Crybbe (AKA Curfew) (98 page)

Joe Powys came out of the passage into the night, into a blinding light
and the face of Edgar Humble.

   
He didn't have to force the
fear.

   
'Hold it. Don't move.'

   
Powys half out of the hole in
the side of the Tump, the wooden box in his arms, Arnold at his ankles.

   
Humble's eyes were fully open,
his lips apart.

   
'You're dead,' Powys said from
a throat full of hairline cracks.

   
'Course he's fucking dead,'
Gomer Parry said, leaning out of his cab. 'Sorry, Minnie.'

   
Humble lay across the jaw of
the digger, quite stiff now, one arm still flung out and his crossbow on his
chest. The big shovel was almost blocking the entrance to the passage.

   
Minnie Seagrove wasn't looking.

   
Gomer said, 'What you got
there, then, Joe?'

   
'Buried Treasure,' said Powys.
is that thing safe?'

   
'Gimme a second.' Gomer raised
the shovel so Powys could climb out from underneath it.

   
'Right, then.' The little man climbed
out of his cab, rubbing his hands on his overalls. 'We got a bit o' talkin' to
do yere, Joe. First off, you finished in there? Got what you want?'

   
'I think so.'

   
'Safe to block 'im up again,
then.'
   
'Don't see why not.'
   
'Good. Mind out, then.'

   
He climbed back into his cab,
cigarette end waggling, lowered the shovel, started to tip Humble's body over
the entrance of the hole.

   
'What the hell are you doing,
Gomer?'

   
Minnie Seagrove turned away as
Humble's remains tumbled into the soil and rock.

   
'Nicked that box, did you?'
Gomer shouted.

   
'What?'

   
'Treasure trove, that, boy. I
won't say nothin' if you don't.'

   
'I had to tell him, Joe,'
Minnie Seagrove said. 'I said, I'll go to the police and admit everything. And
you'll speak up for me, won't you, Joe? You're a famous writer, that'll count
for quite a lot. But he wouldn't hear of it.'

   
'Bollocks,' said Gomer. 'Could
be centuries before they finds 'im, if ever. And if they does turn 'im up, 'ow
could it possibly have anythin' at all to do with a sweet little old lady?
Sorry, Minnie, I didn't mean old . . .'

   
The more Powys thought about it,
the less difficult it became to fault.

   
'You can't leave him near the
entrance.'

   
I shall drag 'im in just as far
as 'e'll go, then I'll fill this 'ole up and pack 'im tight, see, and pile up
them stones, so it looks like the wall collapsed on it, like.'

   
'I can't stop to help you,
Gomer, I'm sorry. I've got to go somewhere and I don't think there's much
time.'

   
'No problem. I'll take Minnie
'ome.'

   
'And could you do me another
favour - take Arnold, too.'

   
'I'll take him,' Mrs Seagrove
said.

   
'I'll come back for him.'
   
I hope.
   
Or Fay will.

   
'Thanks, Arnie,' said Powys,
pulling the box down and sinking his hands into Arnold's fur, rubbing his face
at the dog's encouragingly cold nose.

   
Arnold licked him once.

   
'And thank Henry for me,' Powys
said, 'if you see him around.'

   
He picked up the box. It was
quite heavy but not too unwieldy. He balanced the lamp on top. 'You're sure
this is going to be all right? I have the awful feeling it'll look like a excavation
site.'

   
'Joe,' said Gomer patiently,
'this yere is Gomer Parry Plant Hire you're dealin' with. I already got the
reputation of havin' fucked up once on this site - sorry, Minnie - and I'm not gonner
risk 'avin' myself pulled in by that Wiley if I can 'elp it, am I?'

   
Gomer lit another cigarette,
lowered his voice. 'Wynford Wiley,' he said. 'Wouldn't give 'im the
satisfaction. Fat bastard.'

   
Powys nodded. 'Minnie. I . . .'

   
'She never did nothin',' Gomer
Parry said gruffly. 'So you got nothin' to thank 'er for, is it? Bugger off.
Good luck.'

CHAPTER XVIII

If anything, it was stronger now. She thought she'd get used to it, like
when you were staying on a farm during the manure-spreading season, but this
wasn't manure and it was getting stronger.

   
In it there was human waste and
animal waste, raw meat, blood perhaps, body odours, rancid fats . . . and now
smoke.
   
Woodsmoke? Maybe.

   
Or was it the church? Could she
smell the fire in the church because the church was on the line linking the
centre of the square with the Court and the Tump?

   
Joe Powys would know. Or he
wouldn't. Either way, it would be good to have him here. Not such a world-class
crank after all, not when you listened to this bunch.

   
Fay walked among them, the
night still alive with natural radio.

   
'He'll come back.' Graham
Jarrett.
   
'What if he doesn't?' Hilary Ivory.

   
'I tried walking.' One of the
lawyers, in tones of defeat. 'I kept on walking, looking for a light. I kept
walking, and I just felt like I was fading out . . . fading away. Losing my
physical resistance to the air, becoming absorbed in the atmosphere. I mean, it
was very soporific, in a way. I think it'd be good to die like that. But not
yet. I got scared. I thought, I've got to go back. And when I thought that, I
was back. Like I hadn't been anywhere.'

   
'There's nowhere to go.' Oona
Jopson. 'Accept it. Relish it. It's not likely to happen to you again.'

   
'Good.'

   
'Or maybe it will. Maybe we're
being opened up to a permanent kind of cosmic consciousness, you know?'

   
She wondered what was happening
outside the square. Was the church alight? Was Jimmy Preece alive? And what
about Warren? Were the Crybbe people attending the meeting still inside the
town hall? And what of their relatives in the town - had they any idea what was
happening? Perhaps it had happened before, the town square sealing itself off
in the past - a past which was always close to the surface of this town.

   
Not for the first time tonight,
Fay genuinely wondered if this was some long and tortured dream. And, if it was
not a dream, whether, when (if) it was over, it would have no more significance
than if it had been.

   
Somebody was coughing very
weakly, a thin scraping sound.
   
'Where's Colonel Croston?'
   
'I'm here. Who's that.'

   
'It's Dan Osborne, Colonel, I'm
a homeopathic practitioner, but I have a medical qualification. There's a woman
here in a bad way. Over here, just come towards my voice. I'm bending across
her, you won't walk into her.'

   
'OK, I'm on my way. Do you know
who she is?'

   
'She's wearing what feels like
a silk blouse and . . . a fairly light skirt. She's got. . . thick hair, quite
long I suppose.'

   
Guy said, 'is she wearing a
thickish sort of necklace thing?'

   
'A torque, I think. Dear God, what's
this . . . ?'

   
'Jocasta! What's happened?
Where are you?'

   
'She's . . . The bloody torque's
been twisted into her neck. Please, Christ, just hold still . . .'

   
'OK, Mr Osborne, I'm here. Is
she OK?'

   
'I don't know. She didn't
bloody well do this to herself, did she? Somebody's tried to garrote her with
her own .. .'

   
'OH GOD! GET ME OUT OF THIS!'
The woman from the crafts shop hurling herself about the Crybbe vacuum bouncing
off people. Somebody had to crack up, sooner or later.

   
Have one for me. Fay thought.

Col Croston sat down on the cobbles, cross-legged, and looked hard at the
darkness. Held his own hand up in front of his face from six inches. He could
see it. Just. Could tell it was a hand or was that because he knew it was a
hand?

   
The woman would live. Her
throat would be a mess, but she'd be OK. She'd tried to speak. 'Who did this?' he
asked, but if she'd identified her attacker he hadn't been able to make out the
name. Wouldn't be much use anyway; how could you go after anyone without light?

   
I am here, Col said silently,
letting his eyes half-closed. I can sense myself. I can sense my toes (flexing
them and then letting them relax), my calves (trying to tighten the muscles in
his leg and letting them relax), my thighs . . . my stomach . . .

   
An exercise.

   
As a soldier (all his family
were soldiers), Col had gravitated to the SAS not because of a need for action
and physical stress but because he wanted to
feel
life and for that, he'd decided one needed to be out on the
edge of something, always within sight of the abyss.

   
Rather thought he'd got over
that stage now.
   
. . . chest (tighten, breath in, hold
it . . . relax . . .
   
. . .shoulders . . .

   
Mind control. Expansion of the
senses. Spent two weeks with a meditation expert learning techniques for
dominating the body in tight spots. Optional course for officers; some of the chaps
thought it was all crap. Not Col. He'd actually taken it further, after the
course.

   
. . . neck . . . face (tensing
the muscles in his cheeks and jaw, letting the tension go). . .

   
At the end of this exercise -
he'd done it many times over the past twenty or thirty years - there should be
a moment of pure awareness. Awareness of oneself and one's situation. And sometimes
. . .

   
. . . back of the head . . .

   
. . . one emerged from it and
everything looked clearer.
And one knew precisely what to do next. Probably elements of yoga and
meditation in there, so it was never wise to tell some of the chaps one was
indulging in this sort of thing, or they'd be putting it round the Colonel
talked to plants and things. Not a word to these New Age characters either, or
they'd be recruiting him as an emblem.

   
Gradually, his breathing slowed
and the voices around him in the void began to fade.
   
'Warm night, isn't it?'
   
'Hmm?'

   
'Stuffy. Humid.'
   
'Yes, it is really.'

   
Old chap in a T-shirt sitting in
a doorway a few yards away.
   
'Colonel Croston, isn't it?'
   
'Col. Hey, just a minute . . .'

   
He could see this chap. It was
still dark, but he could see him, could see his white beard and what it said on
the front of his T-shirt. Didn't make any sense, half-faded, but he could . .
.

   
'It's Canon Peters, isn't it?
Seen you in the Cock.'
   
'Alex.'

   
Col turned around to look at
the square. He could see the shapes of buildings, very dimly; he could hear the
sound of people talking and possibly screaming although there was nothing
immediate about this, no involvement; more like the sound of someone's TV set
from a distance.

   
'Heard you talking to my
daughter,' the old man said 'Young Fay.'

   
'Fay Morrison. Yes. I was. But
you weren't . . . with us were you? You weren't in . . . in . . . Look, Canon,
can you help me to understand this? When you heard us talking, could you, you
know,
see
us?'

   
'No.'

   
Col sighed. 'Thought not. Started
out thinking it was some sort of gas. Some leakage from somewhere. Or an MOD
experiment, just the kind of place they'd choose. And now I'm inclined to think
it's something psychological coming out. Some mass-psychosis thing. I can't
begin to ... I mean, what your daughter had to say was interesting in a purely
academic sense but not . . . Frankly, I'm lost, Canon. Where does one start . .
. ?'