Pulling the Rug II

When the last thing you remember is something that feels like a bee sting on the side of your neck, and you open your eyes to see a skeleton sitting in a wing-backed chair, apparently reading what looks like a very dog-eared copy of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ by the light of a hissing Tilley lamp, the temptation has to be to close your eyes and wait for it to go away. So I tried that. But it was no manner of use. All that happened was that I heard a dry bone-ish sort of chuckle inside my head.

I...