Butterfly Catchers – Part XVI

The two of them spent an interesting hour in the south aisle of the cathedral. If they positioned themselves near the transept they could hear, drifting in from the door that led onto the cloister, the rippling notes of the boys at practice, starting and catching up a tune, then falling silent before they began again.

Alternatively, they could wander down towards the great west door, and there, after a little while, there was a gratifying bustle of comings and goings. A balding, middle-aged man had been the first, climbing up the stair with the snail’s pace of a schoolboy and then hurrying down a minute later, his face the colour of week old milk. He had returned with two other men, both in clerical black, and remained at the foot of the stairs, wringing his hands and pacing whilst they went up. Then on their return they had fetched others, and they yet more so that the end of the nave filled with a succession of anxious, whispering groups that bunched and separated like flocks of nervous sparrows flitting from bush to bush. Until at last a very fat, very tall man arrived and he did not go up but stared upon the assembled people until silence fell. Then swiftly and firmly he gave his orders, to be answered with a brief nod of the head that a hundred years ago would have been a bow and the concurrence ‘Yes Dean.’

Angelus wondered if they should kill the dean next.

Just when matters were beginning to grow repetitive and dull there was the sound of boyish voices in the cloister, laughing and jostling, and abrupt silence when they reached the door and the choristers processed into the cathedral. As the first notes of morning prayer soared up, the men by the schoolroom steps looked guilty, as if caught in something furtive that had no place in the cathedral. The two attendants awkwardly negotiating the stretcher back out of the narrow door paused for a moment, heads turning to look up the length of the great nave. From under the coat someone had dropped over it, a wrinkled hand flopped out, before one of the men hastily stuffed it back out of sight and they trudged out. Angelus smiled and Darla gasped and held her hand to her face and he apologised to those around them and led her away again.

Once again he felt drawn to the music, just as he felt drawn to the cathedral itself. It tingled in his blood and buzzed in his ears. A flame that drew him with its heat and light although he knew it would burn. He could feel the towering menace of the high alter and the blood stained figure of the pure white marble crucifix above it. Not a scent, but something that tugged at the back of his mind and in the pit of his stomach – the knowledge that he was not worthy. That in this place something very old and very powerful was aware of him. Not inclined to do anything yet, but it was awake and it was watching.

And as ever he wanted to defy it, to stand with his legs straddling a pile of corpses in the very centre of the church and dare this God to challenge him.

Darla at his side was silent, her eye running over the stonework. She seemed tense, watchful.

‘What do you want to do now?’ he asked.

‘Hush.’ She tilted her head and he realised she was listening to the choir. The sound built and swelled, the voices blending and moving apart, then soaring together again.

Exquisite, he said to himself, and he tried to distinguish his own boy’s voice amongst the rest, but though he thought he caught a thread from time to time he never fully succeeded.

‘Vouchsafe, O Lord to keep us this day without sin.
O Lord, have mercy upon us.
O Lord, let Thy mercy lighten upon us, as our trust is in Thee.
O Lord, in Thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded.’

When they finished the silence hung on the air like frosty breath, still and perfect, then somebody walked down the aisle, footsteps clomping on the stone, and the moment was gone.

Angelus gave a little tug at Darla’s arm and together they worked their way back to near the schoolroom door, and waited for the most interesting part of the morning.

The choristers were a long time leaving their vestry, and when they came it was with wide eyes and glances that flitted between them on a suppressed rush of unspoken emotions. Angelus felt a wrench of regret that he had not been there when they were told.

‘Do you think there was much blood?’

‘Bound to’ve been. All over the floor, I expect.’

The boys stopped under the regimental memorial and peeped round the pillar.

‘I heard there was so much blood it ran down the stairs and the men slipped going up,’ a cherubic faced lad piped up.

Angelus frowned.

‘Well I heard his body was so stiff they had to break his legs to get him down the stairs.’ This elicited appreciative Oohs from the others.

‘Why stiff?’ demanded a stocky lad near the back.

‘Stiff with horror, course. Everyone knows you go all stiff when you die of fright.’

Angelus scanned the group, searching for one little form amongst the dozen.

‘He didn’t die of fright.’ The stocky boy shoved his way to the front. ‘Shows what you know, Tommy Brown. Old Ashworth said he had a heart attack.’

‘Yes, so there’ll’ve been masses of blood,’ insisted the first boy.

‘No!’

‘Yes! If your heart breaks all the blood spills out.’

The boy’s voices began to get louder and louder.

‘But Tommy said fright, and—’

‘I meant heart attack – you get a heart attack when you’re so frightened you—’

‘Well I can’t see any blood—’

‘Who told you about the blood—?’

‘Must have been blood because—’

At last Angelus spotted James, walking slowly up to join the rest, clutching a book of music to his chest. ‘What’s happened?’ he asked softly.

‘Boys! Boys!’ The thin, balding man clapped his hands and most of them stopped talking, several even looking slightly shame-faced.

Only Tommy Brown was left, trailing off with ‘But he must have been scared when he started to feel his heart break…’ He bit his lip.

‘Is this seemly? Is this appropriate?’ the thin man demanded.

The boys exchanged sidelong glances amongst themselves, as if hoping that one among them might have the answer to this question.

‘Please, sir,’ the first boy said ‘Mr Ashworth said a man climbed into the schoolroom and he died there.’

Angelus saw James’s eyes widen, his fingers clenching around his music.

The bald man looked stern. ‘And is that any reason to be chattering about it like a gaggle of geese, Harry White?’

‘No sir. But was there blood, sir?’

‘Who was he, sir?’

‘Why did he come here to die, sir?’

‘Was it that tinker who’s been living under the bridge, sir?’

‘Will there be any lessons today, sir?’

At this important question they all stopped and stared at their master, who cleared his throat and replied ‘I think not until…’ There was really very little need for him to say anything more because with a cheer the boys had hared off, spinning and laughing out of the door and into the sunlight, James the last of their number – with a slight frown on his little face but trotting after the rest.

Angelus watched him until he was out of sight, then swung his eyes back to the balding man.

The master looked after the boys blankly for a second, and then he smiled, perhaps a little guiltily, and tilted his head a fraction towards the sun, as if realising that he too would have an unexpected holiday.

‘Callous little brutes,’ Darla remarked, and the schoolmaster jumped and peered into the shadows.

‘I…I didn’t… Forgive me, madam, I had no idea anyone was there.’

‘Why aren’t they more upset?’ Angelus demanded.

‘Well, er, boys can be strange creatures, sir. I dare say they will be solemn enough when they have had time to think, and when they understand just what it means, but for now it is altogether too fascinating to be entirely unpleasant to them.’

Angelus stared at him, until the man shifted nervously and made as if he would nod politely and move on.’

‘What is your name?’

‘I-I— Denman, sir. Septimus Denman, master of the choir school.’

‘Ah!’ Angelus instantly changed his glower to a beam, holding out his hand. ‘You are Mr Denman. The Dean’s description was most misleading.’

‘It was?’ Denman seemed astonished and not a little concerned. ‘That is— the Dean?’

‘Naturally.’ Darla said. ‘He particularly wanted us to speak to you.’

Denman’s face fell.

Angelus took up the game. ‘We require your services, Mr Denman. We have a young relative who requires extra tutoring – a matter of an important examination in a few months that we are most anxious he should pass. Now my dear wife has suggested that we should return to town, find one of the top men there.’ He looked down at her affectionately and patted her arm. ‘But I have been forced to prolong our stay in the city, on other business, so we have decided that for now a local man might be just the thing.’

‘To tide us over,’ Darla said.

‘Oh, oh so…’

Darla smiled, Angelus smiled. ‘Perhaps we might have a chat?’ And between them they drew Denman back into the dark shadows of the church.

As soon as they were away from the west door and the sunlight and the bustle of people coming and going, Darla turned her full charm on Denman. ‘Dear William’ needed help with his Latin and his history, and before long a quite astronomical fee had been proposed – and by a rather dazed Denman, hastily accepted – and Darla was moving on to the fine details about just when the lessons should be held. She proposed from five until eight every evening, and was quite prepared to give up her parlour for that time if it would help William. And could Mr Denman also provide help with French? With German? Perhaps a little Italian? The Dean had spoken so highly of Mr Denman’s abilities that she was quite keen not to waste the chance for their dear boy to gain all he could from his tuition. Finally everything was settled and all parties were left beaming at one another, if with a little bewilderment on Denman’s part.

‘Splendid,’ Angelus said, ‘and now I was wondering, Mr Denman, since you have an unexpected holiday, would you possibly be so good as to show me and my dear wife around the cathedral?’

Denman looked alarmed. ‘Well, sir, I’m not sure that I—’

‘Oh do say you will,’ Darla trilled. ‘I am sure that a tour with a scholar such as yourself would be most instructive. And I so long to have the architecture explained to me.’

Angelus smiled down at her fondly and then they both turned to look politely at Denman.

‘Well of course, it would be my pleasure. Er…’ He looked around. ‘Perhaps we should start with the clerestory, and fan vaulting of the nave. A particularly fine example of the English Perpendicular, that… If you would just move out into the nave where we can get an unobstructed view?’

Angelus and Darla exchanged a look. ‘No, you misunderstand, Mr Denman. My wife wishes to see the clock tower.’

‘The clock tower is not open to… Yes of course, sir, madam, if you would care to walk this way?’

Darla and Angelus linked arms and went after him.