‘Come to me,’ he found himself saying, ‘come on, come on. Come to me. Come to me.’ Like he was willing it into his embrace, this treasure, like it was a girl he wanted, his hard-on wanted, and he was hypnotising her into his bed.
‘Come to me, come to me – ‘
The wood facade was breaking. Panting now, he used the corners of the candlestick base to lever larger chunks of timber away. The altar was hollow, as he’d known it would be. And empty. Empty.
Except for a ball of stone, the size of a small football. Was this his prize? He couldn’t believe how insignificant it looked: and yet the air was still electric around him; his blood still danced. He reached through the hole he’d made in the altar and picked the relic up.
Outside, Rawhead was jubilating.
Images flashed before Ron’s eyes as he weighed the stone in his deadened hand. A corpse with its feet burning. A flaming cot. A dog, running along the street, a living ball of fire. It was all outside, waiting to unfold. Against the perpetrator, he had this stone. He’d trusted God, just for half a day, and he got shat on. It was just a stone: just a fucking stone. He turned the football over and over in his hand, trying to make some sense of its furrows and its mounds. Was it meant to be something, perhaps; was he missing its deeper significance?
There was a knot of noise at the other end of the church; a crash, a cry, from beyond the door a whoosh of flame. Two people staggered in, followed by smoke and pleas. ‘He’s burning the village,’ said a voice Ron knew. It was that benign policeman who hadn’t believed in Hell; he was trying to keep his act together, perhaps for the benefit of his companion, Mrs Blatter from the hotel. The nightdress she’d run into the street wearing was torn. Her breasts were exposed; they shook with her sobs; she didn’t seem to know she was naked, didn’t even know where she was.
‘Christ in Heaven help us,’ said Ivanhoe. There’s no fucking Christ in here,’ came Declan’s voice. He was standing up, and reeling towards the intruders. Ron couldn’t see his face from where he stood, but he knew it must be near as damn it unrecognisable. Mrs Blatter avoided him as he staggered towards the door, and she ran towards the altar. She’d been married here: on the very spot he’d built the fire. Ron stared at her body entranced.
She was considerably overweight, her breasts sagging, her belly overshadowing her cunt so he doubted if she could even see
it. But it was for this his cock-head throbbed, for this his head reeled –
Her image was in his hand. God yes, she was there in his hand, she was the living equivalent of what he held. A woman. The stone was the statue of a woman, a Venus grosser than Mrs Blatter, her belly swelling with children, tits like mountains, cunt a valley that began at her navel and gaped to the world. All this time, under the cloth and the cross, they’d bowed their heads to a goddess.
Ron stepped off the altar and began to run down the aisle, pushing Mrs Blatter, the policeman and the lunatic aside.
‘Don’t go out,’ said Ivanhoe, ‘It’s right outside.’
Ron held the Venus tight, feeling her weight in his hands and taking security from her. Behind him, the Verger was screeching a warning to his Lord. Yes, it was a warning for sure.
Ron kicked open the door. On every side, fire. A flaming cot, a corpse (it was the postmaster) with its feet burning, a dog skinned by fire, hurtling past. And Rawhead, of course, silhouetted against a panorama of flames. It looked round, perhaps because it heard the warnings the Verger was yelling, but more likely, he thought, because it knew, knew without being told, that the woman had been found.
‘Here!’ Ron yelled, ‘I’m here! I’m here!’
It was coming for him now, with the steady gait of a victor closing in to claim its final and absolute victory. Doubt surged up in Ron. Why did it come so surely to meet him, not seeming to care about the weapon he carried in his hands?