by Rhys Hughes
My method of operation is a trade secret, though I can reveal that it was invented by my father, the Great Legume. One of the best, if not the most stylish, escapologists on the seaside circuit, he’d entertained dozens of drunken soldiers during the war; the curious ones often beat him up afterwards, to see if he could evade the blows. The Great Legume cared not a bean for these attentions. He was a proud man, descendant of an aristocratic Italian family. Wealth had not been left him; drooping moustaches and sad eyes were his sole inheritance from the heady days of Garibaldi. His account of a childhood in San Marino was tedious in the extreme. For the duration of the war, he lived with false papers. He was a skilled forger of documents.
His technique of passing through walls came to him in a dream. He jumped out of bed, groping for the light-switch. He had to write it down before he forgot it. He tripped over Benito, the cat, and fell against the wardrobe. Suddenly he was inside, among the waistcoats. That moment, he afterwards told me, was one of infinite sadness. He’d struggled all his life to succeed and now fame and fortune had been handed to him on an oneiric plate. It mocked his earlier sufferings. He decided never to make a single penny out of this new gift, employing it solely in charity work or for the astounding of friends.
On his death-bed, he passed the secret on to me, his only child. I also vowed never to turn it to commercial advantage. His funeral was his final performance. After we buried him and returned home, we found him waiting for us in an armchair. He often jested about escaping from Hell; my mother, who took such things seriously, paid a dissolute priest to hammer a stake through his heart. We hastily reburied him in the garden. His original grave was exhumed and a furious Benito sprang out and took up residence in the nearest yew.
I practised the method until I mastered it. Journeying through a wall is not an invigorating experience, it palls after a while. There is little sensation; the body tingles, the mind winks. Then you are on the other side. There is no magic involved. It is a physical process as yet undiscovered by the sages of science. I have no doubt they will soon chance upon the technique. And then my days as trickster and rogue will be numbered. I shall have to take up a more conventional hobby, attempting to impale fish on tiny hooks, perhaps, or endlessly turning a hoe in the dirt of some barren suburban allotment.
As ignorant of the exact mechanism as was my father, I nonetheless maintain that the gift is not so surprising considering the emptiness of existence. This is more than a hollow metaphor. Matter is essentially porous, containing more holes than substance. Everything you can think of on this world —rocks, cheese, raspberries, paper, oboes, grandfather clocks, brushes, teapots—is comprised of a relatively small amount of solidness and a vast amount of nothingness. There are yawning chasms between molecules, through which a miniature Hannibal could lead a horde of atomic elephants. As always, the small mirrors the large; it is the same with two colliding galaxies, which pass through each other without scraping the gilt off their suns.
There are disadvantages to my talent. There was Charlotte, my first girlfriend, who decided to introduce me to the joys of physical love. The motions necessary are not dissimilar to those needed to travel through walls and doors. She guided me across the border of her undiscovered country, so to speak, but before I could get my visa stamped, I passed right through her and the bed and struck my head on the bare boards beneath. “You selfish brute!” she wailed. I was forced to agree. I lost my innocence in a knothole.
Another time, posting a letter, second class, I forgot to release it and followed the epistle into the pillar-box. Overwhelmed by the poor quality of my confines, the mass of mundane correspondence around me, the odour of the myriad salivas that had sealed it, I temporarily lost my powers. I had to wait for the postman to deliver me with his sack and grin. Despite his outward benevolence, he charged me excess postage and ignored my protests of “Fragile! Do not bend!” Since that time, I make use of the service as little as possible. I send few festive cards and, as a consequence, receive few in return.
Generally, however, I enjoy myself without caution, for travelling through walls is not a pastime for the timid. There is always one worry at the back of the mind: what if I become stuck halfway? My father held it would happen eventually. It did not deter him, though he often liked to imagine future archaeologists discovering foundations for his belief in the foundations of a building. I don’t pay serious homage to fears of this kind. I restrict my activities to passing through doors of moving vehicles, too thin to become embedded in. Landing on the road, rolling away unhurt and unseen are greater problems.
Last month, I was working my way through the villages of Yorksire in a half-hearted snowstorm. I disregarded the chills in pursuit of my favourite fraud. I hitched across the entire county in a single day, disappearing from a total of twelve vehicles as I ventured north. The quilt of snow protected my bones each time I emerged on the other side of the passenger door. Furthermore, I’d chosen a white suit to blend in with the environment. The rural roads lay like hairs on a vast lake of undulating milk, black and thin. It’s a region rife with phantoms, generally stringy misers and hermits.
The best time to slip through a door is when the vehicle is turning into a bend. Whatever the attractions of the passenger, few drivers will desire conversation until the road straightens out again. In that pause, I tumble sideways, leaving an empty seat, horribly warm for the curious hand. So a necklace of ghost-tales was strung out on the creamy moors, beads carved from skulls. I made one mistake: leaving my briefcase with a student taking home washing. It was full of leaflets for pepper-pots, doubtless reducing the ghastly effect.
By evening, I had broken my record of hauntings and was considering finding a warm bed for the night. Accordingly, I polished my thumb for a genuine lift. There was a grimy town some dozen miles distant, a typical set of houses gathered round a reconstructed inn. I didn’t have long to wait; a blue Volvo pulled up and I climbed in. The driver turned out to be a blond giant in strange garb: furs and leather. He was more reticent than the average host and I wondered about his motives for giving me a lift. To break the silence, I felt compelled to remark on the wetness of the snow, the disappointing ice.
“Aye,” His voice was gruff. “Winter’s not what it used to be. I recall log-fires and axes, mead and runes.”
I frowned. “Did you say runes?”
“And wolves and longships. Those were the days.” He tugged his huge beard and cast a steely blue gaze at me. Then he returned his attention to his driving. Rather than betray astonishment, I kept quiet and didn’t ask him to elaborate. We continued awkwardly for some time. Finally, I could bear it no longer and cried:
“So what’s your line of work?”
He darted another glance, less calculating than before and laughed. “Questing and hacking. What’s yours?”
Having left my briefcase in the other car, I had no ready prop to back up my salesman claim. A hawker without a product is like a vulture without a beak. An alternative identity was required. I was free to name any profession I chose, which is doubtless why I was unable to think of one. Variety can be truly sterile.
At the same time, I was determined not to be browbeaten by such a cryptic fellow. He’d obviously marked me out as a simpleton to be toyed with. It would be a delight, I mused, to turn the tables on him—in his case, round tables which needed to be flipped as well as spun. I lowered my own tone an octave, made it as dry as a desiccated eyelid and stifled a pretend chuckle. My teeth glimmered.
“Haunting drivers. I am the phantom hitch-hiker.”
Instead of greeting this pronouncement with derision or fear, the driver gave a joyous cry and pounded the steering-wheel with his massive fist. “Excellent,” he muttered to himself. Then, addressing me directly, he added: “At long last, a companion on my journey, a kindred spirit! I have waited centuries for this.”
I assumed he’d misheard. “Phantom hitch-hiker,” I repeated.
He clapped me on the knee, keeping his
eyes on the road. “Pleased to meet you. I’m Olaf Smorgåsbord, the phantom-driver. Been wandering this area a thousand years, on horseback originally, but I’m no purist. I make use of available technology. Spent the Middle-Ages on wagons and carts. Now I’ve got an engine. It gets lonely, this ceaseless questing, and I often pick up travellers. But humans have such trivial concerns, it’s nice to meet another ghost. Tell me, does your ectoplasm ache first thing in the morning? Or is it just me?”
I swallowed and tried to still my beating heart (I can do this by actually reaching inside my chest.) I resisted the temptation to ask him to drop me off. He seemed an unpredictable sort. He might take offence and perform the rite of the Blood-Eagle on me. I’d read about these ancient Nordic chaps; I didn’t wish to have my ribs snapped and peeled back from my chest to appease a heathen sensibility. I could smell organic mushrooms on his breath; always a bad sign. With a gallant effort, I controlled my extreme panic.
Small-talk was the order of the evening. Nonchalantly, I asked, “Which quest might that be?”
He heaved a sigh. “I’m looking for Thor’s nail.”
I nodded, rubbed my chin and made convincing sympathetic noises at the back of my throat. “That sounds like a difficult task. I hope I’m not interrupting your search?”
“Not really. I don’t think I’ll ever find it. I wish Thor had asked someone else. Ready to give up, I am, but he won’t have it. What use is his hammer without a nail? I can see his point. Without a nail he can’t hang pictures in Valhalla. Edvard Munch is his favourite painter.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “To be honest, he prefers Monet, but he won’t admit it. Odin would make jokes.”
“I see. But I must be an inconvenience. Wouldn’t you rather search in peace? I can walk from here.”
“And deny me the chance to play with a fellow spectre? No fear! How often do shakers and moaners cross paths? This is a rare opportunity for us both. With mortals I generally keep my idea of fun under worm-gnawed wraps. I don’t like being a closet wraith, but I mustn’t jeopardise the quest. I spook the occasional student, of course, who doesn’t? But it’s hardly satisfying for a berserker ghost! I crave something more violent, something with a bit of exposed marrow.”
“Alas,” said I, “my disposition is withered and sober and I really don’t consider myself suitable for whatever you have in mind. I’m sure a more compatible soul will come along soon. Plenty more frights in the aether. A ghoul would suit fine.”
“Nonsense. You look just the type for a wild night. We can commence our ghostly pranks right now. For example, let’s accelerate at that tree and dash our insubstantial minds out. Whoever loses his bottle first and dematerialises has to pay a forfeit.”
Without waiting for a reply, Olaf depressed the pedal. That caused us to rush at horrible speed down the ill-lit road. Then he turned off onto the frozen verge and we bounced over a field. The tree, a massive oak, engulfed the periphery of my vision. At this speed, it was out of the question for me to escape through the door, whether by conventional means or otherwise. I gripped my seat and ground my teeth and started to whimper: the usual weaknesses.
I turned to face my driver, to plead with him to slow down, but to my utter horror, he had vanished. For what it was worth, it seemed I’d won this first game. I screamed: “I give in! I confess everything! I’m not the phantom hitch-hiker, but a pepper-pot salesman! For pity’s sake come back and stop the car!”
Suddenly, he was back in his seat and the brakes were squealing and we were spinning in ludicrous circles, radii as wide as the rings of the very tree whose trunk we avoided kissing by a few inches. I slumped in my seat and loosed tears.
Olaf frowned. “Are you sure you’re not a phantom hitcher? You’re not just saying that, are you?”
“My name is Mark Anthony Zimara. I’m a trickster and lovable rogue, fluffy hair, smooth tongue. Nothing more. I play pranks on drivers when they pick me up. The joke no longer seems funny. I never really believed in the spirit world; I thought all ectoplasm was muslin. I apologise for deceiving you, barbarian spectre.”
He puffed out his cheeks and guffawed. I was agitated by his mirth, which I took to be at my expense, but then it dawned on me that it was expressing relief. He was actually pleased I wasn’t a ghost; I couldn’t account for this, after all he’d said.
Finally, he explained, “You had me worried back there. I’m also a prankster. I pretend to be a sort of doomed soul, condemned to wander the earth on an impossible quest. I’m a tax-inspector from Leeds, which perhaps is not dissimilar. When you announced yourself as the phantom hitch-hiker, I was terrified!”
I blinked. “But I saw you vanish into thin air.”
“No, no, I merely made myself invisible. It’s a technique my father taught me on his death-bed. He was an escapologist, better known as the Wondrous Pulse. Discovered the secret in his sleep, was nearly crushed when my mother sat on him.”
The coincidence was so remarkable that I couldn’t speak for many moments. It emerged that his father had performed in the same venues as mine, though they’d never met, revolving round the circuit at different points. The art of invisibility was akin to the art of passing through walls. It was a question of allowing light to travel unhindered between a body’s molecules, rather than absorbing it. This meant conquering greed at the microscopic level.
“Well fancy that! I guess we had to cross paths at some point. But tell me more about your father. So he performed for soldiers during the war? And they often beat him up! That’s too bad. Did he, by any chance, own a cat? He did! And what was it’s name? Quisling, eh!”
Olaf opened the glove-compartment and took out a flask of akevitt, an abrasive northern spirit. We both needed to settle our nerves. It’s not everyday that a pepper-pot salesman and a tax-inspector, sons of escapologists, manage to alarm each other to the extent where both are ready to give up the ghost— literally and metaphorically. I mean that fear had tempted me to forsake rascality and live a simple life. Olaf felt the same; but as we drank and the liquor warmed, our terror melted by degrees until even the memory of it had thawed.
We toasted ourselves, our talents and our fathers. “Here’s to the Great Legume! Here’s to the Wondrous Pulse! Here’s to the phantom hitch-hiker and the phantom driver! May the former never mill aimlessly, may the latter never tax his brains!”
While we sat, a car pulled up on the side of the road and a figure got out and began to stalk across the icy field. I watched its progress in the mirror and nudged my companion. It was dressed in a black uniform which the wind-driven snow seemed reluctant to settle on. Then I noticed that it wasn’t sinking into the drifts.
Olaf wound his window down and leaned out expectantly. The figure approached and flashed a badge—an inverted pentangle. It crouched and leered at us, eyes like dark grapes which are due to be trampled into Black Mass wine.
“I saw what happened back there. I’m arresting you for dangerous driving. Get out of the car.”
Olaf shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know what you mean. We pulled off the road deliberately. We decided to sit in this field awhile and enjoy the view—not much of one I grant you, but there’s no law against appreciating bland vistas. Besides, you haven’t got any authority over us. That badge is a fake. I think you’d better state exactly who you are and what your business is.”
“I am the phantom traffic-policeman.”
At this solemn pronouncement, I couldn’t forbear laughing. Olaf, a more robust chap, slapped the dashboard with a hand and cried: “Phantom traffic-policeman? Of course you are! I bet your father was called the Remarkable Bean! And had a cat named Franco!”
The figure reached for its belt. It drew a hawthorn truncheon and levelled it at Olaf’s head. My companion gave a start and tried to wind the window up. “He’s barmy!” The figure inserted its weapon into the gap and levered the glass back down, a considerable feat of strength. Poking its face in, it recoiled in disgust.
“You’ve been dr
inking! That’s a serious offence. You’ll get several centuries for this!”
Olaf tried to start the car, but the engine wouldn’t turn over. I was more placatory. I got out, opening the door properly this time, and held my hands in the air. “I won’t resist,” I said, “but there’s been a mistake. We’re mortals. If you truly are a phantom policeman, you have no jurisdiction over us.”
It’s voice was heavy with cynicism. “Mortals are we now, sir? I suggest we go along to the station to discuss that. My colleagues will be pleased to hear what you’ve got to say on the matter. No disrespect, but to me you look like a phantom hitch-hiker and a phantom driver. Now if you’ll just exhale into this bag . . .”
Olaf followed my example and got out, but he was in a bad temper. “Don’t do anything he asks. He’s an impostor, just like us. Walk away from the fool.” And he started tramping.
The phantom policeman reached out and grabbed him by the elbow. Olaf winced but then lashed out. “Hands off me, you swine! I’ll make black-puddings out of your intestines!”
I tried to intercede, to pull them apart. There was a tussle. Then I felt the weight of the truncheon on my skull and sagged to my knees. “Make yourself invisible!” I hissed to Olaf. He turned to catch my words and the staff caught him on the head also. He sprawled on top of me, knocking me to the ground and smothering me in his bristly beard. The snow blackened to a crisp and I was plummeting down a crevasse that had opened up in its midst . . .