Free Sidney Chambers and the Perils of the Night by James Runcie Page A

above suspicion?’
    ‘Not these days. Priests can be as capable of corruption as any other man.’
    Sidney stood up to order a second pint of bitter. ‘I am not so sure about that, Geordie. We do have our standards.’
    ‘What about the vicar of Stiffkey?’ the inspector called out, enjoying the fact that he had to raise his voice to make his point heard. ‘The Prostitute’s Padre? He had a very “hands on” way of dealing with fallen women.’
    ‘I think he was much misunderstood.’
    ‘Didn’t he end up applying to manage Blackpool football club and working as a lion tamer?’
    ‘None of that is illegal, Geordie.’
    ‘I heard that his daughter became a trapeze artist and went on a date with Joseph Goebbels.’
    ‘You are making this up.’
    ‘I am not.’ Inspector Keating was now in full flow. ‘I will swear on any Bible. It just goes to show how much the clergy think they can get away with. I’ve learned that you have to watch them as much as anyone else.’
    Sidney returned with the beers. ‘I think, in my case, you can make a general presumption of innocence.’
    ‘You have always told me to be careful of presumption, Sidney. I am only following procedures that you yourself have influenced. One can’t be too careful.’
     
    The hot dry weather continued. Away from the meadows, and in front of the Grantchester cottages, the small front gardens and proud English lawns became parched and brown, the blowzy roses shed their petals, and the airless afternoons left many of the villagers too languorous either to weed or water.
    It was at the end of one such day, when the sun had beaten fiercely through all the south-facing windows of the village, that two Cambridge fire engines were called to an old summerhouse at the bottom of a field behind the garage. The building had been rented to Daniel Morden, a photographer who was away taking pictures at a wedding in London, and the alarm was raised at such a late stage that the fire had already taken hold by the time anything could be done. Flames leapt up the side of the building and into the roof space exposing its beams and rafters; windows cracked open, glass shattered and the front door fell forwards on to the ground.
    By the time the fire brigade arrived, the first floor was on the point of collapse. The heat travelled so far in advance of the flames that it was impossible to get close to the centre of the blaze. A changeable breeze meant that the conflagration was spreading in three different directions at the same time. A small group of people filled buckets from an outdoor tap and both Gary Bell and his parents were terrified that the flames would jump to the garage with its plentiful supply of petrol. Thomas Bell was swearing that they should never have rented out the building in the first place, that he had always thought the photographer was a liability. It was typical of Daniel Morden to have evaded any responsibility by being in London. ‘I bet it was one of his bloody cigarillos,’ he shouted to his son, who answered that it was too late to worry about that now.
    Suddenly there was flashover. The summerhouse sucked in the surrounding air and burst out of itself in a mighty eruption that filled the entire structure, the violent flames circling in an uncontainable whirl of fire that swept across each surface. This was the full venom of a blaze at its highest temperature. The timber-framed building could offer no resistance. The roof collapsed under its force. The air was filled with the crack of wood, the fall of brick, and the force of a wind that contained pure heat.
    Within half an hour the dwelling had been reduced to its skeletal structure. A few supporting vertical poles smoked and steamed against the midnight-blue sky. Sparks, ash flakes and fire-drops crackled and drifted through a smoke that carried with it the stench of charred wood, burnt fabric and photographic chemicals.
    It took over two hours to bring the flames under control and by