Fallen Gods

Twenty-Seven

Not being an adherent of any faith, Stevie Steele had admired the grey sandstone building that housed the Church of Scotland headquarters, but he had never before thought of stepping inside.

Much of the ground floor was actually retail space selling a fairly broad range of products, appropriate to the nature of the Church.

Walking past, Steele saw Cliff Richard's face smiling up at him from a rack of CDs.

He found the reception desk and announced himself and the sergeant, using names rather than ranks. When he had made the appointment it had been agreed that its nature should be kept off the office grapevine if possible.

Steele's police training had taught him to avoid preconceptions, and so he was less surprised than he might have been by the appearance of the

Principal Clerk to the Moderator of Scotland's established church, or indeed by his name. The Reverend Cahal O'Reilly, an ordained minister of the Church of Scotland, looked to be in his early forties, or perhaps even a few years younger. He greeted the detectives at the door of his panelled office, dressed in tight black trousers and a short-sleeved Ralph Lauren polo shirt, open at the neck and tie-less.

"Morning, chaps," he said. Steele tried to detect an accent, but could hear none.

"Good morning, Mr. O'Reilly. I'm Steven Steele; we spoke earlier.

This is my colleague George Regan."

The Principal Clerk stood aside to usher them into his room. "Grab a seat," he told them, pointing towards a meeting table. "I'm afraid this is a smoke- and coffee-free zone, but I can offer you chilled water, still or sparkling."

"I'm fine, thanks," the inspector replied. "You, George?" Regan who had a major caffeine habit, shook his head.

"So," said O'Reilly, as he sat in a high-backed chair at the head of the table, 'what have we been up to? Which one of the fathers and brethren have strayed from the straight and narrow and how far is the stuff going to spread off the fan?"

The sergeant's eyes widened slightly, but he held his poker-faced expression. In contrast, a broad grin spread across Stevie Steele's face. "Which of the shepherds has been getting among the sheep, do you mean?" he replied. "You can relax. It's nothing like that. Are you aware of the exhibition of religious art, which opened on Saturday?"

"In a blaze, you might say? Sure, I know about it. I helped organise the damn thing."

"You did?"

"Yes. I wasn't alone, you understand; my opposite numbers in other

Christian churches and in other faiths were involved too."

"You don't make it sound like a labour of love."

"Pain in the arse would be a better description," O'Reilly said, with a rueful frown. "And it's a particularly sore point with me. Actually,

I'd assumed that's what you wanted to see me about, all joking apart.

I'm just not clear why you wanted to keep your visit hush-hush, given the publicity the thing's had."

"We'll get to that, Mr. O'Reilly."

"Cahal, please."

"Fine, Cahal. But can you fill us in on the background to the event?"

"Sure, it started off as a glory trip. Some bright boy in the Scottish

Arts Council dreamed up the idea. He thought it would be a good lead-in to the Papal visit, and sold the sponsorship to Candela and

Finch. Then they discovered they didn't really know how to go about organising it. All that C and F know about art is that you can write it off against tax, and the SAC boy found that it wasn't as easy as he'd thought to persuade galleries around the world to part with their priceless works. So, Nike baseball cap in hand, he had to come to me, to the Roman Catholic Church and to various others, to ask for our support. We wound up making a joint pitch for most of the major works on show over there. In one or two cases we had to visit curators to win them over."

"What about the Vargas?"

O'Reilly grimaced. "That's my sore point; it's cost me a lot of grief on the telephone this weekend. That was my baby. The Catholics didn't veto it, but given its, let's say, controversial nature, they didn't want to be seen to be involved in negotiations. So I got to go by myself to the Guggenheim in Bilbao, which owns it, to secure the piece.

Some building, I tell you. You think our parliament's something? It's a Wendy house compared to that. Seeing it was the only saving grace of the whole show as far as I was concerned.

"We had to make all sorts of promises, of course. Among them we had to take personal responsibility for the reception and storage of each piece, and we had to be present when they were hung, to ensure that the positioning and lighting matched the specification of the owner gallery."

"So you were there when the Vargas arrived?"

"I saw it unpacked."

"How did it look when it came out of the crate?"

"Perfect. In perfect condition, that is. Personally I thought it was a load of crap, but everyone to their own taste and all that. I'm no art critic'

"Did you see the back of the picture?" George Regan asked

"I suppose I did. Why?"

"Can you describe it?"

O'Reilly frowned. "How do you describe the back of a picture? Frame, canvas, that's it; it looked like a sack stretched tight. Will that do?"

"Very well indeed," said Steele. "When it was hung on the wall the back was covered over with brown paper. While it was in storage downstairs, between the arrival and the hanging, someone placed an incendiary device inside the frame and then taped paper over to cover it."

"That's what happened, was it? I read someone had claimed responsibility."

"Someone usually does, Cahal. We don't always believe them, though. I have to ask you something; when you went to the Academy to receive the picture, did you go alone?"

The principal clerk leaned against the high back of his chair. "No, I thought there was an outside chance that the couriers would actually expect us to remove the thing physically, so I took Jan Laing, my secretary… you spoke to her earlier… and Andrea, our clerk, with me."

"Andrea?"

"Andrea Strachan; she asked if she could come with us for a sneak preview of the pictures. She's with us on a sort of temporary basis.

We pay her a little, but she's more or less a volunteer. Jerome

Strachan, her father, even if he is a bit right-wing in Presbyterian terms, is a friend of mine; he lectures in religion up at Napier. The girl's had emotional problems, and he asked if I could fit her in somewhere as a sort of therapy. She's a nice lass; pretty serious, but very helpful and keen, almost over-keen at times."

"Do you know the nature of those emotional problems?"

"Jerome told me she's been treated for schizophrenia, if that's what you mean."

"That's all he said?"

"Yes, and I didn't press him. Should I have?"

"Not the way I see it. He's your friend, so why should you?" Steele glanced across at a fridge in a corner of the big office. "Do you think I could have some of that water you were offering earlier?" he asked.

"Sure." O'Reilly rose to his feet. "Still or fizzy?"

"Still; and don't bother with a glass. By the neck will be fine."

The Principal Clerk took three bottles of mineral water from the fridge and brought them back to the table. He opened one himself and handed the others to Steele and Regan. As he took his, the sergeant smiled, for the first time. "Why were you guys not on the list for the opening, since you did so much work?" he asked.

"If I was interested, George, that would be another sore point with me.

All us organisers were thanked very effusively, by the boy at the Arts Council, and were told very apologetically that space at the opening bash would be limited and that only the Moderator and the archbishop would be invited; no one else from any of the executives.

"The Mod did his nut, I have to tell you; he was going to decline, but I persuaded him that my Saturday would be more ruined if he did that, than if I missed out. I was sorry Jan and Andrea didn't get in on the act, but as far as I was concerned, he'd drawn the short straw. I'd seen the exhibition and I don't like champagne, even when it's free."

"What about the boy with the Nike baseball cap?" asked Regan, casually.

Cahal O'Reilly frowned, then his face split into a grin. "Oh, he was there all right, don't you worry!"