Ghost of a Dream

FOUR STAGE BUSINESS

When an audience comes to the theatre, all they usually see is the lobby and the stage. They may notice, in passing, the Ticket Office…posters on the walls, maybe some concession stands, but that’s it. But what an audience sees is only ever the tip of the iceberg; most of the work and most of the world of the theatre is the nine-tenths of the iceberg that remains hidden from view. For the same reason that most patrons never get to see the kitchens of the restaurants they visit. Because if you could see what went on behind the scenes, what really goes into everything, all the illusion and glamour would be stripped away in a moment. Acting is like athletics—a lot of effort goes into making it all seem effortless.

So getting from the lobby to the stage isn’t always a straightforward affair. Old Tom led them all through a warren of narrow backstage corridors, so they could see everything there was to see, cheerfully pointing out all the various points of interest. Everything from dressing-rooms to costumes to props…Everyone was very polite, of course, while silently wishing he’d get a move on. JC did his best to keep an eye out for signs and landmarks, so he could be sure of finding his way around on his own if the need arose. But most of the signs had been taken down long ago, and all the doors and all the corridors looked eerily alike. JC quickly lost all track of where he was, or even in which direction the lobby lay. He looked across at Benjamin and immediately realised that the actor looked as lost as he did. JC fell in beside him.

“Something wrong?” he said quietly.

“I’m not sure,” said Benjamin, frowning. “It’s just…I don’t remember its taking this long to get to the stage, back in my day. And I’m almost sure the layout was never this complicated. It almost feels like we’re going round and round in circles.”

Elizabeth nodded vigorously. “I do have to wonder, darling, whether Old Tom is so far gone that he doesn’t actually remember where he’s going and is too proud to admit it. Or even…if he isn’t really the caretaker he claims to be and some journalist trying to bluff his way through. Or could he be deliberately trying to disorientate us? I don’t know what’s going on here, Benjamin, but I don’t like it. Something doesn’t feel right.”

JC left Benjamin and Elizabeth muttering uneasily together and fell back to walk with Happy and Melody. Happy was scowling even more fiercely than usual.

“Something is definitely not kosher with these corridors, JC. The amount of time we’ve spent walking, we should be through the back of the theatre and half-way down the street. It feels to me…as though there’s more space here than there should be. As though the local geometry isn’t as properly nailed down at the corners as it should be.”

“I wouldn’t argue with that,” murmured JC. “This whole theatre feels wrong to me.”

“Maybe we should start leaving a trail of bread-crumbs,” suggested Melody.

As she was saying that, Old Tom took a sharp right turn, led them up some steps, and out onto the main stage. All the lights were on, bathing the entire massive stage in a fierce illumination. Everyone stood together, blinking through the harsh glare at the gloom of the massive auditorium, laid out before them. It was like standing on an island of light, peering out at a sea of darkness.

“Who the hell left all these lights on?” said Elizabeth. “The workmen assured me that everything had been turned off when they left! I really don’t need the theatre’s owners adding their energy bills to our running costs.”

“There weren’t any lights on in the lobby,” observed JC.

“So why are they on here?” said Benjamin.

He strode forward across the stage, Elizabeth sticking close beside him. Lissa wandered after them, smiling happily about her as though she was finally where she belonged. Old Tom stayed by the wings, at the far side of the stage, as though he knew his place and wasn’t prepared to venture beyond it. JC moved cautiously forward. To his surprise, he found he didn’t like being on stage. It felt too open, too exposed, too vulnerable. He glared out into the shadowy auditorium, and the rows upon rows of empty seats stared silently back at him. JC knew what the workmen meant, now, when they talked of being watched by unseen, unfriendly eyes. He slipped his heavy sunglasses down his nose, so he could peer over the top of them, but even his augmented eyes couldn’t make out anything useful. He pushed the glasses back up his nose again. He didn’t want his glowing eyes to freak out the civilians; and he was getting really fed up with having to come up with clever answers to distract them.

Happy and Melody stuck close together, braced and ready for an attack that never came.

“Must bring back memories, eh?” Old Tom said cheerfully to Benjamin and Elizabeth. “All the plays you appeared in, all the characters you played; must feel like coming home. I suppose.”

Benjamin and Elizabeth walked to the very front of the stage, as though drawn there. They stood arm in arm, looking out into the Past, smiling reflectively.

“This was our kingdom, once upon a time,” said Benjamin. “Where we were Kings and Queens, angry young men and femmes fatales…We played Shakespeare and Marlowe, Becket and Brecht, Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw, bless his declamatory speeches…Hell, we did it all, didn’t we girl, one time or another. For everything from standing ovations to sullen silences. Because you can’t please all the people all of the time, the ungrateful bastards…”

“I sometimes think we had more fun backstage,” said Elizabeth. “Applause is what it’s all about, of course; but there’s more to theatre than the smell of the crowds and the roar of the grease-paint. For happy times and camaraderie, give me a theatre bar any day. Do you remember the one time we did the Scottish play.”

“Ah, the Caledonian Tragedy,” said Benjamin.

“Do you by any chance mean Macbeth?” JC said innocently.

Everyone except the Ghost Finders winced.

“Please,” said Benjamin, with all the dignity he could muster. “Don’t do that. It’s unlucky.”

“And I really don’t think we’re in any position to push our luck at the moment,” said Elizabeth.

“Anyway,” said Benjamin, “you remember young Dicky Moran, dear; playing Seyton, MacB’s second in command? He was lumbered with one of the most familiar lines from Shakespeare: The Queen, my lord, is dead. Well, what can you do with that that hasn’t been done a hundred times before? Particularly if you’re young and ambitious and keen to be noticed, like Dicky? We got all the way to the technical rehearsal, before Dicky came up with his Big Idea and presented it proudly to the director. He wanted to walk on stage with the Queen lying limp in his arms, present her to the King, then say the line! Would have been very effective. You were up for it, weren’t you, darling?”

“It would certainly have made a big impression,” said Elizabeth, which JC couldn’t help noticing wasn’t exactly the same as agreeing, “But the director wouldn’t wear it. Complete sense-of-humour failure…Which is probably why Dicky did what he did the next evening, at the dress rehearsal…You remember, darling; it was right at the end, with half the cast on stage celebrating MacB’s death, and the rest of us watching from the stalls. Hoping it would all end soon, so we could get a drink in. Someone has to bring on a fake severed head and say it’s MacB’s, then the big names go into soliloquy mode. Well, Dicky noticed that the actor holding the head was surreptitiously turning it back and forth so that it seemed to be looking at whoever was speaking. Well, once Dicky saw that, he couldn’t help himself. He started going Gottle of Gear from the front row, and other ventriloquist classics, like Get back in the box! I don’t want to get back in the box! And, of course, the moment he pointed it out, everyone else could see it, too! We rocked with laughter, all of us! We fell about, we leaned on each other, we laughed till we cried. Completely ruined the atmosphere…”

“The director blew his top,” said Benjamin, nodding happily. “Wanted to fire young Dicky, right there on the spot. But I put my foot down.”

“Indeed you did, darling,” said Elizabeth, “and quite right, too. Though the first night we had to go on without a severed head because no-one could look at it with a straight face any more. And might I point out, darling, you could be just as bad yourself. I’ve never been able to forget what happened with Cider with Rosie…”

“Oh God, yes,” said Benjamin, grinning broadly and not looking in any way ashamed of himself. “It was the technical again, when evenings grow long, and nerves grow short. We’d been running the play for hours, and we were all exhausted. We wanted to go home, or to bed, or both. Anyway, we’d finally made it to the last scene, where young Laurie Lee is in the hay-cart with young Rosie, and she’s about to give him a glass of cider and show him what life is all about…Except, neither of the two youngsters could get their lines right! They kept stopping, or jumping, or getting it wrong, over and over and over…The rest of the cast were all out there in the auditorium, watching from the shadows, getting more and more impatient. Until finally a voice was heard, rising out of the dark, saying For God’s sake, Rosie, will you please wank him off, then we can all go home!”

There was general laughter, while Elizabeth shook her head in mock condemnation. Benjamin smiled innocently.

“Might have been me. Might not. Who can say?”

Lissa wasn’t laughing. She had her arms folded tightly across her chest and was trying very hard to look as though such unprofessional behaviour was entirely beneath her. Elizabeth smiled at her frostily.

“You haven’t done much stage-work, have you, dear? You mustn’t worry—it’s the little moments of madness that keep us all sane. And after our play, you’ll be able to command every stage you walk onto. You really must try some Shakespeare; nothing like the Bard to stretch the acting muscles.”

“I have always fancied putting myself up for Lady MacB,” said Lissa. “But if I do, I’ll stick to the words. I really don’t have any time for sparking up the material with special bits of business, like certain actresses who’ve played her nude, or peed on stage during the sleep-walking scene.”

“Yes,” said Benjamin. “I remember that. I do recall being a bit nervous about which way the stage was sloping…”

“It’s all about the performance,” Lissa said firmly. “Shakespeare doesn’t need improving.”

“It’s all about getting noticed,” Benjamin said wisely. “But, then, you’ve probably never had any problems with that, have you?”

They all stopped and looked around sharply. Suddenly, without any warning, there was the sound of loud footsteps approaching from off stage. No build-up, no quiet sounds growing louder; only very heavy footsteps in the far wings, heading towards the stage. Everyone turned to look. The footsteps grew even louder, and heavier, as they drew nearer, slamming down with more-than-human weight and an inhuman sense of purpose. The stage itself seemed to shake and shudder with every step as though in anticipation. As though it was frightened. The footsteps reached the edge of the stage, left the wings, and continued on; but there was no-one there. Nothing to see, nothing at all. Only the sound—one loud crashing step after another, heavy enough to break the world, loud enough to raise the dead, crossing the stage with horrid determination, heading straight for the living.

Benjamin and Elizabeth clung to each other tightly, stupefied by what was happening, unable to move. Lissa fell back to stand behind Old Tom, who didn’t seem to know what to do. He stood there, staring blankly at the approaching footsteps. As though it were all happening to someone else. JC moved forward to face the sounds and place himself between the advancing footsteps and the civilians. Melody started after him, realised Happy wasn’t moving, grabbed him by the arm, and hauled him along with her. The three of them stood shoulder to shoulder, facing the approaching sounds.

“Talk to me, Happy!” said JC. “What is this?”

“I don’t know!” said Happy. “I’m not seeing anything! Anything at all!”

JC whipped off his sunglasses and turned the full force of his glowing eyes on whatever was before him; but the footsteps kept coming, and he couldn’t see a damned thing. He held his ground, and the footsteps walked right up to him and stopped. Silence fell across the stage, the quiet broken only by the strained harsh breathing of the living as they waited for something to happen. But no-one appeared, and there weren’t any more footsteps. JC carefully extended one arm and waggled his hand back and forth before him; but there was nothing there.

JC put his sunglasses back on and frowned thoughtfully. “Okay,” he said finally. “That…was a bit odd.”

“Really?” said Happy, mopping at his damp face with a grubby handkerchief. “You think?”

“I was expecting whatever was making the footsteps to turn around and walk away,” said JC. “But they didn’t. The sounds just stopped. As though they’d served their purpose, accomplished everything they were supposed to…”

He turned around and looked back at the civilians. Benjamin and Elizabeth had let go of each other and were looking around a bit self-consciously. Old Tom was standing very still at the wings, as though he didn’t know where to look or what to do. Lissa emerged from behind him, looking pale and strained and quite decidedly spooked.

“I didn’t like that at all!” she said loudly. “I thought ghosts would be…thrilling. Exciting! But that was nasty. Horrid.”

Elizabeth moved over quickly to put an arm across Lissa’s shoulders and comfort her. “It’s all right, dear. We understand.”

“Do you want us to call you a taxi?” said Benjamin. “You could always go back to your hotel and wait there, till this is all over. We have to be here; but you shouldn’t have to put up with this.”

Lissa’s chin came up. She straightened her back and shrugged off Elizabeth’s arm, almost rudely. “No. I’m not going. Nothing’s scaring me off.”

Benjamin gave her his professional smile. “Brave girl.”

Happy moved in close beside JC. “Look at the stage,” he said quietly. “There’s a layer of dust. See? If you look behind us, you can see all our footsteps, crossing the stage from the wings to here. But there are no footsteps in the dust before us, not a mark anywhere between us and the far wings. Which leads me to believe that there never was anything here. No physical presence, at all. Just the sound of footsteps…”

“Could be an echo out of Time,” said Melody. “Sounds from the Past. Stone tape memory, past events impressed on the surroundings, playing back in the Present.”

“Why are we still calling it a stone tape?” Happy said suddenly. “Shouldn’t we be calling it a stone CD, these days? Or even a stone download…”

“Concentrate, Happy,” murmured JC. “That was no echo. Those sounds had a deliberate aim in mind. A purpose…”

“How very theatrical,” said Melody; and then they all looked at each other for a long moment.

JC looked across the stage at Benjamin and Elizabeth. “Is this the kind of…event you were expecting?”

“Well, sort of,” said Benjamin. “You have to understand; we never experienced anything first-hand.”

“And I have to say,” said Elizabeth, slowly, “that the whole thing seemed to me more menacing than scary. Almost…a threat. We should never have come back here, Benjamin.”

“We had to,” said Benjamin. “We owed it to the play.”

And then they all froze in place again as they heard something moving about, under the stage. They all looked down, listening hard, concentrating. Some distance underneath the stage, somebody was walking back and forth, loudly whistling a merry tune. JC stamped hard on the stage; but the whistling didn’t stop, or even interrupt itself for a moment. JC looked sharply at the actors and Old Tom.

“Is there supposed to be anyone else in the building?”

“No, sir,” said Old Tom. “No-one. I’d have been told.”

“No-one whistles in the theatre!” Elizabeth said sharply. “It’s bad luck!”

“Anyone recognise the tune?” said Happy. There was a general shaking of heads.

JC looked at Old Tom. “What’s down there, under this stage? Is there any way to reach it?”

“Of course, sir,” said Old Tom. “That’s the understage area, easy to get to. There’s a way to everywhere, and I know them all. Follow me, ladies and gents!”

The way down turned out to be an old iron stairway that spiralled around as it descended into the gloom of the understage area. The stairway didn’t feel properly attached or supported, worn loose through many years of hard use; and it swayed dangerously and made loud, complaining noises as Old Tom led the way down, one careful step at a time. Though whether his pace was due to the infirmities of old age or sensible caution, JC couldn’t tell. He stuck right behind Old Tom, peering down into the gloomy depths in search of the phantom whistler. Happy came next though he didn’t want to. Melody had to drive him down ahead of her, with fierce encouragement and appalling language that the actors pretended not to hear as they brought up the rear.

The whistled tune cut off abruptly the moment Old Tom and JC emerged from the bottom of the stairway. The understage area was completely empty. Nothing to see, nothing to hear, not even the faintest echo. The light from a single hanging naked light bulb spread a grubby yellow glare across a wide-open space much bigger than the stage above. Everyone relaxed. With no phantom whistler, no footsteps, and nothing in any way unnatural, the open area seemed safe enough. Benjamin made a point of smiling easily around him.

“Well, this place brings back memories! Remember when we were playing the leads in the Restoration comedy, She Stoops to Conquer?”

“Oh God, it’s another anecdote,” muttered Happy. “I think I’d rather have a ghost…”

“Of course I remember!” said Elizabeth, seizing the moment to lighten the mood. “We had a real pit band, you see, in the open area before the stage, to play real Georgian music; but at the end of the play, they had to leave the pit and come up onto the stage to accompany the final banquet scene. At the end of which, I would walk forward, the curtains would close behind me, and I would deliver the long closing speech straight to the audience. This was to give the other actors time to race off stage and change into their final costumes for the final walkdown. But it also meant the pit-band had to hurry down here, via that awful old stairway, charge across the understage area, and re-emerge in the pit in time to play music for the walkdown. Well, to begin with, all went well. But by the end of the run, I was belting through the lines so we could all get off stage and get to the bar that much earlier; which meant the poor pit band had to run like fun to get to the pit in time. Many the night I heard muffled curses drifting up from down here, yelling to me to slow down…”

Everyone managed some kind of smile if not actually a laugh.

“Scratch an old actor, find an anecdote,” said Lissa, and Elizabeth glared at her.

“Did anything ever…happen down here?” said JC. “Anything significant?”

Benjamin and Elizabeth looked at each other. “No,” said Elizabeth.

“Nothing,” said Benjamin.

And then they both looked at JC, as though defying him to contradict them. Which, thought JC, was interesting…

A great roar of angry sound blasted through the whole understage area, filling the place from end to end. Huge, deafening, overpowering; a fierce and vicious sound, like the outrage of an angry god. As though something had given rage and fury a voice and let it loose. Everyone put their hands to their ears and squeezed their eyes shut, whether they wanted to or not. It was an instinctive, protective thing; and it didn’t help at all. The roar went on and on, beating at them like some living creature but continuing on long past the point where any living thing could have sustained it. The sheer anger and malice in the terrible sound was almost palpable.

Benjamin held Elizabeth tightly in his arms, cradling her head to his chest. “Leave her alone!” he shouted into the face of the roar. “Leave her alone, you bastard!”

JC yelled at everyone, straining to be heard above the appalling sound. “Stick together! Don’t let it separate us!”

He forced his eyes open, a bit at a time, but even with his augmented vision he still couldn’t see anyone, or anything. There was only the sound and the rage within it.

And then it stopped. No falling away, no quietening down; it simply broke off abruptly, without even leaving an echo behind it. For a long moment, everyone stood where they were, opening their eyes and lowering their hands from their heads, all of them suddenly limp with relief. The end of the sound was like the ending of a physical assault. It had beaten and battered them like some unseen bully; and now it felt good, so good, that it was over. One by one, they all started to relax and look around them. Benjamin and Elizabeth let go of each other and stepped back to look each other over, make sure everything was all right. So did Happy and Melody.

They were all of them shaken, amateur and professional alike, by the sheer fury in the sound. And, it seemed to JC, a very human fury. He strode back and forth across the wide-open area, glaring into shadowy nooks and crannies, finding nothing. He didn’t like being caught by surprise. He looked back at the others, and was surprised to see Lissa standing on her own, calm and quiet and apparently entirely unaffected by what she’d been through. She didn’t look scared, or shaken; she stared straight ahead of her, her face calm and quiet and completely empty. As though she couldn’t be bothered if there wasn’t an audience…JC stopped and considered her thoughtfully. Shock, perhaps? He started towards her, then Benjamin suddenly spoke up.

“Hold it; where’s Old Tom?”

Everyone stopped where they were and looked quickly about them; but there was no trace of the old caretaker anywhere. They all called his name; but there was no response. And even with the single light bulb and the many concealing shadows, there was nowhere in the understage area where he could have hidden himself.

“Where could he have gone?” said Elizabeth. “There’s no way he could have gone back up that creaky iron stairway without us noticing.”

“Is there any other exit?” said JC.

“Not that I know of,” said Benjamin, looking vaguely about him.

“Maybe something…reached out, and took him,” said Lissa.

Her voice was very small. Almost lost. For a moment everyone stood still, then Benjamin snorted loudly.

“Just because we don’t know of any other exit doesn’t mean there isn’t one! Come on, you all heard the man—There’s a way to everywhere, and I know all of them. I don’t believe he ever was a caretaker; he’s a journalist who’s done some research. That moustache never did look real to me.”

“He could be back up on the stage,” said Lissa. “Where it’s light…”

JC led the way back to the iron stairway.

Back on the open stage again, they all called repeatedly for Old Tom; but there was still no reply. The brightly lit stage was something of a relief, even a comfort, after the claustrophobic gloom of the understage area. It might not actually be any safer on the stage; but at least here they could all see nothing coming towards them.

“He’s got to be around here somewhere,” said Benjamin, with more hope than certainty. “He can’t have come to any harm. We’d have heard.”

“It’s just struck me!” said Elizabeth. “No-one’s been hurt, have they? I mean, yes, of course, it’s all been very scary…but it’s all threats and menaces. Nothing that could actually do us harm.”

“Then where’s Old Tom?” said Lissa. “What happened to him?”

The stage lights flared up suddenly, blazing into blue-white incandescence, then went out, all at once. Darkness fell across the stage, and everyone huddled together. Individual lights blazed up, here and there, sudden flares and flashes…and then the bulbs began to explode, one after another. Everyone on stage flinched away from flying slivers of glass, but none of it came close enough to hurt anyone. A heavy, ponderous gloom filled the stage, only held back by brief surges from individual lights. JC grabbed Happy by the shoulder, and he shrieked loudly. JC shook him hard till he stopped.

“What’s happening here, Happy? Talk to me! What’s behind all this?”

“I don’t know!” said Happy. “I’m not picking up anything! And since I sure as hell bloody well should be picking up something, someone or something must be deliberately blocking me. Which isn’t easily done…” Happy took a deep breath to calm himself, thinking it through. “It’s all tricks, JC! Shock and awe, smoke and mirrors, all of it designed to distract us, draw our attention away from what really matters. But don’t ask me what this is all about…I can’t sense a damned thing. It’s like being deaf and blind and wrapped in poisoned cotton wool, all at once.”

“You are seriously underperforming on this case, Happy,” said JC. He looked at Melody, who immediately shook her head.

“No use looking at me. You know I can’t tell a damned thing without my instruments. I should never have left them behind. You’re the leader! You do something!”

“There’s nothing to do,” said JC. “Happy’s right, for once. This is all ‘sound and fury, signifying nothing.’ Carefully orchestrated bits of theatrical business. Someone’s putting on a show.”

Suddenly, all the house lights came up. Steady, dependable light filled the whole of the vast auditorium and spilled out across the stage, pushing back the darkness. JC looked quickly back and forth across the rows of raked seating, but every seat in the house was empty. The normal, everyday electric light was peaceful and reassuring, and everyone began to relax again. JC looked at Benjamin and Elizabeth.

“Could someone be overseeing all this business with the lights from the lighting control room?”

“I don’t see how,” said Elizabeth. “It hasn’t been wired up properly yet. And even if Old Tom isn’t who he claimed to be, and he was only here to mess with us, he couldn’t have got all the way to the lighting booth in time.”

“Unless he isn’t working on his own,” said Lissa.

JC turned to Happy. “Are you sure you’re not getting anything?”

Happy looked past JC, swallowed hard, and said, “Uh, JC, I am quite definitely seeing something now.”

JC turned around quickly, to follow his gaze, and everyone else looked, too. A horribly emaciated figure, dressed only in rags and tatters and dark splashes of dried blood, was lying full length on the stage by the far wings, facedown, pulling itself laboriously forward by digging its broken fingers into the wood of the stage. The figure crawled slowly forward, in sudden, painful lurches, leaving a long, heavy trail of blood behind it. The head came up slowly, to reveal a ravaged face: a mask of blood with one dark, empty eye socket and a single eyeball hanging down onto the cheekbone from the other. The mouth was gone, the lips torn raggedly away, to reveal blood-stained teeth bared in an endless, horrid grin. The figure hauled itself along, every movement a slow, agonised effort, full of desperate determination. The sound of broken fingertips scratching and scraping across the wooden stage filled the horrified hush on the stage.

Benjamin and Elizabeth clung tightly together, all the colour fallen out of their faces. They didn’t want to look at the awful figure, but they couldn’t bring themselves to look away. JC snapped his fingers at them several times, to get their attention.

“Has either of you ever seen anything like this before?”

“Of course not!” said Benjamin.

“We would have said!” said Elizabeth. “What is that thing?”

Happy and Melody stood close together, studying the slowly crawling figure with professional interest. They might not like the look of it, but they’d seen a lot worse, in their time. JC looked across at Lissa. She was standing very still, staring, wide-eyed; but once again, not nearly as scared as JC would have expected. Most civilians, with no experience of ghosts and monsters, would have screamed or run or even fainted dead away. Lissa looked…as though she’d been expecting this. Or something like it. But that could wait. First things first. JC turned back to Happy.

“Is it real?” JC said urgently. “Is that thing really there? Physically present?”

“Not physically present, as such,” Happy said immediately. “And it’s definitely not what’s left of Old Tom, if that’s what you were about to ask. I’m finally getting something…but don’t ask me what. There’s a strong sense of presence, but…whether we’re looking at a ghost, or a manifestation, or a stone tape memory…is beyond me. I can’t see! There’s so much power here, JC…It’s swamping the aether and saturating all the psychic channels!”

“You made that bit up!” said Melody.

“There’s so much power, I can’t tell what’s what!” Happy said stubbornly. “It’s like staring into the sun, with different radios blasting into each ear…This whole building is soaked in some kind of overwhelming presence. A real genius loci…”

JC glared at Happy for a long moment, then turned away to give the crawling figure his full attention. It had dragged itself half-way across the stage, shaking and shuddering with effort, heading straight for them.

“All right, Happy,” said JC. “Go and talk to it.”

“What? You go and talk to it!” Happy said immediately. “Whatever that is, it doesn’t look like it’s got anything to say that I would want to hear.”

“For once, I am in complete agreement with Happy,” said Melody. “I may be a big brave Ghost Finder, but that thing is officially creeping the hell out of me.”

“Damn right,” said Happy. “You couldn’t drive me an inch closer to that thing with a whip and a chair and an electric cattle prod.”

“Stay here,” said JC.

“You got it, boss,” said Melody.

JC slowly walked forward and took up a position right in front of the crawling figure, blocking its way. It stopped, and slowly raised its bloody face to JC. The dangling eyeball rolled slowly back and forth across the crimson cheekbone. JC knelt before the figure, lowering his face so that it was on a level with the thing before him.

“Can I do anything to help?” he said. “Who are you? What do you need? Who did this to you?”

On the last question, the figure raised one hand and pointed a single finger past JC, at Benjamin and Elizabeth. Blood dripped thickly from the pointing, accusing finger. Everyone turned to look at Benjamin and Elizabeth; and when they looked back again, the crawling figure was gone. And so was the long, bloody trail it had left behind it. There wasn’t a single trace remaining to show that the awful thing had ever been there. Lissa giggled suddenly, and perhaps a bit hysterically.

“My agent is so going to hear about this…”

Elizabeth looked hard at her, and Lissa turned her back on Elizabeth. JC joined Benjamin and Elizabeth.

“Did that figure mean anything to you?” he said.

“No,” said Benjamin. “Nothing.”

“Then why did it point to you two?” Lissa said loudly, having moved some distance away. “Why did it point only at you? What do you know that you’re not telling the rest of us? You’re the ones who’ve got a history with this theatre! What did you do here, twenty years ago?”

“This is nothing to do with us!” Elizabeth said sharply. “Nothing!”

Happy moved in quietly beside JC. “The figure may be gone, but I’m still getting that strong sense of presence. Something’s still here with us.”

JC scowled about him, frustrated. “I hate it when there’s nothing solid to get a grip on, literally or metaphorically. But it does seem to me that a lot of what’s been happening here doesn’t mean anything. As though…we’re stuck in the middle of someone else’s game.”

“Unfinished business?” said Melody.

“Almost certainly,” said JC.

“Doesn’t this all strike you as more…dramatic than anything the renovators described?” said Melody.

“As though it was saving the best stuff for us,” said Happy.

“Or some of us,” said JC. “The question has to be, who is this aimed at, us, or the civilians?”

“I need my instruments,” said Melody.

“There must be something, something specific, in this building that’s powering this haunting,” said JC. “Something must have happened here, and in a sense is still happening, to make this theatre a bad place.” He looked steadily at Benjamin and Elizabeth. “Has there ever been a murder in this theatre? Or perhaps some major accident? A fire? Some sort of catastrophe?”

“No,” said Elizabeth, immediately.

“Nothing at all,” said Benjamin.

“Right!” said JC, clapping his hands together hard, then rubbing them briskly. “I have had enough of this. We need to split up and search this place thoroughly. See if we can find Old Tom, see if he’s behind any of this…And see if anyone else has got into the building. If not, we need to turn this place upside down and shake it to see what falls out. Search everywhere, people, for something that will make sense of all this. Presumably, we’ll know it when we see it. Come along, my children, we need clues, we need evidence. Happy, you go with Benjamin and Elizabeth. Look after them and try very hard to keep them alive.”

“Who, me?” said Happy.

“Lissa, you stick with me,” said JC. “Melody, I want you back in the lobby. Fire up your equipment and scan this whole building to within an inch of its life.”

“You do know,” said Lissa, “that in nearly every horror movie, when people split up and go off in different directions, it nearly always turns out to be a really bad idea?”

“Ah,” said JC. “But I and my associates are professional supernatural arse-kickers, and very experienced in these matters. We don’t take any shit from the Hereafter.”

“I want to go home,” said Happy.