An All-Consuming Fire (12 page)

All Antony could think of was to offer a weak protest. “Er—but really, heretics were burned at the stake, not hanged.”

“And how effective an image would a pile of kindling wood be, I ask you? Think, man! A gibbet is a much stronger statement. It’s all about making pictures in the viewers’ minds. Pictures they will carry with them. Television is a visual medium.”

Antony gazed at the stark black beams silhouetted against the winter sky, cutting a black gash through the glory of the sunset. The empty loop in the dangling rope swayed in the breeze, giving Antony a momentary feeling that it was swinging out toward him. He shuddered and stepped back. A powerful image, indeed.

A
ntony woke completely disoriented the next morning. Rays of the nascent sunrise struck the wall beyond his bed, making him startle. Flames? A heretic being burnt? He threw his covers aside, then realized he had been dreaming about the execution of William Sawtrey, the first Lollard martyr.

He had attempted to tell the story to the cameras as the blaze of sunset sank behind the Hambleton Hills last evening. But Harry insisted on his gibbet image, so Antony had mentally speed-read through his church history notes as if his files were in front of him. “Well, Sir John Oldcastle, a friend of Henry V’s and Shakespeare’s model for Sir John Falstaff, was a Lollard who led Oldcastle’s Revolt—a widespread Lollard conspiracy, which planned to seize the King and establish a commonwealth.

“The plot was discovered. Sir John was condemned, hanged, and burnt—gallows and all.”

“Well, there you are, then. Tell the story, man. That’s what we’re paying you for.”

“But the execution was in London,” Antony protested. Harry made an impatient gesture and Antony told the story.

And now here he was, without so much as a toothbrush, in a farmhouse B and B just beyond the abbey. Again, at Harry’s insistence. The whole crew was staying there. Well, Harry and Sylvia were in the B and B. Several of the others were staying in the small caravan that accompanied the crew to locations. And Antony suspected some had slept in their cars to save money, for all that Harry was paying them.

It seemed someone had failed to warn Antony that this was to be an overnight stay when the whole venture was set up in haste on Harry’s orders that they were to capture the sunset and begin filming at the Terrace the next morning as soon as the sun illuminated it. In spite of the discomfort, though, of being caught out without his kit, Antony was glad they hadn’t had to make the drive back through the dark last night and then set out again before sunrise this morning. Fortunately, the B and B had been able to accommodate Felicity and Cynthia with a room just down the hall.

Again, Antony puzzled over the fact that they were to begin filming at the Terrace. What place that scene would play in the story of the mystics he couldn’t fathom, but it was Harry and Sylvia’s film and as Harry reminded him, they were paying his salary, such as it was. Apparently Sylvia, as producer, had scouted the sites months ago and set the filming agenda. It remained for the rest of them but to obey.

Antony crossed the room to splash his face and swirl water around in his mouth at the sink in the corner. At least he had a comb in his pocket, but that was about the extent of what he could accomplish in the way of morning ablutions.

He clicked on the electric kettle sitting on the wide window sill. It had just boiled when a tap and soft voice at his door told him that Felicity would share his morning tea with him. Acutely aware of the dog-eared mien he presented, he blinked at her glowing appearance. After a good morning kiss he asked, “Goodness, how do you manage to look so fresh?”

She laughed as she added a container of long-life milk to her tea. “I’ll have to say my mother is a wonder. She had everything in her bag—including an extra toothbrush they had supplied on the airplane.”

“You know, Felicity…” Antony stopped. He wouldn’t go there. Felicity would find her own way with her mother.

“Hmm?” She raised an eyebrow at him over her teacup.

“Er—uh, it looks like it’s going to be a brilliant day. How about going for a walk? We’ve got at least an hour before the cameras roll.”

“Sure. Do you have your script ready?”

Antony shrugged. “I’m not sure what I’m to do today. Just technical advice, I think. I understand Joy will be interviewing a local expert—descendant of the local great family, I think she said. Whatever that has to do with the Mystics I can’t imagine. Seems considerably farther off-topic than the Lollards to me.”

They finished their tea quickly and slipped down the stairs before Antony could be waylaid by Harry Forslund. They heard his booming voice and Sylvia’s murmured responses as they tiptoed past their door.

“Oh, it’s magical!” Felicity held out her arms to the awakening world. Overnight frost had limned every tiniest twig and branch of the vegetation bordering the lane to the abbey and the millions of tiny prisms caught rays of the dawning sun and made rainbows dance like fireflies. Woolly sheep baaed at them from the fields beyond.

“I’d been hoping for snow for our wedding, but maybe frost would be even more romantic.” Felicity slipped her gloved hand into his and they walked on in silence as the radiance increased around them.

Although the abbey was closed on Mondays during the winter, Harry had made arrangements for one small gate at the back of the grounds to be left unlocked for the crew. Antony held the gate open for Felicity, then led the way across the frost-brittle grass to the foundation stones of the broken walls of the infirmary. “Let’s just go around that way into the infirmary cloister,” Antony directed her. “It would have been a marvelous medicinal garden in Anselm—”

His words were lost when Felicity gasped and shoved him to his knees behind a partially standing wall. “He’s got a gun!” She hissed.

Antony followed her pointing hand to see a figure in a long black coat and hat standing in the arched alcove high up on the infirmary wall. A shaft of sunlight struck the end of the dark object he held raised to his eye. Antony froze.

Then he relaxed in laughter. “That’s not a gun. It’s a camera.” He pushed himself to his feet and waved at the figure in the oversized niche. “Lenny!” Antony called and strode toward the cameraman. “This is devotion to art. What brings you out so early?”

Lenny held out the Leica with its long telephoto lens. “Well, you can call it art if you want to. I call it following orders. Although I can hope some of those sunrise shots might qualify as artistic.”

Before Antony could reply Lenny jumped from the wall in something of a daring feat. “We’d best be heading back if we want breakfast before the action starts. This morning air has me ravenous.” He took a few steps toward the exit then turned back. “Coming? Gill in the catering van does a killer bacon butty.”

“We’ll be along soon.” Antony waved him away, then looked at Felicity. “Are you hungry?”

“Not yet. I didn’t really get much of a look round last night. This is truly magnificent, isn’t it? One forgets.” Her head lifted to the soaring Gothic arches of the east end of the nave. As she walked across the frosty grass the morning sun highlighted the intricate molding of the arcade arches high above.

Antony pointed out the paired lancet windows of the clerestory, then suggested they take the path running along on the hillside beside the nave for an overview of the building. As they made their way down the length of the building from the higher elevation of the path Antony started to point out what a celestial effect it created to look through the high-vaulted arches linking the piers of the nave. But before he could give words to his thoughts Felicity grabbed his arm. “Ugh. Why don’t they take that thing down?”

Not wanting to tear his gaze from the shafts of morning sun streaming through the open panels of the east window, Antony gave her a rather abstracted answer. “The gibbet? I’m sure Harry’ll get rid of it later today. Probably too dark to take it down last night.”

“But it’s obscene.” Antony felt Felicity shiver beside him.

“Shall we go back then?” He started to turn.

But Felicity took a step up the hillside toward the gibbet. “No, look. He’s added something else. It looks like—”

Felicity’s scream ripped the dewy serenity of the morning.

A
slight breeze twisted the plump, nearly naked body dangling on the end of the rope. The morning sun made the white skin appear even more snowy than the frosty landscape. Wisps of black and lavender lace underwear cut like gashes across the pale form. Spikes of magenta and blue hair pierced the morning sky.

Felicity closed her eyes but the image was burnt into her eyelids. She shivered inside the blanket Sylvia put around her shoulders, her chill more from shock than from the icy air. Now all she wanted was to get back to the warmth and security of the B and B. And to her mother.

But she wasn’t leaving without Antony. And he couldn’t leave until Police Constable Leonard Craig, Helmsley Beat Manager of the North Yorkshire Police, had finished questioning him. PC Craig had arrived in record time in response to Antony’s emergency phone call. Craig took one look at the situation and summoned backup from the Ryedale Station, but at the moment he was soldiering on alone. And doing so admirably against the odds, Felicity thought, since the entire Studio Six crew had arrived on the scene just moments after Craig.

So far the constable, with considerable help from Sylvia, had managed to keep the filmmakers from trampling over the scene in spite of the best boy’s hysterical pleas that the body be taken down, Zoe’s wild barking at the foot of the gibbet, and Harry’s thundering demands to be allowed to carry on with his work. When his dictatorial approach failed, the director tried another tack, offering his crew’s assistance. “We have two professional photographers here, Constable. Surely you’d like pictures of the scene of the crime.”

“We have a forensic photographer on the way from Ryedale Station, sir.” Craig even managed a “Thank you,” that somehow made his refusal sound more final.

“No! You can’t just leave her there! It’s indecent.” Savannah, her red hair flying out like flames, tore from Sylvia’s grip and flung herself at the gibbet. “How will I live without her?”

Sylvia summoned Fred to help her restrain their best boy and PC Craig turned back to Antony. “Now let me get this straight, sir. You and this young lady were out for an early morning walk when you spotted the body?”

“Felicity saw it first,” Antony replied. “I approached the gibbet to be sure she was dead, but I didn’t have to get close.” He shook his head as if to clear the image. “The cold would have killed her if the rope hadn’t.”

“And you recognized her?”

Antony nodded. “Tara. She did the make-up. That’s all I know. The others could tell you more.”

“Did you observe any special relationships, Father? Did she have a boyfriend, for example? Or girlfriend?” His gaze followed the still-sobbing Savannah being sherphered toward the catering caravan.

“I wouldn’t know about anything like that. But I wouldn’t have thought her affections would lie in that direction. Pete, the electrician—python wrangler in their parlance—rumor was he was attracted. But from what I saw it was all on his side.”

“And how did she seem yesterday?”

Antony thought. “Very efficient. She was good at her job as far as I could tell. Harry was hurrying us to get the cameras rolling before the sunset faded, so she didn’t do much work on me.”

“She didn’t seem to be upset or depressed?”

“I would have said maybe a bit keyed up. Excited. But I thought that was because Harry was yelling at us all to hurry.”

The rest of the morning went in a blur: the arrival of the Scene of Crime officers, another round of questions from Inspector Tracy Birkinshaw, Harry’s repeated rage when the officers began wrapping the abbey in what seemed like miles of yellow crime scene tape and moving the Studio Six crew beyond the barrier.

Felicity’s last look back was the sight of Tara Gilbert’s body being cut from the noose and lowered onto a white plastic sheet. Felicity felt she would never be warm again.

“Come on. A good soak in a hot tub for you, my love.” Antony’s arm around her had never been more welcome.

And that broke the tight control Felicity had been holding on herself. She turned her face into his shoulder and sobbed. He held her, gently rocking her and making soothing noises as one would comfort a child.

When the storm subsided, arms still around her, Antony directed her feet toward the lane that would take them back to the B and B. They got about six steps when Harry stopped them. “Up here, Father. Nothing like having a priest around when you need him, huh?”

Felicity looked around and saw that Harry had assembled the crew on the hillside, just above where the police were still working over Tara’s prone body at the foot of the gibbet. “You’ll know what to do.” Harry motioned Antony forward.

Felicity was surprised. For all that he was directing a mini-series on a spiritual topic, this was the first Harry had shown of any personal religious feelings. But she was pleased. Of course it was the right thing to do.

Antony took a deep breath and stood facing the little group shocked and shivering on the hillside. A sob broke from Savannah, quickly muffled. Pete stood a little apart, his ashen face a frozen mask. “In the midst of life we are in the midst of death.” Antony began. His voice wavered, but it quickly picked up a ring of assurance as he found the rhythm of the psalm, “Though I walk in the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me…”

Then he signaled the beginning of the litany: “Lord, be merciful. From all evil,” he paused and looked at Felicity.

She caught his eye and led forth with the response, “Lord, save your people.” A few voices around her joined in uncertainly.

“From every sin,”

Now more voices joined Felicity’s, “Lord, save your people.”

“At the moment of death,”

This time the response was heartfelt, “Lord, save your people.”

“Lord, look on our sister Tara. May she rest in peace where sorrow and pain are banished and may the everlasting light of your merciful love shine upon her through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Antony made the sign of the cross and the meager service was ended.