Phil Rickman - Midwinter of the Spirit

‘Go on, do it!’

Rowenna? Jane heard Rowenna’s voice again from yesterday. Death can also just mean the end of something before a new beginning . She saw Rowenna pointing her knife across the table… Lord Satan, take me! … the Tower struck by lightning, people falling out of the crack… a long way down, on to the hard, cold stone floor.

Jane felt very afraid. Must get up . She opened her eyes once and saw, in a lick of light, another face right under her own, with dead stone eyelids.

They’d laid her out on one of the effigies.

She tried to lift her head from that stone face. But she couldn’t, felt too heavy, as if all the stones of St Thomas’s tomb were piled on top of her. Then the candlelight went away, as they pushed her further down against the stone surface. She felt stone lips directly under hers.

‘Never go off on your own with an exposed flame,’ Rowenna said. ‘It’s bad news, kitten. Night-night then.’

A stunning pain on the back of her head and neck.

Time passed. No more voices.

Only smoke.

Smoke in her throat. Her head was full of smoke – and words. And Mum whispering…

Let me not run from the love that You offer

But hold me safe from the forces of evil .

But Mum was not here. It was just a mantra in her head.

‘Thank God for that,’ George Curtiss grunted from the pulpit, as the lights came back on.

There was laughter now in the nave – half nervous, half relieved – as George’s words were picked up by the suddenly resensitized microphone.

‘Well, ah… we don’t know what caused this, but it was most unfortunate, very ill timed. However, at least, ah… at least it demonstrates to our Boy Bishop that the life of a clergyman is not without incident.’

The Boy Bishop stood, head bowed, beneath the edge of the corona, in front of the central altar itself. Mick Hunter stood behind him, one hand on the boy’s shoulder.

‘We’d like to thank you all for being so patient. I realize some of you do need to get home…’

Merrily stood in the aisle, near the back of the nave, looking around for Jane, and very worried now. This is all that matters, isn’t it? This is all there is .

Something was wrong. Something else was wrong. The power seemed to be restored, but there was something missing. A dullness lingered – a number of bulbs failing to re-function, perhaps. The round spotlights in the lofty, vaulted ceiling appeared isolated, like soulless security lamps around an industrial compound.

‘It’s been suggested,’ George said, ‘that we now carry on with the ceremony, with the prayers and the Boy Bishop’s sermon, but omit the final hymn. So, ah… thank you.’

And no warmth either. The warm lustre had gone from the stones; they had a grey tinge like mould, their myriad colours no longer separated.

George Curtiss stepped down.

An air of dereliction, abandonment, deadness – as though something had entered under the cover of darkness, and something else had been taken away.

Dear God, don’t say that .

Under her cloak, the cross drooped from Merrily’s fingers, as the choir began – a little uncertainly, it sounded – with a reprise of the plainsong which had opened the proceedings.

Sophie had appeared at her side. ‘What happened?’

‘Sophie, have you seen Jane?’

‘I’m sorry, no. Merrily, what did Michael say to you?’

‘Basically he sacked me.’

‘But he can’t just—’

‘He can.’

She looked for the puddle of blood left by Mrs Lyden’s nosebleed. It was hardly visible, carried off on many shoes into the darkness outside.

‘Don’t give in, Merrily.’ Sophie said. ‘You mustn’t give in.’

‘What can I do?’

Mick had melted away into the shadows. James Lyden, Bishop of Hereford, was alone, sitting on his backless chair, notes in hand, waiting for the choir to finish.

‘I don’t like that boy,’ Sophie said.

The choristers ended their plainsong with a raggedness and a disharmony so slight that it was all the more unsettling. The sound of scared choirboys? By contrast, James Lyden’s voice was almost shockingly clear and precise and confident: a natural orator.

‘A short while ago, when I took my vows, the Lord Bishop asked me if I would be faithful and keep the promises made for me at my baptism.’

‘You must stop him,’ Sophie murmured.

‘I can’t. Suppose it… Suppose there’s nothing.’

‘Of course,’ James said, ‘I don’t remember my baptism. It was a long time ago and it was in London, where I was born. I had no choice then, and the promises were made for me because I could not speak for myself.’

Sophie gripped her arm. ‘ Please .’

‘But now I can .’ James looked up. Even from here, you could see how bright his eyes were. Drug-bright? ‘Now I can speak for myself.’

‘Don’t let him. Stop him, Merrily – or I’ll do it myself.’

‘All right.’ Merrily brought out the cross. It didn’t matter now what anyone thought of her. Or how the Bishop might react, because he already had. The worst that could happen…

No, the best – the best that could happen!

… was that she’d make a complete fool of herself and never be able to show her face in Hereford again. Or in Ledwardine either.

Untying the cloak at her neck, she began to walk up the aisle towards James Lyden.

As James noticed her, his lips twisted in a kind of excitement. She kept on walking. The backs of her legs felt weak. Just keep going. Stay in motion or freeze for ever .

Members of the remaining congregation were now turning to look at her. There were whispers and mutterings. She kept staring only at James Lyden.

Who stood up, in all his majesty.

Whose voice was raised and hardened.

Who said, ‘But, as we have all seen tonight, there is one who speaks more… eloquently… than I. And his name… his name is…’

‘ No! ’

Merrily let the cloak fall from her shoulders, brought up the wooden cross, and walked straight towards the Boy Bishop, her gaze focused on those fixed, shining, infested eyes below the mitre.

LOL WAS SEEING himself with Moon down below the ramparts of Dinedor Camp. They were burying the crow, one of his hands still sticky with blood and slime… for him, the first stain on the idyll. He saw Moon turning away, her shoulders trembling – something reawoken in her.

‘Did you ever watch her charm a crow?’ Anna Purefoy asked. ‘It might be in a tree as much as fifty, a hundred yards away, and she would cup her hands and make a cawing noise in the back of her throat. And the crow would leave its tree, like a speck of black dust, and come to her. I don’t think she quite knew what she was doing – or was even aware that she was going to do it until it began to happen.’

It fell dead at my feet. Out of the sky. Isn’t that incredible?

‘It was simply something she could always do,’ Tim added. ‘Further proof that she was very special.’

Lol glanced at the red-stained photograph of Moon over the fireplace. Not one he’d seen before; they must have taken it themselves. Athena White had told him how they would use photographs, memorabilia of a dead person as an aid to visualization.

He turned back to the Purefoys. ‘Why don’t you both sit down.’ He didn’t trust them. He imagined Anna Purefoy suddenly striking like a cobra.

‘As you wish.’ She slipped into one of the cane chairs. Tim hesitated and then lowered himself into the high-backed wooden throne.

‘After she was dead,’ Lol said, ‘you left out that cutting from the Hereford Times , like a suicide note. She’d probably never even seen it, had she?’