Amanda Cadabra and The Strange Case of Lucy Penlowr by Holly Bell (i like reading .TXT) 📗

rats were to be found on the upper floors. To which species they were referring was left to the listener to decide.

The Raykes would be moving to a smaller house, although still in Hampstead. Cal accepted the change from public-school day pupil to local grammar calmly.

‘I’m sorry, son,’ apologised Sir Philip. ‘It’s just that the fees ....'

‘That’s alright, Dad, honestly. Brook Bridges Grammar is a decent school. I ... I know someone who goes there,’ he added with a faint flush. ‘It’s got good pass rates and extremely strict anti-bullying policies ... well ever since that accident two years ago.’

‘Ah, this someone-you-know wouldn’t happen to be a young lady, by any chance?’

‘As it happens, yes, but Sarah ... er, we ... we ....’

‘Splendid,’ Sir Philip commended him. ‘You already have a friend there. And an actual girl.’

‘Friend,’ replied Cal hastily. ‘That’s right.’

‘And I,’ pronounced Lady Rayke, with every appearance of gratification, ‘shall be paid to keep an eye on your father, in the post of his able assistant.’

Cal looked at his mother in dismay.

‘Assistant? But Mum, you’ve been running an entire —’

‘Yes, dear,’ she replied firmly, ‘and I’ve had a good bite of the apple. More than most women even get a nibble at. Besides, this work is important. Every bit as important as what I've been doing. Maybe more so. However, we’re mainly concerned about how the changes will affect you. You see, we’ll all have to pitch in. We’ll have to let Mrs Beetin go, and Camilla will only be able to come in once a week.’

‘Oh,’ replied Cal, wondering how this would affect the quality of his dinners.

‘But it’s quite all right, because I’ve been to the library,’ stated Lady Rayke, in triumph.

She gestured towards the pile of books on the table beside her. Cal drew closer to inspect the titles. Making Meals Without Cook by Olive Venreddy, Cleaning Up - A Practical Guide to Housekeeping, by Iva Nubrum. Stitched Up: Starting Sewing by Polly Longcotton, and other guides for the domestically uninitiated.

‘Yes,’ she continued, ‘I am now a student of the domestic and culinary arts. It’ll be fun. A new project!’

Enthused by his mother’s Dunkirk spirit, Cal threw himself into the downsized life with gusto. He learned to cook and help out around the house. The younger members of the family helped Lady Rayke redecorate and refurbish the new office. Cal, once he’d made a start on his homework, would set to, peeling and chopping vegetables in preparation for the evening meal.

The new life, however, was not, in Cal’s view, without its repercussions. His parents remained as loving as ever, in fact, more so. He remembered the evening his father had walked from his study to the kitchen, holding a sheaf of important-looking papers, in search of his lady. Cal was on the other side of the room, seeking an obscure ingredient for tomorrow’s dinner. Sir Philip put his arms around his wife, saying,

‘I do like you in an apron.’

‘Hm. I expect you’d prefer a white one with a short black dress?’ came the teasing reply.

‘Rather. I’ll bring the feather-duster.’

That solicited what could only have been an unsuitably girlish giggle from Cal's mother, and a silent sigh from her son.

However much Cal appreciated his parents’ harmony, he did wish they wouldn’t flirt in front of him. That sort of thing was surely appropriately done only in private. He said as much to his sister as she was getting him off to school one day.

‘Nonsense,’ she declared. ‘If my husband ever ceases to flirt with me in both private and public, I shall divorce him on the spot.’

This insightful piece of wisdom provided Cal with food for consideration. It led to another thought.

‘Do you think someone will marry you then?’ he enquired with guileless curiosity. The merest notion of being married to his sister was so unthinkable, it was a stretch of the imagination to envision any other male wishing to do so.

‘Yes, Hatchling,’ came his sister's emphatic but good-natured riposte, as she tied his school scarf securely over his collar. ‘I do!’

And, as predicted, such a man did, in time, present himself. He was, alas, so far from their father’s choice, that a blazing row ensued and the couple departed for foreign lands. Cal and his mother received letters now and then and cards at Christmas, but the breach seemed unfillable.

Onlookers said, who could blame her? Her father’s fall from grace must have been an unbearable humiliation. One could hardly reproach her for taking the first opportunity for that offered escape.

It was some time before Cal’s next visit to the office. The first thing he noticed was that a map board had been installed on the wall behind Sir Philip’s desk. It was speared with pins, mostly red, some yellow, blue and the occasional brown one. There were two of the latter in Cornwall, another two in Wales, others in Ireland, Scotland, more in Northern France, the Iberian peninsula, Germany and elsewhere.

Cal went and stood before it. Seeing his interest, Sir Philip explained,

‘Blue: unexplained incidents or crimes. Red: confirmed supernatural. Yellow resolved.’

‘And brown?’

His father drew a breath as the phone rang, and that was the end of the conversation. Thereafter, Cal found him evasive on the subject and his mother likewise.

Over time, Cal noticed that while the blue pins might be replaced with red or yellow and the red with yellow, a brown one sometimes disappeared, as it had in Cornwall. Sometimes one might appear elsewhere, either in the same country or in another land altogether. One day, Cal hazarded a guess.

‘Dad, the brown pins, are they agents?’

‘Of sorts,’ replied Sir Philip vaguely.

‘Why do they disappear?’

Hearing the tenacious note in his son’s voice, he replied, ‘Die of old age or illness. Decide it's too risky to continue. And