The Ghost Sonata Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Prepare Yourself

  I wasn’t prepared to feel helpless as I watched my best friend experience a disturbing change. Nothing in my Master Psychic’s Handbook had prepared me to watch the most reliable person I know become the victim of the most unusual haunting I had yet encountered.

  The Chinese have a saying: “If you believe it, there will be, but if you don’t, there will not.” But what about people like Wendy, who do their best to remain rational--even a bit skeptical--and who nevertheless find themselves haunted by an unwelcome ghost?

  The English have a saying when calamity strikes: “Put the kettle on; we’ll have some tea.”

  But I needed more than tea to help unravel a haunting on foreign soil. I needed every ounce of the expertise and psychic intuition I had developed in my career as Gilda Joyce, Psychic Investigator.

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  DUTTON CHILDREN’S BOOKS

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  Published by the Penguin Group

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the

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  Copyright © 2007 by Jennifer Allison

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  Published in the United States by Dutton Children’s Books,

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  eISBN : 978-1-440-65276-9

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  “After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”

  —ALDOUS HUXLEY

  PROLOGUE

  I suppose none of this would have happened to us if we hadn’t traveled to Oxford, England--to a land where eccentric scholars ponder the great questions of life while safely nestled within their Gothic walls and dreamy gardens, to a city of antiquity, where ghosts haunt the winding back streets, silent cloisters, and damp hallways of elite colleges.

  My best friend, Wendy Choy, hoped to distinguish herself in an international piano competition. I simply dreamed of traveling overseas to escape a tedious week of school, a seemingly endless Michigan winter, and the humiliation of an unrequited ninth-grade crush. I pictured myself snacking on tea and scones while practicing my English accent. I would impress college dons and students alike with my penchant for using British sarcasm and slang, not to mention my lively collection of interesting hats. Together, Wendy and I would bask in the warm glow of applause following her piano performances.

  Naturally, I was also prepared to test my psychic skills in a land where nearly every old hotel, pub, and college library has a ghost story--a tale of some lonely apparition appearing to the sleep-deprived student or drunken reveler in the wee hours of the morning.

  I was prepared for all of these things.

  I wasn’t prepared to feel helpless as I watched my best friend experience a disturbing change. Nothing in my Master Psychic’s Handbook had prepared me to watch the most reliable person I know become the victim of the most unusual haunting I had yet encountered.

  The Chinese have a saying: “If you believe it, there will be, but if you don’t, there will not.”

  But what about people like Wendy, who do their best to remain rational--even a bit skeptical-- and who nevertheless find themselves haunted by an unwelcome ghost?

  The English have a saying when calamity strikes: “Put the kettle on; we’ll have some tea.”

  But I needed more than tea to help unravel a haunting on foreign soil. I needed every ounce of the expertise and psychic intuition I had developed in my career as Gilda Joyce, Psychic Investigator.

  1

  The Nightmare

  Wendy Choy saw two shadows in the room. She heard the clinking of knives—metal scraping against metal—then a tearing sound, as if someone were ripping cloth or gauze to make bandages.

  “Hilp me wheel the tray over hiere. Make sure everything is sterile, okay? Good, good.” The familiar voice had a Russian accent. “How are you feeling, Windy?”

  “I don’t know. Sss—” For some reason, Wendy couldn’t find the word she wanted to speak.

  “Don’t worry; it will be quick,” said the voice. “We need to make a few
adjustments.”

  Someone flipped a switch, and an overhead light revealed a grand piano on top of which shiny objects were spread upon a tablecloth. As Wendy looked more closely, she saw scissors, knives, scalpels—an assortment of surgical instruments lined up very symmetrically, like rows of piano keys.

  “No—” Wendy breathed. “N—” Her brain screamed the word, but it seemed that her voice no longer worked. Her teeth clenched. She felt paralyzed. She couldn’t articulate the word no. She couldn’t move or speak.

  In the light, she saw two faces peering over the table of instruments—a wrinkled, wizened face with raccoonlike eyeliner and next to her a round, moonlike face, the face of a little girl. Two hands picked up scalpels and began to cut.

  Wendy awoke suddenly to discover a spiral notebook embedded in her cheek and a puddle of drool on top of her biology textbook. She had dozed off while studying in the school library, and she was late. It was after four o’clock, and her mother would already be sitting in the parking lot, waiting to drive her to her piano lesson.

  As she hastily gathered her belongings and stuffed them in her backpack, Wendy sensed the disquieting residue of the nightmare she had just experienced. She couldn’t quite recall the details, but she felt as if she had just received an ominous warning.

  2

  The Piano Lesson

  Waiting outside the front door of her piano teacher’s house, Wendy clutched her sheet music and did her best to stifle the feeling of trepidation that often preceded her lessons.

  “Windy! Come een; come een!” A petite, exquisitely dressed woman threw open the door and beamed at Wendy, her deep-set eyes framed by heavy, black eyeliner and a web of wrinkles.

  Mrs. Mendelovich spoke with a Russian accent. She wore an ornate red scarf around her neck, and her silvery hair was slicked back tightly in a French twist, her perpetual hairstyle. She walked gracefully, with poker-straight posture, reminding Wendy of an aging ballerina.

  Mrs. Mendelovich had converted her living room into a piano studio where two full-grand pianos filled the room like black racing cars in a garage.

  “I haf wonderful news,” Mrs. Mendelovich declared as Wendy sat down at one of the pianos.

  Wendy immediately felt nervous.

  “Windy, my darling, your audition was a success! You haf been chosen to travel to Oxford, England, to compete in Young International Virtuosos Piano Competition!”

  Wendy felt dizzy, as if she were suddenly peering down at Mrs. Mendelovich from a tightrope. The words “international virtuosos piano competition” seemed to soar with too much importance.

  “Are you happy?”

  “I guess.”

  Wendy imagined how her parents would respond whey they learned the news. Her father’s face would turn ever-so-slightly pink. He would come close to breaking into a huge, sloppy grin—a smile he would quickly control with a more appropriate, humble appreciation. Her mother would slyly post information about the competition next to her manicure station at the Happy Nails Salon so she could tell her clients all about her talented daughter who is “one of the best young piano players in whole country! Going to England!” Her parents would be thrilled. They would also nag her incessantly during the next few weeks to make sure she practiced enough.

  “Wish to win,” Wendy’s mother would say.

  “Play that spot again,” her father would say, eavesdropping on her practice sessions. “Sounds messy there. Do over. No, no. Still not right. Here, listen to how Lang Lang plays on this CD. You do enough times, you can be perfect, too.”

  Wendy’s father greatly admired the pianist Lang Lang, and he often enjoyed reminding Wendy how Lang Lang gave his first public recital at age five; how Lang Lang and his father had shared a tiny, cramped apartment and endured much suffering for the sake of Lang Lang’s music studies in Beijing; how Lang Lang was so grateful to his family—his father in particular— that he allowed his father to perform with him in concert at Carnegie Hall.

  “But Dad, even if I make it to Carnegie Hall someday, you won’t be able to perform with me because you won’t take any music lessons.”

  “Too late for me,” said her father. “Too old now. Point is that Lang Lang is a great boy. A great son.”

  “Sorry to be such a disappointing daughter.”

  “You will surprise me,” he said. “There is greatness in you. Your mother and I have sacrificed much, and someday you will make us very proud.”

  “Ming Fong and Gary weell also compete,” Mrs. Mendelovich continued, shaking Wendy from her reverie. “I am so ploud of all my very best students!”

  Ming Fong was also in ninth grade, and her mother, Mrs. Chen, worked with Wendy’s mother at the salon. Because the workplace friendship between the two women masked a thinly veiled competition, Wendy constantly heard about Ming Fong’s achievements. Ming Fong made straight A’s (“not a single A minus! Only A pluses!”). Ming Fong never wasted time watching television. Ming Fong always helped her parents cheerfully and expressed humble gratitude. Unlike Wendy, who was born in America, Ming Fong had come to America only a few years ago, but her English was excellent and she constantly helped her parents communicate with hospitals, schools, employers, and the Department of Motor Vehicles. Of the two girls, Wendy had won more piano competitions, but Ming Fong was hot on her heels, often placing second. It bothered Wendy that she often caught Ming Fong watching her, as if observing her behavior and calculating something—striving to either imitate or undermine the object of her ambition.

  “Wow,” said Wendy, feeling at a loss for words as she imagined traveling to England with Ming Fong, Gary, and her piano teacher. “All three of us qualified for the competition?”

  “They found the audition tapes of my students superb. This is gleat, gleat honor for me as well, being your teacher.”

  Wendy sighed and tried to smile. She felt a great sense of honor and a greater sense of dread.

  After her lesson, Wendy sat on Mrs. Mendovich’s front porch, waiting for her mother to pick her up. A slate-gray January sky glowered overhead. Wendy watched as two young girls wearing parkas dragged a sled down the icy sidewalk, followed by a small dog. For some reason, she envied both the girls and the dog.

  Wendy pulled her cell phone from her backpack and dialed Gilda’s number.

  “Gilda Joyce here.”

  “Why do you answer the phone that way? You know it’s me calling.”

  “This is my business phone, Wendy. For all I know, it could be a client looking for help with a haunting. Anyway, I’m kind of busy right now.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Watching a rerun of Saved by the Bell.”

  Wendy wished she could sit down next to Gilda with a bag of potato chips and do absolutely nothing except watch a simpleminded television show that she had already seen several times before. Gilda always had multiple projects in the works, but she somehow also managed to prioritize things like watching television and reading books that had nothing to do with school. Of course, Gilda’s grades were far less consistent than Wendy’s straight-A average.

  “If you can believe it,” said Wendy, feeling reluctant rather than excited to share her news, “I got into that piano competition I was telling you about.”

  “The international one?”

  “I’ll be going to England in just a few weeks.”

  There was a moment of silence at the other end of the line because Gilda was so excited, she jumped up from the couch and began to pace back and forth. “No way.”

  “Way.”

  “Then why aren’t you jumping up and down and screaming? Wendy, this is awesome!”

  Wendy wished she could share Gilda’s enthusiasm. For some reason, she felt a lump rising in her throat—a strange homesickness. It reminded her of the feeling she had on the first day of summer camp.

  “You are so lucky!”

  “It isn’t luck; I spent the whole year practicing.”

  “That’s true; you kept practicing
even though I did the best I could to thwart you.” Gilda often called during Wendy’s scheduled practice times to tell her what was on television or to encourage a “mental health” break. Occasionally, she turned up at Wendy’s house uninvited and offered her services as a “live studio audience.”

  “Wendy, I can’t wait! You know how I’ve always wanted to go to England!” Gilda’s many career goals currently included plans to become a novelist who lived in either a cramped, dimly lit London apartment or a grand English manor house filled with ghosts. Her published books would all be based on the bizarre and extremely dangerous mysteries she solved in real life.

  “Gilda, I don’t think this competition is going to provide free airfare for friends of mine who want to come along for the ride.”

  “You can’t possibly go without me, Wendy. That would just be wrong.”

  “Believe me, I wish you could go, too. I just doubt your mom is going to pay for a plane ticket and hotel on such short notice. In fact, I doubt my parents will even be able to afford the trip right now; I’ll be stuck traveling with Mrs. Mendelovich, Gary, and Ming Fong.”

  “I’ll think of some way to get there,” Gilda insisted. “If you’re going all the way across the pond, you’re going to need my help.”

  “Why would I need your help?”

  “You don’t understand the English and their ways.”

  “And you do?”

  “I read novels, Wendy. I know all about tea and crumpets and bangers and mash, and all that stuff. For example, when you’re in England and you need to find an elevator, you say, ‘Where’s the lift?’”

  “You’re right. I can’t possibly compete in a piano competition without knowing about English elevators and the history of tea and crumpets.”