The Fabric of Sin

had inflated into something disturbing. Or something seriously disturbing which James, in this otherwise routine letter to a female friend, was deliberately making light of.

The editor of the website had made a kind of pilgrimage to the area to track down the settings for the main Herefordshire story ‘A View from a Hill’. Although the story seemed to be set in the general area of Garway, the village itself didn’t appear to feature, even under a different name.

‘I love this guy.’ Jane was glowing. ‘Greatest ghost-story writer ever. Because he just … well, basically, he just … he didn’t do ghosts.’

‘What did he do, then?’

‘Entities. He did entities. Creeping things. Indefinable things, exuding … malevolence. In traditional settings, like old churches and deserted shores and places with burial mounds. According to the website, he once said there was no point at all in writing about the supernatural if it wasn’t evil.’

‘Doesn’t that kind of invalidate the Bible?’

‘He meant fiction, Mum.’

‘Wow,’ Merrily said, ‘there’s a step forward for you.’

‘I mean complete fiction. Anyway, he wasn’t exactly anti-religious. His old man was a vicar, in Suffolk. He was brought up in the Church. He might even have gone that way himself if he hadn’t got into academic research and teaching and stuff.’

‘And did you know he came to this area?’

‘Well, no! I just didn’t! It’s incredible.’

‘But you’ve read all the stories.’

‘Erm …’ Jane fiddled with the mouse. ‘Not all of them, to be completely honest.’

‘You totally love him, but you haven’t read all his stories.’

‘OK … mainly, I’ve just seen the TV versions.’

‘I don’t remember us watching them.’

Remembered them being on. Usually around Christmas, and mostly before Jane had been born.

‘Erm … I didn’t mean us.’ Jane’s face had clouded. ‘I saw them at Irene … Eirion’s. His dad had a complete set of the videos, and we watched most of them one night, one after the other. It was … it was pretty good. We were on our own and we scared ourselves silly.’

‘That must’ve been a long night. Watching them all.’

‘Not that long.’ Jane looked away. ‘They only lasted half an hour each. Or a bit longer.’

Oh, Jane, Jane …

Merrily guessing they’d watched them tucked up together in Eirion’s bed, when his parents were out.

‘Anyway,’ Jane said. ‘The TV versions were obviously set in East Anglia or somewhere. To be honest, I bought the book but I only got round to reading a couple. And I didn’t read the foreword, otherwise I’d’ve known about him coming here. Obviously, I’m now going to read everything. I’m going to find a biography. It’s amazing.’

‘Mmm.’

It was certainly a complication. Did Fuchsia know M. R. James had been to Garway? It was not unlikely.

‘So …’ Jane sat back, hands behind her head. ‘What’s your angle on this, Mum?’

‘Oh, it … it’s just somebody else who scared themselves silly.’

‘In a house belonging to Prince Charles?’

‘Did I tell you that?’

‘Not directly, but I just happened to click on history …’

‘And found the Duchy of Cornwall website.’ Merrily nodded, resigned. ‘Right.’

‘Didn’t mean to snoop, but this one was interesting. And you know it never goes any further, with me. Not any more.’

‘I’d’ve told you all about it, if you’d asked.’

‘I know, but … Anyway. Sorry. So, like, the house is at Garway, then. With the Knights Templar church. How did you get on to M. R. James?’

‘Because … there’s a mention of a Templar preceptory in one of his stories — “Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad”.’

‘That one is really scary. In the TV version, this professor, he’s not what you’d call sociable and he just goes around kind of mumbling to himself on this grey beach, and then he—’

‘Do you know of any more? Any more stories mentioning the Knights Templar?’

‘No, but I could email this website and ask this Rosemary Pardoe, who obviously knows, like, everything about M. R.’

‘OK,’ Merrily said. ‘Why not?

Whatever had happened to M. R. James at Garway, he didn’t appear to have used it in a story, but perhaps he had, in some less obvious way. If he’d been at Garway in 1917, it would have to be one of the later ones.

And Fuchsia … whatever Fuchsia had seen or imagined or invented at Garway, she’d linked it to a story set in East Anglia, albeit with a Templar connection.

James had talked of next time. Next time we shall know better.

You sensed a residual fascination.

‘Holy shit …’

‘Jane—’

‘Look at this …’

Jane had read further down, to where Rosemary Pardoe was passing on her own observations about Garway Church and its environs. Merrily leaned across.

‘The dovecote?’

‘Mum, did you know about this?’

‘Sophie mentioned it. It’s apparently the finest of its period in the country.’

‘Oh, yeah, that too … Now, read the rest. Go on.’

‘It was built by the Knights Templar?’

‘Probably. And then rebuilt by the Hospitallers who took over at Garway. Go on … read it.’

Jane stood up. Merrily sat down.

As well as the ancient Garway church itself with its (semi) detached thirteenth-century tower, there is a huge dovecote on private property on the adjoining farm …

Its doveholes number a worrying 666.

‘Oh.’

‘When are you going back?’ Jane said. ‘And can I come?’

When she went upstairs to change into jeans and sweatshirt, Merrily took the mobile with her and called Felix again from the bedroom.

Unsure, now, of how best to approach this. It was all subtly turning around, M. R. James himself becoming a player, seventy or so years after his death.

As for the dovecote … if it had been there for the best part of eight centuries, it was a bit late now to start worrying about the implications of 666 dove-chambers.

‘The person you are calling is not available. If you would like to leave a message … ’

‘Felix, it’s Merrily. Could you or Fuchsia please call me. I need to talk about the …’ She hesitated. ‘The face of crumpled linen.’

Crumpling her cassock for the wash basket, she put on jeans and the Gomer Parry sweatshirt. The alarm clock said one-forty. Meditation was seven-thirty. She swallowed two paracetamol in the bathroom, came back downstairs to find Jane still hanging around in their chilly kitchen.

‘Not got a meeting with, erm … Coops today?’

Jane shook her head. She looked less happy, her face a little flushed.