Outside the vicarage, she took a deep breath of the outside air, cooler than it had been at midday but holding clear. From here, she could see a wide slice of this place. The fields were the softest green, still mixed with the browns of late winter, and embroidered with huge trees and stone fences. Everything felt like a storybook, a little unreal.
Edie took a deep breath, and Cosima appeared at her side. She’d buttoned up her jacket again and refastened her hair. “Let’s go see the green man.”
“After we fish around in his nose, do you think we should walk the mile to the Gregory Arms? Morag has probably given up on us for lunch. I’ve only gone to the pub one other time, but it’s nice. They fry their chips in peanut oil and bring vinegar to the table. It’s the vegan lunch of champions. Only two pounds forty pence, also.”
Cosima pulled open the church door. “If you like.”
Her voice was nice and sharp. It released the last vestiges of panic from Edie’s chest.
They found the green man halfway down the aisle, thepoppyhead slightly bigger than the others on its row of pews. The head of the wooden carving was about the size of a grapefruit. Its nostrils were worn smooth at the edges, suggesting that generations of children had been sticking their fingers in his nose.
“Do you want to do the honors?” Edie asked.
“Hmm.” Cosima reached a hand up, then crossed her arms, tucking her hands into her elbows. “Hmm.”
Edie laughed. “You don’t.”
“It seems unseemly.”
“I’ll do it!” Edie fished her finger into the green man’s left nostril, wiggling as she went. She twisted her finger around. Nothing but smooth, polished wood. “No gold.”
“Ew.”
“I meant gold-gold, not boogers. Lord. California girls are prissy. I’m going into the right.” Edie slid her finger into the other, slightly larger nostril, again wiggling her finger around like a wormy scope. She was just about to give up when the edge of her fingernail caught something hard that wasn’t wood. “Oh.”
“What?” Cosima stepped closer. “What is it?”
“I don’t know. I can’t quite get it.” Edie switched to her middle finger.
“Aarrgh.” Cosima looked away, toward the altar.
“Really?” Edie stood in the aisle, her middle finger up to her knuckle in the carving’s nose. “It was my using my middle finger that tipped this over into indignity for you? It’slonger, Cosima.”
“I know! I just. I can’t. I can’t look at it.”
Edie gazed at the soaring ceilings and fished around again, directing her fingertip to where she’d felt the anomaly. “It’s a coin.”
“Can you get it out?”
“It’s hard to get my fingertip to grip it. Hold on.” Edie pulled her finger out and shoved her hand down the front pocket of her jeans. “Trident.” She unwrapped the gum and stuck it in her mouth. “I remembered I put the last piece from a pack I bought at the airport in my jeans this morning. Give me a minute.”
Cosima watched Edie chew her gum. “What if the gum gets stuck in there?”
“It might.” Edie blew a bubble. “I’m actually surprised there wasn’tmoregum down there. Do you think there’s a volunteer whose job it is to clean gum out of the nose of the green man?”
Cosima’s nose wrinkled again.
“Did anyone ever tell you your face is going to freeze like that?”
“All the time.” Cosima sighed. “Followed by a lecture on why I should never get filler, because they don’t rigorously test injectables.”
Edie blew another bubble, then popped it with her middle finger, leaving the skin of gum over her fingertip. “Here I go.”
She carefully dipped her finger into the nose, not wanting to stick the gum anywhere but to the coin, then pressed her finger on the edge of it. “Okay. I stuck it to my finger. I’m going to pull out.”
Cosima’s choking laugh echoed through the empty church. “Maybe Iamprissy.”
Edie was smiling as she slowly slid the coin out, watching it emerge until she had it grasped between two fingers. She held it triumphantly in the air. “It’s fifty pence! Twenty percent off my chips!”
