reason St. James had left the two of them together precisely so that Lynley could do just that.
Chapter 3
The bodyhad no head. That single, grisly detail was the most prominent feature of the police photographs that were being passed among the three CID officers gathered at the circular table in the Scotland Yard office.
Father Hart looked nervously from one face to the next, and he fingered the tiny silver rosary in his pocket. It had been blessed by Pius XII in 1952. Not an individual audience, of course. One could never hope for that. But certainly that trembling, numinous hand making the sign of the cross over twothousand reverential pilgrims counted for a powerful sort of something.
Eyes closed, he'd held the rosary high above his head as if somehow that would allow the Pope's blessing to strike it more potently.
He was well on his way into the third decade of the sorrowful mysteries when the tall, blond man spoke.
"What a blow was there given,'" he murmured, and Father Hart looked his way.
Was he a policeman? Father Hart couldn't understand why the man was dressed so formally, but now, upon hearing the words, he looked at him hopefully. "Ah, Shakespeare. Yes.
Just the very thing somehow." The big man with the awful cigar looked at him blankly. Father Hart cleared his throat and watched them continue to scrutinise the pictures.
He'd been with them for nearly a quarter of an hour and in that time barely a word had been exchanged. A cigar had been lit by the older man, the woman had twice bitten off something she'd intended to say, and nothing more had occurred until that line from Shakespeare.
The woman tapped her fingers restlessly on the top of the table.
She at least was some sort of police person. Father Hart knew that by the uniform she wore. But she seemed so entirely unpleasant with her tiny, shifting eyes and her grim little mouth. She would never do. Not what he needed. Not what Roberta needed. What should he say?
The horrid photographs continued to be passed among them. Father Hart did not need to see them. He knew far too well what they captured. He'd been there first, and it was all so unspeakably engraved on his mind. William Teys sprawled out on his side - all six feet four of him - in a ghastly, quasi-fetal position, right arm extended as if he'd been reaching for something, left arm curled into his stomach, knees drawn up halfway to his chest, and where the head had been...There was simply nothing. Like Cloten himself. But no Imogen there to awaken in horror by his side. Just Roberta. And those terrifying words: "I did it. I'm not sorry."
The head had rolled into a mound of sodden hay in a corner of the stall. And when he'd seen it...Oh God, the stealthy eyes of a barn rat glittered in the cavity - quite small, of course - but the quivering grey snout was brilliant with blood and the tiny paws dug!
Our Father, who art in heaven...Our Father, who art in heaven...Oh, there's more, there's more and I can't remember it now!
"Father Hart." The blond man in the morning coat had removed his reading spectacles and had taken from his pocket a gold cigarette case. "Do you smoke?"
"I...yes, thank you." The priest snatched quickly at the case so that the others might not see how his hand trembled. The man passed the case to the woman, who shook her head sharply in refusal. A silver lighter was produced. It all took a few moments, blessed time to allow him to gather together his fragmented thoughts.
The blond man relaxed in his chair and studied a long line of photographs that had been posted on one of the walls of the office. "Why did you go to the farm that day, Father Hart?" he asked quietly, his eyes moving from one picture to the next.
Father Hart squinted myopically across the room. Were those pictures of suspects? he wondered hopefully. Had Scotland Yard seen fit to begin pursuing this malevolent beast already?
He couldn't tell, wasn't even certain from this distance that the photographs were of people at all.
"It was Sunday," he replied as if that would somehow say everything.
The blond man turned his head at that. Surprisingly, his eyes were an engaging brown.
"Were you in the habit of going to Teys's farm on Sundays? For dinner or something?"
"Oh...I...excuse me, I thought the report, you see..." This would never do.