seeing him like than anymore, and I told him so. He said… he said some horrid, cruel things and slammed out of here, and I haven’t heard from him since then. That was nearly two months ago. I did see him, about ten days ago, coming out of a club with a… a girl hanging on his arm and laughing in that way they do when they’ve been taking something and the whole world is so hysterically funny. He looked awful, like a skeleton, and his cough was back. He sounded like he had when he was home after being gassed; it made my chest hurt to hear it. I do get news of him—I see his sister all the time, but she says he never visits his parents unless he runs out of money before his next allowance is due.”
“And they give it to him.”
“Yes.” She blew her nose and took a deep breath, then looked straight at me, and I braced myself.
“Mary, is there anything that you can do?”
“What could I do?” I did not even try to sound surprised.
“Well, you… investigate things. You know people, you and Mr Holmes. Surely there must be something we might do.”
“Any number of things,” I said flatly. “You could have him arrested, and they might be able to keep him until the drugs have left his system, though it would probably mean hospitalisation, considering the shape he’s in. However, unless he’s actually selling the drugs himself, which sounds unlikely if his parents support him, he’d be let free in a few days and would go right back to the source. You’d have put him through considerable discomfort with little benefit. Or, you could have him kidnapped, if you don’t mind great expense and the threat of a prison sentence. That would ensure his physical well-being, for a time. You’d want to let him go eventually, though, and then it would almost surely begin again.” It was cruel, but not so cruel as raising her hopes would have been. “Ronnie, you know what the problem is, and you know full well that there’s not a thing that you or I or the king himself can do about it. If Miles wants to use drugs, he will. If not heroin, then morphine, or alcohol. As you said, he’s just not there, and until he decides to find his way back, the only thing on God’s green earth you can do is make sure he knows your hand is there if he wants it, and leave him to it.” I offered her a pain-filled smile. “And pray.”
She collapsed, and I stroked her hair and waited for the storm to abate. It did, and when she raised her face, I felt a moment’s pity for the man Miles, confronted by this red-eyed, dull-haired, earnest young woman with her Good Works and her small eyes set into an unfashionably round face of pasty skin, now blotched from her tears. For someone terrified of responsibility and commitment, Veronica in her present state would loom huge and hideous, the embodiment of everything his former life held to reproach him with. Despite my harsh words, for her sake I should make an effort.
“Ronnie, look, I’ll see what I can do. I know a man at Scotland Yard”—this was a slight exaggeration—“who might be able to suggest something.”
“You’re right, Mary.” She fumbled with her sodden handkerchief. “I know you’re right; it’s just that it’s so damnable, feeling completely hopeless while Miles is destroying himself. He’s—he was—such a good man.” She sighed, then sat back, her hands on her lap. We sat together as if at a wake.
Suddenly, she looked up at the clock on her wall, and a curious look of shy animation crept onto her face.
“Mary, are you free tonight? I don’t know what you had planned, but there’s someone you might be interested in meeting.”
“Yes, I told you I’m free. I had thought to go up to Oxford for a couple of days, but it’s nothing that couldn’t wait.”
“Oh, good. I really do think you’d like to hear her, and I could introduce you to her after the meeting.”
“Meeting?” I said dubiously. She laughed, her face alive again and the signs of the storm fading fast.
“That’s what she calls it. It’s a bit like a church service, but tons more fun, and she gives a talk—her name is Margery Childe. Have you heard of her?”
“I have, somewhere.” The name brought with it an impression of disdain overlying unease, as if the teller (writer? in a newspaper?) had been uncomfortable with the woman and taken refuge in cynicism. Also a photograph—yes, definitely in a newspaper, a blonde woman shaking hands with a beribboned official who towered over her.
“She’s an amazing person, very sensible and yet, well”— she gave an embarrassed little laugh—“holy somehow. I go to the meetings sometimes, if I’m free. They always make me feel good—refreshed, and strong. Margery’s been very helpful,” she added unnecessarily.
“I’d be happy to go, Ronnie, but I don’t have any clothes other than that suit.”
“There’ll be some stuff downstairs in the jumble box that’ll fit you, if you’re not too particular.”
Thus it was that scarcely half an hour later I, wearing an odd assortment of ill-fitting garments, followed Veronica Beaconsfield out of the taxi and across the wet pavement, under the sign that read NEW TEMPLE IN GOD, and into the remarkable presence of Margery Childe.
THREE
Monday, 27 December
I Corinthians 14:34-35
The service was well under way when we arrived and found two seats in the back. To my surprise, my first impression was more of a hall filled with eager operagoers than a gathering of pious evening worshippers. The room was a hall, rather than a church or temple, had tiered seating, and was larger than it had appeared from the street. On the raised stage before us stood a small woman, a diminutive blonde figure on the nearly bare boards; she was wearing a long, simple dress—a robe—of some slightly peach-tinted white material, heavy silk perhaps, that shimmered and caught the light in golden highlights as she moved. She was speaking, but if it was a sermon, it did not resemble any I’d heard before. Her voice was low, almost throaty, but it reached easily into all corners and gave one the eerie impression of being alone with a friend and overhearing her private musings.
“It was shortly after that,” she was saying, “that I went to church one lovely Sunday morning and heard the preacher, who was a large man with a thundering voice, speaking on the text from First Corinthians, ‘Let your women keep silence in the churches.’ ” She paused and gathered all eyes to her in anticipation, then her mouth twitched in mischief. “I was, as you might imagine, not amused.”
The gust of appreciative laughter that swept through the hall confirmed her audience’s—congregation’s?— endorsement of her attitude and hinted at an admiration that edged into adoration. It was also overwhelmingly soprano, and I took my eyes from the laughing figure onstage and surveyed my fellows.
There were perhaps only two dozen obvious males in a gathering of some 350, and of the ones near me, three looked distinctly uncomfortable, two were laughing nervously, one was scribbling furiously in a reporter’s notebook, and one alone looked pleased. However, on closer examination I decided that this last was probably not male.
The laughter trickled off, and she waited, totally at ease, for silence before starting again.
“I was grateful to that large and noisy man, however. Not immediately,” she added, inviting us to chuckle at her youthful passion, and many obliged, “but when I’d had a chance to think about it, I was grateful, because it made me wonder, Why does he want me to keep silent in church? What would be so terrible in letting me, a
