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‘Listen sweetheart, whois this Gerald? Please tell me, so I know what to say when I callthe police.’

Before Carla could openher mouth, Tamsin intervened on her behalf, ‘Gerald’s her doctor,Helena, and her doctor appears to be mad.’

Carla heard the newsrace round the party – mad doctor!

Helena produced aglacial smile. ‘Well, if you don’t want to go back to hospitalbecause your doctor is mad, you don’t have to. But dear, you can’tstay here, now can you? So, tell me, what is it exactly that youwant to do?’

Carla clutched at herstomach as the pain dazed her for a moment, then, collecting herthoughts, she made a supreme effort to carry on like nothing waswrong and to answer the question.

‘I want to supply allthe flowers for your funeral,’ she wailed. ‘So before you die,could you please call Rupert Nodes. You can’t go wrong – he wasestablished in eighteen ninety-nine.’

And with that she sankto the floor in agony.

Once down there, sheassumed the position – it always eased the pain to get her knees asclose as possible to her ears.

Apart from her gruntsand snorts, an utter and complete silence descended on theroom.

Till Tamsin spoke, thatis. Or rather, screeched, ‘My God, she’s gone into labour!’

Carla dropped her legsin alarm and also screeched. ‘What?’

She gaped at thetowering figures around her. The guy with the bongos clutched themto his chest in horror. Phoebe reached out to take the lugubriousman’s arm, but the lugubrious man took a deft step out of reach andshe gripped the freestanding lamp instead. And Juliet – Juliet puther hands to her sheet-white temples now and emitted aspine-tingling shriek.

‘Dear God, not on myfloor!’

This banshee cry sent aconvulsion through the crowd. Many were galvanised into action.Amongst cries for towels and boiling water and – Call the firebrigade, the heftiest guests, not all guys, lurched forward inorder to lift Carla and carry her into the bedroom. Though some ofthem tried to take her to the kitchen instead. As she receded intothe darkness of the bedroom, Carla saw Philip holding onto Julietwhile calling for an ambulance on his mobile. Several guests werealso calling for an ambulance on their mobiles. But then, shereflected, you could never have enough ambulances, could you?

Carla was laid groaningon the bed. She closed her eyes to stop the room spinning, and thenshe must have blacked out, because all at once she was beinggrappled by two ambulance medics.

They made a right jobof getting her onto the stretcher, groaning louder than thepatient. After a moment to recover, they heaved her up, and stampedout into the living room like they were carrying a pianoinstead.

To get through to thestairs they now had to pass through an awkward succession ofdoorways. At their first attempt they got stuck and there wasnothing for it but to back out and try again. But then they foundthe stretcher had lodged tight.

‘Nige!’

‘Vern!’

‘Back!’

‘Give us a chancethen!’

‘Just push!’

Vern pushed, Nigepulled and with Carla shouting, ‘What the fuck are you doing tome?’ they lurched free and pitched back into the livingroom.

People leapt out of theway, fearing for life and limb. Carla screamed, finding herselfhurtling towards the window. Unhindered, Nige and Vern stumbledbackwards right across the room, gaining momentum as they went.They crashed, with tooth-jarring force, into the dining table.Carla heard the thing squeal and scrape on its pointy legs andturning, she saw Phoebe’s metal candelabra topple, bounce and rolloff. Tamsin, staring wide-eyed at the unfolding drama, was standingin wrong place at the wrong time. The candelabra felled her in oneand pinioned her to the floor, where she lay, screaming andbloodied.

Carla squeezed her eyesshut tight as she heard Nige say, ‘Better bring her too.’

Merciful darkness sweptover her then like a wave of warm water. She seemed to swirl roundand round till a hand reached out and held her arm. All at once shewas back at the shop. The plants were grotesquely overgrown. Shecould barely breathe in the fetid air. The hand gripped her armmore tightly.

It was Juliet.

‘Carla dear, what anabsolutely divine little place you have here. It’s just so sweetand lovely. Look at all these fabulous flowers. Why, this is justheaven – you’re so lucky, you really are.’ Juliet was wearing thatlittle smile that all her snooty customers wore when they claimedthey envied her.

Carla couldn’t bear anymore.

‘Flowers! Flowers!Flowers! I hate the bastards! This shop is the bane of my life andI can’t wait to sell it. I tell you this, when I move to a newplace, I’m going to cover the front garden in concrete and park alorry on it!’

Juliet laughedderisively. ‘But, darling, I wasn’t ever going to buy any flowers.I’ve got what I want from you.’

Carla howled and triedto wrestle free. ‘No!’

The grip tightened onher arm. Juliet’s thin face was devilish. ‘Oh yes.’

‘God, help me,’ Carlacried, and, in that instant, He did! A brilliant idea came to her –the best idea she’d ever had, so it must have come from above – andshe commanded Juliet, her most nightmarish customer yet, to – ‘Goto hell. I’m going to have an abortion, see, and I’m going to billyou for the funeral!’

Juliet’s face twisteddemonically. Too late, Carla saw she was grasping a fork in herhand – a garden fork. In the next instant, the evil creature thrustit into her stomach.

There was no pain.

‘Carla?’

The smooth voice wasfamiliar. She tried to open her eyes but the light was blinding.She shook her head and groaned. ‘Carla?’ The voice again. ‘How areyou doing?’ It was Gerald. Other voices were murmuring furtheraway. Some were laughing.

A gentle hand rested onher forehead and in its shade she managed to focus a little. Thekind face of a middle-aged nurse was smiling down at her. ‘It’s alovely little boy,’ she said.

Ten: Taking Stock

It was about six monthslater when Charmaine and Gwynne’s relationship fell apart.

Everyone was taken bysurprise. And that included Charmaine and Gwynne. They couldn’tseem to see why they had to break up either. It just didn’t makeany sense. And yet . . . they did.

Gwynne moved back toRomance, and was disconcerted to find the place seemeddifferent somehow. And after he was disconcerted, he