‘See, no traffic at all,’ he said. ‘Earlier, I believe, the TV and radio stations were warning motorists not to venture out unless it was absolutely vital.’
Time of transition? In the tingling mist, Merrily felt as though she was being drawn into a developing, lucid dream and had to go with it – some of the way, at least – to see if its destination could possibly be what she was half-imagining.
Or make a wild dash across Broad Street for her car. Or…
She heard Jane saying,
‘Mick, look, I actually think it’s beginning to thaw. I can be home in half an hour.’
‘Nonsense. Merrily, you know you don’t really want to do that.’
‘I have to.’
She began to walk away from him towards the road, and then stopped and turned as the Bishop spoke again with quiet insistence.
‘You only
‘That’s not true…’
This was not the Bishop talking but the bulge in his tracksuit trousers. She closed her eyes briefly and wished him gone.
‘Oh… Excuse me, miss.’
A man stepped out from behind one of the trees like some accosting beggar – one of those homeless that Mick and Val would
‘Not now,’ the Bishop told him irritably.
‘Sorry, sir. Not you – the lady. Are you by any chance the lady whose daughter ordered a minicab?’
‘Huh?’
‘Mrs Watson?’
‘Watkins.’
‘Yeah, that’s it.’
Mick Hunter didn’t move. Merrily shrugged and gave him a bashful smile. ‘I didn’t know she’d done that. Kid does my thinking for me. Thanks anyway, Bishop. What time do you want to see me on Monday?’
‘Eleven o’clock,’ the Bishop said tonelessly, ‘in the Great Hall.’
She nodded.
‘Good night,’ he said.
‘It’s this way,’ said the cabbie.
Mick Hunter had vanished by the time she found out that the cabbie did not have a vehicle with him.
20
Not Good
THEY WALKED IN silence a short way along Broad Street until Merrily was sure the Bishop had returned to the Palace. Then Lol Robinson hurried her discreetly across the whitened green and into Church Street.
‘Little Jane called me, about half an hour ago. Said you were heading this way and you might be able to use a cup of coffee at some stage. I’ve just been… hanging around.’
‘So intuitive, that kid.’ God, she was pleased to see him. Although, under the circumstances, anybody at all would have been a serious blessing.
‘I think she was worried about you,’ he said.
Merrily smiled. ‘I’m sure.’ She felt light-headed – glad, for the first time she could remember, to be out of the Cathedral.
‘Who was that guy in the tracksuit?’ Lol unlocked a recessed door in the alleyway next to the little music shop.
‘That, Laurence, was the Bishop of Hereford.’
‘Oh, I see.’ Lol wore nothing over the familiar black sweatshirt with the Roswell alien face printed on it in flaking grey. He must be freezing. ‘I had him down as some late-night jogger, who… I don’t really know.’
‘Thought I was a prostitute.’
‘Like you always find in the Cathedral Close.’ Lol grinned. ‘Who was the bloke they put in the ambulance?’
‘Canon Dobbs. He’s had a stroke. We found him collapsed in the Cathedral.’
‘Oh.’ Lol shouldered the door open and turned on the light. They entered a hallway with a flight of stairs and a mountain-bike.
‘They called me in,’ Merrily said, ‘because he was… still
‘Well, you know, I’ve talked to Jane.’
‘Then you know everything.’
She looked around the shapeless, lamplit room with its beams and trusses and sash windows with lots of little square panes. Lol’s old guitar rested on a metal stand by the bricked-up fireplace. A stained and sagging armchair she remembered from his old cottage in Ledwardine.
‘Ethel used to sleep in this,’ she said.
‘How
‘Ethel is fine. You get extra points for being a vicarage cat.’
Lol moved around, opening up radiators. His brass-rimmed glasses had half-misted.
‘This place is better for you?’ Merrily flopped into the chair without taking off her coat. ‘Do you feel better here?’
‘Haven’t been here long enough to think too much about it. It’s OK, I suppose.’ He went into what was presumably the kitchen, leaving the door open, a blue-white light flickering.
‘Very central. Convenient for the Cathedral.’
‘Right.’
She forced herself out of the chair, and went to join him in the kitchen. It had barely room for two people. The fluorescent strip-lighting hurt her eyes, reminding her of the sluice-room next to the Alfred Watkins Ward.
‘That was your idea, the taxi?’
‘All I could think of at the time.’ He had his back to her, filling the kettle.
‘Thank you,’ she said solemnly. ‘You… got me out of something heavy.’
‘Really?’ He turned round, looking happy. ‘Like you did for me and Ethel that night?’
‘Oh, more than that. The way this was going, I might not have had a career.’
‘Well, you know, I didn’t really hear anything.’
‘Yes, you did.’
‘OK, I did. How many points for sleeping with a lady vicar?’
‘For a bishop? I honestly can’t recall a precedent. But bishops are survivors – especially this one, I suspect. Lady vicars… they’re expendable. Especially ones caught in sin.’
She was startled at how easy it was to discuss all this with Lol, though they hadn’t spoken for months. It might have been just this morning she last saw him. She looked around the little kitchen: plywood cupboards, a small fridge, a microwave, three mugs with hedgehog motifs on a shelf. Nothing suggestive of permanence. She was looking for a sign that Lol was out of limbo now and not finding one.
‘Erm…’ He turned to pull two of the mugs from the shelf. ‘When you said just now that you might not have had a career, does that mean that if I hadn’t shown up…?’
‘What it would have meant,’ Merrily said slowly, ‘is that, in order to get away from him, I would probably have had to stop pretending he was simply offering me a room for the night.’
‘Right.’ Lol set down the mugs. His glasses had misted again. ‘Jane’ll be glad to know that.’
They sat and drank their coffee, Merrily in Ethel’s old chair, Lol on the floor, his back to the window. She’d have to be going soon if she was going to grab a couple of hours before Holy Communion.
