22. A Letter.

REMEMBERING REBECCA, Part 22

From the expression on his face Rosie thought it highly likely Superintendent Knott was about to have some sort of seizure when his phone rang just as her rant came to an end.

He picked it up and barked “Yes!” into it in the sort of voice that deterred friendship, and then he paled, and looked at his Detective Inspector who was still glaring at him.

“Yes sir,” he said, then “Yes sir,” again, then “right away, sir.”

Then he replaced the phone on its cradle.

”That was the ACC upstairs,” he said, almost choking, “He’s coming down here, here mind you, and he’s bringing the Bishop with him. I might suggest that you hand in your resignation before you are summarily dismissed! He hardly ever deigns to come here, and I wouldn’t recognise the Bishop if he was the last man on Earth!”

“Yes sir,” responded Rosie, her expression still defiant, and she turned to go.

“Wait!” snapped the Superintendent, “he wants you here too, and we can only guess why, can’t we!”

“I see, sir,” replied Rosie, “I want you to know I believe in my job and I believe in doing my duty without fear of outside influential interference.”

Before the Superintendent could howl a further insult her way the door opened.

The Assistant Chief Constable was a small, dapper man with the expression of one who has a huge wealth of experience behind him, and the truth was he had climbed to his elevated position due to his own efforts. There was no hierarchy behind him, no family influence, just a couple of decades of hard work and success on the ground. Rosie had never met him, but immediately recognised the sort of man that he was.

The Bishop was with him, an austere man who was overweight and wore his collar as if it had the weight of the cross he claimed to believe in.

“Ah, Inspector Baur,” began the ACC when he and the Bishop were seated in the only two comfortable chairs, barring the Superintendent’s own on which he sat, behind his mahogany and highly polished desk.

“I have warned her, sir,” put in the Superintendent, “we can’t have members of the clergy demonised in this fashion.”

“I think you should wait to see what the Bishop has for us, Knott,” growled the ACC.

“But, sir, I am not complicit. I have made it quite plain, that orders should be obeyed and if they are not there might be serious disciplinary trouble.”

“Knott!” almost snapped the superintendent, “before you find yourself hoisted by your own petard!”

“Sir,” growled the confused Superintendent Knott.

The ACC cleared his throat. “The Bishop has had a document in his possession for some days. Like all men of intelligence he has been troubled about what he should do with it. It would have been better all round had he brought it to me immediately, but he had different advice.”

“It was the opinion of some of the clergy that it was a hollow threat, a sadistic raking through old matters that could hardly have any bearing on matters in this day and age,” said the Bishop, uncomfortably, “but I received this letter about a week ago. Here, let me read it to you:

“We the undersigned have proof positive that the Reverend Richard Roper was singly responsible for the decades-old murder of a child called Rebecca Rowbotham, and has known about it since his time at Brumpton Primary School, and believe that the time has come for this information to be distributed throughout the parish in the near future so that all may know what a charlatan that church official is.

“(Signed)

Amelia Armstrong

Betsy Bullard

Paul Pritchard (Mayor, Retired).”

The Superintendent turned a strange shade of green as the gist of the message seemed to bore deep into his being.

“It would seem, Detective Inspector, that your abilities were not exaggerated,” murmured the ACC, “you seem to have latched on to the substance of this letter very efficiently, and without the privilege of seeing it first.”

“But sir,” replied Rosie, daring to criticise the high and mighty of both the religious and the secular worlds, “had we been warned as soon as that letter surfaced we may have saved at least two innocent lives. The first two signatories to that letter have both been murdered in exactly the same way as the poor little girl was, sixty years ago, and certainly by the same man.”

“I accept a portion of blame and accept your chastisement,” murmured the Bishop, “but in all honesty we put the contents of the letter down as a malicious prank.”

“Meanwhile the Reverend Roper went around killing those he saw as a threat to him. He was caught in the neighbourhood of Mr Pritchard’s home as well, but the fear of discovery sent him underground before he could do the deadly deed. Then someone decided to take the law into his or her own hand, and he was the target of a sharp shooter. My team need to follow the trail sir, we need to put an end to all the killing, if time hasn’t already done that.”

“What are your plans, Inspector?” asked The ACC, ignoring for the moment the Superintendent who really ought to have asked the question.

“Well, sir, we believe we know who owns the gun that killed Roper, but we can’t be at all sure who pulled the trigger,” murmured Rosie. “What the letter Bishop Ackroyd just read out does is provide a motive for Roper to decimate what he must have seen as a likely group ready to expose him and render any good works he’s done as valueless. But there are others who might have an interest in seeing the man punished, chief among them being the girl’s mother. But she’s almost ninety and infirm and my Constable, who spoke to her, is of the opinion that her annual trek to her daughter’s grave, on the child’s birthday, is enough for her. Anyway, she’s physically restricted, in a wheelchair, and in my judgement no killer, though we will, of course, keep on open mind, as we always do.”

“That’s what I approve of, Inspector,” nodded the ACC, “a policeman or woman with an open mind. Don’t you agree, Knott?”

But the best the Superintendent could muster was a world-weary nod as he shuffled a pile of papers on his desk, nervously.

Then, “Carry on Inspector,” he said as if the words had to be forced from his mouth.

“So I’m not suspended, sir?” she asked.

The Superintendent had the grace to blush as she walked from his office, the slightest hint of a smile on her face.

“© Peter Rogerson, 27.01.21