Broken Homes

ball in your half of the court. As soon as he got wind of the sport, Dr Walid had insisted that we wear cricket helmets and face guards when we played.
    Nightingale grumbled that in his day they would never have dreamt of wearing protection – not even in the sixth form when they’d played with cricket balls – and besides it reduced the player’s incentive to maintain good form and not be struck in the first place. Lesley, who never liked wearing a helmet, objected right up to the point where she found she could get an amusing boing sound by bouncing the ball off mine. I’d have been more irritated except, 1) helmet, 2) Lesley would pass up easy body shots to go for my head, which made it easier to win.
    Back in the days at Casterbrook the boys had placed bets on the game. They had wagered fag-days, fagging being when a younger boy acted as a servant for an older one, which tells you just about everything you need to know about posh schools. Me and Lesley, both being aspirational working class, staked rounds at the pub instead. The fact that I had a seven month head start as an apprentice on Lesley probably being the only reason she ever had to pay for her own drinks.
    In the end it was a draw with one body strike to me, one boing to Lesley and a disqualified point caused by Toby jumping up and catching the ball in mid-air. We broke for what me and Lesley called dinner, Nightingale called supper and Molly, we’d begun to suspect, thought of as field trials for her culinary experimentation.
    ‘This potato tastes a bit different,’ said Lesley poking at the neat conical pile of mash that balanced one side of the plate against what Nightingale had identified as seared tuna steak.
    ‘That’s because it’s yam,’ said Nightingale – surprising me. It’s not like yam is big on the traditional English menu. Although if it had been, they probably would have mashed it and then covered it in onion gravy. My mum boils it like cassava, slices it up with butter and a soup spicy enough to cauterise the end of your tongue.
    I looked over at Molly, who watched over us as we ate, and she lifted her chin and met my gaze.
    ‘It’s very nice,’ I said.
    We heard a distant ringing noise that confused everyone until we recognised the Folly’s front door bell. We all exchanged looks until it was established that since I wasn’t intrinsically supernatural, a chief inspector or required to put on a mask before meeting the public I was nominated door opener in chief.
    It turned out to be a cycle courier who handed over a package in exchange for my signature. It was an A4 envelope stiffened with cardboard and addressed to Thomas Nightingale Esq.
    Nightingale used a serrated steak knife to open the envelope at the wrong end, the better, he explained, to avoid unpleasant surprises and extracted a sheet of expensive paper. He showed it to me and Lesley – it was handwritten and in Latin. Nightingale translated.
    ‘“The Lord and Lady of the River do give you notice that they will be holding their Spring Court together at the Garden of Bernadette of Spain”,’ he paused and reread the last bit. ‘“Bernie Spain’s Garden and that you are hereby charged as if by ancient custom to secure and police the fair against all enemies.” And it’s sealed with the Hanged Man of Tyburn and the Waterwheel of Oxley plus signatures.’
    He showed us the seals.
    ‘Somebody’s been watching way too much Game of Thrones ,’ said Lesley. ‘And what is the Spring Court?’ Nightingale explained that it had once been traditional for the Old Man of the Thames to hold a Spring Court upriver, usually near Lechlade, where his subjects could come and pay their respects. It generally occurred at or around the spring equinox but there hadn’t been a formal court since the Old Man abandoned the tideway in the 1850s.
    ‘Nor, if I remember history correctly, did the Folly play a role,’ said Nightingale. ‘Except to send an envoy and our respects.’
    ‘I notice it says “as if by ancient custom”,’ I said.
    ‘Yes,’ said Nightingale. ‘I imagine both Tyburn and Oxley enjoyed the ambiguity of that statement.’
    ‘Perhaps they’re not taking it very seriously,’ I said.
    ‘If only that were true,’ said Nightingale.
    After supper I headed for the tech cave for a beer and to see what I could find on cable. I thought Lesley might join me, but she said she was knackered and going to bed. I pulled a Red Stripe from the fridge and