“Hello, Sara,” she said, giving me an encouraging smile. “It’s lovely to see you. I’ve missed you so much.”
I repeated the words, laughing. Sara had the ability to make anyone smile, not a quality widespread among journalists. It had helped her break some major stories.
“Sorry,” I added. “I’ve had a hard day at the typeface.”
Shit. Now she was on her way over to the screen.
“What have you been working on?” She looked at me hopefully. “Not the new novel.”
I wasn’t quick enough to dissemble. “Uh, no. Just some reviews.”
The smile didn’t fade. “Never mind. I’m sure it’ll come together soon.”
“Sara, my darling,” I said, taking her arms. Her scent filled my nostrils. It took me back to the first time I’d met her. She’d walked up in a wave of perfume and I’d fallen head over heels in love on the spot. That had never happened to me before. Even more amazingly, she told me she’d had the same experience the first time she laid eyes on me across the crowded room. I shook my head to dispel the memory. “I…there’s something I have to tell you.” My serious tone made her move her head back to study me. I’d had it with the bastard I’d let into my life. I was going to share the burden. “Well, it’s a bit weird. This morning I-”
My mobile rang. I raised my hands at her and went to my jacket pocket.
“Hello?”
“Matt, you will remember not to tell anyone about today, won’t you?” The White Devil’s voice was calm, almost cheerful. It had a neutral tone, as if it weren’t really his-as if he was putting it on.
How did he know I was about to tell Sara?
“Matt, I know you’re there. Speak!”
“Yes…I will remember that.” I tried to smile at Sara as she went past me into the bathroom. I waited till the door had closed. “You bastard. Are you bugging me?”
There was a laugh that tailed off into a snarl. “What do you know about surveillance technology, Mr. Award-Winning Crime Novelist? As much as a sparrow can crap.” The line went dead.
I sat down, my heart pounding. He was right. I didn’t have a clue about modern surveillance hardware. He could have been beaming a camera down from a satellite for all I knew. The bastard had even found out my mobile number, though I guessed that wouldn’t take either too much time or money. Shit. I was in this alone, after all. I couldn’t risk anything happening to Lucy.
When Sara came out, I’d turned my computer off. I had my head in my hands.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, clutching me to her warm body. “Who was that on the phone?”
“Just some tosser,” I mumbled. Understatement of the millennium. Suddenly I remembered how close Sara and I had become over the past nine months. I was at the stage where I trusted her with everything. She was my savior; she could make anything better.
“Come to bed,” she said, tugging at me gently, her cheeks red-they were always like that when she was aroused.
I followed her into the bedroom, the blood hot in my veins. But my head was filled with confused thoughts. Something was trying to make itself known.
“Come on,” Sara said, tugging back the duvet. “I’ll make you feel-”
The thought that had been nagging me burst to the surface.
“No!” I said, lunging forward.
“Well, well, Mr. Wells,” Sara said, her smile slowly disappearing. “What have you been up to?”
She picked up the bundles of twenty-pound notes that I’d stuck under the covers when I brought Lucy round, and gave me a questioning stare.
5
After what seemed like an eternity, Mrs. O’Grady, seventy-three and deeply wrinkled, finished arranging her bucket and mop in the cupboard off the sacristy. “Will that be all for tonight, Father Prendegast?” she asked.
“Yes, yes,” the priest replied impatiently, his head with its large bald patch bowed over the papers on the table.
“Are you sure now?” Mrs. O’Grady had been doing the Wednesday night cleaning at St. Bartholomew’s, West Kilburn, for more than thirty years and she prided herself on the solicitude that she afforded the men of God. The previous fathers had appreciated her, but this one was different. Although he’d been there for nearly ten years, she hardly felt that she knew him at all. He paid her little attention. She didn’t like gossip, but she’d begun to believe what some of the other ladies said-that he’d come to their church under a cloud. There had been a scandal somewhere in the East End that was hushed up. She raised her head to the stained ceiling. Dear God, she thought, why can’t your representatives on earth keep their hands to themselves?
Mrs. O’Grady took a step back when she realized Father Prendegast was glaring at her, as if he knew what was in her mind. She took her coat and hurried away, mumbling, “Good night to you, then.” She stopped when she got outside and shivered. It wasn’t cold-the last of the sun had spread in a red carpet over the western sky and its warmth was still in the air-but she felt a chill. There was something about that man, something she could almost smell. He was…he was dirty, a wrong ’un. She walked quickly down the gravel path, anxious to get back to her council flat and her little dog. She didn’t notice the figure that rose up from behind one of the larger gravestones and moved silently toward the door of the church.
Norman Prendegast pushed his chair back and got up. At last the old cow had left him in peace. He selected a key from the ring on his belt and slotted it into the bottom drawer of an antique rolltop desk. He took the bottle of Jameson that one of the faithful had given him at Easter and broke the seal. The first few gulps did nothing, and then he began to feel the warmth rising from his belly. That was the stuff. He went back to the table and sat down again, setting the bottle on the accounts book he’d been trying to complete. He’d leave that chore to another night.
After he’d taken another long pull from the bottle, the priest fell into a reverie. Fifteen years he’d been in exile from his flock in Bethnal Green; fifteen years he’d been banned from even visiting them in his time off. It wasn’t fair. He’d been everything a priest should be-unstinting in his efforts, a source of comfort to the faithful in times of loss and pain, a beacon of joy at weddings. His choir, his football and cricket teams, they’d won prizes. He swallowed again, but now the spirit tasted bitter as his grievances rose up around him like a demented chorus. You didn’t do anything wrong. You were only offering them friendship. The boys loved you. The boys wanted you to touch them.
Father Prendegast heard a noise from the church. Mrs. O’Grady must have forgotten something. He stayed where he was. He didn’t like the way she looked at him. She knew, he was sure of it. The hypocrites, the old harpies. They all knew about him, but they pretended they didn’t. They pretended he was a normal priest rather than one who’d been given a last chance by the archbishop, and that only because the church couldn’t face the shame. Five years in an isolated retreat in County Kerry and then this run-down hole. It was only full when the sinners came at Christmas and Easter. No one bothered to confess anything other than venial sins these days, anyway. They thought that meant they could forget the truly bad things they’d done. Hypocrites. Whited sepulchers. At least he’d confessed, though it had been required of him. Confessed and asked forgiveness. His conscience was clean, even if his desires still tormented him.
Norman Prendegast drank again. The bottle was still at his lips when the sacristy door opened, and then closed again.
“Who’s that?” he demanded, his vision blurred. “Is it you, Mrs. O’Grady?”
The key turned in the lock.
“What’s going on?” the priest said, his voice wavering. He tried to get the bottle out of sight. “This is a private room.”
“Calm down, Father,” said a low male voice. “I’ve just come for a little chat.” The figure drew closer. “About old times.”