‘I don’t know how many church bells are still used as a general alarm – which was one of their old functions – but this old boy certainly is. One tweak,’ he said, with a mischievous gleam in his eye, ‘and every able-bodied adult in Walwyk would come running to deal with the fire or the flood. It was last used – now, let me see – six years ago, when the cottages in Curlew Lane had to be evacuated at a moment’s notice. They lie very low, close to the river, which had to deal not only with an exceptional rainfall but with a phenomenally high tide as well. You are quite safe,’ he hastened to add. ‘Your house and the one next door are the highest-standing in all Walwyk.’

She was so cold by this time that the mere thought of chilly flood-water rising made her shiver again.

‘You’re cold,’ he said, instantly solicitous. ‘Let’s get out into the sunshine.’

It was a mental, as well as a physical, relief to step out into the mild, bright afternoon. From the corner of the churchyard to which Canon Thorby led her, she looked back at the solid building with its dark guardian yews and for the first time in her life suspected that things could be too old for comfort; she remembered Rose’s account of her visit to the Catacombs and of the physical and spiritual malaise which had attacked her there.

‘Here we are,’ said Canon Thorby.

The stone lay flat in the centre of a close-clipped mound roughly the size of a double bed. The inscription had weathered into illegibility, but the deeply carven cross above it was still quite clear.

‘It says: “Under this stone lie the bodies of ten men who, though they came uninvited, were well tended in their dire sickness and buried according to the rites of the Established Church.” It then lists their names and requests prayers for their souls. The date is 1653.’

‘He was a bold man, that ancestor of yours. Puritanism was in full flood then; how did he know that another contingent of Puritans might not arrive and accuse him of Popery?’

‘Maybe he had faith in the marsh fever. Or maybe he waited until after the Restoration before setting up the stone. Either way, I’m sure he thoroughly enjoyed his verbal ambivalence. Well, you have now seen our little church, and I’m afraid I must tear myself away and get ready to go to Wandford. Oh, one thing more. On no account do I wish you to feel that teaching in our school puts you under an obligation to attend church unless you wish to. I know places where that is the unwritten rule, and I think it highly reprehensible.’

‘I rather enjoy attending church.’