The Translation of the Bones Read Online Free PDF Page A

candlewick while Melinda screened the new flame with her hand. Melinda carried the candle to the chapel and raised it to the crucifix. It flickered in the darkness, throwing the shadows of the two girls across the wall. They could just make out the silver reliquaries behind locked bars in niches in the wall, a painting to one side of a figure they could not identify. The pink legs and feet of God. But there was no blood. Kiti and Melinda were disappointed. Although what more could one expect from a silly Englishwoman who had given herself a big blow on the head? Then Kiti screamed. And Melinda too. Oh God, they screamed together. Did you see that? It was far too frightening. Melinda dropped the candle and they both fled from the church.
    Felix Morrison spotted his mother hurrying across the pitch and felt a small constriction in his heart. She was late and the under-elevens were already being thrashed, as usual, having missed their first conversion and a penalty kick. But that wouldn’t worry his mother, she never seemedto mind whether the team won or lost. In fact, she never even seemed to know which side was winning or losing until the match ended and the victors cheered. Felix had tried to explain the rules to her a hundred times but she still got them muddled up. The important thing is that you enjoy yourself and do your best, she had told him once, and he had not wanted to upset her with the truth, which was that winning really mattered. In the harsh world of his boarding school no amount of motherly solace could save a boy from being a loser.
    In keeping with custom, Felix only nodded curtly to his mother when she reached the touchline, and ran past her after a disappearing ball. She gave him a little wave. That she was there, though, that she’d made it when he hadn’t been sure she’d be able to, gave Felix a rush of strength, as if the sluggish blood in his veins had all of a sudden been displaced by something warmer and more pure. Ichor, he said to himself under his breath. The clear fluid that flowed in the veins of gods. The horrible hard ball was now cannoning toward him and could not be evaded unless Felix were to turn tail and head in the opposite direction. With the strength of heroes flooding through him, Felix lunged for it, grabbed it and ran for the tryline.
    Stella kept her eyes trained on her child as he was tackled, stopped breathing as he disappeared beneath the ruck, breathed again when he emerged, without the ball but with his nose unbloodied. This barbarous pursuit, she thought, why do we do such terrible things to our sons? Rufus had been a rugger Blue at Oxford.
    Some of the under-elevens, who could, apparently, be almost twelve, were nearly as tall as men and growing bulky.Felix was by far the smallest of the team, a child so thin you might think you saw the gleam of bone through his white skin. A child made of lines and angles, the nape of his neck heartbreaking, his new front teeth like trespassers in his mouth. When the game was over he ran across to Stella. She looked beautiful, he noted, as she always did, much nicer-looking than the other mothers. She knew not to kiss him. Match tea, he said, I’m sorry, Mum. We have to have it with the visiting team. That’s fine, she said. I hope it’s good. You must be starving after all that brilliant playing.
    I am, said Felix. It’s a bit less than two weeks, I think, to the end of term?
    That’s right. About ten days, she said. I’ll see you then. He nodded quickly and turned back to his team, now streaming off toward the changing rooms. She watched him go, yearning after him, the mud-stained hollows behind his fragile knees.
    Father Diamond, readying the church for Saturday’s vigil mass, saw the candle lying on the floor outside the Chapel of the Holy Souls. People can be so careless, he said to himself. The candle was no longer burning but it had evidently been lit; it could have caused a fire. He picked it up and stuck it in the