[King rings, delirious, ecstatic, victorious!]

‘Ring-ring! Ring-ring! Ring-ring! Ring-ring! Ring-ring! Ring-ring! Ring-ring!

‘RING-RING! RING-RING! RING-RING! RING-RING! RING-RING! RING-RING!’

Then, suddenly, he stops.

[King.]

‘Eh?’

[Head twizzle.]

He becomes horribly aware of another presence in the ‘sitting room’.

Oh dear. It is Bitch, back from ‘outside’, still in her ‘coat’, and she is holding the ‘phone receiver’ in one hand (the curly wire stretched straight as it distends from its ‘hallway’ ‘table’ position and all the way into the ‘sitting room’).

[Bitch.]

!

[King.]

‘Oops!’

[Bitch, incandescent with rage.]

‘*** ** ***, King? *******? *** ** **** ***? ***, King? *** *****?!’

[‘Was it you, King? Ringing? Has it been you? You, King? All along?!’]

[Baldo speaks.]

‘WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!’

[Brief inhale.]

‘WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!’

[Brief inhale.]

‘WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!’

Splat!

Erk!

Thud.

All manner of chaos promptly ensues.

27

Miss Carla Hahn

Two things. They may seem completely insignificant – stupid, even – but I should probably mention them up front. First, the digits. The four digits. Orla’s special number: 4.0.0.4.

I double-checked that old stump on my way back out of Mulberry. Remember earlier, when I pulled off all the ivy from the trunk and I thought I saw …? Etched deep into the wood? Just before I was stung by that vile insect and then Mrs Barrow …? It’s actually been playing on my mind ever since.

Well (sound the horns!), I hadn’t just imagined it! Because there they were, large as life: those four digits, cut deep into the bark. Which led me to thinking that maybe it wasn’t just about Orla, after all (the dream, the whole, strange ‘number’ fixation). Maybe they’d been there for years and years. Since the war. Since I was a kid. Carved into the trunk by … by an American serviceman, possibly … Although, from what I can recollect (and this wasn’t a big topic in the family home during my childhood) there were mainly Canadians stationed in these parts during WW2.

I remember something about the Americans writing their dates the other way around, but can’t be sure if they put the year before the month (i.e. 1940.04), or the month before the day. Either way, that wouldn’t mean the Canadians did it too, and even if this theory did hold water, the Yanks only joined the war in 1941.

I mean Orla could always have carved the numbers there herself, I suppose. Which wouldn’t really solve the problem …

And the second thing? The second little detail? After I arrived back home (soaking wet from a sudden downpour) I was getting changed – grabbing something clean and dry from the old wardrobe in the spare bedroom – when I noticed a small pool of dark sticky goo on the old oak planks at the base of the thing. I promptly knelt down to investigate, tentatively prodding my finger into the syrupy mess and giving it a quick sniff only to discover … you guessed it: eucalyptus oil! I clambered to my feet and started searching for the source. Eventually (after climbing on to a chair) I located a tiny, old, brown bottle in a cloth bag on the top shelf which is (and always has been) full of Tilda’s stuff: several hand-made felt hats, a moth-eaten Welsh blanket in such an advanced state of disrepair that even I wouldn’t consider using it, an old family kilt, an ancient mauve-coloured lambswool jumper etc.