A Crown of Lights

JUDITH STILL HELD the shotgun, her face creased in concern.

‘Poor man,’ she said. ‘But, see, what did he have to live for now?’

Judith held the gun with both gloved hands, the stock under her arm.

‘Not much,’ she added. ‘Not much at all.’

Weal’s great body blocked the door. His blood and flesh and bone and brain blotched the walls, but most of the mess, still dripping, was on the ceiling. Merrily, sobbing, was still hearing the sound of Weal’s head hitting the ceiling. Would hear it for ever.

‘A terrible accident,’ Judith said.

Two smells now: the embalming room and the slaughterhouse. Merrily hung her head. She felt very cold. She heard something sliding stickily down the wall behind and above her.

‘An accident, Mrs Watkins. A terrible accident.’

‘Yes,’ Merrily croaked.

‘Or perhaps he meant to do it, do you think? You saw me handing it to him. Such a tall man, it was pointing directly under his chin.’ She laughed shrilly. ‘Such a big man. They calls him Big Weal in Kington and around. Big Weal – The Big Wheel.’

‘That’s very good,’ Merrily said.

Judith said flatly, ‘I’m making excuses, isn’t it?’

Merrily felt something warm on her forehead, wiped it roughly away with her sleeve. She thought that maybe being squashed into a corner had protected her from most of the carnage. She remembered Judith jumping quickly back, snatching the gun away too. Not a speck on Judith.

She heard herself say, ‘These things happen,’ and felt a bubble of hysteria. She began to get up, levering herself, hands flat behind her pushing against the floor, her bottom against the wall. Now she could see J.W. Weal’s huge shoes, shining in the lantern light, his legs...

‘Oh no, you don’t!’ Judith swung round, the stock hard against her shoulder. ‘You’ll stay there while I think, or you’ll have the other barrel.’

Merrily froze. Judith’s eyes were pale – but not distant like J.W.’s had been. Her gaze was fixed hard on Merrily.

‘You made me do that. It’s your fault. You suggested to J.W. that he must’ve sent Barbara Thomas to me. He never did. He wouldn’t do that.’

‘Didn’t she... tell you?’ Merrily’s gaze turned to the river of blood that had pumped from J.W. Weal’s collar. She gagged.

‘She was off her head, that woman,’ Judith said. ‘Off her head! Screaming at me. Standing there, screaming at me, in her fancy clothes. How dare she run away, go from here, spend her life in cushy... where was it? Where was it?’

‘Ham... Hampshire.’

‘Hampshire. Soft, cushy place that is. How dare she come back from Hampshire, start screaming at me – me who’s had it hard all my life. They comes here, the English, think they can say what they like.’

Half a mile over the border – just half a mile – and this myth of the English having it so good.

Judith’s accent seemed to deepen as she remembered the encounter. ‘But a scrawny neck, she had, like an old bird. Trying to hide her scrawny neck with a fancy, silk scarf. But I found it, Mrs Watkins.’

Oh God. Merrily stiffened in her half-crouch against the wall. Sinewy hands around a scrawny neck. Maybe a silk scarf pulled tight.

‘Going to tell everybody, she was, that bitch! Everybody! Going to shout it all over Radnorshire that Mrs Councillor Prosser was a lesbian! How dare the bitch call me a lesbian? “I’ll sue you!” I said to her. “I’ll hire J.W. to sue you. See how long your English money lasts you then!” ’

Merrily retched again.

‘Never seen blood before, Mrs Watkins? Used to kill all our own pigs, we did, when I was a girl. And whatever else we wanted to, until the regulations. Regulations about this and that... Regulations, it is, killing country life.’ She calmed down, sighed. ‘Poor Jeffery – it’s just like putting down an old horse.’

‘What was... the matter with him?’

‘It was since she died.’ A toss of her head towards the tomb. ‘He was hardly awake since. Couldn’t face being awake.’

‘Was he... on medication? From Dr Coll?’

‘Wouldn’t have it. Said it was the mourning took his energy, eating him up inside.’

Took his energy?

Menna.

‘Do you know what I think?’ Judith said, brightening. ‘I think he ought to have killed you, Mrs Watkins.’

Merrily felt the first spasm of a cramp in her right leg. She had to move.

‘That’s what I think. Meddling little bitch, you are, come to spy on Father Ellis.’

Merrily braced herself against the wall, straightened the leg in front of her, looking up. Into the black, metal-smelling barrels of the twelve-bore hovering six inches from her face.

Judith said, ‘Perhaps he did shoot you.’ She raised a hand to her head for a moment, horribly childlike, as if putting something together in her mind. ‘Likely he shot you before he killed himself. Blew your little head off with the one barrel, saved the other for himself. He was a solicitor. A logical man, see.’

She looked delighted – the woman was mad.

Merrily looked along the barrel of the great gun towards the stock. She saw two triggers, one slightly in front of the other, Judith’s finger around the second one. The speed she’d managed it last time, there must be hardly any tension in those triggers.

Merrily jerked her head to one side, but the two holes followed her.

Judith was a practical woman.

‘First used one of these when I was nine year old,’ she said proudly, ‘when I could hardly lift it. Saw my father shooting crows.’ She smiled happily. ‘Country girl, see, always the tomboy. Always a better shot than Councillor Prosser.’

The trigger finger relaxed. Merrily still held her breath. Could she summon the strength to throw herself from the wall, knock the barrel aside? As if she’d picked up the thought, Judith backed away smartly, smiling.

‘Jeffery thought you were one of the hippies broken in. Thought you were a hippy, and you went for him and his gun went off. That’s what they’ll say, isn’t it? Then, when he saw what he’d done, he turned the gun on himself. Suicide while the balance of mind was disturbed. Went to an inquest two year ago, we did, Councillor Prosser and I. One of our old neighbours hanged himself – verdict of suicide while the balance of mind was disturbed. Everyone here knew J.W.’s balance of mind was gone.’

Merrily shook her head helplessly.

Judith waggled her fingers to show she was still wearing gloves. ‘Dropped the gun as he died. Two of you dead.’ She glanced at the open tomb. ‘Went to say goodbye to his wife, before he killed himself. Poor Jeffery, he’s with her now – is that what you think, Mrs Watkins?’

‘Yes.’

Judith’s face turned red. ‘Rubbish! Nonsense! How can a woman be so stupid. There is nothing after death! Menna waiting in the clouds with her arms open, waiting for her J.W. with no head? Is that what you would tell them in your church, Mrs Watkins?’

‘Is that what you say to Father Ellis?’

The barrel moved down to Merrily’s chest. At this range, the blast would cut her in half, and it could happen any time. If she moved too quickly, Judith would blow her apart. She wouldn’t feel anything. She wouldn’t even hear the shot. Her last moment would be a moment just like this.

‘We could have been friends, you and I, Merrily Watkins.’

‘I’m not sure that we could,’ Merrily said honestly.

‘I’m not a lesbian, you know. Are you calling me a lesbian?’