A Division of the Light

by Christopher Burns

  “I believe I know of that ossuary. There’s a dispute over what to do with the bones.”

  “A journalist is doing a piece that will need illustration. I’m told that the parish only reluctantly agreed to let me work in the crypt. Do you have any influence?”

  “None at all, Mr. Pharaoh. I’m an architect, not an archaeologist.”

  Gregory walked back along the sodden carpet and framed both rector and architect in a wide shot. Wells deliberately turned to one side so that he would be seen in profile.

  “Rector,” Gregory said, “just stand as you are. No, don’t move; right in front of me is fine. I can get you nicely in focus and also pull in much of the background with a wide-angle.”

  The rector demurred. “I’m really not sure that I should. This isn’t about me.”

  “No, but you’ve been interviewed by reporters and it’s important that the public sees your face. They’ll be able to read things into it.”

  The rector’s hands fluttered across his scalp as if checking on hair that had vanished long ago. Gregory made the exposure but, knowing he was being taken, the rector unintentionally stiffened his facial muscles.

  Wells moved closer. The rector was still uncertain.

  “Our bishop should be standing here, not me.”

  “The bishop isn’t available,” Wells explained to Gregory. “Yet another conference agonizing over social problems, I’m afraid; attendance compulsory for scholars.”

  “I’m pleased he’s not here. To have him in the picture would be something of a cliché.” Gregory nodded at the rector. “You’re much better.” And then, after a pause, he looked at Wells and said, “But you would make this an interesting piece of photojournalism.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t be so coy, Mr. Wells. You know I’m right.”

  “Well, I have no objection. What do you want me to do?”

  “We should wait for a minute or so. The light is strengthening, I think. When it slants in through the hole I’ll take you looking up at the roof.”

  The three men walked further down the church and came to a heap of debris resembling a pyre that had collapsed inwards as it burned. Glass fragments lay across the floor like bright discarded tiles. Both Gregory and Wells took photographs, but Gregory did not have to check to know that his would be unsatisfactory. There was no form to be found within the wreckage, only ruin.

  As Gregory neared the altar there was the sound of a shutter clicking. “I heard that,” he said, without turning round. Incinerated spars were strewn on the floor like the remnants of a sacrifice.

  “I had the altar and the painting framed,” Wells explained. “Thank you for giving a scale.”

  Beyond the altar, set within a gilded frame, was a large canvas of a Christ with sad eyes and one raised hand. In the center of the palm, like a small target, was a circular spot where the crucifixion nail had been driven. Behind and above him the painted clouds parted. A coating of stippled gray covered the surface of the painting so that it was impossible to make out its true colors.

  “We are proud of this,” the rector said quietly. “Many of our worshippers find solace in that face.”

  “Pre-Raphaelite,” Wells said briskly. “Unfortunately not the Brotherhood, just a minor follower. You can tell by the inferior brushwork. Nevertheless it’s certainly worthy of preservation.”

  “It looks filthy rather than damaged,” Gregory said. “You’ll be able to get it cleaned and restored, won’t you? Like the church as a whole, I suppose.”

  “If you come back in a year,” the rector said, “all this will be cleared up and restoration almost complete. I’m certain Mr. Wells will help us with that.”

  “Only a year?”

  “Perhaps a little more. It takes a long time to rebuild order from chaos.”

  “I’m not in a position to give estimates,” Wells said. “This was a freak accident and I know from experience that freak accidents cause damage that isn’t always obvious.”

  He received no reply other than a shake of the head. Gregory began to wonder if the rector might not be able to believe what was so obviously true.

  “You do see that it was an accident, don’t you?” he asked.

  The rector nodded. “Of course. Chance operates beyond the will of God. Although some—a very few—believe that the fireball was a divine warning.”

  “God sends a lightning strike as a punishment?”

  “They see it as a purifying force.”

  “Against what—ungodliness, blasphemy, sexual license?”

  “You can see why they should think such a thing.”

  “It’s difficult to argue against the irrational.”

  The rector spread his hands. There was still a smudge of soot on his fingers.

  “Some of us live in a world of signs and portents,” he said. “That girl who has visions—who is to know if what she sees is a hallucination or a true revelation?”

  A hazy shadow moved across the floor and all three men looked up as they heard a flapping of wings. A bird descended through the hole in the roof, settled on the summit of an exposed pillar, and looked down into the nave.

  “If this is a sign,” Gregory said drily, “then that should be a dove.”

  “Sad to say, it’s a pigeon. There are hundreds, thousands of them round here. Last month one got in somehow. It took us weeks to get it out. Its droppings were everywhere.”

  Gregory smiled. “At the moment, rector, a pigeon is the least of your problems. I’m sorry it wasn’t a dove.”

  “Even then it would have been chance and not design. Look around you—see what has to be done here. The church has more to worry about than false signs.”

  At that moment there was a sharp crack from somewhere in the roof, followed by a rattling sound like a handful of gravel falling against a board.

  “That certainly wasn’t a divine sign,” Wells said drily. “It was a physical one telling me that the sequence of destruction isn’t finished yet. And that the two of you should be in hard hats, too.”

  Gregory rubbed his hands together to signal that he was ready to take his photographs.

  “I think it would be good if you could look up toward the source of that noise,” he told Wells. “I need just a handful of shots. And if you could stand over here—a bit closer; yes, there.”

  “I’d be in profile again.”

  “Yes, and in shadow. Believe me, it will be an evocative image. Not quite St. Paul’s in the Blitz, but near enough.”

  Wells posed with the efficiency of a model, taking his stance and tilting his head exactly as Gregory asked him to do. In silhouette the brim of his hard hat was a thin diagonal sliver of blackness against the verticals of the church. A check on the Canon screen demonstrated that the images were effectively dramatic. Even Wells nodded in agreement when he was shown them a little later.

  Gregory shouldered his camera bag. “I’ll take my leave and let you get on with things,” he said.

  As he looked round for one last time he realized that he did not like the church. It was too dark, too formal and too cold. The architecture was both lofty and restrictive, the memorial tablets all spoke of a demanding but complacent imperialism, and the dark hardwood pews were uncomfortable places to sit.

  If God had existed and ever spoke in his ear, Gregory thought, he would want it to happen not in a place like this but outdoors, on a road or on high ground, with space around him and a wide clear sky above.

  “When they built this,” he remarked, “rank and social order and penitence must have meant a lot more than they do now.”

  “A different world, Mr. Pharaoh,” Wells said airily. “Everyone will want this building restored so that it still conforms to that world. Perhaps if the destruction had been greater—and many would say it was sacrilegious for me to propose this—then we could have built a modern church on this site: one that was welcoming, inclusive, with closer connections to the everyday world. Are you shocked?”


  “You’re suggesting that destruction can bring benefits.”

  “The past doesn’t hold all the advantages. We have to rebuild—but perhaps we have missed a chance to build something better. You say that the world is full of chance events. It’s also full of chances that are missed. And you, Mr. Pharaoh, strike me as a man who misses very few chances.”

  Gregory laughed. “I try not to. I don’t always succeed.”

  He shook hands and prepared to walk away, but the rector had a question for him.

  “Tell me: I was told only about your spiritual work, and yet you say you will do no more of that. But what else do you specialize in?”

  “I’ve worked across a wide range of subjects, rector. I think you could say that I’ve taken almost everything.”

  “I see. And your next project? Apart from those bones?”

  Gregory laughed. “Flesh, rector; I shall be working on studies of the flesh.”

  After a few weeks, Alice was able to look back and see clearly that the crisis of one particular day had gained direction and force far away from Thomas; instead its origin lay amongst the half-truths and recriminations of business life. As the working day progressed it became increasingly obvious that to remain working in that office would be corrosive.

  Alice realized that matters would only get worse shortly after she arrived at her desk. A particular transaction had been dogged by weeks of misunderstandings, errors and delay, and now it appeared probable that the entire contract would collapse. She was held to be partly responsible, but to Alice it was evident that a vindictive management had merely selected her as a scapegoat. To that management, however, her opinion seemed uninformed, and her questioning demeanor little short of insolent. When she was reprimanded in front of her colleagues, all of them sat with averted eyes. Not one voice was raised in her defense. After all, Alice Fell had always been aloof, had never tried to be popular; why should she expect support now?

  Aggrieved at her treatment, Alice was certain that her life would become intolerable if she did not take action. Her imagination had been shaping the decision for weeks. She would, of course, walk away at a time of her own choosing, and when her departure would cause the greatest possible disruption. The more she thought about it, the better it seemed that she should work a few more days, perhaps secretly degrade or hide several important files, and then walk out.

  When she arrived back at her flat Alice was in no mood for compromise. Even the way she closed the door was notable for its controlled aggression. When Thomas asked how she was, she saw only the falseness of his concern.

  She waited for several seconds before replying that she was fine. The words displayed her resentment like a badge. When Thomas nodded and told her that was good, it was clear to Alice that his pleasure was counterfeit.

  Thomas was attempting to ingratiate himself by preparing a meal. It was a simple pasta dish, but he fussed over it as if it required particular expertise. He realized that Alice could turn on him at any moment.

  She walked across the floor, pacing out the width of her property like a letting agent. Thomas glanced at her and smiled, but then looked away. There was a fluttering around the muscles of his heart.

  “I was hoping you wouldn’t be here when I got back,” she said.

  The flutter became a hard fist in the center of his chest. It stopped him breathing freely. Not knowing how to respond, he began to check the temperature controls on the cooker as though they were complex devices.

  “I said,” Alice repeated, “that I was hoping you wouldn’t be here.”

  “I’m not teaching today,” he answered weakly.

  She walked across the floor again. For the moment Thomas dared not turn. Her glare would be enough to unman him. A part of him knew he should say nothing, but another part lacked the resolve to remain silent. He spoke as if they were continuing a discussion Alice had begun days ago.

  “I’ve been thinking about journeying north to visit those locations but I haven’t been able to plan it out yet.”

  The speech collapsed around him like a deflated balloon.

  Alice paused and folded her arms. She knew what the truth was. Thomas would never get to see his overlooked and unimpressive sites. The Neolithic ax factory on the side of a mountain, the stone circle that was too far off the beaten track, the high barren moor with its near-formless mound of stones—these were all destinations he would never reach. These bleak locations, unvisited and ignored by his peers, were emblematic of Thomas’s modest, unadventurous life. He was a clever man but so flawed that all his potential had been wasted. It was too late now for any form of recovery. Thomas Laidlaw was beyond redemption.

  And what terrified Alice most of all was the suspicion, the threat, that in many ways she and Thomas could have similar futures.

  “I wasn’t talking about your travels,” she announced. “I was talking about you moving out.”

  The expected blow always falls the hardest. Thomas drew his elbows in at his sides and raised his shoulders as if a current had passed through his body.

  Alice moved a step closer, but stayed far enough away to be out of reach were he suddenly to whirl round. She went on.

  “I was hoping you’d be gone. Because we both know there’s no future for us.”

  It felt as if she were inserting a knife, but at the same time she knew that such a moment of truth was justified. She continued. “I thought you would have read all the signs—they’ve been clear enough. I thought that maybe we could avoid a scene like this. But if you’d understood you’d have offered to go before now. What is it that makes you want to stay? Nothing that you can do will take things back to what they were. I’m sorry, you’re sorry, we’re both sorry. Why do we say that? Our apologies make no difference.”

  She paused, took a breath, and said what had to be said.

  “Thomas, I want you to leave. I want you to leave straight away. I want you to go and not come back. I don’t want you to phone, I don’t want you to write, I just want you to go.”

  He turned and looked at her, his face stricken into a kind of paralysis.

  “We have to talk about this,” he said.

  “No, we don’t have to talk about it. Words will change nothing.”

  “We can’t just give up on things.”

  Exasperated, Alice shook her head. “I’ve told you, there’s no point in discussing it. It’s settled. Whatever you say I’ll not change my mind. Look inside yourself and you can see that I’m right. If this didn’t happen now then it would happen tomorrow or next week or next month. It’s better for us both if we just end it today, now, this minute.”

  Desperation laced his speech. “Whatever happened today has got you in such a mood that you see everything as black. But it isn’t. We have a future together.”

  Thomas held out his arms to embrace Alice, but she moved away.

  “Hold me and it will be all right,” he pleaded. “I promise you everything will be all right.”

  And he stepped forward, his gait as ungainly as any monster’s, his arms stretched out as if in parody. Alice raised a hand. It stopped him like a charm. He stood there looking at her with shocked eyes.

  “This is it,” she said firmly. “End of the road. We both knew it was coming. It’s here. Understand? It’s here now.”

  And he looked so helpless, so unequal to everyday life, that for a moment, but only for a moment, Alice pitied Thomas and hated herself for making him suffer.

  The mood passed as suddenly as it had arrived. There was no alternative. He was a dead weight, he was manacle and shackle, and she needed to be free. What happened to Thomas now was his own concern; Alice was not his keeper.

  A part of her life closed behind her and a new part began to open up. She could sense its energy and its heat. And although Thomas had been a small element in the past, he featured not at all in the future.

  Alice had the lock changed the day after she had finally succeeded in banishing Thomas. Only then did she feel secur
e and confident that she was moving on.

  Getting rid of him was prolonged and distressing, and she could not fully understand why he had to cling so desperately to the past. Men were like that, she thought—fundamentally they were needy and unambitious. Their braggadocio was nothing but a threadbare camouflage for insecurity. Usually they wanted a wife to come home to, although not necessarily to be faithful to. At deep levels that they were unwilling to admit, men were always anxious for affirmation. They constantly hunted for compliments but if given one were never sure how to deal with it.

  Before he was shamed into leaving, Thomas exhibited a range of emotions that were unpleasant and annoying. He walked around, he stayed still, he sat down and immediately stood up, and he moved from room to room as if he expected Alice to follow, crumple, and then tell him she did not mean what she had said. Alice was always determined, but Thomas tacked back and forth across the sea of his emotions as if he did not know which course was best. In turn he was jealous, bumptious, angry and craven. When he left, he was like an innocent man found guilty of a terrible crime.

  Soon after she had closed the door on him, Alice began to cry.

  At the end of each of her relationships she always wept spasmodically for two or three days. After that she was calm, she was happy, and the rest of her life seemed as though it would be worth living. And although she wept because she could not avoid inflicting pain, Alice was never overwhelmed by guilt.

  Her lovers, on the other hand, were never able to forgive. Even though each affair had turned stale, they all acted surprised, wounded and betrayed. She believed that this could only be because of an irrational masculine pride. As a young woman Alice had expected men to be tougher, even unfeeling. She had not known that their emotional bruises never faded. Men who had craved affection were unable to recognize its decay and hopeless at recovering from its collapse.

  As soon as the lock was changed Alice began to clean the flat, move the ornaments and rearrange the furniture. This was important even if the differences she made were only minimal. On several occasions she had to stop, sit down and weep. But after a few minutes she was able to stand up and carry on as if nothing had happened.