When you enter the front doors of Lambeth Palace, there’s a flight of red-carpeted stairs directly in front of you, less of a stairway to heaven than a celebrity airstair. At the top, turn left for first class, the holy bits, drawing rooms and chapels. Right for the rough trade, admin and staff. I was turned right.
A large library at the end on the left. A huge bay window, overlooking gardens and Parliament’s terraces beyond. A conference table the size of a Thames pontoon. This had been the archbishop’s study until a predecessor had decided it was too grand and should be more widely used. It amused me momentarily that an archbishop should think that he was wasting space.
There were already two of the lawyers I’d met several times before, a woman and a man, in their forties but looking prematurely old. The Palace’s chief of staff slid into the room through a door concealed in the bookcases that covered one wall. And a nice young man from Church House, our civil service function from the north side of the river.
And there was another woman already in the room. In the shadow, by a cabinet on the right of the window. She had a slim ring-binder open in front of her and she looked up when we came in, but didn’t move until the chief of staff came in, then she walked down the room and handed him the file. She was short, with a grey untended bob, and she wore a floral blouse, open at the neck revealing a modest string of pearls.
“Thank you, Cara,” said the chief and Lambeth’s Moneypenny smiled briefly at everyone except me and trotted out. I bet they think I don’t remember those details, but I do.
We settled to it at the window end of the table. The gist of it was that the Australians would settle for aggravated damages, including the replacement of the damaged truck, amounting to some $400,000.
The male lawyer did most of the talking. “As we know, the good news is that we avoid a UN tribunal, both expensive and wearisome. We can probably get them down on damages.”
“Insurance will pay,” said the chief of staff, turning to me reassuringly.
“The plaintiff has, as you know, always wanted to come after the Church Commissioners, who were technically your employers at the time of the incident, rather than The Fed,” continued the lawyer. “That’s partly because we have more money – cleaning out a small charity is neither lucrative nor edifying. But it’s partly because they’re also demanding that in settlement a CDM is taken against you, Natalie, as principal party.”
Not quite the absolution that the Bishop had promised. A Clergy Disciplinary Measure in a consistory court, almost certainly meaning the suspension of my clerical licence, so no job with the Church any more. It wasn’t what I had been expecting. Naturally, a CDM had been mentioned in the past, but only in the context of it being unnecessary because the Church was essentially my codefendant.
“Why, if they’ve got their money?” It was the chief of staff again.
“They’re accepting that Natalie acted alone. I suspect it’s their principal witness, James Adaire, whom I think you know, Natalie?”
“Jimmy. Yes, I know Jimmy,” I said. “Blimey, he still wants his revenge after all this time. I thought the drift of it was that they’d climbed down. I thought my crucifixion was off the agenda.”
“There’s still another way,” said the lawyer, shifting on his seat like he was coming to the whole point. I looked hard at him. “Now they’re talking of settling, we don’t need to go to court. But if we were to refer Natalie for a psychiatrist’s assessment, it could be treated as a pastoral rather than a disciplinary matter.”
It took a moment for the horror of that to sink in.
“No,” I said. And left it there.
“Listen, Natalie, this needn’t be arduous or intrusive,” said the chief of staff. He’d clearly been prepared by the lawyers. “But you were in a very post-traumatic circumstance. The Bishop said as much. If you needed some treatment, some counselling, that’s not just good for the case, it’s good for you.”
“No,” I repeated. “I’m not mad. You can’t make me see a doctor this side of a criminal trial. Anyway, it sends the wrong message after everything that’s been in the papers. It’s not mad to want to feed people.”
They variously looked at their files.
“I can’t see that we could get the damages down or avoid a CDM if you’re sure you’re refusing that path,” said the lawyer.
“I am sure. I’m not mad, whatever a shrink might find, and I’m sure they can find something, anything, in anyone. Is that what you want?” I’d turned to the chief of staff and he looked kindly at me. “Anyway, I can’t see that it works. Either they find I’m mad and you have to defrock me, or I’m not mad and we’re at square one.”
I could tell it was a good point, but not one they wanted to hear. In practice, it’s very hard to remove a priest’s holy orders, but if I was sick in the head, I could be on long-term suspension being looked after. Some of them would like that, I knew.
The meeting broke up shortly after that.
“Take care, Nat,” said the chief at the top of the stairs.
“I’m sorry this has taken so very long. I’ve been a lot of trouble,” I replied, looking away down the corridor.
“The Archbishop sends his love,” he said and retreated into the dark.
That evening, Adrian leaned against a
