The slow old station-master, whose handlebar moustache was the colours of pipe-smoke and nicotine, came out of the office to meet him. He glanced at Ben's ticket, and then past him so sharply that Ben had to look. The purplish woman was heaving at a window with one hand and labouring to open the door with the other, and shouting to the station-master to keep Ben there. Ben thought the whole of Stargrave must be able to hear, muffled though her voice was. "You'll have to wait," the station-master said.
He was between Ben and the passage out of the station. Ben's chest was aching with holding his breath by the time he realised that the station-master meant the woman. "You'd think she'd know how to open a door by now," the station-master said, and winked at Ben as he took the ticket from him.
Ben hurried out of the passage, hunching his shoulders for fear of a shout behind him. The bell of a shop door rang somewhere on his left, towards the bridge. To his right, in the square, market stalls were being dismantled, their skeletons clanging on the cobbles. Ahead of him the narrow side streets wandered towards the forest as if they were too tired to climb straight. When he heard the door of the railway carriage slam open and the woman yelling at her children to shut up, he dashed across Market Street, dodging a spillage of oil beside the deserted taxi-stand, and up an alley between the backs of two side streets.
He didn't slow down until the station was out of sight, and then he trotted uphill between the high rough walls of back yards. Someone was hammering and being told "Mind the paintwork", someone was repeating a name to a squawking bird. A sports commentator was chattering so excitedly that the radio lost its grip on his voice, while in an upstairs bedroom a woman was saying "See if her old dress fits you." Hearing the town around him and unaware of him made Ben feel as if he was on a secret mission – a mission which, as he approached his destination, was beginning to seem less than entirely clear to him.
A lorry chugged around The Crescent towards the builder's yard. Once it had passed the mouth of the alley, Ben sprinted across the road into the next stretch, which was steeper. A dried trickle of earth dislodged by rain snaked over the plump uneven flagstones. Two twists of the alley brought him in sight of Church Road, and he seemed to feel his heart shiver. He tiptoed quickly to the end of the alley and peered hard at both downhill curves of the road until he was convinced that there was nobody to stop him, and dashed across to the churchyard gate. He lifted the latch and opened the iron gate just wide enough to let himself slip through, and made himself take his time about closing it so that it wouldn't squeal again. "I'm visiting," he said, and then he had to turn and show his face.
Nobody was behind him after all. A few small marble angels perched on headstones, gazing at the sky. St Christopher towered in the window beside the church porch, securing a boy on his shoulder with one massive stained-glass arm and holding hands with a little girl, a scene which looked as if it had been assembled from fragments of a dozen skies and sunsets. Ben glanced about the grid of paths which led away from the church, and picked his way through the graves to the white marble obelisk.
It was among the older graves, between a cracked stone urn and a dried-up blackened wreath. It stood almost as tall as the infrequent trees which made the graveyard seem a borderland between Sterling Forest and the town. The marble was so bright with sunshine that Ben had to narrow his eyes. As he read the inscriptions, interweaving his fingers in front of him, the miles of forest above the common beyond the hedge felt like a shadow encroaching on his vision. His father's and grandparents' names were carved on the shaft now, above the name of Edward Sterling and his dates from the previous century. Only Ben's mother was missing, because his aunt had had her sister buried in the family grave in Norwich.
He stared at the names as if they might tell him why he was here. After travelling so far, he felt as if he hadn't gone far enough. He gripped his fingers with his fingers until the flesh between them ached, as if the ache was a wordless prayer that might bring him guidance. At last he had to desist, and the pain faded slowly, leaving him feeling hollow and bereaved, unable to think of anything to do except gaze at his breath which was misting the air in front of him.
He had been staring at it for some time before it occurred to him to wonder how his breath could be visible on such a hot day. By then he had wrapped his arms around himself to stop him shivering. Again he had the sense, much stronger than it had been at the gate, of being watched. He lifted his gaze and made himself peer through the mist of his breath towards the forest.
Something had entered the graveyard. Ben had to shade his eyes with one shaky hand, to block off some of the glare from the obelisk, before he could begin to distinguish what he was seeing. Between him and the hedge below the common, a patch of air as wide as several graves and taller than the obelisk was glittering with flecks bright as particles of a mirror. Beneath it a faint pale line glistened on the grass, and Ben saw that the particles were dancing leisurely towards him.
As the glittering passed beneath a tree, two leaves fell. He saw them turn white as they seesawed to the ground. He thought he drew several long breaths as he watched them fall, but he could no longer see his breath. His body seemed to be slowing down, becoming calm as marble, though he felt as if he was holding himself still against a threat of shivering panic. Yet his hands were moving, rising almost imperceptibly as though to greet whatever was coming to him. As they reached the level of his vision he saw that his fingers had begun to glitter with flakes of the ice in the air. A silence far more profound than the peace of the churchyard was reaching for him. He was distantly aware of pacing towards a gap in the hedge which led onto the common, following the dance of ice as it moved away. He felt that if he followed where it led, he might understand what the dance was suggesting.
A man was shouting, but Ben ignored him. He was sure he had time to reach the trees and hide. He felt as if the hushed dance might already be hiding him, for the dazzling crystals were lingering around him as if they wanted him to join in the dance. The vanishing patterns they made in the air, and their almost inaudible whispering which he was straining to hear, seemed to promise mysteries beyond imagining.
Then he was falling behind as the glittering passed through the hedge around the gap. A man's hand fastened on his shoulder, jerked with surprise, redoubled its grasp. "He's ice cold, poor little bugger," the man called, and Ben heard a woman – the purplish woman – emit a sympathetic groan. He saw a group of trees at the edge of the forest sparkle and grow dull, and then there was nothing to see beneath the trees except the greenish gloom. He felt abandoned and bewildered, and all he could do was shake.
TWO
The Stargrave police station was a cottage with a counter dividing the front room. A policewoman with large wrinkly hands took Ben into a smaller room next to the kitchen and brought him a glass of milk. "Straight from the cow, that. Drink it right up." The policeman who had found him in the graveyard questioned him with a slowness which Ben realised was meant to be kind, but which he found patronising. Did Ben know his own address? Had he come all this way by himself? Had he told anyone he was coming? Even if he'd left a note that told his aunt not to worry about him, didn't he think she would? "Suppose so," Ben muttered, feeling small and mean.
At least he wasn't shaking now, though his body felt so brittle that he thought a touch might set if off again. While the policeman went to a desk behind the counter to phone Ben's aunt, the policewoman held Ben's hand and told him about her daughter who wanted to be a train-driver when she grew up. Before long the policeman called him. "Just tell your aunt how you are, will you?"