by Fay Sampson
Veronica was making her own peace with Morag at her university. Hilary made similar apologies to her daughter Bridget.
The two women switched off their phones and looked at each other.
‘I have to say,’ Veronica said, ‘Morag wasn’t only concerned for my welfare. She wanted to hear every last detail of what happened. I didn’t tell her, of course. She got the edited version. But it made me think how journalists, you know, have to switch something off. Change their priorities. All Penny wanted to hear was whether I was safe.’
‘Must be girls. Oliver caught the morning’s headlines about the Chalice Well. Said he was dashing off to work then, but meant to ring me this evening. Hadn’t heard about today, luckily. But Bridget scolded me as though it was all my fault. Said she’d been trying to get in touch with me ever since.’
‘I think we’re moving into that stage when our children are becoming more worried about us than we are about them. I never thought to ring them straight away.’
‘You could say we had more important things on our minds.’
Hilary was becoming aware of a strange, insistent sound coming towards them. A high whistling and the thump of drums. She strode to the window.
Her ears had not deceived her. Coming along the street below was a strange procession. Women in white gowns, with wreaths of flowers in their hair. Some were playing pipes. Others held hands in fours and danced in circles as they advanced. At the rear tabors and tambourines kept up a steady blood-beat.
At the head of them all, like the Pied Piper, pranced the impossibly long-legged figure of Rupert Honeydew in his motley garb.
‘What day is it today?’ she asked Veronica sharply.
‘May the thirteenth.’
‘Hmm! I suppose by the old calendar this would have been May Day. Those certainly look like may blossoms they’re wearing in their hair.’
‘Don’t you think it’s a bit inappropriate for them to be dancing in the streets? Today of all days.’
‘Mmm.’ Hilary studied the procession as it jigged beneath her. ‘Our mad Rupert is always on about the healing power of the Goddess. Maybe this is his contribution to today’s mayhem. A dance for life.’
Veronica had joined her. ‘You sound surprisingly sympathetic. After that do on Glastonbury Tor.’
‘At least I can put out of my mind the idea that he might have been behind the bombing. From the sound of it, the shop that was attacked was just the sort he might have frequented himself. Probably selling his book.’
‘Oh, look!’ Veronica cried. ‘That’s someone I never expected to see with him.’
‘Who? Where?’
‘The fourth circle of dancers from the front. Do you see that one with the short blonde hair? I’m almost sure it’s her.
‘Who? Stop being so maddeningly obscure.’
‘Mel, I think her name was. The young woman behind the counter in the Chalice Well gift shop.’
‘Are you sure?’ Hilary pushed the window wider open and leaned out. It was hard to tell from above. ‘You could be right. But she’s the last person … I mean, she didn’t seem at all sympathetic when we were asking questions about Honeydew. She pushed off as soon as she spotted a customer.’
She stared down for a moment longer, then spun on her heel. In swift strides she was down the stairs, across the lobby and out on the street.
The dancing procession had met the same obstacle as Hilary and Veronica had. The police had cordoned off that section of the High Street where debris from the bomb still littered the ground. The shop that had borne the brunt of it hung drunkenly out from its neighbours.
The drums faltered and died to an almost inaudible tapping. The dancers slowed and stopped. Rupert Honeydew, the Guizer, Hilary remembered, tossed a padded stick in the air. He twirled about and set off along one of the side streets, just as Veronica and Hilary had done. As the line of dancers changed direction, Hilary caught a clear view of the blonde woman Veronica had pointed out. It was true. Seen clearly as she spun, right hand linked to her companions in a star shape, it was undoubtedly Mel from the gift shop.
‘A dark horse. She let her friend do all the talking about our Mr Honeydew. You wouldn’t have thought Mel had ever seen him before, let alone be one of his dancing troupe.’
‘It’s probably some sort of esoteric society. Not exactly secret, but what they get up to when they’re dressed up like this is quite separate from their everyday life.’
‘I wonder where they’re going.’
‘Let them alone, Hilary. It’s got nothing to do with us.’
‘Right now, I feel that everything that happens in Glastonbury has to do with us. I’ll get my coat. Do you want yours?’
Veronica sighed. ‘I suppose so.’
It was not hard to follow the sound of the distant music when Hilary reappeared at the hotel gate with both their jackets. A brisk walk soon brought them in view of the dancers. They had threaded their way round the centre of the town, and seemed to be heading out towards the Chalice Well.
‘I can guess where they’re bound for,’ Hilary said. ‘The Tor.’
‘They say the terraces round the slopes are really a sacred maze. People dance it to honour the Goddess.’
‘Well, this is as far as I feel like going. It’s been a long day.’
They stood on the street leading out of town, watching the retreating troupe of dancers. The Tor was hidden from them here, but Hilary could imagine the flashes of white on the grassy cone, as Rupert Honeydew led his dance up the spiralling terraces that encircled the hill.
‘I wonder what they’ll do when they get to the top,’ Veronica mused.
‘Some hare-brained ceremony, cooked up in the belief that it’s what the ancient Celts did. Victorian romanticism, most of it. An idea of druids and such dreamed up by an overheated imagination. I bet the real Druids were nothing like that.’
‘More terrifying,’ Veronica agreed.
‘Just for a moment yesterday, Rupert Honeydew terrified me, but I don’t suppose that makes him genuine.’
‘But fancy Mel getting caught up in stuff like that. She seemed such a … modern young lady.’
‘Not too modern to have fallen under the spell of the Guizer, apparently.’
‘So you remembered. About the Guizer.’ The words came from an unexpected voice.
Both women turned. Blue eyes surveyed them through a slit in the burka. Amina Haddad held a notebook covered in her swift writing.
Hilary registered a feeling of shock.
‘You’re still taking notes for your thesis, on a day like today?’
The eyes narrowed thoughtfully. ‘Who’s to say that what happened in the High Street isn’t connected with the deep old traditions of a place like this? I know you laugh at Rupert Honeydew and his kind as a comic sideshow, but there are dark and strong beliefs under what he does. Don’t underestimate their power.’
Amina was in her twenties, still a post-graduate student. Hilary had just retired from a lifetime in the teaching profession. But she felt rebuked by the younger woman’s authority.
‘If you say so,’ she said abruptly. ‘Not my field.’
‘Excuse me,’ Amina said, smiling through the slit now. ‘You may not feel like climbing the Tor after them, but I think I have to. I can only guess what today’s ritual is about.’
‘Will they want you there?’ Hilary remembered the flash of hatred in Rupert Honeydew’s eyes. ‘It might be more dangerous than it looks to muscle in on their secret ceremonies.’
‘That’s OK. I can look after myself. I’ll be discreet.’
They watched her blue-gowned figure dwindle along the road towards the Tor.
FIFTEEN
The hotel dining room had an air of desolation. There was only one other table occupied, seemingly by a pair of businessmen. They were talking sombrely, heads bent close together.
‘I’m beginning to wish we’d gone out to a local pub,’ Hilary said. ‘There might have been a jollier
atmosphere.’
‘Hardly. The locals are bound to have known people involved. I should have thought the atmosphere would be the opposite of jolly.’
‘I didn’t mean to be crass,’ Hilary said gruffly. ‘Just, you know, the Blitz spirit. Don’t let the rotters get you down.’
A young waiter with a receding chin approached their table. ‘Good evening, ladies. Glad to see you’re still with us. Not like some.’
‘Rats? Sinking ship?’
‘Most of them have packed up their bags and gone. Can’t really blame them, can you? These things tend to come in threes.’
Hilary turned to stare him in the face. He was a spotted youth with a lugubrious expression.
‘Really? You think there’s still another bomb to come?’
‘My gran says it’ll get worse before it gets better.’ He placed the menus before them. ‘Chef says to tell you the turbot with asparagus is very good.’
‘Hmm.’ It had not occurred to Hilary that it might not be over yet.
It seemed strange to be pondering what she wanted to eat. Strange to be interested in eating at all. There was an air of unreality that things should go on as before. Of course, for seven families it would not. Eight. If Baz survived, he would have what the press called ‘life-changing injuries’.
Hilary attacked her spiced red pepper soup with gusto, but before long she found her appetite waning. Soup was comfort food, like the whisky. The main course was proving harder to swallow than she had expected. She laid her knife and fork aside.
‘Do you think Amina will be all right?’ Veronica asked.
It was an unexpected interruption to Hilary’s train of thought.
‘I don’t see why not. She looks a competent young woman. Well, sounds like one. We haven’t seen more than her eyes. And I’ve pretty much ruled Rupert Honeydew off the list of suspects now. If it had been just an exploded bomb at the well then, yes, I could have dreamed up a rationale for him to do it. But bombing the crystal shop … It doesn’t fit. No, I really think he has taken his acolytes up the Tor to dance before his goddess and perform some sort of healing. He’s a freak, but harmless.’
Veronica twisted her fork but said nothing.
‘Yes, well, he did look a bit malevolent yesterday evening,’ Hilary agreed. ‘But that could just have been because we’d invaded his sacred space.’
‘He might think that’s what Amina is doing if she follows them, taking notes.’
Hilary sighed. ‘We’ve got a mass murderer in our midst. I hardly think there’s going to be a separate murder of a post-graduate student with too sharp a nose under that veil.’
‘I hope you’re right.’
‘You may be in trouble with your children for not ringing them, but you’ve still got the maternal instinct. Amina, the Townsend girl, that crying toddler this afternoon.’
‘I do hope things worked out for Joan. Somebody must have taken her big story, mustn’t they? It’s terrible to think that what happened today could actually do somebody good, but she was in a prime position to get the first impression.’
‘Thanks to you.’
‘That was sheer accident. I rang her to tell her we’d found the Marsdens. I had no idea what was going to happen next.’
‘I should hope not. Look, I don’t know about you, but I think I’ll skip dessert. We might still be in time to catch the news.’
‘It’s almost eight o’clock.’
‘There’s the BBC news channel, or Channel Four Plus One. We could pick up their seven o’clock news an hour late.’
‘If you really want to. I’m not sure I want to hear any more about disaster and death today.’
‘Stay and have your coffee in the lounge, then. I’m going up.’
But Veronica followed her up the stairs.
They were in time to catch the headlines. That repeated figure. Seven dead.
Hilary let out a glad cry of relief. ‘That must mean Baz is still alive, surely?’
‘I’m glad there’s some good news.’
There were pictures of the shattered High Street, speculation about who might have perpetrated the horror. ‘No one has claimed responsibility,’ a police spokeswoman said. ‘The police are currently pursuing several lines of investigation. We have an open mind at this stage, but two local people are currently helping us with our enquiries. A woman of forty-three and a man of sixty-two. I should stress that so far no charges have been made.’
Hilary half leaped out of her chair. ‘It’s them! It’s got to be! The Marsdens.’
‘Do you really think so? The police can’t have had much to go on. We told them the Marsdens were in the High Street at the time. And at the Chalice Well not long before you found that knapsack. But that’s just circumstantial.’
‘Never mind.’ Hilary sat back with a glow of satisfaction. ‘We pointed them in the right direction. They’ll have taken it from there. Questioned them, searched the house. That sort of thing.’
‘There are thousands of other couples in the Glastonbury area. It may not be them.’
‘You mark my words. It’s the Marsdens.’
She almost failed to hear the newscaster’s next announcement. ‘There are reports, too, that the police are keeping an armed guard on one of the seriously injured survivors in hospital. He is thought to be a young man of Eastern Mediterranean origin.
‘Baz!’ Hilary was on the edge of her seat, her eyes incredulous. ‘Oh, no! Surely it can’t be him?’
Her impressions of that terrible afternoon somersaulted. Had she made all that effort to keep the bomber alive?
They were woken before midnight. Hilary opened her eyes to find moonlight streaming in through a gap in the curtains. It had a more ethereal quality than the security lights in the hotel car park.
It was not the light which had woken her. An eerie noise was penetrating the bedroom. The window was shut now, but her suddenly sharpened mind recognized the notes of pipes and drums, more ghostly this time, muted by the double glazing. She padded across to the window to see.
‘What is it?’ Veronica’s voice came sleepily from the further bed.
‘It’s them again. Rupert Honeydew and his circus.’
‘What are they doing this time? At this time of night?’
‘I rather think it’s particularly at this time of night. Don’t you remember what he said, about dancing to the Goddess at full moon? There’s one tonight. The whole countryside’s washed with silver. Rather beautiful, really, and a bit eerie.’
‘Leave them to it, Hilary. Come back to bed.’
But something nagged at Hilary’s brain. ‘I can’t think they’re going up the Tor again. If so, why do it in daylight earlier?’
Before she really knew what she was doing, she had crossed to the wardrobe and was pulling out clothes: trousers, sweatshirt, jacket.
‘You’re not going out, are you? Don’t be an idiot, Hilary. Leave them alone. If it makes them happy to do their dances to their deity, let them get on with it.’
‘I want to know what’s going on.’
Without waiting to see if Veronica would follow her, she hurried downstairs, patted her pocket to make sure she had remembered the hotel keys, and stepped outside.
The music was suddenly loud, the moonlight brilliant.
The procession it illuminated was not the same as before. There were more men this time. Hilary saw animal masks, as well as the ghostly flowers in the women’s hair.
She found herself drawing back into the shadows. She did not understand what was going on, but she sensed that this was more than the sunlit May-time dance she had witnessed earlier. There was a darker element. She watched the light flash on eyes glimpsed through the holes in the masks. She was reminded, incongruously, of Amina’s burka, though the student’s eyes had looked nothing like this. Was it the evil that had erupted in the High Street which had called forth this darker response? What did Rupert Honeydew mean by leading this dance through the streets of Glastonbury at midni
ght?
She looked up at the other houses along the road. Here and there, curtains had been tweaked aside and the occupants peered out. But few other people had come out to stand at the roadside, as she had.
She looked over her shoulder and was more relieved than she had expected to find Veronica standing behind her. The slighter woman had her hands in her pockets and her shoulders hunched, as if against the cold, though the night air was mild.
‘That drumming gets into your blood, doesn’t it?’ she murmured. ‘Like Padstow at May Day.’
‘I wonder what they’re doing. It can’t be the Tor again, surely?’
Past St John the Baptist’s church, the procession of dancers had halted as before where the police tape barred the way to the central High Street and the epicentre of the explosion. The figure of a policeman loomed against the light on the other side. The drums were beating insistently. Was Rupert Honeydew going to stage a confrontation? Break through the tape and lead his dancers to reclaim the wounded heart of the town?
He held out his long arms sideways, palms down. The drumming subsided to a gentler rhythm. The pipers keened and a singing rose from the ranks of stationary dancers. It was an eerie sound in the moonlight. A shiver ran down Hilary’s spine. It was piercingly beautiful, and yet it scared her. She had an uneasy feeling that the singing might be conjuring up something she did not want to believe existed. Foolish, really. Just the effect of the moonlight and the darker shadows, the unearthly singing, the relentless rhythm of the drums. It must be calling to something buried thousands of years deep in her past.
‘Can you see Amina?’ Veronica whispered.
Surprised, Hilary peered through the tricking shadows that barred the moonlight. The street lighting fell only in intermittent pools.
‘No. Why? Should I?’
‘She was here before. I should have thought this was even more relevant to her thesis. There’s much more going on here than women in white, dancing with flowers in their hair.’
‘She’s probably tucked up safely in bed somewhere. Doesn’t know what she’s missing. We wouldn’t have known ourselves if they hadn’t come prancing past our window, with their drums a-drumming and their pipes a-piping.’