‘Well,’ said the young man, drawing Anne Herbert even closer to him, ‘I’ve known what the headline should be for some time, but I’m not sure all my readers will understand it.’
‘Share it with us, Patrick,’ Lady Lucy smiled, ‘we’ll do our best to grasp it.’
Patrick looked sheepish all of a sudden. ‘You’re teasing me,’ he said. ‘I shan’t tell you about my headline at all. You’ll never get to hear about the Bonfire of the Vanities.’ ‘Who is the King of Glory? Who is the King of Glory? The Lord of Hosts, he is the King of Glory.’
Powerscourt was dazzled as he and his companions finally entered the cathedral, their candles rekindled by the paschal candle at the door. The glacier had reached the bottom of the choir. Looking back down the nave he thought he had seldom seen anything so beautiful. He transposed Wordsworth’s daffodils into the candles of Compton in his mind.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way
They stretched in never ending line
Across the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
Powerscourt placed his candle on a sconce at the top of the choir, Lady Lucy’s behind it, Johnny’s nestling very close to a wooden angel with a harp. The wounds of Christ on the banners were gleaming in the light. The choir were belting out Handel’s most famous Chorus.
‘Hallelujah! Hallelujah! For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.’
The queues were still there as they left, shorter now, but still patient, snaking their way towards the west front. An extremely excited Patrick Butler was waiting for them.
‘Lord Powerscourt, you must all come at once! I found Chief Inspector Yates with the Chief Constable. They’ve been looking for you, my lord. They should be in Anne’s house by now. I didn’t think you’d want to talk to them anywhere near the cathedral.’
Powerscourt remembered meeting the Chief Constable very early in this investigation. He had seemed a most capable individual then, sitting in the Dean’s front room, discussing the murder of Arthur Rudd. Now he was distraught.
‘Powerscourt, Lady Powerscourt, Lord Fitzgerald, please forgive me for the lateness of this visit. I would welcome some advice. Chief Inspector Yates informed me of your suspicions some time ago, Powerscourt. I wasn’t sure whether to believe your theories or not, and it is difficult to take action when nothing has been done. But now I am convinced these people are going to rededicate the cathedral to the Catholic faith tomorrow. The Archdeacon said so. Even then I don’t think I have the power to act until something has actually happened.’
‘Do you think you can arrest them?’ said Powerscourt.
‘That’s just one of my worries, Powerscourt. I’d have to arrest the Bishop, the Dean and the entire Chapter. I’m not sure we have enough cells to hold them all here in Compton. We’d have to throw out the current incumbents, two burglars, one suspected murderer and a couple of horse thieves. I don’t think that would go down too well with the citizens.’
‘Why don’t you put them under house arrest?’ said Powerscourt. ‘Confine them all to their own quarters. Lock up the bloody cathedral for the time being.’
The Chief Constable smiled. ‘I’ve thought of that. But I don’t have the manpower to keep them all confined to their quarters. That’s my other worry, you see. You all saw what that crowd was like on the Green this evening. They could cause a great deal of trouble. They might even decide to storm the jail if they thought their people were inside.’
‘Are you saying, Chief Constable,’ asked Powerscourt, ‘that as things stand, you will be unable to take any action in defence of the laws of this country tomorrow?’
‘I’m afraid that is the case,’ the Chief Constable replied, looking even more miserable as he said it.
Silence fell in Anne Herbert’s little drawing room. Outside they could still hear faint noises of singing. It was Johnny Fitzgerald who spoke first.
‘Francis,’ he said, ‘you will recall that I did some reconnaissance into the military in the locality?’
Powerscourt nodded. That would have to do with Johnny’s acquisition of explosives, not a subject he wished to go into in present company.
‘Well,’ Johnny went on, ‘what the Chief Constable needs are reinforcements. Soldiers can be used like policemen, can’t they? There’s a crowd of infantry about twenty miles from here. I don’t think they’d be able to get here in time. But there’s cavalry five miles further away. I’m sure they could be persuaded to come to the rescue. They always like arriving at the last possible minute.’
‘My dear Lord Fitzgerald,’ said the Chief Constable, ‘your suggestion is admirable. But I fail to see how they could reach here in time.’
‘That’s easy,’ said Johnny, ‘we just get go and get them, Francis and I.’
‘But it’s nearly two o’clock in the morning. Even if you set out at first light they couldn’t get here in time.’
‘Chief Constable,’ said Powerscourt, sensing that Johnny was about to get irritated, ‘what Johnny means is that we leave now. Once we can get changed and on to our horses.’
‘God bless my soul,’ said the Chief Constable.
‘We will meet with you or your representatives outside the cathedral during Mass tomorrow morning,’ said Powerscourt. ‘With or without the cavalry.’
While he waited for Lucy to collect her things before the return to Fairfield Park and the horses, Powerscourt went to have a final look at the cathedral. The last pilgrims were making their way inside. Even at a distance it glowed magnificently, the light from hundreds and hundreds of candles streaming out of the doors. The choir were nearly finished.
‘And he shall reign for ever and ever. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Hallelujah!’
Powerscourt bumped into the Archdeacon on his way back.
‘Shall we be seeing you at Mass tomorrow, Lord Powerscourt?’ asked the Archdeacon.
‘You might, Archdeacon,’ said Powerscourt cheerfully, ‘you very well might.’
24
By four o’clock in the morning Powerscourt and Johnny Fitzgerald were nearly halfway to the cavalry camp at Bampton. It was a clear night with a silver crescent of a moon. The road took them past a number of villages sleeping peacefully under the stars.
Powerscourt was thinking about the murderer. Chief Inspector Yates had told him as they left Anne Herbert’s house that the final checks had been carried out on the movements and the alibi of the butcher Fraser. The police were convinced the man was totally innocent of the murder of Edward Gillespie. And all their inquiries among the murky undergrowth of moneylenders in Bristol and Exeter who might have had dealings with Arthur Rudd had been fruitless. The murderer must reside inside the great circle Powerscourt had drawn around the Cathedral Close in his notebook weeks before. But which of them was it? The Bishop with his service record in the Guards? The Dean with his passion for efficiency that would have been disturbed by defectors who changed their minds? The Archdeacon with that passion for the faith he had demonstrated so eloquently up there on his scaffold the night before? The choirmaster who had threatened to expel Lady Lucy from his choir? The mysterious member of Civitas Dei, Father Barberi, regular visitor to Compton, London and the College of Propaganda in Rome? Five of them, Powerscourt thought, three murders, two attempted murders, himself and Lady Lucy, to their name. Maybe they hadn’t finished yet. Maybe it would take one more murder before the killer was unmasked.
‘What do you know about these cavalrymen, Johnny?’ said Powerscourt, panting slightly as the horses moved uphill. ‘Did you borrow the explosives from them?’
‘I got the explosives from the infantry over at Parkfield. I’d met one of the officers before. The cavalry are part of the Compton Horse. The commanding officer is a man called Wheeler, Colonel Wheeler.’