Toby Ibbotson - Mountwood School for Ghosts

She got up when she saw Daniel and Charlotte.

‘Hello, shall we be off then?’

She sounded cheerful, but her face said something else. Had she been crying? Charlotte wasn’t sure.

They went in the Hugheses’ car to the police station. Mrs Hughes had filled a large basket with all sorts of things: a thermos of hot tea, home-made bread, a pot of her absolutely most special gooseberry-and-rhubarb jam, a Wensleydale cheese that she knew Lottie Wilder was particularly fond of and a very thick book that would take a long time to read. Daniel had a woollen blanket to carry, and Charlotte had the hot-water bottles, the pillow and the bedsocks. They walked up to the front desk. The sergeant behind the desk looked them up and down.

‘How can I help you?’

‘We are here to visit Mrs Wilder.’

‘Visit? You can’t just come in and visit her.’

‘We can. I know we can. My husband talked to a lawyer. She has rights—’

‘Well, just visiting is not on, and there’s an end to it. You must take her home. This isn’t a blooming hotel; it’s a lock-up.’

‘I don’t understand. Is she free to go?’

‘Of course she’s free to go. I doubt if they’ll even press charges.’

‘But Mr Bluffit—’

‘Now you listen here, madam,’ said the police sergeant sternly. ‘That Mr Bluffit might be the bee’s knees over at City Hall, but his writ doesn’t run here, and never will as long as I’m around.’

‘But why is she still here?’ asked Daniel.

‘Ask her yourself,’ the sergeant said, and came around his counter to lead them through to the cells.

Mrs Wilder spoke before the cell door was even open.

‘Please go away; I simply cannot abide this constant disturbance. Oh, it’s you Karin, and Daniel and Charlotte. How nice.’

‘Are you all right?’ Mrs Hughes said doubtfully. ‘We brought you some tea and a few things.’

‘How very kind. But I’ve just had a cuppa. That nice duty officer came in with it a little while ago. That’s why I was a bit shirty when I thought he was back again. Isn’t this amazing?’ she went on. ‘Banged up at my age. In the nick at last.’

‘But, Lottie, they say you are free to go. We came in the car; we can take you home.’

‘Oh, not you too, Karin. I’ve explained several times that I need a few more hours of peace to finish my notes, and then perhaps a little rest. I might leave tomorrow. This is ideal, you know. I was having such a difficult time with my book, and now when I have a chance to get the proper criminal atmosphere, everybody just wants to snatch it away.’

‘You mean you want to stay in prison?’ said Charlotte.

‘Well, not forever, dearest, obviously. But if they put me in here, they can jolly well wait until I’m ready to go. Thank you for the lovely basket and the other things, and now you’d better be off. And please make sure they lock the door properly. It’s that shut-in feeling I’m after. Such a special experience.’

They trooped out, making sure that the cell door shut with a satisfying clang behind them.

When they gathered again at the front desk the police sergeant looked up. ‘You couldn’t budge her either? What a business.’

‘But can’t you make her go?’

‘What, you mean arrest her and throw her into jail?’ And he laughed bitterly at his own joke.

‘She’s writing a book,’ said Charlotte. ‘That’s why she wants to stay.’

‘A book, is it? So my lock-up is some kind of writer’s retreat. What kind of book?’

‘A detective story.’

‘Hang on — Wilder. Is she Lottie Wilder? The Lottie Wilder?’

‘Yes, she writes—’

‘I know what she writes — great stuff.’

‘You’ll probably be in the next one.’

‘You never! Think she’d sign a book for me?’

‘I’m sure she would, but I’d let her get some work done first.’

‘Of course, of course. But maybe another cuppa, and a biscuit… ’

So they left, leaving the happy policeman chuckling to himself. ‘Lottie Wilder, in my cells. That’s something to tell the old woman.’

It was late afternoon when they got home. Daniel climbed the steps to his front door slowly. In Mrs Cranford’s garden next door there was a huge pile of boxes, covered with a big sheet of plastic.

Mrs Cranford was clearing out her house. She was going to stay with her sister on the other side of the river, at least until she found somewhere of her own, and there would be no room for even half of her stuff. And her sister had a small terrier that conducted a personal and very angry war on every cat it met. So Tompkins’s picture was in the newsagent’s window and on the noticeboard in the local library: ‘Gentle tabby seeks loving home to end his years in peace.’

So far there had been no takers. Mrs Cranford knew what came next. Perhaps Tompkins knew too, because he was lying on the on top of the pile of boxes with his chin in his paws.

When Daniel entered the house he heard voices from the front room, or rather a voice — Great-Aunt Joyce’s. She was the only resident of Markham Street who was pleased about what was happening to them, and now, without really meaning to, Daniel found himself eavesdropping.

‘One has to admit,’ Great-Aunt Joyce was saying, ‘that Mr Bluffit has a point. These old houses really are falling apart. Think how much easier it will be for me with fewer stairs to climb. I will be closer to the kitchen, Sarah, and you will not have so far to go with my tray. Of course, in a smaller establishment Daniel will have to contain himself, be a bit less bumptious. In fact I have been giving that some thought. Have you ever considered boarding school, John? A bit of discipline would do the boy some good. And you would have less trouble with him.’

Daniel’s father wasn’t a particularly talkative person, more of a doer. But now Daniel heard him speak.

‘We have no trouble with Daniel, Aunt Joyce. And he will never, ever be sent away to school, even if we could afford it.’

‘Well, I must say, even if it requires some scrimping and saving, I think you should show me some consideration. The new place is much smaller, and I can’t have him on top of me all the time.’

Then Daniel heard a chair being pushed back, and footsteps approaching the living-room door. He leaped up the stairs two at a time and reached the landing as his father came out into the hall below. Daniel looked over the banisters. He saw his father lift both hands to his head, grab two handfuls of hair and raise his eyes to the ceiling. He heard him groan, ‘Oh, God help me, what am I going to do?’

He saw his father go to the front door, pick up his gardening shoes and leave the house.

Sleep would not come. Seeing your father or your mother in despair and not being able to do anything about it is one of the worst things that can happen to anyone. Perhaps the worst. Daniel would much rather have been run over by a train, or had his arm chopped off.

Time ticked slowly by. Daniel cried, and hit his head on the pillow, and got up to walk around, thumping his feet loudly to disturb Great-Aunt Joyce, and crept back into bed again and pulled the blankets over his head. Soon Markham Street would be a ghost town, with boarded-up windows and overgrown gardens and litter in the street, waiting emptily for the end.

A ghost town… Suddenly Daniel sat up in bed. The room was dark, and he remembered vividly that sobbing noise behind the wall and the arrival of Percy. He remembered something else too, a quiet voice speaking out of the darkness. ‘I shall be in your debt until the end of time. If we can ever be of help… I mean it, I do.’