Razorhurst Read Free Page A

staring at Dymphna.
    “And who the fuck are you?”

Miss Lee
    Miss Lee had been dead wrong about Kelpie’s age when they first met. Not that she ever knew that.
    Miss Lee had a heart as soft as bitumen on a stinking hot day and thought it a disgrace that Kelpie had been abandoned on the streets to fend for herself. What was the world coming to? The little girl was skeletal, dressed in rags, and all alone. When Miss Lee had discovered Kelpie could see ghosts, the little girl wasn’t even wearing shoes! Miss Lee had determined at once that she would find the poor child food, clothes, and shelter; she would protect her.
    Miss Lee would have been even more shocked had she known that Kelpie was not a child. When they had met, Kelpie had been about to turn fifteen. Malnourishment had stunted her growth and prolonged her childhood. If you could call it a childhood, out on the streets, ignored by all but ghosts and that hardened standover, Snowy Fullerton.
    But Miss Lee did not know how old Kelpie truly was. How could she when Kelpie herself had little idea? If she had, Miss Lee would have seen it as her duty to prepare Kelpie for womanhood. How would the child know what to do when her monthlies began? Kelpie knew nothing of what her body had in store for her. Miss Lee would have taught her.
    Miss Lee liked to teach. It had been both her profession and her vocation.
    Kelpie was grateful to have found Miss Lee, for the prim ghost had the run of the Hills. Miss Lee was one of the few talkers who could move around. She spent her time going from house to house looking for open books or, best of all, someone reading.
    “Could be looking at anything,” Tommy grumbled. “
Anything
. A picture show. Could go to one of Glory Nelson’s houses. Watch them girls. I’d like to see
that
.”
    Miss Lee ignored Tommy, something Kelpie all too often failed to do.
    “Can’t turn the pages,” Miss Lee explained. “Have to peer over their shoulders and hope they don’t put the book down right when it gets exciting.”
    It was spring when they met. The first hot day. Miss Lee had been so thrilled to find someone alive who could see her that she’d urged Kelpie all the way to the public library. Kelpie had let herself be bullied because she liked Miss Lee. She was enthusiastic. All most talkers did was complain or be mean.
    Not Miss Lee.
    Besides, a ghost who could travel without haunting someone was a novelty.
    Kelpie had had to sneak past the woman at the front desk. Kids weren’t allowed, and even if they had been, it was school time—still a few more weeks before they were released for the summer. The librarians would have handed her to Welfare if they’d caught her.
    She’d never been inside a library before. It was dark, full of dust, and echoingly quiet, but it wasn’t damp, and nothing was rotting.
    “Over here,” Miss Lee yelled. “Get down
Great Expectations
.” She clapped her hands. “
Finally
. Died less than halfway through, didn’t I?”
    Kelpie reached for where Miss Lee was pointing. She wasn’t quite tall enough. She pulled out a big volume from the bottom shelf and stood on it.
    “Oh no, not on a book!”
    “Won’t hurt it,” Kelpie said, quiet as she could. “It’s thick as a brick. Which one d’you want? This one?”
    “
Great Expectations
.”
    Kelpie slid a red volume from the shelf.
    “No, no. Didn’t you hear me?
Great Expectations
. The one next to it. Oh,” Miss Lee said. “You can’t read, can you?”
    Kelpie’s face got hot. Miss Lee thought she was stupid. She wasn’t. She wasn’t!
    Kelpie ran.
    Bolted out of the aisle of books, past the librarian with her mouth wide open, and onto the footpath, almost knocking over a pedlar’s wheelbarrow full of several-days-old fruit and veg most likely scrounged from the ground at the markets. She ran hard and fast until she pulled up in Moore Park, scrambling up the nearest fig tree.
    Miss Lee appeared beside her, and Kelpie was less charmed by