Free The Grace in Older Women by Jonathan Gash Page A

woad. Like in France,
where Toulouse's rich architecture came directly from exporting the stuff in
little rondels a bit bigger than a golf ball. Until about 1562, when holiness
raised its ugly head and religious wars sent the Protestant woad merchants
diving for cover and the industry vanished. Oops. I remembered where I was.
    'Who did it?' I asked. A forger nearly as good as Packo?
    'Some ancient artist long dead, Lovejoy. Anonymous. What's the
matter?'
    The pong of linseed oil was the matter. Frankly, the daftness of
forgers takes your breath away. Little girls have the best noses. Ask one if a
painting smells. She'll wrinkle her little two-year-old conk and go, 'Poooh!'
She'll even tell you if it's the same aroma as your linseed stand oil. It
takes, I assure you, nigh two years for linseed scent to vanish, so it's a good
test. We've all got noses. There's no excuse for getting ripped off.
    'Doesn't feel right. It stinks oil. You've been done.'
    'But. . .' He turned to Miss Witherspoon in perplexity. 'Wasn't it
walled up two hundred years?'
    'It certainly was, Father Jay!' she pronounced sternly. 'I had
heard this man was honest. Now I can see he's a conniving dealer who wants this
painting himself for a song!'
    Patience evaporated. 'I've told you the truth. I've got some rich
Americans to see.'
    'Americans?' I swear Father Jay went pale.
    'They want me. For breakfast,' I added pointedly.
    'Oh. Not here, then?'
    'Why would. . . ?' I caught myself. I'd almost asked why anyone in
his right mind would want to come to Fenstone. ‘Er, in town.'
    'Please don't have any truck with Lovejoy. He's a crook.'
    That was when I left them to it. I'd had enough. It was barely
dawn. I was stuck in the wilderness, hungry as a hunter, no nosh bars anywhere,
and a million miles from civilization where Addie, the Yanks, waited - I hoped.
In an earlier, more condign, age I would have gone to the nearest church door
and knocked, asking for food to stave off my gnawing hunger pains. Not now, not
now.
    Naturally, I couldn't resist peering into the church. A stout
balding gentleman with a pronounced shuffle - stroke? - was lighting altar
candles. He looked vaguely familiar, but it was hard in the gloaming. Then I
thought, tweeds, country gent, the auction, Addie Bigmouth explaining why.
Otherwise, empty. The poor box beckoned, but with true nobility I walked away,
hoping never to see Juliana Witherspoon and her priest ever again.
     
    8
    There was enough light to see the mighty metropolis of Fenstone
was rousing, when I found a bus stop. No bus. Maybe eighteen cottages,
once-splendid houses abutting the road, no pavements in rural fashion. The bus
shelter was falling. I mean literally, its glass shattered, roof holed. No
timetable to show when, if ever, the last train to Marienbad was due. I walked
about. The pub was forlorn, announcing a 'good pull-in for travellers' in a
flaking, frankly disbelievable, notice. One in three of the cottages was
vacant. Faded FOR SALE signs bleached. Fenstone hadn't grown astride a trunk
road, so no traffic was through. A man leading a massive shire horse came by.
    We exchanged greetings. 'No caff hereabouts, is there?'
    'Na, son. Ta'll get nothing at the Bull. Closed for good.'
    'Shop, then?' Some sell milk, boxes of orange juice with a straw.
    'Got none now.' He stopped the great beast by leaning back on its
chest and slithering his boots until it understood.
    'Bus?'
    'Noon, to Dragonsdale, Tuesdays and Thursdays.'
    He was wondering what I was doing there. I explained, 'Been to
your church, and I want to get home.'
    'Left before prayers, then.' He grinned. 'Services to nobody.
Empty since Reverend Fairhurst died of his accident. This stranger's not filled
it, with his rituals, all smells and bells.'
    I found myself grinning. East Anglia's religious issues were
decided by the Civil War, for good. 'Nice bloke, though.'
    'Foreign, they do say.'
    Odd, I've a cracking ear for accents. I'd bet my next meal Father
Jay was