by Angie Sage
THIS HOUSE IS FOR SALE
Later that morning I was looking out of my Thursday bedroom window and thinking about what Aunt Tabby had said. I always find it easier to think when I am doing something, so I was busy picking off lumps of peeling black paint from around the windows and throwing them at the monster statues out on the parapet.
It was lucky that I looked down and noticed the man standing on the front doorstep. He was wearing a shiny blue suit and was staring up at the house while he wrote down notes on his clipboard. I knew what he was right away--a real estate agent. I could see Aunt Tabby meant business. Well, so did I. So I got down from the window and hummed a happy tune to myself: "La-di-da, la-di-da, time to clean out the fish bowl. " I found the old bowl in a dark corner, where I had put it after Brian, my last goldfish, escaped. I don't know where Brian went, but he never came back. For sentimental reasons I had kept the bowl just as Brian had left it, so it was full of slime, old weeds, and some very smelly green water.
The real estate agent was standing right underneath my win- dow. I balanced the fish bowl on the win- dowsill and tipped it. The sludge landed splat right on him.
Bull's- eye! The real estate agent had green goo all over his head and his shiny blue suit. He just stood there for a moment-- like he was really sur- prised--and spat out some bits of slippery weed. Then he looked up, and I aimed my Fiendish Stare at him.
He made a weird, spluttery, yelping noise and ran off down the path. Good riddance.
At lunchtime in the third-kitchen-on-the- right-just-around-the-corner-past-the-boil- er-room, I was not surprised to see that Aunt Tabby looked just as crabby as she had at breakfast. "These real estate agents are really most unreliable, " she said as she stabbed a defense- less potato and thumped it down on my plate. "I have been waiting all morning for one, but he hasn't even bothered to turn up. " I didn't say anything. Aunt Tabby looked at me for a moment and then she said, "I shall put my own sign up this afternoon.
You'll enjoy helping me paint it, Araminta. " "Won't, " I told her.
I tried to avoid Aunt Tabby in the afternoon, but she found me down in the cellar looking for vampires and dragged me out to the garden. "It's a lovely day, Araminta, " she burbled. "Some sunshine would do you good. You are looking quite pale. " Well, of course I was looking pale. It was because of the chalk dust all over my face. Vampire hunting is the same as ghost hunt- ing--you have to look like one of them to have any chance of finding one. I think I look pretty good as a vampire, although I would like to grow my teeth, too (but when I asked the dentist how I could do that, she was not exactly helpful).
Aunt Tabby had cleared a patch of stinging nettles--stinging nettles are what grow best in our garden--and she had dumped down a piece of board and some old paints. Aunt Tabby thinks she's an artist, but I have my doubts. "Come on, dear, " she said, patting the ground beside her like we were going to have a picnic or something, "you know you love painting. " "Don't, " I told her. So I sat on the steps and kicked them, which is quite fun as they are very crumbly and you can often get big lumps of stone to drop off. I watched Aunt Tabby really go for the paint in a big way until she had covered herself in as much paint as she had put on the board.
When she had run out of paint, Aunt Tabby fixed the board to a post and stuck it in the hedge. The sign said:
This House Is for Sale Aunt Tabby looked pleased. She rubbed her painty hands all down the front of her dress and said, "Not too bad. I haven't lost my touch. What do you think, Araminta?" I didn't say what I thought, as it would not have been polite. Also I was thinking hard. I -19- badly needed a Plan--Aunt Tabby was not going to get away with this. So while Aunt Tabby went indoors to shout at the boiler, I thought about my Plan. It didn't take long before I had one. Soon the sign said:
This House Is NOT for Sale Simple.
Chapter Three
HUGE HOTELS
The next morning I was up early. I knew Aunt Tabby was not going to give up eas- ily and I wanted to keep an eye on her, so after breakfast I hung around the hall, pre- tending to count the spiders. Everything (even Aunt Tabby) was suspiciously quiet-- until there was a knock on the door. I rushed to open it, but Aunt Tabby, who had been lurking behind the clock, got there -21- first. She elbowed me out of the way (Aunt Tabby has really sharp elbows) and opened the door. Standing on the doorstep was a very styl- ish woman carrying a briefcase. I did not like the look of her one bit, so I did my best Fiendish Stare. I could tell it worked--she suddenly went very pale and gulped a bit like Brian used to. She opened and closed her mouth as though she had forgotten how to talk, and then she said in a squeaky voice, "I--I've come to see the house. On behalf of Huge Hotels Incorporated. " Aunt Tabby looked thrilled. Drat, I thought. It was just my luck that this Huge Hotels person couldn't read. I stomped outside to check the sign, but it now said:
This House Is -- NOT For Sale Hmm . . . Aunt Tabby was proving more tricky than I had expected. She was busy showing Huge Hotels around the hall when I clomped back inside. "It's very odd, dear, " Aunt Tabby said with a funny kind of smile. "Someone changed the sign last night. I noticed it when Uncle Drac went to work. I wouldn't be surprised if it was one of those estate agents. Anyway, I've fixed it now, don't you think?"
I didn't reply--there was no time to lose. I tore upstairs to my Friday bedroom and grabbed my Ghost Kit. I threw open the box and pulled out my white ghost sheet and emptied a bag of flour over it. Then I blew up a big balloon and put in one of my surprise- your-friends-with-a-strangled-ghost squealers. I held on to the neck of the balloon really tightly to stop the air escaping, then I put the floury sheet over my head so that it covered me and the balloon. I was ready. Soon I could hear Aunt Tabby clumping up the stairs in her big boots, followed by Huge Hotels's scared little clip-clop sounds. It was time to go. I opened my bedroom door, and in the old mirror on the landing I could see a small, fat, -24- dusty ghost shuffling out. I didn't look as scary as I had hoped, but it was pretty good. It was very difficult going down the attic stairs, but I managed to reach the bottom. Then I climbed onto the old chest by the landing window and hid behind the curtains. Yes! The ambush was set. I could hear Aunt Tabby and Huge Hotels Incorporated just along the corridor. Aunt Tabby was rattling on about how she personally liked the dripping taps in the bathroom, and Huge Hotels was muttering stuff to herself: "Great potential . . . Old world charm . . . Theme hotel . . . " We'll see about that, I thought. I jumped off the chest and let go of the squealer. Aiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! It was great.
Huge Hotels went totally pale. I could tell that she knew she had made a Big Mistake. She spun around and screamed. Really screamed. While she was screaming, I hung on to the curtains and waved my arms a lot so that the flour flew all over the place like a thick white mist. The strangled-ghost squealer was great--it kept on squealing and squealing--but just to make sure of things, I made some really horrible groans, too. Huge Hotels was not giving up easily. Her screams were amazing--really piercing-- and she didn't stop, not even to breathe. Aunt Tabby grabbed hold of Huge Hotels to try and calm her down, but Huge Hotels didn't want to calm down. No way. Just then some flour got stuck in my throat and made me choke a bit--well, quite a lot, actually--and that was when Huge Hotels stopped screaming and just stared at me, although she still had her mouth open like she wanted to scream.
She started inching slowly backward along the corridor and went straight through one of the oldest cobwebs, where the biggest, hairiest spiders live--and I saw the biggest, hairiest spider of them all fall down her front. Huge Hotels let out a piercing shriek that made my ears ring. She tore down the stairs and was out of
the front door in two seconds flat. I was impressed. "That was fast, " I said, throwing off my sheet and taking a breath of flour-free air. Aunt Tabby looked cross. "Really, Araminta, what are you doing?" she said. "I don't know what's gotten into you. Is that my best self-rising flour you've been using?" "Yes, " I told her. "But it didn't work. My feet didn't leave the ground once. "
Aunt Tabby tut-tutted and scooped up the spiders that had fallen off their cobwebs and gotten covered with flour. Then she carried Q them down to the kitchens to dust them off. I sat by the moldy curtains in the middle of a pile of flour and unwrapped my ghost sheet. Things were going well, I thought, but I knew Aunt Tabby was not going to give up that easily.
That evening, after Aunt Tabby had read me a story from The Bedtime Ghouls and Ghosties Pink Storybook and gone downstairs to feed the boiler, I got up. I crept down the attic stairs and waited in the shadows outside Uncle Drac's turret. When the moon rose, the red door creaked open and Uncle Drac shuffled out. I watched him walk slowly down the stairs to the hall, -29- where Aunt Tabby was waiting with his ther- mos and sandwiches. She kissed him good-bye and waved him off to work. The front door closed quietly behind him, and Aunt Tabby dis- appeared back down to the basement. I slipped outside and changed the sign again. Now it said:This HAUNTED House Is -- NOT for Sale That was sure to do it. Who would want to buy a haunted house?
Chapter Four
SIR HORACE
Saturday morning was not a great morn- ing. Aunt Tabby was cleaning the boiler-- again. Usually I stay out of the way when Aunt Tabby goes anywhere near the boiler, but today was different. I wanted to collect new supplies of flour for my ghost box, as I thought I might be needing it soon, and Aunt Tabby keeps all her flour in the third-pantry- on-the-left-just-past-the-boiler-room.
I had nearly passed the boiler room safely when Aunt Tabby looked up and saw me. Drat. I could see she was going to be trouble. She had a big sooty scrubbing brush in her hand, and she had just kicked over a bucket of water. I was right; she was trouble. "Araminta dear, " said Aunt Tabby, "will you please go and put Sir Horace back together. He has spent two whole days in pieces now. " Sir Horace? Since when has Aunt Tabby bothered about Sir Horace? "Do I have to?" I asked, annoyed. I had better things to do than put a heap of rusty junk back together. Why was Aunt Tabby always popping up when you least wanted to see her? "Yes, you do have to. "
Aunt Tabby kicked the grate. "There are some people coming who want to buy the house, and I think a nice suit of armor in the hall will make a good impression. People like suits of armor. And Araminta--" "What?" I said. "I want everything left nice and tidy, please! The people are coming this afternoon. " "This afternoon?" I gasped. "But that doesn't give me nearly enough time to--" Oops. "To what?" asked Aunt Tabby suspiciously, peering at me through her sooty spectacles. "To . . . Er . . . Clean up my room, " I told her in my nicest voice. "Well, you had better get a move on then, hadn't you, dear?" said Aunt Tabby. "And take that awful old helmet back up with you. " I picked up Sir Horace's helmet and got out of Aunt Tabby's way.
Not more people coming to see the house, I thought. Couldn't they read the sign outside? I went out into the garden to see if Aunt Tabby had changed the sign, but she hadn't. It still said:This HAUNTED House Is -- NOT for Sale I didn't understand it. Why would anyone want to buy a haunted house? But just to make sure, I added a bit more to the sign:
This HORRIBLE HAUNTED House Is -- NOT for Sale I dumped Sir Horace's helmet on the floor in my Saturday bedroom--which is my favorite, as you can only get to it by climbing up a rope ladder and then squeezing through a small door, which keeps Aunt Tabby out. The trouble was, the rest of Sir Horace still lay all over the floor of my Thursday bed- room, so it took forever to bring all the pieces down the corridor and then throw them up through the door.
I am a pretty good shot, but I have to admit that not all the pieces got through the door the first time. I started to put Sir Horace back together and, while I was working out which arm went where, I thought about my Plans for the afternoon. I thought that maybe I would try the Molasses on the Doorknob with the Invisible Tripwire Plan, although it might need the Slimebucket Surprise, too, just to Q make sure. But whatever I was going to do, I had to get Sir Horace finished quickly, as Aunt Tabby was sure to come and check. Sir Horace was really difficult to put back together. There were even more dents in him now, and lots of the pieces wouldn't go back where they were meant to, no matter how hard I pounded them. It was very irritating. It was nearly lunchtime by the time I had put Sir Horace back together--all, that is, except for his left foot. His left foot was just about the most stupid left foot I have ever known. I was feeling very annoyed, so I told Sir Horace exactly what was what. "It's all right for you, Sir Horace, you moldy old rust bucket, " I said, "but I've got much more important things to do.
If I don't get my Plans ready, then some really stupid peo- ple who can't even read a perfectly obvious sign are going to buy this house, and we will have to move out. And when we do, Aunt Tabby is going to throw you in the recycling bin. And then you'll be taken away and squashed flat like a pancake and melted down and made into hundreds of tins--which will probably be filled up with cat food. Ha-ha. " By now I was really annoyed with his left foot. I banged it upside down on the floor and it rattled. I shook it again, and then something really exciting happened--a small brass key fell out. I could tell it was a very old key, as it was worn quite smooth as if it had been in some- one's pocket for hundreds of years. But the -39- best part was that it had an old brown label tied to it, and on the label was some faint spidery writing in very old-fashioned letters. I could just about read what it said:
This be the keye to Balconie (Doth Fitt all Doors) "Balconie" was a funny word, and I won- dered what it meant. It sounded like a faraway land or an ancient underground city. Maybe, I thought, the key belonged to a treasure chest on a desert island called Balconie. I said the word out loud to myself, imagining the palm trees swaying and the water lapping at my feet, and then I realized what Balconie was. It was only the boring old balcony above the hall. And who would want to go there?
Me! That's who. Suddenly I knew it was the perfect place. I could do my Awful Ambush from there. And I've always wanted to do an Awful Ambush. It has just about everything in it, and it would make the Slimebucket Surprise look like a Sunday school picnic. Anyone coming to buy the house wouldn't last five seconds. I gave one last shove to Sir Horace's left foot and--yes!--it went back onto the end of his leg. So what if it was on back to front? It didn't seem to bother Sir Horace, and it certainly didn't bother me. I had more important things to think about. Like how to get to the balcony. Of course, I knew there was only one answer to that--through a secret passage.
Chapter Five
THE SECRET PASSAGE
I have a Secret Passage Kit, just like my Ghost Kit. I have always wanted to find a secret passage, and now I was sure that at last I had the key to one. First I opened my Secret Passage Kit box and took out a flashlight, a ball of string, and some emergency supplies of cheese and onion chips. You need a flashlight because secret passages are always dark, and you need a ball of string so that you can find your way out again--I'll tell you how that works in a minute.
You need emergency food supplies, as you never know how long you are going to be in the secret passage, do you? I mean it might be a really long one, and you could be in there for days. Weeks, even. Then I set off to look for the secret door. I thought that the most likely place was in the wood paneling under the stairs. It sounds hollow when you kick it. But finding the door wasn't as easy as I thought it might be, as every- thing was covered in Aunt Tabby's favorite thick brown paint. When I looked really hard, I was sure I could see a keyhole-shaped dip. I scraped off the paint with the end of the key and there it was--a small brass keyhole just the right size for the small brass key. It fit perfectly. So I turned
the key and the best thing ever hap- pened--a secret door swung open.
I switched on my flashlight and shone it through the doorway. It looked exactly like a secret passage should look--dark, dusty, and really, really secret. You could tell that no one had been in there for years. Weird, I thought, because now I was going in. On my own. I'm not saying that I wished Aunt Tabby was there with me just then, as she was the last person I wanted to see, but I wouldn't have minded a friend or someone like that. I don't want you to think that I was frightened of going in on my own, as I am quite used to doing stuff on my own and it is perfectly okay. No problem at all. Here's the thing about the string. When you go into a secret passage, you have to tie one end of a ball of string to something and then you unwind the string as you go, so that you can always find your way back again. There was a nail on the back of the secret door, so I tied the string to that. Perfect. Then I closed the door so that Aunt Tabby didn't notice anything unusual, switched on my flashlight, and set off along the passage, unwinding the string as I went. The secret passage was really strange. It -45- was very narrow and full of cobwebs and it smelled funny, kind of damp and moldy. I think it ran behind the wooden paneling of the landing, as it had really scratchy wooden walls. Although it was narrow, it was quite high and easy to walk along, even though I had to keep pushing really thick cobwebs out of the way. It's a good thing I don't mind spi- ders, as there were dozens of those. Really fat ones. I wasn't scared. Not really. After all, I was still in my house, wasn't I? But it was a bit odd when the passage suddenly ended at a wooden platform. I wasn't sure whether to step onto the platform or not. Anyone who knows about secret passages has heard about booby traps and stuff like that, so I stopped and thought about what to do.
I shone my flashlight all around, but it wasn't much help. When I looked more closely, I could see that the platform had sides, a bit like a packing case, and there were ropes running up and down on either side. It reminded me of something, but I couldn't think what. And then I could! It was a dumbwaiter. No, I am not being rude about some poor old waiter--a dumbwaiter is a kind of eleva- tor. I knew that because there used to be one just like it in the first-kitchen-on-the-right- just-past-the-laundry-room, and that is what Aunt Tabby used to call it. I remember one rainy day I was so bored and I got inside the elevator and hauled myself up to the dining room. It was the best fun ever, and I spent all afternoon going up and down until Aunt Tabby caught me.