The Prayer of the Night Shepherd

With her being so tall, sometimes you forgot Clancy was a couple of years less experienced and sat in classes with little children. ‘I meant, there seem to be no rules on whether it’s OK for a female parish priest to be having a conspicuous relationship with a man if neither of them’s married.’

‘They could always get married.’

‘Lifetime commitment? These are two very timid people, Clancy.’

Jane paused at the bend in the drive, where the Hall suddenly opened out in front of them, panels of light from the ground-floor bay windows imprinted on the clean, white lawns. Was this worth another shot?

Nah — face it, none of this was going to get used, anyway. Antony would deal with the arty stuff himself. All he wanted from Jane were snatches of what Eirion called ‘actuality’ — short exchanges, things happening around the place, people in motion. Get Amber in, and Natalie, when you can, Antony had told her. But be discreet about it, they’re not performers like Ben.

Clancy said, ‘It’s the first time we’ve lived with a man. It’s strange… not like I imagined.’

Jane wanted to ask, how… why? But they were getting too close to the Hall to approach an issue this big. The high pines were all around them now. It was like a medieval castle: the pines were the curtain wall and the lawns sloped up to the Hall, which was like the keep on its mound in the centre. In the dark, Stanner looked much older than Victorian. There obviously had been more ivy on the walls than there was now; you could see where it had been cut away for repairs, so maybe when Conan Doyle was here…

‘Something happened at the farm, the other night,’ Clancy said. ‘Something horrible.’

Jane stopped, a hand on Clancy’s arm. ‘You mean between Nat and Jeremy?’

‘No!’ Clancy shook her off. ‘Why do you always have to think of things like that? She was at work, anyway, she was here. It was Saturday night, and Jeremy and me were watching a video… and suddenly there was this blinding light through the window and all this shouting, and these men were outside the farmhouse, with guns and a big spotlight thing.’

‘The shooters — the ones Ben’s been getting hassle from?’

‘I don’t know. They were just… It was like a raid.’ Clancy stood at the edge of the lawn, looking over her shoulder. ‘They came out of the trees with their guns, and they were like surrounding the old barn opposite the farmhouse. They were going to shoot Flag.’

‘The dog?’

‘They would have!’ Clancy’s voice was raw and strained in the razory air. ‘They’d have shot him. It was like they owned the place, and they could do what they wanted. Jeremy told me to stay inside, but I couldn’t. I went out after Flag. And then Jeremy’s mate Danny was there, and one of them hit him with his gun.’

‘Danny Thomas?’

‘Long hair and a scraggy beard?’

‘That’s him.’

‘They hit him on the head, over an eye and made it bleed, and then they shoved his car into the ditch.’

‘Jesus. Is he all right?’

‘I think so, but—’

Jane was appalled. ‘Have you told the cops?’

‘Jeremy was funny about it. He didn’t want to talk about it afterwards.’

‘But he told your mum?’

‘That’s why she won’t let me walk down to the farm on my own any more. I think she and Jeremy think they’ll come back.’

‘Does Ben know about this?’

‘Don’t say a word! Jane, please, you haven’t to say a word! I’m not supposed to talk about it.’ Clancy started walking rapidly towards the house, face splattered with light from the big windows.

Jane thought of the men that she and Ben and Antony had encountered at Hergest, who claimed they’d been hired by a local farmer to get rid of foxes. If one of his neighbours was involved, this might explain why Jeremy didn’t want to cause any trouble.

‘Clan, did they have Valleys accents?’

‘What?’

‘Were they from South Wales?’

‘Might’ve been. I’m not sure.’

‘You should tell Ben. He’ll get something done without implicating Jeremy. Ben doesn’t—’

‘No!’

‘He doesn’t care about treading on people’s toes. He likes that.’

‘Please, Jane…’ As they reached the Hall, Clancy was nearly in tears. ‘I wouldn’t’ve told you if I thought you were gonna go telling tales. I just… suddenly everything’s a mess. It was OK in summer when we came, but now everything’s gone crap. I don’t like the people round here. Wish we could go back to Shropshire.’

‘Where were you in Shropshire?’

‘Craven Arms. It’s between Shrewsbury and Ludlow.’

‘Yeah, I know. Clancy Craven, of Craven Arms, huh?’

Clancy didn’t react.

Jane said, ‘Look, you’ve got to keep me informed of anything else that happens, OK?’ And Clancy nodded, looking relieved. Jane knew what it was like in these small Border communities: you wondered whether the normal rules of Western civilization applied or if you were part of some tight, taciturn little Anglo-Welsh banana republic. Well, she’d be seeing Gomer in a few hours, and if he didn’t know about this, as Danny’s partner…

The very last of the daylight was soaking away into night-cloud, and Jane was glad she’d stopped to do that moody, glistening shot. Even if it never got used, the fact that she’d thought to capture it showed she was like responding to images.

Despite the weather, there were extra cars on the car park. Apart from Jeremy’s old Daihatsu, used by Nat, and Ben’s MG, covered with old carpet where the soft-top was jammed, there were three of them she’d never seen before.

‘Guests? On a Monday?’

‘They’re not staying,’ Clancy said. ‘They’re just here for a meeting. Mum has to run the bar. She was moaning that they probably wouldn’t be drinkers anyway, people like that.’

‘People like what?’ Jane could see some figures through the bay window of the lighted lounge. They were standing around like they were making small talk. Ben was one of them, and then Jane saw a woman with pale hair, and a small thrill rippled through her. ‘Oh wow… it’s them, isn’t it?’

‘I don’t want to know,’ Clancy said, miserable again.

‘It’s the White Company, isn’t it?’ Jane had like just known she had to be here tonight. Psychic or what?

‘People round here are sick,’ Clancy said.

This time, Frannie Bliss was calling her from his home, out near Leominster. She could hear his kids in the background, squabbling over something that made techno-bleeps.

‘Merrily. Just had a call from Melvyn. He was pretty sure about this, but he likes to check his facts. There is a story, but it’s not quite what you thought. And it goes way back. The last time Dexter Harris saw the inside of an interview room was nearly twenty years ago.’

‘When he was nine?’

‘Twelve, actually. And looked older, Melvyn says. Big lad, even then, which was how he wound up in the grown-up felons’ interview room. Hang on a sec, Merrily. I said, No… Daddy will fix it later… Gerrout, or I’ll nick the pair of yer for aggravated assault. Let me shut the door, Merrily.’ Bliss put the phone down and when he came back he said, ‘I had my way, the age of criminal responsibility’d be reduced to four. You might want to make notes.’

Merrily found a pen, pulled over the sermon pad.

‘Right,’ Bliss said, ‘I’ll give you the bottom line first: Dexter killed somebody.’