I am quite aware that everything that happened that night is explicable in a perfectly straightforward way. Two silly schoolboys went into the Cathedral by night for a prank and climbed part of the way up the west tower before compounding their folly by plunging themselves into darkness. The elderly gentleman whose hospitality they had abused came to rescue them. He was not in the best of health. Climbing the tower stairs in a state of acute anxiety brought on a heart attack, which led him to fall — though the doctor was not able to tell whether it was the heart attack or the fall that actually killed him. The younger boy was running a fever at the time, which may have been some excuse for his irresponsible behaviour. But there was no excuse for the behaviour of the older boy.
All this is true. But it leaves out so much. We went up the west tower because of the story of Mr Goldsworthy: because of his anthem for the bells that were never rung, and because of his dying fall from the ringing chamber.
La-la-la-la. We went up the tower because of lost notes that only Faraday heard.
Was Mordred in the Cathedral that night? Was it he who brushed against me on the tower stairs and left the south porch when I did? Did Faraday see something when we were climbing the stairs and, later, just before Mr Ratcliffe had his seizure? After the ratting at Angel Farm, did I really glimpse a man in the arcade passageway when we came through the Cathedral?
Finally, can I trust my own memory?
La-la-la-la.
Lost notes and broken melodies. Sometimes, when I wake up suddenly, I am full of happiness. I know that I have heard in a dream I can no longer remember those notes that Faraday heard and tried to sing to me in his cracked voice. But I don’t understand music. And I never remember my dreams.