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well, now that she won’t be the only young one. Anyway,’ she added, retreating to the high moral ground, ‘who are we to cast the first stone?’
    CHAPTER 2
    Â Â Â Â  When I receive the congregation: I shall judge according unto right.
    Psalm 75.3
    It was unfortunate for Enid Bletsoe, firmly in possession of her new neighbours on Sunday morning, that their appearance at church, and indeed the entire day, was overshadowed by an event of even more momentousness than the arrival of newcomers in Walston.
    They were met at the west door by Ernest Wrightman, whose good luck it was to be on duty as sidesman that day. He spared only a cursory glance for Gillian and Bryony before addressing himself to his sister-in-law as he handed her a hymn book and a service booklet. ‘Have you heard the news, then?’ he asked, knowing full well that she hadn’t, and delighting in the opportunity to tell her.
    â€˜What’s that?’
    â€˜Roger Staines. Had a heart attack last night!’
    â€˜What?!’
    Wrightman shook his head with lugubrious relish. ‘Dreadful news, isn’t it? He’s in a bad way, they say.’
    â€˜Then he’s still alive?’
    â€˜Oh, yes, it didn’t kill him. The ambulance got to him in time, and got him to hospital.’ He lowered his voice confidentially. ‘Who would have thought it? There didn’t seem to be a thing wrong with him yesterday afternoon when I saw him. But that’s the way these heart attacks work, isn’t it? One minute you’re fit as a fiddle, and the next you’re flat on your back in a hospital bed. Or in a pine box. Just like what happened to me four years back. Doris didn’t think I was going to make it, but here I still am!’ His laugh was high-pitched and mirthless.
    Gillian, realising that the man was Enid’s brother-in-law, took the opportunity to observe him. He was short and rather slight, with thin gingery hair slicked to his skull and pinched features: a narrow nose with small dark eyes above and thin lips below a wisp of a ginger moustache. One might have described him as insignificant, had it not been for the aggressive set of his square jaw, and his unexpectedly deep and resonant voice.
    Enid recollected herself enough to say, ‘Ernest, you haven’t yet had the pleasure of meeting my new neighbours, Mrs English and her daughter Bryony.’
    He gave them a perfunctory nod and a quick look of inspection before turning to perform his duties with the woman who followed them. ‘Marjorie! Have you heard the terrible news?’
    Acknowledging defeat, at least in this encounter, Enid hurried them through the empty church and up into the chancel, where a number of chairs were arranged in rows. ‘We always have our services up here,’ she explained. ‘It’s cosier – we’d get lost in the nave, as few of us as there are.’ Though she usually sat near the back, the better to see, on this occasion she decided to sit near the front, the better to be seen.
    Seen they were in spite of the fuss over Roger Staines, and the newcomers were noted by the Rector when he entered from the vestry at the beginning of the service. Stephen Thorncroft was an intelligent young man who didn’t miss much, even though on that morning his thoughts were somewhat distracted by concern about the stricken churchwarden. He’d seen Roger Staines the night before, in hospital, shortly after he’d been admitted, and he hadn’t looked good at all – as far as Stephen had been able to determine, it had been touch-and-go, and the danger was not past. He wasn’t sure how much he ought to say to the congregation about the churchwarden’s condition. Realising that Ernest Wrightman was on duty that morning, Stephen had no doubt that the arriving parishioners had been fully informed about the incident; he decided not to make an announcement and instead to wait