The Chalice

THREE

Hello, are you awake?

'I think so. A little.'

Comfortable?

'I think so.'

Let me moisten your lips.

It felt sweet on her lips. Her head felt very heavy. So did her eyelids, and yet they fell softly, like petals.

'It's very dark. I thought it was morning.'

Don't worry. Let me tell you a story. Yes? About a baby? Whose mother died when she was born?

'That's me. It's my story,' Diane whispered. She had to whisper. It was dark and she didn't want to waken the other patients.

That's right. Your mother died when you were born. She was actually dying when you were born.

'She fell downstairs.'

No, my dear, she was pushed downstairs. Everybody knows that.

'I don't understand.'

She did see you. She opened her eyes and saw you before she died. Did you know that?

'No.'

Lie back, now. Your lips are very dry. Drink some of this. Put your head back.

'Which hospital is this? Your uniform…'

Head back now… open your mouth… there. Relax. You're going to be fine.

'Did you know my mother?'

Like you, I didn't meet her until she was dying. I was your age then. Perhaps a little younger. I was an assistant midwife at the Belvedere. There were two of us. We put you in your mother's arms.

'Oh.'

She died holding you.

Diane knew she was crying.

Didn't you know that?

'No, I… it's so beautiful.'

She bleeds. We have put you in your mother's arms as she bleeds. Do you remember? Her arms around you. And she bleeds and bleeds. And her arms grow cold.

The petals of her eyelids floated like waterlilies on pools of tears.

You are lying in her dead arms. We leave you there in those dead a rms. Until other arms encircle you.

Powys let the knocker fall twice, the sound tumbling away into the slender Georgian house.

The barbed tower of St John's soared above the surrounding roofs, almost shockingly close to this discreet but hardly modest pagan temple.

Nobody answered the knock. Powys glanced at Juanita for guidance.

'Try again.' She was tense. 'They've got to be here. Where else would they be?'

'You OK?'

Stupid question. She looked close to fainting, her face taut as parchment. It was a lovely face but not iridescent, not mesmeric. He wanted to take her home, come back alone. Smash a window with a brick, storm the place. Drag Diane out of there. Get them all the hell out of this increasingly unholy town before they, too, like Jim Battle, like Woolly, fell under the malaise.

Powys raised the knocker again. This time, when it fell back on the metal plate, the door glided eerily open. 'Of course,' Juanita said. 'Electronic.'

She followed him into the hallway. There was nobody waiting for them He saw closed doors and…

'Bloody-hell. What's that?'

In a corner, a tangle of dead branches rose sombrely from a black tub. The branches were wound with holly and mistletoe and there was a circle of small stones on the carpet around the tub.

'I suspect it's… what you might call a Solstice tree,' Juanita said.

On the topmost sprig, where the silver yuletide fairy would be expected to perch, a large, white mushroom sprouted flabbily.

'It's obscene.'

'…'s pretty, isn' it? 'S extremely… pretty.'

'God!' Powys found himself clutching Juanita's arm. One of the doors had opened; the shape which hung there was as white and moist as the mushroom. '

'She wore her druidic white robe with gold edging. It hung open, exposing a black satin shift. There was a huge gold tore around the neck, glittery slippers on the feet, a sheen of perspiration on the face.

'Who're you?' She was obviously pissed as a newt.

'Wanda,' Juanita thought rapidly. 'I'll come straight to the point. We're looking for Diane. You remember Diane?'

'Diane Fortune?' the Druid giggled. 'Oh gawd, Diane bloody Fortune.'

He should have recognised her; she was, after all, famous.

'That's right,' Juanita said tensely. 'Diane Fortune.'

The eyes unclouded for a moment. 'You're not Diane Fortune. I know who you are. You're that woman from the bookshop. Anita. Been away, haven't you? Something happened to you, what the hell was it? Come and tell me about it. Is this man with you?' She peered at Powys. 'Do I know you, darling? Think I'd've remembered. 'Stonishingly few shaggable men in this town. Place is full of new men, show 'em your tits and they offer to do the washing-up.'

Dame Wanda cackled.

Juanita adjusted a glove with her teeth. 'Wanda,' she said very deliberately, 'may I present J.M. Powys, the writer… and bastard son of John Cowper Powys. J.M., this is Dame Wanda Carlisle.'

And whispered to Powys, 'Go with it. We have to make her talk. Put your hand up her robe if you have to.'

She was drowning.

In a red tide.

Thick, salty wetness in her mouth. She awoke in terror from a long, long, long sleep, with blood in her mouth.

Breath bubbling through blood.

Blood drying on cold arms.

She said, 'Please… Have I been in an accident?'

What makes you think that?

'I feel… I can't feel…'

No, lie down. You 're all right. You're fine. No, you haven't been in an accident.

'But I… No. I don't remember.'

But I'm sorry to tell you, my dear, I'm very sorry to tell that you were attacked.

'I… I don't remember.. I don't remember what…'

You were – be calm – you were raped, Diane.

'NooOOOOO!'

Diane. Be calm, my dear. Give me your arm.

'D'you know what I thought?' Wanda Carlisle demanded. 'D'you know why I took a short while opening the door? Thought it was little fucking Verity. My goddess, what a bore that woman is. Come in, come in. Solstice felishi… felicitations. Have some mulled Bowermead plonk. Dreadful piss.'

They followed her into the opulent room with the velvet drapes, the gold braiding and a superior coal-effect gas fire. Dame Wanda rumbled at the drinks cabinet and knocked over a brass lamp. 'Bloody thing.'

Powys righted the lamp. Wanda squinted at him. She wore lots of mascara which had blotched and run. She looked as though she'd been shot through both eyes.

When she flopped down on the sofa, Juanita sat next to her. 'Wanda. listen to me. Where's Diane? You remember. Plump girl. Jenna brought her last night. And Ceridwen. Was Ceridwen here?'

'Nobody's here, darling, nobody't all.'

'You're saying you're alone? All alone in this big house?'

Wanda poured wine, clumsily. 'We're all of us alone.

'And chilled by the draught of death. Yeah. Wanda, where is Ceridwen?'

If she could use her hands, Powys thought, she'd be shaking the great actress until her tore rattled.

'C'ridwen's gawn. All gawn.'

'All? Who?'

'C'ridwen. Domini, Diane Fortune'

'Diane. Diane is with them. Where? Where are they, Wanda?'

'Fuck should I know. I'm just an outer… outer circler. Don't tell us anything. I sit and I drink and I wait for Enlightenment.' She thrust a brimming wineglass at Juanita. Try this. Old Pennard makes it. Ghastly piss.'

Juanita didn't move. Powys swooped and plucked the glass from Wanda's hand, took a sip, grimaced. Wanda laughed.

'Treads the grapes himself, shouldn't wonder. They're on their uppers, you know, s'why he's so keen for the bloody road to go through. Done a dirty deal with Government for about fifty acres. Got a drink, have you, darling?'

'Yes,' said Juanita.

'But we're going…' Wanda stabbed her in the chest with a gold-encrusted forefinger,'… to stop them. Yes we are. C'ridwen will cast the most enormous sodding spell. Not that I'll be there. Bitches. I'm not toh… totally stupid. Know I'm just a figurehead. Also kept for menial chores like looking after little fucking Verity.'

'What's the problem with Verity? I thought you were friends.'

'Lord above,' said Wanda, I'm a fucking actress.' She leaned her head back into the sofa's gold-brocaded cushions. 'D'you know what I've to do today? Have to invite her for Solstice tomorrow. Gawds, up at dawn to join the fucking bishop on the Tor and then Verity for the duration. You imagine that? Verity for Solstice? Stringy old bird, no breast.'

Wanda cackled. She adjusted herself on the sofa, picked up an imaginary phone.

'Oh, but darling, you simply must come. No way you can spend Solstice alone in that dreary, dreary house. And the other point, you see, is Dilys – my housekeeper – has gawn down with this awful bug. Verity would you, could you… I've a lovely room, overlooking St John's…'

Wanda beamed. Lecturing Juanita now, pleased with herself. She seemed to have forgotten all about Powys.

'Double whammy, darling. You see, she'll be desperate to come, but she'll feel it her duty to stay in that hellhole – so the clincher will be the housekeeper line. Housemaid mentality, that woman. Got to be doing for people or she doesn't feel jus… justified. In living.'

Powys nodded to Juanita and moved quietly to the door.

'Piece of cake,' Wanda was saying. 'Putty, that woman. Dear little parcel under the Solstice tree. Set of naff hankies with a monogrammed V. Basket of pot-pourri…'

Powys slipped out of the room and back down the thickly carpeted stairs.

He entered Cauldron country. There was a huge drawing room and library, perhaps two rooms knocked into one. A lecture room now, with about thirty chairs in rows. Shelves around the walls held about twice as many books as you could find in Carey and Frayne, but the same kind of stuff. Alphabetically arranged. Under Fortune, he found about forty volumes, some different editions of the same book, under Powys, nothing.

Choosy. Or maybe no male authors.

On a plinth at the far end of the room sat an enormous, rude goddess-figure, not unlike the thing in the Goddess shop window but carved out of oak with bangles and necklaces of mistletoe.

It was all very tidy. No smells of herbs or incense. But for the goddess, it might have been a conference suite in a hotel. There was another door, between bookshelves.

Powys found himself in Wanda's Home Temple.

'It didn't make sense,' he told Juanita outside, it was done up like Tutankhamen's tomb, only more comfortable. Sofas, drapes, nice coloured pillars. A stone altar, fat candles. It felt as phoney as that woman looks. Why did she come here?'

'Fell in love with the whole Avalon bit,' Juanita said. 'That's the official story. The truth is, she went to dry out at a discreet New-Agey sort of health hydro a couple of miles out of town. Ceridwen's friend Jenna worked there, realised that here was a woman with unlimited wealth in need of a Cause. The reason I know this, my reflexologist, Sarah, was doing sessions there two days a week. Jenna wasted no time introducing Wanda to Ceridwen. Who administered a little psychic psychotherapy. Next thing, Wanda's bought this house and is spending a bomb on it.'

'I don't claim to be heavily attuned to this kind of thing,' Powys said. 'But if there's ever been a heavy ritual in that house-'

'It's somewhere else, isn't it? This place is a front.'

Juanita shivered. She looked ill now; Powys was very scared for her.

'When Wanda set up here, this was when The Cauldron really surfaced.' Over her scarf, Juanita's nose was blue. 'It became the goddess group virtually overnight. All kinds of women who'd never been seen at the Assembly Rooms, attended Cauldron meetings and lectures because of Wanda. Including Verity.'

'The lady with the Pixhill papers. I think we need to collect them, don't you?'

'What about Diane?'

'She's not here, Juanita. She may have been brought here last night, but they've taken her somewhere else. Where does Ceridwen live?'

'Tiny little flat near the Glastonbury Experience arcade. She won't be there. Too obvious.' Juanita walked to the end of the mews, where it led into High Street. 'Time is it?'

'Nearly ten-thirty.'

'Diane's been missing for over twelve hours.'

'We could tell the police.'

'She's twenty-seven. We can't say she's missing from home.'

Juanita's teeth were chattering. Her brown eyes were full of sickness.

'You're going home,' Powys said. 'Now.'

The sleet had eased, but it was very cold and the sky behind the tower of St John's foamed with purplish cloud.