I'm glad I'm alone here, Laurie thought. I don't want anyone. I don't need anyone. She gazed across at the boy Brahms and smiled. "We don't do we, Brahmsie. Just you and me..."

She reached across the kitchen table and stroked the doll's soft dark hair. "Can you feel me?" she whispered. Laurie raised her eyes and scanned the kitchen. "Do you hear me, Brahms?" There was no answer, of course, and she didn't expect one. Brahms had his own ways of letting her know he was around. She might find a rose on the kitchen table, its petals still dewed with moisture. A cup of coffee steaming hot in china, waiting for her after she'd reset the rat traps. Once, she'd found a small wooden foal beautifully carved from rosewood lying on her bed with a tiny red ribbon tied around its neck.

The soft padding she heard around the house no longer disturbed her, for she'd come to gain some measure of comfort to know he was abroad in the night and nearby. Several times she'd tried to catch him out, to open the door or run round a corner in an effort to glimpse his shade; but he was never there; save for his footfall echoing through the walls.

He's always been very shy, you see.

So, Laurie indulged the boy as his parents had and didn't worry too much at his elusiveness. She applied herself to his needs, coming to realise that routine was as important here as it was to any child; that Brahms's happiness and security lay entirely with her. For some reason this gave her a new inner peace she'd not felt for years. A purpose and a calling.

The phone rang in the hall.

"Hey, Laurie!"

"Hi, sis."

"Not heard from you for a few days. How's things?"

"Good."

"Really? Brahms broken you in then?"

Laurie smiled and shook her head. "You could say that."

"Listen, Joel's been sniffing around."

"Jesus. You've not told him anything. Where I am?"

"Of course not. You know what he's like."

"Yeah. A tenacious bastard. I feel like I'll never be free of him."

"He'll give up and move on with enough time."

"That could mean I'll be stuck here forever!"

"Would that be so bad? You might meet an English Lord and get to be lady of your own manor. The Heelshire's sponsored you, didn't they? For your visa?"

"Yes."

"So it can't all be true about Welsh men and sheep? There's gotta be some hot stuff shepherding the hills or whatever!"

"The last thing I want now is any romantic or emotional entanglements. I'm off men. I'd rather have the sheep!" Laurie sighed heavily. "I can't bear it if Joel finds me. I can't deal with him again."

"He won't. He's a loser, Laurie. He can't even get a decent job. You know he's still living like a bum in that flat with Andrew Corser."

"The drug dealer?"

"I wouldn't call him that. Selling pot to down and outs doesn't make him Pablo Escobar. I heard Joel was doing casual around the local farms. Shovelling shit is about all he's fit for."

"He'll be wheeling and dealing, Amanda. He always seemed to have money and he'd never tell me where he got it from."

"Michael's seen him around the bars and clubs. With various women. You're well rid of him, sis. Please don't dwell on what he did. He's not worth your time and energy."

"I know. Listen, I have to go. Don't worry about me. I'm settling in and I feel happier than I've felt for a long time. I feel safe here."

"You take care. I'll ring you in a few days."

"No, I'll ring you. The Heelshire's are paying for the calls remember? Speak soon. Love you."

Laurie eyed the old fashioned gramophone with distaste. She'd shuffled through all the old records, played most of them on full blast and not one of them was something she wanted to listen to. It wasn't that she couldn't appreciate classical music, but one could only stomach so much of Frédéric Chopin: Nocturne in B-flat minor or The Flight of the fucking Bumble Bee.

Today she'd plugged in her iPod dock and was determined to educate Brahms with something more suitable for both their ages.

"Today we've got a different kind of classical, Brahms. Something that probably suits us both down to the ground."

Strains of PInk Floyd's Shine on you Crazy Diamond floated through the house. Laurie turned it up full volume. Dave Gilmour's exquisite guitar filled the room, achingly beautiful. Smiling to herself she sat down and stared at boy Brahms, wondering if the ghost inside approved. Then she closed her eyes and immersed herself in the music. As the last few notes played out she addressed the doll. "That's us, isn't it? Two crazy diamonds. And we're young, and we shine like the sun..." Laurie threw back her head and laughed out loud. "Come on. Let's dance!"

The track was Viva La Vida by Coldplay. She threw herself and Brahms around the room with gusto, singing to him inanely. Twice she dipped him over her arm wagging a finger into his face then waltzing round and back and forth.

A loud thump sounded behind the walls to her left. Laurie came to a stumbling halt. Another bang, this time louder. She ran to the music dock and ripped off the iPod. "It's ok, Brahms. It's stopped." She held the doll in both hands and stared into his face. "I know...I know...my singing's crap and--" Another thump but gentler. Laurie placed the doll on the couch. "Are you in this room with me?" she murmured walking around. The oak panelling felt warm beneath her fingertips as only something that once lived could. She inhaled the musky scent of it. Her lips inches from the wall, she whispered, "Where are you, Brahms?"

A faint, oh so faint, slither beyond the panelling, just to her right. He's in the walls? They can do that, can't they? Spirits can permeate solid matter with their energy...I know because... "...I read it in a book," she finished out loud. Laurie scraped her nails gently across the wood, trying to emulate the sound she'd heard. Her own breath rebounded back at her, warm and tense as her heart began to pound. "Can you hear me, Brahms? Can you..." She placed both palms on the panelling and closed her eyes. "...feel me?"

There it was again; like ghostly fingertips trying to reach her world. She wondered what truly separated them, surely not just the death of matter. What kind of void was the spirit world? Was it true what she'd read about death, that it was merely a change of vibration? It's just me and him. That's why he can communicate. I have no distractions here. It's the peace and quiet and...

In that silent thought she heard a slow exhalation. It was evanescent but enough for her to register it and start back from the panelling in fright. For an age she stood immobile, waiting, listening, hardly daring to breathe. But he was gone, the magic broken.

Three days after the Heelshire's had left for their holiday, Laurie woke to find the post neatly stacked on the hallway table. Usually, she collected the mail from the cast iron mailbox nailed outside the main gates of Fern Deane. She didn't do this every day as there was little point but this odd phenomenon made her realise that Brahms's abilities clearly extended beyond the four walls of the house. Idly, she sifted through the letters. They were all junk so she threw them in the bin. She knew that the Heelshire's had some kind of outside agency that dealt with contract workers; the cleaners came in once week and blitzed the joint and there was a gardener who came through every month or so. The grocery boy, Thomas, had a key to the gates but he always knocked on and left the boxes of food in the porch, and she had yet to meet him. The Heelshires had advised her that Thomas could be trusted and would be her main contact with the outside world.

Laurie never quite pinpointed the moment she realised that despite her orders to save all uneaten food in the freezer, the said freezer never seemed to get any fuller. Not that there was an awful lot of waste put in there what with her only cooking for one and a doll. She was pondering this miracle when she heard the door knocker sound. She glanced at the clock and, realising it was a Friday, leapt to her feet to open the front door.

"Thomas?"

The boy turned to stare at her. He looked about eighteen, tall and gangly the way only half grown men can look. Laurie flashed him a winning smile. "Hey!"

Thomas nodded and shuffled his feet.

"Won't you come in and have a coffee with me? I've been wanting to meet you properly but never seemed to catch you between deliveries."

The boy had a mop of mousy straight hair that flopped about his forehead. He wore faded jeans and a maroon hoodie.

"Come on in, I don't bite."

Thomas sat to attention at the table one eye on that creepy doll he'd heard so much about, as Laurie poured coffee.

"So, how long have you been delivering for the Heelshires?"

"Just six months."

"Cream or milk?"

"Black."

"Do you live far?"

"Just outside Llanberin."

Laurie smiled and sipped her coffee. "I'm from Montana. It's my first time in England."

"This is Wales, Miss Davis."

"Of course, sorry. You know my name. Good."

"My name is Davis too, Miss."

"Well there ya go! Coincidence, huh? Perhaps we're related!"

They both laughed and the ice was finally broken. Thomas's surreptitious glances at the doll weren't lost on Laurie. "Does he make you uncomfortable?" she asked. "I can put him down for a nap." Shit! She could have bitten her tongue. "I mean, you know, sling him upstairs."

"It's alright, Miss. I know all about Brahms."

"Oh, well that's a relief. Please, call me Laurie."

Thomas nodded and drank his coffee in three gulps.

"So what do you know about Brahms? I mean, the Heelshires lost their boy obviously."

"Before I was born, Laurie. But it was the talk of the village."

"What happened?"

"There was a house fire. He burned to death in the attic, they say. But I think it was his own room. If you take a look up at the front of the building, you can still see the smoke damage above his bedroom window. It was his eighth birthday by all accounts."

Laurie blanched. "Jesus! Here? At Fern Deane?"

"Yes. Lucky the whole place didn't go up. Can I have another cup?"

Laurie poured more coffee.

"Was there an investigation?"

"Dunno. There's a grave though. Down by the orchard at the back of the house. My Ma says Mrs Heelshire never let her boy play with the other kids. They're not from around here and well, they're gentry, aren't they? Brahms got schooled at home, lucky bugger!"

"That poor child..."

"Oh, he was weird by all accounts. My auntie Blod used to work here, see, rest her soul. Cleaning and such. She said he was spoiled rotten and a bit odd. She'd be cleaning the stairs or whatever and turn and he'd just be standing there staring at her. You'd never hear him come up close. Used to scare the crap out of her!"

Laurie stared distractedly down at her coffee cup wondering if the spirit Brahms could hear them. "There's a painting of him on the landing upstairs," she told Thomas. "He was a beautiful looking child."

"You know about Emily Cribbs?" Thomas eyed her carefully.

"Who?"

"Brahms wasn't allowed to play with other kids, except a little girl called Emily. She used to come here and they'd play like kids do. Then on his eighth birthday the pair of them wandered off down by Duach y Coed, the Black Wood. Just up the road from here. They found Emily dead with her brains bashed out!"

Laurie felt sick. "He murdered her?"

"It looked that way. Next thing the bloody house is on fire with him in it. The Heelshire's were never the same after that." Thomas glanced again at boy Brahms. "As you can see."

"How did the fire start?"

Thomas grinned, obviously enjoying the drama he was creating, lowering his voice with its thick Welsh brogue. "There's rumours the boy started it himself. Or that his parents wanted him dead and this doll is the personification of their abject guilt."

"I wonder what the truth is...really."

"Could be it's a sight worse than the legends, Laurie. My Ma says there was evil in that boy."

"Good job he's dead then." Laurie tried to keep the emotion from her voice. She began to clear away the coffee cups.

"I'll be off then, Laurie. See you next week?"

"Sure."

Laurie shut the door behind Thomas and walked back to the kitchen. The Heelshire's should be back any day and she was determined to get the truth from the horse's mouth. She was going to share her experiences of spirit Brahms with them too. I don't care if it gives Mrs Heelshire the vapours either. She picked up the doll, hugging it close. How could a child bludgeon another child that way? There must be more to it than this. Subconsciously, she pressed her lips to the cold porcelain forehead, then froze.

"Oh Christ...the attic..."

It was where he'd died? Was it the source of the activity? The haunted heart of the house? Or his room...the one with the toys in it? She swept from the kitchen, still holding boy Brahms, then took the stairs two at a time.

That photo of Brahmsy doll at the top of this page. Those are James Russell's real eyes and I added tears. Now...how creepy is that?