False Tongues (11 page)

‘You disappoint me. I pictured you right in the middle of the gin-and-lace crowd, darling.' He gave her a wicked grin and pantomimed knocking back a large drink.

‘There's very little of either gin or lace at All Saints',' she laughed. Not with Jane firmly in charge.

‘What's your incumbent like, then?' Nicky swivelled his head round and surveyed the earnest role-playing which was already underway in the room. ‘That's what we're supposed to be role-playing, isn't it? A conversation with our incumbent?'

‘Oh, Brian. He's all right.'

Nicky raised an eyebrow. ‘Surely that's
Father
Brian?'

She smiled. ‘Well, he does encourage the congregation to call him Father. But I certainly don't. He's just Brian to me.'

‘My dear!' Nicky looked scandalised. ‘I can't imagine what would happen if I were to call Father Stephen
Steve
. Or even Stephen. Maybe that's the root of your problems with him.'

‘Who said I had problems with Brian?'

‘Everyone has problems with their incumbent,' he stated knowingly. ‘If it's not one sort of problem, then it's something else. That's what being a curate is all about.'

‘Brian's all right,' Callie repeated. ‘He's a bit lazy, I must admit—if he can push something off on to me, he's happy to do it. I think he's been coasting for quite a few years.' As she said it, she knew it was true: she'd never thought about it in those terms before, but it was true. Maybe there was some point in role-playing after all…‘Actually,' she added, ‘I think I'd get on with him just fine if it weren't for his wife. Jane. She hates me, for some reason. And resents me.'

‘Oh, a
wife
!' Nicky gave an exaggerated shudder. ‘He's a
family
man! No wonder you're having problems with him. It was the beginning of the end of the Church of England, when they allowed married clergy.'

‘But there's always been married clergy!' she protested.

‘And the Church of England is in terminal decline.' He nodded smugly. ‘It's taken a few hundred years, but…Elizabeth the First had the right idea. She refused to acknowledge clergy wives.'

Nicky was just being provocative, she told herself. He didn't really believe what he was saying. It was part of the way he operated: to stir things up a bit, to get people to think about their positions.

‘Something I've always wondered about.' Callie deliberately removed the focus from herself. ‘If you're so very High Church, why did you decide to come to Archbishop Temple House? It's so middle-of-the-road. Why didn't you go to St Stephen's House, or even Westcott House? Or Mirfield?'

He laughed. ‘I've asked myself that question a million times. But it was my Bishop, darling. I wanted to go to Staggers, but he insisted. Said it would be good for me, for my formation, to see how the other half lives.'

‘How grim for you,' she smiled.

‘At least he settled for middle-of-the-road. Broad Church, he called it. Liberal. He could have sent me among the Evangelicals, to Ridley Hall or Wycliffe.'

‘I don't think you would have survived.'

‘The Bible thumpers would have torn me apart,' he said quietly, serious for once.

Callie had seen enough of the extreme Evangelical faction in London to know what he was talking about. Evangelicals like Adam's incumbent, with their fear and loathing of homosexuality and their utter certainty that they were right. About everything.

Adam had become rather like that himself, she had observed in the limited contact she'd had with him in London. He'd taken up the Evangelical banner with every semblance of sincerity.

Involuntarily Callie looked over toward him, to where he was earnestly role-playing with Tamsin. Poor Tamsin, who would, of a certainty, rather be with Nicky.

Surely Adam hadn't always been like that? A hard-line Evangelical? When they were here at Archbishop Temple, he had seemed like the rest of them—liberal-thinking, inclusive, willing to listen to other people's points of view. His parents had been missionaries, yes, but he had never seemed to possess that missionary zeal to convert everyone to his way of thinking or his brand of Churchmanship. What had happened to him?

Nicky must have followed the direction of her eyes. ‘He's changed,' he said, as if reading her thoughts. ‘Adam. He's much more…judgmental…than he used to be. About me, and what he calls my “lifestyle.” Not that he knows anything about that,' he added bitterly. ‘We had a chat last night, in the bar. He came over really heavy. I must admit that it got to me.' He leaned forward and took Callie's hands, squeezing them hard. ‘You're not still hung up on him, are you? Tell me that you're not.'

‘No,' said Callie. ‘No, I'm not.'

***

In his years as a Family Liaison Officer, Mark had done this more times than he cared to think about: taken people to the mortuary to identify the body of a relative. Wives identifying husbands, husbands identifying wives; sisters and brothers, children and parents. All horrible, but this was the most difficult of all. There was something particularly repugnant—something unnatural, in the true sense of the word—about parents outliving their children. It wasn't supposed to be this way. And this was the Frosts' only child: their only link to the future of the planet, their only hope of genetic immortality.

So the last thing he needed, as he carried out this sensitive and difficult facet of his job, was to encounter the ghoulish press, in the person of Lilith Noone, at the mortuary.

She waited until the deed had been done—until a white-faced but composed Miranda Frost had entered the viewing room with her husband and said ‘Yes, that's Sebastian'—and they were on their way out.

At least Lilith didn't have a photographer with her. A small blessing, but a blessing nonetheless. Miranda Frost's face was not something that belonged on the front page—or any other page—of the
Daily Globe
. Mark, recognising Lilith in an instant, glared at her and put his hand up to ward her off.

It all happened so quickly after that.

Lilith Noone ignored him and went straight for the bereaved mother. ‘Could I have a word?' she asked in a soft voice, warm with sympathy.

Miranda Frost stopped and turned toward her, blinking, as though the voice had come out of the blue. ‘Yes?'

‘Your son, was it?'

Mrs Frost nodded automatically.

‘I'm so sorry. You must be devastated.'

Richard Frost, at his wife's side, seemed to snap out of his own private hell as he became aware of the intruder. ‘Who are you?' he demanded.

‘I think it's time for us to go,' Mark tried to interpose.

But somehow Lilith Noone had established a connection with Miranda Frost. They stared at each other for a moment, as if no one else were in the room. ‘Sebastian was my only son,' Miranda said.

‘How terrible for you. Do you have any idea who could have done this to him?'

Miranda shook her head. ‘Why would anyone want to kill Sebastian?'

‘He didn't have any enemies, then? He wasn't involved in drugs, in—'

Now, Mark realised, Lilith Noone had gone too far. Miranda took a step backwards, her eyes widened, and the colour suddenly returned to her cheeks. ‘No,' she said sharply. ‘No. Who
are
you?'

Lilith carried on. ‘Could I ask your name?'

‘You can ask all you like,' Mark asserted, regaining control of the situation. ‘No one is going to tell you anything.' He put an arm around Miranda Frost's back and propelled her toward the door.

***

Sebastian Frost: it was official. Mark had rung to tell Neville that the identification had been made, so now the investigation could proceed properly, with a named victim.

Tracing Sebastian Frost's last movements—his final hours—was the priority, and for that, Neville decided, the logical place to start was with his friends.

Miranda Frost had efficiently written out a list of the three boys she knew to be her son's closest friends, including their addresses and phone numbers. Neville studied it: Hugo Summerville, Olly Blount, Tom Gresham. Eventually he would need to talk to all three of them himself, and most likely quite a few others as well, but for now he reckoned it was important to get to all of them as quickly as possible. ‘I'll start with this Hugo Summerville,' he said to Sid Cowley when they'd got back to the station. ‘You can deal with one of the others. Tom Gresham.' He gave him the address.

‘Right, Guv.'

‘And I don't need to tell you, do I, not to antagonise him by suggesting straightaway that he and his friends are druggies?'

‘They probably are,' Cowley stated.

‘See if you can be a bit subtle about it.' Neville sighed. ‘Ring me when you've finished, and we'll decide where to go from there.'

Hugo Summerville lived not too far from the Frosts, Neville discovered. His house was in one of the exclusive squares of Georgian terraces between Praed Street and Sussex Gardens.

It was an impressive house. Whatever Hugo Summerville's parents did, they were not short of a bob or two, Neville realised as he mounted the steps to the front door. He hoped the parents weren't going to be difficult when it came to him interviewing their son.

He needn't have worried: the door was opened by a boy who was almost certainly Hugo himself. ‘Are your parents at home?' Neville asked.

‘No, they're not. Can I help you?' said the boy; his voice was polite and his accent all that one would expect, given the neighbourhood. He looked, in fact, like a typical, quintessential public schoolboy, tall and slim, with floppy fair hair and the sort of bland good looks that would doubtless set young female hearts aflutter.

‘Are you Hugo Summerville?'

‘That's right.'

Neville produced his warrant card. ‘I'm Detective Inspector Stewart, Mr Summerville. I'd like to talk to you, if you don't mind.'

Hugo frowned. ‘It's about Seb, isn't it? His mum rang looking for him.'

‘Yes, it's in regards to Sebastian Frost,' he confirmed.

‘I told her I didn't know where he was.' Hugo hadn't moved from the door. ‘He's not here, I swear it.'

‘Could I come in? I need to ask you a few questions.'

‘I told his mum. He came round in the afternoon to play a video game. I don't know where he went after that.' But Hugo had stepped aside, allowing Neville into the entrance hall.

‘You're here by yourself?'

‘My dad is playing tennis,' Hugo explained. ‘And Mum is shopping. She won't be back for hours.' He hesitated for a moment, then led Neville up a flight of stairs and into a handsome formal drawing room which overlooked the leafy square.

Neville, wanting to establish who was in charge, took a seat in a wing-backed chair and gestured for Hugo to do the same. He may as well get it over with, he decided, rather than beating about the bush. ‘I'm afraid I have some bad news for you,' he said, watching the boy's face closely for his reaction.

Hugo leaned forward and swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. ‘Yes?'

‘Your friend Sebastian is dead, I'm afraid.'

The boy blinked. ‘Dead?'

‘He's been killed. Murdered.'

The brutal words fell between them. Hugo sat still, not moving a muscle, and Neville did the same, waiting. The silence stretched out interminably. Then Hugo exhaled, a long and painful breath. ‘Oh, no.'

‘You're sure you didn't see him last night?'

The boy swallowed again. ‘No.'

‘And you had no knowledge of his movements, or his plans? Whether he was planning to meet someone, for instance?'

‘No.' His eyes flickered away from Neville.

It occurred to Neville that for an articulate boy, Hugo seemed suspiciously at a loss for words. Neville might have expected questions from him at this point: where? How had it happened? How had he been found? And above all, why would anyone want to kill Sebastian?

Maybe Cowley was right. Maybe it had to do with drugs. Dealing? Perhaps, if they were in it together, Hugo knew exactly who had killed his best friend, and why. A drug deal gone wrong? Something as prosaic, as tawdry, as that?

It could happen, even in the best families.

Hugo turned his face toward the expanse of windows. ‘I thought…' he said slowly, then stopped and began again. ‘That is, I rather thought that Seb was seeing Lexie last night. Since his parents were working.'

Lexie? It was the first time he'd heard that that name. Miranda Frost hadn't mentioned any Lexie when she listed Sebastian's friends. ‘Who is Lexie?' he asked sharply.

Hugo's head swivelled back again in Neville's direction, and at last he resumed eye contact. ‘Lexie Renton. Seb's girlfriend.' He shrugged. ‘We call her Sexy Lexie. His parents…well, they thought he was too young to have a regular girlfriend. They thought he should be concentrating on his GCSEs.'

Quite right, too, was Neville's immediate thought. A boy of fifteen…

It was amazing how one's perspective changed with the years. He didn't even want to think what he'd been up to at fifteen. Or would have done, if he'd had the opportunity and had thought he could get away with it. Neville resolutely put that out of his mind.

‘A regular girlfriend, you say? They were…serious?'

Hugo gave another shrug. ‘He was shagging her, if that's what you mean. Whenever he could. When his parents were both at work.'

‘And he told you about this?'

The boy nodded.

Of course he did. They were best friends, and they were boys. Bragging about their sexual exploits, real or imagined, to each other—that's what boys did.

This, Neville realised, changed everything. Drugs suddenly seemed much less likely than…what? A lovers' row? A crime of passion? Two boys fighting over the same girl?