慣hank you,?she says, as she pays an eye-watering sum of money on her debit card. 慖t抯 so good of you to keep working.?
慖 haven抰 got much choice,?says the woman. 態ut thank you. It抯 nice to have some appreciation. People have been shouting at me all morning.?
Ruth drives home feeling grateful that she doesn抰 have to go out to work and despairing at the state of the world. Kate, deep in The Prisoner of Azkaban, hardly notices her return. Ruth goes to wash her hands （they already feel chapped and sore） and then starts to put away the shopping. It takes some time because there抯 so much of it but, eventually, most things are stowed away. Ruth gives Flint some of his new Kitty Treats, which he ignores, and makes herself coffee.
The film has ended so Ruth prints out a maths worksheet and gives it to Kate.
慖 don抰 want to do maths,?says Kate. 慖 want to read my book.?
慜h, all right,?says Ruth. It抯 only eleven o抍lock and already she抯 failing at home-schooling but she needs to get ready for her eleven thirty lecture.
She feels a rush of satisfaction when she manages to sign into Zoom and another when she sees the faces of her first years appearing. They pop onto the screen, some in kitchens and studies, some clearly still in bed. One youth looks like he抯 on a tropical island. 慪ou can get special backgrounds,?he explains in the comment box. Ruth has taken the trouble to angle her laptop so there抯 a studious backdrop of bookcases. Unfortunately, it makes her face look huge. She抣l just have to try not to meet her own eyes. Two squares remain black. Does this mean those students haven抰 switched their videos on? It抯 curiously disconcerting.
At least Ruth knows now to tell the students to mute when they抮e not speaking. Her first Zoom session was a nightmare of competing voices, students appearing in startling close-up if they so much as coughed. They are getting better at listening too, though some are clearly on their phones at the same time.
Today抯 subject is Artefacts and Materials. Ruth projects pictures of pottery, ceramics and stone tools onto the shared screen and sends the students into breakout rooms to discuss them. Whoosh. It抯 like a particularly satisfying magic trick. In real life, even post-graduates make a huge fuss when asked to divide into groups. 慍an I be with Annie? I need the loo. Have I got time for a coffee??Now, one click and they disappear. In the ten minutes?peace before she summons them back, Ruth checks the attendance list. Everyone is here. Who are the students who won抰 show their faces? Ruth checks the list again.
Eileen Gribbon and Joe McMahon.
Chapter 16
Judy sits at her desk, feeling self-conscious in her mask. Should she take it off? Tony is sitting at least two metres away but he is still wearing his. Suddenly, Judy misses Clough who would have brought some normality to this abnormal situation simply by being himself, eating junk food and pretending to be an American gangster. On impulse she sends him a text, 慡trange times eh??Two minutes later, Clough replies: 慖m bulk buying frankfurters. Its a wurst case scen璦rio.?Judy sends back an eye-roll emoji but she does feel very slightly better.
Nelson said to carry on with the Avril Flowers investigation but that抯 going to be hard when everything is locked down. Judy looks at her notes. She has spoken to the people closest to Avril and is no nearer to understanding what happened that night in February. The vicar has said that Avril had been worried but seemed unable, or unwilling, to be more specific. Judy thinks of Mother Wendy saying, 慣hat抯 what the church is here for. For worried people. That抯 why we抣l always be here.?What is Mother Wendy doing now? Judy wonders. The churches are all closed. She was surprised how shocked she抎 been to hear this news. Judy might be a lapsed Catholic, but she抎 always assumed that, all her life, mass would be carrying on somewhere. Thinking of the silent churches, the unconsumed communion wafers, the empty chalices, makes her feel strangely panicky. What about her grandma, who goes to mass every day? But Judy抯 grandmother, an eighty-year-old diabetic, has been told to 憇hield?and stay in her house. Judy doesn抰 know when she will see her again.
The last item in her notes is a reference to Maggie O扚lynn, Avril抯 friend who died in January. There didn抰， on the face of it, seem anything suspicious about Maggie抯 death, which was apparently due to 憁yocardial infarction? But Maggie was another woman on her own, someone who went to church and did good works in the community. And now she is, unexpectedly, dead. It抯 still part of the pattern.