When he was safely gone Xena said to the boy, “Thanks for the rescue, but who are you?”
Before he could answer, Xander said, “I know! You’re the boy from London!”
The boy—Ian—looked baffled. “How did you know I’m from London?” He sneezed again.
“Oh, he’s that one!” Xena said. “I thought he looked familiar!”
“Will one of you please explain what you’re talking about?”
“We saw you our first day here,” Xander said. “We were in that little park by the B and B we’re staying in—”
“The Robertses’ place,” Ian said, nodding. “Trevor is a friend of mine. He told me about you two.”
They explained about the Game and about spotting the transit pass sticking out of his pocket. Xena almost told him about seeing him trip on the sidewalk, but she decided it would be rude. Nobody likes to be noticed being a klutz.
“Very clever!” Ian said with a laugh. “But I don’t always live in London. I go to boarding school there, and I come home to Blackslope Manor on holidays and in the summer.”
“You live here? In the manor house?” Xena couldn’t imagine actually living in this great big place.
“Oh, it’s nice enough.” Ian kicked the gravel. “But it’s dull here. And the house is falling down. I’d rather be in London any day.”
“Why was that old man so angry?” Xander asked.
“He wasn’t really angry. He just sees the stable and the grounds as his own personal property.”
“Why? Is he some kind of relative?” Xena wondered.
Ian shook his head. “No, although in a way he might as well be. Mr. Whittaker’s the caretaker. His family have been with the Blackslopes for generations.”
“I thought you were the Chimingtons.” Xena was bewildered.
“I know it’s confusing. Our surname is Blackslope but the title is Chimington. My father is George Blackslope, Lord Chimington. See?” They didn’t really, but they knew that in England titles were pretty important to a lot of people, so they nodded.
Ian frowned thoughtfully. “Mr. Whittaker’s the last one of his line, though. The Whittakers never had any children.” He went on as if he was talking to himself. “Soon there will be no more Blackslopes and no more Whittakers at Blackslope Manor.” Then he seemed to remember that he wasn’t alone, and he smiled brightly at Xena and Xander. “That will make everything easier for me. My mother will quit her job at the tourist agency, my parents will move into a flat in London, and I won’t have to take the train home on holidays. Home will be right there on the Tube line!”
“Yes, but …” Xander didn’t like to leave a question until he got the answer to it. “But why was Mr. Whittaker angry? We weren’t doing anything.”
“Oh, he’s just suspicious. He breeds dogs and he has a litter of puppies in there.” Ian nodded at the door of the stable. “He’s always convinced some other breeder is going to send spies to see his dogs, for some reason.” He laughed. “I can’t imagine what harm a spy could do, but he’s a little batty on the subject. And anyway, he’s even grumpier than usual these days. He’s not looking forward to leaving the manor, even though my parents are buying him a nice cottage close to town.”
“Hey, I bet you know all about the story of the Beast of Blackslope,” Xander said, “since a lot of it happened right here.”
Ian blinked. “The Beast? What do you know about that?”
Xena and Xander told him what they’d read in Sherlock’s casebook, and what Mr. Tuttle had told them, that he believed the Beast was back.
“Or maybe it never left,” Ian said. “It’s true what Mr. Tuttle said about the cook disappearing. He knows a lot about the Beast. But not everything.”
“What do you mean?” Xander asked.
“This isn’t the first time it’s reappeared. It carried off my uncle Philip when he was a teenager.”
“What?” Xena and Xander couldn’t believe that no one had mentioned this before. Xander felt his stomach turn over at the thought of someone being carried off by the Beast.
Ian nodded. “He just disappeared one day. All they ever found were huge footprints. And his jacket. I still have it.”
“Wow!” Xena said. “What else?”
“Nothing.” Ian shrugged. “There were no more clues. No one ever heard from Philip again. And there’ve been other strange disappearances.”
Just then they heard a woman’s voice calling Ian’s name.
“Got to run!” Ian said. “Maybe I’ll see you in the village before you leave.” He turned and tripped over a garden hoe that was lying right out in plain view. Xena ran to help him, but he got up, brushed off his knees, and said, “Don’t worry! I’m all right,” and limped away.
They watched him go, too surprised to speak for a moment.
“Well!” Xena finally said. “It looks like we have some more investigating to do.”
“Definitely,” her brother agreed. “There’s something here that doesn’t add up. Mrs. Roberts said it was her family that was cursed, not the Blackslopes. And neither she nor Mr. Tuttle mentioned Ian’s uncle. Let’s find Mom and Dad and see if they can take us to the library.” He turned back toward the house. “I want to find out more about this missing Uncle Philip.”
They went in through the manor’s front door, entering a huge high-ceilinged room. The house seemed to be filled with people walking around holding pamphlets. Everywhere Xena and Xander looked they saw shining wood tables heaped with china, silver, books, and paintings. Each item had a sticker with a number written on it. “How will we ever find Mom and Dad?” Xander asked.
“Just start looking, I guess. Let’s split up. We’ll meet back at the front door.”
Xander went to the left down a long corridor with a suit of armor standing in a niche, and Xena turned into a smaller room where even the cushions on the sofa had stickers on them. How sad, she thought, imagining how she would feel if everything her family owned was going to be sold. She didn’t see her parents in there, but she did briefly meet Ian’s mom, who looked a lot like Ian. Xena introduced herself and then moved on to the next room. She was about to give up and follow in the direction Xander had taken when suddenly she saw him waving at her from a doorway.
She managed to get through the crowd to where he stood. “Find them?”
“No,” Xander said, “but I did find something very interesting.”
“What?”
“Ian lied to us. His uncle Philip wasn’t carried off by the Beast or anything else!”
CHAPTER 13
For a minute Xena could only stare at Xander. “What do you mean, Ian’s uncle wasn’t carried off by the Beast?”
“Come with me!” Xander disappeared into the corridor, and for a moment she lost him. When she caught up with him she saw that he was standing in front of a framed poster. It was a painting of a man with long flowing hair, a mustache, flared pants, and a loose flowered shirt. He was playing a guitar. The colors were all bright—hot pink, turquoise, yellow-green.
“So?” Xena couldn’t see the point.
“Look!” Xander gestured to the loopy lettering along the bottom. Philip and the Philistines, it read.
“What’s a Philistine?” Xena asked, but before Xander could answer she said, “Oh, you think this is his uncle? Oh, come on, Xander—it’s not really an unusual name. It could be any Philip.”
Xander was shaking his head. “Nuh-uh. There were two men looking at it before, and one said something like, ‘The way they acted when Philip ran away to become a rock star, it’s surprising they have this poster of him,’ and the other said, ‘That was the parents. The present Lord Chimington always loved his brother. I’m sure he was very proud of him when he made that album.’ Then I asked them if this was Ian’s uncle and they said yes.”
Xena stood still a moment. “Ian must have been trying to throw us off the trail! That means he knows something. If we see him again, let’s not tell him we know he lied, okay?”
“Good idea,” Xander agreed. “Let him think he fooled us until we figure out exactly what he’s trying to hide.”
“Ready to go?” It was their father. He and Mrs. Holmes had come up behind them while they were talking. “We’ve been looking for you two everywhere!”
On the way back it started pouring, and there was no way they could ask to stop in the woods again. The rain cleared up just as they passed the WELCOME TO BLACKSLOPE sign. “Perfect timing,” Xena grumbled under her breath. Then she got an idea. “How about if we go back into town and see if people are talking about the Beast?” she said to Xander. “We need to find out where it’s been sighted so we can try to gather more evidence about what it is. That little clump of fur and the howl don’t get us very far. Maybe somebody’s seen something that could tell us where it hides out when it’s not breaking things.”
“Sounds like a plan,” said Xander. “Could you please drop us in town?” he asked their parents.
“I don’t know,” their father said. “What about that Beast?”
“Quit teasing, Dad.” Xena glanced at her brother. “And anyway, we’ll be back before dark.”
Their dad pulled over to the side of the road, and Xena and Xander climbed out.
The stores were small and each seemed to specialize in only one thing. One sold knitting supplies, the next sold cookware, and the one past it sold children’s clothing. They stepped into every shop and Xena sidled up to anyone she saw engaged in conversation, but she didn’t hear anything connected to the Beast.
“Waste of time,” Xander grumbled, but Xena said, “Let’s try that one.” She pointed at a store that looked a bit larger. Xander shrugged and followed her in. It turned out to be a general store that had a little bit of everything—pots and pans and notebooks and clothing and camping gear and garden supplies.
“Hullo,” came a voice from behind them. Xena and Xander turned and saw Emma, the blond girl who had been carrying the mysterious black case. Now she was paying for a pack of batteries. “Been touring the area?”
“We went to Blackslope Manor today,” Xander told her. “And to the woods near it yesterday.”
Emma frowned as she collected her change. “You really ought to try the other end of town. It’s a lot more interesting.”
“Why?” Xena asked, but the girl just waved at them and hurried out the door.
“What’s on the other side of town?” Xena asked her brother.
Xander thought back to the map of Blackslope and all the brochures he had seen. “Just the herb walk. I don’t remember anything else being in that direction.”
“Strange.” Xena shook her head. “Whatever. It’s going to get dark soon. I want to try to listen in on one more conversation before we go back to the B and B.”
It was fortunate she did, because this time she got lucky. Two middle-aged women wearing sweaters and squashed-looking hats were standing near the real estate agency, and something about the way they clutched their purses and leaned in close to each other intrigued Xena. She signaled to Xander to stay away.
When she heard one woman say “rustling in the bushes” and “ran all the way home,” Xena knew that she had struck gold. She pretended to study the map that showed where the houses for sale were located, and inched closer and closer.
“Right next to where the lane turns in to Gilder’s farm,” the woman was saying. “I didn’t see anything, but what else could be making all that noise?”
“Joseph said he saw something strange down at the bottom of the hill,” said the other woman. “That’s not too far from there. He said it might have been a cow, but all the fences around there are good and stout. And nobody’s reported a missing cow. I think it was the Beast!”
“Oh my,” the first woman said. “Seven feet tall, I’ve heard it was, with horrible long claws and fangs and—”
“Here’s our bus,” the other one said. The bus pulled up and the two of them stepped on.
Xena reported back to Xander.
“Seven feet tall?” He swallowed. “Let’s go back to the B and B.”
On the way home Xena remembered that she had run out of shampoo. They stopped at a store that said CHEMIST on the sign (they had learned this was the English way to say drugstore), and the teenage boy who took their money hardly glanced at them. He was too busy talking to a boy with spiked hair who was hanging around the door.
“Someone’s going to shoot it,” he said. “Mark my words. With the number of hunters around here, it’s only a matter of time before someone with a gun will sight it, and that will be that. Old Man Whittaker”—Xena and Xander pricked up their ears at the name—“says that if it comes on the estate again, he’s going to take care of it.” Xander glanced at Xena, and the clerk seemed to notice them for the first time. He rang up Xena’s shampoo. “Anything else?”
“Um, yes,” Xena said. “Can you tell me where Gilder’s farm is?” He gave her directions. “Thanks,” she said.
“Is that where people have seen this Beast?” Xander asked.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said the clerk. The phone rang then, and he picked it up and began to discuss a football match.
“Come on,” Xander said. “Let’s go look at that map again.”
They stopped at the Realtor’s window. Xena pressed her finger on the glass. “So here’s Gilder’s farm.” Her finger left a smudge as she moved it to a spot a few inches away. “And I guess this is the lane the lady was talking about. There’s only one hill around here that we’ve seen, so that must be the one, and it’s not far from Blackslope Manor. Those guys said that Mr. Whittaker said something about it coming on the estate again, so it must have been there already.”
“Where was the footprint we found?”
She moved her finger. “There. And here’s the B and B.”
They studied the map. “So what can we conclude?” Xena asked at last.
“Well,” Xander said slowly, “except for a few random times, like when it was near our B and B, all the sightings have been near the manor house. Why do you think that is?”
Xena shrugged. “Maybe there are some good places for it to hide near there?”
“Only one way to find out,” Xander said. “We’ve got to pay another visit to the manor house!”
CHAPTER 14
“What are you two doing here?”
Xena and Xander looked up, startled. It was Trevor, the boy from their B and B, standing on the corner. They had been so absorbed in their conversation they hadn’t noticed him. Behind him a young couple stood talking to each other.
“We were just wandering around,” Xena said. “It’s okay in the daytime, isn’t it? Not like at night.”
“Oh, and speaking of going out at night,” Xander added, “we know why you weren’t allowed to go to your friend’s house.”
“What?” Trevor asked, looking startled at the sudden change of subject. “What do you mean?”
“We heard about the Beast,” Xena said. “We know that your grandparents aren’t letting you out after dark.”
Was it her imagination, she wondered, or did Trevor relax a bit?
“They’re pretty overprotective,” Trevor said. “I think that the whole idea of a Beast is silly.”
“Your grandmother doesn’t think it’s silly,” Xander told him. “She thinks there’s a curse on your family.”
“Are you serious?” Trevor asked. “You believe that stuff?” He gave a snort that might have been laughter and shook his head, thrusting a paper at a man walking past. The man took it without looking at it or stopping. “My dad used to tell us that story when we went camping. It was scary when I was five, but I haven’t believed it for a long time.”
“Why didn’t your grandparents say anything to us about the Beast?” Xander asked.
“Nobody here wants outsiders to know what’s been going on,” Trevor explained. “They think it will scare tourists away.”
Xena looked at Trevor curiously. So
mething in his tone interested her. “But you don’t think so, do you?”
“Hope not!” Trevor said with a laugh. A woman pushing a stroller crossed to their side of the street, and he handed her something.
“What are you giving them?” Xander asked.
Trevor passed him a flyer. In large bright red print it read: TREVOR’S EXCLUSIVE TOURS OF THE DEADLY BEAST OF BLACKSLOPE. £5 PER PERSON. Below the words was a crude drawing of a hairy animal with long fangs, shaggy arms outstretched.
“You’re giving tours?” Xena was impressed. Five pounds was a good price, about ten dollars.
“Those two are my first clients.” He jerked his head at the young couple. He reached out his hand, and Xander gave him back his flyer. “Thanks. It took forever to print these out on that ancient computer of my grandparents’. I don’t want to waste any.”
“So have you actually seen the Beast?” Xander asked. Something about Trevor’s tone made him skeptical.
“I wish! No, but I take people around to places where it’s been sighted, that kind of thing. The first tour leaves in a few minutes. I wanted to wait until as late as I could. Nobody’s supposed to be out after sunset, but it’s sort of spooky in the afternoon. Want to come along?” He smiled at them. “Since you’re guests at the B and B, no charge.”
“Sure!” Xena said, but Xander said, “We can’t. We told our parents we’d be back soon.”
“Oh, come on, Xander.”
Xander studied his sister. Xena was so eager, and there couldn’t be any harm if they went in a big group, could there?
“Well, maybe the first part.” He forced the words out.
“Great,” Trevor said. He turned to the couple. “Ready?”
It would have been fun even if they hadn’t been on the trail of the Beast. Trevor knew a lot about the area, and he showed them tiny frogs and brightly colored birds that they never would have noticed on their own. He identified plants and told his clients what their blossoms looked like in the spring. Xander was so interested in the natural history that he’d almost forgotten about the wild animal they were hunting when the young woman asked, “So when did this Beast first appear?”
The Beast of Blackslope Page 6
