The Last Apprentice: Complete Collection

by Joseph Delaney

  It was the worst supper I could ever remember having at home.

  It was so sad not having Mam and Dad at the table, and I kept glancing at Dad’s empty chair. The baby was already upstairs in her cradle, so there were just the three of us, Jack, Ellie, and me, sitting at the table and picking slowly at our food.

  When I caught her eye, Ellie smiled sadly but was really quiet. I had a feeling that she wanted to say something to me but was biding her time.

  “It’s a really good hot pot, Ellie,” I told her. “I’m sorry to waste it, but I can’t eat much. I just don’t feel hungry.”

  “Don’t worry, Tom,” she said kindly. “I understand. None of us have any appetite. Just eat what you can manage. It’s important to keep your strength up at a time like this.”

  “It’s probably not the right time, but I wanted to say congratulations, you two. Last time I was here, Mam told me you’re expecting another baby and that it’s a boy.”

  Jack smiled sorrowfully, his voice subdued. “Thanks, Tom. If only Dad could have lived to see his grandson born . . .” Then he cleared his throat as if he were about to say something important. “Look,” he began. “Why don’t you stay with us for a few days until the weather improves? You don’t have to get back tomorrow, do you? The truth is, I could do with a bit of help on the farm. James stayed for a couple of days, but he had to get back to work.”

  James was the second oldest of my brothers; a blacksmith. I doubted that he’d stayed on after the funeral because Jack really needed help with the farmwork. It wasn’t like spring planting, or the autumn harvest, when you used all the help you could get. No, Jack wanted me to stay for the same reason he’d needed James. Despite the fact that he hated spooks’ business and wasn’t usually happy to have me around, he needed me now to fill the emptiness, the loneliness of being here without Dad and Mam.

  “I’d be glad to stay for a few days,” I told him with a smile.

  “That’s really good of you, Tom. I appreciate it,” he said, pushing his plate away even though he’d hardly cleared a third of it. “I’ll get off to bed now.”

  “I’ll be up later, love,” Ellie said to Jack. “You don’t mind if I stay down a bit and keep Tom company, do you?”

  “Not at all,” he said.

  When he’d gone up, Ellie gave me a warm smile. She was as pretty as ever, but she looked sad and tired, the strain of the past week having taken its toll. “Thanks for agreeing to stay awhile, Tom,” she said. “He needs to talk about the old times with one of his brothers. That’s how you grieve, by talking it through over and over again. But I also think he needs you because he believes that if you’re here, Mam’s more likely to come back. . . .”

  I hadn’t thought of that. Mam could sense things. She would know that I was staying at the farm. She really might come back to see me.

  “I hope she does.”

  “So do I, Tom. But listen, I want you to be very patient with Jack. You see, there’s something he’s not told you yet. There was a surprise in your dad’s will. Something he didn’t expect. . . .”

  I frowned. A surprise? What could that be? The whole family knew that once Dad died, Jack, as the eldest son, would inherit the farm. There was no point in dividing it up among the seven of us and making it smaller and smaller. It was the County tradition. It always went to the eldest son, with the farmer’s widow being guaranteed a home for life.

  “A pleasant surprise?” I asked uncertainly, not knowing what to expect.

  “No, not the way Jack sees it. But I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, Tom. He’s only thinking of me and little Mary and, of course, his unborn son,” she said, smoothing her hand across her belly. “You see, Jack hasn’t inherited the whole house. One room has been left to you.”

  “Mam’s room?” I asked, already guessing the answer. It was the room where Mam kept her private things; where she’d kept the silver chain that she’d given to me in the autumn.

  “Yes, Tom,” Ellie said. “That locked room directly below the attic. That room and everything contained within it. Even though Jack owns the house and land, you’re always to be allowed access to that room and to stay there whenever you want. Jack went pale when the will was read. It means you could even live here, had you such a mind.”

  I knew that Jack wouldn’t want me near the house much in case I brought something with me; something from the dark. I couldn’t argue against that, because it had happened once before. The old witch Mother Malkin had actually found her way down into our cellar last spring. Jack and Ellie’s baby daughter, Mary, had been in real danger.

  “Did Mam say anything about that?” I asked.

  “Not a word. Jack was too upset to talk about it, and then she left the following day.”

  I couldn’t help thinking that giving the room to me now meant that she’d be leaving soon; going off to her own country and leaving us forever. That was, if she hadn’t gone already.

  The following morning I got up very early, but Ellie was down in the kitchen before me. It was the smell of frying sausages that brought me down the stairs. Despite all that had happened, my appetite was beginning to return.

  “Have a good night’s sleep, Tom?” she asked, giving me a big smile.

  I nodded, but it was a white lie. It had taken me a long time to drop off, and then I’d kept waking up. And each time I’d opened my eyes, the pain had come to me again, as if I was realizing for the first time that Dad was dead.

  “Where’s the baby?” I asked.

  “Mary’s upstairs with Jack. He likes to spend a bit of time with her each morning. Gives him a good excuse to start work a bit later, too. You won’t get much done today anyway,” she said, gesturing toward the window. Snowflakes were whirling down, and the room was brighter than on a summer’s day as the light reflected off the snow piled deep in the yard.

  Soon I was tucking into a plate of sausage and eggs. While I was eating, Jack came down and joined me at the table. He nodded and started on his own breakfast; Ellie went off into the front room, leaving us alone. He picked at his food, chewing it slowly, and I started to feel guilty because I was able to enjoy my own breakfast.

  “Ellie told me that you know about the will,” Jack said at last.

  I nodded but didn’t say anything.

  “Look, Tom, as the eldest son, I’m the executor of the will and it’s my duty to make sure that Dad’s wishes are carried out, but I wonder if we could come to some arrangement,” he said. “What if I buy the room from you? If I could raise the money, would you sell it to me? And as for Mam’s things inside it, I’m sure Mr. Gregory would let you store them at Chipenden. . . .”

  “I need time to think, Jack,” I told him. “It’s all come as a shock. Too much has happened too quickly. Don’t worry, I’ve no plans to keep coming back here. I’ll be too busy.”

  Jack reached into his breeches pocket and pulled out a bunch of keys. He placed them on the table in front of me. There was a large key and three smaller ones. The first was for the door of the room; the other three for the boxes and chests inside.

  “Well, there are the keys. No doubt you’ll be wanting to go up and see your inheritance.”

  I reached across and pushed the keys back toward him. “No, Jack,” I said. “You keep them for now. I’ll not go into that room until I’ve spoken to Mam.”

  He looked at me in astonishment. “Are you sure?”

  I nodded and he thrust the keys back into his pocket, and nothing more was said about it.

  What Jack had said was sensible enough. But I didn’t want his money. To buy me out, he’d need to raise a loan and, financially, things would be difficult enough now that he had to run the farm by himself. As far as I was concerned, he could have the room. And I was sure the Spook would let me keep Mam’s boxes and chests at Chipenden. But I suspected that it was Mam’s wish that the room should be mine, and this was the only thing that stopped me from agreeing immediately. It was in Dad’s will but had probably
been her decision. Mam always had a very good reason for everything she did, so I couldn’t make up my mind properly until I’d talked to her face-to-face.

  That afternoon I went to visit Dad’s grave. Jack was going to come with me, but I managed to talk him out of it. I wanted time on my own. An hour or so to think and grieve alone. And there was something else I needed to know. Something that I couldn’t do if Jack came with me. He wouldn’t have understood, or at best, he would have been really upset.

  I timed my walk so that I would arrive at sunset, with just enough light to find the grave. It was a bleak snow-covered graveyard about half a mile from the church. The churchyard itself was full, so they’d consecrated this as additional holy ground. It was really just a small field bounded by a hawthorn hedge with a couple of sycamores on its western boundary. It was easy to find Dad’s grave in the front line of burial plots advancing month by month across the field. His grave didn’t have a stone yet, but they’d marked it temporarily with a simple cross, his name carved deeply into the wood.

  JOHN WARD

  RIP

  For a while I stood near that wooden cross, thinking of all the happy times we’d had as a family; remembering being small, with Mam and Dad happy and busy and all my brothers living at home. I recalled the last time I’d spoken to Dad and how he’d told me that he was proud to have such a brave son and that, although he hadn’t any favorites, he still thought that I’d turn out the best of all.

  Tears came into my eyes, and I wept aloud at the side of the grave. But as it grew dark, I took a deep breath and steadied myself, focusing on what had to be done. This was spooks’ business.

  “Dad! Dad!” I called into the darkness. “Are you there? Can you hear me?”

  Three times I called exactly the same, but on each occasion the only sounds I could hear were the wind whistling through the hawthorn hedge and a lone dog barking far in the distance. So I sighed with relief. Dad wasn’t here. His spirit wasn’t bound here. He wasn’t a graveside lingerer. I just hoped he’d gone to a better place.

  I hadn’t really made up my mind about God. Maybe God existed and maybe He didn’t. If He did, would He bother to listen to me? I didn’t usually pray, but this was Dad, so I made an exception.

  “Please, God, give him peace,” I said softly. “It’s what he deserves. He was a good, hardworking man, and I loved him.”

  Then I turned and, very sadly, made my way back home.

  I stayed at the farm for almost a week. When the time came for me to leave, it was raining, the snow turning to slush in the yard.

  Mam hadn’t come back, and I wondered if she ever would. But my first duty was to get back to Anglezarke and see how the Spook was. I just hoped he was continuing to recover. I told Jack and Ellie that I’d visit them in the spring and that we’d talk about the room then.

  I began the long walk south, thinking of Dad and how much things had altered. It didn’t seem that long since I was living at home happily with my parents and six brothers, and Dad was strong and fit. Now it was all changing. All falling apart.

  In one sense I could never visit home again, because it wouldn’t be there anymore. It was all too different now. The buildings would still be the same, and so would the view of Hangman’s Hill from my old bedroom window. But without Dad and Mam it simply wouldn’t be home.

  I knew I’d lost something forever.

  CHAPTER XII

  Necromancy

  THE farther south I traveled, the colder it got, the rain gradually turning back to snow. I was tired and wanted to go directly to the Spook’s house, but I’d promised Alice I’d visit her first, and I intended to keep my word.

  By the time Moor View Farm was in sight, it was already dark. The wind had dropped and the sky was clear. The moon was up and the snow made everything much brighter than usual; beyond the farmhouse, the lake was a dark mirror reflecting the stars.

  The farm itself was in darkness. Most County farmers go to bed early in winter, so it was what I’d been expecting. I was hoping that Alice would have sensed my approach, though, and sneaked out to meet me. I climbed over the boundary fence and crossed a field toward the cluster of dilapidated buildings. A cattle shed loomed up before me, and hearing an unusual sound, I halted just outside the open doorway. Someone was crying.

  I stepped into the doorway and the animals within edged away nervously. Immediately the stink hit me. It wasn’t the usual warm animal smell, plus a few dozen healthy cowpats. It was scour, a digestive illness that cattle and pigs are prone to. It is treatable, but these cattle were ill and neglected. Things had got even worse since I’d last been here.

  It was then that I realized someone was watching me. To my left, lit by a shaft of moonlight, Mr. Hurst was sitting hunched on a milking stool. There were tears running down the old man’s cheeks, and he was staring up toward me, misery etched into his face. I took a step backward as he came to his feet.

  “Get you gone! Leave me be!” he cried, shaking his fist at me while trembling from head to foot.

  I was shocked and upset. He’d always been so meek and mild, never giving me or Alice so much as a cross word. Now he looked desperate and at the end of his tether. I walked away, my head bowed low. I felt very sorry for him. Morgan must have been treating him really badly: no doubt that was why he was upset and embarrassed. I didn’t know what to do but thought I’d better speak to Alice about it.

  I moved on until I came to the yard. The house was still in darkness, and I wasn’t sure what to do. Alice must have been in a very deep sleep not to be aware that I was close by. I waited for a moment, my breath steaming in the cold air.

  I walked up to the back door and rapped on it twice. I didn’t need to knock again. After a few moments the door opened slowly, creaking on its hinges, and Mrs. Hurst peered out at me, blinking into the moonlight.

  “I need to speak to Alice,” I told her.

  “Come in, come in,” she invited, her voice weak and hoarse.

  There was a mat just inside the door, so I stepped into the small hallway and, after smiling and thanking her politely, stamped the snow off my boots as best I could. Ahead were the two internal doors. The one on the right was closed; but the door to Morgan’s room was partially open, and I saw candlelight flickering beyond.

  “Go through,” she said, pointing toward it.

  For a moment I hesitated, wondering what Alice was doing in Morgan’s room, but I went in anyway. The air was heavy with the reek of tallow, and for some reason the first thing I noticed was a thick candle made of black wax, which was set into a big brass candlestick. It was positioned in the center of the long wooden table with its two facing chairs, one at each end.

  I’d expected to see Alice there, but I was mistaken. Seated at the near end of the table, and facing away, toward that candle, was a hooded figure. He turned in my direction and I saw a beard and a mocking smile. It was Morgan.

  Once again my instinct was to run for it, but I heard two sounds behind me. The first was the door being closed firmly. The second was the heavy bolt being slotted home. Ahead of me was the window covered with a heavy black curtain and no other door. I was locked in the room with Morgan.

  I looked about me, glancing down at the bare stone flags, then across to the waiting empty chair. The room was cold, and I shivered. There was a fireplace, but it was filled with gray ashes.

  “Take a seat, Tom,” Morgan said. “We’ve a lot to talk about.”

  I didn’t move, so he gestured at the chair opposite him.

  “I came here to speak to Alice,” I told him.

  “Alice has gone,” Morgan said. “She left three days ago.”

  “Gone? Gone where?” I asked.

  “She didn’t say. She wasn’t a very talkative girl, that Alice. Didn’t even bother to say she was leaving. Now, Tom, the last time you entered this room you came uninvited like a thief in the night with that girl at your side. But we’ll forget that, because now you’re very welcome. So I’ll say it
again. Sit yourself down.”

  Filled with dismay, I sat down but kept my staff upright by my left side, gripping it firmly. How did he know that we’d been in his room? And I was really worried about Alice. Where could she have gone? Surely not back to Pendle? I looked across and met Morgan’s gaze. Suddenly, with a smile, he pulled the hood back from his face to reveal his unruly thatch of hair. There seemed a lot more gray in it than last time. In the candlelight his face was craggy and the lines were far deeper.

  “I’d offer you wine,” he said, “but I don’t drink when I’m working.”

  “I don’t usually drink wine,” I told him.

  “But no doubt you eat cheese,” he said, a mocking grin on his face.

  I didn’t reply, and his expression became serious. Suddenly he leaned forward, pursed his lips, and blew hard. The candle flickered and went out, plunging the room into absolute darkness while the smell of tallow intensified.

  “There’s just you, me, and the dark,” Morgan said. “Can you stand it? Are you fit to be my apprentice?”

  They were the exact words the Spook had said to me in the cellar of the haunted house in Horshaw, the place where he’d taken me on the very first day of my apprenticeship. He’d done it to judge whether or not I was made of the right stuff to become a spook. They were the words he’d spoken the moment the candle went out.

  “I’ll bet that when you first walked down the steps into the cellar, he was sitting in the corner and stood up the moment you came near,” Morgan continued. “Nothing changes. You, me, and two dozen others or more. Predictable stuff. The old fool! No wonder nobody sticks with him for long.”

  “You stayed three years,” I said softly into the darkness.

  “Found your voice again, Tom? That’s good,” Morgan said. “I see that he’s been talking about me. Did he have anything good to say?”