Scarlett looked around, and saw a man in a fawn-colored raincoat squatting in front of a gravestone. He was holding a large sheet of paper which was blowing about in the wind. She hurried over to him.
“You hold on to it here,” said the man. “One hand here, one hand there, that’s it. Frightful imposition, I know. Ridiculously grateful.”
He had a biscuit tin next to him, and from the tin he pulled what looked like a crayon the size of a small candle. He began rubbing it back and forth across the stone with easy, practiced movements.
“There we go,” he said, cheerfully. “And here she comes…oops. A wiggly bit, down at the bottom here, I think it’s meant to be ivy—the Victorians loved putting ivy on things, deeply symbolic you know…and there we are. You can let go now.”
He stood up, ran one hand through his grey hair. “Ow. Needed to stand. Legs got a bit pins-and-needlesy,” he said. “So. What do you reckon to that?”
The actual headstone was covered in green and yellow lichen, and so worn and faded as to almost be undecipherable, but the rubbing was clear. “Majella Godspeed, Spinster of this Parish, 1791–1870, Lost to All But Memory,” Scarlett read aloud.
“And probably now lost even to that,” said the man. His hair was thinning, and he smiled hesitantly and blinked at her through small, round glasses which made him look a little like a friendly owl.
A large raindrop splashed down on the paper, and the man hurriedly rolled it up and grabbed his tin box of crayons. Another handful of raindrops, and Scarlett picked up the portfolio the man pointed to, propped up beside a nearby gravestone, and followed him into the tiny porch of the church, where the rain could not touch them.
“Thank you so much,” said the man. “I don’t think it’s really going to rain much. Weather forecast for this afternoon said mostly sunny.”
As if in reply, the wind gusted coldly and the rain began to beat down in earnest.
“I know what you’re thinking,” the gravestone-rubbing man said to Scarlett.
“You do?” she said. She had been thinking, My mum will kill me.
“You’re thinking, is this a church or a funeral chapel? And the answer is, as far as I can ascertain, that on this site there was indeed a small church, and the original graveyard would have been its churchyard. That’s as long ago as eight, perhaps nine hundred A. D. Rebuilt and extended several times in there. But there was a fire here in the 1820s and by that time it was already much too small for the area. People around here were using St. Dunstan’s in the village square as their parish church, so when they came to rebuild here, they made it a funeral chapel, keeping many of the original features—the stained glass windows in the far wall are said to be original…”
“Actually,” said Scarlett, “I was thinking that my mum is going to kill me. I got the wrong bus and I am already so late home…”
“Good Lord, you poor thing,” said the man. “Look, I only live just down the road. You wait here—” And with that he thrust his portfolio, his tin of crayons, and his rolled-up sheet of paper into her hands and he set off at a trot down to the gates, his shoulders hunched against the driving rain. A couple of minutes later, Scarlett saw the lights of a car and heard the sound of a car horn.
Scarlett ran down to the gates, where she could see the car, an elderly green Mini. The man she had been talking to was sitting in the driver’s seat. He wound down his window.
“Come on,” he said. “Where exactly am I taking you?”
Scarlett stood there, the rain running down her neck. “I don’t take rides from strangers,” she said.
“Quite right too,” said the man. “But one good turn deserves, and, um, all that. Here, put the stuff in the back before it gets soaked.” He pulled open the passenger door, and Scarlett leaned inside and put his graverubbing equipment down on the backseat as best she could. “Tell you what
,” he said. “Why don’t you phone your mother—you can use my phone—and tell her my car’s number plate? You can do it from inside the car. You’re getting soaked out there.”
Scarlett hesitated. Rain was beginning to plaster her hair down. It was cold.
The man reached over and handed her his mobile phone. Scarlett looked at it. She realized she was more afraid of calling her mother than she was of getting into the car. Then she said, “I could call the police too, couldn’t I?”
“You certainly can, yes. Or you can walk home. Or you can just call your mother and ask her to come and pick you up.”
Scarlett got into the passenger seat and closed the door. She kept hold of the man’s phone.
“Where do you live?” the man asked.
“You really don’t have to. I mean, you could just take me to the bus stop…”
“I’ll take you home. Address?”
“102a Acacia Avenue. It’s off the main road, a wee bit past the big sports center…”
“You are out of your way, aren’t you? Right. Let’s get you home.” He took off the handbrake, swung the car around, and drove down the hill.
“Been living here long?” he said.