The Beggar's Curse Read online

  The two black poodles were called Potty and Dotty and they yapped solidly all the way home. Colin and Prill grinned when they heard the names. It was hard to picture this sensible, no-nonsense Molly Bover yelling “Potty! Dotty!” down the village street. It was a long drive from Crewe across the flat Cheshire plain. The road threaded its way across a patchwork of small fields and went through villages of rather dreary houses. Now and then they saw a thatched cottage painted white, criss-crossed with old black timbers.

  “Magpie architecture,” Oliver said importantly. “It’s in my book. They built the houses like that to make them more stable. The ground’s not always too firm, round here.”

  Prill scowled at Colin. He was off. Why, oh why, did Grandma’s friend have to be in hospital now, just when the holidays started? She’d forgotten how irritating Oliver could be.

  They kept seeing signs to Stang but there was no sign of a village. The car rattled down narrower and narrower lanes, then dived under a bridge. “There’s a canal above our heads,” Molly explained, slowing down so they could see properly. “It leaks a bit. When I was a child I used to stand here and imagine the whole thing collapsing. Anyway, we’d better get on. Not much further now.”

  “But where is Stang?” said Prill. They’d emerged from the dripping bridge on to a perfectly flat piece of road. “It’s miles away, surely?”

  “Wrong,” Molly answered mysteriously. “We’re nearly there. It’s in a valley, you see. You can never see Stang till you’re right on top of it. I expect your dad’s told you the old rhyme, Oliver?

  ‘The last man into Stang at night

  Pulls down the lid and makes all hatches tight.’

  He was always quoting that.”

  Prill felt cold. It would be warmer down in the village, nicely tucked away in its little hollow. She was quite relieved that Stang wasn’t up on this plain where the wind could get at it, or near that gloomy canal. She stared through the window as Molly slowed down to let a tractor go by. Spring had hardly started here yet, though it was a very late Easter. The trees were only the faintest green. It was as if they were waiting for a warm spell, before hanging their flags out. For April the countryside was unusually quiet and still. Spring was well advanced at home, with trees in full blossom and birds busy everywhere. Round here, everything seemed to be still waiting.

  Molly had switched her car engine off. A three-sided argument had developed between the tractor driver, a builder’s lorry, and a loud-mouthed youth on a red motorbike. “Sorry, folks,” she said cheerfully, opening her window. “A bit of local colour for you. That’s Tony Edge, our local Romeo.”

  “A great big scrape,” the boy was bawling at the lorry driver. “Have to be resprayed that will.” Then they heard, “Come off it, mate, you did it on purpose. I know your sort.”

  “Oh, he is ridiculous,” Molly muttered through her teeth. “As if the poor man meant to do it. Come on, Tony,” she shouted. “Move, will you. I’ve not got all day.” And she gave a sharp blast on the horn. At the sudden noise the young man jerked up his helmeted head and stared at the rusty old car ferociously. Colin was peering out of a side window, and their eyes met.

  There was something rather awful about Tony Edge’s face, though he was certainly handsome, tanned, with bold, even features, large eyes, and a good strong nose, and he’d recently grown a splendid moustache. No wonder all the village girls wanted to go out with him.

  But it was his eyes.

  Colin tried to outstare them, but he couldn’t. Something in that face forced him to drop his gaze and he peered down into his own hands, feeling vaguely foolish, not really understanding what was going on. He was shivering slightly, and his flesh tingled as if he’d just had a small electric shock. That awful stare had made their cousin’s cool, calculating look seem quite ordinary.

  He glanced at Oliver but all he could see was a narrow back. His cousin got dreadful car sickness. Perhaps he was taking this opportunity to vomit out of the window. Poor Oll.

  But Oliver was doing no such thing. He wasn’t interested in a slanging match between a village lout and a man in a lorry. He’d seen something much more interesting, and he wanted to take a photo of it.

  Oliver was often very secretive; he slid a small camera out of his pocket, pressed the “telephoto” button, and put it to his eye. His ignorant cousins would say it was only a sparrow, but Oliver thought that the small bird hopping in and out of the tangled hedge might be something much rarer. He breathed in, and clicked. It was the last film on the cartridge so he could get it developed quickly and sent off to his father. Just because they lived in London it didn’t mean he wasn’t interested in wildlife. He knew a lot more about birds than the Blakemans, anyway.

  Molly rammed her foot on the accelerator and they bumped noisily down the hill into Stang. The valley was quite large. Church, green, and duck pond formed the village centre but the road went on going down for some while, then turned up sharply, petering out in an old footpath called Coffin Lane. “There was a tax on salt in the old days,” Molly explained, “and they’re supposed to have smuggled it out of Stang in coffins along this track. Hence the name. I bet there were a lot of funerals!” At its lowest point the track bordered the edge of a deep pool called Blake’s Pit. This was the real heart of the village, she said, and several families still lived there, including the Edges, in houses above the water that clung for dear life to the steep valley sides.

  “It’s a grim old spot,” she muttered, turning in at a gateway. “Walk down later and have a look. Can’t say I’d fancy living there myself though. I like it up here, where the life is. Welcome to Elphins anyway, dears. Can you sort yourselves out? I’ll just go and find Rose, and I’ll bung the poodles in the shed for a bit, so you can bring your dog in.”

  “It’s the best house in the village,” Oliver said firmly. “My father said so.”

  “Elphins” was a rambling old place, black and white with a mouldy thatched roof in such bad repair it looked as if giant moths had eaten great holes in it. It was set well back from the road, in a tangled wilderness that must once have been a garden. Prill and Colin looked at it in dismay.

  “It obviously needs money spending on it,” Oliver said defensively, “But Molly’s not got any. That’s why she does bed and breakfast. Anyway, I like it.” And he lifted his suitcase out of the car and went up the path. The other two weren’t at all sure. Silently they manoeuvred their trunk out of the back and dumped it on the gravel. “You take that end,” said Colin. “It’s not too heavy.” But as they struggled with it he suddenly felt eyes on his back, and, glancing over his shoulder, he saw the face of Tony Edge staring across the road. The same strange feeling began to creep over him again, making him shiver.

  “Hang on,” he lied to Prill. “I’ve not got hold of it properly. Let’s put it down for a minute,” and he turned right round and gave the face a good stare. But it wasn’t Tony at all; this boy was younger, about thirteen, much squatter and more thickset, wearing an old donkey jacket and a dirty baseball cap. But the face was the same, and the same hard, dark eyes were boring into him, making his hands sweat. It was uncanny.

  “Look, have you got it?” Prill snapped. “Because I’m cold. . . Well, come on then.”

  All the time they were at the car the boy lolled against his fence, watching the proceedings with intense interest. Then the church clock struck six and he stood upright, straightened his cap, and stared up the road. But someone was coming towards them; he suddenly put his hands back in his pockets and slouched against the fence, watching.

  They saw the little figure creeping along, a small brown person enveloped in a dingy raincoat and carrying shopping. One hand held a plastic carrier with celery sticking out of the top, the other clutched the handles of an old-fashioned carpet bag.

  “Hello, Rose,” the boy called out. She stopped and looked up. Her hair was tucked out of sight inside a brown knitted pixie-hood that buttoned under her chin, and they saw a small ov
al face, smooth and freckled like an egg. It was hard to work out how old she was; she might have been twenty, thirty, or anything in between. “Want me to carry your bags then?” the boy hollered, and stepped forward.

  “No. . . no. . .” Rose stammered. The sad little face didn’t look anxious any more, it looked terrified. She started to run, but just outside Elphins the road was still cobbled and the ancient stones were loose and dangerous. Rose tripped and fell flat on her face. She clung grimly on to the carpet bag but the carrier landed on the cobbles. “Me eggs,” she whimpered. “All me eggs. Fresh today an’ all.”

  As the sticky yellow mess oozed out on to the road she started to cry. The boy by the fence laughed loudly. “That’s typical of you, Rose Salt,” he sneered. “You can’t even carry a bit of shopping home. Cheshire born and Cheshire bred, Strong in th’arm and weak in th’ead. That’s you.” And he set off, up the street. Rose, still spreadeagled on the stones, sobbed harder than ever.

  The two children were so taken aback they just stood by the car, goggling, but Rose’s wails had brought Molly out of the house. “It doesn’t matter at all, dear,” she said gently, helping Rose to her feet. “It wasn’t your fault. Come on in now, our visitors have arrived. And I saw you’d got tea ready, now that was clever of you, dear.” Then she called up the street in a very different voice. “As for you, Sid Edge, you’re Cheshire born too you know, just in case you’d forgotten. Thick as a brick, like all the Edge family,” she whispered to the two children, steering the sniffling Rose up the garden path.

  “Who is Rose Salt?” Colin asked Oliver, when they were getting ready for bed.

  “I don’t know. My father never mentioned her. I didn’t know she lived with Molly.”

  “I think she’s a bit weird.” Colin was jumping up and down as he pulled his pyjamas on. “This place is freezing. Do you think Molly would mind if I filled my hot-water bottle?”

  “Why should she?” Oliver was putting a pair of thick red socks on, to wear in bed. “She’s not the touchy type, you know.”

  “No, she’s nice. But what about Rose, Oll? She gives me the creeps. And why does she wear that funny hat all the time? Do you. . . do you think she’s bald?”

  The two boys collapsed into giggles, then Oliver pulled himself together sharply. His mother wouldn’t approve of that kind of joke, she was rather religious. “I don’t know. She’s definitely a bit odd. Perhaps she’s the village idiot,” he said slowly.

  “Oliver, what a thing to say.”

  “Well you said she was creepy,” he said huffily, tucking a scarf round his neck and climbing into bed.

  Prill couldn’t get to sleep because of the cold. If this house didn’t warm up soon she’d spend the whole holiday in the kitchen. It had an open fire, and she quite fancied sleeping down there tonight, with Jessie. Colin’s stuff had been in the top half of the trunk. He’d unpacked, then dragged it along the creaking corridor to her room. There was something in the bottom that she hadn’t wanted anyone to see, and she was clutching it now, an old French doll called Amy.

  Amy was the most precious thing Prill had. Her grandmother had given it to her on her tenth birthday. It was an heirloom, brought back from World War One by Grandad Blakeman’s father. Prill was too old for teddies and stuffed toys, and this doll usually sat on the shelf at home, above her bed. There was nothing cuddly about Amy, with her disapproving porcelain face, her frilled dress and her real leather shoes.

  But she smelt of home, and Prill needed something to remind her of Mum, Dad and Alison. She’d only once been separated from them all before, and it was only for a day or so. She knew she wasn’t going to enjoy this holiday very much, and she didn’t like this cold, dark house either.

  Much later, when someone crept into her room, Prill was still awake, though Stang church clock had already struck midnight. When she heard the door open she half closed her eyes and took deep, regular breaths, though her heart was thumping, and she peeped at the figure hovering near the bed.

  It was Rose Salt, still in her pixie-hood, but now wearing a long yellow nightie. She stretched out a little brown hand and touched the doll’s blue frills, then ran a finger over the painted face. A tiny sound escaped from her lips. “Ah. . . Ah. . .” she was sighing, tenderly. But at that moment Prill turned over quite violently in the bed, closed her eyes properly, and clutched the little French doll much tighter.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Molly Bover was a great leaver of messages. Colin came down first next morning and found the kitchen table covered with little notes. One: She’d gone off at seven, with the poodles, and taken a carload of pots to a craft fair near Chester. Two: She would drop Oliver’s film into Kwik Flicks, a new rapid-developing place in Ranswick. Three: Breakfast was on the stove. Four: Her old friend Winnie Webster was expecting them for lunch at twelve-thirty sharp. Her bungalow was easy to find, they just had to follow their noses to Blake’s Pit. “DON’T BE LATE!” she’d added in curly capitals, decorating the exclamation mark with a skull and crossbones.

  There were no notes for Rose Salt. Perhaps Oliver was right, perhaps she was a bit weak in the head. She probably couldn’t read. Colin looked all round, but there was no sign of her. The long brown mack had gone from its hook on the back of the door, and the carpet bag had vanished too.

  He helped himself to porridge and buttered a pile of toast. If Rose had made the nutty brown bread she could certainly cook. Colin ate so much it was quite an effort to get up from the table. Then he remembered Jessie. Molly had put her in the shed in exchange for the poodles – quite a comedown, after queening it all night by the kitchen fire. She was overjoyed to see him and made a lot of noise. He clipped her lead on and they set off along the village street towards the church. Prill thought his fascination for graveyards was morbid, but Colin quite fancied being an archaeologist, and if you wanted to work out the history of a place you should begin with its church, according to Dad.

  Every cottage seemed to have two or three cats and Jessie barked systematically at every single one. As he walked past the village shop a man flung open an upstairs window and bellowed, “Keep that dog quiet, will you!” The shop front was very shabby, and all the blinds were down. “Edge Brothers, General Provision Merchant, High Class Butchers and Poulterers” was written across them in white. It looked anything but “high class”. It was nearly nine o’clock but there were no signs of life at all, and it wasn’t Sunday.

  The man at the window was still in his pyjamas. His eyes followed Colin along the street and watched him turn up into the lane that led to the church. The boy’s neck prickled. One quick, backward glance had revealed the Edge face again. It was as if some demon farmer had gone round Stang with a giant butter pat, stamping his mark. It was the same look, the same stare, the same eyes. Awful.

  When he saw the church he did another double take. On top of a square, chubby tower there was an elegant steeple, but it was definitely crooked; in fact it was toppling to one side quite alarmingly, like the leaning tower of Pisa. The church was obviously under repair. There was a concrete mixer by the door, a litter of scaffolder’s poles, and some piles of newly cut sandstone blocks, all marked with numbers. A man in overalls climbed down a ladder to talk to him.

  “Looks dreadful, doesn’t it?” he said with a grin. “Don’t worry, son, it won’t fall over.”

  “Are you underpinning?” Colin asked, rather pleased with himself for knowing the right word.

  “Oh no, now that really would mean rebuilding, digging into the foundations, and all that lark. No, the spire’s safe enough. They watch it, you know. Lots of buildings lean a bit, in Cheshire. It’s the old salt workings.”

  “Yes, I know.” Cleverclogs Oliver had told them that.

  “We’re just renewing some of the stonework on the tower. Some old woman died recently and left this place all her money. Good for trade, of course.” He started to go back up the ladder. “You could come up and have a look tomorrow, when the boss isn’t arou
nd,” he added in a whisper, pointing a finger heavenwards to a pair of legs.

  “I might. . . Thanks,” Colin said. But as he watched the man crawling spider-like up the underside of the toppling spire he felt quite sick and closed his eyes. It was such a delicate steeple and it leaned so horribly. He could see the weight of the cheerful builder dragging the whole thing down. . .

  For a while he wandered round the churchyard, looking at the graves. Everything was very overgrown; daffodils had speared up through the grass but they were still tightly closed, and the trees remained a sullen brown. How cold and damp it all was. He had no gloves, scarf, or hat. Just for once he quite envied Oliver all those winter woollies.

  The graveyard was dominated by three names: Edge, Wright and Bover. Others had come and gone, but these families had obviously been around for centuries. There were dozens of Wrights, and about twenty Bovers, but the Edges outnumbered everyone else. It was as if they had a stranglehold on the village.

  Colin noticed that several people in Stang had lived rather short lives. One stone marked the death of James Weaver in 1803 “Whom Neptune Deprived of Life”. He was only seventeen. There was an Isaac Bostock and his son Samuel who had both died “pitifully”, in a drowning accident. Where? Could it have been Blake’s Pit? But there was nothing to say. Most pathetic of all was the grave of the three Massey children, “tragically lost” on the night of April 21st 1853. How and why they were “lost” the crumbling headstone did not reveal.

  The Edge clan, on the other hand, had obviously enjoyed rude health. They’d had large families and most of them had lived into ripe old age. This dank, cold village in the valley bottom obviously suited them perfectly.

  At ten o’clock Oliver was walking towards Blake’s Pit with a Thermos flask under his arm. Molly had left it out for Rose to take to a sick old lady in the village. “Now I’ll leave it ready on the kitchen table,” she’d said last night. “Rose? Are you listening, dear? Don’t forget it, will you? Miss Brierley likes her drop of soup. Now don’t forget it, Rose.” But she had, and Oliver had found the red flask still on the table. He didn’t mind taking it to Miss Brierley’s cottage, he was quite used to old people, and they didn’t bother him in the way they seemed to bother his cousin Prill. She’d pulled a face when Molly suggested they might drop in on this old lady, now and again.