Spirit by Graham Masterton Page A

no intention of telling her father aboutLaura’s story. She wasn’t a snitch by nature; and, besides, she would have found it far too embarrassing. But she did want to tell him that, somehow, she had met Peggy on Putnam Street on the way back from Lenny’s house – that she hadn’t exactly
looked
like Peggy, but she was almost certain that she was. After all, hadn’t Bronco’s dead brother looked like a Cuban? It didn’t matter what people looked like, surely, so long as it was still
them
.
    The body is simply the costume of the soul
, that’s what Dick Bracewaite had told them, in church last Sunday.
    Maybe, if her father knew that Peggy was still walking around, it would put his mind at rest – give him hope, and peace. Maybe it would brush off all those ashes of guilt that made him appear so grey.
    â€˜Lizzie, I really have to run.’
    â€˜I’m sorry,’ said Elizabeth. ‘It’s nothing.’ Nothing that she could possibly articulate, anyway. She was mature enough to realize that if she told him and he didn’t believe her, his pain would be even more difficult to bear. And, just at that moment, she wasn’t at all sure that she believed it herself.
    There were two hours to spare before supper, so Laura went off to call for her friend Bindy on Sycamore Street and Elizabeth sat in the kitchen with Mrs Patrick while Mrs Patrick finished off a chicken potpie. Seamus was there, too, sitting on his favourite stool next to the range, his head leaning against the tiles, softly singing a nonsensical song.
    Sad the man, mind the man, day after day
    Flowers and clouds
,
    Flowers and clouds
.
    The kitchen was filled with warm marmalade-coloured sunlight, which fell in shafts through the steam and flour dust. Elizabeth traced patterns in the flour with her finger.
    â€˜Your father’s a poor suffering soul,’ said Mrs Patrick.
    â€˜I know,’ Elizabeth agreed. She looked over at Seamus, who was still nodding and singing. His voice was a thin, tuneless whine.
    â€˜Is he worse?’ she asked Mrs Patrick.
    Mrs Patrick nodded, and gave Elizabeth a sad and wistful smile. ‘Dr Ferris said he’ll have more fits. I like to think that it’s the fairies. They loved him so much that they want him back, to play with him some more.’
    Elizabeth listened to Seamus singing for a little, and then she said, ‘Mrs Patrick – do you think it’s possible for people, when they’re dead, to be other people, and walk around, and meet their old friends?’
    Mrs Patrick was about to put the potpie in the oven. She turned around and stared at Elizabeth in the strangest way. The open oven was so hot that Mrs Patrick’s forehead was beaded with sweat.
    â€˜What made you say that, child?’
    â€˜I don’t know. Something I saw.’
    â€˜What did you see?’
    â€˜A little girl, that’s all. She didn’t look like Peggy and yet she did. And she looked at me so queerly. And she said, “Hallo, Elizabeth”, quite plain, as if she knew me.’
    â€˜Where was this?’
    â€˜On Putnam Street: I was visiting Lenny. He’s had the greeting, and he has to go to Fort Dix tomorrow.’
    â€˜The dead go to Heaven, child, to sit with Our Lady and Our Lord Jesus Christ.’
    â€˜But you said that Seamus would go back to the fairies.’
    â€˜There are fairies in Heaven. There is anything a soul could want in Heaven.’
    Elizabeth had the feeling that this conversation was going to get her nowhere at all. Mrs Patrick was a Catholic, and while she may have been a very superstitious Catholic, and believedin elves and piskies and all sorts of supernatural larkings-about in hedgerows and underneath toadstools, she was still sure and certain that her Redeemer liveth, and his Blessed Mother, too, and that it was They alone who set us down on earth when we were born and scooped us back up again when we