Phil Rickman - The man in the moss

At which point, somebody asked, as somebody was bound to, whether Matt and his old band would get together in Bridelow.

'Good point,' Matt accepted. 'Well, me old mucker Willie's here, Eric's not far off. And I'm working on a bit of a project which might just interest… well, somebody we used to work with… eeeh, must be fifteen years ago. Late 'seventies.'

Everybody listening now, not a chink of bottle on glass or the striking of a match. Outside, the sun was just a rosy memory.

Matt broke off. 'Hey up. For them as can't see, Lottie's giving me a warning look, she thinks I should shut up about this until we know one way or t'other…'

Lottie smiled wryly. Ernie Dawber was thinking, What the 'eck was her name, the girl who used to sing with Matt's band and then went off on her own? Very popular, she used to be, or so he'd heard.

'But, what the hell,' Matt said. 'If I'm going to do this right, I'll need your help. Fact is… it was this business of the bogman got me going. Lottie reckons I've become a bit obsessed. He laughed self-consciously. 'But the thing is… here we are, literally face to face with one of our forefathers. And it's my belief there's a lot he can teach us…'

Ernie Dawber felt Ma Wagstaff go still and watchful by his side.

'I mean about ourselves. About this village. How we relate to it and each other, and how we've progressed. There's summat special about this place, I've always known that.'

Moira Cairns, Ernie remembered. That was her name. Scottish. Very beautiful. Long, black hair.

'Right.' Matt bawled back over his shoulder, into the bar. 'Let's have a few lights on. Like a flamin' mausoleum in there.'

Ma Wagstaff stiffened and plucked at Ernie's jacket. The sun wasn't ever going to get out of that low cloud, he thought. Won't know till tomorrow if it's made it to the hills or if the Moss has got it.

'By 'eck,' he said ruefully, as if his fanciful thoughts were printed on the misting, mackerel sky where Ma Wagstaff could read them, 'I'm…'

'Getting a bit whimsy?'

Ernie laughed through his discomfort. She made it sound like a digestive problem.

'Not before time,' Ma said. 'Never any talking to you when you was headmaster. Jumped-up little devil. Knew it all – what teacher ever don't? Still… better late than not. Now then, Ernest Dawber, I'll try and teach thee summat.'

He let Ma Wagstaff lead him away to the edge of the forecourt, from where terraced stone cottages plodded up to the high-towered church, a noble sentinel over the Moss.

'What do you see?'

'This a trick question, Ma?'

Now, with the sun gone, all the houses had merged. You couldn't tell any more which ones had fresh paintwork, which had climbing roses or new porches. Only a few front steps stood out, the ones which had been recently donkey-stoned so they shone bright as morning.

'To be honest, Ma, I can't see that much. Can't even see colours.'

'What can you see, then?'

'It's not light,' Ernie said, half-closing his eyes, "and it's not dark. Everything's melting together.

'Go on.'

'I can't see the individual houses. I suppose I can only see the people who live in them. Young Frank and Susan and the little lad. Alf Beckett. Millicent Gill at the Post Office…Gus Bibby, Maurice and Dee at the chip shop. And I suppose… if I look a bit harder…'

'Aye, you do that.'

'If I look harder I can see the people who lived in the house before…The Swains – Arthur Swain and his pigeons. Alf Beckett's mother, forty-odd years a widow. I can bring them all back when I've a mind. Specially at this time of day. But that's the danger, as you get older, seeing things as they were, not as they are.'

'The trick' said Ma, 'is to see it all at same time. As it was and as it is. And when I says "as it was" I don't just mean in your lifetime or even my lifetime. I mean as far back as yon bogman's time.'

Ernie felt himself shiver. He pushed the British Museum papers deeper into his inside pocket. Whatever secret knowledge of the bogman Ma possessed, he didn't want to know any more.

Ma said, 'You stand here long enough, you can see it all the way back, and you won't see no colours, you won't see no hard edges. Now when you're out on t'Moss, Brid'lo don't look that welcoming, does it? All cold stone. You know that, you've written about it enough. But it's not cold to us, is it? Not when we're inside. No hard edges, no bright colours, never owt like that.'

'No.'

'Only shades. Ma said, almost dreamily. 'Them's what's kept this place the way it is. Shades of things '

'Shades?'

'Old colours all run together. No clashes. Know what I'm telling you, Ernest?'

'Harmony?' Ernie said. 'Is that it? Which is not to say there's no bickering, or bits of bad feeling. But, fundamentally, I s'pose, Bridelow's one of those places where most of us are happy to be. Home. And there's no defining that. Not everybody's found it. We're lucky. We've been lucky.'

'Luck?' Something was kindling behind Ma's eyes. Eighty-five if she was a day and still didn't need glasses. 'Luck? You don't see owt, do you?' Ernie'd had glasses full-time since he was thirty-five. 'What's it got to do wi' luck?'

'Just a figure of speech, Ma.'

'Balls,' said Ma. 'Luck! What this is, it's a balancing act. Very complicated for t'likes of us. Comes natural to nature.'

Ernie smiled. 'As it would.'

'Don't you mock me, Ernest Dawber.

'I'm sorry, Ma.' She was just a shade herself now, even her blue beret faded to grey.

'Beware of bright, glaring colours,' she said. 'But most of all, beware of black. And beware of white.'

'I don't know what you mean…'

'You will,' said the little old woman. 'You're a teacher.' She put a hand on his arm. 'Ernest, I'm giving you a task.

'Oh 'eck '

'You've to think of it as the most important task you've ever had in your life. You're a man of learning, Ernest. Man wi' authority.'

'Used to be, Ma. I'm just a pensioner now…' Like you, he was going to say, then he noticed how sad and serious she was looking.

'Get that man back.'

'Who?' But he knew. 'How?' he said, aghast.

'Like I said, Ernest. Tha's got authority.'

'Not that kind of authority, for God's sake.' Nobody there. He swallowed. Nobody. Not in or near the bus shelter.

It was on his nearside, which was no good, he might get hurt, so he drove further along the road, reversing into someone's drive, heading back slowly until he could see the glass-sided shelter, an advertisement for Martini on the end panel, lit up like a cinema screen in the headlights: a handsome man with wavy hair leaning over a girl on a sofa, topping up her glass.

He was mentally measuring the distance.

What am I doing! What am I bloody doing?

I could park it just here. Leave it. Walk away. Too far, anyway, for her to hear the impact.

In his mind he saw Therese standing by the telephone kiosk, about to phone for a taxi. In his mind she stopped. She was frowning. She'd be thinking what a miserable, frightened little sod he was.

He could say there had been somebody in the bus shelter, two people. Get angry. Was he supposed to kill them? Was he supposed to do that?

But she would know.

He stopped the car, the engine idling. The bus shelter had five glass panels in a concrete frame. The glass would be fortified. He would have to take a run at it, from about sixty yards.

If he didn't she would know.

He remembered the occasions she'd lost her temper with him. He shivered, stabbed at the accelerator with the car in neutral, making it roar, clutching the handbrake, a slippery grip. Too much to lose. Gritting his teeth until his gums hurt.

Too much to lose.

And you'll feel better afterwards.

Took his foot off. Closed his eyes, breathed rapidly, in and out. The road was quiet now, the hedges high on either side, high as a railway embankment.