The Posthumous Adventures of Harry Whitaker

by Bobbie Darbyshire

  He beamed admiration at her, received a broad smile in return and felt the warmth of it. She was wiping a table, saying something to the couple who were sitting there. Cheerful, outgoing, natural – how hard it must be to keep that up, instead of hiding herself away or yelling ‘Fuck off’ at each open-mouthed bastard. His fury was growing. He had to restrain himself from telling that child in the striped T-shirt to stop gawping. Nothing would change: the next child through the door would gawp just the same.

  For some reason, his mother’s excuses for Harry rose to his mind. What was it she’d said in her obstinate present tense that refused to admit he was dead? Everyday happiness frightens him. He doesn’t know how to do it. It feels like forgetting his lines. What complete self-indulgence. Harry made an art out of not being himself, whereas brave Lily, here she was, staunchly herself despite being cast on life’s stage as a freak.

  Maurice presented himself at the counter, War and Peace tucked under an arm, his face a grimy picture of disdain. ‘Noise pollution,’ he complained above the hubbub of voices and the sound of a mobile phone going off. ‘It’s not good enough.’

  ‘Sorry, Maurice.’

  The customers queuing for coffee were catching a whiff of him and edging away. ‘Fine words butter no parsnips,’ he said, eyeing the cakes.

  Richard slipped him an almond croissant. ‘Just the one, mind.’

  ‘I hear the woman with the face is your sister.’

  Bloody hell. He would have snatched the croissant back if Maurice hadn’t already sunk his yellow teeth into it. He opened his mouth to tell him to watch himself, but Maurice got in ahead of him. ‘She’s fucking gorgeous,’ he said, spitting flakes. ‘Tolstoy would have fucking adored her.’

  Before Richard could answer, Lily arrived at Maurice’s side, waving her mobile. Maurice shuffled backwards, contemplating her as though she were a Hawaiian sunset. She smiled at him, and he bowed.

  ‘I just had Pearl on the phone,’ Lily told Richard. ‘Pearl Allen. She’s in the office completing a house sale. It’s bad news. The letter to Jon Griffiths has come back unopened, marked “gone away”.’

  ‘Who’s Jon Griffiths?’ Maurice wanted to know.

  ‘Enjoy the croissant,’ said Richard.

  ‘It’s a bummer,’ said Lily when Maurice at last shambled off.

  ‘So what happens next? Did Pearl say?’

  ‘I told her I’d have a go. The address is South London, near where I live. I’ll drop by – see what I can find out. Someone may know where he’s gone, or give me a clue at least.’

  ‘Good thinking.’

  ‘And so, I was wondering.’ She smiled across the counter at him. ‘He’s important to both of us, and we never got to the pub yesterday, and today’s lovely, but no time to talk. We could get to know each other on the train, have supper and a bottle at my place. My spare room is nice. Any chance you could get away for the rest of the weekend, big brother? Come back this evening with me?’

  Lily

  Mrs Jones’s daughter was out with her mates for the evening. Her son and husband were watching the doubles finals. ‘I’ll be upstairs reading,’ she told them. If they bothered to come looking, she had the perfect excuse for being in her daughter’s bedroom: it was flooded with the end of another lovely day’s sunshine. She pushed up the sash and leaned out to look along the row of small gardens. No one in sight, just a cat sunning itself among next door’s geraniums.

  Soon, feet up on the bed, head propped by pillows, she opened her book. It was some literary thing chosen by her reading group. All right, she supposed. She tried to think of intelligent things to say about it at the meeting next week. The main thing was to finish it. Trouble was she kept dozing off.

  Sitting up with a jolt, she found the light fading. Some noise had woken her. She peered from the window, and there they were across the fence, on the smart Yorkstone patio, laughing and clinking their glasses together. The young woman with the birthmark, and a young man who wasn’t her husband. Good heavens, they looked really chummy. What was going on?

  Sunday

  Harry

  I can’t help it, I’m fretting again. Since Friday afternoon, through a long night and day and another long night, the elation of homecoming sadly has faded. I’ve done my best to prolong that first, insane happiness, but relief is an emotion that resists extension. Sotheby’s are coming tomorrow, said Simon. My home will soon be dismantled, and every beautiful feature and facet of it now fills me with grief and disquiet.

  I am too much in my own company. The only flesh-and-blood human who comes through the door is Mrs Butley. Powered by wrath, she pops in once a day to feed Henry V, drop cigarette ash on the floor and loot drawers for spare cash and small valuables. I try not to begrudge these losses, to see them as payment for the entertainment of hearing her curse me. I have heard all she has to say on the subject – she has the habit of repetition, as if to assert something twenty-nine times to thin air makes it truer or more worthy of indignation – but it’s nevertheless cheering to hear my name still in her mouth. Even when she falls silent or chunters to herself about people unknown to me, her fleeting presence here passes the time. People-watching is my only alternative to stultification, and I’d rather watch Mrs Butley than no one. She’s my one-woman soap opera.

  Henry V himself mostly sleeps. His few waking hours are spent roaming free beyond the flap in the garden room downstairs. I’ve been tempted to go out with him, hunting for mice in the shrubbery, but so far can’t bring myself to risk the adventure. I’m not ready to let this place out of my sight.

  I no longer tease Henry because the last time I managed to spook him he bolted through the flap and stayed out for so long that I worried he wouldn’t return. It was getting harder to alarm him in any case, requiring more effort and ambush each time. It seems that an invisible spirit tickling his nose and bouncing around in his whiskers has become unremarkable to him, almost beneath his notice. Like the abrupt hum of the fridge-freezer, the washing machine’s spin-cycle, the sound of the flushing lavatory and the large cat that lurks behind the mirror on the top-floor landing, like all these things and more that once sent him into paroxysms of fight-or-flight, the resident ghost is now barely worth a blink or a pause in his grooming.

  So, I’m running out of ways to distract myself or help the time pass. Sometimes I gaze from a window, wishing there were more people to see. The summer crowds on the lower road and the beach are obscured from my view, even from the bedrooms. Beyond the green railings on the far side of Marine Parade, opalescent water stretches towards the blue sky. A few take a stroll at this upper level, walking their dogs, licking their ice-creams, leading their children by the hand, but my house is set back and the road and far pavement are broad, so it’s hard to make out their faces.

  I’ve whiled away several hours in contemplation of Hockney’s fine portrait of me, examining the detail of his brushstrokes, the audacity of his colours, trying to conjure the echo of his dry, Yorkshire tones as he peered owlishly at me around his huge canvas and nattered on about painting northern trees in all seasons.

  The nights are the worst. There’s little light to see by and time slows to a stop. No wonder some old ruins fair shriek with suffering spirits. No soul in Brighton watched today’s rosy dawn break upon the Channel with more abject gratitude than mine, but the sunrise brings only another promise of sunset. I’m interminably weary.

  This morning I lingered a while with the photograph of Larry and me that hangs on the wall of my study. How handsome and easy we were, arm in arm, Larry and Harry, he in his sixties, I in my thirties already tipped to outshine him, alive and full of tomorrow, tingling, nerve-ends excited, eyes open, ravenous for fame. Smiling proudly, dazzled by flashbulbs, holding our BAFTAs aloft.

  ‘The effort to carve yourself into different shapes,’ I remember Larry asking me shortly before he died, ‘to be successful, to be famous – what’s the alternative?’

  He was afflicted with stage fright
, poor Larry, unlike myself. I never made the trip from the dressing room feeling less than utter conviction in the character I was about to embody. Never happier or more at ease, no room for nerves or self-consciousness.

  ‘There isn’t an alternative,’ I told him. ‘We are the lucky ones, who outshone the rest.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, thumping his chest. ‘The future will be looking back at us giants straddling the theatrical world. We are the best bulls in the ring.’

  But even fine memories pall. Because he breathes, dreams and twitches, the nearest I can get to contentment today is to watch Henry V sleeping. This last hour it is all I have done. He lies on his side on the deep-pile Persian carpet, his tail extended behind him and his front and back legs arranged so that he seems frozen in mid-leap among the stylised flowers and trees. His white muzzle gives the illusion of a smile as he quivers at private visions. Oh sleep, the time out of time that humanity begrudges itself, how I long for you. How I miss the dreams you might bring me, the strange, illogical power they would have to ease my fears.

  ‘Do you sleep?’ I asked Scotty last night. ‘One level up from me, do you close your eyes, put your angelic head on some celestial pillow and tune out for a few hours?’

  ‘Not as such,’ he said, ‘but I can’t say I miss it. Between assignments and visits to the wife, I meditate. Want me to teach you?’

  ‘I know how to meditate,’ I snapped. ‘It didn’t work in the mortuary fridge, but I’ll give it another try if you say so.’

  He’d dropped by just after sunset, filling the sitting room with his golden glow and me with a storm of delight at the postponement of the terrible hours of darkness. ‘Scotty darling,’ I greeted him. ‘How immensely glad I am to see you.’

  He was squeezing me in between induction visits to newer ghosts. ‘I’m not supposed to be here at all,’ he said, glancing furtively around. ‘Your case has been signed off for annual review.’

  When I asked how his job was going, he launched into a tirade. ‘Don’t get me started. Talk about top-down management, it’s monolithic – not a shred of respect for local knowledge. I’m the caring end of the operation, and I care very much, but what earthly good does it do?’

  He didn’t pause for an answer. ‘I’m supposed to be in awe, but if you ask me the higher echelons are clueless. They have their smug fixed ideas and refuse to see past them. Only one right way of doing things, no initiative expected or tolerated. They don’t consult – you can’t tell them anything. They’re all ego, no commonsense.’

  Working himself into a fury, he began throwing his arms about. ‘Middle management are just as bad, busy parroting top management’s nonsense, wilfully blind to how stupid it is, kowtowing up the line. The whole enterprise is a good idea gone wrong.’

  ‘Well I never,’ I said when at last he subsided. ‘You certainly needed to get that off your chest.’

  He looked abashed. Settling himself slowly on a tapestry footstool, he regarded his gilded toenails. ‘You’re quite right. I’m letting it get to me. I should rise above it – channel it into positive thinking.’

  He wasn’t impressed by my own fretfulness. ‘You’re doing better each time I see you,’ he told me. A jug fills drop by drop said his T-shirt. ‘But you haven’t the first clue how to meditate,’ was his parting shot as he shimmered away into nothing.

  So I’ve been trying to do it, if only to prove him wrong. It used to be all about watching my breathing, but I’ve no breath to watch, so I try ‘om’ again, as I did in the fridge – om, om, om – but I can’t get the hang of it: my thoughts refuse to switch off. Okay, you were right. I give in. Come back and show me how, Scotty.

  Breathing.

  The cat breathes.

  I may as well watch the cat breathing. He has rolled on his back to keep his head in the sun. His front paws dangle either side of his chest. His chest rises and falls, rises and falls.

  Yes... my thoughts are settling... I think I’m feeling it... maybe...

  No, stop thinking. Stop trying. Empty the mind.

  Rises. Falls.

  Rises. Falls.

  Rises.

  Falls.

  Richard

  South London might not be Bali or Goa, but strolling through it with his new sister was giving Richard a taste of freedom. His troubles were far away. This was what it would be like to take off into the world. His vision would clear. New places and people would engage him.

  Lily was leading him on a mile-and-a-half-long zigzag between her house and Jon Griffiths’ last known address. The backstreets were quietly busy with Sunday hedge-trimming and car-washing. Each corner they turned, the hedges stretched away to a new suburban horizon, golden privet, green privet, all clipped to within a millimetre of their lives. The houses were clones of the basic Victorian model, their porches and doors painted a variety of hues, their bay windows offering kaleidoscopic glimpses of interior worlds.

  The miles between Brighton and London were making it easy for Richard to smile at his mother, and even at Claire and her baby. If he never went back, they would sort themselves out somehow without him. He had just made Lily laugh with the story of his mother’s seduction, including every embellishment – Harry’s bare chest and iridescent eye-makeup, the smell of his greasepaint and sweat, the Barbican full to capacity eager for his next entrance.

  ‘How romantic,’ said Lily. ‘No wonder your mum was swept off her feet. What a rogue Harry was. I’d give anything to know how my own mother met him. She had all sorts of jobs, but I’ve an idea she once worked as a film extra. Maybe that’s when it happened.’

  ‘Rogue’ was a word Simon had used: an old-fashioned term, not altogether masculine. ‘I’ve been wondering if Harry was bisexual,’ said Richard.

  ‘Surely not?’

  ‘Yes, I know, but Simon was in tears at the funeral, so I thought...’

  She grinned up at him. ‘You’re half right. Simon confided in me when he was showing me round the house. His passion was all unrequited. Harry was as hetero as they come. All the same, he fooled Simon into thinking they were friends, and the poor man was mortified by the will. One thousand pounds with thanks for his services. Did he tell you?’

  Chatting with Lily was easy – no subject felt awkward. It was as if he had known her forever. On the train up from Worthing last night he’d even told her about the baby. ‘I’m in shock, trying to pretend it’s not happening. But it is happening, or it could be. I had plans, dreams, but now my life’s on hold until I know what Claire decides.’

  Despite Lily’s sympathy, he hadn’t wanted to say more about it – ‘I’m determined to put it out of my mind for a couple of days’ – and she’d been correspondingly brief about the husband she’d just kicked out. ‘Least said, soonest mended. I think I was some kind of weird trophy to Martin. I met him at uni, where I stood out from the crowd in what seemed like a good way for once. I felt confident there, a bit special. I think that attracted him. I’m sure he believed that he loved me, and I thought I loved him. But since uni it’s not been the same. He’s done so well in his job, which is fine, of course, but work takes all his time and, well, I’ve realised we never had much in common. Marry in haste, eh? He’s a cheat and a liar. I’m sure he’s not giving me a thought, and I’m trying to pay him the same compliment.’

  ‘Feel free to have a proper rant if you want one,’ Richard had told her. ‘You’re entitled.’

  ‘Nuh-uh. I’ve done all that. I was in a real state at first. I did some silly, rash things.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Oh... well... nothing serious. Kicking him out was a good one. Getting angry in public, drinking too much, going on a crappy blind date, that kind of nonsense. I was letting it get to me, only making myself more unhappy. So enough wallowing. Stop it. Forget it. Plans and dreams, you said. Let’s forget all our problems, darling brother. What are your dreams?’

  Darling brother. He had really liked that.

  Travel, he’d told her. Explori
ng the amazing places out there that aren’t Worthing or Brighton. He slipped his arm through hers as they turned another corner. ‘Here I am at last, eh, sis? Living my dream. On the run for two whole days to South London.’ He waved a hand at the hedges. ‘How long have you lived in these exotic surroundings?’

  ‘All my life. I inherited the house from my grandparents five years ago. Martin and I only just finished spending a fortune on it, though actually it turns out it was me spent the fortune. I’m left with the bank loan, which is why Harry’s bequest is so handy.’

  ‘Do you fancy travelling?’ he asked her. ‘Does the wide world ever call to you too?’

  ‘Maybe one day. Who knows,’ she said, ‘but for now home suits me fine. I know it’s dull, but it’s gentle – if that’s the right word. Polite? Civilised? Hell, I’m sounding snobby, small-minded. What am I trying to say?’

  ‘I don’t know. You tell me.’

  She thought for a moment, running her hand along more neat, green privet. Then, ‘I’ve got it. It’s anonymous, that’s what I like. They say suburbia is all twitching net-curtains, but I haven’t noticed. I get stared at less here than anywhere.’

  A man looked up from hosing his tubs of geraniums as they went by. ‘Lovely day,’ he said, smiling.

  ‘Yes, isn’t it,’ she replied. Twenty yards further on, she murmured to Richard, ‘See what I mean. He didn’t even blink. Round here I’m mostly free to be me.’

  He wasn’t sure he believed her. Did she believe it herself? These suburbanites might disguise their curiosity, but it was there just the same. He turned to look back and saw the man staring after them. Lily turned to look back and the man became intent on his hose.

  ‘Brighton was okay,’ she said. ‘People mostly accepted me in Brighton on Friday, no trouble.’