A Hovering of Vultures by Robert Barnard

would be attending the inaugural meeting. He had a rough idea how many were lodged in local hotels, inns and bed and breakfast places, because he liaised closely with the Batley BridgeTourist Office. What he did not know was how many would prefer to stay at more distant places such as Haworth or Skipton, nor how many locals within easy driving distance would decide to come to the inaugural junketings. When he drove into Micklewike an hour before the meeting was scheduled to begin he was pleased to note that the meagre places for parking in the village were starting to fill up. He had a last-minute pow-wow with Mrs Marsden at the farm, then took himself down to the village hall. Here he had another pow-wow with Mrs Cardew, an elderly resident of Micklewike, whom he had persuaded to take notes at the meeting, and whom he hoped would eventually act as (unpaid) secretary to the Fellowship. For the title, and the cost of the postage, he anticipated getting a great deal of work out of her. Then he went to stand at the door of the hall, mingle with one or two familiar faces outside, and generally to act as mine host and onlie begetter of the Fellowship. But while he was welcoming and mingling outside in the watery sunlight he was all the time keeping an eye on the number and kind of people who were assembling around him in dribs and drabs, smiling tentatively at each other, and generally beginning the business of coming together.
    â€œA nice little bunch,” Gerald Suzman thought, with the part of his mind that was not commenting on the weather or pointing out landmarks from the Sneddon novels to perfect strangers. “I wouldn’t mind betting we shall have sixty or seventy, and there’s a fair number who are only arriving this afternoon. Ah—a member of the ethnic minorities: that always looks good. Young too—in fact it’s generally a gratifyingly young lot.” By which he meant that there was a scattering of genuinely young people, and that there were more under-sixties than are generally found in such societies.“What’s that—German? No, not guttural enough. One of the Scandinavian languages, I should think. Oh— very nice! Young, but not too young, lovely long blonde hair.” He was stirred by an unmistakeably lascivious urge. Mr Suzman had been a notable womaniser in his time, and his time was not yet up. He suppressed the urge as suitable neither to the time nor the place, but mentally registered an intention to engineer a time and place that was suitable. And the place wouldn’t be a hedgerow or a barn, he told himself. “Down, Gerald,” he said mentally to dampen his ardour. “Look at her legs. Not graceful. And her bearded boyfriend looks very capable. Why boyfriend? Why not husband? Scandinavians marry sometimes, I suppose. But he doesn’t look like a husband, so I will hope . . . Ah—she’s meeting up with another young girl. I suspect that may be the—what is it? Parker, Parkin, something like that, woman. Writes long letters full of questions, and very interested in the manuscripts. No doubt a future contributor to our journal. To be encouraged, but not allowed too close. Ten minutes to go. Yes, a very nice little group indeed. Perhaps we should all be moving inside.”
    As he himself began the move back to the door and into the hall people gathered around him obediently and followed: his photograph had been several times in the Batley Bridge Advertiser, and recently in the Yorkshire Post. He moved down towards the platform and his seat in the centre of it, and from it he sat surveying the people assembling. Most of them were coming down for good seats at the front, though he noticed that the young black man had taken one in the middle of one of the back rows. Diffident, he thought to himself. I must try to bring him out, bring him forward.
    It did not occur to him that only from the back could one see everything that was going