The Revelations (18 page)

Sally shuffled past Philip and out into the aisle. She held up her hands towards her husband and began to speak in tongues, her eyes tightly shut, her head shaking violently from side to side as she moved in time to the music. The words – like the priest’s – seemed ripped from an ancient world, the chanting of a forgotten race. Marcus watched the Earl behind the lighting desk train the spot down the aisle. Mouse was the next to be seized by the Spirit. He yelped and squealed, called out in a high voice as he crashed his cymbals and rolled the snare. Abby fell down on her knees. She tried to keep singing the words of the song but, possessed, strange phrases fell from her lips. She twitched like a compass needle and held her hands up to the sky, shaking them in trembling ecstasy.

The twins were the first of the new members to let themselves go. The girls blew out their candles and made their way out into the aisle to join Sally. Ele took her sister by the hand, held it upwards and began to scream. Alice lifted her own voice alongside that of her twin. Slowly their words came through, the screaming softened into the beauty of the tongues. Sally wrapped her arms around them and hugged them to her chest as they laughed and chanted.

Marcus had never spoken in tongues. He had not been able to give himself up to the Spirit during the first Retreat, and ever since he had found the whole process rather embarrassing. As he played his guitar he yodelled every so often, trying to copy David’s voice as closely as possible. He would have liked to be able to abandon himself the way Abby did, rolling on the floor at his feet, a grin of utter exultation on her face, but he knew he would never be able to embrace this central part of the Course. Marcus was surprised that Lee hadn’t joined in yet. She was usually one of the first to go, said that she felt as if she was falling into a warm nothingness when the tongues got hold of her. Marcus looked over at her and saw that she was hitting the chords automatically, her shoulders slumped, none of the usual intensity that surrounded her when she was playing.

Neil moved into the aisle, walking with his head held up as if in challenge to his own shyness. He sank to his knees and lifted his trembling arms, fixing his eyes intently on David, who was still stretching skywards. Neil began to keen gently, his cheek pressed to his shoulder as he cried. The girls from Marcus’s group chanted as one, leaning heavily against their braying boyfriends, weak from the Spirit. By the end only Philip, Maki and Mrs Millman stood unaffected in the congregation. Even the Earl let out a brief series of grunts and barks.

With a nod to Marcus and Mouse, Lee stopped playing. The Earl, startled from his reverie, brought the lights down so that the priest was held in a golden glow; the rest were in darkness. Abby continued to call out for a while longer, there was the sound of the voices slowly abating, the
occasional
yelp from Mouse or Neil. The storm raged outside, but its tone was altered. Marcus thought that the deluge seemed somehow tamed by the power of what he had witnessed in the little chapel. As the lights came slowly up, Neil stood, head bowed, in the centre of the aisle. Marcus reached down to help Abby to her feet. The twins pressed themselves against Sally’s chest, shoulders heaving. The priest’s wife hugged them closely to her, whispering quietly in their small, pointed ears. Then David spoke, his eyes turned seriously upon the congregation.

‘For those of you who have just experienced the tongues for the first time, congratulations. It is an immense feeling, to have the Holy Spirit come down upon you and speak through you. For those who weren’t moved by the Spirit this time, don’t worry. It’s not for everyone; it certainly isn’t required. Now please take your seats again and let us pray. God, thank you for moving among us in this place. Thank you for blessing us with the presence of your Holy Spirit. May you not leave us now, but continue to speak to us, and through us. Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer.’

After a long silence, the priest walked down the aisle shaking hands with the congregation, smiling and laying his hands on their heads, blessing them and welcoming them into the church. Marcus saw Philip drift away from the group, pretending to admire the ogees that lined the columns alongside the nave. Marcus tried to move towards him, but David was shepherding people towards the door and Marcus was swept up in the happy babbling surge of Course members. The priest led them out into the night, where the rain had finally stopped and mist was curling up towards the house from the lake. Marcus walked up to the hall with Lee, who looked at him with a strange complicit glance as they left the chapel. She insisted on sitting beside him when they got to the hall, perching on the arm of his chair as Abby had earlier, occasionally smoothing his hair distractedly with her cold, thin fingers.

A sense of exultation fizzed around the new Course members as they waited for dinner. The Earl and David poured wine into glasses on a table that had been laid along one side of the hall. A huge vase of heavily scented lilies sat on the main dining table. Sally kept fidgeting with the arrangement, and each time she touched them, orange pollen stained her fingers. The twins stood at the centre of a circle of members, falling over each other to describe what they had just experienced.

‘And it was like everything dropped away . . .’

‘And you were falling, but you knew someone was there to catch you . . .’

‘It would have been scary but . . .’

‘But it wasn’t. It felt wonderful. I remember taking Alice’s hand and it was like we were one person.’

‘Exactly, Ele, like we were one person falling together.’

‘It was so beautiful. Not just the sound of the singing, but the feeling of love.’

‘It felt like we had spent all our lives until that point searching for something . . .’

‘And we didn’t know what it was we were searching for until the tongues came along. Then we knew. It was that. It was giving ourselves up to the Holy Spirit.’

Neil stepped forward, his bald head shining, and put his arms around the twins. There was a great deal of hugging that evening. The twins gripped Neil passionately, and Marcus was distressed to see the older man’s body shaking with sobs. David stepped towards the group and laid his hands on Neil’s shoulders. Neil turned from the twins and embraced the priest. Abby strode over to them and wrapped the pair in her long, strong arms. They stood for a while, breathing deeply. Mouse was talking with great intensity to Sally and a couple of the girls from Marcus’s group next to the fire. He scurried over to the table to refill his wine glass every so often. Whenever a bottle was finished, the Earl or Mrs Millman opened another. Abby and Lee were also drinking heavily. Lee would give Marcus’s hand a squeeze each time she left him to refill her glass. Marcus realised he hadn’t seen Philip for a while.

Dinner found most of the Course members drunk. Even David was flushed and beaming, an extra button open on his shirt revealing a hairless white chest beneath. Sally was sitting next to Mouse and they continued to speak very earnestly. Marcus had only had a couple of glasses of wine, partly because he found it hard to stir himself from the comfortable armchair, and partly because he was tired and full of conflicting emotions after the drama of the service. He noticed that Maki was sitting alone at the head of the table. She picked slowly at her food, making ridges in her mashed potato with the tines of her fork, lifting up a piece of lamb and then allowing it to fall back to her plate. Marcus pulled a chair over to the corner of the table and sat down.

‘Don’t worry, Maki. It’s not everything. Some people never speak in tongues.’

Maki was quiet, made another slow tour of her plate with a fork held like a dagger, sending runner beans writhing in its wake.

‘It’s not that. I just feel this has been a waste of my time. I should have been doing something useful, should have learned another language, or at least gone out and made some real friends. I sat there, looking at you all, and it just struck me as very funny. And a little bit sad.’

‘I guess it’s not for everyone.’

‘It was so un-English, all that emotion. It seemed bizarre to me.’

‘It really works for some people.’

‘Not for me. You’re too bright for this, Marcus. You know that, don’t you?’

She looked at him quizzically. He met her gaze and then stared down at the plate of food. He felt hands gripping his shoulders.

‘Hey guys, what are you talking about?’ Lee brought her face close to Marcus’s ear, her breath hot against his skin, sweet with alcohol. Her fingers kneaded the muscles in his neck.

‘Maki wasn’t carried away by the service. She didn’t speak in tongues.’

Lee laughed. When she spoke, her voice was manic, interrupted by stutters and giggles.

‘Oh, don’t worry about that, dear. Half of us fake it anyway. It’s all just part of the game. I bet you David fakes it sometimes. I always find it a bit fishy that the Holy Spirit can be called up on demand like a genie in a lamp. And each performance so perfectly controlled. I always got the feeling that true revelation needed a bit more work than that. And got a lot messier. Now, who wants another drink? I’m going to get shitfaced.’

‘Sorry. I’m going upstairs. Goodnight.’

Maki made her way slowly down the hall towards the steps, her head held up, a melancholy half-smile on her lips. Marcus was about to follow her, but Lee draped herself further over his shoulders, the blinking of her eyelashes flashing across his cheeks, her lips dangerously close to his own. He reached for his glass of wine and drank from it, then held it up for Lee to take a swig. She giggled as red liquid spilled down her chin.

Lee sat down in Maki’s place and began to eat her meal, chewing the lamb stew loudly, shovelling fluffy white potato between her wet lips. Abby was further down the table between David and Mouse, and Marcus watched her turning from side to side, joining Mouse’s discussion with Sally and then, catching something that David was saying to the twins or to Neil, turning back to the new members. Lee had begun to tell Marcus about her visit to Lindisfarne earlier in the year. She gripped hold of his hand as she spoke and he could feel the bones of her fingers through her skin.

‘The church has these amazing buttresses that face out to the North Sea, so worn away by the wind and the rain over the years that they seem to be made out of coral, to grow out of the land. When I was there in March there was a storm blowing up and the waves were crashing over them. It was amazing, it really was.’

Marcus, who had only been half-listening, saw Philip standing in the doorway looking over towards him.

‘Sorry, Lee. Give me a second, will you?’ he said, and rose from the table. He walked over towards the door where Philip had already backed away into the shadows. He was standing in the entrance hall beside a ragged blue holdall, his leather jacket fastened to his throat. He smiled at Marcus and shook his head.

‘Sorry to interrupt your dinner. Do you think you’d drive me to the station? There’s a train from Banbury at ten. I’ll call a taxi if it’s a problem.’

‘Have you told David you’re leaving?’

‘No.’

‘Don’t you think you should? I mean, he might want to speak with you. I know that it can be frightening to hear the whole tongues thing, and not manage to do it yourself. I almost walked out after the Saturday night service on my first Retreat.’

Philip picked up the holdall and turned to look towards the front doors.

‘I’d prefer not to see him, if that’s OK. I’d just really like to go.’

Marcus stood leaning against the frame of the door. Philip watched him through narrow eyes. A few moments passed and then, with a sigh, Marcus spoke. ‘Fine. I’ll take you. I don’t think we should force anyone to stay here that doesn’t want to.’ They walked out into the night.

The mist was now thick in the air outside, licking itself around the gables and turrets of the house, snaking between the trees and lying out along the gravel of the driveway. The lights that shone at the front of the house caught the mist and sent bright swirling haloes up into the air above them. Dampness dripped down from the trees as they crossed to where the Audi was parked.

The mist fell away behind them when they pulled out of the driveway and the night on the crest of the hill was vast and bright above the little car. They drove along the narrow ridge in silence and then turned onto the Banbury Road.

‘I felt awkward in there earlier. Awkward and very lonely,’ said Philip, staring away from Marcus into the darkness. The moon was dimmer than the previous night, but its light was enough to discern the outlines of the surrounding valleys, farmsteads, villages.

‘Sometimes it can take a few attempts before you manage the tongues.’

‘It wasn’t that. Or it wasn’t only that. It was just that nothing had changed. I felt that I had come all this way, sat through all these sermons and discussions and heard all this high talk and then, when it came down to it, I felt nothing. I was in the same boring service listening to the same meaningless words.’

‘You just need to give it more time. I’m not completely there myself yet, and I’ve been doing this for years. You should try to stick it out.’

‘I have. I’ve spent so much time in St Botolph’s. And the time I’m not there, I think about you all. It’s very appealing for someone like me, someone who you guys wouldn’t even
consider
as a friend in the real world, to find himself in the middle of such a bright, beautiful gang. Tempting for me to just fake the religion to stay part of it.’

‘Oh, come on, Philip, that’s not fair.’

‘Isn’t it? Look at Lee. She’s always talking about love and forgiveness, but she used me. She didn’t think of my feelings for a moment once she had what she wanted, and you’ll all be the same. You’ll cast me aside because I won’t let myself become some gibbering fool in praise of a God that I don’t believe in.’

They continued to drive in silence. As they reached the outskirts of Banbury, Philip spoke again.

‘I think Lee’s really close to the edge. Please watch her, will you? Some of the things she said that night we were together really frightened me. You need to take care of her, Marcus. If you don’t, no one will.’