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IT DIDN’T TAKE THE DOCTORS long to pronounce their verdict They couldn’t find any breath or pulse or movement It was an open-and-shut case as far as they were concerned
The worst thing was knoas going on around ive me another potion, which could have put , Annie screaan arriving after a couple of hours, the cue forand moans
I’d have loved to avoid this I would have rather run aith Mr Crepsley in the ht, but he’d told me that wasn’t possible
"If you run away," he’d said, "they would follow There would be posters up everywhere, pictures in the papers and with the police We would know no peace"
Faking ht I was dead, I’d be free Nobody co for a dead person
Now, as I heard the sadness, I cursed both Mr Crepsley and myself I shouldn’t have done it I shouldn’t have put theht side, at least this would be the end of it They were sad, and would be for soet over it eventually (I hoped) If I’d run away, the ht have lived the rest of their lives hoping I’d co I would one day return
The undertaker arrived and cleared the room of visitors He and a nurse undressedand I could feel his cold hands prodding and poking me
"He’s in excellent condition," he said softly to the nurse "Firm, fresh, and unmarked I’ll have very little to do with this one Just soe to make him look a little redder around the cheeks"
He rolled upman I was afraid he’d spot life in ently from side to side, which ile a creature is hed, then went ahead with the rest of the exaht and laid e cloth spread across it, so people could co all those people discussingabout my life and what I’d been like as a baby and how fine a boy I was and what a good rown up to be if I’d lived
What a shock they’d have gotten if I leaped up and shouted: "Boo!"
Ti it was to lie still for hours on end, unable to h or scratchbecause s returned to les and itches would start, long before I fully recovered I couldn’t move, but if I’d ht have giventhe up and down my body like tiny spiders They orst around my head and neck, where the bones had snapped
People finally began leaving It must have been late, because soon the room was empty and totally silent I lay there bythe quiet