Quartet of Human Love, Human Frailty

By Elizabeth Muir-Lewis

These four short stories embrace many emotions and characters: the man who goes back to his past to find a lost love; a woman with terminal cancer who finds a miracle in Australia; a shy girl who finds a lover and deals with her eccentric grandmother; and a visit to heaven, where a woman is amazed to find herself at the pearly gates.
There are intriguing characters and unusual stories in a collection that explores human tragedy and frailty, and also love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Feb 28, 2022
• ISBN: 9781398409811

Elizabeth Muir-Lewis

Elizabeth Muir-Lewis has two published books. This book, When the Last Note Sounds, is a biography about her life as the wife of one of Britain’s finest singers, Richard Lewis CBE. As a singer herself she has the unique position of understanding the extraordinary world of the international singer. Through Richard she heard about that great era after the second world war when British music had a renaissance. It is a tale of great composers, conductors and singers. Elizabeth brings to life the strenuous world of international singing, itsdownsides as well as its glories. She does not mince her words but illuminates the art of singing as she saw it.

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About the Author

Elizabeth Muir-Lewis is a singer, conductor and teacher. After a career in America, Europe and Great Britain, she decided to extend her conducting by forming and directing a large choral society in the South of England. She took the choir on three European tours, as well as, unusually, dramatizing many choral works, such as Mendelssohn’s Elijah and Bach’s St Matthew Passion. Elizabeth has always written poems and stories, but never took it seriously. In recent years she has begun to find stimulus in word painting, something that has fired her creativity.

Elizabeth hopes that whoever reads these short stories, enjoys them. They are the result of many things: something she heard, people she knew and little things that become embroidered and finally become a story.

Dedication

To my dearest husband for his patience and Sir Philip Anson for his wonderful technical help.

Copyright Information ©

Elizabeth Muir-Lewis 2022

The right of Elizabeth Muir-Lewis to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398409804 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398409811 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2022

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Now There’s a Surprise

I don’t know what I expected. When I died, I mean.

You know. All that religious stuff. Expectations of some heavenly place.

Never heard anyone qualifying the stories mind you. Will St Peter welcome you through the pearly gates? It’s something you say without thinking about it.

So I must say, now I’m here, it’s a bit disappointing. He’s nowhere to be seen.

All I can see so far is an angel sitting disconsolately on a stool in a box, reminiscent of the ones outside Buckingham Palace. His wings are distinctly rather moth-eaten.

As I stand queuing, a voice behind me says, Oh so you did find there was a heaven then?

Is he talking to me? Not proven yet, I thought… Well, I am a lawyer.

Not so long ago, I suddenly said my last goodbyes. Papers always say, She died with her family round her bed. No such luck! I went before they could get there. Thought I had longer actually, but how can one anticipate an idiot motorist driving at sixty miles an hour the wrong way down the motorway?

So I’m here. Will questions be answered? You know, the usual ones. What happens now?

I’ve found out one thing though. I have a body. That’s a real surprise. All one’s life you imagine turning into some translucent being. I never thought I’d be an angel. But surely something happened.

For instance, I’m wearing my driving shoes. The same ones I had on when the crash came.

All I can say therefore is, I’m glad I had on a decent dress, and had remembered to put on my best underwear. After all, you never know.

As I go waxing on, I can hear my daughter say, Oh really, Mum. Even finding dying is interesting. Well, why not, I ask!

I’ve always found that questions beget questions. That’s the lawyer speaking of course.

So a good one is, If this is Heaven, and it doesn’t look like Hell, will I meet other souls. And a really worrying one, will my husbands be here. All four of them?

I hear you ask, You had four? Yes. Loved them, buried them, mourned them. In my own way.

As the queue moved slowly forwards, I asked myself, Will we be told what to do? And how do I get past the angel who seems singularly bored. Well who wouldn’t be. So many lining up behind me. So many souls.

Behind me I see someone I know. Coee, I call. She turned away with a