Fremlin By Horror Haunted

Stories
Main
ISBN: 978-0-571-31267-2
Verlag: Faber & Faber
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 166 Seiten

By Horror Haunted (1974) was Celia Fremlin's second collection of stories, and it runs the gamut of her many talents. The nightmarish plots, wit, elegance, and domestic details with an undertow of unease have lost none of their edge. 'Her Number On It' is a compelling portrait of kleptomania; the 'Unsuspected Talent' of a dissatisfied wife has dangerous consequences; while 'Don't Tell Cissie' is a superbly original ghost story. 'The reader is lulled in to a false knowledge of events... At the last moment the events are turned inside out and the actions are re-interpreted nastily, chillingly or with penetrating realism.' Catholic Herald 'A really delightful collection of short stories...the suspense, in some of them, is almost painful... [Fremlin] is the complete mistress of an extremely difficult art form.' Huddersfield Day Examiner

Celia Fremlin (1914-2009) was born in Kent and spent her childhood in Hertfordshire, before studying at Oxford (whilst working as a charwoman). During World War Two, she served as an air-raid warden before becoming involved with the Mass Observation Project, collaborating on a study of women workers, War Factory. In 1942 she married Elia Goller, moved to Hampstead and had three children. In 1968, their youngest daughter committed suicide aged 19; a month later, her husband also killed himself. In the wake of these tragedies, Fremlin briefly relocated to Geneva. In 1985, she married Leslie Minchin, with whom she lived until his death in 1999. Over four decades, Fremlin wrote sixteen celebrated novels - including the classic summer holiday seaside mystery Uncle Paul (1959) - one book of poetry and three story collections. Her debut The Hours Before Dawnwon the Edgar Award in 1960.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fremlin, Celia

Leseproben

HER NUMBER ON IT

JUST CATCHING SIGHT of the woman for a second time didn’t prove that she was a Store Detective! Well, of course it didn’t! Clutching the carrier-bag with a hand already slippery with sweat, Martha forced herself to maintain her strolling, leisurely pace … past the glittering rails of cocktail dresses … past the sumptuous evening skirts of velvet or brocade … slowly … slowly does it!… If she once let herself quicken her steps by no matter how small a fraction, she knew that she would be lost. Panic would seize her, she would break into a run, make a dash for the escalators … and by that time it would be the whole shop that would be after her, not merely this slim, elegant woman in the oatmeal trouser-suit….

“After her!” How ridiculous! Martha struggled to control her galloping imagination, to think beyond the wild hammering of guilt in her brain, and to consider, coolly, the factual, commonsense reality of her situation.

No one had seen her take the dress. Indeed, in the raucous, blood-red darkness of Young Ideas, with pop-music blaring out, and the long-haired boys and girls roaming the gangways between the clothes like herds of jungle-creatures—in such a setting it would have been hard enough for anyone to notice anything, let alone to bother about such a dull, middle-aged customer as herself. She had been all alone behind the tight-packed rail of maxi-dresses at the far end of the room, out of sight of everyone, and even with time to make her choice. No one had seen her, either, as she slipped out from behind the rail with her spoils; and now here she was, already half the length of the store away from the scene of her crime, in a different department altogether. And as to the woman in the oatmeal suit—why, it was coincidence, sheer coincidence, that she should have turned up in this department as well! She wasn’t even looking in Martha’s direction—hadn’t been, either, on that earlier occasion, when they’d encountered each other on the way out of Young Ideas.

What would the woman have seen, anyway, even if she had looked? Just one more plump, smartly-dressed, middle-aged woman strolling through Cocktail and Evening Wear with a carrier-bag in her hand. Exactly like all the other middle-aged women who had come shopping in their thousands this winter Thursday afternoon. All of them smart … all of them with carrier-bags in their hands … and all of them—well, an awful lot of them, anyway—with lines of tension round their mouths and a look of furtive anxiety in their eyes, even though they hadn’t—well, Martha presumed they hadn’t—stolen anything at all.

So there was nothing to mark her out from the rest of them. Absolutely nothing. Stupid to allow her heart to race like this, her hands to sweat! All she had to do was to keep dawdling along—she was in Day Dresses now—pausing to examine a neckline here … a price-tag there … just keep her nerve, and all would be well!

At last, the escalator! As she set foot on the moving track, and saw the Ground Floor gliding up to meet her, Martha felt the kind of thankfulness and gratitude that the pilot of a damaged plane must feel as he catches sight of the perfect spot for an emergency landing. For the crowds down there on the Ground Floor were so vast, and packed so tight in all the aisles, that surely all possibility of detection would soon be over! Down, down she sailed, diving towards that milling anonymous sea of humanity like a fish escaping back into its native element.

Safe! Safe! In her relief, Martha almost skipped off the end of the escalator, and as she began to battle her way through the crowds towards the main entrance, she was aware of an exultation that went far beyond the satisfaction of having successfully acquired an £8.50 dress without paying for it. It was as if what she had done was some kind of a triumph of the human spirit; a slap in the face of middle age. It was even an argument of sorts—a clinching, final argument in the dreary, long-drawn out conflict with her husband.

“See, Leonard?” her theft seemed to be saying to him, in gleeful triumph. “See? That’ll show you!”—though what he was to “see”, and how the theft was going to “show” him, she had no idea. Especially since—God willing—Leonard was never going to know anything about it at all!

Already the entrance doors were in sight. Beyond them she could see the glittering dusk of Oxford Street, lit up like fairy-land against the coming night. “I’ve done it! I’ve done it!” she found herself exulting, in wordless joy, as she pushed and squeezed her way towards the jam-packed entrance. “It’s worked! It’s succeeded!”—and in that very moment, just as the revolving doors were drawing her in, she became aware of the woman in the oatmeal suit, not a yard away from her.

*

Martha did not know how far along Oxford Street she had been running before her breath gave out. Not very far, probably, for her muscles and her wind were not what they had been once. Not what they had been before—well, before security, and Leonard, and a nice home, had got their grip on her. Before television, and chocolates, and over-lavish cocktail parties had become the pattern of her days. “Everything a woman could want!”—Leonard had once launched the hackneyed reproach at her in the course of one of their weary rows; and of course he had been right. She had got everything—and how, over the years, it had sucked the strength out of her muscles, the zest out of her soul! The strength and the zest which once, long ago …

“Excuse me, Madam….”

Maybe the words were not addressed to Martha at all. Or maybe, even if they were, it was only some stranger asking the way to Selfridges…. She would never know. For before the sentence could be completed, she was off and away, battering her way once more through the crowds, pushing, dodging, worming her way through the interstices of this human maze, until, at last, she found herself at the entrance to an Underground station.

Which station it was, she did not know and did not care. Headlong, she plunged into its seething, anonymous security; and in almost no time at all, it seemed, she was on the train, standing, wedged tight against her fellow-passengers, and with the carrier-bag still clutched grimly in her left hand.

But the sense of exultation was gone now. The triumph—the exhilaration—the excitement—had all drained out of her, and she felt sanity returning, like a recurrent illness.

Why?—Why had she done it? She’d had plenty of money in her bag—Leonard had never been mean. It wasn’t as if she’d even wanted the dress—it was ridiculous, four sizes too small at least, and years and years too young for her, with its frilly, scooped-out neckline and little puff sleeves! Why had she done such a thing—risking the career of her hard-working lawyer husband, at the same time as bringing total, irremediable humiliation upon herself? She could almost see already the headlines in the papers … “WIFE OF WELL-KNOWN BARRISTER IN COURT FOR SHOP-LIFTING”—and she could almost quote by heart the article which would follow … “victim of a neurotic compulsion …” “psychiatric treatment” … “not uncommon symptom among women who feel themselves useless and unloved….”

Useless and unloved. If any of the neighbours didn’t know it already, they would know it now! Or would do, if she wasn’t very, very careful …! Rousing herself, Martha glanced along the coach to reassure herself that there was no oatmeal trouser-suit in sight—no official-looking personage peering covertly in her direction….

She was surprised, faintly, to notice how much the rush-hour crowds had already thinned out. There were even some seats vacant. Thankfully, still clutching her carrier-bag, Martha sank into the nearest one. Only now had she become aware of how tired she was … how much her feet hurt. Indeed, her whole body ached with tiredness after her day’s shopping—if “shopping” was the word! She leaned back, gratefully, on the upholstered seat, and closed her eyes.

*

Had she dozed off? Martha sat up with a jolt, and with an uneasy feeling that a long, long time had passed. Where had they got to …? Had they passed Hammersmith Broadway, where she had to change …? Peering out through the grimy window, she caught a momentary glimpse of an ill-lit platform, dingy and narrow, and crowded with a confusion of people; but before she had been able to ascertain the name of the station, it was gone, and they were thundering on into the darkness.

They must have passed Hammersmith long ago! That grimy, poorly-lit station they had just left was wholly unfamiliar. They must be nearing the end of the line—or—an even more disturbing thought—maybe she was travelling in the wrong direction altogether? Maybe, in her state of confusion and panic, she had got on to an East-bound train by mistake?

Yes, that must be it! How infuriating! Now she would have to cross over to the other side of the line, perhaps wait ages for a return train…. She would be late home, that was certain! Leonard would be home before her; he would be waiting, irritable, censorious,...