Free The Ghost in Love by Jonathan Carroll Page B

for a drink of water and a quick check of his food bowl.
    The ghost was sitting at the kitchen table smoking a cigarette and staring at the drifting smoke. “What happened, Pilot? Who’s that old man? Where did you get him?”
    Instead of answering, the dog bent over and took a long drink.
    â€œPilot?”
    â€œWait a minute, willya?” He drank some more and then stopped. “I don’t know what’s going on. We were walking down the street and gradually started going slower. I didn’t pay any attention until we stopped moving. I turned around and there
he
was.”
    â€œFrom one minute to the next he turned into an old man?”
    â€œI guess so. I told you, Ling, I didn’t see it happen. Suddenly there was an old guy holding my leash and looking around like he was completely lost. I led him back here and he let me. End of story.”
    The ghost put the cigarette out on the tip of its tongue. Then, after laying the butt carefully down on the table, Ling said, “This is not good news. Not good at all.”
    They heard the sound of footsteps coming down the hall towardthem. German Landis entered the kitchen. She went to a cupboard and took out a teapot and two cups. After filling a kettle with water, she put it on the stove to boil. Opening another cupboard, obviously familiar with where everything was kept in this kitchen, she looked at the large assortment of teas arranged on the shelf. Ben and his teas: Ben and his love for good food. How on earth could that old man in the other room be him?
    The dog and ghost watched intently as she moved around, preparing tea things on a tray. Before leaving the living room she had helped old Ben into a chair and said she would make them some tea. Afterward they could talk. The old fellow sat down with an exhausted groan and nodded gratefully at her offer. He looked so spent that she was almost afraid to leave him alone.
    A few minutes later in the kitchen the three of them snapped to attention like an animal when it hears a piercing whistle. But a whistle didn’t capture their attention: it was singing. Someone was singing in the living room, which meant it had to be the old man.
    Rapt at the unexpected sound of his very good voice, all three of them listened to the singer.
    â€œ ‘A-live-a-live-oh
,
    A-live-a-live-oh,’
    Crying ‘Cockles and mussels, a-live-a-live oh.’
    â€œIn Dublin’s fair city
,
    Where the girls are so pretty
,
    I first set eyes on sweet Molly Malone . . .”
    Pretty as it was, the dog and ghost thought the singing was strange. German winced. The song was the Irish ballad “MollyMalone” and it was what Ben sang whenever he was happy. Often he sang the song when he wasn’t even aware of doing it, such as when he was cooking something challenging. No matter where German was, whenever she heard Ben singing “Molly Malone,” she knew he was content.
    Leaving the tea tray on the table, she hurried out of the kitchen. She found the old man singing in front of Ben’s bookcases. He was looking at an open book in his hands.
    Glancing up at her, he said in an excited voice, “I know this one; I
know
this book!” He sounded so pleased, as if he had found the way home all by himself. He held it up for her and she saw the name John Thorne printed on the spine. Thorne was one of Ben’s heroes. He loved to read to her from the writer’s books on food and often tried the recipes in them if they weren’t too exotic. German didn’t like complicated food.
    As quickly as his face had lit up, it shut down again. The hand holding the book trembled and dropped to his side. “It’s horrible. Can you understand how horrible it is not to be able to remember your own life?
    â€œWhen you’re young, it’s all about what you do with your life. When you’re old, it’s really only about what you remember. The only thing I’ve got left of my