Excerpt from Peculiar Ground by Lucy Hughes-Hallett, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

'Ingenious,' said Mr Rose. 'I had wondered how he could preach out of that text.'

Now came the moment for which all this pageant had been merely a prologue. Joshua informs us that his followers, preceded by trumpeters, carried the Ark of the Covenant around the walls of Jericho day after day for seven days. We were spared that iteration. A herald announced in a piping voice (I think he was one of the chambermaids, breeched) that when he commanded us to do so we were to shout out as loudly as our lungs would allow. We nodded and clapped in sign of assent. Then on came Joshua – Mr Goodyear resplendent in buskins and with a mane of plaited straw. His breastplate was one my Uncle Rivers had worn, before he left fighting for preaching.

Joshua spoke at length, and in rhyme. Then he spread his arms wide and called upon the trumpets to sound. On came my Lord's huntsman with his horn, followed by young Arthur with his trumpet. And behind my young cousin came five more boys, each smaller than the one in front, each furnished with a pipe or a whistle, or in the littlest one's case, a rattle with bells. The band formed up to one side of the stage. The huntsman turned towards them and fixed them with a commanding gaze. As he raised his horn to lip, they began to emit as cacophonous a sound as was ever heard on earth or beneath it. The boys' cheeks puffed out and pinkened. Their chests pumped like bellows. Their feet stamped. And then, the huntsman leading, they strutted across the stage, the army following and swinging their arms vigorously to mark time. They passed behind the paper walls and re-emerged. The herald reappeared. The horns gave a final eldritch screech. Joshua shouted, 'Let the walls of Jericho come tumbling DOWN!' The herald cupping his hands and waving them expressively, gave us to understand we were to echo him, and so we did, lustily. 'DOWN!' We hollered. 'DOWN DOWN!' Joshua's voice boomed out above the din. Mr Goodyear is a serious man, a man of prayer, one who played a dignified and authoritative part in the community of my youth, but he is also known for his skills as an entertainer. Under his influence a stately masque was shaking itself free of stilted artifice and becoming raucous.

Another blast fit to awaken all the devils of pandemonium, and with a certain amount of twitching and juddering, the walls were wheeled apart, and tilted over, and while the boy-trumpeters jumped and down on them in a merry ecstasy of destructiveness, Rahab was revealed devoutly placing a cross upon the altar of the unbelievers, her hair escaping from its gilded net in the most becoming disorder. She clasped her hands, she rolled her eyes, and then abruptly Lady Woldingham became herself again. With a disregard for theatrical convention as brazen as her employing a Christian symbol in a story which predated Christ's incarnation by several centuries, she stepped to the front of the stage, gathered up her trumpeting son and then set him down again to hold out her arms to her husband and her little girl. A flurry of blossoms and green leaves were tossed down by mechanicals clinging to the top rail of the pergola.

The audience rose to applaud. I saw Mr Norris, his responsibilities ended, circling around behind the rows of auditors, looking purposefully at me. And of a sudden I was abducted by bashfulness, something that had never before weakened me. I pushed away, I dodged, I ran. Passingmy brother, I dragged him with me. He came, alarmed, thinking I had had some fright, as I suppose I had. I saw my future approaching and it scared me. I despise coyness, but coy I was. We ran through the shrubbery and out into the park. I wanted just to be at peace to collect myself. I didn't know what I wanted. I looked back, but neither Norris nor anyone else was following. At once I was chilled by regret.

From the book Peculiar Ground by Lucy Hughes-Hallett. Copyright ©2018 by Lucy Hughes-Hallett. Reprinted courtesy of Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.