The Book of Hours (19 page)

He did not know what Heather's riddle was about, but there was no question of his own greatest fear. He was terrified of having a future. Planning for tomorrow meant committing himself to a place and a course. Commitments meant the risk of sacrifice, of being called to give and do and go beyond the comfortable. Shadows of soul-racking pain remained draped about him, so close he could feel them even within these hallowed walls. Brian knew he had no choice but to go forward, yet doubted his own strength to do so.

The sun was blanketed by a windswept cloud, and suddenly the church hall went gray and dark. Brian found his attention drawn toward the only electric light in the chamber, the one that shone upon the pulpit.

The preacher's rostrum was reached by a spiral staircase of intricately carved marble that wound its way around a vast central pillar. The podium itself was sheathed in polished granite and inlaid carvings of saintly knights, and from it Trevor's voice rang with quiet authority. “In the sixteenth chapter of Matthew, we read that when Jesus entered the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples,‘Who do men say that I am?' There were a number of responses, from a reborn Elijah to a modern prophet. Jesus then asked them,‘And who do you say that I am?'

“Jesus asked His disciples because He wanted them to go beyond opinion. He asked them for a verdict. He was telling them, ‘Now is the time to declare yourselves before God and man alike.'”

Trevor looked out over the congregation and quietly demanded, “As we approach the holy day when we celebrate His birth, who do you say He is? Are you able to stand before the world and declare that the Lord dwells in your heart? When voices throughout the land are raised in criticism and condemnation, can you stand fast and say that you are living for Christ?”

For Brian it seemed as though he listened to two voices. The vicar's tired, drawn features added as much dignity and weight to his words as the shining robes. Yet behind this voice there echoed another, one carved from the same timelessness as the chamber, one that whispered to Brian's heart, and beckoned, and challenged.

“It was Simon Peter who answered for all the generations to follow. He was the very first to declare in openhearted certainty, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' Jesus responded with the same direct certainty that marked all His statements,‘Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah . . . You are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church.' Peter said the blessed name twice in that sentence—‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' He had removed himself from life's spectators. Jesus rewarded Simon Peter for being courageous enough to declare.”

The sun chose that moment to strike the stained-glass window, casting the vicar's features in a golden glow. “Jesus did not reward Peter with an authority to erect earthly structures. Let us be perfectly clear about this. The word Jesus used, which today is translated as
church
, was the word for community. Jesus was saying, ‘You, in all your frailty and humanness, shall be remade into something so strong that not even the gates of darkness shall prevail against you. You, and others like you who commit to the truth of salvation, will be bonded together by the Spirit's gift.'”

It seemed to Brian that the vicar's own frailty spoke to him. There before him stood a man wearied to the point of fatigue. Yet he spoke with a confidence that rose beyond his exhaustion and his worry. He spoke with an authority that defied how he felt and what he feared. Brian found himself able to listen and accept, because there before him stood the power of a living example.

“Jesus does not expect perfection,” The vicar continued. “He does not welcome you because you are either strong or whole in your own right. He knows you are weak, flawed, sick, worried. He is fully aware that you are human. And His response to all of us, no matter what our condition or our needs, is the same: Come home. We also shall become part of this rock, this community, this herald to a dark and confused time. Find the hope, the healing, the peace, the power to face tomorrow—whatever you need, it is here in the Lord's open arms.”

Nineteen

C
ECILIA'S HEAD POKED UP THROUGH THE ATTIC HOLE AND
said, “Gladys tells me you've found another letter.”

“That's right.” Brian shifted the final board into place and dug in his shirt pocket for another nail. “At least, Bill Wilke did.”

“Are you sure I can't help you up there?”

“There's not room for two.” Every pound of the hammer meant almost clobbering himself in the forehead, the crawl space was so narrow. It was also freezing. Winter seeped through a multitude of leaks and crevices. “There's hardly room for one.”

When he stopped hammering Cecilia said, “I can't thank you enough for helping out like this.”

“I'm happy to do it.” Brian tested the board, found it secure, and started sliding out on his back. “To tell the truth, I needed to find something like this to do.”

She backed off the ladder to let him down. “What do you mean?”

“The way you stood up there in front of the crowd, it . . .” He was stopped by the look on her face. “What's the matter?”

“I was a miserable failure!”

Brian's laugh was halted only by the distress in her expression. “You were a lot of things, but a failure was not one of them.”

“Oh, please.” She collapsed the ladder with an angry clatter. “I was so nervous I couldn't even recognize my own voice. I dropped my cue cards. I sounded like a loon.”

“Cecilia.” He waited until she had turned to face him. “I don't know how to make you believe this, but I spent all last night convicted of all the mistakes I've made. And it was because of you.”

She studied his face for any hint of mockery. “Because of all the blunders I made?”

“No. Because you did what you believed in, despite the fact that you were afraid.”

“Terrified out of my skin,” she woefully agreed.

“Right. And everybody saw that. And they admired you for doing it anyway.”

“They thought I was nuts.” She kicked the wall. “Not to mention the fact that I let Trevor down.”

“Nobody could have done a better job,” Brian replied with conviction. “Of that I am absolutely certain.”

“You're . . .” She was halted in midflow by the sound of an engine revving just outside her cottage, one loud enough to rattle the windows. A horn sounded impatiently. Cecilia walked over to the window and said, “It's Bill Wilke. Whose car is that?”

“Mine, at least for a few days.” Brian walked over to stand beside her and looked down. The car positively gleamed in the afternoon light. “Would you come for a ride with me?”

The walrus mustache parted in a wide grin as they emerged from the cottage entrance. Bill Wilke revved the engine another couple of times before cutting the motor. In the sudden silence he called over, “Grand afternoon for a spin.” But his breath sent plumes out over the car. “That is, it shouldn't rain for the next couple of hours. In this fair land, you take what you can get.”

Slowly Cecilia approached the car, then turned back to where Brian stood. “This is yours?”

“Miss Heather left it to the lad.” The mechanic grunted with the effort of squeezing himself out from behind the wheel. He rose to his feet, whipped a clean cloth from his back pocket, and began stroking the already gleaming hood. “Goes like a rocket, she does. Alex never took her out more than once a week or so, and only in summer. Clock doesn't have but four thousand miles.”

“I can't thank you enough,” Brian said.

“Think nothing of it.” Bill Wilke gave Cecilia an affable nod.

“Grand performance you put on last night.”

Cecilia cast Brian an uncertain glance before timidly responding, “Thank you.”

“Left a lot of us thinking perhaps we ought to do more. Spent a good few hours pondering on just that last night. That is, when the wife wasn't getting on me for opening somebody else's mail.” Bill turned to where Brian was circling the car. “Any luck with the riddle?”

“Nothing so far.”

“Well, sleep on it, that's my motto. Anytime you can't see heads from tails, have a kip. Wife says it's on account of my lazy nature, but I've solved more of life's puzzles flat on my back than I ever did deliberating.”

Brian knew it had to be said. “About the bill for the repairs. I'll have to wait until I sell it to pay—”

“Like I said yesterday, lad. Think nothing of it. You're good for what you owe, of that I have no doubt.” He squinted at the sky. “Lovely to see the sun, ain't it?”

“Fantastic,” Brian agreed, wishing there were some way to offer real thanks. “Been like this almost every day since I arrived.”

“Then you're lucky. Rained all but three days last month. We often get a nasty November. And October. Mind you, December can go right off as well. And January's not worth mentioning. Gets so cold I've frozen my mitts to an engine block. Happened the year I repaired my first E-type. That was one nasty job. The old place didn't have heating, and I was so cold I couldn't remember what I'd done and what I'd left. The fellow got halfway down the street, and the motor blew right off the frame.”

Cecilia asked, “What did you do?”

“Took off for parts south, what do you think?” The twinkling eyes surveyed the two of them, and Bill Wilke seemed to nod his approval. But all he said was, “Four feet of snow we had that very same week. Sixty degrees two days later. That's England for you. All the weather, all the time.”

Brian asked, “Anything I should know about driving this car?”

“Turn the key in the ignition, press on the gas, put it in gear, aim, and shoot. That's the way most motorcars work this side of the puddle.” He nodded once more. “Guess I'll be off, then.”

“Can I give you a lift?”

“Thanks, lad, but I live just past the good doctor's clinic. Been within sound of the village bells all my life.” His look to Cecilia was one of deep affection. “Almost forgot how much all that clatter meant to me, or what it stood for. Guess too many of us did.”

In the silence of his passage, Brian found himself smiling at Cecilia's look of utter confusion. When she finally turned his way, he asked, “Do you have an extra scarf I can borrow?”

Their departure became a rather public affair. Gladys spotted them there by the car and came bustling out, her arms loaded with Arthur's clothes—two sweaters, flannel trousers, a garish checked cap, even a leather bomber jacket. The only reason there was only one pair of trousers was because she had only found the time to let out one set of cuffs. At the women's insistence, Brian retreated into Rose Cottage and changed. He came out smelling of mothballs. Even with the cuffs let out, he showed quite a lot of ankle. But the leather jacket was cut broad in the shoulders and small in the waist. Cecilia's checked scarf almost matched the cap, and both went extraordinarly well with the car.

The car started with an impatient roar, then settled back to a purring impatience. Gladys watched Cecilia clamber on board, and announced, “The two of you look like an advert for days gone by.”

They left Knightsbridge by way of the central square. Any number of people stopped what they were doing and watched as they went roaring by. Cecilia found herself unable to hold back the smiles. The wind pushed and buffeted and rushed in her ears. The sun was bright enough to offer a myth of warmth. The car roared and bounced her about upon the stiff springs and hard leather seat. Every corner threw her one way or the other. She could see how Brian was forced to grip the wheel tightly and use real effort to make the turns. He kept to the small country lanes, roads so narrow he had to slow and pull to one side to allow oncoming traffic to pass. The lanes were bordered by high hedges and even taller trees, opening only when they entered hamlets of a dozen houses and a church and a pub, then closing back again to fragrant burrows.

He halted at a sign posted on a squat stone marker with hand-painted names. She was relieved to see he could not seem to contain his smile, either. Brian asked, “Any idea where we are?”

To Cecilia it seemed as though the entire day had been leading her to this point, where she could look at a medieval road marker and realize it was time to share with this stranger one of her closely guarded secrets. And feel in the process only a rightness as gentle and comforting as the afternoon. “Take a right.”

Brian squinted through the narrow windscreen and read aloud, “Wittenham Clumps.”

She directed him down one country lane after another, until the road ended at the base of a hill so strange Brian could only gape and say, “Is this natural?”

Cecilia opened her door and asked, “Feel like taking a walk?”

A narrow path cut a swath through fields browned by the season, leading up a steep hill that looked like a perfectly fashioned golden cone. That time of year, they had the path to themselves. It felt wonderful to be up and moving. Gradually her muscles worked out the strain from the bumpy ride, and warmth returned to her ears and cheeks.

Cecilia pointed ahead and explained, “This is a dwelling area that dates back to the time of Stonehenge. Back before the Roman era, a tribe cleared the hillside and planted their crops. They founded their village in the forest you see at the top. They built two walls—an outer barrier of thornbushes that still grows today, and an inner one of stone. Their final defense was the forest. They left the trees standing close and tight, protecting them from invaders and the weather.”

She led him up and into a crown of trees so tall and dense neither sun nor wind could enter. Cecilia found herself tempted to halt here, where the loudest sound was birdsong and the strongest sensation was of peace. But this was not why she was here, and to do anything less than complete the task would be to leave unfinished a truly fine day. She pointed to the path leading out the forest's other side. “Let's go this way.”