‘Then let someone else look into it.’
‘You really think someone else is going to?’
‘That’s not your problem.’
‘I can’t believe you said that. Look, give me one more day, and I’ll submit a written report which I’ll email to Sophie so it’s on your desk by ten o’clock tomorrow. It will explain exactly why – with the underlying issues here – I feel this is not something we can, in all conscience, ignore.’
‘Merrily, you clearly haven’t been listening.’
‘And – as you’ve accepted that there should be at least a blessing at the Master House – there’s at least one person I need to talk to before I can organize it.’
‘And that would be …?’
‘His name’s Sycharth Gwilym.’
‘Mrs Watkins,’ the Bishop said, ‘the only thing I want to see on Sophie’s desk tomorrow morning is the Reverend Murray’s bill. Tell him we’ll pay him for the full five days.’
‘This is totally—’
‘I most certainly don’t want you to talk to anyone else. Please humour me. Pack your case.’
‘Bishop, be honest. I think we’ve always been honest with one another. Have you been – how can I put this? – got at?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
Merrily saw her watch glinting underneath the bedside table, bent and retrieved it, peered at the face and was initially relieved. It wasn’t yet ten minutes past seven. She knew the Bishop always rose early these days, but this was …
‘I’m sorry,’ Merrily said. ‘That was a bit offensive.’
Dead silence.
He’d hung up.
Christ.
Jane had been down since seven. In the cold kitchen, fully dressed for school. She’d fed Ethel, put the kettle on, was spooning tea into the pot when Siân Callaghan-Clarke appeared in the doorway, wearing a silk dressing gown – sea green, very expensive, almost swish.
‘Good morning.’
Jane took a breath.
‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I’m not sure it is.’
She’d avoided Siân last night, claiming that she had essays to do and escaping to the apartment, where she seemed to have lain awake half the night, replaying the drab, whiny voice of Shirley West. Listening to edited highlights of her own history, twisted by an expert.
Siân walked into the kitchen, pulled out a cane chair near the head of the refectory table and sat down, gathering her robe across her knees. This was where Mum would have lit a cigarette. Siân didn’t move. Jane pulled down two mugs.
‘Sorry. I’ve forgotten. Is it one sugar?’
‘It’s no sugar, Jane.’
‘Right.’ Might have guessed. ‘I’ve only just put the kettle on, so it’ll be a minute or two.’
‘Thank you.’
‘OK,’ Jane said. There was no clever way of dealing with this. ‘Here’s the situation. I was in the church last night, while you were talking to that woman. I was in the Bull Chapel. Behind the screen.’
‘I know,’ Siân said.
Jane stared at her. Siân’s sleek metallic hair was brushed back from her face, which had surprisingly few lines, even first thing in the morning, and no expression. A barrister face.
‘I was mildly concerned …’ a barrister tone of voice ‘… when you didn’t get off the school bus at what I’d been advised was the appointed time and I didn’t like to leave the house until you were home. I know you aren’t, strictly speaking, my responsibility, but I did think it wise to wait until the last possible moment. When I eventually saw you on the square, I decided it was safe to leave. And when you walked directly past me and Mrs … I’m sorry, I …’
‘Prosser.’
‘Yes, of course. When you walked directly past us – particularly Mrs Prosser – without saying a word and with your face concealed, I rather anticipated your intentions.’
Shit.
‘Look,’ Jane said, ‘I just …’
‘You were curious.’
‘I was suspicious.’
‘Why?’
‘Because, I …’ Jane tossed the spoon onto the worktop. ‘Oh, for—’
‘Come and sit down, Jane.’
‘I’m not going to apologize.’
‘What have you to apologize about? You were simply – I would guess – trying to protect your mother.’
Jane said nothing. Siân steepled her fingers.
‘Jane, there are certain issues on which Merrily and I are unlikely ever to agree but, for what it’s worth, I suspect the level of my regard for her somewhat exceeds the level of hers for me.’
Siân’s smile was kind of wan and regretful. Jane didn’t know how to respond and didn’t.
‘I realize that I would hardly have been her first choice for looking after the parish,’ Siân said. ‘She was probably dismayed?’
‘Erm, yeah.’
Jane sat down, near the bottom of the table. Couldn’t get anything right at the moment, could she? Walked right into this one, thinking she was going to nail Callaghan-Clarke first thing in the morning, while her senses were fuddled.
As if.
The tables had been turned, Jane stitched up like a unreliable witness in the box. Stitched herself up, in fact. Mum might almost have predicted it last night: Jane, I don’t want you handling anything.
Siân Callaghan-Clarke, practised in silence, just sat there. Waiting for you to dig yourself further in.
‘OK …’ Jane proceeded with extreme caution. ‘If you knew I was there, in the church … why did you get her to go through it all? All the stuff about me being a not-so-closet pagan, worshipping the goddess in the vicarage garden.’
‘Do you?’
‘No. I mean, I did once, maybe a couple of times, in a half-hearted kind of way, but not any more. And, like, all the stuff about me having an altar in the attic and, like, chanting and trying to raise dark forces, that is total crap. I wouldn’t do that. I mean, OK, I thought about it … an altar. But only as a kind of a focus point. I didn’t … I mean, I was just a kid.’
‘A teen-witch?’
‘Never that much of a kid, Siân.’
‘My apologies.’
‘And, for heaven’s sake, it’s not satanic, is it? She’s making the fundamental mistake that all these ignorant fundamentalists— I mean, Satanism’s just a perverse reversal of Christianity. It doesn’t even qualify as any kind of paganism.’
‘Yes, Jane, I have read my deliverance handbook. And – since you ask – the reason I invited Shirley to pour out everything was that I thought it might help if we both knew the extent of it. There’s one in every parish, Jane. Often more than one – a faction, even.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Probably harmless most of the time, but she needs watching. She might well be used, for instance, by opponents of the plan to re-erect your standing stones in Coleman’s Meadow.’
‘Right.’
‘Although I wouldn’t imagine it would improve their case to any great extent.’
‘No.’
‘Well …’ Siân sat back. ‘And there was I, feeling rather pleased with my success at drawing Shirley out in a way that perhaps wouldn’t have been open to Merrily. I’m sorry you felt the need to put a rather different interpretation on it.’
Jane sagged in her chair.
‘But I’m glad you brought it up this morning,’ Siân said. ‘It says something about you.’
‘Like that I’m a totally immature idiot who shouldn’t be allowed out?’
‘I think the tea should be almost brewed by now,’ Siân said. ‘Would you like to pour for us, Jane? And have you eaten yet, or were you waiting for me?’