And stories of the strangeness of continental Europe continued to be told. In the morning, in Lourdes, you would hear the adults say, they just had coffee and a "roll" for breakfast. They didn't have tea in France. I can still see myself sitting quietly watching the adults discussing this. You'd be dying for a cup of tea, someone would say, and the rest would nod, remembering their ordeal, exotic and frightening at the same time, and so oddly memorable. And maybe then there would be a moment's silence and someone would say that there was nothing like Lourdes all the same, nothing like the procession, the torches at night, and the invalids being led down to the basilica. And they all would agree, all nod in a thoughtful, melancholy and distant way. If you believed that you had problems, they'd say, you'd always meet someone worse.

*

In the cathedral in the town the names of the bishops from the beginning of time were written on a painted scroll which stretched down on the high walls on each side of the altar. There was benediction after the boys' confraternity when the priest's voice would boom down the huge, half empty, almost dark church: death comes soon, he would say, judgement will follow, so now dear children, examine your conscience and find out your sins.

This was the centre of power, our neo-Gothic cathedral at the top of Main Street. Designed by Pugin, towering over us all, much grander than the town's Protestant church, it was a sign of the great, rich might of the Catholic church in nineteenth century

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