Ghost Talkers

by Mary Robinette Kowal

  “Tapping.” Ginger mouthed and laid her head against the dirt wall.

  Ben slid against the wall to sit next to her. He tapped back on an exposed piece of stone, but his hand passed through it. Ginger scrabbled in the earth to find something—anything hard, and came up with a spent shell casing. She placed it against the stone and raised her eyebrows in question.

  Ben nodded and repeated his taps. Ginger matched his movements.

  The tapping paused and then resumed, but in a different pattern. Ben said, “Morse code.”

  She nodded and began to record the tapping that the other person was sending to them. It was a series of numbers, obviously a book code, but she had no idea what the book was. It continued until she had filled the page with:

  (112 3 5) (4 1 8) (38 7 3) (206 9 3) (53 5 9) (98 9 8) (136 4 5) (60 38 8) (63 7 44) (3 3 51) (78 21 18)

  (47 6 3) (51 7 3) (226 2 7) (38 37 8)

  (38 2 4) (50 4 7) (40 9 41) (39 8 4) (30 15 4) (25 44 2) (202 3 8) (49 55 9) (63 7 5)

  (58 4 3) (62 34 3) (34 8 73)

  (50 35 1) (73 25 3) (67 44 7) (266 6 6) (77 64 2) (88 8 10) (99 68 8) (95 5 8) (68 49 3) (48 74 5) (74 1 1) (54 8 3) (67 12 5) (90 7 8) (27 64 6) (88 5 5) (30 7 3)

  And then the tapping started to repeat. Ginger followed along, making sure that she had recorded everything correctly. As she did, Ben slipped through the wall, disappearing into the earth.

  He reappeared after a few moments, shaking his head. He gestured to the rock and mimed tapping. Ginger matched him, using the shell casing again. It was only a few short taps, but whatever they signalled was met by three single strikes and then silence from their correspondent.

  Ben gestured to the trench. “After you.”

  Ginger raised her eyebrows. She’d rather expected to be out here longer, though truly she did not mind getting away. Tucking the paper and pencil away, she began the long crawl back out of the trench. She waited until they were past the German corpse before she spoke to Ben.

  “So. What does the code say?”

  “I have no idea.” He bit his lower lip, frowning.

  “I think that I somehow thought I was the only one who had to struggle to translate book codes and that you were a crack genius at it.”

  “Alas. No. We need to get a copy of The Story of an African Farm to read it.”

  She had left her copy in her room at the asylum. It had not even occurred to her that he would use the same book as in their private cipher, but it made sense to limit the number of books he had to carry. “So what did you see when you went through the wall?”

  “Hmm? Oh. The fellow who was sending the message is a German oberstleutnant. We met in a café in Berlin when I was doing some intelligence work there. I was just making sure it was really him.” He scratched his head. “He had some paper, besides the notes about the message to me, but I couldn’t see the whole thing. Gespenstiger Spione über Salz gestoppt werden … Ghost spies can be halted via salt…”

  “The relationship between salt and spirit is not exactly a secret.”

  “Hopefully he talks about it in the message.” Ben spun to look back behind them. “You know … being a ghost is so useful for spying that maybe I’ll stick around after we find my killer.”

  Ginger’s stomach turned. She did not want to lose him, but the longer he stayed here, the less of himself would remain. She would lose him just as surely as when he crossed behind the veil. “Please don’t think me rude, but—”

  The ground shook with an explosion, louder and closer than any had been yet. Ginger curled into a tight ball, heart pounding. Dirt rattled down. Clouds of hot dust billowed past, choking her. And over the guns and her own coughing came the hoarse screams of wounded men. The screaming was real this time, not a memory.

  Ben soared up and then shot back to her. “That was the Baker Street trench.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  When Ginger scrambled out of the end of the listening trench, the sandbags and retaining walls on one side had collapsed in a great wave of earth. Soldiers scrambled across the earth, blood spattered over them. They dug frantically with helmets or spades or their hands. Limbs emerged from the dirt like sickly tubers.

  She remembered drowning in mud.

  Ginger pressed her fingers into the wall of the trench. The dugout had been in the wall that collapsed. “Mrs. Richardson and Merrow.”

  “I’ll find them.” Ben dove into the mound of dirt as if it were no more solid than water.

  Wiping her face, Ginger stepped into the chaos. Soldiers lay against the stable wall, away from the collapse, covered in dirt and blood. As men were dragged from the dirt, they were carried down the trench.

  A soldier spotted her and beckoned. “Miss! Can you help?”

  She had been trained in nursing for the war, and had spent the first part working in hospitals as an assistant. She could wrap bandages and change a dressing or hold someone steady. She knew exactly what happened in the trenches when a shell hit, because she’d experienced the deaths of so many who died this way. But these men needed real medical care.

  And where was that to come from?

  Ginger went to the soldier, stumbling over the uneven dirt. He was kneeling next to a man whose leg ended below the knee. He’d tied a crude tourniquet with his belt, but the wound still oozed blood.

  She knelt by him. “My supplies were in the dugout, but I’ll do what I can. Is there any water?”

  “I’ll see what I can find, and—Miss Stuyvesant?” The man laughed and slapped his knee. “Well this is awkward, what?”

  Ginger stared at the soldier for a moment before his features resolved themselves. His usually blonde hair had been dyed to a dull brown. “Capt. Axtell. What…?”

  “Classified.” He winked at her. “And call me Sgt. Meadows. Got a bit of a concern with this company. Don’t tell a soul you saw me. Not even Harford.”

  “He’s … he’s dead.”

  Axtell blanched and looked past her to all the dirt. “In that?”

  “No—before. At the camp 463 explosion.”

  “The what?” He snorted and shook his head. “That’s what comes from being out in the field. Miss all the news. Sorry about Harford. Now, about these men. Can you help them?”

  The sheer joviality of his tone made Ginger’s throat tighten with revulsion. When they had been in meetings together, his laughter had seemed an inadequate mask for the constant anger in his aura. Here the juxtaposition was beyond macabre. She shifted a little away so that the thick fury of his aura did not touch her. Swallowing, she focused on the task at hand. “I’ll need cloth for bandages, if there is anything even remotely approaching clean.” She glanced down the line of men. Some of them were already soulless husks. None of them, so far as she could see, was Merrow, nor wore the distinctive grey uniform of a nursing sister. “Has someone sent for the medics?”

  “The communication lines are down. Bad luck, that.” He chuckled. “But Lt. Tolkien’s sent a runner, so it shouldn’t be long.”

  “I’ll try to make do until they get here. Find me those bandages.” Without waiting for Axtell to leave, Ginger went to the next patient.

  This one had the braids and pips of a captain and could not be above five and twenty. His blond hair was crusted with blood. He might even have been the man who had killed Ben. Ginger pushed his sleeve back and felt for his pulse. The beat was strong and regular, so he was merely unconscious, though she had no real way of knowing how bad his head wound was. She brushed his hair aside and was rewarded with the sight of a length of split skin and a large contusion, but the skull beneath seemed sound.

  How was she supposed to do anything for these men? She did not even have bandages. And Merrow. And Mrs. Richardson. Ginger’s breath shuddered as she exhaled. She would be in the way if she tried digging. Ben would find them, and then she could decide what to do.

  And on the subject of decisions, even if she couldn’t bandage anyone yet, she could at least decide priorities. Ginger went down t
he line, looking at the wounds. Some of the soldiers were conscious. Some would have been better off if they weren’t. Some were clearly not going to live much longer.

  God forgive her, but some of them were going to report in very soon.

  Feeling like a vulture, Ginger picked one who was struggling but still alert. He must have been near the blast, and his right shoulder was gone. His breath strained and bubbled red on his lips. Ginger knelt by him, and his clear blue eyes focused on her with horrible clarity. She wet her lips. “I am so sorry. There is nothing I can do for you.”

  He gave a small nod and—God help her—he winked, as jaunty as anything.

  “Do you remember your training? About reporting in when you die?”

  He nodded again.

  “All right…” Ginger took a breath and focused on him. “When you reach Potter’s Field, you need to report to Helen Jackson—that will make sense when you get there. Tell her to relive your last moments, and that I said you were very brave.”

  Ginger glanced over her shoulder, but none of the other soldiers had time to spare for the wounded, as they continued to try to find more survivors. “Helen, there is a German medium named Peter Schmitt at the prisoner of war camp near Amiens, and he’s formed a circle with the prisoners there. I don’t know if they have German ghosts reporting to them, but just to be on the safe side I recommend putting salt barriers around all the camps. Ask Lady Penfold to look into Capt. Reginald Harford again. He followed us to the POW camp, and his men attacked us on the road. He seems to know the prisoner Amott Zitron, and Ben thinks they were speaking in code to each other.”

  A couple of small tin first aid kits thumped onto the earth beside her. “Best I can find. That’ll do for a start, what?”

  Ginger jumped and glanced up at Axtell. When had he dyed his hair dark? It seemed as if half the people in the army fit the traitor’s description. She popped a kit open and pulled out the roll of gauze inside. “Thank you.”

  “How’s Royston?”

  “Not going to make it, I’m afraid.” Ginger stood and turned away from Royston. “When did you dye your hair?”

  “By God! How like a woman to wonder that in the middle of a war.” He grinned. “You’d like the name of my hairdresser next, I suppose.”

  “I suppose so.” She turned her back on him and walked to the next man in the line. “Please, go help with the digging.”

  He laughed again, shaking his head. “Oh, there’s no point. Anyone they haven’t found is dead by now.”

  She inhaled sharply and then coughed on the dust in the air. Wiping her eyes, Ginger looked back at the mound of dirt. Merrow might be mixed with the other survivors, but nearly anonymous in his khakis. But Mrs. Richardson … surely there would be no missing an elderly woman among the bodies pulled from the earth.

  She fixed Axtell with a glare. “If you are supposed to be incognito, you might pretend to care.”

  For a flash, his ever-present smile hardened to match his aura. And then he laughed again. “Right-ho. Off I go!”

  Someone so obviously callous could not be the traitor who killed Ben, but beyond that, Axtell had nothing to recommend him. Shuddering, Ginger knelt by the next soldier.

  This was someone she could, in fact, help. He had a long gash down one arm where shrapnel had torn his skin. He held the edges together with one hand and sat against the remaining wall of the trench, shaking. Dirt covered him, masking all sign of rank on his uniform.

  Ginger still had the packet of gauze in one hand and the tin kits in the other. She set the kits down. “Let me see.”

  He did not respond, so she tapped him lightly on the shoulder. The young man jumped. He stared at her with wide brown eyes. “I can’t hear.”

  He must have been close to the blast for the sound to have hurt him. If he had received no more damage than a cut on his arm and the loss of his hearing, he was lucky indeed. Please … please let Mrs. Richardson be all right.

  Ginger patted his shoulder and gestured to his arm.

  He held it out. The damage was more severe than it had first looked. He’d likely lose the use of some fingers. She gritted her teeth and tore off some of the gauze. Using that, she wiped away what blood she could. He stiffened but did not cry out, though his aura was filled with pain.

  Wrapping the remaining bandage around his arm, Ginger tried to draw the edges close enough together to stop some of the bleeding. Why wasn’t Ben back yet?

  And where was Merrow? Ginger stood and moved to the next soldier. He had a broken leg, and there was nothing she could do besides telling him to be brave.

  Brave.

  What a word to use when facing pain. These men were already brave, just to be here. The bold smiles and nonchalance with which they greeted her was not matched by their auras. She did not know how anyone could survive with the amount of grief and fear and pain that these men carried.

  “Ginger!” Ben appeared at her side. She almost answered him, despite the soldier sitting right by her.

  Excusing herself, Ginger stood and turned so that her back was to the wounded. “Did you find—”

  “I can’t make him stop. I mean, he can’t hear me, so of course I can’t.” Ben shook his head and stopped. Inhaling, he closed his eyes and then met her gaze again. “Sorry. I get confused when I’m away from you. Merrow is still trying to dig, but—and I am so, so sorry. More sorry than I can express, but—”

  “Mrs. Richardson is dead.” The words had no meaning.

  “Yes.” He gestured through a deep purple morass of grief back to the mound of earth. “The dugout collapsed with the blast, and.… but Merrow. Can you make him understand?”

  Ginger nodded and walked toward the mound of dirt. Mrs. Richardson was dead. She ought to feel something, but there seemed to be a hollow spot within her. She did not actually believe it was true.

  Scrambling over the loose dirt, Ginger worked her way to the other side of the mound and tried to keep her head down below the range of German snipers. Ginger had expected Ben to die in the war, especially after the reports from the dead started coming in, and the death toll became clear. In some ways, she had begun mourning him the first time she saw him in uniform. But Mrs. Richardson? She had mufflers to knit and Mr. Haden to flirt with and Ginger to admonish and grandchildren to chase, and it was not possible that she was dead.

  And not even dead for a higher cause. Simply a chance shell landing on the trenches. A stupid, stupid, meaningless death.

  A death that was inescapably Ginger’s fault.

  She slid down the far bank, skirt coming up around her knees. Tugging it down as she stood, Ginger found the same scene on this side that she had left on the other. Wounded men lay along the side of the trench with their comrades attending them. A few still dug at the mound itself, but their work seemed more in line with clearing it than with saving anyone.

  Only one man still dug with energy. Merrow had his helmet in hand and was using it as a makeshift shovel. Kneeling, he dug a helmetful of dirt and flung it to the side, widening a hole as if he were going to rebuild the dugout. Dirt covered him. It caked his hair and crusted his uniform.

  “Merrow?” Ginger came up behind him.

  He kept digging.

  What was his first name? She had never heard it. He was always just Merrow or Pvt. Merrow and nothing beyond that. “Merrow—” Ginger put a hand on his shoulder.

  He flinched and jerked around, raising a fist. His aura was terrible, all terror and guilt and guilt and guilt. Tear tracks ran through the dirt on his cheeks and left behind startling white lines of skin. His eyes were red with weeping. “Miss—she’s—I have to…” The young man turned back to the hole and dropped to his knees again. Digging. “It’s my fault. I stepped out, just for a minute, to talk to Sam. I shouldn’t have left her.”

  “Merrow, I’m so sorry.” Ginger watched him dig without any sign of hearing her. “You couldn’t have done anything if you’d been there.”

  He kept digging, w
ith his shoulders hunched forward over the hole.

  “Dear, you have to stop.” Ginger knelt by him and put a hand on his arm. “Ben has looked for her.”

  He flinched again, turning toward her. A line of blood dripped from his ear. Ginger caught his chin and turned his head to the other side. There was blood at the other ear as well.

  She released him and waited until he looked back at her. “Merrow, can you hear me?”

  His brows turned upward in confusion.

  Merrow stared at her mouth as Ginger repeated herself. “Can you hear me at all?”

  He touched his ear and brought his hand away to look at the red stain. Then he started to laugh.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Ginger sat outside the field hospital with a cup of tea, waiting for them to finish treating Merrow. The nurses—the real nurses—had taken a single look at her and declared that she was “shell shocked” and of no use without a rest. Shell shock. A nervous condition caused by exposure to intense trauma. By strict definition, she had been in that state for over a year, as had most of the Spirit Corps.

  God. What was she going to tell Mr. Haden? Mrs. Richardson wouldn’t even be able to report in and send a last message, because only British men were bound with the ID discs. The nexus wouldn’t pull anyone else to it.

  Ben flickered around her in the ghostly equivalent of pacing. He would take two recognisable strides and then be five paces away, without transition.

  Ginger turned the cup in her hand. “I wonder where Axtell got to.”

  “What?” Ben was at her side in an instant. “He should be in Berlin by now.”

  For a moment, she thought it was another sign of his memory slipping, but Ben hadn’t seen Axtell. He had been looking for Mrs. Richardson under the earth, and Axtell had already moved on by the time he came back. She said, “Well … that may be where he was before, but he was in the trench just now.”

  “There wouldn’t have been time for him to get to Berlin and back.”

  “Maybe he didn’t go? He said something about investigating that company. Of course, I wasn’t supposed to tell you.” She turned the cup again, just warming her hands against it. There were times when it seemed she would never be warm all the way through. She should ask Mrs. Richardson for some … no. There would be no more fingerless gloves or mufflers. “I find Axtell inherently unpleasant, so I don’t miss him. Just wondered where he went.”