Joanne Harris - Sleep, Pale Sister

At night, when such things seem possible, I think it very likely that that woman still walks the moonlit cobbles, though the body lies discarded in the morgue: she walks, still longing, still hungry…so cold…and so strong that, if she pleased, she could walk through walls and doors and limitless space to confront her murderers with scenes of black, delicate nightmare and rapturous insanity. She might spin stories of murder or paint visions of the pit…but behind the fury there would always be longing and a cold, despairing hunger. The dead are not forgiving.

There is a pervasive logic in this line of reasoning-and a strange pagan poetry. I find myself remembering snatches of my Classical education, to which I paid scant attention when I was at school. Yes, I read Aeschylus too, and I know where Fanny took the names of her cats. And knowing that I can almost believe…in angels, in daemons, Erinyes…Eumenides.

Almost.

I do have my reputation to think of.

Manuscript, from the estate of Henry Paul Chester January, 1881

The black angel stirs restlessly and I look at the sky, rimmed now with the livid cataract of dawn.

Time.

A sudden panic sends ripples down my ruined spine. I feel the tic which has already frozen half my face begin to twitch again, relentlessly, as if a tiny, furious creature were imprisoned behind my eye-socket, gnawing its way out. The last card of our game is Death…I knew it from the start, but although the looseness in my ribcage is relief, my brain rebels against annihilation, stupid tissue screaming out: no no no no! The lid of night is beginning to lift and beneath it is the Eye of God with its blank, blue iris and terrible humour.

The tale is told and I am no Scheherazade, to slip away at dawn with the wolves snarling at her heels. The wolf is behind my cheekbone, curled in the hollow of my skull, waking…

Hungry.

The black angel reaches for her scythe. My last thought will be of Marta: my crown of thorns, Princess of Cups, hemlock and chloral, dreamchild and executioner, sorceress and penny whore. The pale light falls on the curved blade: lift it, Columbine, take my life, my words…but tell me this: Did you love, Scheherazade? Even once, did you love?

Silence.

Imagine a dead leaf drifting down a bottomless well.

Imagine that, for a moment.

Many thanks to everyone who helped to bring this sleeper back to life. First of all to Christopher, who liked it from the start; to Serafina, Howard, and Brie; to my lovely editor Jennifer and all my friends at William Morrow; to Graham Ovenden for the cover I always wanted; to the booksellers, reps and stockists who work to keep my books on the shelves, and finally to all those fans of my earlier novels who have written, railed, persisted, queried and clamoured to see this one back in print.

JOANNE HARRIS is the author of Chocolat, which was nominated for the prestigious Whitbread Award. Joanne’s latest work is Jigs & Reels-her first ever collection of short stories. Her other critically acclaimed works include the novels Holy Fools, Coastliners, Five Quarters of the Orange, and Blackberry Wine, as well as My French Kitchen-a collection of her family recipes and reminiscences. She studied modern and medieval languages at Saint Catharine’s College, Cambridge, and taught French for twelve years at a boys’ grammar school. The daughter of a French mother and an English father, she lives in her native Yorkshire with her husband and their daughter.

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