I had to do something, but what? I looked more closely at the clothes line, it was quite substantial and she had doubled it around her neck. I had no idea if she slipped out of the window what would happen, would she hang or would it break, in which case she’d land on the patio and possibly break her neck anyway.

She was saying the Lord’s Prayer quietly to herself. I moved as quietly as I could to the other side of the room. I was now only feet from her. I needed to be able to grab her in such a way, that I could drag her back into the room without any risk of either of us getting hurt.

As she came to the end of her prayer, I grabbed her around the waist with one arm and with the other I took a hold of the rope. She screamed but I managed to haul her into the room and drop her onto the bed. Then I closed the window.

“What the hell were you thinking?” I said as I turned away from the window.

“Why did you stop me?” she asked, she’d tied her hands in front of her so she couldn’t help herself.

“Because I love you, because you’re important to me, and because I didn’t want you to die.”

“If you loved me, you’d let me end this pained existence.”

“What d’you mean?” I asked.

“Each time I get a taste of happiness, something awful happens to stop it. I believe I’m cursed, so the sooner I die the better.”

“So who made this curse?”

“How do I know?”

“So how do you know you are?” I countered.

“I have to be, look at all the awful things that have happened.”

“Do you, I look and see a wonderful lady, to whom I owe my very existence both literally and figuratively, and who I am privileged to call my sister.” I felt tears leak from my own eyes, Stella was weeping profusely.

“So why do all these awful things happen to me?”

“I don’t know, Stella. I don’t think it’s a curse, just a whole pile of bad luck, which is random. Pure serendipity.”

“I don’t believe that, and I don’t think for one minute you do either.”

“Sorry, but I do. There is no such thing as luck, except in the random occurrence of events. Now, let’s get this rope off you. Where did you get it?”

“Your garden shed.”

“If I’d known you were into bondage games, I’d have given you the number of the local sea scouts, then they could have practiced their knots on you. It would have to be more fun than sheep shanking each other.”

“You are so dogmatic about some things aren’t you?” she said as I tried to untie some of the knots.

“Am I? I hadn’t noticed.”

“Yes you have, you know that the idea of a god frightens you, so you demean it with science.”

“If there is one, how come there is so much misery in the world? How could so many horrors be committed in His name? Why isn’t there any evidence of Him?”

“What would you see as evidence–being struck by lightning for blasphemy?”

“Well it would be a start, he used to knock down walls of cities in the old days.”

“Cathy, that could all be metaphor or allegory.”

“What, you mean Adam and Eve didn’t exist? Well would you Adam and Eve it?”

“Very funny,” she wasn’t smiling. “I just wanted to join Des.”

“What happens if there is nothing afterwards, would you have joined him then?”

“I’d have been in the nothingness with him, together in the void.”

“Sounds like something from Dr Who. I hate to correct you, if there was a nothingness, you couldn’t be in it.”

“How do you know?” she snapped at me.

“I don’t but the odds are I’m right.”

“You don’t know that–you could be wrong. Why have so many people over the centuries believed?”

“Religion did a good propaganda job.”

“But even today, more people believe in something after death than not, how do you explain that?”

“People are stupid–how else did George Bush get in twice?”

“What? Why are you trivialising this?”

“Am I? I’d have thought the fact that he is in the most powerful position in the world–until the Chinese get their act together–wasn’t exactly a trivial matter.”

“What has all that got to do with Des and me?”

“Absolutely nothing. Now hold still while I untie your wrists.”

“Are you going to have me committed again?”

“I didn’t last time.”

“You know what I mean.”

“It isn’t up to me.”

“Who is it up to then?”

“You. You are going to call the doctor at that fancy clinic and tell him or her, why you were about to do the window jump bit.”

“Me?”

“If you don’t then I’ll call him and say what I heard and saw.”

“You would, too, wouldn’t you?”

“Try me. I’m deadly serious, Stella. I want you alive. I don’t have the training to deal with your demons, so I have to suggest we contact someone who can.”

“I don’t want to go back in there.”

“It’s probably more comfortable than the local mental health facility. I don’t know if I can trust you anymore. So I don’t have much choice, do I?”

“What if I give you my word?”

“Sorry Stella, I can’t take that risk.”

“But you’re my sister, I couldn’t lie to you.”

“What if you did? How could I live with myself if you did succeed next time?”

“I wouldn’t do it again? I gave you my word.”

“I think we’ve been here before and look what I interrupted this time. Sorry, Sis, I just can’t take that risk.” I finished untying the rope from around her wrists. “Please put some clothes on.”

I stood by the bed, she went behind me to get some clothes and the next moment, she shoved me hard and I fell over the bed, landing hard on the floor. By the time I recovered my senses, she was out the door, and took the key with her, locking me in her room. I ran to the door but it was locked shut and I couldn’t budge it.

I rushed to the window and opened it. I could just reach the ‘dirt pipe’ the one that carries toilet waste to the sewer. I made a grab for it and swung out of the window. I then, with a little difficulty, scrambled down the pipe to the ground. I hadn’t done it since I was a teenager and then I wasn’t in a skirt and heeled boots.

I trotted around to the front of the house just in time to see Stella come out of the front door, wearing some of my clothes. She didn’t see me until I was right on top of her.

For the next several minutes, we struggled and I managed to grab her car keys. She knew then it was over. I got her back indoors and called the clinic in Sussex–they could take her back. I got her back there at nearly midnight. It was about three in the morning when I got home again.

The next morning, Tom arrived in my room with a cup of tea. “I think you ought to know that Stella’s bed hasn’t been slept in.”

“I know…” I then went on to explain where she was and why.

“Why didn’t you call for me?”

“Sorry, Tom, but you were newted and no use to man nor beast.”

“I could have watched her…”

“Watched her hang herself? She’s safe for the moment, that’s all that matters.”