by Heide Goody
In the branches above, a certain squirrel looked at him innocently with shiny black eyes.
“Later, there will be an opportunity for confession of sins,” said Francis gruffly, staring at the squirrel, “but now let us start with our first hymn, All Things Bwight and Beautiful.”
“I’ve never wanted to be a man,” said Joan.
“Oh, really?” said Em.
“Perhaps, unlike other women of my time, I felt the need for action and a sense of purpose, the desire to do something. Nonetheless, I am a woman, a maiden, and though I spent my life among soldiers and kings, I have never wanted to be anything other than what I am.”
“Interesting,” said Em. “Shall we look at the evidence?”
“What evidence?”
“You have a man’s haircut.”
“What?”
Em pointed at Joan’s short bob.
“You have man’s hair.”
“Lots of women wear their hair like this,” Joan protested.
“Nowadays they do, most inspired by fanciful pictures of you. But in your time, that was a man’s haircut.”
“I was a wanted woman. I had to travel incognito in my last few years. I was trying to blend in.”
“Which brings me onto the men’s clothing you wore.”
“You try fighting a battle in a dress. I was safer from harm of all kinds in hosen and tunic.”
“And more like a man. And, you reminded me, what was it you carried in battle?”
“My sword sometimes,” said Joan. “And my standard. I was both leader and standard bearer for the king’s armies.”
“Mmm,” nodded Em. “That’s right. Joan of Arc, striding about with a big pole in her hand. Her fingers wrapped around the thick shaft. I bet holding your big pole brought you a lot of comfort.”
“I think it brought comfort to a lot of the men,” said Joan.
Em sniggered.
“Next verse!”
Francis swung his arms in great circles, trying to keep the animals in time.
“The purple headed mountain, the wiver wunning by…”
The rabbits had the best sense of rhythm but, lacking powerful voices (they could produce little more than intermittent squeaks) did little to counteract the toneless squawks of the sparrowhawk and the wretched screams of the foxes.
The forest frogs added their own weird belches and pops to the ensemble, creating a complex arrhythmic syncopation which was either a deliberate work of sabotage or perhaps an attempt to inject a bit of Gallic jazz into the proceedings.
The snails and slugs had seemingly decided that the whole event was simply not for them but, fortunately, were leaving at such a slow pace that no one noticed or cared. Francis sympathised with their views. It had been centuries since he had conducted an animal choir on earth and, in the Celestial City, he’d had the finest Amazonian songbirds to carry the melody and a couple of well-practised elephants to keep the whole thing in time with foot stomps and their basso profundo trumpeting.
“The sunset and the morning, that bwightens up the sky… All together now!” yelled Francis. “All things bwight and beautiful, all cweatures gweat and small…”
The slugs and snails continued to flee at top speed.
“Where’s my wolf?”
The landlady did not take her eyes off the eggs frying on the hob. She had a cigarette tucked in the corner of her mouth and was successfully focussed on keep cigarette ash out of the frying pan.
“Wolf?” she said. “I thought you had a dog.”
Matt ran an anxious hand through his uncombed hair.
“Dog. I meant to say dog.”
“He’s not in your room?” said the woman.
“I think I would have noticed. He’s huge.”
“Almost wolf-like in his proportions.”
“Wolf-like, yes. I think he’s escaped.”
“Ah,” said the woman, flipping the eggs over. “That explains it.”
“Explains what?”
“Someone opened the front door last night. It was ajar when I came down.”
Matt frowned.
“Someone broke in?”
“No. I lock up last thing at night, keys in the lock, the door bolted.”
Matt blinked and tried to clear the muzzy sleepiness from his head.
“So, someone let him out?”
“Either that or your wolf has very dextrous paws.” She turned and smiled at him. “Sorry. Dog.”
Christopher stopped as they came up against an impenetrable tangle of bramble. He looked left and right but there was no continuation of the path, no way for them to press on.
Christopher huffed, looked up and down and back the way they had come. He caught the wolf looking at him.
“First up, we’re not lost. We’re not. I’m the patron saint of travel.”
The wolf sat down and scratched itself.
“Ex-patron saint of travel. Point is, I know travel. I do not get lost.” He spun around, utterly stumped. “And even if I were lost, it’s not a problem. This is just my own way of enacting the Almighty’s ineffable plan. We’re clearly here for – Ha!”
The wolf flinched at the giant saint’s sudden outburst.
“Up there,” said Christopher, pointing up into a nearby tree. “Come on. Give me a leg up.”
“I’m going to ignore your vile comments about my lifestyle choices,” said Joan to Em. “You’re simply trying to deflect attention from yourself.”
“Deflect?”
“Deflect. I think I struck a nerve with you.”
“Have not,” said Em. “You know nothing about me.”
“I know that you’ve been wandering the earth for nearly two thousand years, ignoring all of Heaven’s edicts and generally doing what you want.”
“I’m an independent woman.”
“You’re sulking,” said Joan, hearing a harshness in her own voice she hadn’t intended. “You’re all big strops and grand defiant gestures. No wonder you’ve fallen in with the anarchists and anti-globalisation crowd. They may have noble intentions but, for the most part, it’s about shouting ‘No!’ as loud as you can in whatever way you want. It’s throwing your baby toys out of the cradle.”
“Good mother-twatting God!” shouted Em. “I had no idea you were so fucking… bourgeois!”
“Bourgeois? I don’t even know what that means but it sounds filthy. You’re only angry because I’m right. You’re striking out in whatever way you can, without thought. Mad silly stuff like – what was it you said in Rouen? – when you and your hacker friend compromised a government computer and replaced the main programme with random text. Childish.”
“It was the French military mainframe. We were having a pop at the hawks of this world.”
Joan froze.
“Wait.”
“What?” said Em. “You’ve just realised that you’re a complete arse and need time to rewind?”
“The military mainframe. That was you and Michel who did that?”
“Maybe.”
Joan looked aside, her mind whirring, loose fragments of information struggling to fit together.
“The Systѐme Intelligent Militaire et Opérations Nucléaires.”
“That’s the one. Who told you?”
“Matt.”
“You see, I blame him for this attitude of yours. He’s put ideas in your head and tried to turn —”
“Shut up. I’m thinking. It controls the armies, does it? The planes and the missiles?”
“And all their other phallic symbols of male dominance.”
Joan clutched her head.
“What text?”
Em frowned.
“What?”
“The random text you copied over the mainframe’s – what was it? – key directives.”
“I don’t know. Why?”
Joan held Em in her steely gaze.
“Systѐme Intelligent Militaire et Opérations Nucléaires. S – I – M – O – N.”
Col
our drained from Em’s worn face.
“No,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper. “That’s silly. That’s nonsense.”
“A soulless being makes a prayer to Heaven.”
“No.”
“A being who has the power to launch weapons, set fires and bring destruction raining down from the skies?”
“No,” whispered Em, shaking her head robotically.
Joan smiled but it was a bitter, crazy smile.
“Because you thought it would be funny, didn’t you? A computer system capable of bringing about the end of the world or something very much like it. You picked the book of Revelation as a joke and fed it to the computer.”
“No.”
“Mother Mary, he called you. It called you. And that’s who you are.”
“No! Listen —”
“You’re its mother. You made it!”
“That can’t be true!”
“And it’s doing what its mummy told it to do. It’s taken your words as a set of instructions. There are seven trumpets, Em. It’s already sounded at least three of them. What happens after the seventh trumpet, Em?”
“This is all conjecture, Joan.”
Joan stepped to the tree where her belongings sat, grabbed her sword and swung it to point directly at Em.
“Damn you, Mary! Admit it. What happens when the seventh trumpet sounds?”
Em took a deep breath, her jaw clenched with emotion.
“The world ends,” she said. “Everything. All of it. It ends.”
Joan turned away violently and picked up her bag of armour.
“But is that such a bad thing?” said Em.
“The end of the world?” spat Joan without even looking round. “Yes, I think it might be.”
“The flaming Almighty has let His creation go to ruin for too long. It’s time He stepped in and took some responsibility! If it takes Armageddon to make that happen then so be it.”
Joan gave Em a last backward glance.
“I’ve just realised something,” she said.
“What?”
“You’re an idiot.”
Joan set off through the undergrowth in a possibly southerly direction.
“Where are you going?” Em called.
“To stop what you started!” she shouted back.
“I can help!”
Joan sneered.
“You’ve helped enough,” she shouted and stomped on, taking out her plate arm greaves as she did.
Francis conducted the animals through the final verse with the passion and urgency of a trapped miner clawing his way towards a speck of daylight.
“He gave us eyes to see them, and lips that we might tell… Keep it together, guys!”
He stepped aside as Brother Squirrel launched yet another missile at him from his perch in the ash tree. Like it or not, decided Francis, that creature was going to be first in the confessional.
“How gweat is God Almighty, who has made all things well. Final chorwus, evewyone! All things bwight and beautiful —”
There was a great thrashing sound from the bushes and the Wolf of Gubbio bounded into the clearing, scattering mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and insects before it. The noise (one would have to be very generous to describe it as actual singing) halted at once. As wood pigeons, jays and starlings took to the sky and various rodents fled into the undergrowth, the wolf bounced and leapt, his teeth snapping together.
“Bwother Wolf!” exclaimed Francis.
He was not sure in that first instance if he should be delighted to see his companion again or annoyed that he had effectively destroyed the woodland animal service or, indeed, secretly glad that he had brought the excruciating hymn to a final close.
“How did you find us?” he asked.
“Because he was with me,” said Christopher, strolling in.
“Oh, this is marvellous news.”
The wolf went over to the pack of snails and slugs who were still fleeing and were the only members of the congregation still present.
“Don’t eat them,” said Francis. “This is a place of worship, bwother.”
The Wolf of Gubbio looked at Francis with a sheepishness that the saint knew well.
“Who?” said Francis.
The wolf looked up at a broken ash branch.
“Bwother Squiwwel? Oh, dear.”
Christopher put his hand on Francis’s shoulder.
“Where are the ladies? I’ve sorted our onward travel.”
“Oh?”
“I found the balloon again.”
With no wolf and no phone signals to guide him, Matt had resorted to driving round the local forests, turning from single-laned roads to dusty tracks and back again in what he told himself was a methodical searching pattern but which was nothing more than aimless wandering.
After two hours, with morning almost gone, Matt parked up. He was no longer able to ignore the truth of the matter, that his speculative wanderings were simply a way of putting off an admission of defeat. With no sign of Em or her companions and no further information from the French authorities, he had lost them. It was time to return to the office (by which he meant anywhere with wi-fi and cheap coffee), type up a report for his superiors both here and in the UK and take further instructions from –
There was a sharp hard tap at the passenger window. He startled.
“Open the door,” said Joan. The tip of a metre-long sword rested against the glass.
“I see you’re back in your fancy knight gear,” he said. “Gay Pride was last weekend. And in another country.”
“Open the door,” she said. There was a fearsome and determined set to her narrow jaw.
“It’s open,” he said.
Joan tried the handle and then got in, her sword angled across at Matt.
“I think you should point that somewhere else,” he said.
“You’re going to take me to Marseille.”
“I mean, one corner taken at high speed, you slip and kebab me… That would be very – why Marseille?”
“Your role is to drive, not ask questions.”
“You’re taking me hostage? You do know that’s a criminal offence?”
He could see the flicker of hesitation in her eyes.
“There are greater matters at stake here,” she said, in a voice so grave that it frightened Matt far more than the blade pointed at his side.
“Where are your friends?” he asked.
“Friends?”
“Mary. Francis. Are we meeting them in Marseille?”
She shook her head.
“It’s just me,” she said. “Now, drive.”
Chapter 8 – Marseille and Aubenas
“Didn’t I tell you I'd get us all going again?” said Christopher, patting the edge of the balloon basket.
“Can you get that brute to drool over someone else?” said Em. “His breath is astonishing.”
“He's pwobably just hungwy.” Francis tickled the Wolf of Gubbio under his chin. The wolf shook his head gently, speckling Em's upper body with flecks of frothy grey saliva.
“Why we had to travel in this thing I don't know,” said Em. “I'd be all for it if we could pull over and get a coffee and some fags, but no, we're committed, aren't we? We'll just hang on to the tattered remains of this giant dick which may or may not take us somewhere useful.”
The wolf stretched and put his front paws onto the edge of the basket, pushing Em out of the way to do so. As it leaned over the edge, tongue lolling, Christopher thought he saw a smirk of malicious enjoyment on its face.
“I can get us to Toulon,” said Christopher, “I've got the wind going just right for a nice speedy journey, but we don't know where Joan is.” He looked at Em. “Why did she go off on her own?”
“No idea. She's her own woman, apparently.”
“What?”
“Nothing. She just went off. Okay? Leave it.”
“I thought I heard waised voices back in the fowest,” said Francis.
“I think you'll find that was a fox trying to sing All things Bright and Beautiful,” said Em. “I know it sounded like screams of torment. Easy mistake to make.”
“Did you and Joan have a set to?” asked Christopher.
“A set to?”
“Aye. A ding-dong. An argument.”
“We've not really had anything else since we met, have we?” said Em.
Christopher looked at Em directly, but she looked away. Her hands patted her pockets and she pulled a lumpy roll-up from her pocket and twirled it in her fingers.
“Don't suppose either of you know if these leaves are poisonous?” she asked, holding up a sample.
Christopher and Francis shook their heads. Em let the wind take the leaf.
“Joan would know,” she said.
Joan sat in the passenger seat of Matt's car, her sword held loosely in her lap and only generally pointing at Matt.
“Stunning scenery, isn’t it?” said Matt conversationally.
Joan couldn’t help but agree. The countryside of northern France had seemed achingly familiar from her life on earth all those years ago, but she realised that southern France was very different. Instead of apple trees there were fields of sunflowers and lavender. As they crested a small rise the view to the horizon glowed with colour.
“It’s lovely,” she agreed. “No country on earth quite like it.”
The car radio warbled at the hilltop.
“… opened the bottomless pit and there arose a smoke out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were dark…”
The radio drifted into static.
“Damned thing,” muttered Matt and pressed a button.
“Wait!” said Joan.
“It’s okay,” said Matt. “Just finding a station.”
“— still unclear,” said a radio newsreader. “There has been a series of explosions in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Uncontrollable fires blaze in many of the region's oilfields. The entire region is covered with a highly toxic cloud of smoke, which is visible as far away as Central Europe.”