A Jane Austen Encounter (20 page)

Above the plaque was the memorial window erected in 1900 by public subscription—an indication of the novelist’s rising reputation by that time. The window featured King David and quotations from the Psalms.

Elizabeth and Gerri moved to the other side of the aisle to view the recently installed Jane Austen exhibition, evidence of the continued growth of her popularity—a series of powder-blue Chippendale-style cabinets showing the various places Jane lived, ending with the little yellow house on College Street.

Richard stood apart, observing the steady flow of visitors to Jane’s grave. The sheer number of pilgrims to this site was testimony to how she had touched lives. He smiled, recalling having read of one of the cathedral vergers in the middle of the nineteenth century who was very puzzled why so many people enquired for the grave of Jane Austen. “Was there,” he asked, “anything particular about that lady?” Jane would undoubtedly have been amused. After she got over her astonishment that anyone bothered asking, of course.

“Shall we go see the Gormley?” Gerri interrupted his reverie. “Nothing to do with Jane, of course, but it’s rather nice. You know Gormley, of course?” Richard was relieved that Gerri didn’t wait for an answer. “‘The Angel of the North’ is his best-known work.”

“Ah, yes.” At least Richard had seen pictures of the enormous angel with outspread arms like airplane wings atop a hill near Newcastle. He joined Elizabeth, and they followed Gerri up the aisle and down into the crypt.

They stood on a landing at the foot of the stone steps, Richard with his arm around Elizabeth to steady her. The platform was none too wide and she was at the end, beyond her an arched recess with brick columns, and behind them a maze of pipes of varying sizes. Once he was sure of their secure footing, he could focus on the statue of the single male figure occupying the center of the room. Above, pale stone arches curved over the figure’s bowed head. Below, a smooth pool of water mirrored the image. It was a very effective setting for the sculpture that was meant to lead viewers to take a moment to look into their own spirit.

Part of the effectiveness of the setting was the light. Odd, that it appeared to be natural. Was that daylight coming from between the arches along the outside wall? Could a crypt have windows? Wasn’t it by definition underground? He asked Gerri.

“Yes, real windows,” she said. “The purpose of a crypt isn’t for underground burial—it’s to raise the east end of the cathedral— make the high altar truly high. Like going to heaven.”

Whatever the purpose, it made for a dramatic setting. All the more effective for the small lake around the sculpture.

“What makes it flood?” Elizabeth asked.

“There’s a well in the crypt—meant to provide baptismal water, I think. Anyway, the water table is really high here, so it floods a lot of the year—appropriate because they have St. Swithin upstairs. Well, his shrine, you know. Anyway, we say if it rains on St. Swithin’s Day, it will rain for forty days. Of course, it usually rains whether or not it rains on St. Swithin’s Day.” As she spoke, Gerri led the way back to the exit, and Richard followed.

He was starting up the stairs when he realized Elizabeth had stayed behind, apparently still contemplating the statue in its reflecting pool. He went on more slowly, thinking he would wait for her at the top of the stairs.

He had just stepped aside to make room for a new party of visitors to descend when he heard a scream and a splash.

“Elizabeth!” Richard turned and plunged down the steps, all but shoving the others aside.

He hadn’t mistaken the voice. Elizabeth floundered in the water up to her waist as she pushed herself to a sitting position, flinging drops of water as she shook her head. “I’m okay. Get him!”

The sound of breaking glass made Richard look up just in time to see a jeans-clad leg and tennis shoe disappear beyond the wall. He turned back to Elizabeth. “Go on! I’m fine,” she yelled.

Richard splashed through water halfway up to his knees, but stopped at the thick stone wall. It was clear Elizabeth’s assailant would be long gone by the time he mounted the wall and squeezed through the narrow medieval window slit.

He turned back to help Elizabeth, but other visitors had already helped her onto dry footing. One lady was toweling her hair with a sweater and another offered a large, clean handkerchief for her to wipe her face.

The general concern and help was comforting, and Elizabeth, indeed, seemed to be as unhurt as she declared. Her rescuers pelted her with questions to which she gave terse answers:

“Did you get a look at him?” Not really.

“He snatched your bag?” Elizabeth nodded.

“Where did he come from?” Behind.

“Do you have any idea who it was?” She shook her head.

Gerri came down with a verger who took charge, ushered everyone back up the stairs, and closed off the crypt. Elizabeth and her companions he led into the Chapter House where he produced a blanket to wrap Elizabeth in and summoned a volunteer to bring tea. “Now, can you tell me what happened?”

Elizabeth shook her head, which, fortunately, no longer produced a shower of water. “Not really. I stopped to take a picture and then I just wanted to be alone for a minute. To think, pray—I’m not sure. I just didn’t want to leave. It was so sudden. I had the impression of something—someone—flying at me from behind. He snatched my bag and ran across the pool.”

The verger looked at Richard. “Did you see anyone go in after you left?”

“No. There wasn’t time, I’m certain. He must have been waiting there—in the alcove or behind the pipes or something.”

“Who would do that?” Elizabeth took a gulp of the tea a red-jacketed volunteer handed her.

Richard was wondering whether he should mention Brian Woodhouse—if that was even his name—when a policeman, summoned by another verger, entered. PC Eric Solti asked the same questions others already had, and Elizabeth answered them. “So you didn’t see your assailant at all?”

“No, he seemed to jump out of nowhere. I suppose he could have been waiting behind that column in the alcove. It all happened so fast—he snatched and ran. I don’t think he meant to shove me in. I more just lost my balance.”

They were joined by a woman police officer who had been surveying the damage in the crypt. “It looks planned. He apparently had something heavy with him to smash the window. That was old glass, not easily broken. The Roundheads used bones from the coffins, but I’d bet on a hammer.”

WPC Nelson asked Elizabeth to describe her bag, which she did.

“And what did you have in it?” Constable Solti asked.

“Guidebooks, notebook, makeup, a little money. Oh,” she groaned. “My camera!”

“Passport?” the WPC asked.

“No, I keep that in my pocket.”

“Very wise. May I see it?”

Elizabeth pulled it out of the breast pocket of her light travel jacket and the officer recorded the details. “Anything else you might be able to tell us?”

Richard could see Elizabeth’s indecision, so he spoke up and told them about the young man using the name Brian Woodhouse who, inexplicably, seemed to be following them.

Constable Solti took Elizabeth’s contact information and gave her his card in case she remembered anything else. The police departed. Elizabeth finished her tea and was thanking the verger for his care for her when Constable Solti returned carrying a bright floral bag. Behind him, WPC Nelson ushered in Arthur.

“Arthur!” Elizabeth and Gerri cried at the same time.

“He says he’s your friend. That he found this hanging out of a bin.” He handed the bag to Elizabeth. “Can you identify it?”

“It’s mine. One of a kind. My sister made it.”

“And the contents?”

Elizabeth emptied the bag onto the table in the middle of the room. “Thank goodness, my camera’s here!” She pulled out a couple of guidebooks, a small pouch holding her makeup, a comb . . . She shook her head. “Money’s gone, but it wasn’t much. Maybe five pounds.”

“Anything else?”

She looked back at the books. “My notebook.” She sank into a chair with another groan. “Oh, I hate to lose my notes. I was keeping a journal. Nothing formal—just thoughts and feelings at the moment. Like taking a picture, only in words.”

Richard spoke up. “That seems consistent with it being Brian Woodhouse.” This time he told the officers about their earlier encounter in more detail and gave them the best description he could.

“If his story about being a reporter was true, was there anything in your notes he might find useful?” WPC Nelson asked.

“I think we should give you the whole picture,” Richard said. “It’s hard to see how it could all be connected, but odd things have been happening ever since we arrived.” He told them about Claire, the letters that disappeared and then reappeared—minus one—about Muriel’s accident at Box Hill and her death the next day.

“And you have no idea why anyone would want to cause all this?” PC Solti asked.

“At first we thought the letter might have a lead to a valuable Jane Austen document,” Elizabeth began.

“At least valuable to scholars,” Richard added. “But then we found that the summary of the novel it referred to was already known.” He shrugged. “It’s been published, even.”

Richard considered mentioning the parts of
The Watsons
manuscript that had gone missing. He probably would have done if he had been alone with the police, but he considered: How much did he really know about Arthur and Gerri? They had both been on the scene for most of the events he had recounted to Officer Solti. And Arthur had turned up with Elizabeth’s bag.

Surely it wasn’t possible that Arthur could have been lurking in the crypt instead of visiting his used bookstore. It didn’t seem possible that Elizabeth wouldn’t have recognized her attacker if it had been Arthur. And Arthur could have contrived a far simpler method of looking in her bag if he had wanted to.

But still, giving anyone, no matter how innocent they appeared, the idea that they might suspect all this could have to do with the theft of a manuscript worth a million pounds—a manuscript someone could mistakenly think they
did
know something about—was a risk Richard wasn’t prepared to take. Ignorance was their best protection.

And he had been warned. The attack on Elizabeth showed that whatever was going on hadn’t ended with Muriel’s death. He mustn’t let his guard down for a moment.

Chapter 18

BELLS FROM ST. NICHOLAS’ Church wakened Elizabeth, reminding her that it was Sunday. Richard entered with their morning tea. “Open the window,” she said, “so we can hear them better.”

He set the tea down and obeyed, letting the cascade of changes tumble into the room like a silver shower. “Oh, heaven.” Elizabeth took her tea and leaned back against the pillows.

She could see, though, that Richard was still worried, as his next words betrayed. “Elizabeth, are you sure you want to go on with this? You could have been seriously hurt yesterday.” He sat on the edge of the bed.

“But I wasn’t.” She smiled to give extra reassurance to her words.

“So you want to keep on?”

“Of course I do. I want to finish our Jane tour and enjoy every minute of our sabbatical and . . .” She paused and bit her lip, considering whether or not this was the right moment to bring up the thought she had been chasing around in the back of her head for several days. So far she had expressed it only to her journal. But now that was gone. She took a deep breath.

“Actually, I would rather like it to go on and on.”

“To the end of the summer,” he prompted. “Of course. I meant, should we leave this Jane Austen agenda and take up something else. Something less . . . Well, less fraught.”

Elizabeth laughed. “Like what? Beatrix Potter? You think Peter Rabbit might be safer?”

“Not a bad idea. I would love to visit the Lake District. Wordsworth . . .”

“‘A host of golden daffodils’ and all that. I know.” She reached across the duvet and took his hand. “Yes, that’s rather the point. There are so many places we would love to see—places we’ve studied, taught, and dreamed of all our lives.” She took another sip of tea before going on.

“And then I got an email from Tori last night. She’s applied to do a costume-design internship with the Royal Shakespeare Company. It could be a wonderful opportunity for Gregg’s acting career, too, and, of course, they’ll bring the children and—”

“Elizabeth, what are you saying?” Richard cut her off.

“Just that I think we should consider it.”

“Consider what?”

“Well, with Muriel gone, St. Frideswide’s will need a lecturer on Austen— just until they can fill the position on a more permanent basis, I mean.”

“You’re saying you think we should move to England?”

“Well, there’s no reason you couldn’t apply for extended professional leave from Rocky Mountain and we could stay on for a year or so. I’m not suggesting we actually immigrate or anything like that.”

“I’m not sure I’d have the qualifications to lecture at Oxford, even for an adjunct position—or whatever they call it here.”

Elizabeth was encouraged by his thoughtful tone of voice. He hadn’t dismissed her idea out of hand. “Of course you’re qualified. Your former department head will give you a stellar recommendation. And if you found that missing manuscript, you’d be a hero. They couldn’t deny you.”

“Elizabeth! I told you we weren’t even going to think about that. It’s far too dangerous. And besides, it’s nonsense. That manuscript could be anywhere in the world.”

“Yes, it could.” Elizabeth scooted up higher in bed. “But if we’re correct in thinking that whoever is trailing us is after it, they seem to have reason to believe it’s somewhere in the vicinity.”

“I’m afraid I find your logic terrifying,” Richard said. “It’s like that game we played as children where everyone shouts ‘cold,’ ‘warm,’ or ‘hot’ depending on how close you’re getting to some hidden object. Only in this game, if someone seems to be getting too hot they get hit over the head—or worse.”

Elizabeth set her teacup aside and smiled. She had said enough for now. The subject had been broached. If she pushed harder, Richard would find more negative arguments. She could wait. “I’m going to shower.”