the quieter, more committed ones.
And Diane. And Headlice.
She held her breath, moved back a little from the window. She could see that Gwyn wore… a robe or a long overcoat. His arm, the one nearest to her, was reaching up into the mist, his hand…
His hand was curled around one end of the spectral sickly moon.
Diane gasped. Gwyn stood tall and still, a god with the moon in his hand. Or so it seemed.
Until, with a feeling of deep dread, she became aware that the wan glimmer was from the blade of a real sickle.
Gwyn lowered the blade, in a slow and ceremonial fashion. She watched the curved sliver of light swinging by his side as he strode across the field towards the Tor.
EIGHT
Towers. Everywhere in Glastonbury you were overlooked by towers.
Juanita hurried across High Street. As an established tradesperson, she was permitted a reserved space on the central car park below the fortified Norman tower of St John's.
Like St Michaels on the Tor, over half a mile away, the town's principal church had its own colour chart of moods. In the sunshine of late afternoon, it could be mellow, sometimes almost golden with its four-cornered Gothic crown. But on a dull day it faded to grey and was outshone by the rusty-red tiles on the roofs of the shops and houses packed around it.
And at night it brooded behind its walls and railings. When you looked up, you could no longer make out the four crosses supporting the weather vanes on the highest pinnacles and there was not that sense of the sacred which Glastonbury Abbey always seemed to retain in its ruins, day or night.
There was also a sort of concrete, walled apron where groups of young pilgrims gathered to smoke or chant to bongos and tablas. Which seemed fairly innocent during the day but could be rather menacing after dark
It was also a good place to get yourself mugged, so Juanita very nearly screamed when a shadow moved.
'Oh, my dear, I'm so sorry. Did I scare you?'
'Not at all.' Juanita put a hand to her chest and swallowed. 'Jesus, Verity.'
The little woman wore a quilted body warmer and elflike velvet hat. She carried a shopping bag, even though almost nothing was open.
'Nothing will happen to you here, Juanita. It's a very warm and spiritual spot. And so egalitarian. And the young people know that, and they neither threaten us nor feel threatened.'
'Right,' Juanita said uncertainly. Sometimes you wandered into the church itself and it would be full of young New Age types of indeterminate religion, hugging each other and smiling at everyone. And OK, nobody had actually been mugged in the area recently.
Except, of course, by Verity, who prowled the streets like a small cat because she was lonely when the tourist season was over and there was nobody to stay with her.
'Well, I'm just going to pick up Jim Battle,' Juanita explained, because Verity would keep you talking here for bloody ever. It was rather sad, really, this middle-class, New Age bag lady. 'Going to the pub.'
'I must go too, Juanita,' Verity said surprisingly and actually hefted her shopping bag and half turned. But then she dropped the bait neatly behind her. 'I can't put it off forever.'
Oh God. 'Put what off, Verity?' Juanita was trying not sound over-patient.
'Silly of me, I know. But it's the Abbot's night, you see.'
'Ab…? Oh. Whiting.' Juanita didn't want to hear this at all. Some thoughts were just too damned creepy to carry around with you through darkened streets.
'Poor man,' Verity said. 'He comes for comfort, and there's nothing we can do. They'll still hang him tomorrow.'
Juanita shuddered, couldn't help it. When you knew the circumstances, it wasn't very funny. Verity managed Meadwell, Glastonbury's gloomiest guest house. Abbot Whiting was said to have spent his last night there before he was executed in the king's name. And then they took the Abbey apart and Avalon's dark age began. Every year the Pixhill Trust held a formal dinner in the Abbot's honour.
'I wonder', Verity said wistfully, 'if he will ever be at peace.'
'Well, who knows, Verity. But there's not a lot you can do about it, is there? Look, I have to…'
People say that when there is spiritual unity in the town again, when the Christians and the pagans come together in harmony…'
'Verity,' Juanita said gently, 'old Whiting was a Benedictine monk with no documented pagan leanings.'
'But he was a Catholic, my dear. Therefore a follower of the Goddess Mary. In destroying the Abbeys, Henry VIII was…'
'Yeah, I know. It was a sexist, male-domination trip.'
Propaganda from The Cauldron, the town's fastest-growing goddess group. It was almost a New-Age Women's Institute these days with even people like Verity going to the Outer Circle meetings and lectures. And fashionable since the arrival of the actress, Dame Wanda Carlisle, who was apparently discovering the goddess in herself. They kept urging Juanita to join, but it seemed to have an underlying political agenda. Anyway, the idea of an outfit led by someone calling herself Ceridwen after the Celtic harridan goddess…
'You want to be careful there, Verity. That woman's on a power-trip.'
Verity smiled nervously; although Juanita saw only the gleam of her tiny teeth, she could imagine all the cracks in the walnut face of someone who seemed to have been born to be sixty and sprightly. Verity, surely, was no latent pagan; she could be observed every Sunday toddling along to both morning and evening services at St John's.
'Power,' Verity said. 'Yes. The power to heal and to help people find their way. The Church is embracing spiritual healing again. The Bishop is talking to the alternative worshippers. Glastonbury is becoming whole again. So they say.'
'Do they?' Juanita was slightly incredulous. 'Jesus.'
'If we could help the Abbot find eternal peace after nearly five centuries, wouldn't that be wonderful?'
'Terrific. But if I were you I think I'd just go to sleep and try not to think about it.'
'Oh no! It's my duty to receive the Abbot. Who, thank God, I do not… See…'
'Yes. Well.' Juanita eased herself away. 'Just you look after yourself, Verity.'
She was glad when she'd crossed the shadowed car park and was safely behind the wheel of the Volvo. If Verity was a little unravelled, she was at least in the right place for it.
Dear God, Juanita thought, I used to revel in all this, the excitement of it. A spiritual Las Vegas. The thrill of metaphysical stakes.
A lot had changed Or maybe it was just her. Her agitation threshold had lowered for a start. She worried.
About growing old alone. About the business. About whether selling mystical books was a good and worthy profession any more in a town where mysticism had become a tourist commodity. About Jim Battle, who ate and drank unwisely and what would happen if he ever collapsed with a heart attack over his easel in a little cottage even Hansel and Gretel wouldn't have discovered.
About whether this fourteen-year-old car would start.
'Come… on!'
The Volvo did, though without much enthusiasm, and Juanita was able to get into some serious worrying. About Diane.
Dotty. Confused. Mixed-up. That's all.
That's all?
She edged past the rear entrance of The George and Pilgrims and round into High Street. Followed all the
