Free The Smile of a Ghost by Phil Rickman

to come in for his Star nearly every night.’
    ‘Mam, that was the old bishop. He don’t live here no more.’
    ‘He can’t tell me why, see! That’s why he don’t wanner come.’ She turned to Saltash. ‘Can’t tell me.’
    Mrs Mumford stared at Saltash in silence. Merrily looked away, around the room. The walls were bare, pink anaglypta, except for a wide picture in a gilt frame over a sideboard with silverware on it. But the picture had been turned round to face the wall. All you could see was the brown-paper backing, stretched tight.
    What was it a picture of? Ludlow Castle?
    ‘What would you like the Bishop to tell you?’ Saltash asked.
    Mam kept on staring at him, like she knew him but couldn’t place him. You could feel her confusion in the room, like a tangle of grey wool in the air. Her voice went into a whisper.
    ‘Why did God let her take him?’ Starting to cry now. ‘Why did God let that woman take our boy?’
    Saltash leaned forward. ‘Which woman is that, Phyllis?’
    ‘You’re supposed to be a policeman!’ Mam rounding on Andy, chins quaking. ‘Why din’t you stop her?’
    Andy Mumford drew a tight breath through clenched teeth, the veins prominent in his cheeks.
    ‘The Bishop, when he come round, he sat on that settee with a cup of tea and a bourbon biscuit and he never mentioned God nor Jesus, not once.’
    Merrily said softly, ‘Mrs Mumford, who was the woman?’
    Mam didn’t look at her. ‘I can’t say it.’ She pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and blew her nose. Saltash caught Merrily’s eye.
    Andy said, ‘Mam, you can say anything to Mrs Watkins, and it won’t go no further.’
    ‘What… this girl?’
    Mam snorted. Mumford looked helplessly at Merrily.
    ‘Phyllis,’ Saltash said. ‘I think you were starting to tell us about Robbie.’
    ‘Oh…’ She smiled suddenly, her face flushed. She sat up, centre stage. ‘He loves it here, he does.’
    ‘He felt safe here.’
    ‘He loves it.’
    ‘He was interested in history, wasn’t he?’
    ‘He loves all the old houses. He’s always walking up and down, looking at the old houses. He knows when they was all built and he knows who used to live in them. You can walk up Corve Street with him, and he’ll tell you who used to live where, what he’s found out from books. Reads such a lot of books. Reads and reads. I says, you’ll hurt your eyes, reading in that light!’
    ‘Phyllis,’ Saltash said. ‘Can you see Robbie… reading?’
    ‘No!’ She reared up, nodding the word out, hard. ‘I don’t need to see him no more. I said, please don’t let me see him. I don’t wanner see him like that…’
    ‘Like that?’
    ‘All broken. I don’t wanner— I just hears him now. Nan, Nan… Sometimes he’s a long way away. But sometimes, when I’m nearly asleep, he’ll be real close. Nan…’ She smiled. ‘And he draws them, the old houses. He’s real good. Draws all them old houses. And the church. And the ca—’
    She stopped, her mouth open. And then her whole face seemed to flow, like a melting candle, and a sob erupted, and she clawed at her face and then – as Merrily stood up – kicked her chair back, dropping her hands.
    ‘She took him off.’
    ‘Mam!’ Andy knelt by the side of the chair, steadying it. ‘You mustn’t—’
    ‘She pushed him off, Andrew.’
    ‘No,’ Mumford said. ‘Now, that didn’t happen. Did it?’
    ‘Pushed him off,’ his mam said. ‘He told me.’
    ‘What do you mean?’ Mumford staring up into his mother’s swirling face. ‘What are you saying?’
    Outside, the sun had gone in and there was a cold breeze. Merrily stared across the car park at the Tesco store. Its roof line had a roller-coaster curve, and she saw how this had been formed to follow the line of the hills beyond the town.
    Some town – even Tesco’s having to sing in harmony.
    She felt inadequate. Something wasn’t making sense. Or it was making the wrong kind of sense. There was an acrid air of