Diary Of A Sociopathic Vicar – Part 31

“It wasn’t me,” said Abigail, my housekeeper.

According to the news, a curate had fallen from a gallery at Musdon Minster and killed himself. I turned from the TV to see her standing in the doorway of the living room.

“Why would I think that you had anything to do with the regrettable passing of…” I glanced at the screen, “Gilbert Holdstock?”

“Because he’s one of the Sons of Jesus Lemurian.”

Ah – I began to understand. A while back, Abigail had discovered a secret, heretical cult that intended to take over the Church of England. She wished to see them disappear, a sentiment that I agreed with as I wanted to take it over myself. The difference is that God wants me to become Archbishop of Canterbury, making them surplus to requirements. With some difficulty, I had persuaded her not to kill the Sons of Jesus Lemurian one by one. True, there is the Parable of the Talents, and we should all use our talents in the service of the Lord. Yet I am not convinced Jesus intended a carefully planned programme of assassination when he told that parable.

“I believe you,” I said. Which I did, not least because she’d been in the Vicarage at the time of the death. “So, accident or murder?”

“I don’t know. It just seemed like a good idea to get my denial in early.”

“Does that mean it was an accident?”

“It means Jesus Lemurian has one less Son.”

The price of stopping Abigail’s murder spree was finding another way to stop the group. I’d spent some time and effort making sure that different parts of the society had access to different, contradictory texts that I’d faked up. The idea was that they’d tear each other apart. What I needed to know was whether or not they were going to do that physically. If so, I would have to be careful that they didn’t target me.

“How can I find out if it was murder?”

“Go to Musdon and take a look at the gallery he fell from.”

“What about the police? They’ll be checking.”

Abigail snorted. “They’ll go up to the gallery, say something like, “It’s a long way down,” and leave before they get vertigo.”

As she returned to the kitchen, I was reminded she was a double murderer. Still, she made a very good housekeeper, and was excellent at arranging flowers. In my view, this more than made up for the occasional dead body.

I thought about getting up to the gallery. One doesn’t just wander around the Minster. There are public areas, and areas normally only open to clergy – like certain Diocesan offices. Normally, only Minster staff would have access to the gallery. Fortunately, the Church of England is not very security conscious. A letter from someone important is enough to gain entry, and a quick forage in my desk located an old letter from the Dean. All it needed was re-writing.

The value of a competent forger cannot be overstated. I am curious whether this is my personal innovation, or if they have been widely used by previous archbishops-to-be. Sadly, it is not documented. I took the letter and a one-day parking permit around to Porker the next day and explained what I wanted. He said it would take him a day or so as he was busy making fake amber pendants to sell at the market. That wasn’t a problem as it would give the police enough time to finish whatever they did in such situations.

That afternoon I went down to the Leisure Centre to work out. I noticed that Phil the trainer seemed out of sorts. This is something where people get sociopaths all wrong. They think that we’re unable to decipher emotional responses in others. In fact, we can be very good at it – it’s more a question of how we choose to respond. In my case, my career trajectory requires I respond in a certain way.

“What’s up, Phil?” I asked.

“What? Oh, nothing. Nothing.”

I cocked my head on one side and raised an eyebrow. “Phil, I’m a vicar. I spend half my day dealing with people’s problems. I know something’s wrong. We can either skate around the issue, or we can talk. It’s up to you.”

With someone else I would have been more subtle, but Phil seemed likely to prefer a direct approach. I could see his indecision - he wanted to talk but didn’t feel he could or should. I decided for him.

“Come on,” I said, walking towards the office which was empty at this time. He followed meekly, half glad that he was going to be able to talk, and half afraid too. He dropped into the chair behind the desk and I closed the door. Staring at the computer’s screensaver, he said, “It’s my boyfriend.”

I am not sure what reaction he was expecting, but probably not a good one. The Church of England’s message on such issues has been confused over recent years. Sadly, many of its members have taken this as an instruction to persecute anyone not strictly heterosexual. In other words, a complete violation of everything the Church should stand for.

Frankly, I couldn’t care less about the theology – I just treat everyone as human beings.

Right now, I had a human being in front of me who was desperately hurting and needing help.

If I didn’t help, if I didn’t show the compassion that Jesus showed to those around him, then what would I be?

So, we talked.

What we talked about remains between him and me, but he was looking a lot more relaxed afterwards, and promised to update me soon. I was exhausted. Doing the compassion routine does take it out of me. Still, it enabled me to start building out my influence in the Leisure Centre. Hundreds of people use the Leisure Centre every week, mostly people I wouldn’t normally see. Phil had provided me with an ideal opportunity.

A couple of days later, Porker had finished forging the documents I requested. I popped around and slipped him the cash, walking away with letters of access to any area of the Minster, and a highly valuable unrestricted parking pass. Considering the cost of parking in the Minster car park, it’s cheaper to park on the double-yellows and get a penalty notice.

I drove to Musdon and parked in the Minster, careful that my parking pass was visible. There’s a gift shop inside at the base of the tower, so I made my way there.

“Excuse me,” I said to the lady behind the counter, “can you let me into the tower?”

She glanced at my cassock, and Porker’s letter of authority. “Of course, love, straight through that door.”
Soon I had reached the top of the stairs to the gallery. I waited a moment to catch my breath. To ascend to the top, you had to circle the gallery to more stairs on the opposite side. There was a guard railing of wrought iron, but was on the low side, and not very comforting. From here, it was straight down fifty feet, as Gilbert Holdstock had discovered. I found where he had fallen from because some copper had been careless removing police tape. Abigail was right about the police suffering vertigo, it seems. They’d also missed a couple of cassock buttons. I pocketed them, and then – more from curiosity than anything else - climbed to the roof of the tower.

There, I found Rev. Graham Walters of the Diocesan Finance Office, staring out across the town, and muttering to himself.

Disclaimer: The parking policy at Musdon Minster is carefully determined to ensure the availability of parking spaces to all. Additionally, Musdon is well-served by public transport, and so this should not represent a hindrance to those wishing to access the Minster.