The Ghost Writer

1

Life had been going well for Sam Worth. After he'd left the soap, Upton Village , he'd had a successful run in a West End play and was now being offered more serious roles. Ever since performing in school plays, it had been his dream to be on stage. However, he'd been told by his manager, Karl Crowther, that the day job wasn't enough. He should be on chat shows, in adverts, and sharing it all on social media.

To those in the know, Karl was regarded as the English "Colonel Parker." The reference was lost on Sam. "Elvis Presley's Svengali," people explained, but "Svengali" also had to be spelled out to Sam. This said, the lad did recall being referred to as Karl's "golden goose." Perhaps that's when Sam's doubts began, doubts that grew after Karl had urged Sam to write something, "a children's book or a memoir, maybe."

For highly personal reasons, Sam had taken exception, confessing that he was seriously dyslexic. Karl, though, had simply laughed, which shocked Sam. Nowadays, Sam thought, no one made fun of such a disability. Regardless of his protestations, though, Karl persisted with the idea. "Don't worry, son," he assured his protégé. "We have people to do the heavy lifting. Ghost writers."

Sam did not like the sound of this. He pictured a skeletal figure, like Marley's ghost. However, after being introduced to Tom Graham, Sam was put at ease. Tom explained the process. How Sam just needed to talk about his growing up, which Tom would then shape into some lively prose. "I'm merely a midwife, or ghost," Tom assured him. "The book will come out under your name."

"But that's dishonest!" protested Sam.

"That's the ghost writer's lot," answered Tom. "Just think of me as your amanuensis."

"A man who …what?"

"Sorry," said Tom. "It's a fancy word for a secretary. I suffer from the opposite affliction to you: 'logophilia', a love of words."

Sam shook his head. But he was pleasantly surprised to discover how much he enjoyed his get-togethers with Tom. In a world of glitzy madness, their meetings provided rare moments of sanity. The two made good progress.

Suddenly, though, these get-togethers came to an end. There had been a devastating fire at Tom's house. Had the writer not spent time trying to rescue his precious manuscripts -- including material for the proposed "Book of Sam," as Tom called it -- he might have escaped, so it was said.

Sam was bereft, and felt guilty, too, especially after the police interviewed him, which, they assured him, was just a formality. Karl's reaction also surprised him. Usually, his manager turned any chance of publicity into a media circus, but on this occasion he was uncharacteristically reticent.

2

Karl knew he'd hit gold when he discovered Sam. He'd had to see off a few competitors before he managed to sign the lad, but that was nothing new. All had gone well until that ghost writer had started asking questions. Not that Tom could unearth any dirt about Sam. The lad was squeaky clean. Maybe he'd occasionally inhaled a joint, but that was about it.

Karl realised that he should have found out more about Tom Graham before hiring him. He subsequently discovered that the man had been an investigative journalist, which didn't bode well. Karl then warned his boys against talking to Graham, with whom Karl had a personal word. "Stick to Tom's story and leave mine alone!" he'd suggested.

Such talk, though, had only whetted Tom's appetite. He'd discovered that Karl Crowther was formerly Carl Lowther (not a very imaginative change), a man with a shady past in drug trafficking, pimping and protection racketeering. It was at this point that Karl had decided a fire was necessary. The coroner's verdict cited a faulty boiler as the cause.

After this, Karl shelved Sam's memoir and, given the time of year, booked some singing lessons for his protégé with a view to Sam making a Christmas album. It would open up work in musicals.

******

About a month after the fire, Karl received a strange phone call. He'd been out jogging, something that he'd taken up after a recent TIA. His doctor had told him to mend his ways, or else. Jogging had seemed the least unattractive option to Karl, who didn't intend putting his flabby self on display at any gym or pool. So, wearing his tracksuit with the hood up, Karl would take a few leisurely laps round his local park while listening to the latest Lee Child on Audible. It was on one of these occasions that a phone call interrupted Jack Reacher's exploits.

Karl stopped to look at the caller ID. It was his mother! Since she'd been put in a home, she never rang!

"Ma?" he answered.

"Is that you, Karl?" her voice came shakily through his earbuds.

"Ma?" he said again, pushing back his hood and wiping the sweat from his brow. She was incapable of using a phone, surely, let alone remembering she had a son.

"There's someone here wants a word. Will you take the call?"

It was a strange thing to say, thought Karl, but then it was his mother speaking. For her, it was reasonably lucid.

"Sure thing, Ma. Put 'em on."

There was a brief clicking before a male voice spoke. "I'm glad you invited me in, Karrrl."

Must be a doctor, thought Karl. "Who's that speaking?" he demanded. "And 'let you in' where, exactly?"

"Into your head, Karrrl. You invited me in. Remember that."

Karl disliked the way the man pronounced his name, with a real lip curl, as though it were spelt with about half a dozen "r"s. "Nutter!" was his one-word reply before terminating the call.

He went back to Jack Reacher. But after another lap of the park, he realised he'd not heard a word. In his head, that growling voice still resounded: "Karrrl!"

He went home and took a shower, giving his ears a good scour, as though to rid himself of that intrusive voice.

The rest of the day Karl spent trying to find a singing coach for Sam. Normally, he'd have allotted this task to someone else but, today, he wanted to keep himself busy. It was only towards evening that he let himself relax with a glass of Bell's. In fact, he'd been dozing off when he'd heard that voice again. "Karrrl!"

He woke with a start, scrabbling for his phone, thinking he must have dropped it in his armchair. Then he realised that the voice was inside his head. He tried turning up the volume on his TV to drown it out, but it was no good. He reached for his whisky, slopping the liquid down his shirt.

"You're not answering me, Karrrl … so we've got a long night ahead."

"Bullshit!" said Karl, striving to gain the upper hand.

"You remember me. The one who went up in flames?" Karl winced. "Tom Graham, your ghost writer -- now," the voice chuckled, "fully-qualified!"

"Stop pissing about! Tom Graham's-"

"Dead. Yes, Karrrl. Dead. And we know who's responsible, don't we?"

"I didn't do it!"

"No. You had it done. It's a bit like ghost writing, isn't it? Doing something on someone's behalf."

Karl said nothing.

"Didn't like what I discovered, did you, Carrrl Lowther?"

Karl remained silent.

"So, I'm no longer Sam's ghost writer. I'm yours now. Exclusively. Your resident ghost -- or 'host,' if you'd prefer."

Karl still said nothing.

"Well, I'll leave you to your whisky. Try not to spill any more of it."

Karl spilled a good deal more, but most of it down his throat. Eventually, it rendered him unconscious.

In the morning, Karl tried to laugh it off, blaming the drink. Ghosts, indeed! They didn't behave like that, did they? They made screechy noises and paraded around. That was the point of them, wasn't it? Apparitions. Also, of course, they turned out to be people, didn't they, dressed up in sheets, like on Scooby Doo, or like the Klan?

But try as he might, Karl couldn't escape the feeling that someone else was in his head. While going about his business, he made an effort to guard his thoughts, worried about what he might give away. In meetings, he found himself pausing, mid-sentence, to listen out for an eavesdropper. This went on for several days. His staff became increasingly concerned that their boss was losing it, that his drinking was getting the upper hand. Then, just as Karl began to relax his guard, to feel that this ghost, or host (or whatever), must have been some sort of hallucination, it popped up again.

"Boo!" Karl thought he was experiencing his second TIA. His body jack-knifed in shock. He had planned to ignore the voice, if it returned, but he found it very difficult to do so. He tried turning up his TV; then tried putting in his earbuds and filling his head with AC/DC. However, despite singing along to "Highway to Hell," the ghost writer's voice still penetrated. "Good choice," it said. After this, Karl hit the whisky with vehemence, listening only half-heartedly to the voice reminding him of highlights from his past. Unconsciousness finally liberated him.

The following morning, apart from the self-inflicted clanging and banging inside his head, Karl thought he was alone. He was appalled at the detail the ghost writer had dug up about him, going back to his early drug-pushing and pimping days.

The next week was a nightmare. He couldn't concentrate on anything, always on edge dreading the voice's next interjection. As the days passed, he almost wished it would declare itself as the silence was becoming increasingly ominous. He tried to pursue his "normal" business, but he knew he was distracted, not thinking straight, and his staff seemed to know it, too. They began to treat him like a disturbed child, and he was aware his authority was suffering.

The evenings were the worst, though, when he found himself alone. Initially, he'd tried hanging out in bars, but paranoia soon overtook him, and he narrowly avoided several fights. "Who you looking at, pal?" just didn't cut it when the eyeballer was on the inside. After that, he took to drinking at home, on his own, but the dread of "the voice" was even worse there. In the end, he invited over one of his girls, Sonya, to keep him company.

They'd had a pizza delivered and were drinking cocktails, half-heartedly watching one of Karl's less hardcore movies. Karl had warned Sonya that, if he should behave strangely, she was not to worry. But Karl was thinking only of that voice resounding within his head, not the Hammer Horror effects that were in store for him. It was as though the ghost writer was determined to display his credentials as a bona fide spirit.

It started subtly enough with the curtains billowing.

"Oh, come on!" said Karl, who, with Sonya alongside him, was feeling quite bullish. "You can do better than that, surely?"

"What you on about, Karl?" Sonya asked, lifting her nose from her Prosecco. "You're twitchy tonight."

"The curtains," he replied. "Didn't you see them blowing?"

"There's no wind, Karl, and that window's shut."

"No wind! Can't you hear it in the chimney?" Karl raised his hand, as though to mute the sound of the movie, but the creak of the lounge door was louder. "And look," he said, pointing towards the door, which was slowly swinging ajar.

"What now?"

"Can't you see it?" Karl's gestures were increasingly histrionic.

Then, as he watched, the door creaked shut again, as though proving the wind wasn't the cause.

"For God's sake, Karl. I'd lay off the juice if I were you," said Sonya, quaffing more Prosecco.

Karl flopped back on the settee. He now knew it was all in his head, which was in line with what he'd read on the Internet, earlier: "Auditory and visual hallucinations are relatively common, but if the voices start talking about aliens or ordering you to kill people, report to your GP immediately!"

Next thing, Karl felt his left hand twinge. Looking down, he watched it arch into a claw, his finger ends fastening over the rim of his whisky tumbler. He'd no idea what his hand was up to. He seemed to have lost all control of it -- something he realised when he tried to withdraw it. His attempts became more frantic as he watched his finger ends push themselves down over the rim of the glass, catching his fingernails on the outside. He could hardly believe it. His fingers were methodically prising the nails from their nailbeds. He roared with pain.

"What is wrong with you tonight?" demanded Sonya as she lifted his hand, with seeming ease, from the glass.

Karl was whimpering now. It was at this moment that the voice returned, clandestinely whispering, "That was nothing, Karrrl. Imagine that level of pain lasting an eternity. We don't need red-hot pincers to wrench out your tongue, or metal tongs to blister your flesh!" The voice paused before adding: "Though none of it's not as bad as being burned alive." Karl gulped. "Your mum's a lovely lady, by the way. I'm glad we could trace her."

Meanwhile, Sonya was studying Karl's hand. "There's nothing here," she said. "Was it cramp, perhaps?"

"Leave me alone!" Karl yelled at Tom.

"Well, thank you very much!" said Sonya, flouncing out of the room. "I'm getting a taxi."

"No, I didn't mean you, doll!" shouted Karl.

But she'd gone. Karl grunted and, once again, sought succour in whisky. It was obvious that these things were happening only inside his head, even though the pain was eye-watering. But Karl was relatively inured to pain. It had been the currency of his upbringing: beatings, dousings, burnings, and the like. That said, the way the ghost writer had taken control of Karl's body didn't seem quite fair. He worried about what was coming next.

Immediately this thought crossed his mind, he clamped a hand over his mouth -- as though this action would prevent the ghost writer from eavesdropping. "Nobhead!" he berated himself.

Eventually, Karl started making his wobbly way to bed. But, when he reached the top of the stairs, contrary to what he'd expected of his legs, they marched him in the opposite direction, to the big landing window. He knew he couldn't blame the drink for this. He cursed himself for being so open with his thoughts earlier -- as if that had made any difference.

Next thing Karl knew, he was flinging wide the casement window and clambering onto the sill. He found himself gazing down at the distant pavement.

It seemed an age that he stood there, swaying in the breeze (so there was a breeze after all, he noted), unable to move. Eventually, he could bear it no longer. "Come on, then. Do it if you're going to! Or haven't you the balls? You've certainly got mine!"

The ghost writer broke his silence. "I just realised," he said, "I'm starting to play it your way, aren't I? Intimidation? Scare tactics? But I'm not going to descend to your level -- which, by the way, lies far below that pavement." There was a pause. "No. Unlike you, I like to think I still have a moral compass."

"Yeah! Bet you were in the Boy Scouts, too!" Karl sneered. He suddenly felt cocky, as though he'd finally got the measure of his tormenter. He'd dealt middle-class wankers like Tom before.

However, his cockiness waned as the ghost writer continued: "So we're going to help you take responsibility for your actions. That is, 'rehabilitate' you. Turn you into someone who really cares."

"Jesus, can't you talk the talk!" said Karl. "Who do you think I am? Some character from one of your poncy books?"

The ghost writer didn't rise to this. "Perhaps a few years inside will help you see the error of your ways," he went on. "Let you to come to terms with yourself."

"Inside" was not a word Karl liked to hear. It wasn't doing the porridge that worried him; it was the claustrophobia of the place. Then, as Karl once again realised, he was thinking too openly. "Minds have ears!" he reminded himself.

******

It didn't seem more than a few minutes before Karl's alarm went off -- except that it rang only in his head. Like a condemned man he clambered out of bed, not sure whose volition he was under. The ghost writer was certainly keeping mum, despite Karl's attempts to provoke a response. "What you doing, pal, this time of night?"

Once dressed, Karl found himself walking into his office, switching on his computer, and opening a Word document. "Confession," he found himself typing, after which his fingers sped up. Karl couldn't believe how fast they raced over the keyboard. He could hardly read that fast! But he did see enough to get the drift of this "confession." He recognised the names of victims and accomplices, the bank account numbers, etc. Finally, Tom Graham's name flashed up, alongside the name of the arsonist: Kenny Wall.

The next thing Karl found himself doing was printing, signing, scanning and, finally, forwarding this document to the police.

It was still morning when there was a knock at the door.

3

Prison certainly cured Karl of his claustrophobia. Involuntarily, he'd experienced a therapy known as "flooding." But that wasn't the only thing that had changed about Karl. Those who visited him were amazed at the transformation. For those who believed in the rehabilitatory potential of prison, Karl was a shining example.

Sam was certainly impressed. For the last seven years, he'd managed to concentrate on his acting and his career had gone from strength to strength. He'd starred in a few films and earned some prestigious awards. However, he still found time to visit Karl, despite the terrible things he'd learned about his former manager. Sam kept Karl up to date on his career.

What surprised Sam was the genuine interest Karl now showed in his acting. Karl even helped Sam learn his lines, prompting when necessary. Karl particularly liked to hear Sam deliver the big soliloquies from Shakespeare, and Sam certainly enjoyed performing them.

Even more surprising was Karl's newfound interest not just in reading but writing, too. The two shared books and discussed favourite authors. Sam was still behoven to Tom for opening up this world to him, and habitually sang his mentor's praises. Strangely, Karl did not seem to mind hearing the ghost writer's name lauded. Karl seemed to accept his guilt.

On his most recent visit, Karl had once again surprised Sam by handing the actor a manuscript. "My autobiography," Karl announced.

Sam found it unexpectedly candid. After detailing his tough upbringing and subsequent career as drug dealer, loan shark, pimp, and, of course, impresario, it seemed that Karl had undergone a miraculous conversion.

"I found my moral compass," Karl had written, "which is when I sent that confession to the police." It was no wonder he'd been recommended for early release. He was a shining example for the criminal justice system to champion.

Several other sentences in Karl's autobiography leapt out at Sam, but it was these lines in particular that he found intriguing:

"I know many people employ a ghost writer to write their memoirs. Originally, I'd planned to do the same but, over time, and with the prison library at my disposal, I'd come to feel confident enough to write my own. In fact, I've become a complete logophile. I feel like a new man!"

THE END

Bio: Dr David Rudd is an emeritus professor who, after 40 years, turned from academic prose to creative writing and found fulfilment. He has so far published around fifty stories. Recent works have appeared in "Bandit Fiction," "Bewildering Stories," "The Blotter," "Corner Bar Magazine," and "Literally Stories."

E-mail: David Rudd

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