Unseen Things Above

by Catherine Fox

  Eschatological visions aside, the visiting choir was a far cry from the high professional standards of the Dorian Singers. But I will admit that these are so stratospherically high that ice crystals form in your ears as you listen. Their Christmas CD, Realms of Glory, will zip up through the Classical charts like a Category 4 aerial shell firework and stun us all. We must expect their trademark technical wizardry, combined with an accessibility that jealous rivals will again disparage as ‘dumbing down’. Nip into any cathedral bookshop and buy a copy, if you are the sort who prefers the feel and smell of an actual CD. Otherwise download it like a normal person. In particular, do listen to the third track: ‘What wondrous love is this, oh my soul?’ I’m telling you, your withers will be wrung. It’s a heartbreakingly beautiful folk melody arranged for solo tenor. It’s performed here by a talented young man whose light, pleasing voice seems made for English art songs. So no, we are not talking about Freddie May, (whose timbre has a distinct whiff of the night about it). Freddie was lined up to do it, but . . .

  Look, I’m going to level with you, reader: Freddie does not feature at all on this CD.

  Oh, Freddie, Freddie, Freddie! What have you done now? Don’t tell me you were packed off home in disgrace, as you were from choir tours in your chorister days!

  No, it was nothing like that, I’m relieved to say. Freddie managed to arrive sober at the right place, at very nearly the right time. The rehearsals went well. On two separate occasions Mr Dorian said, ‘Oh, very good, Mr May!’, and on another, he all but smiled at him. Then, just as the sound levels were being checked prior to the recording, whoosh! Freddie had one of his spectacular nosebleeds. An hour later, when all the usual tricks had failed, poor Freddie was put in a taxi and sent up to the nearest A & E. I will spare you a detailed account (in any case, this all happened outside the Diocese of Lindchester) and simply report that an excruciating nasal cautery procedure put an end to any possibility of Freddie singing that week.

  To say he was majorly disappointed comes nowhere near describing Freddie’s feelings. He was distraught. But he knew that a noisy public display of wretchedness would not commend him to his mentor. To be needy, as well as a total flake? No way. Totally killed him, but he reined it in? Any case, he was shit scared that crying would trigger another nosebleed. Consultant was literally threatening him with surgery to sort out his busted septum, if the cauterizing didn’t work?

  So Freddie is not on the CD.

  Actually, I tell a lie.

  ‘That’s you! In your nuddy pants! Ha ha ha! What a hoot!’

  ‘Totty— Gah! It’s not— I had my jeans on?’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it. Aw, he’s blushing! Poor angel! Hoo, hoo, hoo!’

  ‘Shut up, Totty! Listen, it’s, it says something about the incarnation, OK? Power and weakness, yeah? The juxtaposition of . . . Hnn. Wait, human vulnerability, in, y’know, the shoulder blades? Plus the whole archangel . . . wing thing? What? That’s totally what he said!’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Nng.’

  ‘Ha ha! The great man himself! A bit rich after all his lectures! Next minute he turns round and says, “I know, let’s put a hot bod on the CD cover and sell shed-loads of copies!”’

  ‘Hey! Out of order! It’s my shoulders, not my ass! I’m so not talking to you, Totty. Gimme that.’ Totty held the CD out of reach. ‘You’re making out it’s inappropriate?’

  ‘Let me look properly.’ She popped her reading glasses on and studied the black and white image. A figure – radiant, bleached- out – in a stone archway. It might almost be an image from the Souls and Bodies exhibition. ‘All right, Freddie-bear, it’s very tasteful and arty. Not porny at all. And you can’t actually tell it’s you.’

  ‘Mm, they kinda like photoshopped it to death?’

  ‘So how did Mr Dorian know about the tattoos, hmm? Or should I not enquire . . . ?’

  ‘I wish! So I had this massive nosebleed? Had to change? Well, hey girl, never pass up a chance to get your shirt off in public. That’s totally my motto.’

  ‘Hoo, hoo, hoo! Bad bear!’

  *

  Talking of bad bears, the large pink teddy in the bishop’s office is currently sitting in the window, looking out across the car park. He’s wearing the archdeacon’s pork pie hat. Matt left it behind last time he had a meeting with Bishop Harry. Such are Matt’s levels of distraction, he hasn’t had time to work out where he last saw it. In fact, he’s barely registered his hatlessness.

  The battle with Veronica is now in the endgame of Phase One. The complainant has exercised her right ‘to request the President of Tribunals in writing to review a dismissal under section 11(3) of the Measure’. Well, he’d seen that one coming. It’s a time-wasting resource-wasting bit of bloody-mindedness. Harry’s decision can only be overturned if the president believes that the bishop was flat out wrong. It will drag on for another month, six weeks, max.

  And after that, Phase Two. When the archdeacon will be calling the shots. He has all his ducks in a row. A spot of digging around in the Revd Dr da Silva’s CV has thrown up a whole bunch of inconsistencies. A couple of trips to previous workplaces and a few off-the-record chats with former colleagues proved, shall we say, enlightening? He’s been in conversation with the legal team who steered him through the employment tribunal malarkey.

  And then what, Matt? whispers his conscience. Is there a Phase Three? What about the big picture? What about Janey?

  Fair enough, fair enough. He’ll get to that. Right now he’s focused on the short term. He’ll sit tight in his bunker for the next few weeks, then he’ll be strapping on the archiepiscopal gun belt and adjusting his Stetson.

  Talking of which, where the chuff has his hat got to?

  Halloween has been and gone. Father Dominic doled out sweeties and Bonfire Party invitations once again to callers at the vicarage. It was ‘Blended Learning Week’ at Poundstretcher, and young female undergraduates, had they been willing to learn from Dr Jane Rossiter, might have interrogated the messages about women underlying the choice of fancy dress on offer. Slutty nurse, slutty vampire, slutty witch, slutty cat. Oh, for fuck’s sake. Maybe if I publish enough and my funding bids are all successful, one day I’ll be a slutty professor! And think: we can even have slutty bishops now! Yay equality!

  Uh-oh. Looks like I haven’t managed to blend my learning with a sense of humour, thought Jane. She was holed up again, not answering her door to the stream of trick-or-treaters. I just don’t get that it’s ironic, do I? Just because my boobs are saggy, obviously I’m jealous of young attractive women who want to have fun getting their tits out for the boys. Why don’t I go and hire a slutty feminist outfit, instead of judging other people’s lifestyles? Stop ringing my doorbell, you slutty sluts, or I’ll show you empowerment!

  Was it possible she’d drunk a wee bit too much Malbec? Yeah, that was just about possible, given the bottle was empty. Oh Lordy, drinking by yourself, Rossiter. What’s the world coming to? I’ve been doing too much of everything by myself. Still, Danny will be home in three weeks.

  Jane hugged one of her manky cushions so tight it was . . . whatever. Tight. Like her. Oh Danny, I remember when I used to sit you in the laundry basket and wedge you upright with these very cushions! I used to let you suck bunches of keys and eat file paper, just so I’d get half an article read. I was demented with boredom all the time you were little. But now I’m sobbing into a filthy tartan cushion, hugging it and wishing I had my baby boy in my arms just one more time.

  Hah, you maudlin old bag. If you told Danny any of that, he’d probably wedge you in a laundry basket with a manky cushion, just to prove he was a grown-up. He’s going to come back for three weeks, then he’ll be off again. You’ve got to move your life on, gal. Get over yourself, girlfriend.

  It’s Friday. It’s meant to be Matt’s day off, but he’s at his desk trying to keep on top of the old email in-box. If he can get it down to under seventy, maybe he’ll ring Janey and— His
phone bursts into ‘Lady in Red’. He smiles.

  ‘Hello, Janey.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘At home.’

  ‘In your study?’

  ‘Yep. Um, are you mad at me, Jane?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘All righty. Only you sound a bit mad.’

  ‘That’s as maybe. Have you got a utility bill to hand?’

  ‘Probably. Why?

  ‘Find one. Passport?’

  ‘What’s going on, Janey?’

  ‘HAVE YOU GOT YOUR PASSPORT?’

  ‘Flip! Yes, I’ve got it here somewhere.’

  ‘Find it.’

  Pause. ‘OK. Got it. Now what?’

  ‘Pick them both up and come out of the front door. I’m in my car on the drive. Bring your wallet with your driving licence.’

  ‘Ooo-ka-a-ay. Are you going to tell me what’s—?’ He stares at the phone for a moment, as though an explanation is going to appear on the screen. He scans his inner world to check which metaphorical loo seat he’s left up this time. Working too hard? Ignoring her? Yep, that would be it. Unless . . . Oh Lord, was this showdown time? She was never expecting him to put a deposit on a house with her?

  He pulls the door shut. There she is. He gets into the passenger seat. Looks at her face. Yep, it’s judgement day, all right. ‘Janey, where are we going?’

  She takes a deep breath. ‘You are only allowed to say one thing, and that is “Thank you, Jane”. We’re going to the register office to give notice.’

  He stares. ‘I’m sorry, what?’

  ‘Of our intention to marry, dickwad!’ she shouts.

  Like the rising of the sun in the east, like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, like a strong man rejoicing to run a race, that is how the smile appears on the archdeacon’s face. ‘Thank you, Jane.’

  NOVEMBER

  Chapter 28

  Bonfire Night! Smoke broods in strata above the Diocese of Lindchester, and everywhere, in parish and deanery, in back garden and public park – fireworks. BOOM! Far off, near. Ah! Look at the fire blossoms, how they melt to smoky dandelion clocks in the night sky. Then comes a fierce crackling, like the flash frying of recusants. Listen to those screaming fireworks. Don’t they put you in mind of the squalls of live cats in burning effigies of the pope? But perhaps you didn’t know they did that, our forebears? I believe it amused them. But then, the public hanging, drawing and quartering of traitors counted as a fun day out, too. Yes, yes, but the cats, though, the poor cats! Fighting and screaming in terror as they burn! Odd how that detail has the power to trouble an English temperament inured to the fate of Guy Fawkes.

  How can it be a whole year? thinks Father Dominic. He mops the muddy footprints from the vicarage kitchen floor after the last guests have gone. Lord! What larks, trying to explain to his Farsi-speaking congregation what Bonfire Night is all about. Until this year, Dominic has stubbornly contemplated gunpowder, treason and plot through the nostalgic haze of childhood bonfires. It has always smacked of toffee apples and sparklers for him. But now he’s viewing it through the lens of current events. Terrorism. Political instability. Beheadings. Islamophobia. War. Maybe he ought to be glad that Guy Fawkes’ night is being edged out by the commercialized mission creep of Halloween?

  He squeeges the mop and tips the dirty water away. All his kitchen surfaces are cluttered with leftovers from the bonfire feast. Cold sossies for lunch tomorrow. Goody-good. Project Clingfilm is under way when his doorbell rings. It’s Jane. With a bottle of posh Prosecco. Ooh, Lord! There go the good intentions. Well, never mind; Wednesday is day off eve eve. And it falls within the octave of last week’s day off, doesn’t it? Not forgetting that Prosecco goes very nicely with cinder toffee.

  ‘Well, chin chin, fatty,’ says Dominic. ‘What’s the occasion?’

  Jane scowls. ‘There’s no occasion. Why does there have to be an occasion? Oh, I know – what about, because it’s Guy Fawkes’ night? Yes, let’s drink to the hideously protracted torture and death of papists and other traitors to the Crown. That’s the occasion. Or because I haven’t seen you properly for ages. In fact, what’s not to celebrate? Apart from Ebola and UKIP, obviously. And ISIS, global warming, welfare cuts—’

  ‘You’re blethering, darling.’

  ‘True. Cheers.’ They clink glasses.

  Silence.

  Dominic gives good pastoral silence. He knows perfectly well Jane is working up to something. A horrid thought assails him: never say she’s emigrating to New Zealand? No! You can’t abandon me! He arranges his expression into selfless sympathy.

  ‘Oh, stop doing your “Trust me, I’m a priest” thing,’ she snaps. ‘Yes, you are – you’re tilting your head. You look like Susanna bloody Henderson.’

  ‘Eek!’ Dominic straightens up. ‘Come on then. Out with it, you old tart.’

  ‘Very well.’ Jane takes a dignified sip of Prosecco. ‘Now, I’m going to ask you a question, and you’re to answer calmly and sensibly, without screaming. Because it’s really not a big deal. OK? Good. What are you doing on Friday the twenty-eighth of November, at ten a.m.?’

  ‘Well, nothing as far as I know. It’s my day off— OH! Omigod!’ he screams. ‘You’re getting hitched! You’re—’

  ‘I said, no screaming! It’s not a big deal.’

  ‘Omigod, omigod, omigod! You’re actually getting married! This so is a big deal! Oh, congratulations, darling! Mwa, mwa! Let me see the ring. What?! Why haven’t you got a ring? Can I be your flower girl? Oh, please? All right, can I give you away, then?’

  ‘NO! Just shut up, you big ponce. Listen. No, listen to me! Matt and I are entering into a legal contract. That’s all. A legalized partnership. No rings, no flowers, none of that oppressive patriarchal bollocks.’

  ‘Yes, yes, but what are you going to wear?’

  Jane hesitates.

  ‘Why don’t you turn up in your fat bloke trackie bottoms and rugby shirt?’ he asks. ‘If it’s just a legal contract.’

  ‘Fuck off.’

  ‘You fuck off. Oh, this is so exciting! More Prosecco?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘What about that red dress?’

  ‘No! I can’t possibly wear that. I wore it to Danny’s dad’s civil union, for God’s sake.’

  ‘Oh, and I thought this wasn’t a big deal. Silly me.’

  ‘You’re being very tiresome, Dommie.’

  He seizes her face in both hands and plants a smacker on her lips. ‘Oh, this is wonderful, Jane! I’m really, really thrilled for you both. Oh no, I’m welling up!’ He fans the tears back into their ducts. ‘So, it’s at Lindford register office? Do I have a role, or shall I just sit and cry happy tears?’

  ‘We’d like you to be a witness. But it’s a very small low-key private thing, so don’t tell anyone.’

  ‘Of course not, darling. Do you want me to suit up?’

  ‘Wear what you like. I really don’t care. But if you show up in a vicar jumper, I’ll kill you.’

  The question of what to wear is a daily dilemma at the moment. All around the Diocese of Lindchester people come up with different solutions. Some consult the temperature and go about in sandals and summer tops. Others cling to the notion that this is November, and don their boots and scarves. You will see both these extremes – and every possible expression of the sartorial via media – represented on the streets of Lindfordshire’s towns. You will also encounter the full spectrum of explanation, too: from ‘the overwhelming scientific consensus for human-induced global warming’ to ‘that volcano in Iceland’. I mean, can’t we just enjoy the lovely weather without all this doom-mongering? Live in the moment. That’s all we have. Don’t waste the precious moment worrying, what if by some perverse twist of fate the 97 per cent of serious scientists turn out to be right after all? What if, on some cosmic November 6th, our planet orbits silently on without us, and we are just charred sticks and empty cardboard after our brilliance has burnt out to nothing?

  S
till, autumn slowly advances across the landscape. Father Wendy notes its progress on Thursday, as she walks towards the Linden with Pedro. Leaves are finally starting to go now. Her floral wellies scrunch through all the toffee shades: tablet, butterscotch, treacle, liquorice. She raises her eyes. Bare trees on the rim of the field there, with dark clots of magpie nests; although the poplars are still silver-topped and the beeches gold.

  They reach the bank. Moorhens flick their tails and scurry to the river. Among the neglected coppicing to her left she sees a stretch of bright rippled water, like sunshine through a 1960s bathroom window. There’s an alder full of goldfinches tara-diddling softly among themselves. Is anything so green as English grass in the low winter sun, with strands of gossamer criss-crossing from blade to blade? The leaves have all gone from the hawthorn, but every bush is stippled over with wine-coloured berries. She passes under the echoing arch of a bridge where a lane crosses the Linden and a cutter munches its way along the hedge.

  Out on the other side lapwings lollop and pheasants wander in stubble. Pedro leans on his harness.

  ‘Sorry, boy. Can’t let you run here.’

  On they go, past pigs in humpback corrugated iron sties against the backdrop of cooling towers. Behind her she can hear a runner approaching. There’s a blue tractor parked in a field of green; then newly ploughed acres, all blackish brown like moleskin. In the distance a flock of starlings hurls itself up into the sky. It lassoes out, comes sifting, sifting down, then flicks back in like a fish tail.

  ‘Look at that, Pedro!’

  But Pedro has seen another pheasant. He darts—

  It happens in a flash. Pedro yelps, the runner goes headlong.

  ‘Fuck!’

  ‘Pedro! Oh, I’m so sorry!’

  The runner rolls like a ninja, and he’s on his feet. ‘Oh God, I’m—’ he gasps for breath.

  ‘Are you—’

  ‘Sorry – is your dog—’

  ‘—OK?’

  ‘—OK?’

  The runner stands there panting. He grins. ‘Whoa! That was mental. Muscle memory?’