Phil Rickman - The man in the moss

It was all over, though, as was usual, when he walked out across his garden, through the gate and into the churchyard

Half an hour before the evening service.

Now he was back in his study, listening to the leaves with the lights out. All he could see through the window was the reflection of two bars of the ineffectual electric fire.

When Judy, his wife, was alive there'd been a coal fire in the study every night from the end of September until the end of April.

The Rector was cold. Eleven years now since Judy's death. Where had all the warmth gone, the warmth which before had only increased with the drawing-in of the days? Where had the smiles gone, the smiles which lit the eyes while the mouths stayed firm?

And why, for that matter, had Ma Wagstaff's herbal preparation had so little effect this time on his arthritis?

He stood up, hobbled close to the window, cupped his hands to the pane and peered through.

At the garden's edge, a few graves lurched giddily on the slope, and then the church loomed like an enormous black beast. Lately, Hans Gruber had been wondering if life would not have been a good deal simpler in one of those modern churches, where one's main headache was glue-sniffing behind the vestry. Us and Them. Good and evil. God and Satan.

Hans thought, Wouldn't that be wonderful? After his wife had left, they'd wheeled Mr Castle's bed into a the ward where, unless anyone was brought in suddenly, he'd be alone, until…

'Until morning,' the young nurse whispered, reassuring herself.

Mr Castle was sleeping. She was glad; she was still afraid of people who were dying, who were in the actual process of it. She wasn't yet sure how to talk to them, how to look at them, and the awful suspense – what it would be like, the atmosphere in this small, comparatively quiet space, in the moment, the very second when it happened.

She was never going to get used to this. She was supposed to comfort the dying, but more often than not it was the dying who comforted her – old ladies, all skin and bone and no hair, patting her hand, one actually saying, Don't worry, luv, I won't keep you long.

Less bothered, it often seemed, than she was. Sometimes it was like they were just waiting for a bus.

She sat at the desk by the door, under the angled, metal-shaded lamp, the only light in the room. There were four beds in the side ward, three of them empty. It was the only part of this hospital where you could usually count on finding a couple of spare beds, it being the place where terminal patients were often brought in the final stages so they wouldn't distress other patients who were not quite so terminal.

Tamsin, the other nurse, a year or two older, was out on the main ward. Sister Murtry would pop in occasionally, see if they were all right.

Sister Murtry had been very firm with Mrs Castle, who was a tall, strong-looking woman – only Sister Murtry would have dared. 'Come on now, he needs his sleep and you need yours.'

… Mr Castle waking up suddenly and chuckling in a ghastly, strangled way when she said he needed sleep.

(She looked across now at his face on the pillow; his skin was like cold, lumpy, wrinkled custard. He wasn't so very old: fifty-seven, it said on his chart, not even elderly.)

'Will you be sure to…' Mrs Castle had been in the doorway. Sister Murtry's hands on her shoulders, pushing her out.

'Yes, I'll ring you myself if there's any change. But there probably won't be, you know… Just go and get your sleep, or we'll be seeing you in here too…'

She imagined Mrs Castle lying wide awake in a cold double bed, waiting for the phone to ring. The wind howling outside – they lived up by Bridelow Moor, didn't they? The wind always howled up there.

He was quite a famous man, Mr Castle. There'd been dozens of Get Well cards when he was in last year for tests and things. Dr Smethwick, the registrar, who was a folk music fan, had been thrilled to bits to have him in. 'Pioneer of the Pennine Pipes,' she remembered him saying, and Dr Bun had said, dry as a stick, 'Oh, he works for the Water Authority, does he?' And she'd rushed out, scared to giggle because she was still a student then, and Dr Smethwick was senior to Dr Burt.

Dr Smethwick had moved on, to a better job in Liverpool. Now there was nobody left who knew anything about Mr Castle or the Pennine Pipes. All he had tonight was her, and she was afraid of him because he was dying.

She wondered how many folk had died here, in this small space, over the years. Passed away, they still preferred you to say that to the relatives. She said it to herself.

Passsssed… awayyyy. Soft, like a breath of air.

She jumped. Mr Castle had released a breath of air, but it wasn't soft. It was… phtttt… like a cork popping out of a bottle or like a quiet fart (one of the regular noises of the night here).

'Mr Castle…?' Whispering, rising rapidly to her feet with a rustle of the uniform, bumping her head on the edge of the metal lampshade.

'All right, Mr Castle… Matt.' A hairgrip, dislodged by the lamp, fell to the desk, she felt her hair corning loose at the back. 'I'm here.'

But when she reached the bedside he was breathing normally again – well, not normal normal, but normal for a man who… for a man in his condition.

Holding her hair in place with one hand, the grip in her teeth, she went into the main ward to collect her mirror from her bag.

Plenty breathing out here, and snoring, and a few small moans, everything hospital-normal. Up the far end of the ward, Tamsin was bending over Miss Wately's bed. Miss Wately the retired headmistress who wouldn't be called by her first name, which was Eunice. Tamsin straightened up, saw her and raised a hand to her lips, tilting her head back as if the hand held a cup.

She nodded and smiled and pointed over her shoulder to the side ward, and Tamsin nodded and held up five fingers.

'Ger… yer owd bugger…' an old man rasped in his sleep. It was supposed to be a mixed ward but because of the attitude of patients like Miss Wately, the men tended to be at one end and the women at the other. Best, really, at their age.

No kimono-style dressing-gowns and baby-doll nighties on this ward.

She found the mirror, slipped it into her pocket, went back to the side ward and sat down, her eyes moving instinctively from bed to bed, four beds, all empty.

'Moira?'

All empty.

'Oh!' She spun round, her hair unravelling down below her shoulders.

He said, 'You've come then, eh?'

God help us, he was hanging over her… like bones in pyjamas.

'Mr Ca-'

What was holding him up? She'd seen his legs, his muscles, wasted, gone to jelly. Been in a wheelchair for weeks and weeks. They'd said to watch him, he might even die in the night, and here he was standing up, oh God, his lips all pulled back and frozen into a ric-rictus?

'Tarn…' trying to shout for the other nurse, but her voice was so dry the name just dropped out of her mouth like a piece chewing gum '… sin.' Hardly heard herself.

His eyes were far back in his head, black marbles, like the eyes had already died.

Then one of his hands reached out, it was all shrivelled and rigid, like a chicken's foot, and he started… he started playing with her hair, pulling it down and fingering it, looking down at it in his fingers, mumbling, Moira… Moira.

Eventually she managed to say, 'I'm not your wife, Mr…Mr Castle…'

But remembered Sister Murtry saying, 'Her name's Charlotte, I think.' And then, later, 'Come on, Charlotte, let's be having you, can't stay here all night. Not good for either of you.'

She couldn't move. The metal bars on the bed heads made hard shadows on the walls, the little ward was like a cage. If only Sister Murtry would come now, bustling in, short and dynamic. Nobody Sister Murtry couldn't handle.