After the Storm Read Online Free PDF

peak of one of the railings which lined the steps to the front door and through the thickness of her glove she could feel the flakes of old paint first stick into it and then give way beneath her restless thumb. The tip of the railing was not as sharp as had first seemed and it had flat edges which swept to a modest point.
    ‘D’you think if you fell on these they’d go right through you?’ she asked her father. ‘I mean so they come out the other side.’
    He was on the step above her and seemed not to hear. His back was towards her, his face pressed close to the keyhole.
    ‘Don’t be daft Annie,’ mocked Don. ‘You’d have to be right tender and skinny to have them go through. Most people would have ’em stick halfway through and they’d wobble about with their eyes popping out.’
    ‘Until you knocked them off in three throws,’ Annie retorted. ‘Hey, that would make a good fairground game. Roll up, roll up, knock off the gentleman with the funny hat and win yourself a – a what, Don?’
    ‘Clip round the ear if you go on like this,’ he whispered, nodding his head and pointing it towards their father. They sniggered together and tried to count the railings from the bottom to the top even though the gloom made it difficult. Archie looked at them in confusion. They had forgotten him and he was glad for he hadn’t known how to react to their extraordinary conversation. He could not remember discussing impaled bodies with Albert as a child, far less attempts to dislodge them once they were ‘set up’ as these children of his had suggested. Mind you, he and Albert had never been close enough to discuss anything. The key was by now in the frozen lock though it was stiff to turn. Peering closer, working it backwards and forwards, he muttered:
    ‘I’ll have to get Elisabeth to oil this thing. It really is too slack of her.’
    Annie wondered why he didn’t just breathe on it instead of bellyaching about what other people should have done. He’s got a pair of hands hasn’t he, she thought, and in her irritation could no longer be bothered to count the railings.
    She moved her toes inside her boots, her feet ached with the cold but her toes were empty of feeling and seemed heavy in their numbness. She rose and fell, pressing all her weight on to them and longed to squeeze their cold dampness between warm hands. She felt Don close to her, his breath showing white as he blew on his hands. The door loomed large as they grew accustomed to the dimness and Annie’s eyes hurt as she struggled to follow the shadowed bulging shape hanging on the door which minute by minute seemed to sharpen and move even as she looked.
    Well, she thought, fancy having a great big claw knocker on your door and then spending all night fiddling with the keyhole. She stood staring hard, until the knocker disappeared in a blur of cross-eyes and she felt triumphant at reducing the bunched brass to nothingness. As the door finally swung open she began to move with it. Don felt her sway and shook her arm.
    ‘Don’t be stupid,’ he whispered in her ear and Annie felt the sniggers rise and shake her shoulders. Oh no, she prayed, don’t let me start again else I’ll never stop and she wondered where the giggles were coming from.
    ‘Come along then,’ their father directed, standing in the dark of the hall and the laughter drained from her and she held back. Why should she go first to be swallowed up by this strange dark house? Don could, the canny beggar. She twisted from his grasp and stood sideways, her eyes refusing to move until he had passed. Her feet curled in her boots for a better grip and her legs braced for battle.
    ‘Come along Annie,’ her father ordered shortly. ‘Ladies before gentlemen. Donald is quite right.’
    Annie raised her chin in a fury of frustration which contracted her scalp but she could do nothing but obey. It was two against one. Turning she squelched hard down on Don’s foot, twisting as she did so and