THE LAST MONK 13

The laat piece of the puzzle.

THE LAST MONK

13

Inspector Appleby cleared his throat and both me and my newly discovered mother looked at him, me expectantly and she curiously.

“What do we really know about August?” I asked, “I mean, for most of my early life he was there for me all the time, even to punish me if he thought I deserved it, and I thought I knew everything there was to know about him.. But looking back the things he did were mostly to support me…”

“And, what was it you said, he liked to stroke your legs?” asked the Inspector, “that’s not a normal thing for a man to do to a growug girl, is it?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, honestly.

“It;s disgusting,” put in my mother, and that was one thing I hadn’t considered during my years at the monastery.

“That’s the reason why he was avoiding the police,” muttered the Inspector, “he had a thing about touching young girls. He’d been to prison for doing it, and he was doing his best to avoid letting us know where he was, because we were supposed to be keeping an eye on him The three of them in the old monastery were in a similar position, him, Charles Lee and Craig Smith. We had no idea they were hiding out in that derelict building. It would have been pulled down ages ago but nobody could trace who owned it.”

“And he touched me,” sighed my mother, “too many times, but I was a teenager lost to common sense and let him.”

“He only stroked my legs occasionally,” I said, “he said it was to comfort me.”

“He might have been a lot worse but he had decided you were a boy, and he wasn’t so fond of boys. He’d spread the word to the other two that you were a boy and I guess he did that in order to protect you. Three dirty old men on the streets looking for girls and not knowing they had one at home,” murmured my mother.

“It’s sad, but it’s probably why you were confused about gender,” sighed the Inspector to me, “the way you obviously believed you were a young man when it’s plain as a pikestaff that you’re a very attractive young woman.

“And you are, darling,” said my mother with a big smile.

“I didn’t know,” I whispered, “and when I see people I still sometimes get it wrong in my head.”

“Do you know what a computer is?” asked rthe Inspector, looking at me. I shook my head. What does he think I am? A know-all? I’ve never heard of such a thing as a computer.

“Tou will,” he smiled, “it’s a machine that can do a great deal of the hard work when it comes to the complexities of modern life. When I was a boy I struggled to learn what we called the times tables, or multiplication. You know, two times two makes four, and so on. Well, a computer will do that for you, but only if it’s been told the right formula in the beginning. But if it hasn’t it will always get the number wrong, like you with boy and man, girl and woman and so on. Until, that is, you’ve reprogrammed your brain with new information when you pick it up, like boys are one thing and girls nnother, which you seem to have done quite well already.”

I nodded, but I didn’t understand. Not properly.

“You need have no fear that the three so-called monks are going to turn up round the next corner,” he said, changing the subject. “They are most certainly dead. And from papers we found in the cell used by the oldest, Celestial, he called himself, though he was really Charles Lee, the youngest, your August, died about six years ago, and not of natural causes. They evolved a ceremony based on some nonsense he thought up, and the idea was that when they wanted to leave the monastery for ever and not return, they would pretend to be dead and ceremoniously make their way to the ancient crypt in the grounds having sworn an oath that they would never go anywhere near the place again. There was a secret passage that went to a door through which they could find their way into the town quite easily, a one way door apparently. Only that door, which had once existed, was blocked up ages ago and when the had entered the tomb or crypt or whatever you want to call it, Celestial would have gone ahead of them via another secret passage and was waiting for them. He was a nasty piece of work, was Catestial, and he quite brutally killed them before arranging their bodies on one of the stone coffins in there. He was quite strong enough to do that! First with August and then a few ywars later, the one who called himself Colonius, Then, when he was the last of the three having murdered the first two he remained at the monastery until he grew old and knew his didn’t have long left, and he made the ceremonial walk for your benefit, Betty, though there he knew there qas was nobody hiding in the tomb ready to kill him. But that didn’t matter. He was dying anyway, and to be certain that he did die he arranged himself in the third coffin, and then swallowed some poison which ended his life before the illness did. If it’s any use to you, he died of heart failure as far as our pathologist can tell, and quite old, in his eighties. And with his death came the end of three unpleasant characters that disappeared from our sight around thirty years ago and who we’ve had on our books since then, and good riddance to them.”

“But,” I said, “I liked August. Say what you like, he was kind to me. And Celestial, too. He taught me a lot, words, how to write even. I don’t look back on them as being bad to me.”

“Of course you liked August, darling,” murmured my mother, “he was your father. And in a way he brought you up. There may be gaps in your knowledge, and as time passes you may find that some of what you assume is right is not correct, but he could have done a lot worse.”

“Remember what I told you about societies and their beliefs in religious history, beliefs that have nothing more to do with the real world than the deity they believe created them?” asked the Inspector, “you’re no worse off then most people because most people have picked this or that piece of gobbledegook from the world around them, and believe it.”

I frowned. So you said,” I murmured.

“I think we’ll call it a day at that,” said the Inspector, stirring in his seat. “Is it back to Crooked Gates for you, young lady?” he asked me.

Before I could reply my mother spoke up. “What nonsense is that?” she asked, crossly, “she’s my daughter and she’s going where she should go, back home with her mum!”

“Yes,” I said quietly, “that would be nice.”

THE END

© Peter Rogerson, 17.08.23

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