A Crown of Lights

44 Feel the Light

GREG HAD SHAVED. He wore a clean shirt. He stood in the back doorway at the end of the yard and made rapid wiping movements with his arms.

‘No, no, no.’

Merrily stopped about four yards away. ‘She’s worse?’

‘She’s better,’ Greg said. ‘That’s the point, innit? I’m grateful for you taking the witch away and everyfing, but I’m not having you upsetting my wife.’

The day, like Greg, had hardened up. Merrily dug her hands into the pockets of Jane’s much-borrowed duffel coat. She nodded, resigned, looking down at all the crushed glass ground into the pitted concrete yard.

‘I’m sorry, Reverend,’ Greg said. ‘I said I’d ask her if she’d talk to you, but I didn’t in the end. I don’t want noffink bringing it back. These past two days – bleedin’ nightmare. You understand, don’t you?’

‘You think she’s coming out of it?’

‘She’s talking to me. That’s enough for now.’

‘Right, well...’ Merrily shrugged. ‘Thank you. I’ll see you, Greg.’

It was nearly eleven a.m. Martyn Kinsey, of BBC Wales, had spotted her going into the yard, and given her a conspiratorial wink. Martyn was going to be her last resort, if she got nowhere with Marianne Starkey. Martyn Kinsey and a big, unchristian lie: Entirely off the record, the diocese has received two complaints, of a very serious nature, against Father Nicholas Ellis. Yes, of course from women.

Last resort, though.

Merrily had reached the entrance to the alley which led from the Black Lion yard to the village when she heard the wobble and slide of a sash window. ‘Who’s this?’ a woman called down.

‘’S all right,’ Greg rasped. ‘I dealt wiv it. Just go back and siddown, willya?’

‘Hey!’ Marianne leaned out of the upstairs window. ‘I saw you, din’ I?’

Merrily paused. Please, God...

‘Inna toilets,’ Marianne said, ‘with Judy Prosser. ’Cept you was wearing a... whatsit round your neck.’

Merrily put a hand to her throat. ‘Day off today.’

Greg said nervously, ‘Marianne, just leave it, yeah?’

‘You wanna cuppa tea, love?’

‘That would be really very nice,’ Merrily said. ‘It’s quite cold again today, isn’t it?’

Greg hung around, restive, breathing down his nose. Marianne waved him away. ‘It’ll be OK. You go and replace your kegs.’

They were upstairs in the living room of the flat above the pub. The furniture looked inexpensive, but it was all newish, as if they’d ditched all their old stuff when they moved here. For a bright new start.

Greg waved a finger at his wife. ‘You just say what you wanna say.’

Marianne was in a cream towelling robe, and she wore no make-up. She slid back into a big lemon sofa opposite the television. The sound was turned down on two young women ranting at Robert Kilroy-Silk.

‘Slept late,’ Marianne said. ‘Must have a clear conscience.’

‘Good.’

‘You reckon it can really do that? Wipe the slate clean?’

‘Why not?’

‘Siddown... please.’ Marianne picked up a cigarette packet from the sofa. ‘Ain’t taken everything away, mind. I still need these. Don’t suppose you do?’

‘Actually...’ Merrily slipped off her coat, let it fall to the carpet. She sat on the edge of an armchair beside the TV, and accepted one of Marianne’s menthol cigarettes.

‘Blimey, you’ll go to hell, love. In spite of it all.’

‘I prefer to think I’ll just go to heaven a bit sooner. How do you feel now, Marianne?’

‘Bit weird. Bit hollow.’

‘All happened kind of suddenly, hasn’t it?’

‘Can’t believe it. I feel like a little girl. All nervous. Need me hand held.’

Probably why she’d been so glad to see Merrily. A lady priest. Someone who would know, would understand.

‘I mean, you shouldn’t be feeling like that at someone’s funeral, should you?’ Marianne said. ‘Ain’t right.’

‘You mean feeling good?’

‘Yeah.’

Merrily lit their cigarettes. ‘Finding yourself joining in the singing?’

‘The singing. Sure.’

‘Mmm. I know what that’s like.’

‘I should think you do, Reverend.’

‘Merrily.’

‘Nice name. Yeah, that’s what happens, Merrily. I only went along for a laugh. No, not a laugh, I was hacked off with everybody, with this place, with Greg. Like, Greg’s sayin’, one of us oughta go, put in an appearance. It’s the way they are, the locals, innit? God-fearing? So, yeah, OK, I’ll do it – ’cos they all reckon I’m a slapper – I’ll be down that hall with me hat on and I’ll put on a real show for ’em.’

Merrily smiled. ‘And in the middle of the show... wow, it turns into the real thing.’

‘Cloud nine, love. Like after half a bottle of vodka? Nah, not really. I mean, I was so ashamed. Joyful, yet ashamed. Ashamed of me. I was horrified at me – what I was, what I’d been. I wanted... what’s the word...?’

‘Redemption?’

‘That’s a bleeding big word.’

‘Big thing.’

‘Do you know, I went out the back afterwards, and I was sick over the fence? Sick as a dog, with all that hating of meself pouring out. After that, I felt very... light, you know? Cut loose. Then this lady come over, I don’t know her name, but she lives in a bungalow on the road out of here, and that’s where we went. Some other ladies come too, and they was all really kind. I cried most of the time.’

Merrily smoked and nodded. It was difficult to believe it could happen so quickly until you encountered it, but it did happen. It happened particularly to people in crisis, depressed people and – unexpectedly – to angry, cynical people.

‘Found I could talk to them. Talked about stuff I never talked about since I left London. Personal stuff, you know? One of the ladies, she says, “I knew you was in trouble when I seen you and that feller.” ’

‘Robin Thorogood.’

Marianne shivered. ‘I thought it was me invited him. But he was playing with me. He’s a dark person, he is, Merrily. He brought out the bad and lustful part of me.’

‘Who told you he was a dark person?’

‘In the paper, wannit? They come round with the paper... yesterday.’

‘Who did?’

‘Eleri, from the post office. And Judy Prosser. I’d been to church – to the hall – on Sunday, and it was wonderful, I was blown away all over again, really. And afterwards I was introduced to Father Ellis, and he’s like, “I can tell you been deeply troubled. I feel you been exposed to a great evil.” And it sets me off crying again, and he takes my hand and he says, in this lovely soft voice, he says, “You come back to me when you feel ready to have the disease taken away.” And the next day Eleri come round with the paper, and there he is, that Robin, his face – like I never seen it before, I mean you could see the evil in him, snarling, vicious. I went a bit hysterical when I seen that picture. He was like they said he was.’

‘What happened then?’