As is traditional in this village, the Chapel congregation had walked the 100 yards up the hill to unite with the Anglicans for the Harvest Sunday morning service. The Chapel people are on the whole younger and more visibly filled with the Holy Spirit than the Anglicans. Retired postmistress Daphne was standing in the aisle, bubbling over as usual with love and joy, and bestowing hugs and kisses on anyone attempting to squeeze pass.
The Clarke contingent — mother, aunt, grandson — took a pew brazenly near the front. The service this year was led by the rural dean, who is an absolute babe. This was a rare visit, and we all of us, young and old, male and female, feasted our eyes greedily on her as she emerged theatrically from the vestry shooting her glamorous cuffs. ‘Is she going to do a pole dance?’ I said in a confidential aside to grandson Oscar, a once-a-year churchgoer since the age of five.
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