The Cheadle Devil

Last night I read from Lamarck again. He says that characters and traits, can be passed down from generation to generation. Perhaps I’m nervous because of the woman. I have not read Lamarck for a long time and it may be because I am nervous and apprehensive.

I wonder where my superior intelligence came from? Perhaps I’ll never know. But there is no doubt that I am superior. I’m surrounded by fools, and worst of all by dilettantes - stuck in this place in the hills surrounded by barren moors where the wind whistles and the rain pours all winter.

What does Lamarck say? That in every animal, frequent and continuous use of any organ gradually strengthens, develops that organ, while the permanent disuse of any organ imperceptibly weakens and deteriorates it. He says that these strengths are preserved because they arise in the next generation. So it must be with the mind, the brain.

Some individuals are superior and will naturally use their superior abilities to win over, to thrive – or even to survive.

I could feel guilty for what I have done, or grieve. But most of all I must survive.

I saw the woman today, as she alighted from a coach in the square. The woman who’s supposed to look into all the trouble in the town. She’s odd, with a face which seems old and young at the same time. There are many lines around her eyes. She didn’t notice me. She seems small, inconsequential even.

We shall see.

**********************************

Mrs Van Dijk lit a candle and opened the letter. She thought it might be another about her book and was not going to take much notice, but reading the first few lines she saw it was about something else. Howard was pulling his wet boots off, bending over them, rainwater dripping from his hair. She would have to light the fire. Summer had suddenly become wet.

Dear Mrs Van Dijk the letter began.

She read more, her eyes passing over the lines faster and faster. She raised her eyebrows and looked over to Howard.

‘Interesting’

‘What?’  He was standing in a small pool of water, grinning. He never minded getting wet. But that was usually in the winter when they had the fire to dry his clothes quickly.

‘We are wanted’

She read aloud:

I am a clergyman in the small town of Cheadle in the south of the Peak District. Our town is small and until recently had a happy, god-fearing population of farmers, labourers and mill workers.

But things have happened to darken the streets in the last weeks. They are difficult to explain and I fear their horrific and frightening nature has put the people into a panic, so much so that few dare to set foot out after dark. There is talk of a spirit abroad at night, of things flashing in the sky, of pathways to the dark world of hell below.

I am not superstitious – I am a humanist and a rationalist – and for me there must be simple explanations for the events – but the fears of the people are greater, more prevalent, so that there is panic, and no one will listen to a simple man of God. I fear that this tension may overflow and worse may happen.

The facts are briefly these. There have been two unexplained deaths. Both of the bodies have been found in the same place – on a high gravestone which has peculiar prominence in a graveyard of our St Andrew’s church. In both cases the bodies were laid out – hands outstretched sideways, faces turned up toward heaven. The bodies were fully clothed, and in both cases there was no mark on them. A local physician examined them, and no mark could be found – only perhaps a strange discolouration of the skin.

The deaths occurred within one week of each other. First the older man – lying there, his wide open eyes looking up into the grey rainy sky. Then a week later the younger boy – only eighteen – staring up again. His family is in such a state of distress.

Two strange deaths in so small a town! It is almost unthinkable. And the town is being torn apart by fear and distrust.

This is why I would like you and your companion, your assistant, to come and visit us. We will pay for you, and have a place for you to stay. I know something of your work from a clergyman friend of mine in Nottingham, and I feel sure that you will be able to investigate, without prejudice, and find a rational solution. I hope to God that you will find this because otherwise our town will not be able to recover.

I extend this invitation to you in great hope that you will accede to my request.

Yours imploringly

Rev I M Mitchell of Cheadle (St Cat’s, Leek Lane)

‘He sounds terrified’, said Howard. ‘I don’t like being called an assistant though’

Mrs Van Dijk didn’t react. She put the letter down.

‘Shall we have a fire?’ she asked. ‘Even though it’s mid-summer?’

‘It feels like winter’ said Howard. ‘We should – otherwise I’ll stay wet until bedtime’

‘And this letter – do you want to go to – what’s it called – Cheadle?’

‘It sounds interesting’ he said. He put his boots either side of the fireplace and struck a match to light the dry wood and tinder in the grate.

**********************************

The coach rattled over stony lanes west from Derby, for a while between grey limestone walls, and then in darkness under heavy trees and black walls of sandstone. The driver, a grim man, sat out on the front of the coach and shouted abuse occasionally at the horses that struggled over the uneven ground. Howard and Mrs Van Dijk sat alone in the cabin being thrown back and forth.

The deep sandstone valleys that the Reverend Mitchell had described in his letter made the lanes precarious and dangerous for the horses – trying to descend and resist the downward force of the coach – and then trying to ascend, almost stopping with the effort of pulling over slippery cobbles and green patches of bare stone.

Looking from the cabin hatch, they saw the light of the long-gone sun fade into a cool blue, with the silhouettes of heavy clouds sitting on the horizon. On a ridge after a very steep ascent they saw a cluster of lights below and dark shapes that suggested buildings. There were two churches, one with a tall narrow spire that seemed impossibly high, that indeed appeared to be puncturing the underside of a great cloud; and another with a lower, square tower. Howard put his head out to see better, trying to resist the rattle of the wooden wheels. It was odd to see two church towers so close together. He looked out at the dark country around, that itself peered down on the cluster of lights. He smelt rain and wet soil.

The coach rolled into the village after a long descent. They had no idea that they had arrived in Cheadle until the driver called for them to get out. There was light in windows around and the faint light of the lamp on the front of the coach. The coach had stopped in a small square and Howard and Mrs Van Dijk alighted onto the cobbles which were shiny with rain. The houses were indistinct on either side, built of dark brick, with slate or tiles for roofs. Faint candle light flickered behind thin curtains.

But the noise of the heavy wheels of the coach had been loud enough to rouse someone. In the light of the coach lamp they saw a man hurry across the square. He had a cloak pulled tight about him; his hard boots crackled on the cobbles.

‘Van Dijk?’ he said in a heavy accent. His pale face was boyish with red cheeks, but he looked fearful. He blinked rapidly waiting for their answer.

‘Yes’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘You’re to come with me. We have some food for you. I’m to show you where you’ll sleep’

The coach driver was already climbing back on his platform and pulling on the reins.

Howard felt like they were being abandoned. The dark brick houses seemed poor and low, and the place gave off a subdued air. Right above the cobbled square, the very tall spire rose. Howard had not noticed it as they’d come into the square. He turned to look up as the cloaked man began to scuttle off, carrying Mrs Van Dijk’s bag. The spire’s pointed peak was ornate – he could see even in the dark – and like an arrow head. It seemed to be piercing a brighter part of the sky – some sad remnant of the fallen sun.

The man, whose name was James, led them through barely-seen streets of similar brick houses – some with windows lit by candles, some just rectangles of blackness – to a large-fronted building of at least three floors. There was a door on the ground floor which they went through into a narrow corridor, with doors either side. The corridor led to some kind of inner door of glass panels and wood, which rattled when James opened it. Beyond was a small garden with low buildings all around. It was an inner garden – like a retreat in a cathedral or a monastery. Howard couldn’t remember what it reminded him of – something he’d seen in Lincoln cathedral.

‘It’s like a cloister’ whispered Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Yes I remember – a cloister’ he said.

‘It was a monastery. It’s not now. Just a place to stay’ said James hesitantly. His voice was quite high, and Howard wondered how old he was, perhaps no more than a boy.

They followed him under a narrow, covered walkway that led around the garden. A line of doors opened from the walkway.

James opened the second door.

‘You’ll stay here’ said the boy. ‘There’s food in the dining room. I’ll wait while you drop your bags and show you where to eat’

It was too dark to see inside the room, and neither of the two visitors wanted to look for a candle – nor bother the waiting boy. He seemed to be concerned only to do his job quickly and get home - and they wanted simply to eat and go to sleep. So, they dropped the bags just inside the door and followed the cloaked figure back to the corridor. Through one of the doors was a dark room with a small fire. There was a table and two stools, and from the table came the smell of soup and baked potato.

They settled themselves down to eat and watched James leave more quickly than was polite. The candle on the table flickered as they heard the front door shut behind him.

‘The candle will burn out soon’ said Mrs Van Dijk looking at the potatoes steaming on the plate. ‘I’m sure there aren’t any others’

‘Should we take this one?’ said Howard

‘We’ll eat here quickly and take it into the room’

‘This is a dark town’ said Howard gloomily.

They both thought in the silence of the room, that it was darker than they would like.

**********************************

‘This is a terrible place’

Mrs Van Dijk woke hearing the words. Howard was standing by the door. There was only a little light in the room from the door that Howard had opened. It was grey morning. She heard the sound of rain.

Mrs Van Dijk lifted her head from the pillow a little way. She saw through the opening, silvery vertical stripes of rain falling into the grass. The leaves of a small bush shivered in the downpour.

‘A terrible place’ said Howard. He saw again the tall spike of the dark church spire. He’d seen it last night – when they’d arrived. It had looked terrifying. It was still like that – dark and pointed, ornate at the top, made of darkened stone. With that landmark it would not be difficult to find your way in the village of Cheadle.

Howard found an old woman in the corridor through the glass door. She was fussing amongst the rooms carrying a steaming jug of water.

‘There’s breakfast. You brought the rain with you’ she said in her strong accent. She disappeared into one of the rooms, shutting the door behind her. Howard saw two men at a table over the woman’s shoulder before she shut the door. So someone else was staying at the place. But he’d heard nothing the night before.

He stood in the corridor not knowing what to do, and then the woman bustled out again.

‘Breakfast’s in here’, she said, pushing another door open. It was the room where they’d eaten the night before – where the potato and soup had come from nowhere. Perhaps this woman was the cook.

‘Ten minutes’ said the cook.

Howard went back to their room. Mrs Van Dijk had opened the shuttered windows but had gone back to bed. Her pale face looked out.

‘There’s breakfast in ten minutes’ he said.

‘I opened the shutters for light’ she said, ‘but it’s still dark’

The rain now roared on the covered walkway but there was a sound of laughing or giggling outside. Two shaggy heads appeared in the window, two boys. They were mouthing something.

Howard opened the door.

‘Clear off’

‘Are you visitors?’

They spoke in a strong Staffordshire accent, so it sounded like ‘ah you vizituz?’

The boy who spoke was perhaps eight or nine. His hair hung over his eyes. The other boy was younger, with freckles.

Howard said again that they should go away instead of hanging around people’s windows. He gestured at them, but they had pressed their faces against the grimy glass trying to look inside. They were peculiarly unembarrassable. Howard took a step toward them and they dropped down, ready to run.

‘We might come back to see you’ shouted the long-haired boy, making a funnel out of his hand. Then they were running along the covered pathway to a hedge.

‘There’s obviously not much to do around here’ said Mrs Van Dijk from inside.

**********************************

There were two bowls of steaming porridge and chunks of bread in the room in the main house, but the woman was nowhere to be seen. The room had a large window without a shutter, and it looked out onto the enclosed garden. It was still raining heavily, and the grass had a bright washed-green look.

‘Where did they come from – the boys?’

‘I don’t know’

The rain began to slow a little when they left the room and the empty bowls of porridge, which had been very tasty. In the light they saw that the garden was not entirely enclosed. There were trees at the far end and a low wall, that was certainly climbable, and beyond that a tangle of brick houses very close together. The sky was lead-grey.

They thought they would wait in their bedroom for someone to come and welcome them.

The Reverend Mitchell arrived a little while later. There were voices from the main building and a dog barking and then they heard the rattling glass door opening. There were two men – an older man in black with foaming white hair – a big mass over the arch of his red shiny forehead and two large masses on his lower cheeks like white hedges. He had small reddish eyes and a narrow mouth with surprisingly red lips. The other man was smaller, younger, thin-faced with a grey moustache.

‘Reverend Mitchell’ said the older man, calling out. The two men stood under the narrow roof by the door. The rain started again and the roof began to drum.

Howard and Mrs Van Dijk came out to greet them.

Mitchell’s voice was slow, ponderous and cracked. Not of the same accent as the other people of Cheadle.

‘I’m sorry that the place is a little simple’ said Mitchell. ‘Perhaps you could come into the main building. I will have some tea made. Is Mrs Wright here?’ Mitchell turned to the man with the moustache, who nodded.

‘Can you ask her to make tea?’ said Mitchell. It seemed like he was used to giving orders and to having them obeyed.

In one of the other rooms that faced out on a grey street they sat in old armchairs with a low table in between. Tea was brought immediately, and small cakes that Mrs Wright said were potato cakes – a delicacy of Cheadle. The rain continued to patter on the window.

‘I’m grateful that you could come’. The Reverend Mitchell tried to smile but his mouth was too narrow. ‘These events in the town – two unexplained deaths one a week after the other – the shared characteristics of the bodies – all this has led to panic. Few people will go out – even in the day. People say that the devil roams Cheadle at night’

‘Do you believe this, Reverend Mitchell?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk

‘No I do not. As I said in my letter to you, I am a rationalist. I’m sure there is a simple explanation’

Mrs Van Dijk sat forward in her chair. Howard could tell she was interested.

‘Reverend Mitchell – did you see the bodies yourself? I assume that they’ve been taken away?’

‘They have – over a week ago. My assistant here, Mr Wheatley…’ he nodded at the younger man, ‘…he can show you where the bodies were. It was peculiar actually – they were on a high gravestone at the entrance to the big church – St Andrew’s’

‘Did you, yourself – or Mr Wheatley – see the bodies?’ she said again.

Wheatley shook his head slowly. His voice was thin – he had none of the gravitas of Mitchell. ‘Neither I, nor the Reverend saw the bodies. In fact only a few people did’

Mrs Van Dijk nodded and sat back. ‘Gentlemen, we should like to know the exact circumstances of the incidents: of the bodies and the surroundings of the bodies. To look for evidence’

Mitchell nodded vigorously. This was what he wanted from the two people he had hired.

‘Of course. I can tell you something of the bodies. Mr Wheatley can take you to the people that actually saw them. The coroner concluded that there was nothing to conclude beyond two natural deaths’

‘Mr Todd saw Trevor’s body’ said Wheatley.

Mitchell raised his eyebrows. ‘I don’t know if you will get much from Todd. But nevertheless…to begin with…. There were two deaths, the first that of Mr Trevor. He was a weaver and worker of the town. He was discovered two weeks ago lying flat on the gravestone in question. He was on his back, his head looking straight up. I’m told his eyes were open. He was discovered on a rainy day such as this, in fact. It’s believed that he died at night’

‘…his arms were to his side, his hands palms up...’ added Wheatley.

Wheatley’s eyes were earnest. There was a message of fear in them. It was clear that he was himself afraid of what had happened.

‘This position – arms out either side – what is its significance?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

Mitchell shook his head. ‘Of course I didn’t see the bodies, but when it was described to me, I thought of our Lord Jesus. This is what it suggested to me’

‘And the second body?’

‘Ah, this was altogether more distressing’ said Mitchell in his slow voice. ‘A youngish man of perhaps eighteen years – of a good family here in the village. He was found lying a week ago – on the same gravestone’

‘…in the same position – arms out’ said Wheatley.

Wheatley put his hands out to the side half-heartedly to illustrate the position. Howard noticed how thin and white they were.

**********************************

‘What was the name of the younger boy? The eighteen-year-old?’

‘Philip Bass. The family lives here in the centre of the town. The father Joseph owns a small weaving factory. Hardly a factory really, but he employs a few people. He has another son, much younger. They are inconsolable. It has hit the family very hard – the boy would have been the successor to his father’

‘Would they speak to us – the father?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

Mitchell nodded. ‘I’m sure he would. He is a public-spirited sort of fellow, and a great educator. He has a school and his weavers all study. His sons were clever too. Joseph will want to know the root of this mystery as much as I. And he is a rationalist – a modern man – as am I. We don’t believe in superstition – here in Cheadle’

The Reverend regretted the inaccuracy of his statement immediately. Though he and Bass may not have believed in the supernatural, the other people of Cheadle certainly did. He thought the two visitors would see this very soon.

‘Wheatley will take you to Joseph Bass’s house, when you like’ said Mitchell.

The older man put his teacup down and rose abruptly.

‘Unless you would like to know anything else, I suggest you start your work, Mrs Van Dijk’

He put a large black cap on his head pressing down the mass of white hair, and went to the door.

‘I’m at St Catherine’s Church on Leek Lane. You can visit me at any time’ he said.

‘Not St Andrew’s – the big church?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

Mitchell seemed surprised. He shook his head. ‘I thought you knew: St Andrew’s is more or less derelict, empty. No one has worshipped there for fifty years. My own church is smaller, more welcoming, more conducive to the people of Cheadle’

He said this with quiet satisfaction and went out through the door.

Wheatley smiled vaguely after the disappearing figure of the Reverend and then turned to them.

‘When you’ve finished your tea, I suggest we go to the big church, St Andrew’s. To see the scene of the two deaths’

There was a gentle slope down from the building where they were staying, on a narrow cobbled street with dark buildings either side. They didn’t look like houses. The bulk of St Andrew’s rose up above them. It was dark – made of stone that had blackened over the years – and it was curiously vertical – not like a classic Vale church which was long and low – but short, slender and high. The spire was the tallest Howard had ever seen. It was bigger than most churches, its ornate walls and windows more sophisticated. But at the same time it was also more ugly, more austere as well.

The front entrance did nothing to soften the church’s verticality and austerity. Its face seemed long and gaunt, of black stone with two tall windows and the spectacular spire behind. It looked like the whole edifice was about to topple forward.

The small patch of green in front of the heavy door was steep down to the road. An iron gate and cobbled path led up to the door through short bright cut grass. There were a few gravestones, some no longer vertical; and just below the church entrance a large square tomb or mausoleum. Its height was not far off the height of Howard. The markings on it were faint and elaborate – writing commemorating the interred.

Both Howard and Mrs Van Dijk immediately recognised the top of the tomb as the resting place of the two bodies laid with their arms out like Jesus Christ. It was odd - from its position on the little slope up to the door of St Andrew’s – the memorial seemed to look down on most of the town. It had the authority of the church behind it.

Wheatley told them that the bodies had lain on the flat stone roof until mid-morning both times, until passersby had seen the arms of the victims hanging off the platform. The deaths had caused consternation across the village – because as Mr Wheatley said, it looked like the bodies had been lain there to frighten people.

‘This is why people started to think of the devil’ he said. It looked like he believed it too. Wheatley didn’t have the rationalism of his boss.

‘Can I climb up?’ asked Howard.

‘If you can get up there. Go around the back. It’s lower there’

But it wasn’t easy. Howard found a step half way up the stone slab, but he had to pull himself up most of the way holding the lip of the platform. The top was a smooth horizontal slab - like those that formed the sides of the memorial – of a solid sandstone, green and mottled with moss.

Howard felt the prominence of the platform immediately. The slope of the bank below the memorial, and the height of the church itself and the graveyard made it seem very open and exposed, like a headland over the sea. Howard didn’t want to stand up, not because it was the scene of a crime or that it was a gravestone, but because he felt the pull of vertigo in his stomach.

He sat on the stone and dangled his legs over the side. From here he could see the streets running radially from the church, the great dark edifice behind him.

‘Anything up there, Howard?’ called Mrs Van Dijk.

He turned his attention to the slab itself and the headstone at the back. There were scratches on the platform that looked recent. There had been scratches on the vertical side slab that he’d climbed, but these were likely to have been caused by his own boots or the boots of anyone else that had climbed up – perhaps to retrieve the bodies.

Howard thought there was nothing much to be found out at the grave.

**********************************

Wheatley fidgeted while Howard and Mrs Van Dijk looked around the gravestone, and eventually announced that he had to go. He had some business at the other church, he said. They watched him walk down the steep path to the cobbled street and shuffle off. In his long dark coat he looked like a beetle or a stick insect.

‘He’s frightened’ said Howard, leaning on the gravestone. ‘It is an imposing place’

‘Did you see the name on the stone?’

‘Frobisher. The Frobisher family. I’ve never seen a name like that. It doesn’t sound English’

‘I think it’s a Jewish name. I’ve heard it before’

‘Do you think the origin of the stone matters?’

‘I don’t know’

Howard rubbed his chin and felt the roughness – he hadn’t shaved or washed yet. He and Mrs Van Dijk hadn’t even looked around the room where they were staying. He thought they would really have to go back and unpack their things.

‘When I was standing up there, I felt like I was on a dais or a platform’ he said. He grinned thinking about his idea and wondered whether to tell Mrs Van Dijk. He thought he ought to.

‘It’s like it’s a platform where sacrifices might take place’ he said.

‘What do you mean?’ said Mrs Van Dijk, interested. She turned to look at him.

‘I remember reading about how sacrifices were sometimes made – in the primitive world. They were done in high places. Where everyone could see’

‘What an idea Howard!’ She nodded. ‘But I see what you mean’

She was silent as they walked up the cobbled street. Howard looked again over his shoulder at the gravestone and thought he was right. Perhaps the Frobisher family had been important in Cheadle, as important as the church itself. The stone seemed almost to guard the entrance.

They finally got to their room. Howard opened the shutters and light came in. At least it wasn’t raining. The room was quite large, rectangular but for a small enclave that contained a wash basin and a big bath. The floor was shiny wood and there were walls of bare red stone. There was only a bed – in which they’d slept the night before – a table, and a small fireplace opposite the bed. Two old soft chairs faced the fireplace.

‘We could have a fire. I’ll ask Mrs Wright for some wood’

‘Do you think we’ll have to cook?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk sitting down on the bed. She had immediately liked the bed because it was bigger than the one in the cottage in Earls Court. Through the open shutters it was also nice to see the enclosed garden. Now that the rain had stopped, the noise of the garden had picked up. Birds chirruped in the trees and butterflies were looping and diving amongst the flowers. There was a small patch of very green lawn.

‘I don’t know. I think Mrs Wright will make everything’

‘It’s like a holiday!’

Howard was amazed. She seemed not depressed by the gothic darkness of the town and the horror of the two deaths. She yawned.

‘Why do you think the church is abandoned? The big one?’ she asked. She stretched out on the bed, twisting to look out at the garden.

He thought about St Andrew’s again. It was much more striking than the smaller church – where Mitchell was the priest. But it looked desolate and fearsome. Perhaps it was empty because of a simple choice that people had made – not to worship there. But probably it was more complicated than that. He thought they should visit Mitchell’s church.

‘Let’s change clothes and wash and go and visit the other nicer church’ said Mrs Van Dijk, reading his mind.

**********************************

A short narrow street led from their building. Shops with small windows looked out onto the cobbles. But by midmorning there were still no people walking. The weather had improved. The rain clouds had gone and fragments of brilliant blue were appearing and growing. But still people stayed inside. The other church - St Catherine’s - was along the street and to the left. Its warm yellow stone was brighter than the brick buildings all around.

‘Strange that a Jewish family is buried in a Christian church. I wonder if we can find the Frobishers’ house?’

Mrs Van Dijk looked into the shops. They ought to be open but the doors looked shut. There was no activity.

She and Howard stood looking around. It was very odd.

A voice called somewhere. It was a shout – not distinct – but high. There was the bang of a window shutting.

The sun started to shine, lighting the street. The wet pavements started to dry.

‘Go home!’ A shout.

The window banged again. Howard caught the direction of the shout this time. He saw a flash from the window reflected as it was violently shut.

‘What?’ he said, startled.

‘Someone’s shouting’

‘At us?’

‘Yes. At us’

Howard strode over the rough cobbles. The shut window was on a second floor over a small slope of thatched roof. He dimly saw a woman’s face behind the shiny glass. She was looking down at him. He waved rather stupidly at the woman and the face disappeared very abruptly.

‘She’s angry with someone’

‘Who does she think we are?’ said Howard surprised that his wave should cause such a reaction.

‘Maybe we should ask Mitchell?’

But Mitchell was not at the church. They stood in the small, charming porch and looked into the main chamber. They had called but to no avail. It was a church in the style of the Vale – light and rather humble inside - with lines of simple benches. Outside the garden was nice, rather overgrown with tall grass and deep green conifers. The colour of the stone lit by sunlight was quite out of character for rest of the village. A few small gravestones occupied the shady spaces under the conifers.

‘What are the names Howard – on the stones?’

Some were faded slabs of greyish or red sandstone and the names were indistinct, others were more recent. The names were Smith, Smythe, Hopkins.

‘No Frobisher!’

‘I thought not’

There was a new stone with a wreath of holly, around the side of the church in deep shade. The grass was flat around it.

‘Ah’ breathed Mrs Van Dijk. She looked down at the stone. ‘Philip Bass. Aged eighteen’

‘It’s the boy. What a shame. What do you think about the strange pose that he was found in?’

‘I don’t know Howard’

She walked around the stone and examined it from the back. She looked at him through narrowed eyes: ‘But you were right about the sacrifice idea’

 ‘You don’t think they were sacrificed?’

‘No. Not really. But I think you were right - that they – the bodies – were placed there deliberately. To frighten people. It’s such a public place’

‘So the pose was arranged by the person who put the bodies there?’

‘I think so. This village is full of fear. No shops open – even in the day. We haven’t seen many of the people’

She continued to study the gravestone, for what reason Howard couldn’t guess. It was quite peaceful amongst the conifers hearing the wind sigh lightly in the branches.

Mr Wheatley appeared still dressed in his long dark cloak. His face was thinner in the bright light. His moustache was a thick bar under his rather long nose.

‘Reverend Mitchell is out visiting a parishioner’ he said. He looked perturbed. Perhaps he’d heard the woman shouting in the street through the window. Wheatley was a chaperone to the two visitors but he’d not been close enough to them, not looked after them.

‘I saw the Bass boy when he was brought down from the tombstone. I didn’t actually see him up there’ Wheatley said, without being asked.

‘How did he seem?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk. She gazed intently at Wheatley.

The older man didn’t look at her as he spoke. He seemed almost shameful as he looked down at the grass at the base of the gravestone.

‘He was a strange colour. Red or purple. Not normal at all’

‘Were there any marks around the neck?’

‘You should ask the doctor’ said Wheatley, suddenly quite surly. ‘I didn’t see any. The doctor said there was not a mark on him. Couldn’t even see why he had died’

‘There were no wounds?’

‘No wounds. The doctor said he should have been alive, apart from the fact that he was dead’

 Wheatley repeated this as if he’d just heard it from the doctor.

‘Was there anything unusual? How was he dressed?’

‘Normally. Except for something strange’

‘What Mr Wheatley?’

‘Strange. I didn’t think about it at the time. He had bare feet’

He looked up at Mrs Van Dijk, maybe it was the first time he had met her eyes.

‘No shoes’ said Wheatley.

**********************************

There was bread and cheese waiting for them at the guesthouse. In the small dark dining room they watched the sun get brighter while they cut bread. The bread was heavy and coarse – nor like what they were used to – and the cheese was a yellowish red, like the colour of Cheadle bricks. Mrs Wright offered them beer, saying that this was a common lunchtime drink in Cheadle amongst the weavers.

She became a little friendlier and came to stand to talk while they ate, her arms folded under her bust.

‘Beer is very much liked by Cheadle people’ she said with satisfaction. ‘We’ve a brewery here. There was a time that water here was bad tasting and made people sick – even though it looks clear – and so beer became the common drink’

‘We’ll try a little’ said Mrs Van Dijk politely. She quite liked the brick-red cheese.

Mrs Wright brought a jug half filled with foaming beer and two large white mugs. She poured the stuff – and an amber coloured liquid emerged from under the foam.

Mrs Wright looked with satisfaction as they tried it. Howard guessed that she liked Cheadle beer herself. It was rather bitter but good with the slightly sweet cheese. It didn’t taste strong so it would probably be alright to drink, even at lunchtime.

‘The brewery is called Todd’s. It’s on the river at the end of the town’ said Mrs Wright.

‘Todd. This was the man that saw the first body. Is that what Mr Wheatley said?’ said Mrs Van Dijk, suddenly remembering.

Mrs Wright nodded, but she clearly didn’t like being reminded of the deaths.

‘You won’t get much sensible talk from Todd’ she said shaking her head.

She took the empty jug, now that they’d poured the beer, and went out into the unseen kitchen.

‘That’s what Mitchell said about Todd!’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘I wonder what’s wrong with him’

Mr Todd was a drunk. They found him in the yard of his family’s brewery, sitting on a bench watching two young men load beer barrels onto a cart. He wasn’t difficult to find – most people in Cheadle knew him. He had a reputation.

Dogs were barking, running around the men loading the cart, and the barrels rolling on the cobbles made the noise deafening. Mr Todd - who had a mug in his hand – was shouting too, offering loud advice to the workers and shouting obscenities at the dogs.

Howard and Mrs Van Dijk waited while the cart was pulled out of the yard. They watched as the old, huge horse dragged the cart down the street toward the centre of the town. Todd’s shouting died down so they went back into the yard through the wide gates. He was still sitting on the bench but his head was down. He appeared to be already asleep – his legs widely apart, his head resting on his shoulder.

‘Mr Todd’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

He stirred rubbing his forehead. His face was red like beetroot. White hair peeked from under a black cap.

‘Mr Todd, can we ask you some questions?’

He blinked still rubbing his forehead. He sat more upright and the mug from which he’d been drinking clattered onto the cobbles. Some of the amber coloured beer poured out on the stone.

He nodded and then almost smiled. He had crooked teeth, stained by beer and tobacco, but his face was boyish, despite the colour and the white hair. Todd was apparently known for his love of women – he liked them almost as much as beer.

‘What can I do for you?’ he said. He’d recovered from drunken slumber surprisingly quickly. He tipped up the peak of his cap in a demonstration of respect for a lady.

‘We’d like to ask you some things’ repeated Mrs Van Dijk.

Todd looked around for his beer mug then saw it by his feet. He sniffed loudly and shouted very loud.

‘Pat – more beer, more mugs’

He coughed. He’d obviously shouted to someone inside the building. There was a wide-open door to the left from where the barrels had come. A woman presently appeared with a jug and mugs.

‘While you ask, we drink!’ he said raising his hand.

The woman then came out with two small stools. Howard and Mrs Van Dijk sat.

‘Oliver Trevor was the first dead man. He was a weaver’ said Todd, still sniffing. He drank some beer loudly and lifted the mug. ‘He liked our beer’

‘You knew him well?’

‘Not well. I drank with him sometimes. He was more of a drunk than me!’

Todd laughed and coughed at the same time, and his face became redder.

‘But you found him?’

‘On the stone. He’d go home drunk often. Sometimes he didn’t make it’

‘What do you mean, Mr Todd?

‘I mean sometimes he slept out – didn’t manage to get home. Quite often in fact. I remember him saying that once he slept under a tree’

‘Can you tell us how you found him?’

Todd took another long drink and thrust his legs out before him.

‘I was out early Sunday morning, going for a walk. I saw his arms hanging off the gravestone. I thought he’d got up there to sleep it off!’

‘You were with him the night before?’

‘For some of the time. We drink in a tavern most nights. He’d really had a skinful. It must have been two weeks ago. I think he was hammered, in fact’

‘Hammered?’ Mrs Van Dijk looked at Howard.

‘It means very drunk’

Todd nodded, grinning. ‘He was really very drunk’

‘Did you go for a closer look?’

‘Well you have to realise I wasn’t so well myself that morning. I’d come for a walk because I felt a little unsteady. I came up the path to the stone. I was sure it was Trevor, but I couldn’t climb the stone. I went in to get a stool from the church. I called to him a couple of times and he didn’t answer. So I thought I’d have a closer look. I’d no idea he was dead’

‘And so you climbed?’

‘I got on the stool. He didn’t move when I touched his hand and he was as cold as ice. Dead as a door mat’

‘And in this strange position – hands outstretched?’

‘He was just lying with his arms out – like some people sleep. I didn’t notice any strange position. I think he climbed up there to sleep, and it was too much for him. He just conked out’

Mrs Van Dijk looked at Howard for a translation again.

‘It’s an expression for died’

‘Was Mr Trevor barefoot?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

Todd laughed out loud and nearly spilt his beer.

‘No! Why would he be?’

**********************************

Mr Todd may have been a drunk but there was sense in what he said. He coughed and spluttered more as he drank yet another mug of beer. His opinion of the people of Cheadle was that they were a superstitious lot – apt to make up things – he said. But he admitted too that he was an outsider. People had no respect for him, so he had none for them. His red face looked satisfied with this. Beyond a little more conversation, that was all Howard and Mrs Van Dijk could get from him. The man seemed to be capable of periods of lucidity, then the drink would take over. He started to doze while they sat with them, so in the end they left, walking back up the narrow lane following the route the horse and the beer cart had taken back into the town.

Mrs Van Dijk wanted to visit St Andrew’s church - this time to look inside.

The interior was not so austere as its formidable outward presence. They stood just inside the door which to their surprise they had found open and peered in past a heavy red velvet curtain. The space was dim, almost misty or smoky, and the light tinted a dark, ruby red. This seemed to be because of the many coloured-glass windows, most of which were red. The main chamber, the nave, was tall and narrow and the walls between the narrow windows were decorated with wood carvings and painted scenes from the bible, all tinted a ponderous funereal red. The floor was made of hard interlocking wooden tiles. The whole interior looked expensive and grand, but somehow overblown – too luxurious, too rich for the village around it.

There was dust everywhere. The windows were grimy too, opaque with dirt in their corners. The dust had been stirred up along the central aisle between the benches. People had walked there recently.

‘I can believe it hasn’t been properly used for fifty years’

Mrs Van Dijk brushed her fingers over the dust on a bench leaving four parallel marks. The shiny wood showed through.

The bench closest to the door had been moved back slightly so that it was no longer in line with the others. There was less dust.

‘I would say that someone slept here – on the bench. Perhaps our Mr Trevor’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Perhaps he sheltered here sometimes, rather than go home? We should have asked Todd more about him’

‘There was nothing more he could say! We’ll have to try again with Mr Todd when he’s sober’

‘Maybe it’s not bigger than a normal Vale church’ said Howard, thinking out loud. ‘Just higher’

He looked up into the ceiling. In the dim red light it looked very high – made of a complex of dark beams in complicated geometrical patterns. He thought he saw shapes hanging from the cross beams, like dark fruits.

‘I think there are bats in here’

‘Ugh. Horrible.’ Mrs Van Dijk looked up.

They moved along the aisle, Mrs Van Dijk examining the trends of marks in the dust. None of the benches seemed to have been touched.

‘I wonder why it was abandoned?’

‘The church? Perhaps it was like Mitchell said – there were two churches and most people preferred the other one. But we should talk to Mitchell to get the full story’

They sat opposite each other on the benches just in front of the altar. Mrs Van Dijk stretched her legs out looking at the big stained glass window behind. In it was depicted Christ in a pose with hands out – in the typical attitude of the beneficent, his eyes mild and impassive.

‘Someone was dragged along the aisle, I think’ Mrs Van Dijk said.

‘No! Really?’

‘See here.’ She pointed. ‘These long marks, about as wide as my wrist. They’re like heels being pulled along. Mostly the marks are hidden by other footprints’

Howard thought, then said: ‘If someone was dragged like this’, he held an imaginary body in his arms, ‘then the dragging marks would be over the top of the footprints…’

‘True,’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Maybe someone tried to obscure the dragging?’

‘Why would the body be in here?’

‘I don’t know Howard’

They looked behind and to the side of the altar and saw the dragging marks again, sometimes obscured, sometimes just visible. They led past the altar to the right and to another dark velvet curtain. There were fewer footprints.

‘Thank goodness for dust in churches’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Maybe one person dragging something here. Of course it might not be a body – maybe a bit of furniture. What’s behind the curtain?’

Howard stepped over the disturbed dust and pulled the curtain aside. More dust – and behind a narrow door.

Howard knew these narrow doors. It led, probably in a narrow spiral staircase, up high into the spire.

**********************************

Mrs Wright was waiting for them at lunchtime - her arms folded - in the corridor to the garden. Her good mood had evaporated. Evidently they were late, even though no one had told them when lunch would be cooked. Or even if.

There was more bread on the table and soup that tasted like cauliflower. A bowl of fruit had appeared containing apples, pears and plums.

Mrs Wright disappeared after bringing the food, as she usually did. It was odd staying at the guest house. No one had introduced themselves and Howard and Mrs Van Dijk had no idea who the other guests were. There seemed to be men around, eating in the other rooms. Sometimes pipe smoke was thick in the corridor, and the smell of meat cooking.

They went back to their room and took the two soft chairs out onto the path in front of the room so they could look at the garden. It had turned into a beautiful day. The sky over the opposite wall was bright blue and clear, even the dull slate roofs of the Cheadle houses looked brighter. Howard found that if you looked to the left, you could see the spire of St Andrew’s.

In the garden bees buzzed. It was oddly peaceful. Maybe it was because this space was a garden – a little area of the wild that was allowed in the town. But it wasn’t completely wild. There were planted flowers and the lawn was cut regularly.

They were both tired. It was not that they’d walked a long way or done heavy work; it was just that they had been to a lot of new places, and met new people. The shouting in the street in the early morning had been unpleasant, a bad way to start. Oddly, it seemed to Howard that Mr Todd – the drunkard – had been the most friendly of Cheadle’s residents. Perhaps the brewer was right – the town was superstitious and the people were ignorant. They made things up.

Mrs Van Dijk sat beside him. He thought she might be sleeping but when he touched her hand she clasped his fingers. Her legs were stretched out to absorb the sun.

‘Do you want to move completely into the sun?’

‘They probably won’t like us taking the chairs out. I’m alright here. The sun’s very warm’

‘Do you think the people of Cheadle are superstitious, like Todd says? Maybe the first death was just an accident?’

‘Perhaps. But the second! There’s too much of a coincidence’

Howard listened to the bees buzz. It must have been mid-afternoon when they had returned for lunch. No wonder Mrs Wright was angry!

He felt the warmth on his feet and shut his eyes. Presently he was asleep.

**********************************

Shouting woke them. It wasn’t loud but it sounded violent. It wasn’t the shouting of kids or people calling to each other. There was a sharp edge to it that sounded unusual.

They were still sitting with their legs stretched out but the sun had passed into the western part of the sky over the hedges at the end of the garden. Quite long shadows were reaching across the grass.

‘It must be late’ mumbled Howard surprised. He felt some alarm because it was unusual for him to sleep in the afternoon. He was suddenly conscious of sleeping when he was being paid for a job, and was anxious that the Reverend Mitchell didn’t see them. But there was no one about. Another volley of shouts came over the still air.

‘What was that? A fight?’ Mrs Van Dijk was sitting forward rubbing her legs. They’d gone to sleep because of sitting in an odd position for so long.

‘I don’t know. Shall we look? I feel guilty that we slept’

‘It must be late. What if we’re late for Mrs Wright’s food again?’ She said, not serious.

There were no more shouts, but they thought they would go out and have a look, if only to wake themselves up. Howard splashed water on his face and put his boots on. Down the steep cobbles in front of the guest house, they heard voices again and the scrape of stone, then the unmistakeable sound of the Reverend Mitchell speaking loudly, almost shouting.

There was a small gathering at the tall gravestone in front of St Andrew’s Church. Mostly men – two in working clothes and a third man holding the tether of a horse. One of the men was holding a large hammer above his head, about to bring it down. Reverend Mitchell had his hand on the man’s arm, and he was talking loudly. Mr Wheatley also appeared carrying a stick. He stood beside Mitchell.

Howard and Mrs Van Dijk watched unsure whether they should be involved but wandered slowly down the lane to the gate. They could see from below that one side of the gravestone – one of the upright panels of stone - had been broken. A crack had opened and a splinter of stone had been gouged out between. The dark interior of the grave showed.

The shouting had died down. One of the two men was down on his knees thrusting with the handle of a spade in the darkness through the crack. The man with the hammer lowered it and stepped back and Reverend Mitchell took his hand off the man’s arm.

They waited at the foot of the path, watching. At last the three men descended the path leading the horse. The men looked hard at them. They were rough-looking, with straggly beards and uneven teeth, their faces were ingrained with dirt. But they said nothing and simply entered the lane. They murmured to each other as they disappeared amongst the dense houses.

‘Something unpleasant was about to happen’ said Mitchell. He was clearly upset and breathing heavily, but his words seemed an understatement. The three men had looked violent and angry and whatever Mitchell had done seemed to have calmed them down.

‘They were breaking open the gravestone?’

‘Wheatley heard the noise’ said Mitchell

‘I thought they were builders at first’ said Wheatley, his eyes wide. ‘I couldn’t believe what they were doing’

‘Trying to break it open’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Did they say why?’

‘Not fully’ said Mitchell. He was relaxing. His voice was already even and low, but his hand reached out to the stone to steady himself. ‘I had to dissuade them from smashing the stone completely. Mr Wheatley called me immediately and we managed to stop any wholesale sacrilege’

The Reverend looked with an expression of pain at the broken stone and dropped to his knees to examine the open crack.

‘Given a few more minutes and they would have smashed it all. But they seemed to be content with what they saw’

‘You think they just wanted to destroy the stone?’ asked Howard. He could dimly see into the crack. There was a dark space beyond.

‘No’ said Mitchell. ‘This is what I thought at first. They wanted to see inside. They had some mad idea that the stone concealed some kind of staircase down into the Earth! A pathway to hell, or something! The three – the men - they’re all miners from this village. They have active imaginations and little understanding. A poor combination’

Howard bent down to look closer. The stone that had been cracked was thick, of the same sandstone as the hills around Cheadle. The freshly cut edge glittered with mica. In the darkness behind there was a little space, perhaps containing the remains of old rotted coffins, but mostly it was filled with rounded stones. There was certainly no staircase.

‘So’ said Mitchell bitterly. ‘You see what our town has come to? Raiding gravestones like barbarians?’

He shook his head sadly.

They thought of telling Mitchell about the progress they’d made, but he seemed too desolate. They watched him leave with Wheatley and overheard the Reverend give his assistant instructions on repairing the broken stone.

‘I thought the breaking of the stone was more to do with the grave being Jewish’ said Howard, after they’d left. He looked out across the village to the north at the sandstone hills. The sun was setting turning everything copper and lemon yellow. It was beautiful. A shame that Cheadle was such a dark place.

Mrs Van Dijk was looking into the ground on the other side of the stone. She pointed out four marks in the short cut grass that marked out a square.

‘Made by the stool that Todd used to climb up?’ she said looking at Howard. She’d already forgotten about the three miners and their hammers.

**********************************

In the grounds of a grander house than was typical of Cheadle, they drank tea with the doctor, Wolfram Sable, and his wife. It was late evening and they’d finally found their way up a lane west of the town to a natural shelf that was edged with a few fallen sandstone rocks. On this shelf was the doctor’s house and a little further along, the house of a mill owner. The doctor was very pleasant and welcomed them immediately into his living room and then out into the wide garden which consisted mainly of short cut lawn. They sat at an ornate wrought iron table while Mrs Sable brought tea.

Both the doctor and his wife seemed starved of conversation and wanted to talk generally of the outside world and not of the events in Cheadle. It seemed no wonder that they lived above the town, rather than in it.

But they were kindly. Dr Sable was fascinated by Mrs Van Dijk’s nationality and tried to speak some Dutch to his wife’s amusement. They drank more tea and Dr Sable began to talk of geology - how he’d studied it in his youth and how Cheadle had interesting geology. For around the town was the dark millstone grit, while to the north the older limestone appeared from under the grit. This was filled with the most wonderful fossils – great shells the size of your hand, little cylinders that looked like the parts of a backbone, and sometimes coiled fossils. Sable offered to take them to see the fossils if they had free time.

It was getting dark by the time the doctor began to answer the questions they came to ask.

‘I think Mr Trevor died of an excess of alcohol’ said Dr Sable clearly. ‘On that matter I agree with Mr Todd’. Sable’s attitude became more severe when he talked professionally - gone was his light conversation. He looked grim.

‘Which is shortly the way that Mr Todd will go himself, if he doesn’t alter his behaviour’

‘He’s a terrible drunkard’ agreed Mrs Sable shaking her head.

They both looked serious for a moment.

‘This idea that he was somehow murdered isn’t true. It’s come about since the finding of the second body’

He looked out over the moors and they suddenly seemed bleak. ‘In fact there were signs that Mr Trevor had vomited. He smelled of drink’

‘…and the second person on the stone, Philip Bass?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Now that is different. I looked long and hard. I could not even work out how he had died. To me there was nothing wrong with him, except that he was dead’

‘Yes we heard you’d said that’

‘It was curious. The face red, very red. There were marks on one of the hands. Like thin black lines, very thin. His eyes were black!’

Even Dr Sable shuddered. He must have seen many deaths, but this troubled him.

‘I have no idea what killed him’

‘You mean it could have been an accident?’

‘It could. But then he was laid out on the stone’

‘He couldn’t have gone there and died?’

‘No. And he had bare feet!’

‘We heard that too. Was there any sign that he had been brought there, carried up onto the stone?’

‘It’s possible. I didn’t examine the stone. In fact they carried him down so that I could look at him’

‘Did you see anything unusual?’

‘No. There had been a terrible storm the night before. Everything was soaking wet. There were no marks in the soil, if that’s what you mean’

‘Would you like some more tea?’ asked Mrs Sable.

They had already drunk too much tea and it was getting dark, so Howard and Mrs Van Dijk prepared to leave. Dr Sable led them to the door repeating his invitation to take them out one day, his good mood restored.

But then he remembered something and went indoors asking them to wait. He came out a minute later carrying a twist of shiny wire.

‘I saw this on the grass by the gravestone. I don’t know if it came from the body. It just seemed a strange thing to be in a graveyard. I picked it up. Maybe it will help you?’

He nodded and went indoors, perhaps to talk to his wife about higher things than the troubles of Cheadle.

**********************************

They walked down the gravelly lane in the dark. Insects flew around them and they heard cows moving quietly behind the hedges. It was late - even the weak lights of the houses were being extinguished. The two church towers stood black against a dark violet sky where stars were just beginning to show. There was cold and damp in the air.

‘Do you think it will rain?’

‘I don’t know Howard. I don’t know this country as well as the Vale. I’m not so sure how the weather will change’

‘I feel sorry for the two dead men. It’s such a sad thing. It changes the whole character of this place’

They arrived at a gate where there was a gap in the tall hedge, and they could see the village clearly spreading in its deep valley. The spire of St Andrews seemed very tall.

‘I think it would be a nice place without this horrible thing’

‘Could we light the fire in the room tonight, do you think Howard?’

‘I think so. What about the wire? What did it mean?’

Mrs Van Dijk took it out. They looked at the bright coil in the light of the stars and a sickle moon. It was copper, twisted once into a loop with an extended part, perhaps as long as Howard’s forearm.

‘What was it for?’

‘Maybe nothing to do with the death’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

In their room at the guest house, a fire had been lit. The fireplace was small and shallow, but even the few boisterous flames made the room seem warmer and more hospitable. The small room adjoining had been furnished with towels and two wooden barrels of very hot water. Steam curled from under their lids.

There was a note from Mr Wheatley on the small table. Mrs Van Dijk read the note standing by the fire warming her knees. Their clothes felt slightly damp even though it hadn’t rained.

‘Mr Wheatley says we are invited to the school tomorrow - the weavers’ school set up by Bass. He says we should be ready by eight. We can meet Mr Bass – the father of the dead boy’

Howard pulled off his boots while Mrs Van Dijk went to wash. The room was very warm and comfortable now, and the window shutter was closed. He was really tired after all the work, all the visiting and talking. It was less physical work than woodcutting, but it was still more tiring – using your brain all day long. Also he missed the dreamlike state he sometimes had while walking, while in the woods. Here the town was full of human things, human problems. It preoccupied you more, he thought.

They slept too long. Howard heard scraping of boots outside and a surreptitious knock in his thin waking dream, and opened his eyes to see the grey frame of light that surrounded the shuttered window. The fire had long burned out and the room was cold. Mrs Van Dijk slept beside him, her arms stretched as if reaching for something. She woke.

‘Mr Wheatley’ she said with a sigh.

Howard sat up rubbing his eyes. He said croaking – louder than he expected - ‘Mr Wheatley – we’ll be out in a minute’

‘I’ll wait in the breakfast room’ came the muffled reply.

Wheatley was sitting by the fire, as they came in. It was grey in the cloister, and dark low clouds threatened rain. A few spots splattered on the window.

‘Sorry’ murmured Mrs Van Dijk. She smiled at Wheatley, who had a drink of tea in his hands. He wore gloves without fingers. His face was thinner than ever and his moustache seemed to droop around the corners of his mouth to make him look very sad and despondent. She wondered how he could wear gloves in the summer.

‘Mrs Wright will bring food’ he said, and looked back into the fire.

The old lady appeared as if she’d been listening at the door. She carried a tray of tea and bread and the smell of sausages was suddenly in the room. At least the breakfasts were getting better!

Sitting at the table they started eating. Mr Wheatley looked mournfully at the sausages so much that Howard took pity and gave him one.

The thin man continued to sit by the fire slowly chewing his sausage.

‘How has the village changed since the deaths?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk cheerfully. She had decided that this morose man would not make her feel sad.

‘There are people who think that the devil lives here’

Howard told Wheatley about the shouting in the street the morning before, and he nodded. He stroked his drooping moustache.

‘It’s a strange place. A town with lots of different types in it. When I was a boy it was a farming village but the weavers changed it – and then the miners. People don’t mix well here. There are tensions’

‘Religious?’

‘No. More between weavers and miners and farm people’

‘How was the village when you were young?’

‘There were no weavers. The stream here – the river - was good for building water wheels and small mills. The first mill was built, and it attracted lots of people - workers. The village became a town. And then the coal was found south of here. The mines…’

He didn’t finish his sentence, seeming to lose interest. He looked at the grey rectangle of the window and more rain began to cluster on its bright surface.

**********************************

The weavers’ school was an extraordinary place. In a narrow street of brick houses they heard the chanting of children, their high voices reciting something like a saying or a poem. The windows of the classroom were open.

Wheatley left them at the door when he saw a tall man on the steps to the school. They watched Wheatley scuttle off down the street the way they’d come. The tall man was evidently Joseph Bass, the owner of the school and the owner of two mills in the town. He was thin-faced like Wheatley but there was no morose moustache, only a deeply lined clean-shaven face and small deep set eyes. He looked kindly though and smiled a weak smile, extending his hand. The voices of children in the classroom next door suddenly became louder. There were gales of laughter. Joseph Bass almost laughed as well.

He gestured for them to go into a room opposite the classroom where they sat at a large table on which were piled books – mostly children’s books with lessons on how to write the letters of the alphabet.

Bass looked sadly at the books. Now that they were away from the children’s voices his mood was more sombre.

‘I lost my son Philip. But my other son is teaching the children now. He’s Peter, he’s very clever. Some say he’s a genius’

‘He seems to have a talent for teaching’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘He does. Would you like some tea? I believe that you’re here to find a solution. I am completely desolated by my boy’s death, and the district coroner had nothing to contribute. He lived a perfect life. He taught here in the school too’

Mr Bass extended his hands across the table towards them and took hold of one of the books. He leafed through it lovingly.

‘When I came here, I saw the poor children. Some had no education. I thought I’d use the money I earned to start a school. This was once a house, you know. I opened the rooms up, bought furniture and chairs. I taught them myself, but Peter was so clever that he took over. He teaches most – science and mathematics. The children learn poems by heart’

‘What’s being taught now?’

‘Science. Peter teaches well. Of course it’s his first interest. He wants to attend Cambridge University, and I believe he will. He taught himself Latin and some Greek. He reads magazines of science and even corresponds with scientists’

‘An extraordinary boy’

‘He is’ said Bass with pride. But he still looked sad, mourning his other son.

Bass told them nothing more that they didn’t already know. The body of Philip had been brought down from the stone, and laid out on the grass. The doctor had examined him, and pronounced him dead. There was simply nothing that could be done. Of course they’d noticed the boy was barefoot. Mrs Van Dijk wondered whether to ask about the wire. Had Bass seen it too? But seeing the thin man’s sad face she couldn’t bring herself to mention it.

After the short description Bass was quiet, and simply looked at the shiny surface of the table. Eventually, putting the book down, he rose and asked them to come and see the teaching in the next room.

‘There is something good in this school’ said Bass. ‘It makes me more dedicated to it – the fact that I lost my boy’

They came in at the back of the classroom. It was warm with the bodies of perhaps twenty red faced children. The rows of their glossy heads bobbed in the bright light from the open windows. They had just finished reciting something, and were listening to the teacher.

The teacher was extraordinary. Not tall, but thickly set with broad shoulders and very dark hair. He had dark eyes too and a merry shiny face filled with humour and enthusiasm. He stood, his legs slightly apart looking benevolently at the rows of faces. His eyebrows were lifted. It looked like he was about say something.

But then he nodded at his father and turned to write on the blackboard behind him. There was a strange image of a man, drawn very carefully in chalk. The man was dressed finely in a long coat and boots. But on the head of the drawn figure was a very tall top hat, ridiculously tall. On top of the top hat itself was a thin and long spike. Underneath the chalk image, Peter Bass wrote the words Benjamin Franklin. Then he turned to the class and looked sternly at each of the children.

‘Copy this into your notebook – every one of you - and the name Benjamin Franklin underneath. If it’s not well done, you will be beaten’

He pulled out a thin stick and flipped it quickly into his palm to illustrate his point. Then he nodded sternly. The children’s heads went down and they began to draw the strange top-hatted man in their books.

**********************************

Peter Bass came down the short aisle between the rows of desks. His face was still merry and bright, and he seemed satisfied with the immediate quiet in the class. He looked back momentarily at the blackboard admiring his drawing.

‘This is my son, Peter’ said Joseph.

Up close the two Bass men seemed very different. Peter was broad almost fat, and his colouring was very dark for an English boy. Howard guessed his age at perhaps fifteen or sixteen. He was dressed quite formally in dark trousers and a white shirt which gave an impression older than his years. The boy put the thin cane on the table beside them and shook their hands, beaming brightly at them.

‘I heard that you were in the village! Investigators! Have you read the story the Murders of the Rue Morgue by Edgar Poe?’

They said they hadn’t. Peter Bass, speaking rapidly told part of the Poe story, hardly pausing for breath. It was an extraordinary tale - said Bass suddenly very earnest – showing how science could be brought to detection of crime. He spoke with such enthusiasm and such precision that it was hard to believe he was so young. His father, who was presumably used to this, simply watched the boy with pride and admiration.

As well as talking quickly, the boy also nodded continually, and in his speech often stopped to say yes in mid-sentence, as if he were having a conversation with himself. He was sweating slightly, though it was quite cool in the room.

‘We hope to bring a robust method to our investigation’ said Mrs Van Dijk after Bass had stopped talking.

The dark boy looked curiously at Mrs Van Dijk and said a few words in a foreign language, pronounced slowly and falteringly.

‘You know Latin?’ said Mrs Van Dijk in surprise.

Bass nodded again. ‘Yes, yes. I learned it. It’s useful for science!’

‘What are you studying in your science just now?’ she asked.

Bass hesitated for a second and then said electricity. He said he couldn’t think of a suitable word in Latin.

‘He’s very good at electricity’ said his father.

Bass said quickly. ‘I’m interested in fossils too. Fossils are the really interesting things. There are many here and to the north in the limestone country. I’m developing a theory...’ he nodded again.

‘Father’, he continued, ‘...we’re going with Doctor Sable tomorrow – fossil collecting. Perhaps we should invite our friends here? There is so much to see’

Mr Bass said nothing, and Howard thought for a moment that he saw annoyance in his eyes. Perhaps Joseph Bass had something else to do? More likely he was still grieving for his son. Howard looked at Peter’s bright face, the beads of sweat on his brow, the energy that the boy radiated. He realised that there was no sign of grief in the boy’s face – for the loss of his brother.

**********************************

Peter Bass led them to a room at the back of the building. It had a small window that looked out onto an overgrown garden. The boy pointed to a dark brick house opposite.

‘The Bass residence’ he said grinning. ‘This is the way I come to the school in the morning’

‘That is the family house’ said the boy’s father. ‘...and this room is the Bass laboratory. Or in fact Peter’s laboratory. That is, at least, what we call it. Peter comes across the garden here to open the school each morning. He’s the headmaster – in effect!’

The room was filled with boxes, books, fossils – only a central table was clear. On the far wall facing the window was a bookcase, with volumes haphazardly piled on top of each other looking like the whole thing would collapse.

Peter took a tray from a cupboard and sat on a stool at the table, gesturing for Howard and Mrs Van Dijk to look. His dark-skinned hand reached in and took out three or four light stones with distinctive markings upon them. He turned one in his hand and held it out for Mrs Van Dijk to see.

‘A lamp shell’ he said. ‘A shelled sea creature - like a modern seashell. They are huge up in the hills – you can find shells as big as your hand, bigger...’

The boy had stopped sweating, but his bright eyes still burned with intensity. Howard thought he must be exhausting to live with.

‘These are books from Cambridge and Oxford’

Peter pointed up at the bookshelves and then got up abruptly, looking for one of the volumes. He muttered to himself, while Mrs Van Dijk looked at the fossils.  They were surprisingly hard and heavy in her hands.

Peter slammed a huge book onto the table and opened it at a page that had been previously marked by a thin strip of paper.

‘This is the way to identify the fossils...taxonomy’, he said, saying the word carefully. ‘I have hundreds of books’

He was trying to impress them, there was no doubt.  Joseph, his father, nodded.  Howard presumed that the father paid for the laboratory and all the books. He was indulging his son, but then he believed Peter Bass to be a genius. Howard thought perhaps he was, but there was also something unstable about the boy. His roving, questing mind was full of energy, but there was a peculiar self-consciousness about him, and some kind of compulsion that made him sweat all the time.

Despite the protestations of Joseph Bass, Peter persuaded Howard and Mrs Van Dijk to come on the fossil collecting visit the next day. It was to leave in the morning, and they would be back early in the evening. Peter would go – would lead the visit – and the doctor and his wife would attend. There was room in the cart for Howard and Mrs Van Dijk too. A cart would be necessary because it was ten miles to the nearest site for collecting, at a small village called Wear.

‘I feel like we should be working’ said Howard when he and Mrs Van Dijk arrived back at the guest house. They had come straight from the Bass School, and it was already lunchtime. The day had become sunny and warm. They sat on the chairs in the covered walkway looking again at the blue sky over St Andrews’ spire.

‘Why’

‘Well it seems silly to go on this fossil collecting visit. It won’t help us’

‘I don’t know’ said Mrs Van Dijk cryptically. ‘What did you think of the boy Peter?’

‘Odd. Very clever’

‘I asked how old he was. I asked his father. He’s seventeen’

Mrs Van Dijk turned to look at Howard. She seemed to think this fact was significant.

‘So what?’

‘Well if his brother – Philip – was eighteen, then it’s unlikely that Peter is his real brother. It’s rare to have siblings only one year apart’

‘He doesn’t look like the family – Peter. He looks too dark’

‘I think he’s adopted. There was something in his laboratory – his room. Did you see it?

‘What? I didn’t see’

She suddenly went silent. She looked in front, watching bees fly over the flower bed.

‘Not sure’ she said, infuriatingly.

**********************************

She seemed strange up close. Those eyes seemed intelligent and knowing, and there was a map of wrinkles around them that seemed to form and disappear when she smiled or narrowed her gaze. She would be nice if she wasn’t old. But then I’m not sure how old she is. She could be forty or sixty.

I watched her when she looked at the fossils, never once weighing them in her hand, but lightly brushing their surface with the tips of her fingers.

I talked too much about the books. She knows how clever I am and maybe she’s close to my equal in intelligence. Why did I have to boast? I’m excited and scared at the same time, driven to talking too much, to boasting. Close to my nemesis, but then far away.

Her companion seems to be an oaf, a brute that does the heavy work.

**********************************

An old woman came to see them after lunch. They heard her coughing outside in the front yard, and then Mrs Wright letting her in. There was a hushed conversation in the corridor and then Mrs Wright opened the door and the woman hobbled out into the sunshine.

Howard and Mrs Van Dijk were sitting again in the sun. The lunch that Mrs Wright had served had been delicious - a sort of local pie of liver and onions - mixed with small potatoes. But it had been heavy and Mrs Van Dijk was regretting eating so much. She was puzzled too. The boy – Peter Bass – had seemed so strange. It wasn’t as if his strangeness was entirely explained by his cleverness either. The boy was clever, but there was a feeling of tenseness in his face. She thought almost as if he had been playing a game with her. Also had she imagined the boy’s father’s annoyance? His pride was there for everyone to see, but there was another emotion too. She thought for a moment that detection and investigation was more than just looking for evidence for this or that event – like in Mr Poe’s story. It was also looking at people, and at their feelings, their reactions to things.

But the old lady brought Mrs Van Dijk back from her thoughts. She was short and rather fat and walked slowly and painfully moving from side to side, resting her weight on one foot then the other. Her face showed some pain in walking.

‘Howard – get a chair for her’ whispered Mrs Van Dijk.

Howard hadn’t realised at first that she was coming to see them. But the lady’s coughing was also to announce her presence. Howard gave up his own chair and went to get a stool from inside.

When he brought the stool out the old lady was already sat. She was breathing heavily.

‘This is Mrs Kent’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘She lives in the street opposite St Catherine’s’

‘I know who shouted at you the other morning’ said Mrs Kent in a thick, almost impenetrable accent.

‘I don’t understand’, Mrs Van Dijk leaned forward.

‘I said – I know who shouted – from the window’ said the old lady, very loud. She started coughing again. It was a heavy rolling cough. Howard wondered if Mrs Kent smoked a pipe. It was a pipe-smoker’s cough.

‘Oh I see. Well we don’t mind. I can understand why people are upset’

Mrs Kent looked closely at Howard sitting on the stool. She was squinting because the sun was suddenly strong. Her eyes became only slits.

‘You don’t come from around here, do you?’ she said.

Her voice was a little suspicious. She looked very candidly at him. Mrs Van Dijk smiled slightly at Howard’s discomfort.

‘I come from Nottingham, as does Mrs Van Dijk here’ said Howard politely.

Mrs Kent sat back in her seat. She coughed again. Her massive legs were set slightly apart.

‘Anyway I didn’t come about that’, she said. ‘It was wrong to shout out’

She looked out into the garden silently for a long time. It seemed like several minutes.

‘How can we help you?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk even more politely. ‘Perhaps you would like some tea. Howard do you think we could ask Mrs Wright to make some tea?’

‘Ah don’t want tea’ said Mrs Kent irritably. ‘Not at all. I came to say that I saw things the night that the boy died. Strange things’

‘What things?’

‘Things in the sky’

Mrs Kent coughed. Her ordinariness seemed to make her observation even more strange. Things in the sky...

‘What kind of night was it?’ said Mrs Van Dijk very carefully.

‘Dark. Raining – a real storm. It had been hot all day. Then a terrible storm late at night. Most Cheadle folk were asleep, I’m sure’

‘What did you see?’

‘It was very late. I have problems with me bladder. I have to get up in the night, you know?’

Mrs Van Dijk nodded. ‘Was it after midnight?’

‘Long after. Maybe two or three o’clock. I saw something from the back window. Over the church – over St Andrew’s, not St Cat’s’

‘Lightning?’

‘Oh no. No. Something flashing on and off – high up. I looked but I couldn’t see clearly. Then I went back to bed. Didn’t think anything more of it’

**********************************

I read this again from Mr Poe’s story. That ‘…the strong man exults in his physical ability, delighting in such exercises as call his muscles into action...’ - but the scientist, the analyst as Poe calls him – ‘…glories in that moral activity which disentangles, and derives pleasure from even the most trivial occupations bringing his talent into play…’. The analyst ‘…is fond of enigmas, of conundrums. His abilities are so beyond the reach of the ordinary man that the work of the scientist appears præternatural, beyond comprehension…’.

But I don’t want my cleverness to go unnoticed and unappreciated. I am torn. This may be my downfall.

**********************************

Exactly as had been arranged, a cart arrived early the next morning. Howard and Mrs Van Dijk had finished their breakfast and were sitting in the front room where they had first met the Reverend Mitchell. The sky was bright and blue and the wind had dropped. There was a humid, warm balmy feel in the air.

A large white Percheron horse pulled the cart, with an old bearded man on the platform. The cart was covered by a canvas roof and Peter Bass sat in the back, holding a bag to his stomach. There were books on the rough wooden seat beside him. He looked around not seeing them through the hatch and Howard had time again to notice Peter’s odd, self-conscious demeanour, and his quick head movements which seemed to be a symptom off his restless mind.

They went out to meet him. Between his feet on the floor was a basket hamper. The boy grinned at them and patted the hamper.

‘Enough food for an army of palaeontologists – and Cheadle beer too!’

He gestured with his thumb up the road. ‘We have to get the good doctor – and then we’ll be on our way’

He gave them both small cushions – to make the hard wood more comfortable - and shouted to the driver to move on. He held his hand on a pile of books to stop them falling.

The horse strained up the steep gravel path to the house on the hill, the wheels scraping on the stones. Howard looked behind as the view revealed itself. To the north it was clearer than it had been the night before. Beyond the steep valleys and the wooded tops he could see a country of open green – of grasslands – which he took to be the limestone country.

‘What books do you have Peter’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

The boy lowered his head. He never looked Mrs Van Dijk in the eye, and there were always drops of sweat on his upper lip and his forehead. He held up one of the books.

‘Taxonomy for fossil shells. A book about the stars. A book about electricity’

‘We’ll see some of these shells today?’ she asked.

‘At Wear? Yes. There are thousands. Very good specimens. Big ones!’

He curled his hand into a fist shape and stroked his knuckles. ‘They’re the size of your fist – bigger’

‘...and the stars?’

‘I am interested in astronomy. At this time of year we’ll see Orion in the low south of the sky. The hunter with his belt of stars. If you count five lengths from the belt upward you’ll see a collection of stars called the Pleiades. I can show you the North Star...’

He took the second book and was going to open it when the cart turned into the gate of the doctor’s house. Dogs began barking and they heard shouting. Dr Sable and his wife were walking down the gravel drive, each with a bag over their shoulder and big floppy hats on their heads. The hats reminded Howard of pictures he’d seen of Chinese people working in rice fields.

They were breathless and excited. There was also a box of food which a servant carried which was loaded at the back. Mrs Sable sat with Mrs Van Dijk at one side and Dr Sable with Howard on the other. Peter Bass sat at the head of the cart, his back to the driver. He still held on to his books, the picnic basket grasped between his knees, and the bag held close to his chest.

Rather than descend back to the village, the driver pulled the cart round onto a small track that led up, diagonally climbing a steep slope of sandstone ledges. The noisy cart rose up passing the town of Cheadle far below, and from Howard’s angle there was a very good view of the place – its two churches and the two or three main lanes with dense brick houses.

They followed the high parts of the valley of Cheadle, but left the town behind. There were only wooded slopes now and small muddy pastures with quiet heavy cows, their tails lazily swishing. The track became wider when it joined another and the hedges turned to stone walls, of grey and brown sandstone. Farms passed by – small places with barking dogs and low roofs – and sometimes old farmers watched them go by. Once a dog chased the cart for over a mile until the driver stopped and threw stones to encourage the dog to go back. The driver stopped to take the canvas cover off the back.

The passengers were quiet until the brown stone walls began to turn to the white walls of limestone. The land opened up and Dr Sable stood up in the swaying cart to see across the wide plateau.

‘Beautiful, beautiful’ he shouted comically, lurching, his arm stretched out like a preacher in church. His wife laughed indulgently.

‘My husband is very excited by the views up here’ she said to Mrs Van Dijk.

‘It’s certainly nice to get up above the woods’ said Mrs Van Dijk. She was tilting up her face to the sun, enjoying its warmth. It was a little bit confined in Cheadle, she thought. Looking around at the white high clouds, she had a feeling of being at great height, though she knew it wasn’t really high.

She glanced across at Howard and he was smiling, swaying to the movement of the cart, his hair blowing over his face.

She’d not noticed Peter for a while. He was bent over, looking at his book of shells, his chin in his hand. He hadn’t even seen the sun.

**********************************

The party began to talk more now that the land was more open and the awning was off. But the road was rougher so that sometimes the cart moved violently from one side to another between the white stone walls. Larks seemed to be following their progress, but so high up in the blue vault of the sky that they couldn’t be seen.

‘What are your latest researches, young Mr Bass?’ asked Dr Sable.

It was clear that Dr Sable admired Peter. He often looked with approval at the boy reading, even though the cart was throwing them all about. He was so committed to his studies!

Peter looked up. He held the book he was studying on his knees.

‘Something on shells, also the crinoids. But this is mainly description of the forms. I would like to write a paper describing the fossil shells of Wear and Black Dale’

‘You’ve published before?’ asked Sable, his face merry and red in the sun.

‘No. I would like to. I don’t have all the up-to-date books. Perhaps at Cambridge?’

Sable stood up again, looking ahead over the driver’s head. He swayed precariously and his excited voice was lost for a second in the wind.

‘Wear is ahead, somewhere? Can we see it Peter?’

Mrs Sable smiled indulgently over at Howard; she clearly found her husband’s enthusiasm amusing.

‘I am interested in lightning’ said Peter, a little while later. They were in a valley amongst dark trees and a smell of wild onions and wet soil. The light was dull and green. Dr Sable had become quiet and was sat with his wife swaying together with the moving cart.

Mrs Van Dijk thought that Peter had been thinking about this all the while they’d been travelling, but hadn’t said anything. Only she and Peter were alert. Howard was quiet, almost sleepy. Peter addressed his remark directly to Mrs Van Dijk. He looked her in the eye. There seemed a note of challenge in his voice.

‘Is that why you were discussing Benjamin Franklin in your lesson?’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Ah  - you noticed that.’ Peter nodded vigorously. Mrs Van Dijk thought that Peter was either over-engaged in his conversational style, or not engaged at all. He was either ‘full-on’ or off.

‘I noticed your blackboard drawing which was very good’

‘It was from a book on electricity. Not really of Franklin I believe. An artist’s idea of how Franklin might have looked wearing one of his inventions’

‘Inventions?’

‘You didn’t notice? The picture showed a hat that Franklin was supposed to have designed. Stupid actually!’

‘A spike on a hat?’

‘A metal spike that was attached to a hat to wear in thunderstorms – to direct electrical charge away from the wearer of the hat. So that the charge would be conducted into the ground. It meant that a cable would have to trail from the hat. It was a mad idea – no one would wear such a thing. In fact it would be more dangerous than not wearing anything. I doubt if Franklin had anything to do with the idea. But the children found it very funny – in the classroom’

‘We heard them laughing’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘They must like your lessons’

‘Not always. I am a strict teacher. A pity we’ll not be able to think about electricity today at Wear’ said Peter.

He turned back to his book and said nothing more for a long time.

**********************************

Wear was a tiny place – only a collection of farms on a shelf of grassy land above a steep valley dense with trees. Dogs barked again and the cart was forced to stop for a while as a farmer drove some slow moving cows up the narrow lane. The weather was still, the sky bluish grey - like a vapour of thin clouds - but the sun felt strong.

‘We have to follow this lane for a mile or so, up and round’ said Peter to the driver. He had laid down his books and was opening the bag at his chest. There was a clink of metal and he pulled out a hammer and a short steel chisel.

‘...for the fossils’ said Peter. ‘The limestone’s very resistant up here’

The horse had to work hard, up a narrow track past an old farm to a point at a junction of tracks. They were on high grassland now looking out to the north and south over plains and gentle swells, sometimes small clumps of trees grew on the tops of hills. They looked down on the farm.

‘It’s a little further, I’m sorry’ said Peter jumping off the cart. ‘We’ll have to walk’

‘Have I been here before?’ asked Dr Sable, amused at his own forgetfulness.

‘I don’t think so, sir. This is a new place. A fine place for shell fossils. I will go down to the farm now and ask for permission to collect. It’s always best to ask. The farmers up here can be a bit wild sometimes! You walk along here...’ he pointed, ‘...then follow the wall there and it will take you to a low line of outcrops and an old quarry. I’ll be with you soon’

He set off down the path where they’d come, the hammer and chisel clanking in his bag.

‘It’s a beautiful day!’

Dr Sable was already walking off in front. Mrs Van Dijk and Howard walked with Mrs Sable, Howard carrying the picnic hamper over his shoulder.

‘My husband likes these visits. I think the village – Cheadle – bores him’, she said with a smile. ‘He likes science and I think would like to have been a natural historian rather than a doctor’

‘Does he study these shells?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

‘He collects them with Peter. But Peter understands more. He reads the scientific literature. It’s amazing really. His father – you’ve met him - Joseph Bass? His father must buy a lot of this material for Peter – books and papers. The father really supports all of this, including the school...And of course he wants to send Peter to Cambridge University’

‘He’s clever...’

‘He’s a genius! He learned Latin himself. He conducts experiments into electricity. He studies fossils. He has the energy of a young man!’

Mrs Van Dijk looked out along the track. Dr Sable was already out of view. There were hills in the blue distance. She was thinking that Peter Bass’s Latin was not so good. When he had spoken to her the other day - at the school - he’d made lots of grammatical errors. But it was true – it was an achievement to teach yourself Latin.

They walked over uneven ground of small holes and patches of loose limestone blocks amongst long grass and wildflowers to the line of rock outcrops. It was like standing on a castle battlement looking down. The slope dropped away below them and then gathered up into a few very lush looking fields. The farm was right underneath. They could see Peter walking back up the lane. Perhaps he had got the permission.

Dr Sable was already amongst the fallen blocks in a little amphitheatre that must have been a quarry long ago. The stone was almost white and glittered in the pearly sunlight. He stood tilting his head at an awkward angle.

‘This is a marvellous place’ he said. ‘The specimens are very large. They’re everywhere’

‘A wonderful place for the view too!’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

Howard had not really understood about the fossils until he saw them. He left the hamper on one of the big blocks and immediately saw the curves of the big shells in the white speckled surface. One was like the back of a hand bulging out, its surface delicately striated. There were other thin ivory crescents, which were set in lines like the sails of a boat.

Dr Sable saw him looking.

‘I’m sorry you had to carry the hamper. I should have helped.’ He was breathing heavily. He pointed at the crescents. ‘These are the shells in profile. If you cut them sideways’

‘There are thousands’ said Howard, understanding immediately. The surface of the limestone was so bright it almost dazzled his eyes. ‘How do we collect them?’

‘With hammer and chisel!’ said Sable, grinning.

**********************************

As soon as Peter arrived, they took to breaking the stone for specimens and the quarry echoed with the discordant beating of metal on stone. Peter had three sets of hammers and chisels and the men were almost immediately hammering, the women sitting watching. They could hardly talk over the clamour.

‘This is what my husband really likes!’ said Mrs Sable. ‘Breaking rocks! All that education and he just likes banging with a hammer’

Mrs Van Dijk nodded. It was too noisy to talk.

But the rhythm soon got slower because it wasn’t so easy to break the stone. Peter had taken some specimens and they all stood around him. He laid the pieces in the grass and touched them delicately with his boot.

‘They lived in shallow water, seawater. There were two shells connected, called valves, and the animal lived inside the two shells’

‘Like a scallop?’

‘Yes. That’s right’ said Peter without looking up. ‘There are some shells from the side, broken – and some upright in plan view. You can see how big they are’.  He pushed one with his boot.

‘They all look the same. There are thousands’ repeated Howard, bewildered. He was fascinated too. He had immediately been converted to fossil collector.

Peter shook his head. ‘But they are definitely not all the same. There are small differences. You have to train yourself to see them. On these differences, species and genera are defined. There are several here – in the quarry’

He looked up at Mrs Van Dijk.

‘A palaeontologist is like an investigator. Like a person who investigates a crime. He looks for clues, scientifically making hypotheses and testing these with the evidence he has observed. Then he finds his criminal, by a process of scientific elimination’

Mrs Van Dijk nodded. She felt again that the boy was challenging her. He looked her in the eye and there was sweat again on his upper lip and forehead.

‘You mentioned the story of Mr Poe – the Murder in the Rue Morgue?’ she asked.

‘Yes? You’ve read the story?’

‘No.’

‘It is very new. But a marvellous piece of literature. I’m not a reader of novels myself but this story is very good. The detective – I forget his name – by scientific process - discovers the identity of a murderer’

Peter seemed to have forgotten the fossils at his feet but then turned his attention back to the quarry.

‘If we work very hard before lunch we may uncover several species – Dr Sable?’

Dr Sable nodded. He took the hammer in his hand again. He had no idea why Peter Bass was so interested in investigators and detectives when there were fossils to be found.

They became exhausted quickly and the noise was tiring as well. After about an hour Dr Sable and Howard and the two women climbed up to the crest of the slope and sat in the springy warm grass. Peter continued to wonder along the outcrop banging with his hammer here and there, walking up and down.

It was hot but there was a bit more wind on the top, so they opened the hamper next to the specimens that Dr Sable and Howard had collected, and that the Doctor had arranged in a neat line. They examined the fossils as they began to chew the chicken and bread and apples inside the hamper.

‘He’s right – they are different’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Look how thick the shells are. More than scallops at the seaside. They must have had heavy shells’

‘You can take them back to your home, Mrs Van Dijk’ said Mrs Sable.

Mrs Van Dijk thought the doctor’s wife was very friendly – and perhaps a bit lonely with her husband. He was nice, but wayward and childish – and she was serious and thoughtful. Maybe she wasn’t right for him. She watched Howard too. He had been in the sun too long because she could see his neck was already red. He was peering at one of the shells turning it in his brown hand. He had big hands, she thought. She was feeling sleepy after the long journey and her mind was wondering.

But she wanted to ask Mrs Sable something – it was one of the reasons she’d wanted to come on this trip – that, and to meet Peter Bass. But Peter wasn’t revealing anything, and now he was looking for fossils. He’d gone out of sight though they could still hear the clank of his hammer.

‘What was the relationship like between Peter and his brother, the dead boy? I only say because it seems strange to me – I mean Peter’s lack of sadness. He’s not grieving for his brother’

Mrs Sable put a piece of chicken down in the grass and looked out over the moors to the south.

‘The two boys got along most of the time’, she said. ‘Peter has his good points. But you’re right, he seems almost unconcerned, as if nothing happened. I can’t remember seeing him upset at all. Of course, the boys were very different’

‘In what way?’

‘Well – I mean in intelligence. Philip was rather a dull boy, even stupid. He worked for his father, perhaps would have inherited his father’s business, being the older boy’

‘But you never saw them fight?’

‘No never. But I never knew Philip really. He never came on outings like this. He wasn’t interested in fossils or science or anything’

Mrs Sable picked up one of the shells that had lain beside her in the grass. She seemed to have forgotten her chicken. Mrs Van Dijk noticed that her hand was shaking slightly.

‘And his father, Joseph? The mother?’

‘There is no mother. She died a few years ago. Joseph was in despair. The only thing that keeps him going now is seeing his other boy grow up to be a famous scientist’

The afternoon was even warmer because the clouds had cleared. The sun blazed down and the party – all except Peter - lay down in the grass to sleep. But Mrs Van Dijk asked Howard if they could walk away from the others, and they descended the slope a little way into a large steep field of ferns and long grass. They lay amongst the ferns looking up, smelling their strange sweet grassy perfume.

‘How is it going?’  asked Howard idly. He didn’t really expect an answer, certainly not the one that Mrs Van Dijk gave him.

‘I know who did it’ she said confidently, ‘– or at least I’m almost certain. I just don’t know why, and I don’t know how’

**********************************

It had taken almost three hours to reach Wear along the winding country lane and they didn’t leave until very late afternoon with the sun quite low, making long shadows across the land. They walked back to the cart and roused the driver who had been sleeping under the cart most of the day.

The cart was turned round, and the horse reattached, and they rattled off down the rough limestone lane under a southern sky that glowed with the setting sun. They went for an hour through the stone-lined lanes and stopped at an inn that was lit brightly, which they hadn’t noticed on the way up. Its rooms were small and candlelit and there were a few local men sitting, drinking beer and smoking short pipes. They quietened as the travellers entered, blinked and looked into their beer, but then went on talking more quietly.

The party ate hot pie and drank some of the beer, and in the warmth of the rooms they suddenly felt the burn of the sun on their faces because they’d been out all day. Dr Sable and Howard were almost purple with the sun and the beer. Peter – quiet after his excursions on the hills - was darker. His skin was less prone to burning. His broad face and dark eyes made him look Mediterranean rather than English.

Peter had wandered quite far and wide during the afternoon, following the Wear outcrop west and east. He’d collected a sack load of fossils. For his part he thought the visitors had been rather disinterested in the fossils, after their first enthusiasm. They were like a lot of people that said they liked science – dilettantes, shallow people. He thought he really despised them though he tried not to show it. The idiot Dr Sable - he was the biggest dilettante of all. He despised most of the people of Cheadle for that matter. Still he thought with satisfaction, he’d had a good game with the clever woman – the Dutch woman. It had been the only thing he’d enjoyed during the day, apart from the fossils of course!

After the inn, the cart was slower, because the driver had had beer, and in the dark it was much less comfortable than it had been on the way up. The driver kept knocking the cart against boulders in the bank at the side of the lane and going under low branches. At first it was funny, and Dr and Mrs Sable got down to sit on the floor of the cart, but soon it was very uncomfortable. It was taking a very long time to go a short distance. The sky remained clear, but the atmosphere cooled rapidly and they felt some damp descending from high up.

Peter was looking vertically up into the sky leaning quite far back.

‘What are you looking at?’ Mrs Van Dijk asked him.

‘Cassiopeia and Persius. Can you see the big W shape?’

He drew the W with the point of his finger.

‘So you like the stars as well?’

‘Madam I like everything. The pattern of stars – you know – is purely a function of the position of the Earth. If the Earth was in a different place the shapes would be completely different. Every planet has a different pattern of stars. It’s because the stars are at varying distances from us. This one - Deneb...’ he pointed to a bluish flicker ‘– is very far off. This one – the red one – is Aldebaran which is closer. If we moved the Earth sideways Aldebaran would move a lot relative to its neighbours, Deneb hardly at all. It means that everything looks different depending on who you are and where you are. There is scientific truth, cold hard truth on which everything is based. But the human world is based on observation which may represent the truth or may not’

Mrs Van Dijk couldn’t see whether he was looking at her or not in the dark but Peter’s face -  a faint oval - was pointed at her. She guessed he had the intense expression that he always had when he talked to her in this cryptic way.

Long after arriving at the guest house, Howard and Mrs Van Dijk lay awake. The trip had been very rough, and they ached. Mrs Van Dijk felt like she’d been beaten all over by a hard stick and she was only just recovering from dizziness that was like seasickness. They lay side by side in the warm room.

‘What were you saying before? In the ferns?’ Howard asked quietly.

‘I think Peter has something to do with the deaths. I don’t know if it was on purpose’

‘How can you be sure? Is it just from talking to him? He seems very odd. He seems to like you - he talks to you all the time’

‘He’s playing some kind of game. He likes an intellectual challenge and he wants me to find things out. He’s challenged me to catch him. Everything for him is of the mind. He cares nothing for other things’

‘But apart from this challenge he’s set you - what evidence is there?’

‘It’s simple. The wire. You know the wire that was found in the graveyard? Sable thought it related to the boy – to Philip Bass. I saw the same wire, copper wire, in Peter’s laboratory. There was a reel of it, shiny copper wire. It’s such a special thing. Where else would you find copper wire? It’s too much a coincidence for the wire not to be related. It connects Peter and his brother’

‘But what was he doing with it?’

‘That I don’t know’

**********************************

She’s not even close and I gave her so many clues! But it was interesting to talk to her. She knows nothing about the stars. I thought she would. I was told that she speaks several languages and that she knows science. But she seems slow to me. Sitting either side of the cart, it was strange to be so close to her. Facing each other, like we might in a courtroom. But she didn’t recognise the battle which so far we have fought without words. I don’t even know if she realises that there is a battle.

But it is nice to have someone as clever as me in this game. Like a game of chess where the two players are equally matched. I’m finding it exhilarating and frightening at the same time.

Why do I fantasise about being caught? Why do I get so close to revealing all? Is it because I want people to see my cleverness, my strategies; is it because I want to walk along the cliff edge in the wind and be close to falling, but also to succeed, to walk that narrow line and survive and live again.

My weakness is my lack of sadness and grief. It’s something I can’t feign. It’s not in me. I can place little clues in front of the woman to entice her, but I can’t pretend to be sad.

That mention of Mr Poe’s story. Perhaps reckless on my part: to speak of murder and of the modern science of detection. That was too much!

Why do I crave being caught? If I can’t be famous for my brain, I can be known for what I did. For boldness. For boldness.

But – I smile to myself – writing in this diary is stupid. Someone might find it and read it!

**********************************

Howard dreamed that he was walking down a long valley in limestone country. There was grass and low herbs everywhere and a light wind making the bushes shiver. He thought he heard water trickling somewhere amongst the bushes and he looked for it, but there was no sign of a stream. He walked further and further down the long valley hearing the gentle sound of water moving amongst stones but could never see the water. He decided in his dream that the stream was underground and that he would never see it.

He woke.

‘What did you dream?’ Mrs Van Dijk asked sleepily, ‘you were mumbling in your sleep’

‘About being in a limestone landscape and hearing a stream but never seeing it. Did you dream?’

‘I don’t know Howard. I don’t remember usually’

‘Strange that you don’t remember them. My dreams seem to affect my mood – even though they aren’t real’

‘Maybe they are real’ she smiled. ‘Your mind plays when you’re dreaming. But it’s real things underneath’

She sighed and changed the subject. ‘We can’t catch Peter. I can’t prove he did anything. He’s too clever to be tricked into saying anything. He’s almost admitted to me that he’s involved. But without proving some connection what can we do?’

‘What about the wire?’

‘It’s just something that connects the two events. Perhaps if we could show how the wire was used?’

‘I’ve no idea’

‘There is something we can do, but not until dark’ she said slowly.

‘What?’

She told him.

After breakfast they went to see Reverend Mitchell in St Catherine’s. They thought they would ask him about the history of Cheadle and how there came to be two churches, but they decided they would say nothing of their ideas and the evidence they’d found so far.

They sat with Reverend Mitchell in the front room of his house – the rectory that adjoined St Catharine’s. The room was small with a fireplace at one end and four upright leather chairs, but the large window looked out on a small sunny garden. Over the wall was the short square tower of the church. Beyond there was the taller, thinner spire of St Andrews.

‘Cheadle is really a market town and it dates back to Anglo-Saxon times’ said Mitchell, sighing in satisfaction. He liked history and loved the town. ‘It’s mentioned in the Domesday Book as a settlement – a village called Celle. The village was in the manor of the Lord Robert of Stafford. It was, I think, an area of six miles by three miles and only nine families were listed in the book. It must have been an agricultural place then. But in 1176 the Basset family bought the manor. From then it was called Chedle. I don’t know why. In 1250 Ralph Basset was granted a market charter by King Henry III’

‘What’s a market charter?’ asked Howard.

‘It means that the village was allowed to have a market each week. That would have made the town grow’

The Reverend nodded to himself looking out of the window. There were a few yellow leaves falling from a big horse chestnut tree in the garden.

‘In 1309’ he said, ‘seventy-five families were recorded as using a corn-grinding mill in the town. Then about fifty years later, a new church was built in the village replacing a 12th-century ruin’

‘This was St Andrews?’

‘Yes. It was built by Henry Frobisher’

‘Was he from outside Cheadle?’ asked Howard.

‘No, not really. There are many instances in the parish records of Frobishers. They were landowners – really the agricultural part of the village’

‘As opposed to the mills and the weavers and the brewery?’

‘Yes, that’s right Madame. There has always been a division in the town. The farmers, the market traders always treated the new people with distrust, and there were some difficulties even then. The church of St Andrews was the church of the old village. Frobisher - I think – had strange ideas about the village, and the church reflected his ambitions. He wanted the village to become something like a university town, like Oxford. He commissioned the building of the church from an architect in London, and the church was built in a Gothic-Romanesque style. It’s really rather unique’

‘It is’ said Howard. ‘Very striking’

‘After that a grammar school was built’

‘By the Frobishers?’

‘No. By that time the family had begun to fade. I don’t know what happened to them. That grave – the big one in the churchyard that was being defaced the other day – that is one of the last of the Frobisher graves. I don’t think there’s another one after that’

‘But why would they fade?’

‘I think the plague – in the seventeenth century. It affected this area badly. After that Cheadle was perhaps two thousand people – mainly farmers and farm workers. A small religious group came to the village and a monastery, or retreat was built, perhaps encouraged by the Frobishers’

‘So they weren’t Jewish?’

‘Oh no. Where do you get that idea? No - Church of England... and that monastery became the guesthouse in which you’re staying now. The monks left after a short time and went somewhere north of here. Perhaps fifty or seventy years ago, the first weaver’s houses were built. The weavers lived downstairs and the looms for the manufacture of cloth were upstairs. Now there are hundreds of weavers here. Do you know William Morris? A great artist and designer? He visited Cheadle to experiment with dyes and designs, and some special cloth was produced’

‘But in the meantime, St Catherine’s was built?’

‘Ah yes. I forgot. St Catherine’s was built not long after the last Frobishers disappeared. It was a time when sects in the Church were growing. St Andrews was really more High Church, but St Catherine’s was Methodist. Closer to the people – to the weavers. Of course St Andrews is a far superior structure – do you know its spire is two hundred feet high – the highest spire in this whole area – of hundreds of churches. It’s so high that you can see the Welsh mountains from the top. Lightning strikes it regularly’

‘You can go to the top?’

‘Oh yes. I can’t climb so high myself – too old – but you can do it. I’ll show you the steps’

**********************************

They walked with the Reverend Mitchell along the street and past the guest house to the other church. Close up, the structure seemed to pierce the sky – it was so vertical in design. All its elements emphasized the vertical: apart from the spire itself there were the tall narrow windows, the many vertical ribs in the dark stone. It was odd that the stone was darker than the cream stone of St Catherine’s, but it was some kind of sandstone that had weathered a grey-green colour.

Inside, the long drag marks in the dust of the aisle were still clear, and the footprints of Mrs Van Dijk and Howard. But Mitchell didn’t notice them. The light still came from the high windows casting a grey glow on the dark furnishings, heavy dark wood and white cloth.

Mitchell showed them the door behind the curtain that they’d seen before.

‘It’s rather a mess in here – I apologise for this – it’s not my church, but I should look after it, I know. The stairs lead from here – into a very narrow spiral. They’re very steep. Too steep for me.’ He grinned and held the heavy door open. There was a grey light beyond, but Howard could see no steps.

‘I will wait here or outside in the churchyard. When you get up there call down, so that I can see you. It’s years and years since I climbed the spire’

The small passage turned right, and the stairs began immediately. They were so narrow that only one person at a time could climb. Mrs Van Dijk went first. The scraping of their feet and their breathing was suddenly loud in the stony space. Looking up the steep steps Howard remembered how in medieval castles, staircases like these were made narrow to defend against intruders, and were spiralled to the left so that a right-handed attacker couldn’t use his sword freely. Looking down he saw only the stone curving away into the faint grey light. It got darker as they ascended.

‘We should have brought a candle’ Mrs Van Dijk’s voice boomed.

But light began to creep back as they rose higher and they saw the steps they were ascending again and the rough cut of the walls that confined the staircase. Here and there the steps were scratched, but it was impossible to see if the marks were new or old. There was no dust to see footprints.

The stairs were suddenly lit brightly, and a circle of white sky appeared directly above. They climbed up onto a narrow platform with a central point of stone that reached up perhaps another twenty feet. This was as far as they could go. The platform had a castellated barrier around the outside and beyond that was a huge panorama of the hills of Cheadle dappled with sunlight. Howard stepped gingerly to the stone barrier and looked down. His stomach almost revolted and he gasped involuntarily. Below were the packed roofs of Cheadle, the gardens and the lanes. Howard had never seen anything like it. It was like looking through the wrong end of a telescope. All the roofs and chimneys were so far away – and yet seemed to reach up towards him. It was as if this point, the old dark church, was the true centre of Cheadle, and everything was gathered around it. No doubt it was the effect that Frobisher – the original builder– had wanted.

The wind was strong and breathed around the platform blowing up Mrs Van Dijk’s hair. She looked exhilarated.

‘Beautiful!’ she said. ‘But a little narrow for me. Did you look down?’

‘Yes. It’ll make your stomach turn!’

‘I don’t think I will. But the view beyond is wonderful. We must be at the height of the Doctor’s house’

She pointed over to the west and they could make out the house on its shelf of sandstone.

‘Why did you want to come up here?’ asked Howard.

‘To look around. I won’t look over the edge, but we have to search this area very carefully. I brought my magnifying glass. Is Reverend Mitchell there?’

Howard looked over again. Right below was the bright green of the yard with the grey rectangles of graves and stones. There was no one there. He called out but his voice was caught in the wind and went nowhere.

‘He’s gone’

‘Strange. Never mind. We’ll look around carefully. Don’t call out again – I don’t want anyone to know we’re up here’

**********************************

Howard’s stomach felt light, even when he stepped back from the edge. Mrs Van Dijk had not looked at all, and was already busy studying the stone of the platform and the castellated barrier. The wind moaned around the stone spire that rose from the centre of the platform.

‘What do you expect to find, Lotte?’

‘I’m not sure. I think we just have to look. Do you see this?’

 She pointed at a dark area in the stone, a patch that covered some of the wall. She held her magnifying glass close and scraped with her fingernail.

‘It’s not soot – not from burning – it seems to be part of the stone. Do you see any copper wire?’

Howard went onto his hands and knees and felt curiously more secure. His stomach settled down a little because he couldn’t sense the height of the platform anymore. There were marks in the big stone slabs that made up the floor of the platform, but it was impossible to know when they were made, or by what.

‘It would help if I knew what to look for’

‘But I don’t, Howard’ Mrs Van Dijk sounded irritated. ‘It’s like the boy Peter says – there is an objective scientific truth’

‘There’s a small mat or rug here on the floor’

‘What?’

‘Come and look Lotte’

She got off her knees and came to see. It was a small rectangular mat that you might see in front of the fireplace in someone’s house. Made of a hard flexible substance, like nothing Howard had touched before.

‘Let’s take it with us’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘I can’t see anything else important. Probably it’s rained here several times and washed everything away. And the wind’

She squeezed the fabric of the mat between her fingers and looked out over the stone barrier across the rooftops.

‘Let’s go’ she said. ‘Are you ready for tonight?’

Howard wasn’t sure.

On the way down the steep steps Mrs Van Dijk stopped. She turned looking up to Howard behind her.

‘Do you think it would be possible to carry someone down here, to carry a body?’

‘Perhaps down’ said Howard. ‘But not up’

It was late afternoon and there was nothing to be done before dark, so they lay on the bed in their room, listening to the quiet afternoon sounds of Cheadle.

‘I’m slightly worried’

‘About tonight?’

‘Yes’

‘But we have to make some progress. This is the only way’

‘I thought you’d forgotten – up in the spire and everything’

‘No Howard. We have to’

She was listening: ‘Howard - did you leave the door unlocked?’

There was the giggle of kids, just outside the shuttered window.

He got up, went to the door and looked out at the covered walkway. He heard rapid footfalls as the kids ran off, still laughing. There was an abandoned cap on the ground under the window.

‘We’re always being spied on’ he said.

**********************************

They had to wait a long time, listening to the hourly bell tolls of St Catherine’s until Mrs Van Dijk thought it was a good time to go out. A few times after dark she went out to the front of the guest house to see if there were lights in the windows of the houses along the street, but only after midnight had come, did she think it was safe.

They turned into the cobbled street of Joseph Bass’s school and looked along its length, trying to detect any movement, and also to look for lights in the windows. But the buildings were mostly weavers’ storehouses. The building opposite the school looked derelict. The starlight gave the cobbles a slight glow, but that was only because their eyes were used to the dark, and because there was no moon.

They climbed the low flight of steps and examined the door, which was large, and painted shiny black. Mrs Van Dijk pushed at its warm surface but it didn’t yield.

‘I didn’t think it would be locked’ she hissed. ‘Can you push, Howard?’

She moved slightly to the side and looked back down the street where they’d come. She felt nervous here. She would feel better inside.

Howard felt the upper part of the door bend slightly inward when he leaned on it. There was a squeak from behind the door.

‘Maybe it’s locked’

‘Here’

Mrs Van Dijk lowered her head and looked into the keyhole. She whispered something.

‘Try now’

Howard pushed and the door scraped open, rather loudly. It was dark beyond.

‘Magic?’

‘No Howard. The door was just stuck at the bottom’

They slipped inside. There was a window just by the door and Howard looked out craning his neck. Had they been seen? He decided he didn’t like the street. It was a town street with walls all around, hard and cobbled. He preferred the lanes in villages, the softer houses of stone and thatch, not the square and red-coloured Cheadle bricks.

He sighed. But no one had seen them. He was sure.

A door in front led to the classroom. Mrs Van Dijk looked in. The room looked bigger than before and the aisle between the neatly-ordered desks long and wide. The picture of Benjamin Franklin had gone. Light from somewhere outside fell onto the polished wood floor and the desks.

‘Where was the laboratory?’

‘In the back’

Their shoes scraped on the wooden floor and their voices seemed loud in the small space. Mrs Van Dijk took out a candle and matches.

‘We’ll have to be careful with the light. The room faces the back, faces the Bass house’

The laboratory seemed smaller and fuller. There were tables and shelves filled with books. The table that had been clear had two bags on it, probably the fossils from the trip to Wear. The windows on this side were smaller but there was only blackness beyond. The Bass house was quiet.

‘Howard, I can’t light the candle. It will be seen through the window. Can you draw the curtain a little way?’

There was a thin black curtain and Howard pulled it making a puff of dust. He felt his nose itch and thought he was going to sneeze.

‘Howard don’t’

He held his nose and stopped the sneeze with a nasal squeak. They looked at each other smiling at last. The tension was released a little.

‘What do we look for?’

Mrs Van Dijk sat down on the floor by the table and lit the candle. Warm, yellow light flowed out and shadows suddenly appeared on the walls.

‘Anything! Anything curious’ she said. ‘I think Peter took Philip up the church spire. He might have been killed up there. I don’t know. Perhaps it was an accident. Then I think Peter brought Philip down the spiral staircase. But we’ll not be able to take anything away. We’ll have to read it here tonight. He’ll notice if anything is gone’

There was a pile of books on the corner of the table by the bags of fossils. There was a diary, or notebook amongst them, covered with gritty stone dust.

‘More fossil books. Should we read the diary?’

Mrs Van Dijk waved her hand and the candle flickered.

‘No!’ she said urgently. ‘This one’s interesting. It’s about electricity and the page is marked with a bookmark.’

She pulled the candle nearer and read from the faint page:

In 1750, Franklin proposed an experiment with conductive rods being used to attract lightning to a Leyden jar, a rudimentary electrical battery. The experiment was supposed to be executed on the top of the spire on Christ Church in Philadelphia. Franklin conducted the experiment in June 1752. By this time, he had realized the dangers of using conductive rods and instead used a kite because the increased height allowed him to stay on the ground and because the kite was safer. Franklin kept the string of the kite dry at his end to insulate him while the rest of the string was allowed to get wet in the rain to provide conductivity. A key was attached to the string and connected to a Leyden jar, which Franklin correctly assumed to accumulate electricity from the lightning bolt. The kite was not struck by visible lightning, but Franklin noticed the strings of the kite were repelling each other and deduced that the Leyden jar was being charged. Franklin reportedly received a mild shock by moving his hand near the key afterwards, because as he had estimated, lightning had negatively charged the key and the Leyden jar, proving the electric nature of lightning.

‘That’s strange’

They sat, wide eyed, looking at each other over the candle. ‘We found something’

‘You think he flew a kite on the church spire, from the top?’

‘I don’t know. It wasn’t Peter anyway – it would have been Philip’

‘Ah!’  Howard touched her hand.

‘Don’t sneeze Howard!’

‘No. I wasn’t going to. Perhaps the flashing light, the thing above the spire - the thing that Mrs Kent saw – maybe it was a kite!’

‘Maybe’ She flicked through the pages of the book and the candle flickered violently, almost going out.

‘Howard...’, she said. ‘Read the diary. I’ll carry on with this. I’ll have to concentrate. Before we go, we’ll get a sample of the copper wire too. It’s on the table there. If it’s the same as the wire in the churchyard, then…’

There was a creak of wood and then a weak bloom of light through the window.

They froze and stopped whispering.

Howard snuffed the candle between his fingers wincing as his skin burned. Suddenly they were sitting in darkness. The window was a rectangle of faint gold light and a shadow appeared across its face and moved slowly. It was the outline of a head, and light from underneath caught the hair and lit the whole. A nightmarish face was looking in at them.

**********************************

The face was craggy and strange, the eyes small and malicious, the hair standing out in jagged pieces. It stared in through the window blindly, without expression.

But it was the light that was playing tricks. The face was Peter Bass’s and the light that he carried – a small lantern - was illuminating it from below, making it seem foreign and alien. The boy brought the lantern up to his head and his face was suddenly clearer, not the frightening image of before. But no light from the lantern was falling into the room and Howard and Mrs Van Dijk were sat back far enough on the floor to be in complete darkness.

They watched Peter’s face, and his eyes were registering nothing. He blinked and rubbed his forehead. It was clear that he hadn’t seen them. The lantern was lowered, and Peter’s head and shoulders appeared, this time facing away from the window toward the Bass house. There was a yard between the two buildings with a few trees and stray grass. The Bass boy began to walk back to the house swinging the lantern, his silhouette gradually getting smaller.

Only when the lantern was a point of light did they move.

‘How did he know to come here?’ hissed Howard. His heart was beating fast. The image of the face had been so horrible.

‘I don’t think he knew anything. He looked like he was just walking around. You know he told me yesterday – on the trip to Wear – that he doesn’t sleep. He can’t sleep more than a few hours in the night. I’ve heard a lot of clever people are like this’

‘Can we light the candle?’

‘No Howard. Not now. We’ll risk it and steal this book on electricity. Can we take the diary?’

‘I don’t think so Lotte. He’ll know immediately. But I read a bit of it, here and there. It’s strange reading’

‘Tell me on the way back. I want to get out of here’

She took a coil of the copper wire from the reel on the table and pulled quickly, snapping it off.

‘Nearly forgot’ she said.

It was so dark that they had to wave their hands in front of their faces to feel for the handle of the door. There was faint light in the short passage to the main door, and the same grey light lit the classroom.

Howard opened the door and looked out. The street was empty, the far side deep in shadow.

They slipped through the door, down the steps and into the shadow in the far side of the lane, then walked up in the darkness onto the main street.

‘What was in the diary, Howard?’

Mrs Van Dijk was undressing in the light of a single candle. Howard rekindled the fire in their room, as much for light as for warmth.

‘I only read parts and very quickly. In fact, it was more of a fossil collector’s notebook. He’d recorded sample positions, and code numbers for the fossils. But then, in between, there were little outbursts’

‘What do you mean?’

Mrs Van Dijk was still whispering, perhaps nervous of making noise, even though they were streets away from the school.

‘Well, there was one bit where he just went on about how stupid Dr Sable is. He called him something - a dilettante. Then a page that was about inheritance, about things being passed from one generation to the next. Someone called Lamarck, something about how the strong, the superior, always win. How the weak always lose’

Mrs Van Dijk sighed. ‘He doesn’t like Dr Sable, though he hides it. I think he hides a lot’

She lay on her side with the candle on a bedside table and the electricity book in the light of the candle.

‘I’ll have to start reading tonight’ she said. ‘We can take the book back in the morning. We’ll think of an excuse’

‘Maybe the diary would contain a confession?’

‘I doubt it. He’s too clever for that. He’s playing a game with us. He wants us to work hard to catch him. It’s almost as if he wants to be caught’

**********************************

There was loud rain in the night. Even with the shutter and the door tightly closed, Howard could hear it drumming on the awning over the path outside. He felt the air in the room become more humid and colder. Maybe the few days of warm weather were over. In the dark he heard Mrs Van Dijk breathing slowly. She must have stopped reading after he’d fallen asleep. He didn’t remember her putting the book down.

Later, grey light came under the door and around the frame of the shutter. He got up quietly and opened the door a few inches. It was not raining, and the clouds were high. Some of the rainwater was already drying up.

‘What do we do today?’ said Howard. Mrs Van Dijk was sitting up. He saw the book on the floor beside the bed.

He wasn’t really sure what to do, and he was nervous of the book, and wanted to return it as soon as possible. Maybe it was time to confront Peter Bass – or his father? Or maybe they should call the constabulary?

She smiled. ‘We can get breakfast first. Breakfast is getting better and better. Then we’ll think’

Breakfast was good: there was fried bread that Mrs Van Dijk had never tried before - and sausages. She was in high spirits talking about the fossil collection of the day before and the beautiful weather up in the hills. Howard wondered if she’d read something important in the book about electricity. But he couldn’t ask her at the breakfast table.

When Howard went back to the room, Mrs Van Dijk stayed behind to ask Mrs Wright, the cook, about the fried bread. Howard wanted to think of an excuse to go to the school and somehow return the book to Bass’s laboratory.

He decided to make the fire in the room. It was a little damp inside and he thought it would be good to get some heat in the air. He opened the door to the garden courtyard for the air to circulate.

When Mrs Van Dijk returned, he asked her: ‘What did it say in the book. Did you find any answers?’

‘It was interesting, but I fell asleep soon after you. We’ll have to take the book back this morning. The main thing I read that’s important is here. I marked the page’

She picked up the book and flicked to the page. She read:

On May 10, 1752 Thomas-François Dalibard of France conducted Franklin's experiment using an iron rod instead of a kite, and he extracted electrical sparks. Others, such as Professor Georg Wilhelm Richmann were electrocuted during the months following Franklin's experiment, trying to emulate the great American.

She put the book down on the bed and patted beside her for Howard to sit.

‘I remember I read about Georg Richmann. I don’t know when – but he was killed while flying a kite in a thunderstorm. I think this is where Peter got his idea’

‘But to kill his brother!’

‘I know Howard’

They heard giggling again from the doorway, from the courtyard – children laughing. But instead of getting up, Mrs Van Dijk raised her voice, startling Howard.

‘Ben! Ben Booth!’ she shouted.

The giggling became louder. They heard the name Ben repeated.

‘Ben’, said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Mrs Wright told me your name. Can we talk to you? We have a present for you. Some money and some food’

More laughing. Then a child’s voice with a strong accent.

‘How do I know you won’t just hit me?’

‘We won’t!’ said Mrs Van Dijk in her nicest voice. ‘We forgive you for spying on us. We want to ask you some things. About the church!’

Mrs Van Dijk reached for her purse and took some coins. She rattled the coins in her palm.

‘This is for you Ben. Can you come in?’

‘I’ll talk outside’, came the voice.

‘Here it is’

Mrs Van Dijk held out the money through the open door. The long-haired boy, Ben, sat on the wall in the courtyard looking at it.

‘Would you like an apple?’

‘Yes Missus’, said Ben looking up. He was very dirty and dishevelled. He hadn’t washed for a long time and he smelt of soil and damp. His face was pink and healthy though, his eyes bright and playful.

Mrs Van Dijk gave him an apple, and she and Howard sat opposite the boy on the bench against the wall.

‘Mrs Wright tells me that you are sometimes homeless’

‘Yes Missus. Me Ma throws me out sometimes. She always throws me out’

‘...and Mrs Wright feeds you in the morning. She gives you some breakfast?’

‘Yes. Every morning. She takes pity on me’

He looked pathetically at them from under his unruly hair. Mrs Van Dijk felt like giving him another apple. But she needed to ask him questions.

‘Where do you sleep?’

‘Mostly in the church. Mrs Wright knows I sleep there’

‘In St Cats or St Andrews?’

‘St Andrews. St Cats is always locked. Besides the Reverend doesn’t like me in there. I have to go to St Andrews. I don’t go every night. Only when me mum’s bad’

‘She drinks?’

‘When she’s drunk. I have to keep out of her way sometimes. Also she brings men home. And I have to be out of the house then’

Mrs Van Dijk felt very sorry for the boy. Such a little boy and so many troubles. But she’d think about him afterward. She needed to know... She thought it would be terribly lucky if....

‘And you sleep there always – in St Andrews. On the first row of benches?’

‘How do you know that?’

‘I saw. I could tell. We were in there recently and we could see that someone sleeps there at night, sometimes’

The boy stopped smiling. He became guarded and suspicious. Mrs Van Dijk found another apple and gave it to him.

‘You can guess what I’m going to ask you’

‘What Missus’?’ Ben shifted uncomfortably. Howard thought he might run away.

‘About a night a few weeks ago – during a thunderstorm....’

‘Don’t know nothing about a thunderstorm’

‘Don’t be frightened, Ben. If you tell me what you saw, I promise that me and Howard here will make sure that you are looked after. We’ll try to help you. It may be dangerous for you to know what you know...’ she left the words trailing in the air.

‘Know what?’

She sighed. ‘Ben. Did you sleep in the church the night of the big storm a few weeks ago?’

‘Yes Missus.’

‘Did you see anything in the night? Inside the church?’

**********************************

They walked back along the main street and to the street of the school of Joseph Bass. Despite the rain in the night, the sun was now out, and surprisingly warm. Howard had the book on electricity in a paper bag under his arm. He felt its weight while he walked. He was dreading the confrontation that was to come. He wondered if Ben Booth was safe. They’d left him in their room at the guesthouse with instructions not to leave, not even to be seen by anyone.

‘Are there lessons today?’

‘I think so Howard. We can say that we want to ask him something about the fossils we collected. If he invites us into his laboratory, we’ll try to replace the book while he’s not looking’

‘But we know what he did. Why hide anything?’

‘I don’t know Howard. I’ve never done anything like this. He might become violent. You’ll have to watch’

She looked sternly up at Howard. He thought He thought she might be right, after what he’d done.

They climbed the stairs to the door as they’d done the night before. There was no sound from the school room and they could see through the tall windows that it was empty. They knocked and the door opened immediately. Peter Bass stood looking at them. It was odd that the object of their thoughts and trepidation was suddenly there. He looked smaller and less formidable than he ought to. His broad features, his brown skin and large eyes looked suddenly boyish. Maybe they’d got it all wrong? All the stuff about electrocution and kite flying. He was just a boy after all.

‘Morning Peter’ said Mrs Van Dijk lightly. Howard glanced at her, and he could see she was slightly nervous.

‘We wanted to see you about the fossils. I wanted to ask you some questions’

The boy nodded. He grinned an unpleasant grin. There was suddenly arrogance in him. He looked down on them, thought he was better – there was no doubt. He stepped back in a mock grandiose bow and indicated that they should go in. They followed him to the lab at the back.

‘The children are away today. A half-day holiday’

He stood by the sack of fossils on the desk, his hand resting on the pile of papers and notebooks. Howard noticed that the top book was the diary. It would be impossible to replace the electricity book while Peter was standing there. Maybe he knew anyway?

‘Is there anywhere we could sit?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

Peter was surprised. ‘I thought you wanted to talk about the fossils. We can talk in here. I’ll get some stools’

He went out and Mrs Van Dijk gestured for Howard to replace the book. He put it carefully between two papers in the pile by the sack of fossils. Peter came in with two stools that were probably meant for children. They sat, Peter behind the table. Howard wondered what Mrs Van Dijk would say. He looked out across the sunny yard to the Bass house. He was tired now of Cheadle and wanted to go back to Earls Court.

‘I have one question Peter’ said Mrs Van Dijk lightly. ‘How did you lift the body of your brother onto the gravestone. This seems an almost impossible task. The rest of the story I know’

Howard almost laughed seeing Peter’s face. His mouth literally dropped open, and he stared for a moment. But he regained his composure very quickly. He looked down and shuffled the books. Howard saw the cover of the electricity book amongst the others.

Peter’s voice had an arrogant sneer in it. It was consistent with the things that were said in the diary about Dr Sable and his wife. An Olympian arrogance.

‘It was remarkably easy. A stool from inside the church - which I afterwards replaced – then I pulled him up. He was quite dead so there was no struggle. I laid him like the first man. That unfortunate drunk. Can’t remember his name’

Peter smiled icily at them across the table. There was not a sign of remorse. Perhaps he was thinking that he had said too much. Perhaps they saw in him the slightest sign of self-doubt – a battle between his arrogant boastful nature, and his caution. What would he say?

‘Tell me’ he said at last. He opened the drawstring of the sack and took out one or two of the pale stony fossils. He blew the dust off toward them.

‘We don’t know why, but we know how’ said Mrs Van Dijk. She tried to hold his gaze, but she didn’t know what he would do. Howard had no pickaxe handle with him. He looked around for something to restrain the boy if he needed to. But the boy just sat. He rubbed the ribs of one of the fossil shells peering at it curiously.

‘You somehow persuaded your brother up the tower, the spire. There was thunder and heavy rain. Lightning had started to light the sky, even though it was long after midnight. You’d planned it with Philip. He was interested in science’

‘No. He was not interested in science’ said Peter sullenly, never looking up.

‘But he came up with you, up the steep steps, one behind the other. Maybe you had a lantern, to see the way. Maybe the rain was pouring down the spiral staircase?’

Peter was looking at the dusty surface of the fossil. He remembered: his mind went back. It had been black. The walls of the staircase had been wet with running water. They were already wet – he and his brother – from just walking from the house. They’d come out late – after their father had gone to bed. It had been a sort of treat for him - for Philip. He had wanted to see the lightning being caught. It had been easy to interest him – he was fascinated - his brother had been a boy with an unsubtle mind who believed that electricity could be caught in a jar – like an animal. He almost smiled thinking of it. He had been so simple, Philip.

The Dutch woman in front of him on the other side of the table was talking but Peter wasn’t really listening. His memory was taking him back so well. He remembered the rumble of thunder amplified into long booming notes by the cylinder of the spiral staircase – like a big musical instrument. He remembered the scrape of their boots on the steps, the sound of Philip gasping with the effort of climbing. At the top, lightning struck somewhere to the west where the doctor’s house stood. It lit the land momentarily over the hills and further, even to the south – everything blue grey, houses and trees struck still, frozen in a sudden glimpse. He remembered his brother’s face wide-eyed, looking frightened for the first time, looking into his own eyes.

Peter looked into the Dutch woman’s eyes too now, but couldn’t hear her talking, just see her mouth moving. But he didn’t see her eyes; he saw the eyes of his brother.

What do we do, he heard Philip saying. He’d ascended before Peter. He was already standing on the platform looking down. He still had those stupid boots on with the rubber soles. Those would have to come off. The boy really had no idea. For the lightning to be caught, Philip would have to be barefoot!

It had been so easy to persuade the oaf, the idiot, to take his boots off. He complained about the cold rain and the wind. His brother’s feet were big and red and wet on the stone of the platform.

And the kite. He’d had to buy that secretly. He’d burnt it immediately after that night! This woman would never know where it was. The proof was gone. He’d unwrapped the kite while Philip stood shivering in the wind by the castellations looking down at the graveyard below, suddenly uninterested. He’d assembled the kite – which had been hard in the wind. The thing had wanted to fly off before he’d tied the wire to it! It had had a life of its own, its margins kept catching the wind. He, Peter, had stood on the rubber mat all the time, just in case. Philip hadn’t even noticed. He was really stupid. Like a lamb going to the slaughter, like a lamb going to the slaughter.

**********************************

He remembered. The kite had bolted out of his hands and pulled the loose wire so fast that he had thought it would snap. In a second, the kite was bobbing out in the wind up high, turning and twisting. He’d been scared immediately - that the wire might snap and worse that the current might get transferred to him before he handed it over. He had thick-soled boots on and he stood on the rubber mat – which probably protected him – but he knew it was dangerous.

But Philip had wanted to hold the kite. He had smiled, watching childishly as the patch of white jumped and surged in the wind, following it with his eyes. He’d read some of the article that Peter had shown him – on Benjamin Franklin - and immediately wanted to know where the jar was – the Leiden jar for collecting the electricity.

But Peter had never wanted to collect the electrical charge and so he’d brought nothing.

He tried to remember what he’d told Philip up there in the wind, but couldn’t. He only knew that it had satisfied him - his older brother. And the idiot had tied the loop of wire around his wrist and let the kite soar, letting more of the wire out.

They stood, the brothers, their faces tilted up to the rain, which was now intermittent. There was some strange light from the clouds around, something like fluorescence, he remembered. He would have to think about that. Why were the clouds light, where was the fluorescence coming from – maybe some electrical stimulation of the vapour? The light had been enough to be reflected on the filament of the wire that stretched upward.

They had both waited. The kite was there – planted in the clouds – floating amongst all the charge, floating in undischarged electricity – probably millions of volts. More than any human could generate. The wire connected it all to the earth, where it could dissipate. There was a wire between earth and heaven just for a minute – to make it easy for the lightning – so it wouldn’t have to jump an extra few hundred feet. Why didn’t it jump?

He remembered. He remembered the last few seconds. Philip had turned to him as if to speak. There was a small smile on his face. His right hand was up, still buoyed by the silvery wire. His body was light from the cloud fluorescence. He already looked like a ghost.

There was no noise, no crack, no lightning, but current was discharging. His brother was still smiling but now frozen and his eyes were unseeing. He was like a stone statue or a scarecrow with its hand up. His skin glowed, his hand was suddenly bright. There was a tiny smell of burning hair which was then flung off by the wind. Then he’d collapsed.

The wire still attached, still taut, angled up, but Philip was flat on is back on the stone platform, his skin already darkening. Everything was in reverse. The kite was flying the man, since the man was now a thing, not a living thing. The sky was playing, and the kite was like a vein passing life from the ground to the sky, from human to sky.

But he had had to drag his thoughtful cautious mind away from fascinated horror, and had remembered what to do. He’d put on rubber gloves and cut the wire, quickly, just above the wrist. He’d unthreaded the wire from the dead wrist and thrown it over the side. He’d pulled the rest of the wire in fast, wrapping it in huge loops over his forearm, all the time worrying that the clouds would discharge again. But they were sated, satisfied for the moment. In a few seconds he had the kite back and had rolled it in a canvas bag.

He remembered descending with the body down the staircase. He had known that it would be difficult but he had worked out a way - with Philip strapped to his back -  so they were back to back, Philip’s feet stuck out behind him. It meant he had to listen to Philip’s cold heels thump against each step as he descended, but by that time he had been thinking about the moment when the current had struck his brother. He had thought about it over and over again. He’d expected something - a sudden shock reaction, after all electrical pulses governed the movement of the body - everything depended on electricity. Why hadn’t it created something more marked? All that electricity? It had been disappointing as an experiment, there was no doubt.

But there had also been other more important reasons for doing it.

**********************************

Peter had his head in his hands. Mrs Van Dijk knew after a minute that the boy wasn’t listening to her. His eyes had seemed absent, and his mouth had formed silent words as though he were talking to someone who wasn’t there. And then he dropped forward, his head falling into the space between his arms on the rough table, bumping hard.

They sat and watched him, hearing his long deep breathing – and what sounded like whispered words. Birds called outside. Howard was momentarily distracted and watched motes circling in the dusty air near the sunny window. The boy had said almost nothing, just lost his composure, and gone off into some quiet world.

Howard looked back from the window. The boy’s shiny brown hair shook and he noticed how his hair was already thinning on top, how his body was shaking. And now they heard him cry in long deep sobs sucking in air then pouring it out with a slow breathy wail. But still he didn’t get up.

‘I think we’ll have to call his father’ said Mrs Van Dijk. ‘He doesn’t hear us’

Mrs Van Dijk watched Joseph Bass come striding across the yard, Howard behind him. She’d stayed with Peter watching him, waiting for a sign of lucidity. But the boy continued to cry. She had no idea what to do. The boy was locked into a deep part of his consciousness. It would be hard to know what to tell his father. Peter had revealed nothing really, nothing that could be regarded as a confession.

But Joseph was very business-like. He saw Peter, and seemed to understand immediately.

‘He’s sometimes like this’ he said briskly. ‘He goes into a special state. I forget what Dr Sable calls it – catatonia, I think. He’ll not come out for hours. It only happens when he’s upset, when he’s thwarted’

Joseph Bass looked closely at the boy, craning his neck over, searching for movement. There seemed to be no real concern, it was more like a clinical interest. Howard remembered once seeing Joseph annoyed at something that his son had said - his son the genius. Maybe it was hard to bring up a genius.

Joseph sat down heavily.

‘He’s not mine’ he said, looking darkly at Howard.

‘I mean he is not my son’ said Bass again, at Howard’s lack of comprehension.

‘He is an adopted son?’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Yes. He was brought to us. He was from a Spanish family in London. My wife wanted him – to look after him’

‘He knew he was adopted?’

‘Oh yes, from about the age of eight. He worked it out; he was after all very clever’

It was strange the way Joseph talked about his adopted son in the past tense. It was almost as if he wasn’t there – but then Peter was completely closed off. Presumably he’d done this before, been in this catatonia.

‘He will be like this for a while – not really communicating. I’m convinced he doesn’t hear us. He did this a lot when he was young, less so now. But now the spasms are more intense – these periods of withdrawal. I’m afraid the outside world only sees the brilliance, and none of the darkness. Maybe all very clever people are like this – blackness and brilliance’

He patted the boy’s head at last and sighed.

‘He’ll have to be taken to his room – in the house. After a few hours he’ll come out. It’ll be as if nothing happened. What did happen by the way?’ said Bass sighing again. ‘What triggered it? Did you criticise his work - did you ask him a question he couldn’t answer?’

‘Not exactly’ said Mrs Van Dijk slowly. Looking at Joseph’s Bass’s good humoured intelligent face, she could see no sign of suspicion. In Joseph Bass’s mind there was nothing seriously amiss with his son. She thought it would be difficult to discuss things with him.

‘When he’s been taken to his room, perhaps we could talk? Would you come to the guest house with us? I have someone I’d like you to meet’ she said.

**********************************

‘Tell the story again, Ben – like you did for us this morning – after your breakfast’

They were sat under the awning by the entrance to the room in the guesthouse. Mrs Van Dijk had thought it was too dark inside to ask the boy in there. He was already frightened, and when he’d seen the tall figure of Joseph Bass, even more so.

Ben showed no sign of wanting to speak, he looked at Mrs Van Dijk. He seemed to trust her and probably would have talked were Mr Bass not there.

‘Would you like an apple?’

Mr Bass sighed rather loudly. He leant forward in his chair and looked out at the garden. In the midday sunlight it was idyllic. Butterflies floated over the flowers and birds sang. Ben remained silent until Mrs Van Dijk produced an apple from inside the room.

She smiled big and warm at the small boy. He ruffled his hair with his dirty fingers.

‘I saw something mam’

‘What was that?’

‘A beast, a terrible animal. I never seen anything like it. I was so scared that I couldn’t move’

‘When did you see this beast, Ben?’

‘I don’t want to remember.’

‘You only have to do this one thing for me, and I’ll give you an apple and sausages at lunchtime’

Ben nodded and sat straight. His long unkempt hair almost covered his eyes.

‘It was a while back. On the night of a thunderstorm. I sleep in the church sometimes. Not every night, but when me mum doesn’t want me around’

‘You sleep on the benches at the back, don’t you?’

‘Yes mam’

‘And no one knows this?’

‘Except you mam, and Howard and Mrs Wright, the cook’

‘Describe what happened’

‘Well it was a terrible night. I came into the church very late because me mum was arguing with one of her men. I thought it would be more peaceful in the church. I heard the thunder and saw lightning flash, but I went to sleep quickly. I sat up and looked around. It was very scary – it’s scary anyway to sleep in a big old church.  But I saw some light coming from the tower from the open door behind the curtain’

The boy swallowed loudly, as if he couldn’t bear to go on. His eyes were shining with fear, remembering.

‘I saw a thing, a creature, like two men. With two heads’

Joseph Bass sat back up in his chair. He exhaled loudly.

‘Can you say more Ben?’ said Mrs Van Dijk.

‘A thing with two heads. There was a dragging noise – and gasping. There was gasping. It had arms on both sides’

‘But we talked about it this morning. What do you think it really was?’

‘It was a man, missus. A man carrying another man on his back. The other man was asleep, or dead. His legs dragged behind’

The boy’s eyes were red-rimmed. He might cry.

‘Benjamin, thank you. You go inside now and Mrs Wright will give you some lunch. You can have whatever you like. When you’ve finished, come back to this room and stay here until we get back. We’re going to talk a little more with Mr Bass’

She stood and looked sternly at Joseph Bass.

**********************************

They sat in the front room of the guest house looking out on the lane that led into the village. It was the room where they’d first talked to Reverend Mitchell. It seemed to Howard and Mrs Van Dijk that the village had changed completely. Howard tried to remember his first impression on the dark night when the coach had dropped them off; then the grey morning when Reverend Mitchell had hinted at the Cheadle Devil. Now they’d found the devil – but he was just a boy – with his head in his hands talking to himself.

Joseph Bass simply sat staring open-mouthed out of the window at the slowly greying day. The sun of the morning was dying, and cold air was coming over the town from the west, over the hard shelves of sandstone and the bleak moorlands between.

Mrs Van Dijk had explained her idea of the events of the night of Philip’s death, going through each part carefully, watching the old man’s face change. He had simply seemed resigned to the oddness of his adopted son, but as the story had gone on, Joseph had looked more and more forlorn. As Mrs Van Dijk spoke, she herself could hardly believe what she was saying, it seemed so bizarre: flying kites in a thunderstorm – and the image of the two-headed monster that was really Peter and his dead brother strapped behind.

She watched, wondering if the father of Philip would say anything. Only after several minutes when hard raindrops began to hit the rough window did Joseph speak.

‘You think he killed his own brother?’

Mrs Van Dijk tried to move closer - to offer the old man support – but he seemed not to notice.

‘Did they get on well?’ she asked.

‘Peter and Philip? Sometimes. But not so well in recent years. Philip cared nothing for science. In fact he made fun of Peter’s experiments. He said he was clever but that all his experiments were a waste of time, of no practical use. He said that weaving was better, and coal mining. Because you could make money’

‘Did they fight?’ asked Howard.

‘No never. But sometimes they didn’t speak for days. Philip was not intelligent in the conventional way. I’m sure he would have made a very good businessman, a good factory man: when he was to take over the factory’

‘He was to inherit?’

‘Yes. Of course. He was the eldest son. He would inherit the business. He and I spoke about it on many occasions’

‘And did Peter mind – did he object?’

‘Absolutely not. Peter was rather dismissive of the factory. He looked down on commerce. He elevated science to a religion, above all’

‘Was there any friction between them? What would happen on Philip inheriting?’

‘Philip wanted to continue the school...on my death...’ Joseph coughed. His face looked grey in the rainy light from the window.

‘And so Peter was guaranteed a job teaching in the school?’

‘Oh yes. But of course Peter never wanted to be a teacher for long. He intended to go to Cambridge University. He already had an offer to study’

Joseph turned to the window.

‘Perhaps I could have some tea?’ he said quietly. His mood was suddenly worse. He clasped his hands together.

‘Howard – could you ask Mrs Wright to make some tea for Mr Bass?’

She looked up at Howard, her eyes full of meaning. She thought something was coming that was important.

He went to get tea. Mrs Wright was in the noisy kitchen stirring a huge pot. Ben Booth was sat by the window at a table eating sausages and potatoes, shovelling the food into his mouth, his face red with the effort of eating so fast.

‘Are you alright Ben?’ asked Howard. ‘Remember to go back to the room when you’ve finished. Mrs Wright – could you bring some tea in?’

The cook nodded, wiping her brow. Howard went back into the front room.

‘I suppose that could be the reason...’ Joseph Bass was shaking his head bitterly. ‘But it seems unbelievable’

‘That it meant so much to him?’

‘Yes’

Mrs Van Dijk turned to Howard. She said quickly: ‘Philip said to Peter that he would stop giving money to support Peter’s laboratory... and he said he disapproved of Peter going to Cambridge. He said that he would not pay. If his father died and he inherited the money he wouldn’t pay for the laboratory, or to send Peter to university’

‘You think this was enough to explain what happened?’

‘I think so’

She leant forward to touch Joseph’s shoulder. She didn’t want to appear pleased, but this must be the key to the mystery. The boy was obsessed by science. If all that was jeopardised - the lab, the place at university – even if Philip had been joking – it would perhaps have driven the boy to murder.

‘Peter saw the body of the first dead man on the stone in the graveyard’, said Mrs Van Dijk, almost to herself, running through the story. ‘People were frightened by the strange attitude that the body had – hands open to the sky – like a crucifixion. Peter saw his chance. I think he - being so clever - realised that if another body appeared in the same strange position, that people would start thinking of some supernatural cause. This would divert attention from a real murder, from a real human murderer’

‘So the first man died naturally? I can’t remember his name’

‘Oliver Trevor. He was a drinker. He often collapsed with drink. He climbed onto the stone and died there. Dr Sable himself said he thought the death was natural’

Mrs Van Dijk looked at Joseph who had his head in his hands.

Then she glanced at Howard, her finger to her lips. It was perhaps cruel to say any more.

**********************************

He was conscious. What had made him so? He listened and heard footfalls on the hard wooden staircase outside his room.

He lay flat on his back, but couldn’t remember how he’d got there. He looked up at the ceiling, tracing the familiar cracks in the plaster, the bit of damp plaster above the window.

The light from outside was fading.

The footfalls came quicker. He knew from years of listening, the way people moved. He knew from the speed of the steps on the landing outside the door that it was his father. His father’s boots were big and rough - like a workman’s, not a mill-owner’s.

The steps came outside his room, and he straightened waiting for the door to open, to greet his father.

But a key turned in the lock and there was no greeting.

Peter lay listening, really straining his ears, and heard the boots shuffle outside, then heard them move back to the top of the stairs, then down.

He couldn’t think what was wrong. He’d never been locked in before, never in his life. He followed the cracks in the ceiling, thinking and remembering, remembering what had happened earlier in the day.  He’d had one of his episodes. The idiot doctor always talked of them in his stupid whining voice, thinking he was so clever. But it was true that he did sometimes get cut off from the world, when things were too hard for him.

Yes! That Dutch woman and her man had found out about the kite experiment. Did they have proof? He tried to remember what they’d said. It had been mostly supposition. She’d said at the beginning that she knew everything - but that was just to frighten him, to make him confess. He knew that they couldn’t have proof. There were no witnesses, he was positive of that.

But his father must believe their story.

That’s why the door was locked.

He contemplated shouting out and banging on the door, protesting his innocence, but then thought it was better to stay quiet, to think. This was not beyond his mind, of all minds.

Joseph Bass strode around to the guesthouse. He felt better now – after the uncertainty. It was better to do something. He had informed Reverend Mitchell and asked him to summon the constabulary in Stafford. Peter would remain locked in his room until they arrived, perhaps in the morning. It was growing dark, but the boy had been awake in his room, he was sure. He was very quiet though. He should also tell Dr Sable, he thought, after all, this had been the most intense catatonia that he’d ever seen in Peter. He and Howard had carried Peter back to the house from the laboratory, and at no time did he speak clearly or open his eyes - only he spoke breathily, very quietly, as if he were having a conversation with himself.

Howard and Mrs Van Dijk were waiting for Joseph at the guesthouse.

The light faded in the room so that Peter now lay in darkness. The curtain-less window was a deep grey square with the points of stars. He had no candle, and he had eaten nothing. No one had climbed the stairs again. He had not moved from the bed since he’d been laid there hours before, by hands unknown to him.

He thought again, and pictured the yard below the window, the path through to the school. His room was up three floors under the roof of the house. His was the highest bedroom. He’d always been the last even though he was the cleverest - put in the small room under the roof. The damp came through. He had never felt before as if he had been disfavoured by his father, but now he began to contemplate it.

His brother’s room was on the floor below, and it was bigger – facing the front, facing the street. From that side and at that height it would even be possible to jump. From his side under the roof – and at the height of three floors - he would not survive a jump.

He shut his eyes, feeling resentment build in him, the way it had when he had quarrelled with Philip - when Philip had said that if his father died, he would inherit, but that he would not support Peter’s science anymore. That was intolerable! And Philip never showed this bad side in front of their father – he never showed his petty vindictiveness.

Their father. Of course he wasn’t their father. He was Philip’s father.

Peter finally turned in the bed onto his side. He looked out of the dark window and saw part of Orion’s belt close to the night-time horizon. The summer was coming to an end. Soon Orion would only be visible in the far south of England. Perhaps in Spain.

Spain. Where he came from - but a place he knew nothing about.

She had first talked to him about Spain. He remembered – perhaps a year ago. At first he’d thought that she just wanted to mother him. She’d always stood near him, encouraged him. Peter thought she knew that he was adopted, and so she felt sorry for him, wanted to cuddle him. But of course she was childless too. This is what he had thought – that she’d wanted someone to mother because she had no children herself. She had just an idiot husband.

But she had wanted more than cuddles.

She had actually said that they could escape to Spain! But she was nearly twice his age. He had been seventeen when it had started, she perhaps thirty. He remembered how lonely she had seemed. Though he was a scientist given to cold observation only, he noticed people around him and he knew she was unhappy, even lonely. Up in that house on the hill.

But now there would be no trip to Spain. No escape.

**********************************

Someone was knocking on the door. The rain was pouring down outside, really pouring. There was a low drumming on the roof and the awning, and the grass outside was hissing. It was cold.

Howard got up. He wondered if the constabulary had already arrived from Stafford.

‘Lotte, there’s someone at the door’

Mrs Van Dijk’s head was under the white covers but there was just a spray of brown hair on the pillow. She sighed, waking up.

Howard pulled on his trousers feeling how damp they were. This room was always a bit damp, perhaps because it was low down. It didn’t matter that water didn’t come through the roof. It was a problem of damp air. His shirt was cold too.

He opened the door a crack. He saw Reverend Mitchell’s broad back clothed in a big sailor’s sowester. Rain was pouring off it. The garden was like a swamp – water was standing on the lawn and the flowers were bowing their heads and bobbing under the onslaught.

Mitchell turned. His face was red with urgency; his grey hair was streaked on his forehead. Howard noticed for the first time that his teeth were crooked.

‘Peter’s gone’, he croaked. ‘Escaped’

‘How?’

Howard heard Mrs Van Dijk getting up behind him, putting on her boots.

‘What was that?’ she said quietly from behind him.

‘He’s escaped’ murmured Howard. His mood dropped. He was really hoping that they could leave today – go back to Earls Court. But he tried not to look disappointed to Mitchell. He asked again: ‘How?’

Mitchell shook his head and water cascaded onto his shoulders. He looked pathetic.

‘Someone let him out!’ he said blankly.

They walked down the lane to the Bass house between massive, elongated puddles. The hard cobbles were slick and slippery with water and water trickled down the edges of the path. The sky was an angry grey. It was hardly light even though it was already midmorning.

Joseph Bass greeted them at an open door. He looked guilty, and Howard wondered immediately if Bass had let his son go. Without ceremony, Bass led the three up flights of stairs to a landing with two doors. One was to Peter’s room, the other to a storeroom.

‘Have you checked the storeroom?’ asked Mrs Van Dijk.

‘Yes madam. It’s small. There’s nothing in there’

‘And you’ve searched Peter’s room?’

‘Yes of course’

Bass raised his voice but regretted it. It was clear he felt guilty for allowing the escape to happen. ‘There’s nothing there’ he said more quietly.

‘Could he have broken the lock?’ asked Howard. He peered at it. It was a large heavy brass fitting and the door itself was thick and secure.

‘No I don’t think so’

Mrs Van Dijk took out the magnifying glass from her grey bag. She looked at the door and an arc of light passed over the brass lock.

‘There’s nothing. The lock wasn’t forced. You said that someone let him out? How do you know?’ she asked

‘Because the key’s gone’ said Joseph Bass even more guiltily. ‘Also, this is going to sound extraordinary, but Dr Sable was here this morning very early, when the rain was very heavy. He was in a terrible state, crying and fretting. His wife has gone missing - Mrs Sable – and she seems to have taken a lot of money and jewellery with her’

**********************************

Howard watched the sandstone ridges of Cheadle disappear from the small hatch of the coach. The sound of the iron-rimmed wheels on the stony lane was unbearable, so he pulled the leather cover over the hatch. It was dark in the cabin. Mrs Van Dijk was sat opposite him. She smiled as he looked over at her. At least the rain had stopped and they were going home.

Howard thought that the landscape was hard around Cheadle – ridges and long slopes that always let the stone show through. It was always windy on the ridges, and the rain was worse there. It was a hard country. Looking through the hatch he’d seen the lowlands ahead just for a few seconds and they seemed lit up, beyond the low hanging clouds. Towards the Vale and Earls Court.

‘I’ll be glad to get home, Lotte’ he said. He leaned forward to pat her hands. She smiled back, but he could see that she was a bit disappointed.

‘Do you remember I said that she seemed lonely?’

‘Mrs Sable?’

‘Yes. I remember I talked to her on the hill at Wear. She seemed unsuited to the Doctor. He was childish. Maybe he didn’t like his responsibility as a doctor. He had to behave like a child when he wasn’t being serious– for relief’

‘But she really found another child! And a murderer! I hope the constabulary find them quickly. She’ll not be safe with him’

‘Perhaps, but really their ages aren’t so different. She’s young and pretty’ said Mrs Van Dijk quietly. She was thinking that they were probably escaping to Spain.

The carriage hit a very uneven part of the stony lane, and they were suddenly propelled sideways to the left and then the right. Howard pulled back the leather cover and looked through the hatch again. They were at the head of a long low slope. There was nothing but lowland in front. The stones that they’d passed over might have been the last. The last of the stony hills.

After many hours the coach was smoother, as it wound its way on lanes in peat and clay between woods and hedges and fields. The land was flat. The light that Howard had seen from high up early in the journey still lit the plain. It was warmer and the noise from the wheels was much less. Howard lifted the covers on the hatches and the light flooded in, late afternoon light the colour of peach. In the autumn hedges, the berries – hawthorn, rosehip, elderberry - glowed red and purple. The fields shorn of wheat were pale, and the ploughed fields were velvety like thick ochre carpet laid over the summer grass.

**********************************

Peter Bass lay back in the grass. He looked up at the Doctor’s wife, shielding his eyes from the low sun with his hand. She looked uneasy.

‘Irene’ he said.

He liked saying her first name –– but in the proper Spanish pronunciation. He remembered when he had first heard her name said in the English way - it had seemed so genteel, a name of the complacent middle classes. The way Dr Sable had said it took away all its sharpness - the muscular vowels and consonants of Spain.

This was typical of Sable. He made everything a joke. He seemed a symbol of the country middle classes, and Peter despised them – the landowners, the vicars, the doctors – for their lack of intelligence, their lack of courage. They would never take what they wanted, do what they wanted. Everything was so polite.

He said again: ‘Irene, we can stay here for a while. What are you worrying about?’

She picked grass and straw from her skirt and smoothed her hair. She thought she probably looked very untidy.  She thought they should move as quickly as they could, south or perhaps east. There were boats to Holland and Spain. It was a wild coast in the east, grey sea and miles of white sand. It was an easy place to hide. Soon the constabulary would be looking at ports, perhaps in towns with coach traffic.

Peter stood and looked around. There was a tiny lane over the hedge where they’d stopped, and in the hour or so while they had rested there had been no traffic, nothing. In the sun it was beautiful too. They could stop here, find a barn or a farmhouse – somewhere remote - and pay the farmer. No one would even know who they were. No one read newspapers out here.

Irene continued to pick straw from her dress and leaned back, her elbows high, to tie her hair back.

She was beautiful. He’d liked her from the start. He remembered once when he’d been talking to Dr Sable about geology and the doctor had made one of his stupid childish jokes. She had actually raised her eyebrow at him, Peter, in an ironic way – making fun of her own husband. From that moment they had been linked in their disdain of the country Doctor. There was much more to her than met the eye. Before she was married, she was Gonzalez. Irene Gonzalez! This had appealed to him – because she was originally Spanish – and because she wasn’t much older than him, but years younger than Dr Sable. He could never work out why she had married him.

‘Do you feel guilty?’ she asked squinting in the sun at him.

‘For what?’

‘Running away. For killing your brother. For disappointing your father?’

She smiled crookedly at him. She was making fun. But she thought he looked handsome and older than his years, an old hat pulled over his eyes. He was strong, so clever, so ruthless.

‘And you?’

‘What for?’

‘Stealing from your husband. You took everything he owned!’

She shook her head, and stuck her tongue out playfully, wrinkling her nose.

Then he turned to look at her more closely. She sometimes felt frightened by him because he was so intense. When he looked at her completely candidly, it was as if he were looking right through her. But she liked it too. She didn’t understand why.

‘And the other thing?’ he said slowly watching her reaction.

‘Helping you lift your stupid brother up onto the grave? I almost broke my back. And in that wind – in the storm! What a place to display a body’

‘But it had to be done like that, don’t you understand? For the inheritance’

Peter Bass looked over the hedge again into the lane. He thought: and after that your loving husband was going to be found on the grave too! Killed by the Cheadle Devil!

But he said nothing.

She nodded. They were together now. At least for a while.