Conversations with Spirits Page 3

  It struck me that there was something otherworldly about these great municipal railway stations—it was the noise and smoke and waves of dispossessed people. I could readily imagine myself lost in some classical depiction of Hell.

  Having procured a number of newspapers from the bookstall, I walked down the platform and boarded the train in a cloud of filthy air. Due to the delay with the tickets, I was still lugging about the carpet-bag that Sibella had packed for me. I planted the bag and the bowler hat into the wooden rack above my head and settled into a seat within the empty compartment.

  Presently, the compartment began to fill up. A small, sallow-looking man climbed into it, furiously rubbing his hands together. The left leg of his trousers had lost its stitching and hung down behind his heel. As he planted himself into the chair next to me, I was hit by the curiously potent scent of old bread crusts. He was closely followed by a slipshod woman of robust character who dropped breathlessly into the seat on my other side. Unclasping the handbag resting on her knees, she delved inside and surreptitiously extracted a large pink saveloy, which she devoured hungrily.

  Just as the whistle blew and the train departed the station, a beery looking bloke (from the candle wax staining his frayed shirt cuffs, evidently some manner of tallow chandler) clambered into the carriage from the platform’s edge and settled into the vacant seat opposite me—whereupon, he instantly took up a knife that had been concealed within his left boot. Not unnaturally, I started at this, and, observing my surprise, the man looked across at me with some relish. Then, apparently by way of explanation, he took a pippin from the pocket of his dishevelled greatcoat and sliced into it. “Don’t worry,” the man breathed in a low, rasping voice as he pulled away a chunk of the apple with his thumb. “You ain’t my man. You needn’t worry.”

  “I see our boys ’ave gotton Jerusalem back,” said an old man from behind a quivering newspaper, further down the line. “It’s about time we gave ’em what-for—filfy Arabs.”

  “I know,” replied a marmalade-haired woman sitting two seats to my right. “It ain’t right, is it, the Germans ’aving that? After all, it were buildeth ’ere, weren’t it?”

  I laughed at this, but a succession of angry faces suddenly angled towards me made me realise quickly that the remark was not intended as a joke. The old man’s newspaper lowered and he regarded me fiercely.

  “It’s easy to larf if you’re over ’ere, mate,” he said, whistling through his off-coloured overbite. “Different matter when you’re out there, I daresay.”

  I was taken aback. Having never been addressed as ‘mate’ before in my life, I resolved, there and then, to purchase a better hat at the first opportunity.

  “Tickets, please,” called an Inspector, sliding back the glass door and entering our carriage. There was a flurry of activity from the people seated to my right, as they mechanically patted down their clothing, apparently searching for tickets they had all recently bought, but subsequently misplaced en route to the train. It struck me, from their perfunctory manner that what I was observing was sheer pantomime—and I waited happily for what would surely be some interesting theatre to unfold around me. However, as I handed over my own ticket for examination, the Inspector paused and looked at me with an air of uncertainty.

  “You slumming it, sir?”

  “Sorry?”

  “This is a First Class ticket.”

  “I see…” I responded, not quite comprehending. “And that means?”

  “Well, this is a Third Class compartment.”

  There was a brief impasse, as I thought about the implications. In desperation, I looked imploringly about the carriage, surprised to see that the other patrons seated there were now staring back at me with marked looks of hostility.

  “Sorry?” I offered in my confusion. “Is there somewhere else I should be?”

  “Come with me if you will, sir,” replied the Inspector.

  Taking my bundle with me, I followed the Inspector down the winding corridor of the train, until he swung open the door of my new berth.

  “This is you, sir,” he said, opening the door on the darkened compartment. “Looks as though the lamp’s blown out. I’ll fetch the boy.”

  So saying, the man turned on his heel and strode purposefully away. I entered the cabin and stood for some moments inside its gloomy wood-panelled walls, watching the lights of a hundred suburban dwellings blur past the rain-spattered windows. It was a queer sensation.

  When the lamp had been lighted, it was to my surprise that I perceived that there was almost no practical distinction between the Third and First Class carriage, save for a more pleasing atmosphere in the latter brought about by the scent of polish on the leather-cloth seating. I positioned myself by the window and glanced out. The train lurched onward, leaving behind the swirling yellow fog of the London particular, and moving steadily into the Kent countryside. Soon the gaunt houses of the Capital gave way to a patchwork of fields and apple orchards.

  With the screech of its iron wheels on the railroad, the train pulled into Chatham Station, where it seemed to empty out. Clearly for most of the people travelling from London, this was journey’s end.

  Having never seen a Kent town at close-quarters before, I studied the platform with great interest, wondering how closely it would resemble Broadstairs.

  From a squat station building, an ugly parapet jutted out, made perfectly dark by the yellow lanterns on the station floor. From this, a border of white wooden slats, like a downward-facing picket fence resulted; the structure being held in place by a series of rectangular metal pillars of peculiarly ornate design. Under its canopy, a group of wretched people huddled together, staring lifelessly back at my carriage—their widely glaring eyes, so lustreless and glassy, unnerved me to the point that my hand reached, quite automatically, to the pocket of my suit and extracted my hipflask.

  At Faversham Station, a well-dressed young man of oddly solemn appearance opened the door next to me, filling the carriage with the night’s chill air. Pausing, with his boot planted on the foot-rail, he spoke in a tone that was obviously naturally low, but which he had modified in order to raise it above the prevailing wind.

  “Is this First?” he asked.

  I nodded:

  “So I understand.”

  The man considered my reply and, without responding, climbed into the carriage, closing the train door behind him.

  Choosing a seat midway through the compartment and on the opposite side from my own, the man put down a scratched leather Gladstone, unbuckled it and produced from it a note-book, pencil and a small novella. Stowing the bag on the wooden lath above his head, he then sat. For a moment, the man paused, languorously taking in his new surroundings, but suddenly—and with a great sense of purpose—he snatched up the note-book and pencil.

  Picking up my newspaper, I fanned through its pages and, under the guise of reading, continued to observe my new companion. Doing so, I was struck that there was something quite peculiar about his appearance, but, for the life of me, could not place what it might be.

  As the train departed the station, the man seemed to settle. Putting the pencil’s nib to a clean sheet in his note-book, he looked up and stared dreamily at the carriage window, as though searching for inspiration in its black gloss. As he did, it suddenly occurred to me what was wrong with his appearance. The tallow flames that lighted the compartment had given everything a dim yellowish hue, but still, when I looked at the man’s face, as compared with the relative whiteness of his collar, it was suddenly very clear to me that he was heavily jaundiced.

  “You work in a munitions factory!” I exclaimed suddenly.

  The man looked up from his note-book in a startled, guilty sort of way, which made me instantly cognisant of the fact that my remark had not been polite.

  “Yes,” he responded in a gruff, li
feless tone.

  Despite the discolouration of his skin, the man’s eyes were clear and bright. For a time, he looked me over thoughtfully, perhaps pondering the disparity between my shabby duds and First Class seat. But he said nothing. Turning away again, he threw open his coat and rifled his inside pocket, taking from it a briar pipe and a tin of tobacco.

  “Sorry,” I said, worried that I had unduly offended him. “I just meant—you know—your face and everything…”

  “I know what you meant,” the man responded briskly. Opening his tin, he began to stuff his pipe with tobacco. “The girls I work with call themselves ‘canaries’,” he said. “They say the yellow’s a badge of honour.” With the pipe clenched between his teeth, he cupped one hand around the bowl and struck a match. “Know what I call it?” he asked sullenly, a dense cloud of smoke crawling out between his lips, “I call it a three year bloody itch.”

  “You’re a writer?” I said suddenly, wishing to change the subject.

  He was clearly not expecting this. Pulling his pipe from his mouth, I noticed that it wavered momentarily in his grasp.

  “You know me?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “My work, then?”

  “What’s your name, sir?”

  “Price,” he said. “Harry Price.”

  “Of course,” I said in a protracted way, which I hoped would give the impression of familiarity. “You write…books?”

  “Plays,” he said eagerly. “Before the war I was a journalist too. But I’m now concentrating on my theatrical work—when I’m not at the factory, that is. Perhaps you have seen one of my productions?”

  “I don’t spend a lot of time at the theatre, but it is not impossible. What was the story?”

  “It was a true account of my own experiences with a poltergeist in a haunted manor house. In Shropshire.”

  “Really?” I responded with a vapid smile. “Another one.”

  “What do you mean?” Harry Price replied. “If you have seen such a play, it was undoubtedly mine. Shropshire is my county.”

  “I’m sorry. You misunderstand me,” I explained, “I have not seen the play—and do not care a jot about Shropshire.” Price seemed somewhat irked by this remark. “But it seems that everyone I meet these days is obsessed with ghosts.”

  Price blinked at me. “Perhaps,” he said with emphasis, “it’s because we are only now waking up to the fact that spirits are around us at all times.”

  “Yes. Or, perhaps, it’s a way of coping with the senseless carnage that has invaded all our lives.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean the war!”

  “I don’t see how the war has any bearing on what we were talking about?”

  “How could it not?” I queried. “In the Bible we read about the ‘massacre of innocents’—it had nothing on this. Every day, people are losing their husbands, fathers and sons with no more of an explanation than is contained within an impersonal, two paragraph letter from the War Office. I think it’s the most natural thing in the world to seek out a happier parting of the ways. I did so, myself, when my late wife was taken from me.”

  “You saw a medium?”

  “Several.”

  “Did she make contact?”

  “My wife? Yes, once…” I replied, “with the aid of a Mrs. Trubshawe, when I visited her in her lodgings in Bow.”

  “And what message did she have for you?”

  “She advised me to pay Mrs. Trubshawe sixpence. And when I asked why her voice sounded so different, I was informed that in the afterlife everyone has a cockney accent.”

  Harry Price smirked and sat back in his chair.

  “When I roused Mrs. Trubshawe from her ‘trance’, a squeezebox fell from between her knees.”

  “Well,” Price said lightly, “I don’t suppose that you can discount spiritualism on the basis of one disreputable woman. You have to be open minded about these things.”

  “As I said, I saw several mediums, the best of whom simply provided me with more sophisticated lies and trickery.”

  “But you must admit that there are things that can’t be explained?” said Price.

  “There certainly are,” I agreed, “but the work of spiritualist mediums is not one of them. I am yet to meet a clairvoyant who has impressed me that they are anything more profound than a confidence trickster or thief.”

  “Really?” Price murmured, striking the bowl of his pipe off the arm of his chair like a gavel. “Then I wish you were coming to Broadstairs to-night.”

  “Oh?” I said carefully. “Why’s that?”

  “There is a man there that might be able to change your mind. He is the reason for my journey to-day, as a matter of fact. Where are you heading to, may I ask?”

  “Ramsgate,” I said quickly. “But I suppose I could come to Broadstairs. Who is this man?”

  “Name of Beasant,” Price replied. “I was just reading about him in one of my periodicals. And, believe me, if it is true what they say, the things he does are utterly without explanation. By you or anyone else.”

  “I very much doubt that.”

  Harry Price looked hard at me. “I shall show you something that you will not be able to explain.”

  “Really?” I replied brightly, “Please do!”

  Pushing his hands into the pockets of his sack-coat, apparently searching for something, Price produced a white handkerchief with his left hand. With a sudden look of concentration, he drew his right hand out from his pocket and splayed his fingers. Very carefully, he swept the handkerchief through them. Turning the cloth over, he repeated the process.

  “An ordinary white handkerchief,” he said.

  I shrugged. “I have seen one before.”

  With a dramatic sweep of his fingers, Price balled his right hand and quickly pushed the handkerchief into the crevice at the top of his fist, until nothing more than a single white corner protruded from it. Then, moving his hand down, he began to pull the handkerchief from the other side of his fist, so that the cloth travelled down between his clenched fingers. As he did this, I saw that—within the closed confines of his hand—the cloth seemed to have transformed in colour from white to deep red.

  I smiled, but Price rebuked me with a waggle of his left index finger. Snatching up the remaining white corner of white handkerchief, he drove it into his fist with the tip of the index finger of his left hand. When the handkerchief was fully lost to his hand, Price leaned forward.

  “Pull from the bottom,” he instructed.

  Sitting forward on my seat, I reached across and tugged on the cloth protruding from his closed hand, which fell into my fingers as a fully-formed red handkerchief. Then, before my eyes, Price pulled back his left hand and one-by-one splayed the fingers of his right hand until it was open before me—and entirely empty.

  “Remarkable,” I said.

  “You see?” Price responded. “Things are not always so easy to explain.”

  “That was not what I meant.”

  “Oh?”

  “I just find it remarkable that, considering our conversation you would attempt to advance your case with so obvious a parlour trick.”

  “I was making a point.”

  “Were you?” I replied. “And what was that?”

  “That some things are not always so simple to explain even for the rational mind.”

  “I’m afraid you didn’t succeed.”

  Harry Price picked up the red handkerchief and toyed with it for a short time. Then he held it before me.

  “Here. Examine it. You’ll find there is nothing unusual about it.”

  “I’m sure I won’t,” I replied dismissively.

  Price paused for a moment.

  “Well then how did I change its
colour?”

  I leaned forward in my chair: “I don’t understand. You want me to explain the trick you just performed?”

  “If you can.”

  “As you wish,” I replied. “Obviously, I cannot be exactly sure, so please allow for a small margin of error…

  “Firstly…” I began, “it’s fairly obvious that your performance wasn’t as impromptu as you would have me believe. You showed me a white handkerchief. You then turned it, satisfying me that it was white on both sides. You told me that it was ‘ordinary’, so, naturally, my suspicions would be against it. But prior to this, when you had made such a show of taking the handkerchief from your pocket, I imagine you also surreptitiously palmed a slim—probably flesh-coloured—tube. It was this that contained the corresponding red handkerchief.”

  Price sat back in his chair, his eyes fixed upon me.

  “With the tube hidden from my view underneath the white handkerchief, you very swiftly moved it to your right hand, which you then closed tightly around it. I was then presented with your closed fist. Feeding the white handkerchief into it, you were, in fact, forcing it into the tube, which, in turn, pushed the red handkerchief out. At your instruction, I then pulled on this.”

  Blinking slowly, a thin smile played upon Harry Price’s lips: “You saw my open palm,” he said with a shrug. “There was nothing there.”

  I reached into my pocket and took out my cigarette case.

  “That’s how I knew there was a tube involved,” I replied, putting a cigarette to my mouth and striking a match. “When you pushed your finger into your fist, you were also driving it into the tube—the aperture at the top of which being so tight that your finger became wedged inside it. With my attention diverted examining the red handkerchief, you were able to draw your left index finger back with one swift movement—with the tube attached to the top of it. Upon doing so, you instantly closed your left hand with the tube concealed inside it. Then, of course, in the typically flamboyant fashion of an amateur magician, you opened your fist and…” I waved a hand languidly, sending smoke twisting through the air, “I was duly amazed.”