The Religious Body iscm-1 Read online

  “Tell me about her,” urged Sloan gently.

  Miss Lome needed no persuading. “She was professed about four years before me—the year I became a postulant, I think it was, though it’s rather a long time ago for me to be sure. She had given up a very gay life in London, you know, to become a nun.” Miss Lome glanced round the modest sitting-room, economically furnished, plainly decorated. “Dances, parties, the London Season—that sort of thing. Her family had money, I think…”

  Sloan nodded.

  “It used to worry Sister Anne a lot,” volunteered Miss Lome.

  “What did?”

  “All that money.”

  Sloan read the look on Crosby’s face as easily as if it had been the printed word. A lot of money wouldn’t have worried him, it said. Just give him the chance and he’d prove it.

  “In what way did it worry her?” asked Sloan.

  “It was where it had all come from, Inspector, that was what she thought wrong. It was some sort of manufacturing process that was very valuable in making munitions in the First World War. But half the firm was to be hers one day, and then she intended to make restitution.”

  Sloan felt a momentary pang of sympathy for Cousin Harold.

  “She always took an interest in foreign missions,” continued Miss Lome. “She thought it was a way in which she could atone.”

  The look on Crosby’s face, still easily readable, had changed to incredulity.

  “She intended to sell out her interest in the firm?”

  “That’s right. As soon as it came to her.”

  “And this was common knowledge?”

  Miss Lome gave a quick jerk of her head. “We knew it was something that worried her.”

  “All those years?”

  “Time,” said Miss Lome again, ruefully, “has a different meaning in a religious house.”

  She might have left the Convent but she had brought with her the training of a lifetime. When not speaking her eyes dropped downwards, and her hands lay folded in her lap. In gawky, unsuitable clothes, face and figure innocent of make-up or artifice, the mannerisms of the nun bordered on the grotesque.

  “Nevertheless,” said Sloan pedantically, “you must have been very surprised and shocked to read about the murder…”

  Another quick jerk of the head. “I’ve been trying so hard not to think about the past—until today. Now, I can’t think about anything else except poor Sister Anne.” She brightened with an effort. “But one mustn’t dwell on the bad things, must one? There were some very happy times, too.” She stared at him through a mist of tears and said wistfully, “When everything seemed quite perfect.”

  “Yes, miss, I’m sure there were. Tell me, have you been tempted to go back at all since you left?”

  A curious colour crept over her face, and Crosby looked quite startled. Miss Lome was actually blushing.

  “Just to the gate, Inspector. Not inside. There’s a part of the Convent you can see from the road if you know where to look…”

  “The newspaper photographer found it.”

  “That’s right. I’ve been back as far as there—just to have a look, you understand. Silly and sentimental of me, I suppose.”

  “When?”

  “Funnily enough, it was this morning.”

  16

  « ^ »

  All right, all right,” challenged Superintendent Leeyes. “You tell me of someone who wasn’t at the Convent this morning for a change. The whole bang shooting match were there if you ask me—Hobbett, Cartwright, MacAuley, Ranby, Bullen, Parker, fifty nuns and now this woman. Anyone could have killed Tewn. Anyone. It’s a wonder he wasn’t trampled to death in the crowd.”

  “This woman says she just went as far as the gate, sir.”

  “Tewn didn’t go much farther himself, did he? And look what happened to him.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And as for her saying she just went as far as the gate, how do you know that? How do we know she didn’t go farther than the gate on Wednesday? Suppose she’s the answer to it being an inside job or an outside one—a bit of both, in fact? What’s to stop her coming in on Wednesday, slipping into the back of the Chapel for one of their eternal services and then waiting behind afterwards? You tell me the nuns don’t know who comes into their Chapel from outside for services. Then all she has to do is to wait somewhere until just after supper. She knows where to find that old habit. And how to behave in it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Then, after supper she waits in that corridor with a weapon that you’ve proved to me must have come from the Convent though you can’t find it.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then she kills Sister Anne, hears someone coming and pushes her into the broom cupboard. Probably goes inside with her. And at half past eight she creeps out for some service or other.”

  “Vespers.”

  “To stop the hue and cry being raised until the morning. She goes in last, knowing the others are too damn ladylike to look up, pretends she’s got a cold and keeps her face buried in a handkerchief. Probably comes out last, too, then while the others go up to bed she sidles down the corridor and hides somewhere until it’s all quiet.”

  “The necessarium?” offered Sloan.

  “The what?”

  “The smallest room, sir.”

  The superintendent turned a dull shade of purple. “Very probably, Sloan, very probably. I was forgetting,” he added savagely, “that they aren’t fairies. Then when all the others are tucked up in their nice warm cells, she comes out of there and pops into the broom cupboard, heaves Sister Anne’s body down the cellar steps, and lets herself out through the cellar door and legs it back to Luston.”

  Sloan studied the ceiling. “Leaving the habit in the cellar for Tewn, who comes along ten minutes later and takes it away?”

  Leeyes glared.

  “Or alternatively,” went on Sloan, switching his gaze to the floor, “she just happens to discard the habit there and Tewn just happens to come along and pick it up?”

  “Tewn came there by arrangement, didn’t he?” Leeyes shifted his ground with subtlety.

  “With Hobbett, sir. He promised to have the habit there for the students and to leave the outside cellar door open.”

  “Someone knew about that little conspiracy, Sloan.”

  “Yes, sir, unless…”

  “Unless what?”

  “It was a totally inside job. Then it wouldn’t have mattered what happened to the outside cellar door or the habit.”

  “Who would have been lying?”

  “Sister Damien.”

  Leeyes shrugged. “I don’t like coincidence. Never have done.”

  “Neither do I, sir, but you must allow for it happening.”

  The superintendent gave an indeterminate growl. “What next?”

  “Back to the Convent with Sergeant Perkins, sir.”

  “Have they brought Hobbett in yet?”

  “Not yet, sir.”

  “There’s always the chance, I suppose,” said Leeyes hopefully, “that he’ll stand on one of them’s toe…” The other three golfers would be coming up the eighteenth fairway by now—without him. “Sloan…”

  “Sir?”

  “This woman, Eileen Lome—why did she leave the Convent?”

  “She lost her vocation,” said Sloan, shutting the door behind him very gently indeed.

  Sergeant Perkins was in his room when he got back.

  He nodded briskly. “What do you know about Convents, Sergeant?”

  “That they’re not allowed to have mirrors there,” she said. She was a good-looking girl herself.

  “Poor things,” said Sloan unsympathetically. “Now, about the case…”

  She flung a smile at his assistant. “Constable Crosby has been putting me in the picture, Inspector.”

  Sloan grunted. “It’s not a pretty one. Two murders in four days. I don’t know about your end of the county, but out of the ordinary run for us.” />
  “And us, sir. Just husband and wife stuff as a rule.”

  Sloan picked up the sheets of paper the Mother Superior had sent him that morning. “They’ve given us a list of every nun in the place, her—er—given name and her religious one, and what she said she was doing after supper on Wednesday. Now I suppose we shall need to know what they said they were doing this morning.”

  “Never mind, sir, it’s nearer than Wednesday. They’re not as likely to have forgotten.”

  “There is that,” admitted Sloan. He’d obviously got an optimist on his hands, which made a change from the superintendent.

  “How many are there of them, sir?”

  “Just over fifty.” That should deaden anyone’s enthusiasm for interviewing. “And all falling over themselves backwards not to be too observant, inquisitive or whatever else you like to call it.”

  She nodded.

  “And,” he added for good measure, “they don’t seem to think it’s right to have normal human feelings about people. Have you ever tried interviewing people without normal human feelings, Sergeant?”

  “Often, Inspector. I get most of the teenage work in Calleford.”

  He did not laugh. Nobody in the Calleshire Constabulary ever laughed at the word “teenager.”

  He turned to Crosby. “Any luck with that list?”

  “Yes, sir. There are four nuns who came into the Order late like Miss Lome said. Sister Margaret, Sister Lucy, Sister Agatha and Sister Philomena. Judging by all the other dates and ages the rest came in straight from school.”

  “Poor things,” said Sergeant Perkins impulsively.

  “And the other four?”

  “Late twenties—one, early thirties—two, early forties—one.”

  “Which one was that?”

  “Sister Agatha. She came here from”—he flipped the sheets over—“the Burrapurindi Mission Hospital.”

  “It’s a republic now,” said Sloan briefly. “And the other late entries?”

  “Sister Philomena and Sister Margaret seem to have been school-teachers first.”

  “The blackboard jungle.”

  “And Sister Lucy”—he turned the pages back— “there’s no occupation down for her—just that she came from West Laming House, West Laming. It’s not the best address though, sir.”

  “No?”

  “No, sir. One of them comes from a castle. Fancy leaving a castle to go and live in a convent.”

  “Probably the only one who didn’t notice the cold. Which one was that?”

  “Sister Radigund.”

  Sloan nodded. “You might think Sister Agatha was the one to be in charge of the sick if she had been a nurse, but I suppose that would be too simple for them.”

  “There’s a Lady, too, sir.”

  “They’re all ladies, Crosby, that’s their trouble.”

  “No, sir. I mean a real one. It says so here. Lady Millicent.”

  “And what’s she now?”

  “Mother Mary St. Bridget.”

  Sergeant Perkins leaned forward. “Some are Mothers, are they then, Inspector?”

  “A courtesy title, Sergeant, I assure you. For long service, I believe.”

  Crosby made a noise that could have been a hiccup.

  Sloan favoured him with a cold stare. “Was there anything else, Crosby?”

  “Just the Mother Superior, sir.”

  “What about her?”

  “Her name was Smith, sir. Mary Smith of Potter’s Bar.”

  The three of them stood on the Convent doorstep and rang the bell. It was quite dark now. They could hear the bell echoing through the house, and then the slow footsteps of Sister Polycarp walking towards them.

  Sergeant Perkins shivered. “The only other thing I know about nuns is that they used to be walled up alive if they did anything wrong.”

  Sloan was not interested. As a police officer he was concerned with crime, not punishment.

  “There was the nun who was murdered in Thirteen Fifty-One,” proffered Crosby unexpectedly. “By a crazy younger son.”

  “And which was she?” demanded Sloan.

  In the reflected light of the outer hall Crosby could be seen to be going a bit red. He gulped and chanted:

  “An extremely rowdy nun

  Who resented it.

  And people who come to call

  Meet her in the hall.

  “The Police Concert,” he stammered hastily. “We sang it—four of us—it’s Noël Coward’s.”

  Sister Polycarp pulled the bolts of the door back. “Sorry to keep you. I was in the kitchen.”

  “That’s all right,” said Sloan. “Constable Crosby here has been entertaining us with a refrain of Mr. Noël Coward’s.”

  “Coward?” Polycarp sniffed. “Can’t say I’ve heard the name. Ought I to have done?”

  Sloan looked at her respectfully. “Oh, Sister, you don’t know what you gave up when you left the world.”

  “Oh, yes, I do, young man. Believe you me I do.”

  The former Mary Smith of Potter’s Bar, now Mother Superior of the Convent of St. Anselm, was in the Parlour to greet them.

  Sloan introduced Sergeant Perkins. “I’m very sorry about this further intrusion, marm, but my superintendent insists…”

  “But our Bishop agrees, Inspector, so pray do not worry on that score. We appreciate your difficulties.”

  An hour later he wondered if she did.

  It was slow, painstaking work, seeing nun after nun, each with eyes demurely cast down, voices at low, unobtrusive pitch, each having to be asked specifically each question.

  “What did you do immediately after supper on Wednesday evening, Sister?”

  “The washing up, Inspector.”

  “The vegetables for the next day, Inspector.”

  “Prepared the Chapel, Inspector.”

  “Swept the refectory, Inspector.”

  “Some lettering on prayer cards, Inspector.”

  “A little crochet, Inspector.”

  “There was a letter I was permitted to write, Inspector.”

  “Studied a book on the life of our Founder, Inspector.”

  And to each one: “When did you last see Sister Anne?”

  As one woman they replied: “At supper, Inspector.”

  Someone had been in her stall at Vespers, they knew that now, but they had no suggestions to make. None had seen anything untoward then or at any other time. Or if they had they weren’t telling Sloan and that good-looking young woman he had with him.

  It was not noticeably different when he asked about that morning.

  The same pattern of cleaning, cooking, praying emerged.

  “Admin stuff,” he observed to Sergeant Perkins in between nuns.

  “They don’t look unhappy,” she said.

  “I don’t think they are. Once you’ve got used to it, I’m sure it’s a great life.”

  She grinned. “Not for me, sir.”

  “No,” said Sloan. “I didn’t think it would be. Next please, Crosby.”

  There were faces he was beginning to know now. Characteristics were identifying themselves to him in spite of the strenuous efforts of their owners to suppress them.

  Sister Hilda, whose lively, dancing eyes and harmonious voice belied her sombre habit. She had seen nothing on Wednesday or Saturday.

  “But that’s not surprising, Inspector, is it? That corridor is pretty dim in daylight, let alone in the evening. And we don’t exactly go in for bright lights here, do we? As for this morning—once you’re out of range of the windows practically anything can happen.”

  “Could anyone leave the house unobserved?”

  “Probably not, but,” she said frankly, “anyone could go out into the grounds without anyone else asking why. It wouldn’t be anything to do with them, you see, so they wouldn’t notice properly if you know what I meant.”

  Then there was the thin-lipped Sister Damien, who unbent not one fraction without the restraining presence of the Mother
Superior.

  “Had I seen anything suspicious I would have told Mother immediately,” she said.

  “And this morning?”

  “I was dusting the Library. I saw and heard nothing out of the ordinary.”

  “You know Miss Eileen Lome, of course?”

  She shook her head. “The name means nothing to me, Inspector.”

  “Sister Bertha that was…”

  “Ah, yes.” Her narrow features assumed a curious expression compounded of regret and disapproval. “The former Sister Bertha.”

  “Have you seen her since she left?”

  “None of us have seen her, Inspector, since she renounced her vows. It would not have been proper.”

  And, nearly the last, Sister Lucy.

  She came in and sat down, hands folded serenely in her lap, waiting expectantly for Sloan to speak.

  “It’s a little strange, Sister, interviewing you in your own Parlour, but—er—needs must. This is Sergeant Perkins who has come over from Calleford.”

  Two women in two very different uniforms regarded each other across the room. It did something for each, decided Sloan, but then uniforms usually did.

  “You’ve got your keys back, Sister, I see.”

  She patted the huge bunch which hung from her girdle. “Yes, indeed, Inspector, my badge of office. I was lost without them.”

  “Sister, this dead boy, William Tewn, did you know him?”

  “No, Inspector. I had never heard of him until this morning.”

  “Nor seen him before?”

  She shook her head. “Never. Nor the two other boys who came over with Mr. Ranby. The students can be seen from the Convent grounds if they are working on their own land, but they’re not usually near enough to identify and I’m sure no Sister would ever…”

  “We have to ask any number of questions in our job,” he said placatingly. “And they may seem irrelevant.” But they weren’t, he thought to himself. She had been pale and shaking when she met him at the Convent door this morning after the second murder. He had seen that with his own two eyes, which made it cold, hard evidence.

  “Sister, you came later than most to the Convent…”

  She bowed her head. “That is so. I’ve been professed for only ten years now.”