The Secrets of Ice Cream Success (15 page)

‘
You
know?’

‘
Yes! You told
me the day you died!’

‘
I
did?’

‘
Yes! I don’t
know why you just couldn’t name an ice cream flavour after her or
something.’ Carlo grumbled.

‘
Well, perhaps
we shouldn’t dwell on that episode.’ Luigi said, noting his son’s
mood. ‘The point is, someone knew and in the weeks before
that day
they had leaked
the information to the authorities and we were being investigated!
Hang on!’ Luigi interrupted himself. ‘What happened during the
investigation?

‘
There was no
investigation, Dad.’ Carlo answered. ‘The claims were withdrawn the
day of your funeral.’

‘
What? That
doesn’t make sense. Why would Neil withdraw them?’

‘
I don’t
understand why you think it was Neil, Dad.’ Carlo said.’ I thought
you always liked him?’

‘
I did. He was
with us from the beginning, but he was never satisfied with his
position and he was always frustrated that Randy was given more
responsibility.’

‘
But it
doesn’t make sense.’

‘
Of course it
does. I was putting something quite dodgy in the ice cream and when
he found out, his loyalties weren’t with me.’ Luigi sighed. ‘I
guess I don’t blame him really.’

‘
How do you
know he found out? You said no one knew.’

‘
The claims
against us were very specific. A dangerous ingredient was being
used in the manufacturing process and needed to be investigated.
What else could it be? Who else would have reported it?’

Carlo shrugged. He really
didn’t know.

‘
So Neil is
sabotaging the Factory again? How’s he doing it?’ Luigi
mused.

‘
Cockroaches
in the mix.’ Carlo answered. ‘But that could be anything, it’s a
big factory. I guess they could have naturally got in
there.’

‘
Get away!’
Luigi admonished, ‘Cockroaches in my factory?’ Never in a million
years. In all the years you spent here did you ever see one roach?
One rat? Hmmm?’

‘
Well… no,
but…’

‘
Exactly!
Sabotage. It was Neil again.’

Carlo felt he was losing
control of the discussion somewhat. ‘What do you mean, again? Even
if it was Neil last time, he wasn’t sabotaging the factory. If
anything, you were.’

‘
Come on, son.
He was willingly advising the authorities of something that would
have shut us down… that’s sabotage! And he’s doing it again! I’ll
haunt him so bad, just you wait!’

‘
I don’t know.
I think we should wait until Uncle Randy has looked into things,
then we can decide if we need to, err… haunt anyone.’

Luigi sagged a little, anger
drifting away from him. ‘I guess you’re right.’ he reluctantly
agreed. ‘In the meantime, what are we going to do about you?’

‘
What do you
mean?’ Carlo asked.

‘
Well, you
said when you came in here looking for me, you were pretty sure
you’d had enough.’

Carlo sighed. In the excitement
of seeing his father he had forgotten his previous frustrations. ‘I
have… well, I had. I don’t know. It all seemed so easy at first,
but now everything is too…’

‘
Hard?’ Luigi
suggested.

‘
Grown up.’
Carlo finished with a slight smile.

Luigi laughed. ‘Perhaps I can
help?’ he suggested.

‘
How?’

‘
Well, I did
run this factory for decades before you took over, you
know!’

Carlo laughed. ‘Yeah I know,
but what are you going to do, go and talk to Randy?’

‘
Well, no, I
don’t think it’s a good idea to let everyone know I’m here. If you
think cockroaches will ruin a reputation, what will the public make
of a haunted factory? But I can offer advice and maybe have a look
at things for you? Generally help out.’ Luigi finished, sounding
hopeful that he might be able to get involved again.

Carlo looked dubious. ‘It’ll be
good to have someone to talk to, certainly.’ he agreed, ‘But can
you even leave the room?’

‘
I don’t know.
I’ve never tried.’

Carlo popped his head around
the door at the top of the stairs and looked about. The usual
hustle and bustle of the working day had begun as the staff went
about their business in the factory, working on the machines, in
the vans or up at the offices. Other than the vans, there were few
reasons for anyone to linger in this area of the factory so Carlo
just had to wait for a gap in traffic before stepping out as
nonchalantly as he could.

‘
Why are you
walking like that? You look like a zombie!’ his father’s voice
sounded as Carlo very stiffly stepped onto the factory floor,
failing miserably to look casual.

‘
I’m trying to
go unnoticed!’ Carlo whispered back through gritted teeth and a
forced smile.

‘
Why?’ Luigi
asked.

‘
Because…
err…’ actually, Carlo wasn’t sure.

‘
You’re not
doing a very good job at it.’ Luigi said, his voice appearing right
next to Carlo’s ear.

‘
Argh!’ Carlo
screamed in surprise, causing a number of heads to pop curiously
out of the serving hatches in the nearest vans. Carlo waved at them
as if nothing had happened and shuffled along the row of vans with
his hands in his pockets, jumping into the one second in line and
crouching behind the counter. He lifted his eyes level with the
serving hatch and peered out, but no one seemed to be paying him
any attention.

‘
Where are
you?’ he asked quietly. ‘Dad? Damn it. Where are you?’ He walked
back to the door of the van just as his father materialised and
walked right through Carlo into the van making all Carlo’s hairs
stand on end and sending a shiver through his body. ‘Don’t do
that!’ he protested.

‘
Do what?’
Luigi asked, absently taking in the van with a smile on his face.
‘The place looks great; really good!’ he said before spotting the
ice cream machine hanging next to the hatch. ‘Ahhhh, I’ve missed
these.’ he said, caressing his hand across the cold
metal.’

‘
Hey, you can
touch!’ Carlo said in excitement.

‘
If I
concentrate, yes; if not…’ Luigi passed his hand through the
machine as an example. ‘Remember the diary. How do you think I did
that?’ Carlo nodded, remembering.

‘
I’d love to
try some, one last time.’ Luigi said, his ghostly hand picking up a
small wooden spoon from the cup next to the machine, his face
pinched in concentration as he raised it up to the handle of the
ice cream dispenser.

‘
You can’t eat
can you?’ Carlo asked, surprised.

‘
I don’t
know.’ Luigi answered with a ghostly shrug. Taking three attempts
to take hold of the handle, he gently poured a large blob of ice
cream onto the spoon and slowly elevated the precious spoonful to
his open mouth and deposited onto his tongue, where it promptly
fell through his body hitting the floor of the van with a gentle
splat. It was possibly the saddest sight Carlo had ever seen. Luigi
mournfully stared through his own form at the ice cream.

‘
Bugger.’ he
said.

Carlo grabbed a cloth from
below the counter and wiped up the ice cream but screamed as he
stood back up to find someone staring through the hatch at him.

‘
Don’t do
that!’ Carlo said, reaching behind him to place the cloth in the
bin and taking the opportunity to glance around the van, which
seemed to be entirely free of an ethereal presence. He sighed,
relieved that his Father had had the presence of mind to disappear.
‘Sorry.’ he said to the face cheerfully smiling through the hatch.
‘You just surprised me.’

‘
Morning, Mr
Leodoni, sorry about that.’ Andrew Peacock said cheerfully, ‘Can I
help you with something?’

‘
No, no…’
Carlo replied, stepping out of the van. ‘Just carrying out a spot
check. Is this your van?’

Andrew nodded, looking slightly
apprehensive.

‘
Excellent.
Spotlessly clean. Not a drop of ice cream anywhere on the floor.
Keep up the good work.’ Carlo said, in an overly animated manner
before walking away. Not looking back to see if he had got away
with it, Carlo hurried to the back of the factory and hid behind
one of the fork lift trucks poking his head out to see if there was
anyone in his office at the other end of the factory. Seeing it
empty, he saw his chance.

‘
Come on,’ he
said, setting off with a purposeful stride, ‘let’s see if you can
make it to the office. That’s as far from the study as we can get
so if you can reach there, you can pretty much haunt everywhere in
the factory. That’d be great, maybe you
can
help me. It would amazing to
know you could be around, y’know, just so I can ask questions and
stuff and you could keep an eye on how things are going and tell me
if anyone is making mistakes. We won’t tell Randy though, not yet
anyway. Well, I guess that’s up to you really if you want people to
know, I mean I can’t tell anyone, can I? Who’d believe me. But this
will be great, won’t it? You and me back together again, eh, Dad?
…Dad?’

Carlo had reached the other end
of the factory floor just below his office, but there was no reply
from Luigi.

‘
Dad?’ Carlo
whispered as loudly as possible, looking around in the hope his
father might be visible somewhere. He smiled in a strained manner
as one of the staff walked past him.

‘
Carlo! What
are you doing, mate?’ Ben asked striding towards him with his usual
unhurried gait despite
clearly being late
for work.

‘
What?’ Carlo
muttered, still looking to see something amongst all the pipes and
machines that may be his father.

‘
You look like
you’ve lost something.’

‘
I have.’
Carlo sighed. ‘Look, can you keep a secret?’

‘
Ah… the
secret to ice cream success; finally!’ Ben laughed, dramatically
rubbing his hands together in a villainous manner.

‘
Do you know
that day we were all in the study and we heard something?’ Carlo
continued, ignoring Ben’s comment.

‘
I could have
gone years without being reminded of that.’ Ben said, starting to
walk past Carlo towards the locker room until he was pulled him
back.

‘
I’m serious
Ben. Something’s happened.’

‘
What?’

‘
Well, that
voice we heard…’

‘
Noise we
heard… I’m not willing to admit it was a voice, yet.’ said Ben with
a shake of his head.

Carlo sighed
and tried again. ‘That
voice
we heard was my Dad.’

‘
Get
away!’

‘
It’s
true.’

‘
Your
Dad?’

‘
Yes. All the
stuff that’s been going on down there, it was him.’

‘
Your
Dad?’

‘
Yes!’ Carlo
shouted.

‘
How do you
know?’ Ben asked.

‘
Because I’ve
seen him. He’s here.’ Carlo waved his hand vaguely in the general
direction of the factory floor. ‘Somewhere.’ he finished, rather
lamely.

Ben eyed the factory floor
suspiciously for any signs of unusual activity. ‘Where?’ he asked
turning back to Carlo.

‘
He’s here,
honestly. He was right here a second ago, but he disappeared. I’ve
been talking to him all Morning!’

Ben made a face. ‘It’s not that
I don’t believe you, Carlo,’ he said, ‘But…’ he pointed back to the
machinery and the complete absence of Luigi Leodoni.

‘
He must have
gone back to the Study.’ Carlo muttered to himself, still peering
into every shadow just in case. ‘Right, come with me.’ he said,
grabbing Ben and dragging him back through the factory
floor.

‘
Perhaps you
need to take a break? You’ve been under a lot of pressure.’ Ben
said trying to disengage himself from Carlo’s grip, but he allowed
himself to be guided to the back of the factory, through the door
and down the stairs to the study, trying not to laugh at his
smaller friend’s determined expression.

‘
Dad?’ Carlo
shouted, entering the study and gently pushing Ben in front of him.
‘Dad?’

‘
Oh, there you
are, I was wondering when you were going to notice…’ Luigi started,
appearing in the middle of the study before noticing Ben stood in
front of his son. ‘Argh!’ screamed Mr Leodoni, who turned and ran
head long through the far wall in shock.

‘
Argh!’
screamed Ben, who turned and ran headlong into Carlo sending both
to the floor.

‘
Aaaaaaargh!’
Ben continued, struggling to right himself and make his
escape.

‘
Aaaaaaaaaargh!’ came Mr Leodoni’s muffled voice from
somewhere inside the wall.

‘
Will you both
calm down!’ Carlo shouted over the top of them, managing to get
enough weight on top of Ben to slow him down a little. ‘It’s OK.’
he said, catching Ben’s eye and giving him a reassuring smile.
‘Trust me, it’s OK.’

Ben stopped struggling but
didn’t look entirely convinced. As Carlo stood up Ben scuttled
backwards to the opposite side of the room and sat staring wide
eyed at the wall on the other side.