Nicola Upson - Angel with Two Faces

Archie understood the resentment that certainties about life and death could create in someone whose whole sense of purpose had just been destroyed – he had felt it often enough himself – but there had been more to the exchange between Morwenna and Nathaniel, even in the brief snatch that he had heard. ‘Sin is a big word to use, though – is that what you wanted to talk to me about?’ he asked and, when she nodded, added: ‘Let’s go somewhere a bit more private.’

They walked away from the house, down to the edge of the garden where a narrow lane separated them from trees that marked the northern boundary of the Loe estate, still in sight of the cottage but far enough away to be able to talk freely. The soft afternoon light filtered through new leaves on to a sweep of bluebells which seemed to drift like smoke through the woods, and Archie wondered if Morwenna, like him, was thinking of the last time they had sat together in this very spot. It was more than eight years ago now, not long after her parents had died, but the time of year was the same and then, too, she had been racked with grief and in despair about her future. They were already good friends – some people guessed there was more between them, but he was still fighting his feelings for Josephine and Morwenna, who was never short of suitors, treated him more like an older brother – and she had asked him to go with her to salvage what was left of her life from the burnt-out shell of the cottage. Afterwards, he had sat outside with her, holding her as she cried and waiting until she felt ready to leave. He remembered looking down through the bluebell woods: the view had been much as it was today, except for two dead magpies which the gamekeeper of the time had strung up by the neck on the fence – a deterrent to other vermin and, it seemed, a potent denial of the rhyme which he had learnt by heart as a boy. The birds moved gently in the breeze, and the green and violet sheen of their feathers mirrored the flowers that covered the ground, but the lifelessness in their eyes mocked any promise of summer. The image had stayed with him, allied to Morwenna – a pairing of beauty and death which made each the more powerfully felt, and which now seemed more poignant than ever.

‘Just like old times,’ Morwenna said, as if reading his thoughts, but her attempt at lightness was not very convincing. ‘I seem to make a habit of running to you whenever there’s trouble, but I really didn’t know who else I could talk to at the moment.’

‘Twice in eight years is hardly a habit.’

‘No, I suppose not.’ She sat down on an old tree trunk and invited him to do the same. ‘I thought I could carry this on my own, but it’s been eating away at me since Harry died. Somehow it’s easier to talk to you because you’re not here all the time – and I know I can trust you not to pass judgement.’ Archie wondered again about the sin that Morwenna had thrown back at Nathaniel, but he said nothing and let her continue. ‘You see, I don’t think his death was an accident,’ she said quietly.

It was the last thing that Archie had expected to hear. ‘Are you saying that someone killed him?’ he asked, careful to keep the disbelief out of his voice.

‘What?’ Morwenna looked horrified. ‘No – God, no, nothing like that.’ She gave him a look that seemed to doubt, after all, the wisdom of confiding in a policeman, then explained what she had meant. ‘I think he took his own life – it’s the only thing that makes any sense.’

This time, Archie thought before speaking. The idea that Harry Pinching would kill himself seemed to him so unlikely that he had not even considered it as a possibility, and he chided himself for betraying years of training by subconsciously subscribing to the idea that there was a suicide ‘type’. ‘What makes you think he’d do that?’ he asked. ‘Harry always struck me as remarkably positive about life, even after your parents died.’

‘Yes, he was strong then and I don’t know how Loveday or I would have got through that without him, and it’s not that anything’s changed – it’s more the way he died. He was far too good a rider to drown like that. Even if he couldn’t keep Shilling out of the water, he’d have known that his best chance of survival was to hang on and get them both to the other bank. He loved that horse and they trusted each other – I’ve never seen such a bond between a man and an animal. There’s no way he’d simply let go.’

‘Perhaps not, if he could help it – but the Loe’s a law unto itself. You don’t need me to tell you how dangerous it is. We’ve both been here long enough to know that the stories about it live on for a reason – I can think of at least five people who’ve died in the lake or off the Bar in the last thirty years.’

Morwenna looked at him defiantly for a moment. ‘Tell me honestly, Archie – what was your instant reaction when you heard about the accident?’

He couldn’t deny his surprise at the news of Harry’s death – surprise and, if he thought about it carefully, a touch of disbelief which he had put down to his natural tendency to over-analyse. But suicide? There was the sorry state of the cottage, of course: he had assumed that it was Morwenna who was at her wits’ end but perhaps that was simply grief and worry – perhaps it was her brother who had given up on life? Somehow, though, it still didn’t seem to fit with the Harry he had known. ‘I admit I was surprised,’ he said, ‘but it’s a big leap from that to suicide.’ He looked back towards the house, and noticed that Jago Snipe and Morveth Wearne had come out on to the lawn and were looking over to where he sat with Morwenna. ‘You and Loveday meant the world to Harry,’ he continued. ‘Look at how hard he worked when your parents died, how readily he accepted responsibility for the family and the future.’ How he had grown up at last was what Archie really wanted to say, but there was no point in antagonising Morwenna by criticising her brother in any way. ‘Do you really think he’d have left you to manage like this if he had any choice in the matter?’

The pain in Morwenna’s eyes told Archie how many hours she had lain awake trying to answer that question for herself. ‘I don’t know any more,’ she said. ‘I hope not, but I’m too tired to be sure of anything at the moment.’

‘Have you talked to anyone else about this?’

‘No, although I think Morveth suspects. She sees right through me – always has. I nearly told Nathaniel just now – I was so angry after that pathetic speech he made that I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself if you hadn’t turned up when you did.’ Judging by the look of horror on Nathaniel’s face, Archie thought, the curate had already guessed what Morwenna was about to spell out to him, but he decided to keep that suspicion to himself for now. ‘I can’t tell anyone else because I don’t want people to think badly of Harry,’ she explained. ‘I can be as angry as I like with him – he’s my brother – but I can’t bear the thought of everyone else talking about him and judging him, or saying something that Loveday will overhear. There’s such a stigma to suicide.’

‘Surely not these days. People are more sympathetic now – they do at least try to understand, even if the law takes a dim view.’

‘Do they?’ She looked at him wryly. ‘Have you forgotten how your uncle Jasper refused to give Arthur Pascoe the full service because he died while he was drunk? If the Reverend Motley got the slightest whiff of suicide, we’d have been burying Harry at a crossroads halfway between here and Helston.’

‘Surely Nathaniel’s different, though?’

‘In some ways, perhaps, but even he doesn’t understand the despair that people feel sometimes – people who have no faith, I mean. How could he? I don’t think he’s had a moment of doubt in his entire life.’