Revelation

INSIDE, I PICKED my way through the maze of rubble to the old cloister. All was still and quiet. I walked the ancient flagstones, looking out at the deserted inner courtyard, thinking. I had picked up clues, but they only seemed to deepen the mystery. Was it Goddard we were looking for, or the young man who had visited Abigail? And why had the killer chosen Cantrell to be the fifth victim, as it looked likely that he had? If it was Goddard he would know the lad would be unlikely to be able to help himself. I felt an uncharacteristic satisfaction at the thought of Cantrell bringing that piece of wood down on his assailant's head. I thought how Cantrell, like Meaphon, had a peripheral link to me. I shook my head. It was dangerous and foolish to imagine that the killer was somehow focused on me as an audience. Had the killer not gone out of his way to try and terrorize me into dropping the case? Yet I could not prevent a clutch of fear at my heart at the recollection that I fitted the pattern of a man who had turned away from radical religion.

I realized how weary I was. I decided to take a walk through the ancient Westminster Abbey church, to calm myself. As I paced slowly I saw that the door to the chapterhouse stood half open, and heard voices from within. Hesitantly I walked across. To my surprise, I heard the sound of hammering. I stepped into the vestibule.

A group of black-robed clerks were carefully removing thick rolls of yellow parchment from old chests, laying them on the tiled floor. Workmen, some on ladders, were putting up heavy wooden shelves along the walls. One by one, the maroon-framed scenes from the Apocalypse were being hidden from view. As I watched, a heavy nail was driven through the body of the seven-headed monster.

One of the clerks, a tall young fellow, looked up at me enquiringly. 'Are you from the Rolls House, sir?'

'No — I was just passing, I heard the hammering. Of course, I remember now. The chapterhouse is to be made into a repository for state documents.'

He nodded seriously. 'The paperwork of state just grows and grows, we have to put the ancient documents somewhere.'

I looked at the walls. 'So the old paintings are being covered up.'

He shrugged. 'The windows too, I hear. Well, 'tis all old monkish stuff. What are those little pictures anyway? They're not very good.'

'That is the Apocalypse of St John. The story of Revelation.' At my words one of the clerks looked up, and a workman stopped hammering. The clerk who had spoken to me walked over to the wall, studied a painting of the Great Whore uneasily.

'Is it?' he asked. He thought a moment. 'Well, the end-time should not be portrayed in crude pictures like these.' Another gospel man, I thought.

I left them, following the cloister walk to the door to the abbey church. The church was deserted except for black-robed attendants walking slowly to and fro, their footsteps echoing on the stone flags. The great hushed space, stripped now of all its images and ornaments, was lit dimly by a grey light from the high windows. The monks had prayed here for centuries, now all was stillness, silence. There was only one guard, by the door, and he was asleep. There was nothing of value left to steal; the King had it all.

I walked up to Henry VII's chapel where the King's father lay. There the great vaulted shrine was still in place, the white stone bright in the light from the large windows, contrasting with the dimness of the abbey. I returned to the nave, and walked among the old royal tombs.

I found myself in front of the sarcophagus of Edward the Confessor, naked stone now. I had seen it in the days before the Dissolution, magnificently framed by rich gold and silver statues and images reflecting the glow of a thousand candles. There had been crutches and walking sticks piled there too, for the tomb was believed to have the power to cure cripples. I remembered that one of the tomb's first cures was supposed to be a hunchback. All nonsense, but nonsense of such power.