The Plague Stones

by James Brogden

  Reverend Dobson’s face relaxed, and her hands stopped fluttering around each other like nervous birds. ‘That’s lovely to hear. It’s been a very long time since Stone Cottage has had new owners – certainly not within living memory of any of the current Trustees – and as you can imagine some of us are a bit nervous about the, ah, continuity.’

  ‘Well you have nothing to be nervous about on my account. We know exactly what we’re letting ourselves in for.’

  Trish was surprised by how bitter Reverend Dobson’s laughter sounded as she led Trish out of the church and back towards the rectory, saying, ‘I very much doubt that, my dear.’

  * * *

  Back in the reverend’s garden, Richard Nash got their attention in the time-honoured fashion of tapping his bottle with a fork.

  ‘And now,’ he announced, ‘it’s time that we properly welcome our newest Trustee and her wonderful family into our community. If you’ll all…’ He gestured towards the French doors of the rectory study, which stood open. ‘Don’t worry,’ he added to the Feenans as the group headed in. ‘We’re not all going to throw our car keys into a big bowl and dress up in pointed hoods and shag each other, if that’s what you’re worried about.’ It didn’t seem to bother him that her son was listening, and trading smirks with his dad.

  Reverend Dobson’s study was exactly as Trish had imagined – lined with books from floor to ceiling and furnished with a heavy desk and several wing-backed armchairs. The only thing which surprised her was that above the fireplace, where she might have expected an image of the crucifixion, there was instead a reproduction of an oil painting showing shroud-wrapped corpses lying in the streets of a medieval town while townsfolk rolled their eyes in terror and priests prayed over the bodies. In the sky an angel and a demon did battle underneath the figure of a man pierced with arrows like a pincushion, who was kneeling on a cloud and pleading with the Lord. It was entitled Saint Sebastian Interceding for the Plague-Stricken. She nudged Peter and nodded at it.

  ‘Bit grim,’ he whispered.

  ‘Catholics for you,’ she whispered back.

  Reverend Dobson led her to the desk, upon which lay open the kind of large leather-bound tome kept with a precision which might have done a Victorian accountant proud. It was a register of names, each written in a different hand, the dates next to them going back several decades. The most recent ones were the names of all the people currently in the room with her: Richard Nash, Joyce Dobson, Donna Russell, Sean Trevorrow, Natalie Markes, Anik Singh, Alan Pankowicz, Esme Barlow and, a few places above them, separated by names she didn’t recognise going back to the fifties, her great-aunt, Stephanie Drummond.

  ‘This is the ledger of the Trustees of Haleswell Parish,’ said Rev. Dobson. ‘A record of all those who have given service to the village over the years – and now you’re one of them, the new custodian of Stone Cottage. If you still want to sign up, that is, after having met all of us.’

  A ripple of laughter went around the room, but it was polite and subdued, unlike the easy banter from before in the garden. The kind of laughter a congregation might give.

  ‘Oh! Ah…’ Trish tried not to show how flustered she was, suddenly having everybody looking at her so expectantly. ‘I don’t think I’ve got, um…’

  ‘Here.’ The reverend picked up a silver fountain pen from the desk and gave it to her.

  ‘Ah. Thanks. Do I have to… should I say something? I feel like I should have prepared a speech.’

  ‘Oh Lord, no!’ Dobson laughed. ‘This isn’t a formal thing at all.’

  But it felt formal. Over the last six weeks she’d signed insurance documents, title deeds, and all manner of official paperwork, but seeing those names set out by the hands of their owners in ink which had dried long before she was born, this felt like the most formal one of all. The barrel of the pen felt cold and heavy with some unspoken irrevocability, a weight of implications to which she was committing not just herself, but her husband and son. She was half tempted to try and laugh it off, though if someone had asked her what she was afraid of, she couldn’t have said.

  Everybody was looking at her, Peter and Toby included.

  The pen scratched her name on the next blank line down.

  People like us is people like them, now.

  Then there was applause and laughter and more drinks.

  While Trish was having her glass topped up, Natalie Markes came over. ‘If you need any help on moving day, just let me know,’ she offered. ‘I assume it’ll be soon?’

  ‘Oh we have one or two things that need sorting out. We had to give the letting agency a month’s notice so there’s still plenty of time.’

  A small frown creased Markes’ brow, and was gone. ‘The sooner you can do that the better, I would suggest,’ she said, sipping her own wine. ‘Yes. Definitely sooner.’

  5

  REPORTING IN

  AFTER THE CATERERS HAD REMOVED THE LAST OF THE dinner debris the Trustees met in the reverend’s drawing room. As darkness had fallen the weather had closed in, and the sound of rain could be heard being flung at the windows like handfuls of gravel.

  ‘So,’ said the chief executive, ‘what do we make of them?’ He swirled the contents of his whisky tumbler thoughtfully.

  ‘It’s a bit too soon to tell,’ said the director of human resources.

  ‘I know. First impressions is all I’m after.’

  ‘Well, according to the reports…’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake, we’ve all read the bloody reports!’ he snapped. ‘You’ve spoken to them; what do you think of them? Will they stay on when the inevitable ordure hits the ventilation system? Are they keepers? Are they our kind of people?’

  In the awkward silence, Human Resources shot a glance for help at the director of property and development, who sighed. When the chief executive had been drinking there was no telling which way his mood would fall, but they’d always had a good working relationship so her voice was the least likely to get shouted down. ‘Depends on how long it takes Her to make contact,’ she said. ‘The boy has already started poking around in the garden, and he’s young; his mind is more plastic. She’s likely to appear to him first, but I think it’s unlikely he’ll actually say anything to his parents for a while. According to his ed psych report – I know, I know, just hear me out – the thing he’s most afraid of is people thinking that he’s going crazy after the break-in.’

  The chief executive hmmed. ‘Let’s get him bedded into the grammar school as soon as possible. Get him invited to a few parties; build his new social group. He’s already had to leave one group of friends, so he’ll be resistant to abandoning another.’ He laughed shortly. ‘Hopefully he’ll get a shag from some girl who fancies a bit of rough.’

  The director of financial services made a face.

  ‘I recommend no counselling,’ said the reverend. ‘If he feels like his past is following him around and the teachers are talking about him behind his back that will just make him more resistant.’

  ‘Fine then. The father?’

  ‘Uncomplicated provider type,’ said Human Resources, having regained his equilibrium. ‘Feeling a little bit emasculated due to the fact that his wife is the leaseholder and not him, but give him a good job on the Clegg Farm development, promotion prospects, lots of macho bonding to scaffold his need to protect his family and he’ll be fine – especially when he finds out about Her. That’s assuming he even does find out. For him it’ll be a simple risk/benefit analysis: do the advantages for my loved ones of living in this place outweigh the threat She poses? Ultimately all he’ll need is a solution, and we can provide that.’

  Financial Services frowned. ‘Really? You think it’s going to be that simple when it’s the lives of his wife and child on the line?’

  ‘When it gets to that point—’

  ‘If it comes to that point,’ interrupted the chief executive.

  ‘If it comes to that point,’ Human Resources corrected himself, ‘we
can revise the strategy and lean more on the safety-in-numbers angle.’

  The chief executive looked around the table at his grim-faced colleagues. ‘Now look,’ he said. ‘The thing with the rat unsettled us, to be sure, but it’s not as if it hasn’t happened before and She is still weak, remember. Despite what you all seem to think, She is not some kind of all-powerful Demogorgon. Yes, from time to time She finds a way to cause the occasional regrettable incident, but She has Her limitations, and if we all do our jobs properly there’s no reason to believe that anything like it will happen again.’

  Environmental Services gulped a large swallow of red wine and shook her head, muttering, ‘Regrettable incident.’ Her eyes were shiny with tears. Financial Services laid a comforting hand over hers and squeezed.

  The chief executive forged ahead into the awkward silence. ‘So, tick “uncomplicated macho bonding”. What about the mother?’

  ‘Ah,’ said the reverend. ‘Now she’s interesting. Lapsed Catholic.’

  ‘My favourite kind.’

  There was general laughter around the table.

  ‘But she wants to belong,’ Human Resources added. ‘Her involvement in various charitable and voluntary organisations in her old home indicates a need to build connections and put down roots. Do you think you can find something like that for her, Reverend?’

  ‘Oh, just a bit,’ she replied sardonically. ‘I’ve already mentioned it to her, and she seemed receptive to the idea. What caused her crisis of faith? Do we know?’

  ‘We know that she suffered several miscarriages trying for more children after the boy, after which she became much less active.’

  ‘That’s a shame.’

  ‘I know. Poor woman.’

  The chief executive waved this away impatiently. ‘Well yes, obviously, but the one thing guaranteed to build strong ties to a place is having a baby. Let’s subtly push free fertility treatment as part of the Trustee health care package. And once the father is settled, well – after all, a happy hubby is a horny hubby.’

  ‘You old romantic,’ said Financial Services, not even trying to hide her sarcasm.

  ‘She has already expressed an interest in acquiring the cottage’s original furniture, which is a positive sign,’ put in Property and Development.

  ‘Well let’s get that sorted as soon as possible, then.’

  ‘That, ah, might not be so easy.’

  ‘Why on earth not?’

  ‘It’s all still in storage, waiting to be vetted.’

  The chief executive glared at her. ‘Good God, Natalie, why? You’ve had months!’

  Property and Development shrugged, unperturbed. ‘A simple question of priorities, Richard. The physical state of the building needed a lot more work than we’d expected. Stephanie had really let the place go quite badly. It was riddled with damp, rot, and God knows what else. We’ve been so busy working on it that we haven’t finished a full inventory of the contents – she’d hoarded all kinds of rubbish, and there are literally hundreds of books on things like the plague, the paranormal, ghosts…’

  This was accompanied by a mime show of wincing and uncomfortable shuffling around the table.

  ‘…not to mention letters, diaries, scrapbooks and things like that. There’s no telling what she might have written down; we can’t possibly let the family have access to anything which might spook them. Not at this crucial stage.’

  Financial Services drained her glass of red and laughed shortly. ‘Spook them? Is that meant to be funny? Haven’t you heard of the Internet? Besides, as soon as the Feenans move in and She realises that there’s a new custodian of Stone Cottage, She’s going to do everything She can to drive them out. A pile of old Fortean Times is going to look pretty bloody tame once rats start trying to eat their faces, don’t you think?’

  A babble of gossip rose over this until the chief executive tapped his pen against his glass to silence them. ‘Let’s all just try to remember that this is the first time in living memory any of us have had to do this. We have the wisdom of our predecessors to guide us but obviously they didn’t have to reckon with the capabilities of digital technology, so we need to be realistic about what we can achieve. Our goal is not to prevent the Feenans from finding out the truth – that’s in Her hands, not ours. Our goal is to manage expectations so that when they do find out they come to us rather than run screaming for the hills.’

  An action plan was agreed. The Executive Committee of the Haleswell Village Trust broke up as its members each found his or her own way home through the worsening weather.

  * * *

  ‘What do you think, then?’ asked Trish, putting a mug of tea on the kitchen table in front of Peter. Except that the kitchen in their old flat was so tiny that there wasn’t room for an actual table – it was the kind that clipped flat against the wall along with a pair of collapsible wooden stools. Bless the Lord for folding picnic chairs, Reverend Dobson had said, but Trish was fine if she never saw another piece of bargain flat-pack furniture again. All the same, she almost felt sad to be leaving it. It was chipped and scratched and stained, but those scars were the result of innumerable meals prepared for her family, evidence of where her infant son had learned to cut and stick and colour, and even the arena for one spectacularly ill-advised attempt at off-piste sex which had resulted in Peter wrenching his knee and limping for a fortnight. It seemed absurd to be fixating on so stupid and small a thing as a cheap kitchen table, but she supposed that the small things were what helped you cope with the big things.

  ‘What do I think about what?’ he asked.

  ‘Them! The other Trustees. Do you like them? Do you think they liked us?’ Up until today Natalie Markes had been their only contact with the Haleswell Trust.

  ‘I don’t suppose it really matters whether I like them or not, does it?’

  She sat down opposite him and sipped her tea. ‘Well try not to sound so completely over the moon about it, why don’t you.’

  ‘That’s not what I mean. I just mean that we’re going regardless, aren’t we? Doesn’t matter if they hate our guts or invite us to their wife-swapping parties.’

  ‘Ew.’ She grimaced. ‘You think they really have those?’

  ‘Bloody hope so.’

  She kicked him under the table. ‘Git. Although, did you notice that none of them had partners with them?’

  ‘Probably because it was a works do.’

  ‘“Works do”. Listen to you. Common as muck, you are.’

  ‘Ah, you like a bit of rough, lady of the manor.’ He lunged across the table and slobbered theatrically into her neck while she squealed and swatted him away.

  The space was made even more cramped by the fact that most of the cupboards’ contents were already packed in cardboard cartons stacked on the floor and counters. They weren’t due to move for another two weeks, but now that the decision had been finalised and they’d given notice to the letting agent Trish had wanted to get started as soon as possible, even though it would mean living out of boxes until the start of April. As far as the Trust was concerned they could move in tomorrow, but she and Peter had agreed that Toby’s schooling should be disrupted as little as possible, that he would see out the end of the spring term and that they’d move at the start of the Easter holidays. The good news was that he was still only in Year Nine and so the move wouldn’t jeopardise his GCSEs, and he’d have the whole of the summer term to familiarise himself with his new school, wherever that was. There was a decent comprehensive in Haleswell but also a grammar school that had been rated as outstanding and which Natalie had even hinted might be persuaded to have a place for the son of the newest Trustee. Trish supposed that was how it worked now. People like us is people like them. It made her a bit uncomfortable but not half so much as looking at the scratches and gouges around the back door where the intruder had got in to terrorise her boy. She didn’t care where he went to school – and she agreed with Peter, she didn’t care whether she fitted in with the Haleswell peopl
e or not – so long as Toby was safe. The police had never caught the man who had beaten her son, and the thought that he was still out there somewhere terrified her.

  ‘What do you make of all that high-security stuff?’ she asked. ‘You know, the burglar-proof windows and doors?’

  He shrugged. ‘Good thing? Especially given… you know…’

  ‘I know. I just wonder if it’s going to make us feel all claustrophobic and paranoid. She said it was standard on all their homes. You don’t think that makes them sound a bit… oh I don’t know. Closed in?’

  Peter dunked a custard cream and munched it, thinking. ‘I imagine if they’ve all got big houses like that they’re going to be worried about getting burgled. I kind of think it’d be nice to be closed in for a bit. Cosy. Safer for Toby.’

  She mulled that over for a bit, then raised her mug of tea to his. ‘To fresh starts,’ she said. ‘For all of us.’

  ‘Fresh starts,’ he echoed the toast, clinked his mug to hers and they drank.

  ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘You know what I’m going to do in that lovely big kitchen?’

  ‘Other than letting me have my wicked way with you over that big table?’

  ‘In your dreams. No – I, drum roll please, am going to learn how to bake bread.’

  He looked at her for a moment and then burst out laughing.

  She frowned. ‘Not sure I find that encouraging.’

  ‘Oh, honey, I’m sorry, it’s just that, you remember the Christmas pudding, don’t you?’

  ‘Look, it was a simple mistake, okay? Three minutes, thirty minutes, whatever!’ She grabbed a biscuit and munched in embarrassment. ‘Besides, it was only in for ten, and half of it was still edible.’

  He was still laughing.

  ‘How hard can bread be, anyway? It’s like the oldest thing people have ever cooked or something. I’ve always wanted to learn how. Yes, there shall be bread and scones and cakes and things – but only if you behave yourself.’