Sample Sunday December 9th

Bedlam Maternity will be published on December 21st.  Launch Party here.

Chapter Three this week.  Enjoy.

Chapter One Here.

Chapter Two Here.

Comment to go into a draw to win a copy of the ebook on launch day!

    Rose wasn’t sure what was worse, the way the girl had died, or the fact her family refused to claim her body.  Indeed, had refused to come forward.  Whoever Shafiah had been, her decision to shield her family from the pregnancy had been seated in a real understanding of who they were and had not been the unfounded fears of panic.  Rose tried to understand their actions, and what would drive a family to ignore the death of their daughter, or sister, or niece.  Watching them lower Shafiah’s cardboard coffin into the unmarked pauper’s grave, she struggled with it.  Struggled with the loneliness and bitterness of thought, struggled with the despair.  Struggled with the anger and tried to fend off the judgement she wanted to make on the family.  Who was she to judge another?

It was not easy.  The sense of outrage as time had gone on, and Shafiah’s family still had not come forward, had built within her.  As she’d been dealing with hospital protocols on how she’d interacted with Shafiah in the last few hours of her life, Rose had been waiting… waiting for the family to step forward.  To claim the body at least, if not their grandchild.  The police had actively investigated the local communities, but the tight-lipped networks of immigrants had closed down completely.  The more hyped the media frenzy had been, the more clamped down everyone had become.  Admitting to an unmarried birth had become also admitting to a suicide.  Shafiah had clearly had the measure of her family, for she’d been wiped clean from everyone’s memories.  She had simply ceased to exist in any tangible sense.  All she had now was a date of death and burial.  She still had no name, no past, no birth date and no family.  She didn’t even have her own grave.  Rose wished she could shed a tear as she walked away from the raw earth that now held Shafiah: it seemed monstrous to her that a stranger should be the only one to mourn her passing.

She nodded to Sergeant Monica Wills as she exited the graveyard.  It had been kind of the police liaison officer to let her know when the communal burial was going to be held, and to let her attend.  No one else had been told, and they’d opened the grave at 6 a.m., in order to avoid the press cameras that had recorded the death so meticulously also recording the burial.   Neither woman stopped to speak in case the same cameras were hiding somewhere in the shrubbery or early morning mist. 

For Rose, it had been a brutal awakening on the power of the press.  The automatic suspension whilst the circumstances of her final meeting with Shafiah had been investigated had become news-worthy in a way that defied the quite normal and everyday nature of the suspension.  Rose had watched as her name and image, for she’d quickly been identified as being in the photos of the death scene, had been spread across the newspapers.  A hard working midwife of almost thirty years’ experience was of little note, however, compared to a 26- year-old social worker from a department with a few public skeletons to dig back up and be paraded.  Rose had watched the circus turn from her, to social services, and the lions had eaten the innocents whole.  Horrible as it had been for her, it had ended the career of the social worker who had just happened to be on duty when Shafiah gave birth: rather than be torn apart, she’d resigned and moved away within a week of the death.  The public hadn’t been sated and had gone after the head of social services for the district.  The reality of women turning up, birthing, and walking away, had caused outrage and hysteria of an unbelievable nature: as if no one had ever heard of such a thing, and that such a thing should never be allowed.

The hospital, inevitably, had been the centre of the storm.  The unfortunate name, Shafiah’s secrecy, the unclaimed baby lying upstairs as his mother had plummeted to her death… it was the very stuff of nightmare.  It was clear the public adored nightmares and very much appreciated their every detail.  The pictures of Shafiah’s ruined body that had been too bloody even for the British press soon emerged on the internet via other European news agencies.  A carnival had opened at the doors of the Bethlehem Maternity and more than one mother had refused point blank to be taken there in labour, not wanting to birth a baby at Bedlam.  The constant comments about lunatics, women, lunatic women and pregnancy brain had become a tidal wave of negativity that the staff was straining under.

The Chief Executive had started up a focus group to find a new name for the unit.

Most of it had passed Rose by.  She’d retired to routine and her community ties.  Spent a lot of time helping out with the cleaning and maintenance at St Kate’s, as everyone referred to her local church.  Carried on with her work with the Catholic Mother’s Union, and spent a lot of her time helping young mums in her area with the first few weeks of abject panic that motherhood brought.  Her flat was gleaming.  She carried on her breastfeeding support group, and they spotted the journalist who’d been sent in to spy on her within seconds.  That had been rather comical, and when everyone had mentally identified the elegant and supposedly pregnant female with the large handbag she kept fiddling with, the subject matter of the meeting had been rapidly switched to potty training, and they had a two hour discussion on the most environmentally friendly way to get poo stains out of cloth.  The reporter had left halfway through.

She’d been grateful that all the years of work in the local community had given her a family to embrace her.  When the worst moments of media intrusion had turned to scrutinise her life, they had been deflected by that community.  Thankful as she was, she recognised the irony that the same actions were taking place elsewhere, to prevent anyone from finding out who Shafiah had been.

Burying the poor lass appeared to have been the signal for life to go back to normal.  Rose had an interview at the unit later on that morning, to confirm her returning rota.  The press had decamped a week or so prior.  Shafiah was old news now.  The baby had been placed in a permanent home for adoption and that news had vented a lot of the pressure.  New scandals opened up elsewhere and the vultures moved on.

Rose doubted she’d read a newspaper ever again.

Which called for a lot of not looking at things as she strolled down the Mile End Road, heading down to the unit: there were a lot of newsagents nestled in the shops she passed.  She’d kept up her walking, had spent many hours in tranquil walks all over London, some days choosing pretty parks and heaths, others, busy thoroughfares.  It cleared her head and allowed some grace to develop over how she felt about Shafiah’s death.

How she was sure that she’d not committed suicide: it didn’t fit with anything she knew of the woman, and how she’d conducted herself.

How the itch had never lifted: the sense that something was wrong. 

Something was very wrong, somewhere.

Lucy Manning was in the meeting she had with Maggie Saro-Wiwa, the Midwifery Co-ordinator.  Both Maggie and Lucy were relieved to have Rose back, and everyone agreed that a run of night shifts would be the best, for the first few weeks.  Normally Lucy and Rose switched days and nights with each other, on their three days runs of twelve hour shifts, with a half shift on day four to do the switch.  But with the press obtrusions still so fresh, a run of nights gave her a low key return.  This meant the other two supervisors had also mucked their own schedule around for her.  She felt immense gratitude that they’d all agreed to this: it was both a compliment to her and a genuine measure of her colleagues’ respect. 

‘There but for the grace of God…’ was what Lucy had said when Rose had thanked her.  Everyone was aware that Rose had pulled the poison simply for being on duty that day.  It could have been any of them.

An opinion that Rose did not, could not, share.  She’d been raised to believe things happened for a reason.  She’s spent hours discussing the death with her parish priest.  Why she, Rose, had both been the one to take the baby from Shafiah, and also to witness her dying moments.  The theology was pretty clear, but her emotions were not.  For every comment that God worked in mysterious ways, Rose’s body would ring out another alarm bell. This had not been God’s design: suicide never was.  That is why it was such a great sin.  How could it be part of His design that she had witnessed such?  If it was not part of God’s plan, how could her presence have been? The nagging feeling of wrongness served only to highlight her own need for understanding: an understanding which eluded her.

Night shifts were generally busier in terms of births, which was fine in its own way.  Rose settled back to work easily and enjoyed being so busy.  There was much less contact with extraneous others in the wards as well, something she relished.  A few awkward moments with her own team members were soon over, although she suspected Amber would leave soon.  The young woman clearly had never quite reconciled to abandoned babies and Rose suspected she’d be off to richer climes, where such happenings were rare.  The East End was never going to be that place.

The challenge and wonder of her calling was that routine was both the mainstay of her every day role, and yet utterly at the mercy of the Gods at every point.  Birthing was a pretty routine occurrence, but each birth was unique and held its own rhythms.  In the quiet darkness of the wee small hours, there was often frenetic activity as women laboured.  Freed up from outpatients and the operating schedule for when intervention was inevitable, night shifts were fluid and unpredictable in a most satisfying way.  Sometimes, there was even nothing to do, as the parade of soon-to-be mothers would sometimes trail away very early in the morning.  Rose had often thought mothers labouring at home would wait until daylight to call for transport, in the hope they could get just one more hour of uneasy sleep…

Therefore, three weeks into her return, Rose found herself in a quiet and calm labour ward, with all the mothers and babies safely in each other’s arms, and a small gap in incoming.  The staff took advantage of the lull to catch up on endless paperwork and start some serious cleaning.  Rose had taken herself off to the supply cupboards to check inventory.  It was two hours before dawn, and everyone beavered to get as much done as they could before the next wave of life arrived.

Counting suture dressings, Rose felt the itch so sharply she dropped the packages she’d been holding.  Cold prickled up her spine, shivered into her skull and dried the saliva in her mouth.  She swallowed hard, trying to claw back moisture.  Her hand started to shake and for one second, fear rooted her to the spot.  Someone was standing beside her.  The door into the storage room had not opened.  But someone was there, nevertheless.

Someone.

Rose knew before she turned to look.  The sense of wrongness she’d held in her bones these past few weeks was sounding out.  She knew whose eyes she’d look into.  She knew the shape and colour of the vision.

Shafiah Begum was standing next to her. 

She was pale, shaken, haunted.  Rose looked at her and felt the tug in her heart, the pain she’d been holding for this young woman flow out of her.  Fear was replaced by compassion, empathy.  Rose lifted her hand, then stayed it.  Shafiah looked back at Rose, tears brimming but not falling.  A moment of understanding passed between them. 

Then she was gone.

Rose slumped to the ground, finding she’d stopped breathing and that she was dizzy and sick.  As she sat there, heaving, fighting oxygen back into her lungs, her blood, her brain, she saw the shadow under the closed door.  Someone was in the corridor.

Shafiah was in the corridor.

Rose stood up so quickly she almost passed out.  It took her a moment to bring her body back under control.  She was covered in cold sweat and was sure she must reek of it.  Her breathing was ragged and shallow.  She would get hold of this, she would… Shafiah needed her.

As Rose emerged into the corridor, Shafiah moved away towards the back stairs.  Rose followed.

Up they went.  Shafiah walking just ahead, just turning the corner and almost disappearing at each level.  All the way to the top.  All the way to the neo-natal unit.

Rose stood on the outside corridor with the rest of the unit still asleep.  Machines beeped, the occasional baby cry, night staff moving to and fro in the unit itself.  Out here the lights were dimmed.  Rose’s breathing slowly started to steady, her heart settled back down after the five flights of stairs.

Shafiah was standing at the unit door.  Her hand was raised, almost touching the glass.  Tears were cascading down her face.

She jumped, startled, and smiled, wiping the tears from her eyes.  Then she was gone, utterly.

Rose stood staring at the space that had held Shafiah, and understood.  Understood what she’d seen.  Understood the puzzle had a solution.

Shafiah had come back.  She’d come back for her baby.  She’d returned to the hospital for her son.  Whilst everyone had been downstairs with the chaos of the visit, Shafiah had slipped back into the unit and gone upstairs to see her baby.  As she’d stood at the doorway, someone else had approached her.  Someone had spoken to Shafiah.

Shafiah had smiled a greeting to someone.

Rose jumped when the unit door opened, and a nurse came out.  She caught sight of Rose and smiled.

‘Hi, Rose, everything okay?’

Rose could only nod, trying to pull her wits about her.

‘Good.  I was worried for a moment, you look like you’ve seen a ghost!’

Tea was the universal balm, and she clutched the mug’s heat to her shaking hands.  The dawn had brought two mothers-to-be with it and the unit was springing into action around her.  She had to get hold of herself and get back to her duty — get back to being with women.  She shovelled two loads of sugar into the mug, a larger slurp of milk, stirred it and gulped down the contents.  The rush would serve her well, getting her into the routine that would take over her thoughts, allow her to push the fear and worry away for a few hours.

It turned out to be longer than a few hours.  Sickness had struck the next shift and Rose ended up doing another eight hours on top of the twelve she’d just done, but her hand-over shift tomorrow was cancelled out.  Thankful for both the overtime and the four days off in front of her, she took a taxi home and dropped into sleep without even taking her clothes off.  She tossed and turned on the bed, dreaming of blood and crying babies: crying for the mother who would never come.

She slept through for sixteen hours, rising so groggy and unsteady that she felt she’d had a massive blow out on alcohol.  Were hangovers ever this bad, really?  She staggered through to the shower and tried to wake up.  Under the hot stream, she remembered Shafiah, and the vision, and found herself crying, the tears lost in the water.  When she was younger, she could work 24 hours straight and then go out dancing.  Indeed, had done so on many an occasion.  Age was betraying her once more, and she was shocked at the toll the hours had taken on her body, as well as her mind.  Was she losing her mind? 

It was a question she took to Father Tommy Doyle, her confessor of old, and a mate.  Tommy understood when Rose requested he heard her confession, and they retired to the battered and shabby back living room of the priest’s house, the one with the comfy sofas and the TV, not the formal greeting room with the gleaming high backed chairs.  Tommy’s old bones didn’t do wooden confessionals very well these days.  He’d remarked on more than one occasion that he was still paying for his youth, to be kept in rainy England for his retirement.  The truth that he was not retired, or had been, briefly, before the lack of young priests coming up in the ranks had forced him back to work, he skipped over.  It was a great sadness to them both that the Church was dying around them.

It was not a sadness to Rose, however, that Tommy was still here for her, even when he should be enjoying his retirement somewhere warmer and drier.  She was ashamed of how selfish the thought was.

A stickler for tradition, Tommy sat with his back to Rose, as she confessed, and detailed the vision of the dead mother, standing at the door of the neo-natal unit, crying, and smiling in greeting.  They then sat in comfortable silence over mugs of tea, with Tommy filling the air with gentle puffs of pipe tobacco.  He very rarely lit the weed these days, usually sucking on an empty bowl, but today he’d tapped in a few strands.  That said a lot to Rose, about how he’d taken her news.

‘So what’s your worry about it, lass?’  Rose loved that Tommy still called her a lass, after all these years.

‘I feel as if I should be asking myself if it really happened.’

‘But you’re not?’

            Rose shook her head.  ‘No, I’m not.  I know it did, in my heart.  My head… my head tells me to doubt it, to find another explanation…’ she hesitated, thinking it through ‘but it’s just not in me to deny it, really.  I know it in my bones.’

            Tommy nodded.  His silence leaving space.

            ‘We’ve both seen things, things that can’t be denied, or explained.’

            Tommy smiled, the old twinkle in his eyes flaring up. ‘I’ve never said they cannae be explained.’

            Rose nodded.  ‘No, you never seem to doubt…’

            ‘You know that’s not true.  I have more doubts than most.’ She gave him silence to allow him to lead on. ‘But I have no need to question the things I have seen.  They just are.’

            She nodded, old territory between them.  A priest and a midwife had seen enough passings, in both directions, to see more than just flesh and blood in the world.

            ‘What would it mean to you it if wasn’t real?’

            ‘That I’m losing it.  I’ve finally given in.’

            ‘Into what?’

            She sighed.  ‘I’m not sure.  Madness?  Selfishness?’

            ‘Why would it be selfish?’

            ‘Huh?’

            ‘Why would it be selfish, to have seen a young woman’s ghost?’

            ‘It would be selfish to imagine I’d seen a ghost.  Especially hers.’

            ‘I cannot see that.  You saw her death, why would it be selfish to see her ghost?  Surely it would logical that if you saw anyone, it would be her.’

            ‘Then it’s selfish to see a ghost at all.’

            ‘Then there are a lot of selfish people in the world.  Not to mention we used to have a holy one to pray to.’

            She smiled.  He had such a gruff, yet gentle way with her.  He could always get through.  Her life would be sadder indeed, when Tommy left it.

            It didn’t occur to her that the opposite was also true.  The silence stretched out into reflection, once again.

            ‘And tell me now, what would it mean if it was real?’

            And there he went, straight to the heart and soul of the matter.

            ‘It would mean she’d been murdered.  How can that be?’

            They carried on talking it over as Rose made them both a light supper, and they ate it on their laps in the comfy room.  Tommy had more or less taken it over as his own little lair, the other two priests in the house being both non-smokers, and too busy to indulge in afternoon chats with parishioners at leisure.  Rose knew that’s why Tommy was still happy with his lot; he rarely took Mass and spent the rest of the time being the Guardian of the House, so to speak.  The one that kept the open door and took the phone calls; finding the other two when they were needed urgently.   He was, in many ways, the old live-in housekeeper they used to have, when parish funds were better.  But in those days, no one else would have stepped foot over the threshold of the straight backed front room.  It was better this way.  The women of the parish kept the house clean and the freezer filled.  The younger of the priests, Father Jorge, could reheat and recombine enough to keep them all three alive, and there was a dishwashing machine.  All three priests enjoyed the range of foods made for them, from Irish Stews to Polish soups and hot and sweet West African curries.  Tommy had been in the East End longer than Rose, and was used to every manner of meat and vegetable cooked in every way possible, including raw.  Although the days of freshly butchered steak being deposited on the priest’s table for mincing with a raw egg were long gone.  Health and safety had seen some things driven under.  But he liked the constant change of the food the Mother’s Union made sure they enjoyed.

            He also liked smoked salmon with scrambled eggs on toast, and Rose had brought the salmon.  

            ‘Does it mean she had to be murdered?’

            Rose considered as she finished the last of her toast.

            ‘Unless she decided to climb out a window for some reason, how else did she end up at the bottom of the building?  How many people climb out of windows if they aren’t planning to jump?  There was no way to be where she was, without coming out a window.  Not even the roof.’

            They both sat again, and thought in silence.

            ‘They were sure it was the window on the stairwell?’

            ‘That was the window that was open: she was more or less directly underneath.  But there are twenty or so windows above there.  Only she had to have come from the third floor, or higher, the coroner said.’  Tommy nodded.  They’d discussed it a lot, at the time. ‘The only open window was the fourth floor stairwell…’

‘Aye.  So they assumed…’

‘That’s the word, assumed.  They assumed.’  There was irritation in Rose’s voice.  Tommy glanced over at her, with an indulgent sigh.

‘It’s no CSI, Rosie, it’s real life.’

She nodded and clattered her mug down on the china coaster. 

‘I know.  But there should have been more done!’

He let her anger back down again, before picking up the threads.

‘Do you think that’s why you’re seeing her, as you’re so… affected?’

‘I think no one cared that the CCTV wasn’t working, and that no one could work out why she’d come back to the hospital to do it is why she’s back now!  Or at least I thought so at first.  I thought she wanted her name put on her grave… until I saw her smile, and look at someone.  Then I knew… knew that she was telling me something quite different.’

The dishes clattered together as she picked them up.  He let her move about to her own rhythm.  She went through to the kitchen and dropped them into the sink.  He winced, hoping one hadn’t broken.  She put the kettle back on and returned to the dishes, scrubbing them hard under the hot water tap then leaving them to drip dry.  She picked the kettle up and poured a slug into the teapot before swirling it round and dumping it in the sink.  By the time she’d heaped two spoonfuls of tea leaves in, poured on the boiling water and then swished the pot round as she placed it down on the heat mat to mash, she’d slowed down to normal speed.

Tommy came through with the cups, which he rinsed.  He once more spoke out in measured, gentle tones:

‘They’re always tellin’ me to use tea bags.’

‘Cleaner, quicker, easier.’  Her voice had moved to non-committal.

‘But don’t taste as good.’  The twinkle was back, enticing her to join him in peace. 

She returned his smile.

‘That’s better.’  He picked up the strainer and started a dribble off to see if it was strong enough.  ‘Well then, I think it leaves us with a new puzzle, this vision o’ yourn.’  He handed a mug of tea, with a splash of milk to Rose, and put two sugars in his own, black.

‘Who on earth would kill her, and why?’

Chapter Four Here

Sample Sunday December 2nd

Second chapter of Bedlam Maternity this week, in preparation for it being published in a week or so.  Don't be fooled by it saying chapter one - there is a full chapter of prologue, available HERE.

Chapter One

London, present day

Rose Templar walked the frosty streets in the dark before the dawn.  Later on that day, a minor royal personage would be officially opening the maternity unit now under her tender care.  Not that she was in charge of all of it, in fact, she was just one of the tiny cogs in a massive machine named the National Health Service.  She had been given the duty shift that would see her ensuring that no ‘bother’ interrupted the press call and she’d found herself awake, and fretting, a couple of hours before the alarm clock.  So she’d decided she may as well just get on with it, and get to work early.

She usually enjoyed the long walk to and from work.  When her wreck of a Victorian hospital had been demolished and the new spanking bright and very expensive one they’d all dreamed of for years had finally been started, she’d been faced with a choice.  She could have moved out of her old flat, its mortgage paid off in the divorce settlement, and bought something snazzier near the new unit.  However, no matter how much house prices had risen in her old area, the new unit was now in a quite expensive and trendy part of the East End.  Her salary gave her a reasonable standard of living with no mortgage to pay and moving would cut into to that.  Equally, she’d spend a lot of money on transport if she’d stayed where she was.  When trying to make the ends meet in her mind, she’d determined that two birds could be killed with one stone.  She’d started to spread out around her waist, hips and butt, in a most annoying and middle aged fashion; which was appropriate in her mid-50s, but she detested it.  Exercise was something she knew she should be doing, but when to find the time?  And the average day in the wards saw her standing and walking for hours, wasn’t that enough?  Observing her clothes tighten as her breath quickened on stairs, she decided it wasn’t.  Faced with financial problems no matter what route she took to the new unit, she’d decided to take to the streets and walk the four miles every day, there and back. 

Everyone had scoffed at the idea, and declared she’d be shelling out bus or Tube fare quickly.  And, as she’d struggled through the first two weeks, done thankfully when she was on leave, she’d thought they were right.  It was madness.  But Rose very rarely left off on anything that she’d set her mind to, and by the time the new unit had opened up enough for her to start work there, she could do the four miles in forty-five minutes if she had to, and in an hour and fifteen minutes on most days.  The walk home took longer, as it would, after a twelve hour shift.  She’d slowly dropped a dress size and found a lot of her clothes more comfortable to wear as a result.  She hadn’t faced winter yet, ‘tho, and had ordered a pair of ice grips well ahead of time.  The weatherproof clothing she’d bought had been more than a match for London so far.  She’d always enjoyed walking in the rain, anyway.

The walk had become her down time, a soothing space to settle herself into.  Time to relax into the day on the way there, and unwind from it on the way back.  It was particularly useful in coping with shift work and she’d wished she’d found this balm long before economics had pushed it on her.  But there was no peace to be found this morning: she was just winding herself up with all the thoughts that could go wrong.  Some of those thoughts were about what could go wrong with the opening ceremony, the security, the minor royal who was famed for rubbing the patients up the wrong way when chatting to them, and the general behaviour of her team.  Most of the worries were for her women ‘tho, which is how she thought of her patients.  Labour and birth had their own rhythms.  Unlike most areas of a hospital it couldn’t be controlled, scheduled, and made to conform to routine.  At least, not here, not yet.  She’d spent two months in New England, working on an exchange of medical knowledge programme, and had been horrified by how American business has taken over birth.  She’d certainly learned a lot when there, and used that knowledge to bolster her in fighting encroachment here.  Echoes of that worry were pinging through her thoughts.  The new Chief Executive of the Trust had a very presidential attitude to both the patients and the staff.  Fresh from working on a team that had lost millions of pounds of tax payers’ money on the railway system, he’d taken over his new fiefdom with a massive grin for the cameras and an iron grip on resources.  He’d already made it clear he wanted no cries, screams, sweaty labouring women, or bloody babies being spotted when the press were in the building.  Particularly the bloody baby.

He’d actually used those words whilst looking directly over to Rose.  She knew she’d been scheduled in for the delivery ward Supervisor during the visit, in order to keep everything under control.  She’d just sat, absorbing his idiocy silently, nodding every now and then: her normal method of coping with totally incompetent and ill-versed management.  It was one reason she kept her position of some authority, both in the pecking order of staff, and the management structure.

She’d even given up seething silently under her breath: life was too short.

But it was worrying her now, as she turned the corner to see the hospital glowing like the Starship Enterprise in front of her.  The shiny new sign signalling the real problem with seeing anything but a cute, clean, asleep advert baby, in any mother’s arms today.

Bethlehem Maternity Unit

She flinched inside every time she saw it.  But he would not be told, oh no he would not.  When the focus group presented several options for the new unit, based on its Moorfields’s history and the locale, he’d insisted that ‘Bethlehem’ be put high up as the potential new name.  He was seeing Virgin births (no doubt without sweat, shouting, or blood) being photographed for the papers with a holy glow, with himself cast as all three Kings.  In a world of fear for jobs, the protests had been easily quashed.  The staff had warned him, the local community had shuddered, and the original Bethlehem Hospital, still operating elsewhere in London, had let their displeasure be known.  Everything had been swept aside in his march for making a name for himself.  He seized on the ten square feet the new unit possessed, that had been part of the acres of the old hospital and announced it was true to the roots of the hospital in the community.  He paid for an expensive inter-faith focus group that ‘proved’ none of the diverse communities the hospital served would be offended by the name.  He disparaged every other attempt at a sensible naming.  He was determined and he got his way.  He signed the cheques, after all.

And on the day it was announced, he was phoned up by the local newspaper and asked how he felt to be in charge of Bedlam Maternity?

She’d actually found it funny, at that point.  He just would not be told…

Of course, he wasn’t dealing with it on a day to day basis, it wasn’t a tiresome thorn in his side.  She swallowed the temper down as she changed into her blues.  It was still two hours until her shift started, but Lucy Manning, the current supervisor, would be glad for the extra pair of hands, not annoyed. 

Lucy was delighted to see Rose, and the reason for it soon became apparent.  Shafiah Begum had gone into labour a couple of weeks early, and the entire unit was in a tizz.  As Rose came up to speed on the notes, Lucy confided that she’d almost called Rose in.

‘Today of all days…’

Rose nodded.  Oh yes, today of all days…  The superstitious part of her twitched at the coincidence.  Lucy obviously had the same itch, from the worried look in her eyes, and the slight shortness in her tone.  Most nurses and midwives were superstitious to some degree.  Years on the wards, seeing life come, observing life go, brought an awareness of more than the eyes could see and the ears hear.  You kept it in a box, you moved it out of the way if it ever popped out of its box… but you always knew it was there.  A sense that some things were going to be different, somehow.  Rose had known that Shafiah was going to be different, and not just because of the way she’d begun her pregnancy journey, but from how she’d chosen to end it. 

Shafiah was in her mid-20s and a delightful, intelligent and well mannered young woman with no past, other than the pregnancy.  She was clearly from a Bangladeshi family, which had probably been here for two if not three generations and had likely worked its way out of abject poverty.  She was educated and worked in paid employment somewhere close to the hospital; of that Rose was sure.  She was a devout Muslim and wore hijab as a matter of choice, something she’d taken time to explain to the staff at the unit.  She was also unmarried.  Her pregnancy was not a matter of rejoicing for her.  Rose’s heart ached for Shafiah.

Four months earlier, Shafiah had calmly strolled into the hospital, made her way over to the maternity unit, and requested a private chat with a midwife.  Rose had been on her way home after a heavy shift, and had happily taken Shafiah to a private room for a chat.  Shafiah had unfolded her tale.  She was, she thought, about five months pregnant, and both medical care and an adoption would need to be arranged with the maternity unit.  She was not foolish enough to think her secret could be kept via her GP’s office, or in any way that meant her family knew she was attending any medical facility regularly.  She would come into the unit, be checked over, meet the social workers, arrange the adoption and deliver, then go home.  Could the midwives help her set all this up?

The midwives, most of whom had encountered a Shafiah at other places and times, could indeed help set all this up.  Rose herself had contacted Social Services, and been present at the first meeting.  Apart from refusing to give a home address or a date of birth, Shafiah had done everything expected of her in her pregnancy.  She attended the unit directly for ante-natal checks and had cared for herself.  She did not drink, smoke, or use drugs, and she ate well, resisting the impulse to restrict eating, or use vomiting as a method of weight control.  Rose had known a few Shafiahs in her professional life, and often they resorted to bulimia to mask their thickening waists and swelling stomachs.  Food had to be consumed at the family table or bring questions, so it was often vomited up afterwards.  It was not good for either baby or mother.  Shafiah, however, had hijab to aid her and it had been a faithful friend.  She was a tall and slender lass, and had carried the baby high up, with very little evidence of it.  She came from a culture where no one saw another naked, or changing clothing, and hijab covered a multitude of sins.  Or in this case, just one.

Some of the younger midwives and the trainees who’d been involved in her care had not believed such a thing was feasible.  The more experienced ones, like Lucy and Rose, knew not only how often it occurred, but how often it was a completely successful operation.  Usually the only factor in being uncovered was the woman’s own psyche.  Some would buckle, and confide in their own mother, or in another family member.  Some would just leave the area and disappear, transferring far away and starting again before the pregnancy was finished.  Most carried on, and simply walked away the day the baby was born.  An event that scarred every member of staff on duty, and that made every birth thereafter, for a week or so, a special type of pain for everyone.

Rose noted that Amber Purcell was on duty and had ended up being Shafiah’s midwife, given everyone else had been busy.  She sighed.  Amber was the only member of staff to really object to treating Shafiah.  She was just qualified and extremely young in some attitudes.  There had been no leavening by experience with Amber, not yet.  No wonder Lucy had been so glad to see Rose.  She finished reading the notes and made her way down to the room that held Shafiah and Amber.

Amber had the grace to contain how pleased she was that Rose was there, and how delighted she was about her suggestion she go for a short break whilst Rose took over.  Rose watched her sign off the notes and hurry out the room, although she did bid Shafiah a professional good bye.  Midwives often changed over on labours during shift changes, and Shafiah seemed unperturbed.  She was labouring well and keeping herself contained within herself, which was what Rose had expected.  Rose did not doubt that Amber would have been professional with Shafiah, otherwise she’d not have been allowed to attend.

Rose settled into the rhythm of the birth with Shafiah.  To be ‘with woman’ was her calling and vocation and it was a duty she treasured.  Shafiah had been well informed, as had Rose, and she stood as silent attendant to the dance that the young woman was undertaking with her body.  Staff came and went, with Rose forwarding the occasional soft word, or giving a gentle touch to a shaking shoulder.  On full shift change, as Shafiah’s body moved to birth, Caron Gonzalez took over as official midwife whilst Rose held her post as watcher: it was going to be soon and they had to be quick.

Shafiah brought forth a primal scream and a perfect little boy as the rest of the hospital slowly woke to its day.  Caron cut the cord whilst Rose swaddled the baby in a cloth and cradled it in her arms.  She moved forward and held his tiny head to Shafiah’s mouth.  Shafiah whispered the name of God into his ear then turned her face away.  Rose immediately left the room, placing the baby in the receiving station waiting in the hall.  With luck they could… it was not to be.  As soon as he was placed down, the baby erupted into a massive cry of life, and they wheeled him away as fast as they dared in order to take the cries from the mother’s ears as quickly as humanly possible.

Rose and a nursing auxiliary attended to baby Mohammed, as all Muslim boys were known until they were named by their family.  He was perfect, if slightly small, and in fine fettle.  As Rose filled in the paperwork, Bex, the auxiliary, held the baby to try and soothe him.  With no warm skin on his, the baby knew he was without a mother and was not to be consoled.  Tears formed in Bex’s eyes.  Rose patted her on the shoulder.

‘I don’t know how she can…’

‘Then hope to never walk a mile in her shoes.’

‘But… why…?’ Tears were streaming down Bex’s face as she shushed the boy, looking at the baby as his mother should have.  Rose felt the familiar twinge, an ache so deep her bones sat on top of it.  She neatly side stepped it; anything was easy with practice, after all.

‘There is no why.  There is only her wish, and us following it.  It’s not our choice, or our life.’

Bex nodded.  ‘It’s just so hard.’

‘Only as it’s now so rare.  It used to happen a great deal more often.’

Bex looked surprised.  How old was she, 22, 23?  Younger than Shafiah probably was.

‘Really?’ 

It was Rose’s turn to nod, and she carried on talking as they finished the assessment, placed the baby down on a bassinet, covered it with the regulation see through plastic cover it had to have, a baby cloche, in order to wheel him to his bed upstairs in the neo-natal unit.  In line with modern practice Bedlam had no Nursery: babies were helped to bed-in with mothers on the wards.  Any babies requiring any special consideration at all at, from a mother too ill to bed-in to a baby being removed by Social Services, were now being taken to the expanded neo-natal unit.  Money was being thrown at the unit to try and reduce mortality rates from the hospital records: money that could have been better spent in the community during the pregnancy.  Rose and Bex looked down on the mite as they pushed the cart along, his cries meant the conversation was discreet and private to the two women even in the bustle of the over loaded unit. 

 ‘My first Shafiah was a young Catholic girl who called herself Mary.’  Rose smiled at the memory.  ‘Not long after I qualified, she did exactly the same, just walked into the unit one afternoon.  She did tell her family ‘tho, and she went off to a home for unwed mothers.’

‘Unwed?’  Bex’s tones made Rose feel very old, and very tired.

‘Yes, unwed.  Even then, at the end of the 70s, there were still vestiges of such places and attitudes.  The matron I trained under made sure we were all aware to give young women a private space to talk if they just walked into the unit.’ 

The two women fell into silence as they stood in the lift, the baby’s cries bouncing around the walls.  Rose started up again as they wheeled him down the long corridor.

“They were usually called Mary or Teresa, or Rachel and Hannah.  Mostly they’d crumble, and end up going to a home to birth and give up for adoption there.  Sometimes they’d manage it to the end, and just walk away.  Keeping their family from shame, no matter the cost.’

Bex looked down at the screaming baby and then back up to Rose, searching for answers. ‘Do you think she will… just walk away… just leave?’

‘Yes, I think she will.  She’s very strong.’

They fell silent once more, as they delivered Mohammed over to the neo-natal unit, for feeding and observation.  As he was slightly early and a little underweight, he would probably spend his first week of life here before going to a foster home.  Rose felt the loss as she handed him over to the charge nurse.  How arms that had felt fulfilled now felt empty, derelict.  She and Bex rode the lift back down in crashing, awkward, painful silence; the absence of cries cutting both to the quick.  Rose spoke both their thoughts as they walked back into the ward.

‘It’s better than finding a baby in a plastic bag in a shop doorway.’

Bex nodded and hurried away, eager to finish the shift and get home and hug her mother.  As she worked the day out, she vowed to herself that when her time came, she’d never be separated from her own newborn for a second, No Matter What.

Rose checked on the state of play in the rest of the unit, then went to oversee Shafiah’s discharge.  This was the part that was going to need the most care.  Doorways had to be left open without intruding.  Information had to be passed on without preaching.  The girl had to have her chance.

Shafiah was clean and dressed and sitting drinking tea with the female social worker that had been assigned her.  She was pale and missing the heavy kohl makeup she usually wore, making her look more washed out.  She sipped her tea silently.  As Rose took her through the paperwork on taking care of herself post-birth, large tears formed in Shafiah’s eyes and dripped down.  Rose kept her voice gentle and even, open and listening.

‘As I explained before, you can have medicine to dry your milk.’

Shafiah shook her head. ‘No drugs.’

‘Then you’ll need these.’  Rose handed over written instructions on how to cope with the breasts drying naturally, as well as emergency phone numbers in case of bleeding or infection.

Shafiah shook her head.

‘I have read everything I need to know.  I will not be taking anything with me.’

The social worker spoke up.  ‘I would ask you to sign this paperwork.’

Shafiah scrawled her name across several pieces of paper.  Her tears had dried and she wrote confidently, as if in a hurry.  The social worker spoke to her as she did so.

‘You have a right to change your mind.  You can come to us at any point, for the first 21 days.  If you change your mind after that, it will be harder, but you can still do so.  I need you to sign this form, to state you’ve been told you have a right to change your mind.’

With no name, no date of birth, no address… the signature was useless anyway.  All three women in the room knew this.  But protocols had to be followed.  Rose signed as witness.

The social worker took the forms and left.  Rose sat and waited for Shafiah to speak.

‘Can I go?’

Rose nodded.  ‘Yes, of course.  It’s your choice.’

Shafiah stood up, hesitated.  Sat down.

Rose sat.

‘I… I… I need to know.  Was everything okay?  Was he all right?’

‘He is perfect, perfect.’

‘Good.  I’m glad.’

‘Would you like to see him?’

Shafiah shook her head violently.  ‘No!’ 

Rose sat.

Shafiah waited out the emotion that was riding through her.  She looked straight to Rose, her gaze direct.

‘You can come back at any time, Shafiah.  He is safe, and he is here for a couple of days at least.  You know where we are, where he is.’

Again, she shook her head violently. 

‘No.  Thank you, but no.’ Collecting her strength to her, Shafiah stood.  ‘Thank you, you have been very kind.’

She left the room as she’d entered the hospital: quietly and with no fuss.  Rose sat for a few moments, gathering her own strength.  The nag she’d felt when she’d noticed Shafiah’s name on the roster when she came in, repeated.  There was a sense of wrongness that she could not define.  If she’d had Shafiah on the wards she’d be having her checked more often than the others.  Instinct was telling her something was wrong.  But given what had just occurred, how could she not be feeling that?

Rose sighed.

She had four women in labour in the rooms around her, and all her staff needed her.  She shook off the pain and went back to work.

No doubt as it was a special day, the wards were buzzing.  Women were arriving at an amazing rate and for one horrible moment, Rose thought one mother might deliver in the middle of the corridor.  That was going to look so good in the papers… but a room became free at the last moment and all the panics were contained. 

Rose was grateful for how busy it was, as it was easier to fall into work, and to not thinking, when you were run off your feet.  Two photogenic mothers, one black, one white, had been identified by the hospital’s media consultant as ‘correct’ to be visited by the minor royal.  Their babies were one and two days old, and had the required level of both cleanliness and calmness, spending most of their young lives in milk-induced sleep.  Both mothers were bedded side by side in a small bay off the main ward corridor and were signing releases for their photographs as they primped themselves for their public.  Everything was as clean and set up as could be, and there shouldn’t be any complications before the press and officials came up to the ward after the plaque in reception had been unveiled.  Hunger drove her out of the ward and over to the cafeteria just before the press were allowed in to set up.

She thought she’d get back before the big moment but the sheer crush of people in the Perspex poly-tunnel that connected the main hospital to the maternity unit slowed her down.  By the time she’d fought her way into the hexagonal reception area, she was hemmed in by a sea of bodies.  The temperature rocketed as she stood, despite the chill air outside.  A Perspex bubble designed by an architect to be about the ‘transparency’ of birth might be put forward for awards, but it was going to be hell on earth come June.  Which they’d told them.

It’s not as if management weren’t told about these things before they happened…

Rose settled to have to wait out the opening ceremony before making it back upstairs to her ward.  She wasn’t an official part of anything and was confident everything was in place upstairs.  She noted with interest the clashing colours of the scarf the minor royal was wearing as the flashguns around her exploded: where did they get this stuff?

The feeling of someone walking over her grave drew her into herself a moment before the shadow crossed everyone’s vision.  The noise was what exploded in her senses, in everyone’s senses.  The massive impact of splatter and rupture that preceded the heartbeat's silence before the screams began.  Like everyone, Rose looked up.  Unlike most, her gaze stayed where it had rested: ignoring the blood runnels streaming across the transparent roof.  Whilst everyone was screaming, moving, shrieking, and panicking, Rose kept her gaze firmly on the face above her, as the light in the eyes failed.  She felt the moment of passing as Shafiah Begum’s body gave its last, smashed to smithereens on the jagged outcroppings of the reception area’s roof.

The camera shutters roared.
Chapter Three HERE

Lucifer's Stepdaughter...a tease.

Well, less a tease, than some hope.  I know you're all getting very fed up with the delays.  I trully do know that, as you are telling me such.  But I also know you are all being very considerate of the reasons, and just simply need the rest of the story.

I do get it.  I'd quite like it out of my head, as it stands.  :-)

But something nice to tell you.  Whilst Lucifer's is just like Changeling - an epic novel - it has several distinct parts.  Each one is titled for the lead vampire in that section.  Today, I finalised out the sections and where the narrative falls in each section, and I thought I'd let you see them.  actually, I thought you'd like to see them.

So here we go, the six main sections and personalities of Helene's journey to find herself and her fate in the vampire world:

The Book Thief

The Etruscan

The Devil's Whore

The Lord of the Rivers

The Clansman

The Vampire Maker

If you ask here, in the comments, for a wee bit more detail, I may let you have some.  But only here, I'm only saying it once.

There, happier now?  

Sample Sunday October 28th

The final post of October and of taking part in eFestival of Words Hallowe'en Horror event.  Which means the coupon for 25% off Fragments runs out this week.  As the 5000 words sample HERE is of The Fool, I thought I'd go with a good thing and give you the next main sequence of The Fool below.  So unless you've already read the excerpt on the efestival site, start HERE FIRST.  

The Fool introduces Maryam Michael who is one of my favourite characters ever.  She fell into my mind fully formed and came with a long and interesting biography.  Which will unfold slowly over the remaining stories of the Maryam Michael Mysteries, each named after a Major Arcana in the Tarot Deck.  The stories will be sequential in terms of the titles, but the narratives in each will move around Maryam's life.  She starts off here below in her sixties, but there is a lot of back story there, all the way back to her childhood.

I'll be removing all excerpts from the three stories in Fragments off the web for a few months after this week, so you've been warned, if you want more for free, read up on them this week!

I like to give my major characters some time to develop, so son't let the slow and steady start fool you: this is a gripping occult thriller.  Enjoy.

---

    Barham paid her the compliment of picking up a phone first; delivering orders that she had the name of any Muslim officers on duty on her desk within the next five minutes.  She then dialled again and demanded to know if they had any Muslim crime scene technicians on the books at all.  Given it was now late at night, Maryam had no idea whom she had called, but the question didn’t appear to faze them.

            Barham escorted Maryam to a nearby posh office with an en suite to allow her to freshen up, aware she had come straight from the train station.  Maryam took the opportunity to phone ahead to Peckham and inform Father Scott that she would be unlikely to arrive at the priest house for several hours.  She did not inform him this was because she’d be next door in the Church itself.

            Before Maryam left in the squad car, an eager young detective was added to be her main liaison with the Met.  DC Shahrukh Iqbal appeared to have been going off duty when he was called in to be her escort; he very much looked like he’d not long finished a hard shift.  She wondered if this would be his first murder case, his sudden appearance caused a few raised eyebrows with the uniformed officers who were driving them.  Maryam understood why Barham had been promoted so young: she learned fast.

            As they approached the Church of the Mother of All Sorrows in the dark and the pouring rain, Maryam could see the police tape around the main door and the police officer standing guard.  Iqbal held the car door open for her as they sprinted over the path, up the stairs and into the vestibule as fast as they could.   The uniformed officer on the steps had opened the doors for them as they approached.  The Church was probably over a hundred years old and spoke of Pugin and classic Gothic Revival; vaulting stone arches and stained glass windows.  Highly ornate carving and roof painting above the altar and a huge Christ crucified hung central in domed space.  The bright light of the crime scene lanterns and the police tape over the entire sanctuary were painful to experience, as was the smell.  Blood: dead dried blood.  It mingled with the scents of old wood, dust, and incense.  Maryam hesitated looking down on the death at the end of the aisle, imagining how it had looked with the corpse upon the altar.   A blasphemous mirror image of what hovered above it.  How it had smelled when all that blood was fresh?

            ‘Have you been here before, Detective Iqbal?’

            ‘Actually, I have.’

            Maryam looked at him askance.  ‘I thought...?’

            ‘That I’d just been assigned?  I have.  I’ve not been here, at this murder scene, but I’ve been in this Church, during orientation.’

            ‘Ah.  I see.  You did a course on multi-faith policing in Peckham?’

            ‘In the Metropolitan area, I visited here then.’

            ‘So you know Father Jones?’

            ‘No.  I met with a Father Edwards and a Bishop Atkins.’

            ‘Did Inspector Barham know this?’

            ‘Not ‘till about an hour ago, no.  And please call me Shahrukh.’

            ‘As-Saamu alaykum, Shahrukh.  I am Maryam.’ She did not offer to shake hands.

            ‘Walaiakum salam, Maryam.’  Even in his English accent, one of privilege and wealth, Shahrukh managed to pronounce her name with the correct emphasis.  She looked forward to him speaking it aloud in front of Fred Atkins, especially if Fred continued to refer to her as ‘Marie’ in front of him.  

            Maryam indicated that Shahrukh should follow her as she walked down the long central aisle heading for the sanctuary.

            ‘Then you’ll know of the import of this.  Have you been informed of all of it?’

            ‘Nope.  Inspector Barham just asked me to accompany you and to assist you...’

            ‘And to not let me touch anything...’

            ‘And to not let you touch anything... then to escort you to the other house, then to go home.  She said I’d get a full briefing when I came in for duty in the morning.’

            ‘Wise, very wise.  Although I dare say it will be boring for you what I’m about to do.’

            ‘Why, what are you about to do?’

            ‘Nothing.’

            And nothing was what she did, although it was a very active nothing.  With Shahrukh by her side, she walked every inch of the church that was not sealed off by tape.  She went into the empty confessional boxes on the gospel side of the church.  She sat in each of them, on both sides of the screen, and did nothing for five minutes.  She knelt on the penitent’s side and sat in the confessor’s.  She avoided the confessional that was sealed off by police tape.  She walked out of the nave back into the vestibule and took the stairs up to the choir area and sat there.  She asked the detective to walk her out of the Church and into the Sacristy at the back via the outside door, set to one side just for the priests to use.  This ensured she didn’t walk through the taped area of the altar.  The outside door was tucked to the side and had a large steel sheet over it.  She spent ten minutes studying the interior of the small room.  When they returned to the nave, she sat at the front pew and looked at the altar for about twenty minutes. 

            She’d spent about two hours in the Church before hunger and tiredness started to intrude.  She asked Shahrukh to walk her through the rain, and the graveyard, to the parish house.  He advised her to only leave the house with an umbrella in her hands in the morning as there were a few stalwart local photographers snapping away from the street during the day.

              Another uniformed officer stood watch at the door there, who nodded to her as she was allowed in by a very anxious Father Scott. 

            Inside the hallway, the smell of an old parish house met them: dust, age, furniture polish, fried onions, and cigarette smoke.  The days of the smell of cabbage were gone.  Maryam doubted that young Father Jones smoked, but the walls gave evidence that Father Edwards, who had been in residence for decades, did so with gusto.  Father Scott took Maryam’s coat and indicated she should go through to the formal parlour.

            ‘I need to freshen up and change my clothing, Father Scott; please show me to my room first.  Could I ask you to make some tea and toast please? I’m quite hungry.’

            Father Scott nodded and they tip-toed past the sleeping Bishop Atkins, pegged out in a chair by an old gas fire in the parlour, and crept up the stairs.  On the landing, one room showed light under the door sill and Maryam thought that would be Father Jones’s.  All others were dark.  The floor boards creaked as they walked to the end of the hallway and through the farthest door.

            It was a visiting priest’s room, as she had expected, clean and bare.  It had old linoleum and a faded rug, both from the 1950s, a dark wood bedside table of indeterminate age and design.  The lamp and radio on the table were old, but the bed and bedding were modern and looked new.  There was a crucifix on the wall above the bed and a couple of portraits of the Sacred Heart and the Virgin Mother & Child on the walls.  A desk sat with a small television sitting on it, unplugged and forlorn.  A jug of water and a single glass.  A wardrobe and a chest of drawers finished the room.  Her cases had been laid carefully to one side.

            ‘There is a guest bathroom next door.  It is not en suite, but no one else will use it.’

            Maryam nodded. 

            ‘Would you like some soup?’

            ‘Oh yes, please, that would be fine.’

            ‘There is real coffee.’

            Her face lit up.  ‘Oh, that would be wonderful, thank you.’

           

            She longed to have a shower, but had no idea how the plumbing in this old building would react, no need to wake everyone with creaking and groaning.  She washed herself down quickly and dressed in pyjamas and a mandarin collared, floor length house coat.  It was only partially a defence against Atkins: after what she’d seen she needed to feel safe and comfortable.

            Father Scott, who turned out to be called Andrew but preferred Andy, had warmed through a tin of tomato soup and sliced into a crusty loaf of bread.  Tinned soup in the UK was most acceptable and she ate it gratefully.  The coffee was almost good and she enjoyed it thoroughly.  Andy was a most generous and understanding companion who understood the value in silence.  It was something she appreciated about dealing with the clergy: the understanding that silence is often its own defined space and not always an uncomfortable absence.

            It was about three a.m. when Fred blundered into the kitchen, having woken with a crick in his neck.  One look at the tiredness in Maryam’s face and he ushered both himself and Andy out the door, saying they would return in the early afternoon.  Her smile of thanks to him was totally genuine, as he’d restored her memory that he was a kind and caring man who just happened to be good at politics and enjoyed being a power player.  She felt chagrined for her less than charitable thoughts of him and scolded herself for her own weakness.

            Then she hauled herself into bed with a grateful sigh.  She’d been up for almost twenty four hours and her head ached with the weight of the day’s events.  Sleep came swiftly.

            The dawn filled the room with cold light.  The revving of motors and hooting of horns crowded out the bird song.  The rain slashed the panes sideways.  Maryam slept.

            When she rose five hours later, her body was rested and her mind still held a little of the dreaming quality of the spaces in-between.  She sat at the desk and shuffled her Tarot cards and placed them out on the desk.  In her mind she was seeing the layout of the chapel as she’d walked through it.  She placed the cards on the desk in roughly the same positions as the areas that had interested her, finishing with the altar itself.  Only once she completed the pattern she had in her mind, did she look down at the lay. 

            The altar card sprung out at her: The Fool.  Card zero.  The young man off on adventures, too keen and new and full of the love of life to notice the danger he is in.  The Sacristy had the most useful card to her, a reversed King of Swords.  It suggested to her that someone was seeking to make most ill, under the guise of something else.  Her senses had resonated with something in that room and the lay of the cards had reflected that.   The card at the confessional, the reversed Hierophant, rang out a clear warning to her: misinformation, distortion, power achieved from withholding information.  Bad advice.  Not a card you want to see in connection with giving up on sin and the granting of forgiveness.  With no repentance there can be no salvation. 

            There were a lot of positives in the lay, including the World, card twenty-one.  A good ending.  Or perhaps, with the Fool there, central, a new beginning that would end well.  Interestingly, the card by the vestibule, where the police stood, was the Knight of Swords.  Swords were so apt, given the circumstances, and looking at the cards, she looked forward to both meeting Father Jones, and working further with DC Shahrukh Iqbal.

            She cleared the lay away and slipped her cards into her shoulder bag.  Then she spent an hour in prayer and a further hour in meditation.  Around her, people were moving about the house with hushed tones and delicate treads, no doubt trying not to wake her.  The banging from the pipes as she showered both confirmed her suspicions and served to alert them to her being awake, so when she entered the kitchen, she was greeted by the smell of fresh coffee, and frying bacon.

            A startled Father Jones jumped up from the kitchen table and smiled at her, offering her his hand, which she accepted with a smile.  She was dumbstruck for a moment by his size and beauty: his photo had done him no justice.  He was easily six foot two, perhaps six three.  Both his hands enveloped hers with a gentle but firm hold; long, strong fingers with calluses that betrayed much reading, writing, and if she was not wrong, the playing of the guitar.   His eyes were hazel with green flecks, a startling contrast with the dark caramel of his skin.  His Welsh accent, cultured and enchanting in one.  His physique had the sharp and supple tones of the professional athlete.  When he smiled you felt your heart lift.  It was no wonder the graffiti he’d been attacked with had concentrated on his sexuality.  Wyn Jones shone with energy and humanity in a very warm and real body of flesh.  The bruise on his cheek and the slight cut on his lip only served to highlight his perfection.  Poor man, how he must have had to fight to make others believe his vocation was pure. 

            ‘Please, Father Jones, be seated.’ 

            ‘Please call me Wyn, sis...’ His voice trailed off as he drew back in his mistake.  It was one she was used to hearing from the clergy and she smiled back at him.

            ‘Maryam is just fine, Wyn.’ She held her hand outstretched in his grasp, for just a moment, to reassure him of the honesty of her response.  She then approached Father Edwards, who was pouring her a mug of coffee. She extended her hand.

            ‘Maryam Michael, Father, from the Office of the Arcane.  Sorry to meet you in such dreadful circumstances.’

            Father Edwards was over eighty years old and his body was carrying the burden of the murder badly: he looked defeated, wasted in the pain of it all.   Maryam felt his age, his anxiety, his desperate need for the nightmare to be over.  His face was grey and his middle and index fingers stained tobacco yellow.  Priests did not, in general, allow this to happen as they dispensed the host from those fingers to the mouths of the faithful.  It spoke volumes to her of what was going on inside.  He nodded and avoided her outstretched hand by giving her the cup of coffee.  He turned and sat down at the table.  A tobacco tin sat on it and he played with it.  Maryam sat and Wyn jumped up again to make her a sandwich of white sliced British bread and fried bacon.  She thanked him, cut it in half and made herself eat half of that.  The discussion slowly turned their attention from her, to the circumstances, and she was able to dispense with the tiny bites she was taking and concentrate on coffee.  Much more coffee!    

            By the time they had introduced themselves to each other and swapped enough banal pleasantries to get them over not talking about the murder, Inspector Barham had arrived with Shahrukh and a crime scene team in tow.  On their arrival, Wyn went to his room and Father Edwards, who had not offered his forename to anyone, although she knew it was Peter, retired to sit outside in a somewhat dilapidated greenhouse, and smoke.  The rain pouring down on the panes obscured him from view.  Before she and Barham discussed the case, Maryam asked permission to have Father Edwards moved to a different address.  Barham agreed and Maryam phoned Father Scott on the mobile number he’d given her.  He was en route with Atkins.  She requested a respite place be found for Edwards in another parish house, perhaps even at Westminster Cathedral.  After all, they had the apartment they had prepared for her?

            Barham and she discussed the case, with Maryam reporting she had no observations, but requesting that she be allowed to direct the crime team in some additional tests.  Barham was happy with this and they went over to the Church.  Maryam could see Wyn Jones looking down on them from his bedroom window.  She pushed her sympathy to the side and concentrated on being calm and empty, open and flexible.  In her heart she knew what Barham did, that Wyn had no connection with this death at all.  Her head wasn’t so sure they were going to be able to prove that.

            In the Church, Maryam asked if the tabernacle interior had been fully checked, not only for fingerprints, but for fluids.  The crime officers stated it had only been dusted for prints, which she had known, as she’d seen the dusting powder all over the screen and door.  When tested, it proved positive for blood, a tiny amount on the base of the interior. Barham asked what had led her to suspect this and they sat and discussed it with Shahrukh and another detective named Gatto, as the lab technicians catalogued.

            ‘It’s a sacred space.  If the person who committed the murder was also trying to reinforce the sacrilege within Catholic, or Christian, tradition the way they had with Islamic, then it made sense to desecrate the area the sacred host was kept in.’

            ‘Then why not make it obvious?’  Barham and Gatto were taking the lead, with Iqbal listening hard.  Maryam addressed Barham who had asked the question.

            ‘I’m sure the secondary intent is to cause problems between the communities.  Being seen to actively defile the tabernacle at the same time as defiling the Qur’an would put both communities in the same position.  The desecration of the Islamic element is being made more visible than that of the Christian one.’

            ‘Why not desecrate a host?’  This was from Gatto, who shared the same accent as Barham; both natives of this area of London.

            ‘These days there is no sacred host kept in an empty, locked church.  There are usually only unblessed communion wafers.’

            Gatto nodded.  ‘Of course.’  Barham looked at him, and he continued. ‘The priest blesses the host at each service, each mass.  If there is any left over, he swallows them himself so none of the sacred host is wasted.’

            ‘And the host is more sacred in a Christian church, than say the pages of a bible would be?’

            ‘In a Catholic church, yes.  The host is the physical body of Christ.’

            Barham looked confused.  It was Iqbal who spoke up, surprising everyone.

            ‘In the Roman Catholic Church, the bread and wine of the communion are changed by the prayers of the priest into the actual body and blood of their saviour, our prophet, Jesus.  In other Christian communities it represents such, a symbol of it, not the actual thing.  Here, in this Church, it’s treated as if it is actually his body, his blood.’

            Barham looked to Maryam, who nodded.

            ‘Detective Iqbal has said it succinctly.  Ripping up a bible in a Catholic Church would be annoying, but not outrageous or seen as a severe attack.  Polluting the tabernacle with the blood of a murdered man is in line with the offence of ripping and bloodying the Qur’an.’

            ‘So it confirms your thoughts that this is a serious attack on both religions?’

            ‘On this Church, and its beliefs, there has been a serious attack.  I’m still convinced the attacking of Islamic principle is about making more of the offences to this one.’

            ‘The multi-faith leaders have been informed this morning.  Myself and DC Iqbal have an appointment with the Imam of the local mosque this afternoon.’

            ‘I would be interested in attending that, if you would allow it.  But first I must ask what you’ve done to find the weapon used in this murder.’

            ‘The weapon?’

            ‘Yes, the knife, although I suspect, as does your surgeon, that from the writing and the cuts it is a scalpel.  The report says nothing has been found.’

            This time it was Sergeant Gatto who took the lead, taking out a note pad, a very old fashioned and reassuring notepad, and read from it.

            ‘Yesterday, the entire Church and the graveyard were searched thoroughly, including with a metal detector.  Detectors were quite useless in most of the Church, given the nails in all the wood, but it was swept through.  The drains were checked and the main sewer is being examined today, on all the lead points.  The street outside, the bins and post boxes, have been checked and there are ongoing searches in all the local gardens.  The bin collection was the day before the murder, so most of the bins and skips out there are relatively empty, so that’s been quite easy.  So far, we have nothing.’

            ‘Have you searched the parish house?’

            Barham took over again.

            ‘No, we haven’t.  Father Jones was taken to the police station and processed after he’d reported finding the body.  He stayed with the body and phoned on his mobile phone and the CCTV evidence confirms this.  After processing, he was returned to the parish house and asked to stay there.  We haven’t had the manpower to search the premises yet, as the rain has made searching outside areas a priority.  The Bishop has given permission for such a search.’

            ‘The Sacristy was completely searched?’

            Gatto took that in his stride, confirming Maryam’s suspicions that he’d seen the inside of a Catholic Church quite a few times in his childhood; for all that he wasn’t practising now.

            ‘Yes, it was walked through and nothing found, no evidence it had been broken into.  It was locked until we had Father Edwards fetch a key, as Father Jones was still down the station.’

            ‘What’s your point, Miss Michael? What’s so special about this Sacristy room?’  Barham appeared to be intrigued rather than suspicious.

            ‘It’s just that if I were going to desecrate a Church and I knew enough about the Church as this person appears to do, I’d have spent a few moments in there.  Further, if I wanted to desecrate the host without being noticed, and hide a scalpel where it was unlikely to be found immediately, it would be in the sink in there down the plug hole.’

            ‘But we’ve explained that we checked the drains.’

            ‘The sink in there isn’t connected to the drains, Inspector.  It’s a sacrarium.  It’s completely separate from the normal sewage system.  It’s only used to wash anything that a sacred, consecrated host could have come into contact with.  It washes straight down into soil.’