The Essex Serpent(68)

‘It’s torn off one of his brass buttons,’ said Banks, tousling his daughter’s head, but no-one paid much attention: it was a miracle Cracknell had any buttons at all.

‘Our friend has passed away only because he was ill, and now he’s gone to glory,’ said Will, hoping this last was true: ‘He would have wandered out at night for air, or got lost and confused. It’s not the time to talk of snakes and monsters – has someone sent for the doctor? – thank you, yes: cover his face – let him rest in peace – isn’t it what we all hope for in the end?’

On the outskirts of the small crowd Francis Seaborne stood, now and then patting the pocket of his jacket where he’d put a shiny button on which an anchor was embossed. Someone had begun to cry, but Frankie had lost interest: he was looking out to the horizon, where blue clouds banked up all around. They were so like mountain ranges receding into mist he thought perhaps the village had been plucked up out of Essex and dropped, wholesale, into a foreign country.





Dear Cora – I saw this postcard and it called you to mind – do you like it?

I have your letter. Thank you. I will write again soon. Stella sends love.

As ever,

WILLIAM RANSOME

Philippians 1:3–11





Luke Garrett MD

c/o Royal Borough Teaching Hospital 23rd June Dear Rev Ransome,

I hope you are well. I write with regard to Mrs Ransome, whom

I have met twice. On both occasions I observed the following: a significantly raised temperature; heightened colour in the cheek; dilated pupils; a fast irregular heartbeat; and a rash on her forearms.

I believe her also to be suffering a small degree of delirium.

I would strongly advise you to bring Mrs Ransome to the Royal Borough hospital, where as you know I am employed. My colleague Dr David Butler has offered to examine her. He has considerable expertise in respiratory disease. With your permission I will attend. There are certain surgical procedures you may wish to consider.

An appointment is not necessary. You will be expected as soon as possible.

Yours sincerely,





LUKE GARRETT MD





Rev. William Ransome

The Lodge, Aldwinter

Essex

24th June

Dear Cora –

I hope you are well. I couldn’t write sooner, though I wanted to – something has happened: Cracknell has been taken.

Why do I put it like that? I knew he was ill: I sat with him the day before he died. He wanted me to read to him, but we couldn’t find a single book in the house, except my Bible, which of course he didn’t want. In the end I recited ‘Jabberwocky’. It made him laugh. ‘Snicker-snack!’ he said, and thought it very funny.

We found him on the marsh. The tide was coming in and had got as far as his boots. He seemed to have been looking up at something over him, though the coroner says there’s no foul play. He must have been there all night. Already it looks as if World’s End is sinking without him into the mud. Joanna has decided we have to keep Magog (or possibly Gog); she put a rope round its neck and walked it all the way home. It’s in the back garden eating Stella’s flowers. It’s looking at me now. I don’t like its slotted eyes.

Of course the villagers are in uproar: they’re keeping their children in. The night it happened they say there was a strange blue light in the sky – one woman (little Harriet’s mother, do you remember her?) kept saying the veil had been pierced, and I can’t get her out of the church. She’d get up in the pulpit, given half a chance. Imagine if she’d seen the Fata Morgana, as we did! Bedlam would have been the most we could hope for.

Someone’s been hanging horseshoes in Traitor’s Oak (probably Evansford, who is taking a lot of pleasure out of being afraid) and one of the farmers has burned his crops. I don’t know what to do. Are we under judgment? And if we are, what have we done and how can we atone for it? I accepted this flock, and tried to be a good shepherd, but something’s driving them over a cliff.

Your imp of a doctor wrote. By letter he’s a fine firm man: I could hardly refuse. We travel to London next week, though Stella looks better now than lately and sleeps the whole night through.

But all the same, I’m troubled. Dr Garrett showed me what he would do to infants and women if they let him, and it sickened me. Not the cuts and stitches, but how careless he is. He told me that if I believed in the immortal soul I’d have no more reverence for my own carcass than for that of a rabbit; we are all only passengers, he said. He told me that since he reverences science, since he worships the vessels and corpuscles and cells that make us up, it is I who am the barbarian!

Since you’ve been gone I’ve been reading like a student. I hope you don’t think I’m too proud to sift over my thoughts, to order them. What does Locke say? We are all short-sighted. I think more than ever I need glasses with lenses three inches thick.

I won’t accept that my faith is the faith of superstition. I suspect you despise me for it just a bit – and I know your doctor does! – and I almost wish I could deny it to please you. But it’s a faith of reason, not darkness: the Enlightenment did away with all that. If a reasoned creator set the stars in their place then we must be capable of understanding them – we must also be creatures of reason, of order!