‘Another ten miles or so. We go out of this place and turn left,’ said Waldo Mulligan firmly.
‘How long till we get there, wherever there is?’ said Willie John Delaney.
‘I should think it’s about four hours,’ said Christy Delaney cheerfully. ‘We’ll be there in time for tea.’
‘Tea be damned,’ said Jack O’Driscoll. ‘I asked the barman in the St Jacques about this St Private place or whatever it’s called. I think he said it had absolutely no redeeming features, none at all. Except, the man said, it had some of the finest red wine in the Auvergne.’
‘Girvan Connolly, Francis, mother’s side, aged thirty-five or so. Described as merchant from Kentish Town. It’s not clear why he’s on pilgrimage at all. Spent the day with Shane Delaney. Fond of a drink, our Mr Connolly.’
‘How do you know that, Lucy?’
‘I saw him out of the corner of my eye yesterday evening. Our friend Girvan was forever topping up his glass when he thought nobody was looking.’
‘Well spotted, Lucy. Next?’
‘Brother White, late thirties, teaches at one of England’s leading Catholic public schools. He spent most of the day in the cathedral, Francis. He was praying in front of the Black Madonna, he says. Other people who went to Notre Dame say they saw him there.’
‘Why would you spend most of the day praying to the Black Madonna? Does she have any special educational powers, as far as you know?’
‘I don’t know the answer to that, Francis. But there’s something rather horrid about Brother White. I can’t put my finger on it just yet.’
‘Then we have the late John Delaney himself. Cousin again of Michael Delaney. He went to St Michel and the Rocher Corneille in the morning, and the cathedral in the afternoon. The last sighting we have of him was about four thirty when two of our pilgrims saw him going into the hotel.’
‘And nobody saw him go out after that?’
‘No,’ said Lady Lucy. ‘You’re going to like this last one, Francis. Stephen Lewis, mid-fifties, mother’s side again, solicitor from Frome in Somerset. Come on pilgrimage for the sake of his immortal soul and because he likes trains. Our Mr Lewis, if his story is to be believed, and I think it is, did not go to the Rocher Corneille. He did not climb the two hundred and sixty-eight steps to the chapel at the summit of St Michel. Nor he did he go up or down the one hundred and thirty-four steps that lead up to the Cathedral of Notre Dame.’
‘So what did the man do, in heaven’s name?’ asked Powerscourt.
‘Mr Stephen Lewis, solicitor, from Frome in Somerset, went to the railway station in Le Puy. He looked at the engines for some time. Then he took a train south, travelling first class he tells us, to the next port of call, a stop called La Bastide St Laurent Les Bains. It’s on the Nimes line, apparently. Our Mr Lewis took lunch in the Hotel Bristol in the main square, some local pate with cornichons, duck a l’orange, and returned to Le Puy on the 2.55, arriving just before half past four. He said he didn’t have time for coffee or he’d have missed his train.’
‘He may have had a more interesting day than the rest of them,’ said Powerscourt cheerfully. ‘I don’t suppose anybody can corroborate any of that?’
‘Well,’ said Lady Lucy, ‘one or two people did see him coming back into the hotel. They report that Mr Lewis was carrying a book of timetables.’
‘Excellent!’ said Powerscourt. ‘A little bedtime reading, no doubt.’
‘I’ve forgotten one person,’ said Lady Lucy, ‘Michael Delaney himself. He went briefly to the cathedral in the morning. He didn’t go to either of the rocks. During the afternoon he was in the hotel, working on the plans for the pilgrimage with Alex Bentley.’
‘Well, Lucy,’ said her husband, rising from his little table and pacing about the room, ‘these witness statements are about as much use to us as the smile on the face of the Sphinx. This is what I think we should do tomorrow. Could you have another word with our friend Maggie Delaney before she leaves in the carriage? If Michael Delaney has any great sins in his past she may know something about them. Could you see what crimes she comes up with? And ask her about how all these people are related. I’m going walking tomorrow with the young ones and the men of God. Let’s see what they’ve got to say for themselves on the pilgrim trail and the – ’ Powerscourt stopped suddenly in mid-sentence. He looked at Lady Lucy. ‘Wait here a moment, darling. I’ve been a fool, a stupid, stupid fool.’ He headed for the door.
‘Where are you going, Francis? What’s the matter?’
‘Only this, Lucy. Here we have all these statements about people coming in and out of the hotel. All of them refer, unless I’m very much mistaken, to the front door. What about the back door? Side doors? Fire escapes? Balconies? We may have been looking in the wrong direction altogether.’
Jack O’Driscoll and Christy Delaney were in a great hurry. They were both very thirsty, completely parched as Christy put it. They had left their own party far behind. They sped past the religious brethren who had stopped to pray at a wayside shrine to St James. As they drew near to St-Privat-d’Allier a passer-by would have noted that Jack kept writing a couple of phrases in a small notebook which he passed to his companion.
‘I think this is it,’ he said finally, as they passed an ancient mill on the side of an old bridge.
‘Oon boo tile van rouge, seal voo play, that should do it.’
‘Oon boo tile van rouge, seal voo play,’ Christy repeated.
‘Good,’ said Jack.
‘And I presume on core stays the same?’
‘On core oon boo tile van rouge seal voo play might be better,’ said Jack.
‘Bien, tres bien,’ said Christy.
Powerscourt returned from his inspection of the entrances and exits to the Hotel St Jacques in sombre mood.
‘It’s hopeless, Lucy, quite hopeless,’ he said to his wife. ‘The place has got more ways in and out than a honeycomb. Round the back there are two back doors, not locked during the daytime, a rickety fire escape, and rooms on the ground floor all of which have windows that open wide enough for a man to get out. All this work’, he waved helplessly at the notebook, ‘is rendered null and void. Anybody could have got in and out without being seen. All of that evidence is all right for the front but not for the back.’
‘What do we do now, my love?’ asked Lady Lucy.
‘God knows,’ said her husband.
Lady Lucy Powerscourt was taking morning coffee the next day with Maggie Delaney in a corner of the dining room at the Hotel St Jacques. She noticed that her companion ladled in three spoonfuls of sugar.
‘Can you tell me how you are related to Mr Michael Delaney, Miss Delaney?’ she began brightly.
‘That walking heap of wickedness?’ Maggie peered crossly at Lady Lucy as if she had just taken the name of the Lord in vain. ‘It goes back to our grandparents, I don’t know the precise details. I’ve tried, of course. But it isn’t easy to find out what happened in Ireland in the famine years. There’s a story that Delaney’s father did something incredibly wicked in a place called Macroom, wherever that is, something to do with the workhouses. I wouldn’t be surprised. Like father, like son.’
‘So when did your own particular interest in your cousin and his activities begin?’
Maggie inspected Lady Lucy once more. ‘Twelve years ago, it would have been. Somebody on the parish committee for the reclamation of fallen women mentioned that he’d seen the Delaney name in the papers. That’s when I started to read those money pages in the newspapers.’
‘Money pages?’ said Lady Lucy. Had Maggie been picking up tips on domestic thrift, How to Make Your Household Budget Go Further and Keep a Happy Husband? She had not.