‘Quick as I possibly can.’ Merrily was not feeling up to an argument. ‘As soon as I can establish what we’re looking at.’
Meaning help me here. Teddy prised out a reluctant chuckle.
‘Merrily has a most unenviable job. Bumps in the night being an area most of us tend to steer clear of. Too many pitfalls.’
‘If there’s a crisis in the parish, Teddy tends to take himself for a walk,’ Beverley said.
She was maybe ten years younger than Teddy, one of those brisk, practical, short-haired blondes who’d become a familiar breed in these parts, like the golden retriever. Their farmhouse was eighteenth-century, a block of sunburned-looking stone wedged into the hillside half a mile beyond the church, ruinous outbuildings scattered below it like scree. The Ridge: Dinner, B & B. Walkers welcome. Two public footpaths intersected below a terrace with tables and green and yellow umbrellas.
‘Balm for the soul, this landscape.’ Teddy was in thick socks, still carrying his walking boots by their laces. ‘You’ll start to feel it soon, Merrily. Take away that anxious frown.’
‘Teddy!’
‘Well, it’s true, Bevvie.’ He turned to Merrily. ‘Sorry if I’m being tactless, but I have to say I don’t think I’ve seen anyone alter as dramatically as you have in just a few days. Well, yes, sudden death … inevitably a shock to the system. But it’s not your fault, my dear, not your fault.’
‘Yes, well …’ Merrily said, ‘Maybe a good night’s sleep …’
‘Or, as I say, a good walk. Oh, I know Bevvie thinks I’m an avoider, but the countryside calms and strengthens. One of the functions of a parish priest is to remain centred and … essentially placid.’
‘He means passive,’ Beverley said. ‘In other words, uninvolved. Male priests think there’s some sort of dignity to being remote. One of the benefits of having girls in the clergy is that at least they aren’t afraid of getting their feet wet. Women get involved, men go for a walk. He does yoga, too, I’m afraid.’
‘Basic stuff, but it keeps one in trim.’ Teddy dumped his boots by the door. ‘Like to enjoy this place for a couple more decades. That so wrong?’
‘I mean, obviously we’re delighted to have you here, Merrily,’ Beverley said. ‘If only the circumstances were different.’
‘Yes. Thanks.’
If only. Merrily was the sole guest, although a party from Germany was expected at the end of the week. There were no-smoking signs in the dining room, the lounge, her bedroom and the en-suite bathroom.
‘At the end of the day, I’m afraid I really don’t see,’ Beverley said, ‘why this community has to be dragged into something which might be terribly sad but is also sordid, sordid, sordid. Bad enough that Teddy’s forced to conduct a service next Saturday for a bunch of … anoraks, I suppose. But nothing to do with the Knights Templar is terribly healthy, it seems to me. The activities they were accused of … well, no smoke without fire, that’s my view.’
Outside the window, rolling shadows chased the last of the sunlight out of a patch of woodland.
‘I can … understand how you feel,’ Merrily said carefully.
When she’d rung from the vicarage, thinking she’d go to Garway in the morning, Teddy Murray had invited Merrily over for supper. Jane, listening to her vacillating, had held up both palms, pushing: go.
And it was the only way, she realized that now. Time-consuming, but if you went in cold you learned no more than the police would, or the media. Interviews. Statements. On the record, therefore restricted.
Really, it was about listening. As she’d said at the Sunday meditation, not quite getting through to Shirley West. Merrily shivered, not the first time, Beverley noticing at once.
‘Cold, Merrily?’
‘Oh no. Not at all. Goose walked over my …’
After a light supper – Vegetarian? Not a problem, grow our own – the three of them were sitting around a glass-fronted wood stove in the lounge, which had rough panelling and a small cocktail bar, like a pulpit, in one corner.
‘More coffee, I think,’ Beverley said, reaching for the pot, and Teddy, having collected more of Bev’s sidelong glances, discreet as neatly folded notes, made another approach.
‘How much of a public affair does this have to be, Merrily?’
‘Well, I won’t be selling tickets.’
‘No … ha … I think what I’m asking …?’
‘Eight people, max. That’s what I was thinking. You, me, a representative of the Duchy, a couple of friends or relatives of Felix and Fuchsia and – tell me if you think this is going to be a problem – members of the two families who’ve owned the place. The Grays and the Gwilyms.’
‘Oh Lord.’
Teddy’s white-bearded chin sank into his chest, and Merrily pined for a lie-down and a cigarette. She sat up.
‘A bit ambitious, do you think?’
‘They don’t speak to one another, you know.’
‘I did hear that.’
‘Family feuds in this part of the world can be very bitter indeed and go on, literally, for centuries.’
‘It’s not a joke.’ Beverley was filling cups. ‘Personally, I think it might cause more trouble than any of this is worth. There’s still a lot of superstition in this area, and this is almost encouraging it. I mean, how can a house …? It seems more than a little absurd.’
‘Yes.’ Merrily nodded. ‘I suppose it does.’
Later, when Teddy had gone for his evening stroll, she joined Beverley in the kitchen. Stainless steel, halogen lights. Ultra-functional, no dust, no stains, no dark corners. Beverley wiped down a worktop with a damp cloth.
‘I didn’t want to be offensive, Merrily, and I’m still a churchgoer of sorts but do you really think the atmosphere of a place can affect the way someone behaves? Make them do something horrible?’
‘I suppose I have to say yes, sometimes, in a way, but—’
‘And that you can do something about it?’
How were you supposed to answer that? Tell her about the times you awoke in the night and wondered if you weren’t just patching up the fabric of a great big ancient but flimsy construction that was, in fact, completely hollow?
Merrily closed her eyes momentarily, finally admitting to herself that she wasn’t very well. Couldn’t be pre-mentrual, she wasn’t due for another … ten days?
‘You OK, Merrily?’
‘I’m fine. The thing is, I thought at first it was going to be nothing. I thought the Bishop was going over the top in asking for a full inquiry. Then two people die.’
‘Yes.’ Beverley threw the cloth into one of three sinks. ‘Something you said earlier worried me a little.’
‘Mmm?’
‘When you said there should be no more than eight people at this … ceremony. And that one of them should be Teddy. How necessary is that? I suppose what I’m saying – and please don’t tell him we’ve had this conversation, he’d be angry with me – is that I’d really rather you did it without him.’
‘I see.’
‘No, you don’t. What you see is a fit, healthy, athletic man who walks at least five miles every morning before breakfast. You don’t see what I saw when he was the rector of our village near Cheltenham.’
‘How long ago was this?’
‘Six years? That’s how long we’ve been married, anyway. I was recently divorced at the time – when I first met Teddy. And my son was abroad – gap year before uni.’
Beverley said she’d had room to breathe for the first time in years. She’d been awarded the house in the divorce settlement, and there was a recent bequest from an uncle. But she’d only been forty and on the lookout for a meaningful job.