‘I see. I’m sorry to hear of your troubles. I can, of course, pray for their easement, but … I don’t think that’s what you want from me, is it?’
‘Of course not. I’m an atheist, for one thing.’
Adam winced. He should have ordered that tea anyway. He felt the need for something hot and sweet to anchor him, a handle to hold on to. If only he could go upstairs and change his trousers, then he wouldn’t have that creeping feeling that Julia Shields knew what he’d been up to that afternoon.
‘Then, may I ask …?’
‘I think you’ll agree with me that the new owners need to be drummed out of the village when I tell you what they’re doing in my ancestral home.’
He leant forward, finally interested in what this apparently batty woman had to say.
‘What’s that?’ Images of Evie frolicking in the corn wound through his head as if on a film reel. Before Julia’s words were out, he knew sex would be in the equation.
‘They’ve turned it into a porn set.’
‘What? A what?’
‘Exactly! It’s horrifying! My childhood home, the seat of the Shields since 1609, is being used to make blue movies.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Am I sure? Yes. Come with me. I’ll show you.’
‘Show me? They surely won’t …’
‘Just come.’
‘I don’t know about this.’
Adam was far from prepared for a second round of voyeurism that warm April afternoon, but Julia had already left the room and waited impatiently for him by the front door.
He knew where the manor house was – it was almost directly opposite the vicarage, but its handsome grey stone façade didn’t give any inkling of the corruption within.
‘I don’t know about this. What makes you think this is going on? Have you seen them filming?’
But Julia wouldn’t answer any of his questions, guiding him silently along the garden wall until they left the road and followed it through thick foliage, eventually arriving at a small, broken-down section that could be climbed over, with some effort.
‘You want me to break in to the garden with you?’
‘It’s not breaking in. This place belongs to me.’
‘I don’t think the law would recognise that.’
‘I thought there was a higher law, Reverend. Or have I misread that?’
‘No, no, Jesus never advocated law-breaking. I can’t follow you.’
‘Shh. They’re close by.’
Julia, who had managed to climb the wall and drop down into the trees on the other side, crept noiselessly towards the lawns.
‘You’ll be able to hear them anyway,’ she whispered.
He heard a sharp click and a cry of, ‘Action!’ Almost immediately a loud chorus of moans floated through the thicket, the effect eerie to Adam’s already nervous ears. Julia moved back and forth, peering through the branches then reporting her findings to her companion.
‘They’re fucking up against a tree,’ she said matter-of-factly, then, ‘she’s tied him to the tree and she’s sucking him off. He really is enormously well hung.’
It occurred to Adam that she could be making all this up, but the sound effects were so lewdly realistic he thought he should believe her.