Deborah shivered. “Poor man. It’s so cold here. One would think he might prefer to be buried somewhere in the sun.”

“He’s safer here,” the priest answered. He moved reverently to the altar rail, knelt, and spent the next few moments in meditation.

They watched him. His lips moved and then he paused for a moment as if in communion with an unknown god. His prayer completed, he smiled angelically and got to his feet.

“I speak to him daily,” Father Hart whispered, “because we owe him everything.”

“Why is that?” Lynley asked.

“He saved us. The village, the church, the life of Catholicism here in Keldale.” As he spoke, the priest’s face began to glow.

Lynley thought fleetingly of Montressor and restrained himself from looking for the mortar and bricks. “The man himself or the relics?” he asked.

“The man, his presence, his relics, all of it.” The priest flung out his arms and encompassed the crypt, and his voice rose in zealous jubilation. “He gave them courage to keep their faith, Inspector, to remain true to Rome during the terrible days of the Reformation. The priests hid here then. The stairway was covered with a false floor, and the village priests remained in hiding for years. But the saint was with them all the time, and St. Catherine’s never fell to the Protestants.” There were tears in his eyes. He fumbled for his handkerchief. “You…I’m…please excuse me. When I talk about Cedd…to be so privileged to have his relics here. To be in communion with him. I’m not quite sure you could understand.”

To be on a first-name basis with an early Christian saint was obviously too much for the old man. Lynley sought a diversion. “The confessionals above look like Elizabethan carvings,” he said kindly. “Are they?”

The man wiped his eyes, cleared his throat, and gave them a shaky smile. “Yes. They weren’t originally intended for confessionals. That’s why they have such a secular theme. One doesn’t generally expect to see young men and women entwined in dance on the wood carving in a church, but they’re lovely, aren’t they? I think the light in that part of the church is too poor for the penitents to see the doors clearly. I expect some of them think it’s a depiction of the Hebrews left on their own while Moses went up to Sinai.”

“What does it depict?” Deborah asked as they followed the little priest up the stairs and into the larger church once again.

“A pagan bacchanal, I’m afraid,” he replied. He smiled apologetically as he said it, bid them good morning, and disappeared through a carved door near the altar.

They watched it close behind him. “What an odd little man. How do you know him, Tommy?”

Lynley followed Deborah out of the church into the light. “He brought us all the information on the case. He found the body.” He told her briefly about the murder, and she listened as she always had, her soft green eyes never moving from his face.

“Nies!” she cried when he had completed the tale. “How dreadful for you! Tommy, how completely unfair!”

It was like her, he thought, to cut to the quick of the matter, to see beneath the surface to the issue that plagued him at the heart of the case.

“Webberly thought my presence might make him more cooperative, God knows how,” he said drily. “Unfortunately, I seem to be having the opposite effect on the man.”

“But how awful for you! After what Nies put you through in Richmond, why did they assign you to this case? Couldn’t you have turned it down?”

He smiled at her white-faced indignation. “We’re not usually given that option, Deb. May I drive you back to the hall?”

She responded in an instant. “Oh no, you don’t need to. I’ve-”

“Of course. I wasn’t thinking.” Lynley set down her camera case and bleakly watched the doves grooming and settling themselves on the bell tower of the church. Her hand touched his arm.

“It isn’t that,” she said gently. “I’ve a car just over there. You probably didn’t notice it.”

Now he saw the blue Escort parked under a chestnut that was blanketing the ground with crisp, autumn leaves. He picked up her case and carried it to the car. She followed some paces behind.

She unlocked the boot and watched as he put the case inside. She took more time than was necessary to arrange it in a safe travelling position for the short mile back to the hall. And then, because it could no longer be avoided, she looked at him.

He was watching her, making a passionate study of her features as if she were about to vanish forever and all he would have left was the image in his mind.

“I remember the flat in Paddington,” he said. “Making love to you there in the afternoon.”

“I haven’t forgotten that, Tommy.”

Her voice was tender. For some reason that did nothing but hurt him further. He looked away. “Will you tell him you saw me?”

“Of course I will.”

“And what we talked about? Will you tell him of that?”

“Simon knows how you feel. He’s your friend. So am I.”

“I don’t want your friendship, Deborah,” he said.

“I know. But I hope you will someday. It’ll be there when you do.”

He felt her fingers on his arm again. They tightened, then loosened in farewell. She opened the car door, slipped inside, and was gone.

Alone, he walked back towards the lodge, feeling the cloak of desolation settle more firmly round his shoulders. He had just reached the Odell house when the garden door opened and a little figure hurtled determinedly down the steps. She was followed moments later by her duck.

“You wait here, Dougal!” Bridie shouted. “Mummy put your new food in the shed yesterday.”

The duck, unable to navigate the steps anyway, sat patiently waiting as the child tugged open the shed door and disappeared inside. She was back in a moment, lugging a large sack behind her. Lynley noticed that she wore a school uniform, but it was badly rumpled and not particularly clean.

“Hello, Bridie,” he called.

Her head darted up. Her hair, he noticed, had been managed somewhat more expertly since yesterday’s fiasco. He wondered who had done it.

“Got to feed Dougal,” she said. “Got to go to school today as well. I hate school.”

He joined her in the yard. The duck watched his approach warily, one brown eye on him and the other on the promised breakfast. Bridie poured a gargantuan portion onto the ground and the duck flapped his wings eagerly.

“Okay, Dougal, here you go,” Bridie said. She lifted the bird lovingly from the steps and placed him on the damp ground, watching fondly as he plunged headfirst into the food. “He likes breakfast best,” she confided to Lynley, taking an accustomed place on the top step. She rested her chin on her knees and gazed adoringly at the mallard. Lynley joined her on the step.

“You’ve fixed your hair quite nicely,” he commented. “Did Sinji do it for you?”

She shook her head, eyes still on duck. “Nope. Aunt Stepha did it.”

“Did she? She did a very nice job.”

“She’s good at stuff like that,” Bridie acknowledged in a tone that indicated there were other things that Aunt Stepha was not at all good at. “But now I have to go to school. Mummy wouldn’t let me go yesterday. She said it was ‘too humiliating for words.’” Bridie tossed her head scornfully. “It’s my hair, not hers,” she added, practically.

“Well, mothers have a way of taking things a bit personally. Haven’t you noticed?”

“She could’ve taken it the way Aunt Stepha did. She just laughed when she saw me.” She hopped off the steps and filled a shallow pan with water. “Here, Dougal,” she called. The duck ignored her. There was a chance the food might be taken away if he did not eat it all as fast as he could. Dougal was a duck who never took chances. Water could wait. Bridie rejoined Lynley. Companionably, they watched as the duck gorged himself. Bridie sighed. She was inspecting the scuffed tops of her shoes and she rubbed at them ineffectually with a dirty finger. “Don’t know why I have to go to school anyway. William never did.”