At long last, Alice had agreed to come and stay for a little while, as refuge. Though she generally felt out of her depth outside Kilburn - it was either Kilburn or Nigeria, a void in between - she had accepted that time away might do her good. But only for a few days, 'You take me home on Tuesday.' It was the Ansonia clock that had allowed her to be persuaded. The batteries had been replaced twice, still it ground to a halt at 5.20, and three times now the phone had rung at 5.20, one of those in the morning, and when she'd answered there was silence, with a presence inside it. 'Is punishment,' she said, weeping gently; she wept often in this aftermath, her voice would fall into it without event. She was convinced that, somehow, from the next place, Cornelius was trying to communicate with her. Maybe he wanted a Wednesday dinner. He wanted to come and sit, one last time. It was not over. He was stuck. It happened, when the soul was in shock, or if it was too heavy for heaven or if it had been cremated instead of buried like it was supposed to be, maybe he couldn't pass through. 'Mum, it's probably a marketing call,' Melissa persisted. 'Someone's trying to sell you something, that's all.' Alice listened to this explanation, wanting to believe it, folding one of her cloths on her lap and slowly shaking her head. She did look smaller out here, away from her pink walls. She would not say yes to the removing of the Ansonia clock and replacing it with another, in case it made things worse, but was employing her own trusted methods of exorcism involving the use of plantain skin and potent vegetables.