Last Rites Read Online Free PDF Page B

around the font then she stepped nearer and looked into the holy water itself.

    It took Anne only a second to realise that there were several large lumps of excrement lying at the bottom of the receptacle.

    Even if she’d bothered to peer a little longer at the thick brown lump, she probably wouldn’t have realised that the reeking faecal matter was human.

    As it was, Anne turned and ran as fast as she could, her head spinning, her lips moving in a silent litany. Then, as she was halfway up the aisle, she finally gave voice to the scream she’d been holding in from the time she entered the church.

    Christ and all the saints looked on silently.

10

    North London

    Mason made his way back down the corridor slowly and carefully but with very little discomfort.The muscles in his legs and lower back ached but, he told himself, that was due to more than a week of inactivity and confinement to bed as much as it was to any residual damage caused by his beating. He’d come to look forward to his trips to the lavatory. No longer reliant on a bedpan or a commode to relieve himself, for the last two days he’d been making his own way to and from the toilet. He’d even managed a short stroll to the hospital canteen. Relishing freedom from the confines of his room he’d sat and drunk two cups of tea before returning. Now he pushed the door of his room open, ready to return to his bed and the second-hand battered paperback he’d purchased from the hospital shop for ten pence.

    He didn’t recognise the suited figure standing beside his bed as he walked in.

    The man turned to face him and Mason saw that he was in his early forties, perhaps a year or two older than the teacher himself. The newcomer reached inside his jacket and pulled out a thin leather wallet that he flipped open for Mason to inspect. The teacher glanced at the photo within, then at the face of his visitor as if to ensure that the likeness matched that of the man now standing before him.

    ‘Detective Sergeant Ray Weaver,’ the older man announced, pushing the ID wallet back inside his jacket. ‘The nurse said it was all right to talk to you, Mr Mason, I hope this is a convenient time.’

    Mason nodded and clambered back between the sheets.

    ‘It’s not like I was going anywhere,’ he added.

    The detective reached for one of the plastic chairs and seated himself beside Mason’s bed.

    ‘How do you feel?’ Weaver enquired.

    ‘Better than I did when they brought me in,’ Mason informed him.

    ‘You know why I’m here, Mr Mason, so I won’t waste your time. The quicker we can take a statement from you, the quicker we can initiate proceedings against the youths who attacked you.’

    Mason looked impassively at the detective.

    ‘Has anyone been arrested yet?’ he wanted to know.

    ‘Not yet,’Weaver told him. ‘We need you to positively ID them before we can continue with the investigation. We need you to name names.’

    ‘I’m pretty sure who it was.’

    ‘Who were they, Mr Mason?’

    ‘Well, I couldn’t see their faces clearly but I’m pretty sure I know who it was.’

    ‘We need you to be sure, Mr Mason.’

    ‘There were five of them, two or three were wearing hoods.’

    ‘The whole case is reliant on your evidence. On you identifying them.’

    ‘I’m pretty sure I know who they were.’

    ‘That’s not good enough, Mr Mason.’

    ‘And what if I don’t identify them?’

    ‘Then we haven’t got a case.’

    ‘Five of the kids I teach beat me almost to death and you’re telling me there’s nothing you can do about it?’

    ‘You have to see it from our point of view, Mr Mason,’ the detective told him. ‘If there’s not enough evidence in the first place then the CPS will just dismiss it.’

    ‘I want those little bastards arrested,’ Mason interrupted.

    ‘Then give us some names.’

    Mason sighed.

    ‘I can’t be sure,’ he muttered.

    ‘Then we can’t help you,’ Weaver