Phil Rickman - The Wine of Angels

‘Feel free to be human.’

‘Thanks.’ Merrily gratefully extracted the Silk Cut.

‘Agonizing.’ Miss Devenish regarded her intently as she lit up. ‘The need to agonize. That’s very interesting. I wonder, would your predecessor have said the same?’

‘Alf Hayden?’

‘Faced with any moral challenge, the dreadful Hayden would simply erect the screen of buffoonery and vacuous twittering that’s sustained the Anglican clerical tradition for the past fifty years.’

Merrily laughed, the smoke softening her up, the sun warm on her face and arms. ‘You’re a cynic, Miss Devenish.’

‘So perhaps the ordination of women will be the salvation of the Church. Women listen. Women worry. Call me Lucy. Listen, my advice, for what it’s worth, is to let it happen. Let the awful Coffey have his play.’

The face was shaded by the big hat and the eyes were invisible. The hands lay placidly where the hem of the poncho met a baggy frock splattered with sunflowers.

Merrily was cautious. ‘Why do you say that? I mean, Cassidy, for one, would be glad to hear you say it, but—’

‘Good heavens, whichever way it goes, Cassidy’s screwed, isn’t he? The festival needs Coffey for artistic credibility, but it needs Bull-Davies ... well, not for money any more, obviously, but certainly for the use of land for marquees and car parking. And also, more importantly, because Bull-Davies is the voice of the county set, and those buggers still stick together – more than ever, in adversity. Cause offence in that quarter and all kinds of barriers are erected. No, I shall enjoy watching Cassidy squirm. May even poke him with the occasional twig.’

Under the shadow of the hat, the lips twisted with a happy malice.

Merrily sighed. ‘So you think the play’s going to be valid.’

‘What?’ The hat came off to reveal a steel-grey plait in a tight coil and a fierce cobalt glare. ‘Valid? I think the whole concept is absolute cock.’

‘Then I don’t understand.’

‘Frolicking in the orchard with naked youths? Utter tosh. And yet the poor man was misjudged, I’m sure of that. Friend of Traherne’s, you see. Not a poet, unfortunately, but were his perceptions any less keen for that?’

‘So what are you saying? Was Williams a witch?’

‘Was Traherne a witch?’

‘Of course he wasn’t.’

‘Really? You’re sure of that?’

This was getting silly. ‘I wouldn’t claim to know much about him, but people who do tell me he saw God in everything.’

‘Quite.’ Lucy Devenish stood up, jammed on her hat.

Merrily followed her as she stalked down the footpath, across the sloping field towards the village. ‘You still haven’t explained ...’

Lucy carried on walking, with long strides.

‘... why you think the play should go ahead in the church,’ Merrily said, out of breath now.

‘Why? For the truth, of course. Nobody cares about truth any more. Coffey doesn’t care – he just wants to mangle history for his own purposes. Cassidy doesn’t care – he sees the past as a marketing tool. Bull-Davies cares, of course, but only about his personal heritage, his reputation. His family have doubtless been distorting the truth for generations.’

‘But we don’t know what the truth is. ’

‘No.’ The old girl stopped. They were on low ground now. Ledwardine had sunk into the trees so that only the steeple was visible, like a rocket waiting to be launched. ‘But when the ditchwaters are stirred, the turds often surface.’

‘Just don’t tell me,’ Karl said, ‘that you don’t miss it.’

A pigeon, disturbed, battered its way out of the hedge and flew up past the open window.

Lol was silent. Sitting in the blue chair with the cat on his knees. Being himself. A sad person.

‘Well, then?’ Karl looked around the room again, at the few cheap things in it. ‘Well?’

‘I’m doing what you said,’ Lol said desperately. ‘Not telling you I don’t miss it.’

‘Nah. You’re not being honest with yourself, son.’

Karl was leaning back in Ethel the cat’s chair, with one of the three cans of half-frozen lager Lol had found at the back of the fridge. He had his tobacco tin on the arm of the chair, the tin which had upset Dennis Clarke because it was not the drug of choice in his part of Chippenham. As he relaxed, another drug – California – had drifted into Karl’s accent.

‘This guy in LA, right? I hadn’t been there very long, and he was another Brit. Ex-para. Bodyguard to the stars now. Big bucks. We get pissed one night. I’m saying, So this is living, right? He gives me a funny look. Sour. He says, This is cruisin’, man, living it ain’t. He says, You wanna know the last time I was really alive? Port Stanley, he says. Or it might’ve been Goose Green. Back in the Falklands War, anyway. The last time his senses were really buzzing. I didn’t believe it. But like I say, I hadn’t been in Hollywood very long.’

Karl drained the can, crushed it with feeling.

‘What am I saying, son? I’ll tell you. His time in the Falklands was like our times on the road, gigging. The buzz, right? On stage, a little pissed, high on your own music, and the thought of—’

‘No! Bollocks.’

‘Listen, a year ago, I played bass for two nights with a band called APB, from Santa Monica. I was older than any of those guys, by a good twelve years. But it was still there, son. By Christ, it was there. Afterwards ...’

Afterwards. Was that what Dennis Clarke’s letter was saying in its cautious, accountantly way? Was that what had really offended the neat, suburban Mrs Gillian Clarke – Karl going on about the good old days of hot nights and tender young flesh? Lol tried to switch off Karl’s voice, summoning Traherne. Your enjoyment of the world is never right till you awake in heaven, till you ... till you look upon the earth ... no ... till you look upon the skies, the earth and the air as celestial joys ...

‘... tell you, I coulda gone on all night. Incredible. Left my brains all over the bedroom ceiling, yeah?’

Lol’s fingers tightening on Ethel’s scruff; Ethel purred. You never enjoy the world aright till the sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens and crowned with the stars ... and ... and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world ... and ...

‘... stayed in Hereford last night. This morning, I’m in Andy’s, browsing through the albums, and – I’m not kidding, son, this was like a mystical experience – these two young girls, sixteen, seventeen, black stockings, skirts up to here. Combing the racks – obviously not got a bundle to spend – pick one up, study it, put it back, have arguments. Finally, they come up with one CD. One says, Look, it’s midprice, too. Guess what it was ... Guess —’

The world ... the world is a mirror of infinite beauty yet no man sees it. It is a Temple of Majesty, yet no man ...no man regards it. It is a region of Light and Peace ... it is ... it is ... it is ...

‘The reissue. I just wanted to kiss their little feet. Christ, if this wasn’t a sign ... They probably weren’t even born when we did that album. Their mothers had safety pins through their nipples and thought we were soft shit. Now, after all these years, we are becoming warm. Our time has come, son. It’s all turned around. Our ... time ... has ... fucking come. And I will not be deprived of it by someone whose balls are made of blancmange. You follow?’

Jane moved a little closer to the open window. Thanks to Lol’s inactivity in the garden, she was sure she wasn’t visible from the lane, but, Jesus, she’d nearly fainted when that pigeon crashed out of the hedge.