A Coffin for Charley by Gwendoline Butler Page A

not so good, he always noticed hands; these things he had taken in, but not the way her moods swung.
    â€˜Time doesn’t go backwards, though.’ She was shivering. And the mud was marking her new shoes of suede, nearly suede, almost suede. After all, you wouldn’t wear the skin of dead animals, would you? She looked down at the pale stone-coloured sandals and the stain on the toes sharpened her tongue. ‘Bloody cold.’
    â€˜We think of the past,’ he said gently.
    â€˜I’m cold.’ It was cold and she wasn’t dressed for cold weather. Not only were her shoes suffering but mud was spotting her nylons. He felt sorry for her.
    Poor child, he felt sorry for her. Better get on with it.
    â€˜Shall we try again? Are you ready? Just lean your neck forward for me.’ He stopped. ‘You don’t mind?’
    â€˜I think I do a little bit.’
    â€˜I can understand it. It’s tricky, difficult the first time, but I’ll go carefully.’
    â€˜I know you will.’
    â€˜Gentle. Think of it as making love.’
    She giggled. ‘Don’t say that. My sister would die.’
    â€˜Then don’t think about her.’ There was a small pause while he fiddled with a machine.
    â€˜What are you doing? You’re not taping this, are you? I don’t like the idea of that. I mean, I’m not ready for that.’
    â€˜No, I promise, just the last bit. For technical reasons. Timing, you know.’ He bent down again. Better get the sound level right. ‘Just a small adjustment. I’ve got it. Say Eddie.’
    She hesitated. ‘Eddie, is that it?’
    â€˜Just say it.’
    â€˜Eddie … Eddie.’
    She said nothing further. All that was necessary had been said.

CHAPTER 7
    Better not to think of the river
    Annie sat waiting for her sister to come home. Didi was already late, seriously late. She did stay out late and her sister recognized her right to do this. There were no strict rules in that house, she had been out herself earlier that evening after all. With the life they both led there could not be timetables. But Didi was a considerate girl who told Annie if she was going to be very late, or else telephoned to let her know.
    She had a strong suspicion that Didi was out with Eddie Creeley, one of the enemy. Perhaps at the moment the enemy. In her mind, Eddie seemed omnipresent; he might be with Didi, or he might be the figure seen earlier that night lurking in the shadows down the street. Annie knew it was mad and could not be fact and there might not beanyone there at all, just shadows in her mind (and goodness knows, there was reason for that), but sometimes the Creeleys seemed to her to have the power to be everywhere and to inhabit several bodies each.
    But after all, it might just have been her own shadow against the street light.
    Didi, where are you?
    Annie watched the last television programme on the BBC and then switched to the all night channel. She sat there looking at an old film of Bob Hope without a muscle in her face moving, the laughs just wouldn’t come.
    She got up, took three deep breaths, then screamed. Not loudly but with a quiet strength. One of the psychologists she had seen, and plenty had had their hands on her, had said to her: Let it out. Scream. As loud as you like.
    Annie had followed the advice in a modified, Annie kind of way. She very rarely followed advice in the way it was offered: it didn’t seem to suit her body somehow. In the same way she never finished a bottle of medicine. In fact, usually she never took a dose. She had her own ways of effecting a cure for whatever ailed her. Not exactly faith cures but something very like it. She would say a little prayer to whichever god attracted her at the moment: Jehovah, Zeus, Buddha or even the anonymous just addressed as Thou.
    The three quiet screams let out something inside her, never mind what, and did not disturb the neighbours who were old and