In the Flesh Read Online Free PDF

entertainment.'

     

      The table broke up into a cacophony of opinions. After two hours of polite gossip the dinner-party had suddenly caught fire. Listening to the debate rage Helen was sorry she hadn't had time to have the photographs processed and printed; the graffiti would have added further fuel to this exhilarating row. It was Purcell, as usual, who was the last to weigh in with his point of view; and again, as usual it was devastating.

     

     

      'Of course, Helen, my sweet - he began, that affected weariness in his voice edged with the anticipation

     

    of controversy '- your witnesses could all be lying, couldn't they?'

     

      The talking around the table dwindled, and all heads turned in Purcell's direction. Perversely, he ignored the attention he'd garnered, and turned to whisper in the ear of the boy he'd brought - a new passion who would, on past form, be discarded in a matter of weeks for another pretty urchin.

     

      'Lying?' Helen said. She could feel herself bristling at the observation already, and Purcell had only spoken a dozen words.

     

    'Why not?' the other replied, lifting his glass of wine to his lips. 'Perhaps they're all weaving some elaborate fiction or other. The story of the spastic's mutilation in the public toilet. The murder of the old man. Even that hook. All quite familiar elements. You must be aware that there's something traditional about these atrocity stories. One used to exchange them all the time; there was a certain fission in them. Something competitive maybe, in attempting to find a new detail to add to the collective fiction; a fresh twist that would render the tale that little bit more appalling when you passed it on.'

     

      'It may be familiar to you - said Helen defensively. Purcell was always so poised; it irritated her. Even if there were validity in his argument - which she doubted - she was damned if she'd concede it. ' - I've never heard this kind of story before.'

     

      'Have you not?' said Purcell, as though she were admitting to illiteracy. 'What about the lovers and the escaped lunatic, have you heard that one?'

     

     

      'I've heard that...' Daniel said.

     

      'The lover is disemboweled - usually by a hook-handed man - and the body left on the top of the car, while the fiancé cowers inside. It's a cautionary tale, warning of the evils of rampant heterosexuality.' The joke won a round of laughter from everyone but Helen. 'These stories are very common.'

     

     

      'So you're saying that they're telling me lies - ' she protested.

     

     

      'Not lies, exactly - '

     

     

      'You said lies.'

     

      'I was being provocative,' Purcell returned, his placatory tone more enraging than ever. 'I don't mean to imply there's any serious mischief in it. But you must concede that so far you haven't met a single witness. All these events have happened at some unspecified date to some unspecified person. They are reported at several removes. They occurred at best to the brothers of friends of distant relations. Please consider the possibility that perhaps these events do not exist in the real world at all, but are merely titillation for bored housewives - Helen didn't make an argument in return, for the simple reason that she lacked one. Purcell's point about the conspicuous absence of witnesses was perfectly sound; she herself had wondered about it. It was strange, too, the way the women in Ruskin Court had speedily consigned the old man's murder to another estate, as though these atrocities always occurred just out of sight - round the next corner, down the next passageway - but never here.

     

     

      'So why?' said Bernadette.

     

     

    'Why what?' Archie puzzled.

     

     

    'The stories. Why tell these horrible stories if they're not true?'

     

      'Yes,' said Helen, throwing the controversy back into Purcell's ample lap. 'Why?'

     

      Purcell preened himself, aware that his entry into the debate had