Chapter 97
Candlelight is flickering in the chapel. Elizabeth and Matthew Mackie are inches apart, in the confessional.
“I see no point in dressing it up. And I don’t want forgiveness—yours or the Lord’s.
I just want it on record. I want someone to bear witness, before I die and it’s all dust. I know there are rules, even in the confessional, so you must do whatever you need to do with this information.
I killed a man. This was a lifetime ago, and for what it’s worth, he attacked me and I defended myself. But I killed him.
“Go on.”
“I was living in digs in Fairhaven. I don’t know if you’re the type to judge me, but I had invited him home.
Stupid, perhaps, but you were probably stupid back then too.
That’s where he attacked me. The details are grisly, but that’s not an excuse.
I fought back, and I killed him. I was so frightened; I knew exactly how it looked.
No one had seen what happened, so who would believe me?
They were different times, you know that; you remember that? ”
“I remember.”
“I wrapped the body in a curtain. I dragged it to my car. And that’s where I left it while I thought what to do. This had all happened very quickly, that’s what you have to understand. That morning I had woken like everybody else, and now here I was. It seemed so absurd.”
“How did you kill him? May I ask?”
“I shot him. In the leg. I hadn’t thought he would die, but he bled and he bled and he bled. So much blood, so quickly. Perhaps if he’d made a noise it would have been different? But he just whimpered. In shock, I suppose. And I watched him die, as close as I am to you now.”
Silence in the confessional. Silence in the chapel. Elizabeth has locked and bolted the door. No one is going to come in. And, of course, no one is going to get out. If that was the way this was going to end.
“Then . . . well, then I sat and I wept, because what else was there to do? I waited for the hand on my shoulder, for someone to take me away. It was so monstrous. But as I sat there, and I sat there, and I sat there, nothing much happened. No one knocked, no one screamed. There was no lightning. So I made myself a cup of tea. And the kettle still boiled, and the steam rose, and I still had a body, wrapped in a curtain, in the boot of my car. It was a summer evening, so I turned on the wireless, and I waited until dark. And then I drove here.”
“Here?”
“Saint Michael’s, yes. I worked here for a time. I don’t know if you knew that?”
“I didn’t.”
“So I drove through the gates, and I switched off my lights as I drove up the hill. The sisters would always sleep early. I kept driving, past Saint Michael’s, past the hospital, and up the lane to the Garden of Eternal Rest. You know it?”
“I know it.”
“Of course. And I took my spade, and I don’t want these walls to crumble around us, but I chose a grave, of one of the sisters.
It was right at the top, where the earth was soft, and I dug.
I dug until I hit the wood of a coffin. Then I walked back to my car.
I tipped the body out of the boot and out of the curtain.
I hadn’t had to remove any clothes, because he was naked when he attacked me, you understand.
And so I dragged the body up the path, through the headstones.
It was hard going, I remember that. At one point I cursed, and then I apologized for cursing.
I got the body up to the hole, and then tipped it into the grave.
On top of the coffin. Then I took my spade again, I filled in the grave, and I said a prayer.
Then I walked back to my car, I put the spade in the boot, and I drove home. That’s as plain as I can tell it. “
“I understand.”
“And the knock at the door never came. Which, I suppose, is why I’m telling you all this now. Because no one knocked at my door, and surely someone should have? In my dreams they knock every night. There have to be consequences. So what do you think? Please, just be honest with me.”
“Be honest with you?” Matthew Mackie lets out a long, slow sigh. “I’ll be honest. I don’t believe a word of it, Elizabeth.”
“Not a word?” queries Elizabeth. “There was a lot of detail, Father Mackie. The date, the gunshot to the leg, that very particular grave. What a peculiar thing for me to make up?”
“Elizabeth, you didn’t work here in nineteen seventy.”
“Mmm. You did, though. I’ve seen the pictures.”
“I did, yes. I’ve sat here before. And I’ve sat where you are too.”
Elizabeth decides to start turning the screw.
“You sound like a man who wants to talk. Anything I’ve said triggered any memories? Convinced you I might just know something?”
Matthew Mackie gives a sad laugh. Elizabeth keeps at him.
“If you don’t mind me saying, Father Mackie, you gave quite the little jump when I mentioned the Garden of Eternal Rest?”
“I do mind you saying that, Elizabeth, but I suppose I would like to talk. I’ve always wanted to. And since we’re both here, why don’t you play your real cards and see where that gets you?”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m at home here, Elizabeth. In God’s house. Let’s talk awhile, shall we? Two old fools? You just start somewhere, and I’ll join in where I can.”
“Shall we start with Ian Ventham? Shall we talk awhile about him?”
“Ian Ventham?”
“Well, let’s start there, at least. We can always work backward. I might start with a question, Father Mackie, if you don’t mind?”
“Ask away. And call me Matthew, please.”
“Thank you, I will. So, first things first, Matthew. Why did you kill Ian Ventham?”