Free Ritual by David Pinner Page A

Battering itself against a hawthorn hedge and collecting thorns in its flanks. Perspiration skipped from its neck onto the buttercups.
    Slowly the screech subsided. The notes reformed into honey in the late summer. The horse stopped thrashing itself against the briars. Two girlish ribbons of blood tied themselves on the horse’s white belly. The thorns had done their work. The blood was coming.
    The Inspector wanted to go into the field and mop the blood with his handkerchief. But he was very sensitive about being stamped to death. The horse relaxed under the summer sounds. It slowly knelt down. Japanese white against English green. Then with a tired neigh, it unbuckled its beauty and lay still.
    The music had become music, gentle, so gentle. The Inspector had to strain to catch the subtlety of the note patterns. But he broke it by forcing his hypnotised fingers to the latch on the garden gate. Pressing the heel of his thumb down sharply, he clicked the gate open.
    Leaning against his Jacobean fireplace, the Squire heard the click and instructed his flute to silence. His cottage had a very low cream-yellow ceiling, veined with black beams, like giant spiders’ legs. The Squire, who was nearly six foot, smoothed his hair. Then he ducked his head between the beams and looked through a gash in the curtains. As soon as he saw the Inspector strolling up the path, he sucked the flute to his lips and began to pipe a Nursery Rhyme. He missed most of the notes out. It was like a child learning the instrument. An unmusical child. In fact, he missed out more notes of ‘Old King Cole’ than there were notes in the tune.
    He was disturbed by the intrusion. The door knocker clattered twice. The Squire went into the dwarf hall and let the Inspector in. His white hair was no longer parted down the centre with such military precision. There was something distrait about his appearance. As if he had been dancing. Or worse. A whisper of sweat slid down his jugular vein. He no longer wore his cravat and his top shirt button was missing. The thread was ripped away from the shirt as though he had tugged open his collar violently.
    In the corner of the hall, David noticed an expensive modern steel bow and a quiver of aluminium arrows. He remembered that Gypo’s bow was steel and the arrows aluminium. Casually he brushed his fingers over the metal. The bow was strung. It had been used recently. The Inspector was sure of this.
    ‘Nice bow, eh, Inspector? Children must have left it behind. You know how forgetful they are. Always taken a keen interest in ‘em!’
    ‘You were doing some very strange fluting, Squire, if you don’t mind me saying so.’
    ‘Say so, indeed, sir, for I was indeed, sir, very strange! I’m only a beginner, d’you see—like in so many things—one has to begin to die from the start! Disturbing thought, don’t you think? Soon as you’re born, you begin to die. My piping’s just the same. Seems to die on me before it’s been born. Which presents certain chromatic problems, as I’m sure you can see! Come and see my garden. Too fair a day to stifle indoors.’
    The Squire led the Inspector through the front room to the kitchen. They practically crawled on all fours as the roof seemed to meet the mouse holes, which were planned symmetrically round the skirting board. The kitchen was piled with empty bottles of claret and second-best hock. The sink was a junk yard of marmalade plates, eggy saucers, bacon rind and chicken bones. The Squire is an organised man with a deep regard for cleanliness, thought David. The Squire opened the back door onto the garden.
    A long winding path led through fresh beds of roses. A shudder of petals, scarlet and yellow flames in the late afternoon sun. Rose upon rose, uncurling to the furnace in the sky. And the furnace was slowly dying. It was the prologue to the witching time. The centuries of dead felt calmer, knowing the seasons of ghosts were coming. The perfection of darkness was