‘How many pints did you have in the pub?’

‘None, I promise you! What were you and Louise on?’

‘Peppermint tea with ginger.’

‘And a half a pound of cannabis?’

‘Ha ha!’

‘You must remember him!’

‘If you’d brought a vicar in here, into this kitchen, then yes, I would remember him.’

He shook his head. ‘I did.’

‘Was he very small? Perhaps I didn’t notice him?’

He smiled, fleetingly. ‘I – I just…’

‘Just what?’

‘I don’t know what’s going on, unless you and Louise are having a laugh on me. I rang her when I left the pub. She told me she hadn’t seen him either.’

Emily was studying his face hard, in a way that worried him. Was he looking strange? Cracking up? His mind scrambled, clawing and trying to grasp reason. Yesterday morning the Reverend Roland Fortinbrass had rung their doorbell, he’d invited him in, they’d chatted in the kitchen: the vicar, Emily, Louise and himself. He’d asked them if they would join the church choir, and in turn they’d asked him if he could contact the diocesan Minister of Deliverance, which he promised to do.

A promise he would not be able to keep. Because he was dead. Lying in the churchyard at the rear of St Mary’s. His name inscribed on his headstone, the epitaph beneath.

HE LOVED AND SERVED THIS PARISH

50

Tuesday 18 December

He’d seen the man’s grave; he’d read his obituary only a few hours ago; he had met the man who had been in the accident where Fortinbrass had died. He could hardly have more proof that Fortinbrass was dead.

But the vicar had come to their house yesterday. He’d talked to him. They all had, but now neither Emily nor Louise could accept it. Why were they denying it? He knew the human brain could do strange things, sometimes to protect people from shock or horror. He’d also read about a study of a remote South American tribe, who lived in a rainforest and had never been exposed to the outside world. One experiment that had been done was to fly a helicopter over their village, and then ask members of the tribe to describe what they had just seen. Almost all of them denied they had seen anything. It turned out it wasn’t because they were being difficult, or because they were stupid, it was that the helicopter was so far beyond anything they’d ever seen or experienced, they did not know how to process it.

Was this what had happened with Emily and Louise?

‘Jace?’ Emily’s voice was calm but sharp.

He stared at her, his head starting to feel hot again. Swimming.

‘Jace, darling, are you ill? Do you need to go to bed? I think you might be suffering from exhaustion – or stress – or maybe a bit of both. You’ve been working flat out and through the night.’

‘I’m OK,’ he said, not feeling at all OK. ‘Look, there’s something…’ His voice tailed off.