Read Paupers Graveyard for Free Online

how well he was doing, and warned him, as always, that he must never speak to anyone about the book. She told him that the strange, musty scent from within the book was the smell of freedom, that one day he would understand. For now all the words and wonderful things he learned must remain a secret, to be whispered between them late at night, while the others were asleep.
    He hid the book again, replacing the brick and piling the turf back against it. Squeezing back into the chair, he laid his head on his mother’s shoulder and felt her thin arm encircle him, stroking his hair. He was far too old, he knew, to need cuddling, but he let her, for her sake.
    â€˜What’s he like?’ she asked.
    He was puzzled, ‘Who?’
    â€˜The new master, what’s he like?’
    He knew he could be truthful with his mother.
    â€˜He’s a bit cross and strange-looking.’
    Her laugh startled him. There was little that made her laugh and he felt powerful for having done so. Trying to outdo himself, Timmy continued, ‘He walks like a girl as well. I’ll show you.’ He minced his way across the floor exaggerating the master’s walk, hands held in a foppish manner. This was too much for his mother, who roared with laughter and he joined in, delighted. It took them a moment to realise that their noise had awoken his father, who was now glaring at them from the doorway.
    â€˜What in the love and honour of Christ do you think you’re doing?’ He looked from one to the other. The sight of his red-rimmed eyes and angry face was usually enough to frighten them, but now they looked at each other and burst out laughing once more. This made his temper even worse and he lurched towards the corner that held the stick.
    â€˜You see this?’ He waved it in front of their faces. ‘I’ll use it on the both of you in a minute.’
    The laughter died. He threw the stick aside and it landed with a clatter on the floor.
    â€˜Now get to bed and don’t have me tell you again.’
    They set about preparing the room for the following day. His mother steeped the oatmeal for the breakfast porridge, as Timmy filled the kettle and placed it near the hearth. When there was nothing more they could do, they went grudgingly to bed. His father was snoring again and Timmy lay beside his brothers and sister enjoying their warmth.
    Tonight, for the first time, he realised how much he hated his father. If the look in his mother’s eyes was anything to go by, she felt the same. He wondered, as he drifted off to sleep, what made his father so bitter. Martin, his best friend, had six brothers and sisters and his family was even poorer than them, but his father had a smile and a good word for everyone. Life was very strange, he decided.

FOUR
    July 2003
    If Timmy’s life had seemed strange his death was proving to be stranger still. Endless days blended one into the other, no finality, no peace, and it was not at all like the afterlife he had been expecting. He was awakened each morning by the thundering of the great machines. The replanting of the fallen bushes and trees had cordoned off his part of the graveyard.
    Sometimes the smaller children grew bored and ventured into the next field. They could walk and run unnoticed among the living, and took great pleasure in playing jokes on the frightened workmen. A coat would fall from the seat of a machine, pulled by invisible hands, then be dragged through the mud and bushes, its owner watching open-mouthed in amazement. No one dared to follow, afraid of what might lie beyond the boundary. Many voiced their fears to the manager, only to be laughed at and waved away. But Timmy noticed that he avoided looking towards the bushes after that first time.
    Elizabeth spent most of the time in deep thought, although she feigned normality. Sometimes, as the dark closed in, she would walk to the edge of the field and gaze across to the road and the lights of the