The Prayer of the Night Shepherd (MW6)

by Phil Rickman

  ‘He’s part of that farm,’ Danny told Greta. ‘The land, the stock, Jeremy. A whole organism, see, and he’s the part as thinks. And he keeps it all balanced, and in that way I always feel the boy’s good for this whole area. Balance – don’t ask me to explain it. It’s the way he works, goes quietly on... if they’d leave him alone.’

  ‘People?’

  ‘He just en’t good with people. They don’t get to know him easy, and he don’t know them. Hard to go quietly, nowadays.’

  ‘Mary Morson made all the running,’ Greta said.

  ‘Her’d have to.’

  ‘He was a catch. A good, sound farm.’

  ‘Mary Morson’s a cold-hearted little bloody gold-digger.’

  ‘And this Natalie?’ Greta said. ‘Where’s the difference there? Got it made now. Single parent in need of a home. Where’s the difference?’

  Danny drained his mug. ‘There is a difference. All I can tell you is, the first time they met, it was in the air. Like some’ing he’d been waiting for all his life. I can’t explain it. It didn’t seem right, but then it did – later. I don’t know why.’

  ‘She’s beautiful, Danny, how else would he be?’

  Danny bowed his head. ‘This is gonner kill him, Gret.’

  ‘It’ll kill him if he gets it from somebody else.’

  ‘Mary.’ Danny sighed. ‘Aye, Mary’ll spread it.’

  ‘Only thinks of herself.’

  ‘Shit.’ He stared at the light on the stereo, a little red planet. ‘See, the rest of it... I can’t figure it out, but some’ing’s gone unstable. Sebbie Dacre feels it, I’m sure of that. Sebbie feels threatened – big farmer, big magistrate, Master of the fucking Hunt, and he feels threatened. By Jeremy? How’s that possible? Lived side by side with Sebbie all his life, no trouble – no pally-pally either, but that’s a class thing. Yet here’s Sebbie sending his Welshie shooters to terrorize the boy. Why?’

  Greta put a hand on Danny’s thigh. ‘You got a job today, with Gomer?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Then you better go talk to him, en’t you? You go this morning. Get it over.’

  ‘Aye.’ Danny put his mug on the floor and then he put his arms around her, his eyes full of tears that he couldn’t have fully explained.

  Around mid-morning, it finally started to snow. Real snow, the kind you knew wouldn’t stop. Flakes the size of two-pound coins, and it was already an inch deep on the vicarage drive when Merrily opened the front door to Gomer Parry.

  ‘Vicar.’ The end of Gomer’s ciggy was the only warmth out there. He had his old cap on and his muffler. When you looked up, the snow was almost black against the sky.

  ‘You must’ve heard the kettle.’

  ‘Ah,’ Gomer said, ‘that’s what it was.’

  He sat down at the kitchen table, with his cap, his muffler and his ciggy tin in a little mound by his elbow, and she made him tea and put out chocolate digestives for him to dunk. When the phone rang, she let the machine take it.

  ‘You talked to Jane last night?’ She switched on the lamp on the dresser.

  ‘Difficult,’ Gomer said.

  ‘Goes without saying.’

  ‘Don’t wanner break no confidence.’

  ‘You’re not the first to say that, in relation to Jane.’ Merrily came and sat down opposite him. ‘Vicars aren’t good for much these days, but we’re good at keeping confidences. Take it all with us to the grave.’

  ‘I know that, vicar. ’Sides, this prob’ly en’t confidential.’ He glanced around. ‘Her’s at school?’

  Merrily nodded. ‘Last day of term tomorrow. If it carries on snowing like this, she may not even make it tomorrow.’

  ‘So this...’

  ‘This could be our last chance to talk about her behind her back, yes.’

  ‘See this—’ Gomer broke a chocolate digestive in half. ‘Her’s likely told you about it already, but if her en’t...’ He stared up at the snowy window.

  Merrily said, ‘It isn’t about spiritualism, is it?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Contacting the dead?’

  Gomer blinked. ‘No, it’s about this Ben Foley beating seven bells out of this feller the other night.’

  ‘What?’

  Gomer nodded slowly. ‘Her never tole you ’bout that, then.’

  Danny turned the Land Rover around and parked him up against some holly trees on the edge of the farmyard at The Nant. By the time he’d unbuckled and climbed down, the windscreen was already thick with snow. It had to come, and he was glad; it was like some of the tension had been released from the drum-skin sky. Just from the sky, though, not from Danny Thomas.

  Jeremy was already at the gate, like he’d been watching out for something. He had on one of those tea-cosy woollen hats – Badly Drawn Boy job.

  ‘Just passin’,’ Danny said. ‘Reckoned you might need a bit o’ help gettin’ the ewes down from the hill.’ He looked up at the teeming sky. ‘Way all this come on – sudden, like.’

  ‘Had ’em down last night.’ The snow was all over Jeremy, confusing the pattern on his blue and black workshirt.

  Well, he would know this was on its way, wouldn’t he? His friends the clouds, and all that.

  ‘Jeremy, we...’ Danny stood and faced him over the gate, pulling his denim jacket together over the baggy old Soft Machine sweatshirt he was wearing over his King Crimson T-shirt: the layered look. ‘I reckon we gotter talk, boy.’

  Jeremy said, ‘We don’t ’ave to.’ He started waggling his hands, embarrassed. ‘What I mean... the way he’s comin’ down you could easy get blocked in back at your place.’

  Danny rested his arms in the soft snow on top of the wooden gate. ‘Do I give a shit, boy? This partic’lar moment, mabbe not.’ He pointed at the farmhouse door. ‘Inside, eh?’ What was strange was that nothing had changed from when Jeremy’s mam was in charge: the same dresser with some of the pots the old girl hadn’t been able to take with her to the sheltered bungalow in Kington, the same flowery wallpaper between the beams, the same dark green picture of Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane.

  Blocks of wood were turning into glowing orange husks on the open fire in the cast-iron range. The kettle hissed on the hob. Flag the sheepdog lay on the same old brown and green rag rug that had been here likely thirty-five years. Damn near as old as Jeremy, that rug.

  All of which was odd, when you knew there’d been a new woman here for nigh on six months now, a smart woman who’d be expected to make big changes.

  Danny sank into the old rocking chair and told Jeremy about the Welshie, Nathan, what Ben Foley had done to him and what he’d told them on his way to hospital. Just in case Miz Natalie Craven hadn’t given him the full story.

  ‘No problem at the hospital, in the end,’ Danny said. ‘Gomer knowed the nurse from when his missus died. ’Sides, even if they’d wanted to keep the boy in, they’d’ve had nowhere to put the poor bugger. Seen bigger bloody sheep sheds than that new hospital.’

  Jeremy stood his wellies on the stone hearth at the foot of the range. Jesus Christ looked miserably down from over the fireplace, waiting to get betrayed by a bloke he reckoned was his mate. Danny looked up at Jesus, who seemed to be saying, Make this easy, can’t you?

  ‘See, these fellers from Off, you never knows what baggage they brung with ’em,’ Danny said. ‘That feller Foley – big chip on his shoulder, Greta reckons. Had his nose pushed out down the BBC in London. Lot of anger built up inside him. Coulder killed that boy, see. Goes at him like a bloody maniac. And he was a boy. No more’n twenty-four or -five. Thought he was hard, thought Foley was soft. Bad mistake.’

  Danny leaned back and rocked the chair, which creaked. Reason he was going into this episode, apart from buying time to think, was to find out exactly how much Natalie Craven was telling Jeremy about day-to-day – and night-to-night – life up at Stanner. And if this Foley had some unknown degree of violence in his London past, who knew what other secrets might be the
re?

  Specifically: what were Foley’s relations with Natalie? If something was on the go, it wouldn’t be easy for Foley and Nat to get it together in the hotel – not with Mrs Foley around and young Jane at weekends. But a nice camper van within easy jogging distance... and Foley did jog, apparently. Well, the question needed asking, that was for sure. Not that Danny would make the suggestion to Jeremy, bloody hell, no. Not directly, anyway.

  ‘So what do, er, Nat’lie think about him?’

  ‘Nat?’ Jeremy scratched his head through his hat. ‘Well, her thinks... thinks mabbe he was provoked. Not the first time the shooters been on his land. Had guests in at the time. See, he’s worried they en’t gonner make a go of it – that’s the top and bottom of it. Desperate situation.’

  ‘Least you won’t see those boys again.’

  ‘Hard to say, ennit?’ Jeremy had sat himself on a wooden stool, away from the fire, like he was determined not to get comfortable, lulled into saying too much. There was a sprig of holly on the mantelpiece but no mistletoe anywhere: old Border lore reckoned it was unlucky to bring in mistletoe before New Year.

  ‘So we had a chat with this Nathan before we took him to the hospital,’ Danny said. ‘Not a chance to be missed. And he was quite forthcoming, that boy, ’bout how Sebbie Dacre was gonner bung ’em seven grand when they proved they shot the beast.’

  Jeremy didn’t react to this.

  ‘So mabbe that was why they was gonner shoot Flag yere. Paint him black all over, with luminous bits and—’

  ‘I know what you’re sayin’—’

  ‘The Hound of Hergest, Jeremy. Sebbie hired the Welshies to shoot some’ing bearing a close resemblance to the famous Hound of Hergest.’

  Jeremy looked down at his light blue socks.

  ‘It make any sense to you, boy?’ Danny said.

  Jeremy didn’t look up. ‘Can’t shoot what en’t there, can you?’

  Danny pondered this, noting how clean the room was, everything polished that needed polishing. Outside the window, the snow fell real quiet and in some quantity. The only sound was the dog’s breathing.

  ‘By en’t there,’ Danny said carefully, ‘do you mean en’t there as in, like, imaginary? Or en’t there as in... en’t there? If you sees what I mean.’

  They were getting close to matters that Jeremy didn’t talk about, not so much because he was suspicious or embarrassed but because they were hard to put into words. He pulled off his Badly Drawn Boy hat and pushed his fingers through his hair.

  ‘Sebbie Dacre, he won’t have it talked about.’

  ‘Well, that’s pretty obvious, Jeremy, else he’d’ve been down the gun club and wouldn’t need to offer them Welsh boys a penny.’

  Jeremy said, ‘Foley, he was supposed to be goin’ round askin’ people if they’d ever seen it. And Dacre said if any of his employees – or anybody workin’ for the hunt or their relations – which I reckon covers most folks in this area – if they said anythin’ to Foley they’d have the sack.’

  ‘Tole you that?’

  ‘Ken, the postman. We was at school together.’

  ‘So who are they, these folks reckons they seen it?’

  ‘Just folks. Over the years.’

  ‘Like?’

  Jeremy looked at Danny, then looked away into the red fire. ‘Me.’

  ‘I see.’ Danny felt his beard bristle. ‘When was this, Jeremy?’

  ‘It en’t what you think.’ Jeremy’s face creased up, mabbe more with sorrow at Danny’s unease. ‘En’t like in the films, all red-eyed. En’t n’more’n a shadow most times. Might be there, just before dark, see, bounding down off the Ridge, corner of your eye. Might be close up, but real faint, a cold patch against your leg. But you knows.’

  The fire was pumping out heat, but there was places it couldn’t reach.

  ‘It is a dog?’

  ‘Kind of thing.’

  ‘Sebbie reckoned he’d had ewes savaged. What en’t there can’t savage ewes.’

  Jeremy said, ‘The beast they was huntin’ round Llangadog year or so back? All over the papers – police marksmen, helicopters, the lot? It killed a dog, a whippet. Tore his throat out. Folks swore they seen a big cat, but when the police done DNA tests on the dog it killed they figured it was another dog did it. Yet you still had folks swore blind they’d seen this big beast, puma, whatever. Nobody ever found a puma, though, dead or alive. Or a big dog.’

  ‘What’s your point?’

  ‘Things... happens. Things as en’t meant to be explained. Why try?’

  Danny found Jeremy meeting his stare now. Anybody else, he’d suspect a wind-up, but all he could see in Jeremy’s eyes was sadness and acceptance.

  ‘All right...’ He held on to the chair so it wouldn’t rock, wouldn’t creak. ‘What about Sebbie Three Farms?’

  ‘He believes,’ Jeremy said. ‘He just don’t want nobody thinkin’ he believes. So he makes a big noise. Bigger the noise, scareder he is, I reckon.’

  ‘Why’s he scared?’

  ‘’Cause most folk seen it, it don’t matter... not to them.’

  ‘You mean Sebbie...’ Danny held on to the chair arms, trying to anchor himself down. You hung out with Jeremy you lost hold of reality, felt yourself slipping into Jeremy’s fuzzy world. It was like dropping acid again and, same as he’d told Greta this morning, Danny didn’t see himself going there no more.

  ‘Personal,’ Jeremy said.

  Danny sagged back in the chair. This was getting well out of his ballpark. Wouldn’t be a bad idea, mabbe, to get Gomer to go and have a quiet chat with his lady vicar over in Ledwardine, whose specialist subject appeared to be fellers like Jeremy Berrows.

  We keep our secrets to a minimum now, she’d said to Lol. Grown-ups. Mates.

  So this was the kid’s idea of a minimum.

  Gomer, like Lol, had clearly done a lot of agonizing before shopping Jane. See, when you first told me her was working at Stanner, I din’t make much of it, ’cause things change, places change...

  It seemed that, on the way back from taking a smashed-up man to Hereford hospital, Jane had suggested to Gomer that it would be best not to talk about the incident, not even to Mum, because Ben was in a difficult enough position and if this got out...

  Merrily stood by the window, watching the apple trees becoming stooped and shaggy with snow. The probable truth was that the kid had concealed the incident not out of loyalty to her employer but because of what else she might have to disclose – like, for instance, an alleged predatory beast carrying a £7,000 bounty.

  Which made no sense. Not yet, anyway.

  The clock above the old Aga said two-thirty. Couple of hours before Jane was due home, and in this weather it would probably be longer. Merrily could hear traffic grinding up the hill to the village square, the futile sound of tyres spinning. If Herefordshire Council’s foul-weather rapid-response was as rapid as usual, they wouldn’t see a snow plough or a gritter until around lunchtime tomorrow.

  In the interim, showdown time.

  So there’d been a domestic murder in the garden at Stanner Hall in the year before World War Two.

  Well, that was a long time ago, but seeing what Ben Foley – a man with no known history of violence – had done to the intruder, Nathan, in that same garden had brought the superstitious side of Gomer Parry squirming uncomfortably into the light. Superstition was never far below the surface along this Border: the most rural county in England lying back to back with the most rural county in Wales.

  Just if I had a daughter, Vicar, and her was working at Stanner, these is things I’d wanner know. Gomer had still seemed embarrassed. He’d refused a second cup of tea and gone shuffling back into the snow, pulling on his old tweed cap and leaving her to examine all the features of country-hotel life that Jane had been concealing.

  That bloody kid. Did nothing ever change?

  Merrily leaned against the Aga rail, pondering the options. If she couldn’t reveal either Gomer or Lol as inf
ormants, there was at least one person she could shop with impunity.

  She would admit to Jane that she’d raided the apartment. She would produce the copy of Folk-lore of Herefordshire, with the relevant pages marked. It wasn’t much, but it was a way in. And in the course of the subsequent bitter quarrel the whole truth would, with any luck, come pooling out all over the unforgiving flagstones.

  What was good about this weather was that, the way things were looking, Jane would not be returning to Stanner this weekend. Big fires, CDs of Nick Drake, Beth Orton... Lol Robinson, even. Mother–daughter quality time.

  All the same, Merrily watched the ceaseless snow with trepidation. They made jokes about the council and the grit lorries, but they were jokes best made over a mug of hot chocolate in front of a blazing fire. This was a part of the county that had often been cut off, lost its electricity and its phone lines, reverting for whole days to a semi-medieval way of life.

  When the phone rang, she grabbed the cordless from the wall.

  ‘Mum.’

  ‘They let you out?’

  ‘Erm... they sent for the school buses early.’

  ‘Because of the snow.’

  ‘Otherwise about five hundred of us would have been spending all night fighting over the sofa bed in the medical suite.’

  ‘Understandable. So you’ll be home early, then.’

  ‘And we don’t have to come back tomorrow, if it’s bad.’

  ‘And then it’s the holidays.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Well, that’s very thoughtful of the education department. I’ll go and light the fire.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jane said. ‘Do that. It’s just...’

  ‘Something wrong?’

  ‘Not exactly wrong. It’s... like, the snow’s coming down so hard, they reckon all the minor roads in the north of the county could be... difficult, by tonight. So that would mean I probably wouldn’t be able to get to Stanner at all tomorrow, maybe not even with Gomer.’

  ‘Can’t be helped, flower.’

  ‘No.’