'Ned Bain,' Fallon said, 'you're the high priest of a London coven can we use the word "coven"? and also a publisher and an expert on ancient religions of all kinds. I want you to tell me, simply and concisely, why you think paganism is, today, more relevant and more important to these islands than Christianity.'

And Edward Bain had sat, one leg hooked casually over the other like... like Sean had sat sometimes... a TV natural, expounding without pause, his eyes apparently on Fallon, but actually gazing beyond him across the studio. His eyes, in fact, were lazily fixed on Merrily's... and they she clutched her chair seat tightly they were not Sean's.

'Well, for a start, they've had their two millennia,' he said reasonably. 'Two thousand years of war and divison, repression and persecution, torture, genocide... in the name of a cruel, despotic deity dreamed up in the Middle East.'

From the seats tiered behind Merrily came the swelling sound of indrawn breath, like a whistling in the eaves. Part awe, part shock, part admiration at such cool, convincing blasphemy.

'Two thousand years of the cynical exploitation, by wealthy men, of humanity's unquenchable yearning for spirituality... the milking of the peasants to build and maintain those great soaring cathedrals... created to harness energies they no longer even understand. Two thousand years of Christianity... a tiny, but ruinous period of Earth's history. A single dark night of unrelenting savagery and rape.'

There was a trickle of applause. He continued to look at Merrily, his mouth downturned in sorrow but a winner's light in his eyes. The space between them seemed to shrink, until she could almost feel the warm dusting of his breath on her face. On a huge screen above him was projected the image of a serene, bare-breasted woman wearing a tiara like a coiled snake.

'Now it's our turn,' he said softly. 'We who worship in woods and circles of rough stone. We who are not afraid to part the curtains, to peer into the mysteries from which Christianity still cowers, screaming shrilly at us to come away, come away. To us and to the rest of you, if you care to give it any thought Christianity is, at best, a dull screen, a block. It is anti-spiritual. It was force-fed to the conquered and brutalized natives of the old lands, who practised as we once did, when we still had sensitivity a natural religion, in harmony with the tides and the seasons, entirely beneficent, gentle, pacific, not rigid nor patriarchal. The Old Religion has always recognized the equality of the sexes and exalted the nurturing spirit, the spirit which can soothe and heal the Earth before it is too late.'

The trickle of applause becoming a river. John Fallon standing with folded arms and his habitual half-smile. Someone had dimmed the studio lights so that Ned Bain was haloed like a Christ figure, and when he spoke again it might have been Sean there, being reasonable, logical. Merrily began to sweat.

'The clock of the Earth is running down. We've become alienated from her. We must put the last two thousand years behind us and speak to her again.'

And the river of applause fanned out into a delta among not only the myriad ranks of the pagans, but also the shop-floor workers and the wages staff and the middle and upper management of the paint factory in Walsall. The claps and cheers turned to an agony of white noise in Merrily's head and she closed her eyes, and when she opened them, there was the fuzzy boom-mic on a pole hanging over her head, and the camera had glided silently across like an enormous floor-polisher and John Fallon, legs apart, hands behind his back, was telling her and the millions at home, '... really a fair bit of sense in what Ned's saying? Well, Merrily... isn't there?'

She's frozen, Jane thought in horror, as two seconds passed.

Two entire seconds.... on Livenight! A hush in the bear pit.

'Come on, love.' Gerry's hands were chivvying at the monitors. 'You're not in the bloody pulpit now.'

Maurice, the director, said into his microphone, 'John, why don't you just ask her, very gently, if she's feeling all right?'

Jane wanted to haul him from his swivel chair and wrestle him to the ground among the snaking wires. But then, thank Christ, Mum started talking.

It just wasn't her voice, that was the problem. She sounded like she'd just been awakened from a drugged sleep. Well, all right, it was going to be a tough one. Ned Bain was a class act, a cool, cool person, undeniably sexy. And Jane admittedly felt some serious empathy with what he was saying. Like, hadn't she herself had this same argument with Mum time and again, pointing out that paganism witchcraft was a European thing, born in dark woodland glades, married to mountain streams. It was practical, and Jane didn't even see it as entirely incompatible with Christianity.

The camera was tight on Mum so tight that, oh no, you could see the sweat. And she was gabbling in that strange, cracked voice about Christianity being pure, selfless love, while paganism seemed to be about sex at its most mechanical and... feelingless.

Feelingless? Jesus, Jane thought, is that a real word? Oh God.

'This is bloody trite crap, especially after the pagan guy,' Maurice told John Fallon. 'Let's come back to her when, and if, she gets her shit together.'

'All right.' John Fallon spun away, a flying smirk. 'That's the, ah, Church of England angle.'

Someone jeered.

Oh God! When she was sure the camera was away from her, Merrily dabbed a crumpled tissue to her forehead, knowing immediately what she should have said, how she could have dealt with Bain's simplistic generalizations. Now wanting to jump up and tug Fallon back. But it was, of course, too late.

From halfway up an aisle between rows of seats, she caught a glance from Steve Ewing, the producer, his mouth hidden under a lip-microphone as used by ringside boxing commentators. It was as if he was ironically rerunning his pre-programme pep talk: '... you'll be kicking yourself all the way home because you missed your chance of getting your argument across on the programme.'

From the adjacent seat to her left, a hand gently squeezed her arm: Patrick Ryan, the sociologist who was supposed to have shagged half the priestesses in the southern counties while compiling his thesis on pagan ritual practice. 'You'll get used to it,' he whispered.

She nodded. She sought out the eyes of Ned Bain, but they were in shadow now; he seemed to be looking downwards. He appeared very still and limp, as though his body was recharging. She thought, He was staring at me the whole time. And afterwards I couldn't do a thing.

'... gonna talk to Maureen now,' John Fallon was saying, back on the other side of the studio floor, just across the aisle from Ned Bain. 'Maureen, your teenage daughter was into all this peaceful, New Age nature worship. But that was only the start, because Gemma ended up, I believe, in a psychiatric unit.'

Oh, sure... blame Bain for your own deficiencies. Merrily shook herself, furious. Blame poor dead Sean.

'She's still attending the unit, John.' Maureen was a bulky woman, early fifties, south London accent. 'Apart from that, she won't hardly leave the house any more, poor kid.'

'She became a witch, right?'

'She became a witch when she was about seventeen, when she first went to the tech college. There was a lecturer there like... him.' Maureen jerked a thumb at Ned Bain, who tilted his head quizzically. 'Smooth, good-looking guy, on the make.'

Ned chuckled. Really nothing like Sean. How could she have- 'But let's just make it clear,' Fallon said, 'that this was not Ned Bain here. So this other man recruited Gemma into a witch coven.'

Maureen described how her daughter had been initiated in a shop cellar converted into a temple, and within about six months her personality had completely changed. She'd broken off her engagement to a very nice boy who was a garage mechanic, and then they found out she was into hard drugs.

'But I never knew the worst of it till her mate come to see me one day. This was the mate she'd joined the coven with, and she told me Gemma had got involved with this other group what was doing black magic. She said Gemma went with the rest of them to St Anthony's Church and I know this happened, 'cause it was in the papers and they desecrated it.'

'Desecrated, how?'

'Well... you know... did... did their dirt.' The big face crumpled. 'Things like-'

'John, let me say...' Ned Bain was leaning forward. The camera pulled back, the boom-mic operator shifted position. 'This is satanism, and satanism is a specifically anti-Christian movement. It is entirely irrelevant to Wicca or any of the other strands of paganism. We do not oppose Christianity. We-'

'The hell you don't!' Merrily was half out of her seat, but well off-mic.

'We are an alternative to Christianity,' Bain stressed. 'And also, I should perhaps point out at this stage, a precursor, of the tired, politicized cult of Jesus. And I say precursor, because there's evidence that Christianity itself is no more than a fabrication, a modification of the cult of Dionysus, in which the story of the man-god who dies and is resurrected...'

'Yeah, yeah,' Fallon stopped him. 'Fascinating stuff, Ned, but I want to stay with satanism for a moment.'

'As you would,' Merrily muttered.

'Now, Ned, you would say that satanism is as much anathema to pagans as it is to the Christian Church. And yet young Gemma graduated or descended to some kind of devil worship after being initiated as a witch. I want to come back...' Fallon wheeled '... to Merrily Watkins...'

Merrily's hands tightened on the arms of her chair. Please God...

'Now, what we didn't say before about Merrily is that, as well as being one of the new breed of female parish priests, she's also the official exorcist I believe Deliverance Minister is the correct term these days for the Diocese of Hereford. That's right?'

'Yes.' Ignore the camera, the lights. Don't look at Bain's eyes.

'So what I want to ask you, do people like Maureen often come to you with this same kind of story?'

'I...' She swallowed. How could she say she hadn't been in the job long enough to have accumulated any kind of client base. 'I have to say... John... that what you might call real satanism is uncommon. What you have are kids who're playing old Black Sabbath albums and get a perverse buzz out of dressing up and doing something horribly antisocial. Quite often, you'll find that these kids will join a witch coven in the belief that it's far more... extreme, if you like, than it actually is. That they're entering a world of sex rites and blood sacrifice.'

'Which is your fault!' one of the pagans shouted. 'Because that's how the Church has portrayed us for centuries.'

'She's saying,' Maureen shrilled, extending a finger at Merrily, 'that my daughter only joined the witches because she thought they were evil?'

'No, what I'm-'

'She's sitting on the fence!' A heavy man bounded down one of the aisles. 'That's what she's doing.'

Two security heavies moved in from different directions. Fallon blocked the man's path. 'You are?'

'The Reverend Peter Gemmell.' He was grey-bearded and big enough to take on either of the two security men. 'You won't find me on your list. I'm an industrial chaplain, and I came with the factory group from Walsall. But that's beside the point. What I want is to tell you all the truth that my colleague here is too diplomatic, too delicate, too wishy-washy to introduce. And that is to say that Satan himself is present in this studio tonight.'

'Oh hell,' Jane said glumly, 'a fruitcake. Just when I thought she might be really cooking.'

'Lovely.' Gerry leaned back in his canvas chair with his hands behind his head.

Voice-crackle from Maurice's cans. He nodded, scanning the monitors to make sure Gemmell was alone. 'OK, Steve, thanks, will do. John, let's see where this one goes, OK?'

Eirion looked shell-shocked. 'Anything could happen down there, couldn't it? Suppose that guy had a gun?'

'Probably wouldn't be that much use against Satan, anyway,' Jane reasoned.

'Why don't you tell them?' The Rev. Peter Gemmell hissed at Merrily. 'Why don't you tell them that Satan is in our midst? That he's here now. Why don't you stand up and denounce him?'

Fallon saved her.

'Well, you tell us, Peter, since you're here. You point him out. Where exactly is Satan sitting?'

'I shall tell you.' Gemmell didn't hesitate. 'He's sitting directly behind you.'

Fallon stepped aside to reveal Ned Bain smiling and shaking his head, pityingly.

'That man...' Gemmell glared contemptuously at Bain. 'That man speaks from the Devil's script. From his lips spews the slick rhetoric of Satan the seducer.'

Sea of Light? Merrily wondered.

' "The satyr shall cry to his fellow!" ' Gemmell roared. ' "Yea, there shall the night hag alight, and find for herself a resting place!" Isaiah.'

Merrily thought of the number of interpretations you could put on that. In fact, she was sure there was a rather more innocent translation in the Revised English Bible. She just couldn't remember what it was. Couldn't remember anything tonight.

'The satyr,' Gemmell explained, 'is the so-called horned god of the witches the god Pan. The night hag is the demon Lilith. And so the Bible tells us quite plainly that paganism invites the demonic to share its bed. And that is as true today as it was when it was written.'

'The Old Testament,' Bain said wearily. 'This guy comes down here and quotes at me from a hotchpotch of myth and legend and old wives' tales...'

'The voice of Satan!' Gemmell snarled, and Merrily was aware of Steve Ewing to her right, putting the bouncers on alert.

'Thank you, Peter.' John Fallon placed an arm on the big priest's shoulder. 'We're grateful for that, but I don't think we're quite ready for the battle of Armageddon tonight.'

'I have made my point,' Gemmell said with dignity and, with a baleful glance at Merrily, walked back up the aisle and then stopped and turned and, before the security men could reach him, roared out, 'We must and will put out the false lights in the night of filth!'

'Good man,' Fallon said. 'Well... Ned Bain's either the saviour of our planet or he's the Antichrist. But before that interruption, Merrily, you were saying so-called satanists are just a bunch of delinquent kids...'

'No, what I said was that real satanism is uncommon. I do know it exists. I have encountered the use of occult practices for evil purposes and I think Ned's being a bit optimistic if he thinks all pagans are in it to heal the earth.' Her mouth was dry again. She swallowed.

'Go on,' Fallon said.

'Well, I know for a fact that pagan groups are infiltrated by people with less... altruistic aims whether it's money, or drugs or iffy sex.'

'Black propaganda!' a woman screeched. Fallon held up a hand for quiet.

'I do know a young girl,' Merrily said carefully, thinking of Jane watching at home. 'She's a girl who was very nearly ensnared by the people who were secretly running what appeared to be a fairly innocent mystical group for women. It's a minefield. In the glamorous world of goddesses and prophecy and... and nude dancing at midnight, it's very hard to distinguish between the people who truly and sincerely believe all this will heal the earth and free our souls... and the ones who are into personal power and gratification of their-'

'What group?' the woman shouted. 'She's making it up! John, you make her tell us where it was!'

'Ssssh,' Fallon said. 'OK, where was this, Merrily?'

'It was... around Hereford. Around the Welsh border. Obviously, I'm not going to name anybody who-'

'All right.' Fallon turned to the young woman who'd shouted out. 'It's Vivienne, right? And you're the priestess of a coven in Manchester. How do you know what kind of people you're initiating? How do you vet them?'

'You just... know.' Vivienne had cropped hair and earrings that seemed to be made from the bejewelled bodies of seahorses. 'The initiation process itself weeds out the scum bags and the weirdos. It's a psychic thing. You learn to pick up on it, and the goddess herself-'

'That is rubbish,' Merrily interrupted.

Vivienne paused. John Fallon smiled.

Merrily said, 'People don't get vetted before they're allowed to mess with other people's minds. You don't have any real organization or any fixed creed. Your rituals don't go back to pre-Christian times, they were all made up in the last half century. You're a complete ragbag of half-truths and good intentions and bad intentions and-'

'And that's any different from your Church?' Vivienne reared out of her seat. 'Half of you don't believe in a Virgin Birth! Half of you don't believe in the Resurrection! And you call us a ragbag. I'm telling you, lady, you'll have come to bits long before we do. It's happening right now. And you... you're part of the decay. We look at you and the blokes see a pretty face and nice legs, and that's just the Church's latest scheme to deflect attention from the rot in its guts.'

A build-up of cheers among the pagan ranks. John Fallon stepped back to let the camera catch it all.

'Your Church is dying on its feet!' Vivienne grinned triumphantly. 'It's not gonna see the new century out. You took our sacred sites from us, and we're gonna take them back. Your fancy churches will fall, and honest grass will grow up through their ruins, and towers will stand alone, like megaliths-'

'Whoah!' Fallon stepped back into the action. 'What are you banging on about?'

'All right,' Vivienne said. 'She's from the Welsh border, yeah? I can show you a church on her actual doorstep where that's already happened. I can show you a church with a tower and graves and everything... which is now a pagan church. You don't know what's happening on your own doorstep. You don't know nothing!'

15.

Fairground 'MOVE IT!' JANE raced along the bright corridor, trailing her fleece coat over a shoulder. The building appeared to be still only half finished; there were lumps of plaster everywhere, and the panes of many windows still had strips of brown tape across them. 'Irene, move!'

'I was just trying to thank Maurice and Gerry.'

'We'll write them a letter! Come on. Believe me, she is not going to hang on here. She's going to be out of that bear pit before any of them can pin her in a corner. She'll be driving like a bat out of hell down the motorway, swearing that she'll never, never, never again...'

'I thought she did OK,' Eirion said, blundering behind her, 'in the end. She got that woman very annoyed.'

'You thought she did OK. I think she just about managed to rescue the situation. She'll think she was absolutely crap and like disgraced the Church and the bishop and... Jesus Christ!' Jane hit a pair of swing doors, still running. 'Can't you move any faster? I thought you were in the rugby team.'