“But how did he…” He was speaking, without even knowing he was speaking.

“It’s…” began George. “They’re not sure at the moment.”

“Thou shalt not kill,” said old Mr. Devine, shuffling under the rug.

“What?”

“Granda! Sshh!” said George.

“The Lord does not abrogate his care over his elect,” mumbled Mr. Devine.

“What?” said Israel, suddenly angry. “What’s he talking about?”

“It was an accident…Israel…I’m sorry.”

“Accident?”

“Killed hisself,” said old Mr. Devine.

“What?” said Israel. What was this wretched man suggesting? “What happened?”

“He seems to have been…I don’t know. Some bookshelves, they…”

“What?”

“The bookshelves, they came down and…”

“Leonard Bast,” said Israel. He was clutching his head, as though in pain. “Oh, god.”

“Leonard Bast?”

“Howards End. Leonard Bast, he’s…crushed.”

“Howards End by E. M. Forster?”

“Pearce mentioned it to me.” Israel’s voice had become uneven, as though lacking air. “I didn’t think anything of it.” He felt as though he were choking. He felt like prostrating himself. “He couldn’t have…”

“It was an accident,” said George, reassuringly. “It was definitely an accident.”

“He’ll not get a burial if he killed hisself,” said Mr. Devine.

“Granda!” George was becoming exasperated.

“Speaking the truth,” said Mr. Devine, apparently oblivious. “‘Ye that fear the Lord, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield.’”

“Anyway, he’s at peace now,” said George.

“‘And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, Lord-’”

“Will you shut up!” yelled George at old Mr. Devine, unable to contain herself anymore. “You stupid, selfish man!” And as George screamed, Israel recognized the emotion, which wasn’t grief but rage, and the rage not just of today, but of years, and everywhere, and everything, the same rage he’d felt when his father died-the rage of being wounded, of being disgusted with himself, of being sacrificed by the dead to mourning. And he could suddenly see it in George too-having been sacrificed by her parents’ death all those years ago. Hence her rage at Mr. Devine. And “Shut up!” she was yelling again at Mr. Devine. “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” and then she was banging her way out of the kitchen, with Israel hurrying out after her into the yard.

“George!” he called.

“Go away!” she screamed back, not turning, striding away from him, as if she was to blame.

“You want to be left alone?” called Israel.

“Yes,” she said. “I want to be left alone!”

She didn’t want to be left alone.

He left her alone.

He didn’t want to be left alone. He found himself in the van, driving. Out of Tumdrum and down the coast road, remembering what Pearce had said: the best road in Europe. And then he was parking down in Glenarm and taking the keys from the ignition and sitting there looking out to sea. And could see nothing. Because there was nothing to see. And sitting and crying and shivering by himself. With nowhere to go. And nowhere to be. And nothing to think.

And then hours later, having disappeared into himself, in deep, pitiful mournful self-involvement, he was driving back, half-dazed and despairing, to the Devines’. He needed to talk to someone.

He couldn’t talk to George.

He couldn’t talk to Gloria.

So there was no one to talk to.

Except perhaps the Reverend Roberts.

Lights were on in the manse, which was a two-bed semi-inconveniently situated on a new-build estate just off the coast road. Tumdrum Presbyterian Church had sold the original-the real-manse many years before. The original-the real-manse was a five-bedroom redbrick Victorian villa bang in the center of town, with its own orchard and a walled garden, and a small housemaid’s room, and a library, which had been home to generations of upright ministers and their uptight offspring, and which was now home to local pinstripe-jacket-and tight-jeans-wearing businessman Martin Mortimer and his life partner, Kevin, the hairdresser. Martin and Kevin were accepted, on the whole, in Tumdrum because, it was generally agreed, they were not “flamboyant” and “didn’t rub your noses in it,” and they had lavished time and money on the old manse and transformed it into a home of top-of-the-range chrome and mahogany fittings, with a wet room and a lot of signature wallpaper, while the orchard had been sold and was now a development of-only three-executive-style town houses called “The Orchard.” While in the new manse the Reverend Roberts was living simply and quietly, lacking entirely in Martin and Kevin’s financial common sense and interior design flair. The reverend’s possessions consisted almost exclusively of the clothes he wore and a few Bible commentaries, and the furniture in the house consisted of the congregation’s castoffs: an outdoor plastic picnic table in the living room, which served as his desk, a straight-backed mock-velvet armchair, and no pictures on the wall, and no mess. The Reverend Roberts was someone who had somehow cleansed himself of the everyday mess of things, the detritus. He was not distracted. Which is probably what made him a great minister, and which is certainly why, when Israel could think of no one to turn to, he now answered the door wearing a faded blue terry cloth dressing gown that had once belonged to a member of the congregation. It was too short for him. He was wearing his glasses.

“Israel?” said the Reverend Roberts, peering into the darkness.

“I…just happened to be passing,” said Israel.

The Reverend Roberts double-checked his watch.

“At half past eleven on a Monday night?”

“Erm. Gosh. Is it? Sorry. I didn’t realize. I’ll-”

“No, no! Come on in,” said the Reverend England Roberts, reaching out and ushering Israel into the narrow hallway. “It’s fine. I was just making some coffee.”

“At half past eleven on a Monday night?”

“Come on. Come in.”

He led Israel into his kitchen, a room with old white melamine units and nothing else: it could have been the kitchen of a show-home.

“Well,” said the Reverend Roberts, as he busied himself with his coffee-making paraphernalia-the beans, the grinder, the silvery screw-top stove-top espresso pot. He didn’t believe in skimping on coffee. It was his one luxury. Israel sat silently in the bright glare of the kitchen’s down-lighters. “Everything all right?” The reverend asked.

“Yeah,” said Israel, whose eyes were sore and puffy from tears. “Yeah.”

“I was very sorry to hear about Pearce.”

“Yes.”

“I know that you were very close.”

“Well…”

“Very, very sad,” said the Reverend Roberts. “He was a good man.” And then he added, reaching into the pocket of his dressing gown. “Can I tempt you?” He produced a small white paper bag.

“What is it?”

“Cystallized ginger,” said the Reverend Roberts.

“You keep a bag of crystallized ginger in your dressing gown pocket?”

“At all times,” said the Reverend Roberts. “In case of emergencies.” He took a piece himself. “It’s very good. I get it from a shop in Derry. Vitelli’s? Italians. Very good. They do amaretti biscuits as well, but I’m afraid I’m all out till next payday.”

“No, thanks, I’m OK.”

“Sure? You on a diet?”

“No.”

The Reverend Roberts reached into his other pocket.

“I have chocolate limes, if you’d prefer,” he said. He held out the bag. “From the Sweetery. I’ve never known anyone to refuse a chocolate lime.”

“No,” said Israel. “Thanks anyway.”

“You sure?”

“Well,” said Israel, taking one. “Maybe just one.”

“Good,” said the reverend as Israel unwrapped a chocolate lime. “So, let’s get our priorities right, shall we? You take the weight off your feet, and I’ll see to the coffee. Sit. Sit. Go on.” The reverend set two stools incongruously either side of the oven, as though flanking a fireplace: Israel sat down, and the Reverend Roberts busied himself with the grinding and brewing of the coffee.