Jaz Slade grew up in rural Devon, and recently finished an undergraduate degree in History from Cambridge. She loves to write about relationships, conflict, magic, the disturbing, and the Gothic. She is currently working on a novel which aims to explore all of these in graphic and turbulent detail. 

email: jslad001@campus.goldsmiths.ac.uk 

  

This extract is the shortened first two chapters of her book ‘A Dying and Rising God’, set in a strange and isolated village filled with nasty people.

 

CHAPTER ONE

 

In October, they drag Noel Bancroft’s body from the river. His face is a white, bloated balloon of a thing, like the moon washed up with the tide.  

In December, Eva and Hank walk to the antique shop in the village.  

 The man behind the counter is the father of a boy that Eva went to school with. He gives Hank a good bargain; Eva thinks that there’s no such thing as a good bargain when it comes to a broken watch, but she keeps her mouth shut. Instead, she trails through the winding shelves, tracking her finger through the thick dust and ducking beneath the scarves that hang low from the ceiling. The further she drifts, the quieter their voices become. These glass cases are crammed with trinkets, none of them organised; small bronze figurines of Jesus, crooked candle holders, china tea sets painted with those ugly, flat-faced cats, the kind of debris that Hank’s great aunt would keep in her parlour. 

Not everything is second-hand rubbish. There’s a pair of silver earrings she might have bought a few years ago, and a collection of old, faded books about Rome that might look nice in the living room, but she moves on down the aisle. By the time she finds her way out of the cabinets, Hank is already outside the shop waiting for her.  

“I’ll fix it,” Hank tells her. He turns the broken watch over in his palm, smooths his thumb gently over the glass face and across the golden strap. Eva watches his hands, chewing on her bottom lip. They are knobbly at the knuckles, and sprouting patches of coarse hair.  

“Alright,” Eva says. 

“It’ll give me something to do,” Hank continues, and he’s watching her closely as he speaks, “At least until I’m back on my feet.”

“Alright.” 

By the time that they arrive back, it is the late afternoon. While Hank sits down on the leather sofa and switches on the television, Eva sits down in the office and does today’s crossword. They had just missed the rain, and now it batters against the windows and the roof with an almighty crashing which only just drowns out the whistling of the referee from the next room.  

 Three across: the most reactive element. F-L-U-O-R-I-N-E.  

 Six down: it may be held or nursed.  

 Eva thinks about Hank. Hank isn’t his actual name. Hank is what he tells everyone, but his parents have always called him Henry. At last year’s Christmas party, his mother had one too many brandies and, ruddy-cheeked, had told the whole table the story of Henry’s miraculous conception. Twenty-seven years ago, in the toilet of a Pearl Jam concert, and one minute into the second song of their encore, ‘Glorified G’. She thinks about his mother, who had bothered to breathe life into him, give birth to him, and raise him, all so he could fix a broken watch– when all he might have been was a stain on a pair of Cavaricci jeans.  

“Tea?”  

She looks up from her crossword. The point of her pen has broken right through the paper and is now bleeding ink onto the place mat– six down has been blotched black. Hank is standing in the doorway, his thin eyebrows raised.  

Eva smiles, “Please.” 

“Two sugars,” he says, and then disappears back into the living room.  

Heat climbs to her cheeks. She stares at the empty space where he had once been, before pushing back her chair and walking into the kitchen to put the kettle on to boil. She thinks about Hank sitting down on the leather sofa, one hand stuffed down his pants, his feet up on her table. She imagines that he settles himself in just a little too far and slips down the cracks between the cushions like a coin. He’d never find his way out again.  

Eva brings Hank his tea, which he takes from her and cradles between his palms, his gaze still fixed on the football match. She stands by the armchair and watches as he scratches at the dark stubble on his chin, the screen bathing the concave line of his nose in blue light.  

“You haven’t forgotten about tonight, have you?” she says.   

“Tonight,” Hank repeats, but for the first time, his eyes flicker away from the television. “No, of course not.” 

“Really?” Eva is chewing at her lip again, and she knows she’s close to tasting blood. “What is tonight, Henry?” 

He winces, “What is this, a fucking interrogation?” 

“It’s a question.”

Rolling his eyes, he raises his steaming tea to his mouth to take a sip. His nose wrinkles up and he coughs, dipping his head to wipe his mouth on his sleeve. “Does this have salt in it?”  

“What is tonight?” asks Eva again.  

“I don’t know!” Hank snaps, and he slams his cup down so hard onto the table that it topples right over, spilling across the wood and onto the rug beneath. Dark bleeds into the red wool. Swearing, he leaps up, but when Eva does not move, he sighs and looks at her. “I forgot, alright?” 

“We’re having dinner,” she says, “with Paul and Georgia. At seven.” 

 “Why didn’t you just tell me that?” 

“I did tell you. And I put it on the calendar.” 

“You know I don’t check the bloody calendar, Eva.” 

 She stares at him for too long, so long that her eyes burn and she has to blink it away. She stoops to pick up the fallen mug and walks it back into the kitchen, but he does not follow her. After ten seconds, the referee is whistling again from the television and the crowds are cheering and there’s an advert for cereal. 

At half six, they are both dressed. Hank appears from the hallway as she is fixing her necklace in the mirror, turning the clasp so that it sits at her nape. He stands behind her, and kisses her neck. He says he’s sorry. She nods, and he smiles, and snatches the car-keys from the console table.   

In the car, Hank stretches out his legs and smooths back loose strands of his hair that have escaped the gel. The watch that he bought from the antique shop is fastened around his wrist. Eva reaches out to touch his arm, feeling the slow flutter of his pulse beneath her palm, and breathes out.  

She catches sight of the glass face of the watch. The hand isn’t moving. 

Her palm drops to smooth out a wrinkle in her skirt and she stares at the passing hedges, the moon hanging low over the swollen bellies of the fields, the untouched face of the lake beyond. One hand on the wheel, Hank moves to turn on the radio, switching through the thrum of static until a song plays. Pearl Jam. 

“Do you think they’ll talk about it?” Hank asks, his voice quiet. 

“I don’t know,” Eva murmurs. 

They tuck the car into an overgrown layby up the road, and walk down the side of the road, pressing themselves into branches and nettles whenever an engine comes growling from behind. Aside from The Crown’s lit windows, the only other faint illumination creeps out from Yewell’s village church along the lane, its tower a black monolith against the sky. 

Through the doorway of The Crown, Hank stoops, but his head nearly scrapes the low beams. The ceilings are stained a slick yellow from decades of tobacco smoke, the walls panelled with dark oak. Paul and Georgia are waiting for them by the bar: Paul, more hair on his chin than on his head, one hand raised in greeting; Georgia, short, unsmiling, mascara smudged along the bottom of her lashes. There are not many people sitting at the tables, but they cram themselves into one of the dark, dusty corners.  

Georgia remains quiet, stabbing slowly at the leaves in her salad. Hank has not seemed to notice, and is instead telling his favourite story about the miraculous fish he caught when he was seventeen.   

“I swear to God,” Hank is laughing, stretching his arms out wide. His elbow catches his glass, which Eva rights. “Long as my arm.” 

“You’re a bonafide Captain Ahab.” Eva murmurs. Anecdote cut short, Hank blinks at her, his mouth still agape with the thrill of the memory.  

“What?”

“Captain Ahab.” She pauses, pressing her lips together. A bead of sweat trickles down her spine. “Had it in for Moby Dick.”  

 “I used to go fishing with my old man.” sighs Paul, “God, I must have been eleven the last time I had a rod in my hand.” 

“I know a good river down by Tulford,” Hank says, his eyes brightening, “Why don’t you come with me? This Saturday?” 

The grin laced across Paul’s mouth unstitches by a few inches, “Ah. Can’t do this Saturday, mate.” 

Georgia sets down her knife, and speaks for the first time that evening, “We’ve got Noel’s funeral.” 

“Oh. I’m sorry—” Eva trails off. Both she and Hank are quiet now, watching, waiting for more. 

“They finally finished the investigation,” Georgia says, “Took them long enough.” 

Paul’s hand darts across the table to press down upon hers.  

“Darling,” he murmurs, “Not exactly dinner talk.”  

“Not exactly talk at all, is it?” Georgia pulls her arm away from his grip to reach for her glass of wine, the last few drops trembling at the bottom.  Her red lipstick is smudged along the rim, and her dark hair is slipping from its knot at the back of her head.  “Since no one will bloody well speak about it.” 

 “That’s enough, Georgia -” Paul starts. 

 “You don’t have a brother, Paul,” Georgia says, “You don’t understand. You don’t get to tell me that’s enough.” 

 Paul looks at her now, for the first time, “Well I’m sure that Eva and Hank don’t want to hear this.” 

“Oh please,” She hisses, “It’s not as if the whole village doesn’t already know what happened anyway. What he did. It’s fucking awful–” But Georgia snaps her mouth shut again, all at once, her watery eyes flickering towards Eva. 

“Sorry,” Georgia mumbles. 

Looking down at her plate, Eva twists a limp strand of spaghetti around her fork.

“Right,” Paul says, “We ought to head off home. Don’t like to drive around here at night,” He stretches his arm around the back of Georgia’s chair, “and it’s not like this one is getting behind the wheel.” 

“He just wants to shut me up,” Georgia says, tilting her head. Her voice is soft, and sweet, “don’t you dearest?” 

In the silence that follows, Eva follows Georgia’s gaze to stare at Paul. But Paul is looking at Hank, his mouth flat-lining, his eyes rolling with the hard caveman spark of secret understanding. The back of Paul’s palm braces against the table’s edge, ring finger glinting. The fork in Eva’s hand quivers a little: it wonders what it would be like to taste blood. Carefully, she places it down onto the tablecloth, parallel to her near-empty plate.  

“I’ll ask for the bill,” Hank says, quickly. “Crazy how dark it gets in the winter, eh?” 

“Can’t believe it,” Paul shakes his head. “Feels like only yesterday that we had the sun loungers out from the shed!” 

Jumpers and heavy scarves are tugged on again, glasses and plates cleared, and Hank stumbles over Eva’s chair in his haste to get out from the corner. Eva grabs Georgia’s wrist before she can slide out.  

 “Georgia,” she says, “you know you can always call me.” 

“It wouldn’t be fair,” Georgia replies, and she looks away, already moving to follow her husband. Frowning, Eva opens her mouth again, but it is too late. As they are leaving, Paul stops by a figure slumped over the bar.  

“Hello, Father,” Paul says. One hand cradling his head, the other a pint of beer, the vicar twitches his chin in the direction of the voice. “No service tonight?” 

“No,” Father Andrew replies. His sagging cheeks are flushed a deep red, knotted with dark blotches of broken blood-vessels. “It’s as dead as a doornail in there.”  

“Ah well,” Paul frowns. “Don’t jump ship just yet.”

“The Lord,” Father Andrew replies, stiffly, pulling himself up straight, “is not a ship.”  

“Right you are,” Paul mutters, placing a hand at the small of Georgia’s back to steer her out into the night. Eva stands there for a moment longer, waiting, waiting, until the vicar’s glazed eyes find hers, but then Hank is tugging at her elbow.  

On the journey back, the road trembles, and a tractor rounds the corner ahead, a great, hulking thing with an engine that roars like a giant. The driver at the wheel is nothing more than a blur in the pressing dark, but Eva pushes her face to the glass, her breath fogging.  

 

 

On Monday evening, Eva is in the kitchen and she is staring at her cactus.  

Burrowed above the sink, among the errant pots of silver spoons and bulbs of garlic, its flesh has sunken into a slick, mottled brown. At the bend of one of its sprawling branches, the white stem centre gleams through the wet rot like a bone. It feels like a dead body. It feels like a corpse sprawled over her kitchen sink.  

A muscle in the back of her eye pulses: something trapped back there, maybe, silk-wings, sinew, yellow egg clusters shivering. And then, coming over all at once her like a hot, gasping dream, the interior glow of her car door rushing outwards over fields like a cold tractor beam from another planet. A white circle of flesh in the dark. The skittering against metal, the humming of the engine, the wheezing–  

“What are you looking at?” asks Hank from somewhere over her left shoulder. She can see the half-shadow of him in the window’s reflection, his soft frown, his winter’s coat pulled around him.  

“The cactus.” Eva replies. 

“What about it?” 

“It’s rotting.” 

He snorts, an ugly little sound, “Then throw it out.” 

Her eyelid twitches again. “If it was a stag, I could have had the antlers,” she says.  

“What did you say?” Hank asks, and his reflection leans a little closer. When she does not answer, he clears his throat, “I’m off now. Meeting Jimbo for a drink down at The Crown.” 

[…] 

  

CHAPTER TWO

 

The first whisper that the cows have drowned comes by way of the footsteps, quick and hard against the road outside their house.  

Crouched down amongst the soil beds, Eva upturns the earth and the snow, tugging at the long, leafy stems of the parsnips. They do not look like parsnips– instead, they are gnarled and twist like tumours, sprouting clustered strands of thick fingers, all whiskered roots and burned flesh.  

Eva squints against the winter sun, her breath settling inches from her mouth. A bird shrieks from the white-drenched trees that rise beyond the squat square of the house. She waits there for a moment, sitting back on her heels, her hands stinging from the biting cold, before the door opens and Hank half-steps out, one wellied foot planted on the cobblestone, the other still lodged inside, sheltered only by a striped sock.  

“When are you coming in?”  

“In a moment.”  

“Are those the parsnips?” Hank peers at them, but quickly recoils, his nose wrinkling, “Christ.” 

“Think it’s canker,” Eva’s head is bent low. 

“I’m not fucking eating those,” Hank says, his mouth drawn taut like a washing line.  

Eva still does not stand up, but she does look at him. There is a flutter at her lips, a word rising to press against her teeth, before the knocking of boots echoes from up the lane. Although at first there is nothing, no one, only the low line of the wall and the weak glint of the morning sun, a man appears from between the hedges. As he reaches the garden gate, it takes Eva a second to know that the pink, weathered face, the fading brown hair, the crooked glasses, belong to their neighbour. 

“James?” Hank steps out now, still without a shoe on his left foot, “Alright?” 

 James clutches at the metal bars of the gate, one hand gripping his side, and when he breathes, his lungs rattle like an engine. He is wrapped up in an old, moth-bitten dressing gown, a streak of shaving foam still smudged across his stubbled cheek.  

 “Cows,” he pants, “in the Long Lake.” 

 Eva’s heart twists. She rises to her feet. Her eyes twitch over towards Hank, but he is frowning at James.  

 “Can’t cows swim?” Hank asks.  

 James says, “They aren’t swimming,”  

 At first, Eva half hopes to hear them calling, to hear those low, lingering grunts– but as they haul themselves over wooden fences, across the two dry-grass fields that lie between the stretch of their houses and the lake, there is nothing. Even the dozen people already gathered around the water’s edge are quiet. Maybe it is because they are looking at the cows.  

 Maybe it is because the cows’ corpses are like rocks embedded within the ice, no head nor tail, only black humps against the freezing white.  

 Through the crowd, she can see Paul and Georgia, huddled together, Paul’s arm draped across Georgia’s shoulders. She circles around to where they stand, leaving Hank and James behind by the trees.  

 “What happened?” Eva asks. Neither of them looks surprised to see her.  

 “Must have been looking for water,” Georgia says, softly. “They broke through the ice.”  

 Eva frowns, but she does not look out again at the frozen bodies, “Who do they belong to?”  

 “The Gavrocks,” Paul mutters, and Eva’s chin snaps up. “Bad month for Pen.” 

 “Bad year, more like,” Georgia replies. 

 Eva follows her gaze to the edge of the lake, where Pen Gavrock stands: her back straight and wire-rigid, her greying hair trapped beneath the collar of the coat she wears. A man stands by her with his head bowed. Eva does not recognise him.  

 As Pen turns, Eva catches a glimpse of a sharp nose, and of dark eyes set into a weathered, wrinkled face, as if the ovals of her irises are themselves the black hinds of cows stuck in the flat ice. 

 Eva is not the only one watching. Heads twist, one by one, like falling dominos, as Pen Gavrock steps back from the water’s edge and pushes through the gathered crowd. She does not stop to speak, only continues on through the opening of trees, back through the colourless fields.  

 The man trails in her wake, his ratty jumper and jeans spattered with mud. He must be only a few years younger than her, twenty-three or four. He is more familiar now, from the sharp nose that he shares with his mother.  

 “Aren’t you going to pull them out?” Eva asks him.  

 He falters for only a second, then spits into the dirt, without meeting her eye, “When the ice thaws.” 

… 

Hank tries to fuck her the same night that the cows drowned. 

He had gone to bed before her, and when she comes up, he is waiting for her between the sheets, like a spider. Eva rubs circles of cream into her skin in front of their mirror, breathing in the coconut. She had stolen the tub from her parents’ bathroom cupboard. In the reflection, she can see him sat upright against the pillows, watching her.  

Eva climbs into bed, and her feet curl away from the stiff coldness of the sheets. She is reaching for her book on the nightstand when Hank moves over her and he kisses her, the hill of his chest bearing down on her ribs. His tongue jabs at her lips, and it is cold, the head of an eel in her closed fist. Eva’s eyes are still wide open, and all she can see is the stipple ceiling and the droop of his hair and the screwed lines of his forehead. He always kisses her as if it were hard work, straining at the jaw. His hand claws at her breast through her pyjama shirt and it is then that she bites down.  

Hank squawks, and reels back, his fingers flying to his lips.  

“What the fuck,” he snaps. He stares at her. She stares back.  

She says, “You promised.”  

Eva turns over in the bed, laying down upon the pillow, gazing out towards the other side of the room. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see where the shadows gathered in the far corner are creeping up the wall, oily tendrils rising over the crown moulding. She twitches her head towards it. The black sinks back down into the floor.  

Eva can hear Hank’s breathing, the panting from his open mouth, but after a minute, a switch clicks and the yellow light from the lamp blinks out. 

She dreams of them rising from the water, like waves sucked back from black rocks. Their milk-white eyes rolling to brown once again, marbles shifting in a jar, their stiff pink tongues softening. When she wakes, it is to lowing, and the next moment she knows it is thunder, growling from the sky. Beside her, Hank’s body is long and straight under the covers. 

Eva tugs on a thick jumper and goes down the stairs to sit in the garden on the rusted metal bench. The air stings her skin, but the sun is bright. 

She puts her hand to her breastbone. Her skin is cold. She thinks of sitting in front of her grandma’s television up in York, images flashing colours across her face; a cartoon knight staring down at the smoking crater in his own chest, and seeing through to the other side. The wake of a blazing cannonball. Gaping.  

It is the rain that drives her back inside. She trails down the hallway to the living room, her fingertips catching on the chalky marks left behind by hammered nails, the occasional escaped hooks empty of hanging frames.  

[…]  

A floorboard creaks, and she knows that Hank is standing in the doorway behind her.  

Hank clears his throat, “Have you seen the car keys?”  

“We’re not due at Georgia and Paul’s until five,” Eva says.  

“Right,” Hank replies, “but the service is at ten.” 

“What service?” Eva turns now to look at him, “The church service?” 

“Yes,” Hank says, his voice already wound tight, like a rusted tin toy hungry to spring from its box.  

“No,” says Eva, “I’m not going to church.” 

“Eva,” Hank sighs, “I promised my mother I would go to church today.”

“She wouldn’t know if you didn’t go.” 

“That’s not the point,” he snaps at her. She can see the flicker of frustration in him, the same flame from last night. “No one is asking you to come.”

“Henry.” She closes her eyes. The wind outside is howling down the chimney, whistling through the pipes. “You can’t leave me here in this house.”

He shakes his head, unflinching, “It’s important to me that I go.”

Eva hesitates, her eyes drifting over to the window, rattling from the rain, up to the beamed ceiling, the winding wooden stairs.

“Fine,” she says, “but I’m waiting in the car.” 

In the church’s carpark, Hank tugs the keys free from the ignition. He presses down on the button and the seatbelt jumps away from her. Eva reaches and clips it back into the buckle.

“I’m not leaving the engine running,” he tells her. Their warm breaths linger between them.  

“I wouldn’t expect you to,” she replies, “Go on then. You’ll miss all the repentance if you’re not careful.” 

Hank slams the car door hard behind him.

Eva tucks her hands into her armpits, and looks out the window, where there are still edges of frost she hadn’t scraped away from the glass. Two people are walking up the path to the church’s step, their heads bent against the sleets of rain. Wriggling up in her seat, Eva leans over the dashboard to watch them. As they pass through the doors, she opens the car door and steps out. The rain hits a blow at the back of her neck, the freezing drops trickling down her collar.   

“What are you doing?” Hank hisses as she slides down into the pew next to him, but she is spared replying. From behind the carved pulpit, Father Andrew is clearing his throat. 

“When Jesus got into the boat, and his disciples followed him. And suddenly a great tempest arose on the sea, so that the boat was covered with the waves. But Jesus was asleep. His disciples came to him and awoke him, saying, ‘Lord, save us! We are perishing!’…”   

Glancing over at Hank, Eva watches his face, his eyes locked upon the front of the church, his brows pinched together. For a moment, it’s almost as if he’s a stranger. It’s almost as if she does not know him.  

“But he said to them, ‘Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?’…” A smile grows around Andrew’s wet mouth, “He arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.” 

 Eva breathes in the taste of the air: fresh earth, faded flowers. She shivers in the dampness of the church’s low beamed ceilings. Rain spits upon the stained glass above the altar, where Christ’s sad eyes stare out at the benches, head circled by a halo the same colour as weak, yellow tea.  

“What do we learn from this story?” His faded eyes dart across the sitting congregation, “We learn to trust in God. We learn not to hold our fear, but to instead hold our faith. Only then shall we be rewarded. May we keep this message in our hearts as we go into the new year.”  

“I am pleased to note the return of one of Yewell’s dear children,” Andrew flung out a hand with the air of a man with blessings in his palm. His sallow nails were long and chipped, as if belonging to an animal that had been scrabbling at a trap, a rat squeezed by a metal bar. “William Gavrock is in attendance today.”  

The heads turn towards where he sits at the very front of the pews, but he does not stand until Father Andrew beckons an encouraging trigger finger at him.  

“It’s Will,” he says once he is on his feet, “just Will.”  

 “Will. We are delighted to have you back in the arms of our village,” Andrew replies, “the first of many visits to my service, I hope.” 

Will’s mouth twists, “I’m here on my mother’s insistence.” 

Andrew smiles again, “Then may she continue to be… insistent.”   

Before Will can sit back down, Father Andrew speaks out to the congregation, his voice louder. 

“May we extend our prayers to the Gavrock family for the tragic loss of their cows,” Father Andrew says, and he bends his head forwards, dropping his chin to his chest.   

Eva watches as at the front, Pen Gavrock’s head dips also, her pale hair draping. Her thin lips are moving together and apart, pulling back from her teeth. Next to her, her son is still, his eyes fixed elsewhere.   

“And after such a hard and trying year. So much grief,” Andrew sighs, “God has his reasons, although we may not see them. I know the plans I have in mind for you, declares the Lord; they are plans for peace, not disaster. Let us all have faith in Him.” 

Rolling her eyes, Eva slumps down in her seat.  

“May we also keep Noel Bancroft in our thoughts,” Father Andrew says, “His tragic loss is felt deeply at the heart of our village, and in the heart of his family.” 

“I don’t know why you came in,” Hank says to her sharply once the service is over, and he rises from the pew, sliding out before she can open her mouth to say anything. She waits until he is halfway up the aisle before slipping out herself.  

There are two bodies bent together near the confessional booth. Father Andrew has come down from the pulpit and stands with Pen Gavrock, her hands clasped between his own. As Eva watches, her gaze falls again to Andrew’s fingers, the crumpled, white skin of them as they grip Pen’s wrists. Their heads are inches from touching. 

“Mum,” Will, standing nearby, mutters, “Come on.” 

“Don’t be rude, William,” Pen replies, in a faint voice, “After Andrew extended such a heartfelt prayer on our behalf.”

His lip curls, but he only lifts and drops his shoulders once. He knocks into Eva on his way out, striding up the pews towards the doors. Pen whispers something that Eva does not catch, and then breaks away to follow her son. 

“Eva Dawlish. I don’t remember the last time I saw you in the pews of my church.” Andrew says. He braces his hand atop the back of the bench, leaning towards her, stomach spilling over the edge. The stench of beer rots on his breath.  

“I do,” Eva replies. And so had he; he gazes at her with cool eyes.  

“Indeed,” he murmurs, “although that was not under the best of circumstances,” 

“Well,” Eva replies, “That much can be said any time one comes to church.” 

 “God is not here solely for your sorrow, Eva,” Andrew reaches out to grip at her elbow. “He is also there for your joy. What have you to be joyful about?”

“That the Lord is a God who avenges,” Eva tilts her head. Her stomach turns at the papery touch of his fingers. “And what have you, Father? What brings you joy?” 

 “That the Lord gives me the strength to love my neighbours,” Andrew tells her, “As I would love myself.”  

“Yes, Andrew,” says Eva, “you are a strong man.”