Belief is a funny thing.

You may trust me in this. After all, I have spent years achieving the necessary qualifications to be able to talk sensibly and rationally on the topic.

For example, there is belief born of experience. Belief that the sun will rise, belief that if you drop something, it will fall.

There is scientific belief – which ultimately owes its origin to experience, asking why the sun rises and why things fall, but codifies experience as equations and verifies this through peer reviews.

There is religious belief – which many argue has the same roots as scientific belief as it seeks to explain what we see around us, although it is more complex than that.

There is rational belief, such my belief that one day I will become Archbishop of Canterbury.

Then there is Violet, who believes that fairies inhabit the well at the end of her garden, and who had invited myself and my new curate to watch them with her.

The well was a simple affair, a deep hole in the ground, perhaps a metre across, and lined with stone with a wall about thirty centimetres high surrounding it. It was deep enough that there was a good depth of water at the bottom. There was no winch and bucket, no cute tiled roof, just a very deep hole with water at the bottom.

Martin peered cautiously into it, careful to ensure that his centre of gravity remained on solid ground.

“Wouldn’t like to fall down that,” he said.

“I wouldn’t like you to either,” I replied.

He grunted and stepped back.

“It puts Violet out no end when people fall down,” I continued, “All the fuss, you see.”

“What? Someone has fallen down it?”

“Oh, yes,” said Violet, carrying a tray with cups of cocoa to a table set near the well. “That’s how my husband died.”

“I’m so sorry – your husband fell down the well?”

“It’s alright. He had been a bad man.”

“I’m surprised that you didn’t have the well covered over.”

“If I had done that, then where would the fairies have gone?”

“But if it’s dangerous…”

“It’s only dangerous if you fall down it. Like that other man.”

“The Rev. Graham Walters lost his life in the well not so long ago,” I added.

“Oh yes!” said Violet, “I’d forgotten about him. No, I meant the other one, the friend Abigail brought to visit.”

I made a mental note to check on this with Abigail when I got home. After all, it was she who had convinced Violet to have the well dug in the first place.

“Still, perhaps you could have a grating installed?” asked Martin.

“No, no – the fairies wouldn’t like that.”

Martin sat carefully in one of the folding garden chairs that Violet had installed around the well, and edged it back a little.

“Don’t worry,” I said, “You’ll be quite safe, I’m sure.”

“Yes, it’s only bad people who fall down the well,” said Violet.

Violet and I sat in the remaining two chairs. I took a cup of cocoa from the tray and sipped it.

“Um… What do we do now?” asked Martin.

“We wait, and we watch,” I said.

“Watch what?”

“The fairies, of course,” said Violet.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, then Violet said, “Did you see that one? The red one?”

“Yes,” I said, “and did you see the blue one, just behind it?”

Violet eagerly wrote this down in a little book by torch light.

“I think this is going to be a good night for fairies,” she said.

We spent about an hour doing this, calling out the colours of different fairies. Admittedly, there was an awkward moment when Martin claimed that he had seen an orange fairy – because, of course, there’s no such thing as orange fairies – but I pointed out that the light pollution from street lamps can be very confusing for those lacking experience in fairy identification, and Violet had nodded sagely.

As it came time for us to depart – not least because Martin was definitely shivering as a result of not being adequately dressed – Violet asked me, “David, can you help me with something?”

“What is it?”

“I’ve written a book. Would you review it for me?”

“I would consider it a privilege,” I said.

As we passed through the house, she took the tray of empty cocoa mugs back into the kitchen, and returned with a wad of type-written paper several centimetres thick. I accepted this with a smile and dread. Violet might be well loved in the church, but there are those who think that she has a few loose toys in the attic. I would, of course do my best to provide constructive criticism, but feared that it might be an uphill struggle.

As soon as she had closed the door behind us, Martin said, “She’s nuts.”

“No,” I said, “She just has a different perception of the world.”

“She should be put in a care home.”

“But why? She has proven that she is quite capable of independent living. She is physically able, surprisingly so for a person of her age. She can do her own shopping, cook her own meals, takes care of her personal hygiene, and cleans her house properly. There are not many clergy who can tick all those boxes, so what possible reason would there be to place her in a care home?”

“She believes in fairies!”

“There are far more harmful beliefs, I am sure,” I said, thinking of the beliefs of the late Rev. Graham Walters which had led to him falling down the well.
“You’re encouraging her!”

“Can you think of one thing that I could have said or done which would have convinced her that fairies are not real?”

“I… I…”

“Exactly. And there are those who would place our beliefs as ministers of the Church in the same category as her belief in fairies. Now tell me, how do you think that she is feeling at this moment?”

“Well… I don’t know.”

“She is happy that she has shared her fairies with people who care. And we have had the opportunity to monitor her and ensure that she is still able to look after herself properly in a way that the Social Services do not have the resources to handle.”

“Oh.”

“Whereas if we had attempted to disabuse her regarding fairies, she would now be terribly hurt. Not only that, but she would be most distrustful if we ever did need to – as an example – get someone to come in as a professional carer.”

“Oh.”

“Now, if you will excuse me, I have a manuscript to read.”

I returned to the Vicarage, called “Hello” to Mabel who was in the living room watching a travel documentary on TV, and located Abigail in the kitchen. As I did so, I started flicking through the manuscript Violet had given me.

“Abigail,” I said, “How many people have fallen down Violet’s well?”

She looked up from cleaning the gas hob.

“Well, there was her husband, and Graham Walters, of course.”

“She mentioned there had been others. Friends of yours, apparently.”

“The only people who have fallen down her well have been bad.”

“So she intimated,” I said, continuing to flick through the manuscript.

“Are you wanting exact numbers?”

I paused in thought, considering the manuscript. I flicked back and forth a few times.

“David?” Abigail asked.

I sat down, and started looking more closely at what Violet had written.

“I have a more immediate question,” I said. “Who is Violet?”

Abigail froze for a moment, then continued cleaning the gas hob.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“You knew her before you moved to Sutley. Who is she?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because I have just spent over an hour sitting in the cold, watching her watch fairies dancing over her garden well – a sweet little old lady whom I recently heard described as being nuts. And yet she has just asked me to review a book that she has written. Not a somewhat bizarre and irrational book on fairies, as I had originally anticipated. No, it is apparently a very well written treatise on Animism. Well written, detailed, properly referenced, showing clear thought and synthesis of original ideas.”

“Ah, that.”

“I will need to read it carefully to be sure, but my initial impression is that this is easily of a quality that could be used as a university text book. Who is she?”

“I’m not surprised at the quality.”

“Apparently not. But who is she? Or was she?”

Abigail washed her hands, and turned towards me. For a moment I saw what I can only describe as a flash of rage pass across her face, only to be replaced by sadness.

“A very old and dear friend,” she said, staring into the past.

I waited. After a while it was clear she wasn’t going to say any more, so I left, and carefully deposited the manuscript in my study before joining my wife in the living room.

Normally, at St. James the Sunday service is at 9:30 in the morning. However, in deference to the fact that the Methodist Chair of the District – the Methodist counterpart of Bishop James - had to travel about fifty miles, we had moved it back to 10 o’clock. Naturally, this had confused the parishioners. Some had arrived at the usual time, and were wondering whether or not they should wait until the appointed hour, or maybe go home for a quick cup of tea before returning, or maybe just go and do their shopping instead. Fortunately, this was a problem easily anticipated, and I had placed Porker on the door. His muscular bulk persuaded people to stay in a way that words could not. Meanwhile, I had asked Al to start playing the organ at the usual time, creating the illusion that things would be happening soon.

The Rev. Down, subordinate of the Methodist Superintendent Minister Larry Seagry arrived half an hour before the service, just a couple of minutes after Bishop James. For some reason, Rev. Down preferred to be called “Jimmy”, which at least saved confusion when he was conversing with the Bishop. He had a permanently harassed expression, no doubt the result of working with Larry.

I had robed early, to allow time for making those last minute adjustments that always seem to be required for major services. This enabled me to be on hand to welcome the Chair of the District, Albert Tusker – arrogant, overweight, smells of cigarettes, not too bright - when he arrived with only ten minutes to spare.

“Traffic bad around Musdon?” I asked. Traffic was always bad coming around Musdon, due to permanent roadworks. This made it the ideal excuse to offer a senior member of clergy if they were late.

“What? No, no, it was fine,” he replied. “Where’s Seagry?”

“I’m not sure. I was expecting him to be here by now,” I replied, already working out possible reasons for his absence.

Somehow, this felt like business as usual.

Disclaimer: Violet had only mentioned one additional person falling down the well, in addition to her husband and Rev. Walters. However, Rev. Wilson appears to be attempting to trick Abigail into admitting that there had been more than one additional person. Using trickery, even to establish the truth falls short of the expected behaviour of a priest.