The Old Ringer's Notes

The bellringer's cottage still stood empty. Corin had a key. He had never used it — it had felt like trespass — but a bell ringing for the living changes what counts as trespass. The old man had kept notes. Of course he had; he had been that sort. Decades of them, in a careful cramped hand, mostly weather and bell-times and the small accounts of a small life. Corin read for hours, by candle, until the candle guttered. It was on a loose page, tucked into the back, not bound with the rest. The old ringer had written it late in his life; the hand was shakier. It said: The bell does not ring for death. It rings for a soul that is leaving. Sometimes a soul leaves the body before the body knows to stop. If you hear a living name, the bell is not wrong. The bell is early. And you, boy — if you are reading this — you have until it leaves.