Story number number 11 'Pennies from heaven'

Hello friends,

............not one for the faint hearted. Hope you enjoy it.

Pennies from Heaven

They were lucky to get it; a nice little two bedroom flat in a leafy suburb of London. Stella had taken care of all the details and all Michael had to do was get himself back from Cardiff the minute his contract ended and move in.

‘Quite a house, eh?’ he pronounced. They’d parked the van right outside the front door and stood for a moment taking it all in. Despite being chopped up into flats, the place still retained its own grandeur. It was a classic rambling late Victorian mansion. ‘1887’ was worked into the red brickwork on an oval plaque. There were two main gates from which the drive curved in a semi-circle, enclosing a wide expanse of grass. Two large beeches stood slightly to the right.

‘This must have been a beautiful garden once, Stella.’

‘It’s still not bad. You should see round the back’.

Michael drank it all in. It was just his kind of house. No particular order to it but plenty of style. The white woodwork was well painted. Taking a quick ten second look, the observer would come away with an impression of comfortable well being. A house built for pleasure in the style of its day with a blatant disregard for order and symmetry. Instead, a hotchpotch of gables and little balconies, red brickwork and hanging tiles amidst a glorious confusion of assorted windows.

‘Come on then, let’s start getting these boxes in. And so Stella broke Michael’s reverie and the heavy but gratifying task of moving in to their new home began.

They had far too many things. Until there was time to sort out what they really wanted to keep, they’d have to put up with little columns of boxes dotted around the flat. Michael had a good deal more ‘stuff’ than Stella.

‘I’ve already decided’ she said. ‘You have the bigger bedroom. This one at the end of the corridor will suit me just fine’.

The corridor itself was by no means poky but, just before the little bedroom at the end of it was a curiously over-sized fire-place. Gazing up to the plaster embossed surface, they noticed that it disappeared into what was obviously a false ceiling.

‘Come on, Stella. Let’s see what’s above this plasterboard’.

Clambering onto a stool, he pushed up one of the panels.

‘You’ll never believe it!’ he said. ‘The ceiling goes up another couple of feet and there’s some marvelous coping. What a shame it’s all covered up’.

‘Let me see’ – and Stella peered into the gloom of the hidden ceiling. ‘The lay-out of this flat has got nothing to do with the original plan of the house’, she said. ‘The plaster details go straight into the wall’.

They both immediately abandoned the sorting and began a serious exploration of the flat.

The little bedroom was painted swimming pool blue. It was cold, despite its homely size. Michael gave a little shudder and secretly felt relieved that his cousin had generously conceded him the larger room. The mystery of the lay-out began to unravel. Rising up to the right of the window was a plaster arch which not only disappeared in the false ceiling but curved into the dividing wall of the adjacent flat. The decorative coping hidden in the secret void ran straight into both side walls.

‘You know something’ said Michael excitedly. ‘This entire flat was not even just one room. It’s half a room. The other half must be our neighbours' and this enormous chimney breast is part of a central fire-place.’

 Houses weren’t really her thing but Stella loved Michael’s enthusiasm and was quickly infected by the same curiosity.

‘I wonder what it can have been used for?’ he continued.

Stella ventured a suggestion,

‘Perhaps a games room?’ Michael looked quizzical but as no other option came immediately to mind he just hummed thoughtfully.

‘No doubt, we’ll find things out from the neighbours’. Best get on with the job in hand, eh?’ He closed the loosened panel and they set to work.

The next couple of weeks were taken up with the usual business of finding places for things and transforming a series of rooms into some sort of a home. The corridor and blue room were on the dark side but the rest of the flat was bright and sunny. The windows in the remaining part looked out onto a small courtyard and beyond to one of the large flats at the rear. It was quiet and very calm. You could hear nothing besides the odd sparrow and even they were infrequent visitors.

‘John’s coming round this afternoon’ shouted Stella from the kitchen. ‘That all right?’ ‘Yes, great!’ nodded Michael. Stella’s brother, John was always a welcome visitor. There was still plenty to do and he was quite ready to muck in.

They scrubbed tiles and floors, sorted books and hung pictures; always just another something to be done.

A welcome lasagna and a glass of chardonnay ended the evening. It was too late for the tube so a camp bed was squeezed into the hall and John bedded down for the night.

‘Sleep ok?’ asked Stella brightly the following morning. John mumbled something pertaining to yes and shuffled off to the bathroom. He had an appointment at 9.30 a.m. and got himself away fairly quickly. He couldn’t say what it was but he felt a curious sense of relief as he stepped into the drive and gratefully filled his lungs with the fresh morning air.

Stella worked nights; not every night, of course; one on, one off. That suited Michael fine. He could enjoy the luxury of simply doing his own thing and, if that meant a lump of cheese and a rice cake for supper, so be it.

They’d been living there for almost two months. Still not much sign of the neigbours but they had finally met the land-lady; a curious woman of around seventy. Friendly she certainly wasn’t, but she was courteous enough. Her hair was silver grey and hung shoulder length. It was smooth and silky. The eyes, however, were cold and lack lustre. She wore almost no makeup but beneath the deterioration of her face a handsome bone structure remained.

‘She must have been a beautiful woman once’, remarked Stella as she closed the door.

‘Yes, but the alcohol can’t have helped much. Couldn’t you smell it on her breath?’

Stella confessed that she had. She remained quiet for a moment.

‘What a sad woman’, she though to herself. ‘Sad and wintry, as though she were all closed up to everything and everyone’.

‘I don’t supposed we’ll be inviting her much round for coffee’, piped in Michael.

‘No’, sighed Stella. ‘I don’t suppose we shall’.

A glorious spring morning; the sun was spilling through the white nets and filling the living room with a delicious freshness. Stella poured the tea and then, in mid pour, stopped and looked seriously at Michael.

‘I’ve got something to tell you’, she said.

Michael put his cup down and looked up with curiosity.

‘I know what I’m going to say may sound ridiculous’, she began, ‘but…’

‘Well?’, asked Michael.

‘It’s just that… I… well…, it’s simply that I think we’ve got a ghost’.

‘A what?’, laughed Michael. ‘What on earth makes you think that?’

‘Look, you know me’, she continued. ‘I don’t believe in these things, I don’t even believe in God, but there was definitely something in my room last night. I didn’t see anything but I heard it’.

‘Heard what?’, asked Michael, the cheerfulness having left his voice all of a sudden.

‘I can only describe it as a kind of mumbling; a funny low mumbling that sounded – well, I don’t know what it sounded like. I just know it wasn’t nice – and that’s it’.

She was looking down at her tea cup. Michael pushed back his chair and put his arms round her shoulders.

‘Look, I’m not saying you didn’t hear something’, he said. ‘But let’s be honest, you could have been dreaming and you could really have thought you heard this mumbling, whatever it was. Let’s just wait and see, shall we? And if nothing further happens – and I’m sure it won’t, we’ll just put it down to a bad dream, ok?’

She nodded, pulled in her lips thoughtfully and the two of them went back to their breakfast. At that moment the sun slipped behind a cloud and an unwelcome dullness invaded the room.

-------------

Stella’s night on and Michael had the flat to himself. There was a good murder mystery on the television but, though he loathed to admit it, he consciously avoided watching anything remotely creepy. Instead, he put on some 1930’s dance music and settled down to a collection of Saki short stories.

The following day was a busy one. The graphics studio had a commission to submit by 5.30 p.m. and the entire staff threw itself into the task; not even time for lunch.

‘I’m taking an early night’, he said to Stella that evening and, leaving her in the company of ‘Newsnight’, thankfully slipped into the comforting folds of his duvet.

Some five or six hours had passed when a sudden brightness woke him up. He turned his head and there were Stella by his side, her hand still clutching the light switch and her face completely drained of colour.

‘Whatever is it and whatever time is it?’, he said.

The hands of his clock read 4.00 a.m. There was a curious rattling sound. It was Stella’s teeth. She was actually chattering with fear.

‘My God, Stella. What’s happened? What on earth has happened?’

He swung his legs out of the bed and held her close to him. She was shaking all over. Her lips slowly form the words, ‘There’s … there’s something in my room’.

He didn’t think about anything. He simply strode into the corridor and towards the little blue room. The wardrobe towered ominously to the left and for a moment the word ‘poltergeist’ scuttled across his mind, but he continued marching and stepping straight into the room shouted.

‘Who’s here? Who’s in this room?’ His enquires were met with silence. The wardrobe remained firmly where it was and, apart from the dishevelled bed clothes, the room was perfectly in order.

‘Come on, Stella’ he said. ‘Let’s have a cup of tea and you tell me all about it’.

They settled round the kitchen table and with hands clasped around the staunch British comforter, Stella began her story.

‘It was like this. I was sleeping fine, I know I was and then suddenly my dream, whatever it was, changed and it became horrible and frightening and I wanted so much to wake up – and when I did, I felt what I suppose can be described as a terrible heaviness in the room – and then I saw it’.

‘Saw what?’

‘It wasn’t anything specific. It was dark, remember. But I distinctly saw the outline of a man, standing just at the foot of my bed. I didn’t stop to think, call it police instinct, if you like, I just lurched forward with all my strength and tried to grab him.’

‘And…, go on, Stella’. She was having difficulty to continue, Michael hastily poured her more tea.

‘I just, kind of grabbed myself and fell onto the bedstead’.

‘And then what did you do?’ Michael’s eyes loomed large over the rim of his cup.

‘I didn’t do anything. I was all crumpled up but – oh God, it was horrible’.

‘Please, go on.’

‘He, it, the thing, started speaking’.

‘Speaking?’

‘Well, no. Not speaking, but mumbling. Much louder than the first time. It was low but so aggressive. It sounded like a lot of bees, but bees speaking Arabic or Turkish or, I don’t know. And then, don’t ask me why, but I tried to talk to it.’

‘Talk to it?’ Michael’s voice was only just above a whisper.

‘Yes. I couldn’t believe I was saying it but I asked it what it wanted. It’s like a film, isn’t it?’

‘And then what happened?’

‘Oh, then it was just the worst part. My whole bed simply started banging against the wall. I was being shaken about and the mumbling was getting louder and louder. I tell you, Michael. I have no idea how I got to your room. I just don’t know, I just don’t know’.

A silence slipped in between them. Finally, Michael said,

‘What are we going to do?’

Stella stared hard at him.

‘I tell you what I don’t want’, she said. ‘I don’t want any priests or that kind of nonsense. You know I don’t believe in that stuff.

‘Yes, all right, but you believe in this thing whatever it is’, he protested, and then a horrible thought came into his mind.

‘You work nights, Stella. I’m going to have to sleep here on my own’. She stretched her arm across the table and squeezed his hand.

‘Yes I know. I’m sorry, Michael, but this is all so confusing. I’m a policewoman for God’s sake. I can’t have people knowing about this. Nobody will believe me. They’ll all think I’m raving mad. It’ll be terrible for me’.

‘So, what do you propose then?’ said Michael blankly.

‘That we just try to saw this out ourselves. Maybe we’ve induced it; maybe it’s just in our minds’.

‘So far it’s just in your mind’ – but Michael kept that thought to himself.

‘Ok, he said, we don’t tell anyone’ he yawned suddenly. ‘Look, Stella. It’s almost five a.m. We’ve both got to work. Let’s try and get at least a couple of hours kip. We’ll keep the hall light on, all right?’

Stella nodded and the two of them went to their respective rooms.

Was it something they were passing on to each other? Was it self induced? The theory made no difference to the fact. From that night on, without fail, they would both wake up at exactly four a.m. and always, whatever they might have been dreaming would become a nightmare. Before long, they never turned off their bedside lamps at all. Michael slept with his wooden cross in his hand. ‘Please God’, he prayed. ‘Whatever happens don’t let me see it, please don’t let me see it’ – and he never did. But he felt it sure enough. He described it to John one day, their only confident.

‘It’s like a presence, a heavy presence. I know when he’s in the room. It feels just like a really muggy day and, I talk to him’.

‘You don’t, do you?’ said John incredulously.

‘Yes, I do’ replied Michael. ‘You see, I feel sorry for him’.

‘What you say?’ he asked.

‘Well, I say what I genuinely think. I tell him, ‘Look, I don’t know who you are or what has happened to you. I hope you’re not suffering but – and I can hardly believe I say this, - I’m alive and you are dead. I need my sleep. I can’t sleep properly with the light on and I’m becoming exhausted’. Always, when I’ve finished speaking the pressure goes away and I can quite easily go back to sleep, but you know John, I really am getting tired. It just never stops’.

John remained silent for a moment and then he said ‘Have you tried talking to someone?’

‘Oh, I can’t do that. You’re the only other person who knows about it’.

‘Yes, I know Michael, but maybe you can find out something about this house; anything that might give you a clue as to what is causing all this’.

‘It seemed a reasonable suggestion and the following afternoon, he put John’s advice into practice. He’d often seen a middle aged man around the house fixing things and doing odd jobs. They’d only been on nodding acquaintance but Michael decided to break the ice and push for a conversation.

‘Hello’ he said. ‘I’m Michael from flat 2A’.

‘I know’, said the middle aged man. ‘I’m Derek, Derek Sutcliff’.

- ‘The land-lady’s son’ thought Michael.

Derek was bending over some wiring that he’d pulled out from the skirting board. Under normal circumstances Michael would have taken the hint but he had to find out at least something.

‘How much do you know about this place?’ He tried to sound nonchalant.

‘Oh, plenty’; was he going to talk?

‘You’ll have met my mother, I suppose?’

‘Mrs. Sutcliff? Why yes, urmm, nice lady’

‘You’d be the first to say so’ he didn’t take his eyes off his work.

‘Not an easy lady to get on with. I have as little to do with her as possible – which isn’t too difficult. She hasn’t got much time for me either. She’s got her dogs, a dozen maybe and her gin. No, the old girl can’t do without her gin’.

It was incredible the way the man was talking about his own mother. Michael couldn’t resist.

‘And did you, I mean, she, ever live in this house?’

‘I never lived here. This belonged to her first husband. Sure, she lived here in the beginning but that was back in the thirties. That’s how she got this place’.

‘There really couldn’t be much love between mother and son’ thought Michael. The guy was so eager to spill out the family history.

‘Nope’, he continued, pushing in the bunch of wires back into the skirting board. ‘Mother was no fool’. Know how she got this place? Michael shook his head gravely.

‘Came over from Sweden as an au pair. Just eighteen she was. Rich old man, a widow. Pretty girl – more than pretty. I have to give her credit, she was a stunner. Well, he fell for her, didn’t he? Can’t blame him, can you? Within three months they were married. People say there was a lot of talk at the time. Fact is, the old man died within the year. Don’t want to go down that road but, well, let’s just say, there were some people didn’t think he died altogether naturally, so to speak. Anyway, she inherited the lot – and not just this place; two other mausoleums in this same street. ‘Course, she didn’t stop there. Within a couple of years she was hitched up with another rich geezer; my old man. Not that I saw much of him. He was dead before I was ten. Well, that’s it me old china’ and he gave the re-inserted section of skirting board a resounding kick, ‘I’m sure you’ve heard enough gossip for the day’.

“Yes, err, yes, thank you’, said Michael and he watched Derek pick up his tool box and walk across the hallway to the front door. He stopped suddenly and turned round. ‘Can’t be too hard on the old girl. Guess she was too beautiful for her own good’.

The door clicked shut and Michael saw the blurred image of his informer through the decorated frosted glass receding into the distance.

Nothing concrete to explain the disturbances in the flat but plenty to feed the imagination and plenty to tell Stella. They discussed it eagerly over supper. Who could the spirit be? They knew it was a man. Perhaps it was the butler, angry and resentful at the foolish whishes of his master? Or was it the old man himself, cursing at his own gullibility? Or, if he had been murdered, was this his tormented soul forever wandering his old home bitter and unforgiving? If anything, their sympathy for whoever he was increased but it didn’t alleviate the sleepless nights. It was after one particularly bad experience that Michael decided to take action. He had woken at 4 a.m., as was customary and saw very plainly his cousin pass in front of his open door and into the bathroom. He could hear her moving about but, as though mocking this living world with its trivial banalities, his nightly visitor was sitting on his throat. The pressure was intense. He could hardly breathe let alone move his limbs. He felt his heart would burst. He clenched his diaphragm and with all his might, squeezed out in a tiny voice “St-e-ll-a”. The weight lifted slightly. She didn’t respond at first but, in what seemed an eternity, put her head round the door.

‘Did you just call me?’ she asked. Immediately, he could breathe freely again.

‘Yes, yes I did’ he panted. ‘It’s all right now. It was just Mr. Mumbles’. And it really was all right. Everything was back to normal.

The next day Stella was on day shift and Michael had the whole flat to himself. He didn’t exactly plan anything. It was more of an instinct really. ‘Pennies from Heaven’ – a delightful double album of wonderful songs’ from the 1930’s from a successful BBC series. He knew all the words from beginning to end. He placed the first disc on the turn table, walked in to the little blue room and began the musical exorcism.

‘Life, can’t go on without that certain thing, be no wedding bells, no wedding ring, no Sir, not without that certain thing’ – and another. Mr. Mumbles had to hear them all.

‘You’ll find your fortune falling, all over town, be sure that your umbrella, is upside down’.

The tunes went on and on. The rhythm, like a heart-beat resounding in all corners of the room and Michael singing for all he was worth.

‘I’m alive’, said the songs. ‘Life is for the living. And while I’m here, however brief  or long, I shall live it to the full’.

The last song of the last side came to an end. Michael felt exhausted but strangely elated. There was no more to say. The message had been played and delivered. He had literally sung the sadness away.

*******

In late August, the inhabitants of the rambling house decided to hold a barbecue. It would be nice to bring everyone together and a chance for a little more than  mere passing conversation on the stairs. Michael and Stella’s story had remained undisclosed. There were about twenty-five residents altogether; ten flats in all. It would have been far more sensible to have people standing and milling but then this was an English barbecue and people felt more secure glued to their chairs rather than running the risk of starting up conversations with people they barely knew.

Nobody noticed how it began but it spread like a bush fire.

At first Michael and Stella were incredulous. It was as though something they had believed to be utterly secret, personal and guarded had been all the while existent in the lives of everybody present.

‘Oh, yes!’ Mrs. Barnes was saying ‘My boys were always having friends home from school to stay over. Bangings on pipes ands doors opening and closing – what a commotion! Nothing more than that, though’.

‘How many times the radio’s gone on by itself’ said old Mr. Carter from number seven. ‘But I just goes and turns it off again’.

‘And there was one night’ said a tall thin man, who shared an upstairs flat with four other men ‘do you remember it, Pete? We were all kept awake by constant walking backwards and forwards across the living room. Everyone was accusing everyone else of keeping the others awake’.

‘And what was strange?’ asked Michael.

‘Well’ said the tall man. ‘We had none of us stayed up. We were all of us in our rooms. It was something else that was stomping about – but we heard no mumblings, mind. I don’t think I’d like to have heard no mumblings’.

‘Vwat mumblings?’ said a slightly tremulous voice with a thick Russian accent. A young couple had just appeared. ‘V’re from flat 2A. V’ve just movt in. Vwat are ziz mumplings you are sayink?’

‘Have a sausage’ interjected Michael quickly. ‘I’m sure you’ll find them very tasty’, and the conversation hastily moved on to another topic.

Story number 10 Train Talk

Hello friends,

Something, I hope, to amuse.

Very best wishes from Philip

Train Talk

                                                                                                                                    Mr. Dubois was not what you would call a shy man. He was congenial and popular with his friends. His quickness of wit and freshness of spirit lent a delightful breath of extempore to the stuffy drawing rooms of late Victorian Dewsbury.

To some, his disregard of etiquette overstepped the limits of bonhomie but to the majority his intractable sense of fun brought welcome relief.

The day promised to be a hot one. He wondered if he shouldn’t have avoided the tweed suit and gone for sometimes light, but his client was not a modern thinker and he didn’t want to ruffle his hidebound feathers unduly.

 The journey from Dewsbury to Leeds was uneventful enough. The carriage was but half full which allowed ample room for spreading his paper at ease and, with legs unconstrainedly crossed, burying himself in the latest from the Boer.

“There’ll be just time enough to down a cup of tea at the station” he thought to himself. The buffet was right at the other end of the platform. There really wouldn’t be sufficient time but the dilemma between realizing his desire and bowing to common sense had yet to thrash out their differences. A large queue decided the question and, mentally planning an immediate diversion to a tea shop on arrival at York, he gave a reassuring squeeze to his neck tie and positioned himself on the platform. Within minutes the train arrived, with the very last compartment stopping directly in front of him. Taking a firm grip, he swung open the door and let himself in. As they pulled away, he just had time to see his paper on the bench where he had left it.

“How maddening!”

The compartment was stuffy. His collar already beginning to rub mercilessly on his neck.

“Do you mind?” he directed towards the only other passenger, as he leaned up to open the window a little. She said nothing but remained motionless, her head inclined towards a thin volume she secured between grey kid gloves.

“Very hot, Madam, don’t you feel?”

The lady continued reading. Mr. Dubois’ eyes wondered to the advertisements above the dark green upholstery.

“Enjoy a bracing sojourn at Skegness!”

“Has Madam ever visited Skegness? He ventured. “I believe it is most bracing”.

Still not a word. Mr. Dubois began to observe her. She was probably about his age, something between fifty and sixty. She was wearing a cavernous black hat that resembling a collapsing meringue with a rather impertinent plume bobbing incongruously at the front.

“How dull!” he thought. “An hour and a half with a taxidermic contender and no paper to alleviate the boredom”.

The woman was draped from head to toe in black. She wore jet beads that ran from her high collar and terminated in a squat bog oak cross. She was compacted in impregnable taffeta. Tightly crimped lace besieged her neck and wrists; he wondered how she could breathe at all.

“It really is most intolerably hot. Does not the lady desire that I open the other window to facilitate a refreshing passage of air?”

Her kid gloves twitched slightly and she breathed out fractionally harder through her nose. The exercise was becoming amusing.

“I’ve always thought it judicious to carry a flask of water in this sultry season but today I quite clean forgot. Do you have any recommendations for alleviating the discomfort of summer train travel?”

This time, the collapsing meringue rose suddenly, the incongruous plume almost knocked from its perch and, inclining her chin upwards to the right, she resolved to stare out of the window, not before emitting a very audible “hurumpf”.

The game was going nowhere, the sun was unrelenting and gradually, the lady resumed her reading position while Mr. Dubois absently re-scanned the promise of bracing diversions at Skegness.

The abrupt rocking of the compartment as the train crossed rails pulling into York woke them both to their senses. The slim volume had fallen to the floor and for a moment, the lady in black was incapable of making a move. Mr. Dubois stood up and stretched copiously. Alarm spread upon his reluctant companion’s face. He bent down to pick up the temporarily relinquished article.

Slowly their eyes met and, as the train jerked to a halt he adroitly dropped it into her lap.

“Madam”, he said. “You may have denied talking to me, but you cannot deny having slept with me. Good day!”

Story number 9: 'In the Name of Art'

Hello friends,

I hope this gives you some pleasure.

Best wishes,

Philip

In the Name of Art

Nobody liked the graffiti. It had begun as a small daub of unintelligible lettering – an obscure symbol on the last corner house but, over the last year and a half, it had spread like a deadly fungus over every available surface: garden wall, garage door, even the lamp posts. The houses with no front gardens to offer protection were most hard hit; below the ground floor windows, around the front doors, the space between the upper and lower windows – anywhere the spray cans could reach. No-one saw the perpetrators; they came in the dead of night working quickly and silently. Only when their next victim left his house the following morning would the evidence of their nocturnal labours be noticed. Residents complained to each other; various neighbourhood schemes were set up but with little effect. People needed to work, and if they needed to work, they needed to sleep. Nobody was prepared to sit up all night, perhaps for an entire week, on the off-chance of observing the night visitors.

Mrs. Jupp lived at number 57. Her house had been particularly targeted. It was once a pale peach colour with pretty plasterwork details around the windows. It now resembled a painter’s palette. The prolific but untalented artists drawn by the cool canvas of the facade, had competed one with the other until it was a dense confusion of juxtaposed letters and symbols, almost obliterating the door and windows themselves. Mrs. Jupp sympathised with her neighbours and they nodded and sympathised with the jumbled mess that was now the front of her house. “Poor thing. Such a sweet old lady – and her house had always looked so pretty!”

The old dear loved her garden – more of a jungle really. She hadn’t her old energy and she had learned to love the weeds as much as the faithful perennials that jostled for space amongst them. There was one part of the garden, however, that she never went. Years before, surveyors had been and declared that the whole place would have to be dug away and re-earthed – all at great expense; something about an old unregistered tin mine that was conjectured to have existed some two hundred years previous. But nothing had ever been followed up and Mrs. Jupp had ceased worrying about it. But there, between the michaelmas daisies and the rockery was a straight oblong of grass that had curious dents in it. She could just as easily reach the rockery via the rhododendrons so she had no cause to step onto it. It was often wet long after the rest of the garden had dried off from the rain and, if she bent her ear close to the ground, she could hear strange popping sounds. For half the night, Mrs. Jupp sat thinking. Her bedroom light, glowing like a luminous peach behind the drapes, burned well into the early hours. The following morning at around 11.00 o’clock she returned from town with several large plastic bags in each hand. For the remainder of the day she kept quietly to herself.

The side of the house was reached by a wooden gate, which lead directly from the street; a huge tract of sprayable wall which composed the entire right lateral of her home and stretched upwards and long-ways – a perfect heaven for any would-be spray handler with itchy fingers.

A little after midnight she crept out of the kitchen and round to the side of the house and there, right by the wooden gate, she placed her first irresistible treasure: a brand new spray can full of luxurious purple dye. A few steps further an identical canister, only orange; and then, a foot away from the michaelmas daisies, a luminous green variety. It was from here that she had thrown, with certain difficulty, some dozen more – all a glorious rich red, mounted up like a funeral pyre over the strangely uneven tract of grass between the daisies and the rockery.

That night, Mrs. Jupp omitted to bolt the gate. In fact, she left it wide open, giving a perfect view of the virgin canvas and there, in the still of the back bedroom, she sat and waited.

To keep herself busy she picked up her knitting – a navy woollen scarf for an undeserving great nephew. Still, it kept her occupied. Click, clack, click, clack,… the needles kept time with the bedside clock. Click, clack, click, clack… She could wait all night if needs be. And then she heard it; an uninvited foot had knocked over the first trophy. There were footsteps, she had no idea how many. The prey were taking the bait. She let go her knitting and peeped just above the sill. There must have been at least half a dozen of them – the whole gang may be. One of them had spotted the final prize. There was no order, no caution. Ah, foolish youth. The daisies were crushed underfoot as eight pairs of legs ran thundering onto the forbidden rectangle. What nocturnal scribe would not have jumped for joy at such a find? – and with the prospect of two hundred square feet of free expression into the bargain.

There were no cries, no shouts, no commotion at all. As silently as they came, they made their final exit. Mrs. Jupp heard a short, low rumble. The house shuddered very slightly and a huge cloud of dust rose up and began drifting over the garden wall. She made her way slowly downstairs and stepped onto the gravel path. The rockery had all but disappeared. A couple of pieces of stone were sticking up through the soft earth and the rhododendron was leaning perilously to one side. The michaelmas daisies would have to be sorted, quite hopeless they were. But that could wait until morning.

During the following few months the street began to put on a fresh face. It was imperceptible at first; a lick of paint here and a lick of paint there. Slowly it began to assume its old charm as the awakening house owners took pride once more in their homes; none so much as dear Mrs. Jupp. There was even a whip round to help her. Her little house had been so disfigured.

“Not peach this time I feel” she was heard to say.

“Something a little bolder… why not a nice bright red? … and, by the way, I’d be terribly grateful if someone could lend a hand with the garden, it’s really needing a good going over?”

Short story number 8

Collectables

Sarah Miles had practically the entire collection but then she would, wouldn’t she? Sarah Miles had just about everything she ever wanted and whenever she wanted it. She would line them up provocatively along the edge of her desk; ten wonderful little rubber animals. Two more and the collection would be complete. Darell looked longingly at them. So far he had only managed an elephant with a torn ear, which he had exchanged with Jimmy Robson for five highly prized bubble gums. They were expensive. Why did things always have to be expensive? Darell sat behind Sarah well to the left and had a clear view of his heart’s desire. Every single class there they were: a tiger poised and ready to pounce, with his tail curled high, an eagle with wings fully outstretched, a bear on his hind legs, a dear glancing behind her, a snake coiled around and around with just its head peeking out from its concentric form – so much fun to be had, so many fights, attacks – sometimes fatal, sometimes not. A whole world of wonderful adventures, and all Sarah Miles could do was to stick them in front of her and ignore them. Darell turned back to his exercise. “What I did at the weekend”. He could think of nothing at all. It had rained most of the time. He leaned his head on his hand and stared out of the window. Finally, and it surprised him, the bell went. He just had time to see the prize menagerie scooped up and squashed into a pink fluffy pencil case. Outside, his mother was waiting for him at the gate, along with a lot of other Mums or Dads or older brothers and sisters. “I have a few things to do before we go home, ok Darell?” Darell nodded mechanically and they began to make their way towards the parade of shops that ran just behind the playing fields. They stopped at the bread shop. A wonderful honey smell and lots of things stuffed with cream or smeared with a pink gloss with coloured bits on. His mother bought a ready sliced family loaf and then she suddenly said: “Do you fancy a doughnut, Darell?” She never bought doughnuts. She never bought anything apart from the white sliced and, occasionally, a macaroon for Granny. “Err, yes!”, he stammered. He wondered if he ought to try his luck and ask for one of the pink glossy cakes or two fat meringues with cream bulging between them and a sticky glace cherry submerged on top, but the moment passed.

“Just the post office and then we’re done”.

Off they trudged. The post office was in fact tucked away at the back of a stationer’s. It was the oldest building in the street with lots of steps up and down and curious rooms to the sides. There was a narrow staircase somewhere in the middle but it had a chain strung across it with “Private, no admittance” written in red on a white sign. He always longed to step over it and see just what was beyond the “no admittance”. Right next to the staircase was a small counter crammed with all kinds of useful things for school and behind it, a big roundy lady in a pale blue overall. She had soft, pink cheeks and wore glasses with a gold chain. Her lips were bright red and when she smiled she showed incredibly perfect white teeth. “And, how’s Darell today?” she asked, half looking at Darell and half at his mother.

“Fine, thanks”, he mumbled. The two women began talking and Darell began to idly scan the counter. His eyes stopped short; there they were: the whole incredible collection all practically spilling out of a box right in front of him – all the animals jumbled together. There must have been at least five of every kind. He didn’t plan anything. He didn’t even look up at his mother or the lady in the pink overall. He simply opened his palm as wide as it could go and, spreading his fingers over a random assortment, thrust the rubbery loot into his trouser pocket. For a second, the world stopped: surely something horrible would happen, but it didn’t. He could feel his treasure pressing on his leg and he pulled his jumper down to hide any tell-tale bulge.

“See you soon, Darell”, the pink lady said, and his mother propelled him out of the shop and along the street.

“I’ll get the kettle on as soon as we’re in and we’ll see about those doughnuts”.

Doughnuts? He couldn’t even think about them. What had he done? There must have been at least ten in his pocket. How could he possibly smuggle them into his room? Where would he hide them? He’d never be able to play with them except in the strictest privacy – and he’d never be able to take them to school. No, it was lunacy. They’d just reached the pedestrian crossing. The little green man lit up; they stepped into the road. “It’s now or never” he thought; and ramming his hand into his trousers, he dug out the mass of rubber animals and, as hard as he could, flung them behind him. They were both walking towards the other side and the animals were thrown behind. It should have been the end of a very painful dilemma. But a blue and a red one bounced ahead of them, directly in front of his mother. It was a wonderful turquoise dragon and a bright red crocodile – right in front of his mother.

“What the - ? Darell!” She spun round and there were the remaining pieces of the filched collection at varying intervals over the tarmac.

“Get back onto the pavement”, she yelled.

Cars were already hooting their horns but with one arm held up in an awkward halting position she continued picking up every one of them. Her face was red and puffy looking.

“Right, straight back to the shop” she panted. They marched along in silence, his mother’s plastic mack making a harsh crackling sound as they walked. It wasn’t happening. She wouldn’t make him go back into the shop. She wouldn’t do that. They’d reached the front door.

“In you go, Darell”

The shop was still busy. The lady with the pink cheeks was serving somebody. His mother didn’t wait.

“I’m sorry to interrupt”, she burst out. “My son’s got something to say, haven’t you, Darell?” And she glanced down at him, her eyes wide and staring. He couldn’t speak, he could hardly move.

“What did you do, Darell? She was breathing hard. “Tell the nice lady what you just did”.

“I,..I…-“

“Hello, Darell”, said a familiar voice at his elbow. And there was Sarah Miles, in a smart white imitation leather coat with black shiny buttons.

“I’ve come to buy the two missing animals I need to complete my full set – a dragon and a crocodile. Then I can start collecting ‘My Little Pony’!

Short story number 7

Hello friends,

Please read at your leisure number 7.

Best wishes, Philip

The Heart of a City

The streets may be dirty, the buildings unkempt, the shop traders noisy. When a man has a friend, he sees beyond the physical incognito and what may have been hostile and alien now warms his heart and he feels truly at home.

Meredith had lived fifty years in the city. After seven he had stopped counting. The place had claimed him for its own. He could have left at any time, it was certainly ugly enough, but something had knotted him to it, like a tangled green moss wedded to a wall of granite.

“Full cycles”, “Things come round again” – was that something he’d heard in a song? He hadn’t allowed his thoughts to develop the notion further but, nevertheless, the phrases sat uncomfortably on his chest. Was this city going to discard him after all? a faithless lover who would drop him off now she’d taken all she’d wanted? He turned into Rua Otavio Rocha. So many people, rushing, rushing, “The city is anxious” he thought, “but what could be so pressing?” He wondered if anyone of them would abruptly keel over should he stop them suddenly. Did they see what he saw? They were trampling all over his town. It was his town, not theirs. What were they doing? They had no business to be pounding their vulgar trainers over its cobbles and pushing, pushing. “Perhaps they will push me over?” He felt small and frail. A shudder of helplessness shook him and he teetered into a doorway where in the sudden cool of its corridor he sensed an aura of protection.

A long gray corridor with a number of faceless offices to right and left but right at the end something completely different. There are plenty of such corridors in Porto Alegre. It is impossible to know all of them. Exactly at the end of this one was a large plate glass window and a simple glass fronted door to the left; a beacon at the end of the gray gloom. There were lights burning and the place was buzzing. Instinctively he walked towards it. A large counter swept away to the left and waiters in long white aprons were gliding deftly between the tables. He noticed that there was plenty of movement amongst the customers themselves; some were sitting, others standing. There was a contagious air of animation among them and he stood transfixed at the window. It was then that he saw him. Somebody leaned forward and for a moment he could see a couple sitting a little way behind. He gasped. “João, it’s João!” The gap closed again and he felt his head grow strangely hot. “João, my dear friend, but…”  João had died some forty years previous. He must be mistaken but, no, his prematurely gray beard and moustache and the way he hunched his shoulders forward when he was talking. Had João noticed him? Yes, he had for a moment looked up. They were his eyes; brown laughing eyes but with a whisper of sadness behind them. It was too much. A waiter was walking directly to the door and he quickly moved away back down the corridor and out into the busy street.

How they had laughed together! It was after knowing João that the city had begun to change. How many coffees had they drunk together? How many films had they seen? And what about the choir? Yes, he’d even joined a choir. Those were good days, such good days, and then he’d suffered a devastating stroke and that wonderful friend had simply passed out of his life.

Meredith steadily made his way home but he was no longer conscious of the pressing crowds around him. He was walking once again with João and the certainty of a true friend filled him with an unspeakable joy.

The morning bought with it cold reason. It was just a coincidence; of course, he hadn’t see João but, nonetheless, he got dressed with a curious lightness in his heart and knew without knowing why that he must find that corridor again.

Rua Otavio Rocha once more and teeming with bodies. Perhaps he wouldn’t find it? Perhaps he’d imagined it? Panic gripped him and his head began to swim. A dumpy looking woman stepped out of a doorway and, to avoid colliding with her, he veered sideways and, lurching to the right, found himself standing again in the familiar cool. He slowly raised his head and there it was. He’d not been deceived. This time there was music playing. He knew the tunes, good ones. He could have danced to the door. How cosy it looked. How inviting! There was such laughter and so much activity. He longed to go in. It seemed busier than yesterday. There were people leaning up against the counter and cups and glasses were passing to and fro with a delicious clatter. He couldn’t help it, a smile, one that had long been discarded, crept across his tired face. A peal of laughter, fresh and candid filled his ears. He knew that laughter. Only one person in his life had laughed like that; Elza, his saintly friend, the kindest soul he had ever known; a shoulder to cry on, an ear for a good gossip and a ready companion for any adventure. There she was; a glass of something in her hand and she was looking directly at him; her round eyes laughing and her face radiant and full of love. But dear Elza had been brutally murdered. Her assassin never discovered and her simple, beautiful life extinguished. “Please, come in, Mr. Williamson”. The door was open and an olive skinned waiter with a neat black moustache was standing in the entrance. His long white apron was smooth and spotless. His tray covered in glasses of varying shapes and sizes, “If you want to come back later, please do. We’re keeping a table for you”.

Meredith began to back away. He felt his breath coming hard. He wanted to scream. He wanted to turn around and get back to the clamour of the streets and yet, it looked so tempting and the waiter had such a smile. Elza, João, there they were, and behind them he could just see his old friend Bernardo and Dona Linda, and there was Seu Henrique, dear Seu Henrique.

“Yes, yes, I think I’m ready. Please show me to my table”, and stepping lightly, he crossed into the warm embrace of the little café.

*********

A small crowd had gathered at the end of the gray corridor. They were clustering round something crumpled on the floor.

“Do you know him?” a voice said.

“Don’t think so. Looks pretty old, poor thing”.

“We’d better call the police but first, let’s move him away from in front of the fire exit”.

Short story number 6

Hello Friends,

At your leisure, short story number 6.

Thank you and best wishes,

Philip

Necessities

Was it a dull life? She rarely asked herself that question and even when she did she wasn’t sure if she could answer it. Mrs. Johnson was fifty seven. She’d been a widow for more that eleven years – it could just as easily have been five or seven. Time was no enemy to her. She never looked longingly to the past and the future was simply a non - threatening blank. She had a cat of whom she was fond and she lived on the 3^rd floor of a bland but comfortable block of 1970s flats. Nothing particularly perturbed her. She was on friendly terms with her neighbours, paid bills on time, was punctual for appointments and never returned her library books late. She occasionally went away by herself to a quiet hotel on the coast, Bengy and her modest pot plants being fed and watered by a friend. Despite these domestic assurances, she was never entirely comfortable and felt a heave of contentment as soon as her train returned home to Oakhampton.

Saturday was market day and when it wasn’t raining she was glad enough to push her shopping trolley around the familiar stalls. True, the fruit and vegetables were not in convenient packs or plastic bags but her inherent instinct for economy would never have allowed her to forego this weekend ritual; however, the supermarket was another story. There were no restrictions as to which day she went and she never imposed any. It was just five minutes from the flat and from her living room window she could see its red neon sign, a beacon of comfort and security, which blazed assuredly night and day. There was always some little thing to be bought. She had become expert at convincing herself of the utter indispensability of any stray item that came into her head. It wasn’t unknown for her to actually go in with no pending item at all but with the certainty that the temporarily unremembered necessity would announce itself forthwith, and it always did. There was a glow about the place; a cheery welcoming plethora of all that reinforced her feelings of well being. The music was never too loud and the songs were neither too modern nor vastly out of date. The wheels of the trolleys were smooth, the floor was smooth and the aisles were wide and welcoming. She knew every shelf and every corner and prided herself on remembering the cashier’s names without having to look at their identity tags.

There weren’t just items to be bought, there were friends, old familiar friends, loyal to the nth degree. She knew their colours, their shapes, even their smells. They sat in her trolley and spoke assuredly to her, ‘We are with you, we will always be – you are quite safe with us’.

There was only one thing guaranteed to unsettle Mrs. Johnson’s sea of calm and that was when, just to peeve her personally, the manager took the unthinkable decision of transferring a perfectly well placed sector of the supermarket to a totally foreign location. It vexed her and she would return home, not before having had a good few words with the erring manager, with the feeling that an intruder had broken into her home and deliberately rearranged all her furniture – it was so upsetting.

One fine Thursday afternoon, a notion to clean the silver came over her. There was more than enough silver polish to complete the job but she couldn’t possibly run the risk of letting stocks run low. She ran her entire home on the same lines – like a tip-top supermarket itself, only in miniature. Immediately, she reached for her pale blue woollen scarf, picked up her handbag from the hall table and lightly stepped out for her daily spiritual sustenance. Not the most fervent church goer could have rivalled her for loyalty and dedication.

As she crossed the road something disturbing caught her eye – the stalwart neon light, the herald to the faithful, was blinking erratically. She would have to speak to the manager at once, it was unheard of. And was it a trick of the light or had the ‘m’ from ‘market’ dropped slightly to the right? There was no time to lose and, quickening her step, she almost threw herself through the plate glass doors, determined to remedy this careless oversight at once.

Her path was almost blocked by a barricade of shopping trolleys – all huddled together any old how instead of in nice neat lines and she was obliged to squeeze through the end one and a pillar, and then she stopped short. The first aisle was littered with pyramids of packages piled high in all directions. She glanced nervously to left and right and almost felt her heart in her throat. Stretching along the shelves and into eternity were dozens of white objects, some square, some rectangle. She craned her neck slightly and found herself reading in plain black lettering ‘sugar’. A long marching column of square white boxes all exactly the same. The boxes swam into other boxes and she read ‘coffee’ and then ‘tea’. All white, all a monotonous uniform white. Her eyes were beginning to glaze over. She looked bewildered up and down the row.

And now she began to notice there were other shapes: bottles; tins of different sizes but all of them, every single one of them dead white. One said ‘oil’, another ‘fish’. Her knees were trembling and she reached out to steady herself.

‘Everything all right, Mrs. Johnson?’ – It was the manager himself but he was different. His tie had gone and he was wearing a white t-shirt with big black letters on it that read ‘Back to basics’. She mouthed the words falteringly and slowly  looked back into his face.

‘That’s right, Mrs. Johnson. Back to basics. We sell food here now, not ideas. You’ll have to bear with us for a while until we’re sorted. Feel free to look around – and now you must excuse me, I have a hundred things to attend to. Good bye, Mrs. Johnson’.

She had never felt so lonely in her life. A woman accidentally nudged her back with a trolley that jogged her forwards. She stumbled like an abandoned child to the end of the aisle. There was a horrible noise in her ears and a ritualistic beat – almost tribal. The voices were laughing at her, taunting her. Something they called ‘rap’, was it? She wanted to get away but there were people behind her and she had to go on – on into that world of white.

‘Oh my friends, why have you forsaken me? Through a doorway with thick strips of transparent plastic, somebody was stuffing something into black sacks. She just had time to see a rich brown, red capped jar, smooth and comforting with ‘Bovril’ written boldly across it being thrust into oblivion; and wasn’t that a  noble green and silver tin of golden syrup disappearing into the black void? No, it was too horrible. No act of barbarity could have more agitated this woman’s heart. They were massacring her closest companions right in front of her and there was nothing she could do about it.

 ‘Bumper introductory bargains this way’ a harsh confident voice growled over the intercom and she found herself being jettisoned forward like a piece of driftwood at the mercy of the tide, carried by a great wave of animated and excited shoppers anxious to buy the basics at sensible prices. Perhaps she should have been grateful for she was suddenly standing by the exit and, inhaling deeply, pushed herself forwards out into the open.

One unsteady step after another and she was at her own front door. It opened heavily. She took off her scarf and placed her bag on the table and, with trembling hands drew the living room curtains. There was comfort in the dark room. She steadily lowered herself into her armchair and sat perfectly, perfectly still.

It’s been six months since the supermarket initiated its new policy. You very rarely find Mrs. Johnson on the premises: in fact, it’s very hard to get hold of Mrs. Johnson at all, what with painting classes, Italian lessons, bridge parties. Nowadays, she’s pretty much game for anything – that is, when you can drag her away from her allotment.