Miss Lemuel is crazed with grief for the loss of her nephew, Edward, a gallant young airman who came down blazing after a raid on Berlin. A compact is offered to Gunning that was once offered to Faust. It is not Helen of Troy that will be his reward and the riches of philosophy, but his health back again and his Cockney wife, Sal. The pact is duly sealed with blood. He permits entry into his body of the "ghost" of Edward. Or was there any "ghost" at all? Was a state of split personality induced by the old woman for her own demonic purposes? Was the old woman herself to blame, or was she as much to be pitied as execrated?
Jim came closer to the old woman, though he was not aware he moved. Theghost of a bark, rather than a bark, rumbled inside the dog's throat."Quiet, Hunish!" the old woman said. On the puckered upper lip spread apale grey down. There was a wart beneath her right cheek-bone from whichthree or four long white hairs started.
Ghost In The Wires Epub Download
Download Zip 🔥 https://ssurll.com/2y4D5P 🔥
Five minutes passed, ten minutes. The plovers dipped and whined, makingthe loneliness lonelier. A stack of peats by a peat-marsh lookedabandoned and unwanted, as if the man who had cut them had died and theywould be no use to his ghost.
He remembered very clearly her words to him during that ghostly firsttalk in the kitchen: You're going to tell me all about your wife, andyour little boy, aren't you? But when he actually did try and bring uptheir names, her manner became remote and preoccupied.
Funny, I said? Funny? I don't make tea for just a living woman, but fora dead bloke, too! Honey for the ghost! So matter-of-fact, like, just asif I was totting up paper accounts in the evening. Have I gonealtogether balmy? He stopped with one hand on the table, on his way backto the kettle, which was boiling now. He considered the question, as hehad done before. And gave himself the same answer.
"You may call him a ghost, if you like. Let's not be afraid of words.Edward was cut off in the prime of his days. He's what was left of him,what was still unexhausted. He had energy and wisdom and love. With hiswisdom and his energy he has come back again. He's come back to thethings he loved, because he loved them so intensely. I reach my hand outto him, but it is hard for him to take it. We shall find a bridge."
But there was not that sort of Christmas, either, at Skurr nan Gillian.You couldn't expect it, said Jim to himself, just a shade ruefully. Youcouldn't expect Edward's Christmas with only Edward's ghost. Miss Lemuellocked herself up all Christmas Eve, and most of Christmas Day, inEdward's hut. That was her Christmas. She had the spirit stove inthere, to make tea. That was enough to keep her going.
Shall I send it, now this has happened? Why shouldn't I send it? Whyshouldn't I? Because all along I've said I didn't want her to see medying, a young bloke like me, coughing my lungs up, getting thinner andthinner, till the cheek-bones stick out of my face like door-knobs. Butshe'd want to come along and be with you, Jim. If it was the other wayround, you wouldn't shirk it, Jim, would you? You can't die up here, alllonely, with two dames you don't know, and a ghost knocking all the timeat the window, a bloke shouldn't be so proud.
The next wire also sent love, and said a letter from Gunning was on itsway. That meant that he was, at all events, fit enough to write. Therewas another wire soon. Behind this spatter of wires she divined the lovethat had demanded them, despite the evident difficulties involved, andhis own wretchedness. Then at last a letter arrived from him by way ofBirmingham. It was not a long letter. Perhaps he had not the strength towrite a long letter. And also what was there to say?
"It would be easy enough to repudiate the contract," she went on. "In amatter of moments the consumption would get hold of you again. It wouldbe the 'galloping' type. That's what they call it, isn't it? You woulddie. But that would not be the end of it, it would be the beginning. Youwould have quite a long chapter ahead of you. You are a lot younger thanme. Your ghost would dance attendance on your wife and son a good deallonger than my nephew on me up here. You understand me, don't you?"
"Bob!" she called out again. A voice answered her from somewhere beyondthe big cedar on the lawn, to the left. She hurried forward. "Bob! Idon't want to be a nuisance!" She saw him now, walking along the paththat led down to the pool, where now the swans, that by day burned likesnow, glimmered like ghosts against the dark night. He was limpingslightly, the way he always did when there was damp in the air, orsomething upset him. She came up to him.
It was not at all the same Miss Lemuel talking now as the forbidding oldlady she had first met. She was a poor, sad, lonely old creature. Tearswere in her eyes. Miss Lemuel continued: "Maybe you will sympathize,"she repeated. "It gave me a certain sort of ghostly happiness, the onlyhappiness I had known since poor Edward died. I loved talking about him.There had been no one in the world I could talk to about him before.Gunning saw a number of Edward's photographs and school trophies stuffedaway in cupboards. He brought them out and insisted on putting them upall over the house. As you see." She raised her eyes to the varioussouvenirs of Edward around the room.
"I think Father Melrose would be of the view that the devil that cameout of hell to occupy Gunning's body would be quite grateful for anywork done in advance by Miss Lemuel. Though, of course, beingsupernatural, he would not depend on it," Mr. Merrilees said, with theghost of a smile.
"All I've said is that I don't understand, from their point of view,how the ghost of a non-Roman (still assuming we're dealing withTourneur's ghost and not with a demon) is susceptible to a sprinkling byRomish water, and will flee screaming from a mixture of Romish signs andincantations."
"Do please come in!" urged Miss Lemuel. Mrs. Winckworth stepped backtowards the door quickly, in case she should be needed. Then at lengthSal stepped down into the kitchen. Her eyes found Jim's at once. Jimstood there, shambling, his limbs all over the place, his eyes fixed onhis wife with an intensity of grief that was almost beyond enduring. Helooked like a ghost on the other side of Lethe, gazing towards the lovedones he has lost for ever.
"Mrs. Purdom, we want you to do exactly what we suggested in our wires.He knows nothing of my journey to you. I have the feeling that if hesets eyes on Dickie here--very suddenly, you know, like a film--itwill make him snap out of his nerves. It's not certain. With nervesnothing is certain. But the doctor thinks it might work the trick. Andit will mean an awful lot to your daughter. The thing is to--to getcracking. Have you started to pack yet? Can I do anything to help you?"
"I see," murmured Jim. "I see." He shrugged his shoulders. It was veryvery funny in a frightening way, to hear a big beefy policeman in thedead hours of the morning yapping away about dead candles flutteringaround like flitterbats and the ghosts of planes and saws and hammersknocking up ghost coffins. Ah, thank heaven, here was the doctor'scar... if it wasn't a ghost car, carrying off the spirit of Miss Lemuel. e24fc04721
download free excel invoice template