he kitchen of the Harte cottage was deserted when Emma entered and closed the door softly behind her. It was gloomy in the late-afternoon light, and desolate. The fire had burned out and the grate was filled with cold ashes and there was a smell in the air of cabbage and fried onions and burnt pots. Me dad spoilt the Sunday dinner again, Emma thought absently, as she took off her coat and scarf and looked around. The cottage was ominously silent and Emma shivered as she crept up the stone steps to her mother’s room, her heart beating rapidly as her alarm increased.

Her father was alone, bending over Elizabeth. He was gently wiping her sweating face with a flannel and he stroked her damp and tangled hair lovingly. He looked up as Emma tiptoed in. His eyes were dark and brooding and filled with sorrow, and his face was harshly set and the colour of dull lead in the twilight.

‘Me mam—what happened?’ Emma whispered hoarsely.

Jack shook his head wearily. ‘Dr Mac says it’s a relapse. She’s been growing weaker and weaker these last few days. She’s no fight left in her,’ he mumbled in a strangled voice. ‘Doctor just left. No hope—’ His voice cracked and he looked away swiftly, biting down his grief, swallowing hard on the incipient tears aching in his throat.

‘Don’t say that, Dad,’ Emma cried softly but with great vehemence. She glanced around. ‘Where’s our Winston?’

‘I sent him ter get Aunt Lily.’ Elizabeth stirred restlessly. Jack turned back to her quickly and sponged her face again, and with tenderness. ‘Thee can come over ter the bed, Emma. But don’t make a noise. Thee mam must rest quiet like,’ Jack said, his voice low and sorrowing. He stepped back, so Emma could sit on the small stool, and he touched her shoulder gently. ‘Thee mam’s been asking for thee,’ he murmured.

Emma took hold of her mother’s wasted hand. It was icy and lifeless. Elizabeth opened her eyes slowly, as if the effort to lift her lids was almost too enormous. She stared blankly at Emma. ‘Mam, it’s me,’ Emma said quietly, tears brimming into her eyes. Her mother’s face was utterly without colour and there was a peculiar sheen to it. Faint purple smudges stained the skin around her eyes, and her delicate lips were as white as the bedsheet. She continued to look at Emma dazedly. Emma clutched her mother’s hand more tightly and fear rose in her like a fierce wave. She said again, and more insistently, ‘Mam! Mam! It’s me, Emma.’

Elizabeth smiled faintly and recognition illuminated her eyes, which suddenly lost their cloudiness and became more comprehending. ‘Emma luv,’ she said weakly. She attempted to touch her daughter’s face, but she was too exhausted and her hand dropped limply on to the bed. ‘I waited for yer ter come, Emma.’ Her voice was a fluttering whisper. Her breath came in small, rapid pants, and she shivered under the blankets.

‘Mam! Mam! Yer’ll be all right, won’t yer?’ Emma said, her voice urgent with apprehension. ‘Yer’ll get better, won’t yer, Mam?’

‘I am better, luv,’ Elizabeth said. A gentle smile played around her lips. She sighed deeply. ‘Yer a good lass, Emma.’ She paused and her breathing became belaboured. ‘Promise me yer’ll look after Winston and Frank. And yer dad.’ Her voice was now so faint it was hardly audible.

‘Don’t talk like that, Mam,’ cried Emma, her voice quavering.

‘Promise me!’ Elizabeth’s eyes stretched wide with mute appeal.

‘Yes, I promise, Mam,’ Emma said chokingly. The tears rolled down her cheeks silently. She leaned forward and touched her mother’s dwindled face and kissed her lips, and laid her face next to her mother’s. ‘Fetch yer dad,’ cried Elizabeth, with a little panting gasp, and the last of her rapidly diminishing strength.

Emma turned and motioned to her father, who was standing by the window. He strode over to the bed and sat down, and took Elizabeth in his arms and held her to him desperately. He felt as if a scythe was ripping at his insides, tearing out his heart. He did not know how he could endure the pain, the agony of her dying. She lay back on the pillows. Her face was waxy and turning grey. She opened her eyes and he saw they were filled with a new and radiant light. She tried to clutch his arm, but she was far too weak and her hand fell away, trembling. He bent towards her. She whispered to him and he nodded, unable to speak in his searing grief.

Jack pulled back the bedclothes and lifted Elizabeth in his strong arms, carrying her carefully to the window. She was so light, as light as a fallen leaf, and she barely stirred in his arms. The window was open and the curtains billowed out in the evening breeze, and her dark hair was blown around her face. He looked down at her. She had the most rapturous expression on her face and her eyes were shining. She breathed deeply of the fresh air, and he felt her whole body stretch tautly in his arms as she lifted her head and looked out longingly towards the moors.

‘The Top of the World,’ she said, and her voice was so clear and so strong and so young at that moment, he was momentarily startled. It echoed around the room with a vibrancy that was almost abnormal. She fell back in his arms. A tender smile flickered briefly on her lips. She sighed several times, long deep sighs that rippled through her whole body. And then she was still.

‘Elizabeth!’ Jack cried, his voice raw with emotion, and he cradled her body in his arms, rocking her to him, and his tears drenched her face.

‘Me mam!’ Emma screamed, and flew across the room. Jack turned and looked at Emma blindly, tears coursing down his cheeks. He shook his head. ‘She’s gone, lass,’ he said, and he carried Elizabeth back to the bed and covered her body with the bedclothes. He crossed her hands on her breasts and smoothed her hair away from her face, so tranquil in death, and touched her eyelids. He bent down and kissed her icy lips, and his own shook with his pain and despair.

Emma was sobbing by his side. ‘Dad, oh, Dad,’ she cried, clinging to him. He straightened up and looked down into her streaming face. Then he put his arms around her and pulled her to him comfortingly. ‘She’s free now, Emma. Free at last of the terrible suffering.’ He choked back his own sobs and held Emma closer to him. He stroked her hair and consoled her, and they were locked together for a long time in their mutual anguish.

At last Jack said, ‘It’s God’s will,’ and he sighed.

Emma moved away from him and lifted her tear-stained face. ‘God’s will!’ she repeated slowly, and her young voice was excessively harsh and unremitting. ‘There’s no such thing as God!’ she cried, her eyes blazing. ‘I knows that now. Because if there was a God, He wouldn’t have let me mam suffer all these years, and He wouldn’t have let her die!’

Jack stared at her aghast and before he could respond she was running out of the bedroom. He heard her feet hammering on the stairs and the front door banging behind her. He turned wearily, his great body sagging, and he looked down at his dead wife and a sob rose in him again, and he was engulfed by a terrible darkness. He stumbled like a sleepwalker to the window and looked out. Dimly, through his pain, he saw Emma running up Top Fold towards the moors. The sky was saffron bleeding into scarlet as the sun fluttered down below the bleak hills. Its last shimmering rays were streaking across Ramsden Crags, just visible in the gloaming.

‘If Elizabeth is anywhere, that’s where she is now,’ he said. ‘At the Top of the World.’