the table. “We didn’t know him,” she said urgently. “Perhaps we have imagined him the way we wanted him to be.”

“Everyone speaks well of him,” he pointed out, closing his fingers over hers.

“Well, they would!” she said, biting her lip. “He was a priest, and now he has died! Who is going to say he was brutal, a slimy betrayer of trust who blackmails the most vulnerable? They would only know it if they had been a victim themselves, and wished him dead, possibly murdered. Who would admit that?”

“No one,” he said miserably. “Please God, I hope you’re wrong. We’re wrong,” he corrected himself.

D ominic went out again to visit one of the old gentlemen who was too frail to leave his house in the snow, and afraid of what the deepening winter would bring.

He stayed a little while, assuring Mr. Riddington of his care. Regardless of who the vicar of Cottisham should be, he would always have time for going to those who could not come to the church. Then after bidding him good-bye he walked along the lane toward the green in the dusk. Again he became aware of footsteps behind him. They seemed to be gaining on him, as though the person was keen to catch him up.

He stopped and turned. He saw the brisk figure of Mrs. Paget hurrying toward him, her breath a white vapor in the freezing air. She was dressed rather smartly with a russet-brown cape, and there was a flush in her cheeks.

“I’m glad to see you, Reverend Corde,” she said warmly as she reached him. “Have you been to see Mr. Riddington? Poor old soul can’t make it even to his front gate anymore. Afraid of slipping and breaking a leg. Very wise he stays in. Broken bone at his age can be nasty. Don’t let me hold you up. I’ll walk beside you.” Without waiting she started forward again, and he was left to keep step with her.

“Mrs. Blount next door drops in every day,” he told her.

“Not the same as having the vicar call.” Mrs. Paget shook her head. “No one else can comfort with the spiritual promises of the church.”

“Believe me, Mrs. Blount is a far better cook than I am,” he replied, keeping his balance on the uneven path with difficulty. “And there are times when a hot apple pie is more use than a sermon.”

“You may joke, Vicar,” she said seriously. “But there are dark things to fight against, darker than most folks are willing to admit.”

He was uncertain how to answer her. The wind was rising again. It whined in the branches above them, and little flurries of dry snow skittered over the ice.

“I know the truth,” she went on, her voice quiet but very clear. “The Reverend Wynter was murdered, wasn’t he? Please don’t try to spare me by denying it. It doesn’t help to close one’s eyes. That’s how evil flourishes, because we want to be kind and end up being cruel.”

He wanted to argue, but she was right. He asked her the question that filled his mind. “How do you know that, Mrs. Paget?”

Now it was she who was silent. They were out of the lane and starting across the open green. The pond was almost invisible: just a smooth white surface a little lower than the slope of the grass. The air was darkening, color staining the west with fire and the shadows growing so dense the houses blended into one another. He began to think she was not going to answer.

“The Reverend Wynter was here in Cottisham well over thirty years,” she said at last. “He knew a lot about people, sometimes things they’d rather no one did. He wouldn’t have told, of course. Priests don’t, do they.” It wasn’t really a question, but she stopped as if waiting for him to speak, her features indistinguishable in the shadows.

“No,” he replied. Was she trying to find a way to tell him that the Reverend Wynter had done infinitely worse than use his privileged knowledge to manipulate and extort? The darkness felt as if it were inside him as well as beyond in the sky and the black lace of the trees.

“But those that betray don’t trust anyone,” she said, looking straight ahead of her.

“Is that why you believe he was murdered, Mrs. Paget?” he asked. “Just that he knew people’s secrets? All priests do.”

“What are most village secrets?” she asked. “A few silly mistakes, a little spite. All things you can repent of.” Suddenly her voice dropped and became bitter. “Cottisham’s different. But here there are things that are against the law of God, and a priest can’t overlook or forgive them.”

“God can forgive all sins, Mrs. Paget,” he pointed out.

“After you’ve paid,” she said harshly. “Not while you’re still committing them, and the innocent are suffering. Don’t tell me that’s God’s way, ’cos it isn’t. I know that, and so do you, Vicar.”

“Yes,” he said a little tartly. “And the Reverend Wynter would have pointed that out to anyone who was continuing to do what was wrong.”

“Exactly,” she agreed, staring at him. “But what if that person didn’t want to stop? What if they weren’t going to stop, no matter what?”

He didn’t want to know, but he couldn’t avoid it simply because it was uncomfortable. If a priest refused to address sin, what use was he to anyone? He was here precisely to deal with weakness: physical or spiritual. He must face it, wherever it led him. He started to walk again, trusting his instincts though he could only dimly see the road.