The Norfolk Mystery (The County Guides) (35 page)

‘I'm suggesting that we shouldn't take his word for it merely because he happens to be a professor, Sefton.
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est
. Ah!' he said. ‘Here we are. The chapel of Our Lady. Time to visit your desecrated Virgin, Sefton.'

Six Norfolk fonts

By the weak light of Morley's candle I could make out an image of the Virgin, her face having been crudely – and, one suspected, frantically – scraped away, so that all that remained were scars and scratches where the eyes and mouth should have been. I was reminded horribly of some of the churches I had seen in Spain – defaced and degraded.

‘Who do you think—' I began.

‘I have an idea, Sefton. But …
Caudae pilos equino paulatim oportet evellere
, eh?'

‘Something about a horse?' I said.

‘We must pluck the hairs of a horse's tail one by one, Sefton.'

‘Right.'

‘Let's just retrace our steps, shall we?'

We made our way towards the altar, and up the steps into the room where we had found the reverend. It looked different in the dark: worse; more sinister; like a tomb. Morley seemed unperturbed.

‘Now, where was it exactly we found him, the reverend?'

‘Here,' I said, pointing up.

‘Hanging.'

‘Yes.'

‘Hanging. Significant, Sefton, do you suppose?'

‘Well, it's certainly one way of committing suicide,' I said. ‘It's quick and—'

‘The Greek Fates, Sefton, you may remember, imagined the life of man hung by a thread spun by Lachesis, while Clotho held the distaff, and Atropos waited to snip the thread whenever she would.'

‘Right,' I said. ‘And?'

‘Just thinking out loud, Sefton, that's all. Where exactly was he hanging?'

‘Here.' I pointed up again towards the pitch-black ceil-ing.

‘From?'

‘A beam.'

‘Yes. And above a …?'

‘Table.'

‘Correct. What kind of a table?'

‘Just a … table. This table,' I said, tapping the table with my hand.

‘Yes. But there are tables, and there are tables, Sefton, are there not?'

‘I suppose so.'

‘There are indeed. There are card tables, and gaming tables, billiard tables, tea tables, marble-topped tables, tables for the sporting of aspidistra—'

‘And plethoric bonsai,' I said.

‘Indeed, and plethoric bonsai tables, and dining tables, and refectory tables, and credence tables and the great tables of history … You know the story, of course, Sefton, that Napoleon was buried in a coffin made from an Englishman's mahogany dining table?'

‘I'm not sure that I did know that story, actually, Mr Morley, no.'

‘No? Well, make a note, Sefton. The History of Tables. That might make an article, mightn't it?'

‘I'm sure it would, Mr Morley, but—'

‘Sir Galahad, Sir Lancelot, Sir Percivale, Sir Tristram—'

‘The Knights of the—'

‘Round Table, precisely, Sefton. Sitting down with King Arthur and Merlin. Those noble phantoms of the dawn.'

‘I'm not sure what that has to do with us and the reverend though, Mr Morley.'

‘Nothing.'

‘Ah.'

‘No. Nothing at all. Except that great tables, Sefton, might make us think of “Who loves another's name to stain. He will not dine with me again,” might they not?'

‘You've lost me again, I'm afraid, Mr Morley.'

‘Augustine, Sefton!'

‘The saint?'

‘The very man. Carved the words onto his table.'

‘Really?'

‘So legend has it. A message writ on the table, for all the world to see.'

‘I see.'

‘But that's the point, you did not see, Sefton. You did not observe. And then you did not connect. What if the reverend had left us a message, Sefton, carved onto the table?'

‘But he didn't. There was no suicide note … You don't mean he scratched a message on the table?' I started to lean down closely to examine the table.

‘Unlikely, Sefton, don't you think? The final desperate act of a desperate man, carving a message on a table. But what did he leave us? On the table?'

‘The Bible?'

‘Correct! And his message to us was what?'

‘I don't know.'

‘Fortunately we made a note of the passage. Do you remember?'

‘No, I'm afraid—'

‘Judges 16. Which is?'

‘I … Erm …'

‘Samson at Gaza, of course.' Morley put on his preaching voice. ‘“And they called for Samson out of the prison house: and he made them sport: and they set him between the pillars.” Did our reverend fancy himself as a Samson, perhaps?'

‘Perhaps.'

‘And why would our Samson have come here, Sefton, do you think? To Blakeney. Hardly the
caput mundi
, is it?
Caput mortuum
, more like.'

‘Perhaps he wanted a quiet life?'

‘Perhaps. Perhaps. And possibly … No. This brilliant young man from Oxford chooses to come here to Blakeney to fulfil his vocation.'

‘It's possible.'

‘But unlikely. What if he had been lured here, in love with a woman in the valley of Sorek?'

‘Sorry, I …'

‘Just thinking out loud, Sefton. Oh. And one final thing.'

Morley led us back out of the church, candles aloft, and into the graveyard.

It was, by this time, gone one o'clock in the morning. There was a sharp chill in the air. Morley stood staring around the graveyard, and then spoke, not looking at me, as if addressing the dead.

‘Do you know the tale of the Norfolk mermaids?'

I wasn't sure he was speaking to me.

‘Sefton? You know the story of the mermaids?'

‘No.'

‘They are said to be the souls of the damned, that come up from the sea at night and press against the North Door of the Holy Church from which they are for ever shut out.' He gestured behind him. ‘Many places have similar legends – the tale of the silkie you may know, from Ireland. Here in Norfolk there is the story of the mermaid who came up and tried to gain entry at the North Door of the church at Cley. She is depicted there to this day. When she was turned away she returned to the sea, where she continues to suck her prey into unseen whirlpools.'

I was tired and cold and I was thinking of Hannah. I was beginning to feel rather uncomfortable.

‘But you know of course, Sefton, the story of Shuck the Phantom Hound of the Stiffkey Marshes?'

‘I don't, Mr Morley, no.'

‘Really? But you should! For the
County Guides
, at least, Sefton. Black Shuck: inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle – great writer, of course. Terrible thinker. Like a lot of creative types, a mind susceptible to nonsense. Anyway, Black Shuck – from “scucca”, I think, from the Old English, for a fiend—'

‘Mr Morley, I don't quite—'

‘
The Hound of the Baskervilles
, Sefton. Inspiration for.'

‘Ah,' I said.

‘Nonsense of course. But the story goes there was a storm, and a ship was wrecked up at Salthouse. And all the crew were lost, including the master and his dog, and at night the dog comes howling, looking for his master. If you hear the call of Black Shuck, they say, you're doomed. You don't hear anything do you, Sefton?'

‘No,' I whispered.

‘Good,' he said. ‘Me neither. But many years ago, Sefton, as a young reporter, I was called to report on a case at Cromer. A young woman had come to enjoy the summer, and had been drawn out to sea where she couldn't swim back. The lifeboat was at work elsewhere. And you could hear her scream for an hour before she drowned …' He gazed again around the foggy churchyard. ‘Real terrors, you see, are much worse than the imagined, Sefton.'

‘Is there a reason we're out here, Mr Morley?' I asked.

‘Yes! Of course. Because we have work to do, Sefton. Work apace, work apace—'

‘Honest labour bears a lovely face,' I added.

‘Ah, you know the saying?' I knew the saying because Morley said it a dozen times a day. ‘So we need corroboration, Sefton.
Testis unus, testis nullus
. One witness, no witness. We have the Virgin. We have the Bible. But we need something more.'

‘Such as?'

‘What we need, Sefton, alas, is the witness of the dead.'

And so between us, shoulder to shoulder, we wandered among the hundreds of gravestones of Blakeney church with our candles until almost dawn: Sam and William Starling, the crew of the
Caroline
, who saved the lives of thirty men; Charles William Grant, Master Mariner; James Spooner; Jane Pinney; Robert Jennings; dozens of In Memory Ofs and Sacred to the Memory Ofs; dozens of Here Lieth Interred the Bodies.

And shortly before dawn, finally, we found what Morley was looking for.

The stone was clear and clean, as though it had been tended only yesterday.

‘Olivia Swain, Beloved Sister, Died April 24th 1924,Aged 20,' read Morley.

‘A long time ago,' I said.

‘Ever lost anyone, Sefton?'

‘Yes.'

‘Then you'll know. It might as well have been yesterday.'

T
HE MORNING SERVICE
at St Nicholas, Blakeney, was conducted by the Reverend Dr Richard Swain, done out in full regalia: cassock, surplice, robe. ‘No expense spared,' remarked Morley later. And his sermon, apparently, ran the full gamut, from Daniel in the Lion's Den to the Prodigal Son to the Conversion of St Paul, a ‘good old-fashioned Church of England sermon', according to Constable Ridley, who was present, in a good old-fashioned church of England. Everyone from the village was there – the Thistle-Smiths; the Chancellors; Miss Harris and Miss Spranzi; the Podgers; Mrs Snatchfold; half of the staff from the hotel – ranked, as is according to custom in an English church, from high to low and front to back, the worthies, best-dressed, up front, and closest to God.

Morley and I missed the service. We were outside, Morley explaining his theory to the Deputy Detective Chief Inspector for the Norfolk Constabulary, while I absented myself and took a final turn around the graveyard, smoking, thinking of all that had happened there, coming back round upon the two men in the final throes of their conversation.

‘Methinks not, Deputy Detective Chief Inspector.
E contrario
. I simply do not believe that a man would commit suicide for no reason.
Ex nihilo nihil fit.
And if we find ourselves
a fronte praecipitium a tergo lupi
, so be it!'

The deputy detective chief inspector called me over.

‘He's speaking foreign languages again. What did he just say?'

‘I don't know,' I said. I was too tired for Morley's word games. ‘Mr Morley, could you—'

‘Between the devil and the deep blue sea, gentlemen,' said Morley.

‘Well, you're right there, Mr Morley,' said the deputy detective chief inspector.

‘I think, Inspector, it must be your decision, what action is to be taken.'

‘I'm not sure it all adds up, Mr Morley.'

‘I know,' said Morley, ‘but a few crumbs of information, gathered all together, do add up to a sizeable loaf, do they not?'

‘Let's hope you're right, Mr Morley. And you can be on your way.'

We entered the church as the Reverend Swain concluded the service with the blessing: ‘The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with us all evermore.'

There were suspicious glances as Morley and the deputy detective chief inspector made their way up to the pulpit while the congregation chimed in on the final ringing ‘Amen'.

‘Beautiful pulpit,' said Morley, to no one in particular. ‘Late Victorian?'

The deputy detective chief inspector spoke briefly with the Reverend Swain, and then explained to the shocked congregation that Morley had an announcement to make.