"Please keep the key, Miss Spookie, " he said. "I would be very pleased for you to use my balcony for your Awful Ambush. I myself have done many Awful Ambushes from there in years gone by. They can be very effective. I will ask my faithful page, Edmund, to assist you. " Aha. So that was who Edmund was, I thought. "Thank you very much, Sir Horace, " I said. "You are most welcome, Miss Spookie, " he replied, and bowed low. "Careful!" I shouted, but it was too late. Sir Horace's head fell off and rolled along the corridor. I caught it just as it started bounc- ing down the stairs, but unfortunately Aunt Tabby saw me as she was attacking some spi- derwebs on the landing below.
"Haven't you put Sir Horace back together yet, Araminta?" she snapped at the same time as she made a hundred spiders homeless. Aunt Tabby likes making spiders and people homeless. "Nearly finished, Aunt Tabby, " I told her, and I rushed back to find Sir Horace. He was sitting on the bottom step looking surprised. Well, I think that was how he was looking, although it was hard to tell. I put his head back on. I was more careful this time, and I could tell it had gone on the right way as there was a little click when it settled onto his shoulders. "Ooh, that's better, " he said. "That crick in my neck has completely gone. " He moved his head about, and it didn't make the pepper mill noise any more. I felt pleased. Then he hung on to the banister and heaved himself up, so that he was standing almost straight, and he said, "Well, jolly good, then, Miss Spookie. You do your ambush and leave the rest to me. " "Great, " I said. "Right ho. And tell young Edmund I said to provide you with all necessary assistance. Until we meet again, Miss Spookie. " He started to bow, but then he changed his mind.
He walked away, kind of lurching from side to side until he reached a dark corner on the Q landing and propped himself up in it. This was turning out to be good day after all--a secret passage, two ghosts, and one Awful Ambush coming up. What could be better?
Chapter Nine
AMBUSH KIT
You need a lot of stuff for an Awful Ambush. And most of the things I needed were--bats. Lots and lots of bats. So I went off to Uncle Drac's turret to catch as many as I could. I'm pretty good at catching bats, as I always help Uncle Drac with them whenever they escape. Aunt Tabby hates bats. She thinks that they are going to nest in her hair, but no self-respecting bat would want to go anywhere near Aunt Tabby's hair, as it is stuffed full of hairpins.
They would be bat-kebabs in five seconds flat. Anyway, I found my bat sack and soon I was crawling very carefully along a rafter at the top of the turret. Uncle Drac was fast asleep, snoring in his sleeping bag, which hung from the rafters and swayed with each snore. There was a crowd of bats fast asleep all around him, although I don't think the bats were snoring. Or perhaps I just couldn't hear them. Maybe bat snores are too high- pitched for humans to hear. "Here, bats, " I whispered, and scooped up as many as I could and stuffed them into the sack. The bats didn't mind; they liked my bat sack. Well, all except Big Bat, who does not like anything, as he is a grumpy old bat.
But I really wanted to have Big Bat in the ambush since I figured he would be pretty scary.
I grabbed him when he wasn't looking, and he squeaked really loudly. Uncle Drac stopped snoring and snuffled a bit in his sleeping bag, and I froze. I really didn't want him to wake up, as I knew he would not let me have any of his precious bats, even if they were going to save the house from a lot of stupid people who wanted to take it away from us. Uncle Drac's bats are more important to him than anything else in the world. When I had enough bats, I took them all down to Sir Horace's room and left them roosting in the dark. They looked really happy. The next thing I needed for the Awful Ambush Kit was . . . Strawberry Jell-O. This was more difficult, as I had to go back into Aunt Tabby's territory.
I had to get to the fourth- kitchen-on-the-right-just-past-the-boiler- room. I zoomed by the boiler room at top speed, and I didn't see Aunt Tabby anywhere, although there was a large pile of soot in the corner, so I knew she'd be around soon to sweep it up. In no time at all, I was in the fourth- kitchen-on-the-right-just-past-the-boiler- room and had found what I was looking for--a giant box of mix for Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O. I had made two buckets full of strawberry Jell-O and was slowly slopping my way along the basement corri- dor with them when, sure enough, I heard Aunt Tabby. "Is that you, dear?" she called out. I don't like it when Aunt Tabby says "dear" like that, -90- through gritted teeth. It always means trouble. I sped up as fast as I could, but it was too late. You can never escape Aunt Tabby, however hard you try. As I splashed past the open door to the boiler room, the large pile of soot spoke to me. "Well done, dear, " said the pile of soot. "It's very sweet of you to clean your bed- rooms. It makes such a difference if people see a nice clean house. I just hope they get to see a nice clean boiler as well.
"The pile of soot shook itself, and I could see it was really Aunt Tabby with a broom. "You know, I have a funny feeling that these people will be just right for the house, " she said. I stomped off with my buckets. "Funny feeling, " I muttered. "I'll show them a funny feeling all right. " I soon had all the other stuff for the Awful Ambush. I had:
Q a large bag of assorted spiders Q a big pile of pillowcases Qa massive tub of strangled ghost squealers Q a huge box of balloons Q a giant bag of flour QQQ
I took it all down to Sir Horace's room and dumped it in a big pile in the middle of the floor. Phew. And then someone coughed. I jumped about six feet into the air and nearly fell into a bucket of Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O. "Hello, " said Edmund. "You shouldn't go creeping up on people like that, " I told him, "especially if you are a ghost. Someone could hurt themselves. " "But Sir Horace told me to come and help you, " Edmund said. "He said that there were some people coming who were going to put him in a dust bin with some bicycles and make him into cat food. But I do not understand why they wish to do this. " "It's because of the Tabitha, " I told Edmund. "Ah, " said Edmund, "I see. "
After that Edmund was really helpful. First we got the "ghosts" ready-- Edmund blew up the balloons and I put the squealers in. I tied a slipknot around the ends so that I could set them off quickly. I put the balloons in the pillowcases and poured flour over them, then I opened the fireplace and Edmund wafted the "ghosts" out onto the balcony. Next I scooped all the spiders out of the spider bag and hung them from the bars of the balcony. It was perfect--they dangled just above the place where people always stopped with their mouths wide open.
Last of all I carried out the buckets of Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O and set them up on the edge of the balcony. We left the bats sleeping in Sir Horace's room until they were needed. Then Edmund and I sat down behind the buckets and waited.
We were ready for anything.
Chapter Ten
ARAMINTA'S AWFUL AMBUSH
W e didn't have to wait long--soon someone was banging on the front door so hard that I was surprised the door didn't fall off, just like it did last week. Aunt Tabby was at the top of the basement stairs in no time. She was still covered in soot, and she was looking around to see if I was going to try and race her to the front door like I usually do.
She looked really pleased when she realized I wasn't there, and she scurried across the hall like the biggest spider you have ever seen and pulled the front door open with a thump, spraying soot everywhere. Standing on the doorstep was the weirdest bunch of people. Edmund stared at them like he had never seen anything like them before in his life--which I suppose he hadn't, since he'd last been alive about five hundred years ago. The first person on the doorstep was a short, round woman wearing sunglasses and a bright pink dress. She was holding an extremely fat black cat. Who takes their cat with them to look at a house? Weird.
Next was a really tall, thin man. He was wearing a bright green coat and long, yellow pointed boots. On his head he had a blue bowler hat with a small green frog on the top of it. I thought it was probably a stuf
fed frog until it hopped off his hat and landed on the smallest person on the doorstep. She looked really boring, and a little stupid. Well, quite a lot stupid, actually. She had short, mousy hair and was wearing a blue school top and a gray skirt. The only slightly interesting thing about her was the green frog that was now sitting on top of her head. But the green frog soon got bored too, and it hopped straight back onto the blue bowler hat. Aunt Tabby looked at the weird people like they were the best things she'd seen all day.
"How lovely to see you, " she cooed in her very best polite voice. "Do come in. " "Thank you, " said the sunglasses woman. "So nice to meet you, Mrs. . . . Er?" "Spookie, " said Aunt Tabby. "Tabitha Spookie. " "I am Brenda Wizzard, " said the sunglasses woman. "This is my husband, Barry, and our daughter, Wanda. We saw your wonderful sign and we'd love to buy your house. " "Great, " said Aunt Tabby. "Do come in. " The weird people who wanted to steal my house walked into the hall and stood just where I expected them to stand--right under the balcony. Perfect. And then they did just what I expected them to do--they gazed around in amazement with their mouths wide open. Fantastic!
"Ready?" I asked Edmund. He nodded. So I set the "ghosts" off.
WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE- EEEEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIII- IOOOOOOOOEEEEEEE! It was the best! Swarms of screaming white pillow- cases zoomed around and looped the loop. Thick clouds of flour dropped all over the weird people and then the pillowcases fell on their heads.
One of them dropped right over the small boring one so that she looked Q like a ghost too. All you could see were her spindly little legs. Then I tipped the buckets of Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O out. SPLATTTTTTTTT! It was perfect. The Jell-O was just right. Lumps of horrible, sticky, red slime fell on their heads. It ran right down their necks and got stuck inside their clothes. Then came the best part. Edmund woke up the bats and shooed them out of Sir Horace's room. They came out like a huge black cloud, and they went everywhere. The whole hall was just a storm of flapping bats. It was fantastic.
Aunt Tabby screamed, almost as loudly as Huge Hotels had done. And while she was screaming, I cut the spiderwebs. It rained spiders. Really fat ones. Hundreds of them fell onto the weird people. They got stuck in their hair, they dropped down their necks and got covered in Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O. They shot up their sleeves and trouser legs, trying to find somewhere safe to hide. A family of fifteen particularly hairy spiders fell on the sunglasses woman. I don't think she liked spiders much. She screamed really loudly too, and her cat leaped into the air and landed on Aunt Tabby's head. It was the best thing I'd seen all day. But things got even better because, you see, Aunt Tabby is allergic to cats. Really allergic. They make her sneeze the hugest sneezes I have ever heard and give her big, -103- red, scratchy bumps. It is not nice. So Aunt Tabby sneezed--and when Aunt Tabby sneezes, she really goes for it. "Ah-ah- aaaah-aaaaaaaaaaah-TISHOOOOOO!" She lost her balance, slipped on a pile of Jell-O, and hurtled into the sunglasses woman at full speed. The sunglasses woman toppled over like a falling tree and kind of clung onto Aunt Tabby as she went down. Then they both slid across the hall together, complete with the cat, which was still hang- ing on to Aunt Tabby's head. Aunt Tabby sneezed again. "Ah-ah-aaaah-aaaaaaaaaaah-TISHOOOOOOOOO!" The cat screeched and leaped up into the air. It was just amazing; I can still see it now, in slow motion.
This great fat cat flying through the air with its hair standing up on end and its claws out, coming gracefully to land on a large puddle of Extra-Sticky Strawberry Jell-O. It touched down beauti- fully, then it streaked across the hall, twirling around like an ice skater--and collided with Sir Horace.
Edmund told me later that Sir Horace had prepared a speech and was planning to deliver it to Aunt Tabby to make her see the error of her ways. He had been carefully clanking down the stairs ever since he had heard the weird people arrive, but no one had noticed him what with all the other stuff going on.
But they all noticed him now. The cat cannoned into his left foot, which flew off and skittered across the floor. Then, with the most horrible noise and very slowly, piece by piece--just like a tower of cat food cans in the supermarket--Sir Horace col- lapsed into a rusty heap. I peered over the balcony to see how the weird people were taking this. It looked promising. The smallest one was still strug- gling to get out of her pillowcase. The frog man was covered in bats, and the sunglasses woman was just lying on her back like a stranded beetle, staring up at the ceiling. Aunt Tabby looked really, really angry.
She got up, dusted herself off, then looked straight up at the balcony and said, "Really, Araminta. You have gone too far this time. " I didn't reply, as I was too busy looking at the sunglasses woman trying to get up. She did exactly what stranded beetles do--kind of waved her legs about, rolled over, and picked herself up. Then she scrabbled through the remains of Sir Horace and fished out her cat, which leaped at her and clung to her like a piece of Velcro. I nudged Edmund, but my elbow went right through him and hit the balcony rail. Ouch. "You wait, " I told him. "She'll be out the front door in five seconds flat. " But she wasn't. She just stood in the mid- dle of the hall, gazing around her. "Wonderful, " she said. "This is our dream home!"
Chapter Eleven
GO AWAY!
I could not believe it. There was the sun- glasses woman gazing into space like her best dream ever had just come true. Then the frog man got up and waved a few bats away, and he said, "Perfect! It's even bet- ter than we expected, isn't it, dear?" "It is, " agreed the sunglasses woman. She turned to Aunt Tabby and shook her hand. "What a wonderful welcome, " she said.
"Thank you so much. " And then the small boring one heaved herself out of the pillowcase and said in a really stupid squeaky voice, "I'd love to live here; it's so exciting. " She tugged at the woman's sticky sleeve and pestered her, "Can we live here, Mom? Please, please, please can we, Mom?" "Of course, dear. " The sunglasses woman smiled. Huh. I really don't think it is good to give in to children who pester, especially irritating ones with squeaky voices.
But the sunglasses woman went right ahead and said to Aunt Tabby, "This house is perfect. We'll take it. We can move in tomor- row!" What? Now I really could not believe it. It had been the best Awful Ambush I could pos- sibly have done. Everything had worked per- fectly--even Sir Horace had turned up. But not only had the weird people liked it, it had made them want to buy the house. What more could I do? So I yelled at them. "GO AWAY!" I shouted as loud as I could. It was great yelling from so high;it echoed around and around the hall, and everyone looked up. Three of them looked amazed and one looked annoyed. "You can't live here, " I yelled at the top of my voice. "It's my house and I live here. GO AWAY!"
The annoyed one opened her mouth to say something, but I got in first. "It's all your fault, Aunt Tabby!" I told her. "You never asked me about selling the house, and you never asked Uncle Drac, either. You just told us what you had decided to do. It's not fair. We all live here, not just you. And I want to stay living here and I'm not going, I'm NOT!" Aunt Tabby wiped the soot and flour and strawberry Jell-O and spiders off her face. "Well, " she said, "making a disgusting mess doesn't exactly make me want to stay here, Araminta. The place is difficult enough to keep clean as it is. I suggest we all go and have a cup of tea and talk about it. I'm sure you'll feel better about things when you have talked to Mr. And Mrs. Wizzard. "
The weird people followed Aunt Tabby down the stairs to the kitchens. Just before they disappeared, the stupid short one looked up at the balcony. I stuck out my tongue and gave her my best Fiendish Stare. That showed her. "What a twit, " I said to Edmund. And can you guess what Edmund said? It was completely idiotic. He said, "I thought she looked all right. " I thought she looked all right! I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I gave him my Fiendish Stare as well, and he shot off into Sir Horace's room, but I followed him. I had a Last Chance Plan, and I needed Edmund's help. "You've got to come down to the kitchen with me, " I told Edmun
d, who had backed into a corner. "If they saw a real ghost, they wouldn't last five seconds. "
"You said that before, " Edmund said, in an irritating way, "and they're still here. Anyway, I think they're nice. I'd like them to stay. " "Look, Edmund, " I told him, as he obvi- ously had not got the point, "if they stay, I have to go. You wouldn't want that, would you?" Well, that told him. He didn't say anything at all; he just floated off and headed for the crummy old ladder. But there was no way I was going to let him get away. "Edmund!" I yelled. "What?" he said in a really grumpy voice. "You're Sir Horace's page, aren't you?" I asked him. "Yes . . . " he said.
"So--you're meant to do what he tells you, aren't you?" "Ye-es . . . " "And Sir Horace told you to help me, didn't he?" "Yes . . . " He sighed just like Aunt Tabby does when the boiler has done something really annoying. "Well, I need you to help me get rid of all those horrible people. Right now. I want you to come with me and scare them away. " "All right, " said Edmund in a sulky voice. But I didn't care how sulky he was. This was my Last Chance Plan, and it had to work.
Chapter Twelve
THE LAST CHANCE PLAN
Uncle Drac was part of the Last Chance Plan as well. I could see that Edmund was probably not up to the job. It would be just like him to float off at the wrong moment, or not be scary enough. So I needed Uncle Drac, too, because I knew he would be on my side. I was just about to open the little door to the bat turret when it flew open and Uncle Drac fell out onto the landing.
"Oh, Minty, Minty, " he said, "something terrible has happened. All my bats have gone. " "No they haven't, " I told him. "Yes they have. They've--" "Uncle Drac, " I said sternly, "while you've just been hanging up there asleep doing noth- ing but snore, Aunt Tabby has gone and sold our house!" Uncle Drac looked confused. He doesn't like being awake during the day. "Wha-at?" he mumbled. "There are three weird people here, Uncle Drac--and one of them is really yucky, you wouldn't believe it, she's so stupid--and Aunt Tabby is selling them our house!" "Eh?" Uncle Drac can be really slow at times.