Phil Rickman - The Chalice

'The day will soon come, woman, when the only sanctuary to be found will be at the bosom of the Goddess. You know that we have to take full control of the spiritual life and welfare of this community. And soon. As for you…'

Ceridwen appraised Juanita, head to toe, like a fashion-shop manageress sizing up a customer. Or an undertaker estimating the amount of wood it would take for the coffin.

'… your time is close, woman. You have to come to terms with it. It'll happen sooner than you dread.'

'Are you threatening me''

'Oh, Juanita.' Ceridwen laughed. 'I mean the hot flushes. Have you had the hot flushes yet? There are, as we say, three aspects of the Goddess. The virgin. The Mother. And…'

'Piss off,' said Juanita.

'And the crone.' Ceridwen placed her cup and saucer on the arm of the chair. 'The hag.' She stood up, stately and mature and wise.

'The last transition for a woman', she said gently, 'can be a wonderful and fulfilling time, full of enlightenment. If you are on the Path. A time of wisdom and reflection. And latent power.'

She paused. Her large bosom swelled under the tight gabardine.

'But it can also be a time of disillusion and decay, constantly chilled by the draught of death. It you reject the Goddess inside you.'

Juanita found she'd backed into the doorway. The bitch. The fucking bitch.

'That's what they said about HRT,' she said lightly and was gratified to see Ceridwen's face darken.

'Come, Domini,' Ceridwen said.

Juanita stayed in the doorway. 'Where are you taking her? Tony's in the shop.'

'Packing, I trust,' said Domini.

'We're going to a place of sanctuary,' Ceridwen said. 'Let us through, please.'

'Wanda's house?'

Ceridwen didn't reply. The actress's elegant town house had been virtually taken over by the bloody Cauldron. It had endless bedrooms: they would put Domini in one, surrounded by candles and ministering angels and the brainwash would be complete.

Bollocks to that.

'Why don't you stay here, Domini?' Juanita closed the parlour door, her back to it, both hands around its handle behind her. 'Take some time, think about it. You've a lot to lose. Tony's a decent guy.'

'I've been trying to tell her…' Diane said, as Ceridwen came forward, very much the nursing sister advancing down the ward. Briskly, she closed in on Juanita, rapidly detaching her hands from the door handle, taking Juanita's hands in each of hers and bringing them tightly together.

Grey coils of hair settled around the broad, coarse face, looking down on Juanita's. It had all happened very quickly, Juanita flinched, half-expecting the woman to hit her, but when she spoke it was the voice of Ruth Dunn again, the firm but kindly nurse.

'You silly, silly woman. I think you're really quite unstable. I think you need counselling.' Ceridwen putting on a show of strength and sanity for Diane and Domini.

She was a much larger woman than Juanita, built for holding down distressed patients in the night. The grip was stronger than it looked.

'Oh, it's understandable,' Ceridwen said, the voice of experience. 'You're frustrated and depressed by your loss of belief. And by Diane's youth, because yours has gone. You're afraid that, before you know it, another twenty five years will have passed and you'll look into the glass and your face will be the face of…'

She raised her heavy eyebrows.

'…Verity Endicott.'

Positioning both of Juanita's hands away from her body, moulded together, palm to palm, like an old-fashioned teacher showing a child how to pray.

'What lovely, slender hands you still have,' she said almost tenderly, and Juanita was suddenly and irrationally scared that her palms might be fused together forever.

'But you're afraid, I think, that beneath the silky, brown skin which, sadly, now caresses only books…'

Juanita saw a splinter of spite in Ceridwen's eyes.

'…are an old woman's curling claws.'

'Let me go.' Juanita felt a coldness under her heart. 'How dare you? How fucking dare you?'

After a long moment, Ceridwen smiled, relaxed and let both Juanita's hands fall away like a discarded pair of silk gloves.

As the two women left, Domini smirking, Juanita felt sick and humiliated. Like Jim Battle after his Execution.

At first, she couldn't feel her hands at all. Self-consciously she rubbed her palms together to restore the circulation, experiencing a moment of relief followed by a palpitating insecurity. And a creeping, bitter shame.

Diane went to shut the shop door.

'No.' Juanita walked out on to the pavement. 'I need some air.'

It was gone midnight. The street was deserted, not even one of those stoned guitar-and-bongo duos under the church wall. The very air felt thin and exhausted, used up by lungs involved in excess panting and screaming and sighing. The town was full of madness tonight.

She walked across the street to the war-memorial, a good twenty feet high and carved like a Celtic cross. Iron railings separated it from St John's churchyard. Juanita leaned against the railings, pulled out her cigarettes.

'We've got problems here,' she said as Diane joined her.

'Look', Diane stared down at her trainers on the first step of the memorial, 'what she said. That was awful. Cruel. But…'

'But true,' Juanita said. 'It wouldn't have been cruel otherwise. I've looked at Verity Endicott more than once and thought, yeah, that'll be me one day. Toddling round the town with my shopping bag when all the shops have closed.'

'That's not what I meant. You're not remotely like Miss Endicott. I hope I look like you when I'm…'

'Forty-something.'

'I wish I looked like you now.'

'Oh, shut up, Diane.' Juanita lit a cigarette. 'Listen, we really have a problem. Nothing to do with that woman.'

'I wish you hadn't offended her.'

'Oh for God's sake… Diane, that boy, Headlice…'

Diane went still.

'He's dead,' Juanita said. 'I'm sorry to tell you like this. It was in tonight's paper. They found his body in an abandoned bus in a wood at Stoke St Michael.'

Diane stared across the street as if it were a distance of several miles.

'He had head injuries,' Juanita said. 'It has to be him because of…you mentioned a swastika.'

'On top of his head.'

'The police are suspicious. You know what that means, don't you?'

Diane put her arms around the stem of the Celtic cross. Her shoulders shook.

'They're appealing to anyone with pertinent information to come forward. Which probably includes anyone who might have seen the boy having his head kicked in by their father's farm manager.'

Diane laid her cheek against the stone.

'Diane?'

'Was it his own bus? That he was found in?'

'It was a black bus.'

Diane nodded.

'I really think you need to go to the police,' Juanita said. 'Tomorrow. I'll come with you.'

'They wouldn't believe me.' Diane's voice was tiny. 'My father would say I'd made it all up. He'd tell them I was unbalanced. Just like he always does.'

'They'd still have to check it out.'

But she was right. Juanita sighed. Lord Pennard and Rankin had had a whole day to make provisions for this incident getting out. They'd have something ready, some watertight story. Especially now the boy was dead. Also, Pennard would undoubtedly have connections at chief constable level and beyond. And with Archer's political career on the line and all it represented in terms of the future wealth and influence of the House of Pennard, there was nothing they wouldn't do.

'Listen, I'll get Jim to look after the shop. While we go to the police station.'

Of course, she'd have to promise Jim first that nothing would come out about the Execution. What a can of worms.

'They'll ask why I didn't report it before,' Diane said. 'Because you didn't know the boy was dead.' She put a hand on Diane's shoulder. 'Come on, Diane Fortune. I'll make us some hot chocolate.'