The Time of the Ghost (6 page)

Ah!
said Sally.

She dived toward it like a swimmer in her eagerness. And there, sticking sideways out of the top, was a sheet of blue writing paper with round, ragged writing on it which could well be hers.

“Dear Parents,” she read. “When you find this, I shall be far away from here.”

There was no more, nothing but a doodled drawing of a face. Sally guessed she must have drawn it while she was thinking of what else to say. Then, of course, she could not use that paper. The real letter must be elsewhere.

But where was I going? What was I doing?
she wondered frantically.

Desperately she pressed her face down among the other papers. Thank goodness! Here was another, on paper decorated with roses this time.

“Dear Parents, This is to inform you that I have taken…” Taken what? Sally wondered: the family jewels, a short holiday, leave of her senses? She had no idea. But here was more rosy paper.

“Dear Parents, Let me break this to you gently. I have decided, after much thought, that life here has little to offer me. I have…”

I think I was going to run away from home
, Sally said.
But I don't think I had anywhere to go. Both grannies would send me back at once. Why didn't I say more? Oh, here's another one.

“Dear Parents, My life is in ruins and also in danger. I must warn…”

Shaken, Sally withdrew her face from the basket and hovered like a swimmer treading water, staring at the papers. So there had been danger. That matched her feeling of an accident, though not her feeling that something had gone wrong. But what danger, and where from? And now she came to look, the whole top of the wastebasket was packed with the same rosy writing paper. She must have used the whole packet, trying to explain whatever it was to Phyllis and Himself. Perhaps if she read every single one, together they would tell her what had happened. She plunged her face among the papers again.

But it was impossible; they were packed in so tightly, some sideways and some upside down, some rolled into balls, some torn in half, and all so mixed up with old drawings and things Cart had thrown out, that Sally's bodiless eyes could pick out hardly any of it. The ones she did see were only variations on the first four. And it got darker—too dark to read—more than four packed layers down. It was the merest luck that when Sally was about to emerge from the basket and give up, her sight came up against a larger paper wedged upright against the side of the basket. At the top was her own writing—the now-familiar “Dear Parents”—but the next line was, to Sally's wonder, in writing that had to be Cart's. Cart's writing was neat and unmistakable.

“We think Sally has come to a sticky end.”

Underneath that the spiny writing with the angrily crossed
T
's was surely Imogen's. Sally brought her face up, backed away, and drove in again, right through the basket and the papers, so that her noneyes were right up against the paper. It was dim yellowish gloom, nearly too dark to see.

“Her bed has not been slept in, and we have not seen her since—” Imogen had written. It was too dark to see any more. All Sally could gather was that Cart's writing and Imogen's alternated, line by line, all down the page, from yellowish brown gloom to night black. Horribly frustrated, Sally backed out and hovered.

I am going to see that letter!

There was a deal of noise downstairs. Imogen had seemed calmed by Cart, but in the irritating way it had, her grieving now sprang up again like a forest fire, loud and wild, in a new place.

“But don't you see, I may be using these difficulties as an
excuse
to hide the truth from myself! I'm hiding away behind them! I know I am!”

“Now, Imogen,” Cart said soothingly, “I think that's just tormenting yourself.”

Oh, shut up!
Sally called out.
Imogen enjoys grieving. She doesn't need sympathy; she needs shaking. It's me that needs the sympathy!

Furiously she threw herself at the heaped wastepaper basket. She went right through and found herself looking at the wallpaper beyond. But she was so determined that she backed away and threw herself forward again, and again, and again. She still went right through, but ever so slightly the basket rocked. The papers rattled and crunkled.
Oh, good!
said Sally. She threw herself at it once more. There was such a rustling that Oliver started to growl again. But Sally knew she was making some impression.
If I try hard
, she said.
Trying does it. I am made of something after all. I'm not quite nothing. I'm probably made of the life stuff that was all round the boys. I shall think of myself like that.
Bash, slide, crunkle. Sally thought of herself as strong, crackling, flexible, forceful, and bashed forward again. Bash, crunkle, crunkle.

She had done it. Instead of going into the basket, she was bounced off from it. The basket, already swaying, swung sideways, tipped, and fell heavily, sending a slither of paper out across the Rude Rug. Oliver's growls rose to sound like a small motorbike.

Imogen's voice, bloated and throaty with crying, said, “What was that?”

“There must be a mouse in the bedroom again,” said Cart.

“Ugh!” said Imogen. “Send Oliver up.”

“He won't go,” said Cart. “Besides, he just makes friends with mice.”

Sally was hovering, hovering, over the scattered papers. She had done it wrong. The vital letter was still in the basket, packed in by other papers, lying against the floor. And now she found she could not get in to read it. She had made herself so forceful that she kept bouncing off. She could get no farther than the letter on top. Wait a minute! This top letter was in Fenella's writing.

“Dear Parents, We have killed Sally and desposed of the boddy. We thouhgt you ouhgt to know. You are neckst of kin. Love, Fenella.”

What!
said Sally.
They haven't. They didn't. They can't. So I did come back for revenge!

Downstairs Fenella herself had come in. “Oh, is Imogen still grieving? I nicked four buns for tea.”

“You needn't have nicked one for Sally,” said Cart.

No, you needn't, need you!
Sally yelled out, unheard.

“I didn't. I need two myself,” said Fenella. “Why is Oliver growling up the stairs like that?”

“There's a mouse up there,” Imogen said, still throaty.

“I'll go up and catch it, then,” said Fenella.

Sally could not face this. Ever since she read the letter, anger and panic had been swelling in her. Now these feelings swept her away, dissolved her through the wall, then over the field, turning and twisting and hardly knowing where she went.

The next hour or so was more like an unpleasant dream than ever. Sally found herself now here, now there, with very little knowledge of how she got to places or what happened in between. From the fact that everywhere she noticed was filled with the ringing mutter of boys, she thought she was mostly in school. First, she was among the smallest boys queueing up somewhere, each with a brown, sticky bun in his hand. Next, she was in a dismal room, with gray, ringing distances, in which two or three gray, dismal boys sat writing. Detention. Himself was there, gray as granite. He was sitting marking exercise books. Sally hovered round him, wondering if he was hating detention as much as the boys did. He looked very grim. The way his hair bunched, iron gray, at the back of his head, put her in mind of the ruffled crest of an iron gray eagle, brooding on a perch, with a chain on its leg.

“Please, sir,” said a dismal, distant boy.

Himself said, without looking up, “What is it now, Perkins?” His hand, holding a red ballpoint pen, swiftly crossed out, and out. Wrote “See me” in the margin.

“I need to pee, sir,” said the boy.

“You went five minutes ago.” Himself slapped that book shut. Slapped another in front of him. Slapped it open.

“I know, sir. I have a weak bladder, sir.”

Himself crossed out, crossed out. Made a tick. “Very well.” His eagle face lifted and caught the boy half standing up. “You may be excused, Perkins, on the strict understanding that for every minute you spend out of this room, you spend half an hour in it. Off you go.”

“Yes, sir.” The boy hesitated and sat down again. He would have to go down two long corridors and then come back up them, not counting the time in between. That was three hours more in detention, even if he ran. He looked annoyed.

Himself lowered his beak and made three swift ticks. A slight moving under the iron skin of his face showed his satisfaction. He was enjoying himself. He loved detecting a try-on. Sally realized it, and realized she did not dare try to attract his attention just then.

A vague ringing while later she was in a warm brown room, with thick brown lino on the floor. This room was provided with an iron bed, a white cupboard with a red cross on it, and a desk. Phyllis sat at the desk, dealing with a line of boys. She screwed back the top on a bottle and passed a small boy a pill. “There, Andrew. Are you still wheezing?”

The small boy put his head back, expanded his chest, and took several long, croaking breaths. He seemed to be trying very hard to breathe.

Phyllis smiled kindly, an angel of judgment. “No wheeze,” she said. “You needn't come again tomorrow, Andrew. Now, Paul, how's that boil?”

A large boy with a red swelling by his mouth stepped up as Andrew dwindled away. Phyllis put up a kind, cool hand and felt the boil. The tall boy winced.

“I think we'd better get the school doctor to look at that tomorrow,” Phyllis said. “I'll give you a dressing if you wait. Now, Conrad. Let's have a look at your finger.”

Mother was very busy just now, Sally realized guiltily. She must not try to interrupt her.

Later again she found she was with Himself once more. He was sweeping down a corridor among a crowd of boys. One of them was carrying a metal detector.

“We're not going to use that again, Howard, unless we find ourselves in any doubt,” Himself was saying. “Untold harm has been done to archaeology by wild metal detecting and wilder digging. We must behave responsibly. Are you sure you marked the place, Greer?”

A boy assured him that he had marked it. Himself swept on, talking eagerly. He was in his whirling mood, when his coat fluttered behind him like wings and seemed to catch up and carry people in the excitement of his progress. He looked younger like this, Sally thought tenderly.

“Who knows what it may be?” said Himself. “Possibly a cannonball. Unquestionably, School House was once the site of Mangan Manor, where Cromwell's army besieged the royalist forces during the Civil War. We may have lighted on their camp. Yes,” he said as they thumped through a door, whirling Sally with them, “I plump for a cannonball as the most likely thing.”

They were out in the gold-green of early evening. The playing field stretched toward faraway trees in faint white mist, flat as a lake, bright as water. The ringing mutter of school went suddenly distant.

“Neither can we rule out the possibility of something earlier,” Himself continued, whirling out onto the flat green space. “Round here we have some of the earliest British settlements—but I doubt if those would yield much metal. It's more likely to be metal from the Roman occupation. I must say I fancy finding a hoard of Roman coins. In which case it would be treasure trove. Which boy knows the law about treasure troves?”

Sally paused. Once again the wide-open green space made her uncomfortable. In spite of the hurrying group, she was defenseless. She thought she might dissolve. Besides, Himself was still thoroughly busy.

“Of course,” he was saying as they whirled away from her, “we mustn't discount the possibility of a complete sell. It may be a cache of Coca-Cola tins.”

Sally faded back into the ringing, muttering school. By now there was a strong gusting of gravy from the kitchen. Phyllis was hurrying toward the kitchen with a lady wearing a white overall and a bent cigarette stuck to her lower lip.

“Well, you must do what you think best, Mrs. Gill,” Phyllis was saying. “Haven't we a tin of processed peas left that we could eke it out with?”

The bent cigarette wagged. “Those all went last week,” said white-coated Mrs. Gill. “Did you order more in, Mrs. Melford? I can't see how I'm going to manage for the Disturbed Course without, if you didn't.”

“I'll see to that tomorrow,” said Phyllis.
Thump
went the silver door behind them both, and a gust of gravy.

Still busy, Sally realized, hanging heavily in the corridor.

But they must notice me!
she was saying to herself before long.
I must tell them I think I'm dead. I think it's important. It has to be more important than cannonballs and processed peas. They have a right to be worried about me.

A battering bell shortly summoned battering feet and furious gusts of gravy to a high brown place full of tables. Sally was sucked in by the rush. And then hung quiet, because everyone hushed. Himself stood up to say, “For what we are about to receive, may the Lord make us truly thankful. Amen.” Again he had a different manner, more like a priest. Himself's voice rolled out the few words like organ music. Chairs scraped. Cutlery clattered. Voices blared, and Phyllis and Himself were again immersed in talking to the boys at tables where they sat.