The ghost led Daniel and Rosie to a body that was hidden in a priest hole in the wall of a large room downstairs. The corpse was covered with car air fresheners and the hole was full of a sweet chemical smell.
Dust moved in tiny tumbleweeds as Daniel leant down over the curled-up body, his movement disturbing them. Something had nibbled one of the ears. Spiderwebs trailed over the dead man and caught the dust and grime. The clothes had something white and furred growing on them in patches. Daniel put his head to one side and held his breath as he took the flask out of his pocket.
After the ghost had told him what to do, he unscrewed the cap and paused, wondering how much of the liquid he should drop on to the corpse’s head. Two drops at first. And then another two. And one for good luck.
They all disappeared. Nothing trickled out of the hairline down the neck or the throat. The body had soaked up every drop.
‘This is the secret of the flask,’ said the ghostly man. ‘This is what Lawson knew would happen,’ it said as its outline started to fade away. And then it vanished as if someone had turned off a projector and the image was gone.
Daniel and Rosie waited to see what was going to happen.
But when they heard footsteps running round the paving stones outside the house, and the front door being pushed open, they squeezed each other’s hands.
‘What’s happening? What’s going on?’ asked Rosie and Daniel could only shake his head.
They stood up and turned to face the doorway as they heard feet frantically running in the hall.
‘Mason?’ shouted a voice. ‘Mason!’
They knew who it was before Frank appeared in the doorway, a black revolver in his hand.
He stared at them. Sunlight glancing off the muzzle of the gun.
‘Where is he? His car’s still here. What’s happened to him? Has he mugged me off? Has he?’
Sunlight mottled the floor.
Daniel heard a sound behind him.
The crick of joints.
The gasp of a breath.
And he looked back round at the body in the priest hole as it started clawing the webs from its dirty clothes, combing the grime and dirt from its hair. Its lungs like paper bags as they crackled.
As the man opened his eyes, he smiled at Daniel. And then he looked beyond the boy and saw Frank moving towards him with the gun pointed, his mouth wide open.
‘What the hell are you doing here? You’re supposed to be dead!’ Frank’s tongue whipped round the outside of his mouth like a lizard licking its lips and he fired a shot.
The man put his hands to his chest and suddenly they were leaking red. He tried to push the blood back in, but it was coming too fast and he looked up with bright blue eyes as he fell back into the priest hole, the dust flying and the air fresheners scattering in his wake.