11. THE FUNERAL, AND AFTER

funeral, illegal immigrant, lovers, Father Absolom, graveyard

I was still wondering what could possibly be difficult about burying the dead after sunset when we buried the dead after sunset because, right on cue, the sun started setting. And nothing went wrong. The was no catastrophe, the geriatric angels didn’t turn into swallows and fly away, the earth didn’t open up and provide us with a pit reaching down to the centre of the Earth where endless fires raged as a resting place for our friend. It was as normal a burial as you would expect under such abnormal circumstances.

On the plus side, the grave had already been dug. I wasn’t looking forward to helping dig a deep hole at night. But there, just visible in the fading light, were several piles of earth and several what could only be empty graves.

“I like to have a few holes open, just in case,” Father Absolom had explained to us as he led us to a very quiet corner of a quiet graveyard, towards the piles of earth. It was so quiet that the ringing voice of a blackbird that clearly didn’t understand the meaning of the word quiet made us all jump, and I was sure I heard a spider sigh as I almost trod on it.

“Here we are,” intoned the grinning Father Absolom as we stood by an open grave that may or may not have been six feet deep. Personally, I thought it didn’t look a great deal more than two feet, but my powers of subterranean measurement have never been that good. In fact, they’ve never actually been put to the test, so I wasn’t in any position to pass accurate judgement, and I kept quiet.

“It’s shallow,” muttered Scabby, confirming my own suspicions.

“But deep enough,” beamed the good Father, surrounded by his angels, the one using a zimmer frame having finally caught up with the rest of us and slightly out of breath.

I frowned and shook my head, but a little thought suggesting that the depth didn’t really matter, sad as it was, Crin was dead as a dodo and no matter what happened in the weeks and months to come he would remain dead. Suddenly, all I wanted to do was get the macabre ceremony over and done with and the rest of us safely away from the place.

But Father Absolom had the need to speak. He had developed, most likely via the gift of practising in front of a mirror, a sombre and extremely clerical tone of voice which, apparently, he switched on for funerals.

“Brothers and sisters,” he pronounced, “we are gathered here on the good turf of Saint Beatrice where the blessed crone herself once stood and in the presence of our Lord, in whose care we commend ourselves, and whose love is all around us, to bid farewell to our friend, our lover and our corpse, the good Crin...”

When he had reached the word lover Angela started sniffing and when he rolled the word corpse around his mouth and seemed to spit it out she burst into uncontrollable tears.

Two of the angels nudged each other and one whispered something I couldn’t quite catch, but oddly it sounded like it’ll make a change to get a night’s sleep now that he’s got a new toy...

The so-called service continued for a short time after that and then Father Absolom led Angela quietly away, supposedly to help her in her grief and dry her tears, one arm round her shoulders as he grinned something into her ears.

“That’s one more to share the load,” sighed one of his three angels.

“What load?” I asked, thinking that the housework in the ancient church can’t have been that plentiful or onerous.

“Wouldn’t you like to know!” she replied, and she winked at me. It was the most lascivious wink I have ever seen. I mean, how can such a simple thing as a wink be lascivious? But this one was.

“Come on,” urged Jed, surprisingly not kicking me, “let’s get back to the reunion site. We need to rehearse before Saturday’s show.”

“What about Angela?” asked Joanie, “she’s still cut up about Crin. Shouldn’t we wait for her?”

“She won’t be coming,” Scabby told her, “she’s decided to stay with the good Father and his angels.”

“Old birds, if you ask me,” grunted Jed.

“No matter what we might think, this is where she wants to stay,” insisted Scabby.

“Don’t you think we should at least ask her?” I suggested. “We can’t just scarper as if everything’s as plain as day, because in my eyes it isn’t.”

“You go then,” muttered Jed, “As for me, I don’t want to go anywhere near the spooky old place and its even spookier Absolom, and the sooner we get away the better.”

“You’ll wait for me?” I asked, fearing they’d leave me to walk the mile or so back to the ruined castle. Not that the distance troubled me over much, but it was getting really dark and there was no moon anywhere in sight, the road was shattered and broken and I suspected wild creatures abounded in the surrounding woodland.

“Of course, mate,” assured Scabby, so I made my way back and knocked on the door of the old church. The wooden door looked impenetrable in the near black of a falling night. The knocker fell off and broke a milk bottle that had been place in exactly the right place to be broken by a falling door knocker. The noise was nuclear, shattering the evening air.

It seemed to be ages before the door was opened a crack and a face peered out. My immediate thought was how like one of those old horror films this scene was becoming.

“Yes?” asked the ancient angel whose face I could just see through the crack. She made the simple monosyllabic yes last for an age, finally spitting the very last echo of its last consonant so that it hit me firmly in the eye.

“Is Angela coming?” I asked, almost afraid to give utterance to a single word as her eyes bored into me.

“You mean the new bird?” asked the angel.

“Yes, her,” I replied.

The answer, though, didn’t come from her but from within the murky building, which didn’t smell anything like an ecclesiastic building but more like one of those houses with red lights in the windows and ladies peeping shyly out, not that I’ve ever been in one to really know what they smell like.

“Oooh,” came the answer from somewhere within, “Oooh, don’t stop … don’t stop, ooh, more, more, I want more...”

And the reply in a rich, grinning voice,

“My my, you naughty girl, my my...”

“I see,” I said, not really seeing, “she’s busy, then...” and I made my way back to Scabby and company.

“Well?” he asked.

“I don’t think she’s coming. At least, not in the sense we mean,” I explained. “Come on, let’s get away from this wretched place. I only hope Crin’s spirit’s happy here because I couldn’t be.”

“Too true, mate,” agreed Scabby, and Joanie shivered as Jed started the engine.

© Peter Rogerson 27.06.18