The Birds of the Air by Alice Thomas Ellis

clamped firmly shut on the silver spoons with which they were born for the purpose. Or alternatively they might get the authors of the animal books to write their scripts for them. (The heir already spoke of elephants as ‘heffalumps’.)
    In each home in the Close the inhabitants, like Mrs Marsh, would be avidly lapping up these banalities. People who believed in monarchy, reflected Mary, were certifiably mad – madder than people who believed in little fat gurus or addressed their prayers to Elvis Presley. She looked aside as the high gentle voice delivered a final, deplorably limp and unleavened platitude.
    ‘Well, she can’t be controversial,’ said Mrs Marsh, observing her daughter’s expression. ‘You haven’t been to church for ages,’ she added, taking the offensive. Both her children had been brought up in their father’s faith, but she herself had never converted and Barbara had naturally lapsed when she married Sebastian.
    Her mother’s train of thought satisfied Mary that she was right in estimating that the belief in monarchy was religious in character rather than secular and patriotic.
    ‘I’ll get Father Whatsit to pop in and see you later this week,’ Mrs Marsh said rather threateningly. ‘All right,’ said Mary placidly. She wasn’t an enthusiast. She was resigned to faith rather than a believer, having no doubts – no doubts, that is, as to the existence of God. Of his mood, his intentions, she wasn’t sure. She saw no reason to suppose that he meant her well in the accepted meaning of that term. He didn’t, as her mother did, wish her a nice house, a nice husband, nice children, a well-trained pet, happiness, longevity and a sherry in the evenings. Nor did she want any of these things. She sometimes thought he might have left her Robin, but that wasn’t his way. Her anger stopped short of God and was sustained by her hatred of death and the little demons in whom she saw herself reflected: destructive, gleeful, purple-tongued and bloody-mouthed – eternally mindless and beyond appeal. There was no point in fearing these unpleasant little gods since she knew they were subject to the limits of her consciousness and would never make it across the wilderness. Even Death, the jaunty jester-king, would flag before he reached the end of the wilderness. God was beyond the wilderness, but God without Robin was not enough and Mary, like an abandoned dog, couldn’t decide whether to stay in life, where she had last seen her darling, or to set off in pursuit.
    Sebastian, Barbara and Kate went for a walk, surprising everybody with this evidence of family solidarity. Barbara wanted to clear her head before Hunter arrived. She had begun, inevitably, to wonder, as the time approached, whether her dreams were capable of realisation. Would
The Bear
, for instance, be open on Christmas Day? Would Hunter invite her to accompany him to
The Bear
? Did he even know of its existence? Could she suggest that he accompany her? Hardly. She began to construct a new fantasy in which all her family went for a walk – Mary could go to sleep – leaving Hunter time to begin to woo her. That would be enough to start with. The thought of illicit sexual congress in the Close made her nervous. A glance, a touch, would be enough, thought starving Barbara, sweating slightly in her sheepskin in the damp dull day.
    Sebastian said nothing. He muttered occasionally, but not of his mistress. He was thinking of his work. Kate, at her most determinedly winsome, gambolled. She picked leaves and remarked on their symmetry; she nibbled berries and made faces; she pointed out features on the houses that they passed and recited bits of poetry. Even Barbara began to find her annoying and to wish she had left her behind. But it wasn’t impossible that Mrs Marsh and Evelyn would also leave the house and that Kate, her ewe lamb, would be alone with Mary. In Barbara’s mind her sister had taken on a mythic, fairy-tale quality, a witchlike