'That's right. Seen pictures, have you?'

'No,' said Johnny. 'Not exactly.'

Grandad put his cap back on.

'I'm going down to the shops,' he said. 'Want to come?'

'No, thanks. Er ... I'm going round to Wob- bler's house.'

'Righto.'

Grandad wandered off towards the main gate.

Johnny took a deep breath.

'Hello,' he said.

'It was a scandal, them not giving me the "E",' said William Stickers.

He stopped leaning against his memorial.

'What's your name, comrade?'

'John Maxwell,' said Johnny.

'I knew you could see me,' said William Stickers. 'I could see you looking right at me while the old man was talking.'

'I could tell you were you,' said Johnny. 'You look ... um ... thinner.'

He wanted to say: not thin like in thick. Just... not all there. Transparent.

He said, 'Um.' And then he said, 'I don't under- stand this. You are dead, right? Some kind of... ghost?'

'Ghost?' said dead William Stickers angrily.

'Well ... spirit, then.'

'There's no such thing. A relic of an outmoded belief system.'

'Um, only... you're talking to me ...'

'It's a perfectly understandable scientific phenomenon,' said William Stickers. 'Never let superstition get in the way of rational thought, boy. It's time for Mankind to put old cul- tural shibboleths aside and step into the bright socialist dawn. What year is it?'

'Nineteen ninety-three,' said Johnny.

'Ah! And have the downtrodden masses risen

up to overthrow the capitalist oppressors in the glorious name of communism?'

'Um. Sorry?' Johnny hesitated, and then a few vague memories slid into place. 'You mean like ... Russia and stuff? When they shot the Tsar? There was something on television about that.'