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apart at the seams.
     
    Later, I was woken by a loud crash. The window screen had come loose. A blast of cold air hit my bed, raindrops spattered on my writing table.
    Elsewhere in the house a door slammed, the wind howled around the windows and one thunderclap followed another in quick succession. I heard Uncle run across the landing.
    Before I had well and truly come to my senses I found myself getting out of bed to shut the window. The treetops were being buffeted in all directions. I saw a sheet of heavy-duty plastic flapping among the gravestones, doing a cartwheel and coming to rest for a brief moment before sailing off again and catching in the branches of a tree, where it remained.
    I put on my trousers and vest and went downstairs. Uncle and Aunt were both in their dressing gowns, sitting at the table while the lightning flashed through the slits in the blinds.
    ‘Why don’t you put the kettle on,’ said Aunt. ‘We won’t have any peace for the next hour or so anyway.’
    I went through to the kitchen and lit the gas under the kettle. Outside, the sky was seething with rage, the thunder was crashing everywhere.
    ‘It’s right on top of us!’ I shouted.
    They did not react. I took three cups from the cupboard and set out the teapot on the draining board.
    I overheard Aunt saying that a vault might not be such a bad idea, though she didn’t know how much it would cost.
    ‘We must do
something
,’ agreed Uncle.
    I entered the room, put the cups down on the table, took teaspoons from the drawer and began to distribute them.
    ‘Leave it,’ said Aunt. ‘I’ll do that. Don’t forget the sugar. And bring some cinnamon biscuits, will you.’
    I went back to the kitchen. Out in the courtyard the rainwater gushed over the flagstones into the drain. Between two thunderclaps I heard the alarm bells go off at the level crossing.
    ‘She never cared,’ Aunt went on. ‘A flowerpot once a year, that’s all. She might show some interest. It’s the least she could do …’ I could hear the nervous shuffle of Uncle’s slippers on the tiled floor.
    The water began to boil, making the kettle whistle. I heard the scrape of a chair. ‘Let’s not discuss it now, Laura,’ said Uncle. ‘The lad …’
    I took the kettle from the hob and filled the teapot.
    We drank our tea.
    ‘Hark at that, hark at that,’ Uncle repeated after each crash of thunder. He was standing by the window, craning his neck as if he could look right through the blinds at the sky. ‘Hark at that …’
    In the meantime Aunt fished out the soggy remains of her biscuit with her teaspoon. She always left the biscuit in for far too long.
    ‘What do we need a new vault for?’ I asked as casually as I could. ‘Seeing as we’ve got two cellars already.’
    It was true. In one of them stood several empty oil drums, and in the other were endless rows of bottled fruit which had been gathering dust for years along with a stack of Aunt’s unsold goods from the shop.
    ‘What did I tell you?’ said Uncle, looking hard at Aunt. He took a sip of his tea.
    ‘Not a vault like a cellar,’ said Aunt. ‘It’s for your uncle and me. And for your dad.’
    ‘My dad?’
    ‘He’s got to move,’ said Uncle. ‘They’ve all got to move. Don’t know why. They say it’s not healthy, a churchyard in the middle of the village. They’re going to make a new one, out in the fields by the lane.’
    ‘It’s only because of the Freemasons, if you ask me,’ said Aunt. ‘They don’t like being buried in the shadow of the church. That’s the reason, I’m sure. Simple as that.’
    ‘There there, Laura,’ soothed Uncle. ‘There’s not much we can do about it anyway.’
    A loud thunderclap rattled the windows. It was as if a mighty block of ice had shattered in the air, right over the roof.
    ‘Well that was close,’ said Aunt. Shortly afterwards we heard the wail of sirens out in the street.
    Uncle sat down with us again, around the table. He pushed his