Phil Rickman - The Fabric of Sin

Whether or not you accepted this, Teddy Murray had said, the charges against the Templars were surely made up.

‘Like many of those levelled at various abbots by Henry VIII’s people during the Reformation. What kings tended to covet most in religious organizations was their money.’

The last Grand Master of the Order, Jacques de Molay, had been burned alive in Paris, but the persecution had been less extreme in Britain, where most Templars had been allowed to join other monastic orders – except, apparently, the order of Hospitallers of St John to which the properties of Garway had been transferred.

De Molay was now seen as a martyr and Friday the Thirteenth … ‘Because of this? That’s the reason for the whole superstition and a bunch of slightly distasteful movies?’

‘Such is the received wisdom, Merrily. What rather bothers me is that the church promises to be packed. I’ve had letters from all kinds of organizations wanting to be represented – from Templar re-enactment groups to more … shall we say more sinistersounding societies.’

‘Like what?’

Teddy had said there seemed to be a number of occult-sounding groups whose rituals were supposed to be based on Templar practices. He said he didn’t know much about them. Merrily knew a little more, from Huw Owen’s reading list. Supposedly ancient formulae handed down through Renaissance magical orders and then developed by the fashionable fraternities of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Mainly bollocks.

‘Lucky the anniversary is going to be a Saturday, then,’ Merrily said.

‘You think that will change anything? I don’t. It’s their first opportunity in a century to commemorate the suppression – and a century ago few, if any, of these theories were in the public domain.’

‘Why here? There must lots of Templar churches all over the country. In fact—’

‘Actually, no,’ Teddy said. ‘Nothing so perfectly preserved. The London temple, for instance, was wrecked in the Blitz. There’s nowhere more authentic. Or more isolated and yet … get-at-able.’

He’d unlocked the tower, dark and starkly atmospheric with its funeral bier and a magnificent medieval oak chest hewn from a massive log.

‘Whose idea was it to have a memorial service?’

‘So many people wrote in, we couldn’t get out of it, Merrily. So I’m quite anxious that this business with the Master House should be dealt with before then. Do you think that will be possible?’

‘Before next weekend?’

‘Bad enough when the girl arrived. Wish I hadn’t been here.’

Merrily had been forced to say that she’d do her best to get it wrapped. And if Huw was right that might be on the cards. She’d asked Teddy where the Master House came into the picture. One of the Templar farms, he’d said, that was all. They farmed sheep, as did the Hospitallers after them.

As did the locals today. Not much had really changed in Garway, Merrily was thinking as the mobile chimed to indicate that DI Bliss had left the building.

‘Raining hard in the police car park, is it, Frannie?’

‘It’s not raining at all, and I’m not in the police car-park. I’m off the premises entirely, and if it was known I was calling you I’d probably have a tail.’

‘Sorry?’

Merrily was still thinking about the Garway Green Man who, having small, stubby horns, might be expected also to have a tail.

‘All right, listen,’ Bliss said. ‘I may be touching upon something you already know about, but why would the gentlefolk that humble coppers like myself used to call the Funnies suddenly have become interested in you?’

‘The Funnies?’

‘I’m thinking specifically of a feller in an unmarked room at headquarters who very occasionally creeps around this division when it’s felt that national security might be at stake.’

Merrily rubbed vainly at the condensation on the windscreen. Without the engine running, it kept re-forming under her palm.

‘You’re talking about the Special Branch?’

‘I hope you’re on your own using language like that.’

‘Frannie, are you actually saying the Special Branch are making inquiries about me ?’

‘I’m saying nothing, Merrily.’

She scrubbed furiously at the windscreen, starting to put it together, and it was … it was beyond ridiculous.

‘What are you doing, exactly?’ Bliss said.

‘Trying to see out of the bloody—’ She sank back in her seat. ‘I’m looking into something connected with the Duchy of Cornwall’s investments in Herefordshire. Would that explain anything?’

A short silence, except for a car engine somewhere and a clanging that became duller. What sounded like Bliss moving away from something to a place of greater safety.

‘That would possibly explain it, yes,’ he said.

‘It’s nothing particularly contentious.’

‘With respect, Merrily, how would you know?’ Bliss paused. ‘You want to explain? Being as we’re old mates and those smart-arsed cloak-and-dagger twats get right up my nasal passages?’

‘Well …’ She thought about it, could see no harm. ‘All right. The Duchy of Cornwall have paid good money out of the Prince’s piggy bank for an old farmhouse which their favourite conservation builder is refusing to work on because his girlfriend says it’s haunted.’

‘That’s it?’

‘Sorry to disappoint. Obviously I’d like to be able to tell you that the vengeful spirit of Princess Diana’s been seen around Highgrove in a—’

‘Yeah, yeah.’

‘But that’s it, Frannie. That’s the lot. As far as I know.’

‘I see.’

‘You don’t, though, do you? Where’s the threat to national security in that?’

‘Maybe there’s more to it than you know.’

‘I’ve already been thinking along those very lines. These inquiries about me … is that still going on?’

‘I don’t know, Merrily. I’ve been off for a couple of days. I got this from Karen Dowell – now promoted to DS, by the way. They wanted your background, potted biog, any political connections and … Oh, yeh, they wanted to know about little Jane and her widely reported altercation with the Herefordshire Council over the proposed development of Coleman’s Meadow.’

‘Wha—?’

It was like yobs had strolled up and starting rocking the car.

‘Calm down, Merrily, it’s not so unusual. And it would’ve been pointed out by somebody fairly quickly that the kid’s a force of nature, as distinct from a rural terrorist.’

‘It doesn’t matter, it’s just—’ Merrily sat up, dipping into her bag for the Silk Cut packet. ‘The bastards! I mean, you know what else they’ve done, don’t you? Someone’s leaned on the Bishop, so that he’s actually freed me up to … to devote all my attention to a minor issue which, the way it’s shaping up, may not even be Deliverance business.’

‘The Bishop’s told you this himself?’

‘Bishop Dunmore is conveniently away in London until Tuesday.’ She lit a cigarette, opened the window to let out the smoke, which blew back in a blast of wind from Garway Hill, wherever that was from here. ‘Sod this, I’m going home.’

‘You’re on this now?’

‘Mmm.’

‘Where?’

‘Garway Hill.’

‘Be a spectral sheep-shagger, then, would it, Merrily? All right, just remember we haven’t spoken and you know nothing of this. If you need to speak to me, call the mobile. Using your mobile. As distinct from the vicarage landline.’

‘You actually think—?’

‘I’m just being careful.’

‘Bloody hell , Frannie.’

‘Stay cool, Merrily.’

Switching off the phone, she felt hunted, exposed, focused-on … and just tired, brain-dead. Sod it . She took two angry drags on the cigarette and then put it out. Pulled her waterproof jacket from the back seat and walked out into the rain.