The Darkest Hour (19 page)

As soon as she climbed into bed she found herself reliving the anguish she had felt and heard at Box Wood Farm, thinking about Elizabeth and wondering if Ralph, like his mother, would be called back by the mention of his name. The harder she tried to put him out of her head, the more insistent his memory became. On the way back from the farm, still stunned by the events of the evening, she realised she had forgotten to visit the church at Chilverly. Not forgotten actually, just not found time for it. Not found time to go and look at Ralph’s memorial. Not wanted to. Maybe. ‘If I go tomorrow, will you let me sleep?’ she murmured into the pillow.

She left the following morning half an hour before Robin was due. Heading east through the centre of Chichester she drove through a light mist of warm rain towards the airfield at Westhampnett and up past Goodwood on the road which presumably Evie had taken to and from the farm when she was sketching the airfield. It was a pretty route, taking her through woods past the racecourse and then across the Downs, climbing steeply then heading down again with stunning views across the valley, towards Chilverly. St Margaret’s was a lovely old Norman church, nestling in a small churchyard thickly sewn with lichen-covered gravestones. Under the gentle summer rain it smelled of grass and roses and wet moss.

The ancient oak door was locked. It was a moment before she spotted the note on the board in the porch directing her to a house in the village if she wanted the key. She wandered up the village street through the rain rather hoping she would not run into Elizabeth again; she wanted some space to assimilate everything that had happened the day before.

She collected the key from an elderly woman in a row of almshouses near the pub and, promising to lock up and return it when she had finished, made her way slowly back down the quiet street. The cottages and houses which lined it were all old and mostly in perfect condition. The whole place seemed oddly quiet and she found herself wondering if this was a commuter area, or maybe a haven for holiday cottage owners. Perhaps these people like Mike Marston spent most of their lives in London leaving a ghost community behind them to struggle on during the week.

The door of the church creaked as she pushed it open. She closed it behind her and stood looking round in the dim light filtering through the windows. It was a small narrow building with no side aisles or pews. A few lines of chairs had been arranged haphazardly on either side of the aisle and if their number was anything to go by there was a very small congregation. There were no guide books or postcards on the table near the door and only a box of slightly mildewed hymn books on the one remaining pew, against the wall, at the back. In spite of this, perhaps because of it, the church felt overwhelmingly peaceful and she found herself slowly relaxing as she wandered towards the back and began to look at the memorial stones and brasses on the walls.

The whole history of the community was here. As far as she could see, the earliest memorial, a carving on a stone tablet, dated from the late fifteenth century. Most of them were from the nineteenth. It was several minutes before she found Ralph. She stood looking up at the simple stone slab on the wall for a long time.

In loving memory

of

Ralph James Lucas

1919-1940

who gave his life for his country

greater love hath no man

Evie would have come here. Evie would have stood on this precise spot, gazing at her brother’s memorial with tears in her eyes. Evie would have come here for his funeral, and probably for her own wedding. This place was part of her history and her life.

As Lucy stood staring up at the memorial, lost in thought, she heard the door open behind her but she took no notice. Whoever had come in did not approach her and she barely heard the soft footsteps making their way up the aisle towards the chancel.

She only realised there were tears on her cheeks when she heard someone clear their throat immediately behind her. ‘A very brave young man.’ The man’s voice was soft and tactfully noncommittal. ‘Was he a relative of yours?’

She turned and found herself face to face with the vicar, a man in his late sixties, she guessed, with a thatch of white hair and brilliant green eyes. He wore his dog collar with a dark blue sweater and jeans which strangely seemed to suit him very well.

‘No he’s not a relative,’ Lucy answered. She took a deep breath, trying to rid herself of the terrible sadness which had swept over her, and to remember why she was here. ‘Were you here when the Lucases lived in the village?’

He gave an unexpected hoot of laughter. ‘Good Lord no. I may have white hair but I’m not that old.’ He paused. ‘I’m sorry. That was crass but I’ve been here only eighteen months. I am only just beginning to feel my way round all the ins and outs of this place. The house where the Lucases lived was up a lane off the Goodwood road. The couple who live there now are not part of my flock sadly.’ He glanced round. ‘As you can see not many people are, though I’m working on it.’ He paused. ‘Are you from round here?’

Lucy shook her head. ‘I live in Chichester. I’m working on a biography of Ralph’s sister, Evelyn.’ She glanced at the memorial again and then back at the vicar to see if there was any sign of recognition at the name. There wasn’t. ‘She was a war artist and went on to be quite well known in her day. Sadly there isn’t that much biographical information around so I am trying to find as much as I can from scratch. I went to Box Wood Farm yesterday and met Mrs Chappell. She very kindly showed me round. Evie Lucas was born there and lived there until she married.’ She paused. Was that true? She didn’t even know that much for certain. ‘The family had been there for generations, I gather, but when her parents died and Evie inherited the place she sold it without ever coming back here to live.’

‘The world was a very different place after the war.’ The vicar nodded slowly. ‘I’m Huw Redwood, by the way.’ He held out his hand.

She shook it. ‘Lucy. Lucy Standish.’

‘So, did you see the ghost at Box Wood Farm?’ His eyes twinkled mischievously.

She stared at him. ‘You know about the ghost?’

‘Everyone knows about the ghost. Besides, ghosts are part of my job. In theory anyway.’

‘So you believe in them. You think they are real?’ She heard the anxiety in her voice.

He nodded. ‘I do, yes.’ He eyed her curiously.

Lucy walked a few steps away from him and threw herself down on one of the chairs.

‘I heard it,’ she said. She found her hands were shaking again at the thought. ‘I stayed to have supper with Elizabeth last night and we heard it. Her. It was awful, frightening, sad.’

He studied her face for a few seconds and silently came to sit beside her leaving an empty chair between them. ‘Tell me about it,’ he said quietly.

She described what had happened.

‘Poor woman.’ She wasn’t sure if he meant Rachel or Elizabeth. ‘Several people told me about it when I first came here. I think it is one of the ways that congregations assess a new pastor – how will he deal with the local legends and will he feel compelled to exorcise any ghosts still knocking around in the old buildings? There are, of course, said to be several ghosts in the village but this one is the most tragic. No one has asked me to do any exorcising I am glad to say. I’m not allowed to anyway. There is a special department in the bishop’s office that deals with that sort of thing, but stories of ghosts always intrigue me. They usually betray so much unhappiness which has remained unresolved.’

‘Elizabeth isn’t one of your congregation, you said,’ Lucy reminded him.

He shook his head. ‘I went and introduced myself, of course, when I arrived in the parish but I wasn’t asked in.’

Lucy gave a rueful smile. ‘I’m afraid I’m not a churchgoer either.’ She hesitated and he waited, patiently. ‘My husband died nearly four months ago,’ she said at last. ‘We had a church funeral because his parents wanted it and I couldn’t think of anything else. Laurence, that’s my husband, would have laughed and said he wanted a blazing pyre on the beach, or a rocket to the moon or something, but I knew he would want to comfort his mother as well. She was inconsolable.’

Huw slowly nodded. ‘And so were you,’ he said gently.

She sighed. ‘I wanted him to be a ghost. I wanted him to come and speak to me and explain what happened. I needed him so much.’ Suddenly she was crying properly, unable to stem the tears running down her face.

Huw reached into the pocket of his jeans and produced a pack of tissues. ‘How did he die?’ he asked at last.

‘A car crash. The police think someone ran him off the road, but they never found anyone. It was all so pointless.’ She was sobbing out loud, unable to stop. ‘I’m sorry. This is silly. I’m over it. It’s just I miss him so much.’

‘We never get over the loss of the ones we love,’ Huw said after another long silence. ‘We learn to live with our pain, that’s all.’

‘Rachel Lucas never learned to live with the pain of losing her son,’ Lucy whispered. ‘She is still crying.’

‘It must have been a horrific experience for you both to hear her like that.’ Huw sighed. ‘Poor Elizabeth. It would be very hard for her and her husband to live with that.’

‘I don’t think her husband is there much.’ Lucy blew her nose. ‘I think he has other interests.’

‘Ah, I see. Then I am even more sorry for her.’

‘Rachel is not the only ghost in this story,’ Lucy blurted out suddenly. Everywhere she was looking for Evie, and everywhere she was finding Evie’s family. ‘Ralph, that’s the guy on your memorial there, Rachel’s son, Evie’s brother, has been haunting me. At home.’ He wasn’t a nightmare; he wasn’t a construct of her imagination; however much Robin tried to hint that he might be, Phil was right. Such things existed and Ralph was one of them.

There was another silence and she looked at him anxiously. ‘You do believe me?’

‘I do believe you, yes,’ he said. ‘There is obviously a desperately sad story here. But I am interested in why he is haunting you. Is there a family connection to the house you live in? You said you weren’t a relative.’

‘No, but I’m writing about his family and he comes into the story. I’m thinking about them, I’m already so involved with them.’ She scrubbed at her eyes with the tissue. ‘I was scared of him at first but he never does anything. He never says anything. He is just a shadow, standing there, in the studio.’ And suddenly she was telling told him the whole story. When she had at last finished she gave a weak smile. ‘You must be very good at your job. You know how to wheedle secrets of the confessional out of people.’

He laughed quietly. ‘That wasn’t part of my training, I assure you. I just know how to listen. And,’ he added, suddenly serious again, ‘I know how to keep my counsel.’

‘Would you do something for me?’ Lucy asked after another moment’s pause. She liked this man and instinctively she trusted him. ‘Would you come and talk to him? I don’t want to have him exorcised. I don’t want anything to do with your bishop, I just want someone to talk to him and ask him what he wants.’

‘Why don’t you ask him yourself?’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t think I could. Or, at least, I have asked him if he is Ralph – when he didn’t answer I assumed that was it, he was just a shadow standing there, and I would never know for sure who he was. But now I have seen photos of him. I recognised him. I know it is Ralph, but I still don’t know why he is there.’

‘And so you came to find his memorial. If I came, would I be allowed to pray?’ Huw looked at her seriously. ‘I don’t try and force people into my church or railroad them into my beliefs, but God is what I do. If I come I would have to pray for Ralph and for his family.’

‘And you think that works?’ She couldn’t hide her scepticism.

‘Oh, yes, it works.’

‘And you think no one else has prayed for them in all these years?’

‘Ah, that is a good point.’ He shook his head. ‘I am sure they have, but maybe not properly. Maybe there was too much sadness, too much anger. Maybe too much bitterness. Without forgiveness and love and understanding people get stuck.’

She stood up and walked slowly up towards the altar. It was modern, in some ways out of keeping with the rest of the church, but somehow it fitted. A huge raw chunk of pale wood with a plain wooden cross and two small vases of flowers on it.

‘I wish I knew how to pray,’ she said sadly. ‘I know it means a lot to some people but to me it means nothing. It would be hypocrisy to speak to a God I don’t believe in.’

‘He wouldn’t mind.’ He followed her and stopped several paces away from her. ‘He would be pleased that you were trying it out, giving him the benefit of the doubt.’

‘Really?’ she turned to face him.

‘Try it one day when no one is looking.’ He smiled. ‘Now, my dear, I am afraid I do have to go. I only came in to collect some notes I had left in here. I need to get to the hospital. If I give you my card – I know that seems unexpectedly businesslike for an otherworldly guy like me but that’s the way we work these days – will you ring me if you would like me to come over and talk to Ralph? I would like to meet him, and if you don’t object too violently I will in the meantime pray for you and for the Lucas family.’