your advice.' Nonchalantly he would add, 'Just across the street at the police station.'
Sorted.
He sat back in the pew and submitted to the solemnity of what was going on, listening to the soft strains of the organ playing a communion interlude, doing his best to be respectful and forget he was a policeman on duty. So it was remarkable that a terrible thought popped into his brain just as Otis Joy was moving along the altar rail with the chalice in one hand and the napkin in the other.
One of the other priests had already administered the wafers to the Foxford candidates. Joy was following, quietly intoning the words of the service.
George felt compelled to act. The congregation at large hadn't moved yet, but he did. By chance he had a place at the end of the pew and he stood up and strode up the aisle, his regulation shoes clattering on the paved floor. Presently he broke into a run. It had to be a real emergency for George to run. People turned to stare. Clearly he wasn't racing to be first in line at the altar rail. Probably if he had not been in uniform someone would have tried to stop him. Even the bishop looked up.
George continued running, as unstoppable as the Athenian who brought news of the victory at Marathon. Otis Joy was one of the few who didn't look up. He was absorbed in what he was doing.
Unluckily George was not built for speed. He wasn't in time to stop Joy administering the wine to Burton Sands. Burton got off his knees, took a pace back from the rail, turned, put his hand to his throat and collapsed like a felled tree.
Joy didn't give him a glance. He had already moved on and was offering the chalice to the next communicant, Ann Porter. Ann, of course, was a crucial witness in the case, the person who had seen Gary Jansen visit the rectory on the day he was poisoned.
George yelled, 'Ann, don't drink it!'
This time Joy looked up.
Everyone looked up. Even the people kneeling to receive the sacrament turned to see what was going on. They saw the burly policeman leap over Burton's lifeless body and dash the chalice from Joy's hands.
The bishop said, 'Christ Almighty!' into his amplifying system and was heard all over the church. He could have said something worse.
Twenty-five
'If that was your idea of 'low key,' what happens when you pull out all the stops?'
George Mitchell tried to let Somerville's sarcasm pass him by. Silence was the best option.
'You dash up the aisle like a demented bride and knock the communion wine out of the priest's hand, assuming it was poisoned? Is that discreet policing? What were you doing in the church in the first place? Don't answer that. I don't wish to know.' Somerville turned to one of his team. 'What's the latest on Mr. Sands?'
'He's fine, sir. Gone home.'
'Fully recovered, then?'
'He fainted.'
'I don't blame him. I would have fainted if I'd seen this buffalo bearing down on me.'
'He says he thought he must have swallowed poison. He passed out with the shock.'
Somerville turned back to George. 'So having created mayhem, stopped the service, splashed wine over the bishop's hand-embroidered vestments-a laundry bill that puts us over budget for this year and the next-you charge the Rector of Foxford with attempted murder and march him over here in cuffs and hand him to the custody sergeant. Not what 1 asked you to do, was it? Jesus Christ, what a foul-up.'
George could have said he had perceived a real danger to the lives of two crucial witnesses, but he knew there was no defence after the bear garden he'd made of the communion service. He just thanked his stars he was uniform branch, not CID. Somerville could rant to kingdom come. The fact remained that he'd asked a uniformed officer to do a job that should have gone to a detective.
Somerville raked a hand through his hair and groaned. 'So how do we unscramble this mess?'
There was an uncomfortable silence in the major incident room. Finally he said to George, 'When you arrested him on suspicion of murder, did you mention which murder?'
George thought about it and shook his head. At the time, he'd thought Burton was dead. He would have given Burton's name if he had given any, but he had not.
'That's a small mercy, then. You'd better leave us while you're riding high.'
George left.
Somerville looked at his watch. 'Let's go to work on this tosspot. We've had him in the cells for an hour already.'
Otis Joy sat behind the table in the interview room looking as you would expect a priest mistakenly arrested to look: puzzled, troubled and innocent. He was no longer in his church robes, but he had the air of a Christian martyr.
Somerville couldn't help being affected by it. 'This isn't the way we wanted this to be, Rector,' he admitted humbly once the taping procedures had been explained. 'It's been triggered by events beyond my control. PC Mitchell-the officer in the church-exceeded his brief. He shouldn't have been there.'
'It was sacrilege,' said Joy, seizing the high ground.
'Possibly.'
'No, Chief Inspector. Not possibly. Certainly.'
'All right, have it your way.'
'If the bishop is worth his salt, he'll demand an enquiry from the Chief Constable.'
'We'll see.'
'About what happened in the church and what's happened to me since.'
'Have you suffered any violence?'
'To my reputation, yes. Three hundred people saw me handcuffed in church.'
'Not without cause.'
'The man fainted. He wasn't poisoned with the blessed sacrament. It's a revolting idea.'
'I said PC Mitchell made a mistake.'
'Is that where the buck stops? With George Mitchell?'
Somerville had no answer.
Joy went on, 'I know him pretty well. He respects the church. He must have been under orders.'
'He was supposed to invite you here to help us with our enquiries into a suspicious death.'
'He arrested me for murder.'
'If you want to make an issue of this,' said Somerville, 'you are here on a murder rap. We exhumed the body of Gary Jansen. The results of the forensic tests came in today and traces of poison were found.'
'That doesn't surprise me,' said Joy-and he didn't appear surprised either.
'You know he was poisoned?'
'Oh, yes.'
At first it seemed Somerville hadn't heard, but after a moment's delay he exchanged a triumphant glance with the detective inspector sitting beside him, turned back to Joy and said, 'How do you know?'
'Sorry. Can't say.'
'Why not?'
'I don't betray a confidence.'
'What do you mean-someone confessed to you?'
'No, no. We don't go in for confessions in the Church of England, except in the General Confession. 'We have done those things which we ought not to have done.' '
'If you know someone poisoned this man, it's your duty to inform us.'
'I'm not taking lessons from you about my duty.'
'You're bullshitting, Rector. You know about this because you poisoned Gary Jansen yourself.'