Authors: Christopher Priest
In the meantime, I struggle unwillingly on. Covering the incident I was travelling to was
partly the consequence of another story I had filed several months earlier, about a group
of UFO enthusiasts. Since then Len Wickham, my supervising editor, had assigned me to any
story that involved witches’ covens, levitation, spontaneous combustion, crop circles, and
other fringe subjects. In most cases, I had already discovered, once you went into these
things properly there was generally not much to say about them, and remarkably few of the
stories I filed were ever printed. Even so, Wickham continued to send me off to cover them.
There was an extra twist this time. With some relish, Wickham informed me that someone
from the sect had phoned to ask if the
Chronicle
was planning to cover the story, and if so had asked for me in person. They had seen some
of my earlier articles, thought I showed the right degree of honest scepticism, and could
therefore be relied on for a forthright article. In spite of this, or perhaps because of
it, it seemed likely to prove yet another dud.
A Californian religious sect called the Rapturous Church of Christ Jesus had established a
community in a large country house in a Derbyshire village. One of the women members had
died of natural causes a few days earlier. Her GP was present, as was her daughter. As she
lay paralysed, on the point of death, a man had entered the room. He stood beside the bed
and made soothing gestures with his hands. The woman died soon after, and the man
immediately left the room without speaking to the other two. He was not seen afterwards.
He had been recognized by the woman's daughter, and by two members of the sect who had
come into the room while he was there, as the man who had founded the sect. This was
Father Patrick Franklin, and the sect had grown up around him because of his claimed
ability to bilocate.
The incident was newsworthy for two reasons. It was the first of Franklin's bilocations to
have been witnessed by non-members of the sect, one of whom happened to be a professional
woman with a local reputation. And the other reason was that Franklin's whereabouts on the
day in question could be firmly established: he was known to be an inmate of the
California State Penitentiary, and as Sonja had just confirmed to me on the phone he was
still there.
The community was established on the outskirts of the Peak District village of Caldlow,
once a centre of slate mining, now heavily dependent on day trippers. There was a National
Trust shop in the centre of the village, a pony trekking club, several gift shops and an
hotel. As I drove through, the chill rain was drizzling through the valley, obscuring the
rocky heights on each side.
I stopped in the village for a cup of tea, thinking I might talk to some of the locals
about the Rapturous Church, but apart from me the café was empty, and the woman who worked
behind the counter said she drove in daily from Chesterfield.
While I was sitting there, wondering whether to take the opportunity to grab some lunch
before going on, my brother unexpectedly made contact with me. The sensation was so
distinct, so urgent, that I turned my head in surprise, thinking for a moment that someone
in the room had addressed me. I closed my eyes, lowered my face, and listened for more.
No words. Nothing explicit. Nothing I could answer or write down or even put into words
for myself. But it amounted to anticipation, happiness, excitement, pleasure,
encouragement.
I tried to send back: what is this for? Why was I being welcomed? What are you encouraging
me to do? Is it something about this religious community?
I waited, knowing that these experiences never took the form of a dialogue, so that
raising questions would not receive any kind of answer, but I was hoping another signal
would come from him. I tried to reach out mentally to him, thinking perhaps his contact
with me was a way of getting me to communicate with him, but in this sense I could feel
nothing of him there.
My expression must have revealed something of my churned-up inner feelings, because the
woman behind the counter was staring at me curiously. I swallowed the rest of my tea,
returned the cup and saucer to the counter, smiled politely, then hurried out to the car.
As I sat down and slammed the door, a second message came from my brother. It was the same
as the first, a direct urging of me to arrive, to be there with him. It was still
impossible to put it into words.
The entrance to the Rapturous Church was a steep driveway slanting off the main road, but
barred by a pair of wrought-iron gates and a gatehouse. There was a second gate to one
side, also closed, marked Private. The two entrances formed an extra space, so I parked my
car there and walked across to the gatehouse. Inside the wooden porch a modern bell push
had been attached to the wall, and beneath this was a laser-printed notice:
RAPTUROUS CHURCH OF CHRIST JESUS WELCOMES YOU
NO VISITORS WITHOUT APPOINTMENT
FOR APPOINTMENTS RING CALDLOW 393960
TRADESMEN AND OTHERS PRESS BELL TWICE
JESUS LOVES YOU
I pressed the bell twice, without audible effect.
Some leaflets were standing in a semi-enclosed holder, and beneath them was a padlocked
metal box with a coin slot in the top, screwed firmly to the wall. I took one of the
leaflets, slipped a fifty-pence piece into the box, then went back to the car and rested
my backside against the nearside wing while I read it. The front page was a brief history
of the sect, and carried a photograph of Father Franklin. The remaining three pages had a
selection of Biblical quotes.
When I next looked towards the gates I discovered they were opening silently from some
remote command, so I climbed back into the car and took it up the sloping, gravelled
drive. This curved as it went up the hill, with a lawn rising in a shallow convex on one
side. Ornamental trees and shrubs had been planted at intervals, drooping in the veils of
misty rain. On the lower side were thick clumps of dark-leafed rhododendron bushes. In the
rear-view mirror I noticed the gates closing behind me as I drove out of sight of them.
The main house soon came into view: it was a huge and unattractive building of four or
five main storeys, with black slate roofs and solid-looking walls of sombre dark-brown
brick and stone. The windows were tall and narrow, and blankly reflected the rain-laden
sky. The place gave me a cold, grim feeling, yet even as I drove towards the part of the
drive made over as a car park I felt my brother's presence in me once again, urging me on.
I saw a Visitors this Way sign, and followed it along a gravel path against the main wall
of the house, dodging the drips from the thickly growing ivy. I pushed open a door and
went into a narrow hallway, one that smelt of ancient wood and dust, reminding me of the
Lower Corridor in the school I had been to. This building had the same institutional
feeling, but unlike my school was steeped in silence.
I saw a door marked Reception, and knocked. When there was no answer I put my head around
the door, but the room was empty. There were two old-looking metal desks, on one of which
was perched a computer.
Hearing footsteps I returned to the hallway, and a few moments later a thin middle-aged
woman appeared at the turn of the stairs. She was carrying several envelope wallet files.
Her feet made a loud sound on the uncarpeted wooden steps, and she looked enquiringly at
me when she saw me there.
“I'm looking for Mrs Holloway,” I said. “Are you she?”
“Yes, I am. How may I help you?”
There was no trace of the American accent I had half-expected.
“My name is Andrew Westley, and I'm from the
Chronicle
.” I showed her my press card, but she merely glanced at it. “I was wondering if I could
ask you a few questions about Father Franklin.”
“Father Franklin is in California at present.”
“So I believe, but there was the incident last week—”
“Which one do you mean?” said Mrs Holloway.
“I understand Father Franklin was seen here.”
She shook her head slowly. She was standing with her back to the door which led into her
office. “I think you must be making a mistake, Mr Westley.”
“Did you see Father Franklin when he was here?” I said.
“I did not. Nor was he here.” She was starting to stonewall me, which was the last thing I
had expected. “Have you been in touch with our Press Office?”
“Are they here?”
“We have an office in London. All press interviews are arranged through them.”
“I was told to come here.”
“By our Press Officer?”
“No… I understood a request was sent to the
Chronicle
, after Father Franklin made an appearance. Are you denying that that happened?”
“Do you mean the sending of the request? No one here has been in contact with your
newspaper. If you mean am I denying the appearance of Father Franklin, the answer is yes.”
We stared at each other. I was torn between irritation with her and frustration at myself.
Whenever incidents like this did not go smoothly, I blamed my lack of experience and
motivation. The other writers on the paper always seemed to know how to handle people like
Mrs Holloway.
“Can I see whoever is in charge here?” I said.
“I am the head of administration. Everyone else is involved with the teaching.”
I was about to give up, but I said, “Does my name mean anything at all to you?”
“Should it?”
“Someone requested me by name.”
“That would have come from the Press Office, not from here.”
“Hold on,” I said.
I walked back to the car to collect the notes I had been given by Wickham the day before.
Mrs Holloway was still standing by the bottom of the stairs when I returned, but she had
put down her bundle of files somewhere.
I stood beside her while I turned to the page Wickham had been sent. It was a fax message.
It said, “To Mr L. Wickham, Features Editor,
Chronicle
. The necessary written details you requested are as follows: Rapturous Church of Christ
Jesus, Caldlow, Derbyshire. Half a mile outside Caldlow village, to the north, on A623.
Parking at main gate, or in the grounds. Mrs Holloway, administrator, will provide your
reporter Mr Andrew Westley with information. K. Angier.”
“This is nothing to do with us,” Mrs Holloway said. “I'm sorry.”
“Who is K. Angier?” I said. “Mr? Mrs?”
“
She
is the resident of the private wing on the east side of this building, and has no
connection with the Church. Thank you.”
She had placed her hand on my elbow and was propelling me politely towards the door. She
indicated that the continuation of the gravel path would take me to a gate, where the
entrance to the private wing would be found.
I said, “I'm sorry if there's been a misunderstanding. I don't know how it happened.”
“If you want any more information about the Church, I'd be grateful if you'd speak to the
Press Office. That is its function, you know.”
“Yes, all right.” It was raining more heavily than before, and I had brought no coat. I
said, “May I ask you just one thing? Is everybody away at present?”
“No, we have full attendance. There are more than two hundred people in training this
week.”
“It feels as if the whole place is empty.”
“We are a group whose rapture is silent. I am the only person permitted to speak during
the hours of daylight. Good day to you.”
She retreated into the building, and closed the door behind her.
#############
I decided to refer back to the office, since it was clear the story I had been sent to
cover was no longer live. Standing under the dripping ivy, watching the heavy drizzle
drifting across the valley, I rang Len Wickham's direct line, full of foreboding. He
answered after a delay. I told him what had happened.
“Have you seen the informant yet?” he said. “Someone called Angier.”
“I'm right outside their place now,” I said, and explained what I understood was the setup
here. “I don't think it's a story. I'm thinking it might just be a dispute between
neighbours. You know, complaining about something or other.” But not about the noise, I
thought as soon as I had spoken.
There was a long silence.
Then Len Wickham said, “See the neighbour, and if there's anything in it, call me back. If
not, get back to London for this evening.”
“It's Friday,” I said. “I thought I'd visit my parents tonight.”
Wickham replied by putting down his receiver.
I was greeted at the main door of the wing by a woman in late middle age, whom I addressed
as “Mrs Angier”, but she merely took my name, looked intently at my press card, then
showed me into a side room and asked me to wait. The stately scale of the room, simply but
attractively furnished with Indian carpets, antique chairs and a polished table, made me
feel scruffy in my travel-creased and rain-dampened suit. After about five minutes the
woman returned, and uttered words that put a chill through me.
“Lady Katherine will see you now,” she said.
She led me upstairs to a large, pleasant living room that looked out across the valley
floor towards a high rocky escarpment, at present only dimly visible.
A young woman was standing by the open fireplace, where logs blazed and smoked, and she
held out her hand to greet me as I went across to her. I had been thrown off guard by the
unexpected news that I was visiting a member of the aristocracy, but her manner was
cordial. I was struck, and favourably so, by several features about her physical
appearance. She was tall, dark-haired and had a broad face with a strong jaw. Her hair was
arranged so that it softened the sharper lines of her face. Her eyes were wide. She had a
nervous intentness about her face, as if she were worried about what I might say or think.
She greeted me formally, but the moment the other woman had left the room her manner
changed. She introduced herself as Kate, not Katherine, Angier, and told me to disregard
the title as she rarely used it herself. She asked me to confirm if I was Andrew Westley.
I said that I was.
“I assume you've just been to the main part of the house?”
“The Rapturous Church? I hardly got past the door.”
“I think that was my fault. I warned them you might be coming, but Mrs Holloway wasn't too
pleased.”
“I suppose it was you who sent the message to my paper?”
“I wanted to meet you.”
“So I gathered. Why on earth should you know about me?”
“I plan to tell you. But I haven't had lunch yet. What about you?”
I told her I had stopped earlier in the village, but otherwise had not eaten since
breakfast. I followed her downstairs to the ground floor where the woman who had opened
the door to me, addressed by Lady Katherine as Mrs Makin, was preparing a simple lunch of
cold meats and cheeses, with salad. As we sat down, I asked Kate Angier why she had
brought me all the way up here from London, on what now seemed a wild-goose-chase.
“I don't think it's that,” she said.
“I have to file a story this evening.”
“Well, maybe that might be difficult. Do you eat meat, Mr Westley?”
She passed me the plate of cold cuts. While we ate, a polite conversation went on, in
which she asked me questions about the newspaper, my career, where I lived and so on. I
was still conscious of her title, and felt inhibited by this, but the longer we spoke the
easier it became. She had a tentative, almost nervous bearing, and she frequently looked
away from me and back again while I was speaking. I assumed this was not through apparent
lack of interest in what I was saying, but because it was her manner. I noticed, for
instance, that her hands trembled whenever she reached out for something on the table.
When I finally felt it was time to ask her about herself, she told me that the house we
were in had been in her family for more than three hundred years. Most of the land in the
valley belonged to the estate, and a number of farms were tenanted. Her father was an
earl, but he lived abroad. Her mother was dead, and her only other close relative, an
elder sister, was married and lived in Bristol with her husband and children.
The house had been a family home, with several servants, until the outbreak of the Second
World War. The Ministry of Defence had then requisitioned most of the building, using it
as regional headquarters for RAF Transport Command. At this point her family had moved
into the east wing, which anyway had always been the favoured part of the house. When the
RAF left after the war the house was taken over by Derbyshire County Council as offices,
and the present tenants (her phrase) arrived in 1980. She said her parents had been
worried at first by the prospect of an American religious sect moving in, because of what
you heard about some of them, but by this time the family needed the money and it had
worked out well. The Church kept its teaching quiet, the members were polite and charming
to meet, and these days neither she nor the villagers were concerned about what they might
or might not be up to.
As by this point in the conversation we had finished our meal, and Mrs Makin had brought
us some coffee, I said, “So I take it the story that brought me up here, about a
bilocating priest, was false?”
“Yes and no. The cult makes no secret of the fact it bases its teaching on the words of
its leader. Father Franklin is a stigmatic, and he's supposed to be able to bilocate, but
he's never been seen doing it by independent witnesses, or at least not under controlled
circumstances.”
“But was it true?”
“I'm really not sure. There was a local doctor involved this time, and for some reason she
said something to a tabloid newspaper, who ran a potted version of the story. I only heard
about it when I was in the village the other day. I can't see how it can have been true:
their leader's in prison in America, isn't he?”
“But if the incident really happened, that would make it more interesting.”
“It makes it more likely to be a fraud. How does Doctor Ellis know what this man looks
like, for instance? There's only the word of one of the members to go on.”
“You made it out to be a genuine story.”
“I told you I wanted to meet you. And the fact that the man goes in for bilocation was too
good to be true.”
She laughed in the way people do when they say something they expect others to find
amusing. I hadn't the faintest idea what she was talking about.
“Couldn't you have just telephoned the newspaper?” I said. “Or written a letter to me?”
“Yes I could… but I wasn't sure you were who I thought you were. I wanted to meet you
first.”
“I don't see why you thought a bilocating religious fanatic had anything to do with me.”
“It was just a coincidence. You know, the controversy about the illusion, and all that.”
Again, she looked at me expectantly.
“Who did you think I was?”
“The son of Clive Borden. Isn't that right?”
She tried to hold my gaze but her eyes, irresistibly, turned away again. Her nervous,
evasive manner put tension between us, when nothing else was happening to create it.
Remains of lunch lay on the table between us.
“A man called Clive Borden was my natural father,” I said. “But I was adopted when I was
three.”
“Well then. I was right about you. We met once before, many years ago, when we were both
children. Your name was Nicky then.”
“I don't remember,” I said. “I would have been only a toddler. Where did this meeting take
place?”
“Here, in this house. You really don't remember it?”
“Not at all.”
“Do you have any other memories from when you were that age?” she said.
“Only fragments. But none about this place. It's the sort of house that would make an
impression on a child, isn't it?”
“All right. You're not the first to say that. My sister… she hates this house, and
couldn't wait to move away.” She reached behind her, where a small bell rested on a
counter, and dinged it twice. “I usually take a drink after lunch. Would you care to join
me?”
“Yes, thank you.”
Mrs Makin soon appeared, and Lady Katherine stood up.
“Mr Westley and I will be in the drawing room this afternoon, Mrs Makin.”
As we went up the broad staircase I felt an impulse to escape from her, to get away from
this house. She knew more about me than I knew myself, but it was knowledge of a part of
my life in which I had no interest. This was obviously a day when I had to become a Borden
again, whether or not I wished to do so. First there was the book by him, now this. It was
all connected, but I felt her intrigues were not mine. Why should I care about the man,
the family, who had turned their back on me?
She led me into the room where I had first met her, and closed the door decisively behind
us. It was almost as if she had felt my wish to escape, and wanted to detain me as long as
she could. A silver tray with a number of bottles, glasses and a bucket of ice had been
placed on a low table set between a number of easy chairs and a long settee. One of the
glasses already held a large drink, presumably prepared by Mrs Makin. Kate indicated I
should take a seat, then said, “What would you like?”
Actually I would have liked a glass of beer, but the tray bore only spirits. I said, “I'll
have whatever you're drinking.”
“It's American rye with soda. Do you want that too?”
I said I did, and watched as she mixed it. When she sat down on the settee she tucked her
legs under her, then drank about half the glass of whiskey straight down.
“How long can you stay?” she said.
“Maybe just this drink.”
“There's a lot I want to talk to you about. And a lot I want to ask you.”
“Why?”
“Because of what happened when we were children.”
“I don't think I'm going to be much help to you,” I said. Now that she wasn't twitching
around so much, I was beginning to see her more objectively as a not unattractive woman of
roughly my own age. She obviously liked drinking, and was used to the effect of it. That
alone made me feel I was on familiar territory; I spent most weekends drinking with my
friends. Her eyes continued to disconcert me, though, for she was always looking at me,
then away, then back, making me feel someone was behind me, moving about the room where I
could not see them.
“A one-word answer to a question might save a lot of time,” she said.
“All right.”
“Do you have an identical twin brother? Or did you have one who died when you were very
young?”
I could not help my startled reaction. I put down my glass, before I spilled any more, and
mopped at the liquid that had splashed on to my legs.
“Why do you ask that?” I said.
“Do you? Did you?”
“I don't know. I think I did, but I've never been able to find him. I mean… I'm not sure.”
“I think you've given me the answer I was expecting,” she said. “But not the one I was
hoping for.”
#############
I said, “If this is something to do with the Borden family, I might as well tell you that
I know nothing about them. Do you realize that?”
“Yes, but you
are
a Borden.”
“I was, but it doesn't mean anything to me.” I suddenly had a glimpse of this young
woman's family, stretching back more than three hundred years in an unbroken sequence of
generations: same name, same house, same everything. My own family roots went back to the
age of three. “I don't think you can appreciate what being adopted means. I was just a
little boy, a toddler, and my father dumped me out of his life. If I spent the rest of my
own life grieving about that, I'd have time for nothing else. Long ago, I sealed it off
because I had to. I've a new family now.”
“Your brother is still a Borden, though.”
Whenever she mentioned my brother I felt a pang of guilt, concern and curiosity. It was as
if she used him as a way of getting under my defences. All my life the existence of my
brother had been my secret certainty, a part of myself that I kept completely private. Yet
here was this stranger speaking of him as if she knew him.
“Why are you interested in this?” I said.
“When you first heard of me, saw my name, did it mean anything to you?”
“No.”
“Have you ever heard of Rupert Angier?”
“No.”
“Or The Great Danton, the illusionist?”
“No. My only interest in my former family is that through them I might one day be able to
trace my twin brother.”
She had been sipping quickly at her glass of whiskey while we spoke, and now it was empty.
She leant forward to mix another drink, and tried to pour more into my glass. Knowing I
was going to have to drive later, I pulled my glass back before she could completely fill
it.
She said, “I think the fate of your brother is connected with something that happened
about a hundred years ago. One of my ancestors, Rupert Angier. You say you've never heard
of him, and there's no reason why you should, but he was a stage magician at the end of
the last century. He worked as The Great Danton, because in those days all the magicians
used grandiose stage names. He was the victim of a series of vicious attacks by a man
called Alfred Borden, your great-grandfather, who was also an illusionist. You say you
know nothing about this?”
“Only the book. I assume you sent it.”
She nodded. “They had this feud going, and it went on for years. They were constantly
attacking each other, usually by interfering with the other one's stage show. The story of
the feud is in Borden's book. At least, his side of it is. Have you read it yet?”
“It only arrived in the post this morning. I haven't had much of a chance—”
“I thought you would be fascinated to know what had happened.”
I was thinking, again: why go on about the Bordens? They are too far back, I know too
little about them. She was talking about something that was of interest to her, not to me.
I felt I should be polite to her, listen to what she was saying, but what she could never
know was the resistance that lay deep inside me, the unconscious defence mechanism a kid
builds up for himself when he has been rejected. To adapt to my new family I had had to
throw off everything I knew of the old. How many times would I have to say that to her to
convince her of it?
Saying she wanted to show me something, she put down her glass and crossed the room to a
desk placed against the wall just behind where I was sitting. As she stooped to reach into
a lower drawer her dress sagged forward at the neck, and I stole a glimpse: a thin white
strap, part of a lacy bra cup, the upper curve of the breast nestling inside. She had to
reach into the drawer, and this made her turn around so she could stretch her arm, and I
saw the slender curves of her back, her straps again becoming discernible through the thin
material of her dress, then her hair falling forward about her face. She was trying to
involve me in something I knew nothing about, but instead I was crudely sizing her up,
thinking idly about what it might be like to have sex with her. Sex with an honourable
lady; it was the sort of semi-funny joke the journalists in the office would make. For
better or worse that was my own life, more interesting and problematical to me than all
this stuff about ancient magicians. She had asked me where in London I lived, not who in
London I lived with, so I had said nothing to her of Zelda. Exquisite and maddening Zelda,
with the cropped hair and nose-ring, the studded boots and dream body, who three nights
before had told me she wanted an open relationship and walked out on me at half past
eleven at night, taking a lot of my books and most of my records. I hadn't seen her since
and was beginning to worry, even though she had done something like that before. I wanted
to ask this honourable lady about Zelda, not because I was interested in what she might
say, but because Zelda is real to me. How do you think I might get Zelda back? Or, how do
I ease myself out of the newspaper job without appearing to reject my father? Or, where am
I going to live if Zelda moves out on me, because it is Zelda's parents’ flat? What am I
going to survive on if I don't have a job? And if my brother's real, where is he and how
do I find him?