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‘Already know about that, do you?’ said Robertson, jaws still working hard on his nicotine gum. ‘Yeah, exactly. Drowned Prophet.’
‘Ex-members seem pretty scared of the Drowned Prophet.’
‘Well, she comes after them if they leave, see.’
‘Comes after them,’ repeated Strike.
‘Yeah. The membership’s taught if they reveal the Divine Secrets, she’ll come and get them.’
‘What are the Divine Secrets?’
‘She wouldn’t tell me.’
Robertson now downed the rest of his beer.
‘Two days after she talked to me, she saw the Drowned Prophet floating outside her bedroom window in the early hours of the morning. She rang me, hysterical, saying she’d said too much and the Drowned Prophet had come to get her, but I should still print the story. I tried to talk her down. Told her she needed a therapist, but she was having none of it. She kept saying, “There’s something you don’t know, there’s something you don’t know.” Got off the phone, locked herself in her parents’ bathroom and slit her wrists in the bath. She survived – just.’
‘Shit,’ said Strike.
‘Yeah. Her father blamed me, the fucking prick – he was still being a shit to her for joining the cult and giving them all her money, so on the one side I had the source’s family claiming I tipped her into suicide, and on the other, UHC threatening to bankrupt the paper for what they say are fake claims, and I’m stuck in the middle with my job hanging by a thread.’
‘Where’s the girl now?’
‘New Zealand, last I heard. The suicide attempt panicked her family, the father finally stopped bullying her and got her some help. Packed her off to some relatives down under. Fresh start.’
‘Did you put it to her that whatever supernatural stuff she’d seen in the church must’ve been faked?’
‘Yeah, but she wouldn’t have it.’ Robertson now extracted a large ball of chewed gum out of his mouth, pressed it into one of the empty slots in the packet, took out a fresh piece and began chewing again. ‘She swore she’d seen ghosts and magic – but they didn’t call it magic, obviously. Pure spirits, that was the terminology. Pure spirits could do supernatural stuff.’
‘So what was too hot to print?’
‘I could use another pint,’ said Robertson, pushing his empty glass towards the detective.
Strike heaved a sigh, but got back to his feet, his hamstring throbbing.
When he’d returned to the table and set down the fresh pint in front of Robertson, the journalist said,
‘D’you know who Margaret Cathcart-Bryce was?’
‘Rich old woman, left her entire fortune to the UHC in 2004, buried at Chapman Farm, now known as the Golden Prophet.’
‘That’s the one,’ said Robertson. ‘Well, it wasn’t a good death.’
‘Meaning?’
‘They don’t believe in medicine in the UHC. My source told me Cathcart-Bryce died in fucking agony, begging for a doctor. She said the Waces were scared that if they let one in to see her, she’d’ve been taken into hospital, which would’ve meant next of kin being alerted. They didn’t want some distant relative showing up and persuading her to change her will. If I could’ve proved that… but no corroboration. You can’t sling something like that in without checking it out. I tried to get hold of some of Cathcart-Bryce’s relatives, but the closest she had was a great-nephew in Wales. He’d already resigned himself to the fact he wasn’t getting a sniff of her money and didn’t give a fuck what had happened to her. Hadn’t seen the old dear in years.’
Strike made a note of all this, before asking,
‘Anything else?’
‘Yeah,’ said Robertson. He glanced around and lowered his voice. ‘Sex.’
‘Go on,’ said Strike.
‘They called it “spirit bonding”, which basically means fucking whoever you’re told to fuck. The girls prove they’ve above material considerations by putting out for anyone they’re told to.’
‘Really?’ said Strike.
