Phil Rickman - The man in the moss

They drove to a country pub and parked the Saab very noticeably under a window at the front, being careful to lock it and check the doors. He wondered how exactly she'd stolen it and obtained the keys, but he knew that if he asked her she would simply laugh at him.

In the pub, as usual, he couldn't prise his hungry eyes from her. She sat opposite him, wearing an old fox fur coat, demurely fastened to the neck. Shaw wondered if, underneath the coat, above (and inside) her black tights, she was naked.

With that thought, he felt his desire could lift their heavy, glass-topped, cast-iron table a good two inches from the floor.

'You could arouse the dead,' he said, almost without breath.

'Would you like to?' Therese's lips smiled around her glass of port.

'Pardon?'

'Arouse the dead?'

He laughed uncomfortably. Quite often she would say things, the meaning of which, in due course, would become devastatingly apparent. Later, two miles out of Macclesfield town, Shaw driving again, she said, 'All right, let's deal with this, shall we?'

'What?'

But she was already unzipping his trousers, nuzzling her head into his lap. He braked hard, in shock, panic and uncontainable excitement. 'Yes, Shaw,' she said, voice muffled, 'you can stop the car.'

'Somebody… somebody might see us… you know, somebody walking past.'

'Well,' Therese said, burrowing, 'I suppose somebody might see you…'

Five minutes later, while he was still shivering, she said, 'Now let's get rid of the car.' She had the interior light on, re-applying lipstick, using the vanity mirror. Her fur coat was still fastened. He would never know if she was naked underneath it.

'How are we going to get home?'

'Taxi. There's a phone box across the road. I'll ring up for one while you're dispensing with the car.'

A shaft of fear punctured his moment of relief. 'Disp…? How?'

'I seem to remember there's a bus shelter along here. What… about a quarter of a mile…? Just take it and ram it into that.'

He just stared at her. Through the windscreen he could see high, evergreen, suburban hedges, sitting-room lights glimmering here and there through the foliage.

Shaw said weakly, 'Why don't we just leave it somewhere?

'Parked, you know…'

'Discreetly,' Therese said. 'Under a tree. With the keys in.'

'Yes,' he said inadequately.

She opened her door to the pavement, looked scornfully back at him. 'Because it wouldn't do anything for you. Your whole life's been tidy and discreet. I'm trying to help you, Shaw.'

His fingers felt numb as he turned the key in the ignition.

A car slowed behind them.

'What if there's somebody in the bus shelter?'

Therese shrugged, got out, slammed the car door. Shaw dug into his jacket pocket, pulled out a handful of tissues and began feverishly to scrub at the steering-wheel and the gear-lever and the door-handle and anything else he might have touched.

He'd been doing this for a couple of minutes when a wetness oozing between his fingers told him he was now using the tissue he'd employed to clean himself up after Therese had finished with him. And they could trace you through your semen now, couldn't they, DNA tests… genetic fingerprinting… oh, no… Banging his forehead against the steering-wheel… no…no…no…

The passenger door clicked gently open.

The police. The police had been surreptitiously following them for miles. That car going slowly, creeping up… He'd be destroyed.

Shaw reacted instinctively. He flung open his door, threw his weight against it, hurling himself out into the middle of the road, a heavy lorry grinding past less than a couple of feet away.

Across the roof of the Saab he looked not into a police uniform but into Therese's dark, calm eyes.

'I'll be listening out,' she whispered, 'for the sound of breaking glass.'

Matt Castle was standing on the pub steps with an arm around the shoulders of Lottie, his wife. Looked a bit awkward, Ernie noticed, on account of Lottie was very nearly as tall as Matt.

Lottie Castle. Long time since he'd seen her. By 'eck, still a stunner, hair strikingly red, although some of that probably came out of a bottle nowadays. Aye, that's it, lad, Ernie encouraged himself. Think about sex, what you can remember. Nowt like it for refocusing the mind after a shock.

How had she known? Was the bogman part of the Bridelow tradition? Was that it? By 'eck, it needed some thinking about, did this.

But not now.

'I'll stand here.' Matt Castle was smiling so hard he could hardly get the words between his teeth. 'So's you can all hear me, inside and out. Can you all hear me?'

'What's he say?' somebody bleated, to merry laughter, from about three yards in front of Matt. Ernie noted, rather disapprovingly, that some of this lot were half-pissed already.

'Yes, we can,' Ernie called helpfully from the edge of the forecourt.

'Thank you, Mr Dawber.'

Ernie smiled. All his ex-pupils, from no matter how far back, insisted on calling him Mr Dawber. When they'd first met, he was a baby-faced twenty-one and Matt Castle was eleven, in the top class. So he'd be fifty-six or seven now. Talk about time flying…

'I just want to say,' said the new licensee, shock-haired and stocky, 'that… well… it's bloody great to be back!'

And of course a huge cheer went up on both sides of the door. Matt Castle, Bridelow-born, had returned in triumph, like the home team bringing back the cup.

Except this was more important to the community than a bit of local glory. 'Looks well, doesn't he?' Ernie whispered to Ma Wagstaff, who didn't reply.

'Always wanted a pub of me own,' Matt told everybody. 'Never dared to dream it'd be this pub.'

The Man I'th Moss hung around him like a great black overcoat many sizes too big. Ernie hoped to God it was all going to work out. Draughty old pile, too many rooms… cellars, attics… take a bit of upkeep, absorb all the contents of your bank account by osmosis.

'To me, like to everybody else, I suppose, this was always Bridelow Brewery's pub.' Matt was dressed up tonight, suit and tie. 'We thought it always would be.'

At which point, quite a few people turned to look for Shaw Horridge, who'd long gone.

'But everything changes,' Matt said. 'Fortunes rise and fall, and this village owes the Horridge family too much not to make the effort to understand why, in the end, they were forced to part with the pub…and, of course, the brewery.'

We've all made the effort, Ernie thought, as others murmured. And we still don't understand why.

'Eeeh,' Matt said, his accent getting broader the more he spoke. 'Eeeh, I wish I were rich. Rich enough to buy the bloody lot. But at least I could put together enough for this place. Couldn't stand seeing it turned into a Berni Inn or summat.'

No, lad, Ernie thought. Left to rot.

'But… we got ourselves a bit of a bank loan. And we managed it.' Lottie Castle's fixed smile never wavering, Ernie noted, when Matt switched from 'I' to 'we' covering the money aspect.

Matt went on about how he didn't know much about running a pub, but what he did know was music. They could expect plenty of that in The Man I'th Moss.

Matt grinned. 'I know there's a few of you out there can sing a bit. And I remember, when I was a lad, there used to be a troupe of morris dancers. Where'd they go to?'

'Orthopaedic hospital,' somebody said.

'Bugger off,' said Matt. There's to be no more cynicism in this pub, all right? Anyroad, this is open house from now on for dancers and singers and instrumentalists. If there aren't enough in Bridelow, we'll ship them in from outside… big names too. And we'll build up a following, a regular audience from the towns… and, brewery or no brewery, we'll make The Man I'th Moss into a going concern again.'