Authors: Curtis Jobling
‘Sod off! I’m not jealous!’
‘Yes you are! You’ve been like a kicked dog ever since we started seeing each other. Face like a wet weekend. I know you fancied her, but you’re gone. I’m not. Should I
ignore my feelings?’
‘You?’ I shouted, my own anger now getting the better of me. ‘Feelings?’
‘Damn right,’ snarled Dougie. ‘Feelings! That’s why I’ve pandered to your every whim since you died, tolerated your creeping around like my flaming shadow every
minute of the night and day. See, that’s what mates do, Will. They make sacrifices. It’s me that’s taken you wherever you want, whenever you want.’
‘Oh yeah?’
‘Yeah. Popping round to your folks for awkward conversations after I haven’t seen them for months. Trips to the hospital so you can spend time with your mate, the Major. I do all
this for you, and do I grumble? You won’t allow me a moment’s happiness with Lucy.’
‘This
isn’t
about Lucy,’ I said, regretting any previous moodiness. I’d turned a new leaf since my chat with the Major, but the epiphany had come too late. I was
already damned by my actions.
‘It’s always about Lucy!’
‘I’m trying to help you see the bigger picture, but you just won’t listen, you idiot.’
‘You patronising sod,’ said Dougie, and took a swing.
Ordinarily, such a punch would have flown straight through me, sending him on to his bum. For whatever reason, probably the anger and raw emotion that had boiled up between us, the old rules
didn’t apply. His punch connected with
me
, his knuckles catching me flush on the chin. My head recoiled and I reeled back, through the air, through the bed, staggering through the wall
and on to the landing. Dougie followed, appearing in the doorway to his bedroom.
‘Stay away from me, Underwood.’
He slammed the door as I nursed my jaw.
‘If only it were that easy.’
The next three days saw my relationship with Dougie plummet to never-before-seen depths. We went from best of friends to the finest of enemies. For the first two days we said
nothing to one another. I was the shadow we’d joked about, following him, impossible to shake. He spent time with Lucy – a
lot
of time. Perhaps he was trying to rub my nose in
it, I couldn’t say. He’d got me wrong in tremendous fashion, and I had no hope of persuading him otherwise. So I kept my back turned, tried to shut them out, ignored what was going on
behind me. In his crueller moments, Dougie would occasionally mention me to her, recounting embarrassing stories from my extensive back catalogue. But he couldn’t shake me. I was going
nowhere. I was haunting him, for real.
Dougie was hurting, that much was clear. The words he’d thrown at me during our row still rang in my ears, much of which was true. He
had
gone out of his way to help me. How had I
repaid him? I’d been sulky over his relationship with Lucy. I felt bad about it, only realising my stupidity after my chat with the Major, but it all seemed so terribly late now. The cannon
had fired, the horse had bolted, and I was covered in manure.
The third day saw Dougie catching up with Andy and Stu. Previously, whenever I’d anything to say to them, Dougie acted as a conduit. He was the mouthpiece, passing on my comments. Only
now, sat in the public library, he wasn’t being quite so helpful. As the three of them trawled through the local records, searching for the Major’s old flame, Dougie didn’t
acknowledge me once. He actively ignored me. If the others asked me a question, he’d tell them I was exploring the library. It was hopeless; he’d cut me out. I was farting into a
gale.
‘
Captain
Chip Flowers? So he wasn’t a major after all?’ asked Stu, rifling through the DVD library beside the computer terminal.
‘Try and keep up,’ said Dougie.
My former best friend might have been ignoring me, but at least he’d returned to the topic at hand. The Major was a mate to both of us, and Dougie had never been one to shy away from a
challenge. There was investigating to be done. He leaned on the back of Andy’s chair, peering over his shoulder, our Dungeon Master working his magic on the keyboard. His fingers were a blur,
searching through the Births, Deaths and Marriages website.
‘Says here twelve men died when the base was bombed,’ said Andy with a shiver. ‘Maybe that’s how the Major kicked it? Have to say, though, this is like searching for a
needle in a haystack.’
‘Chip’s a nickname for Charles, right?’ said Dougie.
‘Right, but there’s no point in looking for him. He’s not the focal point of my search. There’ll be nothing connecting him to any local woman. All I have to go on is
Ruby, and there were forty of them alive in the town around that time.’
‘She’d have been somewhere between fifteen and thirty-two years of age I reckon,’ said Dougie. ‘The Major said she was younger than him.’
‘That brings the number down to twelve lovely ladies.’
‘How many were married?’ asked Stu. ‘I mean, during the war years.’
‘Before or during? There’s quite a difference.’
‘I dunno. Look for both.’
The fingers tapped away, Andy squinting through his glasses as he inspected the monitor.
‘You think the Major’s still here because of this Ruby lass then?’ said Stu.
‘Possibly,’ said Dougie. ‘The pattern seems to be great love or great trauma keeps ghosts here.’
‘Or both together,’ I added, but he didn’t respond.
‘Alright,’ said Andy. ‘Six were married before the war had begun and three more of them married during the war years.’
‘What years were they married?’ asked Dougie, thinking hard now, his brow knotted.
‘Two in 1940 and one in ’42. Is that important?’
‘Yes. We can rule those three out also. The Major told Will that he was born in 1910 and died when he was thirty-three years old. So the Ruby he was in love with must have been single in
1943, by my reckoning.’
‘Good work, Sherlock,’ I said, hopeful for a reaction, but got zilch back. Dougie continued talking.
‘So, we have three left. What happened to them?’
Andy shrugged. ‘Two of them married after the war, the other remained a spinster until her death in 2001.’
‘So,’ said Stu, spinning the DVD rack, ‘our mystery lady’s one of those three?’
‘Can we rule out the one who passed away?’ asked Andy.
‘Why?’ asked the vicar’s son.
‘Well, if it
is
love that’s keeping the Major here, then doesn’t it make sense, with that Ruby having died, that he’d have joined her? Crossed over to the other
side when she did?’
‘We can’t rule her out,’ said Dougie. ‘If it
was
her, and we can’t be sure, then it doesn’t necessarily hold true that with her passing the Major could
move on. I don’t think ghosting’s as simple as that. He could be here until the next millennium, patrolling those hospital corridors.’
‘She sounds dodgy to me,’ said Stu, as I manoeuvred closer to Andy, beside Dougie. My old mate glowered at me briefly, disapproving of my proximity, but I ignored him.
‘Dodgy?’ asked Andy, leaving the three remaining ladies highlighted on the screen. ‘Why’s that?’
‘Imagine, not telling someone your name? What was she hiding?’
‘She may have been hiding nothing,’ said Dougie. ‘Just being flirtatious. Mysterious.’
‘Perhaps she came from an important family,’ said Andy. ‘Could’ve been controversial if folk knew she was seeing a GI. After all, not everyone welcomed the
Yanks.’
I was half listening to them as they discussed the various possibilities, but my attention was focused on the computer monitor, specifically the women’s names.
Stu smiled smugly and shook his head. ‘You two muppets aren’t seeing the big picture. What if she was
married
? Have you not thought about that? Her bloke could’ve been
overseas, fighting. Or he could’ve been the local butcher, who knows? What I’m saying is that the fact she never told him her surname casts a massive question mark over who it might be.
We could be back to looking at twelve again.’
‘Call off the search,’ I said. ‘I think I’ve found her.’
‘You what?’ said Dougie, his first words to me for three days. ‘What makes you think it’s her and not any of the others?’
I pointed a shimmering blue finger at one of the three we’d whittled it down to. Of those three, it was one of the women who had married after the war.
‘Ruby Hershey,’ I said. ‘Like in the chocolate.’
‘Eh?’ said Dougie.
‘Is that Will?’ asked Andy.
‘What’s he saying?’ said Stu.
It was the one piece of information I’d failed to pass on to Dougie after my heart-to-heart with the Major. I didn’t think it had been important, hadn’t figured upon it having
a piece to play in the puzzle until it was there before my eyes.
‘Hershey as in Josh Hershey,’ I said, sighing as I recognised the tragic parallel. ‘He was the Major’s best mate, the guy who asked Ruby to marry him but she turned him
down for Chip.’
I turned to Dougie, his face pale as he caught the irony too. When he spoke to our friends, his voice was fragile.
‘She married the Major’s best mate.’
‘The Major’s mate,’ tutted Stu. ‘Worst. Friend. Ever.’
I don’t know whether it was my inspired catch on the whole Hershey thing that did it, but a distinct thaw in my relationship with Dougie followed. He no longer ignored
me, answering questions in a fashion, either with nods, single-syllable words or reluctant grunts. So long as we stuck to the topic of ghostly mysteries, we were on safe ground, but anything
regarding family or friends was strictly off limits. For me to bring up Lucy Carpenter or Mr Hancock would’ve been insane. We weren’t best mates – I doubted we ever would be again
– but we were talking, and that was something.
Dougie stood by the hob, the saucepan of beans bubbling, as he pasted butter over four slices of toast, two for each plate on the work surface.
‘So we’re calling in on the Major at some point in the next few days?’ I asked optimistically.
‘Mmm.’
‘We need to tell him what we’ve discovered about Ruby.’
‘Yup.’
‘I was also wondering – and shoot me down if this sounds too stupid – could we revisit the railway station? Perhaps in daylight? Check out the theory that the
Lamplighter’s cursed to remain there and can’t leave? It’d be good to know for sure.’
Dougie said nothing, taking the saucepan off the heat and carrying it over the plates of toast. He poured the gloop out on to the slices of steaming bread as I yammered on.
‘See, I’m wondering if there’s some way we can banish him? Exorcise him like Reverend Singer suggested that time? Stu says his dad knows people, right? Getting an evil spirit
vanquished once and for all has to be a good thing. I’d call it a win for us if it worked.’
Dougie clattered the pan on to the hob. He turned to me, his face humourless.
‘There
is
no “us” any more, Will. You were always the bright one, surely you can see this? We’re stuck together, like it or lump it. We can move on, but I
can’t forgive and forget what you said.’
‘Mate, we’ve both made mistakes, said some dumb things—’
‘Stop calling me “mate”, Will. We’ll go and see the Lamplighter, like you suggested.’ He picked up the two plates, cutlery in his shirt pocket. He cocked his head
and smiled. ‘Who knows? If we
can
banish his ghost, perhaps that’s the good deed that finally sends you on your way, eh?’
I didn’t reply as he walked away. It seemed he took a touch too much pleasure from that last comment.
‘You can but hope,’ I whispered, before following him through to the lounge.
Mr Hancock was already hunched forward in his armchair, cutting a corner off a slice of bean-topped toast. He was putting it away, clearly hungry. I wondered when he’d last had a meal. The
empty bottles were visible behind the chair, as were the pills he took, the bottle sitting on the cabinet beside him.
Dougie sat on the sofa, plate in lap, less enthusiastic with the feast before him. They ate in silence for a minute, Mr Hancock’s gaze fixed upon his plate.
‘When are you going back to work, Dad?’
Mr Hancock’s knife screeched as it cut along the plate, causing me to jump. He smacked his lips, clearing his mouth of mashed-up beans and bread. He was in no hurry to answer, carefully
considering a response.
‘I’m not sure, son. Perhaps I’ll pop along to the surgery tomorrow, see what the doctor can prescribe. These pills help me sleep, but I need something to wake me up, I reckon.
Then maybe I’ll be good to work.’
‘You could always try drinking coffee instead of booze.’
There was no instant comeback from his father. He sawed at his second slice of toast, as if he hadn’t heard Dougie.
‘I’m sure I can get back into work, Douglas, just as soon as I clear my head.’
‘Your head’s been fogged for ages, Dad. The only way you’re returning to work is by quitting drinking.’
‘I know, son, really I do. I promise, I’ll knock it on the head once I’m done with what’s in the house.’
‘You’ve promised me that before.’
‘Well, I mean it this time.’
Dougie placed his plate on the floor, the food barely touched.
‘Just because they’re in the house, doesn’t mean you
have
to drink them, Dad. You could pour them down the sink right now.’ He rose from the sofa. ‘I could
help you. Come on—’
‘Sit down, son. Maybe later, eh?’
Dougie shook his head. ‘It’s always later. Why won’t you get out of that armchair? What’s
really
stopping you from going back to work? Why do you no longer work
for Bradbury? What happened?’
Mr Hancock slammed his cutlery down. ‘I’ve told you already, we’re not going to talk about Mr Bradbury.’
‘You’re wrong. That’s exactly what we’re doing.’
I could see tears in Dougie’s eyes. I’d never seen him make a stand against his father like this. He’d never had to. Mr Hancock had always been such an easy-going, mellow chap.
It was only recently that he’d fallen apart, in the last few months. He was a mess of the man he’d once been, his own son now his nursemaid. If Dougie didn’t cash the disability
cheques and dip into the old man’s bank account when needed, there’d be no food on the table. The situation was dire – and Dougie had reached breaking point.