Read Online Dead Man's Embers by Mari Strachan - Free Book Online

‘Whole-time. We’re doing this census for this exact time here on the nineteenth of June and never mind what you were doing a week ago or what you think you’ll be doing after the summer. Whole-time. Write it down, Non.’
    Non scratches the words on the form. A photograph is a picture of a few moments captured by the camera when they dare not move, but this census is capturing a picture in words where they have jumped about like . . . like fleas. Does that mean it will be blurred? She does not want to hand down a blurred photograph.
    And what will be happening in another ten years’ time when it is done again? Where will they all be? It is hard to remember where they all were ten years ago. Davey married to Grace with no idea that she would soon be dead. Wil started at school and Meg playingwith her dolls at Grace’s knee. No thought of Osian on anyone’s mind. Gwydion just about to start at the County School with his future stretching before him, a clever and graceful boy already. And she, a student teacher in lodgings, already at nineteen, it seemed, meant for a single life, looking after other people’s children. No children for her or she would be dead. And it is true that the descendants she imagines will not be flesh of her flesh.
    â€˜Next column, Non,’ Davey says. ‘It’s easy, look, carpenter for me, housewife for you, apprentice carpenter for Wil.’
    Dip, scratch, dip, scratch. Non fills the form with her bold handwriting. Her father insisted on absolute clarity when she wrote first the Latin names, then the Welsh, on the labels for the herbs and concoctions and decoctions and ointments and pills that he made, for fear of anyone mistakenly taking or applying the wrong and dangerous remedy.
    â€˜Then put Albert’s name down in the next column as my employer and Wil’s, then the workshop address in the last column.’
    â€˜But Albert’s never there, you say he lets you do what you like,’ Meg says.
    â€˜He still employs me, he pays my wages,’ Davey says. ‘He still puts food in your mouth and clothes on your back.’
    â€˜It’s your hard work that does that,’ Non says as she blots the ink.
    â€˜Is that it? Is it finished now?’ Wil stands up. ‘I’ve got to see Eddie, Tada. I promised.’
    â€˜Two more columns,’ Non says, ‘but you can go, Wil. One’s to say which language we speak – Welsh or English or both – and the other’s putting an X by all you children’s ages here. I don’t know why it has to be done again when it’s already on the form. Ah, well. See you later, Wil. Try not to wake Osian and Gwydion if you’re very late.’
    Wil vanishes from the parlour and a moment later they see and hear him leaping down the front steps and running down the hill.
    â€˜Oh – to be footloose and fancy free,’ Gwydion says, making a face at Meg that makes her giggle.
    Non gives the form to Davey for his signature. The tremor has vanished from his hand and he signs it neatly.
    He would have made such a performance of it, the old Davey. He would have had them all laughing at him. The last thing Non wants is still to be like this in ten years’ time. She has to find what is troubling him. It is something more than that wretched nurse, that Angela, she is sure of it. How would she go about finding someone who served with him in the War? Would the War Office tell her who his comrades were? Maybe she can concoct a story, pretend he is ill and needs to see his old army friends. She does not know where to begin. And she has no idea where it would all end. But anything would be better than this. Wouldn’t it?

10
    She recalls what she had thought last night, anything would be better than this. Is it a memory from last night that has brought on Davey’s attack this morning? She has not seen the start of one of his attacks; she cannot fathom what might