A Ghost in the Machine

by Caroline Graham

  “You said something about tablets.”

  “I’m coming to that. So, next time I went out – I didn’t. Just slammed the door, came back inside and hid. After a while Polly got up and went to the kitchen. She looked really freaked out. I snuck into her place and it was just gross. Like that room in Seven? She must have been holed up there for days. I saw my sleeping tablets by her bed—”

  “Oh God.” Mallory left the door but couldn’t sit down again. Just shifted and moved about. “Had she taken any?”

  “Some.”

  “Did you get a doctor?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “She wouldn’t let me in. You think she’d let a stranger?”

  “But stuff like that…an overdose…”

  “She’d been taking them to get to sleep.”

  “How do you know? How do you know she didn’t take them all at once? Christ, with no one looking out for her—”

  “If no one’s looking out for her, how come you’re here?”

  “You should have got in touch straightaway. I would have—”

  “Hey, hey! Now you listen to me. I have run my ass off trying to help your daughter. I biked all the way to Parsons bloody Green. I knocked on every door trying to get your new address. I finally got the estate agent who sold your house. His solicitor gave me your number. Straightaway I ring you—and not collect, in case you hadn’t noticed. Next thing you’re crashing in here and knocking me over. And not even a fucking ‘sorry,’ never mind a fucking ‘thank you.’”

  Mallory stared at her. At Debbie Hartogensis who had gone to so much trouble to make the phone call that had practically put him into cardiac arrest. She was young. She had on combat trousers and a tight pink top with shoulder strings and little glasses with blue lenses.

  Some of the panic drained out of Mallory. He was here and he would not leave. Whatever happened, there would be no more terrible messages out of the brazen, heartless blue. Now only sorrow and gratitude remained. Sorrow for his daughter, whatever her plight. Gratitude towards this young girl who had done so much and could so easily have done nothing.

  “I’m so sorry. Forgive me, please. I was distraught.”

  “Yeah. Right.”

  “I know Polly’s mother also would wish to thank…to say…”

  “That’s OK, Mr. Lawson.” Christ, he looked as if someone had pulled his insides outside and stamped on them. No kids, vowed Debbie for the millionth time. Absolutely no kids.

  “Look, I gotta split.” She had picked up a black helmet and a pair of roller skates and was making for the door.

  “Split?”

  “I’m meeting someone. There’s tea and stuff in the kitchen if you want.”

  Surprisingly, when she had gone, Mallory found he did want. After knocking softly on Polly’s door and getting no response he made some tea in two mugs and took it back to the sitting room. Then he tried again.

  “I’ve made us a hot drink. Will you come out or shall I come in?”

  In silence he waited. In silence he sat down again, drank his tea and waited some more. He was prepared to wait for ever to find out what had happened to Polly. To wait – how did the song go? – till all the seas run dry.

  What had happened to Polly was this. After those final astonishing moments in Billy Slaughter’s flat she had danced home. Gambolled like a child. Grabbed the vertical rail on a moving bus and whirled around, swinging over the road. Couldn’t stop even when the conductor told her off. Pelted down the road to the flat and let herself in, still feverish with exhilaration. Unable to keep still, she had put on a Nineteen Gazelles CD and danced violently about, heedless of the insider information rattling around her mind like primed sticks of dynamite.

  “‘…Oh, fire flash of love…’” sang Polly, swirling and twirling, “‘burn me away…burn me away…’”

  There was a lot of time to kill. Hours, actually. There was no way she could enter the offices of Brinkley and Latham in the bright early evening. A curse on British Summer Time, cried Polly, but without rancour. She couldn’t just hang around the flat. She would explode. She decided to go to see the latest Coen Brothers movie at the Curzon and buy something special at Oddbins on the way back to celebrate.

  Polly finally set off around eight thirty for Baker Street, there not being a convenient Green Line. She caught a Metropolitan train to Amersham and was pleasantly surprised at the spacious, high-roofed carriage. It was more like a proper train than the Tube. Still simmering with happiness Polly gazed out of the window and, once Harrow-on-the-Hill had been left behind, became more and more charmed by the prettiness of the landscape.

  She decided that she would buy a house in the country and that Buckinghamshire would be ideal. Such fresh, healthy air, so close to town. It would be a modern house, naturally. An airy structure of spun steel and glass. She would commission an architect. Not one of the stuffy old school. Chadwick Ventris, perhaps. Or Giles Givens. The house would almost certainly win an award. Polly saw herself at the ceremony in something backless and glittering, the architect at her feet.

  Variations on this pleasant fantasy lasted until the train drew into Chorleywood. There were several taxi cards in the station phone box and a cab arrived quickly. Causton was about ten miles away. It was almost dark by the time Polly alighted in the market square.

  Approaching the street door to Brinkley and Latham, she had deliberately refrained from looking over her shoulder but slipped the key into the lock, turned it and entered the building as casually as anyone with a genuine right to be there. Once in Dennis’s office, just to be on the safe side, she drew the blinds down.

  While finding her Market Maker and setting up her screen Polly thought about her father. She remembered the lie she had told after he had agreed to release some of her money. Her pretence that these disastrous speculations had really been for him all along. So that he could abandon a job that was killing him and be free. Mallory had believed her and was touched, Polly could see, almost to the point of tears. But what if…what if…this time it was really true?

  The idea of using any special knowledge to benefit someone other than herself would normally never enter Polly’s head. But this was something different. Something personal. Imagine being able to double the Lawson inheritance overnight. What on earth would they say, her parents? They wouldn’t believe it, of course. Not at first. Polly imagined this disbelief. Then pictured her father’s gradual amazement at the realisation that it had actually happened. Her mother would be pleased too. More money to throw down the bottomless pit of literary publishing. But it didn’t matter what the stuff was used for. The point was that Polly would be helping them and – improve on this – at no cost to herself. Only down side would be an inability to take the credit for such a brilliant coup. For she could never reveal how she had stolen keys, entered offices illegally and broken into a file – even if it was one relating to her own affairs. OK, the first time there was some excuse. Then she had been in rapidly expanding debt, and desperate. But this time the reason was straightforward maximisation of profits. Or, as the self-righteous whingers denied access to the golden mile would doubtless put it, naked greed.

  Of course it would soon become obvious that someone had been tinkering profitably with the Lawson finances. That should be fun, thought Polly. She wondered if Dennis would take responsibility but straightaway discounted the idea. He was far too honourable (i.e., sober, self-regarding and principled). No, eventually she would have to own up. And they would all see she had done a wrong thing but for all the right reasons.

  Satisfied with this conclusion Polly completed both her transactions and dispatched a heart-stopping amount of money. Even though she had watched Billy Slaughter transfer much, much more and had already seen a slight but definite increase in the share price, it was still a deeply frightening moment.

  Anxious now to get away, she found a local directory and checked out a minicab. Careful not to draw attention to an unusually
late call on what might be an itemised bill, she rang from a box in the market square.

  Financially, she just made it home. She shouldn’t have been short. Earlier, coming back from the movie, she had drawn out the permitted maximum from a cash machine (a humiliating fifty following an acrimonious snarl-in with the bank). But then, high as a kite on great expectations, a mighty wack of it had gone on a bottle of Veuve Clicquot. No matter: even though it was long past midnight when she arrived back in London with a few pound coins in her pocket, one of the night buses would get her home.

  Polly had imagined that, like a spy or commando after the conclusion of a particularly dangerous mission, she would return fizzing with a mixture of elation and relief. She saw herself unwinding, playing a little music, drinking the wine. Walking about till the first papers were on the street. Until the whole financial world now knew what she knew. But, in fact, once the string of tension had been cut, she felt very tranquil. Tranquil but tired. She pulled off her dress, slipped into bed and within seconds was fast asleep.

  When she awoke it was high noon. Polly couldn’t believe it. How could such a thing have happened? The traffic, the phone that was always ringing, the passers-by clacking sticks against the railings, the yapping dogs – where were they when she needed them? Twelve o’clock!

  While Polly fumed she was climbing into jeans and flinging on an old striped shirt. Into sneakers, grab keys, run from flat. The nearest newsagent a five-minute hurtle. She picked up the Financial Times. Gillans and Hart had made the front page.

  Masood Aziz, giving change, was surprised to find his attention urgently drawn in the direction of the magazine rack. A young woman stood there. She looked stricken; about to fall. Sheets of pink-coloured newsprint slid through her hands and floated to the ground.

  Mr. Aziz shouted for his wife, who came quickly, threshing through strips of plastic curtain at the back of the shop. They found a stool and tried to persuade the girl to sit down without success. And when Mrs. Aziz brought a tumbler of water it was pushed fiercely away. The girl set out for the door, stumbled, righted herself. People gathered in the shop entrance, watching as she staggered off down the road. At one point she stopped and vomited in the gutter. Mr. Aziz picked up the newspaper, which was dirty, and started grumbling about lost revenue.

  Polly had no recollection of returning to the flat. But suddenly she was there staring into the bathroom mirror, swilling sick from her mouth, cleaning her teeth with such force her gums began to bleed.

  Consumed utterly by fear and rage, incapable of intelligent thought, she paced round and round the flat, punching the furniture, banging on the wall till her knuckles bled. At one point she stood in the middle of the room yelling, “Bankrupt…bankrupt…bankrupt…” a wild ululation like a bird screaming in the jungle. Just after this the telephone rang and she ripped it from its socket and hurled it across the room.

  Eventually, her throat raw, Polly wore herself out. At any rate physically. Her mind still ran at a lunatic pace. She sat down and, for the first time ever, wished she was more like her American pain-in-the-backside flatmate. Debbie was always doing what she called her “practice.” Sitting on a cushion staring into space for half an hour at a time. Said it calmed her nerves; softened her edge. Polly should try it. Polly had no wish to try it. She wanted her edge honed as keenly as an executioner’s axe. Enter the exchange with anything less and you deserved all you got.

  However, even as she despised such inane and woolly thinking, Polly squatted on the floor and breathed slowly for at least five minutes. It didn’t calm her nerves or soften her edge but she did start seeing things with just a shade less emotion. This led her to consider her next move. No doubt at all what that would have to be. The question was, how should she handle a confrontation with Billy Slaughter? What she couldn’t do was what she longed to do. Go round there and stick him with an extremely sharp instrument. He was bigger and stronger and the whole business would no doubt end in her complete humiliation. And if, by some freakish stroke of luck, she did inflict any serious damage, the police would be called and she’d be in even worse trouble than she was now.

  Polly flung a denim jacket over the scruffy clothes she had on, grabbed her credit card, plus the three remaining pound coins, and ran. On the bus she sat upstairs, leaning forwards, urging it ahead. Drumming her fists hard against thighs and muttering, “Come on come on come on come on…”

  Polly had given no thought to her appearance. She was unaware that her hair was sticking out all over one side of her head and totally flat on the other where she had slept on it. Or that the gamey, slightly unpleasant smell on the top of the bus was not coming from the old man sitting directly behind her. Or that there were splashes of vomit down the front of her shirt. So she thought nothing of walking straight through the swing doors of Whitehall Court and heading across the vestibule towards the lift.

  One of the porters behind the counter called after her. The other came quickly around to the front and caught up with Polly at the lift gate.

  “Can I help you?” The words and his voice were quietly civil but his eyes were not.

  “I’ve come to see Billy Slaughter.” Polly rattled the handle in her impatience though the lift was already groaning downwards.

  “Mr. Slaughter?”

  “Room seventeen.”

  “Ah, yes. I’m afraid he is no longer here.”

  “We’ll see.” Grimly she stared upwards through the metal trellis. “Get down here, you lazy fucker.”

  “I wonder…would you happen to be Miss Lawson?”

  Polly gave the man a suspicious stare. “Why?”

  “There is a parcel for you at the desk.” He stepped back, stretching out an arm, indicating that she should precede him. And, as the lift had suddenly stopped and now seemed to be returning to the stratosphere. Polly did so.

  Joining his colleague behind the vast polished counter, the porter took a small Jiffy bag from one of the pigeonholes. Although neither man as much as glanced at each other Polly sensed what she was convinced was shared contempt.

  “Do you have any identification, miss?”

  Polly slapped her credit card down. She had now decided not to risk the humiliation of a journey in the lift to an empty flat. “Do you have any idea when Mr. Slaughter will be back?”

  “Probably not at all,” said the second porter. “He doesn’t live here.” He observed Polly’s suddenly white face with trepidation. The last thing they needed on the premises was a fainting female.

  “Doesn’t.”

  “That’s right. Just stays occasionally.” The first man took down a large, lined ledger. “Being a friend of Mr. Corder.”

  “Corder?”

  “Who does live here.” He opened the book and offered Polly a pen. “Would you sign, miss, please? For the package.”

  Polly found it hard to get a grip on the pen but managed to scrawl something on the page, if not actually on the line. She took the Jiffy bag and her card then, totally disoriented by shock, turned the wrong way, blundered down another corridor and found herself in a large room with lots of comfortable chairs and low tables. There was a bar at the far end and the place was full of people. Mainly men who began staring at her but not in the way she was used to. Polly realised why when she caught sight of herself in a long mirror. Staring, unfocused eyes, a tangled mat of hair, sick all down the front of her shirt. She looked filthy and mad.

  Even so, she attempted, when leaving, to walk the walk. Her proud walk to the exit doors and down the steps to the street. But the force field of her confidence had vanished and Polly knew she appeared merely grotesque.

  In the street outside, in the baking heat and dust surrounded by surging tourists in souvenir hats, she began to cry. Running dangerously into the road she flagged down several taxis, planning to dodge the fare by jumping out at the lights in Dalston. But though some of the cabs were for hire, none of them stopped. Polly turned, doubling back past the Ministry of Defence, turning toward
s the Embankment, looking for a cash machine. She found one in the Tube station but it flashed, in bilious green: “Unable To Process This Transaction” and spat out the card.

  She had to get home to open her envelope. Quite why was beyond her understanding but she knew that she absolutely must not realise the contents when other people were about. Though muddled and afraid, Polly was quite sure about that. Briefly she played with the idea of finding an abandoned underground ticket to brandish, waiting till the pushchair/heavy luggage gate was busy and slipping through. But then she’d have it all to do again at the other end and might well get stopped. While she hesitated, the decision was taken for her when someone on the staff shouted, “Oy! No beggars.”

  Eventually she got home by catching a series of buses, travelling till the conductor came for her fare, then asking for a destination in the wrong direction. Flustered and apologetic she would then get off, catch the bus behind and repeat the procedure. The journey took five changes and lasted over an hour.

  Back in the flat Polly prepared to open the package from Billy Slaughter. She had been gripping it so tightly her fingers had stiffened into claws. She sat down on the bed, reading her name, immaculately written in authoritative black script, again and again. Then she squeezed the bag. Tracing an outline of something hard and rectangular, Polly’s breath caught in her throat. The news lately had been all about letter bombs; of certain ministerial departments where explosive experts were permanently on call to handle any suspicious mail. But such items were planted by stealth, surely? Not brazenly couriered by someone unmasked and known by name.

  Polly tore the bag open and turned it upside down. A tape fell out wrapped in a sheet of A4. She smoothed out the paper and read:

  My Dear Polly,

  Remember these things. Rumours as to an upturn in commodities are easily started. Insider dealing is a criminal offence, whether loss or profit results. Computers tell the truth as much and no more than the person operating them. If you thought I bought shares in Gillans and Hart you were sadly deceived. Play the tape. And consider carefully before you ever speak to anyone in such a way again.