Fabric of Sin (38 page)

Amid the distaste, an unexpected fizz of excitement as Merrily put down her pen.

‘Lol, did Lord Stourport miss something when he was in London, do you think?’

‘I can’t help wondering if he even
went
to London,’ Lol said. ‘Or if, whatever happened towards the end, he was effectively dissociating himself from it. Giving himself an alibi. And the way he was stressing that he was only in it for the sex, wasn’t really involved in the ritual magic.’

‘Was that true, do you think, or just a blokey thing to say?’

‘Well, it
was
blokey, but … the sex, the magic, I don’t think you can divide them. I think he
did
get off on all that. You sensed a kind of pride. After a while, he was enjoying talking about it – his decadent youth, before he had the responsibility of property and a title dumped on him. I think he’d do it again tomorrow if there was another Mat Phobe around to set it up.’

‘But he never went into detail?’

‘No. You’d probably be looking at whatever rituals Crowley did in that context.’

‘Templars. He was always intrigued by the Templars.’

Thinking of the time, while she was waiting for the first deliverance course at Huw Owen’s chapel in the Beacons, when she’d been reading heavily about magic, and Crowley in particular. All the books came back to Crowley, his attempts to raise spiritual and demonic entities, representing various energies – sexual arousal going hand-round-cock with higher consciousness. His ambition to become godlike.

In a seedy kind of way.

She remembered once making the mistake of reading in bed about how, at his
abbey
in Sicily, Crowley had supervised a ritual which involved a woman having sex with a goat, culminating in Crowley cutting the goat’s throat so that the blood washed over the woman.

It was about the magical energy of blood. Crowley liked to call them Scarlet Women, and that was how they’d end up, the sick bastard.

‘The Welsh guy,’ Lol said. ‘
He
must’ve been there at the end.’

‘Yes. That’s your big discovery, Lol, and I’m truly grateful for this. I need to talk to the guy, don’t I? If it’s who I think it is.’

Was
she going to talk to Sycharth, in defiance of the Bishop?

Oh yes. Oh God, yes.

Lol said, ‘You foresee him reacting with the same kind of half-suppressed glee as Jimmy Hayter?’

‘Not exactly. He’s a big businessman in Hereford now. He owns the Centurion on Roman Road.’

‘Do
not
go on your own.’

‘What’s he going to do, sacrifice me?’

‘You need a witness.’

‘I just want to invite him to a small service.’

God, was she still going to
do
that? A deliverance swansong?

‘You’re not going today, are you?’ Lol said.

‘I’ll call him, make an appointment.’

‘Get Sophie to do it. Makes it seem more official.’

Merrily said nothing. It would take too long to explain.

‘You’re OK, aren’t you?’ Lol said. ‘I mean, you’re feeling all right?’

‘I’m feeling surprisingly well.
Surprisingly
well. What time will you be home?

‘Gig’s at nine.’

‘Decent gig?’

‘Not bad.’

‘Do this one for Nick,’ Merrily said. ‘You know what I mean? And when you get in, come round. I don’t care what time.’

‘Well, then.’ Lol knelt down next to the grave. ‘Made it at last.’

Two blokes in the same business, one who went down, one who – having begun his career by shamelessly copying the other – had somehow come through.

This was silly. Embarrassing. Futile. Not only did he not know what to say, he wasn’t even sure who he was addressing. He was now over a decade older than Nick had been when he’d died alone in his bedroom in a big house in this village, from an overdose of antidepressants.

Having already overdosed on cannabis and commercial failure. The house was called Far Leys, and apparently was quite easy to find, but Lol had decided that he wasn’t going to.

If Nick Drake was alive now he’d be nearly sixty. What would he
sound
like now?

Now we rise and we are everywhere
.

Could hear him breathily singing those words on the summery ‘From the Morning’, the last song on the last album released in his lifetime.

Like a prophecy.

The last one. His songs had always been full of dark prescience, if you wanted to hear it – as if he’d seen the design of his short life laid out in symbols. He was the
fruit tree
that would only flourish when his body was in the ground, when the
pink moon
had taken his life after the years of the
black-eyed dog
howling at his door, asking for more, giving nothing.

This man who could stand in silence for two hours on the periphery of a party, like a half-formed apparition. Some people had actually seen his possible suicide as part of a life-plan. Others thought he was just plain screwed up and smoking too much dope.

Maybe, it was often said, a woman might have saved him, if he’d been able to let a woman in. Or a man? Gay men liked to suggest that Nick – who, despite his elegance, his good looks and his profession, never seemed to have had a physical relationship – had been in the closet.

The most likely answer was that he was too well brought up in the careful, post-war Agatha Christie Fifties, too plain uptight middle English.
I can’t really imagine Nick having sex with anyone
– a friend, quoted in the latest biography –
because he would have to take his clothes off and he was always far too shy
.

This in the Seventies, when Jimmy Hayter, close to the same age as Nick, and actually far more upper-class, had been
up to here with peace and lerve and ready to get steeped in the dirty stuff
.

Jimmy Hayter, who was Lord Stourport, who hadn’t spoken to Lol again as Lol stood up, murmured ‘thank you’, nodded and walked away
like he was walking on an open blade. Hayter’s body never moving, only his stare coldly following him to the door.

‘You’d have encountered people like him, right?’ Lol said. ‘I mean, you were just a little too late – especially with your background – to have been a real hippie.’

Lol picked up one of the plectrums, tortoiseshell, and then put it back, finding he’d rearranged them into a rough semicircle around the gravestone.

‘You came in at the wrong end of the dream. When everybody was waking up into the cold daylight, trying to pull the covers over their heads and it was … all going rancid under there.’

Those sublime albums bombing, one after the other. No reason for it; they were massive these days, the songs ubiquitous.

Now he
had
risen and he
was
everywhere.

The last prophesy fulfilled. There was nothing left to say.

Lol stood up. He had no plectrum to leave. Hadn’t used one in years, just his fingers and his nails on light strings.

As he walked away, a slow breeze passed through the brittling leaves on the oak tree, like a low sigh, and Lol turned and thought for a moment that a tall figure was shadowed under the tree. Slightly stooped. Raising a languid hand in a brief, shy salute.

Lol smiled and waved once and ran out of the churchyard, all the way back to where he’d left the Animal at the side of the road in a quiet lane with trees.

Only it wasn’t there.

Using the landline, Merrily rang The Centurion in Roman Road.

A woman said, ‘I’m sorry, Mr Gwilym’s in a meeting. Who shall I say called?’

‘When will the meeting be over?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know. Can I take a—?’

‘I’ll call back,’ Merrily said, the mobile starting to chime at her elbow.

‘It’s Adam Eastgate, Merrily. About that call I warned you to expect.’

‘It hasn’t happened yet.’

‘Well, no. As it turns out, this is it.’

‘Sorry?’

‘I’ve been asked to make the call rather than somebody whose voice you wouldn’t recognize. Bottom line, Merrily, I have to ask you if you ever do any work … privately, like.’

‘
Privately?
’

‘You know what I’m saying.’

‘Independently of the Diocese?’

‘And on a confidential basis.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like the service in the Master House. Paul Gray says he’ll go along with it, though perhaps I’m not the best person to make an approach to Mr Gwilym.’

‘You want me to go ahead, despite the Bishop.’

‘It’s not seen as a confrontational thing. Just something we feel should take place, and if it’s done quietly there won’t be any of the problems Bernard was afraid of.’

‘Who else would be there?’

‘Me.’

‘Anyone else?’

‘It wouldn’t be wise for there to be … anyone else.’

‘This is a tough one, Adam.’

‘Aye. I can see that.’

‘If I did it,’ Merrily said, ‘and it got out … it could get me in a lot of trouble.’

Because there was a difference here. If she just went ahead with it on her own, it would be merely a small rebellion, out of conscience.

Where the royals are concerned – the royals and Canterbury – the smallest rumour can cause a seismic shift, and little folks like you can get dropped down the nearest crevice
.

‘It won’t get out, Merrily. Nobody wants it to get out.’

‘And the idea’s been approved, has it, at the highest level?’

‘I referred it up. The suggestion came back.’

‘From?’

‘Just from higher up.’

‘When did they have in mind?’

‘Soon as possible. Soon as you can get the people together. What’s the earliest, do you think?’

‘I suppose …’ Merrily thought about it, counting days. ‘I suppose the earliest might be the day after tomorrow. That would be … Friday?’

She looked at the calendar and her gaze caught the sermon pad, propped up now against the computer, open to the list of names: PIERRE MARKHAM … MICKEY SHARPE … SIGGI—?

‘That would be Friday the twelfth?’ Adam Eastgate said. ‘I’m writing it down.’

MAT PHOBE?

‘Or Saturday, I suppose,’ Merrily said.

‘The thirteenth.’

It was like one of those damn signposts being erected in the scullery, hammered into the floor in front of the desk.

MAT PHOBE?

Something about that name. Not a real name, obviously.

‘Think about it and let me know early tomorrow,’ Adam Eastgate said. ‘OK?’

‘OK. I will.’ Her stare travelling up and down the names, alighting on—

SYCHARTH????

‘Adam, tell me something.’

‘If I can.’

‘The threats received by the Duchy—’

‘Oh, now—’

‘It’ll go no further, I promise. Come on. Someone’s given you the green light to trust me.’

‘Where did you get this?’

‘From Jonathan Long.’

Which she had, in a way.

‘Wales,’ Merrily said. ‘He was talking about Wales.’

‘Aw, look, it was rubbish, Merrily. They decided it was all complete rubbish. A joke.’

‘What sort of threats were they? Please. It’s important.’

‘I have to refer these things up, you know? They have to be looked
into. Once we got them translated … the grammar wasn’t even right, apparently. I can’t tell you any more.’

‘OK. Thanks.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I’ll be in touch,’ Merrily said, going up the list from the bottom as she clicked off.

CROWLEY.

DE MOLAY

MAT PHOBE?

Printing that last one out again, separating the letters.

MAT PHOBE

Then, in slight disbelief, she began to pick out individual letters, writing them down in a different order. Very lightly, so that it was almost a ghost of a word. As if she couldn’t bear to give it more solidity …

BAPHOMET

T
OO EARLY TO
panic.

It couldn’t happen. Not on a mild autumnal Wednesday afternoon in Tanworth-in-Arden, in Middle England.

And he must have done this a couple of times before – distinctly remembering leaving his car in a particular place when it was actually somewhere else. It had definitely happened before.

If never with nearly four thousand pounds’ worth of kit in the back, not including the Boswell guitar which was as close to priceless as anything he’d ever possessed.

Who was he trying to fool?

Lol stood in the road, in the empty space between two vividly green-gold beech trees. Standing exactly where he remembered parking the truck … and parking it not too confidently, because the Animal was so much longer than his old car.

But it had been a strange, unpredictable day. He needed to check and double-check before reporting it to the police.
Damn, damn, damn
.

The sky was clouding over, the sun hazed like a smear of butter on white bread, and he’d begun numbly retracing his steps to the churchyard, when his mobile played the riff from ‘Heavy Medication Day’.

When he opened up the phone, a phone number he didn’t recognize appeared in the screen.

A male voice he didn’t recognize, either.

‘Robinson.’

‘Yes.’

‘Try the pub car park.’

Lol said, ‘Who’s that?’

There was no answer.

Lol said, ‘Listen …’

There wasn’t going to be an answer; this was the time of no reply. He began to breathe hard, that sense of dislocation again. He turned around, and the pub was directly opposite.

He didn’t move, realizing he could actually see the truck from here, silver blue, centrally parked. A man in a suit, with a briefcase under one arm, came out of the pub and bleeped open a BMW. Nobody else was about.

Lol approached the Animal slowly, walking all around it from a distance, until he was sure there was nobody sitting in it. Clutching his keys, very much afraid that he wasn’t going to need them. Not to open the driver’s door, anyway.

Nor, as it turned out, the roll-top that Gomer and Danny Thomas had fitted onto the box, now bunched up at the end like an accordion.