‘I see.’
‘I’m not trying to interfere, Gerald. If you’d rather do everything yourself, I’ll stay out of your way.’
‘No, no,’ he said, reaching out to take her hand. ‘It’s kind of you to offer. I need help from someone — thank you, Caroline.’
She sighed with satisfaction. ‘That’s settled, then.’
‘The truth is that I’m all at sea at the moment. I was going to ask the vicar what to do.’ He sighed. ‘It’s strange the way things work out, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Cyril never expected to die, of course, so he couldn’t plan ahead for his own funeral. If he’d done so, my guess is that he’d have wanted Father Howells to take the service rather than the vicar.’ He glanced sorrowfully at the newspaper. ‘But that’s not possible now, is it?’
The Reverend James Howells lay on the bed while a nurse took his blood pressure. Head heavily bandaged, he had various tubes attached to him and was under almost constant supervision. His parents were in the nearby waiting room, hoping for the slightest improvement. The vicar was with them, offering succour, leading them in prayer and telling them time and again what an asset their son was to the parish. Cards and messages of goodwill had come flooding in by hand, showing the anguished parents how popular the curate had been. Only close family members were allowed to visit the single room where the patient was kept, but that didn’t stop a stranger from slipping into the hospital and finding out his whereabouts. Wearing a white coat by way of disguise, he lurked in an alcove from which he could keep the room under close observation. When a doctor and nurse emerged before going off in the other direction, he saw his opportunity and moved swiftly forward.
Before he reached the room, however, the door opened and a third person came out. Legs apart and hands behind his back, the uniformed constable was there to prevent any unauthorised visits. The stranger was baulked. As he walked past the policeman, he manufactured a smile.
‘Good evening,’ he said, pleasantly.
Then he headed for the nearest exit.
Gordon Leach felt as if he were being crushed between two millstones. On one side of him was Mansel Price and on the other was Fred Hambridge. The three friends were in the bakery, discussing the forthcoming marriage. Price was unequivocal. If Leach betrayed his principles and joined a non-combatant corps, the Welshman threatened to assault him. Hambridge took a more reasoned approach but his quiet reprimands were just as wounding as Price’s belligerence. The two of them kept on at Leach until the latter could take no more.
‘That’s enough!’ he yelled. ‘You’ve made your point.’
‘So what’s your decision?’ asked Hambridge.
‘Gordon has got to tell Ruby that he can’t do it,’ said Price. ‘I don’t know why he didn’t have the guts to do that when she came up with the idea.’
‘It wasn’t Ruby’s idea,’ said Leach. ‘It was her father’s. Mr Cosgrove was only trying to find a compromise.’
‘Remember what Cyril used to say. We never compromise.’
Leach was outnumbered. With Ablatt resurrected, he was up against three of them and his resistance cracked. It had been an article of faith for all four of them that they wouldn’t assist the war effort in any way. Joining a non-combatant corps would, in essence, be almost as bad as joining the army. It was easy for Price and Hambridge to maintain their extreme position. They only had to think of themselves. Price’s family lived in Wales and took little interest in him. Hambridge’s parents supported him in his stance. Leach’s situation was more complicated. After apparently being spurned by Ruby, he’d been forgiven in the wake of the attack on the curate. She’d been so concerned for his safety that she came to assure him that she still wanted to marry him and that there was a way to do it that could be reconciled with his pacifist beliefs. What would Ruby say if he rejected the compromise suggested by her father? Would he lose her altogether? What had brought her running to him was a combination of love and fear. If he sided with his friends, Leach might well be sacrificing her love while doing nothing to allay her fear. He was impaled on the horns of a dilemma. All that he could do was to squirm in agony.
Hambridge’s softly spoken question was like a stab in the ribs.
‘What are you going to do, Gordon?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know,’ echoed Price with lip-curling disgust. ‘You’ve spent all this time with Fred, Cyril and me, boasting that you’d never, in a hundred years, join the army, yet you’re ready to serve in a non-combatant corps.’
‘I didn’t say that, Mansel. I’m still thinking it over.’
‘What is there to think over?’
‘And don’t get the wrong idea about a non-combatant corps,’ cautioned Hambridge. ‘I’ve got a friend who joined one of those. They sent him off to Belgium as part of an ambulance unit. He spends all his time carrying wounded soldiers on a stretcher. If that’s not taking part in the war — then what is?’
‘There’s another thing, Gordon. Suppose you get sent to the front like that. Do you think the commanding officer will give a monkey’s fuck for your wedding plans? He needs every man he’s got,’ said Price. ‘He’s not going to release you so that you can get married and have a wonderful honeymoon. You’re going to be stuck in some godforsaken place with no chance of even seeing Ruby, let alone jumping into bed with her at long last.’
‘Shut up!’ howled Leach. ‘Let’s keep Ruby out of this.’
‘But she’s the bloody problem.’
‘Be quiet, Mansel.’
‘Who’s going to wear the trousers in the marriage — you or Ruby Cosgrove?’
Leach was on his feet. ‘I told you to shut up!’
‘Who’s going to make me?’ demanded Price, getting up.
‘I am.’
Leach exploded and grappled with the Welshman. Before they could get in any punches, however, they were each grabbed by the neck and pulled roughly apart by Hambridge. He was seething with fury.
‘That’s enough!’ he bellowed. ‘We’re friends, for heaven’s sake! Is this the way to behave? We’re supposed to be in this together. Act like it, the pair of you!’
On his way to the hospital, Marmion nursed the faint hope that James Howells might have regained consciousness and been ready to give him some idea who might have been responsible for the attack. In reality, he knew that it rarely happened like that. He’d seen other victims who’d sustained appalling head wounds. Most of them had been unable to remember the moment of attack, let alone speculate on who was behind it. Earlier that year, there’d been the case of a man who was deliberately knocked down by the driver of a motor car. Although he survived, brain damage was so serious that the victim couldn’t even speak and was doomed to spend the rest of his life trapped in a private world. Marmion hoped that the curate would escape that fate.
The news at the hospital was not encouraging. The patient was stable but there’d been no marked improvement. He needed more time and continuous care. Marmion spoke to the constable on duty outside the room. The man had just started the night shift. Marmion felt that it was unlikely the attacker would make a second attempt to kill Father Howells but he didn’t wish to take any chances. He was pleased to hear that the curate’s parents had finally been persuaded to leave. At the invitation of Simon Ellway, they were staying the night at the vicarage. Marmion suspected that Mr and Mrs Howells would be back in the waiting room shortly after breakfast on the following day. Since there was nothing else he could do at the hospital, he was given a lift home in a police car. His wife was still up, delighted at his comparatively early return.
‘This is a nice surprise!’ said Ellen, giving him a welcoming kiss.
‘I’ll have to be off again at the crack of dawn, love.’