Читать книгу Celtic Fire - Alex Archer - Страница 8

Chapter 2

Daybreak began somewhere over the horizon.

The faint glow in the sky signaled the start of the day.

For the curate, there was more than enough time before the 8:00 a.m. service to unlock the doors of the cathedral and make the preparations for Communion.

He hurried along the path in the slowly brightening gloom, enjoying this time of the morning as he always did, when God’s glory was there for all to wonder at. He was a simple man who enjoyed simple pleasures. Anyone who had ever heard him in the pulpit knew that. The curate crossed the old wooden footbridge spanning the brackish water of the narrow River Alyn before it moved out to the sea. The man in the shadows knew that it wouldn’t be long before he arrived—the curate was a creature of habit—and like it or not he was going to have to give up his search for now if he wanted to slip away unnoticed.

He had already spent a couple of days checking the grounds, examining individual gravestones, crossing them off on the rough map he had sketched out to be sure he didn’t return to overlapping areas of the bone garden.

But he still hadn’t found what he was looking for.

More than once he had been approached by staff and clergy of the cathedral asking if he was all right, or if he needed any help looking for a particular grave. Each time he smiled politely, said thanks but no, and they left him to wander the huge grounds. It was more attention than he wanted to draw to himself, but it was of the natural sort, in keeping with what the staff saw every day. That was the trick, to remain inside the ordinary, not to do something outside of it that would be remembered. There were tourists doing wax rubbings of some of the older gravestones, school groups being given a guided tour of the noteworthy dead and told the stories of the old town in hushed voices.

The curate’s shuffling figure drew closer, the man looking like something out of a cartoon as he held up a hand, conducting the nature around him in time with the music he was humming, and the man knew he’d have to stay where he was now until the holy man had gone inside. He was a genuinely happy man. There were so few of those in the world. He almost skipped as he came through the lych-gate, his footing sure on the cracked and broken cobblestones that lead up to the main cathedral doors. A huge weeping willow overhung the path. Its long thin dagger-leaves rustled in the breeze. To hide from the curate, the man had taken to the deep shadows the willow cast rather helpfully.

He was silent, still, allowing the shadows to shroud him. That meant he was as good as invisible to the curate.

As the curate neared he took a single slow step back, allowing the tree trunk to come between them.

When his heel came down it was on something harder than grass, but as he placed his weight on it a sound cried out.

A strange noise...

A voice calling?

The curate stopped in his tracks, his head cocked on one side as he looked directly at the man even though he couldn’t see him for the protection of the shadows.

“Hello?” The curate waited for a response, his eyes scanning the shadows for any sign of movement, which proved he couldn’t see the man hiding there. The man didn’t answer. “Who’s there?”

The man held his breath, readying himself in case the clergyman moved closer.

He would hate to have to kill him.

Mercifully he stood still, too.

He had no idea what had caused the “voice”—the sound of stone grinding against stone. Some sort of echo effect caused by being so close to the great cathedral?

“If you need food or shelter you are welcome,” the curate called. “I can get you a hot drink as soon as I have done my duties inside. Would you like that? Tea? Coffee?”

The man tried hard not to laugh.

There was something about do-gooders that brought out the worst in him. Put them in the robes of the church—which they stupidly believed gave them a cloak of invulnerability—and they were insufferable. He decided to have some fun. “I could murder a cup of tea,” he replied in a voice more gruff and deeper than his usual tone. It masked his accent. “Thank you.”

The cleric waved in his direction, the smile on his face broader than the simple act of boiling water warranted, and made for the main door of the cathedral with his keys jangling in his hand. The curate was clearly a trusting soul. But then why would he imagine the man would need anything more than that? Why would he conjure imaginary thieves intent on mugging him? Why indeed.

No doubt there were processes and procedures in place to protect the relics—triggers that would dispatch a silent alarm to the police if anyone tried to force their way inside. That didn’t concern him. He had no interest in what was inside. None of the ritualistic paraphernalia held any fascination for him. It wasn’t about value. While there was a chance that what he was searching for lay inside the building, it was a slim one because by rights it would have been discovered long ago if that was the case. No. The only thing that interested him about this particular patch of hallowed ground was a long-lost burial plot he knew must lie somewhere within the property.

And what was buried there along with the old bones was worth more to him than anything the church in Wales held precious: it was the final resting place of Giraldus Cambrensis, Gerald of Wales.

Once he was sure that the curate was inside he waited another moment, then heard other voices carrying in the air as the holy man was greeted by his brethren. The man then ran as quickly and as lightly as he could to reach the car he had parked in a pay-and-display lot tucked at the bottom of an overgrown country lane a couple of hundred yards beyond the towering spires of the cathedral.

He was intrigued by the “voice” and the curious stone that seemed to have triggered it, but it wasn’t worth the risk of returning in daylight. At least not today. A few days, maybe, to allow the curate to forget about the poor soul who was too timid to come in to claim his cup of tea.

He started the car and drove carefully through the narrow lanes and one-way system until he found himself on the road to Haverfordwest. Once he reached Solva he pulled off the road to take advantage of the unobstructed—and spectacular—view over the bay, then settled back to catch a couple of hours’ sleep.