by Phil Rickman
Merrily bent to where the grass was scorched, blackened and grey with damped-down ashes.
‘I parked where the car is now,’ Julie said, ‘and smelled it at once, and then you could see the smoke in the air. When I looked over towards the other field gate – that one, back there, there was Sir Lionel Darvill in his wheelchair – he has this sort of all-terrain chair with thick wheels and a motor.’
‘He was there when you arrived?’
‘I don’t think so. His truck certainly wasn’t there when I was parking, although it was when we went back down. They must’ve followed me in – Gareth Brewer was with him, and he came over. “Nothing for you here, rector, the church is quite safe.” As if he wanted me out – or Darvill did. But I wasn’t going anywhere till I found out what had been happening. And then I saw it. Oh my God.’
Julie looked back towards the castle ruins.
‘A great glowing crucifix – that’s what it looked like. A man with flames bursting out of his… of his head, for heaven’s sake. Strands of flame coming out of it, like a Catherine wheel, and the face was just… raging with gassy flame.’
‘Bloody hell, Julie.’
‘Then I saw it was probably just a ball of cloth with a turnip or something inside it. A dummy. Like a scarecrow with a crosspiece to hang the jacket on. Burning through. An effigy? I tripped over the remains of a top hat.’
‘Oh.’
‘Evidently set on fire in the shelter of the tower to get it going. Darvill’s shouting at me. “Julie! It’s all right, Julie. Some silly buggers. All over, no harm done.” Just kids, he said when I went over to him. Kids getting bored in the period between Guy Fawkes’ Night and Christmas. No need for the fire brigade, he and Gareth would keep an eye on things. I don’t think he means to be patronizing. But I found out later that he’d had a phone call, too. And I wasn’t going anywhere, having heard the bells by then. The post was burned through and it collapsed in a shower of sparks, and the bells began to sound. Very eerie.’
‘There’s a hole here.’
Merrily had slipped a hand down into the paste of ash.
‘That’s where it was sunk into the ground.’
‘Where were the bells?’
‘Bound to the lower part of the post. Attached to this sort of leather pad. Little round bells. A cluster. I saw them afterwards.’
‘A morris dancer’s bells?’
‘Correct. I just… wanted you to see this, to show I wasn’t making it all up.’
‘You told anyone else?’
‘No, I haven’t. No one was hurt. I thought at first it was a joke. We can go back now. Steady… it’s harder going down.’
Because of the treacherous ground, they took a different route back, down a shallower slope, and out through a metal-barred gate to the car park. If this was summer, the sun would have been warm on their backs. Merrily was putting something together like arranging a hand of playing cards, the dark cards, clubs and spades predominating. She looked up at Julie Duxbury.
‘So let me get this right. Somebody had dressed a scarecrow frame in morris kit, sunk it into the ground and set it alight. Somebody who evidently wanted Sir Lionel Darvill to see it – unless, of course, he did it himself. Or had it done?’
‘Oh no. It was too dark to see his face, but I imagine it as white with rage. I… felt his fury. His helplessness. He’s a courageous man, rolling through the mud in his off-road wheelchair, but he must be horribly aware of his limitations.’
‘You think he knew who was behind it?’
‘Oh, yes, he knew.’
‘Would he have been looking in the direction of Ledwardine perhaps?’
‘I think he would.’
‘And the person who alerted him – could that’ve been the same person who rang you? What was the voice like?’
‘I’m not sure. I thought at first it must be a local accent, and then I thought it was non-UK. It was an accent. I couldn’t think why they’d rung me rather than the police, except that it would no doubt take the police for ever to get here even if they knew where to find us.’
‘So what happened in the end?’
‘Darvill invited me round for coffee next day. He has a woman to look after him – an American woman who’s his physiotherapist and… whatever else. Several businesses work out of Maryfields, quite a little community down there. Because he didn’t have an alternative after what I’d seen, he explained some of the history of the Darvills and this Iestyn Lloyd. And it… didn’t sound at all healthy. I’d been told some of the history by various people but I didn’t realize it was still… active. Quite venomously active.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I listened. I asked if I could help. He laughed rather sourly – as if, what could a priest do, a woman priest who couldn’t even drum up a respectable congregation across half a dozen churches? I didn’t say anything. But I knew I couldn’t sit by and do nothing.’
They stood in front of Kilpeck Church at the heart of a disappeared village. It had looked so small and modest to Merrily when she’d arrived, but now she couldn’t stop looking at it. It was as if it had been built to be hidden until sunset which, at this time of year, was a short-lived show but dramatic, more blinding than summer because of the leafless trees. Although the sun had nearly gone it looked as if it had gone into the church, turning it a deeper red, solar energy firing the stone from within. Like an oven.
‘It glows,’ Merrily said.
‘Yes. Though it’s a cold glow sometimes. According to the experts, this is the best example of a Norman church in all England – Romanesque, built in the classical style but with Celtic and Saxon, even Viking twists. Doesn’t matter much to me. I don’t want to preach to people who’ve only come to admire the building. Or the ones who come because they think it hides mystical secrets. They had a bunch of dowsers here – water diviners who now profess to detect former buildings and old stones and… energies.’
Julie scowled. Merrily could see the Norman doorway now, a big statement, hugely ornate archway, richly carved tympanum, stone figures in shadows. There were still areas of Britain where the magnificent was unobtrusive, almost subdued. Julie Duxbury stood with her hands on her hips and stared at the church with what seemed like resentment.
‘I don’t like being responsible for an enigma. And I don’t like people who communicate in symbolism.’
‘Did Darvill explain the significance of the top hat, the bells?’
‘Only as an insult to his beloved morris. And the man who’d worn them.’
‘This was on the eve of the funeral of Aidan Lloyd.’
‘Yes.’
‘And he…’
‘Danced with the Kilpeck Morris.’
‘Aidan Lloyd?’
‘So I believe.’
‘Hang on. I mean… still?’
‘Until his death. The inference is that his father, Iestyn Lloyd, didn’t know his son was doing this – coming here to dance. After his death, someone found his top hat, bells, jacket… and brought them back and… made a spectacle of their contempt.’
‘Blimey. This… is a moment of revelation.’
Explained everything that happened in the churchyard at Ledwardine… to a degree.
‘One thing, Julie. How could Iestyn Lloyd not have known his son was dancing with the Kilpeck Morris? I realise they don’t exactly travel around, but presumably they are seen.’
‘I’ll let someone else explain that.’
‘And this burning effigy… I can understand them wanting Darvill to see it, but why you?’
‘I’m assuming that was someone who saw it and simply wanted me to know. I’ve certainly been taking it as a sign that I – as parish priest – need to do something about this. A longstanding feud – an active feud – creates a dreadful atmosphere of threat, tension, fear, affecting all kinds of people. It’s not often that a priest is presented with such a clear opportunity to try and bring… healing, I suppose. Don’t you think?’
&nbs
p; ‘I think… you need to be a bit careful until you know more about it. Also, there’s something else I can’t quite grasp. How long did it take you to get here, after the phone call?’
‘Less than half an hour, I’d guess. Twenty minutes?’
‘It’s just… if they soaked the effigy in petrol and set it alight and it was still blazing furiously when you arrived… after all that time you’d expect it to be just smouldering, surely?’
‘Dear God.’ Julie had unzipped her jacket, slipping a hand inside to finger her dog collar glowing in the last light like a cyclist’s armband. ‘I didn’t think. What does that mean?’
‘Might mean you were phoned before the effigy was set alight, don’t you think?’
‘But that—’
‘Suggests you were phoned by the man with the matches. It was a man, wasn’t it?’
‘Oh yes.’
‘When did Sir Lionel get his call?’
‘He said about midnight. Then he phoned Gareth Brewer, to meet him. Poor Gareth.’
Merrily flicked her a sideways glance.
‘Why?’
‘I’ll let his wife explain. It’s why I asked you to come over.’ Julie rezipped her jacket over the dog collar. ‘A duelling banjos situation, if I can put it like that. She’s waiting for us, I hope.’ She turned back to the church. ‘In there.’
32
First brick
MRS BREWER WASN’T a particularly religious person; she just wanted her kids to grow up with a sense of right and wrong, Julie said. Until the secular society came up with something that simple, that basic, she’d be pointing them at the Church. Julie couldn’t complain – this was what had brought her, a committed socialist and once a committed secularist, into the job.
‘How do you get round the Old Testament?’ Merrily asked outside the legendary south door. ‘Plagues of locusts, God behaving like Herod on steroids.’
‘I’m selective, Merrily. Aren’t we all?’
‘And you’ve known Mrs Brewer for some time?’
‘Since we first bought the house. She used to ride past. Our lane becomes a bridleway. This was before she had children.’
‘Anything else I need to know?’
‘Quite honestly, I think you’ll find she’s so disturbed by what’s been happening that she’ll be ready to meet you more than halfway.’
Framed by stones that looked as if they might hold all the answers to all the questions, the oak door had great lyre-shaped hinges and a metal ring. This door promised access to something significant. As Julie turned the ring, Merrily looked up into a face with bulbous eyes and a great fish-mouth, luxuriant swirling foliage curling out of both sides. The doorway had given pride of place to the Green Man. A character too complex, Jane had once said, to be a Christian symbol.
Inside, it was all less awesome. Whitewashed walls and two Norman arches. Signs of Victorian modernization, but nothing too disruptive, nothing too grandiose. Little halogen lights made a nest at the bottom of the short nave, but the rest was in shadow.
‘This is Mrs Brewer,’ Julie said. ‘Lara.’
‘Who, I’m afraid, was rude to your… friend?’ Mrs Brewer said.
Like she needed to get that out of the way. She was a tall, black woman, early to mid thirties, wearing jeans, a thick jumper and a quilted body warmer, a pink woollen hat over her tight curls. The three of them stood looking at each other next to the font, a huge hollowed mushroom on pillars.
‘This is probably a mistake,’ Julie said. ‘We thought we’d come here because it would be quiet. Lara’s mother’s at home with the children, so we couldn’t really meet there. But – one tends to forget – there’s no proper heating in this church and it gets very cold after dark.’
‘You live far away?’ Merrily asked Mrs Brewer.
‘Walking distance. A bungalow.’
She looked nervous. Julie led them under the first arch and soft lights came on in the chancel. Small, blue-cushioned pews faced one another and there was a matching chair, probably Victorian. Julie offered it to Merrily.
‘I’m going to leave most of this to you. I’ve explained to Lara what you do – what I think you do – and why I’ve asked you to come, but I’m still a little uncertain. If you hadn’t approached me I wouldn’t be asking for your help now. Things… converge.’
‘It’s become rather surreal very rapidly,’ Lara Brewer said. ‘Can we just talk about it, before we take it any further? I’m feeling a little disloyal.’
‘To whom?’
‘My husband. I wanted him to get an appointment with a doctor. Even phone my dad – he’s a psychiatrist.’
‘Locally?’
Mrs Brewer shook her head.
‘Back in London now. And then I get a call, out of the blue from Ledwardine, which seemed to kick-start something. Then Julie appeared, and it all seemed too coincidental. And now an exorcist? From Ledwardine? Somewhere I’ve never been to,’ Lara Brewer said. ‘And never even had particular cause to think about until—’
Merrily took a breath.
‘Until your husband spent a night there last week?’
First brick dropping into the quiet pool. Julie’s head turned.
‘For a funeral, yes,’ Lara said. ‘They went to Ledwardine for Aidan’s funeral. The Kilpeck Morris.’
‘For the funeral itself?’
‘Don’t you know? I thought you were the minister there.’
The words coming faster, as if Lara was chasing the ripples on the pool.
‘I can’t say for certain that Gareth and his friends were there,’ Merrily said, ‘because I don’t know what they look like, and we weren’t introduced. But I’ve been told they spent the night at a pub in the village. The Ox.’
‘Well that— It was supposed to be a kind of wake. I realize wakes are meant to take place before a funeral, but— Oh God, look, I don’t know. I’ve just accepted these traditions. Gareth said it was about saying a proper goodbye. Which usually means having a lot to drink. After which you don’t drive home.’
‘I didn’t know, until just now,’ Merrily said, ‘that Aidan had been a dancer with the Kilpeck Morris. Would’ve been something to mention at the funeral, but I wasn’t told. His family didn’t tell me.’
‘His family didn’t know. Or weren’t supposed to. Or at least his father wasn’t, for pretty obvious reasons.’
‘But Aidan and your husband…’
‘Danced together for years. They’re like a close family, the KM. In that way, Aidan had never left, and Gareth always said he belonged here. A primitive tribal thing, men dancing together. Like football… only different.’
‘But the Kilpeck Morris,’ Merrily said, ‘that’s not the same as all the others, is it? All those benign, village green dancers. Kilpeck doesn’t do fetes and festivals.’
‘Only religious ones. Festivals.’
There was a faint rustling from behind and Merrily turned her head, but there was nothing. The nave was less than half the size of Ledwardine’s, though there was a small gallery reached by steps.
‘When Lol enquired about the possibility of the Kilpeck Morris performing at the Ledwardine Festival, you referred him to Sir Lionel Darvill.’
‘Yes.’ Sound of Lara trying for a laugh that wouldn’t come. ‘Look, where I grew up, in Kent, if they kept something like this private, it’d be because it was a cover for sex games or something. Here, it’s… a cover for itself.’
‘This might sounds like a daft question, but I mean, if it isn’t for public entertainment… if they don’t play at fetes and festivals, what’s it about?’
‘It’s about itself. Lionel’s father had studied morris – its origins, what it meant. He developed new dances, which he insisted were actually old dances. I don’t, to be quite honest, think Gareth could explain it himself. He’s a part of it because of Sir Lionel.’
‘Sorry, you’ll have to explain that.’
‘They’re all tied, in some way, to the Darvill estate. A coup
le work directly for Lionel – one’s his shepherd, one’s a cheese-maker – ewe’s cheese from the Darvill flock. Another makes cider from the Darvill orchards. And Gareth… he’s the farrier, self-employed but his forge is on the estate. It’s a prestigious work address. And Lionel knows lots of people, from miles around, who have need of a good farrier. He has friends all over the place, other organic farmers, people who cut hay with scythes and plough with big horses that need shoeing.’
‘Sounds almost feudal,’ Merrily said.
‘It’s entirely feudal. Except that Lionel doesn’t take a share of their income. The rent for the forge is peppercorn. What he takes is their time and their commitment. Another thing… the Kilpeck of the Kilpeck Morris is not the rambling village you’ve just driven through, it’s the one you can’t see any more. Behind the church.’
‘They do perform in public here, though.’
‘Oh yes.’
‘You see, I can’t understand how Iestyn couldn’t’ve found out his son was in the side. Even with his face blacked up.’
‘Ah… he also wore a mask. He was the Man of Leaves. It’s a rule of Border morris that they’re not seen to put on or take off their—’
‘Perhaps…’ Julie leaned up alongside Lara on the pew, as if bored by morris talk. ‘Perhaps you should tell Merrily what happened after Gareth returned from Ledwardine.’
‘It’s stress,’ Lara said. ‘I’ve been thinking about it and it’s just stress.’
‘When I suggested that, you didn’t think so.’
‘He’s taken on too much work. He didn’t want to… although he was upset about Aidan’s death, he didn’t really want to go to the wake. He was very tired that day. And he doesn’t drink much. It all came down on him that night.’
