The Running Grave полностью

‘Why would it be in here?’ said Jiang. His right eye had begun to flicker. He rubbed it to disguise the tic.

‘I just had a funny feeling it might be,’ said Robin, her voice high and unnatural in her own ears, ‘so I thought I’d check.’

‘You playing at being Daiyu?’ said Jiang with a sneer, and Robin remembered that one of the Drowned Prophet’s supposed gifts was that she could find lost objects, no matter how far away they were.

‘No,’ said Robin. ‘No, I don’t know why, but I just felt this pull to the woods. I thought maybe one of the children could have picked up the fish and brought it in here, then dropped it.’

The story sounded extremely thin, even to Robin.

‘This place is odd, isn’t it?’ she added, gesturing at the stumps of posts in their circle. ‘What d’you think this ring was for? It looks like a miniature Stonehenge.’

‘Like what?’ said Jiang irritably.

‘It’s a prehistoric monument,’ said Robin. ‘In Wiltshire.’

‘I know what you’re up to,’ said Jiang, advancing on her.

‘What?’ said Robin.

‘You were gonna meet Emily here.’

‘Wh—no, I wasn’t. Why would—?’

‘Friends, aren’t you?’

‘I barely know her.’

‘When we were up on the vegetable patch, you came interfering—’

‘I know. I thought you were going to hit her, with the hoe.’

Jiang advanced a few steps, dragging his feet through the overgrown weeds. The dense canopy overhead made dappled shadows move across his face. His eye was winking frantically. He raised his hand to hide it again.

‘Emily sneaks off, to fuck,’ he said.

It was the first time Robin had heard sex described as anything other than spirit bonding in the church.

‘I… don’t know anything about that.’

‘Were you a lesbian, outside?’

‘No,’ said Robin.

‘So how come you knew where Emily was, in Norwich?’

‘I didn’t,’ said Robin. ‘I just checked all the bathrooms I could find, and she was in one of them.’

‘Were you doing it with her, in that bathroom?’

‘No,’ said Robin.

‘Why’s she looking at you so much since Norwich, then?’

‘I haven’t noticed her looking at me,’ lied Robin.

She couldn’t tell whether Jiang’s grubby accusation was made to shock and offend, or because he really believed it: he’d never given her the impression of much intelligence, although he’d certainly just proved himself to be surprisingly observant. As though he’d read her thoughts, Jiang said,

‘I see more than the rest of ’em with my eyes shut.’

‘Can I ask you something?’ Robin said. She needed to placate him: he was potentially violent, and her interference on the vegetable patch, and her association with Emily, whose disappearance had caused him to be harangued by his brother on the way back from Norwich, had clearly left him with considerable animus towards her.

‘What?’

‘You’re obviously very high up in the church.’

She knew this wasn’t true; Jiang had no real position of authority, though he displayed a definite liking for exerting power within the limited scope he was given. He now lowered the hand concealing his flickering eye and said,

‘Yeah.’

‘Well,’ said Robin, ‘how come you seem to work harder than anyone else in…’ She deliberately let the words ‘your family’ hang in the air before finishing, ‘you know – in your position?’

‘I ain’t got no false self,’ said Jiang. ‘Don’t need any of that other crap.’

As she’d hoped, he seemed subtly flattered by her question, and she sensed a slight diminution of aggression.

‘I just noticed you kind of… live what we’re all supposed to do. You don’t just preach it.’

She was momentarily afraid she’d overdone it, but Jiang squared his shoulders, with the beginnings of a smirk on his grubby face.

‘That why you won’t fuck Taio? ’Cause he don’t live it?’

‘I didn’t mean Taio doesn’t—’

‘’Cause you’re right,’ said Jiang, aggressive again. ‘He’s full of fucking EM, him and that Becca. Both of ’em. I work harder than anyone.’

‘I know,’ said Robin. ‘I’ve seen it. You never stop. You’re out in all weathers, helping run the farm, and it’s not like you don’t know doctrine. What you told me about the kids, and materialist possession – you know, that day Will was fussing over that little blonde girl? – that really stuck with me. It actually opened my eyes to how weird and abusive the materialist parent-child thing is.’

‘That’s good,’ said Jiang. He gave the bottoms of his tracksuit an unnecessary tug upwards. His tic had subsided and he was almost smiling. ‘That’s good you remembered that.’

‘You’ve got a way of putting things really clearly. Don’t get me wrong,’ Robin added, careful to sound nervous, ‘Taio and Becca are good at it, too, but they…’

‘Taio wanted to fuck her,’ said Jiang, smirking, reverting to what seemed to be his favourite subject. ‘Did you know that?’

‘No,’ said Robin.

‘But then Papa J went with her, so Taio wasn’t allowed any more.’

‘Oh,’ said Robin, eyebrows raised, and she lied, ‘I thought I kind of sensed something between Becca and Taio…’

‘Got your eyes open too, then, haven’t you?’

Perhaps because he was so rarely praised or appreciated, Jiang now seemed almost friendly.