Its head. The phantom was carrying its head.
Knowing that his end had come gave Oliver a sudden spurt of strength. Managing to draw air through his lungs, he sat bolt upright and switched on the light. ‘Come out of there,’ he called, ‘and show yourself.’
The figure did as it was told. If it was a nun or a bride it was a very small one, and it seemed to be dressed for bed.
‘Who are you?’ asked Oliver, between the chattering of his teeth. The ghost came forward. ‘I’m Adopta Wilkinson,’
she said. ‘There’s no problem about that. But who are you, because you’re certainly not a nun.’
Oliver stared at her. She seemed to be about his own age, with a lot of hair and sticking-out ears. ‘Why should I be a nun?’ he asked. ‘It’s you who are supposed to be a nun. And headless.’
‘Do I look headless?’ she asked, sounding cross.
‘No. I thought... your sponge bag was your head.’
The ghost thought this was funny. ‘Would you like to see what’s inside?’ she asked.
Oliver nodded and she unpacked her tooth-cleaning things. Then she took out the fish and put it down on the counterpane, where it lay looking peaceful, but not at all energetic. ‘I tried to find a friend for it when we were living in the knicker shop. I haunted every fishmonger in London – you know how there are always rows and rows of dead fish on the slabs – but not one of them had become a ghost to keep him company. Not a single one.’
‘He doesn’t look unhappy,’ said Oliver.
‘No.’ Addie repacked her bag. ‘But I don’t understand; we were supposed to come to a convent and this can’t possibly be a convent. Nuns don’t have little boys and they wouldn’t have those awful rude words carved everywhere.’ She pointed to the head of the bed and the words ‘I Set My Foot Upon My Enemies’ carved into the wood.
‘No – that’s the motto of the Snodde-Brittles,’ said Oliver.
‘They sound awful. I bet the feet they set upon their enemies have yellow toes with hair on them and bunions.’
Oliver began to explain about Helton, but he was interrupted by the most extraordinary sound: a gurg ling, guggling sort of noise ending in a hiccup.
‘Good heavens, what’s that?’
‘Don’t worry, it’s only Aunt Maud. She’s practising wailing woefully or moaning muffledly, you can’t be sure. She’s terribly worried, you see, about not being dreadful enough for you. All of them are. Shall I tell them it’s all right?’
‘Yes, please do. And Adopta, could you just make it clear that muffled moans are not at all big with me?’
So one by one the Wilkinsons came and Addie introduced them. As soon as she saw Oliver all the nonsense about being horrible went straight out of Aunt Maud’s head and she glided over to the bed and gave him a big hug. Being hugged by a ghost who cares about you is a most wonderful feeling, like resting inside a slightly bouncy cloud. Not since he had left the Home had Oliver been so comfortable.
‘Well, this is a big room for a small boy,’ said Aunt Maud. ‘And I can’t see the point of all those nasty people hanging on the wall, but never mind – we’ll soon have you shipshape.’
Grandma then came down from the curtain rail where she had been hovering.
‘I said I wouldn’t curtsy,’ she said, ‘and I mean it. But the dust up there’s shocking and if you find me a nice feather mop in the morning, I’ll give it a good going over.’
Eric had been standing by the door. Going to new places always made him shy and brought out his old worries about his spots and being unhappily in love, but now he came forward and gave the Scout salute, and then the budgie fluttered his wings and said ‘Open wide’, and ‘My name is Billie’, and even ‘Ottle’ which was the nearest he could get to saying Cynthia Harbottle, this not being an easy thing for budgerigars to say.
But Uncle Henry now took charge. ‘I think we should make ourselves known to your parents. It would be polite and they might have orders for us.’
‘I don’t have any parents,’ said Oliver. ‘I’m an orphan. I lived in a Home till three weeks ago and they brought me here. I’m...I’m actually...I mean, I seem to own this place,’ he said, and blushed because it really embarrassed him, having this huge house when so many people had nowhere to live.
The ghosts stared at him in amazement. This small boy who had welcomed them so warmly was the owner of Helton Hall!
‘Well, in that case we had better speak to your guardian or whoever is in charge of you.’
‘There’s no one here, Uncle Henry.’ Calling this manly ghost ‘uncle’ made him feel less alone in the world. ‘I’ve got some cousins but they’re away, and so are the servants. There’s no one here at all except me.’
Aunt Maud couldn’t believe her ears. ‘You mean you’re all alone in this great barrack of a house?’
Oliver nodded. ‘Actually,’ he said, ‘I was a bit frightened before you came. But now...’ He looked up and gave her the most trusting and delightful smile.
‘Well that’s it then, isn’t it?’ said Grandma. ‘We wanted something to do and we’ve got it.’ She gave Oliver a prod with her umbrella. ‘I can tell you this, little sprogget, while there’s a spook called Wilkinson left on this planet, you aren’t going to be alone again.’
An hour later, the ghosts were settled for sleep. Grandma was in the coffin chest, Eric was curled up on top of the wardrobe, and Uncle Henry and Aunt Maud lay side by side on the hearthrug.
As for Addie, she’d made it perfectly clear where she was going to spend the night.
‘That bed is far too big for you,’ she said to Oliver. ‘We’ll lie head to feet and if you snore I’ll kick you.’
It was when she came back from cleaning her teeth that Oliver noticed a dark patch on her arm where the sleeve of her nightdress had rolled back.
‘Have you hurt yourself?’ he asked.
She shook her head. ‘You mean that mark on my ectoplasm? It’s a birthmark. I’ve always had it.’
‘Goodness! They have them in fairy stories and then people come and say: ‘‘You must be my long-lost daughter the Princess of So-and-So!’’ ’
Addie was not pleased. ‘No one had better try any of that stuff on me. I’m a Wilkinson and that’s the end of it.’
Her eyes began to close, but she forced them open. ‘Oliver, when we came here we passed a farm right close to your grounds. Does that belong to Helton too?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, look... if... just if there happened to be a sheep who’d passed on... you’d let me have it, wouldn’t you?’
‘Of course I would. You shouldn’t even ask,’ said Oliver. ‘And anyway—’
But at that moment Aunt Maud’s cross voice came from the hearthrug. ‘Will you two stop talking at once and go to sleep.’
Oliver smiled. Matron had sounded just like that when they were fooling around in the dormitory. Feeling wonderfully safe, he closed his eyes and, for the first time since he’d come to Helton, he fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
Chapter Ten
The nuns of Larchford Abbey were very excited. It was the morning of Saturday the 14th and they knew that their ghosts had come. The owls had screeched horribly, the field mice had scuttled for shelter, and the bell in the ruined chapel had given a single, deathlike clang. Moreover when they woke at dawn they saw that a strange, chill vapour hung over the old buildings which they had offered to their guests.
‘Oh, it is a real adventure, having proper spooks!’ Mother Margaret said.
‘Yes, indeed. What is better than being able to share our lovely home with others,’ said Sister Phyllida.
Larchford Abbey was certainly a most beautiful place. Set in a green valley with a little burbling stream, it was surrounded by gardens and orchards. Bees flew up from the hives; the apple trees were coming into blossom; a herd of pedigree goats gambolled in the meadow.
‘I wonder if we shouldn’t just go and see if they have settled in all right,’ said M
other Margaret in her kind and caring way. ‘We wouldn’t bother them of course, but there may be some little thing they would like to make them comfortable.’
‘Yes indeed,’ said Sister Phyllida, who had been a nurse before she became a nun and was very practical and sensible. ‘The first few days in a new place are so important.’
They waited till the evening and then made their way over the wooden bridge towards the ruined part of the abbey.
‘We must remember that this is their breakfast time; they will only just have woken up. Sometimes people are not very friendly first thing in the morning.’
‘Oh dear, I hope they’re not in bed,’ said Mother Margaret. She remembered that there had been a gentleman, a Mr Wilkinson, and it was a long time since she had seen a gentleman in bed.
When they had crossed the stream they saw, on the path leading to the door of the ruined building, a set of footprints. They were truly horrid footprints, made by a spectre with only three toes, and they stopped suddenly as though the ghost who made them had got bored with walking and had suddenly become airborne.
‘Oh, isn’t this thrilling!’ said Mother Margaret, clapping her hands.
‘I wonder what happened to the other two toes?’ said Sister Phyllida. Nurses are interested in that kind of thing.
Before they reached the door of the Abbey they had another treat.
‘Look, Sister – bloodstains. I’m sure they are.’ Mother Margaret bent down and dipped her finger in the red pool and sure enough her finger came away with a sticky dark spot.
‘They must have settled in,’ said Sister Phyllida. ‘People don’t make bloodstains, I’m sure, unless they feel at home.’
But when they reached the door of the bell tower, and pushed it open, the noises they heard did not seem to be those of a contented family of ghosts at breakfast.
The Shriekers were quarrelling as usual.
‘And what exactly is that?’ Sabrina yelled at her husband, throwing something soft and furry at his face.
‘It’s a dead shrew, you loathsome grub-pot,’ screeched her husband.
‘Oh ha ha, you’ve frightened it to death I suppose! Why don’t you frighten something your own size? Don’t lie to me – that shrew has been lying there for days. It stinks.’
‘Of course it stinks. And you stink too. You’ve got rotten egg yolk oozing out of your ear hole.’
‘I should just hope I do stink. I swore I would stink from the day of our Great Sorrow. I swore I would stink and suffer and claw and kill!’
Fortunately the nuns down below could not hear the actual words that the Shriekers were saying. They did, however, get the idea that their new guests were not completely happy and relaxed.
‘Of course it’s often like that with married people before breakfast,’ said Mother Margaret, who knew that a lot of couples are best not spoken to before they have had their early morning cup of tea.
‘And the journey may have been a strain,’ said Sister Phyllida. ‘Larchford is rather low-lying, it takes time to get used to the damp.’
So the kind nuns decided they would leave their new guests to settle in and call back on the following day. ‘Though I would have loved to see the little girl. She sounded such a dear thing in her nightdress with her sponge bag and the fish.’
When the nuns had gone, the Shriekers went on quarrelling and pelting each other with foul things they had found on the floor of the ruined abbey. Then suddenly they got bored and decided they were hungry.
The ghoul lay on a tombstone, quivering in his sleep.
‘Wake up and cook something, stenchbag!’ screeched Lady de Bone, twitching his rope.
‘And be quick about it or we’ll nail you up by your nostrils,’ yelled Pelham.
As they screamed at their servant and jerked his rope, the ghoul became madder and madder, uttering his weird cooking cries and waving his frying pan to and fro.
‘Fry!’ he gabbled. ‘Sizzle! Burn!’
As he ran about, the pan became less grey, more reddish... hotter. Suddenly it burst into flame and he scooped a dead owl from a rafter, tore its feathers off and threw it into the fire. Then he tossed two burnt thighs at the de Bones and collapsed again on to the slab.
Back in the convent, the smell of cooking came quite clearly to the Sisters.
‘That’s their breakfast now,’ said Mother Margaret. ‘They’ll soon feel better.’
‘There’s nothing like a nice cooked breakfast to settle the stomach,’ agreed Sister Phyllida. ‘So many families just start the day with nothing but a piece of toast, and it’s so unwise.’
They felt very relieved, sure now that the ghosts they had invited were going to lead a sensible life, and then they said goodnight to each other and went to bed.
But the Shriekers, tearing the flesh off the roasted owl, were not exactly being sensible. Mind you, they had had a very difficult journey. The mouse had not agreed with the python, who had been sick, and the ghoul kept passing out at the end of his rope like a log. And when they had at last lost height and come down where the instructions had told them to, they had seen none of the things they had been promised. No great hall with towers and battlements, no writhing statues, no suits of armour or stone pillars or iron gates. Instead there were a few tumbledown buildings and a ruined abbey with the most awful feel to it – the feel of a place where people had been good.
And then when dawn broke they saw something that made them stagger back in horror: a row of nuns on their way to the chapel to pray!
‘I’m not staying here!’ Sabrina yelled. ‘I’m not having that awful gooey goodness clogging up my pores. I can feel it between my teeth. Ugh!’
But they had been too tired to glide back at once. Now they decided to wait for a few days and gather up their strength.
‘There might be a child we can harm,’ said Pelham.
‘How could there be? Nuns don’t have children.’
‘No. But they might run a school.’
The idea of scratching and strangling and smothering a whole school full of children cheered Sabrina up a little.
‘Well, all right. But I won’t stay for long.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Pelham. ‘I’m all set to make those women in the agency wish they’d never been born!’
Chapter Eleven
A new and happy life now began for Oliver.
He woke to find Adopta sitting on the bottom of his bed and heard the other ghosts splashing about in the bathroom and thought how wonderful it was not to be alone.
They all came down to breakfast and made themselves invisible while Miss Match brought him toast and cereal. Just as she was putting it down, the budgie said, ‘Open wide’, and she jiggled her hearing aid and said, ‘I’m not going to open wine at this time of day. Wine is for supper.’
‘I’ll bet she can’t see us,’ said Adopta – and before Aunt Maud could stop her, she flitted off into the kitchen.
‘I told you,’ she said when she came back. ‘I leaned over her and said ‘‘Boo’’ and she just went on reading some silly story in the paper. We’ve got nothing to worry about there.’
But in any case, Miss Match was only supposed to leave out Oliver’s meals. The rest of the day she spent in the village with her cousin. Fulton’s plan to leave Oliver quite alone was turning out to be the best thing that could have happened.
The ghosts simply loved the house.
‘Oh, my dear boy,’ said Aunt Maud. ‘These cellars... the fungus... the damp! It’s a bit strong for me, but just think what poor Mr Hofmann would make of this place. How happy he would be!’
‘Who’s Mr Hofmann?’ Oliver wanted to know.
‘He’s Grandma’s boyfriend,’ said Adopta. ‘He lives in a bunion shop and he’s got every ghost disease in the book, but he’s terribly clever.’
The ghosts liked the kitchens and they liked the drawing room with its claw-footed chairs, and the faceless statues in the library. They liked the hall with its huge fireplace which
you could look up and see the sky, and they absolutely loved the library with its rows of mouldering books.
‘I bet there are ghost bookworms in those books,’ said Adopta. ‘I bet they’re full of them. Can I look later?’
‘Of course. I wish you wouldn’t ask, Adopta.’ Oliver sounded quite cross. ‘If Helton’s mine then what’s mine is yours and that’s the end of the matter.’
If they liked the house, the ghosts liked the gardens even more. The weeping ash tree with its drooping branches, the rook droppings on the stone benches, the yew trees cut into gloomy shapes . . .
‘It’s so romantic, dear boy, so cool!’ said Aunt Maud. ‘You can’t imagine what it is like to be here after the knicker shop.’
When they reached the lake they found Eric staring down into the water.
‘There is someone in there,’ he said. ‘Someone like me. Someone who has suffered.’
‘There’s supposed to be a drowned farmer,’ said Oliver. He had been afraid of the body trapped in the mud, but already the ghosts were making him think of things differently.
Eric nodded. ‘He died for love,’ he said. ‘I can tell because of Cynthia Harbottle. She wouldn’t go out with me even after I’d bought her a box of liquorice allsorts. It took all my sweet ration and she didn’t even say thank you. And this man’s just the same. People who have been hurt by women can recognize each other.’
‘Can you call him up, dear?’ said Aunt Maud. She was thinking how nice it would be if Eric could talk to someone else about being unhappily in love. When he talked to her about Cynthia Harbottle she got terribly cross. Mothers always get cross when people do not love their sons, and Cynthia had been a nasty piece of work, wiggling her behind at American soldiers and smearing herself with lipstick.
‘He doesn’t want to; not now,’ said Eric – and Oliver couldn’t help being glad. He didn’t feel quite ready yet for a drowned farmer covered in mud.
But the farmer reminded Aunt Maud of something she wanted to ask Oliver.
‘Now please tell me honestly,’ she said, taking his hand. ‘Don’t be polite. But... how would you feel if... if someone came here, someone appeared, who was only wearing a flag? Would she be welcome?’