It was crazy! The more he thought about it, the more certain he was that he had imagined the whole thing. Boys in the ventilation system? What next? Ladies in the sink, babies in the piano? Truly he was going mad. He’d get taken out of his own apartment and put in a home, which terrified him—the social worker, Mrs. Grey, had been hinting at it for ages. Then he’d fall to bits and die surrounded by helpless old people, and he’d be wetting his bed and not knowing who he was or what was going on around him in no time.
And now it had happened again. He was hearing the same two boys jeering and hooting at him from behind the walls. What on earth was going wrong with him?
Mrs. Grey was due to visit later that day, but one thing he was certain of—he wasn’t going to mention that voice teasing him from the ducts. They’d lock him away for sure if he said anything about that.
First his body had grown weak and slow, and now his mind was going as well. He felt like a small boy, lost in an immense dark place. He had no idea how he was going to get out of this trouble, or even if it was possible to escape. When your mind went, what did you have left? Not even yourself.
Sitting alone in his armchair, trying not to look at the fearful ventilator grille behind his head, Robert Alveston held his face and felt cold little tears run down between his fingers.
5
Mr. Alveston’s Apartment
What are ghosts? The spirits of dead people, they say. Had a boy died in there long ago? Maybe he fell down one of the long ducts. Maybe there was a skeleton lying at the bottom, staring blindly up. Maybe it wanted David to make sure it got properly buried. Maybe it wanted him to join it.
That night David lay scaring himself silly with thoughts of monsters that could never die creeping in the dark behind the walls, waiting for him. But it hadn’t been him the ghost was angry at. It was the old man it was after. Why? Was it just joining David in his nasty little games, or was there another reason for it haunting him?
Ghosts were supposed to come back from the dead to torment the people who had done them wrong in real life. Perhaps Mr. Alveston had done something terrible to the boy in the past. But what?
Was Mr. Alveston a murderer? How awful—to be living in the same apartment building as a murderer! If that was true, then the ghost only wanted its revenge. It wanted justice. Perhaps David ought to be feeling sorry for it, not scared of it, after all.
Once again, David left the warm safety of his bed and crept through the shadows to the grille in his wall. He listened for a long time with his ear close to the grille. He heard echoes and other dull noises that could have been anything. Only when he was about to give up did he hear a voice, very close to him.
“Play with me?” said the ghost, and with a little scream, David ran back to bed and hid his head under the covers. It was impossible! A voice must have traveled up the ducts from one of the apartments! He’d give anything not to have to believe that there was a real ghost there. For long hours David lay, with his head tucked just under the covers, straining to hear another whisper from the grille. But he heard no more. He fell asleep still shivering with fright and when he woke up, a sunbeam was shooting through a gap in his curtains. By the time he was out of bed and looking down at a bright sunny day outside, he was doubting that anything had happened at all. In the daylight such things seemed to be only nonsense, crazy dreams. But what dreams! And how well he remembered them!
“No, it wasn’t a dream. It really happened,” he said to himself. And all through the day the memories came back to him: the angry face of the boy, the terrified old man, the voice from the darkness begging him to come out to play …
* * *
A week passed. Two weeks. The adventure was beginning to fade. David was trying hard not to think about it at all and it was working quite well. If he never thought about it, it was the next-best thing to it never having happened. He’d put another poster up over the duct. He hadn’t heard any noises for ages. It was all just going away. Then, one Monday after school, he met Mr. Alveston in the entrance of Mahogany Villas.
The old man was only little, just a head higher than David himself. He was so slight and frail, he looked as if you could break him in half by bumping into him. He had a cane in his hand and nodded politely as they passed in the lobby. He wore glasses and David could see the waxy splat of a hearing aid behind his ear. David nodded back. He was certain that the old man didn’t know who he was.
“Good afternoon,” he said politely.
“Hello, Tiger,” said Mr. Alveston.
“What?” But the old man was smiling. He was joking.
“Grrrr,” said David, and laughed. Mr. Alveston laughed, too.
“Nice to see someone with a bit of life in them,” he said. He peered out up at the sky and saw gray, even cloud.
“Not raining, anyway,” he said. He stepped carefully down off the step, as if he might slip and break a bit of himself off.
“Where are you going?” asked David. He wanted to know how long Mr. Alveston was going to be away.
It never occurred to the old man that David had anything bad in his head, and he smiled at the boy for his curiosity. “To the shops,” he said. David noticed how he trembled—how his hand trembled on his cane, how his face and his whole body trembled. Not dangerous at all. Standing next to him in all his rough youth, David felt like he had once when he was in a shop selling china and glassware. He’d been scared to move in case he broke something.
Mr. Alveston smiled again at David, turned out of the lobby, and headed up the road. David went inside. The apartment would be empty for at least an hour. He ran upstairs, changed, and got into the ducts straightaway.
* * *
As usual, just before he went in, David stopped with his head inside and listened. His blood was banging in his ears. There was only the noise of the ducts—the noise of the darkness muttering and shuffling and turning over in its sleep. But there was something in the darkness. It was waiting for him and the funny thing was, David knew it was pleased to see him. It had missed him and it wanted him back.
“You and me. Let’s do it!” it seemed to be saying. “Come on in—the darkness is lovely today!”
The ghost liked him!
David clambered in. He crawled to the duct going up and squirmed his way up to the floor above. Then he made his way on his belly like a snake directly toward Mr. Alveston’s empty apartment. It only took a moment, then he was in the duct leading straight into the living room. The first thing he noticed was a sweet, thick scent filling the air. Then he was there, looking in.
Mr. Alveston’s apartment was packed full of all sorts of things he’d gathered during his long life. There were little china figures, ornaments and vases and knickknacks covering the surfaces. The walls were covered with photos and paintings. There was a vase of white lilies with yellow stamens on a big table; it was their scent that filled the room. One whole wall was covered with books. On a little table near the window was a small, round box with a tiny model Santa Claus on the lid, with reindeer pulling a sled. Little elf figures were arranged in a circle around the edge. All around it was a crowd of tiny figures of angels playing musical instruments.
Robert and his wife Greta used to put these little figures out at Christmas to decorate the house for their two children.
David climbed down into the apartment.
The first thing he did was have a look at the fascinating little table with the Christmas things on it. The round box was a music box with a key still in it. When he wound it up, the top revolved, making the little Santa Claus and his elves go around in circles while the box played “Silent Night” in a clear, mellow tinkle.
David put the key to the music box in his pocket and turned his attention to the little figures. The angels were made of painted wood, all flaking with age. David rearranged them in a battle scene, some lying down as if they were dead, some head butting each other, some in a little heap to one side. One of them was playing a trombone made of golden wire, and he
straightened the wire out and twisted it around another one’s neck. He broke off a couple of arms and legs. He found a felt tip pen by the telephone and drew some ugly faces on the angels. Then he turned to have a look at the rest of the apartment and as he turned, he caught sight of the boy.
It was just a glimpse. He was standing next to the mantelpiece, grinning wildly and shouting something. But he had no voice. Then he turned and pointed to the mantelpiece and faded. It was like watching words vanish on a piece of paper. In just a few seconds he was gone.
David felt a prickle of excitement. A real ghost! Was it possible to be friends with a ghost?
David walked over to the mantelpiece to have a look. There were more of the little wooden angels playing instruments—it was the rest of the orchestra. David had already had his fun with the angels, but because he felt the boy wanted him to, he knocked more down and twisted their instruments and made another battlefield with them. And like a reward, the boy appeared again over by the little telephone table, bent double and howling with fun.
David was delighted. The horrible dangerous atmosphere of the dark ducts had all gone now. It was just fun. He had a friend—so what if he was a dead one? The things you could do with a ghost!
He looked around for more mischief. He turned some of the photos to face the wall and pulled handfuls of things out of the drawers. He went to the kitchen and drank some milk out of the bottle, then spat in it—and there was the ghost boy, over by the sink, clapping! He ate some chocolate biscuits out of a tin, trod one of them into the carpet, and hid the rest under the cushions in the living room. He used the toilet and peed on the floor. Then he spent some time rearranging things, moving the china from the mantelpiece to the windowsills, turning the doormat upside down. He scattered the sweet-scented lilies on the floor.
It was at that moment that one of the pictures fell off the wall. He was nowhere near it. It hit the ground and shattered. Then, as it lay on the floor, it broke again—just cracked into dozens of splinters as it lay flat on the ground with no one anywhere near it. He saw it quite clearly. It was exactly as if someone had stamped on it. But there was no foot.
“Be careful!” said David. He didn’t want things getting out of hand. He went over to look at the picture. It was a photograph of Mr. Alveston, still old, but younger than he was now, standing arm in arm with a woman. This was his beloved Tulip, although of course David didn’t know that.
“Don’t break things,” said David, but even as he spoke, another picture fell off the wall and crunched on the floor.
Ghosts weren’t likely to do as you told them. David didn’t want this—he was just having a bit of fun! He said, “What’s your name?” just to try and change the subject, but there was no answer. Instead, everything went very still. Was the ghost offended? Had he said the wrong thing? Perhaps it had no idea who it was.
David decided that was enough. He walked back to the vent in the wall. “It’s all right for you; I’m the one who’ll get blamed,” he said aloud. But there was no answer.
He climbed back into the ducts, listening anxiously for sounds of more breakages. It was a naughty ghost, that was for sure. It really enjoyed doing those bad things in the old man’s apartment.
Just to show the ghost what else he could do, David went down into Mary Turner’s apartment to fool around some more. He took her boot, which he had hidden in the ducts, back into her apartment and stole the other boot instead. That would confuse her! He also stole the remote to her TV, a bra she’d left on the back of a chair, and her hair dryer and took those to hide in the ducts. That was a big joke! He was partly showing off to the ghost, but it didn’t show up. It only seemed to be interested in Mr. Alveston.
Back in the dark ducts, David glanced at his watch. It was almost six o’clock! Terror! His dad would be home at any time. He’d get caught!
He rushed back to try and get all the evidence out of the way before his dad came home.
As it happened, his dad was late that evening and to make up for it he bought fish-and-chips for dinner as a treat, but David was anything but grateful. In fact, he was furious and started scolding his dad for being late as soon as he stepped in the door. He kept on nagging all night. The truth of it was, he was scared silly by what he’d just done. It had been fun when he was there, but he had just been showing off. When he looked back on it, it was spooky and horrible.
As he ate his fish-and-chips he started having horrible fantasies about being found out. No one would believe his stories about a ghost. The police and social services would be called in. He’d be arrested. He might even be taken into foster care. He must have left fingerprints all over the place! Why didn’t he think to wear gloves! Of course, he’d be blamed for what the ghost had done, too.
When his dad told him to help clear the plates away after dinner, he threw a huge fit. His dad infuriated him by calling it a tantrum, as if he was a baby, so he called him a big dummy and got sent to his room for an hour.
Later, when he sneaked out again after only fifteen minutes and his dad wanted to know why he was so touchy, he lied magnificently about being picked on at school. His dad was always worried about him being bullied because he was undersized. He was completely taken in. He said he’d call the school and have a word with them about it.
“Don’t—I want to try to sort it out myself,” David told him.
His dad smiled ruefully at his son’s bravery. He was only a shorty himself and knew all about being teased.
“But you won’t get into any fights?” he asked anxiously. He knew that was David’s usual way of solving problems.
“I don’t think it’ll come to that,” said David. “Perhaps I’ll have a word with the teachers myself.”
Terry was so pleased with his son’s grown-up attitude to the problem that he felt guilty as hell about sending him to his room and apologized to his son, as if it had been his own fault the whole time.
* * *
Robert Alveston had been having a good day. His memory, which came and went like a blackbird on the lawn, was firmly at home. He’d tidied the apartment up and written a letter to his grandchildren in Australia. He’d said nothing about the problems he’d been having lately. He didn’t want to worry them. They had their own lives to live.
Every now and then one of them wrote inviting him to come and live with them, and he’d been seriously thinking about actually doing it. But now that he was going crazy, he was scared of turning to them. Who knew, pretty soon he might need round-the-clock care. His grandchildren had children of their own; they had busy lives. He’d just mess things up for them.
In the afternoon he went out to mail his letters and get some groceries. Lately he’d been getting the crazies, as he called them, at all sorts of inconvenient times, but this time everything was splendid. He got a herring and some new potatoes for his dinner. He was going to have the herring coated in oatmeal and fried in bacon fat. He got the ingredients for a cake, too. Jeremy Spalding, the chair of the residents’ association, and the middle-aged lady with gray hair who lived with her husband a couple of doors down had both been popping in and out to see him lately, to lend him a hand and chat. He’d bake three cakes, one for each of them and one for himself, just to show he was still with it and knew how to show his gratitude.
He was looking forward to getting back home to his nice tidy apartment. He’d spent ages getting it perfect a couple of days ago. He’d done a good job and it had taken him this long to recover from the effort. The housework was getting beyond him. He was going to get a cleaning lady from the social services—there was one coming by to have a look tomorrow—and he wanted them to see that he still did his best. It was the first time in ages he’d got the place really clean. He had to admit it, the housework exhausted him.
But when he opened the door, nothing was as it should be. All his things had been switched around and messed up. Dreadful! He must have had another attack of the crazies before he left the house, but it had never been this ba
d before. The fridge door was wide open. He’d apparently eaten all the chocolate biscuits and left crumbs all over the carpet. He vividly remembered vacuuming, but he had no memory at all of eating the biscuits. The beautiful stargazer lilies he’d bought were all over the place, trodden on, broken. There was pee on the bathroom floor. It was horrible.
Worst of all, two of his favorite pictures of him and Tulip had been thrown to the floor and trampled on, and his display of Christmas ornaments from Germany was ruined. The little Engel Choir was scattered all over the table. The trombone had been straightened out and one of the angels was strangling another one with it. He’d drawn stupid, childish faces on the little things. The key to the music box was nowhere to be seen.
That music box was one of Robert’s most precious possessions. His first thought was that perhaps he’d put the key in his pocket for safekeeping, although he never usually did that. He dropped his shopping on the floor and went all through his pockets. He put handfuls of change on the table, but the key wasn’t there. Then he emptied the shopping on the sofa to see if he’d dropped it in there, but it wasn’t there, either.
He began wandering around the apartment, muttering to himself and racking his brains, trying to remember what he’d done and where he’d left the key. It was dreadful! He’d started to go crazy even when he thought he was having a good day. There was no telling what he’d been up to. Perhaps he ought to go into a home after all, but the thought terrified him.
He began searching for the key, going through his pockets again in case he’d only thought he’d looked there but hadn’t really. He looked again in the music box to see if he’d only imagined it wasn’t there—once your mind started going, you couldn’t trust anything, certainly not yourself. Then he went through all the cupboards and drawers, emptying things on the floor and scattering them about as he got more and more anxious. He even emptied the fridge. He even stuck his fingers in the butter to see if it was in there. He could have done anything without knowing about it! Look at the incident with the trousers. And that time he’d imagined he saw a child in the ventilation system.
The Ghost Behind the Wall Page 4
