Walking with Ghosts

can stay there with him. Be like a honeymoon. I told the hospital you’d pick up the tab.’
    ‘I’m stunned,’ Sam said. He cocked his head to one side, listened to the sound of a distant cash register.
    ‘I thought you’d want to make a gesture.’
    He shrugged his shoulders. ‘What the hell. It’s better to give than lend, and it costs about the same.’
    ‘We didn’t get a look at the guy,’ said Marie. ‘He wore a hood. Like a medieval monk. But he was deadly serious.’ Sam turned back to Celia. ‘Get on the phone to J.D. Tell him thanks a lot for his letter, but I need him over here now. I don’t want to leave you unprotected. As soon as we leave, lock the doors and make sure the windows are all fastened.’
    ‘We going somewhere?’ asked Marie.
    ‘The guy who attacked you,’ Sam said. ‘I know where he lives. You game for a bit of house breaking?’
    ‘Will I need a note from my mother?’
     
    They detoured to the hospital. They walked through the main entrance and took a lift to the second floor. Marie led the way on to the ward, past the nurses’ station to a private room. Geordie was flat on his back, Janet sitting in a chair by the side of his bed.
    ‘Great security system here,’ Sam said.
    Marie laughed. ‘Yeah, you can walk in and smother all the patients. Kill the doctors if you like. No one will stop you unless you’re smoking.’
    Sam went to the bed and placed his hand over Geordie’s, looked down into his face.
    ‘It was weird,’ Geordie said. His voice was faint and hoarse. Didn’t sound like him at all. ‘I knew I was dying and I was really pissed off. I didn’t see all my life pass in front of my eyes. Nothing like that. It was like being drowned, like being in an ocean, being dragged down into the depths, all alone. Up on the surface there was Janet and Barney in the sunlight, you and Marie and Celia. And down below it was pitch black. I didn’t want to go but there was no way round it. It was so disappointing.’
    Marie took a step towards the bed. ‘But you didn’t die, Geordie.’
    He put something like a grin on his face. ‘Thanks to you.’ He reached out his good hand and she took it, leaned over the bed and put her cheek next to his. When she pulled away Geordie looked exhausted.
    ‘We’d better be on our way,’ Sam said.
    ‘You gonna get him, Sam?’ Geordie asked. His face was whiter than snow, his eyes huge and black.
    ‘Yeah. We’ll wrap it up tonight.’
    ‘Careful. He’s Radio Rental. He’s not big but he’s stronger than you think. I tried to kick him in the grapes.’ Sam nodded. Glanced at Janet, then snapped back to Geordie. ‘You gonna be OK?’
    Janet said, ‘The doctors and nurses are really good. They could put scrambled eggs back into the shell.’
    Geordie did something with his face, another stab at a smile, but not much better than the last one. ‘I could use some grapes,’ he said. ‘I thought that’s what’s supposed to happen. People come and visit you and tell old jokes and feed you grapes.’
    Sam got up and headed for the door. ‘Don’t be a sprout,’ he said.
     
    *
     
    St Mary’s was quiet. The moon was bright but the wind had dropped away. Billy’s attic room was lit with a flickering glow that could only have come from a candle. The other windows were in darkness.
    ‘We’ll go in the back way,’ Sam said. He led Marie through the pedestrian passage to Marygate Lane, and from there to a brick wall and tall wooden gate which led to the back of Billy’s house. The gate was locked from the inside. Sam asked Marie to hold his torch. He put a dustbin against the wall to give him a start, went over the wall and unbolted the gate so Marie could follow. The bolt on the gate hadn’t been used for some time.
    They stood together in the dark and listened. There was no sound from the benighted house, no sense of life or movement from within. The concrete floor of the yard was little used, there was moss growing in the cracks and a smell of cat piss. An old bicycle was leaning against one of the walls, both of its tyres flat, all of its moving parts rusted and crusty. Sam felt Marie tremble next to him. He took hold of her arm and squeezed it gently. ‘You OK?’ he whispered.
    ‘I’ll manage. It feels weird.’
    ‘You can wait out here if you like. Watch my back.’
    She shook her head. ‘I wanna be where the action is. I’d shake to death out here.’
    He smiled and moved over to the door. He turned