Cuthbert's Way (DCI Ryan Mysteries, #17)(45)

“Was she all right?” Eve asked, not caring so much about the book as the person. Anna smiled privately, understanding where Ryan had learned compassion and his unwavering belief in people over things.

“She’ll be all right,” Ryan assured her. “She took a nasty blow around the head, but she’ll recover.”

Physically, at least.

“So, you intercepted him?” Charles guessed.

“Not quite,” Ryan said, with some disappointment. “By the time we discovered what had happened, he’d reached the main doors. I chased him as far as King’s Cross, where he boarded a train. We managed to stop the train and search it, but he seemed to have vanished.”

Charles made a murmuring sound in his throat.

“I’ve asked for the footage on the train, so I can track the man’s movements and find out how he did it, but that will take a day or so, possibly, which is time we don’t have when a perp is clearly escalating their behaviour. That makes two incidents in two days, if we’re right.”

“I have some old notes on the St. Cuthbert Gospel,” Anna said. “I could look them out for you, if that would help?”

Ryan thought of how lucky he was.

“That would be enormously helpful,” he said. “The extent of my knowledge is a potted summary from Lowerson and what I read on the display placard—something about it having been made locally by monks in Jarrow and Monkwearmouth as an offering to Cuthbert, who was already dead by that time. It was always intended to be placed inside his coffin, as a kind of amulet.”

Anna nodded. “Not a bad start,” she smiled. “I’ll tidy up my notes tomorrow, when Madam isn’t demanding my attention.”

Ryan grinned at the thought.

“It’s a pity we can’t look at the book, now,” he said. “I think there has to be something in it that would explain why the monk died; I only wish I knew what it was.”

“Well, you know, the British Library scans all its pieces into a digital archive,” Anna said. “The images are very high quality, so you can actually scroll through the pages of the gospel as if you had the real thing in front of you.”

Ryan framed her face in both of his hands and delivered a smacking kiss.

“Let me know if you’re ever looking for a job,” he said, with renewed optimism. “I’d hire you on the spot.”

“You couldn’t afford me,” she joked. “But, since I like you so much, I’ll have a scroll through the digital copy tomorrow and let you know if anything stands out.”

“We’ll help with the baby,” Eve volunteered, happily. There was nothing she loved more than spending time with the newest member of the Ryan family. “Won’t we, Charles?”

“Try and stop us,” he said.

Talk turned to other things and, as the fire began to die and his parents excused themselves for the night, Ryan was left alone for a few precious minutes with his wife.

“I missed you, today,” he said.

“I missed you, too,” she said, softly, and brushed her lips against his. “I could tell there was more you wanted to say, just now, but didn’t. If you need to talk about it, I’m here to listen; it cuts both ways, you know.”

Ryan pulled her close and rubbed his cheek against her hair.

“The closer we get, the more dangerous it becomes,” he said, as they watched flames lick at the remains of a log, its light casting flickering shadows against the wall. “I don’t want to but, if it comes to it, you may have to take Emma somewhere safe, maybe down to Devon with my parents.”

Anna’s arms tightened around his chest, and she breathed in the scent of him, hardly able to imagine being parted when they’d so recently become new parents.

However much it hurt her to think of it, it must have hurt him even more to suggest it.

She told herself not to make things even harder.

“We’ll do whatever’s necessary to keep our family safe,” she said, and hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

*

Finally, the key rested in their hands.

It had been overwhelming, seeing it there in the reading room of the library. Such a little book, its pages faded and worn, but they could feel the power radiating from it in waves.

Cuthbert’s power.

Now, their power.

They brought the book to their face, sniffing the goatskin binding, touching the tip of their tongue to the glue, rubbing it against their skin in a manner that might have been sexual, for some. But they were not concerned with pleasures of the flesh. Like Cuthbert, they were far above that now, however their thoughts might have strayed in the past.

Indeed, impotence was a blessing.

They chanted old rites and prayers as the book skimmed their naked body, and the sound of crashing North Sea waves surrounded them, pumped through hidden speakers in the wall. They’d have liked to have been on Inner Farne, Cuthbert’s sanctuary and the place where he’d passed on to a higher realm, but that was not possible.

Not everyone understood such greatness, but there was a chosen few who did. They were the true believers…the true guardians of Cuthbert’s way of life, and only they, through him, could benefit from his miraculous power.

From time immemorial, Cuthbert had rested with his relics; items destined to be buried with him for all eternity, invested with fragments of his strength. Through the ages they had been separated, scattered around the country to sit in glass boxes, until their power began to wane. Only when made whole again, could Cuthbert’s strength be restored.