In Competition No. 2485 you were invited to submit a short story entitled ‘Can You Forgive Her?’ The standard of the entry was mixed, but none was worthy of the mockery heaped on Anthony Trollope’s novel of the same name by Punch, which, infuriated by the indecisiveness of the heroine Alice Vavasor, referred to it as ‘Can You Stand Her?’ Henry James wasn’t much of a fan of Alice either, reputedly remarking that he could ‘forget her too, for that matter’.
The unforgettable prizewinners, printed below, get £35 each. Hats off to Peter Smalley’s beguiling if bemusing Pinteresque two-hander, but the bonus fiver goes to Brian Murdoch’s compromised priest.
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‘Father,’ came the whisper. ‘I need a quick favour.’
‘I thought you had someone in your own confessional just now, Father,’ the second priest whispered back.
‘I have, and that’s exactly the problem.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, Father, she says she’s been a little bit naughty but she is sorry now.
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