Like thunder in the air

"And often a fellow who beat the heads off the flowers with a stick would be sorry he did it but he wouldn't know how to say that."

"I know." Kit said. She was pleased to know that Sister Madeleine thought her mother had a poet's heart and was a good and gentle soul. And she'd forigve Clio in her own good time.

Provided, of course, Clio apologies properly.

"I'm verry sorry." Clio said.

"That's all right." Kit said.

"No, it's not. I don't know why I did it, why I keep doing it. I suppose I just want to be one better than you or something. I don't like myself, that's the truth."

"And I don't like myself sulking." said Kit.

Their families were relived. It was always unsettling when Kit and Clio had a falling out. Like thunder in the air, and the hint of a bad storm ahed.

********

Sometimes it was harder to break the news of a death that was meaningless than one which would cause huge grief. Peter Kelly paused for breath before he went to tell Kalthleen Sullivan that her husband had finally succumbed to the liver disease that had been threatening him as seriously as the brain deterioration which had given him his place in the Country Home.

He knew there would be no conventional words of grief or consolation. But it was never simple. Kathleen Sullivan took the information with a stony face. Her elder son, Stevie, a dark, good-looking boy who had felt his father's fist once too often, and left of his own volition for the uncle's farm, just shrugged.

"He died a long time ago, Doctor." he said.

The younger boy, Michael, looked confused. "Will there be a funeral?" he asked.

"Yes, of course" the doctor said.

"WE'll have no funeral." Stevie said unexpectedly.

"No mourning or making a mockery of the whole thing."