Phil Rickman - The Fabric of Sin

‘ Coming over, lass. I’ve things to clear in the morning, so it’ll be mid-afternoon .’

Huw seemed about to hang up, then came back.

‘ The bloke who cleared you for the Duchy. Nowt to worry about .’

Another silence, questions drifting like steam in the scullery’s sepia light. There was a soft tapping at the window; Merrily turned sharply.

‘ But don’t go near Dunmore yet ,’ Huw said.

‘You did say it didn’t matter what time,’ Lol said at the back door. ‘I’ve been back an hour, but you were obviously busy.’

‘Why didn’t you just come in ?’

They’d swapped keys months ago.

‘I thought I’d walk around for a bit.’

Maybe it was the light or the lateness, but he looked washed-out, stripped down, drained, as sorrowful and weary as Jesus in The Light of the World that still hung in the hall.

‘Do you want something to eat?’

‘No, thanks. Not hungry.’

‘You sure?’

‘I’m fine. Really.’

‘Come to bed, then,’ Merrily said.

SHE WAS AT the farm by eight-forty-five. Not a problem; Roxanne reckoned she’d been up since five. A wiry woman, early thirties, in a dark blue fleece and a baseball cap over curly hair already greying at the front. Out by the gate with two sheepdogs when Merrily drove in; now in the kitchen, clinking mugs, scraping toast.

‘You’ve just missed Paul, he’s taken the kids to school, then he’s got an appointment at the hospital, which always puts him in a bad mood. Very wary of the drugs, reckons your mate Mrs Morningwood does him more good. The doctors humour him on that score, and that makes him even madder.’

‘What, reflexology?’

‘Has it once a week now. Probably just as well he isn’t here, actually – you talk to him about the Gwilyms, it takes him the rest of the day to calm down. And he isn’t even family.’

The farmhouse was red brick and pebble-dash with bay windows downstairs. Built to function, two barns in front, no name displayed. The kitchen table was scrubbed pine, the coffee as bitter as Roxanne.

‘You know they brought Foot and Mouth into the valley in 2001? You know that, do you? Way to get rid of all your stock, clean up on the compensation. Well, a lot of unscrupulous farmers did it, but rarely anything so blatant. He made no secret of it, he wanted it, he embraced Foot and Mouth.’

‘You mean Sycharth Gwilym had his farm deliberately infected?’

‘Yeah, but try to prove it. Well, we did, we told the press, but the press wouldn’t use it. He’s a big man now, Sycharth, the King of Hereford. Most of his money’s in property and he wanted his stock gone, and he grabbed the opportunity and sod the rest of us. We had a lovely herd of Herefords, wiped out in an afternoon by the trigger-happy bastards from DEFRA. Paul cried. He stood out there and he cried. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction. I’m a Newton, I know what they are, the Gwilyms. Scum is what they are.’

Roxanne brought her coffee to the table, snatched off her baseball cap.

‘Adam put us in the picture about what you’re doing. I’ll be there, never fear. Well, it should be me. I’m the Newton, no way Paul should be put through that .’

‘It’s not meant to be an ordeal.’ Merrily spread some honey on a half-slice of toast. ‘Most people say they feel much better afterwards. Some people even …’

She didn’t like to mention the sense of healing. An occasional side effect of a cleansing and not necessarily restricted to residents of the affected property. But … too many false dawns in this household, you could tell.

‘I’m sorry,’ Roxanne said. ‘I didn’t mean you. Sycharth Gwilym. Always so considerate to Paul, opening doors, laying ramps. With a sneer on his face that he barely tries to conceal. Gives him a sick buzz. Or it did, when he thought we’d have to sell up and get out. So, yeah, I’ll do it, you can count on me, I’ll stand shoulder to shoulder with Adam Eastgate, and I’ll look Sycharth in his shifty eyes and I’ll pray to God for anything that remains of the Gwilyms to be eradicated from that house until the end of sodding time.’

‘Knows all the history, that girl,’ Mrs Morningwood had said when she came off the phone at seven-thirty a.m., ‘but you’ll need to keep her on track. All she really wants is to pour venom on the Gwilyms.’

Was the venom deserved? Rage could be inherited, the reasons for it long forgotten. Sins-of-the-fathers.

‘You know what this is about,’ Merrily said to Roxanne. ‘Some people refusing to work in the house.’

‘Poor bloke. I showed him round, the first time he came. He was all right, I thought.’

‘But did that make any sense to you? Why people were scared.’

‘Just the one person, I think?’

‘Maybe one more.’ The darkness of the inglenook, the crackle of bird bones, the face . She took a hit of the coffee. ‘Possibly.’

‘Well, I never lived there, obviously.’ Roxanne crunched toast. ‘My parents’d been over here for some years when I was born, so this is the only home I’ve ever known. But I know my mother was glad to move out of the place.’

‘You know why?’

‘Not really. When I was a kid, the times it was empty – between tenants – I always wanted to get inside, it looked so mysterious, like an old castle or something. But it was always kept locked up, and my mum told us it was dangerous. I mean falling slates and stuff. Then it would be let again, to some family – people with horses once – but they never stayed long. I remember one couple, the Rogersons, banging on the door one morning and the woman yelling, “You should’ve told us! Should’ve told us about it, we’d never have taken it.”’

‘You ever find out what had happened to them?’

‘Nope.’ Roxanne shook her head. ‘Wasn’t talked about in front of us kids. Any more than I’d talk about it in front of mine.’

‘They didn’t want to sell it?’

‘No, they didn’t. I suppose the farm was doing well, and it was an asset. Also, the Master House is in the centre of the land, and they didn’t want to sell any land. So there’d be access to organize, a road to put in, rights of way … and the Gwilyms were always hovering. They’d bought another farm – the one Sycharth has now – and the Master House was between us and them, and even if we’d sold it to someone else, what was to stop them selling it on to the Gwilyms?’

‘What’s to stop the Duchy doing the same?’

‘I don’t think they would. He doesn’t give up on things, the Prince, what I’ve heard.’

‘I wouldn’t really know. Was much said about what happened when it was leased to a commune?’

‘That was before my time, but I’ve heard there was a lot of drugs and wild parties. Oh … and I also remember, when I was little, some chap with a big beard coming to the house, saying he was researching a history of … I think it must’ve been the Templars, and could he have a look around the Master House? And my dad was quite rude. He said, “No, bugger off, we’ve had enough of all that.”’

‘So you heard that they were into the Templars. The commune.’

‘Must have.’

‘Did you ever hear any stories about treasure?’

‘What?’

‘Treasure being hidden at the Master House?’

‘Treasure?’ Roxanne laughed, pushing fingers through her curls. ‘If there was any suggestion of treasure at the Master House, you don’t think we’d’ve ripped the place apart to try and find it? The only thing they ever found, my dad used to say, was a priest’s hole, when he was a boy – there was a lot of persecution of Catholics around Garway. But that was completely empty, so they blocked it up again.’