They started down the steep stairs.
‘Who’s the gentleman?’ asked Stella.
‘I d-don’t know,’ said Ottilie. ‘It’s been very strange. I don’t remember what happened. I felt like I was asleep and just doing whatever they told me to. But then I woke up suddenly in that wagon. I tried to climb out the window and run away, but they caught me.’
‘That was you, burning that page in the album,’ said Agapanthus to Stella. ‘That’s why she woke up.’
Ottilie went on, ‘They said you’d been poking around, looking for me, and they were going to lock me up here in the Helter-Skelter, and it wouldn’t matter if I yelled, because n-nobody would hear me. So, I quickly scratched the pictures underneath the shelf in the wagon, just in case you came back. But it was dark, and I couldn’t see what I was doing.’ She sniffed and wiped her eyes. ‘I didn’t really think you’d find them.’
‘It was a good clue. Very mysterious. Nobody else would have guessed that was a walrus,’ said Agapanthus. ‘Truly. Not ever.’
Ottilie and Stella giggled.
Suddenly, Agapanthus hissed, ‘Shhh! What’s that?’
Footsteps were approaching. Keys rattled.
‘They’re coming back!’ gasped Ottilie.
‘Quick,’ whispered Stella.
They turned around and clambered back up the stairs as fast as they could go.
Lantern light flickered. Huge shadows loomed on the walls of the tower.
They scrambled up and up, dragging Ottilie with them. She was shaking.
‘Come on,’ whispered Stella.
Heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs behind them.
They reached the ladder that led to the very top of the tower. Agapanthus went first, then Ottilie, then Stella. Agapanthus pulled Ottilie up the final few steps. An icy wind was blowing. The fairground stretched out below them, shadowy shapes and scattered, glimmering lights.
The ground seemed a long way down.
Agapanthus leaned out, looking at the top of the slide. It dropped away into darkness, impossibly steep.
Stella’s insides gave a horrible, sickening lurch.
‘We have to do it,’ said Agapanthus. ‘Don’t think about it. Come on.’ She snatched up a hessian sack from a pile nearby.
One of the Gabbro brothers appeared at the top of the ladder. He clambered up the last few rungs and lunged towards them.
Stella gasped.
Ottilie shrieked.
‘Quick!’ said Agapanthus, and she flung her arms around them, bundled them all together onto the sack, and leaped off the tower and into the night.
They hurtled down the slide. Stella heard a shriek, and she could not tell if it was herself, or Agapanthus, or Ottilie, or all three of them at the same time. Around and around they went, clinging together, plunging downwards. The wind whipped past, and the ground rushed up to meet them. They slammed into it with a thump that rattled their teeth. They tumbled over and over and staggered to their feet.
A man loomed out of the darkness and grabbed Stella’s arm. She yelled and struggled. His grip tightened. Then a heavy body came hurtling off the slide and crashed into them, knocking them over. Stella rolled free. The men cursed.
‘Come on,’ gasped Agapanthus, pulling Stella up. They grabbed Ottilie’s hands and fled, sprinting past the dangling flying boats and around the merry-go-round. At the entrance to the fairground, a large shape stepped out to block their way, arms outstretched, but they darted around its clutching hands and ran out into the street.
A coach was standing nearby. Stella had a glimpse of a dark figure inside it. Before she could think, they were bolting down the street. They passed the public house, diving between the people who were gathered outside, their feet skidding on the slippery cobblestones.
Behind, they heard shouts. The Gabbro brothers were coming after them.
Agapanthus looked back over her shoulder. ‘This way!’ She pulled them into a narrow alley between the houses. The ground was uneven, and they stumbled as they ran. They came out into a little court. A street lamp flickered overhead. Several alleys branched off in different directions. Agapanthus chose one that sloped steeply down the hill, and they continued running. On either side were tall warehouses. No lights showed anywhere. Something scuttled across the lane. A rat, perhaps. There was a smell of laundry and old cabbage leaves and something else, something nastier.
There were more shouts behind them.
Stella looked back. ‘They’re still coming!’
The girls ran on, stumbling down a flight of slippery steps and splashing through a drain. They hurried along a narrow, winding alley, gasping for breath, and came to another little court. On one side was a warehouse. On the other side was a high wall with broken bottles set along the top.
It was a dead end.
Footsteps were approaching. Lantern light flickered.
They looked around desperately for a way out. There was a small wooden door, but it was locked. Stella rattled the handle. Agapanthus banged her fist against the door, but there was no answer.
‘Let me,’ said Ottilie. She put her hand against the lock of the door and closed her eyes.
There was a little click, inside the lock. She pulled the door open, and they tumbled inside and slammed it behind them. Ottilie put her hand on the door, and they heard the lock click again.
They stood in the dark, trembling.
Something slammed against the door. They all jumped.
‘Bleedin’ lockwitch.’
‘I flippin’ told you.’
There were loud thumps on the locked door, and then grunts of disappointment, and cursing, and a few more thumps.
They waited. The men cursed some more. Then they muttered together for a bit. At last, their footsteps went away and there was silence.
‘That was utterly astonishing,’ whispered Agapanthus. ‘How did you do that?’
Ottilie hesitated, and then whispered, ‘If I touch a lock, I can open it. The locks want to open, really. They do. I can feel it. It’s easy.’
‘So you’re fey,’ whispered Stella, after a moment.
‘S-some people say that.’ Ottilie hesitated again, and then said, ‘I’m a lockwitch. My mother too. All the girls in our family. My grandmother told me that her great-great-grandfather married a fairy lady. That’s what she told me when I was little.’
Stella wondered if she should tell them that she was fey too. That she could turn invisible. Before she could decide, Agapanthus whispered, ‘Well, I can see why they want you. If you can open doors as easily as that.’
‘Those men came and took M-Mother away to do a job. They wanted her to open a lock. She was frightened — she didn’t want to go. But she went, all the same. And she never came back. Something happened to her. That’s why they want me now.’
‘What do they want you to do?’ asked Stella.
‘I heard them talking. That gentleman wants me to open a lock. An underground door.’ Ottilie’s voice was shaking. It sounded as if she was crying again.
Stella patted her arm. ‘We’ll take you back to school. You’ll be safe there.’
Agapanthus put her ear to the door. ‘D’you think they’ve gone away?’
‘I bet they’re waiting for us,’ said Stella. ‘Perhaps we can find another way out.’
She reached about in the darkness and felt bundles and boxes. They were in a storeroom of some kind. Cautiously, they felt their way along, their outstretched fingers encountering feathers and fur, and rolls of fabric sewn with tiny beads. They passed shelves full of ribbons and jars of buttons and sewing thread, and emerged into a shop. Tall marble columns were decorated with curly gilt patterns. A crystal chandelier glinted in the shadows overhead. The long counters were lined with plaster heads. All the heads were wearing extraordinary hats. There were hats with huge velvet bows, and dangling beaded grapes, and exotic, spiky flowers. One hat was decorated with a large pineapple surrounded by yellow roses, and another had a whole s
tuffed bird perched on top of it, the long green tail feathers trailing down behind.
They tiptoed across the gleaming marble floor to the tall windows. Stella peered through a narrow gap between the shutters. The street lamps flickered in the mist.
‘It’s the High Street,’ she whispered.
Outside, something moved. Stella clutched Agapanthus by the arm. ‘Look!’ she gasped.
Something large and pale flapped past overhead and disappeared into the darkness.
‘What?’ whispered Agapanthus. She put her eye to the gap.
‘There.’ Stella pointed.
‘Where?’ asked Agapanthus. ‘I don’t see anything.’
‘There,’ whispered Stella again.
‘It’s only mist.’
‘I was sure I saw something,’ said Stella. She watched the mist swirl, making uncanny shapes in the light of the street lamp.
‘There’s nothing —’ Agapanthus stopped abruptly, and then gasped.
A stocky shape appeared on the pavement on the other side of the street. One of the Gabbro brothers.
‘Shhh,’ whispered Stella.
‘He’s looking for us,’ whispered Agapanthus.
They watched him cross the street. They crouched underneath the window as he peered in between the shutters. Stella held her breath. She felt Ottilie trembling, and she reached for her hand and clasped it.
They heard him mutter something. He rattled the door handle. Then he walked away along the street.
They waited until everything was quiet.
‘Come on,’ whispered Agapanthus. The door was bolted and locked. They pulled back the bolts, and Ottilie put her hand on the lock and shut her eyes. There was a click, and the door opened. They edged out of the shop and closed the door. Ottilie locked it behind them.
Stella looked cautiously to the left and the right, her heart thumping. The light from the street lamps gleamed on the cobblestones. It was difficult to see in the darkness and the swirling mist, but the street seemed to be deserted. ‘Let’s go,’ she whispered, and they tiptoed down the steps as silently as they could and made their way along the High Street, looking around all the time, keeping to the shadows.
They reached the end of the grand shops.
‘Nearly there,’ whispered Agapanthus.
‘We can explain to Miss Mangan,’ whispered Stella to Ottilie. ‘We’ll make her understand what happened.’
They turned the corner.
Something moved in the shadows beside a high garden wall.
Three hulking shapes stepped forward.
Stella gasped.
Agapanthus yelled.
Ottilie shrieked.
The Gabbro brothers laughed. One of them flung away a pig’s trotter he had been chewing on and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
‘Grab ’em, boys,’ he said.
Fourteen
‘Run!’ gasped Stella.
They spun around, but before they could escape, one of the Gabbro brothers snatched Agapanthus. The second brother grabbed Stella, yanking her arm viciously.
She struggled. ‘Ottilie! Run!’ she shouted.
Ottilie turned, but she was not quick enough. The third brother seized her and gave a sharp whistle.
A dark coach swept out of the mist. The coachman pulled the reins and the horses stopped, their breath steaming in the cold air. Stella could see a dark figure in the coach. A gentleman. Ottilie wriggled and screamed as she was picked up and bundled inside.
Stella kicked and yelled for help. Her captor thumped the side of her head, making her ears ring. She struggled to free herself from his grip, but he wrenched her arm around behind her back. It hurt so much she thought she might faint.
Agapanthus thrashed and shrieked. The brother who was holding her slammed his hand over her mouth. She bit it, making him yell, and managed to wrench herself free from his grasp. She dashed to the coach and pulled open the door. The gentleman lunged towards her. They struggled in the doorway. The gentleman raised a walking stick, and Agapanthus snatched it away from him. He shoved her, and she fell backwards down the steps, into the gutter. She rolled over and lay still.
‘Agapanthus!’ Stella twisted and kicked, trying to escape.
Suddenly, there was a screeching yowl from overhead. It was the stripy cat. He dashed along the top of the high wall, fur bristling and green eyes gleaming. He leaped down, landed on the head of Stella’s captor and clawed at his eyes. The man gave a howl of pain. He let go of Stella and staggered backwards, thrashing his arms around. The cat yowled again, sprang away and disappeared into the darkness. Stella pulled Agapanthus to her feet. She was limping. She leaned on Stella’s arm, gasping with pain.
The three brothers came towards them again.
With one arm around Agapanthus, Stella crouched and snatched up the fallen walking stick from the gutter. It was heavy, with a large silver knob on the end, decorated with curls and engraving. She grabbed the other end and swung the silver knob as hard as she could at one of the brothers. It struck his arm with a satisfying crunch. He yelped in pain and cursed.
‘You’ve got to run,’ Agapanthus whispered. ‘As fast as you can. It’s our only chance.’
‘I’m not leaving you behind,’ said Stella. Holding Agapanthus tightly, she backed away from the men, waving the stick at them in a threatening manner.
‘You have to,’ said Agapanthus. Her voice shook a bit. ‘I can’t run. When they grab me, you run as fast as you can.’ She gripped Stella’s hand and squeezed it tight.
‘No —’
Suddenly, the three brothers swooped in. One of them snatched Agapanthus and wrenched her away.
‘Run, Stella!’ Agapanthus shouted, struggling as she was dragged towards the coach.
Stella swung the stick wildly. She banged one of the brothers on his jaw. He gave a yell and lurched backwards.
She swung the stick again. One of the brothers caught it, twisted it from her grasp and flung it away, over the garden wall.
‘Haha,’ he snarled.
Agapanthus was shoved into the coach. The door slammed.
‘Go!’ yelled one of the brothers to the driver.
The coachman cracked the whip, and the coach clattered away. As it passed, Stella could see the white faces of Ottilie and Agapanthus at the window. Sitting beside them was the dark shape of the gentleman. The coach swept away down the High Street, disappearing into the mist.
‘We got the lockwitch,’ said one of the brothers, panting. He rubbed his hands together, his knuckles cracking. ‘Now let’s finish this one off.’
They came towards Stella. One of them slapped his hands together with a sound like a gunshot.
Stella turned and fled. She sprinted back along the High Street as fast as she could go. She plunged down a dark side street and ran on, turned again and darted into a narrow alley behind the shops. She could hear the heavy footsteps following her. As she passed a flickering street lamp, she shot a glance behind and turned into another alley, ducking around piles of rubbish and empty boxes.
The alley came to an end. There was no way out.
Voices and footsteps approached. She backed around a pile of old crates.
‘She’s here somewhere,’ growled a voice.
‘Niggle her out.’
Stella crouched in the shadow behind the crates and tried to make herself disappear, but she was gasping for breath and her heart was pounding, and she could not concentrate. She felt her head swim.
Crash! A crate was pushed over. She jumped.
The men were close now. She could see their shadows, looming like giants, on the wall of the alley.
‘Come on out, little girl, we won’t hurt you,’ said one of the brothers.
The other two laughed.
Stella took another breath and tried again to disappear, but before she could manage it, she heard a faint scraping sound. Not far from her feet, the iron cover of a drain lifted and slid aside. A round hole appeared. A pale face popped up out
of the hole, and a voice whispered, ‘Come on. This way.’
There was no time to think. Stella scrambled over and clambered down into the drain.
‘Here,’ whispered the voice, and she felt a hand guiding her feet onto the rungs of a rusty ladder. There was a scraping sound from above as the iron cover was pushed back in place. She climbed down. At the bottom of the ladder, her boots splashed into icy water. The air was damp, and there was a very unpleasant smell of drains and rotting things.
‘This way,’ whispered the voice. ‘Watch your head.’
She crouched down and splashed through the water.
‘Wait.’
She stopped, and there was a flare as a match was struck, and a small candle lantern was lit. In the glimmering light, she recognised Joe, the boy from the fairground. With him was a smaller boy. Both were barefoot, and they each had a hessian bag slung across a shoulder.
‘We heard you,’ Joe whispered, grinning. ‘We keep an eye out for them Gabbro brothers. They’re always up to no good. We heard ’em yelling, and so we come up to see. Then we seen ’em chasin’ after you, so we come to the rescue.’
‘Thank you,’ whispered Stella. She took a breath and looked around. The candlelight glistened on the wet bricks of a low, arched tunnel. They were standing in several inches of water. It flowed past silently, glinting in the candlelight.
‘This is my little brother, Will,’ Joe said.
Will grinned. He looked just like Joe, but smaller. He wore a patched coat, many sizes too large for him. It was belted around his waist with a piece of rope.
‘I’m Stella,’ said Stella.
‘I know,’ said Will. ‘Joe told me about you. He gave me your wipe.’ He waved his arm, and Stella saw her handkerchief had been tied around his hand. ‘I got bit by a rat.’
‘They get right big, down here,’ said Joe. ‘Big as bleedin’ mawkins.’
Will grinned again.
‘The Gabbro brothers took my friends,’ said Stella. ‘They were trying to catch me too.’ She remembered Agapanthus’s and Ottilie’s white faces looking out of the window of the coach as it disappeared into the darkness. Where were they? How could she ever find them?
Wakestone Hall Page 9