7

‘Ash, a metre thick.’

The man doesn’t appear to want to make eye contact. His pained blue eyes stare at the floor as though the layer of cinders were right there in front of him. I glance outside. It is a bright, sunny day. The snowdrift, a metre and a half deep, ripples towards the edge of the forest. I don’t understand how the man has managed to get an appointment for today. But I remember: he’s always checking the diary for cancellations, always calling the office at the church hall. He was sitting opposite me only yesterday, and now he’s the first arrival of the day.

‘Seismologists and volcanologists all agree on the matter,’ the man prattles on. ‘The supervolcano beneath Yellowstone National Park – the caldera – erupts regularly. The next catastrophic eruption is only a matter of time. The last time it erupted, the ash cloud caused waves of extinction and climatic changes. The volcano is fifty kilometres by seventy kilometres in size. Half of North America would be instantly covered in a layer of ash a metre thick. The ash cloud would block out the sun. This would cause a nuclear winter – a new ice age. After the last eruption, the ensuing winter, complete with acid rain, lasted a thousand years. And there was no prior warning. You can’t predict when a supervolcano will erupt. The lights across the world would go out in an hour, two at most. You’ll probably say it won’t erupt in our lifetime.’

I’m not about to say anything at all. Not now. If things in Yellowstone are quietly simmering, inside me they’ve already reached boiling point. I think about Krista, last night, the grenade, the meteorite, the explosion, the pair of criminals. Less than twenty-four hours have passed, and nothing in my life will be the same again.

‘The surface of the caldera rises and falls all the time,’ he continues. ‘There are hundreds of subterranean earthquakes measured every year. Then there’s the fundamental question: do you think they’d tell us if they thought the supervolcano was going to erupt in the next four or five years? Of course they wouldn’t. If people learned that the world was going to end in three years’ time, there would be anarchy. Nothing would matter anymore.’

I don’t hear the question in the man’s monologue, but he stares at me as though he expects at least some sort of comment.

‘Life can sometimes feel quite unpredictable,’ I say.

The man puffs out air, agitatedly shifts position in his chair. The chair legs creak, the white brick walls respond with an echo.

‘You know what?’ he says. ‘I know everybody in this village. Judging by what you and I have talked about over the last two years, I would say every single one of them, even the most fervent communist atheists, seems to have more faith than you do.’

I look at the man and see him more clearly than at any time before. Those anguished eyes, his stubble rough like a bear’s tongue. The top button of his flannel shirt is done up. It must be hot beneath his cardigan. I hear his words again.

‘You know everyone in the village?’

‘Of course I do,’ he says with a shrug of the shoulders. ‘I’ve lived here all my life – that’s forty-nine years. I’ve gone to school here, worked here. My ex-wife is from here. Both our extended families. I’m involved in all kinds of community activities. The sports club, fixing people’s motors, the deer-hunting club. There’s nobody here I don’t know.’

I think about this for a moment.

‘In a small village, word gets round quickly,’ I say.

‘It certainly does,’ the man nods, relieved. ‘Which brings me to why I think an eruption is imminent. Nobody has mentioned this subject in the last few years. What happened before that? The papers were full of articles, there was exploratory drilling going on down to a depth of several kilometres inside the supervolcano. At first they told us about the results; now there’s silence. What do you think that means?’

I wait for a few seconds, then say, ‘If someone did something that might be considered, let’s say, inappropriate, word would get round the village quite quickly, yes?’

‘What’s that got to do with the Yellowstone caldera?’ he asks.

‘It would be an eruption of sorts,’ I say, and gauge from the man’s expression that I need to get straight to the point. ‘It’s to do with what you said earlier. If someone in the village had … dalliances … then people would know about it, right?’

‘Dalliances?’

‘If they, say, coveted their neighbour’s property.’

‘You mean stealing?’

‘Something like that,’ I say. ‘Something that would get tongues wagging, that people would talk about in whispers.’

The man turns his head; I follow the movement. A tall, gleaming snowdrift always looks more durable than it really is.

‘This is a nice place,’ he says. ‘Honest people. We’re fair to one another. We uphold law and order…’

I wait.

He turns to look at me. ‘You’ve taken a vow of confidentiality?’

‘Yes.’

The man leans forwards in his chair.

‘People brew their own moonshine. They bring cigarettes across the border. Rattle their fists at people – maybe even take out a knife. Not that they’d kill anybody, mind. Not straight away. They might stab the arm or the thigh first, the chest only if it’s a more serious matter. You rarely see axes. Or chainsaws. There was this one time. Rami Kärkönen took a few too many of those steroids he’d brought from Russia. The chainsaw felt so light, and it cut like a knife through butter. It was an accident, sort of. Rami works at the florist these days. People drive around drunk – otherwise they’d never get home. That’s about it.’

There’s nothing in his words that I didn’t know already. Despite what the average Joe seems to think, pastors don’t live outside the real world. We are not unaware of people’s capacity to do anything imaginable, and plenty of things you couldn’t begin to imagine until you heard about it. Sometimes it’s hard to appreciate why anyone would cause such injuries to themselves or others.

‘Like I said, it’s a nice place,’ he adds. ‘Decent, upright folk.’

We sit in silence. I haven’t discovered any new information with regards to Krista. And then I see another way of approaching the subject: the meteorite. My encounter with the rally driver is still fresh in my mind, as are the events of the previous night. The thought, which I slightly adapt to the situation, is a bit nonconformist. Perhaps it goes against the fundamental idea of the pastoral care I’m supposed to be providing, but this is an exceptional situation in every respect.

‘I’m looking for something,’ I say.

‘Me too,’ the man nods. ‘There are so many things that threaten our—’

‘I thought you might be able to help me. Confidentially. Just like our conversations here.’

The man squints as though he were trying to see something very far away. ‘Me? Help you?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘How does that sound?’

He hesitates, glances to one side then the other. ‘What … or how … would I…?’

I’ll help you see end-of-the-world scenarios you can hardly even imagine … I stop myself from suggesting that.

‘How about we find you a regular slot?’ I say. ‘You could come here without queuing, without checking for cancellations. You would have your own mark in the calendar, just like at school.’

‘And how can I…?’

‘I’m looking for a particular perfume.’

In all the hours the man has spent at my surgery, this is the first time he is lost for words. This would be a welcome exception at any time, but especially so now.

‘This is a small village,’ I say. ‘I guess you’ve been face to face with all the adults round here many times, and, without noticing, breathed in the air around them. You’ve smelled everything. Because we all have our unique scent. It could be something very faint, discreet or almost overwhelming.’

‘It’s true,’ he says, still hesitating profoundly.

‘I’m looking for a perfume that’s strong but not too heavy. Not one of those dark, robust evening perfumes, but something much lighter. The person in question wears a lot of it. It hangs in the air when this person walks past. There are undertones of citrus, but the primary ingredient is something else. I believe that once you’ve smelled it, you’ll easily recognise it in the future.’

‘You’re looking for someone in particular?’

‘First and foremost I’m looking for the perfume.’

The man gives this some thought. ‘A regular slot, you say?’

‘We can look at the diary right away.’