THERE WERE NO OTHER SCHOOL CHILDREN on the streets. It was too early. The girls dawdled, took a long-cut through Tangletree Park, new-mown and summer-scented. Overhead the clouds were separating, and bursts of fresh white sun were blasting the grass. Molly trailed Lowry past Howlfair Museum, festooned with twitching flags and guarded by gargoyles, its three spires rising skyward. Down dozing lanes, posters advertised candidates for the upcoming mayoral elections, known locally as the Blue Moon Elections. Mayoral elections in Howlfair were rare, only ever taking place on or around the time of what astronomers call a blue moon, the second of two full moons in the same month. Some candidates didn’t stand a chance:
There were posters featuring the current mayor, Lawrence de Ville, posing in the pictures with his wife, Doris, who happened to be Molly’s form tutor:
But most posters looked downright shabby alongside the glossy billboard displays urging passers-by to:
Thanks to a lavish advertising campaign, Benton Furlock’s giant displays were all over town, his intense white face glaring from scores of posters: the abysmal scooped-out caverns of his eye sockets; the astonishing moustache whose slick ends hung heavy and hornlike, stretching below his chin; the thin lips drawn back in what might have been intended as a smile. One hand was stuffed into his shiny-buttoned overcoat. Behind him, the huge disc of a full moon glowed sapphire, the blue moonlight glinting off his bald patch.
“His campaign must be costing a fortune,” said Molly as the girls passed a huge poster. “He’s got adverts on the radio and telly every two minutes. And have you seen the World War One biplanes flying over the valley with the Make Howlfair Scary Again banners?”
“I can’t believe you like him,” said Lowry. “Dad’s hated him ever since he persuaded the council to let him use Loonchance Manor for his ghoul tour.”
“Howlfair has more scary legends than any town on earth,” said Molly. “Our town could be world famous if it had a really creepy mayor who knew how to attract tourists.”
“Well, Furlock’s definitely creepy,” said Lowry. “He’s got a face like a short cut through a graveyard.”
The girls had some time to spare before they were expected at registration. So Molly asked Lowry if they could pop into Howlfair Infirmary to visit Grandma Thompson, who was recovering from what the doctors had described, not very helpfully, as “something like pneumonia”.
“But visiting hours don’t start for ages,” Lowry said, steadying Molly, who’d tripped over a cobblestone and nearly ended up on her face. “Unless you’re planning to break your neck falling over, in which case they’ll let you in any time you want.”
“Larry on reception lets me in,” said Molly. “Gran threatened to run him over in a wheelchair if he ever stops me from visiting.”
“This is because of Felicity Quick, isn’t it?” said Lowry. “You always go to your gran for a pep talk when you’re stressed.”
Molly blushed. “Put a sock in it, Lowry.”
“Your gran is so fantastic,” Lowry sighed as they took a detour past the Old Dark Movie House, turning right onto Poorhouse Lane and past the offices, now derelict, of F&H Property Surveyors. “She’s not like a gran at all.”
She wasn’t. She was like a prize-fighter. But since she’d been committed to the plain-brick Genevieve Wakely wing of Howlfair Infirmary, in a ward with nine other patients, she seemed to Molly to have lost some of her gusto. She spent most of her time in the ward sleeping.
Larry, the receptionist, authorized Molly’s visit without protest. But Ben, a young nurse, stopped the girls as they headed down the corridor to the ward.
“Your gran’s awake,” Ben told Molly, “but she’s been acting a bit strange.”
“Are you sure she’s not just teasing you?” asked Molly, worried. “Like when she hid her arm up her sleeve and pretended it had fallen off?”
“She says someone visited her last night.”
“Who?” Lowry asked. “A nurse?”
“She said a woman in a green shawl came into the ward and told her that something horrible was on its way to Howlfair. And she said something about a sandwich.”
“So, basically, she was dreaming,” Lowry said.
“She was definitely dreaming,” said Ben. “No green-shawled women wandered in here last night. Which is just as well, because all of our beds are taken up.”
“So what’s the problem?” Molly asked.
“Well, your gran swears blind that she was awake. I tried to convince her otherwise and she got argumentative and put me in a headlock.”
Molly said, “I’ll talk to her.”
In her hospital bed Gran lay scowling like an imp. But she broke into a gaping grin when she saw Molly and Lowry. Her candy-floss hair looked as frantic as ever. The girls tiptoed across the snore-filled ward and hugged her.
“What are you doing, visiting at this time?” Gran whispered.
Lowry said, “Molly needs a Grandma Thompson pep talk.”
Gran narrowed her eyes at Molly. “Is someone picking on you?”
Molly did not have to answer. Gran could tell.
“Whoever it is, tell them I’ll strangle the life out of them!” Gran rasped, miming wringing a goose’s neck. “Ah, but I won’t need to strangle them, will I? ’Cause your granddad’s looking out for you, and he doesn’t stand for anyone picking on his Molly! And your dad will be with you, too. He was always a bit of a wimp, of course…”
“He was not!”
“Molly, when he was your age, your dad’s way of dealing with bullies was to fall over and pretend to be dead. Except he’d always sneeze or start giggling.”
“Yeah – and that’s how he learned to make people laugh,” said Molly indignantly. “Just ’cause he was friendly to everyone, it didn’t make him a wimp.”
“Well, I’m sure he’ll be sticking up for you in his own watery way, unless he’s upset at you for not visiting him.”
“Gran…”
“You really should visit him, Molly. It’s been three years.”
“Two years and eleven months,” Molly mumbled.
“And it’s lovely up there, at the foot of the hills.”
“It’s not really him up there Gran. It’s just a gravestone. I don’t want to see it.”
Gran shrugged. “Well, I’m sure he’ll help you out anyway. And I wouldn’t be surprised if that cat of yours turns up too – he can sense when you’re in trouble. Tell me, who’s the brat who’s giving you grief?”
“Oh, it’s no one, Gran…”
Lowry said, “It’s Felicity Quick, Mrs Thompson.”
Gran’s brows levitated. “Hmph! Nice family, the Quicks. Locksmiths. Weren’t you and Felicity friends once, Molly? Never understood why she turned into such a grotty scab of a girl.”
“Me neither!” said Lowry. “She used to be a proper teacher’s pet, didn’t she?”
“Ben said you were upset about something in the night,” Molly said to Gran, keen to change the subject.
“Molly, it was the strangest thing! I had a visit from Hectoria!”
The girls looked at each other.
“She walked right in here. Lord knows why they let her in. A jade shawl wrapped around her gigantic shoulders and her chins dancing in the moonlight…”
“That’s definitely Mrs Fullsway,” murmured Lowry. “Mrs Thompson, are you sure you didn’t dream it?”
“I know the difference between being awake and having a dream, Lowry Evans! I may be barmy, but I’m not mad.”
“Did she say anything?” Molly asked.
“Ah!” Gran’s eyes glimmered. From under her duvet she drew a huge flour-topped ham bap, wrapped in cling film. “She said to give you this!” Gran handed it to Molly.
“A ham bap?”
“Exactly. Have you brought any lunch today?”
“Um, our kitchen flooded this morning and all our food got spoiled…”
“Well, Hectoria must’ve known about it, ’cause she told me to give you some lunch if I saw you. So as soon as she’d gone, I sneaked over and stole a bap from Bert’s cupboard.” She gestured towards Bert, who was snoring apocalyptically on the other side of the ward. “He stole my pudding off the trolley last week. I’m prepared to forgive him and not smother him to death with a pillow – but only if you take that bap.”
Molly dropped it guiltily into her laundry bag. “Did Mrs Fullsway, uh, say anything else?”
“I think she wanted to tell me about the plot of her latest awful novel,” sniffed Gran. “Actually, it’s a bit better than the usual romantic puke. Something about a dreadful horror coming to Howlfair…”
Molly and Lowry exchanged looks.
“Doesn’t sound like one of Mrs Fullsway’s books,” said Lowry. “I read her last one for a bet, and the worst thing that happened in it was that Lady Agatha got her foot stuck in a Ming vase. By the end of the book even the hero’s and heroine’s horses had got married. I nearly heaved up my lunch.”
“I think Hectoria’s gone soft in the head, truth be told,” said Gran, tapping her cranium. “She was building up to telling me who the villain of the story was – as if I’d care – but then suddenly she got all flustered and said that her transportation had arrived, or something, and she scarpered.”
“I’ll have a word with her,” said Molly. “She’s staying at the guesthouse.”
“Oh, how lovely that must be for you,” Gran cackled, but then her laughter dissolved into coughs.
“Gran, are you OK?”
“Frog in my throat,” wheezed Gran. “You don’t need to worry about me, Molly – Hectoria said she was convinced I wouldn’t be in here much longer…” She squinted up at the clock on the opposite wall. “You’d better get to school, young ladies. Molly, stop looking so sombre – I can’t remember the last time I saw you smile. And come over later and tell me how the three of you got on today.”
“Three?” said Molly.
“You, Dad and Granddad,” said Gran.
“And me,” Lowry added. “I’m not leaving Molly’s side.”
Gran nodded. “Then Miss Quick doesn’t stand a chance.”