Ghost Species

by James Bradley

  He nods. ‘I do.’

  ‘Are you worried I might be a distraction?’

  He regards her dispassionately. He has changed, somehow, she realises. The affectlessness he possessed when they first met has given way to something harder, closer to madness. Or has he always been like this and she is only noticing it now because he has power over her? A few weeks earlier he was the subject of widespread condemnation after a Twitter meltdown in which he accused a progressive Congresswoman in the United States of doing deals with big oil after she criticised the focus of the Foundation’s activities.

  Suddenly he smiles. ‘We only want what’s best for Eve. That’s all we’ve ever wanted.’

  A fortnight later Jay summons her to his office and presents her with a proposal. She will return to the Foundation three days a week. On these days Eve will accompany her to the labs or, more often, remain at home with a carer selected by the Foundation. When Kate demands to be involved in the choice of carer it is made clear that will not be happening. Despite the offer to provide her with work and housing, the Foundation – or more likely, Davis (and perhaps Jay) – seems intent on ensuring her responsibilities are limited, as a security measure or a punishment, or both.

  In the end the Foundation selects a behavioural psychologist with experience working with children. The weekend before her first day Jay brings her to meet Kate and Eve. It is not the first time Jay has been here on the weekend: since Kate’s return he has made a point of visiting two or three times a week, often bringing gifts for Eve, as if determined to be a part of her life. Kate does not know how she feels about these visits: although she resents both his assumption she will welcome them and her inability to object to them, there is no question Eve has grown fond of Jay, often asking about him and when he will visit again.

  Kate opens the door as Jay pulls up; he waves but she does not respond, instead focused on the woman who opens the passenger door. Kate has already googled her, meaning she knows what she will look like, yet she is surprised by the other woman’s relative youth as she steps out, the easy athleticism of her long limbs. Seeing Kate standing there, the other woman smiles.

  ‘This is Cassie,’ Jay says.

  Cassie smiles warmly and extends a hand. Beneath her long ash-blonde hair her face is friendly, open. ‘It’s very exciting to finally meet. Jay has told me a lot about you,’ she says. Her Californian accent a reminder of Kate’s years there.

  Kate takes her hand. Behind Cassie, Jay is watching her, his face carefully composed. ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you as well.’

  Once they are inside, Cassie stands and looks around, her face giving nothing away. Kate is uncomfortably aware that despite the Foundation-arranged furnishings the house still feels bare, only half-lived in. Once when she and Jay were first together he joked she lived like she was always ready to stage her own disappearance; he had laughed, but in the moment before she realised he was joking she had felt herself tense, all her years of being afraid others might see who she was, where she came from, coming rushing back.

  ‘What a great house,’ Cassie says.

  ‘Apparently the architect has won awards.’

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ Cassie says, but before she can say more Jay interposes himself between the two women.

  ‘Is Eve around?’

  ‘Of course,’ Kate says, moving towards the door to the yard. ‘She’s outside.’

  Cassie and Jay follow and stop beside her.

  Eve is playing a game with sticks and leaves beneath the tree, her tawny hair bright in the pale sunshine. Cassie hesitates, just long enough for Kate to see she didn’t quite believe what she had been told before she came here.

  ‘Have you been with the Foundation long?’ Kate asks.

  Cassie smiles. ‘Three years. I was working on the project in Canada. With the Inuit.’

  ‘And they moved you here for this?’

  Cassie’s eyes dart towards Jay, as if seeking his permission. ‘No,’ she says. ‘I came for another role. Davis and Jay recruited me for this.’

  ‘Have you worked with children before?’

  Cassie nods. ‘Yes. I specialised in work with kids, but I also worked as a nanny right through university.’

  ‘We chose Cassie as much for her personality as for her qualifications,’ Jay says.

  Kate folds her arms.

  ‘I’m excited to be doing this,’ Cassie says. ‘For scientific reasons, obviously, but also because of who she is, the chance to be near her. It’s astonishing.’

  ‘Perhaps Cassie could meet her?’ Jay says.

  Kate glances from him to Cassie and back. Then she places a hand on the door and, sliding it open, calls out to Eve.

  ‘Eve? There’s somebody I’d like you to meet.’

  On the far side of the lawn Eve’s shoulders immediately tighten and she does not look up. Instead she concentrates on her game with renewed energy.

  Cassie glances at Kate. ‘May I?’

  Kate hesitates, then nods.

  Cassie crosses the lawn and crouches down beside Eve. ‘Hi Eve,’ she says. ‘My name’s Cassie.’ When Eve does not respond Cassie leans back and sits, cross-legged. ‘What’s that you’re doing?’ she asks, quietly. Eve still refuses to respond.

  Kate cannot move. She knows that Eve will withdraw if pushed. But she is also concerned Eve will seem difficult, sub-normal, that Cassie will mistake her manner for pathology. Perhaps sensing this, Jay places a hand on Kate’s arm. She flinches, then relents.

  Long seconds pass. Cassie does not move, just sits, quietly, watching Eve move her sticks and doll around. And then, without speaking or looking at her, Eve turns, and presses one of the leaves into Cassie’s hand, before returning to her game. Kate touches her throat, her heart too full to speak.

  One of Cassie’s first initiatives is the creation of a playgroup for Eve. Because of the danger Eve’s appearance will arouse suspicion if she spends extended time in the wider world, Cassie proposes they work within the organisation by identifying staff who have children a similar age to Eve.

  ‘You don’t think they’re more likely to guess the truth about her if they’re already involved in the Foundation’s projects?’ Kate asks.

  ‘I think we have to assume that will happen,’ Cassie replies. ‘But working internally means anybody involved will be bound by the non-disclosure clauses in their employment agreements.’

  A week later Cassie has a list of six possible candidates, all within a year of Eve in age. ‘We’ll have to assess them, obviously,’ Cassie says, ‘and run some background checks on their parents. But they look promising.’

  In the end only four are deemed suitable: one of the original six – the oldest girl – is disallowed after an analysis of her mother’s social-media postings suggests she is likely to pose a security risk, while another is found to have a tendency to resort to physical violence with younger children. (‘It’s not just about protecting Eve,’ Cassie tells Kate. ‘There’s also the issue of Eve’s unusual strength creating the possibility she could harm him.’) After briefings with the parents the others all agree, though, and so, as the winter gives way to spring, two days a week are given over to a structured program of group activity and play.

  Kate and Eve arrive early for the first session. Cassie has organised for one of the rooms to be converted into a play area for the session, arranging toys and art materials and beanbags in particular zones. Eve has spent enough time in the facility to understand she is allowed to play with them, so after a quick glance at Kate and Cassie she goes over to the collection of dolls in one corner and begins to play.

  Cassie stands beside Kate, watching. ‘She’s going to be fine,’ Cassie says. ‘The others are all great kids.’

  Kate nods. The first day she left Eve with Cassie she could not concentrate on her work, and although she successfully resisted the desire to call, at the end of the day she left early and raced home, heart pounding, pushing her car so far over th
e speed limit its systems felt the need to caution her. When she arrived Eve was standing in the drive with Cassie, and as Kate got out of the car Eve charged towards her and threw herself into Kate’s arms. Perhaps Cassie saw the anxiety in Kate’s face, because she stepped forward and stroked Eve’s hair.

  ‘We’ve had a great day, haven’t we, Eve?’ she said, her eyes meeting Kate’s and holding them. Over the weeks, Kate’s initial suspicion of the younger woman has given way to wary regard and an understanding that, whatever her wider agenda, Cassie genuinely cares for Eve, but Kate still had to fight the fear she was being supplanted.

  ‘They’ve all agreed to the study?’ Kate asks as they wait for the rest of the playgroup to arrive.

  Cassie nods. The other parents have not been told about Eve. Instead they have agreed to their children taking part in a longitudinal study into language development. ‘They have. And they’ve all signed the relevant non-disclosures.’ She points to the roof. ‘We’re going to record the whole thing as well.’

  Kate is about to reply when the door behind them opens, and a man Kate recognises from one of the other labs looks in. He has a thick ginger beard and carefully sculpted hair and holds a girl of about Eve’s age by the hand.

  ‘Is this the playgroup?’ he asks.

  Cassie smiles. ‘Hi Daniel!’ she says. ‘And Rose! How are you?’

  The three other children – a boy, Felix, and two more girls, Heti and Zelda – arrive soon after, accompanied by their parents. Cassie has been careful to ensure none of them already know each other, meaning they are wary at first, but gradually the four sapient children drift together. Eve does not join them, instead continuing to play quietly on her own. Kate waits. It is obvious she knows they are there, but does not feel able to approach them. Finally Cassie intervenes, taking Eve by the hand and leading her across. Kate watches, fists clenched, her heart leaping.

  ‘This is Eve,’ Cassie says, crouching down beside the other children. ‘She doesn’t know anybody. Would you all look after her for me?’

  There is a moment’s silence, then Rose nods. Cassie places Eve’s hand in Rose’s, and Rose solemnly instructs her on the game she and the others have been playing.

  ‘She’s yours?’ a voice says behind her. Kate turns to find Daniel standing there.

  ‘Yes,’ she says, forcing herself to smile.

  ‘Eve?’

  She nods.

  ‘How old is she?’

  ‘Three and a half.’

  Daniel glances at Eve again, his surprise obvious. Cassie has chosen the children so they are all within a year or so in age, but Eve is considerably more powerful and physically developed than any of the others.

  ‘And Jay. He’s her dad, right?’

  Rose whispers something to Eve, and Eve laughs shyly. Kate smiles.

  ‘He is. Although we’re not together.’

  Daniel looks at her, his blue eyes careful. ‘I’m sorry. The first years can be tough, can’t they?’

  Kate nods. ‘They can.’

  Rose leads Eve closer to the others and then releases her hand to return to the game. Eve stays where she is, looking down and away. Kate forces herself to smile.

  The second session is easier. Although Eve still spends much of the time playing alone, she also joins in group activities and, gradually, with the games of the other four. At first it is mostly parallel play, but by the third session she and Rose and the boy, Felix, begin to play together. Watching Eve run and shout, or her shy pleasure in playing with the blocks and dolls leaves Kate full of love.

  Despite herself, Kate also finds herself drawn into conversation with the other parents. At first it is mostly coincidental, glancing meetings during drop-offs and pick-ups, but one day she accepts an invitation to have lunch with Daniel and Heti’s mother, Seepaj, in the dining area. Kate is friendly but distant, wary of Daniel’s desire to draw her into his social circle, his curiosity about Eve, but as she walks back to her office afterwards she finds she was grateful for a chance to compare notes with other parents. It is only later that it occurs to her this may have been Cassie’s intention all along.

  Meanwhile she finds herself drawn back into her work. For obvious reasons she has been moved off the main project; instead she has been attached to a virtual team working on the development of synthetic organisms capable of consuming methane with a view to slowing the release of greenhouse gases from the permafrost and the ocean bed. The work is technical but absorbing, and although Kate tries not to think too much about it, charged with urgency. Each week brings worse news about the hastening changes in the north, images of sinkholes and rivers collapsing through the earth, of the melting corpses of ancient animals rising from the ground, as if the past is intruding, ghostlike and uncanny, into the present, and time is hastening, hastening, hastening.

  Spring becomes summer, then winter returns, snow with it, whistling down from the mountains and covering the lawn outside. Kate takes Eve outside, watches as she races across the narrow patch of lawn, her dark footsteps crisscrossing its white oblong. Afterwards, inside, she heaps wood into the fireplace. Somewhere in the distance she hears a peculiar, wheezing cry, and a moment later a sort of yip in reply, the sound raising the hackles on the back of her neck, not just for its strangeness but for its unsettling familiarity.

  On the rug by the fire Eve is drawing, her crayons spilling colour onto the page in the flickering light. Immersed in her task she seems oblivious to Kate’s scrutiny.

  The cry does not come again. Opening her screen, Kate finds a story about thylacine sightings. A shiver runs down her spine. Could that be what she has heard? And if it is, have they come from the facility? Glancing at Eve again, she feels a sort of vertigo, a feeling the world is shifting beneath her.

  The snow passes, replaced by freezing rain and low mist. Despite its elegant design the house leaks heat, warmth bleeding away into the dank darkness outside. In the afternoons Kate takes Eve walking, pushing through low bushes and spiky shrubs, their branches glistening with droplets of freezing water; as she brushes against them they lose their shape, splash down against her.

  Eve seems at home in this wet gloom: she moves quickly through the trees, her hair thick, fiery in the half-light. Once or twice she looks around, checking Kate is watching, that she has not left her behind; each time Kate smiles back.

  Back at the house she sees a missed call from Yassamin. Although Yassamin and Sami have come to the house several times since that first visit, in recent weeks Yassamin has taken to suggesting Kate and Eve visit them in the city, an idea Kate has rejected, uneasy about the potential for disturbing the delicate equilibrium of her and Eve’s life.

  Pressing the button she calls Yassamin back. She answers quickly, greeting her.

  ‘I wanted to check you’re all right,’ says Yassamin. ‘I saw there had been snow.’

  Kate reassures her they are fine.

  ‘And your work? It goes well?’

  ‘Yes,’ Kate says. ‘Very well.’

  ‘It is Sami’s birthday in a few weeks,’ Yassamin says. ‘I thought Eve might like to come.’

  Kate hesitates. ‘I don’t know. Eve finds large groups difficult.’

  ‘Perhaps you could come another weekend, then? Sami would love to see Eve.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Kate says. ‘Perhaps.’

  They talk for a little longer, exchanging stories about work, the two children, until eventually Yassamin says she has to go; Sami is shouting in the next room. Placing the phone down Kate stares at the window, her reflection. The house is almost silent, the only sound the distant dripping of water from the trees and gutters. She has grown used to their isolation, but sometimes she wonders what will happen when Eve is older. How will she find friends? Develop relationships?

  As she boils the pasta for Eve’s evening meal she continues to consider the question, reminded again of her own childhood, her mother’s moods and need for attention, how difficult it made it to make or maintain normal fri
endships. How much of who she is has its origins in those years? Would she have been different, less unyielding, more able to trust if her mother had been different? Or would she have been this way anyway? Once she would have rejected her inability to decide. But being with Eve has made her understand these questions are never simple: we are never either the teller or the tale; we are both, and neither.

  Later, adrift in the warm glow of the lamp by Eve’s bed, Eve’s small body pressed against her as she reads to her, she watches the solemnity with which Eve listens and wonders, not for the first time, how much she understands. Not the narrative, the sequence of events as it is related, but the meanings that move beneath the surface of the story. Can Eve make sense of the pictures? Interpret the emotions they are supposed to communicate and provoke? Can she infer motivations, purpose? Is her mind capable of symbolic meaning, of making sense of metaphor?

  Of course it is difficult to know with a child so young, but as Kate watches her touch the picture and turn the pages, wanting to know what happens next, it is difficult not to believe that Eve understands. One day she reads her a picture book about a lying bear and is surprised when Eve erupts into laughter at the end, immediately recognising the bear’s frantic overcompensations for his untruth for what they are.

  At other times, Kate is less certain. Out on the track one day they come across a raven lying dead on its back, its glossy black plumage rumpled and dull, its eye filmy. Ants are already describing lines across its beak, inside its mouth.

  Kate is uneasy. A group of ravens nest in one of the trees behind their house, and most mornings they spend an hour or so tracing long arcs in the air above the lawn, their wings creasing the air in stealthy beats as they pass overhead; more than once Kate has come upon Eve sitting in the kitchen, watching them, her face intent. One day she asked Kate what they were, and since then she has called them ‘raffins’ – sometimes they are ‘Eve’s raffins’, other days they are ‘Mummy’s raffins’. How will she react to finding one of them dead like this?