Peter Lovesey - The Reaper

Not everyone in the village thought all this was a good idea. One or two called it a freak show and worse, but the majority were willing to keep an open mind and joined in cheerfully. Otis Joy had announced the arrangements in church on Sunday, urging everyone to respect Gary's love of jazz, move to the rhythm and rejoice in the Lord.

The main assembly point was in front of the Foxford Arms (not yet open for business). King Gumbo, magnificent in black tails with gold satin lapels and epaulettes, top hat, white gloves and a huge gold-fringed Gumbo Jazz Band sash across his chest, marshalled the marchers as well as anyone can marshal jazz musicians. Five bands and several solo players-totalling seventy or more-drew up in formation across the street, brass instruments gleaming in the pale October sun.

Hats were removed in respect when someone spotted the hearse approaching the village along the lane. What wreaths covered the big black Daimler! The roof rack was a mass of colour and the coffin hardly visible for floral tributes shaped into trumpets, saxophones, tubas and drums. Rachel's wreath was a huge music stave made of white Arum lilies. She arrived with two of Gary's jazz friends and took her position behind the hearse. She was in a new black coat with artificial fur trimming and a black straw hat. When she saw the crowds she had a moment of panic and thought of going straight to the church, but having suggested the whole thing she had no choice except to join in.

A whistle blast from King Gumbo at the head of the procession alerted everyone. The Gumbo band drummer began a slow beat. Responding to a plaintive note from King Gumbo's muted trumpet, the saxes took up the touching blues melody "Spider Crawl." Trumpet and clarinet combined and spoke to each other between the twelve-bar chord sequence. Further back in the line, other bands blended in. Swaying, taking tiny flat-footed steps, the leaders of this extraordinary cortege took the first steps up Foxford's street towards the church. The hearse crawled behind them and after the hearse came Rachel, walking alone at the head of; a column of mourners from the village.

The strains of "Just a Closer Walk with Thee" took oven The crowd listened respectfully, many swaying to the music. Gary, everyone agreed, would have approved.

They took almost forty minutes to reach the church, only six hundred yards off. At regular intervals King Gumbo stopped and bobbed and swayed to the beat, and everyone was compelled to do the same. The hearse-driver quietly cursed and kept the engine running and thought about asking for a higher fee. But all along the route, the visitors enjoyed the music and the spectacle, following along and joining the end of the procession.

Otis Joy waited at the lychgate of St. Bartholomew's to receive the coffin, dressed simply in black cassock. Behind him, the church was full except for the places reserved for the principal mourners and the Gumbo Jazz Band. "I am the resurrection and the life…" he began, when the coffin was finally withdrawn from the hearse and borne towards him. Hundreds came to a halt, in the churchyard and a long way back along the street.

Inside the church, the coffin, with just Rachel's wreath resting on it, was lowered onto trestles. Rachel took her place in the front pew. She was the only family mourner, but she had Gary's jazz friends sitting beside her. They had helped choose the hymns, gospel numbers movingly sung by a choir that specialised in spirituals. That line of "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot"- coming for to carry me home -had a poignancy she had never been aware of before. She pressed a Kleenex to the corner of her eye.

And Otis was equal to the occasion when the time came, finding noble things to say about a man who had not had a noble thought in his life. " 'Behold, I show you a mystery,' " he began with a text from St. Paul. " 'We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.' "

He spread his hands, his voice subdued. "Never in its long history has our church echoed to such singing. Gary's devoted wife Rachel and his friends decided this was what he would have liked, and how right they were. He loved his jazz. It's a strong consolation in a time of great sadness that he managed to visit New Orleans shortly before his final heart attack. Gary was not specially religious by temperament, but he found spirituality in music, and he would rejoice that the music he loved has provided this marvellous send-off today. He was taken from us at only forty-two, gathered, very suddenly, on the evening of our harvest supper. He could have told you of great jazzmen who died young, like Bix Beiderbecke and Charlie Parker. I'm often asked for a reason why good men and women are sometimes taken from us prematurely. We have to accept it. In those words I spoke from the Prayer Book, "The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away." Our thoughts now must be with Rachel. May she come through the grief of the present days and find peace. For Gary, there is peace already. Like Mr. Valiant-for-Truth in The Pilgrim's Progress, 'So he passed over, and the trumpets sounded for him on the other side.' And today in our village they sounded for Gary on this side as well."

After the service, the Gumbo Jazz Band serenaded the coffin with the "Beale Street Blues," a number traditionally played in slow-drag tempo. Then the hearse was driven to Haycombe for the burial. Rachel had resisted all suggestions of using a plot in the village churchyard.

Inside the cemetery gates, the undertaker (who had been rather upstaged by King Gumbo) had his moment of attention, walking in front of the cortege wearing his top hat. Rachel and the jazz friends went to the graveside with Otis, who spoke the words of committal. Quietly, they took leave of Gary.

On their return to Foxford they were greeted with the enlivening blare of "When the Saints Go Marching In" played lustily by King Gumbo and his lads. This was up-tempo time. The mutes were off, the top hats were back on and the music swelled. All the bands joined in, giving full vent to their playing, bobbing, stomping and swinging to the end of the street and back again, ending at the pub.

King Gumbo sank two glasses of beer in a short time and said, "Man, oh man, that was some boogaloo."

In Rachel's cottage, over cheese and wine, the real Foxford people, friends and neighbours, had come, as if to reclaim the occasion for the village. Long after the camera crews and jazz bands had gone, this was the community that would help the young widow adjust to her changed life. More humdrum than big drum, as Bill Armistead put it. The talk was subdued compared to the bedlam in the pub, but all agreed it had been a day to remember. "And wasn't the rector wonderful, the things he said?" Peggy Winner enthused. "I was so proud of him. He had me in floods of tears, and between ourselves I was never very fond of Gary."

"That's a gift from God, being able to fit your words to the occasion like that," said Geoff Elliott. "Not that I recall what was said, but I found it moving at the time. Beautiful words, yes."

"And not the same words he used at poor Stanley's funeral. Not the same at all."

"Different man," Elliott pointed out.

"Yes, but two funerals coming so soon, one after the other, it would be easy to repeat yourself."

"No, no, Peg. He thinks it through. Next time someone goes, it will be different again. You'll see."

"I hope no one else is going," she said. "Two in just over a month is more than we can afford to lose."

"And that's not counting the bishop."

"The bishop wasn't a Foxford man."

"No, but he was our bishop. It's a connection. Rector remembered him in church, if you were there."