faced out to sea and another bay on their right too small to have a name, more of a creek really, heaped with stones of various sizes and always empty - well, in the past Rhiannon had seen a couple of fishermen there, serious ones in oilskins and thigh-boots standing into the sea, but it would have been safe to say that nobody went there now for any reason.
There was room on the promontory for not much more than the church itself, three or four lines of graves and dozens of mature trees, sycamores mostly, tall and flourishing even in the salt air and at this season deeply shading the ground underneath. Nobody came here either in a manner of speaking, but the two of them were here today, and somebody else had been here not long before to take a bit of care of the graves and make the place seem not quite desolate, though hardly a single stone remained in one piece or uneroded. But some names and dates could still be read easily enough, Welsh names, English names, none that she saw later than 1920. The church was very thoroughly shut up and impossible to see into from anywhere at ground level.
'It's still a church,' said Malcolm, having let the matter rest for quite a long time. 'That's to say it hasn't been deconsecrated. '
'But they can't still be using it.'
'The last service was held here in 1959. Longer ago than half the people on that beach can remember.' He smiled and went on confidingly, 'I looked it up. Perhaps they think there might be something left here some day.'
'Who? What son of thing do you mean?'
'Well... I don't know,' he said in a gentle tone. 'At the moment it's too far for anybody to come, you see. Too far by car, that is. How many years would it be since it wasn't too far to come on foot, with that climb for most of them to face after? Eighty-four in congregation the nave held, according to what I read.'
'Do you believe in it yourself, Malcolm?'
'It's very hard to answer that. In a way I suppose I do.
I certainly hate to see it all disappearing. I used to think things would go on round here as long as anywhere in the kingdom, but do you know I doubt if they have?'
'Well, there's nothing to be done about it, that's for sure.' Rhiannon tried to sound gentle too. 'One thing, it's too far for vandals to come too, by the look of it.'
'Yes. Small mercies. I like to come here occasionally. It helps me... no, it's impossible to say it without sounding pompous. Anyway, it's a wonderful spot. Peaceful. Solitary.'
'A bit lonely, though. Windy too.'
'I'm terribly sorry, Rhi, are you absolutely - '
'No, no, I'm fine.' She looked about. 'It certainly has an atmosphere. '
'You remember coming here before?' he asked eagerly.
'Oh yes, of course.'
She would have added 'lots of times' but he hurried on.
'What about that terrible concrete hut, I think it was concrete, just where the road stopped? That's gone too now, of course. Ha, one's quite glad to see the back of some of what they pull down. It was the only place to eat, though.'
'That's right, and the lady washed up so loudly you couldn't hear yourself speak, and kept the key of the lav in her apron.'
'Do you remember having lunch there?'
'Oh yes,' she said in the same spirit as a moment earlier. 'We took what we were given - sausages and chips and OK sauce.'
'M'm. There was a hopeless cat there too, that when you stroked it, it looked at you as though you were barmy.'
'I'd forgotten about that. You drank Mackeson stout, didn't you? It was your regular 'tipple in those days.'
'So it was. You never seem to see it now.'
'And the two of us went for a stroll after.'
She felt she probably should have spoken then but she could not think how to say it, just smiled and waited and crossed her fingers in her head. He stepped a pace back from her before he went on, still with insistence, 'When we got up here we found there'd been a storm a night or two before and there were leaves and bits of twigs and branches and stuff all over the place, and the sea was still very rough. And we went right up to the end there where it jutted out over the water just there, remember? - quite dangerous it was, I suppose, but we do these things in our youth, actually I think most of it's fallen away now. And I said, I know I'll never mean as much to you as you mean to me, anywhere near, and I'm not complaining, I said, but I want to tell you nobody will ever mean as much to me as you do, and I want you to remember that, I said. And you said you would, and I think perhaps you have, haven't you, Rhiannon?'
If it had been too early a moment ago to contract out of his recalling of that day, it was obviously much too late now. Not sure that she could have spoken in any case, she nodded.
'Wonderful. Oh, that is lovely.' The tautness departed from his manner. 'Well, an awful lot of things seem worth while after that, I can tell you. Thank you for remembering me, with so much else in your life.'
He sent her a smile of simple affection and indicated they should move. As they began strolling down the slight incline towards the gate he put his arm chummily round her waist.
'Yes, I'd got my pal Doug Johnson to lend me his car for the day. It was the first time I'd taken it out and I was a bit nervous, I hope it didn't show.'
'I didn't notice anything,' she said.
