Read Online Walking with Ghosts by John Baker - Free Book Online

didn’t know the answer. But he know that you can’t rule anyone out. And when some-was killed with violence, statistically the perpetrator was the person they were married to.
    Sam took the CD out of the player and put it back in its case. He went quietly up the stairs and stood by Dora’s bed. Her eyes flickered for a moment, then opened. She said: ‘Sam, I’d like to see Billy again.’
    Her son, Billy. She hadn’t seen him or heard from him for years. Sam had never met him. ‘I’ll try,’ he said. ‘Maybe Diana’ll have an address? But if he doesn’t want to be found, I won’t be able to do much about it.’
    Dora had gone back to sleep. Maybe she hadn’t been awake. She knew too much to argue.
    An hour later Sam was sitting in a chair downstairs, the television with the sound switched down to drooling level, wondering if he should go to bed. He pressed the buttons on the telephone without lifting the receiver. Practising.
     

10
     
    She was white, looking thinner than normal, especially her face, her eyes wide and dark. ‘I feel sick,’ Janet said. Geordie panicked momentarily, a quick flutter at his breast, a tightening around his hairline. Then he breathed again. Something she’d eaten, or too much work.
    ‘Why don’t you go back to bed?’ he asked. ‘I’ll give Marie and J.D. a bell. They can manage without me for a day.’
    ‘No.’ Janet shook her head. ‘I’m going to work. We’re expecting deliveries. It’ll be chaos if I’m not there.’
    ‘But if you’re being sick—’
    ‘I’m not being sick, Geordie. I feel queasy. It’ll pass.’ Geordie was standing in the doorway to the bathroom, Janet with her back to the wash basin. She went over to him and touched his face, and he leaned forward to kiss her forehead.
    ‘You sure?’ he said.
    ‘Yeah. I’ll be all right.’
    ‘I should go in, as well. I said J.D. could come with me today. I’m gonna see the woman who used to be Edward Blake’s secretary.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Time to go.’
    ‘I’m ready,’ Janet said. She followed him outside, grabbing a coat from a hook and putting it on while she waited for Geordie to lock the door. Barney looked up at her, his head cocked to one side. Banks of dark cloud had stacked themselves up over the playing field — shadowy, heavy. But to the south the clouds were grey, blue, fluffy. Over the ditch at the bottom of the garden there was a huge tree. Geordie didn’t know what kind of tree it was. He made another mental note to look it up in a book.
    When Geordie looked back a couple of years, to the time Sam had picked him out of the gutter, he sometimes thought it was a dream. But it wasn’t. He had been a homeless down-and-out, and for some reason Sam Turner had pulled him out of it. Geordie would never understand why. And he’d never stop being grateful.
    Look at him now - not only Janet, and a house with real radiators for the winter, but all this nature as well: trees, and birds, horses in fields.
    They hadn’t switched on the heating yet, because it would cost money and it wasn’t really cold enough. But when they’d moved in during the summer they’d run it one day, just to make sure it worked. The whole house had been unbearably hot. They’d had to open all the windows and take off their clothes.
    At the end of the track they waited a couple of minutes for the bus, and sat together on the back seat, looking out at the other commuters making their way into York.
    In the city, Geordie left Janet outside the remainder bookshop where she worked, and walked on to the office.
     
    J.D. and Marie were already there, standing close to each other by the window. They turned towards him as he came in, both of them with a sheepish smile. Marie looked like Janet sometimes looked on a Sunday morning after a late Saturday night and a bit of a sleep in. J.D. just looked rough. His beard was pointing in a dozen different directions. But he jerked into life when he saw