The Mystery of Wickworth Manor (6 page)

Black people in servants’ uniforms. People who sat on top of their owners’ coaches, to show all the neighbours how wealthy the family were. Their boy had the same uniform: livery. Did he decorate the top of the Burtons’ coach like the hood ornament on a posh car?

Curtis took another slow breath.

He read the next section carefully, looking at the dates.

In 1807 the Triangular Trade was banned.

In 1832 slavery was abolished in the British Empire.

Their boy, the boy in the painting, in 1805, had he been a slave? Had he been brought to Britain from Africa or the West Indies to be paraded around like a pedigree dog to show everyone just how rich the Burton family was? The idea made him feel sick to his stomach.

It wasn’t right.

Curtis switched off the computer. It just wasn’t right.

Chapter 12

CJTE/009 – Model of the Sandford Frigate, after Pocock.

Land was spotted after nearly two months at sea. The cry came first from the crow
’
s nest atop the main mast. Then the crew and all the passengers stood on the deck to observe the thin streak of grey on the horizon.

Land, at last.

He had found what the crew called his sea legs by the second week. But he would still be glad to walk on solid earth once more. He knew he should go to his master
’
s cabin. There was work to be done. But he stood fast for a while and watched the grey become green.

His mother, Maggie, had prayed for this, with the preacher and with the obeah man. Prayed for her boy to walk on free soil. Word had come, filtered through sailors and overseers, that when a slave stepped on to British soil he became a free man. So, Maggie had let their master, Sir William, take her son as his new manservant.

He looked at his new home. England.

He was ready to take his first free step.

Chapter 13

Paige had no idea where Curtis was and she cared even less. He had completely blanked her on the nature walk and he’d vanished at lunchtime. Well, fine. If he was so stuck-up and hoity-toity that he minded getting into a tiny bit of trouble, then she was better off without him.

After dinner time she joined Mr Appleton’s group in the courtyard at the back of the house. She noticed Curtis standing at the edge of everyone. He could stay there.

On one side of the courtyard was the Art Barn she’d been in yesterday. Sal and Jo’s group were in there now and she could hear everyone chatting as they found their tables.

That wasn’t where their group was headed. They were waiting for Mr Appleton to unlock the shed where the ropes were kept. This afternoon, it was climbing. Paige shuddered. If there was anything she hated worse than spiders and rats and snakes combined, it was heights. This was going to be horrible.

Paige took her harness and helmet when the instructor handed it to her. But she wasn’t about to put it on. Not unless they forced her to. Mr Appleton looked like Bob the Builder with his yellow hat on. Paige could hear Liam and his mates whispering ‘he can fix it’ as they tramped around the lake. They were all headed towards a place in the grounds where rocks bulged out of the earth like boils on a plague victim. Paige felt her mouth getting dry.

‘Right, equipment on, everyone,’ the instructor yelled. Then she went around the group making sure everyone was buckled in right.

The rock was at least twenty metres high. It was browny-grey like a rotten tooth and covered in lumps and cracks that they were supposed to climb up. No danger.

‘Problem, Paige?’ Mr Appleton asked. Then he chuckled. ‘Problem page, ha, like in a magazine.’

Paige glared at him.

‘Sorry. Are you having difficulty, Paige?’ he asked.

‘No. I just don’t like heights. I don’t want to do this.’

‘Oh dear. Well, maybe you should let your partner go first. Where is he? Oh, there. Curtis! Come here. Paige has nominated you to go first. I hope that’s OK.’

Curtis looked at them. Paige thought for a moment that he was going to say something, but he just pressed his lips together and stepped over. He pulled his helmet on in silence.

‘Sir,’ Paige tried again. ‘I am not going up there. If God had meant us to climb, we would still be monkeys. But we’re not; we’re people. Therefore, God didn’t mean for us to climb.’

The corner of Mr Appleton’s mouth twitched.

‘I went up a ladder once,’ Paige said. ‘I was so scared I froze. Mum had to bribe me back down with mini Mars bars.’

‘Well,’ Mr Appleton said. ‘I’ll keep some chocolate on standby, shall I?’

The instructor finished getting everyone ready. The ropes were threaded through metal loops near the top of the rock; one end was meant to be tied to the climber, the other was for their partner to hold. Once the instructor had tied everyone’s knots properly and double-checked the harnesses it was time to climb.

Curtis rested his palms on the rock face. ‘Don’t let me fall,’ he said before he lifted himself up.

She nodded. He might be a stuck-up snob, but that didn’t mean she’d drop him on his head. Probably. Curtis began to climb. Paige watched him stretch for a handhold, then shift his weight from one leg to another before reaching up again. She had to admit that he was pretty good at it.

Once he was at the top, the instructor came over. ‘Right,’ she called up to him. ‘Hold on to the rope and sit back in your harness.’ She took the mechanism from Paige and released it gently. Curtis hopped down the rock as though it was the easiest thing on earth.

‘Swap over,’ the instructor said, then moved to the next set of climbers.

‘That was great!’ Curtis said. He was out of breath, but smiling. ‘My fingertips are a bit sore, but that was an amazing feeling.’

He seemed to have forgotten his sulk.

‘I don’t want to,’ Paige said.

‘I know, I heard all that stuff you said to Mr Appleton.’

‘I mean it, I can’t do it.’

Curtis untied the rope from his harness and passed it to Paige. She took it, with her fingers trembling. Curtis tied the knot for her. The instructor glanced at it and nodded before moving on.

‘You’re not scared, are you?’ Curtis asked.

Paige felt herself bristle. Of course she was scared. But she didn’t want Posh Pants to know that. She found herself moving towards the rock.

She took a big gulp of air and puffed it out again. With one hand on the rock face she stretched upwards and took her feet off the ground. The rope tightened. She felt the tug on the harness around her waist. She paused.

‘You’re not stopping, are you? Don’t be ridiculous,’ Curtis said. ‘You’re only thirty centimetres off the ground. Like standing on a box. Just do what you just did another six or seven times and you’ll be at the top.’

The rock was just in front of her nose. She was close enough to see every grain of sand. The brim of her helmet clipped the cliff face and she heard the rasping sound it made, almost a vibration, in her skull. She crept up a little further. There was a bulge of stone an arm-stretch away. She raised her hand slowly. Her palm had a sheen of sweat on it.

‘Go on,’ Curtis said from below, ‘you’re taking for ever.’

Around her people had already made it to the top and were dropping down like conkers on strings, plummeting back towards the ground on their thin ropes.

‘I can’t move,’ Paige whispered at the rock.

‘What? Of course you can. Just lift your arm, it’s not hard.’

‘I’m stuck.’ Paige could see her knuckles turning white. Her hand was clamped so tightly to the rock that it was as though it had fused there.

She stifled a sob.

And then she felt something awful.

The rock leaned, ever so slightly, towards her. It tipped her backwards.

She gasped.

Her fingers uncurled.

She fell.

Her stomach lurched upwards. Adrenalin shot through her, tingling like a cold shower.

Then she was yanked to a halt. The rope had broken her fall, but now she was dangling three metres above the ground. Her fingers curled around the rope. She closed her eyes and tried to slow her breathing. Curtis was lowering her down. As her feet touched the floor, her knees gave way and she landed in a crumpled heap.

‘What was that?’ Curtis asked. ‘You dropped like a stone.’

Paige sat on the ground, her palms pressed against the earth. They felt cold and clammy, despite the sunshine. ‘It wasn’t me. It moved,’ she whispered.

‘What are you talking about?’

‘It moved. The rock kind of, well, shrugged.’

Paige looked up, Curtis’s face was in shadow; the sun was behind him. But it was still easy to see his look of scorn.

‘Look, I know what I felt.’ Paige lifted herself up from the ground.

‘What you felt was vertigo – it’s a sense of disorientation or dizziness. An imbalance of your inner ear. What you did
not
feel was the rock moving.’

‘I did.’

‘Are you really trying to tell me that the rock decided it didn’t want you climbing it? Are you saying rocks have spirits now, as well as paintings and tarot and all the other rubbish you believe in?’

Paige tugged at the knot around her waist, desperate to untie it, to get herself away from the rock face. ‘I know what I felt,’ she gasped. ‘And it isn’t rubbish. Who do you think you are anyway? Looking down your nose at us all?’

The rope was finally undone. She flung it to the ground. ‘You think you’re so much better than us because you went to some snobby school. But you’re not there any more, are you? You’re here with us.’

Curtis stepped backward. ‘That’s not . . . that’s not what I think.’

‘Yes, it is. And I’m sick of it. Don’t believe me if you don’t want to, but I know what I felt.’

‘Is everything OK here?’ The instructor was back by their side.

‘Yes, Miss,’ Curtis said. ‘Paige just got a bit . . . I mean, she felt something funny.’

‘Hmm, yes, she does look a bit poorly. Sunstroke, maybe? I think you should sit this one out, Paige. Do you want to sit down in the shade?’

Paige nodded. She wasn’t going near that rock again. What she had felt was real. The rock hadn’t wanted her on it and it had pushed her off. Curtis didn’t want to believe that there were things he couldn’t understand. He wanted everything neat and clear and straightforward. But the world just wasn’t like that. It was obvious that they had disturbed something here. Maybe by moving the painting. They had woken something that had been sleeping for a very long time. Paige sat down in the shadow and drew her knees up to her chin.

If only she could ask Mum what to do.

Her eyes prickled. She suddenly wished that she was back at home, with Mum singing pop songs at the top of her voice while Paige danced around their tiny kitchen. Even if the neighbours did moan about the noise. She’d rather be there, or back at Friar’s Street, or mucking about on the estate.

Anywhere but here.

Chapter 14

Paige thought he was a snob. And Liam and his friends definitely thought he was. Curtis stood holding the loose end of his rope, alone. He watched Paige sit down in the shade and rest her chin on her knees.