Phantom Pirates
Page 1
First published in Great Britain in 2012 by
Quercus
55 Baker Street
7th Floor, South Block
London W1U 8EW
Copyright © Daren King, 2012 Illustrations copyright © David Roberts, 2012
The moral right of Daren King and David Roberts to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue reference for this book is available from the British Library.
eBook ISBN 978 0 85738 410 2
Print ISBN 978 0 85738 408 9
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
You can find this and many other great books at:
www.quercusbooks.co.uk
Phantom Pirates
Daren King studied in Bath and lives in London. Mouse Noses on Toast, his first book for children, won the Gold Nestlé Children’s Prize. Peter the Penguin Pioneer was shortlisted for the Blue Peter Award. He is the author of four adult books. Boxy an Star was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.
David Roberts is the award-winning illustrator of over thirty titles. He has had a variety of interesting jobs, such as hair washer, shelf stacker, and hat designer. He was born in Liverpool and now lives in London.
Praise for Daren King
‘I loved all the ghosties’ beautifully sketched characteristics, and the sensitive way in which King’s story helps children understand fear: a “wibbly feeling in the tummy”’
Daily Telegraph
‘King is very good at making children think about their world . . . hugely inventive and charmingly funny, early readers will adore having this book read to them and will love trying it themselves’
Literary Review
‘Full of fun, humour and ridiculous behaviour’
My Child
‘Children will laugh out loud at the zany humour and the witty one-liners . . . while David Roberts’ comical illustrations can’t fail to raise a giggle’
Scholastic Literacy Time Plus magazine
‘Writer and illustrator have produced a hilarious fun-packed riot’
Herald
For Rebecca
By Daren King for children
MOUSE NOSES ON TOAST
SENSIBLE HARE AND THE CASE OF CARROTS
PETER THE PENGUIN PIONEER
FRIGHTFULLY FRIENDLY GHOSTIES
FRIGHTFULLY FRIENDLY GHOSTIES:
GHOSTLY HOLLER-DAY
FRIGHTFULLY FRIENDLY GHOSTIES:
SCHOOL OF MEANIES
FRIGHTFULLY FRIENDLY GHOSTIES:
PHANTOM PIRATES
Contents
1 The Competition
2 Eleanor Wraith
3 Stowaways!
4 Skull and Crossbones
5 Gold Coins
6 Swept Deck
7 Sewn Sails
8 Ginger Pop
9 The Ghost Ship
10 Boom!
11 Fish Fingers
12 The Mermaid’s Tale
13 Pamela’s Plan
14 Lost and Found
15 Dressing Up
16 Force-Ten Gale
17 The Porcelain Princess
18 Cabins and Corridors
19 Garlic Wafts
20 The Mermaid’s Tail
An Interview With Daren King
An Interview With David Roberts
1
The Competition
If you had seen us ghosties wafting by the water’s edge that morning, laughing and singing summer songs, you may have thought we were headed somewhere pleasant.
How wrong you would be to think that!
I’m Pamela, by the way. Pamela Fraidy. Not that I’m afraid or anything.
It began two weeks earlier, the day the post-phantom delivered the letter—
No, that isn’t right. It began two months before that, when Tabitha had one of her bright ideas, and every light bulb in the house went POP!
I expect you know that Tabitha Tumbly is a poltergeist, the sort of ghosty who can make odd things happen just by thinking.
It’s funny, but some ghosties find this frightening.
‘Wither,’ Agatha said, ‘do light that candle, before we all bump into each other in the dark.’
‘Consider it lit,’ Wither said, and I heard that rough, zipping sound a match makes as it strikes the side of a matchbox.
‘That’s better,’ Agatha said. ‘I say, where’s Pamela?’
‘I’m here,’ I said. ‘When the bulbs popped, I suddenly remembered I had to tidy up behind the bookcase.’
‘Do come out, Pamela,’ Tabitha said. ‘I want all six of us together, so I can tell you my idea.’
And out I wisped.
‘Let’s hear it then,’ Wither said, and he rolled his eyes and folded his bony arms.
‘What us ghosties need,’ Tabitha said, ‘is a holler-day.’
‘Our last holler-day was a disaster,’ Agatha said.
Charlie straightened his trilby. ‘At Frighten-on-Sea? Yes, we spent most of the holler-day fleeing that caped figure.’
‘And such rotten weather,’ Humphrey said, biting into a sausage roll.
‘That,’ Wither said, ‘is why we need another holler-day. Is that what you were about to say, Tabitha?’
‘Precisely,’ Tabitha said. ‘But this year, we holler-day in the June sunshine.’
‘We don’t have time to organise a holler-day,’ Agatha said. ‘Charlie has twelve gold watches to sell, Humphrey has his schoolwork, Wither is elbow deep in unfinished poems, and you, Tabitha, have cupcake class. Oh, and I promised I’d help my friend Eleanor pen her gothic novel.’
‘Pamela can organise the holler-day,’ Charlie said, and that was that.
On the first day of June, Tabitha wisped us all into the lounge, declaring that today was the day I’d reveal our holler-day plan.
I was about to explain that the plan had fallen flat, when we heard a whistling sound from the front lawn.
‘That post-phantom always whistles a cheerful tune,’ Wither said.
‘Well,’ Charlie said, doffing his trilby hat, ‘it is the polite thing to do.’ And he passed through the wall to the hall.
You probably know that Charlie Vapour is the only ghosty who could do so. The rest of us have to use the door, like you still-alives.
Agatha prodded me on the arm. ‘Pamela, you were saying?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘You see, I was about to order the holler-day brochure when I spotted a competition in the Daily Wail.’ I pulled a newspaper clipping from my pocket and held it up for all to see.
COMPETITION, it said in bold letters. WIN A SPECTRAL SUMMER CRUISE.
‘The chances of winning a competition are one in a million,’ Humphrey groaned.
‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ I fibbed, and I was about to explain how we’d just have to spend summer in the safety of our own haunted home when Charlie passed back through the wall.
‘How exciting!’ Charlie said. ‘This letter is from that ghostly newspaper the Daily Wail. We’ve won a summer holler-day, on a still-alive ocean liner.’
‘Hoorah for Pamela Fraidy!’ Agatha cried, clapping her hands.
‘Pamela,’ Tabitha said, ‘you’ve turned white as a sheet.’
>
The truth is, the thought of another ghostly holler-day terrified me. What if we got into frightful trouble, or lost our way and couldn’t get home?
‘Um, it’s the excitement,’ I said, and I wisped behind the bookcase to finish the tidying up.
2
Eleanor Wraith
The evening before the first day of the cruise, the six of us booked into a ghostly guest house overlooking the harbour.
We did ask for a room in a still-alive guest house, but the still-alives yelled mean things and hid behind the counter.
‘I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news,’ I said as we floated down the shimmering corridor, ‘but I’m afraid we won’t be setting sail after all.’
‘Why ever not?’ Charlie said, jangling the brass room key.
‘The cruise is for seven, and there are only six of us.’ I held up the newspaper clipping.
‘Pamela,’ Tabitha said, ‘why didn’t you mention this before we packed our suitcases?’
‘We could’ve invited one of the other ghosties,’ said Humphrey Bump, bumping my case.
‘Rusty Chains,’ Charlie suggested, ‘or Headless Leslie or Gertrude Goo.’
‘I didn’t think about it,’ I said, biting my tongue.
‘Fortunately,’ Agatha said, ‘I read the newspaper clipping myself, and I invited a friend. She’s meeting us at the harbour before we board.’
‘Pamela,’ Tabitha said, ‘I’m starting to think you don’t want to go on this summer cruise.’
‘She’s a scaredy-cat,’ Humphrey said, and he bumped open the bedroom door and rolled into the room.
Early next morning, as we wafted down to the harbour, we were greeted by the palest ghosty I have ever laid eyes on. She was tall and willowy, like, um, a willow tree.
‘This,’ Agatha said, ‘is my dear friend Eleanor Wraith.’
‘How lovely to meet you,’ Tabitha said, and four frightfully friendly ghosties shook Eleanor’s ivory hand.
‘Right,’ Wither said. ‘Now we can board the Porcelain Princess and begin our summer holler-day.’
‘And what a fine vessel she is,’ Charlie said, doffing his hat at the vast ocean liner.
‘Wait,’ Eleanor said. ‘This Wither chap said there are seven of us, but I shook only four haunted hands.’
‘You didn’t shake Agatha’s hand,’ Tabitha said. ‘If you had shaken Agatha’s hand, that would be five.’
‘Plus yourself,’ said Humphrey. ‘Five and one is seven. It’s maths.’
‘Five plus one equals six,’ corrected Wither.
‘But Eleanor has two hands,’ Agatha said. ‘And five plus two equals seven.’
Wither withered. ‘That’s hardly the point.’
‘One of us is missing,’ Tabitha said. ‘And no prizes for guessing who.’
‘Pamela the scaredy-cat,’ Humphrey said. ‘We’d better find her. The ship is about to set sail.’
The ghosties spent the next five minutes floating up and down the harbour, checking behind bollards and beneath the wings of seagulls, but the missing ghosty – that’s me, by the way – was nowhere to be found.
‘Are you looking for someone?’ I said, and I wisped out from my hiding place inside Eleanor’s felt hat.
Wither frowned. ‘Bother. And now our ship has sailed.’
‘Pamela!’ Tabitha snapped. ‘You did that on purpose. You hid so that we would miss the boat.’
‘Tabitha, don’t be mean,’ Wither said.
‘I’m afraid Tabitha is right,’ I said, peering through my summer shoes. ‘Our holler-day is ruined, and it is my fault.’
Wither cracked his knuckles. ‘Then it is you, Pamela, who is mean. Though I have to say, Tabitha is mean too, for snapping at poor Pammy.’
‘Pamela,’ Tabitha said, ‘I’m sorry I snapped. But why did you make us miss the cruise?’
‘I’m . . . I’m frightened of water,’ I said, and I hid my eyes with my hands.
‘You’re frightened of your own shadow,’ Wither said, and he gazed poetically out to sea, at the ocean liner sailing towards the glimmering horizon.
3
Stowaways!
‘All is not lost,’ Agatha said after a moment’s thought. ‘There is a way we can board the ocean liner after all.’
‘Oh yes?’ said Wither, brightening.
‘It says in the newspaper article that the ocean liner spends the first night at the Isle of Fright.’
‘Is the Isle of Fright terribly far?’ I said.
‘Barely an hour’s waft,’ said Eleanor. ‘I visited the island while researching, for my first novel, The Pendulum Doth Swing.’
‘Oh, what a lovely title!’ Wither said, and his eyes glazed.
‘We’ll hitch a ride on one of these dear little fishing boats,’ said Agatha. ‘I say!’ she called out. ‘Can you help us?’
When the fishermen saw Agatha rattling her pearls, hair billowing in the breeze, they yelled mean things and covered their heads with their fishing nets.
‘I expect they’ve got sunstroke,’ said Agatha, gazing up at the blue sky.
The further along the harbour we floated, the meaner the still-alives became, and it wasn’t long before we ran out of boats.
‘Oh well,’ I said, clutching my suitcase to my chest. ‘We’ll just have to catch the train home.’
‘There’s a ship at the end of that jetty,’ Tabitha said, pointing at a wooden pathway that led out to sea.
The ship was called the Raggy Dolly, and it looked about ready to set sail. It also looked ready to fall apart. The wooden sides stank of plankton and rot, and the sails were so worn they could barely waft’.
‘Now we’re here,’ Eleanor said as we reached the end of the jetty, ‘we might as well have a nose around.’ And she floated aboard.
Agatha, Tabitha, Charlie, Wither and Humphrey followed, leaving the suitcases in a heap.
I was trying to decide which frightened me more, the vast ocean or the journey home alone, when Tabitha grabbed my haunted hand and wisped me over the short stretch of water.
‘Ahoy there!’ Agatha called breezily, but no reply came.
After a minute of peering into barrels and behind sails, we stopped, and Charlie adjusted his trilby and turned to face the shore.
Then he froze.
‘Charlie,’ Tabitha said, ‘whatever is the matter?’
‘Wasn’t the ship a little closer to our luggage?’
We wisped towards the rail at the rear of the ship.
Charlie was right. When we wafted aboard, the gap between ship and jetty had been a mere flit. Now it looked like a float and a half at least.
‘I don’t think we should risk it,’ Tabitha said. ‘We’ve never floated across open water before. I’m worried we might fall in.’
The seven of us wisped this way and that – ‘henceforth and therefore’, as Wither put it, the dear old fool – until Agatha rattled her pearls and declared that we were stowaways.
We floated about for a bit, then Wither said, ‘So we’re stowaways then?‘
‘Stowaways,’ Agatha said.
‘We’re stowaways!’ Wither cried, his poetry voice wafting out across the open water.
‘Stowaways we may be,’ Eleanor said, scribbling in her notepad, ‘but at least we’re headed in the right direction.’ She unfolded a flute-like finger and pointed at a swelling shape on the horizon.
‘The Isle of Fright,’ Charlie said. ‘We can board the ocean liner and begin our summer cruise.’
But as the ship sailed on, the Isle of Fright drifted away to the left.
‘How odd,’ said Wither. ‘The island is moving.’
‘The island isn’t moving,’ Humphrey said, bumping Wither’s bony elbow. ‘We’ve changed direction.’
‘Then I daresay we’re sailing around the Isle of Fright and heading directly for France.’
‘Um,’ I said, hiding my eyes, ‘does anyone know how to steer a ship?’
4
Skull a
nd Crossbones
As the Isle of Fright faded into the distance, the sky clouded over and a mist descended.
‘I say,’ said Agatha, folding her arms, ‘what happened to the summer weather?’
‘This does not bode well,’ said Wither.
‘No,’ said Eleanor, scrawling in her notepad, ‘but it’s frightfully inspiring.’
‘I’m tired, cold and hungry,’ I said.
Humphrey shrugged. ‘I’ve got doughnuts in my suitcase.’
‘There’s warm clothes in our cases too,’ Charlie said, buttoning his jacket. ‘Fat lot of good that is, with our luggage on the jetty.’
‘Let’s huddle together, for warmth,’ Tabitha said. ‘If we float above the lookout platform at the front, we can keep an eye out for land.’
‘The front of a ship is known as the bow,’ Wither said as we wafted up the three rickety steps to the platform. ‘The sides are the portside and the starboard, and the back—’
‘Shh,’ I said. ‘I heard something.’
‘That was my tummy rumbling,’ said Humphrey.
‘Not that. It came from below deck, and it sounded like a door creaking open.’
We listened.
CREEEEAAAAK!
‘What was that?’ Agatha said.
‘The door again,’ I said, ‘creaking closed.’
‘Impossible,’ Charlie said. ‘We’re alone.’
A wooden hatch opened at the foot of the three rickety steps, and a figure emerged.
‘It must be the still-alive who owns the ship,’ Tabitha said.
The mysterious figure closed the hatch and knelt by a coil of rope.
‘Whoever they are,’ Charlie said, ‘they don’t seem to know we’re here. In this mist, us ghosties are almost invisible.’
‘I felt a spot of rain,’ said Wither. ‘Perhaps they’ll allow us to shelter below deck.’
‘We’d better make friends with them,’ Agatha said. ‘Charlie, you’re the polite one. Show us how it’s done.’
‘Um, ladies first,’ Charlie said, hiding behind his hat.