The Prayer of the Night Shepherd

deeper amusement.

‘So, Beth.’ Antony casually uncoiled from the wall. ‘the White Company… is what, exactly?’

Jane saw Ben throw him a look that said: Back off. She guessed that Ben, on the threshold of the bleak season, didn’t give a toss if the White Company was a society of rubber-fetishists, as long as they left a deposit.

Beth Pollen gave him a candid look. ‘I think you’ve already guessed, Mr Largo.’

‘But you could humour me.’

‘Well… the society was officially formed in 1980 — the fiftieth anniversary of Arthur’s passing.’

‘Arthur’s passing. Ah Beth, you’re dropping wee clues the whole time.’

‘Well, of course I am.’

Ben said, ‘Antony, would you please—’

‘No, no…’ Mrs Pollen lifted a hand. ‘It was originally called The Windlesham Society, after Arthur’s much- loved last home in Sussex. It wasn’t terribly well supported in the early days, and many of the members were rather elderly and found it increasingly difficult to get to meetings. After a few years, it faded virtually out of existence. And then, about six years ago, Alistair Hardy, of whom you might have heard…? A fellow Scot?’

‘Big country, Beth,’ Antony said.

‘I’m sorry. We do tend to think that because someone’s eminent in our particular field he must be a household name. Alistair’s a very well-known trance-medium from Edinburgh. His spirit guide, at the time, was Dr Joseph Bell, who, if you recall—’

‘Doyle’s tutor at Edinburgh University medical school. Impressed young Arthur with his incredible deductive skills, thus becoming the prototype for Holmes himself. Arguably a useful guy to have as your spirit guide.’

Ben whispered, ‘You’re spiritualists?’

Jane had to laugh.

Mrs Pollen said, ‘Approximately six years ago, Dr Bell communicated to Alistair Hardy that a friend and former student of his was most anxious to find an enlightened audience because he didn’t feel his work here was complete.’

‘Now, I wonder who that would be,’ Antony said.

Beth Pollen merely raised an eyebrow at him. ‘In the last years of his life, Arthur’s beliefs were derided. But let’s not forget that when it was introduced in the West in Victorian times, spiritism was considered a science and had enormous credibility. When Arthur first applied to join the Society for Psychical Research, in 1893, its president-elect was Arthur Balfour, who would later become Prime Minister.’

‘Did I know that?’ Antony wondered. ‘I don’t believe I did.’

‘New technology was rampant. If we could pull voices from the air into a radio set, capture images on film, how long before we would all be seeing and talking to the dead?’ Mrs Pollen made a wry face. ‘By the twenties, we had commercial aircraft, phones, cinema, but spiritism wasn’t felt to have come up with the goods, so it was considered a crank fad. Everyone’s idea of a medium was Madame Arcati from Noel Coward. So it’s quite reasonable to suppose that Arthur was biding his time.’

Jane thought, And she seemed such a balanced woman.

‘The way you always refer to him as Arthur,’ Antony said, ‘suggests…’

‘An affection. He’s our patron, after all.’

‘You’re all spiritualists?’

‘We’re all spiritists, but we’re not all mediums, if that’s what you’re asking — I’m not. Essentially, we’re a group of people committed to furthering the work which occupied a good twenty years of a fine man’s life.’

‘He was — how should I put this? — a somewhat credulous man,’ Antony said, avoiding Ben’s agitated gaze.

‘Not as credulous as his critics would have us believe, Mr Largo. He fought two elections. He campaigned on behalf of the wrongly convicted. He was a passionate, liberal-minded man who constantly questioned his own beliefs and fought against injustice the whole of his adult life. His only flaw — if that’s how you want to regard it — was a desire to offer hope.’

Nobody spoke for a few seconds. Mrs Pollen turned away and spread her scarf over Ellen Gethin’s face, as if she wanted to protect her from cold scepticism.

‘Aye, OK, I’ll buy that, Beth.’ Antony leaned back against the wall. ‘I’m just no’ gonnae ask, if you don’t mind, under what circumstances Conan Doyle became your patron.’

The short drive back to Stanner started in silence, Antony lounging against the passenger door of the MG, chewing his lip and watching Ben drive with one hand on the wheel and his hair flowing behind him. Ben’s expression was so bland that Jane knew there had to be frantic action behind it. Which was understandable because, like, Jesus…

Coming up to the bypass Antony said, unsmiling, ‘My friend, if this is a set-up, I think it would be wise if you were to tell me right… now.’

Ben didn’t look at Antony. Jane had the impression he’d been expecting this.

‘We go back, pal.’ The open cuff of Antony’s denim jacket rolled back along a muscular forearm and his forefinger came up like a knife. ‘But not far enough that I wouldnae—’

He grabbed at the dash as Ben spun the MG into the side of the road, then up onto the grass, hitting the brakes hard and tossing Jane all over the small back seat.

‘Sorry about that, Jane.’ Ben took both hands from the wheel and half turned, as if offering his heart to Antony’s blade. ‘Look, I’ll say this once. Until half an hour ago all the White Company meant to me was a Boys’ Own adventure story that I had no particular wish to read.’

‘You’ll forgive me,’ Antony said, ‘for thinking it was all a wee bit lucky from your point of view.’

‘It was quite awesomely serendipitous, but I’m telling you I knew nothing about it.’

This is Natalie, Jane thought, sliding back into the narrow rear seat, saying nothing, holding down her excitement. Nat arranged for all this to be unveiled in front of Antony, and whatever you’re paying her it isn’t enough.

‘You wanted a contemporary dynamic,’ Ben said. ‘Now you’ve got one… and some.’

‘And you think they’d play ball? All the way?’

‘You came bloody close to asking her, matey. I was nearly soiling myself with anxiety.’

‘I’m no’ quite that stupid,’ Antony said. ‘I realize that to appear too eager at this stage would not be the thing.’

‘No.’ Ben leaned back into his bucket seat. ‘Even I couldn’t have dreamed up a woman with both a personal axe to grind against Neil Kennedy and a desire to prove — if only because she happens to live in this area — that The Hound begins on the Border. And to set it up for us like— I mean, you can see it, can’t you? To think I was originally going to offer you, as a frame, the tired old Baker Street League debating the origins of The Hound. Jesus.’

‘When all you needed,’ Antony said, ‘was for someone to… ask Arthur.’

‘It’s what they do, Antony. It’s what they bloody well do.’

‘So we’re looking at this Alistair Hardy, who has the temerity to claim Dr Joseph Bell as his spirit guide?’

‘Seems like it.’

‘At Stanner.’

‘You heard what I heard.’ Ben slid the gearstick into second and drove back onto the bypass.

‘And you think they’d let us shoot it? All of it? Like, they’re no’ gonnae give us any of this privacy’s crucial to the success of the operation kind of bullshit?’

‘Are you kidding? Listen. Some months after Doyle’s death in 1930, more than five thousand people attended a memorial seance at the Royal Albert Hall, during which a chair was left empty for him — how private was that?’

‘And did he, um, manifest?’

‘They had a well-known medium called Estelle Roberts. And Doyle’s widow Jean was on the stage. Great