Breaking and Entering (32 page)

‘Blue?'

She flushed. ‘That's my name for the master. I know it must sound silly, but blue's always been my favourite colour – the colour of big peaceful things like sea and sky and …' She faltered, as if afraid he'd think her pretentious. ‘What do
you
call him?' she asked.

Now it was Daniel's turn to hesitate. Studiously he attacked a blackened saucepan with his dishmop. ‘I … I haven't quite decided,' he replied. ‘I can't make him out at all. I mean, I really don't know the first thing about him. Does anyone? Do
you
?'

‘Oh yes! That's the only reason I came. I live in Wales myself, you see – only thirty miles away – and someone in our village knows this man who had cirrhosis of the liver, but was cured by Blue within three days of arriving here.'

‘Oh, really? And have you
met
the chap, questioned him yourself?'

‘No, he lives in Shrewsbury. But apparently it was almost like a miracle, and even his doctor said he couldn't believe his eyes.'

‘Mm, that's the trouble, though, isn't it? It's always “apparently” or “a friend of a friend”, never anything more precise. I think we need to check up on him – ask to see his credentials, so to speak.'

Claire twisted the damp tea-towel in her hands. ‘But that would look as if we didn't trust him. And it would be a bit ungrateful, when he does all this for free. Yes, I know a few people make donations, and we all share food and stuff, but basically he's giving and we're taking.'

‘Maybe,' said Daniel tersely. ‘But if it's our children's health at stake, then we shouldn't take any risks.'

‘But what risks could there be? I mean, it's not as if he uses drugs or surgery. And Happy told me he learned his healing methods from really amazing people like Australian Aboriginals, and shamans in Peru, and Pueblo medicine-men. He's actually
lived
with them, Daniel, travelled all over the world, from one tribe to another.'

Daniel tossed aside the ineffectual dish-mop and seized a scouring pad, venting his frustration on the saucepan. Claire's disclosures had made him still more alarmed. Wasn't it the height of irresponsibility to allow his daughter to be used as a guinea-pig for the dubious (if not dangerous) remedies of some Pueblo medicine-man? He glanced around at the various bodies sprawled out on the grass – they might be sunbathing on holiday rather than here in search of cures. Did no one share his apprehension, or at least his belief in basic standards and precautions? Most of them looked half-asleep, lulled by the fine weather, or perhaps drowsy after the meal. And those still awake seemed absorbed in some weird rite or other. Happy and Corinna were performing an exotic dance underneath the trees, circling with slow rhythmic steps and semaphoring with their arms. Another girl sat cross-legged outside her tent, meditating presumably, with her hands resting palms up on her knees. She was humming on one note, the low drone occasionally punctuated by the laughter of a child. Outwardly, the scene was tranquil enough – the stream burbling over stones, white butterflies alighting on gold buttercups, the sheep still placidly grazing. Only he was out of tune with the general air of peace; his mind churning with unanswered questions; suspicion of the healer overlaid with a grudging respect and a streak of indefinable fear. He was also worried about Penny. She had disappeared straight after lunch – and so too had JB. He only hoped they weren't closeted together in the intimacy of the tent, he giving and she taking.

‘Another thing,' said Claire, drying a clutch of forks and packing them in the cardboard box which served as a cutlery drawer. ‘He's been ill himself – quite seriously ill – and I'm sure that makes a difference. If you've experienced suffering first-hand, you're far more likely to sympathize. He confided in me the first night I arrived, which I thought was really touching. I was pretty low at the time – in tears and everything – so I suppose he realized it would help to know
he'd
been through the mill as well, and yet survived and come out stronger for it.'

‘The healer healed,' Daniel murmured.

The irony was lost on Claire. ‘Yes, that's right,' she enthused. ‘He says we're all wounded and all capable of being healers, but we deny our natural powers.'

Daniel scrubbed vigorously at the pan, cursing the ban on detergents. A slimy bar of household soap was no match for burned-on sludge. ‘Has your son had any healing yet?' he asked. ‘I mean, a proper kosher session with the laying on of hands, or whatever?'

‘No, and even if it was offered, he'd resist it at this stage. He's very shy and suspicious, you see. But Blue always takes his time. He won't force himself on people, but waits until they're ready. And anyway, there are others here who need him more than Rick does. Take Doris, for example. She's got MS, but she hasn't had a session either. You just have to be patient. It's all part of accepting things, and acceptance is really crucial. He's taught me that already.'

Daniel resisted the temptation to argue the point that if acceptance of one's ills was healing, then all and sundry could set themselves up as Magic Men. He had taken an instant liking to this woman, despite her simplistic views, and had no wish to upset her. In appearance she was plain and rather gawky – not the sort of female he would normally look at twice. She was an inch or two taller than he was, and although she stooped to disguise her height, her apologetic posture only emphasized it more. Her hips were narrow, boyish; her breasts indiscernible beneath the baggy shirt. She wore glasses which seemed frivolous and completely out of character – magenta-coloured frames with little specks of glitter on them – as if she had allowed herself just one stab at glamour, and then settled for drab clothes and lank straight hair. But the eyes behind the spectacles were sensitive and trusting, and her warm outgoing manner put him at his ease.

‘Are you Welsh?' he asked, moving to a less contentious topic.

‘No, but my husband is – or ex-husband, I should say. It's stupid, I suppose, but I can't bring myself to use the word.' She swallowed, made a pretence of re-arranging the forks. ‘He walked out three months ago.'

‘I'm sorry.'

‘It's okay. And oddly enough, I really mean that now. Blue's helped me to see that it
is
okay to be depressed. He says depression's simply part of life – the shadow side or dark side. We shouldn't call it an illness, or suppress it with electric shocks or pills, but actually try to welcome it instead, because it teaches us compassion and develops what he calls our soul. Not soul in the religious sense, but …'

‘Mum!'

‘What?' Claire turned to see her son approaching, cradling something in his hands.

‘Look! I've found a sheep's skull. Isn't it fantastic? It's still got all the teeth in.'

‘So it has.' She took it from him, stroked a careful finger around the hollow of the eye-socket. ‘It must be pretty old. it's completely smooth and clean.'

Picked clean by the crows, thought Daniel. He could picture the cruel birds circling; the foxes tearing flesh from bone. It disturbed him somehow – this reminder of clean death. ‘Where did you find it?' he asked.

‘Just in the next field. I'm going back there now to take another look. There might be other bones and things, to add to my collection.'

‘Quite the little ghoul, isn't he?' Claire grabbed Rick's sleeve before he could dash off again. ‘You're not going anywhere, my lad, until you've had your medicine.'

‘Oh, not again!' Rick groaned. ‘It's absolutely foul.'

‘That's as may be, but Blue says it's doing you good, and he wants you to take it every two hours.'

Daniel returned to his improvised sink: a battered plastic bowl perched precariously on two upturned crates. ‘I thought you said Blue didn't believe in drugs?'

‘He doesn't. This is based on plants. In fact, I collect them myself each morning, now he's shown me which ones to use – comfrey, and burdock, and red valerian, when I can find it.'

‘And deadly nightshade,' Rick muttered, ‘and great big flabby toadstools.'

Daniel laughed. He felt a certain sympathy with Rick. The boy was tall and gangling, as
he'd
been in his teens, and seemed constitutionally unable to keep still; continually shuffling his feet, flicking back his hair or gnawing at his thumbnail. He remembered his own restlessness at school; being forced to sit quietly at his desk while inwardly he was exploding through the roof, streaking to the nearest airport and hurtling back to Zambia. The change from prep-school to senior school hadn't ended his unhappiness. It was still the dreaded Greystone Court – just a transfer to another building (bigger, colder, greyer than the Junior House). As if prompted by the move, he had grown six inches in as many months, shooting up from dwarf to beanpole; wrists protruding from his blazer sleeves; trouser-legs embarrassingly short. He recalled the hated nicknames: ‘Stick Insect' and ‘Broomstick', even ‘Twiggy', worst of all. If Rick was suffering similar taunts, then it was quite possible his pains were psychosomatic. Being so much taller than your classmates could prove a heavy cross to bear, especially if you were the shy type and longed to be invisible – not exactly easy when there was so much of you to hide.

‘It's amazing,' Claire was saying as she poured some murky greenish liquid from a Thermos flask into a glass, ‘how Blue's changed my attitude to things. Even gathering these plants is a sort of sacred task. You have to speak to them first, not just grab the leaves or flowers as if they're your natural God-given right. He says we need to respect them, ask their permission before we help ourselves.'

‘Well, I wish they'd said no,' groaned Rick, as she pushed the glass into his hand.

‘Go on – be brave!' she urged. ‘Remember what Blue said: “Close your eyes and down it in one go!” '

‘You must be joking.' He took a tiny sip and gave an extravagant grimace, clutching at his throat and pretending to gag. ‘I refuse to drink another drop of this vile stuff unless I can have a sweet or something, to take the taste away.'

‘Blue doesn't approve of sweets, Rick. You know that perfectly well.'

Rick aimed a kick at the cutlery box. ‘He doesn't approve of anything, if you ask me. No crisps or Coke or telly – not even a flipping biscuit. This place is worse than a prison camp.'

‘Well, you could have a piece of carrot cake. Or there may be a bran muffin left. I'll go and check the tin.'

‘I don't want that muck, Mum! I want some proper sweets.'

‘I've got some toffees in the car,' Daniel admitted, giving the word ‘toffees' a whispered emphasis, to stress their status as contraband. ‘Almost a full packet. You're welcome to them, Rick, so long as your mother doesn't object.'

‘Well, I do,' retorted Claire. ‘They'll undo all the good Blue's done,
and
it's going behind his back. I just don't think that's fair.'

‘You're such a fuss-arse, Mum! One little sweet can't hurt. And anyway I reckon I deserve one. I'm stuck here with nothing to do, the food's disgusting and you keep shoving that shitty medicine down my throat. No one in their right mind would come here in a thousand years. Can you imagine what my friends would say? They're all away on proper holidays stuffing themselves with burgers and chips, and probably beer and fags as well.'

Much the same as
my
friends, Daniel thought wryly. Except with them it would be entrecote and
pommes dauphinoises
, washed down with a good claret and perhaps followed by a cigar. He could already smell the whiff of the cigar, taste it in his mouth. The mention of ‘fags' had roused in him a sudden intense desire to smoke.

‘Don't be silly, Rick,' said Claire. ‘I'm sure your friends don't drink. Their parents wouldn't allow it.'

‘Get a grip, Mum! You really are pathetic! Pete and Darren have been swilling lager since they were ten, and Barry often helps himself to his dad's whisky.'

The argument continued, until Claire reluctantly gave in, though probably more to spare Daniel the embarrassment of a protracted family tussle than from any real conviction that a bag of Creamline toffees was any less heinous than cigarettes and Scotch.

‘Okay,' said Rick to Daniel. ‘Let's go.'

Claire took over with the scouring pad, tackling the last cooking-pot – a heavy iron contraption even more charred than the previous ones – while Rick and Daniel strode off to find the car. All the vehicles had been moved to higher ground to prevent any further mishaps. George and Margot had told him that when they first arrived, their spanking new Cortina had stuck chassis-deep in the mud, and could only be hauled out with a tow-rope. He was surprised that they had actually stayed the course, rather than turning tail for home, or swapping the healer's ministrations for those of Thomas Cook. He was sure they would be far happier in a nice hotel in the Algarve, with all mod cons and a courier on hand.

His thoughts returned to Rick. He wondered if his truculence was a reaction to his father walking out. Away from his mother, he seemed far less outspoken, retreating behind a façade of glum reserve. Was it worse to lose your father in your teens, or when you were only four, as Pippa had been?

‘How old are you, Rick?' he asked, instantly regretting the question. He had hated it when grown-ups asked his age. Whatever answer you gave, it was invariably the wrong one, and you'd be judged too big, too small, too old, too young, too something.

Rick evidently felt the same. ‘Nearly fourteen,' he mumbled, picking up a stick from the ditch and slashing at the grass with it.

Daniel refrained from comment. He'd have guessed fifteen at least, but he suppressed his exclamation of surprise. So the boy was little older than Pippa. Perhaps the two could be friends – both silent types and both deprived of their fathers. He hadn't seen Pippa since last night, and was struck with new guilt about how little he'd actually thought of her. They were only here for her sake, yet he had no idea how she was. Had she opened up and blossomed now that she had new responsibilities, or was she feeling still more miserable? She had said very little yesterday, but that was hardly surprising in such unconventional surroundings. He really ought to find her; reassure himself that she was not at any risk from either the healer or the injured dog.