*
The half-three bell sounded its monotonous percussion as corridors and stairwells swarmed with the rushing, chattering throng of demob-happy schoolkids, fighting their way towards doorways all over the school. The double doors of the red-brick retiree flew open as pupils exploded out onto the pavement before sprinting through the rain to the sweet shop on the corner for a confectionary celebration.
Within ten minutes, Chillingworth House was deserted, teachers and students alike all eager to be away. Its interior reverberated to an unbearable din of silence; an unwanted calm after a lifelong storm; an empty table after a hearty feast.
*
Through windows streaked with running rivers of tears, it watched the last remaining children pick a hop-scotch route around puddles in the rain-soaked street as they gave up sheltering in shop doorways and bus shelters and took the plunge to venture home.
For the first time in a century it felt completely alone, completely empty – trapped in its prison of bricks and mortar.
2
“Here you are…white with two sugars.”
Roger Davies lifted the delicate china cup to his lips and took a cautious sip of the hot tea. “Perfect!” he exclaimed, smiling at the elderly lady who stood over him. She held a blue glass sugar bowl in her wrinkled hands in case the tea wasn’t quite sweet enough. Satisfied, she placed the sugar bowl on the table beside her then shuffled across to the sofa to seat herself opposite her visitor. Roger watched her frail frame, her floral print dress hanging from her bones. He felt guilty about letting her make the tea, but she insisted he be seated and to let her get on with it.
He studied her as she fidgeted, making herself comfortable: the thin, wispy white hair; the pale, watery eyes; the desiccated skin on her hands and face dappled with liver-spots.
How old is she?
She must be ninety if she’s a day…
Roger took another sip of his tea before leaning forward to place the cup and saucer on the coffee table in front of him. As he settled back again, propping himself against a cushion, he picked up a smoker’s pipe from the arm of the chair and began to explore its surface with his fingertips. The elderly woman leant forward, scrutinising his every movement, her hands visibly trembling. The room was silent save for the slow ticking of a clock.
Roger shut his eyes. His fingers roved over every inch of the pipe, detecting every discernible detail of the wood grain around the bowl and stem. His facial muscles twitched spasmodically, eyes flicking back and forth beneath his closed lids as if in a state of dreaming as he attempted to tease out whatever secrets were held in the microscopic ridges of the wood. His pulse and breathing rate increased alarmingly as his mind’s eye finally tuned into the images he sought.
*
A haze of blue-grey, tobacco scented smoke curled through the air, its misty movements highlighted by the flickering of a television set. On its glowing screen, a scruffy old man was being chased down a flight of steps by a broomstick-wielding woman in wrinkled stockings.
Guffaws of laughter boomed around the room, followed by a thick hacking cough that sent cathode ray bathed particles of smoke spiralling up to the ceiling.
“You alright, Charlie?”
“Aye, aye,” came the croaked reply. Charlie thumped his breastbone as another spasm gripped his lungs. He pulled a grubby handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the ejected phlegm from his mouth, conscious not to look at it as he folded the handkerchief away; too scared to look in case the blood red tinge he had spotted in his tissue that morning had not just been a trick of the light.
He turned, offering a weak smile to his wife. “Plenty of life in these old lungs yet, you know…”
“You want to cut down on that smoking, Charlie. It’s doing you no good.”
“It’s not the smoking that does it, it's them daft buggers on there.” He waved his pipe towards the flickering screen.
“If you say so.”
“You what?”
“Nothing. You just get back to watching your programme.”
Charlie snorted and let slip another, health confirming cough.
*
Roger’s eyes blinked open, his vision blurring for a second before focussing on the expectant face of Mrs Jessop. He coughed, the taste of pipe tobacco still strong in his mouth.
“D...did you see anything, Mr Davies? Did you see my Charlie?” The elderly woman stammered with excitement.
“Oh yes,” Roger beamed at her, “I saw him.”
Mrs Jessop clasped her gnarled fingers together with delight. “Is he alright?”
“He’s fine. Charlies…”
The woman could hardly contain herself and interrupted her guest with a barrage of questions:
“Does he miss me?”
“Is he in Heaven?”
“Oh my goodness! What is it like?”
Smiling again, Roger moved across the room to sit beside his client. Taking her frail hands in his, he looked into her pale, tear-filled eyes, “Charlie’s perfectly well, Mrs Jessop. He is in Heaven and…yes, he misses you very much. Although he also says he misses ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ as well…”
The old woman’s eyes lit up, tears coursing over the furrows of her smiling face as if this last remark confirmed the truth of everything Roger had told her.
“Oh yes. We always watched that together, it was Charlie’s favourite.”
He took her hands again. “Charlie said he often watches over you…to make sure you’re alright…and…hmmm-” Roger paused for a second. “I’m afraid this is a little delicate, Mrs Jessop - Charlie said that you must go and see the doctor…about your bowels.”
The woman put her hands up to her face, her cheeks flushed. She was not a woman who was used to talking about her bodily functions with strangers.
“I do hope
