The Mystery of Wickworth Manor (17 page)

He grinned at her. She gave a shaky laugh. ‘Hello,’ she said.

‘You were brilliant. Now, grab hold of this globe and twist.’

Their hands interlocked over the sphere, her pale hands over his dark ones. The globe made a tight, grinding sound. It turned right round. Curtis heard a crisp click at the back of the alcove. A small door opened up.

He shone his torch into the dark space. ‘Come on,’ he said and slipped inside.

Chapter 32

The only light came from Curtis’s phone and Curtis was between his phone and Paige. So she could see hardly a thing beyond the small doorway. But the answer to Verity’s secret was ahead, and an angry Miss Brown was behind – not to mention Mrs Burton-Jones. Paige took a deep breath and followed. The space was low and narrow. They had to crawl in.

‘Be careful,’ he whispered, ‘there are steps.’

They were so steep, she had to climb down backwards. She eased down after him, her fingers gripped the cold edge of each stone tightly. It was like dropping into a well. She could hear Curtis breathing hard below her as he made his way down. She shivered. The spirits wanted them here. The spirits were helping. She had to believe that. If the spirits weren’t friendly, then she and Curtis were being led down into who knows what and not a single living soul knew where to look for them. If the door above closed behind them, they would be trapped in the dark. Alone with the spirits. Paige felt a surge of panic. She bit her lip and tasted the metallic tang of blood.

Ahead of her, Curtis stopped. Paige banged into his back.

‘It’s a dead end,’ he said.

‘What? It can’t be.’

‘It is. It’s just a stone wall.’

Paige could hear Curtis’s fingers rasping over the wall. Quick flashes of light from the torch showed dark rows of stone like the clenched teeth of a giant.

A sound came from above. A solid click. She only noticed that there had been a draught of air from above now that it stopped. The doorway had closed.

There was a dead end in front of them. And the way out was closed behind them. And the walls on all four sides were tighter than a chimneybreast. They were trapped.

Paige gasped. She felt as though strong arms had clamped themselves around her chest. She sucked in air, but her lungs wouldn’t fill. She heard a distant roaring in her ears, growing louder. Her hands flew to her throat, which tightened shut. She slumped to her knees.

Curtis squeezed down next to her. She could see his mouth moving, but she couldn’t hear his words. The only sound in the whole world was the roaring inside her own ears.

Her head dropped forward; she was curled in a tight ball. The smell of soil and decay was strong.

Tears rolled down her cheeks, dripping on to the earth.

Then the light from the phone went out.

She froze, her eyes desperately trying to make out shapes. Nothing.

Then, in the darkness, she realised she could feel something.

Air on her cheeks.

Where was that coming from?

She tried to lift her head. It felt as heavy as rocks. But she managed to wriggle closer to the source of the draught. There was definitely air coming from the bottom of the solid wall in front of them. She reached out with a shaking hand. Her fingers passed under the wall, into blackness. There was a gap. The wall didn’t go right the way down.

Paige blinked a few times, trying to clear the fuzziness. She lifted her head, her shoulders; she pushed herself until she was sitting up.

‘Are you OK?’ Curtis asked. ‘I think you fainted. There may not be enough oxygen in here. Which is bad news. We need to get out. If we climb back up, we can try to get the door open. Or we can shout, maybe Liam and the others will hear us. Maybe.’

Paige laid her hand on his arm. ‘There’s a gap at the bottom of the wall. See.’ Paige reached out and stretched her hand into the darkness. ‘It’s small, but we can probably wriggle through.’

Curtis whistled slowly. ‘Paige, you’re brilliant.’ He paused. ‘Only –’

‘What?’

‘Are you sure you want to go through? Think about it. We climbed up above the memorial. Then dropped down behind it. If we crawl under there, we’ll come out inside their tomb.’

Paige shivered. Was Curtis right? It was hard to know which direction they were facing in the darkness. Were the bodies of the Burton family mouldering there on the other side of the wall?

She felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up. They were going to have to do it, crawl into a space with dead bodies. She didn’t know if she could, not even for Christopher. Not even for Curtis.

He bent down and shone his phone into the gap at the bottom of the wall.

‘Can you see . . . skeletons?’ Paige asked.

‘I don’t think so. I can see something though.’ He lay down and crawled his way under the wall. Now Paige was left alone in the dark. She took one look back. It was so black that she couldn’t make out the stairs any more. If she didn’t go after Curtis, she would be stuck in this horrible dark well for ever. No way was she doing that. She took a deep breath, then forced herself to follow.

She was in a small space, even smaller than the one she’d climbed in from. She lifted herself into a crouching position, waiting to hear a sickening crunch as her feet trod on bone. But there was nothing. Only Curtis, breathing close to her ear.

‘What did you see?’ she asked.

He swivelled the light around. ‘No bodies. But there is that.’

The light shone on a wrapped something in the middle of the space. It was squarish, with rounded edges, swaddled in cloth. A thick envelope leaned against the object.

‘Commended to the Lord,’ Curtis whispered. ‘This is what Verity wanted to keep secret.’

Paige reached out to touch it, but a cry made her freeze.

‘Curtis! Paige!’ The call came from nearby. Someone was on the other side of the memorial stone. ‘Curtis! Can you hear me?’

The phone clattered from Curtis’s hand and went dark. ‘Mum?’ he said. ‘Mum! Mum!’

‘Curtis? Where are you?’

‘Here! We’re in here!’ He banged against the heavy stone with the flat of his hands. Paige banged hard too. Clouds of dust flew up into her mouth and eyes.

‘Curtis?’ The cry was more like a wail now, desperate and cold.

‘Mum!’

The stone in front of them groaned.

‘It moved!’ Paige said. ‘It moved. Here, quick.’ She grabbed Curtis’s shoulder and pulled him back so that they were both sitting down. She raised her feet and pushed them as hard as she could against the slab of stone. ‘Help me.’

Curtis lifted his feet too and together they strained against it. It was definitely moving now, inching forward. There was a squeal of rock against rock. Dust swirled. And then a chink of pale light.

‘We’re nearly there!’

One last heave and the stone slid out and crashed to the ground.

A strong torch beam shone on her face, then flicked over to Curtis. ‘Curtis,’ a woman’s voice whispered. ‘You’re OK. Oh, thank God, you’re OK.’

The woman reached out and half pulled, half lifted Curtis from the space.

‘Mum,’ he said and fell into her hug. Then he stood upright. He was nearly as tall as her. ‘Mum, what are you doing here?’

Curtis’s mum made a noise that was somewhere between crying and laughing. She pulled him back into her arms.

Paige lowered herself from the hole they’d made in the wall. The memorial was on the floor, broken in half. Flour and dust had risen up giving the air a milky colour. She could feel it settling on her skin and hair. Paige lifted the wrapped object and the envelope down from the place where they had been hidden for nearly a hundred and fifty years. Curtis’s phone winked at her. She took that too.

‘Curtis, do you want to see what it is?’ she asked, holding up the object.

He turned towards her. ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’

But his mum held up her hand. ‘You must be Paige, yes?’ Paige nodded. ‘Well, Paige, we are not doing anything until we’ve got back to the house and into some dry clothes. I want to know what you both were playing at going out on a lake in a storm, but only when you’re both safe.’

Paige felt sick at the thought of going to face Miss Brown and Mrs Burton-Jones and even Liam, but it had to be done. And at least they had Verity’s secret, even if they didn’t know what it was yet.

She followed Curtis and his mum out into the night. The rain had turned into a fine mist and heavy drops plopped down from the trees. It smelled clean, like fresh laundry. Curtis leaned against his mum and she took his arm to steady herself on the wet path. ‘We’ll take the long way back,’ she called. ‘No more canoes.’

Paige gripped the object tightly and followed the torch beam and the two figures back around the lake.

Chapter 33

Mum was here. Curtis couldn’t believe it. How was she here? Why? Her hand was laced through his arm; he could feel the weight of it in the crook of his elbow as they stumbled along the path.

‘I thought something awful might have happened to you,’ she said into the dripping dark. ‘I got here and no one knew where you were. The awful woman who owns the place didn’t even know where your room was. The boys you were meant to be with had never even seen you. And you didn’t answer your phone. Curtis, I thought . . . I thought, well, awful things.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were here.’

‘I had to come.’

Curtis waited for Mum to explain. Paige stomped along behind them, but she was too far back to hear.

‘Those calls from you,’ Mum said, ‘they broke my heart. You sounded so unhappy here. I couldn’t stand it any more. I had to see you. I know I’ve let you down.’

Curtis almost stumbled. ‘You?
You
let
me
down?’

‘Yes, I know I did. We should have tried harder. We should have found a way to keep you at Northdene. It’s all my fault. Well, we will find a way, I promise. I’ll get a new job, and an evening job too. Dad as well. Bar work, or cleaning, or something. We’ll get enough money together so that you can go back. I can’t bear it that you’re so unhappy.’

‘No!’ Curtis couldn’t help but shout. ‘No, it was my fault. I was the one who failed. I had my chance and I didn’t take it. It was me who failed the scholarship exam, not you.’

Mum’s hand squeezed his elbow. ‘But we put too much pressure on you.’

‘No. I failed. But it’s OK. I swear it is. I don’t want to go back. I want to stay here.’

‘Are you sure?’ Something like a sob caught in Mum’s throat.

‘I’m sure. If they’ll let me.’ They were close to the house now and he could see people on the driveway. Lots of them were still in their pyjamas and dressing gowns, others had phones clamped to their ears or torches in their hands. Mum moved towards one of the grown-ups to call off the search.

Liam stepped away from a group of boys. His swagger wasn’t as pronounced as usual.

‘I didn’t do all this,’ Liam said, waving towards the crowd. ‘They all got up and started looking for you anyway. I didn’t snitch. I couldn’t.’

Curtis looked at Liam whose dark eyes shone with emotion. Curtis nodded; Liam needed a fresh start just as much as he did himself. ‘I know. It was my mum. She woke everyone up.’