Terry Pratchett - Johnny And The Dead

Thomas Bowler sighed.

'Well, supposing it is?' he said. 'You know what I'd say? I'd say: I did the best I could for eighty-four years. And no-one ever told me that afterwards I'd still be this fat old man who gets out of breath. Why do I get out of breath? I don't breathe. I passed away, and next thing I knew I was sitting in a marble hut like a man waiting an extremely long time for an appointment with the doctor. For nearly ninety years! I'd say: you call this justice? Why are we waiting? A day will come. We all ... arrive knowing it, but no-one says when!

'Just when I was beginning to enjoy life,' he said. 'I wish this night would never end.'

Mr Fletcher nudged Solomon Einstein.

'Shall we tell them?' he said.

'Tell us what?' said William Stickers.

'Veil, you see—' Einstein began.

'Times have changed,' said Mr Fletcher. 'All that stuff about being home at dawn and not hearing the cock crow and stufflike that. That was all very well

once upon a time, when people thought the Earth was flat. But no-one believes that now—'

'Er—' One of the dead raised a hand.

'Oh, yes,' said Mr Fletcher. 'Thank you, Mr Ronald Newton (1878-1934), former chairman of the Blackbury Flat Earth Society. I know you have Views. But the point I'm trying to make is—'

'—dawn is a place as well as a time,' said Einstein, spreading his hands.

'What on earth do you mean?' said Mrs Liberty.

'On Earth, and around earth,' said Einstein, getting excited. 'One night and one day, forever chasing one another.'

'There is a night that never comes to an end,' said Mr Fletcher. 'All you need is speed ...'

'Relatively speaking,' said Einstein.

There is a night that never comes to an end ...

The clock of the world turns under its own shadow. Midnight is a moving place, hurtling around the planet at a thousand miles an hour like a dark knife, cutting slices of daily bread off the endless loaf of Time.

Time passes everywhere. But days and nights are little local things that happen only to people who stay in one place. If you go fast enough, you can overtake the clock ...

'How many of us are in this phone box?' said Mr Fletcher.

'Seventy-three,' said the Alderman.

'Very well. Where shall we go? Iceland? It's not even midnight yet in Iceland.'

'Can we have fun in Iceland?' said the Alderman.

'How do you feel about fish?'

'Can't abide fish.'

'Not Iceland, then. I believe it's very hard to have fun in Iceland without fish being involved in some way. Well, now ... it'll be early evening in New York.'

'America?' said Mrs. Liberty. 'Won't we get scalped?'

'Good grief, no!' said William Stickers, who was

a bit more up to date about the world.

'Probably not,' said Mr Fletcher, who had been watching the news lately and was even more up to date than William Stickers.

'Look, we're dead,' said the Alderman. 'What else have we got to worry about?'

'Now, this may strike you as an unusual means of travel,' said Mr Fletcher, as something in the telephone began to click, 'but all you have to do, really, is follow me. Incidentally, is Stanley Roundway here?'

The footballer raised his hand.

'We're going west, Stanley. For once in your death, try to get the directions right. And now

One by one, they vanished.

Johnny lay in bed, watching the stricken shuttle turning gently in the moonlight.

It had been quite busy after the meeting. Some- one from the Blackbury Guardian had talked to him, and then Mid-Midlands TV had filmed him, and people had shaken his hand, and he hadn't got home until nearly eleven.

There hadn't been any trouble over that, at least. His mum hadn't come in yet and Grandad was watching a programme about bicycle racing in Germany.

He kept thinking about the Pals. They'd come all the way from France. Yet the dead in the cemetery were so frightened of moving. But they were all the same type of people, really. There had to be a reason for that.

The dead in the cemetery just hung around. Why? The Pals had marched from France, be- cause it was the right thing to do. You didn't have to stay where you were put.

'New York, New York.'

'Why did they name it twice?'

'Well, they ARE Americans. I suppose they wanted to be sure.'

'The lights are extremely plentiful. What's that?'

'The Statue of Liberty.'

'Looks a bit like you, Sylvia.'

'Sauce!'

'Is everyone keeping a look out for those Ghost- breakers?'

'I think that-was just cinematography, William.'

'How long to morning?'

'Hours, yet! Follow me, everyone! Let's get a better view!'

No-one ever did work out why all the elevators in the World Trade Centre went up and down all by themselves for almost an hour ...

October the 3 ist dawned foggy. Johnny wondered about having a one-day illness in preparation for what he suspected was going to be a busy evening, but decided to go to school instead. They always felt happier if you dropped in sometimes.

He went via the cemetery.

There wasn't a living soul. He hated it when it was like this. It was like the bits in the film when you were waiting for the aliens to jump out.

Somehow, they were always more dreadful than the bits with the fangs in.

Then he found Mr Grimm. Anyone else walking along the towpath would have

just seen the busted set. But Johnny saw the little man in his neat suit, watching the ghost of the television.

'Ah, boy,' he said. 'You have been causing trouble, have you?' He pointed to the screen.

Johnny gasped. There was Mr Atterbury, very calmly talking to a lady on a sofa. There was also one of the people from United Amalagamated Consolidated Holdings. And he was having some difficulty, was the Consolidated man. He'd come along with some prepared things to say and he was having problems getting his mind round the idea that they weren't working any more.

Mr Grimm turned up the volume control.

'—at every stage, fully sensitive to public opinion in this matter, I can assure you, but there is no doubt that we entered into a proper and legal contract with the relevant Authority.'

'But the Blackbury Volunteers say too much was decided behind closed doors,' said the lady, who looked as though she was enjoying herself. 'They say things were never fully discussed and that no-one listened to the local people.'

'Of course, this is not the fault of United Amalagamated Consolidated Holdings,' said Mr Atterbury, smiling benevolently. 'They have an enviable record of civic service and co-operation with the public. I think what we have here is a mistake rather than any near-criminal activity, and

we in the Volunteers would be more than happy to assist them in any constructive way and, indeed, possibly even compensate them.'

Probably no-one else but Johnny and the Consolidated man noticed Mr Atterbury take a ten-pence piece out of his pocket. He turned it over and over in his fingers. The man from the company watched it like a mouse might watch a cat.

He's going to offer him double his money back, Johnny thought. Right there on television.

He didn't. He just kept turning the coin over and over, so that the man could see it.

'That seems a very diplomatic offer,' said the interviewer. 'Tell me, Mr — er—'

'A spokesman,' said the Consolidated man. He looked quite ill. There was a glint as light flashed off the coin.

'Tell me, Mr Spokesman ... what is it that United Amalgamated Consolidated Holdings ac- tually does?'

Mr Atterbury would probably have been a good man in the Spanish Inquisition, Johnny told himself

Mr Grimm turned the sound down again.

' Where's everyone else?' said Johnny.

'Haven't come back,' said Mr Grimm, with horrible satisfaction. 'Their graves haven't been slept in. That's what happens when people don't listen. And do you know what's going to happen to them?'