'What is it?' asked Farther.

Monro was jumping up again, sniffing the air. Father Bernard popped the latch on the wire mesh door and it swung open and something landed at his feet. Monro leapt upon it immediately and took a chunk out of it before it slithered out of his jaws.

'b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l,' Farther said and backed away, taking me with him.

Father Bernard grabbed Monro's collar and hauled him off.

'Let's go,' he said and we made our way quickly back through the trees, almost running by the time we got to the field above Moorings.

Back on the lane, we walked three abreast, Farther's boots squelching with mud. Monro padded along just ahead. No one spoke. Each of us was thinking how we might explain what we'd seen in the wood. We'd tell them that there was no man hanging there. It was a joke. There was nothing to worry about.

There was nothing else we could say, because it had been agreed instantly and silently between the three of us at the moment it had fallen from Jesus' chest and onto the ground that we would tell no one about the pig's heart stuck through with nails.

Chapter Fourteen.

Everyone was waiting in the hallway, and as soon as we got through the door, they all broke off from their conversations and moved towards Father Bernard. What had happened? Had someone really hanged themselves? Should they fetch the police? Father Bernard sent Monro off to the kitchen, closed the door behind him and waved his hands to quieten everyone down.

'It was nothing,' he said. 'Someone's strung up an old blanket for a joke, that's all.'

Farther nodded in a.s.sent and took off his coat.

'There, Joan, you see. It'll just be kids from the village messing about,' said Mrs Belderboss, patting Miss Bunce on the shoulder.

She was still sitting at the foot of the stairs, biting the edges of her fingernails, puffy eyed and cross with herself for being hysterical in front of everyone.

Mr Belderboss clicked his fingers. 'That's probably what we heard the other night,' he said. 'The noises.'

'Aye, well, there you go,' Father Bernard replied.

'Honestly, some people have got nothing better to do,' said Mrs Belderboss.

'Not round here, they haven't,' said Miss Bunce, directing her resentment at Mummer.

Mummer's face began to open with indignation and before anything could flare up Father Bernard took her by the shoulders and steered her away.

'In my room there is a bottle of brandy on the dresser. Would you be so kind as to go and fetch it for me?' he said.

'Brandy, Father? It's Lent,' said Mummer.

'I brought it for Monro. The cold plays havoc with his chest. I thought a drop of it might do Miss Bunce some good,' he said. 'For the shock.'

Mummer folded her arms and rolled her eyes.

'She's been sat there for half an hour, Father. I should think the shock will have subsided by now.'

Father Bernard gave her a straight look. 'Even so.'

'Will you need to call the police, Father?' said Mr Belderboss.

Father Bernard looked at Mummer for a moment and then shook his head.

'To be honest, I can't see them taking it too seriously.'

'Well, I'm not staying here, Father,' said Miss Bunce.

'Oh, will you talk some sense into her,' said Mrs Belderboss to Father Bernard. 'She's sent poor David upstairs to pack her bags for her.'

'I don't care,' said Miss Bunce. 'This is an awful place. I said we ought to have gone to Glasfynydd.'

'But how will you get home, dear?' Mrs Belderboss said, sitting down next to her and taking her hand.

Miss Bunce looked up at Father Bernard.

'I was going to ask Father if he'd drive us to Little Hagby,' she said. 'We'll be able to phone for a taxi to take us to the station in Lancaster.'

'Oh, for pity's sake, Joan. You can't expect Father to go out now,' said Mummer. 'It's gone nine. You'll have missed any trains to London.'

Miss Bunce squared her face.

'There are rooms at the pub,' she said. 'We can stay there overnight and get a train in the morning.'

'Don't be ridiculous,' said Mummer.

'Mrs Smith,' Father Bernard said abruptly. Then, calming his voice, 'Would you please go and have a look for that brandy?'

'Go on, Esther,' said Farther.

Mummer looked at Miss Bunce a second longer and then went off along the hallway. Everyone turned to Father Bernard. He regarded Miss Bunce and then took off his coat and hung it up on the rack by the door. He rubbed his eyes, kneading them with the heels of his palms.

'Miss Bunce,' he said, sitting down on the chair next to the grandfather clock. 'I know you've had a fright, but I should try and forget about what you've seen in the woods and make the most of the time we have here.'

Mummer came back with a gla.s.s tumbler of brandy and handed it to Father Bernard, who in turn pa.s.sed it to Miss Bunce.

'I don't want it, Father.'

'Just take a sip and you'll feel better.'

Miss Bunce wetted her lips with the brandy and screwed up her face.

'You may not agree at the moment,' said Father Bernard, taking the gla.s.s from her as she held it out. 'But, given what I know of your commitment to your faith, I think that in the cold light of day you would regret it very much if you went home so soon.'

'Father's right,' said Mrs Belderboss. 'We haven't been to the shrine yet. You wouldn't want to miss that.'

Miss Bunce nodded and wiped her eyes. David came down the stairs, alternately banging Miss Bunce's suitcase against the wall and the banisters.

'Are you ready, Joan?' he said.

'False alarm,' said Mrs Belderboss and David hesitated for a moment, looked at Miss Bunce and then went back upstairs.

When everyone had dispersed, I went up to check on Hanny. He was sound asleep, an arm lolling out of the bed towards his soldiers, the stuffed rats and the envelope of money. He'd taken it out from under my pillow and rifled through the contents. There were bank notes all over the floor. I collected everything together and hid the money under the mattress so that Hanny wouldn't find it again before we had to take it back.

In his other hand were the p.o.r.nographic pictures Billy Tapper had given me. I took them off him and screwed them into a ball. They needed to go on the fire whenever the opportunity arose. Why we'd kept them, I didn't know, and what Mummer would have done had she found him with them, I couldn't imagine. Though I'd have naturally got the blame and branded a deviant like poor Henry McCullough who had been caught in mid strike as he lay on his bed with his mother's underwear catalogues.

It had been around that time that a boy called Paul Peavey joined us as an altar server. He was younger than Henry and I, thin and pale, small for his age and keen as mustard to please Father Wilfred. He was the type that, given a different time and place, would have joined the Hitler Youth like a shot or been on the front row at a public hanging. His father was a regular fixture at the bar of the church Social Centre, where I helped collect the gla.s.ses on a Friday night. One of those loud individuals whose thinking is done for them by the tabloids. With him it was usually something about immigrants, or the unemployed or the Labour Party, or the nefarious connection between all three.

One Sunday after our ca.s.socks had been inspected for dirt and creases and stowed in the vestry wardrobe, Father Wilfred went into his little office next door and came back with two pairs of gardening gloves. One for me and one for Paul. Henry held out his hands for his pair of gloves but Father Wilfred told him to sit down and guided Paul and I to the vestry door with instructions to go the end of the graveyard and pick as many nettles as we could carry.

Not daring to question Father Wilfred, we duly hurried out, found a clump of nettles by the large Victorian vaults and came back with fistfuls of the things, which, despite the gloves, had still managed to sting our arms.

Henry looked up at us, his eyes widening when he saw what we'd brought back, knowing that they were destined for him in some way, his mind racing with terrible possibilities.

'Sit down,' Father Wilfred said to us and we did so, trying not to let the nettles sting us anymore.

Henry started to ask us what was going on, but then jumped back into a rigid shape when Father Wilfred slammed the door to the vestry. For a few moments, Father Wilfred stood against the wall looking at us, prolonging Henry's unease.

'I have a question for you, boys,' he said at last, setting off on his routine of pacing back and forth across the stone flags, patting his Bible. 'Come the Day of Judgement, who is to be cast down the deepest?'

Paul immediately raised his hand.

'Heathens?' he said.

'No,' said Father Wilfred. 'Even lower than the heathens.'

'Protestants?' said Paul.

Father Wilfred stopped walking abruptly and stood in front of Henry.

'What do you think, McCullough?'

Henry looked up at him nervously.

'Murderers, Father?'

Father Wilfred shook his head.

'No, McCullough,' he said. 'The people I am talking about will look on with envy at the punishments of murderers.'

'Fornicators,' Paul said suddenly.

'Close, Peavey. Onanists,' said Father Wilfred.

Henry looked down at his feet.

'Wicked little fellows who have too much time on their hands,' he said. 'McCullough, your mother tells me that you are an onanist.'

'No, Father.'

'She tells me that you keep vile magazines in your room.'

'I don't, Father. They're hers.'

'Are you calling your mother a liar?'

Henry said nothing.

'Fifth Commandment, Peavey.'

'Honour thy father and thy mother,' said Paul, watching Henry expectantly.

Father Wilfred put down his Bible on the table. 'I'll ask you again, McCullough. Is your mother a liar?'

'No, Father.'

'Then what she tells me is true?'

Henry put his head in his hands and Father Wilfred curled his top lip as though he had smelled something unpleasant.

'Sinful boy,' he said. 'I didn't have time for that kind of behaviour when I was your age. I was too busy begging for the sc.r.a.ps the butcher's dog wouldn't even eat to feed my family and the family next door. Think of The Poor next time you're tempted; they don't have idle hands, lad. They're either working or praying for work.'

'I'm sorry, Father,' Henry sobbed.

Father Wilfred continued to glare at Henry, but held out his hands towards me and Paul, and after a moment where we looked at one another uncertainly, we pa.s.sed him the nettles, which he took from us without flinching.

'Hands,' he said to Henry.

'What?'

'Give me your hands.'

Henry held out his hands and Father Wilfred put the nettles into his open palms.

'Squeeze them,' he said.

'Please, Father,' Henry said. 'I won't do it again.'

'Squeeze them, McCullough.'

Henry gently closed his hands and Father Wilfred suddenly clamped them tight. Henry cried out, but Father Wilfred only crushed them harder until green juice seeped out from between his fingers and ran down his arms.