Eva Ibbotson - Dial a Ghost

‘But not like that. Whipping would have been all right, taking food away would have been all right. Thumping and scourging and walloping would have been all right, but not what we did.’

She began to moan again and roll about on the floor among the owl droppings and scrabble her feet in the filth. Even as she did that, the guilt and sin made her little toe go all wibbly and Pelham slapped her hard on the behind and said, ‘Stop it! I too suffer. I too feel my guilt and my sin, but you have hardly any toes left and enough is enough. We must act. We must be revenged on the world. We must see that no other child is left unharmed to remind us of that ghastly day when our—’

‘No!’ shrieked Sabrina. ‘Don’t mention that name. Don’t dig the knife deeper into my bosom.’

‘You haven’t got a bosom any more,’ said Pelham. ‘It’s all skin and bone and—’

They began quarrelling again about whether or not Sabrina had a bosom. Then they sat up and tried to pull themselves together.

‘It’s true that we have to rid the world of children,’ said Pelham. ‘It’s not till the sobs and moans of other parents mingle with our own that we shall get some rest. But there don’t seem to be any children here, and in the meantime…’

He glided over to the window and stood looking out at the fields and stables and orchards which the nuns had tended so lovingly.

‘In the meantime what?’

Pelham’s scarred face was a grimace of hatred. ‘Meanwhile, there are little lambs gambolling —’ he spat out the word. ‘And puppy dogs playing… and baby goats — ugh — leaping for joy.’

Sabrina came to join him. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And you know what they call baby goats. They call them kids …’

‘Bend over,’ said Fulton Snodde-Brittle — and the small boy standing in front of him in his study bent over.

‘Right over,’ said Fulton, and the child doubled up over the arm of the leather chair. His name was Toby Benson and he was just seven years old.

Fulton went for his cane, and then frowned and put it back. Canes left marks and the school inspector was due in the next couple of weeks. Not that it mattered — by then he and Frieda should be living in Helton Hall and the school could go to the devil. Still, might as well play safe. He fetched his gym shoe out of the cupboard and bent it back. You could get quite a decent thwack with that, but it wasn’t the same. Everything had become namby-pamby nowadays.

‘You know why I’m going to beat you, don’t you?’ said Fulton.

Toby sniffed and a tear ran down one cheek. ‘Yes, sir. Because I was eating sweets in the gym, sir. My mother sent me—’

‘That’s enough,’ roared Fulton, raising his arm.

But when he had finished, and the little boy had hobbled out, Fulton didn’t feel as cheered as he usually did after beating a child. His mind was on Helton Hall and what was happening there. Oliver had been alone now for nearly a week and he had hoped to hear that he had been taken ill or gone off his head. Perhaps they should phone and find out what was happening? He went down to find Frieda, who was in the school kitchen telling the cook to remove one fish finger from every one of the children’s helpings laid out for lunch.

‘But that’ll just leave one, Miss Snodde-Brittle,’ said the cook. ‘One fish finger’s not much for a growing boy.’

‘Are you telling me what growing boys should eat?’ said Frieda, towering over the poor cook. ‘You don’t seem to be aware that over-eating is very bad for children. It makes them fat and gives them heart disease. Now let me see you take the extra finger away and put it in the freezer for next week. And I thought I said one tablespoon of tinned peas. She bent over a plate and began to count. ‘I find it very hard to believe that twenty-three peas make up one tablespoon. I do hope you can count because—’

But at this moment Fulton appeared by her side and said he wanted to speak to her.

‘I’m going to telephone Miss Match,’ he said, when they were alone in the study.

So he dialled the Helton number and after a very long time Miss Match’s voice could be heard at the other end. She had forgotten her hearing aid and her voice sounded croaky and cross.

‘Helton Hall.’

‘Ah, Miss Match. It’s Fulton Snodde-Brittle here. I’m just ringing up to find out how Oliver is. How has he been?’

There was a pause at the other end. Then: ‘I’ve never given him any beans. It’s the wrong time of year for beans. Beans come later.’

Fulton tried again.

‘No, not beans to eat. I want to know how he’s getting on. Have you any news?’

‘No, of course I haven’t got any newts. Can’t abide the things — slimy little nasties.’

Frieda reached for the phone. ‘Let me try,’ she said. ‘I’ve got a more carrying voice.’ She put the mouthpiece to her lips. ‘We want to know how Oliver is,’ she shrieked. ‘How is he in himself?’

There was another pause. Then Miss Match said, ‘Barmy. Off his head.’

A great smile spread over Frieda’s face.

‘Barmy?’ she repeated. ‘You mean mad?’

‘Mad as a hatter,’ said the housekeeper. ‘Talks to himself, runs about waving his arms, won’t come in for meals.’

‘Oh that’s wonderful — I mean that’s terrible. But don’t worry, Miss Match. We’ll be back soon to take him off your hands.’

She put the phone down and the Snodde-Brittles stood and grinned at each other. ‘It’s worked,’ said Fulton. ‘Oh glory — think of it. Helton Hall is ours! We’ll give him another three or four days to go off the deep end completely, and then we’ll get a doctor and have him put away.’

Frieda flopped down in the armchair. The thought of owning Helton was so marvellous that she almost thought of telling the cook to leave the second fish finger on the children’s plates. But in the end she decided against it. Happiness didn’t have to make you stupid.

When the Wilkinsons had been with Oliver for a week, they called up the ghost of the farmer from the lake.

Oliver had been worried about this, but it turned out to be a very good thing to do. They called him up the way they called Trixie, telling him he was wanted and needed and that he should not wander alone in the Land of the Shades, and gradually there was a sort of heaving on the lake, and then a kind of juddering, and slowly the spirit of Benjamin Jenkins, who had run the Home Farm at Helton a hundred years ago, floated up and out of the water.

He couldn’t have been nicer. He was simply dressed, in breeches and a checked shirt, and carried a gun over his shoulder because he had meant to shoot himself if the drowning didn’t work, and the first thing he did in his pleasant country voice was to thank them for calling him up.

‘I was getting a bit bogged down in there,’ he said, ‘but I couldn’t make up my mind about coming out.’

Eric and Mr Jenkins took to each other at once, and in no time at all they were telling each other how badly they had been treated by the women they loved.

‘Her name was Fredrica Snodde-Brittle,’ said the farmer. ‘She used to ride through my fields every morning on a huge horse and I was always there, holding open the gate for her. I was so sure she’d come to care for me.’

‘That’s what I thought about Cynthia Harbottle. I used to carry her satchel all the way to the bus stop.’

The farmer sighed. ‘She was so haughty . She said no Snodde-Brittle could marry a common farmer.’

Eric nodded understandingly. ‘Cynthia was haughty too. She used to blow bubble gum in my face.’