The Whizz Pop Chocolate Shop (21 page)

“Were you there?” Caydon asked Isadore. “I wouldn’t like going to my own funeral, but I wouldn’t be able to keep away either.”

“That is a very cheeky question,” Isadore said shortly.

“Of course he went to the funeral,” hissed Demerara. “We saw him—didn’t we, Spike?”

“He was disguised as a woman,” Spike said, “but we spotted him all right. We’d already suspected he wasn’t dead.”

Isadore was pale. “You don’t need to remind me. I’m not the same man—I’m making this chocolate to atone for my crimes.”

“Hmm,” Demerara said. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“The most important thing is Marcel’s mold. I won’t be able to touch it—you three must come with me to collect it.” Isadore made a few notes, and suddenly gave the extravagantly curly cat a searching look. “And I’ll have that Wavio bean you’re hiding in your cheek.”

“I—don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Yes you do—and I refuse to work with someone who looks like a feline Shirley Temple.”

“Pooh,” said Demerara. Very slowly and sulkily she spat out a small, withered brown bean. “You’re so selfish—why shouldn’t I have lovely curls?”

Isadore picked the bean up off the floor with a pair of tweezers and dropped it into a plastic bag. “Do you want curly teeth? Curly bones? That’s what would have happened if you’d kept that magic cacao bean in your mouth, you ludicrous animal. Kindly stop messing about with things you don’t understand. I’m in charge now, whether you like it or not.”

“I came here with my class in Year Five,” Caydon said.

“I sat on my carton of apple juice and my packed lunch was soaked.”

“We came here in Year Four,” said Oz.

“And my classwork was the best for once,” Lily added. “I drew a picture of one of the ravens. He wouldn’t stop staring at me and he wouldn’t go away, so I just drew him.”

The SMU’s secret vault was in the Tower of London. It was a bright summer’s day and the ancient gray castle swarmed with tourists. The famous ravens, with their clipped wings, flopped across the smooth lawns. The even more famous Beefeaters posed for photos in their red and gold uniforms. A long line had formed to see the Crown Jewels.

Isadore said something to one of the Beefeaters and they were waved through the main entrance. He led them through a stone arch to the square lawn on Tower Green. Bright blue doors were set into the ancient
walls. There was a sentry in a red coat and bearskin, like a toy soldier or a picture on a London tea towel. Two ravens, large and black and angry looking, hopped determinedly after them.

“Those birds are following us,” Caydon said.

Isadore was pale and nervous, and kept poring over his notes. “It’s because of Lily.”

“Me? Why—do I smell of bird food or something?”

“These birds are masterful detectors of magic; when my mother came here they wouldn’t leave her alone. Ignore them. This is Devereux Tower, where the SMU has its office.”

“Well, this place has got to be extremely haunted,” Oz said. “So many people were murdered here. They used to put their heads on the gate.”

“The Tower is the most haunted place in London—more than Tyburn, where they burned those Catholics, or Smithfield, where they burned those Protestants.” Isadore knocked loudly on one of the blue doors. “But I’m not here to give you a guided tour; this is business.”

The door was opened by a straight-backed old man in army uniform. “Isadore Spoffard? Come in quickly, please—and you two clear off.”

The ravens, who had been flapping uncomfortably close to Lily’s heels, instantly turned round and hopped away.

“Ravens at the Tower are members of the British
Army,” the old man said. “They have to obey orders.” He shut the door behind them. “I’m Colonel Turnbull—officially retired, and unofficially in charge of SMU business at the Tower.”

“These are the children,” said Isadore.

“Lily, Oscar and Caydon.” The colonel smiled kindly at them under his white mustache. “Thanks for helping out. Would you all follow me, please?”

Lily had expected the inside of the building to look historical, like the rooms they had seen on the school trip, and was a bit disappointed to be walking along a functional white-painted corridor that could have been anywhere. They walked up some stone stairs.

“My back’s tingling again,” Caydon said. “It feels like someone’s dripping freezing water down my spine.”

“Mine too,” said Oz. “Uncle Isadore—are you OK?”

Isadore’s face was like wax. “I’m feeling a little faint.”

“Sorry about that,” Colonel Turnbull said. “We’ve just done another spraying of anti-ghost paint; my magic operatives tell me it can sometimes make them ill.”

“Aren’t you magic?” Caydon asked.

“No, I’m just an ordinary nonmagic person who can see ghosts. All the buildings here are incredibly haunted. And not merely with human ghosts—before the Regent’s Park Zoo was built, all kinds of wild animals were kept here.”

The colonel stopped in front of a heavy metal door
with a keypad on the wall beside it. He tapped in a long number and the door swung open to reveal a large office with a cheerful view over Tower Green.

The man known as J stood in front of a fireplace that contained a safe. “Good afternoon.”

“I see that you don’t trust me yet.” Isadore collapsed into a chair, mopping his forehead with a handkerchief. “You’re as bad as that wretched cat.”

“You know perfectly well I’m the only person with the authority to hand over the items in this safe,” said J. “You’ve brought the other molds?”

“Yes. I have my moon. Lily’s carrying Pierre’s sun.” Isadore pulled the black velvet bag containing his mold from his pocket.

Lily took Pierre’s mold, wrapped in a freezer bag, from the pocket of her fleece.

J took the two molds, unwrapped them carefully and placed them side by side on the empty desk.

Lily gasped aloud—her spine was fizzing like champagne and the other voice made her and Oz reach for each other’s hands.

“It’s a bit cold in here,” said Caydon.

“A bit? It’s deathly!” Isadore leaned back in his chair. “This isn’t the anti-ghost paint. It’s because the molds are so close to each other; it creates a force field that is particularly agonizing for anyone with a guilty conscience. Let’s get this over with!”

“Very well.” J punched a series of numbers into the keypad on the safe. He opened it and took out a flat tin case like one of Lily’s boxes of watercolor paints, filled with neat squares of different types of chocolate, each one neatly labeled. J placed this on the desk. After this he took out the golden mold they had pulled out of the river: Marcel’s star, which caught a shaft of sunlight and blazed gloriously in his hand.

“Unwrap them,” Isadore whispered. “Place them close together in a little circle, so that they’re touching each other. And the children must stand one behind each mold to complete the circle.” He was incredibly pale.

J did as he said. The three golden molds stood together on the desk, and goose pimples rose all over Lily’s skin. She and Oz and Caydon stepped behind them.

There was a clap of thunder; the day darkened. The room filled with shadows.

A humming sound came from the three molds, gradually getting stronger and stronger until they almost danced on the polished surface of the table.

More thunder boomed above them; flashes of lightning slashed through the sudden gloom. Lily caught her breath—two figures stood on either side of Isadore’s chair. She saw glimpses of them in the lightning: two men with dark hair and mustaches, one stout and one thin.

“NO!” screamed Isadore.

There was a final, shattering clap of thunder—and the weather suddenly changed back to breezy sunshine.

Isadore’s chair was empty.

Caydon fainted.

“You can stop teasing me about throwing up now,” Lily said. “At least I didn’t faint.”

“OK, OK,” Caydon said crossly. “But I bet you were shocked—those ghosts—and then he wasn’t there anymore.”

“The ghosts were Marcel and Pierre,” said Lily. “I know Pierre from the picture in my bedroom.”

“Where did they go, anyway? Does this mean Isadore’s dead?”

“I don’t think so,” Oz said. “He’s still immortal. He has to come back.” He didn’t like to admit how worried he was; if Isadore didn’t come back, how could they save the baby?

Colonel Turnbull had opened the window and given them all glasses of iced Coke.

“You mustn’t be ashamed of fainting,” he told Caydon. “I fainted once, and I didn’t have the excuse of being as young as you are.”

Caydon looked a little less cross. “What did you see? Was it something here?”

“I saw the bear,” the colonel said with a shudder. “Everyone faints when they see the bear.”

“Not all animal ghosts are like Edwin,” J said. “Many are terrifying enough to make a strong man die of fright. The bear is the ghost of a polar bear that lived here in the Tower in the thirteenth century. He belonged to King Henry the Third. The local people used to enjoy watching him when he went salmon fishing in the Thames; it wasn’t full of old trams in those days.”

“I’ll never forget the night I met him,” Colonel Turnbull said. “I’d been to dinner with a friend who was quartered here, and I was enjoying the crisp spring evening on the Green—and suddenly an immense polar bear with snarling, bloody jaws and blazing eyes was bounding across the grass toward me—so real that I could feel its breath on my face in the second before it swiped me with its claws. That was when I fainted.”

“Wow.” Oz tried to imagine this. “I’m not surprised!”

“Please keep that bear away from us,” Caydon said. “I’m not as magical as the others and it would probably kill me.”

“I’d love to see it,” Lily said; being the brave one was a novelty and she couldn’t help swaggering a bit.

“Caydon, you really must get over this notion that you’re not as magical as the twins,” J said. “Your inheritance is every bit as strong.”

“But they’ve got magic in the family. My family isn’t
magical at all. My parents are both bus drivers and my gran’s a midwife.”

“You’ll find a witch somewhere in your ancestry,” J said. “People were ashamed of their magic in the old days and tried to cover it up.” He glanced at his watch. “Isadore’s been gone for over an hour.”

“Do you know where he is?” Oz asked anxiously. “He will come back, won’t he? He must!”

“He’ll be back,” said J. “I’ve seen this kind of switch before. Colonel, could they do something educational while they’re waiting?”

“Certainly,” Colonel Turnbull said cheerfully. “We’ll get an ice cream and watch the ravens having their afternoon tea—the Ravenmaster is a particular mate of mine.”

It was good to be out in the afternoon sunlight, licking ice cream and weaving among the hundreds of tourists. Lily loved watching the ravens; her face lit up and her hair crackled joyfully as she fed an angry old bird squares of cheese and hard-boiled egg. Oz would have enjoyed it too, if he hadn’t been so worried about Isadore.

To his huge relief, Isadore was in the office when they returned. He was soaking wet, wrapped in a tartan blanket, sipping hot tea.

“Are you OK?” Oz asked. “What happened?”

“I can’t tell you in any detail,” Isadore said, “but I
saw my brothers and we talked. They have now decided to help us.”

“I knew that was Marcel and Pierre,” said Lily. “I thought they hated you. Why are they suddenly on your side?”

“Please—I can’t say any more.” Isadore was white to his lips. “We talked, that’s all. Now kindly take us back to Skittle Street.”

“What awful bad luck to fall into the Thames on your educational trip to the Tower,” Dad said. “If you’re really sure about staying this evening, you must let me lend you some dry clothes.”

“Thank you,” said Isadore. “It would be a little inconvenient to have to go home in between.”

Oz wondered where Isadore was living now that his hideout had been destroyed, and he asked him as soon as they were alone together.

“The department gave me a small room in Regent’s Park barracks,” Isadore said. “It’s a bit of a comedown, but I won’t be there for long.”

“What do you mean? Are you leaving?”

“My dear Oz, I do believe you really would miss me! But I’m not leaving just yet; there’s far too much to do.”

The two of them sat at the kitchen table with the back door open, drinking mugs of tea. Isadore looked strange in Dad’s old jeans and shirt. He was officially “babysitting” while Mum and Dad were out at the
cinema—there was a film Mum particularly wanted to see while she had the chance, before the new baby arrived. Lily was watching television in the sitting room upstairs, with Demerara and Spike.

Oz said, “Nobody else is here. You can tell me what happened today. You know you can trust me not to tell anyone else—not even Lily.”

“Yes, dear boy, I do know. Perhaps it will help me to talk about it—my head’s still spinning.” Isadore sighed and stared out at the weedy back garden, so ordinary and peaceful in the sunset.

The silence stretched on. Oz decided to help him. “Where did you go when your brothers came for you?”