“So far,” Havers noted.
THE VILLAGE OF ZENNOR was bleak at the best of times, a situation arising from its location?tucked into a protective fold of otherwise windswept land perhaps one half mile from the sea?and from its monochromatic appearance, which was unadorned granite occasionally graced by the oddity of a desiccated palm tree. At the worst of times, defined by foul weather, gloom, or the dead of night, it was sinister, surrounded by fields from which boulders erupted like curses rained down by an angry god. It hadn’t changed in one hundred years and likely wouldn’t change in another one hundred. Its past sprang from mining and its present relied on tourism, but there was little enough of that even at the height of summer, as no beach close by was easy to get to and the only attraction even remotely likely to draw the curious into the village was the church. Unless one counted the Tinner’s Arms, of course, and what that pub could provide in the way of food and drink.
The size of the car park of this establishment did suggest that, in the summer at least, a fair amount of business occurred. Lynley parked there and went inside to enquire about the mermaid’s chair. When he approached the publican, Lynley found him working a sudoku puzzle. He held up a hand in that universal give-me-a-moment gesture, jotted a number in one of the puzzle’s boxes, frowned, and rubbed it out. When he finally allowed himself to be questioned, he removed the possessive from the chair Lynley was seeking.
“Mermaids not being much inclined to sit, if you think about it,” the publican said.
Thus Lynley learned it was the Mermaid Chair he was looking for, and he would find it in Zennor Church. This structure sat not far from the pub, as indeed, nothing in Zennor sat far from the pub since the village consisted of two streets, a lane, and a path winding past an odoriferous dairy farm and leading to the cliffs above the sea. The church had been built some centuries earlier on a modest hillock overlooking most of this.
It was unlocked, as most churches tended to be in the Cornish countryside. Within, silence defined the place, as did the scent of musty stones. Colour came from the kneeling cushions, which lined up precisely at the base of the pews, and from the stained-glass window of the crucifixion above the altar.
The Mermaid Chair was apparently the church’s main feature, for it had been established in a special spot in the side chapel, and above it hung a sign of explanation, which gave an account of how a symbol of Aphrodite had been appropriated by the Christians of the Middle Ages to symbolise the two natures of Christ, as man and as God. It was a reach as far as Lynley was concerned, but he reckoned the Christians of the Middle Ages had had their work cut out for them in this part of the world.
The chair was simple and looked more like a one-person pew than an actual chair. It was formed from ancient oak and it featured carvings of the eponymous sea creature holding a quince in one hand and a comb in the other. No one, however, was sitting upon it waiting for Lynley.
There was nothing for it but to wait himself, so Lynley took a place in the pew closest to the chair. It was frigid in the building and completely silent.