December (9 page)

      
'The dogs?'

      
'Sure.'

      
Donald put himself shyly on the edge of the sofa. He picked up
the guitar and sat it on the cushion next to him, as if it was a holy relic,
the Dobermans like temple dogs at his feet.

      
Moira crept numbly into the kitchen to make tea, moving
crockery, milk, sugar, spoons, oatmeal biscuits on to a tray without thinking,
like setting up the pieces on a chessboard, slow and precise and deliberate,
laying it down for herself: a not-yet-elderly woman, known, a little
irreverently, as the Duchess because of her authority and her wisdom and her grace,
this woman had died, suddenly, in her palace on wheels, on a run-down
local-authority gypsy caravan site near the west coast.

      
And yet this simply was not possible. It was not possible the Duchess
would die without telling her. It was not possible the Duchess could die
suddenly.

      
She carried the tray into the living-room, set it down on the
deep window ledge. 'And did no one,' she said grimly, 'think to call the
poliss?'

      
'Hey, now, come on, hen. We had the doctor. Wis natural. She
wis always frail.'

      
'Was
not at all
frail, Donald, you know that ...' Moira dropped a cup, felt her face collapse,
the grief finally overcoming the disbelief. 'A damn
stroke
? My mother spent half her life learning ... learning how to
die, you know what I'm saying?'

      
'Aye,' Donald said, sighing, knowing there could be no
argument. 'Wid ye let me drive you doon tae the site?'

      
Moira shook her head. He knew more than he could say. 'Was
good of you to come.'

      
'Nae choice in the matter, hen. It wis laid down. If she wis ever
...'

      
'But I have to go down alone,' Moira said. 'You know?'
      
She bent down to pick up the pieces
of broken cup. 'I'll fetch some water,' she said. 'For the dogs.'

When Dave came down after
packing his things, Jan was still in the same position, only it was near-dark
outside and the kids with the football had gone home.

      
The room was cold, but he knew she wouldn't light the fire until
he'd left.

      
'Put the light on,' Jan said. 'You'll break something with those
cases.'

      
He had two suitcases and his guitar case. He put on the wall lights
with their Tiffany shades, a soft ambience.
      
'The main light,' Jan said sharply.

      
The main light was hardly ever used. In its hard, white glare
he searched her face for anything salvageable. She held his gaze, with all the
insolence of grief, for more than long enough to convince him. Her thick red hair
was tied back. She wore no make-up. She'd never looked as beautiful.

      
But that was always the case, wasn't it, when you were getting
the elbow?

      
'Can I call you? I'd like to know. How it works out.'
      
'You've done enough,' Jan said. 'We
don't need you to know.'

      
He started to fed angry. 'I didn't
make
it happen to her, Jan. I just saw that it
had
happened. I mean, shit ...'

      
Jan took a long breath. She was a professional teacher; she made
it all sound very reasonable.

      
'Dave, I know very well you didn't make it happen. I know you
couldn't
make it happen. Of course I
don't believe you did anything. I also don't actually believe you saw anything.
But it's the thought that
you
believe
you saw something ... Can you understand that?

      
'To a point, but ...'

      
Jan held up both hands, warding him off.
      
'But more than that,' she said,
'it's the thought that one day you might be convinced you saw something around
me.
Or my parents. Or one of our
friends. Now I know there has to be a sound psychological explanation for your
appalling behaviour, but it's not my field of study. You've put yourself
outside my parameters, Dave, and I want you out of my life. That plain enough
for you?'

      
All he could think to do was nod. The bright light made him
blink. It was completely plain. Jan despised him. Fear and ignorance could be
overcome, given time. Contempt - forget it.

      
Silently, he picked up his suitcases, carried them to the door,
went back for the guitar.

      
'Dave, haven't you forgotten something?'
      
Like she was asking for a goodbye
kiss.
      
He stopped and thought, bitch. He
laid the guitar case down, found his key ring in a hip pocket of his jeans.
From it he detached her front door key.

      
He laid the key, almost ceremoniously, on the table in front
of her. Feeling like a small boy required to turn out his pockets and surrender
his bag of toffees. The humiliation somehow made it easier.

      
He thought, fuck you, Jan.
      
'Thank you,' she said.

Climbing into his peeling
Fiat, he looked over his shoulder once and saw the curtains had been drawn in
Jan's living-room and he hard light had given way to the soft light. All very
homely. He used to love arriving here after midnight, and these lights would
still be on. Or, better still, there'd be a rosy light in the bedroom.

      
It was cold in the car and wouldn't warm up; the heater was
clapped. It occurred to him that he had nowhere to go, ought to have had something
worked out. Wasn't as if he hadn't known this was coming. There should be a
telephone help-line organization, Self-Pitying Bastards Anonymous, which you
could dial on such occasions as this, it was ...

      
somebody call?

      
Glancing up warily, Dave saw two tiny orbs of white light in the
misted rear-view mirror.

      
some ineffectual little
twat seeking a spot of advice?
      
'Piss off, John.'

      
now what kind of
attitude's that? listen, take it from someone who's been there, you're well out
of that one, nice girl and everything, but you start suppressing one side of
you for a quiet life, you're inviting grief, pal.

      
Dave drove away.

      
tie a knot in it, that's
my advice, son. just for a while.

      
Dave considered his options. Muthah Mirth had offered him a
few gigs coming up to Christmas. Fees weren't monster, but the availability of
Bart's bedsit round the comer was a plus.

      
cos you've got problems
coming.

      
'What?'

      
fax it.

      
Moira? You reckon?
      
fax
it, dickhead.

      
It was fully dark now. The link road to the bypass curved back
over a new viaduct overlooking Jan's terrace. The last he saw of the end house
was a curl of new white smoke from its chimney.

IV

Profanity from a Man
of the Cloth

Two men and a sheepdog
strolled down the valley from Ystrad Ddu, thickly conifered hills either side
and the grey sky flat and low like a lid on a box.
      
'Why do you say "brave"?'
the new vicar asked.
      
'Ah well,' said Mr Eddie Edwards,
who was built like a pillar-box, 'perhaps ill-chosen, that was, I don't know.
It depends on what kind of a man you are.'

      
He looked up at the vicar from under the brim of his crimson cap,
pulled down to prevent the wind stealing it and thus enhancing the illusion
that you could post letters in him.

      
'A challenge, it was, for some of your recent predecessors,
see. The old biblical stony ground. Could they persuade from it a harvest?' Mr
Edwards laughed. 'Could they hell.'
      
'But in trying ...'

      
'Aye. In trying, they produced their own harvest. Or not. As
the case was usually.'

      
'You sound disillusioned,' the vicar said.

      
'An old cynic I am. Not from these parts, see, originally, as
you might have guessed, but from a, shall we say, less
agricultural
part of Wales. Another refugee, Vicar, like yourself.
Early retirement, ten years ago. But, still, we nosy retired people, we have
our uses. And we talk. We talk to the locals, and we also talk to the
strangers. And this way we find out.' Mr Edwards beamed. 'Sooner or later, we
find out everything.'

      
This was true. The vicar had served at two previous parishes,
one as a curate, one his own living. And each of them had had its Mr Edwards:
bright, retired, time on his hands. Anxious to show the new vicar around, put
him wise on local issues.

      
I knew a lot about this place, mind, before we came. Zap, come
yere, boy, it's only an old dead sheep. Typical, this is. Bloody farmers are
supposed to bury them. Hydatid disease, heard of that? Tapeworm. Breeds in the
sheep, gets picked up by dogs from carcasses and passed on to the owner. No
time at all, bloody cyst the size of a grapefruit in your liver or somewhere.
Dangerous place, the countryside, Vicar, got to learn the rules.'

      
'Yes,' the vicar said, 'that's true' Several clergymen had
expressed an interest in having this parish. He suspected he'd been chosen
because the others had been simply too enthusiastic about the delights of rural
life. And also, perhaps, because he'd hoped so desperately that he
wouldn't
be chosen.

      
'And also, see, Vicar, it's a funny place as regards the
church. Ecclesiastical history lies deep on the ground - all these ancient
abbeys and priories: Abbey Dore, Craswall, Llanthony. And of course our own,
which we shall come to soon.'

      
Mr Edwards paused to take in the sharp November air.

      
'When we lived in Aberdare, we'd spend weekends out by Raglan,
so we always knew we'd retire this way, get ourselves a bit of ground. But the
prices! The motorways done it, see, M4, M50. But this is a bit out of the way,
so the prices come down accordingly.'

      
The home Mr Edwards and his wife had finally acquired was the
former vicarage, now replaced by a smaller, less characterful modern dwelling
in Ystrad hamlet. For which the vicar, who lived alone, was grateful.

      
The track followed the path of the river, not much more than a
rocky stream. They came to a vague fork, marked by a wind-bent thorn-bush. The
main path went with the river, but Mr Edwards took the other one, not much more
than a sheep track.

      
Zap! This way, boy. Bloody silly name for a dog, eh? My
grandson, Jason, his mam and dad brought him up to see the puppy; he says. Grandad,
you got to call a sheepdog something simple, so's he can hear you when you
gives him a command. What would you call him then? I says. Daft thing to say to
a ten-year-old. So he's Zap.'

      
The dog grinned at the vicar, the way sheepdogs did. The vicar
gave him a sympathetic pat.

      
'Slowly now,' Mr Edwards said. 'Don't let him know you're coming.
Have to try to catch him unawares, see.'

      
'The dog?'

      
'No, no, man, the Abbey.'

      
The vicar said sharply, 'Why do you say that?'

      
'I don't know really. Daft to talk about catching a building
unawares. But the Abbey ... all alone down here, the Abbey's got his thoughts,
it always seems to me. And his moods. Well, how would you feel. Vicar? For centuries
you're this important place, this great centre of worship, everything revolving
round you, and then you're nothing and falling down a bit more each year. I can
sympathize with the Abbey, being retired, like. Now ... prepare yourself.'

      
They were half-way to the summit of a green hump when Mr
Edwards stopped and seized the vicar's arm. A row of stones like brown and
rotten teeth had arisen from the grass.

      
'Here he comes, see.'

      
The sight of the rising stones had taken the vicar's breath away.
Literally. He stopped.