Phil Rickman - The Cold Calling

Andy reached for his hand and he stood up shakily. He was wearing baggy trousers and, bizarrely, a string vest. He clasped her hand to his chest, as if to make sure she was flesh and blood.

‘I’m sorry, Marcus. Unforeseen circumstances. Everything OK?’

‘No.’ Pulling from his trouser pocket a chequered handkerchief the size of a small pillowcase. ‘No, it’s fucking not.’

‘What’s happened? Marcus?’

‘I’m sorry, it …’ Snatching off his glasses, wiping his eyes. ‘Andy, oh God, I think she’s dying on me.’

They heard the noise before they saw her. It was suddenly sickeningly familiar to Andy. Like very loud snoring.

She ran ahead. About six feet back from the monument, there was a low, wooden stockade-type fence, several rows of barbed wire strung over the top. But the wire was cut and hanging like briars. They climbed over the fence.

‘You brought her up here, Marcus?’

‘Course not. She bloody well brought herself up. Oh God, can you do something?’

‘OK. Just … you know … keep calm.’

‘Woke up early, knew something was wrong. She’d come down in the night, let herself into the barn and pinched these … look.’ Holding up a pair of rubber-handled wire-cutters. ‘She cut the fence. Can you believe it?’

Close up, the burial chamber looked like a huge, collapsed crab, the shell split as if someone had stood on it. The old woman was laid out along the damaged capstone like …

… like a sacrifice … Andy smothered the image.

Mrs Willis wore a bright green coat and a yellow woollen scarf. Her hair in a tight, white bun. The volume of her breathing sounding perversely healthy.

‘It’s a stroke,’ Andy said. ‘No question. I’m sorry.’

‘What I feared. Fuck.’ Marcus sighed. ‘Blood pressure. Why wouldn’t she see someone? Someone else .’

The old woman’s head was pillowed by Marcus’s folded tweed jacket. Eyes were closed, mouth open, tongue protruding. Spittle and mucus all round her lips and her chin.

‘Do we get her down, that’s the question, Marcus? Maybe not. She up here when you found her?’

‘Just as she is now.’

‘OK.’ Andy removed Mrs Willis’s glasses, handed them to Marcus. ‘We need to get her in the recovery position. Don’t want her choking, swallowing her tongue. Bobby, can you take … this is Bobby Maiden, Marcus, patient of mine. Easy now. On her side.’

She stepped back. Bars of bright crimson had appeared in the eastern sky like the elements in an electric fire. Marcus said, ‘Look … Anderson … can’t you … you know … do anything?’

‘Limited amount you can do for a stroke. We need to keep her still. Then we need an ambulance.’

‘How the hell’s an ambulance going to get up here?’

‘That’s their problem. You just go back to the house and call them, I’ll stay here.’

‘When I said do anything …’ Marcus stood up. ‘Look, you know what I meant …’

The sun had come out, full and round and red.

‘Aye, I know.’ Andy went to sit behind the old woman in the shelter of the stones, wiped her mouth with a tissue. Took the white head gently between her hands. ‘Come on, Annie, you can hold on.’

The sun was turning to gold. Andy lifted her face to it, closing her eyes, waiting for the warmth to enter through the centre of her forehead, travel down through the chakras, until her hands were burning.

Marcus said, ‘ What did you call her?’

‘Oh, Marcus,’ Andy said softly. ‘Old fool that y’are. You telling me it never occurred to you? The natural feeling she had for this place?’

‘Her name’s Joan,’ Marcus said stupidly. ‘Yes. Yes, it did occur to me, the way she just arrived, out of the blue. But Annie would be at least ninety. Mrs Willis can’t be that old. Can she?’

‘If she’d told you she was pushing ninety when she first came, would you have even considered taking her on?’

‘If she’d said she was Annie Davies, I’d have given her the Earth.’

‘You wouldnae have been able to keep it to yourself. Not for a day. And you’d’ve been on at her about it nonstop, questions, questions, questions. She didnae want the Earth.’

‘Oh my God.’ Marcus sat in his string vest, the sweat drying on his arms, staring down at Mrs Willis then up at the sun, his glasses misted. ‘She came here to die.’

‘She came to heal.’

‘No, I mean … here. She came up here to die at the Knoll. In the dawn.’

‘Aw, Marcus …’ Andy flexed her fingers in Mrs Willis’s hair. ‘How do we know what was going through her head?’

Andy’s hands still weren’t warm. She saw that Bobby Maiden had stepped between her and the sun. His face was deeply shadowed, but she could see the Sellotape was peeling away from his skin and he was holding the eyepatch in place.

He said, ‘How about we get her down from there?’

‘Bobby?’

‘Get her off the stone.’

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know why.’

‘He doesn’t understand,’ Marcus said. ‘She loves this place.’

Bobby turned away from them and the stones. He was trembling. He walked away down the side of the Knoll.

Andy said, ‘Go phone for an ambulance, Marcus. Please?’

‘Yes, of course. Yes. Sorry.’ Marcus scrambled to his feet. Behind him, the sun was full and round and red, like a bubble of blood. He looked down at Mrs Willis. ‘Oh God.’

‘Marcus … go.’

He didn’t look back. When he reached the bottom of the mound, Andy called out, surprised at the tremor in her voice.

‘Bobby, come here. Talk to me.’

He came over reluctantly, not looking at the stone, left hand clamped over his eyepatch.

‘I’m sorry. I don’t know why I said that. What do I know?’

‘Never mind what you know,’ Andy said. ‘This is no the damn crown court, what do you feel ?’

‘Cold. Sick.’ Gauze from the eyepatch was hanging down his cheek. ‘Frightened.’

‘Give me a hand with her. Take her legs.’

They lifted her. Bobby Maiden wouldn’t touch the stone. They laid her on the grass, Marcus’s jacket still under her head.

The sun was on the old woman’s face. Her eyes were open.

‘Annie? Can you hear what I’m saying?’

The eyes glared up at her.

‘Blink. Blink if you can hear me.’

Mrs Willis’s eyelids moved a fraction. Her skin was translucent, like tissue.

‘Annie,’ Andy said softly. ‘You feel better now? Off the stone? You feel better where you are?’

The blink was a long time coming, but when it came it was more pronounced, as if she’d been concentrating her energy.

Andy looked up at Bobby Maiden. Then across at the sun.

Her hands were feeling cold.

The sun was a lantern of hope, the land aglow. In the valley, the spire of St Mary’s church was tipped with gold. The birds were singing. And her hands felt cold.

One of the least understood aspects of shamanic work is soul-retrieval, in which the shaman journeys to retrieve the soul of a sick person, who may be near to death. It relates to the phenomenon of ‘soul loss’ experienced by so many people today.

John Matthews, The Celtic Shaman: a handbook .

Inside the body of the Old One, the Green Man awakes .

His muscles are stiffened and numbed after his long, foetal sleep. A rich, resinous, ancient life soaks his senses. It is a while before he understands where he is .