Mary Ann and Bill Read online

  When he up and dashed from her, dragging the eiderdown with him, she threw herself full length on it, and the result was disastrous. Pulled to an abrupt stop his never very steady legs gave way and he overbalanced and landed against Fanny’s feet, and in the process of scrambling up again he dashed between them, and over she went.

  Corny was standing within a yard of her, and springing forward he grabbed at her as she fell, hoping to break her fall; and luckily he did. It was also lucky for him that the old chair was behind him and he found himself almost pushed through the sagging bottom of it with Fanny’s weight on top of him.

  There was a moment of utter silence in the room; then it was broken by a rumble of laughter, a rumble that could only erupt from a chest as deep as Fanny’s.

  Corny, from his cramped, contorted position, had the wind knocked out of him, but the shaking body of his granny raised in him a chuckle, then a laugh, then a roar. And now Rose Mary and David, each tugging at Fanny’s hands, joined in with a high squealing glee.

  And Mary Ann?

  Mary Ann was lying on the eiderdown, her face buried in the crook of her elbow. When she raised her head it was to look into the eyes of Bill, who was prone once more, his muzzle flat out, staring at her. She now looked about her, at the shambles the room represented, then ceilingwards, at the feathers floating and settling everywhere, then she looked at the huddle of her family in and around the battered armchair, and she joined her voice to theirs. She laughed and laughed until she felt that if she didn’t stop she’d be ill. But it was cathartic laughter; it was what they needed to dispel the last of the nightmare. And it could never have come about except at Fanny’s. Oh, thank God for Fanny…And Bill. Oh, yes. She put out her hand towards Bill and he wriggled his body forward. Oh yes, and Bill.

  The End