Page 141 of The Mercy Chair

‘And what did you do, Eve?’

‘I killed Noah and Grace for you.’

Bethany swung the mallet at Eve’s head. It sounded like steak being hit with a meat tenderiser. Poe winced and Eve went limp. Bethany turned to Aaron. ‘Is that true?’ she asked as if nothing had happened. ‘Didour sister kill Noah and Grace to avenge me?’

Aaron stared in horror at the mallet. He shook his head manically. ‘It was so we could be together,’ he sobbed.

‘In other words, it wasn’t about me, it was about her.’

Bethany raised the mallet again.

‘Wait!’ Poe said.

She gave him a reverse head nod. ‘What is it? As you can see, I’m busy.’

‘Israel Cobb being your biological father explains why he wanted you to survive the mercy chair,’ Poe said, ‘but it doesn’t explainhow. I saw him slash your throat, Bethany. He didn’t fake that. Hecouldn’tfake that, not while Cornelius was watching.’

She lowered the mallet. ‘Tell me what you saw,’ she said.

‘Israel Cobb ran that blade across your neck like he was scouring pork. Your skin sprang apart like it was elastic. There was blood. Lots of it. That couldn’t be faked.’

Bethany faced him. She untied her scarf and leaned in to Poe, close enough for him to see her neck. ‘No,’ she said, ‘it couldn’t.’

‘But . . . how?’

Her scar was white and glossy and thin, like there was a fishbone under her skin. It started just under her left ear and stretched to her right. It was neat, as if a surgeon had cut her. Poe knew that, fully extended, Stanley knife blades were an inch long. An injury like that wasn’t survivable.

Ifthe blade had been fully extended . . .

‘Israel retracted the blade, didn’t he?’ Poe said.

Bethany nodded. ‘He told me he was panicking by then,’ she said. ‘He’d meant to save me by having me wear a doctored hood. He’d stuffed it with wire wool and metal padding. He thought that would be enough to absorb the worst of the rocks. He’d then tell Cornelius that the stones had killed me.’

‘But because Cornelius had refused to let you wear a hood, he had to improvise.’

‘Cornelius knew I was Israel’s daughter. Don’t ask me how. I suspect Grace confessed to him. She probably asked him for advice. Israel breaking one of the Ten Commandments had enraged Cornelius. He had believed my biological father to be as devout as he was: pure and untainted and unconcerned with worldly possessions and desires. By having an affair, Israel had betrayed him.’

‘Which is why Cornelius wanted Israel to see your face.’

‘It was. Watching his daughter die was his punishment. And because Aaron was unable to land any serious blows with the rocks he was throwing, Cornelius ordered Israel to finish me off. He had taken a perverse delight in that.’

‘He went to plan B,’ Poe said. ‘Tried to kill you without killing you.’

‘He left the tip protruding, enough to pierce the thin skin on my neck, but retracted the rest of the blade. And because he’d jerked my head back before he did it, it looked more violent than it actually was. He didn’t know if it would work, but he was out of options by then. He had to cut me deep enough for it to look real, but he wasn’t a doctor; he had no way of gauging what a safe depth was. The man who later patched me up told me that if the blade had been protruding even one more millimetre it would likely have been a fatal cut.’

Poe nodded. It had been a desperate move. Wouldn’t have worked nine times out of ten. Bethany would have bled out or screamed in pain. ‘A cut like that would have been like a head wound,’ he said. ‘Lots of blood, but ultimately superficial. And luckily Cornelius didn’t check.’

‘It wouldn’t have occurred to him, Sergeant Poe. To check would be to admit he wasn’t confident his orders were being carried out.’

Poe thought that sounded about right. Cornelius Green was the Children of Job’s founding member, their magnetic leader. His word was infallible.

‘Did you know Cornelius had a grave earmarked for you?’ Poe asked.

‘Yes. Israel told me.’

‘Where did he take you instead? Your scar isn’t raised or lumpy so I assume you had medical attention that same night.’

‘Before the Children of Job, like Cornelius, my father had been active in what he called the fight to preserve the sanctity of life. But whereas Cornelius’s background was in direct action, such as firebombing abortion clinics in the States, Israel had been one of a select few who sought out the underground networks. Northern Ireland was a fertile battleground in those days as abortion was illegal in all but a few circumstances. A lot of girls were smuggled across to the mainland to give birth or to have their pregnancy terminated. My father tried to stop the doctors secretly performing abortions over here. The transport arrangements. The families who looked after these young, often terrified girls, while their parents thought they were away on a school trip. The ones who made sure that when they returned to their communities no one was any the wiser. He sniffed them out like a bloodhound.’

---