Mr Cassidy, of Cassidy's Country Kitchen naff, twee, or what? parked his tight arse, in pristine stonewashed jeans, on the edge of a stool. He held a glass of white wine. He smiled indulgently down.

'And how are you, Jane?'

'Getting by.'

'We really must arrange for you to meet Colette.'

His snotty daughter, who went to the Cathedral School in Hereford. You saw her posing around the square in the evenings. Sixteen (nearly) and sultry. Jane kept her distance.

'Super,' she said.

'Got a problem, Terrence?' Mum said briskly.

Mrs Fixit. Why didn't she just tell him to sod off until she'd finished her lunch?

'No ... No ...' Cassidy said airily. 'It's simply ... Are you doing anything special tonight?'

Is she ever?

'Depends which part of the night, really, Terrence.'

'Mum hates to miss Homicide, Life on the Street.'

The vicar frowned at her daughter. Mr Cassidy smiled thinly. Everything about him was thin, which told you all you needed to know about his bloody awful restaurant.

'This would be about eight,' he said. 'It's an impromptu meeting of the Festival Committee.'

'Am I on the Festival Committee?' Mum wondered.

'Well, Alf Hayden wasn't. But we rather thought you should have a say. Especially as we were hoping this year to make more use of the church itself in other than musical areas. To be specific: drama.'

'Oh, I'm sure it's seen plenty of that in its time.'

'Quite. In fact, it's about that ... You see, Richard's over from London for the weekend ... Richard Coffey.'

'With his boyfriend?'

'Shut up, Jane,' Mum said.

'As you may have heard,' Cassidy said, 'Richard has agreed to write a short play especially for the festival, to illustrate a lesser known aspect of local history.'

'Gosh,' Mum said. 'There's prestigious.'

'We originally had in mind something social. Perhaps showing how the trade in high-quality cider was almost irrevocably damaged in the eighteenth century by the growing fashion for French wines.'

'Yeah, you could invite the Euro-MP-'

'Jane ...'

Jane retired behind a smirk.

'However,' said Cassidy, 'Richard's apparently become fascinated by the story of Wil Williams. Which I suppose also has a social aspect, in its way.'

'Mmm,' Mum said.

'Obviously, it's not something the village nowadays is particularly proud of.'

'No,' Mum said. 'Quite.'

'Although I suppose it has its tourist possibilities, in a lurid sort of way. Point is, Richard's drawn certain conclusions which appear to have quite excited him. The case itself is not well documented, as you know probably some sort of kangaroo court. But this, of course, gives Richard considerable artistic licence.'

'Right.' Mum nodded.

'And as he's even talking about bringing in some professional actors, which would be wonderful, especially if the play went on to London. Be rather super, wouldn't it? Premiered in Ledwardine Church, and then conquers the capital.'

Mum nodded again. Her eyes had acquired a guarded look.

'I'd have to talk to the bishop.'

'Of course.'

'And, er, Richard's going to be revealing his plans at tonight's meeting, is he?'

'We hope so.'

'Eight o'clock, you said.'

'At the village hall. We normally meet in the restaurant, but Saturday is our busy night. You'll be there?'

'Well ... all right.'

'You haven't met Richard, have you?'

'We've seen him in the bar, though,' Jane said. 'With his b-'

'Look forward to it, Terrence.'

Mum laid her knife and fork neatly down the middle of her half-full plate. Another aborted lunch. You could get quite worried about Mum sometimes. She wasn't getting any younger. Past the age when you should be eating like a supermodel.

'Splendid.' Cassidy wove off through the crush, holding up his wine like some sort of sacrament.

Jane grinned.

'I thought you didn't.'

Mum tossed her bag on her bed.

'How the hell should I be expected to know who Wil Williams was. I've been too busy to even think about local history.'

'Never mind, you've got hours yet.'

'No, I haven't. I've got to meet Gomer Parry at four. The digger man. Wasn't for him and the gardening club, the churchyard'd be some kind of nature reserve.'

'What a great idea.'

'Don't start!'

Mum flopped back on the bed, covered her eyes. The sun blared in through the old leaded window and turned her into a tableau: the exhausted saint.

'And it's Saturday afternoon, so the libraries are closed in Hereford and Leominster.'

'Mum, this is ridiculous, nobody expects you to know absolutely everything.'

'Yes, they do! That's the whole point. Jane, I'm the bloody priest-in-charge. I'm supposed to have done my homework. I suppose I could go round and see ... who's that old bloke who does the all-our-yesterdays bit for the parish mag?'

'God, no. I heard him in the post office once. Great queue of people and he was on about how you could send a three-piece suite through the post for less than a shilling in 1938. You'd be lucky to get away in time for the meeting. Look, OK ... I'll find out who he was.'

Mum took her hands away from her eyes.

'How?'

'Don't look at me like I've never done anything for you ever!'

'I mean ... properly?'

'No, I'll make it all up. Of course properly. And I'll keep you out of it. I'll say it's for a school project.'

'Where will you go?'

'Ledwardine Lore.'

'But that's-'

'Miss Devenish.'

Mum sat up. 'Oh no. You said properly. You'll just get the Miss Devenish version, which may not ... And anyway ...'

'Yes?'

Mum did one of her heavy sighs. She'd had this thing about Miss Devenish ever since the great Powell suicide. The old girl had made a scene about this wassailing scenario being all wrong and no good would come of it and ... bang!... no good came of it. Spooky, yeah? Right. Jane was never going to forgive herself for missing all that. Of course, that was in her Ledwardine Denial Period; she was over that now.

'Mum, look, that's the only shop in the village where you can get real local history books. We're going to have to get one sometime.'

'All right, just pop in and grab a book.'

'I won't know which one it's in, will I? You can't stand there in a shop that size, going through all the indexes. I'll have to ask her about it.'

Jane sat on a corner of the bed, searching out her mother's eyes. People said they had the same eyes, dark and curious.

'Got you,' she said. 'You don't like me going in there, do you? Because people say she's a bit of an old witch. Daughter of the priest-in-charge mustn't be seen consorting with satanic forces, right?'

'That's cobblers, Jane. However, until we've got our feet under the table we're going to have to tread carefully, walk on a few eggshells. Is that a mixed metaphor?'

'No, spot on, actually. In an accidental sort of way. So. How do you want to play it? Do you want me to find out who Wil Williams was, or do you want to busk it with Coffey and Cassidy? Hey, you think Stefan might be there tonight?'

'I have no idea.'

'Can I come?'

'Absolutely not. God forbid. Neither will you hang around the bar. You can stay up here and watch TV.'

'It's Saturday night.'

'Look, flower, we'll have a home in a week or so. We can start shipping all your clothes and your albums and books and stuff over from Cheltenham.'

'Yeah.' She supposed there had been cultural withdrawal symptoms, from the music especially. Weeks since she'd lain on a bed with her eyes closed in a room full of Radiohead.

'You won't have to be bored any more,' Mum said. 'We'll be settled, for the first time in years.'

'You think so?'

'Actually, I don't know. I don't really know what I'm doing.' Mum sighed. 'Sod it, flower,' she said wearily. 'I suppose I could consult Ted, but I've been bothering him too much lately. Go on. Go and ask Miss Devenish who on earth Wil Williams is.'

4.

Straight Shooter.

THIS FRENZIED SLAM, slam slam, flat of a hand on the door panels, someone who'd given up with the bell, given up with the knocker.

Lol flailed out of unconsciousness. Must've fallen asleep. Did that so easily now in the daytime, result of spending evenings dozing in front of the stove, staggering miserably to bed and lying awake until it was light. Yet there was something different about today ... wasn't there?

Now the door handle was being rattled, the letter-flap pushed in and out, his name being screamed.

Oh my God. The black cat sailed from his knees. He rolled out of the chair. Alison. She's here.

Go carefully. Go slowly. You only get one chance. Be cool.

Yeah, I'm fine. I just needed to talk to you. No weeping, no pleading. Just the truth. Because I can't believe it was some fast-flowering infatuation did this to us, nor a sudden realization that he was what you'd always wanted. I can't believe you saw him in his tweeds and his gumboots and you thought, that's what I need to give my life direction, a genuine old-style landowner in a damp old seven-bedroomed farmhouse with cowshit on the lino and- 'Laurence! Are you there? Laurence!'

Close to the door, Lol sagged.

It was not Alison. No indeed. He opened up, and there she was under the big hat, elbows making batwings out of the poncho.