The copper, by the way, is also known as the 'brew kettle' because in it the hops are boiled into the wort preparatory to the addition of yeast.
They say the insurance assessor passed out after finding the bodies of Shaw and Therese, which must have boiled for nearly two hours before the boiler, reaching danger-level, had automatically cut out.
Was this, I wonder, another example - drowning, boiling and perhaps, in Therese's case, simultaneous strangulation - of that ancient mystery, the Celtic Triple Death?
What was Shaw's state of mind? Was he angry? Embittered? Remorseful? Or a dangerous brew of all three?
Tell me,' I ask Cathy. 'When you heard them on the edge of the Moss, was Shaw stuttering, as he used to do? You know ... You'll fer-fer-feel ber-ber-better?'
'No,' she says. 'I'm pretty sure he wasn't.'
'I'm glad,' I say.
Poor Mungo.
His larynx full of peat, his eyes staring up in terminal terror into the eyes of the madman Stanage, his mouth no doubt full of flip New York obscenities which he now knew he would never utter.
Poor lad.
The stranger in a strange land. Thrown upon the Scottish shore with the instruction, I am told, to discover his 'roots'.
By 'eck. How gullible some of these Americans are apt to be.
And the winds of fate ... nay, the typhoons of fate, can sometimes pick you up and put you down precisely where you wanted to be. Only when you look around, do you realise it's the very last place you wanted to be.
He found his Celtic roots, all right. We might not wear kilts or speak a different language or owt like that, but I reckon we've been closer in Bridelow to the true Celtic way - Shades of things, Ernest! (Aye, thank you, Ma) - than you'll find in any lonely hamlet in Sutherland or Connemara.
And I think it will survive. I think the Mothers will watch over the rebuilding of a stronger Bridelow, I doubt they'll ever again 'let things slide'.
Cathy won't let them.
Did you know, Hans, by the way, that your daughter was coming to the end of her second and final year at a very reputable theological college outside Oxford? I bet you didn't. I bet she just kept telling you she was doing 'post-graduate research' or something of that order.
But Ma Wagstaff knew. Ma Wagstaff spoke more than once of the 'one who'll come after me' and everybody laughed because it sounded so quaintly biblical.
They have a fund, you know, the Mothers. A bank account in Glossop or Macclesfield or somewhere, to which
unexpected windfalls and bequests are added from time to time, and there was sufficient money in that to put Cathy through theological college without anyone knowing.
If all goes well, it'll be The Reverend Cathy soon. And in a few years, all things being equal, Bridelow will have its first woman minister. Oh, aye. You can count on it. You really think the Archdeacon won't give us his full backing in ensuring that the lass is appointed? By 'eck, lad, we've got enough dirt on that bugger to buy his soul off him, and we're not afraid to use it!
Makes you think though, doesn't it. Another giant step for mankind in little Bridelow: probably the first official Anglican clergy person (as we'll have to say) equipped to serve both God and the Goddess.
By 'eck.
Could've given Macbeth twenty-five years at least, this bastard, his face white as a skull, white as the skulls that tumbled from the walls in the Earl's Castle so long ago, in another time,
another life.
But so goddamn strong. His hands so hard, so tight around Macbeth's throat that Macbeth figured one finger must have been driven, nail first, through the skin, through the flesh and up his windpipe where it had lodged and swollen to the size of a clenched fist.
He fought to breathe, but there was no air left, not anywhere in the world.
Stanage's eyes had receded into his skull as he thrust Macbeth's head down under the water once, twice. Second time he came up, Macbeth's eyes were popping too far out, probably, for eyelids to cover, and he was seeing nothing through the black water. Only his inner eyes saw everything, with a helpless clarity:
... this is how it happens, this is how you drown.
His lungs hard as concrete, his whole body filled up with peat.
... gonna be preserved. For all time. For ever.
'I remember you now,' he heard Stanage saying. 'Scotland, yes? An American. Followed the Cairns creature around like a bloody lamb.'
Stanage must have known the last question, the one Macbeth couldn't speak, the one which even his blacked-out eyes could no longer convey.
He said, almost gently, 'She died.'
And Macbeth stopped resisting, surrendered to the limitless night.
'Bloody unfortunate, really. Didn't want her dead at a crucial stage. But it'll be OK, I suppose; she won't be doing much yet. They're very bewildered, you see, m'boy. At first. It can take about three days - well, weeks, months, years in some cases. Oh, she was doubtless better prepared than most, but however developed they are, it's three days, minimum, 'fore they can do damage.'
Stanage wore a black jacket over a white shirt. The shirt was spotless; suddenly this was the worst thing, a spiritual travesty; Macbeth, dying, felt sick at the injustice of it.
'Caught her unawares, I think, when it came, m'boy. Even though she certainly did have a spirit. Damn well caught me unawares on one occasion, as you saw. Bitch. But the Scottish business, that was really …'
Forcing Macbeth under the dark water again; this time no struggle, get it over ...
But Stanage brought him up again.
'... just a small clash of egos, in comparison. Small clash of egos. This, though ... this is a splendid shake-up. Past and present, worlds colliding ...'
Macbeth's eyes cleared a moment; he saw a big yellow grin.
'... roof coming in, I was expecting it, threw myself under a table. Central beam - oak beam - came down on her. If she'd had all her hair - ironic, really - I wouldn't have seen it happen. Not in quite such exquisite detail ... crrrrunch. Like an eggshell.'
Eased his grip a fraction, so that a thin jet of air entered Macbeth's lungs. He used it.