The Ghastly Gerty Swindle With the Ghosts of Hungryhouse Lane (6 page)

“Are you sure they won't suspect you?” said Alexander through the window of his van.

“No. I was out all afternoon, wasn't I? Went to the village for some stamps. I'll be in touch when I've gathered up enough stuff for a second run. Two trips should do us, then I'll split. Take care now, you hear? We don't want things swishing around in the back. Half of those lovely goodies are mine, duck. I want to be comfortable in my old age.”

“Don't worry about a thing,” Alexander said with a sly little smile. I'll send you a postcard from Rio, he was thinking. “See you, Mom.”

“And have that chest seen to,” cried Gerty. “There's nothing worse than a summer cold.”

It was a comfortable drive home for Alexander. He was disappointed, in a way, that he didn't even spot a policeman, for there was an odd kind of excitement in driving a van full of somebody else's property under the very nose of the law. Back at the shop, the jeweler's assistant from next door helped him to unload the goodies.

And now, on his own at last, Alexander uncovered the six stolen pictures from Hungryhouse Lane. Five of them weren't up to much—perhaps a thousand each. Nice frames. But the sixth picture had all the moody charm of a landscape by Rembrandt. Oh man, we're talking big money here, thought Alexander. Sunshine, here I come! The old magical thrill of
stealing things surged once more through muscle and vein, making him lightheaded.

That was when he saw the monkey. He saw it quite plainly—the ghostly outline of a little monkey in a jacket and short trousers. And a fez. It seemed to be nibbling something. Nuts?

Well, of course, this had to be an extraordinary trick of the light. Alexander knew that it would be gone when he looked again. And so it was. He gave himself a shivery sort of shake and smiled.

You're the one who's nuts, Alex, he thought. Sillybilly!

9 …

“They've Got Lulubelle …”

On a dry patch of ground near the top of the pond field, Amy Steadings laid out the picnic blanket and caressed its green tartan with such a long, sad sigh.

“I've always used this blanket for picnics. It doesn't seem to get old. It's the very same blanket as it always was….”

The Sweet kids watched in amazement as the old lady's eyes misted over with great big wobbly tears. They had never seen a blanket make anyone cry before.

Amy attempted a recovery with a smile. “You see, my friends and I used to come here and picnic in the old days. My, but I wish I had a penny for every glass of barley water and sparkling wine that we spilled! Memory is the strangest master of all, you know. One can't choose what to remember and what to forget. There comes a time when you can't share your
memories with anyone at all. Your friends and loved ones have gone. They have all gone.”

Amy ended with her lower lip trembling and out of control. Without thinking, Zoe reached out and took her hand.

“We're your friends, Miss Amy,” she said.

“I am your friend,” Bonnie piped up. “I will always be your friend.”

“I'll get out the sandwiches,” Charlie mumbled.

But Amy dried her eyes on a hanky that looked very like the one on the wrist of that snooty ghost with the sword. “I'm just being so silly,” she said. “And thank you very much, Charlie, but no—
I
shall prepare the picnic. You three are on your holiday, so off you go and enjoy nature while I set out all this. Don't be too long.”

The Sweet kids were used to being told “Do this” and “Do that,” and so were experts at thinking up reasons why they should never be asked to do anything. They seemed rather surprised that all of a sudden these skills weren't necessary. They followed Muldoon through a gap in the hedge.

It cannot honestly be said that the Sweet kids admired the shimmer of cloudy light on the running brook, or that they looked for the colorful flash of a kingfisher blue among the trees. Instead, they dive-bombed the sleeping trout with stone hand grenades and talked to the local sheep.

“Hey, Lamb Chops.”

“Yo-ho, Woolly Bum!”

“Who knit your sweater, Baa-baaa!”

Charlie tried to interview a cow on his tape recorder, but the beast stared at him blankly and refused to say moo. Bonnie wondered if its tongue had been made into sandwiches. As for Muldoon, an alien creature with sticking-up ears popped out of the ground and made him run for his life. Being a town dog, he'd never seen a rabbit before.

“Yaaaa, you chicken, Muldoon,” jeered the Sweet kids.

When they got back, everything had been laid out for eating and Miss Amy had made a daisy chain for Bonnie.

“I thought Lulubelle would like it,” she said. “Where is she, anyway? I thought she would enjoy a picnic.”

“Hiding,” said Bonnie. “Where nobody will never, ever find her even if they look until she's very old.”

“She's old already,” said Charlie.

“She's not old.”

“We'll find her when she falls asleep,” said Charlie, “because she snores.”

“She doesn't
snore.
”

“Swimming pool!” screeched Zoe.

“And anyway,” Bonnie added in a grown-up way, “she can't snore, because she's only a doll, and she can't pick her nose either, so there.”

Charlie decided to say no more. Whether Lulubelle snored or not, he knew where she was right now and Bonnie didn't. She was in that clock on the landing. He got out his tape recorder and taped a wasp that suddenly came to the picnic.

When they had finished eating, Zoe supervised the clearing-up operation because she believed in a clean environment. Then they went back to the house, bringing most of the square tongue sandwiches with them.

“Perhaps Gertrude will eat them,” said Amy. “I do hate waste.”

The Sweet kids were helping Amy to dunk her hanging baskets in the kitchen sink when Gerty appeared with a terribly pained expression on her face. (Muldoon slipped quietly out of the kitchen as soon as he set eyes on her.)

“Ooh, do I wish I had wings! My poor feet are killing me!”

“You should have taken a taxi from the village, Gertrude.”

“Not me, dear. I'm not one to waste other people's money when I have the two legs the good Lord gave me. Did you have a nice picnic?”

“Oh yes, it was lovely. There are some tongue sandwiches left over if you're hungry.”

“Square ones,” added Zoe.

“Not me, dear. Them and corned beef don't agree with me. By the way, have you been moving the furniture?”

“No,” said Amy. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, I've just walked past the parlor, and the lounge-sofa isn't there anymore.”

Frowning, Amy went to see for herself. The sofa had certainly disappeared. So had the two fine bronzes that sat on the mantelpiece. And the long brass fireplace fender with all the hearth irons. Amy's hand shook as she clutched the ruby brooch at her throat.

“Charlie, look in the front room. Is the writing bureau there? It has solid-silver candlesticks on top of it.”

After a few seconds Charlie returned with the news.

“Nope. It's gone and so are the candlesticks. We've been done.”

“Done?”

“He means we've been burgled, Miss Amy,” said Zoe.

“The attic,” Amy said breathlessly, seizing Zoe's hand and shaking it. “Check the attic for me, child. Quickly!”

Knowing exactly what she meant, Zoe sprinted up the two broad flights of stairs to the twist in the upper landing. One glance into the attic confirmed that the big glass bottle had been stolen and so had the elephant's foot. Had the robbers got their evil hands on little Bobbie, too?

No! Zoe spotted her huddled in a corner. The awful spiky hair—snipped off so that she could be sold as a boy sweep—made her look like a human brush. What a pity, thought Zoe, that you couldn't give a spook a good cuddle.

A tortoise could have passed Zoe as she came down the stairs. What could she possibly say to that old lady? All her friends had died, she had only memories, now even her best furniture was gone and the spooks had been kidnapped. Two of them, anyway. You needed more than a first-aid kit to mend a broken heart.

On the first landing she met Bonnie, who was staring pop-eyed at the empty space where the big grandfather clock used to be. So that was gone too.

“Zoe?”

“What?”

“Are the bugglers jugglers?”

“
What?
”

“The bugglers have taken Charlie's juggling balls,” Bonnie said in a frightened whisper.

“Try harder not to be a complete dope,” said Zoe. “Burglars aren't jugglers. Come on, let's break the news.”

The news, of course, was bad from start to finish. Amy sat on a hard-backed chair in the middle of the kitchen, saying, “They were my responsibility. I have let them down badly, you know. All they ever asked
for, apart from a little conversation now and then, was to be left alone. And I couldn't even manage that.”

She was feeling old and useless, Zoe could tell. But it wasn't your fault, Miss Amy, she was about to say, when Bonnie started to howl.

“THE BIG CLOCK IS GONE AND CHARLIE THEY'VE GOT YOUR JUGGLING BALLS BUT I ONLY PUT THEM THERE BECAUSE YOU SAID SHE DOESN'T USE TOILET PAPER AND SHE WANTS TO MARRY A DUCK.”

Gerty, who had been quietly trying to make sense of this whole conversation, now gave up with a shake of her head. They'd all gone barmy.

“They haven't got my juggling balls.”

“Yes they have, Charlie. I put them in the big clock and they took it away.”

“They're in my rubber boots,” said Charlie. “I switched them for Lulubelle.”

“The doll was in the clock?” cried Zoe.

“Probably still is. She's been kidnapped,” said Charlie.

Bonnie had gone completely stiff. Then, on hearing the word “kidnapped,” she threw herself sideways and began to beat the living daylights out of a flowery cushion. To do this she used her head as well as her hands and feet.

“THEY'VE GOT MY LULUBELLE THEY'VE GOT MY LULUBELLE AND I'LL NEVER SEE MY LULUBELLE
AGAIN,” she screeched, assisted by the loyal Muldoon in the hall.

“Look, dear, have a blueberry muffin,” said Gerty. “There's no use getting worked up over a silly old doll. It didn't even have a mouth, now, did it? There are plenty more where that old rag came from, I can tell you.”

“She did have a mouth,” Charlie said fiercely. “She had a new mouth. And she wasn't old, and we liked her.”

Bonnie stopped crying. She stopped because she couldn't believe her ears. She had never known this before—that Charlie liked Lulubelle.

The phone rang. “I'll get it, dear,” Gerty hurried to say. “That'll be my sick mother.”

“Well,” sighed Amy, pressing herself out of the chair, “let's not be too downhearted. That is always very important in life. Perhaps if we make a list of the things that are missing, we can think of what to do next.”

When the others went out of the kitchen, Zoe decided to make herself useful by tidying away the remains of the picnic. Everything went into a trash can except for the leftover sandwiches, which she put into the fridge. And that was when she noticed something that didn't quite fit.

The tongue sandwiches—the ones that Gertrude Moag had said she didn't like
twice
—weren't there.

10 …

Clues

The police arrived.

Well, he was actually only one policeman—Bill Partridge's grandson, also called Bill. Amy remembered pushing him through the village in his baby carriage.

“Good afternoon, ma'am,” he said. “If I may take down the particulars.”

Perhaps it was the uniform that made him talk funny, Amy supposed, but of course she gave him details of the crime, and Zoe had prepared a list of missing items in the hope that some of them might be traced.

“A heinous crime, burglary, Miss Steadings,” Constable Bill Partridge said gravely. “Every thief in the country seems to be at it at the present time.”

“They captured Lulubelle and two ghosts,” Bonnie chirped, “but they didn't get Charlie's juggling balls or the chimney sweep.”

“I should hope not,” the constable responded
bravely to this piece of nonsense. “But we're going to get
them
, aren't we, my lovely?”

With a quiet click Charlie's little recorder ran out of tape. Constable Partridge watched him change the cassette, and frowned as if to wonder whether it was legal to make a recording of criminal investigations.

“Rest assured, Miss Steadings, that we shall do everything in our power to apprehend these villains and bring them to justice. Meanwhile, it might not be a bad idea to change your locks. And of course we shall keep you abreast of any developments in the case. Good-bye.”

On the way out they passed Gerty in the hall, who plonked down the phone when she saw the policeman and gave a sort of breathless curtsy.

“I must go and slice that cabbage for tea, dear—it won't do not to eat.”

Zoe followed her into the kitchen. “How sick
is
your mother, Mrs. Moag?”

“Poorly, dear. It upsets me to talk about her, so run along.”

“Did you get your stamps?”

“What stamps?”

The stamps you said you were going into the village for, thought Zoe. “I was just wondering what happened to the tongue sandwiches in the fridge.”

“You people ate them.”

“No, we ate the square ones. I mean the lovely equilateral triangles with the parsley on top. I guess
you ate them yourself, even though they give you heartburn, right?”

“Wrong!” Gerty whacked the cabbage in two with a mighty stroke. “Go and play skipping or something. In my day children were seen and not heard!”

On the way into the garden Zoe wondered about that cabbage, too. Hadn't Gertrude Moag said she would buy a turnip?