Chapter 41

The somewhere ‘a little more private' was the old school basement. It was directly underneath the gymnasium and appeared to mirror the dimensions above, albeit with a claustrophobically low ceiling. It looked like school basements did the world over. Tables and chairs stacked high. Old chalkboards pushed against the wall. A storeroom for anything too big to go in a storeroom. At the far end, a table and chairs were set up conference style.

Poe cocked an eyebrow.

‘Sometimes we have to discuss things of a . . . sensitive nature,' Joshua explained. When they were seated, he said, ‘I would like to know how you came to be in possession of this information.'

‘Not gonna happen,' Poe said.

‘I will discuss what was on Miss Bradshaw's tablet momentarily, Sergeant Poe, but first I must know where your information came from. Our course members expect . . . no, demand confidentiality, and if there has been a data breach then there are actions I must take immediately.'

‘Your information is secure, Joshua. Tilly didn't find this in a dumpster.'

‘Then where?'

‘I won't be revealing my source, but I can assure you I am unaware of anything in the public domain.'

‘I have your word?'

‘Is my word worth anything to you?' Poe said. ‘If it is, then you have it; if it isn't, then rest assured, I don't imagine anyone else is looking for it.'

Joshua breathed a sigh of relief. ‘I know your opinion of us is very low, Sergeant Poe, and to be honest I don't care. I've dealt with this my entire adult life and I am used to it.'

‘You have no idea what my opinion is, Joshua.'

‘Your mind was made up the moment you read what was on Miss Bradshaw's iPad.'

‘Time and time again conversion therapy has been discredited as ineffective, and worse, deeply damaging,' Poe said. ‘The fact the Children of Job persist with it is a damning indictment of what you stand for. What you might be capable of.'

‘I completely agree,' Joshua said.

‘You do?'

‘Of course. You can't stop someone being who they are in here,' – he pressed his hand against his chest – ‘any more than you can stop the wind. And although I believe homosexuality is a mortal sin, it is not my role to judge. That is God's privilege alone.'

‘So why do you run them?' Poe asked.

Joshua hesitated before answering. It looked as if he was deciding the best way to frame his response. ‘I've already told you Cornelius was an easy man to admire, but a hard man to like,' he said eventually.

‘You have.'

‘And you've referred to him as a zealot.'

‘I said zealots frighten me, Joshua. I don't think I attributed the term to Cornelius Green.'

‘But that's what you think?'

Poe shrugged then nodded. ‘I've read his file. If I were asked, I would say he does fit the Home Office definition of an extremist.'

‘Although I'm a relative newcomer here, I'm told conversion therapy was entirely Cornelius's idea,' Joshua said. ‘He believed it worked and developed the programme accordingly. Other than a few tweaks to keep up with technology, the core programme has stayed the same for thirty-five years.'

‘Talk me through it.'

‘I can't.'

‘A man is dead, Joshua. Now is not the time to be coy.'

‘I can't because I don't know.'

‘It was running for thirty-five years,' Poe said. ‘How can you not know?'

‘Because I wasn't told.'

‘You weren't told, or you didn't ask?'

‘I agreed with Cornelius Green on almost everything. His position on abortion, the sanctity of marriage, how our children should be raised, his belief that Christian values should form the central tenet of government.'

‘But not conversion therapy.'

‘I'm an intelligent man, Sergeant Poe. I read law at Corpus Christi. I was a practising barrister. I've reviewed many papers on the subject, and a man with half my intellect would come to the same conclusion I did. Conversion therapy is futile, counterproductive and the psychological impact has the potential to be catastrophic. Ultimately, there are only three ways to achieve aims such as ours: we win the argument, we win the election, or we put judges in the right places.'

‘But?'

‘But for Cornelius it was a burning belief, almost a crusade. He couldn't be talked down and there was no point trying. Over the years there have been three or four other members who believed in the efficacy of conversion therapy, and they were the only ones Cornelius allowed to assist with the programme. The rest of us remained unaware of what went on in that classroom.'

‘It must be written down somewhere though.'

‘I'm told it isn't.'

‘I want to speak to the ones who do believe in conversion therapy then. The ones who helped him run it.'

‘I wish you luck. One died of liver cancer in 2016; the others ventured to pastures new many years ago. The only man currently running conversion therapy was Cornelius Green.'

‘The course died with him?'

‘And maybe that's a good thing,' Joshua said. ‘I believe the Children of Job deserve a voice in discussions about faith – and that wasn't going to happen while we ran that course. Perhaps this is a chance for us to take a step towards palatability as far as mainstream Christianity is concerned. To redirect the narrative. That's certainly the position I'll be urging the board to adopt.'

‘Is there anything you can tell us about Cornelius Green?' Poe said, checking his watch. They'd been there for almost two hours now. ‘Something we might find helpful in tracking down the person who killed him?'

Joshua considered the question carefully. ‘Whatever you might hear, Sergeant Poe, whatever impression I might have given you, know this: Cornelius Green was a good man. Some of his ideas were misguided but his faith never wavered. I am profoundly sorry that he never managed to find the peace he deserved, and I can only hope the rest of us can live up to his exacting standards.'

As they left the basement Poe hummed ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life', partly to annoy Joshua, although he doubted the starchy bigot had ever seen Monty Python's Life of Brian, and partly to keep up his spirits. It had been a disturbing interview in a weird, dank location.

They walked back through the rapidly filling gymnasium and out into the fresh air. Poe took in a lungful, glad to be above ground again. The sun was now high in the sky and he wished he'd had the foresight to park in the shade. His car was going to be like an oven. He squinted at his windscreen. There was something off with the glare. It wasn't uniform. He shaded his eyes and realised what it was.

‘We'll see ourselves out from here, Joshua,' Poe said.

‘I'll walk you to your car, Sergeant Poe. I'm going to check on Alice anyway and the greenhouse is on the way.'

Poe stopped. ‘I'm afraid I must insist. There's something I need to talk to my colleagues about and it's confidential. Don't worry, it's nothing to do with you or your organisation.'

They shook hands outside the old school's front entrance.

‘Why didn't you want Joshua to walk back to the car with us, Poe?' Bradshaw asked.

‘Have a look at the windscreen, Tilly.'

Bradshaw's eyesight wasn't as good as his, but they were now close enough for her to see it. ‘There's a bit of paper tucked under one of the windscreen wipers,' she said. ‘What do you think it is?'

‘I have no idea, but the fact it wasn't hand-delivered must mean something. As Joshua's probably watching us, I'm going to leave it where it is until we're out of sight.'

Which was what they did. The moment Poe drove around the guardian rhododendron bushes he stopped the car, nipped out and collected the piece of paper. It was a folded page torn from an A5 notebook. He climbed back in the car and read the neat, cursive writing.

If you really want to understand cornelius green, seek out israel cobb. They had a massive falling out – ask him what it was about. Ask him why the courses stopped. This is where your answers will be found.

Linus reached forward and took the note from Poe. After a moment he said, ‘Who the hell is Israel Cobb?'

‘He sounds like a salad,' Poe replied, frowning. Israel Cobb was an unusual name. He would have remembered if it had been in the bishop's dossier. He retrieved the note from Linus and read it again. Who the hell had written this? And what courses were they referring to?

He passed the note to Bradshaw. She glanced at it then opened her laptop.