Stephen Booth - Blind to the Bones

Further on towards the motorway it would be even worse, with lorries jamming the lights on the A57 and traffic at a standstill right the way through Hollingworth and Mottram. It was always like this. And it always would be, unless someone got around to building a bypass. That’s what Neil always said.

Philip found a gap between two cars that was just wide enough for him to reach the kerb and drew his motorbike on to the pavement in front of his brother’s house. He gave the engine a quick rev before he switched it off, then kicked down the stand and propped his bike against the brick wall. The machine was an old Triumph that had been carefully restored once, though not by him. The roar of its engine was deep and loud, and people who knew him were usually in no doubt that he had arrived somewhere.

He stared back at the car drivers on the road as he took his time unfastening his helmet, locking it into a box mounted over the back wheel of the bike and fastening a chain through the front spokes. You couldn’t be too careful in these parts.

By now, Neil would normally have recognized the sound of the Triumph and left the front door off the latch for his older brother to get into the house. But when Philip walked up the short path he found the door still locked. He rapped the knocker a couple of times, and rang the bell, but got no answer. He knocked again, waited a minute, then backed down the path to look up at the bedroom window, where the curtains were still closed.

Philip glanced at the windows of the houses on either side. Sure enough, the woman on the right was peering at him through her curtains. She didn’t like him, or his motorbike. But Neil said she didn’t like anybody very much. She hated cars and their drivers even more than she hated bikers.

So Philip gave the woman a little wave, gestured at his brother’s bedroom, shrugged and grinned. She stared back at him without a smile.

He fumbled in the pockets of his leathers for some keys. Neil had given him a key to the house when Philip had first helped him move to Tintwistle from Withens. The front door opened straight away with the Yale key, which meant it wasn’t bolted on the inside. Philip couldn’t remember whether Neil used a bolt when he was in the house or not.

In the hallway, with the front door still open, Philip shouted up the stairs.

‘Neil! It’s me!’

He waited a moment.

‘Neil! Are you awake?’

There was no answer. Philip went up the stairs, his motorcycle boots thumping on the steps. The walls of the houses in this terrace weren’t very thick, and the woman next door would probably be waiting outside to complain about the noise he was making, but he didn’t care.

He could see there was no one in the bedroom, though the bed had been slept in. He checked the other rooms and went back downstairs, where he opened and closed all the doors, just to make sure. Finally, he went out into the little back garden and looked at the patch of ground behind the houses where Neil normally kept his car. The VW wasn’t there.

Philip looked at the house next door again, and caught a glimpse of the neighbour watching him. He decided to knock and ask her if she knew where Neil was. But when he did, she shook her head at him from behind a security chain.

Slowly, he went back through Neil’s house and stood for a few moments in the sitting room to take one last look round. Everything seemed as it should be. There was nothing out of place, as far as he could see. But Philip picked up a small brass box on the mantelpiece and looked at the ornate pattern beaten into its lid before putting it down again, a couple of inches to the left. He cocked his head and examined it until he was satisfied.

Then Philip locked his brother’s front door and dug his phone out of an inside pocket. He dialled Neil’s mobile, but it rang without being answered. The second person he called was the Reverend Derek Alton.

In St Asaph’s Church a few minutes later, Derek Alton found his eyes drawn towards the east window and its stained-glass representation of St Asaph, the obscure Celtic saint to whom his church was dedicated. The saint was depicted carrying hot coals in his cloak without setting fire to himself or his clothes – an act that had provided enough evidence of his saintliness for those who decided these things. It was almost the only thing known about his history.

The picture had been created from hundreds of tiny fragments of glass – some green, like fresh grass, or blue like the sky, or red like fire. In the morning, they glowed in the sun from the east. But Alton could see that the bottom half of St Asaph was darker than the rest of him. No light passed through the glass below the red glow of the burning coals held in a fold of his cloak. The saint looked as though he had been cut off at the waist. Alton knew that the effect was caused by the rampant ivy that covered the east wall and was now spreading over the windows. Its spring leaves were a virulent green where they lay against the stonework, and its tendrils were grasping and eager, seeking new holds in the lead that held the pieces of coloured glass together.

When Alton looked closely at the saint’s waist area, he could see the triangular shapes of the young ivy leaves clearly. They were like little green tongues licking at St Asaph’s robes. They were growing day by day now, creeping towards the sun, slowly eating up the picture. Already, the saint’s legs had been swallowed by the relentless force of nature.

If nothing was done to curb the ivy, the lead would crumble and the glass would be pulled apart, piece by piece. One day, it would take only one loud noise to shatter the entire window, and St Asaph would drop into the east aisle.

‘Catching flies, Vicar?’

Alton felt a guilty flush rising under his collar. A tall young man stood in the aisle near the west door. He was dressed in jeans and a blue sweater, and his blond hair had recently been cut and gelled.

‘Oh, it’s you, Scott.’

‘Thank goodness it’s only me, eh? It’s a good job I’m not the chuffin’ bishop. He’d whip your frock off and give your dog collar back to the dog before you could say “Heil Mary”.’

‘Hail Mary,’ said Alton.

‘Yeah, right.’

He watched Scott Oxley move towards him up the narrow aisle, slapping his hand on each pew and rubbing his palm over the carved wooden ends.

‘Did you want something, Scott?’

‘No.’

Scott let him wait for a minute, looking around the church with a smile.

‘Have you heard from Neil today, Vicar?’ said Scott.

‘No, I haven’t. And he said he’d be here to help me work on the churchyard.’

‘Good old Neil.’

Scott walked up to the oak pulpit and smoothed the pulpit cloth with his hand. Alton wished he wouldn’t touch anything, but he held his peace.

‘I phoned Philip and he called at Neil’s house, but he’s not at home. Do you know where Neil is, Scott?’

‘No idea.’

Scott walked back down the aisle of the church, slapping the ends of the pews again as he went. Alton listened to Scott go out into the porch. He needed to make sure that the young man had left. He knew that the big oak outer door would close with a painfully loud slam, as it always did.

A thud shook the church as Scott Oxley slammed the door. Layers of dust danced on the window ledges. But the stained-glass picture of St Asaph didn’t shatter. It wasn’t the time. Not yet.

Sarah Renshaw looked as though she hadn’t combed her hair that morning. She had a perm several weeks old, but it was springing out in all the wrong directions, like a burst mattress. Her plaid skirt was covered in dog hairs, and her shoes had dried mud clinging to the edges of the soles.