Totentanz

When the Stranger came for her again, it was Thursday in the early afternoon and Mrs. Green was dreaming of roses. The women used to bring them from the countryside, bundle them up to sell by the fistful or parcel them out in ones and twos for poor lovers suddenly moved to part with a coin. Yellow roses, the rich gold of saffron buns and evening sunlight on water. The soft, delicious scent enveloping her senses, petals stroking the nub of her nose—a distant trill, like some strange bird in the distant forest—the glimpsed profile of her mother’s face—oh, that’s the bell—but come back, I haven’t seen you in so long—the bell again, pulling her back into the waking world, a new-old, cold country and a new millennium.

Whoever it was rang the bell again for good measure and then stopped, presumably waiting outside. Mrs. Green was startled but not surprised to find herself on the little downstairs sofa, where she had drifted off after lunch, the ready meal half-eaten in front of her on an enamel tray commemorating the Royal Wedding. She had been opening her post, nothing very exciting except for an early birthday card from one of her grandchildren who had wished her a happy ninety-fifth birthday, though this year she would in fact be turning ninety-six. She could no longer remember what age she had put on which forms and which lies she had told to whom and supposed it no longer mattered much to anyone except her, anyway....