The Ghost Manuscript

by Kris Frieswick

  She tried to breathe. She didn’t have the time to cry right now. She inhaled and exhaled deeply, then wiped her nose on her sleeve.

  “I’ll call him later today.”

  “I have something else I have to tell you,” said Annie. “It’s not bad news. But I need you to know. I called your father.”

  “You did what?”

  “Just shut up and listen,” said Annie. “I was worried sick. You didn’t expect me to sit here and wait around for you to call, did you? I had no choice. He is the only person on the whole goddamn continent who knows you and cares about you.”

  “He doesn’t care about me,” she said. “How do you even know where he is?”

  “Just because you wouldn’t communicate with him doesn’t mean my mother didn’t,” Annie said. “Did you honestly think she wouldn’t tell him how you were doing?”

  “If he cared how I was doing,” she said, “he maybe should have showed up at some point since my mother killed herself twenty-two years ago. You had no right to call him.”

  “Just shut up and listen,” said Annie. “You cannot do this by yourself. We’re talking about murder now. This isn’t just some little adventure.”

  “It was never a little adventure,” she growled.

  “I only told him that you’d run into some trouble and he needed to find you,” said Annie. “I didn’t tell him about Nicola or the treasure. I just told him that he needed to find you.”

  “I do not want my father involved. He doesn’t even know what I look like.”

  “He’ll know you,” said Annie. “He’s already on his way to Mumbles.”

  Carys started to speak, then stopped.

  “How did I know you were in Mumbles?” Annie asked. “Is that what you’re going to ask?”

  Her knuckles went white on the steering wheel.

  “It’s the only place in Wales that you know other than that unpronounceable town where your father lives,” said Annie. “I knew you’d never go there. Mumbles is where he grew up. And the only place in Wales you’ve ever been. It was pretty obvious.”

  “I never told you my dad grew up in Mumbles,” she said.

  “Yes, you did. Remember when Mayor Menino got his nickname, ‘Mumbles’? And you told me that your dad grew up in a town of the same name.”

  Carys had to smile.

  “I forgot I told you about that. You have a good memory.”

  “Where are you driving to?” asked Annie.

  “For your information I’m not in Mumbles anymore,” said Carys. “You just sent my father on a wild goose chase.”

  “Goddamn it, Carys! Where the hell are you?”

  “I’ll call you later,” she said and hung up. She pulled back out onto the highway and sped north toward Bardsey and, she hoped, more than almost anything she’d ever wanted in her life, toward Riothamus Arcturus.

  ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

  Frank waited in his car in the parking lot across the street from the Mumbles police station, watching its main entrance in his rear-view mirror. The car was beginning to warm up, and he could have easily drifted off. Fortunately, the buzz of his nerves kept him awake. He didn’t like being so close to the police.

  Carys Jones’s father looked just like his teenage son. And he looked just like his daughter. Dark, shiny hair, big eyes, high cheekbones, strong chin, tall, fit. But under it all, afraid. Frank could see that quite clearly. Kids were such a liability, a big open sore that anyone could press and torture and use against you. He’d made a career of doing just that. Children make you do crazy things.

  Anthony came out of the police station and began to walk down the main waterfront road. He watched him for a moment, then got out of the car and followed half a block behind.

  Then, Anthony stopped and answered his phone. Frank could just barely hear him.

  “What do you mean she left?” Anthony asked the person on the other end of the phone.

  He strained to hear the rest but could not. Anthony hung up and stood still, rubbing his head, then turned around and walked straight toward him. Frank knelt down, pretending to tie his shoe. After Anthony passed, he stood up, straightened his coat, and resumed his tail.

  The maid thing rattled him. He hadn’t meant to kill her. He’d killed before, of course, and in his experience, his victims usually deserved it. The maid hadn’t, though, not really.

  Although, on the flight over from the U.S., he realized that he had recognized the look in her eyes just before the gun went off. She’d known someone might be coming for the manuscript. When it happened, she offered herself up to save it. Crazy thing, that. Sacrificing yourself for a book. Just thinking about it gave him a sick feeling in his stomach.

  Anthony stepped into one of the small inns that lined the main street. The Victorian. Frank approached and peeked into the window. Anthony showed the receptionist a photo. The receptionist shook her head no. Anthony shook her hand and walked back out.

  Slowly, over the next hour, he followed Anthony as he checked every single inn and pub in Mumbles. There must have been twenty of them. It gave him plenty of time to think.

  Gyles thought he was stupid. Gyles thought he wasn’t paying attention. Gyles thought he didn’t know that he was a dead man as soon as the tomb was located. Fuck Gyles. He had been studying that psychopath for twenty years, the whole time they’d been working together. Even a psycho has an ego, and Gyles’s ego was his biggest weakness—as it is for most men.

  But in Gyles’s case, this affliction meant he didn’t feel doubt or threat. Gyles would go into business with anyone who could help him make money—no matter who they were—because he was completely confident that he could out-terrorize the person if need be. He usually could. But the men he was working with now were on a completely different level of insanity. Gyles didn’t seem to notice what he’d opened himself up to.

  He, on the other hand, had a sixth sense. He knew within seconds of meeting someone if the person would rat, or if he’d stay loyal to the end. He knew if a person was completely unhinged, a danger to anyone who got too close, someone for whom contracts were never final. He knew who could be intimidated and who would lash out. It was his specialty. He wasn’t too book smart, but when it came to reading people, he was a genius. Still, he had misread the maid until it was far too late.

  Anthony stepped into another pub, and Frank stopped in front of an antiques store next to it. He looked through its big display window and examined the delicate Portmeirion tea set on a table at the front of the store.

  Mum had collected Portmeirion, back when his father was around and they still had some money. The last time he’d seen her, before she went into the hospital that last time, she’d been so frail that it made him feel like a scared kid. Parents, mothers especially, are another vulnerability, but one you don’t get to choose. She’d turned into a hornet that day when he offered her money for rent. She still took it. She had to. Her pension barely covered her food. As she crumpled the cash in her bony hand, her rage turned into loathing—he didn’t know which of them it was aimed at. Mum had the sixth sense, too.

  He never should have made contact with the Jones woman. He shouldn’t have tried to bribe her. He should have just taken what he wanted from the beginning. But he didn’t have the stomach for the violence anymore. His mother’s death had started a slow bleed of his aggression, replacing it with exhaustion. But the Jones woman—that was a mistake that he was going to own. A mistake that Gyles was going to try to make him pay for.

  The good news was that the police had no idea he was involved with the murder. They couldn’t know. He had traveled on a fake passport. No one, not even Gyles, knew where he lived—at least he didn’t think he knew. The Jones woman had seen him, but to her he was just a nameless brute with a gun. There might be video, but Jones was the only one who could identify him, and she was here in Wales. Gyles wouldn
’t ever out him, because then he’d be tied to all the other murders, not to mention a thousand lesser crimes. And Gyles needed him to find this treasure.

  The problem was that although Gyles would never rat on him, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill him. Their long and fruitful relationship meant nothing the minute that gun went off in the mansion. As soon as he found the treasure, Gyles would hire someone to do the job. All those other people he had killed for Gyles had been in the business. They’d been a collection of liars, cheats, and scum. The maid was a civilian, a bystander caught up in something violent, and the employee of a famous billionaire to boot. The police would be far more diligent solving this one than they’d been with the junkies, or the thieving antiquities dealer, or the dozens of other players in this dark world who had crossed Gyles. And that meant Frank was marked.

  He turned away from the store window when he saw Anthony leave the pub. Anthony walked a block and went into the next pub in line, the Farmer’s Arms. Frank was beginning to get thirsty. It was time for a beer. He took a deep breath, waited a beat, and pulled open the door to the Farmer’s Arms.

  Anthony was at the bar, and he clearly knew the bartender, a gray-haired man smiling broadly to reveal a row of yellowing teeth. He took a position at the other end of the bar but within earshot. The bartender looked over.

  “What can I get you?” he asked.

  “Pint of the bitter, thanks,” Frank said. He was actually looking forward to it. The man drew the beer and never stopped talking to Anthony. He slid the pint down the bar. He left a ten on the bar and took a gulp of the smooth beer.

  “Dear god, man, it’s been ages,” the bartender said to Anthony. “How are you and the missus? What are you doing down here?”

  “We’re fine, we’re fine,” said Anthony. “Unfortunately, I can’t stay, much as I’d love to catch up. I’m here looking for my daughter, Carys. She came to Mumbles, but she left and I’m trying to find out where she went.”

  “What’s wrong?” asked the bartender.

  “She’s in trouble,” said Anthony. “We haven’t really seen each other…in a long time.” He reached into his pocket and showed the man the photo.

  The bartender looked at the photo, and his eyes grew wide.

  “She was here. She stayed here, upstairs. Said her name was Jane. She’s American. But she would be, wouldn’t she? She checked out just a few hours ago. You just missed her.”

  Frank nearly choked on his beer.

  “Did she say where she was going?” asked Anthony.

  “No. Why are you looking for her?” asked the bartender.

  “Her friend, the girl whose mother took Carys in when…who she grew up with, called me and said Carys needed my help, that she was in Wales,” said Anthony. “She didn’t give me any specifics. She just said I had to find her and that she was pretty sure she came to Mumbles.”

  “She didn’t say a word to me about where she was headed,” said the bartender. “Let me see that photo again.” Anthony placed it on the bar. The bartender picked it up and studied it closely. “She really is the spitting image of you, isn’t she? I can’t believe I didn’t see it.”

  The bartender put the photo down.

  “Priscilla, the woman who took Carys in after Patricia, uh, died,” said Anthony, “she’d send me photos every year on Carys’s birthday and holidays and such.” Anthony held up the photo. “This one was taken at her birthday dinner a couple of years ago. She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”

  The bartender said nothing.

  “She never forgave me for leaving, then I made it worse, didn’t I?” said Anthony, almost to himself.

  The old man silently examined Anthony’s face.

  “She seemed like a lovely woman,” the bartender said. He turned his attention to cleaning the bar. Frank could feel the questions the bartender wanted to ask, but that friends wouldn’t. He wanted to ask them, too. And he wouldn’t be nice about it.

  “How many years has it been since you’ve been back to Mumbles?” asked the bartender.

  “At least ten. Haven’t been here since I started at the university,” said Anthony.

  “Oh, that’s right. Professor Jones. PhD. Too good to come visit the old stomping grounds now that you’re educating the next generation of…what was it again?”

  “Geopolitical historians,” said Anthony.

  “Whatever the hell that is…”

  “Researching and analyzing shifting geographic and political boundaries, to you simple folk,” said Anthony.

  “Suppose you’d have to go into academia with something like that. Not much call for it out here in the real world, where people do actual work,” said the bartender, a sparkle lighting up his eyes.

  “Sod off,” Anthony said, smiling. Then his smile faded. “Peter, did Carys say or do anything that might help me find her?”

  “Not really. Did you talk to the cops?”

  “Yeah. They said they’d ask around. They didn’t seem much bothered about it. I guess missing girls are as common as cats.”

  “You know,” said the bartender, “after she checked out this morning, I overheard her call a local guy, Dafydd Reynolds. Something about her wanting to hire him for something.”

  “He wouldn’t hurt her, would he? You know him?” asked Anthony.

  “He’s a solid guy. Owns a salvage boat and a dive tour company for the visitors.”

  “Where can I find him?” asked Anthony.

  “He’s usually in here after work. You could come back at around six. You’ll probably find him right where you’re standing.”

  “I’m in a bit of a hurry,” said Anthony. “Can you give me his cell phone?”

  The man looked over Anthony’s shoulder and squinted.

  “I’ll do you one better,” he said, and pointed out the window. “See that guy right there climbing into his truck with a cup of coffee? That’s him.”

  Frank did his best not to smile as Anthony turned and headed out the door. He stood glued to his spot, slowly drinking, just a normal guy enjoying an afternoon by the seaside. Once Anthony was gone, he and the bartender had the bar to themselves.

  “Can I get you another?”

  “Why not,” said Frank.

  The man slid another bitter his way. He drank long and deep again, and turned to look out the window just as Anthony was extending his hand to Dafydd. He watched the two men shake, watched Anthony retrieve the photo and hand it to Dafydd. Frank turned his attention back to his beer.

  “That sounded like a pretty bleak tale,” he said to the bar in general. “Daughter gone missing. Tough day for ‘im.”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” said the bartender. “Anthony left the girl and her mother and came back here when his daughter was just a tyke. Then the girl’s mother died when she was fifteen.”

  “What of?” he asked.

  “Killed herself. They say she had the depression pretty bad. And he didn’t go back to the States and get the girl after the mother died. He’d already remarried, started a new brood. Bloody selfish thing to do to a child, if you ask me.”

  He took another sip of his beer. “Which thing—killing yourself or ditching your family?” he asked.

  “I guess they’re about the same thing,” said the bartender. “That girl’s been through the ringer. Not sure how much help she’s likely to take from him. But he’s her only family. I’m not gonna get in the way of that.”

  The door swung open and Dafydd and Anthony came in, the tension palpable between them.

  “Peter,” said Dafydd before they’d even closed the door. “You know this guy?”

  “I do,” said Peter. “Known him my whole life. He’s good people. Looking for his daughter.”

  “She said her name was Jane, but he says her name is Carys. He says she’s in trouble,” said Dafydd. “What kind of
trouble?”

  “That I would not know,” said Peter, “but I don’t think it much matters. If Anthony Jones says his daughter is in trouble, I’ll be believing him. And I’d suggest you do whatever he needs.”

  Frank watched as Dafydd took another look at the photo. “She hired me for a job,” Dafydd said.

  “Where?” asked Anthony. Dafydd paused.

  Peter looked hard at him. “Tell him,” he said. “She’s his child.”

  “Aberdaron,” said Dafydd.

  “When?” asked Anthony.

  “I’m supposed to meet her tonight,” Dafydd said. “She wants to dive on Bardsey Island tomorrow.”

  “Well, we’d better get moving then,” said Anthony. “You can drive.”

  “I’m going to call her,” said Dafydd. “I think I should tell her that you’re looking for her.”

  “No,” said Anthony, as the two walked back through the pub’s door. “We’ll never see her again if you do that.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

  If Carys’s heart had not been breaking for Nicola, she would have been transfixed by the tiny seaside village of Aberdaron. It was everything beautiful and calming that she remembered about Wales from her childhood. Its narrow main road wound up and down the dune-like, grassy hillsides that clung to the gray ocean edge. The whitewashed, thickly thatched hotels, pubs, and houses of the village were, as in Mumbles, built right up against the road—but in this town there wasn’t even room for a tiny sidewalk.

  The walls of the buildings alternated from bright white to muted beige as the clouds rolled across the face of the sun, rolled away, then rolled across again, like a slow strobe light. Couples strolled in the streets, and she had to pull over and stop twice to allow an oncoming vehicle to pass. She was starting to crave this dreary, lovely country, to crave it like a nest, or a cave—an enclosed, safe place in which to hide for the rest of her life. She wished for a moment that she was in the cave and not Arcturus.

  She called ahead for reservations at a hotel with an unpronounceable Welsh name that was near the town dock. The first, and it seemed only, language here was Welsh. She pulled into what she assumed was the parking area for her hotel—the sign next to the lot was composed entirely of consonants. She pulled her bag out of the back seat and entered the inn. It was all dark wood—on the floors, the walls, and even the coffered ceilings. As her eyes adjusted to the dimly lit space, she saw an older man sitting behind a simple desk.