Chapter 6 Summary

The Old House rapper stirs up a ruckus on night when Christine stays behind, locking up the bookshop. She makes tea while Florence lights the paraffin fire. The fire reacts strangely. Although there was no draft, the flames shot up and sank. While the young girl and the woman comfortably talk together, 'two stages of the same woman's life,' Christine becomes ill at ease and goes to the back door to check it.

Noises start upstairs, whispering, scratching, and tapping, as if something were being dragged. Florence reaches out to hold Christine's cold hand and the noise upstairs grows louder. The noise moves downstairs, and then grows to battering and animal screams outside the window.

Christine says that she knew it was the rapper and that it wanted them to stay and be tormented. The 'siege' lasted just over ten minutes. Ten...