However, I realised I had not actually solved any Mysteries. There was still The Mystery of the Travelling Sleeping Bag, The Mystery of the Terrified Bats, The Mystery of the Forbidden Bat Turret and now we had The Mystery of the Bat Net at Midnight and The Mystery of the Barricaded Bedroom.
When I told my sidekick this she said, “There are too many Mysteries, Araminta. Why don’t you just make them into one big one?”
“Mysteries are not like gummi bears, Wanda,” I said. “You can’t just put lots of different ones into one packet.”
“Why not?” asked Wanda. “Maybe that is where they all belong.”
I sighed. That was no help at all. I had a whole stack of Mysteries piling up far too fast for even a trained Chief Detective to solve, let alone a Detective-in-training with a dozy sidekick.
I sat down on a windowsill behind some mouldy old curtains and considered what to do. I still had my Number-Two-Suspect to interview, but unfortunately this was Aunt Tabby and I knew she would not tell me anything. So I decided to do what we detectives call a stake-out. A stake-out is where you keep watch on something suspicious without anyone noticing you. For a stake-out you need three things.
The first is something to stake out. I decided to go back to the original scene of the crime, which was the little red door to Uncle Drac’s bat turret.
The second thing you need for a stake-out is somewhere to hide. Lots of detectives have old vans or rundown cafés to sit in but seeing as there is not a rundown café in Spook House and I could not get Barry’s old van up the stairs (and even if I did, Aunt Tabby would be sure to notice it), I made do with sitting on the pirates’ chest behind the mouldy curtain, just along from the little red door. It gave me a good view of the door but was really dark and shadowy, like a place for a stake-out should be.
The third thing you need for a stake-out is a cover. A cover is something that, if people get nosy, gives you a reason for being there. For example, if you were sitting in a café you would have a cup of coffee. My cover was my book called Beastly Bats and my cover story, just in case I needed it, was that I was waiting for Wanda. Because it was so dark I was wearing the present that uncle Drac had brought me back from holiday. It was a head torch and on it was written: A Present from the Caves of the Werebats.
I enjoyed being on the stake-out. I sat on the pirate chest with my head torch switched on and under the cover of reading my bat book I watched and waited for something to happen. And soon something did. I heard Aunt Tabby’s boots clumping up the stairs. Aha, I thought, here comes Number-Two-Suspect. I switched off my head torch at once.
Unfortunately Number-Two-Suspect was very nosy. I think she must have seen my feet sticking out or something because she pulled back the curtain and said, “What are you doing, Araminta?”
I had my cover story ready. “I am reading my book while I wait for Wanda,” I told her.
Aunt Tabby frowned and I could see she did not believe me. I sighed. It looked like my stake-out was not going to work, so I decided that I might as well interview my Number-Two-Suspect. I switched my head torch back on and I looked up so that the light pointed straight at Aunt Tabby. Aunt Tabby’s face was weird lit up from below. She looked like someone out of one of the vampire movies that she likes watching. Not the beautiful heroine—obviously—but one of the ancient victims, who has been living in the cellar for hundreds of years and has just been discovered by the hero. If I hadn’t known it was Aunt Tabby, I think I would have screamed just like a beautiful heroine. However—as Uncle Drac says—I am made of stronger stuff, so I did my scary smile just for fun. I do wish that I had little pointed teeth like Uncle Drac. I think it would make my smile much better.
“Turn that thing off, Araminta. I can’t see,” Aunt Tabby said irritably. “Why do you have to wait for Wanda here?”
I did not answer because it was what we detectives call a leading question. This means that if you answer it, you give the game away. Anyway, as Chief Detective it was my job to ask the questions, not answer them. It was then that I noticed that Aunt Tabby was carrying some planks, a large hammer and a bag of nails. I smiled. My stake-out had been successful after all. I had caught Number-Two-Suspect acting in a suspicious manner. So I tried a leading question myself.
“What are those planks and nails for, Aunt Tabby?” I asked.
“They are to put a stop to this nonsense,” Aunt Tabby said.
Aha, I thought. Aunt Tabby definitely knows something. “What nonsense, Aunt Tabby?” I asked, and then I yawned so as not to appear too interested in the answer. Some suspects will be lulled into a false sense of security if they think you are not listening properly. However, this did not work with Aunt Tabby.
“Nothing for you to worry about, Araminta,” she said, and she zoomed off to the little red door. In three seconds flat she was nailing the planks across it.
Bang bang bang!
Bother, I thought. My cover was blown—which means Aunt Tabby knew where I was hiding now—and I hadn’t found out anything at all.
Bang bang bang! The noise from Aunt Tabby’s hammering echoed through the house.
Wanda came to see what was happening. “Hello, Araminta,” she said. “Why are you wearing a head torch?”
Bang bang bang!
I did not reply. A detective does not discuss a case with her sidekick in front of her Number-Two-Suspect.
Bang bang bang!
And then Uncle Drac arrived, all rumpled from getting out of his sleeping bag too fast. He looked very upset when he saw what Aunt Tabby was doing.
“Tabby, stop!” he said. “Please. Don’t. My poor bats won’t have a chance in there if that—”
Aunt Tabby swung around. She was holding three nails between her teeth and she looked fierce. She spoke out of the corner of her mouth, like a real villain. “Drac Spook. I have been up all night. I have searched this house from top to bottom and the …” she stopped and pointed at Wanda and me as if to warn Uncle Drac we were there, “… you-know-what is definitely not in the house.” She turned around and began hammering again.
Bang bang bang!
“And if the you-know-what is not in the house,” said Aunt Tabby, “then it must be in the bat turret. And if the you-know-what is in the bat turret …”
Bang bang!
“… then that …”
Bang!
“… is where the you-know-what is jolly well going to stay!”
Bang bang bang BANG!
“But my bats!” Uncle Drac yelled. “What about my bats?”
Aunt Tabby swung around, clutching her hammer like she was looking for something else to hit. “The bats will have to take their chances, Drac,” she hissed. “Just like we have all had to ever since you brought that wretched thing back.”
Uncle Drac pointed at us now. “Shush, Tabby, we agreed we wouldn’t tell them.”
Wanda, who is very nosy, piped up, “Wouldn’t tell them what?”
I sighed. Sometimes I think I may not be employing my sidekick for very much longer. If we had listened for just a little while more, our suspects would have given themselves away and the mystery would have been solved right there and then. But Wanda had stopped all that with her silly question. And I knew exactly what Aunt Tabby was going to answer. So I said it with her.
“That is for me to know and you to wonder,” we both said.
Aunt Tabby frowned at me, but Uncle Drac didn’t even notice. He was still desperate about his bats being shut in the turret. “Please, Tabby. My poor bats. You can’t do this to them.”
“Well, I just have,” Aunt Tabby replied in the voice she usually uses with me.
Uncle Drac tried another tack. “Look, Tabby,” he said in the kind of voice you use when a horse is about to tread on your foot and you are trying to get it not to. “Look, Tabby, the er, you-know-what could be still out here. It’s very tiny, you know. And extremely good at hiding in dark places.”
“And I am extremely good at looking in dark places
,” said Aunt Tabby. She picked up the hammer and nails. “I am not discussing this any more.” She stalked off with her pointy nose in the air and walked straight into Great-aunt Emilene. Aunt Tabby let out a little shriek and dropped the hammer.
I suppose all the banging noises meant that none of us had noticed her arrive, but suddenly my great-aunt and her dead ferrets were standing there, staring at the bat door covered in planks. It was very creepy.
“The trunk is packed,” Great-aunt Emilene said.
I was suddenly very suspicious. “Trunk? What trunk?” I asked. But no one answered me.
My great-aunt Emilene ignored me and carried on. “Tabitha, I have placed everything that will be required in the trunk. However, I have left it open for you to check.”
Aunt Tabby glanced at me; she looked a bit guilty, I thought. “I don’t need to check, thank you, Emilene. I’m sure you have thought of everything. Drac, go and lock Araminta’s trunk, will you?”
I jumped up. “Araminta’s trunk? What trunk? Why? Why is it packed? Where am I going?”
Wanda just stared at me. Her eyes were very round and glistening and her bottom lip looked a bit trembly.
Uncle Drac’s expression reminded me of Brenda’s cat when it is about to be sick. As he shuffled past me he muttered, “Sorry, Minty. It’s for the best.”
I watched Uncle Drac walk slowly down the stairs. “Aunt Tabby,” I said. “You have to tell me. Why have I got a trunk?”
My aunt took a deep breath. “Because, Araminta, you are going to boarding school.”
Wanda said it for me. “No!” she yelled. “No! You can’t send Araminta to boarding school. You can’t!”
This was what we detectives call a set-up. This is when a Chief Detective has been ganged up on by people who have secretly plotted to make something bad happen to her.
I had been well and truly set up.
I knew this because Aunt Tabby had my school uniform ready and waiting in our Friday bedroom, which meant that she had been planning this for ages. So while Uncle Drac went to find the key for the trunk and Wanda ran downstairs crying like a baby, I had to put on a horrible school uniform. There was a black tunic with a red sash, and a black blazer with a badge on the pocket that had the letters GAG underneath an embroidered picture of the head of a monster with its mouth open. The worst thing was the hat. Now, I like hats. My cousin Mathilda (who is surprisingly nice considering Great-aunt Emilene is her grandmother) makes brilliant hats and she gave me a wonderful one with dead mice on it for my birthday, but this school hat was horrible. It was made of yellow straw and it had a bright red ribbon around it. It was not subtle at all, not like my beautiful dead-mouse hat.
We went downstairs to the hall and Uncle Drac said he could not find the key to the trunk. He winked at me and I guessed that he was hoping Aunt Tabby would change her mind. But I knew she wouldn’t, not with my great-aunt glaring at her. Emilene wasn’t going to let a little thing like a lost key stop her sending me away to a horrible boarding school for ever. She took a huge padlock out of her pocket and locked the trunk herself, then she put the key in an envelope, wrote on it and gave it to me. It said: Property of Miss Araminta Spook, c/o Miss Gargoyle’s Academy for Girls, Gargoyle Hall. Not to be opened until destination.
So now I knew where I was going: Miss Gargoyle’s Academy for Girls. That would explain the weird badge on my blazer, which I now realised was a gargoyle. I know what gargoyles are because I have read a book called Ghastly Gargoyles. They are carved monster heads that live on big old buildings. While I was wondering which one Miss Gargoyle would look like, I heard the clanketty-clank noise of Barry’s van outside in the lane and then the pop-pop-pop sound it makes just before it stops.
“Time to go now, Araminta,” Aunt Tabby said.
I didn’t reply. I decided that I was never going to speak to Aunt Tabby again. Never, ever, ever again. But I did say goodbye to Sir Horace, who was standing in his favourite place beside the clock in the hall.
“Goodbye, Miss Spook,” he boomed. “We will meet again. If you are ever in need of assistance, send this kerchief as a message and I will be at your side in a moment.” And he slowly raised his arm and placed a red silk spotted handkerchief in my hand.
It was such a sweet thing to do, but I almost wished he hadn’t because I very nearly burst into tears. But one look at the double-ended ferrets stopped me doing that.
“Thank you, Sir Horace,” I said. “I will not forget you.”
“We will not forget you, Miss Spook,” said Sir Horace. “Even if we do not meet for another five hundred years.”
That made me feel even worse. Five hundred years might not seem very long to Sir Horace, but it felt like for ever to me. I hurried out fast. I patted Fang on his ghostly head as I went and he gazed up at me mournfully, like he knew he would never see me again. I said a quick goodbye to Edmund, who waved gloomily, then I looked around for Wanda.
But Wanda wasn’t there. And that made me feel sadder than anything.
Barry and Uncle Drac picked up my trunk. “Oof!” said Uncle Drac. “I don’t know what you put in there, Tabby, but it weighs a ton.”
“Emilene packed the trunk,” Aunt Tabby told him. And then she looked at me in a peculiar way, gave me a lopsided kind of smile and said, “It is nothing to do with me.” It was almost as though she was saying she was sorry.
“I have packed a rather large book for Araminta to read,” said Great-aunt Emilene. She smiled at me like a wolf—her yellowing teeth sparkling with spit, her clotted lipstick like blood. “I think you will find it useful, Araminta.”
Huh, I thought. I bet it is a horrible book telling me how to be good.
“Now, Araminta, put your hat on,” Great-aunt Emilene said. And—would you believe it—she grabbed the horrible school hat out of my hands and stuffed it on my head. I felt so annoyed that suddenly I stopped feeling sad and felt really cross instead. If Aunt Tabby was going to gang up on me with my great-aunt and spend her time secretly planning to send me away, then I didn’t want to be at home any more. I was glad that I was going to boarding school. So I walked straight out of the door and as I went I didn’t even look at Great-aunt Emilene or Aunt Tabby.
Uncle Drac was waiting by Barry’s van. “Goodbye, Uncle Drac,” I said.
“It’s not goodbye yet, Minty,” said Uncle Drac. “I’m coming too. I’m making sure you get there safely.”
Recently, Barry has put three new seats in his van so that Wanda and I can travel in the front together. I got in, took my school hat off and put it on the middle seat, then I sat on it. Uncle Drac squeezed in beside me. Aunt Tabby and Great-aunt Emilene came out to wave me goodbye but I ignored them.
I did look around for Wanda, but she still hadn’t bothered to come and say goodbye to me—there was nothing for me any more at Spook House.
It was a horrible journey. Barry and Uncle Drac argued all the way. Barry took the road that went along by the sea, even though Uncle Drac said we shouldn’t. Then, after a while (and a lot of rude words from Uncle Drac) Barry turned off on to a little road that went up into some hills. It was very late in the afternoon by now and the sun was making long shadows across the fields. The road was very bendy and I was beginning to feel sick because every time Barry said something to Uncle Drac he pressed the accelerator pedal angrily and the van shot forward, and when Uncle Drac disagreed, Barry put his foot on the brake. So I was actually pleased when I suddenly saw a signpost with a long pointing finger. It said: Gargoyle Hall.
“There!” I yelled. “There it is!”
Barry slammed on the brakes, yanked the steering wheel over and screeched into the lane. We went bumping along for what felt like miles. Every time Barry zoomed around a bend—which he did a lot—Uncle Drac told Barry what a rubbish driver he was. And Barry told Uncle Drac to shut up.
At last we got to a huge pair of iron gates with a big sign above them saying, Miss Gargoyle’s Academy for Girls. Except when I looked closer someone h
ad crossed out Girls and written Gools. I smiled. Even I knew that you didn’t spell ghoul like that.
Barry slowed down—probably because Uncle Drac was screaming, “Slow down, you idiot! Slow down!”—and the gates opened before us. Barry accelerated through the gates, past a tiny boarded-up little house, and we went hurtling up the drive like there was a whole gang of ghouls chasing us.
It was getting dark and misty now and the van’s headlights kept flickering on and off. But every time they went on I could see the shape of a huge house with lots of pointy turrets at the end of the drive. There were tall trees scattered around and the swirling mist made it look like they were moving. In fact, I think they were, because as we got nearer there was a row of trees on either side of the drive looking like they had all lined up to see who was coming.
Barry was now busy swerving to avoid potholes. Uncle Drac had stopped yelling but now he was groaning in my ear and I was afraid he was going to be sick. Much as I love Uncle Drac, I did not want him to be sick in my ear. So I was quite pleased when Barry did his favourite handbrake turn and we skidded to a halt on the gravel in front of the entrance.
It was very impressive. Gargoyle Hall was just like a house out of Aunt Tabby’s vampire films. It had lots of pointy windows—most of which were dark—and it was almost completely covered in ivy. It had four turrets, one on each corner, and against the darkening sky I could see a whole forest of chimneys soaring up. There were what looked like lots of monsters leaning out from under the roof, but I knew that these were the gargoyles.
Barry got out. A set of very wide steps with lots of columns led up to big double doors at the top. The doors swung open, a beam of light shone out and I saw a small, round figure in black step outside. She was followed by two identical girls—much taller and thinner—each carrying a large lantern. The three of them stood in a line at the top of the steps staring down at us. They looked very weird, like an apple stuck between two chopsticks.