Johnny and the Dead Read online

  ‘Yes, we’re taking him back this week. He gave us a map reference. Very precise, too.’ The man patted the second box he’d been given which, Johnny suddenly realized, probably contained all that was left in this world of Atkins, T., apart from a few medals and some faded photographs.

  ‘What will you have to do?’ he said.

  ‘Just scatter his ashes. We’ll have a little ceremony.’

  ‘Where . . . the Pals died?’

  ‘That’s right. He was always talking about them, I do know that.’

  ‘Sir?’

  The man looked up.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘My name’s John Maxwell. What’s yours?’

  ‘Atterbury. Ronald Atterbury.’

  He extended a hand. They shook hands, solemnly.

  ‘Are you Arthur Maxwell’s grandson? He used to work for me at the boot factory.’

  ‘Yes. Sir?’

  ‘Yes?’

  Johnny knew what the answer was going to be. He could feel it looming ahead of him. But you had to ask the question, so that the answer could exist. He took a deep breath.

  ‘Are you related to Sergeant Atterbury? He was one of the Pals.’

  ‘He was my father.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I never saw him. He married my mother before he went off to the war. There was a lot of that sort of thing. There always is. Excuse me, young man, but shouldn’t you be in school?’

  ‘No,’ said Johnny.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I should be here. I’m absolutely sure about that,’ said Johnny. ‘But I’d better be getting to school, anyway. Thanks for talking to me.’

  ‘I hope you haven’t missed any important lessons.’

  ‘History.’

  ‘That’s very important.’

  ‘Can I ask you one more question?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Tommy Atkins’s medals. Were they for anything special?’

  ‘They were campaign medals. Soldiers got them, really, for just staying alive. And for being there. He went all the way through the war, you know. Right to the end. Didn’t even get wounded.’

  Johnny walked back down the drive barely noticing the world around him. Something important had happened, and he alone of all the living had seen it, and it was right.

  Getting medals for being there was right, too. Sometimes being there was all you could do.

  He looked back when he reached the road. Mr Atterbury was still sitting on the bench with the two boxes beside him, staring at the trees as if he’d never seen them before. Just staring, as if he could see right through them, all the way to France.

  Johnny hesitated, and then started back.

  ‘No,’ said Mr Vicenti, right behind him.

  He’d been waiting by the bus shelter. Haunting it, almost.

  ‘I was only going to—’

  ‘Yes, you were,’ said Mr Vicenti. ‘And what would you say? That you’d seen them? What good would that do? Perhaps he’s seeing them too, inside his head.’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘It wouldn’t work.’

  ‘But if I—’

  ‘If you did something like that a few hundred years ago you’d probably be hung for witchcraft. Last century they’d lock you up. I don’t know what they’d do now.’

  Johnny relaxed a little. The urge to run back up the driveway had faded.

  ‘Put me on television, I expect,’ he said, walking along the road.

  ‘Well, we don’t want that,’ said Mr Vicenti. He walked too, although his feet didn’t always meet the ground.

  ‘It’s just that if I could make people see that—’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Mr Vicenti. ‘But making people see anything is a long, hard job – excuse me . . .’

  He jerked his shoulder a bit, like a man trying to find a difficult itch, and then pulled a pair of doves from inside his jacket.

  ‘They breed in there, I’m sure,’ he said, watching them fly away and disappear. ‘What are you going to do now?’

  ‘School. And don’t say it’s very important.’

  ‘I said nothing.’

  They reached the entrance to the cemetery. Johnny could just see the big sign on the old factory site next door, its blue sky glowing against the dustier blue-grey of the real sky.

  ‘They’ll start taking us out the day after tomorrow,’ said Mr Vicenti.

  ‘I’m sorry. Like I said, I wish there was something I could do.’

  ‘You may have done it already.’

  Johnny sighed.

  ‘If I ask you what you mean, you’ll say it’s hard to explain, right?’

  ‘I think so. Come. You might enjoy this.’

  There wasn’t even a dead soul in the cemetery. Even the rook had gone, unless it was a crow.

  But there was a lot of noise coming from the canal.

  *

  The dead were swimming. Well, some of them were. Mrs Liberty was. She was wearing a long swimming costume that reached from neck to knees, but she still kept her hat on.

  The Alderman had stripped off his long robe and chain, and was sitting on the canal bank in his shirtsleeves and some braces that could have moored a ship. Johnny wondered how the dead changed clothes, or felt the heat, but he supposed it was all habit. If you thought your shirt was off there it was . . . off.

  As for swimming . . . there was no splash when they dived, just the faintest of shimmers, that spread out like ripples and vanished very quickly. And when they surfaced they didn’t look wet. It dawned on Johnny that when a ghost (he had to use that word in his head) jumped into the water, the ghost didn’t get wet, the water got ghostly.

  Not all of them were having fun, though. At least, not the usual sort. Mr Fletcher and Solomon Einstein and a few others were clustered around one of the dumped televisions.

  ‘What are they doing?’ said Johnny.

  ‘Trying to make it work,’ said Mr Vicenti.

  Johnny laughed. The screen had been smashed.

  Rain had dripped into the case for years. There was even grass growing out of it.

  ‘That’ll never—’ he began.

  There was a crackle. A picture formed in the air, on a screen that wasn’t there any more.

  Mr Fletcher stood up and solemnly shook Solomon Einstein’s hand.

  ‘Another successful marriage of advanced theoretics and practical know-how, Mr Einstein.’

  ‘A shtep in the right direction, Mr Fletcher.’

  Johnny stared at the flickering images. The picture was in beautiful colour.

  Enlightenment dawned.

  ‘It’s the ghost of the television?’ he said.

  ‘Vot a clever boy!’ said Solomon Einstein.

  ‘But with improvements,’ said Mr Fletcher.

  Johnny peered inside the case. It was full of old leaves and stained, twisted metal. But over the top of it, shimmering gently, was the pearly outline of the ghost of the machine, purring away without electricity. At least, apparently without electricity. Who knew where the electricity went when the light was switched off?

  ‘Oh, wow.’

  He stood up and pointed to the scummy green surface of the canal.

  ‘Somewhere down there there’s an old Ford Capri,’ he said. ‘Wobbler said he saw some men dump it in there once.’

  ‘I shall see to it directly,’ said Mr Fletcher. ‘The internal combustion engine certainly could do with some improvements.’

  ‘But . . . look . . . machines aren’t alive, so how can they have ghosts?’

  ‘But zey have existence,’ said Einstein. ‘From moment to moment. Zo, we find the right moment, yes?’

  ‘Sounds a bit occult,’ said Johnny.

  ‘No! It is physics! It is beyond physics. It is—’ he waved both hands excitedly, ‘metaphysics. From the Greek meta, meaning “beyond”, and physika, meaning . . . er . . .’

  ‘Physics,’ said Mr Vicenti.

  ‘Exactly!’

  ‘Nothing ever finishes. Nothing
’s ever really over.’

  It was Johnny who said that. He was surprised at himself.

  ‘Correct! Are you a physicist?’

  ‘Me?’ said Johnny. ‘I don’t know anything about science!’

  ‘Marvellous! Ideal qualification!’ said Einstein.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Ignorance is very important! It is an absolutely essential step in the learning process!’

  Mr Fletcher twiddled the ghost of a tuning knob.

  ‘Well, we’re all right now,’ he said, watching a programme in what sounded like Spanish. ‘Over here, everyone!’

  ‘How very interesting,’ said Mrs Liberty, dressing herself in the blink of an eye. ‘Miniature cinematography?’

  When Johnny left they were all in front of the busted television, arguing over what to watch . . .

  Except for Mr Grimm. He stood a little apart, hands folded obediently, watching them.

  ‘There will be trouble because of this,’ he said. ‘This is disobedience. Meddling with the physical.’

  He had a small moustache as well as glasses and, in daylight, Johnny saw that the lenses were those thick ones that seem to hide the person’s eyes.

  ‘There’ll be trouble,’ he said again. ‘And it will be your fault, John Maxwell. You’re getting them excited. Is this any way for the dead to behave?’

  Two invisible eyes followed him.

  ‘Mr Grimm?’ said Johnny.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘That’s none of your business.’

  ‘No, but it’s just that everyone else always talks about—’

  ‘I happen to believe in decency. I believe life should be taken seriously. There is a proper way to conduct oneself. I certainly don’t intend to indulge in this foolish behaviour.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to—’

  Mr Grimm turned around and walked stiffly to his little stone under the trees. He sat down with his arms folded, and glared at Johnny.

  ‘No good will come of it,’ he said.

  He said he’d been to see a specialist. That was always a good one. Teachers generally didn’t ask any more questions.

  At break, Wobbler had News.

  ‘My mum said there’s going to be a big meeting about it in the Civic Centre tonight, with television there and everything.’

  ‘It won’t do any good,’ said Yo-less. ‘It’s been going on for ages. It’s too late. There’s been all kinds of inquiries and stuff.’

  ‘I asked my mum about building things on old graveyards and she says they have to get a vicar in to desecrate the site first,’ said Wobbler. ‘That should be worth seeing.’

  ‘It’s de-consecrate,’ said Yo-less. ‘Desecrate is all to do with sacrificing goats and things.’

  Wobbler looked wistful.

  ‘I suppose there’s no chance—’

  ‘None!’

  ‘I’m going to go along tonight,’ said Johnny. ‘And you lot ought to come.’

  ‘It won’t do any good,’ said Yo-less.

  ‘Yes it will,’ said Johnny.

  ‘Look, the place has still been sold,’ said Yo-less. ‘I know you’re sort of wound up about it, but it’s all over.’

  ‘Going along will still do some good.’ He knew it, in the same way he’d known the Pals were important. Not for reasons. Just because it was.

  ‘Will there be any . . . freak winds?’ said Bigmac.

  ‘How do I know? Shouldn’t think so. They’re all watching television.’

  The other three exchanged glances.

  ‘The dead are watching television?’ said Wobbler.

  ‘That’s right. And I know you’re all trying to think of funny things to say. Just don’t say them. They’re watching television. They’ve made an old TV set work.’

  ‘Well, I suppose it passes the time,’ said Wobbler.

  ‘I don’t think they experience time like we do,’ said Johnny.

  Yo-less slid down off the wall.

  ‘Talking of time,’ he said, ‘I’m not sure tomorrow would be a good time to go hanging around cemeteries.’

  ‘Why not?’ said Bigmac.

  ‘You know what day it is?’

  ‘Tuesday,’ said Johnny.

  ‘Halloween,’ said Wobbler. ‘You’re all coming to my party, remember?’

  ‘Whoops,’ said Bigmac.

  ‘The principle is astonishingly simple,’ said Mr Fletcher. ‘A tiny point of light! That’s all it is! Whizzing backwards and forwards inside a glass bottle. Basically it’s a thermionic valve. Much easier to control than sound waves—’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Mrs Liberty. ‘When you stand in front of the screen you make the picture go blurred.’

  ‘Sorry.’ Mr Fletcher went back and sat down. ‘What’s happening now?’

  The dead were ranged in rows, fascinated.

  ‘Mr McKenzie has told Dawn that Janine can’t go to Doraleen’s party,’ said William Stickers, without taking his eyes off the screen.

  ‘I must say,’ said the Alderman, ‘I thought Australia was a bit different. More kangaroos and fewer young women in unsuitable clothing.’

  ‘I’m quite happy with the young women,’ said William Stickers.

  ‘Mr Stickers! For shame! You’re dead!’

  ‘But I have a very good memory, Mrs Liberty.’

  ‘Oh. Is it over?’ said Solomon Einstein, as the credits rolled up the screen and the Cobbers theme tune rolled over the canal. ‘But there iss the mystery of who took the money from Mick’s coat!’

  ‘The man in the television just said there will be another performance tomorrow,’ said Mrs Liberty. ‘We must be sure not to miss it.’

  ‘It is getting dark,’ said Mr Vicenti, from the back of the group. ‘Time we were getting back.’

  The dead looked across at the cemetery.

  ‘If we want to go, that is,’ he added. He was smiling faintly.

  The dead were silent. Then the Alderman said, ‘Well, I’m blowed if I’m going back in there.’

  ‘Thomas Bowler!’ snapped Mrs Liberty.

  ‘Well, if a man can’t swear when he’s dead, it’s a poor lookout. Blowed, blowed, blowed. And damn,’ said the Alderman. ‘I mean, look, will you? There’s radio and television and all sorts. There’s things going on! I don’t see why we should go back in there. It’s dull. No way.’

  ‘No way?’

  William Stickers nudged Mrs Liberty. ‘That’s Australian for “certainly not”,’ he whispered.

  ‘But staying where we’re put is proper,’ said Mrs Liberty. ‘We have to stay where we’ve been put—’

  ’Ahem.’

  It was Mr Grimm. The dead looked at their feet.

  ‘I entirely agree,’ he said.

  ‘Oh. Hello, Eric,’ said the Alderman coldly.

  Eric Grimm folded his hands on his chest and beamed at them. This worried even the dead. The thickness of his glasses somehow made his eyes get lost, so that all that was on the other side of them was pinkness.

  ‘Will you listen to what you are saying?’ he said. ‘You’re dead. Act your age. It’s over.’ He waved a finger. ‘You know what will happen if you leave. You know what will happen if you’re too long away. It’s dreadful to think about, isn’t it? You’re letting this idiot child get you all upset.’

  The dead tried not to meet his gaze. When you were dead, there were some things that you knew, in the same way that when you were alive you knew about breathing. It was that a day would come. And you had to be prepared. There’d be a final sunrise, and you had to face it, and be ready.

  A final sunrise. The day of judgement. It could be any day. You had to be ready.

  ‘Not gallivanting off apeing your juniors,’ said Mr Grimm, who seemed to read their thoughts. ‘We’re dead. So we wait here, like decent people. Not go dabbling in the Ordinary.’

  The dead shuffled their feet.

  ‘Well, I’ve waited eighty years,’ said the Alderman, at last. ‘If it happens to
night, it happens. I’m going to go and have a look around. Anyone else coming?’

  ‘Yes. Me,’ said William Stickers, standing up.

  ‘Anyone else?’

  About half the dead stood up. A few more looked around and decided to join them. There was something about Mr Grimm that made you want to be on the other side.

  ‘You will get lost!’ warned Mr Grimm. ‘Something will go wrong, you know! And then you’ll be wandering around forever, and you’ll . . . forget.’

  ‘I’ve got descendants out there,’ said the Alderman.

  ‘We’ve all got descendants,’ said Mrs Liberty.

  ‘And we know what the rules are. And so do you.’ She looked embarrassed.

  There were rules. You were never told them, any more than you were told that things dropped when you let go of them. They were just there.

  But the Alderman was unbudgeable in a sullen kind of way.

  ‘At least I’m going to have a look around. Check out my old haunts,’ he muttered.

  ‘Haunts?’ said William Stickers.

  ‘Check out?’ said Mrs Liberty.

  ‘That’s modern talk for—’ William Stickers began.

  ‘I’m sure I don’t want to know!’ Mrs Liberty stood up. ‘The very idea!’

  ‘There’s a world out there, and we helped to make it, and now I want to find out what it’s like,’ said the Alderman sulkily.

  ‘Besides,’ said Mr Vicenti, ‘if we stick together no one will forget who they are, and we’ll all go further.’

  Mrs Liberty shook her head.

  ‘Well, if you insist on going, then I suppose someone with some Sense should accompany you,’ she said.

  The dead marched off in, as it were, a body, down the canal path and towards the town centre. That left only Mr Einstein and Mr Fletcher, still sitting happily beside their television.

  ‘What’s got into them?’ said Mr Fletcher. ‘They’re acting almost alive.’

  ‘It is disgusting,’ said Mr Grimm, but somehow in a triumphant tone of voice, as if seeing people acting badly was very satisfying.

  ‘Solomon here says that space is a delusion,’ said Mr Fletcher. ‘Therefore, it is impossible to go anywhere. Or to be anywhere, either.’

  Einstein spat on his hands and tried to smooth down his hair.

  ‘On ze other hand—’ he said, ‘there was a nice little pub in Cable Street.’

  ‘You wouldn’t get a drink, Solly,’ said Mr Fletcher. ‘They don’t serve spirits.’