Arthur Sutton
Written for readers who have finished Book 1.
Arthur Sutton is the churchwarden of St Botolph's in Aldcaster, a market town in the Lincolnshire fens, and he is very good at it. A retired surveyor in his early sixties, he enters the town's christenings, weddings and burials in a copperplate hand that has not wavered in nearly forty years. He tolls the bell for funerals, counts the plate, and knows the roof fund's shortfall to the penny. Everyone says he has a fine reading voice. He has been a widower for eighteen months. Arthur keeps the church the way he keeps everything, carefully and well, and he has never once had to ask himself whether he believes what it is for. When a calm new order reaches England and asks the parish to help, he is glad to be useful.