The Secret of Crickley Hall

The church was built with grey, probably local, stone, as was the irregular wall around its boundary. It was a small but solid structure, with a square tower surmounted by a short steeple, a weathervane at the steeple's apex. The escarpment, lush with the deep greenery of trees and thick scrub despite the late season, rose up majestically behind the building and Gabe thought, not for the first time, that Devil's Cleave was more like a deep-sided valley than a gorge. A gravel path from the wall's lychgate led to the porch through a grassy graveyard; headstones dark with age leaned as if wearied, an occasional elm tree breaking up the quiet grimness of the landscape.

Close to the gateway was a mounted wooden board with faded gold lettering announcing that this was the church of ST MARK and the vicar was one REVEREND ANDREW TREVELLICK and his curate was ERIC RISSEY, all of this in neat capital letters. Underneath, also in faded gold, were times of services, and below this, in caps again but the largest message of all, it said: 'IN GOD WE TRUST'.

Yeah, right, Gabe said to himself as he read the comfort legend.

'I want to go inside,' insisted Eve, stepping towards the closed gate, her tone allowing no dissent this time.

Loren pulled a face, while Cally wasn't bothered either way.

'Sure,' agreed Gabe, his spirits sinking.

The gate opened with a squeal and they all passed through. As they trudged along the path, Gabe saw that the gravestones, some larger and more ornate than others, continued round to the side and possibly the back of the church. They crunched their way to the porch, glad of its cover even though the rain was now no more than a light drizzle.

Eve tested the black metal handle and one side of the big door opened easily. She stepped inside and the others followed, Gabe reluctantly. Although it was gloomy in there, stained-glass windows glowed brightly above them despite the poor light of the day. There was only one centre aisle, with pews on either side, that led to the high pulpit and altar. Some of the pews near the front had little doors on them so that the seats were segregated from the rest, and Eve assumed that these were once for the more important families of the community—probably still were. Her footsteps echoed hollowly as she went to an open pew halfway down the aisle. She knelt on the padded knee-rest and bowed her head into her hands.

Loren looked round at Gabe and he gave a short nod of his head. She went to a pew just behind Eve's and Cally followed. Cally sat on the wooden bench while Loren joined her mother in prayer.

At the back of the church, Gabe wished that he could have their faith. All he felt was anger, though, anger at a God who could put them through such agony. If there was a God, of course. If He did exist, then He seemed to care little for the part of His creation called mankind.

Gabe's fists clenched and his teeth bit into his lower lip. He wanted to pound the stone pillar beside him with his fist. But instead, he turned away and let his anger subside into bitterness. Let Eve and Loren pray for their miracle. As for him, he knew miracles never happened. Not in this life, they didn't. And this was the only life anyone ever had.

Gabe turned away and paced the uneven stone floor, straining to drive these useless thoughts from his mind as he went to the other side of the church. It was then he saw all the names on a polished board mounted on the rear wall of the church. In fact there were two boards, side by side, but it was the first one that made him pause.

The lettering was inscribed in white yellowed by age and it was the heading that had caught his attention:

IN MEMORY OF THE POOR ORPHANS WHO PERISHED IN THE GREAT STORM OF 1943

Below this there followed a list of all the children who had died in that storm:

ARNOLD BROWN—7 yrs MAVIS BORRINGTON—7 yrs PATIENCE FROST—6 yrs BRENDA PROSSER—10 yrs GERALD PROSSER—8 yrs STEFAN ROSENBAUM—5 yrs EUGENE SMITH—9 yrs MAURICE STAFFORD—12 yrs SUSAN TRAINER—11 yrs MARIGOLD WELCH—7 yrs WILFRED WILTON—6 yrs

Reading the names of all these dead children—orphans every one of them—almost broke Gabe right there and then. He had contained his anguish, his debilitating grief, for nearly a year now so that he could be resolute for Eve and their daughters, refusing to break, to weep, to expose the weakness he felt in such adversity, because his family needed his strength, especially Eve, who blamed herself. Now today, inside this small ancient church, absorbing the poignant death list on this board before him, Gabe's self-control wavered. Sixty-eight, the shopkeeper in the village had told them, sixty-eight victims either drowned or crushed. How many other kids had been among that number?

He lowered his gaze, stared sightlessly at the stone floor beneath him, his shoulders slumped.

He was aware enough to realize his sorrow was looking for expression, a release, so that once unmasked the healing might begin. And this plain but emotive memorial to all those lost children was almost the catalyst that bent him, for it confirmed his own despair at the perpetuity of life's unfailing cruelty—happiness was only in the pauses between suffering.

He regretted having entered the church. For two months after Cam had disappeared, Gabe had accompanied Eve and their daughters to Sunday Mass—and only because he wanted to support Eve, not because he had suddenly seen the light and thought miracles might just happen if you prayed hard enough—but when nothing had changed, when there was still no trace of Cam after all that time, he had desisted. And Eve had not urged him to go with her any more, because she understood the bitter anger that was beginning to rage inside him, was aware that, for him, attending Mass was doing more harm that good. When he was a juvenile, Gabe had spent time in the Illinois Institute for Delinquent Boys, where he had been obliged to attend chapel twice a week, but in those days he had been cool about it; it beat working in the sweltering laundry room or raking dirt on the drill yard. Chapel service meant little to him, but at least it gave him the chance to think for an hour—thinking time was at a premium on a campus full of wayward, excitable youths. Sure, in those days he was resentful—he figured he had a right to be— but he never blamed God for his circumstances then. Didn't blame Him because he didn't believe in Him, despite the sermons and the priest's entreaties.

But Eve had mellowed Gabe and, even though she hadn't necessarily been deeply religious herself when they were first married, she had gradually coaxed him to see the goodness around him, and that this spirit of goodness had to come from somewhere. She hadn't made him believe in a Supreme Being, but he no longer dismissed the idea out of hand. And the blessings that were their children opened up his heart even more. There was a period of time when he had wanted to believe.

Gabe deliberately trod lightly as he made his way out of St Mark's and it took some effort. It was not that he felt contempt for Eve's so-called 'Supreme Being'—whatever that meant—it was just that he had no respect for Him. If He existed.

Gabe left the church, closing the door quietly behind him, not wanting to disturb Eve at her devotions—her pleadings. Outside, in the light drizzle, for the first time since he'd given them up, he wished for a cigarette. That had been when Eve had become pregnant with their first child, Loren, and that, for him, was reason enough. He needed a smoke now, maybe even a large shot of Jack Daniel's. Cold anger was returning like a winter season and it smothered the grief. He walked round to the other side of St Mark's, where the gorge wall rose sheer and abundant with trees and foliage. In the grassy space between church and gorge were more headstones.

He saw them at once, for they were better tended than the other graves around them. Their small headstones were clean even though over half a century old and their carved inscriptions were clear. The small plots were set out in a tidy row and bunches of wild flowers were in water jars below the headstones. In the rain, the flowers looked fresh, vibrant, and Gabe wondered who had put them there. Perhaps it was a kind of ceremony, the flowers laid out every year in the month of October; Gabe had already glanced at the preface of the book bought in the village store and it had said the Great Storm, as it was called, had occurred in the October of 1943.

He read the names on the neat little headstones and noticed that the Prosser children—obviously brother and sister—had been laid side by side. Arnold Brown, 1936-1943, Patience Frost, 1937-1943, Eugene Smith, 1934-1943, and so on. Gabe felt his eyes moisten, but he would not give in to tears now. His anger became subdued. But there was something wrong about this setting, some small thing that nagged at him.

He walked further into the hidden cemetery, distracting himself by reading the messages on other markers, noticing that all the lives here had ended in 1943. So this was where some of the adult victims of the flood were buried, along with the children. These other graves, though, had not been as well cared for. They were stained, weather-worn, lichen growing on most. It seemed the children were better remembered than the older flood