The Killer in the Choir

TWELVE

The wedding morning dawned beautifully. It was one of those May days which held promise that there really would be a summer soon.

And the florists that Heather Mallett brought in had somehow contrived to make the forbidding vastness of All Saints Fethering look more welcoming. The bride’s beautifully cut dress made her curvaceous rather than dumpy, and the groom looked better and generally more trim in his dress uniform than he did in civvies. It turned out that he was a Major, which Shirley Tattersall, who for some reason knew about these things, said meant he was no slouch. Making Major before thirty was apparently quite a feat. So, Roddy Skelton couldn’t be as stupid as he appeared to be.

At the back of the church, a group of equally smart uniformed friends from his regiment were ready to form a guard of honour, so that the couple could march out under raised swords at the end of the ceremony.

And, proud in the front row on the groom’s side, was a tall old man with black eyebrows, who could only be the object of Roddy Skelton’s hero worship, his ‘Aged P’.

Bob Hinkley conducted the service with appropriate gravitas and what sounded like genuine affection for the participants.

The church choir excelled themselves. As at the funeral, Heather Mallett had chosen to take her place in the choir stalls, rather than the body of the church. And she joined in a lusty rendition of the two hymns that she and Alice had spent so long choosing. They had finally plumped for ‘Praise My Soul the King of Heaven’ and ‘Jerusalem’. Safe, maybe, but tunes they both loved. From her position at the altar, Alice’s clear soprano could also be heard distinctly.

And the choir had ably supported Toby the tenor as they sang Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’ during the signing of the register.

Jonny Virgo had demonstrated his talents at the organ as he played the music for the entry of the bride and the newly married couple’s exit from the church. The first piece was an arrangement of Jeremiah Clarke’s ‘Trumpet Voluntary’, and the final one the very traditional Mendelssohn’s ‘Wedding March’. Though she didn’t know much about classical music, Jude could appreciate Jonny’s virtuosity. She wondered whether there had been a point when, before resigning himself to being a teacher, he had contemplated a career as a professional musician. And whether making that compromise had added to the neuroses of his later life.

He had arrived in good time before the ceremony, leading his frail mother and an elderly friend who was going to look after her during the service. He explained to the choir that Heather, who was at that moment checking arrangements outside the church, had readily agreed to his mother attending the service, ‘because the old dear does so like listening to me play.’

Mrs Virgo was almost skeletally thin. Parchment-like skin stretched tightly over the sharp bones of her face, and cocktail-stick legs looked inadequate even to bear her light weight. She had arrived at the church in a wheelchair, pushed by the friend, but once she was out of it, her mobility, with the aid of a stick, did not seem to be too badly impaired.

And she was very smartly turned out. Under the camel-hair coat she wore against the cold could be seen a dress of pink silk, and her thin feet were encased in smart court shoes. Her sparse white hair had been skilfully shaped by a hairdresser’s lacquer. And she clutched a large brown handbag, as though it were a lifebelt in stormy seas.

But when Jonny introduced her to the choir, it was clear that her mental capacity did not match her physical fitness. She looked vague and uncomfortable, not taking in the names her son relayed to her. She kept peering anxiously at him, worried that he was about to abandon her, and when he had to take up his position at the organ, she was very distressed as her friend led her to their pew.

From the choir stalls, Jude had a very good view of the old lady, whose agitation seemed to grow as the church started to fill up. She kept half-rising from her seat, only to be gently pulled back by her friend. But the minute her son’s hands touched the keyboard to play the first notes of pre-ceremony music, Mrs Virgo settled back into peaceful, listening mode. And when Jonny started playing the ‘Trumpet Voluntary’, the old woman looked positively beatific. She remained in that state of calm throughout the service.

Toby, the tenor whom Jonny had brought in to handle the solos, proved to be very amiable. His professionalism had the effect of raising the choir’s talents in the direction of his own, and Jude could see Heather glowing from the quality of the sounds they were producing. Any residual regret that she wasn’t leading the ‘Ave Maria’ as soloist seemed to have long gone.

In fact, Heather Mallett glowed with satisfaction at the realization of all her dreams for Alice’s perfect day. Her meticulous planning had paid off.

Though she had not invited the choir to the reception, Heather had demonstrated her loyalty by offering them a glass of champagne in the church hall straight after the ceremony. The same invitation had been offered to Bob Hinkley, and when all of the other guests were milling outside the church waiting for the bride and groom to be photographed, Heather whispered to her fellow singers, ‘Come on, quick! I’ll get you sorted out with a drink before I’m needed in the pics.’

The choir appreciated this priority treatment and were soon all equipped with champagne glasses. They looked around in amazement at the transformation of the church hall. The florists who had done such wonders in the church itself, had also worked their magic here. The tables laid for the wedding breakfast sparkled with gold and silver. Jude couldn’t help wondering who had actually bought the decorations. She knew they hadn’t been purchased by the bride on the day of her father’s death. And once again she felt a pang about the difficulty of keeping secrets from the terrier-like Carole.

‘Listen,’ said Heather. ‘I can’t stay, but I did just want to say thank you enormously for all your hard work. You really brought up the standards of the church choir, and showed what we could do when we really set our minds to it.’

‘I hope,’ said Bob Hinkley, ‘that now you’ve proved how good you can be, you’ll aim for the same quality every Sunday at All Saints.’

‘That might be tough,’ said Heather. ‘We put in a lot of extra rehearsal. And, of course,’ she gestured towards Toby the tenor, ‘we did have professional help.’

‘Something I could have provided,’ Elizabeth Browning reminded them, ‘in my Glyndebourne days. Before the nodules.’

‘But,’ Bob went on, ‘we should aim for those standards all the time. We do want everyone to do their best in the service of Our Lord.’

As the vicar remonstrated, he reached out a hand to touch Heather’s arm. She recoiled as if she’d received an electric shock and turned on him, ‘I’m not sure that everyone, Bob,’ she almost spat the words out, ‘thinks that the church choir is as important as you do!’

Jude was amazed by this sudden outburst, and Bob Hinkley looked shocked too. Heather tried to make up for lost ground too. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—’

Further apology was prevented by the arrival of Jonny Virgo and his mother, whose wheelchair meant they had made slower progress from the church than the others. Her friend, whose services as a pusher were no longer required, had presumably gone home. The old lady looked completely relaxed now she was once again with her son, and Jude was reminded of her level of dependence. The pressure on Jonny, as her sole carer, must have been enormous.

Heather grinned, her recent retort to the vicar forgotten, as she welcomed the new arrivals. ‘But here’s the man we really have to thank,’ she said, all charm. ‘Mrs Virgo, you must be so proud of your son.’

The old lady smiled a benign but unfocused smile.

‘And, Jonny, thanks so much for recommending Toby. He’s a star! You can keep your Blake Woodruffs, can’t you?’

Jonny Virgo smiled awkwardly.

‘Well done, Toby,’ Heather went on. ‘Alice was very impressed, I could see she was. She’s the one who knows all about Blake Woodruff, of course. I introduced them. I used to know him very well at one stage in my life and …’

She seemed to pull back on what she was saying, and continued, ‘That is to say, he’s really Alice’s friend. She actually invited him to the wedding, but unfortunately, he couldn’t come. Touring Australia, which, as excuses go, is a pretty good one. Blake and Alice are very close. He confides everything in her. All his guilty secrets, all about everyone who’s ever been in love with him. I think he’s always found it easier to attract love than to give it.’ Heather chuckled. ‘But if he’d been in All Saints today, he would have witnessed the work of a serious rival. Toby, you’re at least as talented as Blake Woodruff!’

‘Thank you,’ said the tenor wryly. ‘I don’t know about his talent, but I wouldn’t mind having a share of his royalties.’

All of the choir members giggled, except for Jonny Virgo, who looked distant and abstracted. Heather’s attention was drawn by someone waving to her from the doorway. ‘Sorry, I’m needed for the photos. Permanent records of this wonderful day. And thanks again to all of you, whose singing was such an important contribution to the day’s wonderfulness.’

Once the main body of wedding guests came into the church hall, the choir dispersed. Jude didn’t contact Carole to tell her how the event had gone, and Carole resolutely pretended that she wasn’t interested, so the phone in Woodside Cottage did not ring for the rest of the day.

On the next day, the Sunday, though, it did ring, soon after nine o’clock. A bleary Jude answered.

‘Did you hear what happened?’ Carole was high with incredulous excitement.

‘What are you talking about?’

‘A body’s been found, washed up on Fethering Beach.’

‘When?’

‘Earlier this morning. I took Gulliver out for his walk, and there was an area of the beach screened off by the police.’

‘Could you see what had happened?’

‘No.’ There was a wistfulness in Carole’s voice, as she said, ‘They wouldn’t let me close enough.’ She soon regained momentum. ‘But I met another dog walker and she’d met the person who actually found the body.’

‘Oh yes?’ said Jude, with a level of scepticism. She could hear the wheels of Fethering gossip clicking into motion.

‘No, really! And she recognized the body.’

‘Who was it?’

‘Heather Mallett.’