Ghosts from the Past

by Sally Spedding

  Buck and Mollie seemed to have frozen. Their father too, and in the thick silence, a solitary cloud appeared as if from nowhere to cover the sun.

  “Mum’s right,” said Buck, keeping his distance.

  “And anyway, Silver’s not to go too far,” dared Mollie, still flushed from her fall. “That nice vet said so.”

  “That nice vet isn’t in fear for his life,” growled Will. “Or his family, if he has one. Besides, the Verderer’s court will never connect me with Norfolk.”

  “You mean Matthew Crane?”

  A nod. Defiance still in those sea-coloured eyes, and I sensed he was about to share the rest of the story.

  “Heard his spade digging and digging as he covered me over. Heard him laugh afterwards. Felt the mud filling up my nostrils. My throat. I stared Doctor Death in the face that night, the same as at Constantinople. And I’m not ready to see him again.”

  With that, he climbed up on to the trap’s front seat and waited for the three of us to join him. In that moment, my little gold crucifix began to burn against my skin. I lifted it away from my collarbone, almost burning my fingers too. I’d never experienced this extreme sensation before, and as Silver began to walk on, ears pricked to all the different sounds of the dawn, I wondered whether it might be a sign of hope or doom.

  10. JOHN.

  Sunday 13th November 1988. 10.30a.m.

  By ten thirty, that early sunshine had gone, soon replaced by a drift of lead-bellied clouds that seemed to hang ominously over St. John the Martyr and Wombwell Lodge alike. Rain coming soon, I thought dismally, aware that my Citroën was not only misted up, but spattered with crows’ fresh droppings. I swore under my breath and looked upwards to see two pairs of the perps eyeballing me from their fir tree branch. Clapping my hands made no difference. They just stared back more solidly.

  I wasn’t here for birdwatching and within five minutes, I was in Stephen’s small but fanatically organised study that smelt of last night’s whisky. According to him, nothing had been removed on Friday evening, and normally, I’d have skimmed the spines of his considerable book collection with some interest. But not then, with Catherine still gone and her blue Allegro and Raleigh bike plus its basket still parked near the back door next to Stephen’s.

  “I can’t.” Stephen made a despairing gesture, when I suggested a call from him to the brother-in-law was better than one from myself, a stranger. And an ex-cop at that. “You don’t understand. We’ve let him think we have the perfect marriage, just like he had. We’ve kept the lie going for some time now. There’s also the small matter of my latest research, which will ruffle more than a few ecclesiastical feathers when it’s published.”

  “Please…”

  “No.”

  Nevertheless, he passed a scrap of paper containig a phone number. “By the way, his wife was called Vivienne. She died of a sudden heart attack almost a year ago. Her old mother’s still up in Edinburgh…”

  As I dialled, I wondered if Catherine really had been in Stephen’s office on Friday evening, and if so, how could he possibly know what she might or might not have said to her saintly and clearly ambitious older sibling.

  Someone picked up immediately. A middle-aged man, by the sound of it.

  “Yes?” he said.

  “Mr. Beecham?”

  “Reverend, if you don’t mind. The Reverend, to be precise…”

  Shit.

  Stephen had winced, quite rightly. I’d never have made that kind of blunder in Nottingham. Starting off on the right foot had been my obsession. Once upon a time…

  “Sorry.”

  “So, who are you, and what do you want? I’ve a Morning Service in Sheepwell in forty minutes.”

  “John Lyon. An old friend of Stephen and Catherine.”

  “I’ve never heard of you.”

  “It’s important.”

  I paused, hearing part of ‘Greater Love hath No Man’- a John Ireland anthem being sung in the background. The same as Carol and I had chosen for our parents’ funeral, now putting me off my stride.

  “What is?”

  Get a grip.

  “Catherine left the house over an hour ago, without saying where she was going. Her car and bike’s still here…”

  He must have switched the music off. His voice sharper without it.

  “Why couldn’t her husband tell me? Why you?”

  Her husband?

  That said it all. I took a punt.

  “I believe she’s close to you. You’re her only living relative. It would help enormously if you had any idea…”

  “I don’t. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Mr…er…?”

  “Lyon.”

  “My flock cannot be kept waiting.”

  Call ended.

  Stephen was searching my face. His own set in a grimace. “See what I mean? What a tosser.”

  I was inclined to agree. Too many years of defensive and hostile witnesses had inured me to this kind of response, and I wasn’t afraid to confront ‘The’ Reverend Beecham again. Preferably in person, and sooner rather than later.

  “Now what?” asked Stephen, blocking out the grey light from behind his one window. “Come on, Johnny…”

  I was about to speak, then stopped. This was Sunday mid-morning. I’d been prepared to spend his research Monday in the history department’s archives and stay over until Tuesday. A toe in the water at least. Now the agenda had changed. Time for some searching questions.

  “Have you checked in here that nothing’s been removed?”

  He nodded.

  “At three thirty this morning. All seemed normal, like I’ve said.”

  Stephen then glanced sideways out of the study window, next to which stood a newish-looking photocopier.

  “Is Catherine in the habit of taking herself off without telling you?” I changed the subject.

  “Never.”

  “So why now? Try and think. The clock’s ticking.”

  He ran a long, thin hand through his hair, leaving it as if he’d seen a ghost.

  “Is it me?” I ventured. “Turning up after so long?”

  “Absolutely not. She always says we never have enough visitors, or people who just call in. Why she’d begun talking about a move to London.”

  “London?”

  “Her publishing contacts are based there, for translations. She’s also said that a more bustling environment might take her mind off not being a…”

  I hazarded a guess. “Mother?”

  He nodded, but the word seemed to have startled him.

  “So, she may have gone house-hunting,” I suggested. “Taking a look.”

  His tired eyes widened at this suggestion. “You could be right. Why hadn’t I thought of that?”

  “But why leave her car, when Sunday trains to the capital from here are probably rare?”

  “They’re non-existent. Just like buses.”

  I noticed six crows fly in formation around the neighbouring church spire before winging away into the greyness. Just then, they represented a troubling ambiguity.

  “May I suggest that there could be something else afoot? As a Detective Inspector I used to dismiss coincidences, but this one’s too hard to ignore.”

  “What coincidence?”

  “The fact you’ve jut started digging into something that could have - in your very words - huge repercussions. Remember, you were always the clever one with the PhD, now Dean of Faculty? The risk-taker keen to make his mark?”

  “So?” He didn’t seem flattered in the least.

  “She’s either gone to tell someone, maybe local, about your findings, or… or…” I couldn’t finish. Not with my old friend staring at me again, clutching a small photo of her that I guessed belonged to one of his long-ago field trips

  “Been taken? Are you serious?”

  “Never more so. And that threat you had may be key. So, we get cracking to find her.”

  11. STANLEY.

  Thursday 22nd July1920. 5.10 a.m


  The Monkey weren’t being punished at all, unlike me, left alone to rot in me own sweat

  and piss and the other stuff. Neither Ma nor Pa had come up to see me with so much as a drink or a bite to eat. Too busy making use of the able-bodied pervert. Oh yes, I’d heard them give him simple instructions for tonight’s start on the water pit. How, down in the yard below, they’d chuckled together at his useless English, and how, to get him keen on the job, there were pork and potatoes for supper as a reward.

  A reward? Were they mad?

  And were this because in pain and panic, I’d dared ask where their money might be stashed away? Yet the more I dwelt on these matters, the more I realised they’d never bothered about me from the day I’d been born. Kept me down with no schooling so I couldn’t work nowhere else.

  They’d had just the one feck - most likely an accident - and out I’d come. A pair of useful hands, that were all.

  I lay on me damp, old mattress imagining what the village school might have bin like. I’d see kids messing about in what had then been a dirt lane leading to Hecklers Green, beyond our Spud Field now an overgrown fire hazard. Girls especially, and Susan Deakins in particular, who’d wave whenever she saw me. Wiggled her little hips like a bitch on heat…

  Who else cud’ve resisted?

  But that’s all done with now. I must think only of getting out of this midden and making me betrayers pay for their favouritism. And if there were no money, and they’d spun me a wicked lie, I’d have other ways…

  And where were Doctor Lovell all this time? A man paid well enough to serve them unlucky to be ill? He told Ma he’d call in today to see me, but it were already past midnight, with me stuck here like a living corpse.

  Enough.

  Physician, heal thyself.

  First, I rolled on to me left side and, gripping the edge of the thin mattress with both hands, managed to reach the floor. The pain of it made me cry out. But not for long. No-one must hear a thing. I crawled towards the shut door, using me right leg to propel me forwards. Me left I knew, had gone below the knee. I’d felt the shin bone sting in pure, clear agony…

  I reached the door and pulled it open.

  I’d forgotten its loud squeak.

  Along the worn-carpeted landing, inch by inch. Me left leg, stiff as a post, got more and more numb with each pull of me arms. The moon, hanging low and large, let in enough light for me to find the rear staircase which led into the old dairy, now used to store our clapped-out farm implements.

  Me right hand found the top step. Solid stone. Cold as the grave, and with no halfway bend, I bumped ten times to the bottom, into a world of reaping scythes, graips and crames, drainage spades, a docking iron, several wheeless ploughs and a heap of ancient seed broadcasters. A ton or two of rusted metal that over the years, had stolen my strength, in case one day, it could add to the money pot.

  By then, every part of me throbbed with pain. Specially me head. But by hook or by crook, I had to somehow reach Parson’s Field.

  *

  By some miracle, me left leg began to work better, as if all the jolting had dulled the pain. As if both legs was me only friends.

  I cud smell mesen. Everything stronger from fear and hurt. Me sweat thick and sour like curdled cream as I continued through the dairy, colliding with one piece of rusty junk after another.

  Suddenly, a church bell’s quarter chime broke the silence, making me jump.

  This were taking far too long. I listened for the slightest sound of The Monkey at work, but nothing. Even the pigs had been knocked out by the day’s heat. All eighty-three of them. The Monkey’s calculation not mine. The incomer who’d learnt to read, write and do numbers in the two months he’d been here. Taking me place. Bit by bit. I’d soon torn up the books that had once belonged to Ma, and fed them to the pigs, just like…

  No. Stop it. She’s dead and gone.

  The moon lit up Parson’s Field like ice, but the hard ground, still warm from yesterday’s sun beneath me hands and feet, were hard as a coffin’s floor. I saw the poplars strung out along the Howse. The dried clumps of thistle to be avoided, but where were that animal already being fed more than me? And paid? That’s what stung the most. What drove me forwards with not just my head full of blood.

  Then I heard him.

  Thud, thud, thud… and what sounded like singing, but nothing I cud understand. A few words repeated over and over. This time, completely naked he were skinny as a gnat. His head of frizzy hair made it too big for the rest of him. Even his cock. Every so often he flung a small shovelful of dry soil behind him before continuing to dig. At this rate, our water pit would take at least a year to finish, and meanwhile…

  I got closer. The moon still a fecking nuisance, but I stayed behind him, me knees and elbows smarting from having to crawl. His sweat tainted not just the night air I breathed, but everything. And each inch brought me nearer to the favoured one, whose crime with our best sow, hadn’t seemed to have mattered. Nor the fact she now waited for him by the yard gate, pressing her fat belly against its bars. Presenting her slit for him to take her again. Just like me little schoolgirl had done for me…

  I’d only advised Pa to feed The Monkey up not thinking in a month of Sundays he wud. All in the past, for whatever I said about it, were met with a brush-off. Or a hit where it hurt.

  Walter Bulling were certainly full of surprises.

  Now.

  “Got ye!”

  Me hands fitted easily around those bony ankles, and a quick pull brought him flat on his face. The spade were close by and I claimed it, while his blubbering scream could be heard on the moon and beyond.

  I’d no choice, and as soon as I lifted its wooden handle, knew God were on me side. It felt almost too heavy, but I gritted me few teeth together, forgetting the pain in me bad leg, because I’d pinned him down and he’s stopped wriggling like a big, black worm.

  “Pig fecker. Rot in Hell,” I hissed.

  He raised his head, still moaning, so I grabbed a handful of his crinkly hair and slammed his head down hard. This time, just a whimper met me ears. The same when with me last bit of strength, I struck my spade into his neck.

  Silence.

  Then again, bringing a welcome snap of bone till his head rolled free, bringing a torrent of dark, sticky stuff reaching almost to me knees.

  12. NICHOLAS.

  Monday 14th November 1988. 7a.m.

  I’ve always been an early riser, not only to give thanks to the Almighty that my fifty-seven-year-old ticker hadn’t skipped more than two beats during slumber, but also to show gratitude for His other many blessings. Most recently, the prospect of becoming Cavenham’s next Bishop. And from there, well, who knew? Yesterday’s Sunday Times article would surely boost my prospects because the young, female reporter, a recent alumna of Peterhouse, Cambridge, had swallowed my story whole, while the photographer they’d sent round, nearing retirement, had been inspired. So much so, that my telephone hadn’t stopped ringing with congratulatory messages from my vergers and choirmasters at my three churches, to the Bishop of Cavenham himself. A lively bet for the soon-to-be-vacant Canterbury crown.

  I’ve always felt that particular pinnacle, which could still be within my reach, represented one missed opportunity after another. Instead of standing up to Rome with our own more inclusive agenda, it has myopically overseen a gradual haemorrhage of betrayers towards the Vatican.

  However, one step at a time. But nevertheless, each step carefully chosen, without any shadow or blemish to hinder progress. Which is why my ever-willing factotum, Piotr Polanyi valeted my late wife’s eight-year-old Fiesta to showroom condition yesterday afternoon, following his mission to the seaside.

  He’d said how the mud on its sills and wheel hubs had been particularly tricky to remove. All in broken English, of course. Piotr had planned to start taking lessons, but I’d discouraged him with the argument that his patois was as charming as he.

  *

  Still in pyjam
as, I switched on my desk kettle and made myself a cup of tea. Always calming, particularly after yesterday morning’s surprise call from a man who could only be described as a simpleton. But why had he phoned me and not Stephen himself? The one I privately called Mr. Moody.

  The hot tea suddenly burned the insides of my cheeks.

  Steady on…

  I watched the wobbling window frame reflected in the teacup. I’d also had a wobble but dealt with it. Bishops must think on their feet. To respond rationally to the demands of parishioners and senior clergy alike. Why that Sunday Times article had repeated I was the obvious choice.

  I didn’t want to think of Stephen just then. Catherine even less. A sister whose faith wavered from one week to the next. Who sneered at all the ‘fancy dresses’ we wear out of respect to tradition. I did, however, want to get on with my day as planned, beginning with a nine o’clock meeting with Diocesan Trust members attached to All Saints Church in Snodbury. One of my three parishes. After that, a working lunch with the Bishop, who’d ordered Welsh Mountain lamb for the occasion. Its biblical significance hadn’t escaped my notice, but rather than dwell upon that, it was best to focus on all my recent support.

  There was still time to shave my balls as I did every Monday. And empty my bowels. Two reasons to be cheerful.

  “Sir?” Came a voice at my bedroom door, followed by a knock. “Clothes ready. Toast?”

  Piotr efficient as ever.

  “Thank you. And yes, toast. Brown. Two pieces.”

  *

  He stood on the drive in the drizzle, waving me off. A tallish, muscular twenty-two-year- old with shaved, blond hair, dressed from head to toe in black leathers who’d come over -- or so he’d said - from a rural village near Cracow, to join his family in Watford, where they ran a small restaurant specialising in Polish cuisine.

  They’d soon fallen out, as people do in these situations, and Piotr, ever enterprising, had sought work of any kind, preferably further east of the country. If he hadn’t shown the iniative to knock on my door offering himself as a general factotum, he wouldn’t be standing there now. Almost as if he owned the place.