Edgar was back at Freshfield Road. He wished, more than anything, that he was calling to tell the families that he’d make a breakthrough in the case. But, instead, he was sitting in the Francises’ tiny front room, telling them about the autopsy report on their daughter. In a few minutes he would have to go seven doors down and have the same conversation with the Websters.
Sandra and Jim sat close together on the sofa. The twins were at school and the baby was in a playpen in the corner. Outside they could hear the dustcart groaning up the hill. The snow had cleared and service was getting back to normal.
But the Francises’ life was never going to get back to normal. Edgar told them, as simply and as gently as he could, that the coroner had found that death was by manual strangulation. The children’s bodies had probably been stored somewhere warm and dry before being left out on Devil’s Dyke. There were fibres in their hair that looked as if they had come from a blanket. The cold made it hard to tell time of death but it had probably occurred two or three days before the bodies were discovered.
‘Two or three days,’ said Jim. ‘That means on Monday. On the day they went missing.’
‘That’s what we think,’ said Edgar. ‘We think the bodies must have been put there before the snow started on Tuesday night.’
Sandra crossed herself. Her face was greenish-white and she had her arms wrapped round her body as if she were literally trying to hold herself together. Jim, on the other hand, was becoming more belligerent.
‘Have you got any leads? Any clues? Seems to me that you lot are doing nothing. Sandra says you were tramping up and down the street yesterday but you’re no further forward than you were before. What about Sam Gee? Have you spoken to him? They were on their way to his shop, weren’t they?’
‘I have spoken to Mr Gee,’ said Edgar. ‘He says that he didn’t see the children on Monday and we’ve no reason to disbelieve him.’
‘Have you searched his flat? Questioned his wife? You said there were—what was the word—fibres on the children’s bodies. Can’t you find out where they came from?’
‘I have questioned Mr and Mrs Gee,’ said Edgar. ‘I’d need a search warrant to search their house and at the moment I haven’t got the grounds to ask for one. We will try to trace the fibres but they’re very small, almost microscopic.’ He looked at the two faces opposite him, one resigned, one angry. ‘Believe me, Mrs and Mrs Francis, we are doing our best. I’ve got my whole team working on this case, day and night. We’ll find the person who did this, I promise.’
There was a silence, broken only by the baby banging a wooden brick against the bars of his playpen. Eventually Sandra said, ‘The funeral’s tomorrow. At St George’s. We arranged it as soon as we heard from the coroner.’
‘I’d like to come,’ said Edgar, ‘and so would my team. Is that all right with you?’
‘We’d like you to be there,’ said Sandra. ‘Are you a Christian?’
The question took Edgar by surprise. He remembered Brian Baxter saying that the Francises were religious. Sandra had made the sign of the cross too. Was it only Catholics who did that? But St George’s wasn’t a Catholic church. He tried to answer honestly.
‘I was brought up in the Church of England,’ he said. ‘I was confirmed. I certainly believed as a child. But, when the war came, I suppose it made me question everything. My brother died . . . I suppose I’m trying to say that I don’t know. I wish I did.’
To his surprise, Sandra smiled. It was the first time he had seen her smile and it completely transformed her face.
‘If you want to believe,’ she said, ‘that’s half the battle. God will see to the rest.’
‘Sandra believes,’ said Jim. ‘It’s a comfort to her. Me, I’m like you. I can’t see why a God would let these things happen.’
‘Would you do a reading at the funeral?’ asked Sandra. ‘It would mean a lot to us.’
Edgar was touched but he wished they hadn’t asked. He hadn’t read aloud since university and the thought of standing up in church, in front of the bereaved families and all his colleagues, made him feel hot and cold all over. ‘I’d be honoured,’ he said. ‘Thank you for asking me.’
‘I’ve asked Miss Young too,’ said Sandra, ‘Have you met her? She was Annie’s primary-school teacher. She’s a lovely lady, always so kind to Annie.’
‘I have met her, yes.’
He was surprised they’d asked Daphne Young. For some reason he had thought the family might resent the teacher’s interest in their daughter. But it seemed that they too had fallen under Miss Young’s spell. He wondered why neither parent wanted to read at the funeral. Perhaps they just couldn’t face it. He thanked them again for asking him and assured them that he’d see them at the church at noon tomorrow.
‘I’m sorry about your brother,’ said Sandra as she showed him out. ‘What was his name?’
‘Jonathan.’
‘I’ll pray for him.’
‘Thank you,’ said Edgar.
‘The Francises are arranging everything,’ said Reg Webster. ‘We don’t really have anything to do with the church.’ He made it sound as if ‘the church’ was a sinister international organisation. Which perhaps it is, thought Edgar.
Reg didn’t sound as if he minded his neighbours taking over. Edgar had not quite worked out the relationship between the families. When he’d first interviewed Edna Webster, he’d thought that she considered her husband superior to Jim Francis, because Jim was a labourer whilst Reg worked for the bus company. But she’d also sounded slightly disparaging about Sandra Francis, who was well spoken and clearly well educated. Both houses were neat and tidy but the Websters possessed ornaments and net curtains, which hinted at a desire for gentility. Maybe it was just that the Websters didn’t have young children who would knock over china Alsatians and miniature cottages inscribed ‘A present from the Lake District’. Perhaps the Websters just weren’t the neighbourly sort. ‘We keep ourselves to ourselves,’ that’s what Edna had said. It could be that this attitude also extended to God.
Edna didn’t seem to have the energy to be disparaging about anybody today. She sat next to her husband, a thin wisp of a woman who seemed to have got thinner and wispier since the news of her son’s death. Edgar had given the Websters the same information from the autopsy but, unlike the Francises, they hadn’t queried anything. They hadn’t told Edgar that he wasn’t doing his job properly. They just stared at him with a kind of dumb resignation that made him feel even worse.
‘Mrs Francis asked me to read at the funeral tomorrow,’ he told them. ‘Is that all right with you?’
Please say it isn’t, he begged them silently. Say that one of you is desperate to do the reading.
‘That’ll be very nice,’ said Edna, as if he had offered to bake a cake for the Mother’s Union Christmas tea party. There was an invitation to this event on the mantelpiece, next to Mark’s photograph. Would Edna still go, now that she wasn’t a mother?
Walking back down the hill, Edgar thought about Friday. Ruby had asked him to come to Worthing that day. Would it be unseemly to think of pleasure so soon after such a funeral? He imagined the newspaper report. ‘Heartless policeman DI Edgar Stephens was seen in Worthing with his showgirl girlfriend on the very day that the tragic children were buried.’ But, even as he imagined the headlines, he thought: Showgirl girlfriend?
He still wasn’t sure if Ruby was his girlfriend. But she’d sent him the photograph and she’d asked him to come and see the show. He imagined taking Ruby home to see his mother. Surely even Rose would be won over by Ruby’s beauty and charm? Actually he had a nasty feeling that his mother was immune to beauty and charm. At any rate she would think them unnecessary qualities in a girlfriend, not like respectability and a light hand with pastry. She would consider Ruby somehow ‘flashy’, like Max’s Bentley or the check suits worn by his Uncle Charlie. ‘You’re over thirty now,’ his mother had said on his last visit to Esher. ‘About time you settled down with some nice girl.’
He should go and see his mother. He couldn’t go now, in the middle of a case, but he knew that a visit was long overdue. It had been early autumn went he last went to Esher, a mild day because they’d gone for a walk on Dit-ton Common and Rose had remembered how he and Jonathan used to cycle there as children. ‘You were always close. You left poor Lucy out sometimes.’ At the time he’d thought that this was a typical Rose remark, wistful but at the same time wounding, but afterwards he had wondered if there was some truth in it. He had been close to his younger brother, who had the sort of sunny personality that was easy to love. Lucy had been altogether more difficult: the middle child, strident and combative. One of the first sounds Edgar could remember was Lucy’s voice raised in protest, declaring that it just wasn’t fair. Well, it probably hadn’t been; he could imagine that his parents, neither of them exactly fans of female emancipation, might have expected Lucy to do more than her fair share of household chores. She had probably been helping their mother wash up while he daydreamed over his Latin. Even so, Lucy had done well at school, passing her exams with honours and going on to do a secretarial course, which had eventually led to a job as a doctor’s receptionist and marriage to a GP. But Edgar had studied Modern Greats at Oxford.
He must go and see his mother at Christmas. The thought made his heart sink but he knew that it was his duty. And besides, what was the alternative? Sitting alone in Brighton with a bottle of whisky dreaming about Ruby? Lucy, Rupert and the boys would probably be at his mother’s too and he’d make a special effort with them. He liked his three nephews, George, Edward and baby David, but he couldn’t remember ever doing anything fun with them. He must try to be a jolly uncle, like Uncle Charlie had been to him, and not a miserable figure in the corner always moaning about work.
Without knowing it, he was back at the station. He had made his decision. He was going to see Ruby on Friday. The funeral was at noon; he’d work all afternoon and then set off to Worthing at five. It would give him something to look forward to at any rate. He was already dreading the service.
Friday was an appropriately overcast day, cold and grey with flakes of snow in the air. More snow was forecast and Edgar just prayed that it held off until he got to Worthing. Then he could be snowed in with Ruby. He worked all morning, putting off the moment when he had to set off for the church. Emma and Bob left at eleven-fifteen. ‘We’ll save you a seat,’ said Emma, looking anxious. It was twenty to twelve by the time that Edgar left Bartholomew Square. Outside he saw Frank Hodges getting into his chauffeur-driven car. He didn’t offer Edgar a lift.
Edgar walked as fast as he could, his old army pace. It was further than he thought. He saw the tower of St George’s from a long way off; it was a curiously Italianate affair, out of place against the December sky. Inside it was exotic too, dark and candlelit, with lots of gilt and statues of the saints. Sandra Francis, who was a regular worshipper here, must be quite High Church. Edgar thought of her crossing herself, of her offering to pray for Jonathan. Well, he hoped that her faith was comforting her now.
There were two solid-looking rows of policemen, most of them in uniform. Emma was sitting at the end of the second row. She moved up for him. ‘Cutting it a bit fine, sir.’ Frank Hodges, who was in the row in front, didn’t look round but Edgar saw his moustache twitch.
The church was packed and the atmosphere sombre yet somehow expectant, almost like the moments before a wedding when you crane around to see a glimpse of the bride’s white dress in the porch. But when the music started, and the vicar began to walk slowly up the aisle, intoning, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life,’ Edgar thought that it was as far from a wedding as anything he had experienced. A pall of complete and utter grief fell upon the church. The two small coffins, each bearing a wreath of white roses; the families following behind; the stifled sobbing in the congregation: it all seemed combined to test the human heart beyond bearing.
Sandra Francis, all in black, looked pale and dignified. Jim followed, looking surprisingly impressive in a dark suit. The Websters walked behind, smaller and less striking, Edna in a grey coat with a dipping hem, Reg in a greenish-black suit. The children were there too. Edgar could see Betty’s red head in the front row beside her grandparents. The Websters, of course, had no other children.
The vicar, an effete-looking man in a snowy cassock, made some general remarks about life, death and resurrection and then it was Edgar’s turn. He walked up to the pulpit, hearing his shoes echoing on the stone floor. He tried not to look at the congregation as he found his place in the open Bible but he did see Max and Diablo sitting in one of the back pews and was touched that they had come.
The reading was from the gospel of St Luke. People bring their children to Jesus to be blessed and the disciples protest. But Jesus says, ‘Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.’ Reading those words ‘suffer little children’ in this place and with the two small coffins in front of him seemed, to Edgar, a new and exquisite torture. He read too quickly, hardly daring to look up, conscious of his voice dying away at the end of each line.
When he had sat down, Daphne Young made her way to the front of the church for the second reading. Edgar had noted that there were quite a few teachers present—including the three heads, Patricia Paxton, Martin Hammond and Duncan Pettigrew—but Daphne hadn’t been sitting with them. It was if she had materialised from the candles and the incense. She walked slowly, not looking to left or right, poised and elegant in a tight-fitting black velvet suit with her Titian hair piled up on top of her head. She scanned the congregation coolly before starting to read and, as soon as she opened her mouth, Edgar realised that she put him to shame. Her voice was low but clear enough to reach to the gilded ceiling. She spoke as if the words had just been revealed to her in a cloud of holy smoke. This reading was from John, the raising of Lazarus. Edgar wondered who had chosen it. It seemed tactless, somehow, to tell the story about Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead when nothing on earth or in heaven was ever going to bring Annie and Mark to life again. Lazarus is sick but Jesus takes His time coming to visit. When He arrives, Mary and Martha (Edgar had forgotten that they were in this story) tell him that their brother is dead. ‘If you had been here,’ says Mary, in what Edgar can’t help but hear as an accusing tone, ‘our brother would not have died.’ Jesus answers: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die.’ Then Jesus goes to the tomb, asks for the stone to be rolled away and calls, ‘Lazarus, come out.’ The dead man appears, still in his grave-clothes. Lazarus is recalled to life.
As Miss Young sat down there was a low murmur in the church. Edgar, too, felt strangely disquieted by the teacher’s performance, for performance was how he thought of it. He thought of ‘The Juniper Tree’. Marlinchen might be a corruption of Mary Magdalene and the boy coming to life could be seen to mirror the Resurrection. So satisfying, the justice meted out in these stories. But where was the justice for the children in their coffins below the altar steps? He looked at the families in the front row. Sandra Francis’s head was bowed, her youngest child sat in her lap. He saw Jim Francis pat her shoulder and turn round to glance reassuringly at Edna Webster. Reg Webster was sobbing into his handkerchief.
The vicar spoke next and his words seemed to be deliberately dry and detached, as if to disassociate himself from the drama of stones being rolled away and dead bodies appearing trailing their shrouds. He said that the death of children was always particularly sad but that, as St Luke said, children had a special place in the Saviour’s heart and that, even now, they were at his right hand in paradise. He said this as though paradise were an address in Brighton. Then the congregation rose to sing ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ and the coffins began their slow journey out of the church.
Max, watching from the back, thought that the vicar could have a future on the boards. His voice, though expressionless, carried effortlessly into the furthest rows, the cheapest seats. As for the previous speaker, the glamorous redhead, she was a thwarted thespian if he ever saw one. Edgar had been barely adequate, rushing through that rather beautiful passage as if he were reading a police report. Max was sure that Edgar had, in fact, been close to tears. He was too sensitive for police work; Max had told him so before now.
‘Dear me.’ Diablo dabbed his eyes as the coffins went past. ‘How sad this all is. Those poor families. They’ll never get over it, you know. My mother never got over the deaths of my two younger brothers in the first war.’ It was the first time that Diablo had mentioned this loss to Max. Edgar had lost a brother in the Second World War, he remembered.
The police contingent marched past. Max recognised the gormless sergeant and the good-looking blonde plus a host of other uniformed plods. Edgar stopped at their pew.
‘Thank you so much for coming. It was very good of you.’
‘We wanted to show our respect,’ said Diablo. ‘This must be terribly hard for you, dear boy.’
‘It’s hard for the families,’ said Edgar. ‘I don’t know how they’ll cope.’
The doors were open at the back now and people were streaming out. The committal, the vicar had said, was for close family only.
‘Who was the red-headed woman?’ said Max. ‘The one who read the Lazarus story?’
Edgar looked round quickly before replying. ‘Miss Young, the children’s primary school teacher. She’s an interesting woman.’
‘She looks it.’
‘What about coming for a quick drink?’ said Diablo hopefully. ‘I’m sure we all need it.’
‘I can’t,’ said Edgar. ‘I’ve got to get back to work.’
‘Tonight then.’
‘I’m busy tonight. I’m meeting Ruby.’
Edgar could never quite say Ruby’s name without blushing, thought Max. Aloud he said, ‘It’s her first night tomorrow, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, wish her luck from me.’
‘I will.’
Edgar smiled rather nervously at them both before making his way out of the church. Max, waiting for the crowds to disperse, wondered why he minded Edgar seeing Ruby. He should be pleased, surely, that she’d found herself such an eminently decent man. Except that Ruby was twenty-one and Edgar ten years older. But Ruby was old for her years. To his surprise, he realised that he was more worried about Ruby breaking Edgar’s heart than the other way round.
‘Bloody hell,’ said Diablo. ‘Look who’s here. It’s Roger the Dodger and that fellow who keeps telling me that I’m getting the lines wrong.’
Max followed Diablo’s pointing figure and saw Roger Dunkley and Nigel Castle amongst the crowd at the doors. He’d told Roger that he’d be attending the funeral, saying that he’d be back in good time for the matinee. Why hadn’t the director mentioned that he’d be there too?
‘Shall we find a side exit?’ said Diablo in a stage whisper. ‘A little of those two goes a long way with me.’
Max acquiesced but he couldn’t help looking back at the two theatricals as they mingled with the children’s family and friends. He couldn’t have said why their presence made him feel so uneasy.