The Valley of the Shadow (17 page)

Fish. Lunch. She was starving. She decided to ring Jocelyn and see if she was free to pick them up. If not, she’d try Nick. And then she’d go in search of fish and chips, or a pasty, she didn’t mind which.

The plight of the stranded family might well include hunger, she thought. She should have suggested that the skipper take supplies. But probably the larger Padstow boat would have food aboard. Boat or ship? She had no idea how big the
Daisy D.
was, not that she had any idea how big a vessel had to be to count as a ship. It was, she gathered, big enough to take more people on board than the
Belinda
. That was all that mattered.

She wished there was something she could do to help, but even if she’d managed to persuade them to take her, she and Teazle would only have been in the way.

She went to find a phone box. This time her call was not urgent, so naturally no one was occupying the box. Picking up Teazle, who always refused to enter the small, enclosed space on her own feet, she opened the door.

As it swung closed behind her, she found herself muttering, “Ship. Ships.”

Teazle licked her cheek. “Chips” was one of her favourite words. Putting the dog down, wiping her face, saying, “All right, fish and chips for lunch,” Eleanor lost the tenuous thread of thought that had resulted in her mutter.

She was sure it had been important.

SEVENTEEN

“Jocelyn, it’s—”

“Eleanor! I’ve been so worried about you. I thought Nicholas was going with you, but he didn’t know where you’d got to. He was quite rude when I rang him. He said Megan had been round to pester him—”

“It’s all right, I’ve seen Megan. And Inspector Scumble. I haven’t got enough change to explain just now. I’m in a phone box in Port Isaac, and—”

“Port Isaac! What on earth—? No, tell me later. Eleanor, I’ve had an idea. Something Timothy said … Are you coming home now?”

“No car. Could you possibly come and pick us up? No rush.”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“Thanks, Joce. We’ll find somewhere to sit near the harbour.”

“I’ll find you. I’m on my way.” Jocelyn rang off before Eleanor could ask her whether she had phoned the Plymouth hospital for news of Kalith Chudasama’s condition.

With a newspaper-wrapped bundle of cod and chips, Eleanor found a seat on a bench overlooking the harbour. Teazle sat directly in front of her, a mesmeric gaze fixed on the paper and its contents.

The only other occupant of the bench was a wrinkled, weathered ancient. He looked as old as the elder Mr. Hawker, but he had all his marbles. He exchanged a nod of greeting with Eleanor when she arrived, bright blue eyes assessing her, then he returned his attention to the harbour. Most of the small boats now lay on their sides in the sandy mud, only those nearest the quays still afloat.

Eleanor, with help from Teazle, ate quickly. Jocelyn didn’t approve of eating in the street. Though Eleanor had been brought up with the same taboo, after all her travels she considered it ridiculous. Still, Joce was doing her a favour coming to fetch her, so she wanted to dispose of the evidence.

As soon as she fed the last scrap of batter to Teazle and balled up the greasy newspaper and supposedly grease-proof paper, her neighbour on the bench addressed her. “I were pulled out o’ the sea by yon, I were. Back when she were a proper boat, not a bitty canvas thing. I allis comes down to watch when she goes out. I don’t hold wi’ young maidies on the boats.”

“Grace Darling,” said Eleanor.

He gave her a toothless grin. “Oh, aye, I were forgettin’ her that went out in a rowboat and saved the shipwrecked sailors, hundred years sin’ and more. Eighteen hundred and thirty-eight, that were. You’ve the right of it, there, missus. Saw you gettin’ out o’ that there polis car, I did, and talking wi’ the coxswain.” He paused invitingly.

“My niece is a police officer.” Eleanor evaded the implicit question. No doubt he’d find out soon enough what the lifeboat’s mission was today. It wasn’t for her to enlighten him.

“Ah.” He shook his head. “I don’t hold wi’ young maidies in the polis. What’ll they think of next?”

Unable to answer the question, she said lamely that the police seemed to grow younger every year.

“Ah, well, I don’t have much to do wi’ they. I be a law-abiding man.”

Eleanor had been wondering whether it would be worth asking him if he knew anything about local smuggling. His firm claim of rectitude decided her against. They chatted for a little longer about the fog, and then Jocelyn arrived and Eleanor excused herself.

Teazle recognised the car and pulled her towards it. She and Jocelyn were not particular friends, but Jocelyn was associated with the vicar, who almost always carried something pleasantly edible in his pockets for his parishioners’ pets. Eleanor opened the door and the little dog scrambled in.

As Eleanor was about to follow, Jocelyn sniffed and said in tones of strong disapproval, “Fish and chips. Do get rid of the papers before you get in, Eleanor. The car will stink of frying fish.”

Meekly, Eleanor looked round for a litter basket and dropped the papers in. A herring gull promptly swooped down to grab the greasy ball. Flapping off, it was attacked by three more gulls. The papers scattered in tatters.

“So much for Keeping Britain Tidy.” Jocelyn changed into first gear and waited for the passing of a sudden stream of traffic, no doubt brought out by the disappearance of the fog. “Tell me about your Boscastle smugglers and your encounter with That Man.” She zipped through a gap between two delivery vans to turn right in front of a car pulling a small caravan. “And why are you stranded in Port Isaac?”

Eleanor told her story as they drove up the hill, out of the village, and through rolling farmland. The lane narrowed, winding and occasionally zigging and zagging around ancient field boundaries.

“Bother!” Joce exclaimed, interrupting a description of Eleanor’s efforts to prise the locations and secrets of the hidden caves from Abel Tregeddle. “I always forget how hopeless this road is. We should have gone the other way.”

“This is definitely the long way round. Never mind, we must be nearly at St. Endellion.”

“Yes, here we are,” Joce agreed, spotting an outlying bungalow. “How did Tregeddle know about the caves?”

“Passed down through the family, for a couple of centuries, at least.”

“Disgraceful!”

“Of course, it must have been someone with similar knowledge who took the Chudasamas to the cave. Always supposing the story is true.”

Stopping at the T-junction, Jocelyn turned to stare. “Megan wouldn’t lie. Do you think the boy was making it up?” She turned right on the B road.

“No, not making it up. But his physical condition was pretty bad, and his mental condition may have been, too. Did you call the hospital, by the way?”

“Yes. I said he was one of my husband’s parishioners. Much as I object to lying in principle, there are times—”

“When it’s necessary to shade the truth for a good cause.”

“Timothy and I tried to work out whether Rocky Valley is within his parish boundary. Unfortunately he’s mislaid the map. He’s quite worried about whether the boy can be considered a parishioner. You know how he is, charity first, then duty, then … But finish your story first.”

“No, you tell me first how Kalith Chudasama is. Joce, why on earth did you turn right? We’re heading south.”

“That’s part of it,” the vicar’s wife said, infuriatingly mysterious. “Kalith is still unconscious, I’m afraid.”

“Oh dear!”

“He had to have a brain operation, and they’re keeping him in a drug-induced coma because … Well, I didn’t really understand the rest. They’re hopeful of complete recovery but they won’t know for some time. Go on about Tregeddle, and I’m dying to hear what That Man had to say.”

Eleanor continued her story. By the time she finished with That Man’s long-distance order to Megan to sail with the lifeboat and Megan’s departure in obedience thereto, they were on the A39, still heading south.

“Joce, where are we going? And why?”

“Truro. It came to me when Timothy was worrying about whether Kalith Chudasama is his parishioner. He’ll pray for him anyway, of course, but he wondered whether he ought to go to Plymouth to see him in hospital. It’s not only what you might call the geographical confusion over the parish boundaries. Also, he doesn’t know whether the boy is an Anglican, or even a Christian at all. What is it proper for him to do if he should be a Hindu or a Mohammedan? I wouldn’t say this to anyone else, but I’m afraid Tim is a little vague about doctrinal questions, the dear man.”

“Charity first, then duty, and doctrine last.” If at all, Eleanor amended silently. “I thoroughly approve. So we’re going to Truro to consult the bishop? I’m hardly the right person to take with you. And I shouldn’t have thought he’d be willing to discuss the vicar’s doubts with his wife, anyway.”

“Not the bishop.” Jocelyn—remarkably—looked slightly shifty. “I don’t imagine you’re aware of it, but one of the canons at the cathedral is an Indian from East Africa.”

“I remember your mentioning him once.”

“The Reverend Dinesh. He came to England a few years ago, when things started getting sticky for Indians. He was personally threatened, I understand. The Church helped him enter the country, so he had no difficulty, but I wondered—”

“Joce! You think he’s involved in smuggling people in?”

“Of course not. A clergyman … and he’s rather quiet and shy. But if it were members of his own congregation … Well, you never know, do you? I thought it might be worth talking to him.”

Eleanor tried to hide a smile. “Under cover of the vicar’s dilemma? Really, Joce, how jesuitical.”

“He might merely have heard something useful,” Jocelyn said defensively. “Do you think it’s a waste of time?”

“No, no, doctrinal doubts must be resolved. Seriously, no, it’s not a waste of time when there doesn’t seem to be anything else helpful we can do.” But she had a niggling sense that there was something she could do, if only she could make the right connections between all the bits and pieces lurking in the murky recesses of her mind. “As you say, you never know.”

“Well, then!”

“Isn’t it a bit beneath the vicar’s dignity to have his wife asking advice for him?”

“My dear Eleanor, surely you realise by now that Tim has absolutely no sense of his own dignity or the dignity of his position. If he did, he would not go buzzing about the countryside on that horrid motor scooter.”

“In that case, you wouldn’t have a car always available in which to do your own buzzing about the countryside.”

Jocelyn sighed. “Very true. I must count my blessings.”

“And I’m sure none of his parishioners respect him the less for his humble Vespa. Look, there’s the cathedral.”

From a distance, the neo-Gothic cathedral dominated the county town of Cornwall. An ancient river port, a city in name if not in size, Truro appeared as a mere backdrop to the three towering spires.

Once they reached the bottom of the hill, crossed a bridge over a tributary of the Truro River, and entered the narrow, cobbled streets, the cathedral seemed less overpowering than ever present. Built at the turn of the century on the site of a previous, much smaller church and a few adjoining buildings, Truro Cathedral had to make do without the spreading lawns of a close. But every side street, every alley between shops, offices, and houses, offered a glimpse of the pale gold Bath stone cladding the Cornish granite bones of the walls and towers.

They were lucky enough to find a place to park in a small cobbled area right in front of the cathedral. As they walked towards the twin-arched porch, several people came out. Jocelyn moved to one side to avoid them and Eleanor veered the other way, so they entered through different arches. Inside the porch, Eleanor was held up by meeting an acquaintance who was giving visitors from the Midlands a tour.

When she managed to get away and go on through one of the doors into the nave, Jocelyn was waiting with an impatiently tapping toe.

“Where
have
you been? I was just about to come and look for you. I was afraid you might have fallen on the cobbles.”

“Just because I tripped while running on a rough, rocky path yesterday…! Never mind. Sorry.” Eleanor explained the delay. “Now that I’m here, where do we find Canon Dinesh?”

“I asked a verger, who thinks he’s in his office. It’s not actually in the cathedral. We’ll go out by the south door.” She led the way into the south aisle.

“Joce, I don’t think I ought to be present when you’re discussing Timothy’s difficulties.”

“You’re right, it would be awkward. But you’ll have to be there to talk about the smuggling. I don’t see how we can do them in reverse order.”

“As the theological quest is designed to soften him up for the interrogation—”

“Really, Eleanor! And in the cathedral!”

Once again she apologised, adding, “It’s true, though; admit it. I’ll tell you what, I’ll just stay here in the cathedral and try not to be sacrilegious, then come and join you in … what?… quarter of an hour?”

“All right.” Jocelyn explained how to find the cathedral offices and went off.

Eleanor was tempted to take a seat in a pew. She was tired, and she needed to consider how to tackle the clergyman about his possible collusion with smugglers. But the place was quiet, in spite of an unexpected number of people wandering about—holiday makers fleeing the fog on the north coast, perhaps. She was afraid she might fall asleep.

Crossing to the north aisle, she went to visit the ebony Madonna. In the circumstances, the black mother and child seemed appropriate. She bought and lit a candle, not that she expected the gesture to help Kalith, his mother, or the rest of his family, but it couldn’t hurt. If a statue of the Buddha had been available, she would have lit incense, or garlanded four-armed Lakshmi with marigolds.

For a minute or two she watched the candle flame flickering in the currents of air as people passed and entrance doors opened and closed. Then she walked on to the Chapel of Unity and Peace.

Here she did sit down to collect her scattered thoughts. She tried to centre her being as she would before starting her Aikido practice, shutting out the world yet conscious of her precise place in it. But tranquillity was hard to achieve. As soon as she closed her eyes, the cathedral, seemingly so quiet just moments ago, echoed with footsteps shuffling, tapping, thudding on the paving stones; though voices were hushed, they were buzzing all about her.