creature to die in agony. And yet, till the end, it repelled pity. It was a long time in dying, for it must have been a gigantic thing.
By the time it had melted into silence, the whole of Abbeywalk was on fire. A dancing red showed in every window. Only the roof was still black, and that was showing forth wisps of smoke and steam from every crack, a grey wool that writhed round the pinnacles and gargoyles.
It was then that we saw him. James. Clinging to a pinnacle, above a second-floor gable. And still singing, though his voice was hoarse with smoke, and half-choked with coughing.
‘Let burning coals fall upon them,
Let them be cast into the fire,
Into the deep pits . . . that they . . . rise not up again.’
And at the same moment, I saw the top of a monkey-puzzle tree in the front garden, rising to within a few feet of where he crouched.
And something made me shout, ‘Jump, you silly sod.’
The death of the creature must somehow have released him. He heard me. He turned and looked at me, as a normal human being might. Now, everybody was shouting ‘Jump’, as the first section of roof, at his back, caved in, leaving a red gaping mouth like a furnace.
Whether sense came back to him then, or whether his holy work was done, or whether even a madman fears the fire, I shall never know.
He leapt. He reached the thin tip of the monkey-puzzle tree and embraced it. Under his weight, it began to bend outwards; more and more. Just when it should have snapped, it collided with another, smaller tree. Now both trees were bending outwards. I heard and saw the first trunk snap. The second one bent more quickly. And then James was catapulted off into the centre of a mass of rhododendrons and, inside it, we heard him crash to the ground. And then we were all running, and burrowing into those bushes like mad.
I was the first to reach him, to hear his high panting. His two strong hands grasped me, and with their strength, I knew he was going to live.
‘They . . . that wait . . . upon the Lord . . . shall renew their strength,’ he said.
‘I don’t call that mounting up on wings as eagles,’ I said. I was that glad to have him back.
Then the ambulancemen were moving in, with their calm, slow cleverness.
‘I suppose I ought to charge you with arson,’ said Sergeant Crittenden, taking me aside. ‘But I heard that . . . thing. And I reckon you did Wheatstone a public service. Now I don’t know what the hell to do. I mean, what are we going to find in there? What’s the fire brigade goin’ to find?’ He nodded to where a few firemen were playing their hoses to contain what was now just a deep pit full of glowing red ash.
‘A burnt-out Landrover,’ I said. ‘I doubt you’ll find much else. I can’t see you getting a giant misshapen skull or thighbone. Not at that temperature.’
‘Pity,’ he said thinly. ‘A gigantic misshapen skull is just what our nick needs.’
How could we have laughed? But they tell me people laughed in the Blitz, when they’d just been blown twenty yards by a bomb. We were none of us quite sane that night.
‘They will also find traces of phosphorous, all over these burnt trees. And pitch, and Semtex . . .’
‘Oh shit,’ said Crittenden. ‘Bought the stuff off the IRA, did you?’
‘Don’t know. He didn’t leave a calling-card.’
‘Mebbe they’ll blame it on the owner of the premises. Mebbe they’ll think he was after the insurance.’
‘It couldn’t happen to a nastier guy,’ I said. ‘In my opinion, he knew perfectly well what was going on. Just went off to sunny climes, and let the thing get on with it.’
‘What worries me is the lack of evidence,’ said Crittenden. ‘Nothing to show.’
‘Oh, I’ve got something that will interest your forensic scientists,’ I said. ‘In an outhouse at my antique shop. A large model steam-yacht. With contents. And they’re welcome to it.’
We flung the doors wide. The smell was so appalling we had to wait half an hour for it to clear. And then it still hung around. I have never used that outhouse again from that day to this.
Wearing the rubber gloves we use for stripping paintwork I gingerly lifted the hatch of the forward saloon of the Circe and craned forward, holding