He started the car, drove out onto the road, headed through the village and back up the hill. There was a simple landmark, a red postbox, directly opposite the entrance to Cold Hill Park. He turned right between the stone pillars and drove in, then along Lakeview Drive.
As he neared their house, he could see from the empty driveway that Emily was not back yet. To his amusement, the Penze-Weedells were still bumbling around outside in their front garden. Maurice was standing, enveloped in a spaghetti tangle of Christmas lights that had evidently fallen from the wall onto him, and he and his wife were gesticulating at each other, clearly having a row. He waved at them as he passed, but neither noticed.
At the end of Lakeview Drive he carried on around the estate, looking for the Cadillac and the removals lorry he’d seen arriving earlier. He drove along silent roads that were not still closed off with barriers, having to make U-turns a couple of times at dead ends, looking at each of the empty houses in turn, some of them finished, some of them just fenced-off shells. He passed a police car parked across the entrance to the still-silent construction site, noticing some police officers beyond, then carried on.
The Cadillac and the lorry had to be here, somewhere. He’d only been gone an hour and a half – no way could the removals men have unloaded the entire juggernaut in that time, surely?
Unless he’d imagined the Cadillac and the removals lorry. Imagined the vicar.
A Cadillac in which a family of four had died outside Cold Hill House?
The O’Hares.
Oh, sure, a ghost car – and a ghost removals lorry. And a ghost vicar.
After fifteen minutes, when he reckoned he had now covered the entire estate, he headed home, perplexed. Emily’s van was now outside, the rear doors open, as was the front door of the house and the double garage’s up-and-over door. The Penze-Weedells were nowhere to be seen – presumably gone indoors. The stepladder and tangle of wiring remained on the front lawn.
He pulled on to the driveway just as Emily appeared through the front door. He climbed out and greeted her with a kiss.
‘Hi, darling!’
‘All OK with David?’ she asked. ‘Will he get the framing done?’
‘In the nick of time – I’ve got to remember to collect them before midday tomorrow, before he shuts up for Christmas. How did the shopping go?’
She pointed at the packed rear of the van. ‘We’ve got everything we need for the anniversary do. They had an amazing offer on prawns – we have to make prawn cocktail starters for everyone, so we’re nicely in profit on that dish!’
‘Brilliant!’
‘They’re still in their shells. It’s a pain to remove them, but they’re so much yummier than the ready-peeled.’
‘Darling, it’s your eye for detail that’s made you such a success.’
She smiled. ‘I just like to give peeps food that I would eat – so long as they’re willing to pay for it.’
‘I’ll give you a hand in with everything.’
For the next fifteen minutes they worked together, removing the bags from the van and stacking the shelves of the upright freezers that lined most of the wall space in the garage.
‘How much food do these people eat?’ he asked, in wonder.
‘It’s not just the anniversary event; we’ve stocked up on basics, too.’
There were fourteen tall freezers in the room, all of them full by the time they had finished.
‘Let’s hope we don’t have a power cut,’ he said.
She blanched. ‘They don’t happen very often, I hope. And when they do, we don’t open any of the doors. Everything will stay frozen for several hours.’
‘Good.’
They went into the house. The kitchen clock showed it was 2.55 p.m. Emily glanced around at the spotless work surfaces and empty sink. ‘Did you have any lunch?’
‘Yes. I thought I’d pop down to the pub – do the local thing.’
‘Did you indeed? Down the old boozer, eh?’ she ribbed.
‘I had a Diet Coke. And a soggy sandwich.’
‘See anyone? Our lovely neighbours?’
‘Just the landlord and that creepy old farmer we saw on Sunday.’
‘Lucky you.’
‘I actually went to the village to see if I could chivvy up the vicar.’
‘Vicar?’
‘The guy who came yesterday, Roland Fortinbrass.’
‘Yesterday? Roland Fortinbrass? Fortinbrass was a character in Hamlet, wasn’t he?’
‘The Hamlet character only had one “s” in his name. The vicar has two, he told me.’
‘When did you see him? You didn’t mention this.’
‘Emily, hello!’ He gave her a pointed look. ‘The vicar who came when Louise was here, and we discussed getting a Minister of Deliverance, or whatever it’s called, to come to the house.’
Her face was blank. ‘Came when Louise was here?’
He felt his skin squirming.
‘Yes!’ he said. ‘Yesterday morning.’
‘Nobody came, Jason,’ she said. ‘There was no one else here.’
‘Babes, we all chatted with him. He asked if any of us could sing, because he needed recruits for his church choir.’
She was looking at him as if he was mental. ‘Yesterday morning?’
‘Yes! Just when Louise was doing her trance thing. The doorbell rang, and I went and brought him into the kitchen.’
‘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.