The Beasts of Upton Puddle (26 page)

With a sinking feeling, Joe realized there was no security pass to get his hands on.

Mr. Duggan pointed at Joe. “Who's that?”

Joe stared in shock.

“Never mind him,” Mrs. Duggan said. “What are you going to do?”

“Do? I'll tell you what I'll do. I'm going to do a bit of breaking in myself. Maybe I'll smash up all his stuff. That'll teach him.”

“And how are you going to do something stupid like that, Einstein?” Kurt said. “You won't even be able to get back in the building without a pass, let alone do any damage.”

“Ah, well, that's where the old grey matter comes in, don't it? Something you weren't born with, boy.” He tapped his head and looked accusingly at Kurt. “I'm
head of security, remember? Had myself a second pass made up months ago and put it upstairs in the CD rack, just in case I ever needed it.”

“You put a security pass in your CD rack?” Joe shouted and prayed Danariel heard.

“Who
is
that?” Mr. Duggan pointed at him again.

“I'm Joe Copper, Mr. Duggan. A friend of Kurt's.”

“I don't care if you're the King of Pluto. Who invited you to come into my house and eat my food?”

“Scott Duggan, how dare you!” Mrs. Duggan stood and pointed a fork at him.

Thunk! Something heavy hit the floor upstairs—the best sound Joe had ever heard.

“What was that?” Mrs. Duggan asked.

“It sounded heavy,” said Joe. “I hope nothing's broken.”

“I'd better go and check,” she said and stomped up the stairs.

The two Duggans stared at Joe like a pair of evil twins, though one was considerably bulkier than the other.

Joe smiled back. “That was a lovely tea. Thank you for having me, Kurt and Mr. Duggan.”

“So you going to tell me about that key or not? You owe me big time, Copper.”

Joe was spared as Mrs. Duggan thundered down the stairs, holding the lantern. It shone like a tiny blue sun and died to a faint glow before blasting another pulse of blue light.

“What the bloody hell is
that
?” Mr. Duggan was
pointing again.

“I think it's broken. One of the cats might've knocked it over. It isn't dangerous, is it?” Mrs. Duggan asked Joe.

“It shouldn't be . . . That is, if you always keep it upright. The gases inside it are a bit—”

“Hey!” said Mr. Duggan. “I asked a question.”

“Well, perhaps you'd better have it back,” Mrs. Duggan said, ignoring her husband and holding the lantern at arm's length as though it contained tarantulas.

“If you're sure”.

“Oh, yes, yes. That's all right. It's the thought that counts, isn't it?”

“Well, all right, then,” said Joe, edging toward the door. “Thanks again for having me.”

“Come again soon,” Mrs. Duggan said, and Joe stepped out of the house, trying to avoid Kurt's glare.

The sound of the door shutting came as a massive relief. Joe ran down the road and headed into an alleyway.

Danariel popped out from the top of the lantern.

“Tell me you got Duggan's pass.
Please
tell me you got it.”

Danariel smiled, and from inside the lantern, she pulled out a plastic card with Scott Duggan's face printed on it.

“You're fantastic.” Joe grinned.

“I do my best,” she said, and they hurried to Merrynether Mansion.

When Joe and Danariel arrived at Merrynether Mansion, Heinrich had just finished tidying the vault. He looked more haggard than ever and trembled as he eased into his chair. “Did you get what you needed?”

“Yes.” Joe remained aloof. “I'm going to Redwar Industries now. We might have to wait about an hour until everyone's gone home, though.”

“Good luck.”

“I'll need Flarp again. He knew exactly the way to the restricted area. Danariel's coming too, like last time.”

“Good . . . Joe . . .” Heinrich looked pained.

“What?”

“Something has . . . upset you. I wish you would tell me what I have done.”

Joe swallowed, anger chewing at his insides. “I know about the letters.”

“Letters?” said Danariel.

“Sorry, Danariel. I wanted to talk to you about it first, but I just didn't know what to do.”

Heinrich lifted his great hands and clenched them. At first Joe thought the worst, but then Heinrich pressed his fists into his forehead, gritting his teeth in obvious despair. “Please forgive me.”

“How could you do it, Heinrich? Mrs. Merrynether trusted you. She
trusted
you,” Joe said, his anger plain.

Heinrich stared at the ground as his hands flopped down. “You don't understand,” he whispered. “I had to . . . I had to. But I could not tell Ronnie. She—”

“Was it power, Heinrich? Blackmail? Why? Why did you do it?”

“It was . . . guilt.” His lips trembled.

“Guilt? I don't understand.”

“I have ruined everything. Everything!”

Joe didn't know why, but his anger melted away as Heinrich spoke. The man seemed so sincere. “How long have you been writing to him, Heinrich?”

“Years and years.”

“But why? What's this about? I don't understand.”

Heinrich lifted his head. His eyes were bloodshot. “I thought it would do no harm . . . I thought . . . And now I may never see her again.” Heinrich's words surrendered to silent tears.

Danariel fluttered onto Heinrich's head and weaved her arms around in his matted grey hair, caressing his scalp with her tiny fingers. Joe saw pain in her eyes too.

“He is deeply hurt, Joe,” she said, “but I can also feel that a burden has been lifted from him. Give him time to recover, and he may tell us more.”

Joe looked at the old man. Any punishment he deserved seemed insignificant compared to his obvious torment.

“All right. Go get Flarp, and we'll rescue Mrs. Merrynether. She's the one who needs to deal with him anyway.”

Flarp removed himself from the wall with some reluctance, but with a little extra persuasion, he was soon traveling with Danariel and Joe through Ringwood Forest, heading for Redwar Industries.

A gentle wind jostled the trees, and the calming sound of rustling leaves reminded Joe of a time when he would sit in these woods, untroubled by things like betrayal and kidnapping. Everything was so much simpler a few weeks ago.

“Danariel, I need to talk to you about Heinrich.”

“Yes, what was all that about? What are these letters you mentioned?”

“When we came to Redwar Industries on Saturday night, I found something in Redwar's safe. There were loads of letters in there, all written by Heinrich and all of them with information about what's been happening at the mansion. He's the informant, and he's even been sending Redwar money—diamonds.”

“Heinrich? A traitor? But I know him. He wouldn't.”

“But he
has
, Danariel.”

“Then Redwar must have some hold over him. Something else we don't know about.”

“Could be. We'll have to talk to him when we get back. And this time, he'll have to tell us everything . . . Speaking of which, you told me
you
were going to tell me everything too. All that stuff about my destiny and—”

“Flarp!” Danariel zigzagged between the trees to catch up with the excited globble.

The gooey eyeball was heading deeper into the forest but stopped when Danariel caught up with him.

“What happened?” Joe called.

“He wants to go this way for some reason.”

“Well, bring him back. I don't know what he's seen, but we need him with us.”

Danariel playfully tugged at the globble's extremities. The eyeball, though apparently frustrated, followed.

“Do you think Flarp has seen something important?”

“He thinks it is. Globbles are hard to understand. Their thoughts are rushed and basic, but all I can feel from him is an urgency to go that way.”

“He did the same thing last time we came out here. Perhaps we should go that way later.”

“Perhaps.”

They continued through the forest, back on track for Redwar Industries, continually pulling Flarp back with them until, a short way before they reached the gates, a scampering on dry leaves behind them caused
them to stop. Joe thought it might be a rabbit or hedgehog, maybe even a badger. He squinted into the dimming light, hoping to get a glimpse, and smiled.

“What is it, Joe?”

“Nothing, really. I was just thinking about all the amazing creatures Mrs. Merrynether has shown me, and I still get excited at the chance of seeing a badger in a forest.”

“That's why I like you. Would you like me to find whatever it was?” The seraph glided backward, bathing the foliage in silver light.

“No, that's all right. I . . . Wait. Did you see it?”

“See what?” Danariel twirled.

“Over there, in between those two trees.”

Danariel flew where Joe was pointing, casting her light over the area and revealing a freshly dug burrow the size of a foxhole.

In the space of a heartbeat, Joe saw a flash of long claws, a glint of green eye, and a stretch of black fur before the thing scurried away. Any feelings of sentimentality had been snatched away and replaced with trepidation.

“It escaped into that hole,” said Danariel.

“That wasn't a badger,” said Joe. “It looked like the Beast of Upton Puddle but . . . much smaller.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

The two trees beside the burrow groaned as if
something huge had leaned against them, and without any more warning, the earth surrounding it collapsed and sent a spray of bark and soil into the air as a tangle of roots sprang upward. The tree wavered, then crashed into another before slamming to the ground.

“What happened?” said Joe, catching his breath.

Danariel fluttered around the caved-in earth. “It looks as though that creature caused a collapse when it burrowed away from us.”

Joe puffed in surprise. “I suppose it would have to happen sooner or later. That Beast's been burrowing everywhere.”

“But didn't you say it was too small to be the Beast?”

“Yes,” Joe mused. “Look. It's happened over there too . . . and there. I can see at least four trees that have fallen down near some burrows. There must be loads of them.”

“Heinrich did say it was like a labyrinth, didn't he?”

Joe thought about it, his fear escalating at the prospect of encountering several of these formidable creatures. “We'd better let the police know about this in the morning. Right now we should be concentrating on rescuing Mrs. Merrynether.”

“Agreed.”

Getting inside the building was much the same as before. Danariel performed her extraterrestrial light show above the gatehouse. However, this time the guards were better prepared. One fumbled with a night
vision DVD recorder while the other busied himself making a series of phone calls. Regardless, just as before, Joe and Flarp entered the building without being seen.

The chorus of the
1812 Overture
blasted in Argoyle Redwar's office. Ms. Burrowdown sat in her chair, notepad and pen in hand, bespectacled gaze fixed firmly on Mr. Redwar as he waved his arms in rapture.

“Ah, there's nothing quite like the works of Beethoven, is there, Ms. Burrowdown?”

“Tchaikovsky,” she muttered back.

“What?” shouted Redwar in time with a boom. “I can't hear a blessed word you're saying, woman. Speak up.”

She waggled her head in frustration.

“Can you not picture those glorious cannons laying waste to Papillon's forces—driving their worthless army back to . . . to Germany? Why, that must have been a wondrous day for Churchill.”

Burrowdown peered at Redwar in disgusted bewilderment.

Redwar, throwing his arms about and puffing his cheeks in time with the music, failed to notice the buzzer at his desk until the finale had completed. Breathless, he yanked the phone from its cradle. “Redwar! What?”

His tiny eyes sparkled with evil delight as he listened to the voice at the other end. “Do you have a shotgun? . . . Then shoot it, man! Shoot the wretched
thing out of the sky . . . No, it's not an alien spacecraft, you fool . . . Shoot it!”

He slammed the phone down and hunched over his desk like an excited bulldog. “I knew they'd come back. They're here. We've got them.”

“Ow many?”

“What?”

“Ow . . . Many?”

“Two. One's a boy; the other's a . . .” He grinned sadistically. “See for yourself. It's time we went to the monitoring room. We can oversee the whole thing from there. As soon as we have them cornered, we can send in security.”