Walking with Ghosts

single sheet, a pillow case, and a pair of jeans. None of them seemed unduly stained. Billy put money into the machine and sat down on a bench to wait. He was small and dark. He wasn’t paler, or markedly more drawn. He hadn’t turned into a slobbering Mr Hyde overnight. Didn’t have a twitch. Sam tried to imagine what someone would look like who had recently attempted to murder a young girl and gouge out her eyes with a knife. It was an impossible exercise. Try as he might, he couldn’t imagine that someone who’d done that would casually turn up at the launderette.
    Sam didn’t plan what happened next. He’d vaguely thought of tailing Billy for a couple of days, get to feel how the man lived, observe his habits before approaching him. But without thinking about it, he found himself pushing open the door of the launderette. He walked across the floor and sat down next to the young man. Billy tried to ignore him at first, affecting the studied indifference of a frog on lily leaf.
    ‘Hello, Billy,’ Sam said.
    Billy slowly turned his head. He looked at Sam long and hard before saying: ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know you.’
    ‘That’s right. My name’s Sam Turner. I’m married to yoUr mother.’
    A brief smile crossed Billy’s face, but he didn’t attempt to sustain it. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘One of Dora’s fancy men.’
    Sam suppressed the urge to break his neck. ‘Dora’s ill,’ he said. ‘She’s going to die soon. She’d like to see you.’
    The smile flitted across Billy’s face again. ‘Die?’ he said. And he looked through Sam as he said: ‘My father would have liked to see me before he died.’
    Sam shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. I know you were close to your father. But Dora, your mother... You’d make her happy if you came to see her.’
    Billy turned his head away and watched his clothes going round in the washing machine. Sam looked at his profile. He’d changed from the night Sam had followed him across York. Then his hair had been slicked back and black, reminiscent of Elvis Presley. Sam remembered thick lips and a swarthy appearance. But today Billy’s hair was short and auburn, and his lips were thin. He was paler, too. A different person. The Billy he’d followed across York had been wearing a wig and make-up.
    ‘How did you find me?’
    ‘By chance,’ Sam said. ‘It wasn’t easy. You live like a recluse, like someone who doesn’t want to be found. But at the same time you live in York, fairly close to your mother and sister. That smacks of ambiguity to me, on the one hand you don’t want to be found, but on the other you don’t want to get totally lost.’
    ‘What are you? A psychologist?’
    ‘No. I’m a messenger. I came to deliver a message from Dora.’
    ‘Tell her I’m not coming.’
    ‘Why?’
    The smile again. ‘So many reasons. She’ll know why.’
    ‘Maybe she will,’ said Sam. ‘But you could forgive her, whatever it is you’re punishing her for. Just come and sit with her for a few minutes. That’s all it’d take.’
    ‘Is that part of the message?’
    ‘No. I added that to the message. I’d like you to come as well. I’d like to get to know you.’
    ‘Know me?’ Billy shook his head. ‘Nobody can know anyone else. You can only know what I want you to know. Same with Dora, you only know what she wants you to know. I know other things. A different Dora to yours. I could tell you about her.’ His words were certain, but underneath he had all the foundation of a house boat.
    ‘And if I listened,’ said Sam. ‘If I let you tell me about the different Dora, will you then come and see the Dora I know? Soon. Before she dies?’
    ‘No. I don’t want to see her. She’s no good.’
    ‘It can’t be that simple, Billy.’
    ‘People don’t call me Billy. Nothing’s simple. I don’t want to open the floodgates.’
    ‘What shall I call you?’
    ‘William, that’s my name. After my father. Arthur William Greenhills.’
    ‘OK, William. What do you mean, “Open the floodgates”?’
    ‘Let it all come out. What she did. How she planned it. The destruction. It’s all contained. If we let it out where will we be then?’
    ‘I give in,’ said Sam. ‘Where will we be?’
    ‘Lost,’ said William. ‘I want to keep him alive.’
    There was a deadness in the tone of his voice, and there was that vulnerability around his eyes that Diana had mentioned. But apart from those two things you wouldn’t have picked him out in a crowd.