The Riddle of Ramsey Halls

by Pippa Hart

CHAPTER 4

  “Ow mummy it hurts. It hurts so much,”

  Little Adam was refusing to leave his bed. The stomach cramps had begun in the middle of the night and worsened with every passing hour.

  “She did it,” he cried. “She poisoned me again,”

  “Who poisoned you?” Lady Collins patted his forehead to check for signs of a fever.

  “Mildred. I keep telling you she comes at night and tries to kill me,”

  “Son…. Adam. What have I told you about telling tales?”

  “But I’m not lying. She’s real I promise,”

  But Lady Collins was feeling uncomfortable about her son’s constant fibbing. There was something about it that was so….. What was it? Realistic maybe? Tangible? The woman couldn’t quite figure out what troubled her so much, but there was something behind his stories that was so monstrous that he couldn’t’ have made them up himself.

  “And so this Mildred is she in the room now?”

  “No. I keep telling you she only comes to see me at night,”

  “Oh yes, so you keep saying,” she fiddled with the edge of her lace cuff. “And what is it she poisons you with? Are you not sure you ate too many berries from the hedge outside?”

  “It’s not berries Mummy! It’s something really really bad. It smells like the marzipan Aunt Lottie puts on the top of her cakes,”

  And at that Lady Collins’ spine went stiff and she had the strongest compulsion to stand up and back away from her son. There was no way he knew what dangerous poison smelled like marzipan.

  “Who told you that?” she was walking backwards, bumping into the little boy’s toys as she stumbled.

  “Told me what?” Adam’s face was confused as he cried through the pain with his hands clutching at his stomach.

  “Who told you that cyanide smells like almonds, like sweet marzipan?”

  “What’s that?” he cried harder, his cheeks burning up a dark pink.

  But his words weren’t heard as his mother dashed from the room, bustling down the hallways with her skirts bunched up into her balled fists.

  “Where’s the governess?” she was screaming down the stairs.

  Sir Collins looked up from the great hall below. He had his letter opener in his hand and a sombre look on his face as he tore open an envelope.

  “What have we got here? A case of the hysterics?” he glanced back to the envelope, adjusting his glasses as he sniffed.

  “Where’s the governess?”

  “How should I know?” Sir Collins was reading the letter in front of him with great interest, his lips pursed as he concentrated on the scrawling script.

  “It’s Adam. He’s been poisoned,”

  The bald head swivelled towards Lady Collins, her husband’s eyes wild and staring.

  “Poisoned?”

  “He says he’s been poisoned with cyanide,”

  “Oh nonsense woman, don’t believe a word that boy says. He probably read about the stuff in one of your old Penny Dreadfuls. You know the ones you hide so well under your bed,” he sneered as he returned his gaze to the letter.

  Then he walked away, with his large galumphing footsteps sounding through the house. Meanwhile Lady Collins had started to cry, her silent tears falling onto her dress. She sighed as she worried about what to do.

  “Yes…. It’s just his imagination,” she spoke out loud to convince herself. “Nothing in it at all,”

  ~

  I was sat in the attic waiting for the sun to go down. Looking out through the tiny window with the criss crossed pewter, I remembered how much I used to love the sun. Feeling its warmth on the first day of spring used to warm my heart with the promise of the coming summer. Now it did nothing but irritate me as I waited for it to disperse across the moors, just so I could hide under the cover of the stars.

  “Why do you always look so sad?” a little girl’s voice floated across the beams.

  “Because I am sad Mathilda,” it was a simple answer.

  “But why?”

  “Because……” I trailed off not wanting to explain further.

  Still looking out the window I watched a flock of ducks fly into the clouds, their shape a distinct arrow on top the horizon.

  “You never talk much,” Mathilda huffed and slumped into a wicker chair. “If we’re going to spend eternity up here we may as well be friends don’t you think?”

  I didn’t answer, just kept looking out.

  “And what is your fascination with my brother?” she wasn’t quieting down any time soon. “Why do you love him so much?”

  “I just do,”

  “Why?”

  “Never you mind,”

  At last I pulled myself away from the window as twilight began to fade the skies.

  “Why won’t you tell me anything?” she was throwing one of her girlish fits again with her feet banging on the floor.

  “Don’t do that,” I flicked up my palm and pointed a finger. “They’ll hear us. They’ll come investigating again like before, remember?”

  And how could the girl forget, for it wasn’t that long ago when a whole troop of investigators had traipsed up here with frightening electrical implements. They were supposed to detect us, feel our energy but they only served to annoy us, make us hurl them across the attic. And so Mathilda stopped kicking, feet planted on the floor as though they were glued.

  “Sorry,” she whimpered. “I don’t want them back up here,”

  “Neither do I,” and I walked with gentle grace across the floor, a skill I had learned after many years of existing on the other side.

  “Won’t you teach me how to do that?” Mathilda asked as she watched me.

  “I will do soon,”

  “Alright… Well say hello to Adam for me,”

  “Yes of course,” and I was gone.