Read Mrs. Malory and Any Man's Death for Free Online Page B

figure looks in such a place.
    The church struck chill. “No heating except for services,” he said. “Strict economy is our rule— faute de mieux, I’m afraid.”
    “It seems suitable somehow,” I said, “that the inside of a church should be a different temperature from the world outside.” I instinctively lowered my voice, not being, like Trollope’s Lily Dale, one accustomed to speaking conversationally in church.
    “No tombs,” he said regretfully. “No recumbent Elizabethan figures surrounded by kneeling deceased children. Still, we do have a remarkably fine screen and the font is fifteenth century.”
    He led the way into the vestry, unlocked a cupboard and produced some parish registers, saying, “I think these will be the most useful things I can provide. They go back a fair way.”
    I opened one of the heavy volumes and glanced through the pages.
    “These will be splendid, but I think I’d like to come and spend some time looking at them properly and making notes.”
    He nodded. “Of course; just let me know when. Oh, and do bring your laptop if you want to—we welcome the new technology!”
    I left him in the vestry and made my way out of the church. As I was going towards the rectory to collect my car, I was hailed from behind. It was Annie Roberts.
    “Oh, Sheila, just the person—can you just pop in and have a look at some old letters I think you really ought to include?”
    “Oh, well . . .” I began.
    “It won’t take a moment.”
    Obviously it was impossible to refuse, so I followed her up the village street and into her cottage.
    “Do you always leave your door unlocked?” I asked curiously.
    “Why wouldn’t I?”
    “Well, is it safe?”
    She laughed. “I was only going up to the shop,” she said, “and there’s always someone about in the street. It’s not like in a town, now, is it?”
    We went into her sitting room and she sat me down at the large round table and laid several bundles of letters before me.
    “I saw you going into the rectory earlier,” she said, “so I reckoned you’d be up at the church sometime. Looking at the parish registers, were you? Well now, see what you think of these. They’re letters I found in an old suitcase of my mother’s—a lot of stuff there. These are ones my grandfather wrote when he was in France in the First World War. Now, what do you say about that?”
    I picked up one of the bundles and touched it gently. The paper was stiff and brown at the edges, the ink faded.
    It was, somehow, a very emotional moment, and I suddenly felt I couldn’t examine them with Annie’s eyes upon me.
    “I wonder,” I said, “would you mind if I took them away and had photocopies made so that I can work on them at home? Then I can return the originals; they must be very precious to you.”
    She seemed disconcerted and I wondered if she’d expected us to read them together, something I didn’t think I could bear to do.
    “Well, yes, I suppose . . .” she began.
    “I’ll take great care of them,” I said, “and let you have them back in a few days. If you have a bag or something I could put them in?”
    “I think so. Come into the kitchen and I’ll see what I can find.”
    I followed her along the narrow hallway into a surprisingly roomy kitchen with a stone sink and an old Aga range (both original, not part of a trendy makeover), high cupboards all round and a large table taking up most of the space in the middle. Annie had obviously been preparing a meal; there was a wooden board with chopped-up carrots and onions, a pot half filled with meat and a basket of mushrooms. Though, when I looked more closely, they weren’t mushrooms, but a variety of fungi.
    “Good gracious,” I said, picking up the basket, “are you going to cook with these? Aren’t they dangerous?”
    She looked up from the drawer in the table where she’d been looking for a bag and laughed.
    “Dangerous? Bless you, no! Not if you know what you’re doing. We’ve