‘Small evils mount up, Rowena,’ said Wace. ‘You may say to yourself, “What does it matter, a little lie here, a little lie there?” But the pure spirit knows there can be no lies, big or small. To promulgate falsehoods is to embrace evil.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Robin again.
Wace contemplated Robin for a moment, then said,
‘Becca, fill in a PA form and bring it back to me, with a blank.’
‘Yes, Papa J,’ said Becca, and she strode out of the room. When the door had closed, Jonathan leaned forwards and said quietly,
‘Do you want to leave us, Rowena? Because, if so, you’re completely free to do so.’
Robin looked into those opaque dark blue eyes and remembered the stories of Kevin Pirbright and Niamh Doherty, of Sheila Kennett and Flora Brewster, all of which had taught her that if there were any safe, easy route out of Chapman Farm, it wouldn’t have taken bereavement, mental collapse or night-time escapes through barbed wire to free them. She no longer believed the Waces would stop short of murder to protect themselves or their lucrative fiefdom. Wace’s offer was for the camera, to prove Robin had been given a free choice that was, in reality, no choice at all.
‘No,’ Robin said. ‘I want to stay. I want to learn, I want to do better.’
‘That will mean performing penance,’ said Wace. ‘You understand that?’
‘Yes,’ said Robin, ‘I do.’
‘And do you agree that any penance should be proportionate to your own self-confessed behaviour?’
She nodded.
‘Say it,’ said Wace.
‘Yes,’ said Robin. ‘I agree.’
The door behind Wace opened. Becca had returned holding two pieces of paper and a pen. She was also holding a razor and a can of shaving foam.
‘I want you to read what Becca’s written for you,’ said Wace, as Becca laid the two forms and the pen before Robin on the table, ‘and, if you agree, copy the words out onto the blank form, then sign it.’
Robin read what had been written in Becca’s neat, rounded handwriting.
I have been duplicitous.
I have spoken falsehoods.
I have manipulated a fellow church member and undermined his trust in the church.
I have manipulated and encouraged a fellow church member to lie.
I have acted and spoken in direct contravention of the church’s teachings on kindness and fellowship.
By my own thought, word and deed, I have damaged the bond of trust between myself and the church.
I accept a proportionate punishment as penance for my behaviour.
Robin picked up the pen and her four accusers watched as she copied out the words, then signed as Rowena Ellis.
‘Becca’s going to shave your head now,’ said Wace, ‘as a mark—’
Taio made a slight movement. His father looked up at him for a moment, then smiled.
‘Very well, we’ll forgo the shaving. Taio, go with Becca and fetch the box.’
The pair left the room, leaving Wace and Mazu to watch Robin in silence. Robin heard scuffing footsteps, and then the door opened once more to reveal Taio and Becca carrying a heavy wooden box, the size of a large travel trunk, with an envelope-sized rectangular hole at one end and a hinged, lockable lid.
‘I’m going to leave you now, Artemis,’ said Wace, getting to his feet, and his eyes were wet again. ‘Even where the sin has been great, I hate the necessity for punishment. I wish,’ he pressed his hand to his heart, ‘it weren’t necessary. Be well, Rowena, I’ll see you on the other side, purified, I hope, by suffering. Don’t think I don’t recognise your gifts of intelligence and generosity. I’m very happy,’ he said, making her a little bow, ‘in spite of everything, that you chose to stay with us. Eight hours,’ he added to Taio.
He left the room.
Taio now threw back the lid of the box.
‘You face this way,’ he told Robin, pointing at the rectangular hole. You kneel and bend over in an attitude of penance. Then we close the lid.’
Shaking uncontrollably, Robin stood up. She climbed into the box, facing the rectangular hole, then knelt down and curled up. The floor of the box hadn’t been sanded: she felt the splintered surface digging into her knees through the thin, wet robe. Then the lid banged down on her spine.
She watched through the rectangular hole as Mazu, Taio and Becca left the room, only the hems of their robes and their feet visible. Mazu, the last to leave, turned out the light, closed the door of the room and locked it.
83
Nine in the fifth place…
In the midst of the greatest obstructions,
Friends come.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
Strike, who’d arrived in Lion’s Mouth at one o’clock that afternoon, was now sitting in the dark in his BMW at the blind spot in Chapman Farm’s perimeter with the car’s headlights off. Shah had given Strike the night vision binoculars and wire cutters, and he was using the former to stare at the woods for any sign of a human figure. He’d sent Shah back to London: there was no point two of them sitting here in the dark for hours.
It was nearly midnight, and raining heavily, when Strike’s mobile rang.
‘Any sign of her?’ said Midge anxiously.
‘No,’ said Strike.
‘She did miss a Thursday once before,’ said Midge.
‘I know,’ said Strike, peering through the rain-flecked window at the dark trees, ‘but why the fuck’s the rock gone?’
‘Could she have moved it herself?’
‘Possibly,’ said Strike, ‘but I can’t see why.’
‘You sure you don’t want company?’
‘No, I’m fine on my own,’ said Strike.
‘What if she doesn’t turn up tonight?’
‘We agreed I wouldn’t do anything until Sunday,’ said Strike, ‘so she’s got another night, assuming she doesn’t turn up in the next few hours.’
‘God, I hope she’s all right.’
‘Me too,’ said Strike. With the aim of maintaining these friendlier relations with Midge, even in the midst of his larger worries, he asked,
‘Tasha all right?’
‘Yeah, I think so,’ said Midge. ‘Barclay’s outside her house.’
‘Good,’ said Strike. ‘I might’ve overreacted about the photos. Didn’t want to give Patterson another stick to beat us with.’
‘I know,’ said Midge. ‘And I’m sorry for what I said about her with the fake tits.’
‘Apology accepted.’
When Midge had hung up, Strike continued to stare through the night vision binoculars at the woods.
Six hours later, Robin still hadn’t appeared.
84
Six in the fifth place…
Persistently ill, and still does not die.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
Every attempt to relieve pressure or numbness in either of Robin’s smarting legs resulted in more pain. The rough lid of the box scraped her back as she tried to make minor readjustments of her position. Folded down upon herself in the pitch dark, too scared and in too much pain to escape the present by sleeping, she imagined dying, locked inside the box inside the locked room. She knew nobody would hear even if she screamed, but she cried intermittently. After what she thought must be two or three hours, she was forced to urinate inside the box. Her legs were burning with the weight they were supporting. She had nothing to hold on to except that Wace had said ‘eight hours’. There would be a release. It would come. She had to hold on to that.