The Sin Eater(53)

‘Yes, that would be a good lead,’ said Michael. ‘And since Holly Lodge is your house, you’re presumably entitled to ask for the Deeds – or at least photocopies of them.’ He paused, then said, ‘But it’s a pity there’s nothing in that house that will give us other clues.’

Clues. Such as newspaper cuttings describing a vicious serial killer with Declan’s face?

‘It is a pity, isn’t it?’ said Benedict.

Nina had been all set to accompany him to his next consultation with the neurologist, until she discovered it was a day when she was booked to provide a celebration lunch for a firm who had just won a PR Award. So she had gone breezily off to Soho that morning, amidst explanations about collecting two live lobsters on the way. Benedict ought not to be surprised if he heard of a traffic hold-up in Charing Cross Road, as a result of the lobsters trying to escape their fate en route.

Benedict, guiltily grateful to the PR company, was therefore able to attend the consultation on his own. He was not really surprised when the neurologist recommended he delay his return to Reading University a little longer.

‘I’d rather you remain on sick leave until we’re sure we are dealing with DPD,’ he said. ‘Let this Oxford friend delve around a bit to see if any names or places match up. After that we can think about how we proceed. We still have to get the balance of medication right, for instance. You’re only on mild tranquillizers at the moment, which is really an interim measure.’

‘You don’t think Dr Flint will find anything, do you?’ said Benedict, taking the neurologist back to the real issue.

‘I think,’ said the man carefully, ‘that it’s unlikely this particular alter ego – or any of the people surrounding him – will turn out to be based on fact. They rarely do, Benedict. But,’ he added kindly, ‘I’m still keeping an open mind.’

Benedict had not expected anything else, but he was disappointed at not being allowed back to university. He wanted to surround himself with normality as soon as possible: he wanted to be in his room in the friendly, untidy house, where the other students would be grumbling about essays, exchanging gossip, and complaining about their tutors.

When he returned from the hospital the flat was empty, which probably meant Nina was still engaged in combat with the lobsters in the depths of Old Compton Street. This gave him a clear field to phone the solicitors handling Holly Lodge, to ask if he could have a set of photocopies of the Title Deeds. No, he said, he did not need the whole shooting match and he thought he had better not have the originals, which would be safer in the solicitors’ keeping. But if he could have a copy of the Abstract of Title and of all the conveyances? Well, yes, he did mean dating back to when the house was built, and if there was a Land Registry certificate . . . ? No, there was no need to post it, he would call. Would tomorrow be all right?

As he rang off he had the feeling that he was thrusting his hands deep into a past that might be better left undisturbed, and he was aware that Declan’s world was starting to thrum on the rim of his mind, like a powerful engine revving up. For the first time, there was a physical pain connected to it, not precisely a headache, but the sensation of pressure on a bruise.

Would you just let me in for a few moments, Benedict, said Declan’s voice in his mind. (Or was it in his mind? Wasn’t it whispering in to the quiet bedroom?)

Let me explain to you how it happened . . .

I don’t want to hear, said Benedict. You don’t exist except in my own mind – and maybe a bit in my family’s memories. You’re a chimera and I don’t want anything to do with you. I don’t want to know about the murders or Romilly or any of those other people.

But aren’t you trying to prove that all those people existed? Aren’t you trying to track down the plucked fowl in the waistcoat this very minute? God, he was a poor specimen of a man, that one . . .

‘He didn’t deserve to be murdered, whatever he was,’ said Benedict angrily, and this time he spoke aloud. His words lay loudly and harshly on the air.

For a moment he thought the sudden burst of anger had driven Declan back, and he waited, not daring to hope he could have succeeded so easily. But then the familiar ripple went through his mind, and his great-grandfather said sadly, No, Benedict, no one deserves that.

The painful pressure increased on Benedict’s mind, and a dreadful apprehension started to unfold. This is it, he thought. He’s set out most of his story for me – the childhood in Ireland, the encounter with Nicholas Sheehan – but now we’ve reached the killings, and he’s going to force me to see them all happening. Five people . . . Whatever’s real or unreal about this, those murders happened – they were reported in the newspapers. And I’ll have to stand and watch while they die and there’ll be nothing I can do – nothing I can do to save any of them . . .





London, 1890s


When Colm banged out of the bedroom at the lodging house, Declan assumed he was going to Romilly’s grave – that heartbreakingly new grave that looked like a deep wound in the churchyard of St Stephen’s. That morning, after the funeral service, Colm had said he could not bear to leave her here, in this grey, unfriendly place, where she knew no one, and Declan had had to take his arm and pull him along the church path. Surely if Colm was going anywhere, it would be there? He reached for his own jacket, turned up the collar, and went down the stairs and out into the rain-drenched streets.