Page 83 of The Running Grave

‘Here for your Week of Service?’ said a smiling young man with wavy blond hair.

‘Yes,’ said Robin.

‘I thank you for your service,’ he said immediately, pressing his hands together and performing a little bow.

‘I – don’t know what to say back to that,’ said Robin, and he laughed.

‘The response is, “And I for yours.”’

‘With the bow?’ asked Robin, and he laughed again.

‘With the bow.’

Robin pressed her hands together, bowed and said,

‘And I for yours.’

Before either could speak again, music started from hidden speakers: David Bowie’s ‘Heroes’. The blond-haired man whooped and got to his feet, as did nearly everyone else. Cheers broke out, as Jonathan and Mazu Wace entered the room, hand in hand. Robin spotted Marion Huxley, the undertaker’s widow, pressing her hands to her face as though she’d just seen a rock star. Jonathan waved at the excited church members, while Mazu wore a gracious smile, the train of her robes sliding over the paved floor. There were many cries of ‘Papa J!’ as the pair climbed up to the top table, where Taio Wace and Becca Pirbright were already sitting. Glancing around, Robin saw Jiang sitting in front of his clean tin plate among the ordinary members. The similarity of Jiang’s and Mazu’s narrow, dark eyes made Robin suspect that he was, at the very least, Taio’s half-brother. As she watched, Jiang’s eye began to twitch uncontrollably again, and he concealed it swiftly with his hand.

Mazu took her seat at the top table, but Jonathan walked in front of it, hands raised, gesturing for the church members to settle down. Robin was once again struck by his striking good looks, and how little he looked like a man in his mid-sixties.

‘Thank you,’ he said with his self-deprecating smile, wearing a wireless microphone that amplified his voice over hidden speakers. ‘Thank you… it’s good to be home.’

Will Edensor, who was easy to spot given his height, was smiling and cheering with the rest of the room, and for a moment, remembering Will’s dying mother, she found herself completely in sympathy with James Edensor, who’d called Will an idiot.

‘We shall replenish our material bodies, and then we’ll talk!’ said Jonathan.

More cheers and more applause followed. Jonathan took his seat between Mazu and Becca Pirbright.

Kitchen workers now appeared from a side door, wheeling along large metal vats, from which they ladled food onto the tin plates. The four at the top table, Robin noticed, were being brought china plates already full of food.

When her turn came, Robin received a dollop of brown sludge that seemed to comprise overcooked vegetables, followed by a ladleful of noodles. The vegetables had been flavoured with too much turmeric and the noodles had an overcooked, gluey consistency. Robin ate as slowly as she could, trying to fool her stomach into believing it had consumed more calories than it had, because she knew the nutritional value of what they were eating was very low.

Robin’s two young male neighbours kept up a steady stream of chat, asking her name, where she was from and what had attracted her to the church. She soon found out that the young man with wavy blond hair had been at the University of East Anglia, which had hosted one of Papa J’s meetings. The other, who was wearing a buzz cut, had been to one of the church-run addiction centres and been recruited there.

‘Have you seen anything, yet?’ the latter asked Robin.

‘You mean the tour of the—?’

‘No,’ he said, ‘I mean – you know. Pure spirit.’

‘Oh,’ said Robin, cottoning on. ‘I saw Mazu make the temple doors open, just by pointing at them.’

‘Did you think it was a trick?’

‘Well,’ said Robin cautiously, ‘I don’t know. I mean, it could have—’

‘It’s not a trick,’ said the young man. ‘You think it is at first, then you realise it’s real. You should see the things Papa J can do. You wait. You think at first it must all be a load of bull, then you start seeing what it means, being pure spirit. It blows your effing mind. Have you read The Answer?’

‘No,’ said Robin, ‘I—’

‘She hasn’t read The Answer,’ said the man with the buzz cut, leaning forwards to address Robin’s other neighbour.

‘Oh, dude, you’ve got to read The Answer,’ said the blond man, laughing. ‘Wow.’

‘I’ll lend you my copy,’ said the man with the buzz cut. ‘Only I want it back, because Papa J’s written something in there for me, OK?’

‘OK, thanks very much,’ said Robin.