Witch Hunt

Chapter Twenty-Five




Dan plopped down opposite me in the new hospital, just outside of Basildon. He was pretty doped-up but physically more like the old Dan I knew and loved. His brown hair was giving up the battle against encroaching silver and he’d lost a bit of weight. His familiar t-shirt and favourite Levis seemed to be wearing him, as he sat, caved into the saggy armchair.

I wasn’t sure how much he knew about Mum. I hadn’t wanted to broach it last night. But it turned out that he had worked it all out in his hidey-hole. We were in a small common room with a dozen chairs and a TV turned to a low continuous mumble.

Dan shook his head then said, ‘It was too soon.’

I knew what he meant. I got it. We weren’t ready for Mum to go. It felt like we still had stuff to do together. She was meant to come home with me and start another chapter of her life. I mean, she was still young, only fifty-two. It just wasn’t fair.

Dan looked at me with this thousand-yard stare and said: ‘We are such stuff

As dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.’

A casual observer may have thought this odd but I knew Dan was a teacher groping about in his fractured psyche for a hook to pin the loss on. To remind himself that this was life, and death was as much a part of it as birth. Had been since 1610 when the bard wrote those very words, and would be for ever more.

A strange tranquillity, a vague sound-absorbing haze, had found its way into the room.

I said, ‘Shakespeare.’

Dan said, ‘The Tempest.’

And for a moment I imagined a ship with spirits pouncing all around. And then I thought of John Lowes, a priest hanged by Hopkins in Brandeston, and his yellow imp darting out into the sea. I don’t know why I thought about it then but I did.

The clock on the wall ticked slowly then stopped. Static in the air crackled around us.

And Dan said, ‘Has she come to you?’

I looked at him now sitting upright in his chair. ‘Who?’

Though confusion crept across his brow, when he returned my gaze a keen sharpness entered his eyes. ‘Rebecca.’

I didn’t speak. I was too shocked.

He leant forwards. ‘She’s worried about you.’

At last I found my voice. ‘Who?’

‘Your mum. That’s why I was looking after you. She thought Rebecca was warning her. They were both fifteen, you see.’

I was confused. ‘Rebecca? Mum?’

‘She feels guilty.’

‘Dan. What do you mean?’

He turned his now-alert gaze on me. ‘The ghost.’

I sat back and stared at him. Had he overheard my transactions in the living room while he’d been perched above?

‘She’s a witch,’ he said calmly.

‘Who?’

‘Rebecca. You. Her.’

I shook my head. ‘Dan, have you seen Rebecca or did you hear me talking about her?’

He didn’t respond. He was looking over my shoulder into the mid-distance.

I tried a new tack. ‘Dan, is she in your head?’

He regarded me keenly. ‘Sadie, please don’t be facile.’

Was I being ridiculous or had a pointed clarity briefly come down over him?

He smiled. A thin, sad smile. ‘She texted me.’

I didn’t know what to say or do. So I just inhaled steadily and watched him.

He continued, looking straight into my face. ‘Pretty good too for an illiterate seventeenth-century ghost.’ Then he laughed. ‘I sound barmy, don’t I?’

But he didn’t.

I shook my head and then suddenly with that gesture it was like something shifted into place inside my head. Maybe some drug I had taken way back had decided to fire a latent synapse but it was like I’d stumbled through a wall and could now see what it was like on the other side, in Dan’s world. The lights were brighter over there. The colours more vibrant. The textures and light, wavier. Like when you’re on acid and just completely and fleetingly connect with someone. And for that brief moment you see the same mad things, through the same freaked-out headspace.

I said, ‘She’s Facebooked me.’

And he laughed generously. ‘Seriously?’ He was sane on this side.

‘Yep. Well, private messaged.’ I nodded slowly. The clock was ticking louder than ever before. I angled my head to it. ‘Is it always this loud?’

Dan shrugged. ‘Comes and goes. Depends on where I am.’

I nodded again. ‘It is like a trip. Is this, like, how things are for you?’

He shook his head. ‘Right now, it is. But the medication brings me down to earth. Comes and goes. I’ll be moving out of it soon. I don’t know what happened with my meds. I don’t remember not taking them but I think I can’t have had some for a while. When I was up in your loft I was wholly untethered. But before that it crept up on me. A gradual process. I can describe it like a giant balloon lifting off. You don’t notice it until it’s too late and then you’re way over there.’ He indicated through the wall behind him.

I took it on board. ‘Someone swapped your medication.’

‘Is that right?’ he said and ran his finger over his jawbone. ‘Then she was right.’

‘Who?’ I said.

‘Rebecca. She said there was danger. Your mum was afraid for you. She made me promise that I’d look over you. I took that a bit too literally. But she was so worried, Sadie. Though I could tell there was something she wasn’t telling me.’

I nearly cried at the mention of her and the absurdity of it all. ‘You’re in hospital and Mum’s passed over. I don’t think it was me you both had to worry about.’

‘But she’s come to you. Rebecca.’

‘Yes,’ I said, realising that I had let my scepticism go. That sitting here in the hospital, talking to a man who had just been sectioned, I was finally accepting that it wasn’t madness or grief that I had experienced but an actual external manifestation.

‘Mum said, just before, you know, she passed, to expect a gift. She said I should speak to you. Is this …’ I stumbled over the words, unwilling to articulate what was becoming a solid conviction. ‘Is this it?’

‘Didn’t she tell you what it was?’ Dan asked simply.

‘No.’

‘Have you asked her?’

I nearly laughed. ‘No. Of course not. I can’t now.’

‘You’ll see. That’s it.’ He said it quickly – we both heard footsteps coming down the corridor. ‘Like us,’ he said.

The atmosphere was changing: the unseen mist receding into the corners of the room: the clock returning to its regular tick tock. Time was running out.

‘Look,’ I said quickly. ‘I’ve got to get off. To Manningtree. And Mistley. I need to scout out the place for the book. But I need to contact Rebecca. I want her to know that I’m going to get her a pardon. I’ve got some people at the magazine starting a campaign. Do you know how I can call her up, Dan?’

Dan’s gaze darted to the door. ‘I don’t think it’s up to you.’

‘I will stop back here after Manningtree. And see how you are, okay?

He nodded quickly. ‘Okay.’

Then as the door finally opened wide the weird magic in the air was sucked out and I found myself back over the other side, looking at Dan. His jaw slacked, the neck muscles had lost their tension. He was looking down, in a lolling sort of way, at his lap.

‘How is he?’ said the nurse.

‘Really good,’ I said. ‘Aren’t you, mate?’

The nurse helped Dan to his feet. He gave me a lopsided grin, which spilled a thread of saliva onto his chin. He didn’t wipe it. ‘Bye Sadie,’ he said. Then he added, ‘Be good.’ It came out in a kind of weird E.T. voice. He heard it and stuck out his finger like the little alien.

I frowned. Had he relapsed or was he playing along?

‘Bye bye Dan.’

‘Be good,’ he repeated and stared at his finger.

I dug my own fingernails into my hands and told myself not to cry.