‘My God, Powerscourt,’ said Michael Delaney when he heard the news. ‘To lose two, as that perverted playwright put it, looks like carelessness. I’ve taken to counting them every time I see them now, the pilgrims, I mean. I did a run-through at lunchtime when they all sat down here. Tell me, Powerscourt, do you have any idea what we are going to do? Do we have to start bribing the local worthies as we did in Le Puy? I find it hard to believe we can pull off the same trick twice. Have you, as yet, any idea what is going on?’
‘I have no more idea who killed Patrick MacLoughlin than I do of who killed John Delaney back there in Le Puy. I’m sure it’s the same person, that’s all.’
‘How many people did we have to start with?’ asked Delaney. ‘Sixteen? Now it’s down to fourteen and we’ve travelled less than a hundred miles. At this rate we’ll be lucky if there’s anybody left alive by the time we reach the Pyrenees. It reminds me of a great friend of mine, used to be much richer than me but not any more. Horses were his thing. Four or five years ago he had the finest collection of racehorses in America. He was aiming to win as many of the premier events as possible, the Travers Stakes in Saratoga, the Kentucky Oaks in Louisville, the Belmont Stakes in New York. At the beginning of the season all his animals were in tip-top condition. Raring to race, he told me. Then they started to go. A fetlock here, a splint there, I’m not an expert on equine diseases, but whatever could lay you low if you were a horse his lot got it. By the middle of June they were all limping or hobbling or off their food or off their saddles or off their wits. Man never got over it. Sold all his horses on the first of July and took to stamp collecting. No bloody fetlocks there, Penny Blacks not likely to suffer from equine flu.’
Delaney paused and looked at Powerscourt. ‘Sorry, I digress. What do you think we should do?’
‘I think we need to have a meeting. I think we need to have a meeting with all the pilgrims and everybody. Obviously we all have to wait to talk to the inspector from Figeac. But I feel you should ask the pilgrims if they wish to go on. You have your very special reasons, I know, Mr Delaney, for wanting to continue. But the others may not want to. We have to give them the option of going home. I think we should put it to the vote.’
‘Vote?’ said Delaney suspiciously. ‘Ask the pilgrims? Isn’t that a bit democratic? Nothing wrong with democracy, of course, you just have to make sure your own candidates are the only ones allowed to stand.’
Powerscourt thought that the workers’ councils so beloved of extreme left-wingers right across Europe might not get off the starting line on the Delaney factory floor. He held his peace.
Half an hour later the pilgrim company assembled at the far end of the hotel dining room. Already Powerscourt, as he told Lady Lucy later, was beginning to feel that he could happily go to his grave without any further assemblies in the dining rooms of French hotels. Delaney sat at the centre of a table to the front, flanked by Father Kennedy – always happy to be in hotel dining rooms – on his right with Powerscourt on his left and then Lady Lucy. Alex Bentley basked in the sunshine on the far side of Lady Lucy. The pilgrims sat in two semicircular rows in front of Michael Delaney.
A black hotel cat shot across the floor as Delaney rose to speak. ‘My friends, fellow pilgrims,’ he began, ‘I have to tell you that another of our number has passed away. First there was John Delaney in Le Puy. This morning the body of Patrick MacLoughlin was found in Entraygues-sur-Truyere, the next town on the banks of the Lot, lying in the bottom of a rowing boat that had been dispatched downstream from this hotel. The authorities believe he had been strangled before his last journey. We have to stay here in Estaing to speak to an inspector from the French police. We are here tonight to consider what we should do next. I believe Lord Powerscourt has some thoughts he would like to share with you.’
Maggie Delaney was torn between a delicious mixture of joy and sorrow, joy that further affliction had come on her hated cousin, Michael Delaney, sorrow that a young man of God with so much life in front of him should have been taken away. She began to pray for the dead man’s soul. Powerscourt had told Lady Lucy beforehand that he wasn’t going to mince his words. He felt very strongly indeed about this question.
‘Pilgrims, friends,’ he began, ‘I was called here to look into the death of John Delaney on the rock of St Michel. Now we have a second death. I have to say that I have no idea who is responsible for these murders. They are linked by one small thread. On both bodies was found a scallop shell, symbol and guide to the pilgrims to Compostela through the ages. And Alex Bentley tells me that the body sent in a boat to Entraygues may echo the arrival of St James the Great in northern Spain, where his body was discovered in a stone boat near a place on the coast called Padron. Be that as it may, both of these young men died horrible deaths. People have asked me earlier this evening if I think there will be any further murders on the route. I have to tell you I think it is very likely, that it is almost certain.’
Powerscourt paused. There was a murmur from the pilgrims. He glanced briefly at Lady Lucy for reassurance.
‘One of you in this room here tonight is a murderer.’ He spoke very quietly. ‘It might be you,’ his finger shot out towards the middle of the second row, ‘or you or you or you or you.’ His finger travelled along the entire length of the front row and continued across the top table to take in Father Kennedy and Michael Delaney himself. ‘Only one person can feel safe in this company and that is the killer himself. Only he knows who he intends to murder next. Only he knows where he intends to do it. Only he knows when he intends to carry out his next murder. Do not console yourself with the thought that there may only be one more victim. We do not know. There could be two or three or four. The most dangerous place in any battle is in the heart of the front line waiting for an enemy attack. Tonight you are all in the heart of that front line. All of your lives are in danger.’
Powerscourt wondered if he had said enough. He carried on. It was a long time since he had felt so strongly about one of his cases.
‘So what would my advice be? My advice is very simple. Call off your pilgrimage. Go home, separately I should advise, once the police have completed their inquiries. Go home and see your loved ones. Go home to safety for this gathering is currently one of the most dangerous places in Europe. Go home while you can. Go home while you are still alive. Go home before you are thrown off some huge volcanic rock or sent strangled in a rowing boat down the Lot. In this case discretion is not merely the better part of valour. Discretion is the only way to stay alive.’
Powerscourt sat down. Lady Lucy squeezed his hand. There was a long silence. Then Michael Delaney rose to his feet once more. ‘Does anybody wish to speak?’ he asked. Powerscourt wondered cynically if this was the first time in his life that Michael Delaney had asked for contributions from the floor. There was a rustling among the pilgrims.