Read Online Touch by Graham Mort - Free Book Online Page B

walks to where it lies, almost slipping down the slope as he goes. Snow creaks under his rubber boots. He picks the creature up by its brush. It’s a dog fox and its body is surprisingly heavy. Then that smell of fox, rank and sharp and feral. Bloody foam has already spread across its muzzle. Its eyes are dim, glaucous in death. Daniel climbs back over the stile awkwardly, the gun in one hand, the fox dangling from the other. He trails the corpse as he goes. Snow is driving strongly now. He can only just make out the farmhouse lights. A trail of blood falls into his footprints. They’ll freeze overnight and he’ll find his own trail in the morning, strewn with smudged scarlet flowers.
    At the yard gate, the dogs go wild at the scent of fox. Daniel ignores their row. He takes the corpse into the kitchen. The cat hisses under his feet and flees. Daniel stands the shotgun in a corner and, with one hand, spreads an old newspaper on the armchair opposite his. He lays the fox in it. Its ruined face, its rictus snarl looking towards the door as if expecting a visitor.
    The fire has burned low. Daniel drops on another log and sparks shoot towards the hearth. He slips off his Wellingtons and stands them at the back door, in readiness. Two ewes have still to lamb. He puts his hands into his coat pocket to find the unfired cartridges, weighing them in his hand. They’re dry and papery, their brass percussion caps cold to the touch. That touch of ice, numbing everything. There is something perfect about their weight and proportion. He empties the breech and throws the spent casings on the fire. Then he locks the gun and the spare cartridges away. They shan’t tempt him again.
    Only then does he ease himself into his own armchair opposite the fox. The room is warm after the fells. The fire is catching. Daniel takes his mother’s ring from the table and slips it onto his swollen finger. His cheeks burn. He needs that shave. Tomorrow, maybe. He’s tired now. His eyelids droop towards sleep.
    Â 
The meadows are shorn of hay, burned to bronze stubble. A rope pulls taut on the pear tree under a girl’s weight. Effie’s hair is haloed in the sun of a summer fifty years gone by. The lightning bolt has not yet split the tree. Sap rises in its leaves each spring to make them green. To make the tree blossom and bear a few half-ripe pears. That’s what Annie’s breasts had reminded him of the first time he’d covered them with his hands. There’d been no honeymoon. Just an afternoon’s work. Then entering the bedroom, tired and expectant. Pine boards creaking under his heels. His arms glowing from sun and a cold-water wash. Annie watching him from her pillow, smiling with dark eyes.
    Now Annie turns the colour of smoke. Her white hair flows through his fingers. Snowflakes slide down the window. Darkness presses against the electric light inside. The dogs are silent, though sheep still bleat from the fells. The fox gazes towards the door.
    When Daniel wakes, he holds up his hand to stare at Effie’s ring. Wind is sucking at the chimney. It stirs up ash, kindling a glow from the hollowed log. The fox’s blood has dried across his knuckles. He leans forward to touch its coat, stifling a yawn.

Ducklings
    Lucy’s mother was working at the kitchen table, pulling the bad leaves from a lettuce. From where she sat in the living room Lucy could see her standing in a pool of sunlight. Her strong brown calves and ankles stood up firmly from open-toed sandals. Lucy looked down at her own slender, white legs. Her mother went brown so easily. It was vexing. Like the way she so deftly pulled the leaves from the lettuce and shouted over her shoulder.
    â€˜Do we really need the television on in this weather? Can’t you play outside?’
    Lucy glanced at the screen. The television was on and she’d drawn down the blinds so that the colours showed up better. But she