Gethsemane Hall Page 6

  Meacham liked the logic. Finding out that Adams had his mental train derailed by something real but non-supernatural was the best scenario she could imagine. Debunking, plus the bonus that the CIA didn’t necessarily employ unstable loons. Perfect. “How soon can you make it down there?” she asked.

  Crawford swept his eyes over the post-nuke landscape of his desk. “The day after never. Or tomorrow.” He sighed, dismissing deadline nightmares. “Shall we say tomorrow?” He was beginning to sound excited. Meacham had counted on his not being able to resist the biggest debunking target on the current scene. “I take it you have Lord Gray’s permission to investigate the Hall?”

  “Working on it.” Her two brief phone conversations hadn’t gone well. Bad timing, what with the funeral of his wife and daughter. He’d hung up before she’d made it past the preliminaries. She had all her other ducks lined up now, so time for direct measures. Gray was letting her in the house, like it or not.

  Pertwee and Corderman left the Nelson, stopped at the Tesco to stock up on meat pies for the day, and then mounted their guard at the entrance to the grounds of Gethsemane Hall. Shortly after three, a silver Bristol approached the drive. Pertwee stepped into the middle of the road and waved. The car slowed to a stop. Corderman took Pertwee’s place in the road, and she went to the driver’s side. The tinted window did not descend. “Excuse me,” Pertwee said.

  After another few seconds, long enough to signal extreme reluctance, the window went down. Gray looked out at her, his gaze closed and bullshit-intolerant. “You’re blocking my way,” he pointed out.

  He was handsome, Pertwee thought, and she very much wanted him not to be angry with her. He had the narrow, refined features that bespoke aristocracy, minus the inbreeding. His tan was deep weathering and experience, not a UV bed’s cosmetic vanity, and the hollows of his eyes were hard grief and deep anger. Pertwee was having a romance-novel reaction, and she hated herself for it. Her knees weakened all the same. “I’m very sorry,” she said. “And I really don’t want to intrude during your time of loss.” Damn it. Her speech had been prepared, revised in her head for hours, and that’s exactly what it sounded like. She saw the clouds gather on his face and gave up on her spiel. It was dead as week-old fish. “Look,” she said. “My name is Anna Pertwee, and I investigate ...” She stopped herself. Her confidence was flooding away the longer Gray looked at her. She tried again. “Your house is so important —”

  He cut her off. “No,” he said and started the car.

  “You don’t understand —”

  “I think I do.”

  “The bad things people have been saying about your home. They’re wrong. I can give your house its reputation back.” Oops.

  Gray leaned on the horn. Corderman jumped, rabbit-scared by the blast. He dashed to the side of the road. Gray pointed at Pertwee. “Piss off,” he told her. He punched a remote clipped to his sun visor and the gate opened. He drove in, then stopped as the gate closed behind him. Pertwee only just restrained herself from dashing through while she had the chance. Gray climbed out of the car and stood, arms crossed, while the gate clanged to. “Another thing,” he said. “If I see either of you again, I’m calling the police.” He glanced at his watch. “And by ‘again,’ I mean if I can still see you thirty seconds from now. I said piss off, so hop to it.”

  No more romance novel thoughts as she and Corderman drove back into Roseminster. She wasn’t thinking about the first tiff that leads to eternal passion. She was humiliated. She was taking Gray at his word: she was pissed off. She parked not far from the church and burned rage-holes into the dashboard with her stare. Corderman had been smart and had stayed quiet during the drive. Now he made a mistake and spoke. “So?” he asked. “What’s the plan?”

  “The plan,” Pertwee repeated, flat.

  “Yes. Plan B.” He gave her a poke on the shoulder. “Hey, chin up. This was a setback, but we’ll bounce back.” When Pertwee said nothing, Corderman took the hint. “I’ll ... ah ... I’ll see you back at the rooms.” He swallowed. “I’ll try to come up with something.”

  “Yes, Edgar,” she spat. “You do that.”

  “Right. Right.” Chastened, he got out of the car.

  Pertwee watched him go up the road. When he was out of sight, she climbed out of the car. She walked until she reached the church square. She stood beside the Victoria Jubilee monument at the intersection of Wake Street and Charmouth Road. The ground sloped gently down in every direction from here. She stood at the modest peak and heart of Roseminster, took in the town, and resented it. The town should have been perfect. Its potential for that perfection made its failure to meet her expectations a betrayal. With a population of 5,500, Roseminster was big enough to boast one stand-alone supermarket but small enough that it had avoided the plague of large malls. Most of its citizens still did their daily shopping at the stores that rubbed shoulders along Wake Street as it ran by St. Rose’s Minster Church. Newsagent’s, chemist’s, grocer’s, all present and correct, still the traditional high street. Roseminster had its own parish fair at the end of May. Its architecture was traditional, and there wasn’t much to signal the second half of the twentieth century, let alone the beginning of the twenty-first, apart from the day-long crush of traffic down too-narrow and contorting streets.

  Roseminster was proud of its history. Little plaques dotted the streets, playing up each cameo the town had played in the Norman conquest, the civil war, or the Second World War. If there were a town, Pertwee thought, that should take pride in its ghosts and protect them from calumny, this was it. She hadn’t expected, on arriving, to be treated as a celebrity. She didn’t rate herself with that much delusion. What she had expected was a certain support for her project, a sense that she and the town were on the same side. No such luck. She’d given up trying to enlist the locals as collaborators after the first half-dozen responded to her overtures with an evasive politeness that stayed just this side of actual coldness. She hadn’t encountered hostility, and no one other than Gray had told her to piss off, but she had met an indifference so studied it amounted to a campaign. She couldn’t understand it. It wasn’t as though Roseminster had been shielded from the media’s lurid gaze. The fuss was dying down a little, but the town had made the headlines in the tabs, and its name meant something now. It had a reputation. Pertwee couldn’t believe the rep was one the residents were happy to let stand. She was here to help them remove the town’s tarnish and restore its shine. They gave her no help. They gave her a brick wall. Well, no more, she thought. Not after today. She was going to force the issue.

  She went back to the Nelson and spent the rest of the afternoon marshalling her arguments. Corderman poked his head in her room at one point, mumbled something incomprehensible when she gave him an impatient look, and ducked out. Evening rolled around, and she was ready. She went to find Corderman, and he seemed ready to flinch when he saw her. She had her equanimity back now, and felt guilty. “I’ve been a bitch, haven’t I?” she said.

  “Well ...” His tone was playful and relieved.

  “Cast iron? Steel-plated?”

  “And copper-bottomed.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shook his head. “You don’t have to be. I understand how important this is.”

  “No reason to take it out on you. Anyway, all better now.”

  “We have a plan?”

  “We have a plan. Part of which might involve my going all copper-bottomed again. If that happens, don’t freak out, okay?”

  “Roger.”

  “Let’s do this, then.”

  There was a pub on the ground floor of the Nelson. Pertwee’s initial thought had been to mount her campaign here. She changed her mind after looking around for a minute. Most of the patrons were having meals rather than simply drinking and were seated singly or in pairs. She was looking, she decided, mainly at visitors. Not enough locals for what she had in mind. Though she would keep this scene in her back pocket. Might come in handy l
ater.

  “So?” Corderman asked.

  “Let’s eat out.”

  The Leaping Stag was at the edge of town, just before the forest that separated Gethsemane Hall from Roseminster. Far from central, it was closer to the residential areas than the Nelson. Pertwee had stopped in briefly the day before, but the pub’s obvious potential hadn’t struck her until now. When she entered, she knew she’d hit paydirt. This was the local. This was where Roseminster came to relax and debrief. All the tables were taken, most by groups of four or more. The bar was packed. It occurred to her that if she wanted to make herself unpopular, this was the place for it. Swallowing was suddenly difficult. Corderman must have noticed. “Is this going to be okay?” he asked.

  “I don’t think things are going to become violent.”

  “Good.” His posture relaxed.

  What now, Genius? The grand gesture, seductive in the abstract daydreams of glory, lost its appeal now the moment had come. It shrivelled at reality’s touch. She was going to address the pub, was that it? Was that what she was really planning to do? How? Climb up on the bar? Draw everyone’s attention by doing a trick with ping pong balls? Was she insane?

  “So?” Corderman asked, and this time she had no good answer for him. “What’s the plan?” he prompted.

  The plan was to grow up. “I had a stupid idea,” she said. (If she had the nerve, though. Maybe. Maybe. Try something a bit more subtle first.) She approached the bar and ordered a pint of Kronenbourg. “Mind if I ask you something?” she asked the big man who served her.

  “One minute, luv.” He moved up and down the length of the bar, filling orders with the efficiency of a balletic automaton. He made a complete pass, then, caught up for the moment, he came back to her. “What can I do for you?” He laughed. Pertwee didn’t get the joke, didn’t even see it, but she caught the infection and joined in.

  She held out her hand. “My name is Anna Pertwee, Mr. ..?”

  “John Porter.” His grip was made for hoisting tankards. “Yes, I know who you are.” Still friendly, but a hair less jovial. His eyes gave away nothing.

  So far, Pertwee had behaved. She knew she could trigger at least some small media dust-ups if she wanted. She hadn’t in the past, that damned hope for credibility restraining her from making any overt alliances with the useful but dangerous tabloids. She hadn’t spoken to any reporters in Roseminster, didn’t think they even knew she was here. But the word of her presence was out, it seemed, at least on the local channels. “Do you know why I’m here?” she asked.

  “For the Hall.” That laugh again, but the eyes were wary.

  “Yes, but not for the same reason as all the newspapers. I’m not about making life worse for people.”

  “Never said you were, miss.”

  “But you think I am. My impression is that most of you do.”

  Porter shook his head. “We really don’t, you know.”

  “But you won’t help me get into that house.”

  “A man’s entitled to his privacy.”

  “What privacy? With every red-top in existence camped on his doorstep?”

  “They aren’t —”

  “You know what I mean. I’m sure Lord Gray hasn’t been able to answer the telephone in a normal fashion a single time since he returned from Africa. But to be honest, I’m thinking about the greater good. I’m thinking about all of you.”

  “Are you, now.” No laughter. He was very quiet. For a moment, he was impassive enough to take up residence on Easter Island, then he shifted his attention to her right. “Excuse me,” he said and did another lap of the bar. When he returned, he was still serious. “How, exactly, can I help you, miss?” Formal, almost stiff, that wall she’d run into so many times rising again.

  “You don’t seem to understand. I want to help you. All of you. The good name of Gethsemane Hall has been smeared, and so, through association, has Roseminster’s. You don’t want to become known as the British Amityville, do you?”

  “Exactly.” Corderman had come to stand at her elbow, and piped up now. Pertwee held up a hand to shush him. Porter ignored him.

  “What are you proposing to do?” Porter asked.

  “Investigate the Hall properly. Show people what it’s really all about.”

  “And you think you know what it’s about?”

  “Of course! Don’t you?”

  Porter scratched the back of his neck, studied the bar surface as if he could see his reflection. “You’ll really have to pardon me, miss. Duty calls.” He swept away, and Pertwee heard him begin to laugh again as he took orders.

  You bastard, Pertwee thought. Just for that, I am going to make a scene. Her outrage fuelled her courage. “Right,” she muttered.

  “Should I be brave?” Corderman asked, half-joking.

  “I would say yes,” she said. She grabbed an ashtray and rapped it against the bar. “Excuse me!” she called. The woman standing next to her barely glanced her way. “Excuse me!” Again, louder. Her voice disappeared into the conversational roar. “Oi!” A few more looks, some awkward shuffling of feet. She was on her way to being an embarrassment instead of a provocateur. She considered climbing on the bar after all, but it looked narrow. People were leaning over it. She pictured herself falling over and began to flush in the anticipation of humiliation. “Can you whistle?” she asked Corderman, raising her index fingers to her mouth to indicate the kind of ear pierce she wanted. He shook his head. She couldn’t, either. Her shoulders slumped. Useless. She couldn’t even make a nuisance of herself. “Let’s go,” she said.

  As she headed for the exit, a man stepped forward to intercept her. He was very old. His back was as round as his shoulders, as if from a weight too heavy and carried too long. His eyes were the long plummet of fatigue. He touched his forehead with two fingers, tipping an imaginary cap. “Might I speak with you?” he asked. Pertwee nodded, and the man led them outside. He introduced himself as Roger Bellingham. “I do think you mean well,” he began. “You would, however, be doing the town and yourselves a service by leaving the Hall alone.”

  “I’m sorry. But I don’t think it’s fair for you to keep the house to yourselves. It’s too important.”

  His laugh was a short, bitter bark. “Oh, dear me, that isn’t what we’re trying to do.”

  “What, then? Are you afraid of it?”

  He didn’t answer. He poked at a stone on the pavement with his stick.

  “Can’t you feel it?” Pertwee pleaded. She spoke quietly.

  Bellingham looked up, the movement sharp and quick. “Feel what?” A hint of alarm.

  “It’s hard to describe. Like a pull. When I looked down the drive toward the Hall, and knew I was so close, even if I couldn’t actually see it, I felt drawn to it. Do you understand what I’m trying to say?”

  “Perfectly.”

  “Then you do feel the same thing?”

  “I have felt tugged toward that house every moment of every day of my life.” He said this with a resignation and despair so profound, Pertwee’s heart gave an unpleasant lurch.

  “Then all the more reason,” she began, “for you to help —”

  Bellingham held up a hand. “Do you love the sea?” he asked.

  Pertwee sputtered for a moment, trying to catch up. “Yes,” she said, confused.

  “But if you were swimming, and you encountered an undertow or a riptide, what would you do? Even if you love the sea, you don’t want to approach it on its own terms.”

  Corderman asked, “Are you saying the house is bad?”

  “It can’t be,” Pertwee answered, firm. “It was the home of a saint.”

  “You seem very sure,” Bellingham commented.

  “Am I wrong?”

  “No. It was on that site that Saint Rose the Evangelist lived and died. You are right about that.”

  “And people have, for centuries, found spiritual renewal in that house.”

  Bellingham gave her a curious look. “Yes, those are the stori
es. Go on. What else do you know about the Hall?”

  Corderman jumped in. “Some people believe the spirit of Saint Rose looks out for whoever stays there. More likely, she created a conduit to a higher plane, and that’s what people are experiencing. Either way, it’s the most transcendent residence in Britain.”

  “Is that a fact? My, my, how reassuring.”

  “I don’t understand your sarcasm,” Pertwee said.

  “That’s because you haven’t lived here. You cannot, because we who know it best do not, understand the house.”

  “Maybe you need to be an outsider. How many Parisians visit the Eiffel Tower? I have made a study of such places as Gethsemane Hall, you know.”

  “I don’t doubt it. But if you’d been thorough, then I doubt you’d be here. You would either dismiss the stories you’ve heard as fanciful and not bother with the place, or you would draw the correct conclusions and stay far away.”

  “That makes no sense. All the tales about Gethsemane Hall are positive ones. Except the most recent. That’s why we can’t let it colour the world’s perception of the house.”

  “How reliable are those other stories? No, don’t answer. I’ll tell you. They’re worthless. I have done some research, too, over the years. I wanted to understand this thing that was pulling at me. Do you know, every person who has ever written about what a wonderful oasis of peace and tranquillity and salvation and I don’t know what other rubbish the house is, has never actually resided there?”

  “But Edward Hardsmith’s The Lights of Gethsemane Hall —”

  “A fraud. I have seen the correspondence from the Gray family to their solicitors. Hardsmith was a fabulist. He never visited the Hall.”

  “But the details he gives of the town. Even allowing for the passage of a hundred and fifty years, they’re extremely accurate.”

  “He stayed here. In town. That is far from being a guest of the Grays. The family itself has never spoken of the house, and their tenancy here has not been joyful. Take a good look at the sources that speak glowingly of the Hall. They are all based on hearsay, or on the experiences of those who visited Roseminster and felt the pull.” Bellingham gave her a smile grim with knowledge. “One feels drawn to a place one is convinced is holy. The conclusion one arrives at is obvious.”