Free The Boy Who Taught the Beekeeper to Read by Susan Hill Page A

to do with Norrie, rat’s-tail thin, worldly.
    They had not needed to plan how to get into the church, they knew well enough, and went in file round the side to the door no one used. The priests went in at the other side, at the end of the path leading from the presbytery.
    Sluggy was the smallest and lightest and went in easily, up onto Deano’s shoulder and, after a second or two of fiddling at the inside catch, snaking through, while Mick held his legs and feet until the exact last moment before letting him drop. It wasn’t far. The bolts made too much noise and the key was stiff, the waiting there in the darkness made them old men; Mick could smell Deano’s dirty smell, the smell of his home.
    Then time reeled them in again, as Sluggy opened the door.
    It was another smell. He had never understood how they mattered. All the stale incense and snuffed candle smoke of his life came into his nostrils, making his head spin, whispering to him each word he had ever learned by heart. The Catechism. The Mass. The Sacred Heart. The Holy Trinity. ‘Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned’, ‘Hail Mary, full of grace . . .’, ‘Glory be to the Father . . .’
    ‘Jesus.’
    They clutched at each other, standing in the great black hollow ribcage of the empty church. Above the altar, the red glow of the Reserved Sacrament.
    ‘The body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve your body and soul into everlasting life.’
    ‘No way.’
    The whisper hissed out like a snake’s tongue into the incensed darkness.
    But then, when he had given up all hope of ever seeing him again, he saw Charlie, and not Charlie blackened and swollen with his eyes rolling in his head, but Charlie standing up straight and laughing into his face, Charlie waving both arms above his head, blazing, triumphant.
    Mick let go of Deano’s arm and walked forward down the side aisle, between the pews, and up again until he was at the foot of the altar steps.
    It was not black dark, only dim. He focused on the flickering ruby light. The others were behind him, close to his shoulder.
    He waited a long time, until his heart had slowed down, wiping his palm several times on his shirt. Then he reached behind him and Deano put the catapult and the stone into his hand.
    ‘Mick –’ but he didn’t bother finishing it. He knew it was all right.
    With Charlie just ahead of him, still laughing, Mickwent up the three shallow concreted steps, and stood in front of the altar a few feet from the crucifix. At his shoulder, Deano switched on the torch and focused the beam.
    Charlie was still laughing.
    What would happen?
    But now something changed, though only for a fragment of a second. Now, instead of rage, he felt an extraordinary and overwhelming sadness; it raced up through him like the tide, filled him, drowned him in itself, and then ran back until he was left empty and stranded, trembling. He waited. Charlie laughed again.
    The sound of the stone as it hit the brass crucifix, and then of the crucifix as it hit the stone floor behind the altar, cracked out like cymbals and went on cracking round and round inside the hollow darkness, wave after wave. It was the end of the world and the veil of the temple was rent in two, everything came down on them. The crash of brass grew fainter and fainter. Stopped. They waited for the row from the street outside and the breaking down of the door. The marching men and the torches.
    There was only silence, and after a second thesqueak of a plimsoll as Sluggy moved his foot suddenly.
    Charlie was fading now, he could hardly make him out.
    From habit he genuflected, crossed himself and turned away from the altar. Deano clicked the torch off so that the darkness blinded him.
    They parted from Sluggy at the corner, and he and Deano walked all the way to the Bracken without speaking. Deano evaporated into the darkness there, and even then neither of them spoke a word.
    The back door was just as he had left it. The house still. The