All Things Undying Read Online Free

people.’
    â€˜Bruce?’
    â€˜Her dog. A border terrier.’
    I’d always liked border terriers, ever since Puffy upstaged all the human actors in the movie There’s Something About Mary . ‘Bruce? What an odd name for a dog.’
    â€˜He’s named after Bruce Springsteen,’ Janet explained. ‘You know, “Born in the USA”.’
    I had to laugh. Naming a dog after The Boss would never have occurred to me. ‘You sound like you know her.’
    â€˜Sorry? Oh, yes, I do. We volunteer for the Christian Aid Lunch at St Saviour’s Church. It’s at noon on Tuesday, by the way, if you’d like to come. Not much of a meal, if you want to know the truth. Sandwiches, veggies, tea and cakes, that sort of thing. Only a pound, but I like to chuck in another quid or two for the cause.’
    â€˜I’d love to,’ I said. ‘Will Susan be there?’
    â€˜I doubt it. She stopped coming a while back. Could have been her busy schedule, of course, but I know she found some of the parishioners a bit off-putting.’ Lifting the teapot with one hand and securing the lid with two fingers of the other, Janet topped off my mug. ‘Susan ruffled quite a few feathers when she bought St Anthony’s and converted it into flats.’
    I remembered St Anthony’s, a solid, Victorian-era church near the intersection of Clarence Street and College Way, not far from the river. ‘It was made redundant?’
    Janet drew quote marks in the air. ‘Surplus to requirements. Available for disposal. It just about broke my heart.’ She helped herself to another biscuit. ‘A pity, that, but what can you do?’ She shrugged. ‘St Anthony’s was down to a handful of parishioners. If they ever got double digits at a service, Christ himself would have climbed down from the cross to congratulate the vicar. A beautiful old building, really. Neo-Gothic. Forty-five hundred square feet, give or take, so Susan’s architect had a lot to work with. It’s four flats now.’ After a moment, she added, ‘Susan surprised us, didn’t she?’
    â€˜How’s that?’
    â€˜Everyone thought she’d be taking the flat with the rose window, the one that faces east over the Dart, not that you’d get much of a view out of it, but the sunrise would be spectacular. But, no. Her flat’s on the south side where the special windows are.’
    The way Janet emphasized ‘special’ made me wonder if said windows were endowed with supernatural powers, like the Grotto at Lourdes. I had to ask. ‘What do you mean, “special”?’
    Janet leaned toward me and lowered her voice, speaking in a reverent whisper. ‘When the builders started pulling down the interior walls, they uncovered a pair of Byrne-Jones windows that somebody had covered up with plasterboard during the Second World War. A Miriam and a David, they were, smaller versions of the ones up at St Michael’s and All Angels in Hertfordshire. They’re part of Susan’s sitting room now.’
    Byrne-Jones windows? I was astonished, and said so. ‘How could anyone simply forget a Byrne-Jones window? They’re classic! Trinity Church in Boston has one of his windows. The Adorations of the Magi. I’ve seen it, and it’s glorious.’
    Janet shrugged. ‘Alan claims that Byrne-Jones was hopelessly out of fashion by the 1930s. Perhaps nobody missed them.’
    â€˜What brought Susan Parker to Dartmouth, do you know? It seems a long way out of London. I presume that’s where she tapes her show.’
    â€˜Three hours. But you’ll remember that from before, Hannah. Catch the eight-fifteen out of Totnes and you’re in London well before noon. People have been commuting from London to Dartmouth for at least a century of weekends.
    I remembered that, too. ‘The English Riviera,’ I said, quoting a popular