The Fabric of Sin

found near his caravan at Monkland, and the cops were treating it as suspicious.’

‘It is.’

‘They didn’t mention a woman.’

‘Good.’

‘Mum …’ Jane came down to the landing. ‘Look, I’m not stupid. I can put the pieces together.’

‘If not always in the right holes.’

‘Are you OK? I’m serious.’

‘I’ve been thinking maybe I should take a hairdressing course, open a little salon in Lol’s front room.’

‘Mum—’

‘Do something useful.’

‘You need a holiday.’

‘Mmm. I’ve been thinking about Garway Hill. Nice views.’

‘So do it,’ Jane said. ‘I mean it. If you want to go over there and deal with whatever needs dealing with, I’ll stay here with whichever loopy, militant-lesbian cleric they want to dump on the parish.’

‘Jane, I was just—’

‘And I’ll help however I can. Checking stuff on the net, ringing people, whatever you need. I … well, I just wanted to say that. Any religious differences don’t come into it. I want to help. No ulterior motive, I swear it.’

‘I never thought there was, flower, but—’

‘I looked up some stuff in Mrs Leather last night. Left the page refs on your desk.’

‘Thank you. Maybe I’ll get a chance to read them when you’ve gone to school.’

Merrily set off downstairs, Jane right behind.

‘I bet you didn’t sleep much last night, did you? And not because Lol was here.’

‘Yeah, well, thanks for your concern, however …’

‘For Christ’s sake, Mum, your guy’s had his head smashed in. That must be—’

‘Something I wish I hadn’t had to see, yes.’

‘And, like, not the only thing? I saw your face when you came out of that house.’

This wasn’t going to go away, was it?

‘Look … I’ve told you. I’d seen something that was in the wrong place. The green man — we don’t know what it means, but it’s an odd, symbolic, medieval thing, and it isn’t usually, if ever, found in houses. So it was unexpected, just a bit of a shock.’

‘Bit more than that, if you ask me.’

‘The jury …’ Merrily stopped on the stairs ‘… is still out, all right?’

‘There are some things you just don’t want to face up to. You’re a priest but you’re afraid to confront the reality of, like, metaphysical evil. Even when it’s possibly caused violent death. I’m just putting two and two together.’

‘And making thirteen. Violent death, in my limited experience, is caused by people.’

‘Sure, but what causes the people to cause the violence?’

‘Let’s just get some breakfast, or you’ll be late.’

Merrily carried on to the bottom on the stairs, listening out for the bleep of the answering machine, but all she could hear was Ethel crunching dried food, rocking the bowl on the stone flag.

‘Oh, the other thing,’ Jane said, ‘I emailed the M. R. James site last night, while you were out. About the dovecote and the Templars? So like if something comes in for me don’t feel you have to wait till I get home. Just open it.’

‘Thank you.’

Jane looked at her. That look got shrewder every year; all you could do was stare back and hope you came through.

‘Breakfast,’ Merrily said.

‘I’ll make it,’ Jane said. ‘And I’ll make yours, too, and I’m not going to school until I’ve watched you eat it.’

No overnight messages on the machine and no early calls. Local people had come to accept that Monday was a vicar’s day off, usually the only one. By the time Merrily had read Mrs Leather’s account of the watch after death, the computer’s in-box was showing what looked like an actual email amongst the spam.

Dear Jane,

Thanks for your mail. Garway is certainly the most mysterious and intriguing place I’ve ever visited in my quest for MRJ. I’m afraid I can’t throw any particular light on the dovecote mystery apart from pointing out, as you probably already know, that, before the suppression of the order, the Knights Templar were accused of denying Christ, rejecting the Mass and the sacrament and spitting on the cross. These charges may have been fabricated, but the possibility of the order becoming corrupt in later years cannot be ruled out.

The dovecote, as it stands today, seems to have been largely rebuilt by the Knights Hospitaller, who succeeded the Templars at Garway, but I don’t know of any satanic scandal attaching to them.

Re. your question about ‘Whistle’, I’m afraid I have to disappoint you. Whatever happened to MRJ at Garway seems to have occurred in 1917, a good thirteen years after the publication of the story (it was probably written in 1903). He may have visited Garway before Ghost Stories of an Antiquary came out in 1904, but there is no record of it that I know of. He doesn’t seem to have found any reason to come to Herefordshire until the widow of his friend James McBryde moved there with her young daughter in 1906.

So that was that. Merrily sat back, unsure if she was disappointed or relieved that, despite the Templar connection and the Globe Inn coincidence, ‘Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad’ could hardly have been inspired by whatever happened to M. R. James at Garway Church nearly fourteen years later.

Remiss of her not to have checked those dates herself.

And Fuchsia, the face of crumpled linen, it had all turned around again: more evidence that whatever had happened to Fuchsia had happened inside Fuchsia’s head, whether creatively or otherwise. It was not unlikely that Fuchsia had even made those same connections with ‘Whistle’.

Time to talk to Huw Owen again. As she glanced at the big black phone, it rang.

‘You in, Merrily?’ Bliss said.

‘What’s it sound like?’

‘You’re not still ratty …’

‘Make that confused and upset.’

‘Will you still be in in half an hour or so?’

‘Have you found her?’

‘I’ll have another bloke with me,’ Bliss said.

Background buzz suggesting the CID room rather than the car park. His tone — and the fact that he was ringing on the landline — suggesting she might need to exercise caution.

‘Who?’

‘You’ll like him,’ Bliss said. ‘He’ll make you laugh.’

‘You still haven’t told me whether—’

The line went dead. Merrily sat holding the empty phone, staring blankly at the rest of the message on the screen.

Incidentally, if you didn’t know this, Gwendolen McBryde’s daughter was also called Jane, and MRJ was very fond of her. This may well have been because Jane, something of an artist like both her parents, was fascinated by the supernatural and creepy things generally. So when MRJ says ‘we’ caused offence at Garway, he may well be referring to the, by then, teenage Jane and possibly her mother as well as himself. It occurs to me that you might like to read Michael Cox’s biography of MRJ, relevant pages of which I’ve attached.

Good luck with your investigations; do let me know how you get on!

Rosemary Pardoe

Merrily sat up, clicked on the attachment, bringing up two scanned pages from M. R. James, An Informal Portrait. The first began by examining the possibility that the lively and affectionate young widow Gwendolen McBryde had been rather attracted to her late husband’s best friend, a man who had helped her through difficult times and been conscientious about his role as Jane’s guardian.