"Especially if you picked a particularly dreadful murder method," Ford pointed out. Penny dreadfuls were always gruesome, it seemed; anyone who died had a bloody death, whether it was a monster or a madman who had caused it. Even the lunacy-inspired suicides were always violent in penny dreadfuls. Was there much opportunity for that on the Quidditch pitch? As much as anywhere else, Ford supposed; one could be stabbed anywhere. Not that he thought Cash had it in him to stab someone.

"I'd give you a recommendation but there's no evidence any particular method of death is more likely to produce a spirit than any other," he continued in an offhand tone. This was true, and intensely interesting to Ford though his tone did not imply it. If the method didn't matter, as indeed seemed to be the case, that implied that what determined who lingered and who didn't had something to do with the person themselves, something intrinsic. He didn't seriously believe any of the anecdotes that were sometimes bandied about with regards to choosing to go towards the light or stay behind, or anything like that — mostly because he'd only heard living people talk about such things, and clearly they had no firsthand experience of it. "Be a shame if you went through the hassle of murdering someone and then they just died. You might have to off ten or twelve people before we hit on the right conditions for joint fieldwork."

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