Phil Rickman - The Fabric of Sin

‘No. I mean, I did once, maybe a couple of times, in a half-hearted kind of way, but not any more. And, like, all the stuff about me having an altar in the attic and, like, chanting and trying to raise dark forces, that is total crap. I wouldn’t do that. I mean, OK, I thought about it … an altar. But only as a kind of a focus point. I didn’t … I mean, I was just a kid.’

‘A teen-witch?’

‘Never that much of a kid, Siân.’

‘My apologies.’

‘And, for heaven’s sake, it’s not satanic , is it? She’s making the fundamental mistake that all these ignorant fundamentalists— I mean, Satanism’s just a perverse reversal of Christianity. It doesn’t even qualify as any kind of paganism.’

‘Yes, Jane, I have read my deliverance handbook. And – since you ask – the reason I invited Shirley to pour out everything was that I thought it might help if we both knew the extent of it. There’s one in every parish, Jane. Often more than one – a faction, even.’

‘Sorry?’

‘Probably harmless most of the time, but she needs watching. She might well be used, for instance, by opponents of the plan to re-erect your standing stones in Coleman’s Meadow.’

‘Right.’

‘Although I wouldn’t imagine it would improve their case to any great extent.’

‘No.’

‘Well …’ Siân sat back. ‘And there was I, feeling rather pleased with my success at drawing Shirley out in a way that perhaps wouldn’t have been open to Merrily. I’m sorry you felt the need to put a rather different interpretation on it.’

Jane sagged in her chair.

‘But I’m glad you brought it up this morning,’ Siân said. ‘It says something about you.’

‘Like that I’m a totally immature idiot who shouldn’t be allowed out?’

‘I think the tea should be almost brewed by now,’ Siân said. ‘Would you like to pour for us, Jane? And have you eaten yet, or were you waiting for me?’

Jane stood up and went over to the worktop. Taking the opportunity – which the bloody woman had obviously deliberately just given her – to hide her reddening face.

‘I just want to say, in case you were wondering …’ talking into the mugs ‘… All that stuff about Lol and other women …’

‘It’s nonsense, of course.’

‘You …’ Jane looked up. ‘You do believe that?’

‘I met Mr Robinson once,’ Siân said. ‘He wasn’t what I might have expected.’

‘No. No, he isn’t. Look …’ Jane started talking, in this great, hot rush, before she could stop herself. ‘Why are you really here? Why did you offer to come?’

‘Why do you think I’m here?’

Lawyers. Always elegantly turning your questions around.

All right, then.

‘Mum thinks … that there’s a possibility they’re putting together some kind of carve-up? And that she’s going to end up with about eight parishes and lose the deliverance thing. Or it gets divided up and, like, run by a committee?’

‘I see.’

‘I don’t suppose I should’ve said that, but, you know …’

‘Why not? It’s true.’

‘Oh.’

‘There is such a proposal, and I have been asked to make an unofficial report.’

‘Oh.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Right.’

Siân shrugged.

In the end, the bedroom had been too small to contain Merrily’s emotions. She came out of the shower room and dressed in a hurry: jeans, sweatshirt, trainers. Within ten minutes, she was at the foot of the stairs, sliding back the bolt on the front door of The Ridge, letting herself out into a breeze swollen with rain.

It wasn’t cold and, physically, she was feeling much better. Still slightly … well, not weak exactly, but a bit tender, a bit raw.

Oh, come on … very bloody raw.

The blowing rain was stinging Merrily’s face. Like the Bishop’s veiled threats.

Threats? From good old easygoing Bernie Dunmore? Could she possibly have misheard?

I don’t want to see your position prejudiced .

No. It wasn’t even subtle. It wasn’t veiled at all.

And she’d thought she knew him. Thought he was a friend. But a friend would have said, Come over and we’ll talk about this. There are some things I can’t say on the phone . He hadn’t said that. He hadn’t wanted to talk about it at all. There were other issues they needed to discuss. Of an administrative nature.

And if it was hard to fire an incompetent vicar, it was a lot less complicated to remove a deliverance consultancy from someone who tended to go beyond the brief .

The mist was lifting over the woods in the valley, the landscape forming in a watercolour wash as Merrily walked down the steps to the parking area and the intersecting footpaths, one up to the hill, one down to the church. Behind her the steep, tawny house was silent. Nobody about yet. No real need to be; she was the only guest, and she hadn’t exactly been demanding an early breakfast.

Maybe, by nine, she’d feel up to talking to people.

And then what?

She could go, on her own, to the Master House, suitably attired and equipped with holy water. A straightforward room-by-room blessing. An end to it. Or merely a reprieve, because Bernie Dunmore would know there’d be no easy retrieval of their old relationship.

On which basis, she might just as well ignore the bastard’s instructions and go in search of Sycharth Gwilym.

Angry now, but she cooled it. She unlocked the Volvo, reached behind the driving seat for her waterproof and then, on impulse, tossed it back and climbed in, switched on the engine and let the car slide away, down the hill.

Merrily drove slowly, although there was no other traffic around, not even a tractor or a quad bike. She was looking for a lay-by, a field entrance, a patch of grass verge wide enough to park on. She needed to sit alone somewhere. And listen.

… This sieve of our own needs, desires, fears … what we’re afraid they might really be saying. We’re processing the words, analysing. Our minds are taking an active role. We’re not listening .

In a service with no sermon, it had probably been the best sermon she’d delivered all year.

She needed to listen. She took a left turn, high hedges either side, trees still laden with a summerload of leaves. The point of the tower of Garway Church, with its bent cross, appeared over the trees.

Why not?

Weighted as it was with the density of the Templars, it was still a church, and Merrily wondered if it was open yet.

Never did find out, though, because that was when the dog ran in front of the car.

SHE’D PULLED HARD into the verge, a thorny hedge screeching against the Volvo’s side panels, its scratchy mesh compressed against the window. Finishing up in a cage of brambles, with a back wheel in a shallow ditch and the engine stalled.

Oh God, no …

She’d been travelling at well under thirty m.p.h., but the road was wet and the brakes were spongy. She’d slammed on and gone into a skid on the overflowing verge of grass and mud, letting go of the steering wheel as she was flung back into the seat, the frayed belt slipping and cutting into the side of her neck.

What was she doing in the bloody car, anyway? Driving off in a self-righteous fury. Resentment. Inflated self-esteem. They can’t treat me like this .

Releasing the belt, she inched painfully across the slanting seat, over the gear lever and the handbrake, to reach the passenger-door handle, pushing the door open.

Climbing out and staggering around to the front of the Volvo, Merrily went down on her knees, half-sick with dread, looking underneath.