Mrs Phipps stood over Ferdinand, her mouth grinning in ghastly triumph. She laughed, quietly, and Lady Anne joined in. She let go of Edward. He knew there was no point in running. Mrs Phipps was guarding the place like a sinister kite.
‘Dear old Pollock,’ said Lady Anne. ‘I’m truly sorry that it has come to this. I had expected that we’d be able to do things with a minimum of fuss. A word from me to Mr Fraser and you were packed off to the asylum. You see Mr Fraser trusts me so much. And you were like a little rat in a science lab–I was so looking forward to experimenting on you. My friend Doctor Spawforth had some really interesting ideas. What is science, but another branch of magic? Smallwood!’ she barked.
Edward noticed for the first time the blustery Reverend Smallwood. Once he would have found his broad, cassocked figure comforting–but now he was filled with a deep sense of hatred.
‘Tie up this boy and throw him in the boot. And blindfold him.’
Without questioning her, Smallwood caught Edward by the arm. He found a rope in the boot and, though Edward struggled as much as he could, his skinny twelve-year-old muscles were no match for Smallwood’s rugby-playing frame. He tied a purple and yellow spotted handkerchief around his eyes.
Smallwood had more difficulty getting Edward into the boot, but he managed, and once more the world was dark and small. The door shut on him with a clang.
Edward could hear noises outside–bumps, low murmurings, the sound of Ferdinand’s car being started up, and driven away. He hoped that Guy had had the time and sense to make himself scarce. He guessed if he hadn’t, he’d soon find out. Then he heard more murmurs, and the sound of the car doors being opened and closed, and the thrum of the engine being started up. The car accelerated off.
It was hot and dark, and there was a smell of dog food and earth. Edward’s heart was thumping as fast as a hummingbird’s wings, his throat was as dry as sandpaper, and his stomach felt as if he’d eaten too much lasagne in Kakophagy.
Edward cursed himself and everything around him. He felt at his bonds. The Reverend had tied him up properly. He struggled with them, but however hard he pulled and pushed, he was unable to loosen them. He kicked against the side of the boot, hoping that he might be able to force the door open, but it was impossible. He groaned in frustration.
After what seemed like an age, the car slowed down and came to a smooth halt. He heard gravel crunching underneath the tyres. It was still pitch-black in the boot. Suddenly he heard a ‘click’, and light filtered through his blindfold.
‘Quickly,’ said Lady Anne, and he was lifted out. Edward lay limp, knowing that to fight would be pointless. He thought that maybe he’d even gain some sympathy if Smallwood thought he was ill.
Edward was carried a short distance, up some steps, and he heard the scratchy sound of a key in a lock. He was borne through a door, his head bumping against the frame as he went in, and up some stairs. The Reverend found it hard going, and had to stop twice, dumping him like a sack of potatoes. Eventually he heard the creak of another door, and he was hefted on to bare, dusty floorboards. Smallwood took Edward’s blindfold off, and stuffed the handkerchief back into his pocket.
‘My dear boy,’ he said, holding his arms behind him. ‘I am sorry about this. But it’s necessary, you see.’ He turned to go.
As the last steps of the Reverend faded away, Edward was left with nothing but dust and darkness for company. He lay there on the boards, and watched the shadows on the floor grow longer and longer, until he thought that they would swallow him up into their strange world.
He fell in and out of sleep. Sometimes he would see Tristram in the distance, and Edward would call to him, but Tristram did not seem to be able to get to him. He wondered if this had something to do with Lady Anne. Sometimes the door to the attic would be opened and Mrs Phipps would come in and force water and food on him. She would bring a bucket too. Edward hated seeing her flat, wrinkled, expressionless face, with eyes that glowed with malice. The more he saw it, the more he realised that it was almost an inversion of Lady Anne’s, and the thought troubled him.
Mrs Phipps came and went about five times altogether, although he soon lost count. It felt as if he was kept in there for days. It was utterly silent. He started to imagine that he could hear the movements of insects in the wood, leading complicated lives, building odd, hidden civilisations about which humans could never learn. There was nothing else in the attic except some old junk–ancient rackets, and cricket bats, some croquet hoops, a broken television.
Again and again he called to Tristram, to his parents, to Ferdinand, but no one ever came except the horrific Mrs Phipps, whose smell made him feel sick. Not once did she speak. All she did was make that strange, whistling, insect noise, that burned into his mind until it was all he could hear. He felt that he would fossilise where he was, that he would become part of the bare boards, that he would decompose into millions of little creatures and melt into the walls.
Then one day Mrs Phipps pulled him up roughly and led him downstairs into a gracious room. It was wallpapered in blue and white stripes with gilded decorations. Lady Anne was seated in a gilt chair upholstered in a deep blue, and the Reverend Smallwood hung back behind her.
‘Now then, my dear Edward. We need your cooperation. Will you help us, Edward?’
‘No.’ His voice was rusty, low, and it was hard for him to spit out the syllable.
‘Fool!’ said Lady Anne, and Mrs Phipps gave him a stinging slap on the cheek.
‘Never,’ said Edward, in a quiet but strong voice.
Smallwood drew towards Lady Anne and, as they muttered together, Edward took the opportunity to look around the room they were in. It was graceful and well-proportioned. Elegant chaises longues and high-backed chairs were arranged around a white marble fireplace, on which stood many invitation cards. Comfortable sofas and armchairs were placed around the edges of the room.
There were portraits on the walls, all sharing characteristics of face and bearing. There were shelves of books in the alcoves–Edward couldn’t see the titles but they were all uniformly bound and the spines were stamped with a large golden bird. It was the same bird as the crest on the tomb of Tristram de la Zouche. Edward knew that it was a raven. Then realisation dawned. He must be in Lady Anne’s house.
Smallwood and Lady Anne stopped their murmurings. Lady Anne swivelled towards him, crossing her long, elegant legs, sitting on the deep-blue chair like a queen in judgment.
‘If you won’t cooperate, then I’ll just have to keep you until you do. Take him back up.’
Phipps slithered towards him, and led Edward back up to the attic, slamming the door on him.
Later on, he woke up from a dreamless sleep feeling drained and hungry. Dawn was starting to seep through the tiny window, and he could hear birds singing. Despair was filling his brain, and he could feel the Other Book, whose presence had been largely absent, beginning to make itself known again. Edward cursed it.
‘If I were you I would not do that,’ said a voice.
Edward spun round on to his other side. Sitting behind him on an old trunk was Tristram de la Zouche, his gilded armour a little faded, his helmet by his side. He was playing with his sword, which was sheathed in its scabbard. Edward was so pleased to see him that his despair vanished instantly.
‘Tristram! But why shouldn’t I curse the Other Book? If it wasn’t for the stupid thing, I’d never’ve been here, and I’d still be in lessons doing normal things like I expect Strangore is doing now, and I wonder if they’ve even noticed that I’ve gone, and if my parents knew I was here I bet they’d rescue me, and I’ll never be able to get it back to its owner, if I even knew who that was –’
‘Calm, my friend,’ said Tristram. ‘Soft, soft. The Other Book should not be cursed. I speak as one who knows; for I have a confession that it is meet I make.’
Edward forgot about where he was for the moment. ‘What is it, Tristram?’
‘It all happened so long ago, and I have been punis
hed for it ever since …’ Tristram put the sword down. ‘You remember those dreams that you had? A boy in Great Hall, and his lunatic father?’
Edward nodded. Some distant images were becoming sharper, negatives developed in the darkroom.
‘You remember the book that appeared in that dream? The book which the boy buries, far from sight?’
‘Yes,’ said Edward. It was clearer now. He could remember … the crackling fireplace … ‘There were two dogs, and they were called …’ And Edward realised. ‘It was you? The boy in the dream?’
‘Blanche and Fairfax. Sweet Blanche, and dear old Fairfax. They stayed with me to the end, you know …’ Tristram looked at the floor and said softly, ‘Yes. It was my father who poisoned the Other Book. It is I who have been wandering the worlds of ghosts and shadow-casting men, until the time comes when I can repair the damage that he did, that has come to terrible fruition in Lady Anne. She who will want to become like my father, she who will want to merge this world with the Other … It must not happen. She cannot control the Other World. It will control her, and this world will be chaos.
‘I cannot stay long. I could not access the place in your mind. I had to fight my way into your world. All I can tell you is that you must fight for me. Remember the prophecy.’
Edward was seized with a tremendous doubt. ‘But what if I can’t –’
‘You have been a better champion, my boy, than I ever was. I could have stopped them … I could have rescued her …’ Tristram’s throat seized up and he looked away.
‘Your mother,’ said Edward.
‘Yes,’ he answered. ‘She whose memory was for a long time the only thing that kept me happy during those years after she died. They made me watch her hang. And I … I did nothing to stop it.’
‘Why did … why did your father want to see her dead?’ asked Edward, as gently as he could.
Tristram said, in a matter-of-fact way that Edward knew was covering up great sadness, ‘The villagers had been losing their cattle, and they thought she was a witch. If only they knew that it was my father who had been doing it … But they wanted to see someone blamed. Nothing got better after that. My father and the Other Book made everything worse.’ He pulled his sword in and out of its scabbard, then took it out fully and looked along its length, before putting it back in again.
‘I’m … I’m sorry.’
‘Do not be sorry, for it is all gone now, and I did find peace and happiness in this world for a time.’ Tristram smiled, and Edward saw in his eyes the boy who had stood up to his murderous father. He felt suddenly better.
‘So I have to help you, Tristram. That’s what it was always about. I’ll do anything, I swear.’ Courage and strength slipped into Edward’s bones.
‘It is good that you wish to fight,’ he said. ‘There will be time enough for that. Now, however, I must leave you. I have one message. You are closer to home than you think. Farewell,’ he said, and he was gone. For a moment Edward thought he had left his sword behind for him as a weapon but, as he scrabbled for it, it vanished.
He was incredibly lonely then, and dejected. But the courage Tristram had given him remained, and though he lay on the ground for nearly a full five minutes, he soon pulled himself together and sat upright. He had to plot his escape.
He looked around and saw the old cricket bats and tennis rackets in the corner of the attic. He could knock Mrs Phipps out when she came up with his food and run outside. But then what would he do … Tristram had said he was closer to home than he thought. He rummaged around a bit more and unearthed some ancient tins of tuna. No use, he thought.
He remembered the room he had been in downstairs. The crests on the books, and the portraits … could it be possible that it was the drawing room of the guest house at Oldstone Manor, which was attached to the main house, and into which no boy was ever allowed to go?
The more he thought about it, the more likely it was true. Lady Anne wouldn’t want to be far from the centre of her operations, so it wasn’t likely that he was in London. And all the de la Zouche furniture and paintings would have belonged to the Manor beforehand. Lady Anne was, as she had said, simply returning home.
Edward heard steps on the stairs, and quickly grabbed a cricket bat and lay down with it hidden underneath him.
The door creaked open and, instead of the bat-like Mrs Phipps, in came the back of Reverend Smallwood, struggling with a tray.
‘Dear boy, dear boy,’ he was muttering, ‘poor chap … should never have got into this … can’t think what his parents will say … dear boy … I should have stayed in Middle Temple … who needs that sort of power, I say …’
He backed into the room, and turned round to face Edward.
‘Pollock. I am sorry about this. Don’t worry, we’ll get you out of here soon enough. I’m afraid I can’t do anything about it. You see …’ and he lowered his voice to a whisper, ‘she won’t let me. Some sort of deal hers was … I never should have trusted her … promising me access to the Other Book …’
He came closer and knelt down to arrange the tray. The Reverend had brought him some real food, arranged nicely on a plate with forks and knives, a napkin, and what looked like a whisky. Edward felt sorry for him.
‘Medicinal, you know,’ he said. ‘Thought it might perk you up.’ He gave it to Edward, who drank it down. He’d had whisky before, but there was no water in this. It felt like drinking molten lava, then it settled into a warm glow in his gut.
‘This Other Book thing, I mean, really,’ said the Reverend conversationally. ‘It all seems rather silly to me now, don’t you think?’
The whisky was making Edward feel sleepy. The Reverend’s voice was coming to him as if from a distance. He murmured something.
‘I mean, if you just helped Lady Anne, then it would be over in a very short time. It would hardly hurt … all it would need is a word from you …’
To capitulate … it seemed like such a wonderful thing. To give in now, and lose the burden which had taken up residence in his brain, in his body. To be free. To be Edward Pollock again. The Reverend’s face loomed large and cheerful.
Edward sat up. He was being tricked. Now was the time for action.
Then he heard footsteps on the stairs. He clutched the cricket bat, but there was no use now. Whoever was coming up would be Mrs Phipps or Lady Anne and would thwart any attack he made on the Reverend.
‘Cherry tomato?’ said the Reverend, looking up, and then someone came down on his head with a cricket bat.
‘Sorry, Reverend,’ said a girl’s voice, as he swooned and fell sideways, still holding the plate, a trembling smile on his face.
Standing behind him was Mandy, still holding the bat, a highly amused expression on her face. ‘Crikey,’ she said. ‘Thank goodness I don’t have to confess to him.’
‘How did you get here?’ said Edward.
‘What, not “thank you”? I did what you asked. I kept an eye on Phipps and Lady Anne. There were four trays going in and only three people in the guest house. I followed Smallwood up and found you. Couldn’t you look a bit more pleased?’
Edward looked into her glittering eyes, but somehow all he could do was stammer some stupid words.
‘Well, come on, then,’ she said. ‘I’ll go first and clear the way. Follow close behind.’ She went out of the door, and Edward slipped out behind her.
They made their way quietly down the stairs, passing two landings, and the large drawing room which Edward had seen earlier. Mandy went into the drawing room and made a thumbs-up sign behind her back. Edward heard her speaking to someone, and carried on walking down.
He came to a larger landing which opened on to the hall; he looked down and saw it was empty. There were two large half-tables at the walls, with enormous vases filled with the most tasteful and well-chosen flowers, blue and white orchids. A mirror almost as big as he was made the hall seem much wider. It was nearly black with age at the edges. The black and white marble squares of the hall
looked like a chessboard. He ran down the red-carpeted stairs and burst out of the front door. There were two panes of glass in the door, each with the de la Zouche crest on them.
Edward instantly recognised where he was–at the back of Oldstone Manor, in the small guest-house garden which was next to the churchyard. Mr Fraser was the only person he could think of. He knew that he hadn’t believed him last time. But who else was there to turn to? Edward sped through the garden and leapt over the wall into the churchyard.
A raven that was perched on Tristram’s tomb cawed as he went past. He waved at it. He dashed into the courtyard and, not bothering to knock, came in upon Mr Fraser.
He was still seated at his computer. His red-topped desk was still covered in piles of papers that seemed to have bred since Edward last saw them, half-open files, books with the pages coming out of them, half-full ashtrays and a can of fizzy drink, no doubt confiscated from an unsuspecting boy. He looked up and his creased face became even more wrinkled with astonishment.
‘Pollock! What on earth are you doing here? The hospital didn’t phone to say you were coming back.’
‘You really wouldn’t believe me, sir,’ said Edward. He realised he was wearing a jumper over his pyjamas.
‘Well, Pollock, I am amazed. And you do look awful. Although I’ve got business to be getting on with, I’d rather see you’re all right.’ He said the word “business” with distaste.
‘We do indeed have important business,’ said a voice, cool and graceful, and Edward turned to see the shape of Lady Anne, curled in a chair, wearing a white dress printed with red birds.
Edward had to act quickly. ‘But something terrible is happening,’ he said.
‘Oh, Edward, how did the hospital let you escape, I wonder?’ said Lady Anne, feigning ignorance.
‘Don’t listen to her!’ said Edward. ‘She kidnapped me! She sent me to the hospital. She knew the doctor. She knew he’d try things on me. And then she kept me in her attic!’
Lady Anne looked at Mr Fraser. ‘Do you see what I mean?’ she said. ‘Absolutely mad.’ She said the second word in a fake whisper, behind her hand, as if she was trying to protect Edward from the knowledge, and this made him hate her even more.
The Other Book Page 15