The Witching Pool: A Justice Belstrang Mystery (Justice Belstrang Mysteries Book 2) by John Pilkington (love letters to the dead .TXT) 📗

‘That’s not the reason,’ I said. ‘You did it because Cobbett forced you – because he threatened to expose you for the foul, child-using devil you are. You laid his daughter to rest because you had no choice - will you deny it?’

He could not. With an effort I mastered myself, Boyd and I standing over the wretched Woolland. The sorriest rogue I ever knew: a pious zealot, quick to call down the wrath of God on everyone but himself.

With a muttered oath, I turned from him and made for the door.

FOURTEEN

It was Boyd who questioned Parson Woolland further, after I had gone down the stairs. I did not see the inn-keeper; in truth I looked neither to left nor right as I went. Outside, I stood beside Leucippus for a while, breathing in sweet air with a scent of mown grass. Presently the doctor emerged, and without a word we got ourselves mounted. Not until we had put Kempsey behind us, and were well on the road, did I ask him what had occurred.

‘It’s most odd,’ he answered. ‘That one’s a sorry excuse for a parson, but he’s also a frightened man beneath his bluster - and not merely because he fears his sins being found out.’

I took in his words, and waited.

‘He was loth to speak to me, of course, but I sensed something,’ he went on. ‘Were he a Papist I’d describe him as being eager to make Confession, and to do some sort of penance. As it is, I think he’s desperate to unburden himself to someone.’

‘Well he might be,’ I muttered.

‘Indeed, and yet…’ Boyd frowned. ‘You hit the nail aright, when you accused him of being under Cobbett’s thumb. But instead, I thought to press him further in the matter of your friend Mistress Mason - and the accusations against her.’

I turned sharply to him. ‘What did he say?’

‘Only what you would expect: that she was a demon in female form who must be destroyed, and so forth. I left him soon after, being mighty tired of his company.’ He paused, then: ‘Yet there is a puzzlement here, Robert… this unholy and strange-looking link between Woolland, Cobbett and-’

‘And his tenant, Humphreys,’ I finished. In truth, I had thought the same: that private smile I had seen exchanged at the graveside, and could not forget.

‘Do you have any tasks this afternoon?’ I asked, on impulse.

‘Nothing pressing…’ The doctor eyed me warily. ‘What action are you proposing now?’

‘None, for the present. I was intending to invite you to ride home with me, take dinner at Thirldon and then help me tease this business out. I would welcome your insight. Will you honour me?’

‘Will we dine alone, or with Mistress Hester?’ Boyd enquired. ‘For I generally value her insight too… don’t you?’

I threw him a rueful look, and eased Leucippus to a faster gait as the spires of Worcester came into view.

***

After dinner, we sat outdoors at my garden table in the company of a jug of wine, as well as in the company of Hester. And, since there was no gainsaying him, that of Childers too. I had already given them an account of what had transpired in Kempsey, which distressed Hester a good deal. Having voiced her opinion, that Woolland was unfit to be in holy orders, she had fallen silent on the matter. Now, with all said and done, we assembled like a council of war – or rather like a jury mulling over the evidence, before realising that there was precious little of it.

‘I’ve turned it over until I’m giddy,’ I admitted. ‘I thought to uncover a design to have Agnes Mason hanged, so that Cobbett could seize her bit of land, whether he thinks there’s gold buried there or not. Now, it feels murkier… as if some conspiracy lies beneath, the purpose of which eludes me.’

‘It eludes me too,’ Boyd murmured. ‘Yet I’ll allow that conspiracies sometimes exist. Will we ever forget the Powder Treason, and what might have been had it succeeded?’

I glanced at Hester: neither of us wished to revisit that topic, given my involvement in uncovering the Anniversary Plot, which to most people’s knowledge never existed.

‘Yet as matters stand, sir, you must concede that Giles Cobbett has what he wants,’ Childers said, having waited to make his contribution with impatience. ‘Both of those young people now adjudged suicides, and believed by everyone to have been driven to madness by witchery. When those facts are put before a jury-’

‘I’m well aware of it,’ I broke in, with my withering look. ‘And moreover…’ I glanced at Boyd. ‘It looks if all those in Cobbett’s circle – for a circle it appears to me – are prepared to hide the truth, or even lie under oath, to further him in his aims.’ I was thinking of the testimony of William Mount, who claimed to have found the body, and of the Powick constable, but especially that of Eliza Dowling.

‘Or in the case of Justice Standish, to dispute evidence that doesn’t suit him,’ Boyd said. ‘Or to refuse to hear it.’

‘Hence, you stand alone,’ Hester put in, looking at me. With the eyes of all three of us upon her, she added: ‘Standish is the Magistrate, who will have conference with the judge at Quarter Sessions. Hence, who remains to listen to your theories? Provided you have any, that is.’

None of us spoke, until Childers chose to break the silence.

‘Some might say that you have done all you can for that woman, sir,’ he ventured.

I met his eye, and saw only concern for me; to him, the matter was all but closed. Yet he had not seen Agnes Mason in her cell, nor the distress of her son and daughter-in-law… I took a drink, but made no reply.