Eva Ibbotson - The Great Ghost Rescue

And then at last it was time to say good-bye to Rick. It was a bad moment for all of them but for Humphrey it was almost unbearable.

‘Humphrey,’ said the Hag sternly as they all clustered round Rick to see him off. ‘Ghosts groan. Ghosts wail. Ghosts moan and scream and gibber. But ghosts never, never cry.’

It was the sort of stupid remark that even the nicest grownups make sometimes because Humphrey quite obviously and plainly wasn’t just crying, he was practically floating away on his tears. ‘I’ll come back often and often,’ promised Rick, who wasn’t feeling too dry-eyed himself.

The last few moments after the lorry driver hooted down on the causeway, were just a flurry of handshakes, hugs, curses and thumps from the Shuk’s three tails. Then, with a last pat of Baby Rose’s head and a whiff of rotten sheep’s intestines which the Hag had been keeping specially for the occasion. Rick, squeezing Humphrey’s skeletal little fingers for the last time, was gone.

For the first few miles of the drive through the bleak Scottish countryside Rick’s eyes were too misted up for him to see anything at all. Then, as they drove over an old stone bridge and came in sight of a small copse of hazel trees, something caught his attention.

‘Would you mind stopping for a moment?’

He got out and walked over to the wood. It was as he’d thought. A wavering bit of ectoplasm which, as he spoke to it, became fully visible…

‘Cursed be your name,’ said Rick politely. ‘Can I help you?’

‘Cursed be yours,’ said the ghost, pleased to be addressed correctly. He was a knight in armour and looked fagged to death. ‘I was wondering — you don’t know anything about a new sanctuary in these parts? A ghost sanctuary? I’ve had a dreadful time — my place has been turned into a hotel and—’

‘You’re on the right road,’ said Rick. ‘Just keep gliding till you come to a causeway across a strip of beach and then there you are.’

‘Thank you. I’m most grateful. It’s a good place they tell me?’

‘Not bad,’ said Rick carelessly, and then he turned and went back towards the waiting lorry.

He had only gone a few steps, however, when the spook glided after him and tapped with his withered hand on Rick’s shoulder.

‘I’ve just realized who you are,’ he said, raising his visor. ‘You must forgive me. What a pleasure! What an honour!’

‘Who am I?’ said Rick. surprised.

‘Why the boy who has saved the ghosts of Britain. Don’t tell me I’m wrong? Surely you must be Rick the Rescuer?’

‘Goodness,’ said Rick, waving to the driver to show that he was coming, ‘Rick the Rescuer! Well,’ he said, blushing and feeling much less gloomy, ‘I suppose I am!’

Rick had been back at school for nearly three weeks. At first the Crawlers had fawned all over him and he could do nothing wrong. But as the days passed and no present arrived from Rick’s rich godmother (who naturally could not send a present because she did not exist) the Crawlers went back to being their own nasty selves.

Nothing seemed to have changed while he was away. The boys still played silly tricks on Matron like putting the school hamster inside her knitting bag or pouring bubble-bath mixture in her tea and everyone went on making the same old jokes about Maurice Crawler’s feet. They should have smelled the Hag’s feet, Rick thought — then they’d have something to talk about.

At night, when the new boy called Peter Thorne who slept beside him, sobbed into his pillow, Rick was much nicer to him than he used to be. He really knew now what it was like to miss people so much that you just ached with wanting to see them. Peter might be homesick but Rick, he realized himself, was ghost sick.

‘You really do miss those ghosts of yours awfully, don’t you?’ said Barbara when she found him sitting gloomily under a beech tree with his arms round his knees, just staring into space.

‘Well, they were so interesting . I mean, compared to this lot.’ He waved his hands at a group of boys dribbling a football and bickering about whether Smith Minor was, or was not, offside. ‘And I can’t help worrying a bit. Supposing seals are too tough for Baby Rose whatever Sucking Susie says. And I don’t honestly think Humphrey is getting any Horribler. What if the new ghosts that come to the sanctuary start teasing him?’

‘Oh, Rick, it’ll be all right. You’ve done a smashing job on them.’

‘I suppose so. I hate things to be over . You know, you have an adventure and then it’s all flat.’

‘How do you know it is over?’ said Barbara. ‘I’ve a feeling it may just be beginning.’

Rick just looked at her and shook his head. He had forgotten that Barbara was an extremely clever girl.

Meanwhile the ghosts settled down very happily at Insleyfarne. The Hag soon had the castle really nice and homelike. Jars of bottled rats’ blood, and addled owl eggs, and maggot jam stood neatly on the larder shelves. She trained ivy over the gaping windows so that it made a sinister noise with its loose, tapping branches and she brought up the old torture instruments from the dungeons and hung them very prettily against the slime-green walls.

While the Hag was making the castle lovely, the Gliding Kilt planted a splendid kitchen garden. There was Henbane and Deadly Nightshade, Skullcap and Stinking Hellebore and a fine crop of turnips to make frightful lanterns out of on Halloween.

Mind you, now that they were peacefully settled in their own place, the ghosts did have time for those little, niggling worries that disappear so completely in times of danger. For example there was, as Rick had foreseen, the business of Humphrey’s Horribleness. Although he was very good and went on repeating ‘Every day I’m getting Horribler and Horribler,’ each morning when he woke up at the bottom of his well, even a newborn baby could see that Humphrey wasn’t, in fact, getting Horribler at all. His eye sockets continued to twinkle, his ectoplasm still looked like fleecy summer clouds, his ball and chain went on sparkling like a Christmas cracker.

Of course the new ghosts which kept arriving at the sanctuary didn’t make things any better. They didn’t mean to be rude but they’d say things like, ‘Well, well!’ or ‘You can never tell how children will turn out these days,’ — and as everybody knows, words like that can wound .

But on the whole, those first days at the sanctuary were wonderfully busy and happy. Baby Rose had taken marvellously to seal’s blood and as she grew bigger she started following Humphrey about which helped him to feel less lonely without Rick. No one saw much of Walter the Wet who spent his time under a pile of treacherous rocks trying to lure sailors to a Salty Death Beneath the Waves which was difficult because absolutely no ships passed that way, but he came up in the evenings sometimes, splashing into the castle and telling them tall stories of what he had done. The Mad Monk felt so much better that he got quite giggly, saying Latin prayers backwards and hiccuping as he floated up and down his chapel, and Aunt Hortensia took up Art and made a collage out of driftwood and seaweed which she sai d was two werewolves eating each other up.

And of course there were the new ghosts to be settled in. Almost every day some poor, weary ghost arrived and asked for sanctuary. There were two soldiers called Ugh-tred and Grimbald who had fought with King Alfred, the one who was supposed to have burnt the cakes. They used to haunt an old, crumbling cow-byre under the Malvern hills until it was rebuilt and turned into a Factory Farm, and they had to glide up and down uttering hoarse war cries between three hundred squawking battery chickens laying eggs. They were rough, uncouth fellows, but everybody liked them. Soldiers are often very gentle and good-hearted when you get to know them.