A Lovely Day to Die

by Celia Fremlin

  Are you Christians? You believe in the Second Coming?

  … Could be the New Messiah, d’you think?

  … You believe in Prayer?

  … Turn water into wine, can he?

  … Sent to Redeem the World ..?

  … Not some sort of a trick, is it? Uri Geller sort of stuff?

  … Or Levitation? Has he had lessons in Yoga?

  … Or Transcendental Meditation?

  *

  But to all these questions the tiresome couple just shook their heads, helplessly; they stood there dumb as two fish amid the clamour. It was going to be impossible to get a decent interview out of either one of them, so dim they seemed, so slow in the uptake. Daft, really, as if they couldn’t take in a word that was said to them! And, in a way, they couldn’t. The reporters were asking all the wrong questions anyway, nothing to do with what had actually happened. Amid all the hubbub, Arnold and Patricia stood silent, each of them with a hand still clutching the child-sized spinal-carriage which had gone with them everywhere for nearly seven years, and they watched their son with such joy, such thankfulness, as is beyond all imagining.

  It wasn’t that he was walking on the water; that was nothing. It was that he was walking at all.

  Copyright

  This ebook edition first published in 2014

  by Faber and Faber Ltd

  Bloomsbury House

  74–77 Great Russell Street

  London WC1B 3DA

  All rights reserved

  © Celia Fremlin, 1984

  Biographical Sketch © Chris Simmons, 2014

  Preface © Rebecca Tope, 2014

  Of the stories in this volume, ‘A Lovely Day to Die’, ‘Dangerous Sport’, ‘The Holiday’, ‘The Bonus Years’, ‘A Case of Maximum Need’ and ‘Etiquette for Dying’ have appeared in the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. ‘High Dive’ has appeared in Woman, ‘The Post-Graduate Thesis’ in Verdict of Thirteen, edited by Julian Symons (Faber), and ‘The Woman Who Had Everything’ in John Creasey’s Crime Collection, edited by Herbert Harris (Gollancz).

  The right of Celia Fremlin to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly

  ISBN 978–0–571–31284–9