‘No Cleverley,’ repeated Beverley, glancing around in search of a bookseller. ‘Have a word with that young man, will you?’ she asked, pointing in the direction of a tall, skinny man standing about ten feet from them, stacking a dozen copies of a new biography of Tsar Nicholas II on a display unit. ‘It would be too embarrassing if I did it myself.’
‘What do you want me to say?’ asked the ghost.
‘Just ask him why they’re not stocking any copies of my books.’
The ghost looked mortified but caught the man’s eye, offering him a little wave, and he wandered over with an obliging smile on his face. ‘Can I help you with something?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ said the ghost. ‘We were looking for books by Beverley Cleverley. Do you know her work at all?’
‘Well, I haven’t read any of it, I must admit,’ said the man, whose name tag identified him as Declan. ‘But I’m sure we have some in stock.’ He leaned over and examined the shelves before standing up and frowning. ‘Actually, she wouldn’t be kept here,’ he said. ‘This section is all literary fiction. Beverley Cleverley would be on the other side of the room. In popular fiction.’
‘Oh, I see,’ said the ghost. ‘Of course. Thank you.’
‘Might I ask?’ said Beverley, piping up now, her voice rising both in volume and tenor as she spoke. ‘Might I just make the polite enquiry as to who makes these decisions and what criteria they employ in doing so?’
‘I suppose it’s the shop designers,’ said Declan with a shrug. ‘We carry much more popular fiction than we do literary fiction, so it makes sense to use the largest wall for them.’
‘Not who decides what goes where,’ replied Beverley, impatiently. ‘But what is classified as popular and what is classified as literary? And is the latter, by its very nature, unpopular? Or is it more that popular fiction cannot be literary? I understand that Ian McEwan sells very well. As does Margaret Atwood, who’s a personal friend. Doesn’t that mean that they’re popular?’
‘I don’t really know,’ he said, scratching the place where his beard might have been, had puberty done its job more efficiently. ‘Someone in head office, I imagine. There’s a very nice woman called Leah who works in Central Buying. It might be her.’
‘And you’re perfectly happy to go along with these random choices, are you, Declan?’ she asked, spitting out his name as if it was a piece of unripe fruit. ‘You don’t consider that these decisions create a sort of literary apartheid?’
‘I’m not sure what that means,’ he said.
‘You’ve never heard of apartheid?’
‘No,’ he said.
‘South Africa? In the eighties? When they segregated the blacks from the whites?’
‘I wasn’t born in the eighties,’ said Declan. ‘I’m only twenty-two. But if you’re looking for books about South Africa, then I’m sure I can find some in the travel section. Also, the history section, probably. I can look it up on the computer for you, if you like?’
‘I do not like, no. My point was that you have created an apartheid between the books that you or this Leah woman determine to be popular, which I assume you, or she, consider to be frothy and of little importance and, I daresay, are all written by women, while those you term literary novels, the ones of great weight and authority, are penned by men and given their own special piece of real estate in the store. Isn’t that right?’
‘Someone in head office …’ repeated Declan, sensing that this was a battle he was ill equipped to fight.
‘Yes, someone in head office,’ repeated Beverley, waving him away. ‘Always blame the mysterious someone in head office. It’s so much easier than taking any personal responsibility for these things, isn’t it? And I wonder, if I walked over to the popular fiction section, would I even find—’
‘Mrs Cleverley?’
A voice made her spin around.
‘I’m so sorry to interrupt,’ said a woman, who was clutching a copy of one of her novels as if it was the last bag of frozen sprouts in Iceland on Christmas Eve. ‘But you are Beverley Cleverley, aren’t you?’
‘I am, dear, yes,’ replied Beverley with an ingratiating smile. ‘How nice to meet you.’
‘I should take this opportunity to get away if I were you,’ whispered the ghost to Declan, who didn’t have to be told twice and scurried off to hide in the children’s section.
‘I was just about to buy this,’ continued the woman, brandishing a copy of The Surgeon’s Broken Heart, ‘when I happened to look across and saw you standing there. You don’t mind me coming over, do you? I imagine it must get annoying to be approached by strangers in public, but I’m a great admirer of your work.’
‘I don’t mind at all,’ said Beverley. ‘It’s always a pleasure to meet someone who appreciates my art. Would you like me to sign it for you?’
‘If you would, yes. That would be very kind.’
Beverley rooted in her bag for a pen, and the ghost, having looked the woman up and down several times to make sure that she was not about to make a terrible error, spoke up.
‘How far along are you?’ she asked, nodding towards the woman’s stomach.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘The baby. How many months?’
‘Oh. Only a few months. I’m surprised you could tell. But I am starting to show a little, it’s true.’
‘Oh, many congratulations,’ said Beverley, taking the book and removing the cap from her pen. ‘I have three children of my own and they are the very lights of my life.’
‘Three? How lovely! Do they still live with you?’
‘I’m afraid they do. I can’t get rid of them. Well, one’s at school, so I suppose that’s reasonable enough. But the other two … well, we’ve made it too comfortable for them, that’s the problem. I imagine they’ll move out eventually. Perhaps I need to change the locks.’
‘And do you think your husband and you will stay together once they’ve all fled the nest?’
Beverley stared at her and burst out laughing. ‘What an extraordinary question!’ she said. ‘But yes, I have no reason to think otherwise. Why do you ask?’
‘Oh, it’s just something I was thinking about. I worry about my own future, you see.’
‘I don’t think you need to concern yourself with such things for many years yet. You have the whole wonderful experience in front of you. Now, to whom shall I dedicate the book?’
‘Angela Gosebourne,’ replied the woman. ‘Actually, if you could inscribe it for Angela and George. He’s my fiancé. Or, rather, I hope he will be one day. He hasn’t actually proposed yet but I’m hoping it’s just a matter of time.’
‘My husband’s name is George too,’ said Beverley as she turned the book to the title page and began scribbling away.
‘Yes, I know. George Cleverley. I enjoy his television programme.’
‘Do you? That’s nice. I didn’t know he appealed to a younger demographic.’