Alan served Bryn his drink and then, leaning confidentially on the bar counter while Bryn downed his first whisky of the day, he confided what he’d heard.
Bryn listened with great concentration, wondering how he could turn this to his advantage. Of course! Willie could show the tourists the site of the plague pit and make the point about bones interred there being those of ancestors of people still living in the village. It all fitted in beautifully. Maybe they could put up a plaque, ‘Here lie victims of the Black Death’, in old-fashioned writing. My word! Things were coming together better than he could ever have hoped. ‘Thanks, Alan. That might come in useful.’
‘O’ course, Jimmy’s convinced that storm was caused by them students poking about in the Dell. Reckons we’ll be in right trouble.’
Bryn pushed his glass across the counter and intimated he wanted a refill. That storm. He still felt distinctly iffy about it. Could Jimmy be right? God! This place was getting to him. He’d got a turnip for a head if he thought like that. By the time he’d drunk his second whisky he’d got things under control. This was a real gift, oh, yes! An absolute gift. Well, he’d bide his time and play the long game. Talk about a stroke of luck. By Jove! Things couldn’t be better.
The question of Deadman’s Dell became the main topic of conversation in the bar. It spread to the dining room to people wholly unconnected with the village, people who only saw it as a quaint place to eat on a summer’s evening, but they also had opinions on the matter. Roughly, had there been a head count, they were divided fifty-fifty as to whether or not the Dell should be the subject of an archaeological dig.
Gilbert Johns, in the choir vestry the following morning organising his collection of choirboys into an angelic chorus, remembered that he had to speak to Peter after the service about the Dell, as he chastised one boy for his crumpled surplice, another for his unruly hair, held out a tissue to a third, demanding he remove his chewing gum, reminded the youngest member not to rustle sweet papers during prayers and asked for silence.
Twenty pairs of eyes looked up at him and Gilbert said, as he always did, ‘Good morning, chaps. We’ll run through our exercises, get ourselves in trim. Ready?’ He raised his hand, gave them their note and started them off on a pattern of chords and scales they could have done in their sleep. They’d sung in cathedrals and won choir competitions under his tutelage, and next to archaeology the choir was his passion. Gilbert was so proud of them all, and they in their turn worshipped him. He had the knack of treating them as equals, yet keeping control, of bringing out the best in them but not demanding more than they had to give. This September two of them would be going to cathedral choir schools, and there weren’t many village church choirs could boast of that. All in all they were a brilliant bunch and what was so encouraging was the list of boys waiting their turn to join. They came from Turnham Malpas, Penny Fawcett and Little Derehams, and even from as far away as Culworth.
Gilbert checked his watch: nine fifty-nine precisely. He cocked an ear for Mrs Peel’s final trill before … there it was. ‘Ready. Quiet now. Here we go.’ He snapped a thumb and finger twice, his signal for them to adopt what he called their ‘church face’, and opened the door. Whether it was the ruffs around their necks or the glowing red of the choirboys’ cassocks or their shining morning faces, the hearts of the congregation always lifted when the choir appeared and quite a few female hearts fluttered at the sight of Gilbert processing down the aisle. He had his choirmaster face on and didn’t even see his Louise, freed from their three little ones by the crèche to sit for an hour in comparative peace.
Once the service was over and he had dismissed the choir he went in search of Peter. He found him in his vestry removing his surplice. ‘There you are.’
Peter said, ‘I am. I expect you’ve come to see me about the Dell?’
‘You know, then.’
‘I do. They’re all talking about it and expecting me to stop you doing it. Shall I?’
‘Do you want to?’
Peter sat on the edge of the table, folded his arms and asked ‘Do you want me to?’
‘In fact, you can’t, because if we’re right it isn’t on church land.’
‘Somehow, though, overnight, bones have become my responsibility.’ With a wry smile on his face Peter asked, ‘You tell me what is really happening.’
‘As opposed to rumours and counter-rumours.’
‘That’s right.’
‘We think there’s a pit, dug at the time of the plague, where they buried people because they had no priest to hold services and they were dying so fast they’d no one to dig proper graves so they did the next best thing: dug a big hole outside church land and bunged them all in. If we are proved right, which we can only do by digging, we shall examine the remains, find out what we can. Then what I propose, with your approval, obviously, is to hold a service and bury them in the churchyard. That way they’ll have had a funeral service and be buried on consecrated ground even though it’s … what? … six hundred and more years late.’
Peter sat thinking for a moment, head down, staring at a worn patch in the vestry carpet. ‘No doubt I shall be harangued from Little Derehams to Penny Fawcett for agreeing but yes, I think you should, mainly because I prefer the idea of them being buried in consecrated ground and only for that reason, and you can tell everyone I shall conduct the funeral service.’
‘Thanks. You know we’ll deal with everything with the greatest respect.’
‘Of course. I wouldn’t expect anything other. Mr Fitch will be delighted, he loves anything like this. I hope you’ll make sure for his sake that it gets into the papers.’ He grinned at Gilbert who raised a finger in acknowledgement of Peter’s understanding of the workings of Mr Fitch’s mind.
‘I shall be seeing him tomorrow. He’ll be glad of your approval, likes to be seen nowadays “doing what’s right by the village”. Must go. Louise will be champing at the bit to be off.’
‘Your brood OK?’
‘Fine, thanks.’
‘Good. Doesn’t get easier the older they get.’
‘Thanks for the warning. Talking of warnings, there’s going to be a lot of opposition. Apparently that storm we had was solely a warning to me for poking about in the Dell and worse is about to fall if we continue. Just thought I’d say.’
‘I can see what they mean, though.’
They both laughed.
Gilbert left, then came back and, putting his head round the vestry door, said, ‘By the way, thanks. Grateful for your support.’
As he went to gather up Louise and the children he met Bryn who had paid one of his rare visits to church that morning. He was lurking by the lych-gate clumsily clutching the baby, while Louise was playing a complicated chasing game between the gravestones with the two older ones. Bryn handed the baby to him saying, ‘Here, this is yours. I was waiting for a word.’
‘Be my guest.’
‘I want you to know you have my full support over the Dell. I’ve been thinking, if you find what you think you’ll find, how about a plaque, say, on the church wall by the little gate explaining all about it?’
‘Where my hunches are concerned, I’ve learned to wait and see until I’m proved right. Everything points to us being right but one never knows. However, it would be Peter who would have to give permission for that.’
‘Well, I just wanted you to know that at least you have my full support. We should know about these things, it’s important to the village’s history.’
Rather sourly, for him, Gilbert replied, ‘To say nothing of your tourist scheme, eh?’ The baby began to stir fretfully. ‘This baby is about to scream for his food and my mother-in-law will be frothing at the mouth; she’s expecting us for lunch. Will you excuse us?’
Bryn opened his mouth to protest that he was only thinking of the good of the village, but Gilbert shouted, ‘Louise! Come!’ and she did, scooping up the two gravestone chasers as she came, so before he could explain himself properly to Gilbe
rt they were already crossing the green.
By Saturday a fire was burning near Deadman’s Dell. The students had arrived that morning in a dilapidated old car equipped with rakes, billhooks and thick gloves to clear the undergrowth before commencing their dig.
A small group of onlookers had gathered, among them Alex and Beth from the Rectory, having spied the activity from the attic window, Bryn who tried to pretend he hadn’t a vested interest in their success but seriously failing to do so, going so far as to offer to supervise the bonfire, Willie leaning on the church wall, Fran and Flick who’d had a phone call from Beth in case they were at a loose end, and Mrs Jones who’d walked up to the village to go to a coffee morning in the church hall but couldn’t resist taking a peek, having no doubts that numerous Flatman ancestors were about to see the light of day.
Willie, concerned that the children were getting far too close to the fire, called out, ‘Beth! Alex! You’ll have a better view if you sit on the wall.’ He patted the top of the wall and hoped they’d come; the two of them could come up with some devilish arguments for doing exactly as they wished, arguments which defeated his powers of reasoning. Fortunately for him they saw the merits of his idea and came running. Beth, to her fury, couldn’t get up onto the wall and he had to lean over and help her, but Alex had sprung up without assistance. Beth put out her tongue at Alex, then settled herself after she’d found a smooth piece of coping stone on which to sit. The two of them talked non-stop to Willie and he had to admit to a sigh of relief when he spotted Sylvia arriving with a bag of sweets.
Beth spied the bag immediately. ‘Sylvia! Are those sweets for Willie?’
‘They were, but I dare say he’s kind enough to share.’
They were assorted sweets from the pick’n’mix in Tesco’s, and Beth loved the Turkish delights. With her mouth full of chocolate and Turkish delight, Beth asked Sylvia if she thought she might have ancestors in the pit.
‘I doubt it. My great-grandmother came from far, far away.’
‘How far?’
‘Scotland.’
‘That’s a long way. What about your great-grandfather?’
‘Same. Came to work on Nightingale Farm.’
Beth considered this for a while, watching the great piles of brushwood the students were heaping on the fire, and helping herself to another sweet from Sylvia’s bag. ‘Just think, if we’d got seven children in our house like the Nightingales …’
‘Thank heavens you haven’t, I don’t think I’d have coped. Think of the ironing.’
It was almost possible to hear the workings of Beth’s mind. ‘Did you work at the Rectory before we were born?’
There was a cautious note in Sylvia’s voice when she replied, ‘No, I started when you were about four weeks old.’
‘So you remember us being born, then?’
‘No. I’ve just said you were about four weeks old.’
‘Does Willie remember?’
‘They’ll be needing a saw for them thick branches. I’ll go and get one for ’em.’ Willie beat a quick retreat, and Alex in his absence dropped down off the wall and went to help Bryn with the fire.
Beth turned her guns on Sylvia again. ‘Did you know my mummy isn’t my mummy?’
‘Yes, but if you’re going to ask me if I knew your real mummy, I didn’t. It’s like I said, you were four weeks old when I came to live in. Now watch the fire, it’s getting bigger and bigger, isn’t it?’
Beth agreed. She felt the urge to know about her mother much more than Alex did. They’d discussed it a lot these last few weeks when no one was about and he’d refused to try to find out. But she couldn’t help herself. Something kept rising in her chest, something she couldn’t make go away, a need to know, a need to feel, a need to talk about her real mother. Daddy was Daddy and Alex was like him, so much like him it was unbelievable and the bigger he grew the more like Daddy he looked. But Beth Harris didn’t look like anyone she knew. It certainly wasn’t Harriet or Miss Pascoe at school, or any of the mothers who gathered at the school gate or taught in the Sunday School or helped with the Brownies or walked the streets of Culworth. She was always on the lookout and had not yet seen anyone with her rounded cheeks, her fair skin, or her thick ash-blonde hair, or her sturdy legs, no one at all. So where was she, this mother of hers and Alex? Maybe she’d died when they were born. That could be it! Having twins must be hard work. As Miss Pascoe had said in those lessons they’d had, mothers had to push their babies out and she’d had it to do twice!
Willie came back with the saw but took care not to stand anywhere close to Beth. She knew why. He didn’t want to tell her anything if he could avoid it. Nobody did. She wasn’t a logical person at all, she left all that to Alex, but like a flash of light she realised that the only, only person she could ask who really would know and would give her a truthful answer was her daddy.
So one day she would take her chance. He didn’t bath her any more now she was grown-up. In the past that had always been a good time to talk, so she’d … the fire was out of control, smoke was billowing and blowing straight at her, Sylvia was coughing and waving her arms, shouting, ‘Children! Come with me. Alex! Where’s Alex?’ It caught the lower twigs of a tree growing inside the churchyard wall, the breeze aiding and abetting its spread. ‘Alex! Where are you?’
Beth stood up on the wall and screamed, ‘Alex! Alex!’
Sylvia pulled her down and hurried her away, insisting she stood by a gravestone well away from the fire and didn’t move. Then Beth saw flames leaping, smoke rising in great clouds, voices shouting; that was Willie, that was Bryn, that was Sylvia. Flick and Fran joined her and they stood huddled together, horrified; the tree which had given up its lower branches to the scorching heat now took on a fire all of its own and the flames crackled and licked up the branches.
Willie raced by calling, ‘Go home, out of the way.’
Flick tried to move her away but Beth refused to go. ‘Alex! Alex!’ she kept shouting. ‘Alex!’ Great sobs exploded in her chest. ‘Alex!’
With her eyes squeezed tight with fear she didn’t see him come running through the little gate. ‘Isn’t it a great fire? It’s caught two trees in the churchyard now.’ His face was aglow with excitement. ‘Willie’s gone for the hose.’
Beth opened her eyes, truly saw him standing there in front of her, unharmed and ready to burst with excitement and, fuelled by relief, all the fear balled up inside her went into the beating she gave him. Her fists flying, her feet kicking, her voice hoarse with shouting, she charged him time and again, and it wasn’t until Caroline came running and took hold of her that she stopped.
Willie fastened the hose to the tap in the wall, Bryn and one of the students heaved the reel over into the field and unwound it as fast as they could, Willie turned on the tap but the flow from one hose made little impression at first. Gradually it began to get the fire under control. By then, though, everyone from the coffee morning and most of the villagers living around the green were in the churchyard watching.
Caroline was sitting apart on a flat gravestone, hugging Beth, with Alex standing beside them, puzzled by her onslaught. ‘I didn’t do anything, Mum, honestly I didn’t. It was her.’
‘I know you didn’t. She was frightened, that’s all.’
‘It’s a brilliant fire, isn’t it? It happened whoosh! Just like that. I was throwing twigs and things on and then whoosh! Up it went. I was there right in the middle of it all. Did you see the flames?’
‘All right, Alex, that will do. Yes, I did, that’s why I’m here.’
Beth wriggled free of her mother’s arms and looked at Alex through her tears. ‘I thought you’d been burned up.’
‘No-o-o. Not me. I was too quick.’
‘I shouted and shouted.’
Brimming with excitement, Alex told her he couldn’t hear her shout for the crackling of the flames. ‘You should have seen it.’
‘I did!’ Fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. She put her a
rms round Caroline’s neck and buried her face in her shoulder. ‘Go away, you stupid boy.’
Caroline began to laugh, as much with relief as anything else. ‘Oh, darling, I do love you. I’d have wanted to do just the same.’
‘Hit him?’
‘Well, perhaps not quite so hard as you did, but yes. It’s being glad they’re all right, isn’t it? After being so frightened.’
‘I thought he’d b-b-burned up like a guy.’
‘Here, let’s wipe your face.’ Caroline took out a tissue and dabbed Beth’s face for her, smiling with love while she did. ‘There we are, you’re all presentable now. Better?’
Beth nodded. There was nothing quite like a good hug when you’re frightened and Caroline knew just how to hug her to make her better. Perhaps she’d leave finding out about her own mother till she was bigger. Then, looking over Caroline’s shoulder, she saw her daddy striding between the graves towards them, looking both relieved and angry at the same time. He’d given her his blue eyes, she could see that. She squeezed Caroline’s neck more tightly. There was no doubt that he was their daddy. He came over and gave them both a hug and a kiss. ‘I couldn’t get off the phone. Thank heavens you’re all right. Where’s Alex?’
Beth answered him, ‘The stupid boy is in the field.’
‘Whose fault is this?’
Caroline, her hand cradling his as it gripped her shoulder, said, ‘No one’s. I think it just happened.’
‘I’ll go and see. Coming, Beth?’
She shook her head in reply and held tight to Caroline, content to wallow in security and love for a while longer. ‘You’re the best mummy ever.’ Gradually the excitement of the fire got to her and, filled with curiosity, she disentangled herself and stood up. ‘I’ll just go and see what he’s up to, the stupid boy.’
He was standing by, listening to his father tearing a strip off the students and Bryn.
‘Didn’t it occur to you that the fire should have been made much further away from the wall. I am surprised at you. Where is Gilbert?’
A Village Dilemna (Turnham Malpas 09) Page 8