Phil Rickman - The Chalice

This one was much bigger. It had foot-high black letters on luminous yellow paper, pasted the full width of the window right at the top, where you couldn't hope to reach it from outside. Whoever had done this must have had ladders. Or maybe parked a van on the pavement and stood on its roof.

The sign said, THEAVALOONIAN IS HERE.

'It's all right.'

'Oh please… please, no… I won't tell any… Oh, no… no, please don't…'

'Shhhhhhh.'

'No! Get away from me! You dis-'

'Open your eyes, Diane. You're safe. Nobody's going to do anything to you.'

She opened her eyes. Into other eyes. Shut them in panic.

'Take it easy. You're all right.'

'Oh. Oh gosh.'

'You see?'

'Have they…?'

'Gone. Yes they have. They wouldn't tangle with me. Diane, my dear, you're trembling horribly.'

Light from the tin-shaded bulb sprayed down on her.

Her relief turned it into golden tinsel.

'They were going to rape me.'

'I do believe they were,' said Ceridwen.

Juanita ran up the stairs with her coat flapping and her useless gloved hands held out in front of her like fins.

'Diane? Diane!'

Joe Powys followed, doing what Juanita couldn't, tossing doors open, smacking lights on.

He found her standing in the middle of the upstairs living room. She looked about to faint. He made her sit down.

'She's not here, Powys. Where is she? Why isn't she here?'

'Oh hey, she could be anywhere. She's working flat out on The Avalonian. Goes to meetings and things. Teaches correspondents how to write shorter paragraphs.'

'Well, she can't have been here when whoever it was put that sign up.'

'They could have done it in the last few minutes. Anytime. These Glastonbury First guys move fast. What's more, nobody seems to stop them.'

'How do you know it's them?'

'I don't. But I can't think who else would want to discredit Diane. On the other hand, none of the Glastonbury First people I've met struck me as clever enough to think of that one.'

He helped her take off her coat and she sat there looking lost in the absurdly festive Aztec-pattern skin and the lemon-coloured, off-the-shoulder top. Her face was white.

Powys had never been up here before. It was cozy; dense-pile carpet, many bookshelves; between them, paintings of luminous, twilight skies. Jim Battle.

'Let me moisten your lips. There. Better? lie back on the sofa. That's it.'

'Where is this place?'

'A sanctuary.'

It was dark and warm. She could smell something musty but not unpleasant, not quite incense. Domini Dorrell-Adams and the angular woman, Jenna, had picked them up in a car. She vaguely remembered going through backstreets and across the car park.

Didn't remember arriving because she'd collapsed against Ceridwen, in shuddering tears, on the back seat of the car.

Remembering Darryl Davey, his copper-wire hair, his buck teeth, his penis out. Better than a tube of Smarties, my lover.

'… terrible ordeal, Diane.'

'They… He put his…'

'But he's gone.'

'Yes.'

'Drink this.'

'What is it?'

'Only herbs.'

'It's sweet.'

'It's for shock. Drink it slowly. My, you've lost weight, Diane.'

'Don't seem to have had time for meals.'

'You need looking after. Shouldn't be on your own. Certainly not tonight.'

'No. I mean, I'll be OK.'

'Comfortable?'

'Mmmm. Thank you. Where's…where is this?'

'You've been here before, haven't you, Diane?'

'I don't think so.'

'It's Wanda's temple.'

'Oh.' She almost smiled. When she was up in Yorkshire, Juanita had sent her a two-page picture spread from Hello! magazine. It had said, Dame Wanda Carlisle, newly adopted into the Pagan Faith, receives us in her Home Temple in Mystical Glastonbury. The actress had been photographed in Egyptian costume. There'd been no mention of 'The Cauldron'.

'Diane, listen to me.' Ceridwen's voice so close she could feel the warm breath on her cheek. 'I've dealt many times with this situation. If you're alone, you won't sleep. You won't feel secure. You know they know you can identify them. You'll feel so much safer here. There are plenty of rooms. And we shall watch over you.'

'Honestly, I…' She tried to lift her head from the soft cushion. It felt so incredibly heavy.

'Which brings us to the question of the police. Do you think we should call them? I think perhaps we should. Especially if one of the attackers works for your father…'

'Gosh, no. Please.'

'Unfortunately, I didn't see them do anything. They scattered when they saw me advancing. I could testify that they were there, of course. I know the rest would be your word against theirs, but…'

'No, really. My father mustn't know. That above all. Please don't tell the police. I don't think I could face it. I don't think I could summon the strength. I just feel, you know, so awfully tired.'

'Diane, I know you 're there. Will you at least do me the common courtesy of returning my calls…?'

There were nine messages on the answering machine down in the shop. Most of them from Lord Pennard.

'Yes, well, not calling him back was the most sensible thing she could do under the circumstances,' Juanita said. 'His family have been pushing people around for centuries, and Diane's easy. If he gets to speak to her, he gets what he wants.'

'She does seem a bit malleable,' Powys said. 'For an upper-class rebel.'

'She's not a rebel, she… she's been pushed around all her life. Father, Archer, nannies… even the so-called Third bloody Nanny… That's your rebellion.'

'DF?'

'Right.' Juanita accepted a cigarette in her lips. 'Thanks.'

There was a different tone to Pennard's final message.

' Diane, this is difficult for me…'

Juanita snorted smoke.

'… I should have talked to you properly that night…'

'Old bastard should have talked to her properly from when she was a kid,' Juanita said.

'… but we were both somewhat overwrought. I know what I did was high-handed. I'm sorry. I beg of you to telephone me at the earliest possible…'

'He can sound very plausible sometimes. If the chainmail gauntlet doesn't work, slip on the white evening gloves.'

'Shush,' Powys said. 'This one sounds interesting.'

'… Mrs Shepherd in Coln St Mary, Gloucestershire. I understand you have had dealings with my late husband…'

Juanita went still. 'Late?'

'… who before he died was most perturbed that you had not contacted him after promising you would.'

'Oh my God,' said Juanita. 'He rang up the night before the fire. I'd forgotten all about it. I promised to go and see him, pick up some…'

'… papers, documents which, when I was sorting through his effects, I realised should have been collected by you. I have made several attempts to telephone you and I now merely wish to say that I am sending the package by courier to Miss Endicott at Meadwell. If you wish to collect them from her, that will be in order. Thank you'

'Oh, shit.' Juanita extracted the cigarette, using the tips of her fingers. 'I should have gone over there the day I woke up in hospital. I don't think I've thought about it from that moment to this. Now the poor old boy's dead. He sounded awful, thinking about it, really ill That's another one I've let down.'

'Oh, come on,' Powys said. 'Like you were supposed to ask the ambulance driver to take you to Bristol via Gloucester?'

'I wouldn't feel so bad if I'd even thought about him, just once.'

'Diane…Diane, it's Woolly…'

'Oh God, here we go.'

'…got to talk. I'm at the end of…Oh fuck, we just got to talk…I'm at home. Please call me when you can. Please.'

'There you are.' Powys said. 'That's where she's gone.'