Ghostwriting (6 page)

A silence developed. James said, “Still, you really should talk to her a bit more.”

Rhodes smiled. “I know. It’s strange, James, but I find it so hard to find the right words. Me, who spends his life doing nothing but trying to find the best way to express my emotions...”

The women strolled within earshot, rose cuttings in hand, and James boomed, “So the duffer missed an open goal and I lost my tenner!”

Other friends dropped by later, and the gathering turned into a party, as the sun went down but the summer heat remained in the air. Rhodes drank, and began to enjoy the to and fro of friendly, meaningless conversation.

From time to time, though, he thought back to the computer program and told himself that he had imagined the entire episode.

He lived in a rational word. There were no such things as ghostly communiqués via the latest voice recognition program.

~

They strolled home before midnight. Though Rhodes had promised himself that he would turn in without looking into his study, he was weaker than his resolve. As he passed the door on his way to the bathroom, he stepped into the room, nudged the mouse and saw a block of text on the screen.

His knees seemed to dissolve. His heart thudded. He sat before the screen and began reading.

Please don’t be frightened, you or mum. I know you never believed in anything like ghosties or ghoulies, dad. But I’m nothing like that. I’m me, and I love you both. That’s what matters. Even after death, which is just the end of one stage of existence, what matters is the love that binds us, like a... like a kind of universal glue. I’m in communication with everyone – and I mean
everyone –
who has ever lived. In a way I’m part of them, and they’re part of me. It’s hard to explain. Anyway, what is important is that you know this, and that you don’t feel sad anymore. Love, Jane.

His mouth was dry, and his hand shook as he adjusted the microphone and spoke into it. He was aware that he was whispering, so that Anne would not hear him. The words appeared on the screen.

“Where are you? Are you still in the house? Why now? I mean... Why haven’t you contacted us before now?”

He was weeping, his throat sore, as he relived a sudden flash vision of Jane leaning against his chair as he rewrote a story. She had often read out what he wrote, commenting, “That’s good.” Or, “Oh, too sad!”

He found a tissue and blotted his eyes, composed himself and said, “I want to tell your mum, but... but I don’t want her to think I’ve gone mad.” He laughed. “Perhaps I have. Anyway... Love you, poppet—” he was crying again: he’d called her poppet as a child.

He left the program running and turned out the light.

Anne was already in bed. He rolled in beside her and she held him in silence. He stared at the diffuse glow of the full moon through the blinds and tried to sleep.

~

He was quiet at breakfast, fearing Anne would detect something about his mood and question him.

Once, he almost blurted out what was happening with the program, but something stopped him. It was more than that he feared Anne might think him insane, more that her thinking so would be too painful for her to bear.

“Worrying about the novel?”

He smiled. “How did you guess?”

“It’s as if I’m sharing you with some invisible lover sometimes, Steven.”

After breakfast, nervous now, he made his way upstairs.

He opened the door. The screensaver was on, throwing stars at him. He hurried over to his chair and touched the mouse. The stars gave way to a block of text. He leaned forward and read the spectral message, heart pounding.

Where am I? I’m here, dad. In the house. But at the same time I’m... well, I’m everywhere. It’s so hard to explain in words, because it’s so different to anything I experienced when I was alive. You see, we don’t use words here. Just thoughts. So I’m not used to communicating physical things like ‘where’... I hope that makes a kind of sense. And why haven’t I contacted you before? Well, I couldn’t. I couldn’t make myself heard. I was talking to you all the time, but you just couldn’t hear me. Now, this thing can hear me... You said that you were frightened to tell mum. Well, I think you should. You can’t keep it all to yourself. Show her the words, prove to her that it’s me, okay? Love you both, Jane.

Rhodes sat and stared at the screen, absorbing what she had said.

Prove to her, he thought. That was it. He’d tell Anne, then he’d prove to her that their daughter was not dead...

Paranoid at the thought of losing Jane’s words, and not trusting his PC’s back-up, he copied the file to disc, whispered goodbye to his daughter and made his way downstairs.

~

Anne was in the conservatory, leafing through a gardening magazine. She looked up when he entered. “You’re early. I thought you’d be working longer.” She stopped, then said, “Steven, is everything... what is it?”

He sat down on the wicker chair opposite her. He felt sick with apprehension. “I’ve always been honest with you, haven’t I?”

Something very like fear clouded her features. “What is it, Steven?”

“Look... something’s happened. Something strange. You won’t believe me. But I have to tell you.”

“Steven, for God’s sake, what’s wrong?”
 

He stared into her eyes. “Jane isn’t dead.”

Her features twisted. He thought she was about to cry out. “What?” she whispered, shaking her head.

“She... I now it sounds crazy... but Jane has been talking to me—”

“Oh, Christ—”

“ – through the voice recognition program. I left it running when I collected you the other day. There was something on the screen when I came back. From Jane. I’ve saved her messages. I want you to see...”

He stood and reached out for her hand.

She just stared up at him. “Steven...?”

“I’m sorry. I know what you’re thinking. But I had to tell you.”

He took her hand and led her from the conservatory, through the house and up the stairs to his study.

There were no new words on the screen. He scrolled back to the beginning of Jane’s message, sat Anne in his chair and gestured to the screen.

He switched off the microphone and said, “This is what appeared the other day, when I got back.”

Stunned, she read.

I just wanted to say how much I love you both.

She wept. “Steven... how could you?”

“What? I—”

“I don’t believe it. Jane... is... dead. Gone, Steven. This... It’s part of your novel, isn’t it? Please tell me that it’s...” She broke down and wept.

He took her shoulders. “Anne, Anne...” He scrolled down the page, showing her more.

She read, shaking her head, tears tracking down her cheeks.

When she’d reached the end, Rhodes said, “And there’s a way I can prove it. I’ll leave the program running. We’ll lock the house and go out, come back in an hour or two, okay? If she’s contacted us... then that proves it.”

Anne turned from the screen and looked at him, shaking her head.

He went on, “I’ll ask her a question, give her something to start on.” He had a better idea. “No, you ask her something. Anything.”

She shook her head, wordless. “I... this is insane, Steven. I’m worried. For you...”

“Don’t be. Just say something, okay?”

She stood suddenly and moved to the door, then turned and stared at him.

“Anne?”

“I... I need to think about this, Steven,” she said, and hurried from the room before he had time to reply.

Rhodes moved to the window and stared out, his pulse pounding in his ears. Beyond the window, a chaffinch was singing in the myrtle tree. For some reason its song brought tears to his eyes, like an unbearably poignant passage of classical music.
 

He remembered taking a five year-old Jane to the aviary at the local zoo, watching her delight at the sight of the hundred multi-coloured tropical birds darting about their enclosures. He recalled her feeding ducks at the village pond.

It seemed that his memories contained so much that was linked directly or indirectly to his daughter, disproportionate to the number of years they had spent together. His past was full of her.

“Steven...”

Anne’s voice surprised him. How long had he been standing there, wrestling with the conflicting thoughts that filled his head?

He remained facing the window, staring out but seeing nothing.

“Steven, I always wanted to know who... who did it, who killed our daughter.”

He turned.

She went on, “If you’re right, Steven...” She gestured to the computer.

He closed his eyes. Did he really want to know who had killed her, now that he knew his daughter was not truly dead and gone?

Anne made her way across the room and sat before the glowing screen. She looked up at him. “I... I want to know if she saw the car. Perhaps she saw something, the make, its colour.”

He nodded, wordlessly.

“Is that okay, Steven?”

He switched on the microphone. Anne leaned forward tentatively.
 

“Who did it?” she whispered. “Who knocked you down? Do you remember.” She stopped suddenly, pushed herself from the chair and stood up.

The voice recognition program had mangled her words, and with his left hand Rhodes corrected the mistakes on the screen.

He moved her from the PC, held her and whispered, “We’ll go, leave the house.”

They hurried from the room and made their way downstairs. They locked the front and back doors and set off through the village. Anne clutched his hand with the force of desperation.

They were silent for a time. At last she said, “It’s impossible, Steven. These things don’t happen. Jane is dead.”

He shook his head. “That’s what I thought. I tried to come to terms with what happened... but it wasn’t working. Even writing about it didn’t help. Then this happened.”

She stopped in the lane, turned to him. “Steven, this goes against everything I believe in.”

He pulled her to him. “I know, I know it does. But sometimes belief in the rational can’t explain everything.”

They hurried on, over a stile and through the ancient oak wood, the path shaded and cool out of the glare of the midday sun.

Everything is different now, Rhodes thought to himself. Everything is wonderful and different.

They left the wood and took the long route around Harper’s pond, where as a child Jane had loved to come and feed the ducks. The thought brought back memories which, for the first time in months, were not painful.

They walked back into the village. Rhodes looked at his watch. They had been gone just under two hours. He was aware of his increased pulse.

They approached the house, slowing down. Anne unlocked the front door and they stepped inside. They hesitated at the foot of the stairs. He gestured for her to go first. She looked at him, then climbed.

He opened the study door and they stepped inside.

The screensaver had come on. He nudged the mouse and stared at the screen. Anne was behind him, gripping his arm.

The screen was blank, but for Anne’s line of interrogation.

“Steven...”

“I... Look, she just needs more time. I’ve always been away longer in the past, hours... overnight.”

Anne was staring at him, something like pity in her eyes. “Steven, I love you. You’re all I’ve got. I don’t know what’s going on.” She clung to him, sobbing now. A quick pain cut to the core of him, an ache that she could not share his belief, share in his blessed sense of relief.

She kissed him and moved from the study. “I’ll make some tea,” she said in barely a whisper. “Join me downstairs, okay?”

He nodded as she left the room.

Leaden, he moved to the window and stared out. The garden was silent. There was no sign of the chaffinch. He was unable to explain to himself why he found its absence so terribly painful.

He slumped into his chair before the computer and closed his eyes. Jane needed more time, that was all. Two hours had not been enough.

When he opened his eyes there was, miraculously, a block of text on the screen before him.

I’m glad you told mum. She had to know. I’m so happy. Now she can stop grieving. You’ll be able to enjoy life again, knowing that we never really die, that there is no such thing as death. Mum wanted to know what happened, who knocked me down. Well, it doesn’t really matter, does it? I mean, in the bigger scheme of things. We all end up
here
, don’t we? And, here, we forgive. But if mum wants to know... I can tell her. You see, we know everything. There are no secrets. All I do is think back to that time, think about what happened, and I can see the car coming up behind me, sounding it’s horn. I turned to look, wobbled and swerved, and the car hit the bike, and... well, you know what happened. I recognised the car, dad. It belonged to your friend, James. James Greene. He killed me, but I forgive him, dad. And I hope you will too.

Rhodes sat very still and stared at the screen, reading the text over and over again.

He switched off the microphone, closed the program. Then he hurried from the study and, without telling Anne where he was going, he left the house and took his car from the garage.

~

He realised where he was going only when he turned off the main road. It was Sunday afternoon and James had driven his Porsche into the lane, where he would give it its weekly shampoo and polish.

James was standing beside his car, a couple of hundred metres ahead. Rhodes slowed, feeling nothing at all but a dull, cold ache in his chest. He felt no rage, no anger; not even, he surprised himself, the desire to blame.

He accelerated. Even then, he was not sure quite what he intended. He approached James at speed. It would be so easy to clip him, send his friend crashing to the tarmac...

He gripped the wheel, his features set, and stared ahead.

James saw him coming, lifted a hand in greeting and smiled.

And Rhodes, thinking of his daughter’s last word to him, lifted his own hand in salutation as he sped past.

~

He returned home and hurried upstairs to his study.

There, before he could change his mind, he quickly closed down the program and slipped the CD into its packaging. He deleted the file containing Jane’s words from the PC’s memory, deleted the copy of it on disc, and made his way downstairs.