‘Thank you, darling. But, speaking as a mother, I can’t help but feel concerned about what goes on when my children are out of the house. One reads so much in the papers about ISIS and child brides and boys running off to fight whoever they’re fighting in Syria, so you’ll understand if I worry when one of my own starts quoting the Bible. We don’t really do God in this house, you see. We never have. Sometimes, at Christmas, George lets Him in for a few minutes before we eat but I always usher Him back out on to the street afterwards. God, I mean. Not George. Anyway,’ she added, turning back to Achilles, ‘all I’m saying is, please don’t come home some day with a long beard and waving a copy of the Koran in my face. I wouldn’t have the energy for it.’

‘Can you even grow facial hair?’ asked the ghost, peering at the boy’s skin, which was so smooth that it looked as if he’d never had to buy a razor in his life. ‘Some boys can’t.’

‘Of course I can,’ he said, scowling. ‘I have gone through puberty, you know. If I really put my heart and soul into it for about three months, I can squeeze a few hairs out of my chin. Anyway, don’t change the subject. You still haven’t told me how you interpret your job.’

His phone pinged at this same moment and he picked it up and glanced at it.

Jeremy Arlo

Busy here too. I enjoyed meeting you!

He frowned. Jeremy wasn’t even hinting at getting together again. If anything, this felt like a brush-off. He wasn’t accustomed to having to do so much of the running himself, but if he was going to earn the money he needed to keep his finances on track, then it seemed that he would have to work a little harder.

Achilles Cleverley

Fancy doing it again sometime?

‘I imagine the entire arc of the novel and describe it,’ explained Beverley. ‘Then the ghost commits all my thoughts to the page.’

‘I’d love a job like that,’ said Achilles. ‘Not the ghosting part, that sounds too much like hard work, but the imagining part. It would be great to say, Oh, I’ll just be an investment banker and imagine millions of dollars moving around the globe, but someone else can do the actual slog for me while I swan around on my yacht in the Mediterranean.’

‘You don’t understand the process,’ said Beverley. ‘It’s a lot more complicated than you might think.’

‘And do you enjoy it?’ he asked.

‘It’s not a question of enjoyment,’ replied the ghost. ‘Some of us have to work to pay the rent.’

‘Ha,’ he said, stuffing into his mouth a forkful of chicken coated in a shaved Parmesan that was so sharp it sent a shiver down his back. ‘And do you plan on making a play for my brother while you’re on the job, so to speak?’ he asked, determined to annoy somebody, anybody.