Read Online The Prayer of the Night Shepherd by Phil Rickman - Free Book Online
Authors: Phil Rickman
Ads: Link
positioned a small log over a mesh of thorny kindling. ‘I like this job. I like Stanner Hall. You get to meet people – different kinds of people. I just don’t like to think of you all alone here. Like everywhere dark, except the kitchen and the scullery.’
‘I’ve got the cat. And, of course—’
‘Let’s keep Him out of this,’ Jane snapped. ‘The point is, in under two years I’ll probably be gone, whether it’s university or... whatever. But I might be gone for like... for good. And you’ll be kind of lodged down in that scullery like the last Jelly Baby in the jar, writing your sermons into the empty night.’
Actually, it was going to bed that was the worst time: putting out the bedside light, knowing that the attic apartment directly above you was empty. Thinking of all the empty rooms and all the people who had been and gone. Jane’s dad, long gone. Jane’s dad – that was how she thought of Sean now, as though Jane was the best thing he’d done in his foreshortened, corrupted life.
Biting her lip, she stood over Jane and bent and kneaded the kid’s shoulders. ‘Two years is still a long time.’
‘I used to think that, but it isn’t.’ Jane looked up at her. ‘You’ll be nearly forty then. Have you even thought about that?’
‘Too old for sex?’
Jane pulled away. ‘Stop it.’
‘It was a joke. How are things at the hotel?’
‘Don’t change the subject. You’re here in this mausoleum, on your own every weekend, and Lol’s twenty miles away with no real home at all, and he can’t get near half the time because of appearances and the Church and all that hypocritical bollocks. I mean, if you were gay – if you were a lesbian – nobody would—’ Jane broke off, blushing, probably remembering a certain misunderstanding.
‘ And there’s the question of restarting Lol’s career,’ Merrily said. ‘The album out in March, the chance of a tour...’
The kid smiled maliciously. ‘And groupies.’
‘Do they have groupies any more?’
‘Just trying to inflame the situation. Groupies and Lol doesn’t arise.’ Jane looked up again, an apple glow on her face. ‘But you have to do something soon. Face it, most people know about you and him now, anyway.’
‘Yeah, but cohabiting in the vicarage might just be a step too far. And I don’t think he’d want that anyway. Now that he’s finding his feet.’
‘You’re so... unimpulsive. You piss me off sometimes.’
‘It’s what I’m here for,’ Merrily said.
Later, just before nine, she left Jane in front of the TV and slipped away to the scullery. On the blue blotter on her desk, next to the sermon pad, was a folded copy of the property section of the Hereford Times . Just above the fold, an advert, encircled, said:
LEDWARDINE
Church Street – exquisite small, terraced
house, Grade Two listed, close to the centre
of this sought-after village.
It could be the answer. Tomorrow, she’d call the agent. Tonight, she lifted the phone and tapped in the number of Canon Llewellyn Jeavons.
So he was mad. Maybe she could use some of that.
4
The Room Under the Witch’s-Hat Tower
T HE PINES WERE matt black against the blood-orange sky when Jane was walking up the hotel drive. Friday, late afternoon, and here it came again – that shivery anticipation, her senses honed as sharp as the air, as the cold tide of night swept in towards the Border.
The Border. It was right here . She could actually be standing on it now. The hotel was in England, but the rocks it was named after were in Wales. And here, where the track divided, was where it all coalesced in a burst of sunset.
Letting her school case and her overnight bag slip to the ground, Jane stopped at the fork. The independent working woman, on the Border.
Two witches’-hat towers were prodding up between the ragged pines. Stanner Hall was Victorian Gothic, therefore more lavishly Gothic than the original. And from this distance, at least, it looked
‘I’ve got the cat. And, of course—’
‘Let’s keep Him out of this,’ Jane snapped. ‘The point is, in under two years I’ll probably be gone, whether it’s university or... whatever. But I might be gone for like... for good. And you’ll be kind of lodged down in that scullery like the last Jelly Baby in the jar, writing your sermons into the empty night.’
Actually, it was going to bed that was the worst time: putting out the bedside light, knowing that the attic apartment directly above you was empty. Thinking of all the empty rooms and all the people who had been and gone. Jane’s dad, long gone. Jane’s dad – that was how she thought of Sean now, as though Jane was the best thing he’d done in his foreshortened, corrupted life.
Biting her lip, she stood over Jane and bent and kneaded the kid’s shoulders. ‘Two years is still a long time.’
‘I used to think that, but it isn’t.’ Jane looked up at her. ‘You’ll be nearly forty then. Have you even thought about that?’
‘Too old for sex?’
Jane pulled away. ‘Stop it.’
‘It was a joke. How are things at the hotel?’
‘Don’t change the subject. You’re here in this mausoleum, on your own every weekend, and Lol’s twenty miles away with no real home at all, and he can’t get near half the time because of appearances and the Church and all that hypocritical bollocks. I mean, if you were gay – if you were a lesbian – nobody would—’ Jane broke off, blushing, probably remembering a certain misunderstanding.
‘ And there’s the question of restarting Lol’s career,’ Merrily said. ‘The album out in March, the chance of a tour...’
The kid smiled maliciously. ‘And groupies.’
‘Do they have groupies any more?’
‘Just trying to inflame the situation. Groupies and Lol doesn’t arise.’ Jane looked up again, an apple glow on her face. ‘But you have to do something soon. Face it, most people know about you and him now, anyway.’
‘Yeah, but cohabiting in the vicarage might just be a step too far. And I don’t think he’d want that anyway. Now that he’s finding his feet.’
‘You’re so... unimpulsive. You piss me off sometimes.’
‘It’s what I’m here for,’ Merrily said.
Later, just before nine, she left Jane in front of the TV and slipped away to the scullery. On the blue blotter on her desk, next to the sermon pad, was a folded copy of the property section of the Hereford Times . Just above the fold, an advert, encircled, said:
LEDWARDINE
Church Street – exquisite small, terraced
house, Grade Two listed, close to the centre
of this sought-after village.
It could be the answer. Tomorrow, she’d call the agent. Tonight, she lifted the phone and tapped in the number of Canon Llewellyn Jeavons.
So he was mad. Maybe she could use some of that.
4
The Room Under the Witch’s-Hat Tower
T HE PINES WERE matt black against the blood-orange sky when Jane was walking up the hotel drive. Friday, late afternoon, and here it came again – that shivery anticipation, her senses honed as sharp as the air, as the cold tide of night swept in towards the Border.
The Border. It was right here . She could actually be standing on it now. The hotel was in England, but the rocks it was named after were in Wales. And here, where the track divided, was where it all coalesced in a burst of sunset.
Letting her school case and her overnight bag slip to the ground, Jane stopped at the fork. The independent working woman, on the Border.
Two witches’-hat towers were prodding up between the ragged pines. Stanner Hall was Victorian Gothic, therefore more lavishly Gothic than the original. And from this distance, at least, it looked
Similar Books
