The Wine of Angels

support, whatever goes down. Like if you wants a witness ...’

‘No, I don’t think I’ll be taking it any further.’

‘What’s happenin’ yereabouts, see, it smells off. I were you, I wouldn’t trust nobody. I know that en’t in the spirit of your profession, like, but that’s my advice, see. It smells off. An’ that’s comin’ from a man who was once up to ‘is Adam’s apple in Billy Tudge’s cesspit.’

It was time, Merrily decided, to take Gomer Parry seriously.

‘I suppose,’ she said delicately, ‘that you heard the bit about the intruder.’

‘Sure t’be,’ Gomer confirmed, producing a soggy match, bending down to strike it on a cobble. ‘That would be Mr Robinson, mabbe?’

‘Oh dear,’ Merrily said.

Gomer stood up, his cigarette burning. ‘Vicar, there’s no problem, yere. Friend of poor ole Lucy’s, right? So no problem. See?’ He rubbed mud from his glasses and winked.

‘All right?’

‘Thank you,’ Merrily said.

‘En’t done nothin’, yet. Jus’ lettin’ you know I’m yere. Anythin’ I can do, say the word. ‘Cause, I never told Lucy Devenish, see. I never quite said that to Lucy, and now she en’t yere no more, which was a funny sort of accident, my way o’ thinkin’, and so the only other person I can say it to’s you, an’ I’m sayin’ it.’

‘You knew I was her executor?’

‘Nope. That matter?’

Funny sort of accident?

‘Gomer, can we talk?’

‘We’re talking, innit?’

‘Not here. Back at the vicarage?’

‘Hell, I wouldn’t go in the vicarage in this state. Minnie’d never speak a civil word to me again. I’ll mabbe get a bath and catch you later, if that’s all right with you.’

‘No. Please. Gomer, listen, there is something you can do. You come into contact with quite a few people, and Minnie’s secretary of the WI.’

‘On account of nobody else’ll take it on. Aye.’

‘OK.’ She told him briefly about Stefan Alder’s private preview of the Wil Williams play. To be performed in about ten hours’ time. It didn’t sound remotely possible.

Gomer whistled. ‘Tonight? So this – let me get this right – this is like a play, but it’s ...’

‘It’s a partly improvised drama. Stefan Alder, as Wil Williams, presents a kind of sermon, telling his life story, how he came to be in the mess he’s in. His congregation, as I understand it, will be able to question him. And anyone else.’

‘But they’ll all know it’s just an act.’

‘Gomer, when half the nation’s watching a soap opera, everybody knows it’s an act, but does that stop them getting involved? Does that stop the tabloid papers printing stories about Coronation Street characters as though they’re real people? This guy’s an experienced actor, and this is a role he cares deeply about. They’re the congregation, this is their church. Within half an hour, they’ll have forgotten who Stefan Alder is.’

‘By golly,’ Gomer said. ‘You really are gonner throw the shit in the mincer.’

‘You can get the word around the village? You and Minnie?’

‘Bugger me, the ole phone’ll be burnin’ up. Anybody in partic’lar you don’t want?’

‘At the moment, I can only think of Dermot Child. Bull-Davies is an optional.’

‘Right then.’ Gomer nodded, stamped out his cigarette. ‘Consider it spread.’

‘Well, I suppose there comes a point in your life,’ Lol said, ‘when you start to accept that some people are just not good people and you can’t do anything about that. I know it’s your job to try and put them on the path of righteousness and all that, but that’s not always the wisest strategy. Sometimes.’

‘I suppose, tackling Coffey last night, I thought I was on a roll again. It was a mistake. I shouldn’t have gone to see him.’

‘Perhaps Child wanted you to. I think people like him quite like to be discovered. I’m really sorry. This means you can’t accuse him of indecent exposure. But then he’d know that.’

‘Friday I throw up at my installation service. Saturday, I go to pieces at the opening of the festival. Sunday, while admitting to sheltering a man the police want to question, I claim my organist flashed at me. I think we’re looking at a resignation situation here, at the very least.’

‘Don’t even think of it,’ Jane said. ‘Lucy said—’

‘Sure. The catalyst. Where do you go, Lol? Don’t say the cops, that’s not an option. Not with Child working against us.’

‘Why is he, Mum? Why’s he doing this?’

‘Because ... because he obviously has the most incredible ego. And no remorse.’

‘He’s a psychopath,’ Lol said. ‘Very few of them actually kill people, they just do damage.’

Merrily smiled in spite of it all. ‘Lol has read widely on psychology. Come on, we may not have much time. Where shall we put him, flower?’

‘Lucy’s house? Or Lucy’s shop?’

‘With the cops hanging round the Country Kitchen?’

‘The Reverend Locke again?’

‘Won’t work. Child’s sussed that. And we don’t know what else he knows. We don’t know if or when he’ll go to the police. It’s very unsettling. Look, I have to go and meet Stefan. I’m going to leave Lucy’s house key on the mantelpiece. If you can think of any way of getting across there without being seen, do it. Otherwise, sit tight.’

‘And pray, right?’ Jane said.

‘Tell me about these people,’ Stefan Alder called down from the pulpit. ‘These villagers. Who’ll be here? The older residents, particularly. The ones from the older families.’

‘I’ve no actual idea.’ Merrily sat alone, in a pew halfway down the nave. ‘We’re hardly issuing specific invitations. But, in my experience, anything mysterious, anything faintly bizarre happening in the church’ll still pack them in. They won’t come the following week, but in this case that doesn’t matter, does it?’

‘No. But who specifically?’ Strange, stained-glass colours blurred in Stefan’s thick, pale hair. ‘Who comes to all your services? I’ve been twice, if we include your ill-fated induction ceremony. I made a few mental notes on both occasions. For example, the old lady who arrives in a wheelchair but insists on leaving it in the doorway and have people help her into a pew? Looks terribly fragile. Who is she?’

‘That’s Mrs Goddard. Priscilla. Lives in the Stables House at the end of Old Barn Lane.’

‘What’s wrong with her?’

‘Osteoporosis, quite advanced.’

‘Brittle bones, yes? I wonder what they called it in the seventeenth century. Is she in much pain?’

‘Much of it emotional. She used to be an enthusiastic horsewoman. Ran a riding school from her home. Now the stables are empty, she’s looking out on an empty field and she feels her life’s effectively over. Needs to be handled with great care.’

‘I understand.’ Stefan made a note in the stiff-backed book he’d brought with him. He asked about any other people who were chronically ill, or who’d been recently bereaved, or had sick and disabled children or grandchildren ... or conspicuous money worries, marital problems, difficulty conceiving a child.

All a little disturbing. Audience participation was one thing, meddling with a congregation something else. And what good would it do him if he made a mistake and insulted someone?

‘Stefan, you can’t hope to absorb all that information. Even I still have problems remembering everybody’s name.’

‘Not a problem for me, Merrily. Indeed, my notes are a formality. I don’t forget faces. I have a photographic memory. I’m not boasting, it’s a simple fact, I can learn a fifty-minute television script in a night. And today’ – he