Crybbe aka Curfew

real good – he could feel it. This band fucking cooked.

The box was in one of the sheds on the old workbench now. He'd rigged up an old lambing light to work by, realizing this was going to be a delicate operation. Didn't want to damage the box, see, because it could be worth a couple of hundred on its own.

Now. He had a few tools set out on the bench: hammer, screwdriver, chisel, Stanley knife. Precision stuff, this.

Warren grinned.

OK, if it came to it, he would have to damage it, because he hadn't got all bloody night. But better to go in from underneath than cut the lid, which had a bit of a carving on it nothing fancy, like, nothing clever, just some rough symbols. Looked like they'd been done with a Stanley knife. A sixteenth century Stanley knife. Warren had to laugh.

Round about then, Crybbe had another power cut, although Warren Preece, working in the shed with a lambing light, wasn't affected at all.

But Fay Morrison was furious.

She'd always preferred to do her editing at night, especially in the days when she was producing complete programmes, there'd just be her and the tape-machine under a desk-lamp, and then, when the tape was cut together, she would switch off the lamp and sit back, perhaps with a coffee, and play it through in the cosy darkness. Only a red pilot-light and the soft green glow of the level-meters, the gentle swish of the leader tape gliding past the heads.

Magic.

This was what made radio so much more satisfying than television. The intimacy of moments like this. And the fact that you could do all the creative work on your own, only going into studio for the final mix.

Fay really missed all that. Hadn't imagined she'd miss it so much.

Tonight, she'd waited until her father had wandered off to the pub for his nightly whisky and his bar-supper. And then she'd gone into her office, which used to be Grace Legge's sitting-room.

And still was, really, in the daytime. But at night you could switch off the G-plan furnishing and the fifties fireplace, and the front room of Number 8, Bell Street, Crybbe, became more tolerable, with only a second-hand Revox visible in the circle light from the Anglepoise.

Fay had a package to edit for Offa's Dyke Radio. Only a six-minute piece to be slotted into somebody else's afternoon chat-and-disc show on what was arguably the worst local shoe-string station in the country.

But it was still radio, wasn't it? After a fashion.

And this morning, doing her contribution for a series on – yawn, yawn – 'people with unusual hobbies', Fay had actually got interested in something. For a start, he was ever such a nice old chap – most of the people around here, far from being quaint rural characters, were about as appealing as dried parsnip.

And he'd actually been happy to talk to her, which was a first. Until, she'd come here. Fay had encountered very few people who didn't want to be on the radio: no cameras, no lights, and no need to change your shirt or have your hair done. But in this area, people would make excuses – 'Oh, I'm too busy, call again sometime.' Or simply refuse – 'I don't want be on the wireless' – as if, by collecting their voices on tape you were going to take their souls away.

Yes, it was that primitive sometimes.

Or so she felt.

But the water-diviner, or dowser, had been different and Fay had been fascinated to learn how it was done. Nothing apparently, to do with the hazel twig, as such. Simply a faculty you developed through practice, nothing as airy-fairy as 'intuition'.

And it definitely was not psychic.

He kept emphasizing that, scrutinizing her a bit warily as she stood there, in her T-shirt and jeans, wishing she'd brought a sweater and a wind-muff for the microphone. It had been bit breezy in that field, even if tomorrow was Midsummer Day.

'Do you think I could do it, Henry?' she'd asked, on tape. You always asked this question, sounding as if it had just occurred to you. There would then follow an amusing couple of minutes of your attempting to do whatever it was and, of course, failing dismally.

'You could have a try,' he'd said, playing along. And she'd taken the forked twig in both hands. 'Hold it quite firmly so it doesn't slip, but don't grip it too hard. And, above all,

relax …'

'OK,' she'd heard herself say through the speaker. And that was when the power went off.

'Bloody hell!' Fay stormed to the window to see if the other houses in the street were off. Which they were.

It was the fourth power cut in a month.

'I don't believe it!'

OK, you could imagine that on some distant rock in the Hebrides, even today, there would be quite a few times when the power got waylaid on its way from the mainland.

But this was close to the epicentre of Britain. There were high mountains. And they were not in the middle of an electric storm.

She couldn't remember if it was South Wales Electricity or Midlands Electricity. But neither could be up to much if they were unable to maintain supplies to a whole town – OK, a very small town – for longer than a fortnight without a break.

Hereward Newsome, who ran the art gallery in town, had complained to his MP and tried to get up a petition about it, but he'd given that up in disgust after collecting precisely fifteen signatures, all from newcomers, including Fay and her dad.

Of course, the Newsomes' problem did appear to be somewhat more serious. Not only were they having to suffer the power cuts but they were affected by other surges in supply, which, Hereward swore, were almost doubling their electricity bills. He was getting into a terrible state about it.

Actually, Fay was a bit dubious about the huge bills being caused by a fault in the system. She grinned into the darkness, it was probably Jocasta's vibrator, on overdrive.

There was a bump and the sound of two empty spools clattering to the floor.

'Pushkin, is that you?'

Grace's cats got everywhere.

Fay decided she didn't like this room very much in the absolute dark.

She felt along the wall for the tape-recorder plug, removed it and went to bed.

Living in Crybbe would drive anybody to a vibrator.

Warren should have known.

Sixteenth-century lock. Not as if it was Chubb's finest, was it? Stanley knife into the groove, sliding it around a bit, that's all it took. Then the screwdriver pushed into the gap. Hit just once with the palm of his hand.

It didn't exactly fly open, the box. Well, it wouldn't, would it?

Being as how it had turned out to be lead-lined.

Fucking lead! No wonder it was so heavy. Good job he didn't tried to cut into it through the bottom.

'Course that lead lining was a bit of a disappointment. Warren had been hoping the box weighed so much because was full of gold coins or something of that order. Lead, even antique lead, was worth bugger all, he was pretty sure of that.

Funny smell.

Well, not that funny. Old, it smelled old and musty. He moved the lambing light closer, poked a finger in.

Cloth, it was. Some sort of old fabric, greyish. Better be a bit careful here, bloody old thing might disintegrate.

On the other hand, he couldn't afford to waste any time. His old man – who wasn't much of a drinker – might even be on his way back from the church. He might, of course, have called back round the pub for one with Jonathon and his mates. (If Warren was in the pub with his mates and the old man came