by AD Hartley
‘Well, you said when you came in here looking for me, you were pretty sure you’d had enough.’
Carlo sighed. In the excitement of seeing his father he had forgotten his previous frustrations. ‘I have… well, I had. I don’t know. It all seemed so easy at first, but now everything is too…’
‘Hard?’ Luigi suggested.
‘Grown up.’ Carlo finished with a slight smile.
Luigi laughed. ‘Perhaps I can help?’ he suggested.
‘How?’
‘Well, I did run this factory for decades before you took over, you know!’
Carlo laughed. ‘Yeah I know, but what are you going to do, go and talk to Randy?’
‘Well, no, I don’t think it’s a good idea to let everyone know I’m here. If you think cockroaches will ruin a reputation, what will the public make of a haunted factory? But I can offer advice and maybe have a look at things for you? Generally help out.’ Luigi finished, sounding hopeful that he might be able to get involved again.
Carlo looked dubious. ‘It’ll be good to have someone to talk to, certainly.’ he agreed, ‘But can you even leave the room?’
‘I don’t know. I’ve never tried.’
Carlo Takes Control
Carlo popped his head around the door at the top of the stairs and looked about. The usual hustle and bustle of the working day had begun as the staff went about their business in the factory, working on the machines, in the vans or up at the offices. Other than the vans, there were few reasons for anyone to linger in this area of the factory so Carlo just had to wait for a gap in traffic before stepping out as nonchalantly as he could.
‘Why are you walking like that? You look like a zombie!’ his father’s voice sounded as Carlo very stiffly stepped onto the factory floor, failing miserably to look casual.
‘I’m trying to go unnoticed!’ Carlo whispered back through gritted teeth and a forced smile.
‘Why?’ Luigi asked.
‘Because… err…’ actually, Carlo wasn’t sure.
‘You’re not doing a very good job at it.’ Luigi said, his voice appearing right next to Carlo’s ear.
‘Argh!’ Carlo screamed in surprise, causing a number of heads to pop curiously out of the serving hatches in the nearest vans. Carlo waved at them as if nothing had happened and shuffled along the row of vans with his hands in his pockets, jumping into the one second in line and crouching behind the counter. He lifted his eyes level with the serving hatch and peered out, but no one seemed to be paying him any attention.
‘Where are you?’ he asked quietly. ‘Dad? Damn it. Where are you?’ He walked back to the door of the van just as his father materialised and walked right through Carlo into the van making all Carlo’s hairs stand on end and sending a shiver through his body. ‘Don’t do that!’ he protested.
‘Do what?’ Luigi asked, absently taking in the van with a smile on his face. ‘The place looks great; really good!’ he said before spotting the ice cream machine hanging next to the hatch. ‘Ahhhh, I’ve missed these.’ he said, caressing his hand across the cold metal.’
‘Hey, you can touch!’ Carlo said in excitement.
‘If I concentrate, yes; if not…’ Luigi passed his hand through the machine as an example. ‘Remember the diary. How do you think I did that?’ Carlo nodded, remembering.
‘I’d love to try some, one last time.’ Luigi said, his ghostly hand picking up a small wooden spoon from the cup next to the machine, his face pinched in concentration as he raised it up to the handle of the ice cream dispenser.
‘You can’t eat can you?’ Carlo asked, surprised.
‘I don’t know.’ Luigi answered with a ghostly shrug. Taking three attempts to take hold of the handle, he gently poured a large blob of ice cream onto the spoon and slowly elevated the precious spoonful to his open mouth and deposited onto his tongue, where it promptly fell through his body hitting the floor of the van with a gentle splat. It was possibly the saddest sight Carlo had ever seen. Luigi mournfully stared through his own form at the ice cream.
‘Bugger.’ he said.
Carlo grabbed a cloth from below the counter and wiped up the ice cream but screamed as he stood back up to find someone staring through the hatch at him.
‘Don’t do that!’ Carlo said, reaching behind him to place the cloth in the bin and taking the opportunity to glance around the van, which seemed to be entirely free of an ethereal presence. He sighed, relieved that his Father had had the presence of mind to disappear. ‘Sorry.’ he said to the face cheerfully smiling through the hatch. ‘You just surprised me.’
‘Morning, Mr Leodoni, sorry about that.’ Andrew Peacock said cheerfully, ‘Can I help you with something?’
‘No, no…’ Carlo replied, stepping out of the van. ‘Just carrying out a spot check. Is this your van?’
Andrew nodded, looking slightly apprehensive.
‘Excellent. Spotlessly clean. Not a drop of ice cream anywhere on the floor. Keep up the good work.’ Carlo said, in an overly animated manner before walking away. Not looking back to see if he had got away with it, Carlo hurried to the back of the factory and hid behind one of the fork lift trucks poking his head out to see if there was anyone in his office at the other end of the factory. Seeing it empty, he saw his chance.
‘Come on,’ he said, setting off with a purposeful stride, ‘let’s see if you can make it to the office. That’s as far from the study as we can get so if you can reach there, you can pretty much haunt everywhere in the factory. That’d be great, maybe you can help me. It would amazing to know you could be around, y’know, just so I can ask questions and stuff and you could keep an eye on how things are going and tell me if anyone is making mistakes. We won’t tell Randy though, not yet anyway. Well, I guess that’s up to you really if you want people to know, I mean I can’t tell anyone, can I? Who’d believe me. But this will be great, won’t it? You and me back together again, eh, Dad? …Dad?’
Carlo had reached the other end of the factory floor just below his office, but there was no reply from Luigi.
‘Dad?’ Carlo whispered as loudly as possible, looking around in the hope his father might be visible somewhere. He smiled in a strained manner as one of the staff walked past him.
‘Carlo! What are you doing, mate?’ Ben asked striding towards him with his usual unhurried gait despite clearly being late for work.
‘What?’ Carlo muttered, still looking to see something amongst all the pipes and machines that may be his father.
‘You look like you’ve lost something.’
‘I have.’ Carlo sighed. ‘Look, can you keep a secret?’
‘Ah… the secret to ice cream success; finally!’ Ben laughed, dramatically rubbing his hands together in a villainous manner.
‘Do you know that day we were all in the study and we heard something?’ Carlo continued, ignoring Ben’s comment.
‘I could have gone years without being reminded of that.’ Ben said, starting to walk past Carlo towards the locker room until he was pulled him back.
‘I’m serious Ben. Something’s happened.’
‘What?’
‘Well, that voice we heard…’
‘Noise we heard… I’m not willing to admit it was a voice, yet.’ said Ben with a shake of his head.
Carlo sighed and tried again. ‘That voice we heard was my Dad.’
‘Get away!’
‘It’s true.’
‘Your Dad?’
‘Yes. All the stuff that’s been going on down there, it was him.’
‘Your Dad?’
‘Yes!’ Carlo shouted.
‘How do you know?’ Ben asked.
‘Because I’ve seen him. He’s here.’ Carlo waved his hand vaguely in the general direction of the factory floor. ‘Somewhere.’ he finished, rather lamely.
Ben eyed the factory floor suspiciously for any signs of unusual activity. ‘Where?’ he asked turning back to Carlo.
‘He’s here, honestly. He was right here a second ago,
but he disappeared. I’ve been talking to him all Morning!’
Ben made a face. ‘It’s not that I don’t believe you, Carlo,’ he said, ‘But…’ he pointed back to the machinery and the complete absence of Luigi Leodoni.
‘He must have gone back to the Study.’ Carlo muttered to himself, still peering into every shadow just in case. ‘Right, come with me.’ he said, grabbing Ben and dragging him back through the factory floor.
‘Perhaps you need to take a break? You’ve been under a lot of pressure.’ Ben said trying to disengage himself from Carlo’s grip, but he allowed himself to be guided to the back of the factory, through the door and down the stairs to the study, trying not to laugh at his smaller friend’s determined expression.
‘Dad?’ Carlo shouted, entering the study and gently pushing Ben in front of him. ‘Dad?’
‘Oh, there you are, I was wondering when you were going to notice…’ Luigi started, appearing in the middle of the study before noticing Ben stood in front of his son. ‘Argh!’ screamed Mr Leodoni, who turned and ran head long through the far wall in shock.
‘Argh!’ screamed Ben, who turned and ran headlong into Carlo sending both to the floor.
‘Aaaaaaargh!’ Ben continued, struggling to right himself and make his escape.
‘Aaaaaaaaaargh!’ came Mr Leodoni’s muffled voice from somewhere inside the wall.
‘Will you both calm down!’ Carlo shouted over the top of them, managing to get enough weight on top of Ben to slow him down a little. ‘It’s OK.’ he said, catching Ben’s eye and giving him a reassuring smile. ‘Trust me, it’s OK.’
Ben stopped struggling but didn’t look entirely convinced. As Carlo stood up Ben scuttled backwards to the opposite side of the room and sat staring wide eyed at the wall on the other side.
‘Are you OK?’ Carlo asked, looking concerned.
Ben shook his head vigorously in the negative, continuing to stare at the far wall, but didn’t look like he was going to bolt for the door, for the time at least.
‘Just stay there.’ Carlo said, walking to the far wall. Ben nodded but said nothing.
‘Dad? It’s OK, it’s just Ben.’
‘What’s he doing here?’ Luigi said from beyond the wall.
‘Don’t worry about, Ben. Can you come out?’
Luigi’s head appeared from the wall in front of Carlo frowning. ‘You said we weren’t going to tell anyone!’ he complained.
‘I know, but I got worried. One minute you were there and then you weren’t and then Ben found me looking for you. It’s OK, it’s only Ben.’
Luigi looked over at Ben still shrinking against the opposite side and finally nodded, looking like an annoyed mounted wall trophy. ‘OK, but no one else. Not yet. Now what happened, where did you go?’ he said turning back to Carlo and slowly walking through the wall until he was entirely back in the room.
‘I don’t know, I was just walking along to the offices talking to you and I thought you were next to me, invisible, but actually you just weren’t there anymore. Why did you come back here?
‘I didn’t.’ Luigi said, pacing the room. ‘I was just looking at that new conveyor belt you have at the back of the packing area near the vans. Then I noticed you had wandered off. I was just about to follow you when, poof, I was back in here again.’ he finished waving his hands around the room.
‘That’s weird.’ Carlo said, sitting down at the desk.
‘You think that’s the weird thing?’ Ben asked, finally finding his voice.
Luigi smiled. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.’
‘Perhaps it’s the room?’ Carlo mused. ‘Perhaps you walked to far from the room and you just sort of got pulled back?’
‘Like a rubber band?’ Ben said, getting to his feet but not taking his eyes from Mr Leodoni.
‘Yeah, I guess so.’ Carlo agreed. ‘This is obviously the place that you’re meant to haunt.’
‘Well that’s rather tedious.’ Luigi said. ‘I was hoping to get out some more; see the rest of the factory; help you around the place.’
‘How far did you go before you were pulled back?’ Ben asked.
‘Just upstairs, not far at all.’
Ben was clearly warming to the idea of conversing with a ghost as a grin spread across his face. ‘I’ve got an idea.’ he said, winking at Carlo.
‘That’s doesn’t sound good.’ Carlo replied, being used to the rather rash schemes thought up by Ben and Norton.
‘You’ll like this one. We need to find out how far Mr Leodoni can get from here, right?’
Carlo and his father nodded.
‘Well, why don’t we just go up to the factory and walk from the door across the factory floor and when you disappear, Mr Leodoni, we’ll know how far you can go. We can measure it so we’ll know the circum-thingy.’
‘Circumference.’ Carlo supplied.
‘Yeah, one of those. And we can mark places around the factory so you know.
‘Great plan, lads.’ Mr Leodoni stepped in, ‘Except for one thing. If you two are seen walking across the factory floor with the former and decidedly late owner, do you not think it may raise the odd eyebrow, or possibly exorcism?
‘Late?’ Ben asked.
‘Dead.’ Carlo answered. ‘He means, we can’t just go upstairs and walk around with Dad. It’d scare the hell out of everyone.’
‘You could do it invisible?’ Ben suggested.
‘How would you know when I get pulled back?’ Luigi pointed out.
Ben sat on the stairs next to the door, looking deflated. ‘I guess you are stuck here then.’ he said.
‘Wait a minute, perhaps we can do it!’ Carlo said. ‘You can hold things, right?’ he asked his father, who nodded.
‘If I concentrate, yes. How will that help?’
Carlo picked up a pencil from the desk and stood up. ‘Come with me.’ he said with a smile.
Carlo, Ben and an invisible Mr Leodoni stood at the door at the top of the stairs looking down the main factory floor. Carlo brandished the pencil to the thin air next to him and felt it be taken by his father. He heard Ben gasp as the pencil floated next to them.
‘Go on then.’ Carlo urged.
The pencil began a slow but steady advance across the factory floor, floating around four feet from the ground. Ben and Carlo tried to look casual as they pretended to be stood having a chat, all the while keeping a watchful eye on the progress of the pencil, but Ben swore as they saw Mr Lumsden walking from the huge refrigerators at the far left of the factory towards the centre of the floor, very clearly on a collision course with the pencil. Ben made to dart out to intercept Lumsden, but Carlo pulled him back, whispering under his breath.
‘No! Look.’
Mr Leodoni had clearly also noticed Lumsden as the pencil had stopped its journey and was floating in what Carlo thought was a nonchalant manner next to one of the large mixers.
‘He’s going to see it! He’s going to see it!’ Ben muttered.
Both boys held their breath as Lumsden reached the pencil and then walked straight past. The pencil shot a few feet higher into the air and bounced up and down in a clear victory dance before floating back to its normal height and continuing on across the factory.
As it reached the far end Carlo began to wonder how much farther it could possibly be, when it was his turn to swear as he saw Norton waddle through the main doors to the factory floor, struggling to remove his suit jacket and heading directly towards the pencil. Carlo was just about to call out to him to stop when the pencil dropped out of the air landing at Norton’s feet. The two boys shot forward to get to Norton, who had stopped and was looking heavenwards to see where the pencil had come from, just as Mr Leodoni briefly materialised right where they had been stood just a second before. He saw them sprinting across the factory shouting at Norton to leave the pencil where it was and made to follow them when, in his own words, he went poof and disappeared once more.
‘No, leave it!’ Carlo shouted, sprint
ing across to Norton, who was bending down to pick up the pencil, still looking rather bewildered. Ben reached him first, sliding to a halt in front of him, knocking his hand out of the way and collecting the pencil in one move.
‘What are you playing at?’ Norton huffed as he stepped back from Ben who was looking around making a mental note of the pencil’s exact landing place. ‘Did you throw that?’
‘No, it was an accident…’ Carlo started to say just as Randy’s head popped over the side of the walkway above them.
‘Carlo, can I have a word?’ he said, before disappearing back into the office.
‘Yeah, no problem.’ Carlo called back. He looked at Ben and gave a shrug before motioning to Norton with a nod that meant that Ben under no circumstances should tell Norton what was going on. Ben nodded back in understanding and headed off towards the cafeteria. ‘Are you coming, Norton?’
Norton looked between the retreating Ben and Carlo having noticed the exchange and headed off after Ben in search of breakfast muttering ‘You two are very weird.’
Carlo took a deep breath of relief and jogged up the stairs to the office wanting nothing more than to be heading the other way to see his father in the study.
Randy was making a cup of coffee when Carlo entered whilst steadfastly ignoring the telephone, which was merrily ringing away, unanswered.
‘Want me to get that?’ Carlo asked, sitting at the desk.
‘No, it’s OK. I know who it is.’
‘Who?’
‘Mr Hill.’
Carlo groaned. ‘What does he want?’
‘Sadly, in this town news travels fast. He has heard we have a slight problem and is calling to ask if there is anything he can do to, ahem… “help”. Obviously when Mr Hill says help, he normally means “complicate and assimilate”.’
Carlo swore, but for once Randy declined to reproach him.
‘Indeed.’ he said, sitting opposite Carlo and taking a sip of his coffee. ‘Further to that, I have managed to trace the batches that we are concerned about. Whilst the retailers are very sympathetic to our rather vague assurances of a labelling mistake, I’m afraid there is no way to resolve the issue other than to recall and refund, which is a huge hit on the operation so close to launch. With this in mind and now Mr Hill sniffing around, I can’t imagine how you must be feeling. I assume you have decided to call it a day…?’
