Blood on the Bones Extract A Rafferty and Llewellyn Crime Novel

'Nuns?'

As Detective Inspector Joseph Rafferty considered what his DS, Dafyd Llewellyn

had said, he was filled with so many emotions, he was momentarily incapable of voicing

any further words. Which was probably just as well.

But while he waited for one emotion to gain ascendancy, he surreptitiously palmed

and pocketed the letter he had received in that morning's post. And even though he had

read and re-read it a dozen times since its receipt, the letter's contents still made him go

cold all over. He had been worrying about it all day and had yet to decide on a response.

Now, whether he wanted to or not, after the news which Llewellyn had so calmly

delivered, he knew he had to put the letter out of his mind. His sergeant was still standing

in front of him, presumably expecting some further response and eyeing him as if he was

an exhibit in one of the museums he and his new wife, Maureen, preferred instead of

having a good laugh in the pub like the rest of the team. Rafferty didn't know which of

the morning's two messages was the worst: the paper one the postman had delivered

or the verbal one Dafyd had just presented to him.

For the moment he was forced to put on a brave face about the latter one at least

and be thankful that neither Llewellyn, nor anyone else, knew anything about what the

postman had brought. So, although dismayed at Llewellyn's news, and not feeling much

like it, Rafferty forced the disbelieving grin that he knew was expected, gazed at

Llewellyn's serious, thinly-handsome face, and asked, with little expectation of an

affirmative reply, 'You're having a laugh. Right?'

But when Llewellyn – never one of the Essex station's jokers at the best of times

– simply stood impassively, his intelligent brown gaze patient as he waited for Rafferty to

face up to this latest dilemma, Rafferty added on a plaintive note: 'Aren't you?'

Llewellyn shook his head and with the merest hint of empathy visible in his eyes,

added, 'The Mother Superior of the Carmelite Monastery of the Immaculate Conception

rang the emergency services to report that one of the sisters had found a body buried in

a shallow grave in their grounds. PCs Green and Smales were despatched. They've just

radioed through to confirm that there is a body at the location. One that's been partially

disinterred.'

He paused, clearly awaiting some further response. And when Rafferty remained

silent, he added quietly, 'It's the Roman Catholic convent out past Tiffey Reach and

Northway.'

Unwillingly, as though to do so would confirm that which he would rather not have

confirmed, Rafferty nodded a gloomy acknowledgement. 'I know where it is.'

But even as he made this despondent reply, a far more likely explanation for the

body's presence in the convent's grounds occurred to him and he brightened considerably.

Maybe, he would, after all, be able to escape heading up an investigation into the nuns'

just-discovered cadaver. The thought was a cheering one. 'Most likely the body of one of

the nuns from way-back-when, who died from natural causes,' he told Llewellyn, unable

to hide the relief his deductions had brought him. 'Seems to me that such holy ladies,

what with their vows of poverty and all, would be likely to have given their dear departed

only simple interments years ago. Such burials would certainly save them plenty of the old

moolah.'

Llewellyn let him down gently. 'I think not, sir. For one thing, Constable Lizzie Green

said the corpse was wearing a man's watch, and one that looked expensive. And for another,

from what they were able to see of the skull, she said it looked as if it had sustained damage

consistent with a blow of some sort. And then, there was no coffin. The body was just laid,

naked, in the earth. I don't think a group of holy and modest nuns would give one of their

number such a casual burial, do you?'

Rafferty didn't. But unwilling to be so quickly deprived of his escape clause, he

muttered, 'Maybe he just genuflected too low in a bout of over-enthusiastic religious

fervour and bashed his brains out on a stone floor.' But even as he uttered the thought,

he accepted that he was just clutching at straws like some desperate yokel. Llewellyn's

next words confirmed this suspicion.

'The damage was to the back of the skull, not the front, according to Constable

Green and was inflicted with sufficient force for the victim to suffer severe trauma.'

He's not the only one, thought Rafferty morosely, after Llewellyn had revealed

the latest details of what, as he had said, sounded horribly like a suspicious death. One

moreover, that was, after all, destined to turn into his investigatory baby.

'Lizzie Green said they've secured the scene and will await our arrival and that

of the Scene of Crime team and the pathologist.'

Rafferty nodded absently, but said nothing. He was miles–years away. Back in

the south London boyhood and youth that had not been improved by religion's harsh,

unforgiving hand. Some of those old Catholic teachers certainly knew how to administer

a caning. And he should know, having been on the receiving end more times than he

could count. Strange that all that praying didn't manage to make them kinder human

beings, he thought. Why, he remembered – But Llewellyn's voice dragged him back

from his unpleasant memories.

'Sir?'

The addition of the question mark to Llewellyn's address wasn't lost on Rafferty.

He put his reverie behind him for long enough to go: 'Mm?'

'Would you like me to contact Dr Dally and the Scene of Crime team? Or will

you do it?'

Rafferty waved a hand. 'You do it.' No way did he want to give Sam Dally a

chance to laugh at his predicament. Certainly not until he'd figured out how he was

going to handle it. He gazed into space as Llewellyn turned his back and picked up a

phone. 'Nuns,' he muttered again, under his breath this time. What were a bunch of

penguin dressers doing getting mixed up in a suspicious death?

And what had he done to deserve getting dumped with a case in a Roman

Catholic convent? he asked himself self-pityingly. Of all the locations for their latest

corpse to turn up, this really was Divine punishment at its most inspired. Any location

that held even a sniff of Catholicism was normally a place to be given a wide berth by

the long since and gladly lapsed Rafferty. It was grim to think he'd now have to

voluntarily return to his religious roots.

Then he gave a fatalistic shrug. One thing at least: the nuns' cadaver would

help take his mind off his unwelcome letter, if only insofar as a second trauma lessens

the pain of the first one.

It was some minutes later, after several low and discreet exchanges, when

Llewellyn put the phone down and turned round.

'I managed to contact Dr Dally,' he reported. 'He's confirmed he'll shortly

make his way to the scene.'

Rafferty nodded grimly. 'I bet he can't wait. I could hear him laughing from here.'

Sensibly, Llewellyn refrained from making any comment on Dally or his

amusement and just continued. 'The SOCOs are also on their way.' Quietly, he added,

'As I suppose we ought to be.'

As his sergeant walked to the door and held it open. Rafferty's fatalism wore off.

Now his mouth drooped downward as if he'd suffered a mini stroke. But the only stroke

he'd suffered was another one from a supposedly loving God. Morosely, he thought: Oh

let joy be unconfined. Because, between his unwelcome letter and the news of the

suspicious death at the local RC convent, Rafferty knew deep down to his lapsed Catholic

soul, that Sam Dally wasn't the man not to make the most of his opportunity. Purgatory

awaited. Several sources of Purgatory, in fact.

And as Llewellyn said: 'Shall we go?', Rafferty knew that these several Purgatories

were impatient for his arrival.

He shrugged heroically, like a man with an urgent appointment with the hangman,

said: 'Why not?' Even though he could think of a round dozen reasons 'why not', he

mentioned none of them.

Instead, slowly, as though doom really did dog his heels, he rose from his chair,

grabbed his jacket against the lowering October skies, and followed Llewellyn from the

office to meet his fate, muttering 'Nuns!' in tones of growing horror as he went, and

fingering the letter in his pocket that seemed so hot with threat that he imagined he could

feel it burning its way through the material of his jacket to singe his flesh.

Certainly, that morning's letter had already made his day far from pleasant. The

suspicious death in the Catholic convent seemed likely to complete the job the letter had

started. He only hoped he'd enjoyed whatever murky sins he'd indulged in a previous life.

Because whatever sins he had committed in that incarnation, he suspected he was shortly

to pay for them in this one.