The Four Last Things Read Online Free Page B

consign them to the past. Now they gave her spiritual indigestion. The images stayed with her: the white face on the pillow turning aside from the comfort she brought; the viscous spittle gleaming on her handkerchief; and, hardest of all to forget, the children, some no more than five years older than Lucy, circling her in their monstrous game with knives in their hands and excitement in their faces.
    Nothing went right at home, either. Michael had retreated further into himself since the squabble on the way back from church and the subsequent discovery that Sunday lunch had turned into a burnt offering. There were no open quarrels but the silences between them grew longer. It was possible, Sally thought, that the problem had nothing to do with her – he might be having a difficult time at work.
    ‘Everything’s fine,’ he replied when she asked him directly, and she could almost hear the sound of the drawbridge rising and the portcullis descending.
    Sally persevered. ‘Have you seen Oliver lately?’
    ‘No. Not since his promotion.’
    ‘That’s great. When did it happen?’
    ‘A few weeks back.’
    Why hadn’t Michael told her before? Oliver Rickford had been his best man. Like Michael, he had been a high-flier at Hendon police college. They had not worked together since they had been constables, but they still kept in touch.
    ‘Why’s he been made up to inspector and not you?’
    ‘He says the right things in committee meetings.’ Michael looked at her. ‘Also he’s a good cop.’
    ‘We must have him and Sharon over for supper. To celebrate.’ Sally disliked Sharon. ‘Tuesdays are usually a good evening for me.’
    Michael grunted, his eyes drifting back to the newspaper in front of him.
    ‘I suppose we should ask the Cutters sometime, too.’
    ‘Oh God.’ This time he looked up. ‘Must we?’
    Their eyes met and for an instant they were united by their shared dislike of the Cutters. The dislike was another of Sally’s problems. As the weeks went by, she discovered that Derek Cutter preferred to keep her on the sidelines of parish work. He made her feel that wearing a deacon’s stole was the clerical equivalent of wearing L-plates. She suspected that in his heart of hearts he was no more a supporter of women clergy than Michael’s Uncle David. At least David Byfield made his opposition perfectly clear. Derek Cutter, on the other hand, kept his carefully concealed. She attributed her presence in his parish to expediency: the archdeacon was an enthusiastic advocate of the ordination of women, and Derek had everything to gain by keeping on the right side of his immediate superior. He liked to keep on the right side of almost everyone.
    ‘Lovely to see you,’ Derek said to people when he talked to them after a service or at a meeting or on their doorsteps. ‘You’re looking blooming.’ And if he could, he would pat them, young or old, male or female. He liked physical contact.
    ‘It’s not enough to love each other,’ he wrote in the parish magazine. ‘We must show that we do. We must wear our hearts on our sleeves, as children do.’
    Derek was fond of children, though he preferred to look resolutely on the sunny side of childhood. This meant in effect that his benevolent interest was confined to children under the age of seven. Children grew up quickly in Kensal Vale and the area had an extensive population of little criminals. The picture of him in the Parish Room showed him beaming fondly at a photogenic baby in his arms. In his sermon on Sally’s second Sunday at St George’s he quoted what was evidently a favourite text.
    ‘Let the children come to me, Jesus told his disciples. Do not try to stop them. For the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Mark ten, fourteen.’
    There should be more to being a vicar, Sally thought, than a fondness for patting people, a sentimental attachment to young children and a range of secular skills that might have earned him a decent living in