The Cure of Souls mw-4

by Phil Rickman

  She felt sweat on her forehead and a harsh rawness at the back of her throat. She fought the urge to cough.

  Oh God.

  It had caught her off guard. Until then, there’d been nothing: a growing sense of anticlimax, no sense at all of Stewart Ash. Now the kiln seemed claustrophobic, suddenly stifling, and when the fridge grated like a passing container lorry she realized what she’d forgotten to do.

  She saw Lol watching her, a flaring of alarm in his eyes. She put a hand to her throat, swallowed. Her throat was burning. She was gasping on a stench of gunpowder and rotten eggs and the smell of cheap fireworks from when she was a kid, fierce and searing as a jet from a blowlamp, hot breath of hell.

  21

  The Brimstone Tray

  SULPHUR?

  As she struggled for breath, she was asking herself Is this real? and turning to glance at the stove in case it was pumping black smoke.

  It wasn’t.

  Then Lol’s voice: ‘Merrily…?’

  His normal voice – no wheezing, no coughing. He wasn’t getting it; none of the others were. She began to utter in her head the lines of St Patrick’s Breastplate: Christ be with me, Christ within me…

  Hand to her mouth, she crossed the room and pulled open the door leading to the hop-store-turned-living-room. Rushed in and grabbed a wooden dining chair to wedge the door open.

  Christ behind me, Christ before me…

  Huw Owen coming through. What’ve you forgotten, Merrily? Huw putting them through their paces in a Victorian chapel in the Brecon Beacons. DOORS! All of them… cat-flaps… cupboards… open and wedge… firmly… come on… it’s not a joke! Do it! Open and wedge! OPEN AND WEDGE!

  She dragged open the door of the huge old fridge… a cold, white bulb blinking on inside. Then the heavy door began to swing back on her and she pulled down two bottles of Chardonnay from a shelf inside to set on the flags and wedge it open. When she turned back into the room, Lol was moving towards her.

  She croaked, ‘No!’

  One of them must have jogged the hop-crib table, because the chalice instantly tipped over and the red wine began dribbling into the cracks in the wood. Why hadn’t she put away the sacrament when her plan for the Eucharist was shelved? Why hadn’t she done that?

  She snatched the flask of holy water to safety as the spilled wine dripped down and pooled in the outline of Stewart’s bloodstain on the flags below.

  When she could manage to speak, she said, ‘It’s all right. Not what I thought.’ It came out both hoarse and shrill, no kind of reassurance.

  What she meant was: It’s not Stewart Ash. Something was loose, playing with her senses, but it wasn’t Stewart.

  ‘Grant, Lord—’ She broke off and took a deep breath, watching droplets of holy water from her flask twinkling in a channel of sunlit dust. ‘Grant, Lord, to all who shall work in this room that in serving others they may serve you.’

  But in her voice, the recommended blessing for a kitchen sounded as potent as watered milk. She’d blown it. She’d been unprepared, had come in here, unforgivably, as a partial sceptic, her mind absorbed by something else, and whatever was here had known it and gone for her and only her.

  What is it? What’s here? Who are you?

  She cleared her throat, hands trembling around the flask. She could still taste the sulphur. Stephanie Stock was watching her, amused, as if storing up the whole event for a party anecdote – Stephie’s famous impression of the loopy woman who thought she was an exorcist.

  ‘The living room?’ Merrily asked.

  Gerard Stock nodded. He kept glancing at the small pool of wine on the floor, now a stain on the stain.

  Coincidence? Coincidence!

  But Stock was sweating, wet patches the size of dinner plates under each arm. I’ve lost it, Merrily thought in horror, I’ve let it through. It’s come through me! She was aware of Lol watching her intently, as if there were only the two of them here. Lol, who rarely judged, almost never condemned – because he was a loser and a wimp, he’d insist.

  Stock began to lead the way into the living room. She stopped him, a hand on his arm.

  ‘Gerard, I think I… need to go first.’

  How ridiculous that must sound from the smallest person in the place, and plainly incompetent. She saw Stephanie suppressing a smile, with difficulty. And then she goes, ‘Gerard, I need to go first…’ Howls of laughter.

  In the living room, the only smell was a faint aroma of mould from the two heavy armchairs and the lumpy sofa. Merrily called on God to unite all who met therein in true friendship and love. It sounded trite and hollow. She saw a wood-burning stove and over it a framed photograph of a younger, slimmer Gerard Stock with two people she didn’t recognize and the late Paula Yates.

  ‘Bedroom?’

  Of course, she should already have known where it was. She should have been up there already. Should have been all round this place.

  ‘Through that doorway,’ Stock said, ‘and the stairs are on the left.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  The bedroom was instant vertigo.

  Lol came last up narrow, wooden stairs that were not much more than a loft-ladder, passing through where a trapdoor must once have been, joining the Stocks and Merrily on the platform where hops had once been strewn to dry. It was floor-boarded now, but it didn’t feel safe, somehow – probably because you emerged gazing straight up into the apex of the big timber-lined cone, the witch’s hat of the hop-kiln, all that dark-stained wood rising to the wind-cowl.

  Someone had switched on lights – metal-cased bulkhead lamps bolted to the sloping walls. Just as well; the only windows up here were like the arrow slits in a church belfry. On a stormy night, Lol thought, it would be either wildly exhilarating or terrifying.

  ‘We’ve got quite a lot to do up here yet, as you can see,’ Stephie Stock said, as if they were potential buyers viewing the place.

  ‘Shut up,’ Stock rasped.

  What a turnaround: bullying, boisterous Stock become all edgy and anxious. Swaggering Stock turned sober and tense. His back to the wall. His back to Stephanie. And to the bed.

  The only furniture – apart from a modern sectional wardrobe, its louvred doors now being flung open by Merrily – was a double bed without a headboard, still unmade. Stephie went to sit on the edge, crossing her legs. Lol was aware of a slightly sour amalgam of scents, including – he was fairly sure – hops. Hop-pillows, maybe… or the residue of millions of rustling hop-cones?

  Sleep? Fucking hops work like rhino horn. Fact, man. Me and Steph, we’re living in an old kiln, walls impregnated with as much essence of hop as… as the beer poor old Derek can’t pump. My wife… leaves scratches a foot long down my back.

  The other Gerard Stock. The one who did not bring his wife to the pub.

  From the bed, Stephie gave Lol a conspiratorial smile. Her golden-brown hair was in provocative disarray, her eyes still and knowing; she was now the only one of them who appeared entirely relaxed.

  Lol smiled briefly, uncomfortably, turned away to look for Merrily. Something had happened to her down there, maybe just an attack of nerves, and she’d temporarily lost the plot and then recovered. Now she was moving round the sloping wall with her bottle of holy water, and she looked forlorn, vulnerable, like a child.

  He felt useless – worse than that, faithless; he didn’t believe this exercise was helping anyone, least of all the murder victim. He didn’t know why they were here at all, what Stock was after. He felt superfluous and embarrassed, an extra. He felt Merrily was being made a fool of – joke vicar. He felt an irrational and unusual urge to put a stop to this melodrama, demand an explanation – what Prof Levin, with style and finesse, would have done ages ago.

  Only two people were taking this seriously now, pressing on.

  ‘Stand up,’ Stock said tiredly to his wife. ‘Please.’ It was clear to Lol now that, whether Stock believed in the power of the Holy Spirit or not, this was something he still very much want
ed to happen.

  Stephie came languidly to her feet, stood by the bed. Merrily moved into the centre of the room, and they formed a small circle, the boards creaking.

  ‘Lord God, our Heavenly Father,’ Merrily began, ‘you, who neither slumber nor sleep, bless this bedroom…’

  Water flying again like a handful of diamonds. The bedroom formally cleansed and blessed, but nothing, for Lol, seemed to have changed. At the end, flask in hand, Merrily stood at the top of the stairs. Her forehead was gleaming. She faced the bed.

  ‘Lord God…’ Her voice was louder now, Lol sensing defiance. ‘Holy, blessed and glorious Trinity.’ With her right hand, she made the sign of the cross. ‘Bless…’ Another cross. ‘… hallow and…’ again. ‘… sanctify this home, that in it there may be joy and gladness, peace and love, health and…’

  The noise came out of her surplice. She drew a wretched breath and closed her eyes, carried on.

  ‘… goodness, and thanksgiving always… to You, Father, Son and…’

  It didn’t stop; it shrilled and shrilled, piercing the prayer like a skewer, over and over.

  ‘… Holy Spirit,’ Merrily’s voice shook. ‘And let Your blessing rest upon this house and those who…’

  With a peal of pure joy, Stephanie Stock reeled back on to the bed. A shoulder strap slipped all the way down, half uncovering a breast, with two livid scratches forking up from the nipple.

  ‘I think you’d better answer that, vicar,’ Stephie squeaked, convulsed. ‘It might be God.’

  The minutes after midday. A brutal sun. Global warming: so un-British. Christ. Merrily pressed her back against the ouside brick wall. She’d pulled off her surplice, and she buried her face in it for a moment.

  ‘I’m so… so sorry.’

  ‘These things happen.’ Stock was beside her, sour with sweat.

  ‘I switched it off. I was sure I’d switched it off. I distinctly remember switching it off.’

  ‘You don’t understand.’ He leaned his face into hers, suddenly almost aggressive, his eyes red and squinting in the full sun. ‘These… things… happen here. They happen. I thought you knew this stuff.’

  In a pocket of Merrily’s cassock, the mobile phone went again.

  ‘Answer it,’ Stock said. ‘Go on… answer it. There’ll be nobody there. I guarantee there’ll be nobody there.’

  ‘Don’t go,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to go.’

  Skirt hitched up, shoes kicked off, she was squatting at the top end of the bed, her head back against the wooden wall. She raised a hand. A double click, and two of the bulkhead lights went out, leaving only the one over the bed still on. She was very much in shadow now, and there was no doubt at all any more. She was from his dreams.

  ‘Look.’ She was reaching down now, to the side of the bed, then underneath. A rustling. ‘Remember…’

  Merrily had left very quickly, making the sign of the cross, then almost stumbling down the stairs, with her phone still screeching; she couldn’t seem to switch it off. Stock was right behind her, Lol making to follow, until Stephanie had called him, sultry siren in a slippery tennis dress, slipping off. She glanced down at it, then back at Lol, blinking hard as if trying to wake up. ‘He won’t come back,’ she said rapidly. ‘He’ll see the vicar off and then he’ll go to the pub, drink himself stupid, come crawling home in the early hours. Collapse on the couch, like the sad pig he’s become.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘What’s to be sorry about?’ She lifted a forefinger, crooking it at him. Baring her teeth. She said something he didn’t understand, which began with a sibilance. ‘Usha…’ He didn’t like it. He started down the wooden steps. It was the sound that made him look back – he had to – and he saw her haloed under the utility lamp, fingered by the slitted sunlight.

  Garlanded again.

  ‘… A kam mangela.’

  She was breathing hard, her breath surrounding her, it seemed, like a chilled mist.

  ‘I warn you,’ he heard, ‘don’t say no to me now.’

  The voice came rolling warmly out of the phone, so loud Merrily had to pull it away from her ear. Stock heard and hmmmphed and walked away, shoulders hunched, hands in his pockets.

  ‘Merrily! Wasn’t sure I’d get you. Knew you couldn’t be in church, this time of day. Least, I thought you wouldn’t.’

  ‘Charlie?’

  ‘You had lunch yet, Merrily?’

  ‘Charlie, listen, I’m with somebody right now.’

  ‘Oh, I am sorry,’ Charlie Howe said. ‘Just that I’ve got some information for you, my dear. Talking to Brother Morrell last night about this sad business with the Shelbone girl, and a couple of things rather clicked into place, and I thought… I thought you ought to know about them, that’s all. And, of course, I also thought you might like some lunch.’

  ‘Well, thanks, but… actually, I don’t feel too hungry. I was thinking of—Well, it’s been a complicated morning.’

  ‘A coffee, then. I’ll be here for an hour or so yet.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘The Green Dragon in Broad Street? If you don’t manage to show up, look, give me a ring tonight – though I’ll be out till quite late. But you might find it worth your while, I’ll say n’more than that.’

  ‘All right. Thanks. That’s very good of—Charlie, how did you get this number?’

  He laughed. ‘That Sophie Hill’s a hard one to crack, but her armour’s got its weak points, like everyone else’s. My, you do sound a bit subdued, girl. Nothing else going wrong in your life, is there? Can’t take on all the troubles of the world.’

  ‘No.’ She saw Gerard Stock walking back towards her and realized how badly she wanted to get away from here. ‘I’ll try and get over there. I’ll do my best.’

  Gerard Stock had made an irritable circuit of the yard and, as he came beefing back, she saw the change at once and got in first.

  ‘Gerard, would you do something for me?’ He looked suspicious. ‘If I give you some prayers, would you be sure to say them?’

  He stared at her.

  ‘I’ve got some appropriate ones printed out in a case in the car,’ she said. ‘I’d like you to say them at specific times. Both of you, if possible. If not… one of you will do.’

  ‘That going to help, is it, Merrily?’

  For the first time, he was challenging her. Was this because she’d quite clearly messed up in there? Or was it because his wife was no longer with them? So where is she? And where’s Lol?

  ‘It will help,’ she assured him. ‘But I’d also like to come back again. I think this may need more attention. And more preparation than we were able to give it today.’

  ‘You and liddle Lol?’

  She sighed. ‘Like I said, I’ve known Lol Robinson for some time, although I didn’t know he was living here. He’s somebody I can trust, that’s all.’

  ‘He’s a bloody psychotherapist. That why you brought him? Just tell me the truth.’

  ‘No. Really.’ She shook her head. ‘And he’s not yet officially a therapist, anyway.’

  ‘So what was it that made up your mind?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘What I’m asking’ – he tilted his head, scrutinizing her sideways – ‘is what happened, liddle lady, to make you decide I wasn’t after all just a scheming townie trying to shaft his neighbours?’

  ‘I’d never decided you were.’

  ‘Because something did happen in there, didn’t it?’

  She took a breath. ‘All right, something happened.’

  ‘So tell me. I’ve got to go on living here.’

  ‘Tell me something. What does sulphur mean to you?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Is there anything around here that might… or might once have… released sulphur fumes?’

  ‘Not now. Not any more.’

  ‘Meaning what?’

  He shrugged. ‘I’ll show you.’

  She followed him back into the kitchen. The gloo
m seemed at once oppressive – or was she imagining that? He went straight to the wall where the implements hung, brought down a short pole with what looked like an ashpan from a stove or grate attached. He sniffed at it.

  ‘Can’t smell anything now.’ He thrust it towards her. ‘Can you?’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Was known, I’m told, as a brimstone tray. Used for feeding rolls of sulphur into the furnace.’

  ‘Why’d they do that?’

  ‘Some sort of fumigation. It also apparently made the drying hops turn yellow, which the brewers preferred for some reason. Made the beer look even more like piss, I don’t know. I don’t think they do it any more.’

  ‘Would sulphur have any special interest for Stewart Ash? Can you think of—?’

  ‘You’re saying you smelled sulphur.’

  ‘Quite powerfully.’

  He tilted his head again. ‘Fire and brimstone… Merrily?’

  ‘That was what it smelled like. Could be argued it was subjective, I suppose.’

  ‘Oh… subjective.’ Stock held the wooden shaft of the brimstone tray with both hands like a spade. ‘There’s a good psychologist’s word. Why don’t we ask Lol what he thinks?’

  ‘Like you said, things are inclined to go awry in there. A few minor elements which, when you put them together, suggest a volatile atmosphere. Not necessarily connected with the murder of Stewart Ash.’

  ‘Volatile?’

  ‘I would like to come back, Mr Stock.’ She saw Lol in the doorway. ‘What about tonight?’

  ‘To do what?’

  ‘There are quite a few things—’

  Stock hurled the brimstone tray to the stone with cacophonous force.

  Merrily flinched but didn’t move. ‘—things we can still try.’

  ‘You don’t really know what the fuck you’re doing, do you?’ Stock snarled.

  Lol walked in.

  ‘No… geddout… both of you.’ Stock picked up the chalice and the Tupperware box of communion wafers, shoved them in the airline bag, tossed the bag to the flags near Merrily’s feet. ‘You’re a waste of time, Merrily. I heard you were a political appointment.’

  Merrily bit her lip.