Ghost of a Dream

TWO LAST CALL FOR THE DEAD

“Removed?” said Melody. “You mean surgically?”

“Could be,” said JC. “Or it’s the most extreme case of trepanation I’ve ever seen.”

“What?” said Laurie.

“Where you drill a hole in your head to make yourself smarter,” said Happy. “Trust me, it doesn’t work.”

“Hold everything, shout halleluiah,” said Melody. “I think I know who that is. I’ve seen that face before…in an old photograph. Nothing to do with this case…another case altogether…Yes! Got it! People, we are looking at someone who used to be very famous indeed. This is all that remains of that great Victorian medium and spiritualist, Dr. Emil Todd!”

“You never forget anything, do you?” said Happy, admiringly.

“The name rings a vague bell,” said JC, which was his way of saying he’d never heard of the man but was willing to admit that Melody had. “Still, a dead Victorian medium, and a missing Victorian train. Has to be a connection. But why is he here now?”

“Ask him,” said Happy.

“You ask him,” said JC. “You’re the team telepath. Look inside his mind and see what this is all about.”

“I can’t,” said Happy, frowning. “And not because there’s a whole bunch of fresh air where his grey matter used to be. This is a really powerful manifestation, and it’s very powerfully shielded. I wouldn’t even know this ghost was here if I couldn’t see it standing there scowling at me, and I do wish it would stop doing that.”

“You really think you can get answers out of that thing?” said Laurie.

“Why not?” said Melody. “It’s a ghost. Most of them only stick around because there’s something they need to say to someone. Even if it’s simply Look what you made me do, aren’t you sorry now?”

“You can leave now, if you wish, Mr. Laurie,” said JC. “You shouldn’t have to deal with things like this. Coping with ghosts is our business. We’re trained to deal with things that go Boo! in the night.”

“No,” said Laurie, after a moment, staring steadily at the ghost before him. “Now I’ve seen what it is, up close, it doesn’t seem that scary, after all. It’s a man, isn’t it?”

“Or what’s left of one,” said Happy. “That’s all ghosts ever are, really—people with unfinished business. If you weren’t scared of a man while he was alive, why be scared of him once he’s dead? Even when they walk through walls, or rip their own heads off, they’re only indulging a thwarted theatrical streak.”

“So why is this man running around with his head empty?” said Laurie.

“Because that was the last important thing that ever happened to him,” said Melody. “A ghost’s shape and aspect is determined by its most significant memories.”

“And that certainly made one hell of an impression on him,” said Happy.

“Is this figure what the other volunteers saw, Mr. Laurie?” asked JC.

“I don’t know,” said Laurie. “Maybe. I never saw anything like it before, and I’ve been around here longer than most.”

“Why isn’t he saying anything?” said Melody.

“He’s a Victorian gentleman,” said Happy. “Probably waiting to be properly introduced.”

The ghost of Dr. Todd stood very still, glaring at them all impartially. JC stepped forward again.

“What are you doing here, Dr. Todd?” he said carefully. “What holds your spirit here? Is there anything we can do to help?”

The ghost didn’t speak, didn’t move. His eyes didn’t blink; his mouth remained a flat grey line. He might have been alone in the room.

“This is like when we have an argument,” Happy said to Melody. “And you go stomping around the room, being mad at me but refusing to say what’s wrong because I’m supposed to know. And I never do.”

“There’s no blood on the doctor’s face,” JC said thoughtfully. “Which suggests that the…rather dramatic cranial damage occurred sometime after his death. Ghosts usually like to show off their death-wounds, especially if they’re a bit gory.”

“They do?” said Laurie.

“Oh sure,” said Happy. “Ghosts are all about the show. Bunch of drama queens. Look what happened to me! Aren’t you impressed?”

“It could be surgical,” said JC. “Given the neatness of the job. How did Dr. Todd die, Melody? Do we know?”

“According to the records I am accessing right now,” said Melody, from behind her bank of instruments again, “the files say…nobody knows. He disappeared. Body never found. Big mystery, back in the day.”

“Ah,” said Happy, wisely. “One of those…”

JC nodded to Happy, and they both moved in close, looking the ghost over carefully at point-blank range. He didn’t blink, or flinch, in the slightest. And then they both started shivering violently and quickly backed away. A thin layer of new frost covered both their faces. They wiped it away with their sleeves, looked respectfully at the ghost, and backed off some more.

“Damn, that was cold!” said Happy, beating his hands together to try to force some feeling back into them.

“I could feel the heat being sucked right out of me,” said JC, stamping his feet hard on the wooden floor. “Melody?”

“My short-range sensors are registering a major heat-sink,” said Melody, frowning. “Dr. Todd is still draining energy out of the room to maintain his presence in the material world. Get too close, and he could shut you right down.”

“But it’s not like he’s doing anything!” said JC. “What does he need all that energy for?”

“I think he’s used to scaring people off, simply by turning up,” said Happy. “He isn’t used to people who don’t go all to pieces the moment they see a ghost. I have to wonder: is this all he’s got, or does he have a second act?”

He didn’t have long to wait for an answer. The main-entrance door began to force itself closed. It pushed itself forward, pressing against the wooden wedge set in place to stop it, straining forward in sudden jumps and surges, determined to close. The wooden wedge squealed loudly as it scraped across the wooden floor, and smoke curled up from the contact point. JC moved forward, another wedge already in his hand, only to stop himself abruptly as the wedge under the door exploded, blown apart by the sheer pressure behind it. JC turned his face away as wooden splinters flew through the air like shrapnel. The door surged forward triumphantly. JC ran forward, grabbed the edge of the door with both hands, and threw his weight against it. He struggled for a moment, setting his merely human strength against the implacable unnatural force behind the door. Then JC ripped the door right off its hinges and threw it to one side.

The door hit the floor with an echoing crash, loud enough to wake the dead; and then it rocked briefly back and forth before lying still. But no-one was looking at the door. Everyone was looking at JC. He was looking at his hands, turning them back and forth as though he’d never seen them before.

“When did you turn into the Incredible Hulk, JC?” said Happy.

“Beats the hell out of me,” said JC. “I’m as mystified as you. It was as though the door suddenly didn’t weigh anything at all.” He looked at the shattered brass hinges, hanging loosely from the solid door-frame. “It would appear that the change started in me, by my contact with the Outside, is an ongoing process. That isn’t finished with me yet.”

He knelt beside the door, tried to lift it with one hand, and found he barely had the strength to raise it off the floor. Whatever more-than-human strength had moved in him moments before, it was clearly gone. JC stood up, turned his back on the fallen door, and smiled briefly at the others.

“As long as I’m not actually turning green and exhibiting a more-than-usually-surly disposition…I wouldn’t worry about it.”

The ghost of Dr. Todd advanced suddenly on Happy, striding forward with uncanny speed. The cold, grim expression on the ghost’s face didn’t change at all. Happy quickly backed away, but the ghost went after him, rapidly closing the gap.

“Don’t let him get too close!” said Melody. “He’s still sucking the heat out of everything!”

“I had worked that out for myself, thank you!” said Happy, back-pedalling fast. “I’m trying to hold him off telepathically, but I can’t find anything to lock onto. I’m not even convinced there’s anything there to reach, with his brain gone. All I’m picking up is his presence, a shape impressed on reality through sheer force of will. He shines so bright, JC! Looking at him is like being blinded by a spotlight!”

“Then stop looking at him!” said JC. “Put up your shields! Keep him out!”

“I’m trying! I’m trying! Damn, he’s strong!”

Happy’s back slammed up against the far wall. There was nowhere left for him to go; and the ghost was still advancing. Melody came rushing out from behind her instruments and put herself between Happy and the ghost of Dr. Todd. His expression didn’t change; but he stopped dead, right in front of Melody. His hands came up from his sides and clutched her shoulders. She cried out, in shock as much as pain, as the terrible cold hit her. She shook and shuddered under his touch, the fierce cold stabbing through her like knives. A layer of frost formed on her face, covering her eyeballs like cataracts.

JC ran forward, grabbed Melody by one arm, and hauled her out of the way. The ghost had no physical strength to hang on to her. He didn’t even look aside as Melody disappeared from in front of him. His cold gaze remained fixed on Happy. Melody fell to one knee, shaking and shuddering. Happy moved quickly out from in front of the ghost to kneel beside her, throwing his arms around her, using the warmth of his own body to drive the cold out of hers. The ghost turned to glare at him. JC moved to put himself between the ghost and his partners, whipped off his very dark sunglasses, and showed what he had for eyes to the ghost of Dr. Todd. They glared brightly, fiercely, in the gloom, like the sun come down to touch the Earth; and Dr. Todd could not face the light. He backed away, slowly, seeming to glide as much as walk, until he came to a halt on the far side of the room.

Melody scrubbed roughly at her face with both hands, brushing the frost away. Her skin was blue-white, almost bruised, but already fierce spots of angry colour were returning. She moved restlessly inside Happy’s arms, and he immediately let her go and stood up, letting Melody get to her feet under her own strength. She could be funny about things like that. JC replaced his sunglasses.

“Dear God, man,” said Laurie. “What the hell happened to your eyes?”

“Work-related injury,” said JC. “I let some demons get too close to me during a haunting down in London’s Underground. They very nearly killed me; but something from Outside reached down and touched me, giving me the strength I needed to save myself. I’m more than I was; and you can see it in my eyes.”

“Something from where?” said Laurie. “From Heaven?”

“Undecided, as yet,” said JC.

“Don’t you think you should try to find out?” said Laurie. “You’ve been marked. But is it a sign of grace or a sign of ownership? I think you owe it to yourself to find out the true nature of your benefactor—if only for your own peace of mind.”

“Trust me,” said JC. “It is right there on my list of Things to Do.” He looked across at Melody and Happy, and they both nodded quickly to show that they were themselves again. “Happy, keep trying to read that ghost. Get something out of him. But don’t let him get inside your head. Melody, it’s research time. I need to know everything you can find about Dr. Emil Todd. What’s his story, and what connection does he have to Bradleigh Halt?”

“I’m on it,” said Melody, already back behind her rank of instruments, fingers stabbing stiffly at her keyboards as she accessed the relevant files on her computer. “The Institute still has an open file on Dr. Todd, as an unsolved case…But it is really heavily restricted, JC, for several pay grades above ours. This is the kind of information the likes of you and I aren’t supposed to even know exists.”

“You’ve been hacking the restricted files on your own time again, haven’t you?” said JC.

“Yes,” said Melody.

“Good girl,” said JC. “Now tell me things I need to know.”

“Dr. Todd disappeared, late in the year 1878,” said Melody. “Same year as the missing train…And according to this file, it’s all connected to something called the Ghost Caller. This is pretty obscure stuff, JC. Old-time information, much of it second hand; I’m not sure anyone at the Institute knew about this stuff before we were sent in.”

“Except we can’t be sure of anything where the Carnacki Institute’s concerned, these days,” Happy said darkly.

“The Ghost Caller,” said Melody, talking over Happy with the ease of long practice. “Also known as The Call For The Dead. No definite information here about what it was or how it worked. Presumably some kind of Victorian steampunk break-through, to produce a machine we have yet to duplicate.”

“Mostly because any sane person would have more sense than to build anything that calls ghosts,” said Happy. “Anyone with two working brain-cells to bang together knows it’s in everyone’s best interests to keep the dead at arm’s length.”

“Ah, but it wasn’t always like that,” said Melody. “The Ghost Caller, this incredible machine, was the brain-child of Dr. Emil Todd, (almost certainly not his real name,) one of the greatest and most popular mediums of Victorian times. When they were all going mad for Spiritualism, and raising the ghosts of the departed, so they could make contact with loved ones on the Other Side. Dr. Todd toured the country with his act, appearing in all the biggest theatres, putting on spectacular shows. He produced spirit voices, visions, ectoplasm, and extended conversations with the dearly departed of people in his audience. Charged a pretty price for admission but always gave the people their money’s worth. He was, briefly, a national sensation. But he’d barely been in the big time a year before he was exposed as a fake and a fraud. He really did do most of it with mirrors. And ventriloquism, conjuring tricks, and plants in the audience. All very obvious, in retrospect. A jumped-up showman, with delusions of grandeur. He was ruined, abandoned by the audiences who’d adored and believed in him. He was hounded from the stage and forced into early retirement. Had to go into hiding, for his own safety.

“And then he disappeared. As suddenly and completely as one of his own stage effects.

“With anyone else, the story might have ended there, but Dr. Todd was made of sterner stuff. He was determined to restore his reputation by presenting the public with something undeniably real. So he took the extensive fortune he’d amassed and spent pretty much all of it in having the Ghost Caller created for him. An apparently very impressive device, for which no contemporary description survives, but powerful enough to call ghosts to it, like moths to a bright light.

“However, before Dr. Todd could demonstrate the Call For The Dead on stage, he was shut down by the Queen’s champion of that time, the legendary Victorian Adventurer, Julien Advent. He confiscated the Ghost Caller because of the threat it posed. Not to the Nation, but all Humanity. Apparently, the machine was so powerful that once its Call began, anything, and by that I mean anything at all, could be summoned into our reality from any of the Outer Reaches. Ghosts, demons, abhuman monstrosities—you name it. An irresistible Call, a summons with no limit to its reach…Who knows what that might have let in. There are always things Out There, lurking on the threshold of our world, waiting for an invitation…”

“We’re talking about the Great Beasts, aren’t we?” said Happy. “The Abominations, the Entities from the Outer Reaches.”

“You might be,” said Laurie. “I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”

“Be grateful,” said Happy.

He moved away, to be on his own for a moment. One hand deep in his trouser pocket closed around a pill bottle. Melody had worked hard to keep Happy from depending on chemical supports, mostly by having lots of sex with him whenever he looked like weakening. But really, all she’d done was distract him. And she couldn’t be there all the time. The problem remained the same: that Happy saw, heard, and sensed far more of reality than was good for him. He needed his special medications to shut his telepathy down to bearable levels, to keep the hidden world and all its horrors outside his head. He’d hoped that sex, and maybe even love, might be enough; but they couldn’t give him the peace of mind the pills could. Or the strength. Happy was not a strong man. He never had been. And he knew it. He had done his best to keep off the pills because it meant so much to Melody; but at times like this, faced with imminent dangers from Awful Things from Beyond…Happy reached for the only real strength he’d ever known.

His hand closed tightly around the pill bottle; but he didn’t take it out. Not yet.

Happy didn’t know, but JC had already talked with Melody about providing Happy with some kind of experimental tech support. Some kind of machine, to keep the bad stuff outside Happy’s head. But Melody had been forced to admit she’d already tried everything she could think of, and she could think of some pretty extreme things. Not one of them had worked. She’d failed Happy and failed herself. She wasn’t used to that. JC and Melody hadn’t told Happy any of this. They didn’t want him to give up hope. Because Happy needed hope more than anything.

And Happy wasn’t the only one.

“This…Ghost Caller,” JC said to Melody. “Is it something I could use, to call Kim back to me?”

“Not a good idea, JC,” Melody said quietly. “The Ghost Caller was, by all accounts, anything but subtle. You can’t choose whom you want to call. There’s an On/Off switch, to open and close a Door. And God alone knows what might be waiting on the Other Side.”

“Hold everything,” said Happy, turning back to face them. “Didn’t I hear something recently about an Apocalypse Door? A Door to give you direct access to the Hereafter? Am I remembering that right? Could that be something like our Ghost Caller?”

“Not really,” JC said patiently. “The Apocalypse Door allowed you to open the Gates of Hell. It was destroyed by the Droods.”

“Why would anyone…?” said Laurie.

“Don’t go there,” said JC.

“The Ghost Caller doesn’t give you access to the Hereafter,” said Melody. “It sends out an open call to the restless dead. Of which there has never been any shortage…” She thought for a moment, then sniffed loudly. “What we could really use is a Ghost Repellent. Something to send ghosts away.”

“Some kind of spray, perhaps,” Happy said brightly. “Something in a can—Ghost Away! I’d pay good money for a can of that.”

JC gave Melody a look, and she resumed telling Dr. Todd’s story.

“It seems that Julien Advent took the Ghost Caller away from Dr. Todd, despite his strong and even violent objections. And put the device on a train, under guard, to be taken to a place of safety. Where it could be studied, and, if necessary, dismantled. The files don’t say where this would have taken place…Probably the original Dark Heir Headquarters, down in Cornwall. That was the main repository, back then, our very own Area 51, for all the really dangerous weird shit that the world wasn’t ready for. Is it Area 51, the Americans use, these days? I get mixed up, there are so many stories…”

“It’s Area 52,” said Happy, unexpectedly. “Situated in the Antarctic Circle, up past the McMurdo Sound. So if anything should go suddenly and unpleasantly and explosively wrong, there’s no-one around to be killed, maimed, or nastily transformed. Except a few penguins.”

“There aren’t any penguins in the Antarctic,” said Melody.

Happy glared at her. “They had some moved in, for camouflage.”

“You’ve been working your way through the forbidden files I downloaded, haven’t you?” said Melody. “Good boy. There will be treats later.”

“Young rebels in love,” said JC. “The horror, the horror…Get on with the story, Melody. It’s getting late.”

“Later than you think,” said Laurie. The others looked at him, but he had nothing more to say.

“Anyway,” said Melody. “Pressing on. Enter Dr. Todd, again. It seems he was now so scared of the Ghost Caller, and what it could do, that he wanted it gone. Destroyed, or at the very least, made safe. Apparently he didn’t trust what Her Majesty’s Government of that time might do with it. So he made a deal with Someone, or Something, presumably the same Power that made the Ghost Caller for him in the first place, and had them send the Ghost Caller…Away. You have to understand, though, all of this is conjecture, put together after the fact. No-one knows anything for sure.”

“Oh, I think we can make some pretty good guesses,” said JC. “The Ghost Caller was placed on a train, which entered a tunnel, and was never seen again! Because it was sent Away, out of our reality, to some Other Place. So no-one else could have it. And Dr. Todd’s ghost is here to guard the station, to frighten people away…so no-one could do anything that might bring the train back again. He’s stood guard all these years, to protect us all from the terrible machine he made.

“But the volunteers came and made changes in the station, changing the conditions that helped keep the train Away…And now there’s a dimensional weak spot where the accumulated pressure has burst through. A doorway, or at least a potential doorway, between here and Away.”

“You think the missing train is coming home, at last?” said Laurie.

“And bringing the Ghost Caller with it,” said JC.

“All right, I’m sort of with you,” said Happy. “But none of that explains why the top of Dr. Todd’s head is missing.”

“One thing at a time,” JC said cheerfully. “Let’s go out onto the platform again. See what there is to see.”

“It’ll all end in tears,” said Happy. “Probably mine.”

They went back out onto the station platform, JC leading the way and looking cheerfully about him. He’d recovered a lot of his usual cocky bravado. Happy wasn’t sure whether he approved or not. Yes, it was good to see JC back to his old self again; but the old JC did have a distressing tendency to rush in where angels wouldn’t show up on a bet. Usually while shouting Follow me! to Happy and Melody. Happy looked nervously up and down the platform, sticking close to Melody. It was very late evening now, not much light left in the sky. Hardly any of the station room’s candlelight followed them out through the doorway, and the lights built into Melody’s instrument rack had dimmed right down. Even the sound of their footsteps seemed muffled, far-away. There was a terrible stillness to everything, as though everything in the station was waiting for something. An almost unbearable sense of anticipation, of something important and significant, about to begin.

Laurie stayed in the doorway, looking at the three Ghost Finders as much as the station.

JC strode right up to the edge of the platform and stopped, the tips of his shoes protruding over the drop, and the tracks. He bounced up and down happily, peering into every dark and concealing shadow as though he expected something to emerge and present him with a box of chocolates. He studied the weed-choked tracks, and the heavily rusted rails, before finally giving his full attention to the gaping tunnel-mouth. He studied it thoughtfully for some time. Darkness looked back at him, complete and implacable.

“This where you detected the dimensional weak point, Melody?” he said, without looking back.

“Not so much a door as where a door could appear,” said Melody. “And the more the pressure builds, the bigger that door’s going to be. And the greater the impact it will have upon our reality. You can’t force an opening between worlds without some inevitable spiritual fall-out.”

“Such as?” said Laurie from his doorway.

“Rains of frogs, spontaneously combusting cows, and the dead coming home to roost,” said Happy. “The universe doesn’t like being messed about with and has a tendency to act up cranky, in protest. Is there any way we can stop the train’s coming back, JC?”

“We don’t want to,” JC said briskly. “The train wants to come home, where it belongs. And we want that pressure relieved because it’s been building for over a century; so when the doorway finally opens, it’s all going to happen at once, in a big way. Best we can do is hope to control the situation and keep the nasty side effects contained, here within the station. That train is on its way back, finishing its long journey at last, and nothing in or out of Heaven or Hell will stop it now.”

“The train isn’t the real problem,” said Melody. “Don’t get side-tracked, JC. The real problem is the Ghost Caller. It was dangerous enough when it was first placed aboard the train; by now it could have accumulated enough power to blow a hole clean through the Space/Time continuum. If the stress of the return activates the machine, we could be talking about a mass psychic summoning. One last call for all the dead that ever were.”

“I am leaving now,” said Happy. “Try and keep up.”

“Stand still! Show a brave face, Happy,” said JC, sternly. “There are civilians present.”

“Oh, don’t mind me,” said Laurie. “I told you, no-one with any sense stays here once it gets dark.”

“See!” said Happy. “See!”

“We should get danger money,” said Melody.

Happy stopped and looked at her. “It would help,” he said finally.

“Hold it,” said JC. “We have company.”

They all looked around, to find the ghost of Dr. Todd had joined them out on the platform. He stood on his own, some distance away, staring unblinkingly into the dark tunnel-mouth. JC calmly strode forward to join him, looked into the tunnel opening, then right into the ghost’s face.

“Why are you here, Dr. Todd? You’ve failed to prevent the train’s return, so why are you still here?”

The ghost looked straight through him, as though he weren’t there, and said nothing at all. JC glanced back at Happy.

“Are you sure you aren’t picking up something from him? Anything at all?”

“No thoughts, no personality…it’s as though he’s so far-away, I can barely see him. Something really bad happened to Dr. T; and I don’t think it was only the head injury. I think part of it is still happening. There’s a definite connection between the ghost, the missing train, and the Ghost Caller. I can sense it, feel it; this whole setting is soaked in information. And JC…I can’t feel Dr. Todd, but I can feel something that I’m pretty sure is the Ghost Caller. It’s not simply a machine. It’s close now, closer than it has ever been, ready to break through…And I think it needs Dr. Todd to be here when it arrives. He’s not here through his own free will; the Ghost Caller holds him here.”

“Why?” said JC. “What’s the connection?”

“I don’t know!” said Happy. “I’m getting a headache trying to process all this. It’s something to do with the price Dr. Todd paid for the creation of the Ghost Caller.”

“No-one move,” Melody said quietly. “But look around you. The fog is rolling in.”

They all looked carefully up and down the platform. A shimmering grey fog had descended on both ends and was creeping slowly and remorselessly along the platform towards them. It rose out of everywhere at once, curling and coiling thickly on the still evening air, pulsing with its own eerie light. The tunnel-mouth was already lost to sight. In a few moments, the fog was already so thick that none of them could make out the opposite platform. The pulsing mists spilled along the railway tracks, covering them up in a thick grey tide, and soon the Ghost Finders and Laurie and the ghost of Dr. Todd were surrounded by a grey sea of impenetrable fog, filling the station with its own sour and bitter light.

Laurie stepped back, into the main station building, as though he felt safer inside, in the candlelight. Dr. Todd drifted back before the fog, to stand with the Ghost Finders. He still stared unblinkingly through the thick grey mists, at where he believed the tunnel-mouth to be. The fog was cold and wet and intimidating. It felt like being trapped underwater, cut off from the rest of the world, every sound eerily muffled. The foggy air smelled of smoke and coal dust and times past. It grew slowly, steadily thicker.

Happy suddenly put both hands to his head and pressed hard against his ears to keep out some terrible sound only he could hear. His face screwed up, and he stumbled away from the others. JC yelled for him to come back, but Happy couldn’t hear him. He disappeared into the curling folds of the fog, becoming a dark and indistinct shape. And then he disappeared from sight completely, as his feet took him over the edge of the platform, and he fell.

But Melody was right there behind him.

She’d followed him into the fog, and when he fell, she threw herself forward and grabbed his out-flung hand at the last moment. She slammed facedown onto the platform, driving all the breath out of her lungs with the impact; but still she held on to Happy’s hand with desperate strength.

“Don’t let go!” yelled Happy, his voice rising from the deep gap between the platforms. “I’m not sure there’s anything here, any more! The fog’s eaten it all up! There’s nothing underneath me!”

“Oh hush up, you big baby,” said Melody, between gritted teeth. “I’ve got you. I’ve always got you. Haven’t you learned that yet?”

While they were busy with each other, the fog took advantage of the moment to surge forward, from both ends of the platform at once. A great grey wave swallowed up everything. JC lost sight of Melody, grimly hanging on to Happy’s hand. And when he looked back, he couldn’t see Laurie or Dr. Todd. He was cut off from everyone, standing alone in a great grey sea that was becoming steadily thicker all around as though it was walling him up.

And then Kim Sterling came walking out of the fog, heading straight for him. His lost love, his ghost girl, striding towards him, smiling. The fog fell back from her, as though intimidated by her presence, as though it couldn’t touch her. Kim came walking through the fog, and her feet on the platform didn’t make the slightest sound. She slowed to a halt before JC, and his unbelieving smile slowly widened to match hers. He took off his sunglasses, so he could meet her eyes with his, and the blazing light from his altered eyes blasted the last of the fog away, illuminating Kim like summer sunshine in a church. She stood tall and easy before him, a magnificent pre-Raphaelite beauty with long red hair, in a shimmering, long, white dress. She had a high-boned, sharply featured face, and her wide mouth was a red dream with a smile always tucked away in one corner. She looked so fine, so wonderful, so full of life…JC reached out to take her hand, and she reached out a pale hand to him…but his hand passed right through hers. Because only he was really there. The living and the dead were never meant to touch.

“Where have you been?” said JC; but Kim smiled sadly at him.

She gestured at the sunglasses in his hand, then looked right into his eyes in a meaningful way. JC nodded slowly, looked around him at the fog, and said, very distinctly, “I can still see the platform.” The fog rolled back before him, giving up its hold on the station, unable to withstand the otherworldly glare of his eyes. It slowly faded away and disappeared, as though it had lost its grip on the world. JC looked around for Kim; but she was already walking away, back down the platform. By the time the fog was completely gone, so was she. As though she had never been there.

“I’ll find you,” said JC. “I’ll never stop looking.”

JC didn’t waste time with regrets. He hurried over to where Melody was still lying facedown on the platform, one hand over the edge, grimly hanging on to Happy. JC knelt and grabbed Happy’s other hand, and, between them, he and Melody hauled Happy back up to the platform. Happy scrambled up onto his feet, breathing hard, then retreated quickly away from the edge. Melody went with him, while JC took his time getting back onto his feet, brushing fussily at his marvellous ice-cream white suit.

“What the hell did you hear,” Melody said to Happy, “to make you go rushing off like that?”

“A steam-whistle,” said Happy. “Like a howl out of Hell, getting closer by the moment.”

Melody nodded, then turned away to look back at JC. “Before you ask. Yes, I saw her, too.”

“Saw who?” Happy said immediately. “What did I miss?”

“Kim,” said Melody. “She was back. She helped save us from the fog, then disappeared again.”

“She looked exactly the way she did when I first saw her,” said JC. “Down in the Underground.”

“Everyone else has a guardian angel,” growled Happy. “Trust you to be different and have a guardian ghost. Did she say anything to you, like where she’s been all this time? Who was holding her; how she broke free?”

“No,” said JC. “She didn’t say a word. But at least now I know…she’s not lost. Not gone. She’s…out there, somewhere.”

“Then where’s she been all this time?” said Happy; but JC wasn’t listening. He looked across at Laurie, standing stiffly in the candle-lit doorway. JC considered him thoughtfully for a long moment, then looked across at the ghost of Dr. Todd, back where he used to be, staring into the darkness of the tunnel-mouth. JC moved away from both of them and gestured for Happy and Melody to join him.

The three Ghost Finders stood close together, speaking in quiet voices.

“The train is coming back,” said JC. “We can’t hope to stop it, so I say we do all we can to encourage it and keep all the weird shit limited to this one location.”

“Good idea, oh great boss and leader,” said Happy. “You get on with that while I sprint for the nearest horizon. Be sure and send me a nice postcard when it’s all over and let me know how it turned out.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t do this without you,” said JC. “So stay where you are, or I’ll nail your feet to the platform. Or maybe I’ll only nail the one and watch you walk round and round in circles.”

Happy scowled at him. “You would, too, wouldn’t you? Bully. All right. What do you want me to do, and I know I’m going to hate it.”

“I will use my amazing eyes to find the weak spot in reality,” said JC. “And then you will use your amazing mutant mind to force it all the way open. Lance the boil before it bursts.”

“You have such a way with words,” said Happy. “And all of them bad.”

“You really think that’s going to work?” said Melody.

“Oh yes,” said JC. “The train wants to come home. The Ghost Caller wants to come home. They’ve been Away too long. All we have to do is open the door a crack, and they’ll force it open the rest of the way, from the other side.”

“I’m more worried about what might come through with them,” said Melody.

“I should have been a plumber, like Mother wanted,” Happy said miserably. “Always good money, in plumbing.”

In the end, it really was that simple. JC and Happy stood together on the platform, concentrating on the dark tunnel-mouth, while Melody hurried back into the Station building, gathered up her precious instruments, and hauled them out onto the platform. Laurie watched interestedly, but he had apparently observed enough of Melody in action not to make the mistake of offering to help. The ghost of Dr. Todd ignored them all, still orientated unwaveringly on the tunnel-mouth. JC and Happy gave him plenty of room. It was cold on the platform, but the natural cold of an evening shading into night, not the unnatural chill Dr. Todd had brought to the Station room. Presumably he didn’t feel the need for any more energy; and JC and Happy were quite content for him to go on feeling that way.

JC took off his sunglasses and stared meaningfully into the tunnel-mouth. The deep dark shadows seemed to stir uneasily under the touch of his augmented gaze. Happy stood half-crouching behind JC, concentrating, reaching out with his mind. Feeling for something that strictly speaking wasn’t actually there yet.

“You’re right, JC. There’s definitely something…almost there. A dimensional door with something very powerful pushing up against the other side. There is a light at the end of the tunnel but not necessarily in a good way.”

“Something’s coming,” JC agreed, smiling confidently. “So close now, even I can feel it. Melody! Can you tell me what direction it’s coming from?”

“According to my instruments,” said Melody, breathlessly, as she slammed the last bit of high tech into place, “whatever it is, it’s coming from every direction at once! Forget spatial coordinates; this is coming from Outside our reality. Still, if I were the betting kind, which I’m not, but if I were…the odds do favour its coming through that tunnel-mouth. Completing the journey the train began all those years ago. The Universe has a fondness for circles and neatness. But JC, I have to tell you…it’s not only the train that’s coming. Something really powerful is hitching a ride with it, something so big, so intense it’s overloading all my sensors!”

“Yes,” said Happy, almost absently, all his concentration focused on the tunnel opening. “I can See it, I can Hear it…Like a bright Light, like a great Voice…”

“The Ghost Caller,” said JC.

“The Light is shining very brightly now,” said Happy, in a far-away voice. “I don’t like it. That’s not a proper Light. And it’s not a good Voice. It wants to tell me things. Things I don’t want to know…”

“Is it calling you?” said JC, quickly.

“No,” said Happy, almost reluctantly. “It doesn’t care about me. I’m just in the way. Its attractions are not for the living. I think both the Light and the Voice are lies, lures…It calls to the dead, to trick them away from the true Light and the true Voice…”

“Okay,” said JC, surprisingly gently. “That’s enough of that. Come home, Happy. Come back to me, or I’ll have Melody come and bring you back.”

“I’m back!” said Happy, scowling at JC. “I can look after myself, you know.”

“Really,” said JC. “You do amaze me. Have we done enough to open the door?”

“Oh yeah,” said Happy, scowling at the dark tunnel opening. “All I had to do was pry at the edges, and the train did the rest. The train and what’s coming with it. Still not too late to gather up our skirts and run, you know.”

“We don’t run,” said JC. “We are the Ghost Finders, and we don’t take any shit from the Hereafter.”

“What’s this we stuff, white man?” said Happy.

“It’s close!” said Melody, staring raptly at her sensor readings. “And I mean, really close. My instruments are going crazy! In fact, one of them melted…I’m getting really weird energy spikes, other-dimensional radiations…Time and gravity and…and temperature readings that don’t make any sense in our world…Holy crap!”

She backed rapidly away from her bank of instruments as, one by one, they burst into blue-white flames, then exploded, unable to cope with what they were experiencing. Melody tried to get back, to shut everything down, but the sheer heat drove her away again. She reluctantly abandoned her precious toys and hurried down the platform to join the others. The railway lines down in the valley between the platforms were jumping and juddering, ripping free of the thick weeds that had grown around and over them. The platform vibrated fiercely under the Ghost Finders’ feet. Signs hanging on steel chains swung heavily back and forth. And all the doors in all the buildings slammed open and shut, again and again. Laurie was forced out onto the platform, looking at the tunnel-mouth with wide eyes.

Until, finally, a great light appeared in the tunnel, blasting out of the tunnel-mouth, red as all the fires of Hell; and out of that unnatural light the steam train appeared at last, thundering out of the old tunnel-mouth. It was huge and dark, with gleaming steel and brass, smoke pumping out of its chimney and its whistle screaming like a soul newly damned to the Pit. Strange-coloured sparks rose where its steel wheels met the rusting rails; and then all the wheels screamed and squealed as the brakes slammed on, and the train and its carriages bucked to a shuddering halt, all along the platform of Bradleigh Halt.

Come home, at last.

JC and Happy and Melody stood close together, looking over the steam engine and its seven carriages as they settled to a halt. There was a loud ticking of cooling metal, and great gusts of steam rose on the still, evening air. A thick viscous liquid dripped steadily from every outer surface, bubbling and boiling in reaction to Earth air and Earth conditions. Some alien substance, covering all the train, brought back from the Away place, as though the train had been born again in some strange, alien amniotic fluid. The stuff fell slowly and reluctantly away from the train, dissipating, giving up the ghost, unable to hold itself together in this new kind of world. The whole train smelled like rotting meat, like something that should have been buried long ago.

The steam still issuing in sudden spurts from the cooling engine smelled bad, too; smelled wrong, unearthly, changed. The few sparks still jumping around the great steel wheels were odd and unnatural colours. The weeds that had choked the railway lines for so long, those that hadn’t been chewed up and thrown aside by the train’s return, now curled up and withered from contact with the great steel wheels.

JC beckoned urgently to Laurie, and the old man hurried over to join him. He stared at the old steam-engine with fond, almost worshipful eyes.

“She’s everything my old grand-dad said she was,” said Laurie. “He saw her go into that tunnel, you know, back in the day. He always said she’d find her way home again, eventually.”

“Are all the carriages there?” asked JC. “Is anything missing? Is everything there that should be?”

“Oh yes,” said Laurie. “But look at the state of the engine! All that…stuff, dripping off her! It’s a disgrace…What have they done to you, girl? You were a classic!”

JC looked at Melody. “Any idea where the Ghost Caller might be?”

“All of my instruments are shot, fried, and dead in the water; but if I had to guess, I’d say probably the baggage-car.”

“Look at her,” said Laurie, softly and reverently. “Been away so long everything about her has changed. All the metals and alloys are different now…the wood of the carriages is rotting, corrupt. And what’s inside…makes my skin crawl. There’s more to this train than there should be. As though the whole thing’s alive…How can it be alive?”

“How can you tell all this?” said Happy, staring at him. “I’m a telepath, and I’m not getting half of that!”

“I can feel it,” said Laurie. “Can’t you?”

Happy scowled at the train and said nothing.

“If it is alive, it’s not any kind of life we could hope to understand,” JC said briskly. “Or would want to, probably. Question is—what forms of life might the train have brought back with it?”

“Really not liking the implications of that,” said Happy. He frowned suddenly, his whole face screwing up. “And I’m picking up something really nasty, now. Not a Light or a Voice this time, a feeling…like sticking your hand into a mess of corruption. It’s the carriages, JC! Look at the carriages…Dear God, what’s happened to the passengers?”

They all moved slowly down the platform, peering through the distorted glass of the carriage windows they passed. A strange light blazed through the windows, like the blue-green phosphorescence of underwater grottos. People clustered together inside the carriages, staring out at the world they’d come back to; but they didn’t act like people any more. Their eyes were empty, faces twisted with wild, inhuman emotions. Driven mad, every one of them, or perhaps beyond madness into something else, through being trapped for so many years in a place never meant for humankind. They beat and pattered against the closed windows with flat hands as though they’d forgotten what windows were, or what hands were for. They were all desperate to get out, crawling and swarming over each other like oversized beetles, staring out at a world they no longer recognised, with blank, insect eyes.

“What happened to them?” said Laurie. “What made these people…like this?”

“The Ghost Caller,” said JC. His voice was flat and harsh, with rigidly suppressed rage. “It’s been active, Calling, all the time it was Away. The passengers in the carriages were all killed, either by the abrupt transition to the Other Place or because they couldn’t survive in the alien conditions they found there. But the Ghost Caller wouldn’t let their spirits depart. Their souls have been trapped in their dead bodies all this time, driven insane by horrors the human mind was never meant to cope with. These are dead bodies possessed by mad ghosts.”

“How can you know all that?” said Laurie.

“I seem to feel it,” said JC, a bit dreamily. “Don’t you?”

“We can’t leave them like this,” said Laurie. “It isn’t right.”

“Of course we won’t leave them like this,” said JC, immediately all business again. “Helping the restless dead find peace is all part of our job description. But the only way to free these poor souls is to smash or destroy the Ghost Caller. Then they can pass on to their proper places, in the Hereafter.”

“Hereafter?” said Laurie. “You mean, Heaven and Hell?”

“Don’t look at me,” said Happy. “Way above my pay grade. We have enough trouble coping with the Here and Now.”

“I’m an agnostic,” said Melody. “Mostly in self-defence.”

“What matters is sending these lost souls on,” JC said firmly. “So they can be made whole and sane again.”

“I’m more concerned with what happens if the passengers get out of these carriages,” said Happy. “Those windows don’t look particularly strong, or secure.”

“If they get out?” said JC. “Nothing good, I should imagine. They have enough sense left to know a great wrong has been done them and enough anger to want revenge…”

“You know,” said Melody, “this would be a really good time for you to produce one of those really powerful and utterly forbidden weapons that you carry about your person, the ones that you’re not supposed to have.”

“The Boss made me give them all up, after the last case,” said JC. “In fact, she was most insistent about it. Had me strip-searched, and everything. And you really don’t want to know what the ‘and everything’ involved.”

“She took all your weapons?” said Happy. “And you’re only telling us now?”

“She’s been keeping a very close eye on me,” said JC. “I’ve had to be very careful. I need the Carnacki Institute’s resources to help me search for Kim.”

“Look, do you have any nasty weapons about you or not?” said Melody.

“Not as such,” said JC.

“I want to go home,” said Happy loudly.

“Excuse me,” Laurie said firmly. “But I have to ask…is this a real train or a ghost train? I mean, is it really, physically, here?”

“Good question, Mr. Laurie,” said JC. “To which the official answer is, damned if I know. It certainly seems solid enough…Best to treat it as though it’s real, right up to the point where we decide it’s more useful to treat it as though it isn’t. We are nothing if not flexible in this business, in the face of utter horror.”

“We have to find the machine,” Melody said stubbornly. “The Ghost Caller. We have to shut it down.”

“Dear Melody, practical as ever!” JC said cheerfully. “I love it when a plan comes together, and all the options narrow to a point where decisions become inevitable. And, given that the light blazing out of the rear carriage is so much stranger and soul-numbingly disturbing than all the others, I think we can safely assume that that…is the machine, in the baggage-car. Mr. Laurie, please stay right where you are, so we don’t have to worry about you. Team Ghost Finders, follow me.”

“I’m quite happy to stay with Mr. Laurie,” said Happy.

“What?” said JC. “And miss all the fun?”

“Fun is overrated.”

“You stand a much better chance of surviving if you stick with me,” said JC.

“Right with you, boss,” said Happy, miserably.

“Go, team!” said Melody.

The three of them stuck close together as they moved slowly and cautiously down the platform, maintaining what they hoped was a safe distance from the carriages. Strange phosphorescent lights rose and fell behind the windows as though disturbed by unknown tides. The possessed dead passengers pressed up close against the bulging glass of the windows, crawling over and around each other like so many insane insects. The Ghost Finders did their best not to look at them. Some horrors are harder to bear than others. It wasn’t the passengers’ fault, what had happened to them, what had been done to them; but that didn’t make it any easier to look at. A mad soul is so much harder to consider than a mad mind. Because where sanity runs out, the Outside moves in.

It made sense to have stuck the Ghost Caller in the baggage-car, at the end of the train, as far-away from the passengers as possible; but in the end it hadn’t made any difference. JC insisted that they all walk the length of the train at a steady pace because it would have been only too easy to lose control and break into a run; and they couldn’t afford to lose control here, in these conditions, not even in the smallest of ways. The light blasting out of the baggage-car’s single grilled window was blindingly bright, incandescent almost beyond bearing, so harsh that even JC had to screw up his altered eyes to deal with it. The station gloom seemed to shrink away from the light as though it was afraid or intimidated. JC found the door to the baggage-car and tried it. Locked, of course, with an immense steel padlock. JC tore the heavy door right off its hinges and threw it aside. He pulled himself up into the new opening and entered the rear carriage. Melody and Happy looked at the thrown-aside door, lying on the platform, looked at each other, then followed JC into the baggage car.

The light was easier to bear once they got inside, as their eyes adjusted to the new conditions. It only took them a moment to recognise the Ghost Caller. It wasn’t a machine, after all. It was a human corpse, sitting upright in a stiff-backed chair, held firmly in place by a series of heavy leather straps and restraints. Even after so long Away, or perhaps because of it, the body was still perfectly intact. Not a trace of rot or decay, nor any smell of formaldehyde or any other preservative. The three Ghost Finders looked into the set grey face of the dead man and knew him immediately. It was Dr. Emil Todd. The head had been cut open, quite neatly, sawn across above the eyebrows.

JC, Melody, and Happy moved slowly forward, surrounding the corpse. There was nothing else in the carriage worth looking at. They all leaned in, to look inside the dead man’s head. There was a brain, but quite clearly it had come from someone else. It slumped to one side, not even close to fitting. A series of brass and copper wires had been threaded through the brain, to hold it in place in the oversized skull. Silver pins protruded from the pink-and-grey matter, set in strange patterns, like a grotesque pincushion. And on top of the truncated head, someone had carefully placed an ornate crown, made of silver, with a dozen human eyeballs set firmly in place at regular intervals, staring unblinkingly out at the world.

“Okay,” said Happy, breathlessly, “that is seriously creepy, and I have seen more than my fair share of creep.”

“It’s also a major disappointment,” said Melody. “I was looking forward to examining some glory of steampunk engineering, not this…messed-about abomination. What the hell is this?”

“That is my body, given in repentance for all the wrong I did,” said a new voice, behind them. They all looked around sharply, and there in the baggage-car with them was the ghost of Dr. Todd. Staring sadly at his own corpse. “This is what I gave up my life for and why I have spent my death here, trying to prevent its return. There were supposed to be protections set in place, to prevent the Ghost Caller from activating. They promised me there would be protections…A defensive circle around the chair, binding Wards and Signs carved into the wooden floor…But they lied.”

“They?” said JC, carefully.

“My partners in crime,” said Dr. Todd. His voice was clear, but distant, as though it had to travel some unknowable interval to reach them. “Let their worthless names be forgotten by history. I let them kill me, and make use of my body, to create this wonder…and repair my reputation. I never meant to cheat people. When I started out, I wanted to give comfort to the bereaved. But I was tempted—by the money, and the fame, and the women…and I fell. This was to be my recompense. A device to summon ghosts, real ghosts…To do what I could not.

“I sat down in that chair, and they tightened the straps around me. A terrible experience, to sit down, knowing you will never stand up again. Almost as bad as having the top of my head sawn off. They couldn’t give me opiates, you see; it would have interfered with the process. I can’t remember if I screamed. I probably did. I passed out long before they cut and levered my brain out of my skull, and I died. Imagine my surprise when I discovered I was still there, as a ghost. I watched as they removed my brain, according to my instructions and specifications, and replaced it with the stolen brain of Oliver Lando, a genuine medium, with quite amazing psychic powers. The man who’d replaced me in the public affection, with his very successful tour of the provinces.

“I could have chosen someone else, some other genuine medium; but he was so very powerful…and I regret to say I could be a very petty man, back when I was alive. He was the real thing, you see: no tricks, no showmanship, a genuine Voice for the dead. Everything I’d aspired to be. I like to think he would have approved of what we made from his stolen brain. After I had him murdered.”

“What’s that thing on his head?” said Melody.

“That, dear lady, is the Crown of Tears,” said Dr. Todd. “My associates brought the design to me, the one thing I needed to be sure my Ghost Caller would work. Twelve human eyes, removed from the heads of six genuine psychics. I insisted we take only their eyes, not their lives. I saw no need to be cruel. Twelve psychic eyes, in the proper setting, to amplify the power of Lando’s brain, boosted by what was done to my body. Part engineering, part magic, part…

“I had help. That’s all you need to know.”

“Your Ghost Caller is still operating,” said Happy. “I can hear its false Voice, see its rotten Light. It’s still summoning ghosts, right now. And they will come like moths to a consuming flame. You can’t let this go on. Your…device must be shut down.”

“I don’t know how,” said Dr. Todd. “I never did. Operation of the marvellous device was to be left to my associates as they toured the country, in all the biggest theatres. Bringing back the dearly departed, to give comfort to those they’d left behind.”

“You thought the authorities would allow a corpse to be exhibited, and call up ghosts?” said Melody. “No wonder Julien Advent shut you down.”

The ghost smiled thinly. “Is that what it says in the history books? No. My associates heard he was coming and made haste to load the device onto this train. To get away and hide, and make plans for the future. They didn’t know I was still there, watching. I’d seen how powerful my device was and how much damage it could, would, cause. So I used the last of my power over the Ghost Caller to send the train Away. And I have stood guard in this place ever since, preventing its return. Until now.”

“Maybe we should tear this…thing apart,” said Happy. “You said there aren’t any protections.”

“It can’t be broken,” said Dr. Todd. “I had it made too well. It will…defend itself. And I can’t help you. I’ve been dead too long, worn too thin…That isn’t my body any more. Not a body at all, really. An infernal machine; and no human hand can undo what I have wrought. God damn me.”

“Lucky I’m here, then,” JC said cheerfully. “Because I’m not merely human and haven’t been for some time now.”

He reached inside the dead man’s head, thrust his fingers deep into the soft grey tissues, and ripped the brain right out of the skull, along with all its brass and copper and silver attachments. He threw the brain on the floor and stamped on it hard. Pink-and-grey matter exploded under his foot. Melody and Happy retreated quickly, making loud sounds of distress and disgust at what had splattered over their shoes. The ghost of Dr. Todd looked on blankly as JC tore the Crown of Tears from the dead head and broke the silver frame in his strong hands. He turned it inside out, so that the human eyes were all staring at each other, then carefully replaced the Crown on the empty head. JC stepped back and smiled about him easily.

“Time to leave, I think. Our work here is at an end.”

Out on the platform again, the three Ghost Finders looked hopefully around them. Evening had descended into night. Moonlight dappled the length of the platform. Eerie phosphorescent glows still spilled out of the carriage windows, interrupted here and there by the shadows of human shapes moving in inhuman ways.

“Nothing’s changed,” said Happy, nervously.

“It will,” JC said confidently. “Ripping out the stolen brain and reversing the Crown? Bound to do the job. Symbolic logic, very big in magic circles.” He turned to the ghost of Dr. Todd, trudging silently along beside them. “The rest is up to you, Doctor. If you really want to put a stop to all the horrors you’re responsible for.”

“You know I do,” said Dr. Todd. “I gave my life to creating them, so it is only proper I give my death to ending them. What do you want me to do?”

“I need you to re-enter your old body for a while and make it yours again,” said JC, as kindly as he could. “You can do that now Lando’s brain is gone, and the Crown of Tears has been turned around. Repossess your old body, and you’ll be able to bring the Ghost Caller, or what’s left of it, under your control.”

“Yes,” said Dr. Todd. “A fitting punishment for a foolish old man. Wait here, please. There are some things…that should be done in private.”

He disappeared abruptly, and all three Ghost Finders jumped. They’d got too used to the ghost of Dr. Todd still doing things in human ways. And then they all looked back, as the light blasting out of the baggage-car’s single grilled window shut off abruptly. There was a pause, then the body of Dr. Todd stepped slowly and stiffly out of the rear carriage and down onto the platform. The body walked slowly along the platform towards them as though every step, every movement, was a conscious effort. Dr. Todd lurched to a halt before the Ghost Finders and worked his dead mouth for a long moment before words finally emerged, dry and dusty and determined.

“Of course,” he said. “It’s all so clear to me now, what I must do.”

“Then maybe you’d explain it to me,” said Happy, testily. “Because I haven’t got a clue what’s going on!”

The dead lips smiled, briefly. “Time…to go home. The end of every life, and every death. We all get to go home.”

He strode off down the platform, lurching this way and that, and all the passengers’ heads in all the windows turned to watch him pass. Cracks had appeared in some of the windows; but the passengers seemed to have lost interest in that. Happy leaned in close beside JC.

“He’s doing something. I can feel it. He’s not the Ghost Caller any more; but he’s still…reaching out, to Something. I think…it’s another weak spot in reality, another door or potential door, but at the other end of the tracks! Talk to me, JC; tell me what’s happening here, or I am leaving!”

“Where’s your curiosity?” said JC.

“I had it surgically removed!” said Happy. “It kept getting me into trouble!”

“It’s true,” Melody said solemnly. “I held his hand while they did it. We keep it in a jar on the mantelpiece now.”

“Watch, my children,” said JC. “And learn…”

The dead body of Dr. Todd climbed into the engine cab and started it up again. Steam blew thickly from the chimney-stack, curled up from the great steel wheels, and howled through the whistle. The passengers in the carriages were all utterly still, waiting for something they couldn’t quite bring themselves to believe in. JC stepped forward, took off his sunglasses, and stared down the platform.

“It’s not a weak spot,” he said, “And it’s not a door. It’s a tunnel. I can see the tunnel; and it’s full of light.”

Suddenly, there was a tunnel. An exact duplicate of the old brick-lined tunnel-mouth the train had arrived through, but standing at the opposite end of the railway tracks. Full of a warm and inviting light instead of darkness. The train lurched forward, gathering speed, leaving JC and Melody and Happy behind on the platform. The engine roared into the tunnel, steam-whistle blowing triumphantly, and, one by one, the carriages roared into the light after it. The tunnel entrance disappeared after the train; and all the tension in the night was gone. The air was as clear and calm as a summer night after the storm has passed, and all the shadows were only shadows again.

“Mission accomplished,” said JC, replacing his sunglasses with a flourish. “I wish all our cases were this simple.”

“You speak for yourself,” said Happy. “Hey, where did old man Laurie go?”

They all looked around, and called out after him; but there was no sign of the old man anywhere, and no reply. Melody shrugged.

“Everyone has their limits. Pity he didn’t stick around; he could have told the Preservation volunteers it was safe to return. Now, somebody find me a brush and some sacks, so I can clear up what’s left of my poor machines and take them home with me.”

“Don’t pout, sweetie,” said Happy. “You know the Institute will give you some new toys once we get back.”

“It’s not the same,” said Melody, pouting.

“The important thing,” said JC, “is that my Kim appeared to me, in my hour of need. Which has to mean…that she isn’t being held against her will, any more.”

“We can’t know that for sure, JC,” Happy said carefully.

“I know,” said JC. “But there is hope now.”

“We can’t be sure it was really her, JC,” Melody said carefully.

“Right,” said Happy. “I mean, if that was Kim, why did she disappear again? Why didn’t she stay?”

“Maybe she couldn’t,” said Melody.

“It was her,” said JC. “I’d know my Kim anywhere. Why didn’t she stay? Who knows why the dead do what the dead do?”

“Hey!” said a new voice. “Are you the experts from London?”

They all looked around to see a middle-aged man in workman’s overalls and sensible shoes hurrying down the platform towards them. He held an old-fashioned storm lantern out before him and smiled at the Ghost Finders in an agreeable enough way.

“Sorry I’m late; I got held up. Hope you haven’t been here on your own too long. It’s not a comfortable place here, once it gets dark.”

“Who are you?” said JC.

“I’m Howard Laurie, representing the Bradleigh Preservation Trust. Seen any ghosts yet, have you?”

“I think you’ll find the station peaceful enough now,” said JC. “You’re Ronald Laurie’s son? He’s very kindly looked after us, in your absence.”

Howard looked at all three of them in turn. “You’ve seen my dad?”

“He’s been very helpful,” said JC.

“Then you’ve seen one ghost at least. My old dad’s been dead these past ten years.”