Tom just ignored her and shut the apartment door in her face. At least she didn’t follow him to the cellar.
It was already ten to seven when Tom left the house with Hugo in his backpack. With hasty steps he made his way out of the narrow inner city with all its nooks and crannies, through the park, and then through streets that he knew only from a couple of Sunday walks. He put on his jacket at a bus stop and knotted his scarf, but the gloves he left in his pockets. He’d be conspicuous enough as it was.
The hedges became longer and higher and the houses fewer and fewer, but no Nightshade Walk turned up. Tom looked at the street map and cursed under his breath. Sweat dripped from his forehead. Winter clothes, boom boxes, violet perfume … ghosthunting was definitely a weird business.
“Oh blast!” he muttered. “I probably should’ve turned right ten blocks ago.” Nervously he looked around, trying to find a street sign — and saw Lola. She quickly hid herself behind a bush, but she was not fast enough.
“Come out!” Tom bellowed across the road. “Come out — I saw you!”
Casually she stepped out, a broad, big-sister grin on her face.
“Keep your shirt on, shorty,” she said mockingly. “I’m just going for a nice little walk. And what about you? Are you off to the North Pole?”
What was he supposed to do? Tom looked desperately at his watch. Ten past seven! He was late. Oh blast! If only he could set Hugo on her! But the ghost was no use at all in the daylight.
“Hello? Have you grown roots?” cried Lola.
Tom took off his glasses, cleaned them, and cursed once again to himself. And then he had an idea. A brilliant idea.
“I just noticed I went the wrong way,” he said, looking at the street map as cluelessly as possible. “You know this part of town quite well, don’t you?”
“Yeah, of course I do,” said Lola. “A couple of kids in my class live here!”
Bingo! She’d taken the bait.
“Doesn’t that guy with the spaghetti hair live around here?” Tom asked innocently. “Yes, I remember. He lives on a street with a really funny name.
Ted … Toad …”
Lola went as red as a rose hip.
“Tadpole Terrace! Yes, that’s it!” cried Tom, waving around his street map. “You told us that at dinner once. That’s right here, around the corner!”
“So?”
Tom closed the map. “Well, let’s put it this way: If you keep spying on me, I’ll go and visit Spaghetti Hair to tell him that my poor big sister has a big crush on him!”
For a moment, Lola was speechless. Had this ever happened before? Tom couldn’t remember. She went as chalk-white as Hugo’s pale hands, then red again, like a freshly plucked poppy, then back to white. Tom savored every single second.
“You wouldn’t dare!” Lola said furiously.
Tom shrugged. “Wanna bet?”
Lola chewed her lip angrily. “I couldn’t care less where you’re going, anyway, you stupid baby!” she hissed. Then she turned and stormed off.
11
When Tom arrived at 23 Nightshade Walk, he was completely out of breath and Hetty Hyssop was looking quite annoyed. She was standing in front of the wrought-iron gates wearing a thick winter coat with gloves and scarf. The bucket of graveyard dirt stood beside her and over her shoulder she carried a heavy bag stuffed with whatever a professional ghosthunter carries around. Tom gave it a curious glance.
“A bit more punctuality wouldn’t go amiss, young man,” she said. “It’s already twenty past seven and in the ghosthunting business the right moment quite often may be the difference between life and death. Luckily you arrived before dark!”
“I — I got lost!” panted Tom, quickly putting on his gloves. “And then I had to shake off my sister!”
“Very well, let’s forget it!” said Hetty. “In any event, we’ve got the right address. I’ve never smelled such a strong IRG vapor in my whole ghosthunting career!”
This definitely didn’t make Tom’s heart beat any slower. Disconcerted, he peeped through the heavy wrought-iron gates. The old villa that had once been Hugo’s home stood amongst high, dark trees, and looked anything but inviting. Its narrow, dark windows stared at Tom like dead eyes, and only the white smoke billowing out of the chimneys gave away the fact that someone was living there. Why, though, would anyone light a fire on this warm, late summer night?
“Come on, young man! Let’s have a closer look,” said Hetty Hyssop, grabbing the bucket. The heavy gates squeaked as they swung open. “Oh, what a lovely sound!” moaned Hugo, in raptures, from Tom’s backpack. “I’m back home again. Oooooooh, I think I’m going to cry.”
“Don’t you want to get out?” asked Tom as they approached the house. The nearer they got, the more forbidding it looked.
“Too light, it’s much too light,” grumbled Hugo.
“Well, I wouldn’t exactly describe it as ‘light,’ “ said Tom. The gigantic trees cast dark shadows and it was cold under their massive branches. Tom shivered and looked once again at the dark windows. What if the IRG was already watching them?
A set of wide, moss-covered steps led up to the front door. Hetty Hyssop put down her bucket and pressed the ornate doorbell decisively. The stained brass plate above it read: ZACHARY LOVELY.
Nothing stirred.
Which made Hetty frown. “Hugo, you said Mr. Lovely worked from home, didn’t you?”
“And it’s true!” said the backpack. “He only ever works from home!”
“Hmm, very fishy!” Hetty Hyssop pressed her nose against the window next to the front door.
“Can you see anything?” Tom fiddled nervously with his glasses.
“Just the usual traces of IRGs!” Hetty quietly replied. “Overturned furniture, carpets covered in slime. But no sign of Mr. Lovely!”
“Oooooohoooo!” Hugo wailed. “That dreadful ghost has probably frozen him or blown him to pieces!”
“Nonsense!” said Hetty Hyssop. “Even an IRG needs someone to scare. I suspect Mr. Lovely has hidden somewhere.” She took a flat tin out of her bag. “Here you go, young man. Smear this on the soles of your shoes. First-rate anti-IRG-slime cream. And this —” she said, holding out a small clear cube to Tom “— put it in your jacket pocket. It’s an IRG sensor. As soon as you get near to one, it’ll turn as cold as ice. I’ve got one, too. Very useful.”
The cube felt pleasantly warm. Tom quickly stowed it away.
“And what about me?” asked Hugo, offended. “I need a sensor like that, tooooo!”
“Nonsense!” growled Hetty Hyssop while she bent down to examine the door lock. “You’re a ghost. You’ll know when your colleague gets close to us.” She rummaged around in her pocket and pulled out a small piece of wire.
“This’ll have to do,” she muttered, and carefully pushed the wire into the lock.
“Do you, um, do you often pick locks?” asked Tom, wondering whether this was a typical ghosthunter skill, too.
“Of course! My clients are mostly so rigid with fear that they can’t even manage to open their doors.”
Click! The heavy door sprang open.
“Come on, Tom,” Hetty whispered. “This is where things get serious.”
An icy cold met them when they stepped into the house. Icy cold and a deathly silence. They had entered a high, gloomy hall with only two small windows to let the daylight in. The ghost slime on the carpets shimmered in the dim light like a tangle of giant snail trails. The sweeping staircase up to the first floor was completely covered with the gooey stuff. In the middle of the hall a big table lay like a beetle on its back, stretching its legs in the air. A cupboard was standing on its head. All the pictures on the walls hung askew. And high above them, the chandelier swung slowly to and fro. To and fro.
Tom’s fingers curled tightly around the cube. It was still warm. Reassuringly warm.
There were five doors: two on the left, two on the right, and one at the very farthest end of the eerie hall.
“Come out, Hugo!” Hetty Hyssop whispered into Tom’s backpack. “Where does Mr. Lovely mostly spend his time?”
Wobbling, his face pale yellow, Hugo appeared.
“In the drawing room oooooor in the kitchen,” he breathed. “Second door on the left, then there’s a dooooor behind it. Oooooohooooo, this place is in a terrible state!”
Quietly Hetty Hyssop put her fingers to her lips before she silently opened the drawing room door and peeped inside. Then she gestured to Tom and Hugo to follow her.
It was warm in Mr. Lovely’s drawing room, pleasantly warm, as a big fire was burning in the fireplace. Mellow evening sunlight poured through two windows.
“Uooooooogh!” howled Hugo, and disappeared back into the backpack on the spot.
“Mr. Lovely?” asked Hetty Hyssop quietly. “Are you there? We’ve come to help you.”
Tom thought he heard a sniffle, and then a man with tangled gray hair suddenly peeped out from behind the sofa. “Who — who are you?” he asked.
“My name is Hetty Hyssop,” the old lady introduced herself. “I’m a professional ghosthunter.”
“Oh really? But that’s …” Mr. Lovely struggled to his feet and looked incredulously at the old woman. He was tall and fat and wore a black suit covered all over with flour. “How do you know about my misfortune?” Anxiously he looked over his shoulder. “It’s all quiet at the moment. But that’s deceptive. You’ve just come at a good moment.”
“I know, I know.” Hetty Hyssop smiled. “It’s all a question of planning. There’s just one time of day when IRGs aren’t particularly active — between seven and eight in the evening.”
“You don’t need to tell me that!” groaned the befloured Mr. Lovely. “It’s the only time I get any work done. It’s a catastrophe!” He ran his trembling fingers through his hair. “You see, I’m a cookie inventor, and my newest cookie recipe, ‘Fairy Kisses,’ is — oh dear me! My cookies!” Horrified, he slapped himself on the forehead, rushed to the door, peeped out — and disappeared into the hall.
“Well, he’s a bit of a weirdo,” said Tom.
“Clear symptoms of an IRG attack,” said Hetty Hyssop. “Come on, let’s draw the curtains, then maybe our Cellar Ghost will dare to come out again. We should introduce him to Mr. Lovely.”
“I’m not a Cellar Ghost. How many times do I have to tell yooooou that?” came an annoyed voice from inside the backpack.
Mr. Lovely’s curtains were thick and blue. Once they were shut, the fire in the hearth sent flickering shadows around the dark room.
“Home sweet home!” sighed Hugo, and floated up to the ceiling with an enraptured expression.
Just at that moment Mr. Lovely came rushing back into the drawing room. “I’m sorry!” he cried breathlessly. “But I absolutely had to go and see to my ‘Fairy Kiss’ cookies. Why’ve you made it so dark?”
“Wooooooooooooohhh!” With a triumphant howl Hugo wobbled toward Mr. Lovely clad in his most disgusting moldy colors.
“Oh no, please, not again!” cried Mr. Lovely, covering his face with his hands. “No, I can’t stand it!”
“Hugo!” cried Tom angrily.
“But I just wanted to scare him a little bit,” Hugo protested. “Just like in the old days.”
Mr. Lovely slumped, trembling, onto his flour-covered sofa. “Oh,” he sobbed. “What have I done to deserve this?”
“Calm down, my dear!” said Hetty Hyssop. “We’ve come to help you. And I promise that this Cellar Ghost —” she gave Hugo a withering ‘this house is already haunted’ look “— won’t scare you like that again!”
“I’m not a Cellar Ghost!” muttered Hugo, but he floated remorsefully back into Tom’s backpack.
“I just don’t get it,” moaned Mr. Lovely. “I’ve not understood anything for a long while now. And my cookies —” a fat tear rolled down his cheek “— my cookies don’t taste very nice anymore, either. How’s a serious cookie-maker supposed to work under such conditions? I’ve not invented a single kind since, since …” He started sobbing again.
“… since this house has been haunted in a very serious way,” Hetty Hyssop finished his sentence.
“Yes! Yes, indeed!” Mr. Lovely nodded. “Even my grandfather reckoned that there were strange goings-on in this house. He suspected my late great-great-uncle Hugo of haunting the place after he fell off the roof while sleepwalking. A little family ghost, so to speak. But for the last week it’s been unbearable!” Mr. Lovely shook his head in desperation. “I’m in such a state that I put salt into the dough instead of sugar, capers instead of chocolate, laundry detergent instead of flour. I even burned the cookies four times!” Mr. Lovely covered his face once again with his floury hands. “Before long no cookie factory in the world will buy my recipes!”
Hetty Hyssop nodded sympathetically. “My dear Mr. Lovely,” she said, “the spook manifestations you faced last week had nothing to do with your uncle Hugo. I’m sorry to tell you that you’ve been the victim of an IRG invasion.”
Mr. Lovely raised his head. “Pardon me, a what?”
“An IRG,” said Tom. “An Incredibly Revolting Ghost.”
And then Hetty Hyssop explained to an astonished Mr. Lovely who had been haunting his house recently, and how she’d found out through Tom.
He stared at the pair of them in disbelief. “Uncle Hugo …?”
“… fled to the cellar of this young man here. Yes.” Hetty Hyssop nodded. “He is the ghost who just gave you such a fright. My friend Tom brought your spooky uncle here in his backpack. He’s really quite a harmless kind of ghost, a so-called ASG.”
“I’m not that harmless! Didn’t you see how he trembled when I scared him? He shook like powdered pudding!” With a grim face Hugo floated out of the backpack again. He inflated himself to full size and wobbled once again toward the horrified Mr. Lovely.
“Your grandfather was right!” he breathed. “I’m Huuugo; I turned into a ghost after a tragic accident more than one hundred fifty years ago. Your late great-great-grandfather was still alive then. So wonderfully easy to scare, he was! Had a lot of respect for me.”
“Unbelievable,” murmured Mr. Lovely, his knees trembling. “Just unbelievable.”
“Mr. Lovely,” continued Hetty Hyssop, “we’ve come to help your great-great-uncle get this house back. Would you be prepared to give Hugo a home if we free you of the IRG?”
“Of course I would!” cried Mr. Lovely. “He’s never gotten in the way of my cookie-baking. Though he’d jolly well better not scare me again like he just did then.”
“Ghosts’ honor!” purred Hugo. “I’ll just do a little teeny bit of haunting.”
“Good, that’s all sorted then,” said Hetty Hyssop. “Now we must quickly prepare a couple of things.” She looked at her watch. “There’s less than an hour to go before it gets dark — and then, my dear friends, things will get seriously spooky in here!”
12
“Hmm Hmm!” Hetty Hyssop looked disapprovingly around Mr. Lovely’s drawing room. “Blue — nothing but blue. That isn’t good news. And not a mirror in sight.”
“Mirror?” asked Mr. Lovely, flummoxed.
Tom set his glasses straight. “Mirrors are very useful against ghosts,” he said. “Didn’t you know?”
But Mr. Lovely didn’t reply. Peculiar things were happening to him. His hair suddenly stood on end, his face went as pale as a mushroom, and his knees started knocking. He was staring at the door with wide-open eyes.
A muffled thumping noise came from the hall. The IRG sensor in Tom’s pocket turned as cold as ice.
“It’s coming — hide!” cried Hetty Hyssop. Hastily she seized the bucket with the graveyard dirt and disappeared behind an armchair.
Tom didn’t wonder what all this meant for long, but dived headlong behind the sofa.
“Oooooooooooh!” moaned Hugo, shrinking into a wobbly ball.
“Get back into the backpack!” cried Tom. “Go on, get in!”
> The thumping came closer, accompanied by a hollow howling sound. Mr. Lovely still stood in the middle of the room as if rooted to the spot.
“Get down!” cried Hetty Hyssop from behind the armchair. “Quick — hide!”
“I — I — I — I can’t! I can’t seem to move!” stammered Mr. Lovely, covering his face with his hands. The thumping reached the door. With a crash it flew open, and a hideous, massive, vile-smelling something streamed into the room.
The IRG.
“Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!” it roared, growing as high as the ceiling and making all the lightbulbs explode. Its yellow eyes, pits of bottomless evil, stared down at poor Mr. Lovely. Its gigantic mouth, a good three feet wide, gaped open and let out a foul and violent belch. Then the IRG took a deep breath and blew its icy breath down onto Mr. Lovely, who froze on the spot.
Tom’s teeth chattered like a keyboard. He trembled so much that his glasses slid off his nose. Hugo’s horrified wailing could be heard through the backpack. Only Hetty Hyssop kept her nerve. With lightning speed she grabbed a handful of graveyard dirt from the bucket, stood up — and threw it at the IRG’s nebulous chest.
“Aaaaaaaaarghhhh!” roared the gigantic ghost, turning as purple as a plum. Its yellow eyes spun around and its icy breath turned as warm as central heating. Bellowing hideously it shot out into the hall. The door slammed shut behind it and a couple of pictures fell off the walls. Then, suddenly, there was a deathly silence.
“Ohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboy!” moaned Tom, feeling around for his glasses on the floury carpet.
“We’re doomed!” wailed Hugo, wringing his hands as he wobbled out of the backpack. “We’re doooomed!”
“Air! We’ve got to let in some air!” cried Hetty Hyssop. “Or else that IRG stench’ll give us all blue spots!” She quickly pushed the curtains aside and yanked the windows open. It was nearly dark outside.
“Aaaaaaahhhhhh!” sighed Hugo. “Ghosting time!”
Ghosthunters and the Incredibly Revolting Ghost Page 4
