Diana Jones - The Time of the Ghost

“Dear Parents, Let me break this to you gently. I have decided, after much thought, that life here has little to offer me. I have …”

I think I was going to run away from home , Sally said. But I don’t think I had anywhere to go. Both grannies would send me hack at once. Why didn’t I say more? Oh, here’s another one.

“Dear Parents, My life is in ruins and also in danger. I must warn …”

Shaken, Sally withdrew her face from the basket and hovered like a swimmer treading water, staring at the papers. So there had been clanger. That matched her feelings of an accident, though not her feeling that something had gone wrong. But what danger, and where from? And now she came to look, the whole top of the waste basket was packed with the same rosy writing paper. She must have used the whole packet, trying to explain whatever it was to Phyllis and Himself. Perhaps if she read every single one, together they would tell her what had happened. She plunged her face among the papers again.

But it was impossible; they were packed in so tightly, some sideways and some upside down, some rolled into balls, some torn in half, and all so mixed up with old drawings and things Cart had thrown out, that Sally’s bodiless eyes could pick out hardly any of it. The ones she did see were only variations on the first four. And it got darker – too dark to read – more than four packed layers down. It was the merest luck that, when Sally was about to emerge from the basket and give up, her sight came up against a larger paper wedged upright against the side of the basket. At the top was her own writing – the now-familiar “Dear Parents” – but the next line was, to Sally’s wonder, in writing that had to be Cart’s. Cart’s writing was neat and unmistakable.

“We think Sally has come to a sticky end.”

Underneath that, the spiny writing with the angrily crossed Ts was surely Imogen’s. Sally brought her face up, backed away, and drove in again, right through the basket and the papers, so that her non-eyes were right up against the paper. It was dim, yellowish gloom, nearly too dark to see.

“Her bed has not been slept in and we have not seen her since—” Imogen had written. It was too dark to see any more. All Sally could gather was that Cart’s writing and Imogen’s alternated, line by line, all down the page, from yellowish brown gloom to night black. Horribly frustrated, Sally backed out and hovered.

I am going to see that letter!

There was a deal of noise downstairs. Imogen had seemed calmed by Cart, but, in the irritating way it had, her grieving now sprang up again like a forest fire, loud and wild, in a new place.

“But don’t you see, I may be using these difficulties as an excuse to hide the truth from myself! I’m hiding away behind them! I know I am!”

“Now Imogen,” Cart said soothingly. “I think that’s just tormenting yourself.”

Oh shut up! Sally called out. Imogen enjoys grieving. She doesn’t need sympathy, she needs shaking. It’s me that needs the sympathy!

Furiously, she threw herself at the heaped wastepaper basket. She went right through, and found herself looking at the wallpaper beyond. But she was so determined that she backed away and threw herself forward again, and again, and again. She still went right through, but, ever so slightly, the basket rocked. The papers rattled and crunkled. Oh good! said Sally. She threw herself at it once more. There was such a rustling that Oliver started to growl again. But Sally knew she was making some impression. I f I try hard , she said. Trying does it. I am made of something after all. I’m not quite nothing. I’m probably made of the life stuff that was all round the boys. I shall think of myself like that. Bash, slide, crunkle. Sally thought of herself as strong, crackling, flexible, forceful, and bashed forward again. Bash, crunkle, crunkle.

She had done it. Instead of going into the basket, she was bounced off from it. The basket, already swaying, swung sideways, tipped and fell heavily, sending a slither of paper out across the Rude Rug. Oliver’s growls rose to sound like a small motorbike.

Imogen’s voice, bloated and throaty with crying, said, “What was that?”

“There must be a mouse in the bedroom again,” said Cart.

“Ugh!” said Imogen. “Send Oliver up.”

“He won’t go,” said Cart. “Besides, he just makes friends with mice.”

Sally was hovering, hovering, over the scattered papers. She had done it wrong. The vital letter was still in the basket, packed in by other papers, lying against the floor. And now she found she could not get in to read it. She had made herself so forceful that she kept bouncing off. She could get no further than the letter on top. Wait a minute! This top letter was in Fenella’s writing.

“Dear Parents, We have killed Sally and disposed of the body. We thought you ought to know. You are neckst of kin. Love, Fenella.”

What! said Sally. They haven’t. They didn’t. They can’t. So I did come back for revenge!

Downstairs, Fenella herself had come in. “Oh, is Imogen still grieving? I nicked four buns for tea.”

“You needn’t have nicked one for Sally,” said Cart.

No, you needn’t, need you! Sally yelled out, unheard.

“I didn’t. I need two myself,” said Fenella. “Why is Oliver growling up the stairs like that?”

“There’s a mouse up there,” Imogen said, still throaty.

“I’ll go up and catch it then,” said Fenella.

Sally could not face this. Ever since she read the letter, anger and panic had been swelling in her. Now those feelings swept her away, dissolved her through the wall, then over the field, turning and twisting and hardly knowing where she went.

The next hour or so was more like an unpleasant dream than ever. Sally found herself now here, now there, with very little knowledge of how she got to places or what happened in between. From the fact that everywhere she noticed was filled with the ringing mutter of boys, she thought she was mostly in school. First, she was among the smallest boys queuing up somewhere, each with a brown sticky bun in his hand. Next, she was in a dismal room, with grey ringing distances, in which two or three grey, dismal boys sat writing. Detention. Himself was there, grey as granite. He was sitting marking exercise books. Sally hovered round him, wondering if he was hating Detention as much as the boys did. He looked very grim. The way his hair bunched, iron grey, at the back of his head, put her in mind of the ruffled crest of an iron-grey eagle, brooding on a perch, with a chain on its leg.

“Please sir,” said a dismal distant boy.

Himself said, without looking up. “What is it now, Perkins?” His hand, holding a red ballpoint pen, swiftly crossed out, and out. Wrote “See Me” in the margin.

“I need to pee, sir,” said the boy.

“You went five minutes ago.” Himself slapped that book shut. Slapped another in front of him. Slapped it open. “I know, sir. I have a weak bladder, sir.”

Himself crossed out, crossed out. Made a tick. “Very well.” His eagle face lifted, and caught the boy half standing up. “You may be excused, Perkins, on the strict understanding that for every minute you spend out of this room, you spend half an hour in it. Off you go.”

“Yes, sir.” The boy hesitated and sat down again. He would have to go down two long corridors, and then come back up them, not counting the time in between. That was three hours more in Detention, even if he ran. He looked annoyed.

Himself lowered his beak and made three swift ticks. A slight moving under the iron skin of his face showed his satisfaction. He was enjoying himself. He loved detecting a try-on. Sally realised it, and realised she did not dare try to attract his attention just then.