Silencing the Dead by Will Harker (ready to read books .TXT) 📗

was the same creaky tin box it had always been, but Haz had worked his magic and transformed the interior into something resembling a home. Colourful throws, scented candles, his vintage Garrard turntable and record collection, my mum’s books neatly stacked on a cinderblock bookcase by the bed. It was small and cramped, but it was ours.

Or it had been.

Finally, I drifted back to the TV. An interviewer with a plummy Etonian drawl was introducing a tall, narrow-shouldered man in a well-cut suit. He was aged about fifty and what my mum would have called “well-preserved,” no slackening at the jawline and just a trace of grey around the temples. The only marked lines in his face were those bracketing a somewhat humourless mouth. He wore stylish tortoiseshell glasses and had a habit of almost constantly adjusting his cuffs in a fussy, preening sort of gesture.

“It’s my pleasure this evening to have as my guest a noted figure from the world of popular science. Dr Joe Gilles—”

“Joseph,” the doctor said, that dour mouth puckering. “Only my mother and my partner call me Joe.”

“Dr Joseph Gillespie,” the interviewer appeased. “Tonight, Dr Gillespie is here to discuss his new investigative documentary, Ghost Scammers, in which he aims to debunk all claims of the supernatural and especially those of mediums and clairvoyants. The programme will air on Halloween night, at exactly the same time as renowned—” Gillespie actually blanched at the word, “—celebrity medium Darrel Everwood and his team of ‘Ghost Seekers’ broadcast their live séance from Purley Rectory. Reputedly the most haunted house in England. Dr Gillespie, bearing in mind the long-running success of Darrel Everwood’s show, is ‘Ghost Scammers’ a deliberately provocative title on your part?”

“Yes,” Gillespie deadpanned. “Next question.”

The interviewer’s smile broadened. I imagined he could see his obscure little show trending on social media.

“You are by training a physicist, Dr Gillespie,” he went on. “A serious scientist. And yet in recent years, you’ve waged what can only be described as a crusade against believers in the supernatural. Some might ask, why do you waste your time on such nonsense?”

Gillespie raised his eyebrows. “Because it is dangerous nonsense. Humanity spent its infancy terrified of sprites and demons, but if we are ever to grow into maturity as a species we must abandon the terrors of the cradle. The supernatural not only diverts the ingenuity of the human mind away from the really important questions of existence, but it can also be immensely harmful. People throw away their hard-earned money on these psychic conmen and do damage to themselves in the process. Psychiatry has shown us that grieving is a natural process. It is healthy to let go. Mediums, with their bogus claims of an afterlife, keep the griever stuck in the moment.”

I sat forward. For all his arrogance, I couldn’t help agreeing with Gillespie.

“But you seem particularly fixated on Darrel Everwood,” the interviewer observed.

“He is the most obnoxious of a bad lot, yes.”

I suddenly thought of Miss Rowell and her marked antagonism towards Everwood, then of the public backlash he’d recently suffered. I wondered if there were many people like Nick Holloway who still had sympathy for him.

“And of course his ex-fiancée has recently played into your hands,” the interviewer said. “The videos she’s released in which she claims he’s a fraud.”

“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,” Gillespie said drily. “But then hell doesn’t exist. Mr Everwood’s duplicity does.”

“But this isn’t just personal to Darrel Everwood. This is a crusade. I want to play the viewers an audio clip from a podcast you recently took part in.” The interviewer turned to the camera. “I should explain, Dr Gillespie was invited to challenge the skills of a once-famous spiritualist, Miss Genevieve Bell. Miss Bell and Dr Gillespie were tasked with ‘psychically’ reading the same subject in separate sessions. Here the podcaster reveals the results.”

The camera trained itself on an impassive Gillespie as the audio started to play.

“Miss Bell, in your reading you claimed that the subject’s late mother made contact with you. That from the spirit world, she had provided ten facts about her son. Of those facts, four were verified by the subject and our research team as correct, two were so general as to be statistically insignificant, and four were incorrect. Dr Gillespie, you approached the subject by a method of cold reading: analysing his age, sex, dress, manner of speech, body language, and facial expressions in response to your statements. Of the ten facts you provided, nine were verified as correct, with the subject himself remarking that you were clearly the more gifted medium.”

Dr Gillespie’s voice broke into the audio. “And of course, the truth is that I am not a medium. Nor are there any spirits whispering in poor Miss Bell’s ear. Her entire life has been constructed on a lie so transparent that even she cannot now fail to see it.”

A weak, plaintive voice responded, “But they do speak to me. They always have. Ever since I was a little girl.”

“Oh yes, I’ve heard your silly life story,” Gillespie scoffed. “But it’s results that matter. I won, you lost. Accept it, my dear. Learn from it.”

The clip came to an end and the interviewer turned back to the doctor.

“Poor woman.” Gillespie sighed. “I sat with her afterwards and explained how she does her tricks. Eliciting cooperation from her subjects, picking up physical clues from them, shot-gunning them—as we sceptics call it—with a huge quantity of general information before refining her guesses and then presenting those guesses as facts. The pitiful thing is, I think Miss Bell actually believed she was psychic, unlike Everwood who is fully aware of his chicanery.”

The interviewer shifted in his chair. “But isn’t there an element of cruelty in what you do, Doctor?”

A photograph appeared on a large screen behind the two men. It showed a child of about eight or nine years old, sitting hunched in a wicker chair, knees drawn up her chin, forearms clasped around her shins.