Remains of an Altar mw-8

by Phil Rickman

  ‘Well, Winnie.’ Merrily sat down at the desk in the scullery. ‘Erm … I think there might be a need for a lawyer now.’

  ‘I have to know. I have to call his parents in France—What did you just say?’

  ‘Just that I think he may well need a lawyer. I’ve been trying to confirm the situation since last night but I’m not getting anywhere.’

  She’d phoned Bliss, who’d come back to her late last night to say that Worcester were still holding Loste and studying lab reports, and that was all he could find out at this hour without inviting awkward questions.

  ‘So, like, how long can they hold a guy without a charge?’

  ‘No, look, Winnie, what I’m trying to say is—’

  Merrily waved to Jane, hovering in the scullery doorway with her airline bag, meaning hang on. Jane raised a hand, smiled a worryingly wan kind of smile and was gone. Bugger.

  ‘—What I’m trying to say is I don’t know that there hasn’t been a charge, in the light of new forensic evidence. I—This is confidential?’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘I talked at some length to the officer heading the inquiry, and frankly, after what she told me, even I’d have pulled Tim in for questioning. Even if it was only to have a look around inside his house. He comes across as a very strange person, Winnie, and he’s clammed up on them and that makes it look worse.’

  ‘And strange equals psychotic, right?’

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘Did you say you went into his house?’

  ‘With the police. I was asked to take a look at … some things.’

  ‘What things?’

  ‘Photographs, books…’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because they’re trying to get a handle on him, find out exactly where he’s coming from.’

  ‘They had no goddamn right. You had no right.’

  ‘I tried to explain a couple of points, as best I could. I don’t think I was very successful. There was just too much I didn’t know. For instance, his background. I mean, how long have you actually known him?’

  ‘Background? Background could not be more respectable. Parents are both professional classical musicians. He was a music teacher at private schools, ending up at Malvern College. Played rugby for a local team. How respectable do you want?

  ‘This project of his,’ Merrily said. ‘The oratorio or whatever…’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘He was working on that when you met him? Or was that your idea?’

  ‘What’s that matter?’

  ‘We didn’t go into this yesterday, but when he saw what he … when he saw the figure he identified as Elgar, on his bike … I’m just thinking of the big picture in the hallway … Very much a presence in the house, you’ll agree.’

  ‘He’s a presence in Tim’s life.’

  ‘And obviously a presence, on some level, in Wychehill.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘It’s just that this seems to be the image of Elgar that Tim’s … carrying around with him. And it corresponds with the … with the apparition that people – Tim included – appear to have been seeing.’

  ‘What’s that have to do with getting him out of gaol?’

  ‘And you’re a writer, specializing in books on mysticism, psychic studies, healing … the occult? You said you were helping him with meditation exercises. To deal with his drinking and … maybe to reach Elgar’s level of creative inspiration. A man whose previous output, I understand, has been … fairly ordinary. So he’s living with Elgar’s music, images of Elgar, in a place steeped in Elgar. He’s immersing himself on a very intense level…’

  ‘You don’t even wanna get him out, do you? All you want is to cover your own ass with the cops for whatever reason—’

  ‘This has nothing to do with the cops.’ Merrily felt a headache coming on. ‘But if you want to deal with that first … oak trees? Acorns? Little oaks in pots, the sapling that’s going to be bigger than his house?’

  ‘A symbol.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘A symbol from the natural world that he could use for meditation. He was drinking too much, I was trying to use meditation to give him a focus. And also to make him more … receptive. Why are you asking me this stuff?’

  ‘Because the police are linking oaks to Druidism and Druidism to blood sacrifice and … you know?’

  ‘Oh, Jesus God…’ Winnie’s voice was suddenly perforated with panic. ‘This is shit! This is so wrong.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I mean, why is it wrong? Elgar wrote Caractacus about Herefordshire Beacon. Full of Druidism and magic and prophecy and people’s throats being cut on sacrificial stones.’

  There was a gap before Winnie’s voice came back, the fissures hardening up.

  ‘What are you, Merrily? Some kinda fucking stoolie for the cops? Like I need to waste my time with a police snitch? I don’t think so, lady. I think I told you far too much already, and all you did was you gave it to the cops.’

  ‘That’s not—’

  ‘So from now on you can get off of my case, OK?’

  ‘Look, I’m just trying to—’

  ‘I’m gonna have a good lawyer I can’t truly afford go see Tim right now, and I don’t wanna hear from you again, so … like when we get him outta there you just stay the hell away from the both of us.’

  ‘Winnie, if you could just let me—’

  ‘Goddamn fucking stoolie bitch.’

  The phone went down hard.

  At the start of mid-morning break, the sixth-form common room was like a call centre, a whole bunch of them switching on their mobiles to, like, maintain the temperature of their love lives.

  When Jane switched on hers, just to be sociable, not expecting anything from Eirion this morning, it went directly into its tune. And, not recognising the number, it was like…

  ‘Jane Watkins?’

  ‘Erm…’

  ‘Hi, Jane, this is Jerry Isles from the Guardian. I tried to leave a message on your voicemail yesterday – maybe you didn’t get it?’

  ‘Oh … did you?’

  ‘Never mind. Jane, I have to say it all sounds hugely fascinating. I used to be quite into leys a few years ago – we used to stay with friends in Cornwall, where you’re practically tripping over megalithic sites, so I’ve read Watkins, obviously, and this really brought it all back. Are you running the campaign on your own?’

  ‘Well … you know … me and a few friends, but—’

  ‘But it was your idea.’

  ‘Yes, only I’m not sure—’

  ‘You seem to be wearing school uniform on the picture. How old are you, do you mind?’

  ‘S—Eighteen.’

  ‘Good. And your parents know about it?’

  ‘My mother knows. I don’t have a father any more. She, erm … My mum’s cool with it.’

  ‘Well … I took the liberty of checking your map with the Ordnance Survey, and the line certainly seems to work. Who did the pictures?’

  ‘My … boyfriend.’

  ‘They’re good pix, on the whole. However, I think we’d like to do some of our own. We have a regular freelance photographer in your area, and the picture editor would like to send her along, if that’s all right with you. How about … are you free this afternoon?’

  Through the plate-glass window beyond the tabletennis table, Jane could see Morrell in his shirt sleeves jogging across the quad towards the car park.

  ‘Look,’ she said. ‘I mean this is really good of you, but I’m not sure I want to go through with it now.’

  ‘Oh? That mean you’re no longer convinced?’

  ‘Oh, no, it’s true, it’s all true. Even though when I went to see the local councillor, there were all these council officials there, and they were all, like, Oh, it’s all nonsense and Alfred Watkins was a misguided old man. And the councillor was suggesting I was trying to mess up his plans for turning Ledwardine into some kind of town, which wo
uld be really crap. And I was warned that I should be careful what I said. I mean, I’m not worried about me that much, but my mum’s the vicar there, you know?’

  The line went quiet. If they’d lost it, Jane decided she wasn’t going to call him back, at least not until tonight when she’d had time to think of a way he could maybe do the story but keep her out of it…

  ‘The vicar,’ Jerry Isles said. ‘No, I didn’t know that.’

  Oh hell. Why, in this so-called secular age, were newspapers so fond of vicars?

  Jerry said, ‘Tell me again, Jane, what these people from the council said to you … ?’

  ‘I don’t think I told you the first time, did I?’

  ‘About the councillor wanting to turn your village into a small town? That’s what I’ve got.’

  ‘You’re writing this down?’

  Morrell jogged back and went into the main building, his car keys swinging from a finger.

  Jane began to sweat.

  Merrily sat in the scullery, watching the play of morning light on the vicarage lawn, the clusters of yellow wild flowers in the churchyard drystone wall that bordered it. A whole ecosystem, that wall.

  What are you, some kinda stoolie for the cops?

  Going back over it, she could pinpoint the exact moment when Winnie Sparke’s attitude had altered. It was when Merrily had revealed that she’d been inside Loste’s house. Winnie had been afraid of what Merrily – not the police – might have seen in the house and been able to interpret for Howe.

  Which meant there was something she should have spotted in there and hadn’t.

  She called Syd Spicer, not expecting him to be in. But he picked up on the second ring.

  ‘You’ve offended Sparke, Merrily. Easily done.’

  ‘She told you?’

  ‘She’s walking round wailing and gnashing her teeth. A woman who likes to be in control. And she can hardly control poor Tim at the moment, can she?’

  ‘You think he did it, Syd?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought so, but time will tell.’

  ‘I like an interventionist priest.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I don’t scale walls with pockets full of smoke bombs any more.’

  It was the first reference that he’d made to his past, but this probably wasn’t the time to follow it up.

  ‘Loste and Winnie, Syd. What’s that actually about? This musical work, this search for Elgar’s source of inspiration. I mean, is there anything you haven’t told me that might relate to that?’

  ‘Lots, I imagine. I wouldn’t know what was relevant. Equally, I can’t betray a parishioner’s trust. I can point you in a certain direction, which I’ve done, but I can’t pass on what I’ve been told in confidence, can I? Would you? Maybe you would. Maybe you did.’

  ‘Because I’m a police informer?’

  ‘When Winnie Sparke takes offence, she doesn’t hold back.’

  ‘Why is Loste collecting oak trees?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘OK, Joseph Longworth’s vision. That sounds like a modern-day version of one of those old legends often connected to the foundation of churches. A vision indicating where to build.’

  ‘There are some documents relating to that. It’s in the parish records. Letters. Winnie has copies.’

  ‘Could I have copies?’

  ‘No reason why not, I suppose.’

  ‘Could you send them? Email anything?’

  Spicer sighed. Merrily persevered.

  ‘Do you have any idea what Winnie Sparke might have meant when she talked about a great and beautiful secret?’

  ‘No,’ he said.

  Merrily called the home of the dead girl, Sonia Maloney, in Droitwich. No answer. The Cookman number Syd Spicer had passed on turned out to be a spare line, which meant he hadn’t even tried it.

  She came to the third on the list.

  ‘Who?’ Stella Cobham said.

  ‘Merrily Watkins. The Deliverance woman?’

  ‘Oh, yeah. Look, Merrily, I was just on my way out. Perhaps I could call you back.’

  ‘Won’t keep you a minute, Mrs Cobham. I just wanted – before I make any specific arrangements – to find out if next Sunday would be suitable for you.’

  ‘I’m sorry. What for?’

  ‘We were discussing the idea of a Requiem Eucharist for Lincoln Cookman and Sonia Maloney?’

  ‘Oh yeah.’

  ‘It seemed to answer everybody’s … you know?’

  ‘Yeah, well, look. I don’t think we’ll be coming.’

  ‘But Mrs Cobham, it was your—’

  ‘Things have changed. Change of plan. Change of future.’ Brittle laugh. ‘We’re putting the barn on the market. I’m just off to the agent’s in Ledbury now, actually.’

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘It was a wrong move. Nothing’s been right since we came here. We’re probably going to America. Paul knows this guy in Naples, Florida. Anyway, all I’m trying to say is … it really doesn’t concern us any more. Look, I’ve got to go, all right?’

  Click.

  Merrily threw the phone book at the wall.

  30

  In Their Proper Place

  It had been Merrily’s plan to go into her own church before lunch, when it was quietest. Find a cool place in the chancel and lay all this out, the whole Wychehill mess. To ask the question, Is it time to leave this alone, walk away? An in-depth exchange with the Management on this issue was long, long overdue.

  So what was she doing in Lol’s bed?

  ‘Oh hell…’ She gazed into his unshaven face. ‘This is a bit like adultery.’

  ‘In what way, exactly?’

  Lol rolled off her. He looked almost hurt.

  ‘No, I…’ She trapped one of his legs between hers. ‘I just meant … cheating on the Church. The parish. Sorry. All I need is to offend you, and that’s virtually nobody left still speaking to me.’

  He smiled. Maybe he hadn’t looked hurt a moment ago. Maybe she’d conjured that out of her own hurt.

  Lol’s bedroom had a three-quarter bed in it. That was all. It was a very small room with no space for a wardrobe. He said he needed to sleep here because it had a view across Church Street to the vicarage – they could see each other’s lights at bedtime. Which was nice. But she’d sometimes wondered if he wasn’t just a little timid about using the bigger bedroom where Lucy Devenish had slept.

  Whatever, this room was bare without being stark, a sanctuary, a space out of time. One day, perhaps, she might even get to spend a whole night here.

  ‘Then, at the same time,’ she said, ‘I get the feeling that I’m neglecting you.’

  ‘Some feelings you should listen to,’ Lol said. ‘This could be God telling you that you’re neglecting me.’

  ‘Dangerous to blaspheme in front of a vicar.’ Her fingers paddling over his thigh. ‘Especially when naked.’

  He gripped her hand. They laughed, and when they stopped laughing she told him everything. About Winnie Sparke and Tim Loste and their beautiful secret and her own dismal morning.

  ‘I’m tired. I can’t get a handle on it any more. People’s attitudes change overnight. They want me to do something, then they don’t. They want to talk to me and then … Winnie Sparke, particularly. It was as if she’d picked a fight just to wind up the conversation because I was asking the wrong questions. Like mentioning the blow-up photo of Elgar.’

  ‘Let me get this right. Who’s seen Elgar, other than Loste?’

  ‘Stella Cobham. Who no longer wants to have anything to do with it because they’ve suddenly decided to move. Well, nobody just decides overnight to emigrate. Must’ve been very much on the cards when she came to the meeting in the church and poured it all out, thus burning her boats with Preston Devereaux who, according to Spicer, nobody likes to offend because he’s Old Wychehill…’

  Lol sat up against the pillow, retrieved his little brass-rimmed glasses from the floorboards, and put them on.

 
; ‘But for a couple of things,’ he said, ‘I’d be suggesting that Elgar might be a psychological projection by Tim Loste.’

  ‘Well, me, too. Although, if we step over the threshold … sometimes, if the personality behind it is strong enough, a psychological projection may be perceptible to a third party.’

  ‘Musicians can be obsessive.’

  ‘No kidding.’

  ‘Um…’ Lol hesitated.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Anything I can do about this?’

  ‘I don’t like to interrupt your work.’

  Lol laughed.

  ‘What it comes down to,’ Merrily said, ‘is the only person I haven’t spoken to, can’t get at and may never get at.’

  ‘Loste.’

  ‘Who now seems to be the key to both mysteries, that is, the Elgar thing and the killing on the Beacon, whether he did that or not – and the circumstantial evidence is impressive. But the key to Tim Loste is Winnie Sparke, who isn’t talking. I don’t think she ever planned to say much, and yet she wanted to check me out. Why? I still don’t really know these people or what they’re doing.’

  ‘There must be other ways in,’ Lol said. ‘For instance … a lot of singers in a choir.’

  ‘You know any? I don’t.’

  ‘Not yet. But musicians can be obsessive. Leave this with me.’

  ‘Thank you, Lol. And thanks for keeping an eye on Jane, which I … I’m not getting anything right, am I? I’m a lousy mother, a lousy girlfriend, an inept exorcist and an incompetent parish priest.’

  ‘But at least you don’t suffer from low self-esteem,’ Lol said.

  They went downstairs and shared half a loaf, a pot of hummus and a box of cress, and Merrily resolved to spend the rest of the day in penance, dusting and polishing the church furniture, finding sick parishioners to visit before…

  … A last assault, tomorrow, on Wychehill. Or, more specifically, on Winnie Sparke.

  ‘And I want to look at Coleman’s Meadow.’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Why does Jane think Lyndon Pierce has some secret scheme to expand the village?’

  ‘Probably because he has. Don’t worry. Gomer’s looking into it.’