Ritual Read online

Hanlin smiled. Honey flickered over the eyes, sugaring the anger.

  ‘Do forgive me, Reverend, I’m so sorry, It’s just that I was Dian’s uncle. Was. Her mother’s my eldest sister...’

  The Reverend decided to believe him whether it was true or not. Anything to get rid of him.

  ‘My dear boy, I am so sorry. But why did you not say so before. It would have prevented our accumulative misunderstandings!’

  ‘Yes, I should have. But I’m still a little tense about it all...’

  ‘Well, we buried her here, actually. Well, not specifically here. In the graveyard, of course! Nice service, very spiritual. Though I say so myself!’

  After further diversions, the Reverend explained where the oak tree was. With an elaborate ‘thank you’, clutching his briefcase, David left the church a second time. He vaulted the churchyard wall and headed for the woods.

  *

  Mr. Spark listened to the feet moving in the loft above his shop. It was two o’clock. Three and a half hours since the funeral.

  My wife’s so silly. She just won’t relax. Oh, no, we have to have the dramatics! Fancy holding a literary meeting on the day of your daughter’s funeral. I suppose all the regulars will come. I don’t get it! I never do. My poor little girl. My wife, she says, our Dian died three days ago and the funeral meant nothing. Perhaps she’s right. I know she don’t hold with church, but I wish she had more respect. Anna wouldn’t even come. At least she could have done that. What’s the matter with her? She never listens to me. Never talks to me. Always to her mother. Never to me...

  Mr. and Mrs. Rowbottom entered, so he pushed his thoughts well into his trouser tops. Mrs. Rowbottom spoke for both.

  ‘Is Mrs. Spark upstairs, please? She told us during the service she wanted us all to come round for a reading. We thought it a bit odd, but...’

  ‘Yes, she’s upstairs. Two or three have gathered upstairs already. That’s the shoe-galumphing you can hear!’

  ‘Is it just an ordinary meeting, or...?’

  ‘I think she just wants to take her mind off—well, you know what I mean...’

  The Rowbottoms knew perfectly what he meant. Rowbottom’s eyes licked behind his white lids. He used his eyelids as tongues to moisten his parched eyes. There was something of the lizard about him. A hint of green under the skin and the uncomfortable way his head was wedged into his shoulders.

  As Mr. Spark watched him he felt disgust curve through his body. He did not trust Rowbottom. The feeling was mutual. Spark considered whether to refuse them admittance. Only momentarily. He realised they might calm his wife, so he indicated the stairs, leading to the loft where the meetings were held. They mounted the stairs. Mr. Spark returned to polishing the sweet jars.

  When they reached the landing, the Rowbottoms exchanged smiles. Rowbottom knocked on the loft door and entered. Mrs. Rowbottom followed. The loft had a low thickly-beamed ceiling. Everything was white except the burnt beams. Two latticed windows opened onto the street. In the centre of the long room there was a polished oak table, piled with manuscripts and leather volumes. Quietly two grey candles smoked in a lance of sunlight. Mrs. Spark was serving early afternoon tea to her visitors who sat symmetrically round the table. The Rowbottoms assumed their seats in silence. Rowbottom faced the epicurean, Lawrence Cready. Mrs. Rowbottom smiled at James. William faced Tom, the third labourer. Only the chairs at the head and foot of the table were unoccupied.

  Mrs. Spark continued to serve tea. Suddenly Lawrence Cready reached over and lifted a small volume from the mountain of books. Everyone tensed. Waiting. Water shadows seemed to lap the ingle-nooks and the corners of the ceiling. Tallow embroidered the candelabra. Cready opened his volume at a selected place and chanted the opening verse of Keats’ ‘La Belle Dame Sans Mercie’. This was orchestrated by the asthmatic breathing of William. Mrs. Rowbottom impatiently scratched her spoon on the bottom of her cup, digging for sugar. She removed the spoon from the cup and then proceeded to scrunch it between her false teeth.

  ‘... alone and palely loitering...’

  James began to giggle. William followed suit. Cready was unimpressed, and continued the recital.

  Mrs. Spark set the silver tray on the sideboard and sat at the foot of the table. Amid guffaws, Cready completed the poem, unimpressed by the intellectual reception. The listeners were nervous and he knew it. After all, they’re part of any country experiment, he thought. They are the explosive element in the orchards and cornfields. They stimulate me. And he closed the book. They are the bread and I am the yeast!

  In the cool room, twelve eyes focused on Mrs. Spark. Her midnight emeralds answered them.

  ‘Will he come do you think? To make the round? Will he?’

  Fourteen eyes stared at the empty owl-headed chair at the top of the table.

  Lawrence Cready dribbled softly out of the righthand corner of his mouth, retrieved the dribble with a beige-coloured tongue and murmured; ‘He wouldn’t miss it for words. Oh, he wouldn’t miss it!’

  *

  David Hanlin walked casually towards the woods, noting a telephone booth three hundred yards to his left. He stopped by it.

  Half running, Squire Fenn abruptly came out of the woods. He flickered an eye over the stranger and ran on. David walked out and intercepted him.

  ‘Sorry to bother you, sir, but could you tell me if I’m going the right way for the famous giant oak? You know, where the little girl had the accident...’

  Obviously, the Squire was in a hurry and unwilling to be specific. He swung his arm in a 45-degree arc.

  ‘Over there! Just keep going. You can’t miss it. There’s only forty thousand oak trees between you and it!’

  The Squire jogged into the village. David was pleased that the settlers were being so co-operative. Almost as helpful as the Indians. He left the road and felt excited as his feet passed from tarmac to scorched grass on the edge of the wood. Once under the trees he knew his eyes would be safe from the sun. He ran into the feather-green shadows and listened with his hands and his feet. Deep down. Listened. Remembered childhood. The past leap-frogged into his eyes.

  His brother, younger than him, died in an airplane crash. And they would hunt one another in woods like these.

  Blackberries and strawberries uncoiled under his feet like electric springs. He felt the earth pulling him down. Deeper than slugs and snails, he was being drawn into the whirlpool of summer. Inside his city fingers there was the damp scent of last year’s pinecones and bluebells. Boyhood bluebells plucked so they scream as they’re snapped from the earth. Boyhood.

  He found he had gathered a bunch of honeysuckle. Wet, it clung to his hands. With one hand he removed his sun glasses. His mauve eyes rested in the cool. It was luscious. Too luscious. Unreal. But he had come to these woods for a purpose.

  My brother, funny kid! We’d take our bows and arrows to the woods. Without Mum knowing, of course! And we’d hunt one another! Arrows; any old straight piece of wood with bits of white cardboard to flight them and dart heads screwed onto the ends to make them lethal. And, by God, they were lethal!

  Unconsciously he stopped and rolled up his right trouser leg. He rubbed the white-faced scar on the calf. His fore-finger carefully searched out the creamy surface. The tissue was like the underside of a baby’s wrist. It was about three inches long, surrounded by black tufted hair. Boyhood pain. The kind of pain that snags the memory on day-dream afternoons when it is least expected.

  I was running. Really running. We’d been hunting one another for over two hours. I’d lost sight of you. And you were the better hunter. It was so quiet that the silence hurt. Suddenly my nerve snapped. I broke into the clearing, winging an arrow behind me. And then I ran. And I mean ran. Then out of the green came the quick pain. Worse than when I dipped my hand in Mum’s toffee and burnt my mouth. Far worse. Stupidly I stopped and announced to the grinning trees; ‘You’ve bloody shot me!’ And you had. I looked down as my lunch churned towards my throat. An arrow was stickin
g into my calf. An inch and a quarter in. The dart-head was talking to the bone. And your worried little face followed by you in short trousers appeared. ‘I’ve bloody shot you!’ you said. You were always profound, weren’t you? Twenty years ago. And there aren’t any woods there now. A lovely crematorium. Why remember? You’ve seen worse than that.

  He flicked his hand lightly over the bald spot on the top of his scalp. A bullet scar.

  It’s remarkable I’ve avoided plastic surgery so long. Then there’s the knife scar on my left eyelid. Hardly noticeable now. They’re recent. Too recent. So pull yourself together! This is not a woodland stroll. You’ve got a job to do. So get on with it.

  He began to walk faster. Took out a compass as he felt he was losing his way, then walked on. Listening. And there was something to listen to. Soft foot-scuffles behind him. A rabbit? Or what? Then he felt eyes like minute blowlamps eating into the base of his skull. They were not rabbit’s eyes. He stopped and turned quickly in their direction. Other than the whispering undergrowth, he could see nothing. A slip of the imagination, perhaps. He moved on again. The eyes pursued. He jogged into a light run. He was unsure whether he was frightened, but he thought he might be. The leaf-footed thing broke into a run also. If leaves can run, that is. The woods were no longer on his side. And the honeysuckle unstuck itself from his sticky grip and retired into the grass.

  Why run, you fool? There’s no hurry. Fear is here, and that’s that. You can never leave it long.

  He put both hands in his trouser pockets. He knew it was coming—whatever it was—and he was fascinated to meet it.

  He wiped his perspiring hands on the linings of his trouser pockets. The feet had stopped moving in the undergrowth. The eyes continued to scorch the back of his neck. A dwarf sweat bubble dangled beneath his chin. The sweat glands were working overtime. He stopped walking altogether. He wanted to shout. He did not shout. And the eves laughed.

  4

  The loft was silent. Coldly the Rowbottoms rubbed knees under the oak table. Mrs. Spark was near to breaking point. Mr. Rowbottom pulled open his mouth with a smacking noise.

  ‘What is really the purpose, then, Mrs. Spark? I mean, bringing us here like this, after the funeral. What do you want from us?’

  Deliberately Mrs. Spark replied; ‘I would prefer you not, Mr. Rowbottom, I would prefer you not to speak of my daughter at this time.’

  A tear edged its way to the side of her nose. Impatiently, she dabbed it. Mr. Rowbottom continued; ‘You’ve got us here for a kind of purpose. I know you, Mrs. Spark, and I wasn’t born yesterday! What is it? Is it anything to do with our other celebrations—if you follow me? Which you do—don’t you? Is it?’

  Lawrence Cready’s eyebrow formed a question. He also wanted to know. At this point there was an abrupt knock on the door. All heads swivelled to the door. Squire Fenn entered. Excluding Lawrence Cready, everyone in the room lowered their heads as the Squire moved round the table to take his place at the top. The meeting was open. Rowbottom continued as soon as the Squire had seated himself.

  ‘Well, now the Squire himself is here,’ he nodded deferentially to the Squire and forged on, ‘well, perhaps you’ll tell us the purpose. I mean, it can’t be just to read poetry and that. I know you too well, and if it is only reading poetry and that, we’re going, aren’t we, mates?’

  The labourers smiled and said nothing. Rowbottom was about to chunter on when the Squire silenced him.

  ‘Rowbottom, you say too much. Don’t. Spoils your image. We need silence. I’m right, Mrs. Spark, aren’t I, eh?’

  Mrs. Spark nodded.

  ‘Squire, would you read us an old village legend I came across the other day?’

  She slid a battered volume across the table to the Squire. It hissed along the polished surface before entering his cracked hands. The Squire had a small intelligent head and a feast of white hair, parted down the centre, perfectly cutting his head in half. He was very proud of his hair. He let it curl onto his jacket collar.

  ‘The third legend in the book, please, Squire.’

  The precision of Mrs. Spark’s speech was to say the least unnerving. She carved her words with a ruthless chisel before allowing them to represent her in the doubtful business of communication.

  The Squire opened the book on the legend in question. He began to read.

  ‘And it was the midsummer.

  Celebrations under the sun.

  Morning was heavy with lusting.

  And the young maiden trailed

  Her pale hair in oak leaves.

  Her laughing was longer than summer.

  Then brown hands muscled their way

  And took her and danced her

  And danced her again and again.

  Brown eyes lusting for pale hair...’

  As he read this, even the hungry eyes of Rowbottom glazed. The Squire was surprised. Mrs. Spark did not blink but listened to the floating of silence. Slowly her head began to sway backwards and forwards and backwards and forwards. Her harmony enveloped the watchers. Her music possessed them. Water laved over them. The room became spray. Their heads rocked like tongueless bells on the steeples of their shoulders.

  Mrs. Spark whispered; ‘Brown eyes lusting for pale hair, so they took her and danced her, then took her among them, and delved in her deeply, breasts and her navel shone in the summer, as they took her and danced midsummer dances, maidenhead gone where the poppy breaks corn, and she bled on the poppies under the oak tree when the dancing was over, on her breasts and her navel, now red in the summer, and they climbed with her swaying in the leaves of the oak tree, and blessed fever of summer, and coiled her pale hair round her snow shoulders, and snapped the pale bones in her white-foaming neck, and threw her dead dancing, high through warm branches, low to the shadows, and death her new dancer, and then her ripe blood bubbled her mouth, and swam down her breasts and her navel, and all her bright laughter was loosed to the wind, where the butterflies danced the dance of midsummer...’

  Mrs. Spark’s voice purred on one note. The swaying of the listeners had subsided. Only she moved in time to her thoughts. In the strained faces around her, there was the knowledge that the legend was aimed at them. The legend was of them. Perhaps it was them. Perhaps it was the undercurrent of the summer ritual. Yes, they were excited by the story. And they were appalled by the excitement the story released in them.

  Cready looked along the length of the table to discover each held the other’s hand. The Squire’s mapped fingers were clutching his, and he was clutching James. Unconsciously they had formed the circle. The only noise in the white room was the murmurings of Mrs. Spark. She was repeating over and over sounds which had no meaning. Her eyes were withdrawn in herself.

  The sun continued to pour through the open windows. And then, and then, when there was only sunshine to cling to, a breeze rustled over the window ledge. It paused to catch its breath, and then whispered in a circle round the table. And clinging to it, a flame butterfly twittered into the room. Fourteen eyes clung to the butterfly. Mrs. Spark was still withdrawn in herself. Unperturbed by its audience, it hovered near a bundle of manuscripts. The breeze hissed the butterfly until it was suspended some twelve inches above Mrs. Spark’s nose.

  Mrs. Spark whispered to someone. Someone not in the room.

  ‘Where are you? In your new dimension is there rest? Listen to me, Dian. I know my words are meaningless on the other planes. But I still feel you clinging to the bark of our trees. I still feel you wound in the earth. Try and answer me. Some sign. Any sign. I know words to the dead are only scratches on a pane of glass. You hear the squeak as the glass is marked. But come the mist, the glass is unmarked again and only reflects the light. Dian, I am trying to force my words into a groove that will reach you, though I feel only my friends and the walls hear them. Only the walls...’

  The butterfly fluttered onto her left breast. It sensed the pulse of her tired nipple. The pulse was too slow for living. She had consciously trapp
ed herself between the living and the dead. The strain on her middle-aged heart was acute. For the first time, she noticed the butterfly. Her words became softer and clearer. Slightly cricking her neck, she turned to the butterfly.

  ‘Dian? Are you turned to a pair of wings? How did you die, little girl? Were you murdered? Or was it just the snap of a branch? Listen to me! Help me! If you were only broken by a tree fall, I will be able to sleep again. But if you were killed by men—I will open the pit to help you sleep—I will!’

  Cready, who had enjoyed the experiment until now, felt the sweat on the palms of his hands cool to an ice slush. The labourers allowed themselves to slide into her imagination. The Rowbottoms were very excited.

  ‘Dian? Were you murdered? Tell me! Tell me! I promise you retribution. Blood I promise you!’

  *

  David did not move. Nothing. He listened. Nothing. The eyes still burned on his neck.

  ‘Come out! It’s gone past a game. Come out!’

  The eyes refused to answer. David started to run again. A snail scrunched under his feet. Then, without warning, an arrow bit into an elm tree on his right. Arrows were all right for children, but in the middle of a grown-up wood—this was ridiculous! And slightly critical. David slowed his run down to a stop.

  ‘All right! All right! A game’s a game! But there’s no need to turn it into bloody Robin Hood! Come out and we’ll chat it over!’

  Silence. Even the wood pigeons gave up their shooing. Only a fern uncoiled in a shaft of sunlight. Another arrow flashed in front of him. David pulled it out of the turf. He wondered whether a few words to the archer would solve the dilemma. He decided against it and walked away. A wood pigeon clattered a few inches above his head. David persuaded his feet to run and dashed towards the thicket. The pigeon’s shooing harshed to a tight shriek, and it clattered out of the leaves—an arrow in its stubby neck. Besides being a humourist, the archer was becoming serious.

  David bent down to examine the dead pigeon. A treacle smear of blood made the bird’s beak sticky. Nice in one of Mum’s pies, he thought, as he held it by its old man’s claws. The hooked prongs of the bird’s feet were covered in slimy leather. Just to touch it made David feel sick. Even though it was dead, it quivered twice in his hands.