Milo and One Dead Angry Druid (4 page)
Read Milo and One Dead Angry Druid Online
Authors: Mary Arrigan
I
t was dawn when I climbed through my bedroom window, exhausted and scared. I had intended to sneak into Dad’s office and search the web to find out anything about Mister Lewis, but I crashed into bed and slept until I heard Mum shouting at me to get up. I wished I could tell her what was
going on in the life of her only son, but where would you begin to tell your mum that you’d been hanging out with a dead person all night? So, looking normal on the outside and jittery as a green jelly on the inside, I sloped off to school.
Miss Lee tut-tutted when she saw Shane’s empty desk.
‘Anyone know if Shane is coming to school today?’ she asked.
‘I bet him and his gran are off mucking about with paint,’ someone laughed.
Miss Lee smiled and shook her head as she marked Shane absent. Absent means ‘not here’, I thought. And, unless I put things right, not here ever again. I shut my eyes and wished him back here right now. But that was just being nerdy. So I opened my eyes again and thought about
what I had to do.
I got through that day somehow. Even Mum was worried when I passed up on the ice-cream dessert and yummy sponge cake. And she reached for the thermometer when I said that I was taking an early night in bed.
‘Just call me if you’re feeling sick,’ she said as she felt my forehead and tucked me in.
‘Mum,’ I said. ‘I’m just a bit tired, that’s all.’
How could I tell my mum that, if things didn’t go right during the full moon, she’d never see me again? I’d be wafting about with Shane and Big Ella, looking in through windows, and longing for a spoonful of stew or a pancake.
I watched that moon cross my window. I could hear the comforting sound of the telly downstairs. Then the sounds of Dad locking
up and Mum going to the bathroom. Then Dad singing off-key in the shower. Then silence.
The clock downstairs chimed ten forty-five. I had just fifteen minutes to meet spooky Mister Lewis in Shane’s garden. I wanted to just curl up and hide. But my best friend and his gran were depending on me. With a sharp bite on my lip to get me going, I got up and put on my comforting old Bart Simpson leather (well, fake leather) jacket for good luck. Then I took my torch and the back-door key and crept out into the night.
‘OK, Mister Lewis,’ I whispered. ‘Here I come.’
E
ven though I was expecting him, I jumped when Mister Lewis loomed out of the long grass behind Shane’s house.
‘You sure look spooky,’ I said with a shiver.
Mister Lewis frowned. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked crossly. ‘Nothing has changed, except that I’m no longer alive.
I’ve always looked like this.’
‘Oops, sorry!’ I muttered. ‘Maybe it’s the hat.’
‘Come along, young man,’ went on Mister Lewis, leaving a slight breeze as he wafted through the long grass. ‘And bring that stone with you,’ he added, pointing to the takeaway bag I’d hidden behind the pile of stones the night before. ‘I need to be absolutely sure the two pieces fit together.’
With a sigh, I shoved the stone inside my jacket and zipped up. I could feel it tingling against my ribs.
There weren’t many people about on the street. I kept well back from Mister Lewis in case they’d think I was with a freaky guy. Until I realised they couldn’t see him.
‘How come …?’ I began.
‘That nobody else can see me except you?’
Mister Lewis smiled and tapped his nose. ‘It goes with the job,’ he said. ‘When I want to, I can be invisible. Though you caught me by surprise when you came to the stony place. Still, that’s all for the good, now that you’re helping.’
Not for my good, I thought.
Even with its big red door and the word ‘Museum’ in fancy writing over it, the building still had a creepy, empty look.
‘How are we supposed to get in there?’ I whispered.
Mister Lewis took off his hat and then straightened an ear that had come loose. He looked over the railings into the basement. Apart from a litter of Tayto crisp bags and squashed coke cans, there were just boarded-up windows.
‘Let’s try Chapel Lane,’ said Mister Lewis, putting on his hat again.
This is too, too weird, I thought. I was still trying to get my head around the fact that I was following a dead man down a dark lane late at night to break into a museum. Hold that image and think how I felt.
Mister Lewis stopped in front of a small window high up.
‘That will do, I think,’ he said. ‘That will be our way in.’
‘Huh?’ I said. ‘How do I get up there?’
Mister Lewis tut-tutted, and shook his head.
‘Do you have to be so negative, Milo, my boy?’ He pointed to a wheelybin. ‘Tarra, as you say yourself. Pull it over here and you can climb up. All you’ll have to do then is smash that window. Easy.’
I
looked at the small window. I had never broken a window before. Well, yes I had, but not on purpose, you understand.
‘For heaven’s sake, get a move on,’ hissed Mister Lewis, looking around nervously.
‘It’s OK,’ I retorted. ‘Nobody uses this laneway. It only leads to the river and nobody will be using it at this time of night.’
‘It’s not people I’m worried about,’ said
Mister Lewis. ‘It’s the time.’ He looked around again as the town-hall clock chimed the half hour. ‘We only have until midnight.’
‘Oh blast!’ I swore. I looked at the window again and unzipped my jacket.
‘What are you doing?’ asked Mister Lewis.
‘Putting this to good use,’ I said, taking the stone out and wrapping it in the jacket.
‘Just don’t damage it,’ warned Mister Lewis.
He was right. If the stone was broken some more, then this Amergin guy would certainly lose his cool. But in a freaky situation like this, you have to take chances.
I dragged the wheelybin over to the wall and climbed up on to the roof of the built-on annexe beneath the museum window. With a ‘stand clear’, I swung the stone and smashed it against the window.
The first blow just bounced. I swung the jacket again. This time there was a loud tinkling of glass as the window shattered. Without waiting to find out if we’d been heard, I used the stone in the jacket to clear away the sharp bits that were left. The stone shuddered for just a moment, but it stayed intact.
What was I thinking? I really wanted to go home and lie down. Mister Lewis puffed and panted as he climbed up after me, making me wonder again about ghostly lungs. Then he squeezed through the narrow window and jumped down beside me into the dark museum.
‘I thought you’d be able to waft through,’ I whispered as I put on my jacket again, and noticed, in the light from the street light outside, that Bart Simpson’s face was
hanging off. But I had greater things to worry about. I stuffed the stone inside and zipped up. ‘What sort of a spook are you if you can’t go through walls?’
‘Don’t be difficult, Milo, my man,’ said Mister Lewis. ‘It’s not all wafting and floating, you know. Besides, I’m only a half-ghost.’
‘Sshh,’ I hissed.
‘What?’
‘I’m listening for a burglar alarm.’
‘Pardon me?’
‘Burglar alarm.’ I said. ‘It sets off bells. Computer alarm,’ I added, to let him know how advanced the world had become since his day, hoping he wouldn’t ask me how it worked.
But there were no alarm bells. Anyway, I thought, who’d want to steal anything from here?
‘Come on,’ I whispered, switching on my torch and leading the way to the showcase where the other half of the stone was displayed.
Mister Lewis’s face lit up, as much as a ghostly face can; it went from being white, putty coloured, to a pale beige like my granny’s stockings.
‘Oh my goodness,’ he breathed. ‘There it is, just as I presented it.’
‘You should have left it in the ground,’ I muttered.
‘I know, I know,’ said Mister Lewis sadly, making me sorry for him. After all, even half-ghosts have feelings too.
‘Never mind, Mister Lewis,’ I went on. ‘We’ll have that back with its other half in seconds.’
‘Before you do anything, Master Milo
Ferdinand,’ said Mister Lewis, grandly. ‘Would you mind wiping the dust off that sign there?’
‘Sure.’ I took a used tissue from my pocket and rubbed the sign. The dust lifted from the placard and Mister Lewis bent down and peered at the words. ‘My, my,’ he said. ‘So that’s how I died! I had no idea. You never really remember your death, you know. Not that I’m fully dead,’ he added ruefully.
I looked over his shoulder at the words on the bottom of the sign.
‘“
Tragically and mysteriously killed by a falling stone that struck him on the head
”,’ I read. ‘Did Amergin do that?’ I asked nervously. ‘Clobbered you with one of his ancient stones?’
Mister Lewis sighed. ‘I stirred up things
with a stone, so it seems right I should die by a stone. Didn’t see it coming, though.’
I swallowed hard. So, was that the fate that was in store for me and Shane and Big Ella? Knocked on the head by a Celtic druid with a hunk of stone? I shivered.
‘Let’s get on with this,’ I said. I kicked the glass case. It shattered quite easily. And that’s when the bells started clanging.
‘
W
hat’s that? What’s happening?’ shouted Mister Lewis, his ghostly hands pressed over his ears.
‘It’s the alarm!’ I cried. ‘Come on, we’ve got to get out of here.’
I reached in and grabbed the half stone from the shattered showcase, zipped it inside my jacket along with the other half. We ran between the other showcases, the two stones rattling together against my chest. When we reached the high window that we’d come through I stopped. There was a face at the broken window. And a voice I recognised. ‘Sergeant Johnson!’ I whispered, ducking under a showcase. Too late, he’d seen me.
‘You, boy,’ he shouted angrily, flashing his torch around. ‘What do you think you’re doing? I can see your legs. No point in hiding, the place is surrounded. You might as well give yourself up.’
‘Surrounded?’ muttered Mister Lewis. ‘Oh dear.’
‘Surrounded by him,’ I whispered. ‘There’s always only one Garda on night duty. I
should know − my dad is a Garda and he’s on night duty every third week.’
Still, we’d have to risk going out through the museum door. But as we edged along the wall towards it, I was horrified to hear a key in the lock and bolts being pulled back. We were trapped! I frantically looked around the moonlit room for a hiding place. There was a Famine display of a life-size group of people sitting at a fake fire. I crept over and nicked a bit of sacking from a donkey cart and put it around my shoulders to look raggy. Then I sat beside a model of a boy whose paint-chipped hand was stretched towards the fire. I ducked lower when a beam from a torch flashed around. It was only a matter of moments before I’d be seen.
‘Who’s there?’ came an angry shout. I can never understand why people ask that
question at a time like this. Like, someone who’s broken in is going to stand up and give his name, address and mobile number and say ‘
take me away
’? Anyway, I gasped when I recognised Mister Conway’s voice. I’d forgotten he lived upstairs. He’d heard us!
‘Do something,’ I hissed at Mister Lewis, who was sitting across from me, his tall hat askew, making him look like a worn-out scarecrow.
‘Do what?’ he hissed back.
‘Something ghostly. I’ll be in no end of trouble if I’m caught.’
If I did get caught, then I wouldn’t get to replace the two bits of stone, and Shane and Big Ella would be found dead in the morning. And me − found dead in a prison cell because Amergin, being a full spook,
could just walk through the wall and clobber me. And my dad would be kicked out of the Gardaí and jailed for – I dunno – for having a criminal son, maybe. And Mum would have to leave the country in disgrace with a wig and a false passport. Such worries!
The beam of the torch was coming closer. I shut my eyes and held my breath as it stopped and then passed over me. Then there was a sound that startled me.
‘OOooo.’
I blinked. Mister Lewis was now standing beside a model of an old woman who was stirring something in a pot. His head was raised and he was uttering this ghastly wail. The beam of torchlight stopped, then focused on the display.
‘OoooooOO,’ went Mister Lewis, now in full cry.
‘Help!’ bawled Mister Conway. ‘Help!’ He stood frozen to the spot. With a clatter, the door burst open and Sergeant Johnson barged in.
‘Mister Conway!’ he exclaimed. ‘Have you caught the hooligans?’
‘Sergeant,’ said Mister Conway nervously. ‘There’s something …’
‘What, man, what? Are they armed and dangerous?’
‘Over there,’ whispered Mister Johnson. ‘That old woman …’
Sergeant Johnson shone his torch on the group. I sucked in my cheeks and hoped I looked hungry enough to be a Famine kid.
‘They’re models, man,’ he said, ‘just Famine models.’
‘She ooohhhed at me,’ whispered Mister Conway.
‘Huh? Don’t be ridiculous,’ began Sergeant Johnson.
Mister Lewis launched into another wail.
Sergeant Johnson jumped. ‘What the blazes?’ he shouted, clutching Mister Conway’s arm, even though Mister Conway was already hanging on to Sergeant Johnson’s collar.
‘OOOOooo,’ went Mister Lewis again. Then he changed position and slipped behind a hairy model of a donkey. ‘EEEEHAAAWW,’ he went.
Sergeant Johnson shone his torch in the direction of the donkey.
‘EEEHAAAWWW!’
‘See?’ shouted Mister Conway in panic. ‘It’s haunted!’
I could see the glee in Mister Lewis’s face as he wafted towards the two men. He
turned and winked at me. He was visible to me and invisible to them. Neat trick. Then he shrieked louder than ever into their ears. That did it. The two men ran, tripping over one another. Mister Lewis followed them, screeching all the time. The door slammed and I could hear the clatter of panicky footsteps running into the street. Mister Lewis wafted back to me. He was laughing loudly as he wiped ghostly tears from his eyes with his sleeve and stuck back an eyebrow.
‘That was wonderful,’ he said. ‘Best fun I’ve ever had in my life. Eh, I mean death,’ he added. ‘I didn’t know I could shriek like that. Think of the fun I could have had all those years I’ve spent as a half-ghost. Come on, Milo. Let’s chase those two and maybe a few more passers-by for a laugh, eh?’
‘No way!’ I said. ‘Have you forgotten why we’re doing all this? Come on, we’ve got to get out of here before they come back with back-up.’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Mister Lewis, suddenly ghostly serious again. ‘It must be nearly midnight.’
That made me panic again. Luckily I hadn’t had dinner. I’d have thrown up right there on the museum floor – and if the cops didn’t get me, then forensics would. I’ve seen those guys on the telly – nailing a thug from just a splash of sneezed snot on a doorhandle.