by Andrew Marr
So, as she contemplated the pinkish water gurgling at the edge of the pavement on its way down to the river, and caught the scent of clay, she remembered a worried conversation with the man who had taken over the big farm at Easterly. We all live off topsoil. That was his point. For tens of thousands of years, mankind had survived because of the rich, slowly cooking chemical soup of ground stone, worms, decaying vegetable matter, microbes and water which covered, like a thin blanket, the underlying geology. Bronze Age tribes had grown rough barley and fed their shaggy cattle on this very soil; and the estate workers from the Roman villa had introduced onions, chickens, rabbits and leeks, fancy stuff from the south, to this soil. Alfred’s Saxons had lived off it, fighting the Norsemen for it. The very same pink soil had produced the farms and wealth carefully noted down by the Norman robbers in their Domesday Book; it had nourished the families of the sea dogs Raleigh and Drake; and the doomed, desperate yeomen who had marched to Sedgefield; and, much later, it had grown the grub that kept the British Expeditionary Force fighting in Flanders. In short, said the philosophical farmer of Easterly, no topsoil, no us.
It was very thin, mostly not more than the depth of a human leg. And yet – the young farmer had pointed out to sea – look what we’re doing. And Angela saw the band of bright-red water extending several hundred yards out to sea from the bottom of the cliffs and the rocky shoreline. That was the soil, the very stuff this county, with its rich farmland, fat cattle and glossy green woodland, was made of. In the twenty-first century, heavier winter rains, and new farming methods with fewer hedgerows and less rotation, were steadily driving the soil into ditches, then streams, then down tarmac, and into the rivers and finally the sea. Pebbleton, like all the villages around, had once had an intense, wary and knowing relationship with the soil. That was going. How many of her parishioners, the farmer wondered, could any longer identify the plants all around them?
It was, she’d told Caro on one of her increasingly rare flying visits from Westminster, a slow-motion catastrophe. It was a failure of imagination, really, more serious than anything being debated in the House of Commons. ‘You think we’re somehow behind the curve, out here in the sticks, chewing our bits of grass. But this is the real world. Just as real as any housing estate in Barker, or any row about public spending in London. My eyes are more open to the future and what’s happening around us, sitting in my little study overlooking the Pebbleton graveyard, than yours are in Parliament.’
Splashing past the pub and the hairdressers, noting a growing flush of light blue towards the west, Angela couldn’t remember how that conversation had ended. Probably not well; not well was how things had been going since she’d become the partner of Caroline Phillips MP. She was, as she’d predicted, lonely. But she was angry as well. She felt torn in two directions. On the one hand there was this wonderful new life, where she could make a real difference and dig herself in properly. God, surely, wanted her to be here, consoling and cheering up these admirable, slowly-spoken people. She loved everything about this place. Dawn breaking over Pebbleton Hill, with its oaks and conifers, could move her almost to tears when she pulled the bedroom curtains aside. The splinters of spring sunlight, gouging their way through fields bright with winter barley, set her heart fluttering. For the first time in her life she noticed the arrival in spring of the white hawthorns, and inhaled with delight the banks of wild garlic, twisting up among primroses and bluebells. At times she felt she was actually living inside a gospel, illuminated by wise-fingered monks, whose greens were greener, its golds brighter, than in the humdrum England of the early twenty-first century.
But then, pulling her in the other direction, there was Caro. This too, she felt, was God’s love being offered to her. Those cornflower-blue eyes, candid and challenging, could make her almost sick with delight. Caro’s slightly imperfect mouth, with its fractionally too-prominent upper lip, was, Angela felt, the single most beautiful thing in the universe. Caro was her soul-sister, her real mother, her confessor as well as her lover. When they were apart, Angela simply felt a little deader, and, at night, as if there were an agonising open wound along her side – as if she were a tree split open by lightning.
There was the shop, a 1964 Bedford, pulling in outside the hairdressers. The usual half-dozen local men, the old salts, were waiting for their newspapers, cigarettes and milk with immemorial patience. Gray’s ‘Elegy’ (Miss Symonds and the lower fifth). Well, Angela had a verger – unpaid, sold postcards, a demon with the electric polisher, arms like a gorilla’s – who had tolled a few parting knells in his day; and yes, there was ivy on the clock tower, and yew trees in the graveyard, even if there were no more elms. Hear me now, Miss Symonds.
But, dear Lord, she was going to have to choose …
Angela didn’t usually read the papers. She found them distracting and irritating. Why fill your mind at the start of a fresh, God-given day with human misery, anger and failure? Normally she would put on Radio 3, and when the boys had gone she would read some poetry – Herbert, Traherne or Crashaw. But this morning she’d been woken by a text from Caroline. Early for her. It had read: ‘Front page of the Mail. We need to talk.’ During the few minutes it had taken Angela to dress and walk to meet the van, she had managed to push the anxiety down. It would not be, it could not be, that Caroline had been caught out having an affair. She was not that person. And Angela would die if it were so; thus, it could not be so. But the sense of having to make some kind of brutal and imminent choice had been bubbling through her mind nevertheless.
In front of her in the queue for the hatch of the van was a notorious local gossip, rare in disliking Angela. He had a gentle, baby face with a little watery smile. Angela believed in charity, but she found it hard in his case. If Caroline was on the front page of the Mail snogging some London woman, and she bought a copy, he would see it all.
‘Good morning, vicar. Early for you to be up. Don’t tell me you’re back on the cigarettes? Or is it a lady’s purchase?’
‘Oh, Mr Walker, I’m always up with the early birds.’
‘So I’ve heard, vicar. Playing ducks and drakes and all sorts. If you’re going to be staying long in these parts, you might want a pair of rubber boots.’
‘I just want a paper or two. For my sermon.’
After he had been served, Mr Walker hung around the hatch so he could see what Angela picked up. She chose a Daily Telegraph, big enough to wrap around the Mail, which she folded inside it. But the gossip was too quick for her.
‘The Telegraph and the Mail, vicar? King-and-country choice. I don’t think your socialist girlie-friend would approve of that. Or maybe she’s blotted her copybook already?’
‘Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from deceit, Mr Walker.’
‘Vicar?’
‘Psalm 34, Mr Walker. It’s the text for this Sunday’s sermon. I’m just doing a little research for it. I look forward to seeing you joining us. Such an enthusiastic member of our little community.’
Mr Walker gave Angela an insolent wink.
Back in the vicarage, having kicked off her ruined boots and turned on the electric fire, Angela spread the papers out on the table. Ignoring the Telegraph, she hurriedly scanned the front page of the Mail. To her intense relief there was no picture of Caro, nor, so far as she could tell, any mention of her. The story was headed ‘Sharia Shame Splits Labour’.
Under the byline ‘Peter Roth, political editor’, the article claimed that a ‘shocking new plan to legalise female mutilation and savage Islamic punishments in the heart of England’ was causing ‘civil war’ among Labour MPs. Somebody called David Petrie was quoted talking about ‘the suicide of our moderate and humane Christian culture’, and ‘political correctness gone completely insane’. It was only when she turned to page two and the rest of the story that Angela saw Caroline’s face grinning back at her. She was flanked by an Asian-looking woman in a headscarf, and a rotund figure in a burqa. Angela’s first reaction was to laugh. This
couldn’t be right. Caroline was a level-headed Christian feminist, about as far from endorsing the brutalities of FGM as anyone she could imagine. But something had happened. The article made her seem a dupe and a fool. Angela found herself growing angrier and angrier on Caro’s behalf.
Her girl needed her help. Once, long before, she and Caro had been walking in north London and had passed a yoga outfit that called itself Fierce Grace. Caro had turned and said to her, ‘That’s you. You have grace, but you’re a bloody flame-thrower when you need to be. You are my Fierce Grace.’ Now Angela really felt that she was. She had to choose. She’d known it all morning. So she chose.
Now, Angela did two things. She put in a call to Caro in London, leaving a message on her answerphone. Caro spent most mornings, so far as Angela could tell, in committees. Next, she went to the Church of England website and searched for vacant ministries in the Midlands.
None of the first few she saw appealed instantly. There was a country church looking for ‘a prayerful priest in the Catholic tradition’, which rather ruled out women. There was a benefice looking for a rector but making much of the ‘evangelical and enthusiastic nature of our church’, which didn’t sound like Angela’s bag either. No King James Bible there. But then, on the outskirts of Barker itself, there was a vacancy for a priest who could demonstrate ‘Christlikeness’ and an enthusiasm for ‘reaching out to unchurched communities’. That sounded intimidating, but at least it was in the right area, and it might just be somewhere that an experienced woman vicar would be welcome. Feeling hellish, before she could stop herself or allow herself to succumb to second thoughts, Angela had emailed a Mrs Droop, PA to the archdeacon.
No answer yet from Caro. But Angela, in her mood of Fierce Grace, did not pause. She clambered into her battered Hyundai and drove the five twisting miles to Pebbleton Hall in search of Lady Broderick. She found her half a mile from the house with a pair of shears, dealing severely with an insolent, ill-behaved hedge.
‘This is a private road, vicar. The council won’t send its machine along. Terrible bore, though I do find a certain relish in snipping. Sometimes I have unruly thoughts. So you’re planning to leave us, are you?’
Angela reddened. How had she possibly guessed?
Lady Broderick calmly stowed the shears in a shoulderbag she was carrying, full of withies. She rotated her lower jaw, showing a line of sharp yellow teeth. ‘This is going to be a bit of a chinwag, vicar, isn’t it? I’d better hop in. We can have a little something up at the house.’
Ten minutes later, the two women were standing in front of an open fire. It had been lit first thing in the morning. A dispiriting, sulphurous smell and a thin trickle of black smoke were all the evidence. The logs appeared untouched. No warmth of any kind reached them.
‘Cosy here, vicar, isn’t it? Now, let me say straight off that this is most unfortunate, and extremely inconvenient. When your name came forward, I wasn’t at all sure. We’re simple people here in the West Country, and not quite up with things. So it took a little bit of time for us to get used to you. But we’ve become quite fond of you, Angela – can I call you Angela? And I’ve become very fond of you. I like the tone of your services. A nice religious feel, but not too much. Between ourselves, I’ve always felt that our Redeemer can sometimes be a little …’
‘Preachy?’
‘Yes. In the wrong hands, you see. A bit … strident. Our Saviour means well, of course, vicar. We all understand that. Heart of gold. And he’s got a heck of a task. But he’s very hard-line. And in my experience it’s never a good idea to …’
‘Push things too far?’
‘Exactly so, vicar. Exactly so, Angela. That’s why you and I have always got on so well.’
Angela held her tongue. Then, unbidden, some lines came to her. Thank you, Lord. She intoned:
‘A fine aspect in fit array
Neither too mean nor yet too gay
Shows who is best.’
‘I beg your pardon, vicar?’
‘George Herbert, Lady Broderick. A good Church of England man. He wrote a poem about it all – “The British Church”. We’re in the middle, not too much one thing or the other, not extreme. Not …’
‘Too much?’
‘Exactly.’
Lady Broderick had brought out two small, slightly dirty glasses, which she now filled with a musty brown liquid. Angela sniffed hers cautiously.
‘Madeira, m’dear. Like the song. Just the thing at this time of day, I find. Now, back to business. I will take onto these bony old shoulders the task of finding ourselves another vicar to replace you. It’s a pretty living, and we’ve never had too much difficulty, though you’ll be hard to replace. I could ask about your calling and what happened to it, and whether you find us either too wicked or too dull for your continued attention, but I expect I’d be wasting my time.’
‘It’s nothing like that, Lady Broderick.’
‘No. I gather it’s more about your – I hate the word, but your partner. She’s in a spot of political trouble, isn’t she?’
‘How did you know?’
‘Oh, that sweet Mr Walker popped by earlier. So I did a bit of Googling. It’s a very odd proposition Mrs Phillips is supporting. We can’t have Muslim enclaves in a Christian country. Mind you, in the great days of Devon, when my ancestors meted out punishments far from the nearest court of assizes, there was the odd hand lopped off, and a bit of branding and so on. But things have moved on. I don’t understand about this female genital mutilation business.’
‘Well …’
‘And I don’t want to hear a word about it, or read another word about it. Too horrid. So quite what your Mrs Phillips is up to …’
‘Well, that’s what I have to find out. But …’
‘But vicar, this is really about your priorities, isn’t it? If you’re going to make your life with this Mrs Phillips – who I have always rather liked; she has a certain something – it can’t be with you down here, and her up there. I hope you liked us here, and that you will carry a little bit of Pebbleton in your heart always. But sex first, sentiment second, I always say.’
‘Do you, Lady Broderick?’
‘Rarely. It just came to me. And I know there’s more to it and so forth, but what I mean to say is that I understand.’
‘Do you, Lady Broderick? How wonderful. I’ve loved it here. I’ve loved the church, and the people. I thought I was going to live here always …’
‘Steady on, vicar. Don’t let’s push things. I’ll see to it that someone keeps an eye on your two boys while you make your new arrangements.’
Angela was making effusive thanks and backing towards the door when she remembered she hadn’t drunk any of her Madeira.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Lady Broderick. ‘It’s really not very nice. Like many of our traditions. Go, as you’d say …’
‘In peace. Thank you, Lady Broderick.’
Driving back along the lane towards the coast road, Angela’s Hyundai hit a large pothole. A spray of chocolate-coloured water splashed across the windscreen. She put on the wipers. The topsoil would have to wait.
A Warning from Bunty
And watch your bloody back.
The Master
David Petrie had a very sore back. He’d have to get them to change the chair in his Commons office. After leaving Moncrieff’s Bar the previous evening he’d been in a pretty bad way. But he was still a fit guy. Bounced up again at 7 a.m., cool shower, and then back to work. He was determined to improve the next speech Murdoch White had given him, to show the buggers. His ‘Strident Trident’ speech, as The Times had called it, had made him half-famous, and earned a dirty look from the PM’s PPS. Now the Master’s men had been back in touch, telling him to go on the attack. They’d handed him two neat pages of vicious political assassination. It was horrible, but it was beautifully done. He’d been sitting at his desk for hour after hour, trying to find even one slipshod phrase.
There were none. This was e
ven better than the defence speech, and that had been a belter. The extraordinary thing was that, yet again, it sounded exactly like him. Who were these people? They were taking words out of his mouth before he’d had time to think them. He almost felt sorry for the poor woman. They’d passed at the barrier coming in that morning. She was obviously an early starter too. She’d given him a smile, but it was rather a blank one. Luckily, they’d never pretended to be friends. She wouldn’t know what had hit her. But his bloody back was bloody sore. He wanted one of those fancy chairs with lots of levers, like the one in the office back at home in Glaikit. But would that come out of expenses? Probably. Then the local paper would run a story about how the new MP had spent a thousand quid on a chair, and that would be another lot of voters who’d never turn to him again. Sod it. Thanks to the business, he still had enough money in the bank to buy it himself. He groaned slightly. Bunty, sitting opposite him, looked up.
‘Mr Petrie, man. You’re sounding awful. Do you want a throatie?’
Davie had a sudden horrible vision of Bunty offering him oral sex. He answered rather sharply. ‘No. A bit of a bad back, that’s all. Can a man have no privacy?’
‘It was only a cough sweet. Mental.’
‘What?’
‘Menthol.’
‘Oh, I see. No, it’s just that I’ve been sitting in this chair for too long, working on the big speech I’m giving tonight.’
‘I forgot to say, Mr Petrie. Nasty Neill from the whips’ office was on the phone for you. He wanted to know what you’re going to say in your speech, and was it the same as all the shite you said in the Daily Mail?’
‘And what did you tell Mr Neill?’
