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terror and dope, a wide-eyed witness to every rotting crease and crevice in Mr Hedges decaying face. A huge dry flake of skin floated down from his mottled brow. She just knew it was going to land in her mouth; and then she felt it land. She tasted it. She wanted to be sick. She needed to vomit, her body was already in spasm but could she risk being sick? What if she choked? Somebody would have to help her if she were sick. Surely, he’d have to stop if she were sick! Mr Hedges snapped her mouth shut and squeezed her nose with a deft pinch. Creaking like the decks of an old boat he turned away from her. He stiffly picked another instrument from the trolley and then swung laboriously back with the groan of aging ropes. Evelyn squeezed her lips tight together but again the fingers forced her mouth open and crept inside. A large metal cylinder flashed before her, shifting in size and shape as it moved closer. Evelyn’s weeping eyes managed to focus for a moment. It was a thick metal needle screwed into a syringe. The galvanised scorpion stung her pallet twice. At last the dead hands loosened their grip. The corpse stood before her, fixed to the spot, its jaw open upon its withered chest, the hands pinned stiffly to its side, motionless, it’s dead eyes staring back into its own skull. The tiny grey crown of Jane’s head bobbed into view above the corpse’s right shoulder and then disappeared below it. Evelyn heard an odd mechanical whirr, as if a dry wheeled treadle were being forced into life and then Jane’s head appeared again and the whirring grew louder and faster and then