Chapter Thirty

   The decision to travel to Shrewsbury was taken, momentarily and arbitrarily, when Morse had walked out of the church on his way back to St Aldates; and as Lewis drove the police car round the Woodstock Road roundabout and headed out on to the A34 both men were mentally calculating the possible time-schedule. It was already 4.20 p.m. Two hours, say, to get there - if the traffic was reasonable; two hours actually there; another two hours back. So, with a bit of luck, they could be back in Oxford by about 10.30p.m.
   Morse, as was his wont, spoke little in the car, and Lewis was quite happy to give his whole attention to the motoring. They had started in time to miss the diurnal mass exodus from Oxford which begins at about a quarter to five and continues its semi-paralytic progress for almost another hour. It was good fun, too, driving in a conspicuously marked POLICE car. As always other road-users immediately became punctilious about speed-restrictions as they spied the pale-blue and white car in their mirrors, and ostentatiously shunned the slightest suspicion of sub-standard driving, behaving with a courtesy and care that were wildly at variance with their customary frenetic aggression.
   So it was now.
   Lewis turned left off the A34 through Chipping Norton, up through Bourton-on-the-Hill, through Moreton-in-Marsh, and then, with the Vale of Evesham opening out in a vast panorama before them, down the long, steep hill into Broadway, its houses of mellowed Cotswold stone gleaming a warm yellow in the late afternoon sun. At Evesham, Morse insisted that they took the road to Pershore, in which town he enthused lovingly over the red-brick houses with their white-painted window-frames; and at Worcester he directed Lewis along the Bromyard Road.
   'I've always thought,' said Morse, as they turned north from Leominster on to the A49, 'that this is one of the prettiest roads in England.'
   Lewis sat silent. It was also a pretty long way round, and at this rate it would be about seven before they reached Shrewsbury. Yet as they drove past Church Stretton it seemed to Lewis that Morse was perhaps right; and even more so as they left the Long Mynd behind them, when the sun, still hovering over the Welsh hills far off on the western horizon, suffused the early evening sky with a fiery glow and turned the white clouds to the softest shade of purple.
   It was half-past seven when finally the two Oxford detectives were seated in the Superintendent's office at the Salop Police H.Q.; and it was half-past eight when they emerged.
   Morse had said little, and Lewis less, and neither man felt that the meeting was of more than routine value. There were no grounds for suspecting anyone, and not the slightest whisper of a likely motive. The dead woman had been quietly popular with her fellow-nurses, slightly less quietly popular with the surgeons and housemen, and it was difficult to believe that even Florence Nightingale herself could have found too many faults with her efficient and experienced nursing. One of the doctors had spoken to her the previous evening, had sat in the nurses' common room with her doing a crossword puzzle; but, although he was probably the last person (apart from the murderer) to see her alive, there was no reason whatsoever to suspect that he'd had anything to do with her death. But somebody had. Somebody had strangled her brutally with her own belt and left her for dead on the floor by the side of her bed, from where she had later managed to crawl to the door of her room to try desperately to call for help. But no one had heard her, and no one had come.
   'I suppose we'd better see her?' said Morse dubiously, as they all trooped out of the Superintendent's office.
   In the cream-tiled police morgue, a constable pulled out a sliding container from a stainless-steel structure, and turned back the sheet from the face - white, waxy-textured and washed, the lolling bloodshot eyes bearing their chilling witness to the agony of her death. At the base of her neck and running up to her right ear was the hideous groove left by the belt.
   'Probably left-handed,' muttered Lewis, 'if he strangled her from the front, that is.' He turned towards Morse as he spoke', and noticed that the great man had his eyes shut.
   Five minutes later Morse was looking immeasurably happier as he sat in the anteroom surveying the contents of the murdered woman's pockets and handbag.
   'We should be able to check the handwriting easily enough,' said Lewis, as he saw Morse studying the letter from Kidlington.
   'We hardly need to, do we?' said Morse, putting it to one side and turning to the other contents of the handbag. There were two pocket diaries, a lady's handkerchief, a leather purse, three luncheon vouchers, and the usual bric-a-brac of feminine toiletry: perfume, nail-file, comb, hand-mirror, eye-shadow, lipstick and tissues.
   'Was she wearing much make-up when you found her?' asked Morse.
   The Superintendent frowned slightly and looked less than comfortable. 'I think she was wearing some, but - er. . . . '
   'I thought you said she'd just come off duty. They don't let 'em slink round the wards all tarted up, surely?'
   'You think she might have been expecting somebody?'
   Morse shrugged his shoulders. 'Possibility, isn't it?'
   'Mm.' The Superintendent nodded thoughtfully, and wondered why he hadn't thought of that himself; but Morse had brushed aside the cosmetics as if whatever interest they might momentarily have exercised over him was now a thing of the past.
   The purse contained six one-pound notes, about fifty pence in small change, and a local bus timetable. 'No driving licence' was Morse's only comment, and the Superintendent confirmed that as far as they knew she'd had no car since coming to work at the hospital.
   'She was pretty anxious to cover up her tracks, Super. Perhaps,' he added quietly, 'perhaps she was frightened that somebody would find her.' But again he seemed to lose interest in the line of thought upon which he had embarked, and proceeded to turn his attention to the two slim diaries, one for the current, one for the previous year.
   'She wasn't exactly a Samuel Pepys, I'm afraid,' said the Superintendent. 'The odd jotting here and there, but not much to go on as far as I can see.'
   Mrs Brenda Josephs had certainly started off the two years with admirable intentions, and the first few days of each of the two Januarys were fairly fully documented. But, even then, such aide-memoire entries as her 'Six fish fingers' or '8.30 Nurses' Social' seemed hardly likely to lead the Salop or the Oxon constabulary very much nearer to the apprehension of her murderer. The expression on Morse's face was mildly sour as he flicked rather aimlessly through the pages, and in truth he found little to hold his attention. On the day of Brenda's death he noticed the single entry 'Periods due'; rather pathetic, but of little consequence.
   Lewis, who hitherto had felt his contribution to the visit to have been less than positively constructive, picked up the diary for the previous year and examined it with his usual exaggerated care. The writing was neatly and clearly charactered, but for the most part so small that he found himself holding the diary at arm's length and squinting at it lop-sidedly. Against virtually every Sunday throughout the year up to mid-September were the letters 'SF', and these same letters were repeated at irregular intervals and on irregular week-days throughout the same period. 'SF'? The only thing he could think of was Science Fiction, but that was obviously wrong. There was something else, though. From July up until late September there was a series of 'P's, written (almost imperceptibly) in pencil in the ruled blue lines which separated the days of the month from each other. And the day was always a Wednesday.
   'What does "SF' stand for, sir?'
   'Saint Frideswide's,' said Morse without a moment's thought.
   Yes. That must be it. Harry Josephs (as Lewis now recalled) had been disqualified from driving, and it was his wife's duty to take him down to the church in her own car. That fitted all right. Sunday mornings for the big service of the week, and then, at intermittent intervals, the mid-week days whenever some prestigious saint or other held an anniversary. That was it. No doubt about it.
   'What does "P" stand for, sir?'
   Morse reeled them off with the fluency of a man who had devoted too many hours of his life to the solving of crosswords: 'soft', 'president', 'prince', 'page', 'participle'.
   'Nothing else?'
   'Phosphorus?'
   Lewis shook his head. 'Probably the initial of someone's name. It's a capital "P".'
   'Let's have a look, Lewis.'
   'Could be "Paul", sir? Paul Morris?'
   'Or Peter Morris - if she's a paedophile.'
   'Pardon?'
   'Nothing.'
   'Always on Wednesdays, though, sir. Perhaps she suddenly decided she wanted to see him more often— '
   'And her old man was in the way and so she bumped him off?'
   'I've heard of odder things. She said she'd nipped off to the pictures that night, didn't she?'
   'Mm.' Morse's interest appeared to be engaged at last. 'How much does it cost to go to the pictures these days?'
   'Dunno, sir. A quid? One-fifty?'
   'Expensive for her, wasn't it? She couldn't have been there much more than an hour, at the most.'
   'If she went, sir. I mean, she mightn't have gone to the pictures at all. She might have just crept quietly back into the church and— '
   Morse nodded. 'You're quite right. She probably had the best motive of the lot of 'em. But you're forgetting something. The door creaks like hell.'
   'Only the north door.'
   'Really?' But Morse had clearly lost all interest in creaking doors, and Lewis found himself once more wondering why they'd bothered to come all this way. Nothing had been learned. No progress had been made.
   'There's another "P", isn't there?' said Morse suddenly. 'We've forgotten Philip Lawson.'
   Yes, Lewis had forgotten Philip Lawson; but where on earth was he supposed to fit into this particular picture?
   The constable packed up Brenda Morris' possessions, replaced them in their plastic bags, and redeposited the bags in a labelled cabinet. Morse thanked the Superintendent for his co-operation, shook hands with him, and got into the car beside Lewis.
   It was on the Kidderminster road about six or seven miles south of Shrewsbury that a wave of chilling excitement, starting from the bottom of the back, gradually crept up to the nape of Morse's neck. He tried to conceal the agitation of his mind as he questioned Lewis. 'Did you say that Brenda Josephs marked off the days when she took her husband to church?'
   'Looked like it, sir. And quite a few times apart from Sundays.'
   ' "SF", you said. She put "SF"?'
   'That's about it, sir. As you said, it's "St Frideswide's". Not much doubt about that.' He turned suddenly and glanced at Morse, who was staring with extraordinary intensity into the outer darkness of the night. 'Unless, of course, you think it stands for something else?'
   'No, no. It doesn't stand for anything else.' And then, very quietly, he said. Turn round, please. We're going back.'
   The luminous dial on the fascia board showed half-past ten, just gone, and things were running way behind even the most pessimistic schedule. But Lewis turned round at the earliest possible opportunity. He also was a man under authority.
   The constable in the police mortuary re-opened the cabinet and shook out the contents of the plastic bags once more. They were always a funny lot - these fellows from other forces.
   Morse managed to keep his hand from shaking as he picked up the earlier of the two diaries and turned to the one specific page. And as he looked at the page the blood seemed to congeal in his jowls, and a slow smile of joyous satisfaction formed about his mouth.
   'Thank you very much, constable. Thank you very much. You don't think I could take this diary?'
   'I don't know about that, sir. The Super's gone off now and— '
   Morse held up his right hand like a priest delivering the benediction. 'Forget it! Doesn't matter!' He turned quickly to Lewis. 'See that?' He pointed to the space for Monday, 26 September, the day on which Harry Josephs had been murdered; and Lewis' forehead creased into a frown as he looked at it, and then looked at it again. The space was completely blank.
   'You remember your Sherlock Holmes, Lewis?' But whether or not Lewis was familiar with the works of that great man was not immediately apparent, for clearly Morse himself had a good many passages of Holmesian dialogue by heart, and before Lewis could reply he proceeded to recite one:
   '"Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention."
   ' "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
   ' "The dog did nothing in the night-time."
   ' "That was the curious incident." '
   'I see,' said Lewis, seeing not.
   'How fast will she go?' asked Morse as he clambered into the police car once more.
   'About ninety - bit more - on the straight.'
   'Well, put the flasher on and start the siren up. We must get back to Oxford quickly, all right?'
   The car sped through the darkened countryside, down through Bridgnorth and Kidderminster, along the old Worcester Road to Evesham, and then in an almost incredibly short time back to Oxford. An hour and a half - almost to the minute.
   'Back to the station, is it?' asked Lewis as he turned into the Northern Ring Road.

   'No. Take me straight home, Lewis. I'm tired out.'
   'But I thought you said— '
   'Not tonight, Lewis. I'm dead beat.' He winked at Lewis and slammed the door of the Ford behind him. 'Good fun, wasn't it? Sleep tight! We've got work to do in the morning.'
   Lewis himself drove off home happily. His honest soul had very few vices - but fast driving was certainly one of them.

Chapter Thirty-one

   Perhaps the events of the past few days had disturbed the Reverend Keith Meiklejohn rather less than they should have done; and being an honest man the realisation of this was worrying to him. It was true that, inducted as he had been only in the previous November, he had not known the Morris family personally, and could not therefore be expected to react too keenly to the tragic discoveries of what (if rumour were to be believed) were the bodies of father and son. Yet as he sat in his study at 9.30 a.m. on Tuesday morning he knew that his compassion should have been engaged more deeply, and he wondered about himself; wondered about his church, too.
   Meiklejohn was a robust, well-built man, forty-one years of age and happily unmarried. His childhood had been spent in a family household brimming with evangelical piety, and one forever frequented by inveterate god-botherers and born-again Baptists. From his earliest years the promises of eternal life and the terrors of the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone had been as real to him as liquorice allsorts and the landscape of his Dorset home. In his early youth, whilst his classmates discussed the prospects of their favourite football teams or the merits of their new racing bikes, young Keith had grown zealous over matters ecclesiastical and theological, and by the age of sixteen the way ahead was quite clear: he was destined to take holy orders. As a young curate he had at first been moderately low-church in his views on the liturgy and the sacraments; but gradually he had been more and more attracted towards the doctrines of the Oxford Movement, and at one point he had come within a communion wafer of conversion to the Roman Church. But all that was in the past. With a new-found balance, he discovered he could tread the tight-rope of High Anglicanism with security and confidence, and it was pleasing to him that his congregation appeared to think well of him for doing so. His predecessor, Lionel Lawson, had not (it seemed) found universal favour with an ecclesiastical stance that was decidedly more middle-and-leg than middle-and-off. In fact, when Lawson's curate, some five years earlier, had been promoted to a parish of his own there had been no request to the Bishop for a replacement, and Lawson himself had coped single-handed with the manifold duties of St Frideswide's parish. Inevitably, of course, there had been cuts in services, and it was Meiklejohn's resolve to restore as soon as possible the daily masses at 11.15 a.m. and 6.15 p.m. which were a wholly necessary feature (as he saw things) of a church that was dedicated to the glory of God.
   Yet, as he sat at the ancient roll-top desk, the page over which his pen had been poised for several minutes remained blank. It was high time he preached again on transubstantiation: a tricky issue, of course, but one that was vital for the spiritual health of the brethren. But could that sermon wait, perhaps? His limp-leather copy of the Holy Writ lay open before him at the book of Hosea. A marvellous and memorable piece of writing! It was almost as if the Almighty himself had not really known what to do with his people when their goodness and mercy were as evanescent as the mists or the early dews that melted away in the morning sun. Was the Church in danger of losing its love? For without love the worship of God and the care of the brethren was little more than sounding brass and tinkling cymbals. . . . Yes, a possible sermon was just beginning to shape itself nicely. Not too forcefully expressed: nothing to smack too strongly of the stumping pulpit-thumper. But then another verse caught his eye from an earlier chapter of the same prophecy: 'Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone.' Another striking verse! Idolaters were, after all, those within the Church - not those outside it. Those who worshipped, but who worshipped a false representation of God. And not just the golden calf, either. There was always a danger that other representations could get in the way of true worship: yes - he had to admit it! - things like incense and candles and holy water and crossings and genuflections, and all the sheer apparatus of ceremonial which could perhaps clog up the cleansing power of the Holy Spirit. It was possible, too - only too easy, in fact - to be blinded to the spiritual health of the Church by the arithmetical aggregation of its membership, especially when he considered (as he did with pride) the undoubted increase in the numbers attending divine worship since his own arrival. The records showed that there had been times under Lawson's régime when attendance had been just a little disappointing; and indeed some occasions in midweek when it had been difficult to muster much of a congregation at all! But God didn't just count heads - or so Meiklejohn told himself; and he pondered again the central problem that had dominated his earlier thinking: should he not be more concerned than he was about the spiritual health of his church?
   He was still undecided about the text of his next sermon, the page still blank beneath his pen, the disturbing words of the prophet Hosea still lying before him, when the door-bell rang.
   Had it been the will of Providence that he had been pondering the state of St Frideswide's soul? At the very least, it was an uncanny coincidence that his visitor was soon asking him the very same questions he had been asking himself; asking them pretty bluntly, too.
   'You had a big congregation last Sunday, sir.'
   'About usual, Inspector.'
   'I've heard that you get even more people than Lawson did.'
   'Perhaps so. Certainly in the week, I think.'
   'The crowds are flocking back, so to speak?'
   'You make it sound like a football match.'
   'Bit more interesting than the last football match I saw, I hope.'
   'And one doesn't have to queue up at the turnstiles, Inspector.'
   'You keep a fairly accurate record of the congregations, though?'
   Meiklejohn nodded. 'I've continued my predecessor's practice in that respect.'
   'Not in all respects?'
   Meiklejohn was aware of the Inspector's blue eyes upon him. 'What are you trying to say?'
   'Was Lawson lower-church in his views than you are?'
   'I didn't know him.'
   'But he was?'
   'He had views, I believe, which were - er. . . . '
   'Lower-church?'
   'Er - that might be a way of putting it, yes.'
   'I noticed you had three priests in church on Sunday morning, sir.'
   'You've still got quite a lot to learn about us, Inspector. There were myself and my curate. The sub-deacon need not be in holy orders.'
   'Three's a bit more than the usual ration, though, isn't it?'
   'There are no ration-books when it comes to divine worship.'
   'Did Lawson have a curate?'
   'For the first part of his time here, he did. The parish is a large one, and in my view should always have a curate.'
   'Lawson was on his own, then - for the last few years?'
   'He was.'
   'Did you ever hear, sir, that Lawson might have been a fraction too fond of the choirboys?'
   'I - I think it quite improper for you or for me to— '
   'I met his former headmaster recently,' interrupted Morse, a new note of authority in his voice. 'I felt he was concealing something, and I guessed what it was: the fact that Lionel Lawson had been expelled from school.'
   'You're sure of that?'
   Morse nodded. 'I rang the old boy up today and put it to him. He told me I was right.'
   'Expelled for homosexuality, you say?'
   'He refused to confirm that,' said Morse slowly. 'He also refused to deny it, I'm afraid, and I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions. Look, sir. I want to assure you that whatever you may have to tell me will be treated in the strictest confidence. But it's my duty as a police officer to ask you once again. Have you heard any rumours that Lawson was at all inclined to that sort of thing?'
   Meiklejohn looked down at his feet and picked his words with uneasy care. 'I've heard one or two rumours, yes. But I don't myself think that Lawson was an active homosexual.'
   'Just a passive one, you mean.'
   Meiklejohn looked up, and spoke with quiet conviction: 'It is my view that the Reverend Mr Lawson was not a homosexual.
   I am, of course, sometimes wrong, Inspector. But in this case I think I am right.'
   'Thank you,' said Morse, in the tone of a man who says 'Thank you for nothing'. He looked round the room at the bookshelves, lined with rows of theological works, the spines of most of them either dark-blue or brown. It was in this dark and sombre room that Lawson himself would have sat, probably for several hours each day, during his ten-year ministry at St Frideswide's. What had really gone wrong here? What strange tales of the human heart and the deep abyss of human consciousness could these walls and these books tell, if only they had tongues to speak to him? Could Meiklejohn tell him any more? Oh, yes, he could. There was just that one final question, the most vital question he would ask in the whole case. It was the question which had suddenly sprung to life in his mind the previous evening on the road just a few miles south of Shrewsbury.
   He took from his pocket the now-crumpled Parish Notes for April.
   'You print one of these every month?'
   'Yes.'
   'Do you' - this was it, and his mouth seemed suddenly to grow dry as he asked it - 'do you keep copies of them from previous years?'
   'Of course. It's a great help in compiling the Parish Notes to have the previous year's copy. Not so much with the Easter period, of course, but— '
   'Can I look at last year's Notes, please, sir?'
   Meiklejohn walked over to one of the bookshelves and took out a loose-leafed folder. 'Which month's copy do you want?' His eyes reflected a shrewd intelligence. 'September, perhaps?'
   'September,' said Morse.
   'Here we are, yes. July, August. . . . ' He stopped and looked a little puzzled. 'October, November. . . . ' He turned back to January and went very carefully through the issues once more. 'It's not here, Inspector,' he said slowly. 'It's not here. I wonder....'
   Morse was wondering, too. But - please! - it wouldn't be too difficult to find a copy somewhere, would it? They must have printed a few hundred - whoever 'they' were.
   'Who prints these for you, sir?'
   'Some little man in George Street.'
   'He'd surely keep the originals, wouldn't he?'
   'I'd have thought so.'
   'Can you find out for me — straightaway?'
   'Is it that urgent?' asked Meikiejohn quietly.
   'I think it is.'
   'You could always check up from the church register, Inspector.'
   'The what?'
   'We keep a register in the vestry. Every service - I think it is a service you're looking for? - every service is recorded there. The time, the type of service, the minister officiating, the offertory - even the number of the congregation, although I must admit that's a bit of a rough guess sometimes.'
   Morse allowed himself an exultant grin. His hunch had been right, then! The clue for which he'd been searching was where he'd always thought it would be - under his very nose inside the church itself. The next time he had a hunch, he decided, he would pursue it with a damned sight more resolution than he had done this one. For the moment, however, he said nothing. He was there - almost there anyway - and he felt the thrill of a man who knows that he has seven draws up on the football pools and is just going out to buy a sports paper to discover the result of the eighth match.
   The two men walked down the wide staircase and into the hallway, where Meiklejohn took his coat from the clothes-stand, stained dark brown like almost every other item of furniture in the large, echoing vicarage.
   'A lot of room here,' said Morse as they stepped out into the street.
   Again the Vicar's eyes flashed with intelligence. 'What you mean to say is that I ought to turn it into a hostel, is that it?'
   'Yes, I do,' replied Morse bluntly. 'I understand your predecessor used to take in a few waifs and strays now and then.'
   'I believe he did, Inspector. I believe he did.'
   They parted at George Street, and Morse, in a state of suppressed excitement, and already fingering the heavy church-keys in his raincoat pocket, walked on down Cornmarket to St Frideswide's.

Chapter Thirty-two

   Just as Meiklejohn had said, the bulky, leather-bound register stood on its shelf in the vestry, and Morse felt the same amalgam of anxiety and expectation with which as a schoolboy he had opened the envelopes containing his examination results: any second - and he would know. The pages of the register were marked in faded blue lines, about a third of an inch apart, with each line, stretched across the double page, quite sufficient to accommodate the necessary information. On the left-hand page were written the day, the date, and the time of the service, followed by some brief specification of the particular saint's day, feast day, et cetera; on the right-hand page the record was continued with details of the type of service celebrated, the number present in the congregation, the amount taken at the offertory, and lastly the name (almost always the signature) of the minister, or ministers, officiating. Doubtless in a church permeated by a more fervent evangelicalism, there would have been the biblical reference of the text which the preacher had sought to propound; but Morse was more than delighted with the information he found in front of him. The register had fallen open at the current month and he noted the last entry: 'Monday, 3rd April. 7.30 p.m. St Richard of Chichester. Low Mass. 19. £5.35. Keith Meiklejohn M.A. (Vicar).' Then he turned back a thickish wadge of the book's heavy pages. A little too far, though: July, the previous year. On through August, and his heart suddenly seemed to sink within him as the thought flashed into his mind that someone might well have torn out the page he was seeking. But no! There it was now, staring him in the face: 'Monday, 26th Sept. 7.30 p.m. The Conversion of St Augustine. Solemn Mass. 13. - . Lionel Lawson M.A. (Vicar).' For several minutes Morse stared at the entry with a blank fixity. Had he been wrong after all? For there it was, all printed out in Lawson's own hand - the precise details of the service at which Josephs had been murdered: the date and time, the occasion, the type of service (which, of course, accounted for Paul Morris' presence), the number in the congregation, the offertory (the sum quite naturally unknown and unrecorded, except perhaps for a few brief seconds in Josephs' brain before he met his death), and then Lawson's signature. All there. All in order. What had Morse hoped to find there? Surely he had not expected the amount of the offertory to be recorded? That would have been an elementary mistake of such monumental stupidity on Lawson's part that if repeated in other aspects of his crime would have led to an arrest within a few hours by any even moderately competent detective. No. Morse had not been looking for any such mistake. The simple truth of the matter was that he'd expected there to be no entry at all.
   The door at the north porch creaked open, and Morse felt a sudden brief surge of primitive fear as he stood alone in the silent church. Somewhere, perhaps somewhere very near, there was a murderer still at large, watching every latest development with a vicious, calculating mind; watching even now, perhaps, and sensing that the police might be hovering perilously close to the truth. Morse walked on tiptoe to the heavy red curtain which cloaked the entrance to the vestry and cautiously peered through.
   It was Meiklejohn.
   'This is what you want, Inspector,' he said breezily. 'You must excuse me, if you will. We've got a service here at eleven.'
   He handed to Morse a single sheet of paper, printed on both sides in faded black ink, with rows of asterisks dividing up the Parish Notes for the previous September into a series of closely typed paragraphs, of which the first, in double columns, gave full details of that month's forthcoming (and, in one case, fatal) functions. Morse sat down in the back pew and looked down intently at the sheet.
   He was still looking down at the sheet several minutes later when Mrs Walsh-Atkins made her careful way down the central aisle, passing her left hand from pew-head to pew-head as she progressed, until finally settling herself in her accustomed seat where she knelt down, her forehead resting on the crook of her left arm, for a further protracted audience with the Almighty. A few other faithful souls had come in, all of them women, but Morse had not heard their entrances, and it was clear to him that the hinges on the door at the south porch had received a more recent oiling than those of its fellow at the north porch. He registered the point, as if it might be of some importance.
   Morse sat through the devotional service - literally 'sat'. He made no pretence to emulate the gestures and movements of the sprinkling of ageing ladies; but a neutral observer would have marked a look of faintly smiling contentment on his features long before Meiklejohn's solemn voice at last, at very long last intoned the benediction.
   'It was what you wanted, I hope, Inspector?' Meiklejohn was leaning forward over the low table in the vestry, writing down the details of the service in the register with his right hand, his left unfastening the long row of buttons down his cassock.
   'Yes, it was, and I'm most grateful to you. There's just one more thing, sir. Can you tell me anything about St Augustine?'
   Meiklejohn blinked and looked round. 'St Augustine? Which St Augustine?'
   'You tell me.'
   'There were two St Augustines. St Augustine of Hippo, who lived about A.D. 400 or thereabouts. He's chiefly famous for Ms Confessions — as you'll know, Inspector. The other one is St Augustine of Canterbury, who lived a couple of hundred years or so later. He's the one who brought Christianity to Britain. I've got several books you could borrow if— '
   'Do you know when either of 'em was converted?'
   'Converted? Er - no, I'm afraid I don't. In fact I wasn't aware that there was any such biographical data - certainly not about our own St Augustine anyway. But as I say— '
   'Which one of 'em do you celebrate here, sir?' Upon Meiklejohn's answer, as Morse now knew, hung all the law and the prophets, and the light-blue eyes that fixed the Vicar were almost hostile in their unblinking anticipation.
   'We've never celebrated either of them,' said Meiklejohn simply. 'Perhaps we should. But we can't have an unlimited succession of special days. If we did, none of them would be "special", if you follow me. "When everyone is somebody, then no one's anybody." '
   Phew!
   After Meiklejohn had left, Morse hurriedly checked the three previous years' entries for September in the register, and almost purred with pleasure. The institution of any celebration to mark the conversion of one or other of the great Augustines had only begun - if it had begun at all - in the September of the previous year. Under the Reverend Lionel Lawson!
   As Morse was about to leave the church, he saw that Mrs Walsh-Atkins had finally risen from her knees, and he walked back to help her.
   'You're a faithful old soul, aren't you?' he said gently.
   'I come to all the services I can, Inspector.'
   Morse nodded. 'You know, it's surprising really that you weren't here the night when Mr Josephs was murdered.'
   The old lady smiled rather sadly. 'I suppose I must have forgotten to look at the Parish Notes that week. That's one of the troubles of growing old, I'm afraid - your memory just seems to go.'
   Morse escorted her to the door and watched her as she walked away up to the Martyrs' Memorial. Had he wished, he could have told her not to worry too much about forgetting things. At the very least there had been no error of memory on her part over the Parish Notes for the previous September. For in those same notes, the notes which Meiklejohn had just found for him, there was not a single word about the service at which Josephs would be murdered.

Chapter Thirty-three

   Lewis had spent a busy morning. He had co-ordinated arrangements with the Coroner's Sergeant for the forthcoming inquests on the Morrises, père et fils; he had written a full report on the Shrewsbury trip; and he had just come back from acquainting a rapidly recovering Bell with the latest developments in the case when Morse himself returned from St Frideswide's, looking tense yet elated.
   'What time does the Oxford Mail go to press, Lewis?'
   'First edition about now, I should think.'
   'Get me the editor on the blower, will you? Quick! I've got some news for him.'
   Morse very hastily scribbled a few notes, and when Lewis handed him the phone he was ready.
   'I want this in tonight's Mail, is that clear? Absolutely vital. And what's more it's got to go on the front page somewhere. Got your pencil ready? Here goes. Headline: ARREST IMMINENT IN ST FRIDESWIDE'S MURDER HUNT. Got that? Good. Now here's your copy. Exactly as I tell you. I don't want any sub-editor buggering about with so much as a comma. "The Oxford police today reported that their long investigation into the murder last September of Mr Harry Josephs is now virtually complete stop The further deaths at St Frideswide's reported in these columns last week are now known to be connected with the earlier murder comma and the bodies discovered comma one on the tower and one in the crypt of the church comma have been positively identified as those of Mr Paul Morris comma formerly music-master of the Roger Bacon School Kidlington comma and of his son Peter Morris comma former pupil of the same school and a member of the church choir stop The police confirmed also that a woman found murdered last week in a nurses' genitive plural hostel in Shrewsbury was Mrs Brenda Josephs comma wife of Mr Harry Josephs stop Chief Inspector Morse capital M-o-r-s-e of the Thames Valley Constabulary told reporters today that public response to earlier appeals for information had been extremely encouraging comma and that evidence is now almost complete." No. Change that last bit: "and that only one more key witness remains to come forward before the evidence is complete stop In any case an arrest is confidently expected within the next forty hyphen eight hours stop" End of copy. You got all that? Front page, mind, and give it a good big headline - about the same size type you use when Oxford United win.'
   'When did that last happen?' asked the editor.
   Morse put down the phone and turned to Lewis. 'And here's a little printing job for you. Get it typed and stick it on the outside of the south door at St Frideswide's.'
   Lewis looked down at what Morse had written: 'Because of imminent danger from falling masonry immediately above the inside of the porch, this door must on no account be opened until further notice.'
   'Come back as soon as you've done that, Lewis. There are a few things I've got to tell you.'
   Lewis stood up and tapped the note with his fingers. 'Why don't we just lock the door, sir?'
   'Because there's only one lock on it, that's why.'
   For once Lewis refused to rise to the bait, put a clean white sheet of paper into the typewriter carriage, and turned the ribbon to 'red'.

   The hump-backed surgeon put his head round the door of Bell's office just after 3 p.m., and found Morse and Lewis in earnest conversation.
   'Won't interrupt you, Morse. Just thought you ought to know we're not much forrader with that fellow you found up the tower. I dunno as we're ever going to be certain, you know.'
   Morse seemed neither surprised nor overmuch interested. 'Perhaps you're getting too old for the job.'
   'Not surprising, Morse, old son. We're all ageing at the standard rate of twenty-four hours per diem, as you know.'
   Before Morse could reply, he was gone, and Lewis felt glad that the interruption was so brief. For once in the case he knew exactly (well, almost exactly) where they were and why they were there.

   It was just after half-past four when one of the paper-boys from the Summertown Newsagents turned into Manning Terrace on his racing-bicycle, the drop handlebars (in one of the stranger perversions of fashion) turned upward. Without dismounting he took a copy of the Oxford Mail from the canvas bag thrown over his shoulder, folded it expertly in one hand, rode up to the door of number 7, and stuck it through the letter-box. Four doors in a row next, all on the right-hand side, starting with number 14A, where Ruth Rawlinson was just inserting her Yale key after an afternoon's shopping in Oxford.
   She took the paper from the boy, put it under her right arm, and carried the two fully laden shopping-bags into the house.
   'Is that you, Ruthie dear?'
   'Yes, Mother.'
   'Is the paper come?'
   'Yes, Mother.'
   'Bring it with you, dear.'
   Ruth put her carrier-bags down on the kitchen table, draped her mackintosh over a chair, walked into the lounge, bent down to kiss her mother lightly on the cheek, placed the newspaper on her lap, turned up the gas-fire, almost commented on the weather, wondered why she hadn't already gone mad, realised that tomorrow was Wednesday - oh God! How much longer would she be able to stand all this - her mother, and him? Especially him. There was little enough she could do about her mother, but she could do something about him. She just wouldn't go - it was as simple as that.
   'Ruth! Come and read this!' said her mother.
   Ruth read through the front-page article. Oh my God!

   The man seated on the deep sofa, its chintz covers designed in the russet-and-white floral pattern, was not surprised by the factual material reported in the front-page article, but he was deeply worried by its implications. He read the article through many, many times and always would his eyes linger on the same lines: 'only one more key witness remains to come forward before evidence is complete. In any case an arrest is confidently expected within the next forty-eight hours.' It was the piece about the 'key witness' which he found the more disturbing. Himself he could look after without help from anyone, but. ... In a flash, as always, the decision was taken. Yes, it had to be tomorrow - tomorrow morning. It would be tomorrow morning.

   It was not only Ruth Rawlinson, therefore, who had decided to miss the regular Wednesday-evening rendezvous. Someone else had now made exactly the same decision for her.

Chapter Thirty-four

   At five minutes past ten the next morning, Ruth Rawlinson was not so wholly preoccupied with other things that she failed to notice and to admire the baskets of daffodils that bedecked the lamp-standards all the way along St Giles'. But if the morning was bright and sunny, her own mood was full of dark foreboding, for affairs were getting terrifyingly out of hand. Having been informed of the identities of the two bodies found at St Frideswide's, having learned of the death of Brenda Josephs, and knowing in any case far more than the police could know, her thoughts were in constant and grievous agitation. What was to stop her, at this very second, from cycling straight on through Cornmarket and down St Aldates to the Oxford City Police H.Q.? In any case, it was her duty to do so. It had always been her moral duty, but it was something more than that now: it was a personal cry for help as the walls began to close in around her. Five minutes earlier, when she had left Manning Terrace, her firm resolve had been to go to see Morse immediately and tell him the whole tragic tale. But that resolution was now crumbling, and she told herself that she needed a chance to think things out a little more clearly; a chance to brace herself emotionally, before plunging her own life, and thereby her mother's life, too, into utter ruin and desolation. Yes. She needed time - just a little more time. She propped her bicycle against the wall of the south porch, fastened the lock through the rear wheel, and then saw the notice on the door, pinned rather too high and typed in red capitals. Registering no particular surprise, Ruth Rawlinson walked round to the door at the north porch. It was open.

   From the sub-manager's office on the top floor of the large store almost opposite, Lewis followed Ruth's progress with his binoculars - just as he had followed the progress of the others who had entered the church since 8.45 a.m., when the door at the north porch had first been unlocked. But they had been few, and his task had been far easier than he could have imagined. A flamboyantly dressed group of what looked from above like American tourists had gone in at 9.10 a.m.: ten of them. And at 9.22 a.m. ten of them had emerged into the sunlight and drifted off towards Radcliffe Square. At 9.35 a.m. a solitary white-haired lady had gone in, and had come out, her morning devotions completed, about ten minutes later. During the same time, a tall, bearded youth, carrying an extraordinarily large transistor radio, had gone in, only to make his exit some twenty seconds later, doubtless (as it appeared to Lewis) having mistaken the place for somewhere else. That was all - until Lewis recognised Ruth Rawlinson. He'd accepted the offer of a cup of coffee five minutes after she'd gone in, but had kept his binoculars trained on the north entrance, even refusing to turn round to express his thanks. This, if Morse were right (and Lewis thought he was), could be the vital time. Yet half an hour later it hardly seemed as if it were going to be so. There had been no further visitors, if one discounted, that is, an innocent-looking white-haired terrier which had urinated against the west wall.

   Some of the daffodils on the sides of the altar steps were now well past their prime, and Ruth picked them out, neatly rearranging the remainder, and mentally deciding to buy some more. She then walked boustrophedon along the pews on either side of the main aisle, replacing on their hooks whatever loose hassocks had been left on the floor, flicking the pew-ledges with a yellow duster, and at the same time collecting a few stray hymn-books and prayer-books. At one point she peered curiously up at the stonework above the south porch, but was unable to identify any visible signs of impending collapse.

   Morse watched her with mixed emotions. He watched her large eyes and her full sensitive lips, and he realised once again how attractive she could have been to him. Even her little mannerisms were potentially endearing: the way she would blow a stray wisp of hair away from her face; the way she would stand, her hands on her waist, with something approaching pride on her face after completing one of her humble tasks. And yet, at the same time, he was conscious that she was in far more imminent danger than the masonry above the south porch was ever likely to be. If he was right (which after 10.20 a.m. he was beginning to doubt somewhat), Ruth Rawlinson was not likely to die in her nightdress, but in the very church in which he was now sitting, carefully concealed behind the dull-red curtain of the confessional. His intermittent fears that she would decide to spring-clean his own observation-post had hitherto proved groundless; but now, arms akimbo, she was looking searchingly around her. Did it matter all that much, though, if she did find him? He could explain as best he could - even take her over to the Randolph for a drink, perhaps. Yet he was glad when he heard the tell-tale clatterings and the drumming of cold water into the bottom of the scrubbing-bucket.
   Several members of the public had entered the church during this time, and at each clinking of the latch and creaking of the door Morse felt the tension rise within him - only to fall again as the visitors stared rather vacantly around them, fumbled through the church literature, and without exception departed again within ten minutes of their arrival. Lewis had seen them go in; seen them leave, too - the coffee long since cold at his elbow. But Morse's own vigilance was becoming progressively less keen, and he began to feel just a little bored. The only book within arm's reach was a stiff-backed Bible, whose pages he now turned desultorily, thinking back as he did so to his youth. Something had gone sadly wrong somewhere with his own spiritual development, for he had almost completely lost his early ebullient faith and he now had to confess that when faced with the overwhelming difficulties of forming any coherent philosophy of life and death he had come to regard the teachings of the Church as so much gobbledegook. He could be wrong, of course. Probably was wrong - just as he was probably wrong about this morning. Yet it had seemed such a logical time - certainly the time he would have chosen had he found himself in the murderer's shoes.
   At some point in his musings, he thought he had heard a twanging metallic noise, but only now did it register fully. Could it have been the north door being locked? If so, it must surely have been locked from the outside. Yes. Blast it! He'd forgotten that notice about the recent vandalism, and someone must have come and locked the place up. But surely that someone would have looked into the church first? There was Ruth in there, for a start, although she probably had a key herself. Did she have a set of keys? What about any others who were in the church? If Ruth hadn't got a key, they'd all be shut up in there, wouldn't they?
   Morse was only too conscious how woolly and confused his thinking was becoming - when he suddenly froze in his seat. He heard a man's voice, very close to him. It said, 'Hello, Ruth!' That was all. Quite a pleasant voice by the sound of it, but it seemed to turn Morse's blood to ice. Someone must have locked the door all right. From the inside.

Chapter Thirty-five

   'What are you doing in here?' she asked sharply. 'I didn't hear you come in.'
   'No, you wouldn't would you? I've been here a long time. Up on the tower. It's cold up there; but you get a wonderful view, and I like looking down on things - and people.'
   (Oh, Lewis! If only your eyes had not been focused quite so closely on the door!)
   'But you must go! You can't stay here! You shouldn't be out at all!'
   'You worry too much.' He laid a hand on her shoulder as they stood together in the central aisle, arid pulled her towards him.
   'Don't be silly!' she whispered harshly. 'I've told you - we agreed— '
   'The door's locked, my beauty, have no fear. I locked it myself, you see. There's only the two of us here, so why don't we sit down for a little while?'
   She pushed his hand from her, 'I've told you. It's got to finish.' Her lips were quivering with emotion, and she was very close to tears. 'I can't take any more of this, I just can't! You've got to go away from here. You've got to!'
   'Of course I have. That's exactly what I've come to see you for - can't you understand that? Just sit down, that's all. Not too much to ask, is it, Ruth?' His voice was silkily persuasive.
   She sat down and the man sat next to her, no more than ten feet or so from the confessional. (The man's heavy brown shoes, as Morse could now see, were of good quality, but appeared not to have been cleaned for many weeks.) For some time neither of them spoke as the man's left arm rested across the back of the pew, the hand lightly gripping her shoulder. (The finger-nails, as Morse could now see, were clean and well manicured, reminding him of a clergyman's nails.)
   'You read the article,' she said flatly. It was not a question.
   'We both read the article.'
   'You must tell me the truth - I don't care what you say, but you must tell me the truth. Did you - ' (her voice was faltering now) ' - did you have anything to do with all that?'
   'Me? You must be joking! You can't honestly believe that - surely you can't, Ruth!' (The man, as Morse could now see, wore a pair of dingy grey flannels, and above them a large khaki-green jumper, with leather shoulder-patches, reaching up to the neck in such a way that it was not clear whether or not he wore a tie.)
   Ruth was leaning forward, her elbows on the top edge of the pew in front of her, her head in her hands. From the look of her she might well be praying, and Morse guessed that she probably was. 'You're not telling me the truth. You're not. It was you who killed them! All of them! I know you did.' She was a lost soul now, uncaring in the bitter depths of her misery as she buried her head in her hands. Morse, as he watched her, felt a profound and anguished compassion welling up within him; yet he knew that he must wait. The previous day he had guessed at the truth behind the grim succession of tragedies, and here and now that very same truth was working itself out, not more than a few yards away from him.
   The man made no denial of the charges spoken against him, but his right hand seemed to be working round his throat, his face momentarily turned away. (The face, as Morse had already noticed, was that of a man in his late forties - or early fifties perhaps, for both the long, unkempt, blackish hair and the beard which covered his face were heavily streaked with white and grey.)
   Here it all was, then - in front of him. It was all so very simple, too - so childishly simple that Morse's mind, as always, had refused to believe it and had insisted instead on trying to find (and, indeed, almost finding) the weirdest, most complex solutions. Why, oh, why, just for once in a while was he not willing to accept and come to terms with the plain, incontrovertible facts of any case - the facts that stared him point-blank in the face and simply shrieked out for a bit of bread-and-butter common sense and application? The man sitting here now, next to Ruth Rawlinson? Well, Morse? Of course it was! It was Lionel Lawson's brother - Philip Lawson; the man so despised in the stories of clever detection, the man so despised by Morse himself; the man who committed a not-very-clever crime for the very meanest of rewards; the layabout, the sponger and the parasite, who had bedevilled his longsuffering brother's life from their earliest schooldays together; the cleverer boy, the more popular boy, the favourite - the boy who had grown up without a thread of moral fibre in his being, the boy who had wasted his considerable substance on riotous living, and who had come back to prey once more upon his wretched brother Lionel; come back, with a complete knowledge of his brother's life and his brother's weaknesses; come back with threats of betrayal and public exposure - threats which Lionel had paid off with help and kindness and compassion and, doubtless, with money, too. And then - yes, and then came the time when Lionel himself, for once in his life, had desperately needed the help of his worthless brother, and was more than prepared to pay for it; the time when the two brothers had planned the execution and arranged the subsequent cover-up of Harry Josephs' murder, a murder planned meticulously at the very moment when Paul Morris had just opened the diapason stop on the organ, and was doubtless drowning the church with the last verse of 'Praise to the Holiest in the Height' or something. f f f.
   These were the thoughts that flashed across Morse's mind in that instant, with the multiple murderer sitting there just in front of him, his left arm still resting along the back of the pew his right hand still fumbling with something round his neck; and Ruth still bending forward in her posture of semi-supplication still so pathetically vulnerable.
   Then, even as he watched, Morse felt his every muscle tense in readiness as the adrenalin coursed through his body. The fingers of the man's left hand were holding the narrower end of a tie, a dark navy-blue tie with broad diagonal scarlet stripes bordered by very much thinner ones of green and yellow; and as Morse watched the scene being enacted immediately before his eyes his mind came to a dead stop in its tracks, seemed to turn a reverse somersault and to land in a state of complete stupefaction.
   But the time for thought was past; already the man's left hand had looped the tie round the woman's neck; already the right hand was moving to meet it - and Morse acted. It was ill luck that the low door of the confessional opened inwards, for he had to clamber awkwardly in the narrow space and by the time he was out the element of surprise was gone; and as the tourniquet was already tightening about Ruth's throat she cried a terrible cry.
   'Keep your distance!' snarled the man, springing to his feet and dragging Ruth up with him, the tie cutting cruelly into her neck. 'You heard me! Keep it there! Not a step farther or else— '
   Morse hardly heard him. He lunged desperately at the pair of them, and Ruth fell heavily in the central aisle as Morse seized the man's right arm and tried with all his considerable strength to twist it behind his back. But with almost ridiculous ease his adversary shook himself clear and stood there, a vicious hatred blazing in his eyes.
   'I know you,' said Morse, panting heavily. 'And you know who I am, don't you?'
   'Yes, I know you, you bastard!'
   'There's no sense in trying anything - I've got my men all round the church - ' (the words were coming out in a series of breathless snatches) 'there's no way for you to get out of here - no way at all - now - now please be sensible - I'm going to take you from here - there's nothing to worry about.'
   For a while the man stood quite motionless, only his eyes roving about in their sockets as if weighing the situation with a frenetic logicality, as if searching for some desperate remedy. Then something seemed to snap in the man, as if the glaze that suddenly dilated the eyes had effaced the very last vestiges of any rational thought. He turned swiftly, almost athletically, on his heel, and with his descending peal of maniacal laughter echoing under the vaulted roof he ran to the back of the church and disappeared behind the curtains of the vestry.
   At that point (as Lewis later protested) Morse could have chosen several more logical courses of action than the one which he in fact pursued. He could have gone to the door at the north porch and signalled Lewis immediately; he could have led Ruth from the church and locked the door behind him, with his quarry cornered and powerless; he could have sent Ruth, if sufficiently recovered, to get help, and himself stayed where he was, performing no more than a watchdog brief until that help arrived. But Morse did none of these things. He felt that strangely compelling and primitive instinct of the hunter for the hunted, and he walked almost boldly to the vestry where in a sudden flurry he flung the curtains aside on their rollers. No one was there. The only other doorway from the vestry led to the tower, and Morse walked across the parquet floor and tried the door. Locked. He took out his keys, selected the right one first time, unlocked the door and, standing cautiously to one side, pulled it open. On the lowest of the circular stone steps, he saw a man's greatcoat, long, shabby and dirty; and, placed neatly on top of it, a pair of dark sunglasses.

Chapter Thirty-six

   Traceries of blackened cobwebs lined the under-lintels of the stone steps above his head as step by step Morse ascended the circular stairway. He was conscious of no fear: it was as if his paranoiac acrophobia was temporarily suspended, subsumed by the saner, more immediate danger from the man somewhere above him. Up and up he climbed, the door to the bell-chamber just appearing on his right when he heard the voice from high above him.
   'Keep going, Mr Morse. Lovely view from the top.'
   'I want to talk to you,' shouted Morse. He put his hands out to the walls on either side of him and looked upwards towards the tower. For a second his balance threatened to desert him as he caught sight, through the small low window to his left, of the shoppers walking along Cornmarket, far, far below him. But a raucous laugh from above served only to restore his equilibrium.
   'I only want to talk to you,' repeated Morse, and climbed another six steps. 'I only want to talk to you. As I told you, my men are outside. Be sensible, man. For Christ's sake, be sensible!'
   But there was no reply.
   Another window, again to his left, and the angle down on to the stream of shoppers was now virtually vertical. Strangely, however, Morse realised that he could now look down without that wave of incipient panic. What for the life of him he was unable to do was to look across at the store almost opposite, where he knew that the faithful Lewis would still be watching the door at the north porch with his wonted, unwavering vigilance.
   Another six steps. And another six steps.
   'The door's open, Mr Morse. Not much farther.' Then again the almost insane laugh, but softer this time - and more menacing.
   On the second step from the top of the tower and with the door (as the man had asserted) wide open, Morse stopped.
   'Can you hear me?' he asked. He was breathing heavily, and he realised sadly how ill-conditioned he had allowed his body to become.
   Again, there was no reply.
   'It must have been heavy work carting a body up here.'
   'I've always kept fit, Mr Morse.'
   'Pity the ladder collapsed, though. You could have hidden 'em both in the crypt then, couldn't you?'
   'Well, well! How observant we are!'
   'Why did you have to kill the boy?' asked Morse. But if there was a reply a sudden tugging gust of wind cut across the words and whipped them away.
   It was clear to Morse that the man was not concealed behind the tower door and after taking one further step he could now see him, standing facing him at the northern wall of the tower, about thirty feet away, on the narrow gully that divided the sides of the tower from the shallow central eminence. With a peculiarly detached inconsequentiality, Morse noticed how very large the weather-vane was, and for a second or two he wondered whether he would soon be waking from a terrifying dream.
   'Come down. We can't talk here. Come on.' Morse's tone was gentle and persuasive. He knew the whole truth at last, and his one remaining duty was to get this man down safely. 'Come on. Come down. We can talk then.' Morse climbed the final step, and felt the wind pulling at his thinning hair.
   'We'll talk now, Mr Morse, or we won't talk at all. Do you understand what I mean?' The man hitched himself up and sat on the coping between two of the crenellations, his feet dangling loosely above the tower floor.
   'Don't do anything stupid!' shouted Morse, his voice betraying a sudden panic. 'That solves nothing. That's no way out for you. Whatever else you are, you're not a coward.'
   The last word seemed to strike a chord which could still vibrate with something of its former attunement, for the man jumped lightly down and his voice was steady now. 'You're right, Mr Morse. Dangerous sitting there like that, especially in the wind,'
   'Come on!' Morse's mind was racing now. This was the time when it mattered so desperately that he said and did exactly the right things. He felt sure that there must be some suitable phrases in the psychiatrist's hand-book that would soothe the raging of a maddened lion; but his own brain was quite incapable of formulating any such irenic incantations. 'Come on,' he said again; then, as a minor variant, 'Come along.' And, in spite of the bankruptcy of these banal exhortations, Morse felt that he was adopting the right sort of approach, for there now seemed some hesitation in the other's manner, some indication of a slightly saner attitude.
   'Come along,' repeated Morse, and took one slow step towards the man. Then another step. Then another. And still the man stood motionless, his back to the north wall of the tower. Only five or six yards now separated them, and Morse took yet a further step towards him. 'Come along.' He held out his hand as if to lend support to one who has passed the dangers of a long walk along a tight-rope, and now is only a few feet from final safety.
   With a snarl on his bearded lips, the man launched himself at Morse and pinned him round the shoulders with a vicious vice-like power. 'No one's ever called me a coward,' he hissed. 'No one!'
   Morse managed to grab hold of the man's beard with both hands and to force his head back inch by inch until they both lost their balance and fell heavily against the leaded slope of the central roofing. Morse felt himself pinned beneath the other man's body, his legs and shoulders utterly powerless. He felt strong hands at his throat, the thumbs digging deep into the flesh; and his own hands were now frantically gripping the man's wrists, temporarily staying the irresistible thrust, his lips stretched to their widest extremity over his gritted teeth, his eyes closed with a desperate tightness, as though somehow this might lend him a few extra seconds of time, an extra ounce of strength. The blood thudded in his ears like someone pounding against a heavy door that would admit no entrance, and from somewhere he heard what sounded like the tinkling crash of a broken milk-bottle; and the noise registered coolly and clinically in his brain, as if his mind was now outside himself, contemplating events with an objective detachment that was wholly devoid of panic or fear. He saw the scene with such clearly focused clarity. He was driving through the night along the fast, straight, narrow stretch of road from Oxford to Bicester, a long stream of cars coming towards him, ever coming towards him, their twin headlights staggered slightly in a continuous double line of yellow circles, ever approaching - and then flashing past him. And now there was another vehicle coming straight towards him, coming on the wrong side of the road, its off-side blinker flashing as it closed upon him. Yet (amazingly!) his hands remained firm and steady on the driving-wheel. . . . Perhaps that was one of death's most guarded secrets? Perhaps the fear of dying, perhaps even death itself, was nothing but a great deception after all.... The headlights turned to spinning yellow circles in his brain, and then as he opened his eyes he could see only the dull sky above him. His knees were drawn up under the man's stomach; but so oppressive was the weight upon him that he could gain no leverage at all. If only he could find the strength to co-ordinate his arms and his knees, there might just be the chance of unbalancing the man and turning him sideways, and thus for a few seconds relieving the overpowering pressure of the hands at his throat. But his strength was almost gone, and he knew that his body, any second now, would almost gladly capitulate as the aching muscles in his arms screamed out for rest. He was relaxing already, his head resting almost comfortably now against the cold surface of the central roofing. That weather-vane really was enormous! How on earth could anyone have carried such a weight up here, up the circling staircase, up and up and up, with such a great weight upon his shoulder?
   The full realisation of his situation registered for the last time, and for a few seconds longer his grip on the man's wrists held firm as he dredged up the very last drop of his energy. But he had nothing more to offer. His grip on the steering-wheel slowly relaxed and as he closed his eyes the lights from the oncoming cars were dazzlingly bright. He thought of the final words of Richard Strauss's last song: 'Ist dies etwa der Tod?'

Chapter Thirty-seven

   Morse realised that something miraculous had occurred. The body so inexorably pressing down upon him had become, in the self-same moment of time, both heavier and lighter; the grip at his throat both tighter and looser. The man groaned as if in some intolerable agony, and as he did so Morse's knees thrust him away, almost lightly and easily. The man reeled away towards the side of the tower where he frantically reached out to the nearest crenellation to stay himself. But his impetus was too great. The stonework crumbled away as his right hand jarred into it for support; and head first the man plunged over the parapet.
   Then was to be heard the diminuendo of a terrifying 'Yaooh' as the man's body fell somersaulting to the ground far below, and finally a deadly thump followed by the terrified shrieks of those passing by at the foot of the tower.
   Lewis stood there still clutching the top end of a long brass candlestick. 'You all right, sir?'
   Morse remained where he was, blissfully breathing in the heady air in mighty gulps. The pain in his arms was like raging toothache, and he spread them out beside him, lying there on the gently sloping roof like a man who is crucified.
   'Are you all right?' It was another voice now, a gentler, softer voice, and slim cool fingers pressed themselves against his wet forehead.
   Morse nodded, and looked up at her face. He saw that there was a slight down of very fair hair upon her cheeks and light-brown freckles on either side of her nose. She was kneeling beside him, her large eyes brimming with happy tears. She held his head in her arms and pressed him closely to her for what to Morse seemed many days and many hours.
   They said nothing to each other. When they slowly descended from the tower, she leading but only so little a way in front that their hands could remain firmly clasped, they still said nothing. When a few minutes later Lewis saw them they were sitting in the back pew of the Lady Chapel, her tear-stained face resting happily on his shoulder. And still they said nothing.

   Lewis had seen the two men on the tower, had almost broken his own neck clambering down the five flights of stairs, had knocked several young ladies out of the way as he had run through the ground-floor cosmetic department, and finally, like some frustrated Fury, had hammered and hammered with his fists against the north door. The woman was still in there, he knew that, but it occurred to him that something might have happened to her; and in desperation he had hurled a large stone through the lowest and most convenient window with the dual purpose of making himself heard and of creating a possible means of entry. And the woman had heard him. The door was unlocked and, grabbing a candlestick from the shrine of the Blessed Virgin, he had taken the tower staircase three steps at a time and once on the roof he had smashed the candlestick with all his force across the middle of the back of Morse's bearded assailant.

   Two duty-policemen were already on the scene when Lewis emerged. A ring of people, standing some four or five yards off, surrounded the dead body, and an ambulance, already summoned, was whining its way down St Giles' from the Radcliffe Infirmary. Lewis had plucked a cassock from one of the hooks in the vestry, and now draped it over the dead man.
   'Do you know who he is?' asked one of the policemen.
   'I think so,' said Lewis.

   'You all right?' The hump-backed police surgeon was the third person to have asked the same question.
   'Fine. Few weeks on the Riviera and I'll be fine. Nothing serious.'
   'Huh! That's what they all say. Whenever I ask my patients what their parents died of, they all say the same - "Oh, nothing serious".'
   'I'd tell you if I wasn't all right.'
   'You know, Morse, don't you, that every single person ever born has at least one serious illness in life - the last one?'
   Mm. It was a thought.
   Lewis came back into the church: things were almost ready outside. 'You all right, sir?'
   'Oh, for Christ's sake!' said Morse.
   Ruth Rawlinson still sat on the rear pew of the Lady Chapel, her eyes staring blankly ahead of her - composed, silent and passive.
   'I'll see her home,' said Lewis quietly. 'You just— '
   But Morse interrupted him. 'She can't go home, I'm afraid. You'll have to take her down to the station.' He breathed heavily and looked away from her. 'She's under arrest, and I want you personally to take her statement.' He turned to Lewis with inexplicable anger in his voice. 'Is that clear? You! Personally!'
   Unspeaking and unresisting Ruth was led away to a police car by one of the constables; and after she was gone Morse, Lewis and the police surgeon followed.
   The crowd outside, now standing three or four deep around the covered body, watched their emergence with deep interest, as if the principal protagonists in a drama had just walked on to the stage: the hump-backed, rather elderly man, who looked (had he been around in 1555) as if he might have viewed unmoved the sight of Ridley and Latimer as they had burned to death in front of Balliol, only a few hundred yards away; next, the placid-looking, rather thick-set man, who earlier had seemed to be in charge of all the operations but who now appeared to fade a little into the background as if he were in the presence of his superiors; and finally a slimmer, balding, pale-faced man with piercing eyes, in whose sombre mien - if in any of the trio's - lay the look of a natural authority.
   They stood there, these three, over the covered body.
   'You want to look at him, Morse?' asked the police surgeon.
   'I've seen enough of him,' muttered Morse.
   'His face is all right - if you're feeling squeamish.'
   The surgeon pulled back the top of the cassock from the dead man's face, and Lewis looked down at it with great interest and intensity.
   'So that's what he looked like, sir.'
   'Pardon?' said Morse.
   'Lawson's brother, sir. I was just saying that— '
   'That's not Lawson's brother,' said Morse quietly; so quietly in fact that neither of the other men seemed to hear him.

THE BOOK OF RUTH

Chapter Thirty-eight

   Statement given by Miss Ruth Rawlinson, 14A Manning Terrace, Oxford, dictated by Miss Rawlinson, signed by the same, and witnessed by Sergeant Lewis, Thames Valley Police (C.I.D.)

   Perhaps it is easier to start twenty years ago. I was then in the first-year sixth at Oxford High School studying for my A Levels in English and History and Economics. The headmistress came into the class one morning and called me outside. She told me that I must be a brave girl because she had some very sad news for me. My father who worked as a printer with Oxford University Press had suffered a massive coronary thrombosis and had died within an hour of being admitted to the Radcliffe Infirmary. I remember a feeling of numbness more than anything and little real grief. In fact for the next few days I felt almost a sense of pride as the mistresses and the other girls treated me with a kindness I had never really known before. It was just as if I were a heroine who had suffered much misfortune with great fortitude. But that wasn't the case at all really. I didn't dislike my father but we had never been close to each other. A perfunctory kiss when I went up to bed or a pound note sometimes when I'd done well in examinations but he had shown little real interest and no real love. Perhaps it wasn't his fault. My mother had been struck down with multiple sclerosis and although at that time she was still reasonably mobile my father's first and every thought was for her welfare and happiness. He must have loved her very dearly and his death was a terrible blow to her. Almost from that day onwards she seemed to change. It was as if the woman she had been could never come to terms with such bereavement and therefore had to become a different person.
   Something happened to me too, I suddenly began to lose all pride in my school work and I began to lose all love for my mother. I suspected that she exaggerated her physical handicaps and all the cooking and washing and cleaning and shopping I did for her were accepted with less and less gratitude. I stayed on at school and took my A Levels the next year but I didn't apply for a university place although oddly enough my mother wanted me to. Instead I took a year's course at the Mariborough Secretarial College in the High and soon found that I had a real aptitude for the work. Even before I left the college I had been offered three posts and I finally accepted a very good offer from Oxford University Press as a personal and confidential secretary to a man who had known my father slightly. He was a very kind boss and a very clever man and the five years I spent with him were the happiest of my life. He was a bachelor and a year or so after starting with him he began to ask me out for an occasional meal or a visit to the Playhouse and I accepted. He never tried to take the slightest advantage of me and only when he used to take my arm through his as we walked to the car was there the slightest physical contact between us. Yet I fell in love with him - quite hopelessly as I thought. Then two things happened almost within a few days of each other. My boss asked me if I would marry him and there was a sudden sharp deterioration in my mother's condition. Whether these two things were connected it is impossible for me to say. I had told her about the proposal of marriage and she had told me what she thought about it in typically forthright terms. He was just a dirty old man looking for a bit of regular sex and look at the huge difference in our ages. Ridiculous! I should find myself some nice young man about my own age - that is if I had finally decided to leave her to rot away in some lonely home for chronic invalids. She worked herself up into a most distraught state and I realise that I am perhaps being less than fair in doubting her genuine shock at the news I had brought her. Anyway her G.P. told me that she was very poorly indeed and would have to go into hospital immediately. Then two more things happened almost at once. My mother returned home now needing a great deal of daily attention and I told my boss that I couldn't accept his proposal and that in the circumstances it would be better for me to leave. I remember the look of childlike sadness and disappointment in his eyes. When I left three weeks later he took me out for a marvellous meal at the Elizabeth and he talked quite happily all the evening. When he took me home and we sat in the car trying to say our very awkward farewells I turned to him and kissed him freely and lovingly on the mouth. From that day I grew my own shell round me just as my mother had grown hers. Doubtless I am much more like my mother than I would want to believe. Anyway Mother had probably been quite right. When I left work I was twenty-four and my boss was forty-nine. I met him once or twice after that just casually in the street. We asked the usual polite questions and went our ways. He never married. Two years afterwards he died of a brain haemorrhage and I went to his funeral. Looking back on it I feel no deep regrets that we didn't marry but I shall always regret that I never offered to become his mistress. These facts may seem irrelevant but I mention them only in the hope that someone may be able to understand why things began to go wrong and not in order to exonerate myself in any degree for my own part in the terrible business that was to come.
   I must now talk about money. With my own quite handsome little salary now cut off, our financial situation had to be considered carefully and my mother thought that my own C-grade pass in A Level Economics was a sure guarantee of prudence and wizardry in monetary matters. Soon therefore I came to have a very full knowledge of all our financial affairs and it wasn't long before my mother gladly handed over all the responsibility to me. There was no problem with the house since my father had taken out a combined mortgage and life-insurance policy on it. It was far too big for the two of us but its market value was now about ten times greater than when my father had bought it twenty-five years earlier and with his death it was ours. At that time too my mother had realisable assets of about £2,000 in various stock-market equities and my own deposit account with Lloyds stood at over £800. In addition my mother had a small widow's pension accruing from a policy my father had taken out with the Press and from this time I also began to claim a dependency allowance from the Department of Social Security. For the next ten years or so I took on quite a lot of typing duties at home - mostly theses for doctorates and manuscripts for hopeful authors and that sort of thing. So we lived with a reasonable degree of comfort and security. And then two years ago came the stock-market slump and I was persuaded to realise my mother's stock capital for less than £500. If only I had held on for another six months all would have been well or at least not half so disastrous but there were great fears at the time of a complete collapse in the market. As the shares plummeted even lower in the weeks that followed it seemed that I had been wise to act as I had done but the truth was that I had been badly advised and that I had acted disastrously. I kept all this from my mother as best I could and this was not difficult. She had no real knowledge about financial affairs. Whilst my father was alive he had managed his small resources with a shrewd competence and would never let my mother worry about such things or enquire too closely into them. Since his death the burden of responsibility had fallen on my own slimmer shoulders and my mother fully expected that all was still well. I was too ashamed of my own incompetence to let her think otherwise. I decided then (and remember this was only two years ago) to put all our remaining assets into my one idea of a sound investment. I've already mentioned that our house was far too big for the two of us and I had my plans for it. We would divide the house into two with Mother and myself living on the ground floor and another family on the first floor. My idea was to partition the front hall so that the stairs to the upper floor led directly to a completely self-contained residence. The bathroom and toilet were already on that floor anyway and the only major reconstruction necessary was a kitchen sink upstairs and a small bathroom downstairs with a second front door so that there need be no sharing of keys or door-bells and no postal complications. A friend from St Frideswide's (yes I shall be coming to that soon) drew up some neat little plans for me and after finding out that no planning permission was required I asked for estimates. They all seemed to me surprisingly high but I decided we could just manage the lowest estimate of £1,500. So I went ahead and the work began a few months later with heaps of sand and piles of bricks and builders' planks appearing in the front driveway. Everything was going well until a year last February when my mother received a letter from an old friend of hers who had heard of a marvellous clinic in Switzerland which specialised in the treatment and care of multiple sclerosis. No magical cures were promised but there were glowing reports from satisfied clients and the brochure included with the letter gave full details of the three-week course together with technicolour pictures of the clinic itself overlooking Lake Thun with the snowy summits of the Alps behind and the foothills alive with saxifrage and eidelweiss. The cost was £630 which included the return air fare from Heathrow to Basel and transport to and from the clinic. Never before this time had I fully understood the terrible tyranny of money. If I had it my mother could go. If I didn't she couldn't go. There were no gradations of merit or need. I was rather sceptical about any treatment for my mother's illness but the clinic was obviously a reputable one and I knew that a period abroad would do my mother some good. She had not stirred out of the house for more than eighteen months and often couldn't even be bothered to get out of bed and into her wheel-chair. But now for the first time in years she had taken a firm decision herself. She wanted to go and was excited at the prospect. She went. Although I spent the three weeks of her absence working as hard and as long as I could as a temporary typist by day and as a waitress in the evenings I found the time exhilarating and I once more discovered some of the joy of living. But things were not working out at all well. The builders were finding unexpected snap and I received a letter from the head of the firm saying that if the work was to be properly carried out the estimate would have to be increased by £350. My mother's return did nothing to help of course and when it was discovered that the waste pipes on the ground floor would quite definitely have to be replaced I was compelled to ask the builders to lay off work for a few weeks since I was unable to meet the next monthly instalment. By the middle of the summer I was at my wits' end. It was then I went to see the Reverend Lionel Lawson

Chapter Thirty-nine

   Statement given by Miss Ruth Rawlinson (continued)

   The first time I had been in St Frideswide's was as a girl in the High School choir when we had sung the Stainer Crucifixion with the Oxford augmented choirs. Several of us sang there again especially when the choir was short of sopranos and contraltos for the Palestrina masses. So I got to know some of the people there and began to feel quite at home. Soon I became a regular member of the choir not because I had any deep conviction about High Anglicanism but because I enjoyed having a different ambit of action and acquaintances. There was an old woman there who cleaned the church every morning of the week - a woman so crippled with arthritis that the carrying of mops and buckets was in itself a positive affirmation of her faith and will, I got to know her well and one day I asked her about herself and she said ever so simply and happily that she hoped God would one day reward her for what she was doing but that if He decided she was not worthy then she still wished to praise and glorify Him for the blessings he had given her. Instead of feeling surprised or cynical about this I felt myself most profoundly moved and when she died I vowed that I would try to take upon myself at least some part of her good works. And so I found myself scrubbing and polishing and the rest and discovering just a little bit of the fulfillment in life that the old woman had experienced. In the course of this self-imposed pennance I naturally got to know Lionel Lawson quite well and as I say it was to him that I went for help and advice when I could no longer cope with our financial crisis. I had one of the great surprises of my life when he told me that if all I was worrying about was money I could and should forget my worries immediately. He asked me what I needed and when I told him he sat down at his desk (where I noticed a paper-knife in the form of a crucifix) and wrote out a cheque for £500. It was just like a miracle and when I told him that I had no idea of when I could repay him or how I could thank him enough he just said that he might be in trouble himself one day and if he was he'd like to know that I would try to help him in any way I could. Of course I promised that I would do absolutely anything for him, and I remember clearly how at the time I hoped and prayed that I would one day be able to do some really big favour for him in return. As I was leaving the vicarage that day I saw a man coming out of the kitchen downstairs. For a moment I didn't recognise him although his face looked familiar. He was rather shabbily dressed but he was freshly shaven and his hair had been recently trimmed. I knew that Lionel had a few of the men from the Church Army Hostel to stay with him for a day or two and sometimes he would persuade them to come along to church services. Then I recognised him. He was much the same age and build as Lionel but the last time I'd seen him he'd had a week or so's growth of stubble on his face and his hair had been long and dirty. It was only later that I learned that this man was Lionel's brother Philip.
   It was shortly after this time that Harry Josephs came into my life. One way and another tensions were growing between various members of the church at the end of last summer. It was then that I first heard a nasty rumour about Lionel possibly liking the company of choirboys rather more than he should but I couldn't bring myself to believe it. Even now I am quite convinced that if Lionel was in some way homosexually inclined his weakness was a very gentle and a completely passive one. But there was another rumour almost everyone seemed to have heard about to the effect that Paul Morris the church organist was very much too fond of Harry Josephs' wife Brenda who almost always brought Harry to the services. Harry himself had been disqualified from driving for some reason. Brenda was often seen talking to Paul although she herself would rarely stay in the church for a service and one of the women in the congregation told me she had once seen them holding hands. I must admit that although I had no direct evidence to go on I began to suspect more and more that this second rumour might be true. And then I knew it was true because Harry Josephs told me so. The first time he had called at my home there were the three of us because Mother happened to be up that day and he was very pleasant and polite and he stayed for about two hours. After that he called quite regularly always in the morning and we took to sitting together in the lounge when Mother was in bed. In some ways he reminded me a bit of my old boss because he made no attempt at all to take the slightest advantage of me. Not then anyway. But he couldn't hide the fact that he was a lonely and disappointed man and before long he told me that he knew all about his wife's affair with Paul Morris. At first I think he must have come to see me just to find a little sympathy because he never once asked my opinion of what he should do. But then one day as we walked to the front door he just turned to me and told me that he found me attractive and that he would love to go to bed with me. Of course I felt a little bit flattered and certainly I had no moral scruples about the situation. We had been drinking sherry together and I was feeling rather more vivacious and daring than I normally do. What was I to say? I was still a virgin. I was forty-one, I had turned down the only man I had so far fallen in love with. I knew that life was passing me by and that if I didn't get to know something about sex fairly soon I never would. Not that I said any of this to Harry. In other circumstances I think I would have reminded him that he was married and that I liked and respected his wife too much to think of anything between us. As it was I think I just smiled and told him not to be so silly. He didn't say anything else but he looked so dejected and humiliated as he stood at the front door that I suddenly felt terribly sorry for him. Immediately to our right was the newly installed door to 14B which had just been painted Cambridge blue. I had the key in my pocket and I asked him if he'd like to have a look at the flat. He made love to me on the mattress of the unmade bed in the back room. It wasn't a particularly happy initiation for me but I experienced little regret. In fact I almost felt a sense of satisfaction and for the next few months we made love together once a week. As I became a little more practised in the physical side of it all I found myself enjoying the act of sex itself more and more. But I knew that something was sadly wrong because I felt so shoddy and cheap after it was over and I began to hate myself for wanting sex at all. I tried to stop it but looking back I think my try was half-hearted. The man seemed to have some power over me and I began living more and more on my nerves. I started worrying about my mother finding out although she seemed to suspect nothing. I started worrying about the neighbours too but goodness knows why because the houses on either side of us were multi-occupied with an ever-changing stream of temporary tenants or undergraduates. Above all I was worried about myself. The truth was that I now needed Harry more than he needed me and he knew this. Whatever agonies of self-reproach I suffered after he was gone I knew that I would be thinking all the time about our next meeting. I began to hate him as well as myself. He was like a drug to which I was fast becoming an addict.
   It is perhaps important for you to know all this if you are to understand what happened to me later.