Ann Pilling - The Witch of Lagg

“Grierson said it was oak ,” Prill muttered, standing away from it. “Best oak from my own woodland,” she repeated. “That’s what he said.”

“Well, the first one must have been oak in that case,” said Oliver, taking a tape measure from his pocket. “But, if the site’s as old as people think, it must have been replaced several times.”

“How long has it been here then?” asked Colin.

“Oh, hundreds of years. I don’t know exactly. I’ve not researched it properly yet,” his cousin said self-importantly, measuring the girth of the trunk. “How tall do you think it is?”

Colin stood next to it. “Well, I’m five foot six, so I reckon … one … two … about eight feet, say eight and a half. But what’s it doing here? That’s what I’d like to know.”

“Dunno. We can ask the Rosses. They look after it,” said Oliver, “according to Drac. It obviously marks some significant event though. Perhaps it was the scene of a fight or something. We’re quite near the English border here after all.” He pocketed his tape measure, folded his arms and stared at it thoughtfully. Prill had her back to the two boys and was leaning against the stake, staring out to sea.

“The tide is coming in,” she said dreamily. “Look, it’s filling all these little channels now. We’ll get our feet wet if we don’t budge.”

Colin suddenly whispered something to Oliver and the boy smiled, and dug in his pocket. A minute later poor Prill found herself grabbed from behind and tied securely to the old wooden stump with a green tape measure. The others were running off up the beach. Jessie was leaping about, pawing and slobbering all over her, and the tide was filling those deep channels faster and faster.

“Come back !” she screamed, tugging at the tape. “Don’t be so foul, you two. It’s not funny. This thing’s really tight … I’m getting wet. Oh, come on ”

She didn’t want to do an Oliver and be a spoilsport, though it was rather typical of him to lend his tape measure for a trick he’d have hated himself. But Prill didn’t like it. The tide was coming in, and the bumps and knobbles of the slimy black stake were digging into her back. “ Colin! ” she yelled, starting to panic.

“All right, all right. Hang on Joan of Arc.” He came racing back. He knew Prill was rather thin-skinned about practical jokes. They were both ankle-deep in water now while the cowardly Oliver was striding off firmly towards the dunes. “Sorry,” he muttered, as Prill stood there crossly, lashed to the great wooden stump with her brother picking at the knots. “I didn’t mean to tie it quite so tightly … there .”

She was free, rubbing her wrists and trying to find a bit of sandbank to stand on, to escape from the swirling water. “Trying to drown me, were you? And listen to Oliver, he’s laughing at us. He’s an absolute pig. I’ll tie him up, next time.”

“Nobody’s laughing,” Colin said quietly. “Don’t over-react. He’s just embarrassed because it was his tape.”

“He is laughing,” Prill interrupted angrily, starting to run. “Just wait till I get hold of him.” She began to chase up the beach after the skinny retreating figure in its baggy shorts.

Colin stared after them, and the laughter came again, on the wind. The sound sent an icy chill through him. Prill was quite right, someone had laughed at her as she stood lashed to the stake with Oliver’s tape measure, and they were laughing now. But it was a thin, high-pitched screaming kind of laugh, not Oliver’s voice at all. He’d heard it before. It was the laughter he’d heard in the woodland when the barrow tipped over and the stones hurt his foot.

It was just half past nine. Oliver had been writing his diary and he was now in the bathroom, going through his elaborate bedtime ritual of cleaning his teeth and brushing his hair one hundred times. His mother believed it was the only sure way of avoiding nits.

He called his diary a journal, but it wasn’t a grand leather-bound affair like Hugo Grierson’s, just a small Woolworth’s exercise book, and he didn’t write in it every day. It was kept for events of special importance in his life. There’d been quite a lot to say, tonight.

“ This holiday’s going to be lonely for me,” read Colin. He’d come to talk to Oliver and found the bedroom empty and the notebook open on a table. Down the passage he could hear his cousin making splashing noises at the washbasin. Guiltily, Colin read on.

“ They never take much notice of me ,” the account continued, “ but now they’ve made friends with Duncan Ross it’s going to be even worse. He’s just Colin’s type, big and sporty. They even look alike. Daren’t think what they say about me, when I’m not there .”

Colin and Prill were rather attractive children, and poor Oliver was only too aware that he was a bit funny-looking. Colin was tall and broad, with a handsome mop of auburn hair, and Prill was growing more and more like something out of a Victorian painting. She had red hair too, and she wore it long. Both had large brown eyes and the kind of skin that tanned easily. People sometimes commented on their good looks in Oliver’s presence. He didn’t think it was very tactful. They did quite well in school and they were both good swimmers, whereas Oliver swam like a brick. Colin was getting good at rugby too, according to his father. “ Where was I when all the prizes were given out? ” Oliver had written bitterly, thinking about those great beefy shoulders. “ I can’t help being small for my age ,” the spindly writing went on, “ and I was very ill when I was little. That can weaken you for life. Those two never think about that of course. I couldn’t have lifted those stones at Lochashiel even if I’d wanted to (WHICH I DIDN’T), and anyway, those bones I dug up from the mud may be extremely important. Not sure I’ll show them though .”

Colin, feeling more and more uncomfortable, turned the page in fascination. “ What I really ought to find out is —”

“Seen enough?” said a spiteful little voice from the doorway. Oliver was wearing striped Viyella pyjamas and carrying a large sponge-bag, and his thin face was dark pink with rage. He stormed across the room and snatched the notebook from Colin’s fingers with such force that it ripped across the back. “Do you make a habit of reading other people’s diaries, Colin?” he spat out, in a strangled voice.

“No more than you do,” his cousin answered smartly. “You were reading Mr Grierson’s. I saw you.”

There was an abrupt silence, and Oliver flushed darker than ever. “That was different,” he stammered. “There’s something going on here. It involves Mr Grierson, and we’ve got to get to the bottom of it.”

“I know,” Colin said quietly. “That’s why I’ve come. Prill’s coming too, in a minute.”

The two boys stared at one another. Oliver had lost his usual composure and his face had somehow crumpled up. He actually looked as if he might cry, when he saw the ripped notebook.

Colin felt rather sorry for him, and he hated himself for having read the diary. At least he knew how things looked to Oliver.

“I’m sorry, Oll,” he said. “I shouldn’t have read your diary and … and we didn’t mean to be unfriendly.”

There was a pause, then Colin said awkwardly, “Well, what was in Grierson’s diary, anything important?”

Oliver shrugged. “It was all a bit boring really, with sums down the margin. He obviously studies his bank balance when there’s not much to say. That’s the real sign of a miser.”