Sacrament

a fellow called Eropkin. I got to know him briefly. The Empress had him executed as a traitor the following summer: it wasn't the last winter of the world, you see, except for him. But for the months his palace stood, there on the riverbank between the Admiralty and the Winter Palace, he was the most admired, the most lionized, the most adored man in St Petersburg.'

'Why?' Will said.

'Because he'd made a masterpiece, Will. I don't suppose you've ever seen an icepalace? No. But you understand the principle. Blocks of ice were cut from the river, which was solid enough to march an army over, then carved, and assembled, just the way you'd build an ordinary palace.

'Except ... Eropkin had genius in him that winter. It was as though his whole career had been leading up to this triumph. He'd only let the masons use the finest, clearest ice, blue and white. He had ice-trees carved for the gardens around the palace, with ice-birds in their branches and ice-wolves lurking between. There were ice-dolphins flanking the front doors, that seemed to be leaping from spumy waves, and dogs playing on the step. There was a bitch, I remember, lying casually at the threshold, suckling her pups. And inside-'

'You could go inside?' Will said, astonished.

'Oh certainly. There was a ballroom, with chandeliers. There was a receiving room with a vast fireplace and an ice-fire burning in the grate. There was a bedroom, with a stupendous four-poster bed. And of course people came in their tens of thousands to see the place. It was better by night than by day I think, because at night they lit thousands of lanterns and bonfires around it, and the walls were translucent, so it was possible to see layer upon layer of the place-'

'As if you had X-ray eyes.'

'Exactly so.'

'Is that when you had your moment of ... of...'

'Epiphany? No. That comes later.'

'So what happened to the palace?'

'What do you think?'

'It just melted.'

Jacob nodded. 'I went back to St Petersburg in the late spring, because I'd heard the papers of the learned Dr Khrouslov had been discovered. They had, but his wife had burned them, mistaking them for love-letters to his mistress. Anyway, it was by then early May, and every trace of the palace had gone.

'And I went down to the Neva - to smoke a cigarette, or take a piss; something inconsequential - and while I was looking down into the river something seized hold of my - I want to say my soul, if I have one - and I thought of all those wonders, the wolves and dolphins and spires and

chandeliers and birds and trees, there, somehow waiting in the water. Being in the water already, if I just knew how to see them-' he wasn't looking at Will any longer, but staring into what remained of the fire, his eyes huge. 'Ready to spring into life. And I thought, if I throw myself in, and drown in the river, and dissolve in the river, then next year when the river freezes, if the Empress Anna commands another palace to be built I'll be in every part of it. Jacob in the bird. Jacob in the tree. Jacob in the wolf.' 'But none of it'd be alive.' Jacob smiled. 'That was the glory of it, Will. Not to be alive. That was the perfection. I stood there on the river-bank and the joy in me, oh, Will, the sheer ... sheer ... brimming bliss of it. I mean God could not have been happier at that moment. And that, to answer your question, was my Russian epiphany.' His voice trailed away, in deference to the memory, leaving only the soft popping of the dying fire. Will was content with the hush; he needed time to mull over all he'd just been told. Jacob's story had put so many images into his head. Of carved ice-birds sitting on carved ice-perches, more alive than the frozen flocks that had dropped out of the sky. Of the people - Empress Anna's complaining subjects -so astonished by the spires and the lights that they forgot the deaths of great men. And of the river the following spring, with Jacob sitting on its banks, staring into the rushing waters and seeing bliss. If somebody had asked him what all this meant, he wouldn't have had any answers. But nor would he have cared. Jacob had filled up some empty place in him with these pictures and he was grateful for the gift. At last, Jacob roused himself from his reverie and giving the fire one last, desultory poke said: 'There's something I need you to do for me.' 'Whatever you want.' 'How strong are you feeling?' 'I'm fine.' 'Can you stand?' 'Of course,' Will proceeded to do so, lifting the coat up with him. It was heavier and more cumbersome than he'd imagined, however, and as he rose it slipped off him. He didn't bother to pick it up. There was scarcely any light for Jacob to see him naked by. And even if he did, hadn't he taken Will's clothes off, hours before, and laid him down beside the fire? They had no secrets, he and Jacob. 'I feel fine,' Will pronounced, as he shook the numbness from his legs. 'Here-'Jacob said. He pointed to Will's clothes which had been laid out to dry on the far side of the fire. 'Get dressed. We have a hard climb ahead of us.' 'What about Mrs McGee?'

'She has no business with us tonight,' Jacob replied. 'Or indeed, after our deeds on the hill, any night.' 'Why not?' said Will. 'Because I won't need her for company, will I? I'll have you.'

CHAPTER VIII

i

Burnt Yarley was too small to merit a policeman of its own; on the few occasions police assistance was needed in the valley, a car was dispatched from Skipton. Tonight the call went out at a little before eight - a thirteen-year-old boy missing from his home - and the car, containing Constables Maynard and Hemp, was at the Rabjohns residence by half past. There was very little by way of information. The lad had disappeared from his bedroom sometime between six and seven, approximately. Neither his temperature nor his medication was likely to have induced a delirium, and there was nothing to indicate an abduction, so it had to be assumed he'd left of his own volition, with his wits about him. As to his whereabouts, the parents had no clue. He had few friends, and those he had knew nothing. The father, whose condescending manner did nothing to endear him to the officers, was of the opinion that the boy had made for Manchester.

'Why the hell would he do that?' Doug Maynard, who had taken an instant dislike to Rabjohns, wanted to know.

'He hadn't been very happy recently,' Hugo replied. 'We'd had some hard words, he and L'

'How hard?'

'What are you implying?' Hugo sniffed.

'I'm not implying anything; I'm asking you a question. Let me put it more plainly. Did you give the lad a beating?'

'Good God, no. And may I say I resent-'

'Let's put your resentments over to one side for now, shall we?' Maynard said. 'You can resent me all you like when we've found your boy. If he is wandering around out there then we haven't got a lot of time. The temperature's still dropping-'

'Would you kindly keep your voice down!' Hugo hissed, glancing towards the open door. 'My wife's in a bad enough state as it is.'

Maynard gave his partner a nod. 'Have a word with her will you, Phil?'

'There's nothing she knows that I don't,' Hugo replied.

'Oh you'd be surprised what a child will tell one parent and won't tell the other,' Maynard replied. 'Phil'll be gentle, won't you, Phil?'

'Kid gloves.' He slipped away.

'So you didn't hit him,' Maynard said to Hugo. 'But you've had some words-'

'He'd been behaving like a damn fool.'

'Doing what?'

'Nothing of any significance,' Hugo said, waving the question away. 'He went off one afternoon-'