"The Spooks battle" - читать интересную книгу автора (Delaney Joseph)

Chapter II

Theft And Kidnapping

CURIOUS, I returned my book to its place on the shelf and went downstairs. The Spook had already answered the door and was leading someone into the kitchen. When I saw him, my jaw dropped in surprise. He was a very big man, broad across the shoulders and at least two or three inches taller than the Spook. He had a friendly, honest face and looked to be in his late thirties, but the truly astonishing thing about him was that he was wearing a black cassock.He was a priest!"This is my apprentice, Tom Ward," said the Spook with a smile."I'm very pleased to meet you, Tom," said the priest, holding out his hand. "I'm Father Stocks. My parish is Downham, north of Pendle Hill."I'm pleased to meet you, too," I said, shaking his hand."John has told me all about you in his letters," Father Stocks said. "It seems you've gotten yourself off to a very promising start -"At that moment Alice came into the kitchen. She looked our visitor up and down with surprise in her eyes when she saw that he was a priest. In turn, Father Stocks glanced down at her pointy shoes and his eyebrows gave a slight twitch upward."And this is young Alice," said the Spook. "Alice, say hello to Father Stocks."

Alice nodded and gave the priest a little smile."I've heard a lot about you, too, Alice," he said. "I believe you've family in Pendle -"Blood ties, that's all," replied Alice with a fierce frown. "My mam was a Malkin and my dad was a Deane. Ain't my fault where I was born. None of us choose our kin."That's very true," said the priest in a kindly voice. "I'm sure the world 'would be a very different place if we could. But it's the way we live our lives that counts."Not much more was said after that. The priest was tired after his journey, and it was clear that the Spook wanted us on our way to Jack's farm, so we made our preparations to leave.

I didn't bother with my bag, but just took my staff and a lump of cheese for us to eat on the journey.The Spook walked us to the door. "Here's what you'll need to hire the cart," he said, handing me a small silver coin."How did Father Stocks manage to get past the boggart and cross the garden safely?" I asked as I put it into the pocket of my breeches.The Spook smiled. "He's crossed this garden many times before, lad, and the boggart knows him well. Father Stocks was once my apprentice. And a very successful one, I may add -he completed his time. But later he thought better of it and decided that the Church was his true vocation. He's a useful man to know-he has two trades at his fingertips: the priesthood and ours. Add that to his background knowledge of Pendle, and we couldn't have a better ally."As we set off for my brother Jack's farm, the sun was shining, the birds were singing; it was a perfect summer afternoon. I had Alice for company, and I was going home. Not only that: I "was looking forward to seeing little Mary, Jack, and his wife Ellie, who was expecting another baby. Mam had predicted that it would be the son that Jack had always wanted, someone to inherit the farm after he was dead. So I should have been happy. But as we drew closer to the farm, I couldn't shake off a feeling of sadness, which was slowly settling over me like a black cloud.

Dad was dead, and there'd be no Mam to greet me. It was never going to feel like my real home again. That was the stark truth, and I still hadn't fully come to terms with it."Penny for your thoughts," Alice said.I shrugged."Come on, cheer up, Tom. How many times do I have to tell you? We should make the best of it. Off to Pendle I reckon we'll be next week."Sorry, Alice. I'm just thinking about Mam and Dad. Can't seem to get them out of my mind."Alice moved closer to my side and gave my hand an affectionate squeeze. "It's hard, Tom, I know. But I'm sure you'll see your mam again one day. Anyway, aren't you looking forward to finding out what's in those trunks she's left you?"I'm curious, yes, I won't deny that…"This is a nice spot," said Alice, pointing to the side of the path. "I'm feeling peckish. Let's eat."We sat down on a grassy bank under the shade of a massive oak tree and shared out the cheese we'd brought for the journey.

We were both hungry, so we ate it all. I wasn't on spook's business, so there was no need to fast. We could live off the land.It was as if Alice had read my thoughts. "I'll catch us a couple of juicy rabbits at dusk," she promised with a smile."That would be nice. You know, Alice," I said, "you've told me a lot about witches in general, but very little about Pendle and the witches -who live there. Why's that? Reckon I'll need to know as much as possible if we're heading there."Alice frowned. "I've lots of painful memories of that place. Don't like to talk about my family. Don't like to talk about Pendle much-the thought of going back there scares me."It's funny," I said, "but Mr. Gregory's never talked much about Pendle either. You'd think we'd have been discussing and planning what it's like and what we're going to do when we get there."Always likes to play things close to his chest, he does. He must have some sort of plan. I'm sure he'll share it with us when the time's right. Imagine Old Gregory having a friend!" said Alice, changing the subject. "A friend who's a priest as well!"What I can't understand is why someone would give up being a spook to become a priest."Alice laughed at that. "No stranger than Old Gregory being a priest and giving it up to become a spook!"

She was right-the Spook had been trained as a priest-and I laughed with her. But my opinion hadn't changed. As far as I could see, priests prayed and that was it. They didn't do anything directly to deal with the dark. They lacked the practical knowledge of our craft. It seemed to me that Father Stocks had taken a step in the wrong direction.A little before dusk we stopped again and settled ourselves down in a hollow between two hills, close to the edge of a wood. The sky -was clear, with the waning moon visible to the southeast. I busied myself making a fire while Alice went hunting for rabbits. Within an hour she was cooking them over the fire, the juice dribbling and hissing into the flames while my mouth watered.I was still curious about Pendle, and despite Alice's reluctance to talk about her life there, I decided to try again."Come on, Alice," I said. "I know it's painful for you to talk about, but I do need to know more about Pendle…"I suppose so," Alice said, peering at me over the flames. "Best that you're prepared for the worst. Ain't a nice place to be. And everybody's scared. Whichever village you visit, you can see it in their faces. Can't blame em, because the witches know almost everything that's going on. After dark, most ordinary folk turn the mirrors in their houses to the wall."

"Why?" I asked."So they can't be spied on. Nobody trusts a mirror at night. Witches, specially the Mouldheels, use them to spy on folks. They love to use em for scrying and spying. In Pendle you never know who or what might suddenly peer out at you from a mirror. Remember old Mother Malkin? That should give you some idea of the sort of witch we'll be facing."The name Malkin sent a chill through my bones. Mother Malkin had been the most evil witch in the County, and a year earlier, with Alice's help, I'd managed to destroy her. But not before she'd threatened the lives of Jack and his family.

"Even though she's gone now, in Pendle there's always someone else ready to step into the shoes of a dead witch," Alice said grimly. "And there are plenty of Malkins capable of that. Some of em live in Malkin Tower, which ain't a place to go anywhere near after dark. People who go missing in Pendle -that's where they mostly end up. There are tunnels, pits, and dungeons under the tower, full of the bones of those they've murdered."Why isn't something done?" I asked. "What about the high sheriff at Caster? Can't he do anything?"Sent justices and constables to Pendle before, he has. Lots of times. Not that it did much good. Mostly they hanged the wrong people. Old Hannah Fairborne was one. She was nearly eighty when they dragged her off to Caster in chains. Said she was a witch, but that wasn't true. Still, she deserved to hang because she poisoned three of her nephews. Lots of that goes on in Pendle. It ain't a good place to be. And it ain't easy to sort things out there. That's why Old Gregory's left it so long."I nodded in agreement."I know more than most what it's like to live there," Alice continued. "There've been lots of unions between Malkins and Deanes, even though they're rivals. Truth is, the Malkins and Deanes hate the Mouldheels a lot more than they do each other. Life in Pendle is complicated. Lived there most of my life but still don't understand em."Were you happy?" I asked. "I mean, before you were looked after by Bony Lizzie?"

Alice grew silent and avoided my gaze, and I realized that I shouldn't have asked. She'd never talked much about life with her parents or with Lizzie after they'd died."Don't remember life much before Lizzie," she said at last. "I mostly remember the rows. Me lying there in the darkness crying while my mam and dad fought like cat and dog. But sometimes they talked and laughed as well, so it wasn't all bad. That was the big difference afterward. The silence. Lizzie didn't say much. More likely to give me a clout round the head than a kind word. Brooded a lot, she did. Gazed into the fire and muttered her spells. And if she weren't gawping into the flames, she'd be staring into a mirror. Sometimes I caught sight of things over her shoulder. Things that don't belong on this earth. Scared me, it did. Preferred Mam and Dad's fights to that.''"Did you live in Malkin Tower?"Alice shook her head. "No. Only the Malkin coven and a few chosen helpers live in the tower itself. But I went there sometimes with my mam. Some of it's underground, but I never went down there. They all live together in one big room, and there was lots of arguing and screaming and smoke stinging your eyes.

Being a Deane, my dad didn't visit the tower. He'd never have got out alive. We lived in a cottage near Roughlee, the village where most of the Deanes live. The Mouldheels live in Bareleigh and the rest of the Malkins in Goldshaw Booth. Mostly keep to their own territory, they do."After that Alice grew silent, so I didn't press her further. I could see that Pendle held a lot of painful memories for her-unspoken horrors that I could only guess at.Jack's nearest neighbor, Mr. Wilkinson, had a horse and cart, and I knew he'd be only too happy to hire them out. No doubt he'd have one of his sons drive us so I wouldn't have to make a return journey later. I decided to call in at my brother's first to let him know -what I intended to do with the trunks. We made good time and came within sight of Jack's farm late in the afternoon of the following day. My first glance told me that something was badly wrong.We'd approached from the northeast, skirting the edge of Hangman's Hill, and as we began our descent, I could see right away that there were no animals in the fields. Then, as I caught sight of the farmhouse, it got worse.

The barn was a blackened ruin: It had been burned to the ground.It never even crossed my mind to ask Alice to wait at the farm boundary. Something bad had happened, and all I could think of was checking that Jack, Ellie, and their daughter, Mary, were all right. By now the farm dogs should have been barking, but everything was silent.As we hastened through the gate and across the yard, I saw that the back door of the farmhouse had been smashed in and was hanging from one hinge. I ran across, with Alice at my heels, a lump in my throat, afraid that something terrible had happened.Once inside, I called Jack's and Elbe's names over and over again but received no answer. The house was unrecognizable as the home I'd been brought up in. All the kitchen drawers had been pulled out and there was cutlery and smashed crockery on the flags. The pots of herbs had been taken from the windowsill and thrown against the walls; there was soil in the sink. The brass candlestick had gone from the table and in its place were five empty bottles of elderberry wine from Mam's store in the cellar. But for me, the worst thing of all was Mam's rocking chair, which -was in big, jagged pieces, as if someone had taken an ax to it. It pained me to see that. It almost felt like they'd hurt Mam.Upstairs, the bedrooms had been ransacked -clothes scattered across the beds and floors and every mirror smashed. But the scariest moment of all came when we reached Mam's special room. The door was closed, but there was blood splattered across the -wall next to it, and there were bloodstains on the floorboards, too. Had Jack and his family been here -when this happened?

I became filled with a terrible dread that someone had died here."Don't think the worst, Tom!" Alice said, gripping my arm. "It may not be as bad as it seems…"I didn't answer, just kept staring at the splatters of blood on the walls."Let's look inside your mam's room," Alice suggested.For a moment I looked at her, horrified. I couldn't believe that was all she could think about now."I think we should look inside," she insisted.Angrily I tried the door but it didn't yield. "It's still locked, Alice. I've got the only key. So nobody's been inside."Trust me, Tom. Please…"For safety, I kept the keys on a piece of string round my neck. There was a large key for the door and three smaller ones for the three largest trunks inside. In a moment I'd opened the door and stepped inside. Additionally, I had a key made by the Spook's brother, Andrew, who's a locksmith, and it will open most locks without trouble.

I'd been wrong. Somebody had been in the room. It was completely empty. The three big trunks and the smaller chests were gone."How could they get into the room?" I asked, my voice echoing slightly. "I have the only key."Alice shook her head. "Remember the other thing your mam said: that nothing evil could enter here. Well, something evil's been here and that's for sure!"I certainly did remember what Mam had said. It had been on my final visit to the farm when I saw her for the last time. She'd stood in this very room, talking to Alice and me, and I remembered her words exactly.Once locked, nothing evil can ever enter here. If you 're brave and your soul is pure and good, this room is a redoubt, a fortress against the dark… Only use it when something so terriblepursues you that your very life and soul are at risk.So what had happened? How had someone gotten inside and stolen the trunks that Mam had left me? What did they want them for? What use were they to somebody else?

After checking the attic, I locked the door to Mam's room again, and we went downstairs and out into the yard. In a daze I walked across to what was left of the barn-just a few charred posts and fragments of wood among a pile of ashes."I can still smell the smoke," I said. "This happened recently."Alice nodded. "It happened soon after dark, the day before yesterday," she said, sniffing loudly at the tainted air.Alice could sniff things out. She was usually right, but now, looking at her face, I didn't like the expression there. She'd discovered something else. Something very bad. Maybe worse than what we'd already found."What is it, Alice?" I demanded."There's something else as well as smoke. A witch has been here. Maybe more than one-"A witch? Why would a witch come here?" I asked, my head whirling with what I'd seen."For the trunks, what else? There must be something inside 'em that they wanted badly."But how would they find out about the trunks?"Mirrors, perhaps? Maybe they have powers beyond Pendle."

"And what about Jack and Ellie? And the child? Where are they now?"My guess is that Jack tried to stop 'em. Big and strong, Jack is. Wouldn't have given up without a fight. Want to know what I think?" Alice asked, her eyes wide.I nodded but was afraid to hear it."They couldn't go into that room themselves because your mam protected it against evil in some way. So they made Jack go in and fetch out the trunks for them. At first he put up a fight, but when they threatened Ellie or little Mary, he had to do it."But how could Jack have gotten in?" I cried. "There's no sign of the door being forced, but I have the only key. And where are they? Where are theyNow?" "They'll have taken your family with them. That's what it looks like."Which way, Alice? Which way did they go?"Needed a horse and cart to carry the trunks. The three big trunks looked heavy. So they'd have kept to the roads mostly. We could follow and see…"We ran to the end of the lane and followed the road south, walking fast. After about three miles we reached the crossroads. Alice pointed."They've gone northeast, Tom. It's just as I thought. They've gone to Pendle."Then let's follow them," I said, setting off at a run. I'd taken fewer than ten paces before Alice caught me, spinning me round by my arm.

"No, Tom, this ain't what to do. They'll be well on their way already. By the time we get there they'll be hidden away, and there's lots of places to hide in Pendle. What hope would we have? No, we should go back and tell Old Gregory what's happened. He'll know what to do. And that Father Stocks will help, too."I shook my head. I wasn't convinced."Tom, think! Alice said, squeezing my arm until it hurt. "First we should go back and talk to Jack's neighbors. Maybe they know something. And what about your other brothers? Shouldn't you send word to them about what's gone on? Surely they'd want to help. Then we should run for Chipenden and tell Old Gregory what's happened."No, Alice. Even at top speed, it's well over a day back to Chipenden. Then half a day or more to Pendle. By then anything might have happened to Jack and his family. We'd be too late to save them."There's another way, but you may not like it," Alice said, letting go of my arm and dropping her gaze to the ground."What do you mean?" I asked. I was impatient. Time was running out for Jack and his family."You could go back to Chipenden, and I could go on to Pendle alone -"No, Alice! I couldn't let you go alone. It's too dangerous."

"It's more dangerous if we're together. If they catch us together, we'll both suffer. Imagine what they'd do to a spook's apprentice! A seventh son of a seventh son. They'd be fighting over your bones, for sure. Ain't nothing more certain than that! But if I was caught alone, I'd say that I'd just come back home to Pendle, wouldn't I? That I wanted to be back with my family again. And I'd have a better chance of finding out who's done this and where they're holding Jack and Ellie."My stomach was churning with anxiety, but gradually Alice's words started to get through to me. After all, she did know the place and would be able to travel through the Pendle district without arousing too much comment."It's still dangerous, Alice. And I thought you were afraid of going back."I'm doing this for you, Tom. And your family. They don't deserve what's happened to them. I'll go to Pendle. Ain't nothing else for it now." Alice came forward and took hold of my left hand. "See you in Pendle, Tom," she said softly. "Get there just as soon as you can."I will," I assured her. "As soon as you find out anything, go to Father Stocks's church at Downham. I'll be waiting there."With that, Alice nodded, turned, and set off along the road to the northeast. I -watched her for a few moments, but she didn't look round. I turned and ran back toward Jack's farm.