Midwinter of the Spirit

you secrete it away in your bag and save it up, probably sneaking the occasional peep to stoke up your holier-than- every-bastard-formiles-around righteous indignation—’

‘Sit down, flower.’

‘No! I thought you were behaving funny. You’re bloody terrified, aren’t you? It’s not, like: How dare this old fart point the finger at my daughter? Oh, no, you’re crapping yourself in case this gets back to Michael and you get, like, decommissioned from the soul police! Jesus, you are one sad person, Mother.’

‘Jane…’ Merrily steadied herself on the Aga rail. ‘Would you come back and sit down? Then we can talk about this like… adults?’

‘You mean like priest and sinner. I don’t think so, Merrily. I’m going upstairs to my apartment. I’m going to light some candles on my altar and probably offer a couple of meaningful prayers to my goddess. Then I’m going out. I’m not sure when I’ll be back.’

‘Light a couple of candles? I see.’

‘Maybe four. They say it’s always so much more effective,’ Jane said, ‘coming from a vicarage.’

‘Really?’

Jane turned away and opened the door to the hall.

‘That’s what they say at the Pod, is it?’ Merrily said.

* * *

The phone rang in the kitchen just then, and half a second later in the scullery-office. And it went on and on, and Merrily didn’t dare answer it because she knew Jane would be out of the room before she reached the receiver.

‘You’d better get that. It might be Annie Howe,’ Jane said, and Merrily could see she was trembling with rage. ‘She must… she must’ve already taught you everything she knows. About spying on people, undercover investigations… The soul police will never look back – you fucking nosy bitch.’

‘Right! That’s it!’ Merrily bounced off the stove and into the middle of the room. ‘You think you’re incredibly cool and clever and in control of your own destiny, and all this crap. The truth is you’re either a complete hypocrite or you’re unbelievably naive, and has it never entered your head that the only reason this little… sect is interested in you is because of me and what I—’

‘Me! Me, me, me!’ Jane screeched. ‘You are so arrogant. You are soooo disgustingly ambitious that you can’t see the truth, which is that nobody gives a shit for your Church or the pygmies strutting around the Cathedral Close, not realizing what a total joke they are. Your congregations are like laughable. In twenty years you’ll all be preaching to each other. You don’t matter any more. You haven’t mattered for years. I’m just like embarrassed to tell anybody what you do, you know that? You embarrass me to death, so just get off my back!’

The phone stopped. ‘Get out,’ Merrily said.

‘Fair enough.’ Jane smiled. ‘I may be away some time.’

‘Whatever you like. In fact, maybe you could go and stay at Rowenna’s for a few days. I’m sure there are lots of spare bedrooms in Colonel Napier’s mansion.’

Jane paused in the doorway. ‘Meaning what?’

‘Only that you may not know as much about your very best friend as you thought you did.’

‘You’ve been investigating her too? You’ve been checking up on Rowenna?’

Tears spurted into Jane’s eyes, and Merrily took a step towards her. ‘Flower, please—’

‘You keep away from me. You keep away. You don’t care how low you sink, do you, to protect your piddling little reputation?’

‘Get a life, Jane.’

Jane’s smile was horribly twisted. ‘Oh, I will. I will certainly get a life.’ She was whispering now. ‘You see, there’s no way I could ever trust you again, and if you can’t trust somebody, what’s the point? I don’t have to stay at Rowenna’s. There are loads of places I can live. I know lots of people now – like really good people.’

‘That would be really stupid. You’re sixteen years old.’

‘That’s right, at least you can count.’

‘And these are not good people.’

‘What the fuck would you know, Merrily?’ Jane prodded a finger at the air between them. ‘I’ll tell you something. I’d rather sell my soul to the Devil than spend one more night in this mausoleum.’

‘All right,’ Merrily said. ‘Stop right there. I don’t care what you say about me, but don’t ever say that. Just don’t… ever… say it.’

Jane shrugged. ‘Like… come and get me, Satan?’

She tossed back her hair, which wasn’t really long enough to toss, and went out into the hall and Merrily heard her snatching her coat from the peg and then the creak and judder of the front door.

Merrily stood in the centre of the kitchen. After a while, she was aware of Ethel, the black cat, mewing pitifully at her feet. She picked up the cat, and saw that the mist outside was thickening.

The phone rang again.

She’d been hoping the first call would be from Huw. But now she hoped it was Lol. She needed to tell somebody.

‘Merrily? It’s Barry Ambrose.’

‘Oh… Hello, Barry.’ She sat down at her desk in the scullery-office, hoping, just at this moment, that he was calling to say he hadn’t found out a thing.

‘I found out about that girl, Merrily.’

‘Rowenna?’

‘I hope she’s not too close to you, that’s all,’ Barry said.

PART FOUR SQUATTER

40 Dark Hand

THE FOG WAS worse in Leominster, which was why the bus was late, the driver explained. Fog, just when you thought you’d got rid of it!

Then again, if the bus hadn’t been late, Jane would have missed it – thanks to the Reverend Bloody Watkins.

She slumped down near the back and felt sick. That was it, wasn’t it? That was really it. There was no way she could go back there tonight. Outside the bus windows, the hills had disappeared, the view of fields extended about fifty yards, and then all you saw were a few tree- skeletons.

Why had she done this to herself? Why hadn’t she just sat it out, mumbled a few apologies about going to the psychic fair and… but that wouldn’t have worked, would it? Mum knew about the Pod. How the hell did she find that out? Was the Pod leaky? Had it been infiltrated by Christians?

This was just like so totally unfair. Jane felt sad and shabby in her old school duffel coat – hadn’t even had a chance to find something else. If you’re storming out, you had to do it, like, now! You couldn’t blow the whole effect by going up to your apartment to change into your tight black sweater and your nicer jeans, or collect your new fleece coat.

Ironic, really. This morning, doing her salute to the Eternal Spiritual Sun, she’d