Phil Rickman - The man in the moss

Or maybe I'll just throw up the shitburger I had near Carlisle.

'I'm sorry,' he said. 'That was unavoidable. Thing is, I do recognise him. His name is Frank. He was in the pub earlier, was pretty smashed.'

He certainly looks pretty smashed now,' Moira said, sounding harder than he liked to hear. He was shocked.

'He fell?' Looking up the steps, all slimy with something that stank.

'You could convince yourself of anything, Macbeth. OK, after you.'

'Up there?'

'Well, we're no' going back now.'

Oh, shit. Please. Get me outa here.

'OK. You stay down here, then. Wait for me.'

'No! Jesus. But, like, I mean, what if they're waiting for us?'

'There's nobody here, Macbeth.'

'How'd you know that?'

'I was… listening. And watching. And… you know.'

No, he didn't fucking know. But he wasn't going to make an issue of it. He went slowly up the metal steps. She stayed at the bottom, lighting his way, until he reached a blank wooden door.

He hesitated, looked back down the stairs at where the beam bounced off the white walls and cast a soft light on her. She looked smaller than he remembered inside this bulky duffel coat, too big for her by a couple of sizes. And yet she seemed strangely younger, without most of her hair.

Well, shit, of course he'd seen that, soon as he'd walked in out of the rain. It was the most awful mutilation, like slashing the Mona Lisa, taking the legs off of the Venus de Milo. It was a goddamn offence against civilization.

But was it self-mutilation? Was it like a novice nun cuts off, all her hair to give herself to Christ?

And this was why he'd never even mentioned it. This was why, Willie being in the car too, all he'd said to her by way of explanation for him being here was, 'The Duchess asked me to lookout for you.'

To which she'd made no reply.

Moira's face creased sympathetically now in the white light. 'Look, Mungo… fact is, if the sight of this poor guy made you chuck your lunch, you're not gonny find it too pleasant in there. There's no shame in that. Willie's pretty squeamish, too, which is why he was glad to go off in search the old schoolmaster guy. So… if you… what I'm saying is, this isn't your problem. You really don't have to put yourself through this.'

'And you do?'

'Yeah,' she said. 'I'm afraid I do. Me more than anybody."

He just stared down at her.

'Goes back nearly twenty years. This is the consequences of getting involved with Matt Castle.'

'He's dead.'

'Yeah,' Moira said.

Macbeth said, 'People here keep seeing his ghost. That's what they say. You believe that?'

'Yeah,' Moira said.

'What am I gonna find behind that door?'

'You don't ever have to know, Mungo. That's what I'm trying to tell you.'

'Aw, shit,' Macbeth said. 'The hell with this.' He scraped the hair out of his eyes, opened them wide and pushed open the door with his right foot.

Willie's youngest sister was in her dressing gown, making tea. 'Sleep through this weather? Not a chance. Our Benjie's messing about up there, too, with that dog. I've told him, I'll have um both in t'shed, he doesn't settle down.'

'Where's Martin?'

'Working up Bolton again. Takes what he can. Bloody Gannons.'

'Right,' Willie said. 'Well, if you can get dressed, our Sal. You've been re-co-opted onto t'Mothers.'

'Get lost, Willie. I told Ma years ago, I said I'll take a back seat from now on, if you don't mind, it's not my sort of thing.'

Aye, well, no arguing with that. Certainly wasn't her sort of thing these days. Sal's kitchen was half the downstairs now. Knocked through from the dining room and a posh conservatory at the back. Antique pine units, hi-tech cooker, extractor fan. All from when Horridges had made Martin sales manager, about a year before Gannons sacked him.

'Anyroad,' Sal said. 'Can't leave our Benjie. God knows what he'd get up to, little monkey.'

'Well, actually,' Willie said, 'I wouldn't mind getting the lad in as well. We're going to need a new Autumn Cross, a bit sharpish.'

'Be realistic. How can a child of his age go out collecting bits of twigs and stuff on a night like this?'

'Aye, I can!' Benjie shouted, bursting into the kitchen, already half-dressed, dragging on his wellies. 'I can, Uncle Willie, honest.'

'Get back to bed, you little monkey, if I've told you once tonight, I've…'

'Lay off, eh, Sal. We need everybody we can get.'

'Is this serious, Willie? I mean, really?'

Willie said nothing.

'What's in that briefcase?'

'This and that.'

'Uncle Willie,' said Benjie, 'T'Chief's been howling.'

'They're all howling tonight, Benj.'

'And t'dragon. T'dragon growed, Uncle Willie. T'dragon's growed.' When Milly caught Cathy's eye over the heads of the assembled Mothers they exchanged a look which said, this is hopeless.

Altogether there were seven of them squeezed into Ma's parlour, standing room only – although at least a couple were not too good on their pins and needed chairs.

'Susan!' Milly cried. 'Where's Susan?'

'Staying in with the little lad,' Ethel, Susan's mum, told her. 'Frank's not back. Likely on a bender. She won't leave the little lad on his own on a night like this.'

'Wonderful!' Cathy moaned. 'Hang on, what about Dee from the chippy? Needs must, Ethel.'

'She's had a shock, what with Maurice, she won't even answer the door.'

'Well, get somebody to bloody break it down. And if Susan's got to bring the kid along, do it, though I'd rather not. That'll be nine. Willie! How's it going? Any luck?'

'We found it, I think.' Willie came in clutching Mr Dawber's old briefcase. 'Here, make a bit of space on t'table.'

'How is he?'

'He's resting. Had a bit of a do wi' Shaw Horridge.' Willie was spreading out sheets of foolscap paper. 'Thank God for Mr Dawber, I say. Anything to do with Bridelow he collects. Whipped it off Ma 'fore she could put it back of t'fire.'

'Looks complicated.'

'It's not as bad as it looks. They're all numbered, see, and they join up, so we've got a complete map of t'village wi' all the key boundary points marked. Ma did um all barefoot. But that were summer. What you want is one woman at each, and each to take a new stone. Alf's got um ready for consecration, like, end of his yard.'

'How big are they, these stones?'

'Size of a brick, maybe half a brick. Some of um are bricks, come to think of it. Ma used a wheelbarrow.'

'We'll never do it,' Milly said in despair. 'Are you proposing to send old Sarah out to the top of Church Field with half a brick?'

'She could do one of the closer ones,' said Cathy. 'If you or I take the Holy Well…'

'We still haven't got enough.' Milly lowered her voice. 'And what kind of commitment we'll get out of half this lot I don't know. Ma was right. We've been hopelessly complacent. We let things slide. We haven't got a chance.'

'There's always a chance,' Cathy said, and even Willie thought her voice was starting to sound a bit frail. She was overtired, lumpy bags under her eyes, thin hair in rat's tails.

'What?' said Milly, approaching hysteria – and Willie had never seen that before. 'Against a feller who's spent half a lifetime stoking up his evil? Against that hideous girl? Against all them practising satanists?'

'They're idiots,' Cathy said. 'Any idiot can be a satanist.'

'Aye,' said Milly, 'and any idiot can make it work if they've got nowt to lose.'

'All right.' Cathy turned to Willie. 'How's Alf getting on?'

'Moaning,' Willie said. 'Reckons cement won't hang together wi' all the rain. Stan Burrows and them've fixed up a sort of a shelter for him. I told him, I says, you can do it again proper sometime, Alf, just make sure it sticks up tonight. I called in at Sal's, too, and young Benjie'll be along wi' a pile of stuff for a new cross. Reckon you can fettle it?'