Father Brown and the Mirror of Truth
A New Father Brown Mystery
The trouble with the Abbey of St. Walburga began, as such troubles often do, with something that was not there.
Father Brown noticed the absence before anyone else had seen anything at all.
He had come to the abbey as a guest of the Benedictine prior, a round, rosy man named Dom Anselm, whose laugh shook his spectacles and whose theological opinions were as generously portioned as his puddings. The abbey stood on a low rise overlooking the grey sweep of the North Sea, its stone walls salted by centuries of wind. It was not an ancient abbey, but it had been built with such devotion to older models that even the gulls seemed to treat it with medieval respect.
Father Brown had arrived the previous afternoon, having been invited to preach a quiet retreat to a small gathering of benefactors and friends. Among these guests were a philanthropist, a scholar, a retired colonel, a London art dealer, and a fashionable young couple who treated the monastic silence as if it were an exotic spa treatment.
And, of course, there was the Mirror.
It hung in the abbey’s small museum room, a narrow chamber off the cloister that displayed a modest collection of religious art and relics donated over the years. The Mirror of St. Walburga, as it was known, was a tall, narrow thing set in an ornate gilt frame carved with vines, angels, and small, mischievous-looking demons. The glass itself was slightly cloudy with age, giving back a softened reflection, as if the viewer were already half a memory.
The legend, which Dom Anselm cheerfully admitted was “about ninety percent pious nonsense,” claimed the mirror had once belonged to a medieval anchoress who could see into men’s souls. Pilgrims had come to gaze into it and confess their sins on the spot. Whether the mirror had ever possessed such powers was doubtful, but it had lately acquired another sort of value: an expert from London had declared it an extremely rare example of early Renaissance Venetian glass, worth a small fortune.
“It is the only thing we have that might tempt a thief,” Dom Anselm had said with a laugh. “Which is why I sleep like a baby every night, knowing no one in the modern world is interested in old saints, only old mirrors.”
Father Brown had smiled at that, but his eyes had lingered on the glass a moment longer than was necessary.
The first scream came just after Lauds.
It echoed through the stone corridors like a bird striking a bell.
Father Brown, who had been saying his private prayers in the chapel, rose at once and shuffled toward the sound with surprising speed. He met Dom Anselm at the corner of the cloister, the prior’s face pale beneath its usual cheer.
“It’s Mr. Chillingworth,” he puffed. “In the museum room. Something’s happened.”
Mr. Alistair Chillingworth was the London art dealer, a thin, elegant man with silver hair and the habit of touching things as if appraising them. When Father Brown entered the museum, Chillingworth was standing in the middle of the room, trembling like a man who had discovered a corpse.
Which, in a way, he had.
The mirror was gone.
Only the frame remained, hanging on the wall like an empty doorway. The glass had been neatly removed, not smashed, not stolen with brute force, but delicately extracted, leaving the carved surround untouched.
“That— that was worth fifty thousand pounds at least,” Chillingworth stammered. “Perhaps more. It was unique. Irreplaceable.”
Dom Anselm crossed himself automatically. “But how? The doors were locked. Brother Matthew always locks the cloister doors at Compline.”
Father Brown had moved closer to the frame. He ran a small, round finger along the inner edge where the glass had once sat.
“Not broken,” he murmured. “Not forced. Taken out like a picture from its frame.”
Chillingworth let out a strangled laugh. “Yes, Father, that is exactly what has happened.”
Father Brown peered at the back of the frame. “And put back again.”
“What?”
“The frame was removed from the wall,” said Father Brown mildly. “See the fresh scratches in the plaster? It was taken down, the glass removed, and the empty frame hung up again.”
Dom Anselm blinked. “But why would a thief take the trouble?”
“So that,” said Father Brown, “for a little while, no one would notice anything missing.”
The police arrived by mid-morning, in the person of Inspector Mallory, a long-faced man who looked as if he disapproved of the modern world on general principles. He listened to the story with a professional sigh.
“So we have a valuable antique glass, stolen during the night, from a building full of people, with no sign of forced entry. Classic country-house theft.” He glanced at Father Brown. “I suppose you’ll tell me it’s about the human soul.”
Father Brown beamed. “Eventually.”
The inspector rolled his eyes and began his methodical inquiries.
There were, counting the monks, twelve people in the abbey overnight. The monks themselves were quickly ruled out in Mallory’s mind; thieves seldom rose at four for Matins. That left the guests.
Sir Percival Hume, the retired colonel, was a bluff man with a bristling moustache and a strong sense that civilization had been declining since 1918. He declared he had slept soundly and heard nothing.
Dr. Lydia Vane, a historian specializing in medieval mysticism, had been up late reading in the library. She admitted she had passed the cloister around midnight but noticed nothing unusual.
The young couple, Julian and Clara Trent, claimed to have gone to bed early after complaining that the abbey’s Wi-Fi was “positively monastic.”
Then there was Mr. Chillingworth himself, who had been the last to leave the museum room the previous evening, having spent a long time admiring the mirror.
“I confess I was fascinated,” he said, dabbing his forehead. “Such craftsmanship. Such— transparency.”
Father Brown, who was sitting on a bench in the cloister, looked up at that word.
“Transparency is a rare thing in mirrors,” he said.
Chillingworth forced a smile. “I meant in the sense of clarity.”
“Ah,” said Father Brown.
Inspector Mallory had the doors and windows examined. All were locked from the inside. No footprints were found in the dew outside the cloister. No ladders, no broken glass, no obvious means of escape.
“It’s as if,” the inspector muttered, “the mirror walked out by itself.”
Father Brown looked thoughtfully at the empty frame through the museum doorway.
“Or walked deeper in,” he said.
That afternoon, the abbey’s atmosphere grew thick with unease. The monks tried to carry on as usual, but the guests clustered in corners, whispering.
Father Brown found Dr. Vane in the garden, sketching the abbey walls.
“You study mystics,” he said, sitting beside her on a stone bench. “Do you believe a mirror can show a man his soul?”
She smiled faintly. “Metaphorically, perhaps. Not literally.”
“Yet people came here to confess in front of that mirror,” said Father Brown.
“Yes. Because they believed it saw through them. That’s often enough.”
Father Brown nodded. “And if someone were afraid of being seen through?”
Dr. Vane paused in her drawing. “You mean, someone who feared their secret might be discovered?”
“Yes,” said Father Brown. “A mirror is a dangerous thing to a man with something to hide. Especially a mirror with a reputation.”
She laughed softly. “You think our thief stole it out of superstition?”
“I think,” said Father Brown, “that superstition is often just guilt wearing a mask.”
The real shock came at Vespers.
Brother Matthew, the young monk who tended the museum, failed to appear in choir. A search was made, and he was found in the museum room itself, lying unconscious on the floor behind a display case.
He had been struck on the head.
Inspector Mallory was summoned again, looking even grimmer than before.
“Attempted murder now,” he said. “Or at least serious assault.”
Brother Matthew, when revived, could remember little. He had come to the museum in the afternoon to check the cases. Someone had called his name from behind. He had turned—and then darkness.
“Did you see who it was?” Mallory pressed.
The monk shook his head weakly. “Only— only a reflection.”
“A reflection?”
“In the glass of the display case. A face behind me. But I could not see it clearly.”
Father Brown, who had been listening from the doorway, whispered, “A mirror again.”
That night, Father Brown could not sleep. He wandered the cloister under the moonlight, his hands tucked into his sleeves.
He found Sir Percival Hume there, pacing like a sentry.
“Can’t rest either, Father?” the colonel growled.
“I rarely do,” said Father Brown. “Too many interesting sins in the world.”
Hume snorted. “If you’re hinting I stole that mirror, you’re barking up the wrong gargoyle. I’ve no use for looking at myself.”
“That is usually a sign of great virtue,” said Father Brown gravely. “Or great fear.”
The colonel stopped. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” said Father Brown gently, “that some men avoid mirrors because they are vain. Others because they are ashamed. And a few because they are both.”
Hume stared at him, then burst out laughing. “Well, I’m certainly both. But I didn’t knock out that monk.”
“I know,” said Father Brown.
“You do?”
“Yes,” said the priest. “You would have used a heavier object.”
The next morning brought a new development. Inspector Mallory, after a restless night of his own, had ordered a search of all rooms. In Mr. Chillingworth’s luggage, carefully wrapped in clothing, they found not the mirror—but tools. Fine, specialized tools used for removing glass from antique frames without damaging them.
Chillingworth turned ashen.
“I— I brought them to examine the mirror more closely,” he stammered. “Purely professional interest.”
“At two in the morning?” Mallory snapped.
“I didn’t— I mean—”
Father Brown watched him sadly.
“You did remove the mirror,” he said softly. “But not to steal it.”
Chillingworth looked up, startled. “What?”
“You took it out of the frame,” Father Brown went on, “because you were afraid of it.”
The room fell silent.
“Afraid?” Mallory said skeptically.
“Yes,” said Father Brown. “Mr. Chillingworth has built his career on spotting forgeries. He prides himself on seeing what others miss. But recently, he made a mistake—a very expensive mistake. He authenticated a fake painting for a wealthy client. When the truth came out, his reputation trembled like a house of cards.”
Chillingworth sank into a chair, his face crumpling.
“I was going to tell them,” he whispered. “I was. But then I heard about this mirror. A mirror that sees into men’s souls. It sounded absurd—until I stood before it. I felt as if it knew. As if everyone could see my fraud written on my face.”
“So you took the glass out,” said Mallory slowly, “to stop it ‘seeing’ you?”
“Yes!” Chillingworth cried. “I meant to hide it somewhere, then claim it had been stolen. I thought— I thought it would all blow over.”
“But you didn’t hide it,” said Father Brown. “You put it somewhere else.”
Chillingworth hesitated. “I— I panicked. I heard footsteps. I wrapped the glass and slipped it into the only place I could think of.”
“Where?” demanded Mallory.
Chillingworth swallowed. “Behind the altar in the old side chapel. There’s a hollow in the stonework.”
They found it there, wrapped in a monk’s towel, the cloudy glass catching the candlelight like a sleeping eye.
“But that still leaves,” said Mallory, “the attack on Brother Matthew.”
All eyes turned to the priest.
Father Brown sighed. “Yes. That is the darker part.”
He looked at the assembled faces: the colonel, the scholar, the young couple, Dom Anselm, and the trembling art dealer.
“The mirror did not show men their souls,” he said. “But it made them think about them. And that is sometimes worse.
“Brother Matthew did not see a thief in the reflection. He saw someone he knew—someone who should not have been in the museum at that hour. Someone who realized he had been recognized.”
Dr. Vane’s pencil dropped from her hand.
“It was you,” Father Brown said gently.
She closed her eyes.
“I didn’t mean to hurt him badly,” she whispered. “I only meant to frighten him.”
“Why?” Mallory asked.
“Because I knew the mirror was fake,” she said bitterly. “Not the glass—its history. I’ve been researching it for years. It never belonged to any saint. It was an ordinary Venetian mirror given a false legend in the nineteenth century to attract pilgrims. I was going to publish my findings. But when I heard it had just been valued at a fortune—based partly on that legend—I realized the abbey might sell it under false pretenses. I wanted proof. I went to examine it secretly. Brother Matthew saw me. I panicked.”
Dom Anselm looked stricken. “You could have told us.”
“I know,” she said. “But I was proud. I wanted to expose the truth dramatically.”
Father Brown nodded. “Pride again. The oldest distortion in any mirror.”
Inspector Mallory straightened. “Well, Dr. Vane, I’m afraid dramatic exposures are best left to the police.”
As he led her away, Father Brown gazed at the recovered glass, now leaning safely against the wall.
“It’s funny,” he said to Dom Anselm. “The mirror never showed anyone their soul. But it made three people act as if it could. One stole it out of guilt. One attacked a man out of pride. And one”—he smiled faintly—“almost sold it out of simple ignorance.”
Dom Anselm wiped his brow. “I suppose we shall have to rewrite the label in the museum.”
“Yes,” said Father Brown. “But keep the legend.”
“Keep it? After all this?”
Father Brown nodded. “Legends are often truer than facts. This mirror did make men confess. It just needed a little help.”
He looked once more into the cloudy glass. His own round face looked back, blurred and gentle.
“After all,” he murmured, “every mirror shows the soul—if you know how to look.”