Category Archives: As you read it

I stood at the side of the  lake  looking up, “yes, it’s almost dark, I thought, so I can get this awful clammy suit off, I have collected what I came for, ” suppressing a slight  giggle at the unintentioned pun. Reaching between my legs I released the carefully concealed catch and the smooth, velvet-like, false skin peeled all the way around. With a little effort, due to the tightness of the fit I was able to pull the head and torso over the top of my scalp to hang like a deflated balloon around my waist before rolling the lower half down my legs to the gound. It lay on the bank, a shapeless porcine, sluglike mass. My whole body shuddered,  “Yuk, ” I thought, “how do they look at themselves in this, it’s creepy. ”

The air felt cool against my scales and once more checking that the shore was deserted I picked up the bundle and walked down to the water’s edge. Slowly,  eagerly, slipping into the cold waters I prepared to swim down to the bottom to meet up with the rest of my clan. Once again I had completed my task and my ever-growing family would continue to expand.

I thought about my encounter the previous evening with the one who said his name was  Brian, “he must have thought that his luck was in when I started coming on to him. Well, he did look a little lonely sitting in the corner. It had been hard work trying to convince him that  my intentions were purely to have a good time. After I had established his capacity to satisfy my needs by having once been married with a family but now alone and in need of some company. He could never have guessed the real reason for my eagerness. If he could see me now he would swear that it had all been a bad dream, very bad, after he had stopped being sick of course. Even the funny video camera he had used, for reference purposes, his words not mine, would have been thrown away I’m sure. I had been a little worried at one stage, wondering if the sample I needed could be collected from where he suggested but we soon sorted that problem out. Now I was able to carry some more of the human sperm back to the colony where it would help in our next spawning. Not too many more trips and there would be enough of us to break free from the waters and start our slow colonisation of the land.”

“Hey, look at this, wow the sound will be great in here, just like St. Paul’s, you know the whispering gallery,” Jane the first violin exclaimed, the nervous excitement lending a sharpness to her voice that I had never heard before. We were all excited though, just beginning to make a name as an occasional string quartet and out of the blue an invitation from the bursar at St. Danae’s girls college. Although we had honed our collected skills on intimate evenings of chamber music in some of the swankiest  little cocktail bars this was big league. By the way I’m second violin, Allan is viola and Suzanne is cello. Jane is our leader in more ways than one.

We weren’t due to perform for another eight hours but as soon as our hosts had shown us the venue we knew that we had to get in and start warming  up. What an opportunity. Trouble was we had to lug our instruments from the van, through the tradesman’s entrance at the side of the stables and down through the gardens. At least it wasn’t an uphill pergola or whatever they’re called.

Passing between the columns  we entered a round dark-brown oak wainscoted chamber. There were a handful of upholstered high-backed chairs on one side and four wooden chairs sitting separately to one side. We assumed these to be ours. With our mouths open in wonder we must have looked like a group of schoolchildren meeting J K Rowling or her creation Harry Potter.

“Let’s give it a go.” Jane enthused, breaking the spell.  We laid our cases to one side and almost in a subdued manner extracted our instruments. With our music stands in front of the chairs it would have looked to anyone coming through the door as though we were playing to an empty hall.

We had decided on a mainly Bach evening so struck up for practise,”The art of fugue,” generally one of his most popular. We wanted to know the musical quality of the dome high above our heads. After a few bars I thought I could hear someone humming along but we were the only ones there and none of my companions would hum and play at the  same time. “Stop, stop a minute,” I said holding my bow in the air, “What is that strange noise, can any  of you hear it?” They all sheepishly nodded their heads, each admitting that they had thought it was one of us but not sure from which of us the sound was emanating. Before we could resume the humming started to get louder, increasing in volume and frequency. It sounded like the wind passing around the doorframe but it was copying the tune we had just been playing.   “It doesn’t do that in St. Pauls,” Suzanne whispered. Allan agreed stating that he was going to have a look round.

“But, there’s nothing to look  round,”I argued,”just bare wooden walls and a few plaster carvings on the ceiling.” I hadn’t taken any notice of the carvings when we entered but looking up we could see that the immaculately carved. figures were cherubs. All had instruments much as ours  forming a quartet and they surrounded a figure of a woman. She was wearing a long evening dress and with her hands clasped in front of her breast in typical singing pose. In our heightened state of mind we all agreed  that perhaps this was not the time to continue practising  until we had spoken to the Bursar and see if there was anything he could tell us about the chamber, perhaps even if it had a reputation for eerie events or characters.

As I was cycling out of the village I couldn’t help but notice a little thatched cottage. Around the doorway and windows there bloomed a delightful rambling rose of deepest crimson. A woman was standing in the garden, a pair of secateurs gripped tightly in her right hand and she was doing battle with a large buddleia that filled one corner of her narrow strip of land.

I was astounded at the beautiful colours of the flowers that seemed to fill and cover every inch of space on both sides of the gravel path that led to the small lopsided front door. I plucked up courage and announced my presence to the lady. I complimented her on her lovely floral display and out of curiosity asked her if she had a secret to her success.

Smiling, she answered that she could only surmise that her home made fertiliser was the key. Continuing her explanation she mentioned that her husband had always tried to get a nice garden but since he had gone she had been very successful. He would never see it, though he had been a great influence. I persuaded her to tell me the secret ingredient and tapping the side of her nose, she said as if in confidence.

“Blood and bone my dear, plain old blood and bone.”