Cold Shoulder Road

Table of Contents

COLD SHOULDER ROAD

“Oy!” shouted Is. “Don’t forget about us! We’re still down here! Hi! Hollo! Let down the ladder, ye dumfoozle squareheads. Don’t leave us down here!”

There was no reply.

But, a moment later, a loud bang overhead caused Is and Arun to jump. Looking up they saw that a heavy, round wooden cover had been lowered into place over the hole. And a metallic clang suggested that it had been bolted down. At the same moment their lantern went out.

THE WOLVES OF WILLOUGHBY CHASE

BLACK HEARTS IN BATTERSEA

NIGHT BIRDS ON NANTUCKET

THE STOLEN LAKE

THE CUCKOO TREE

DIDO AND PA

IS

THE WINTER SLEEPWALKER

(
illustrated by Quentin Blake
)

THE WHISPERING MOUNTAIN

MIDNIGHT IS A PLACE

THE SHADOW GUESTS

This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

Epub ISBN: 9781409024866

Version 1.0

  

A Red Fox Book

Published by Random House Children’s Books

20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London SW1V 2SA

A division of Random House UK Ltd

London Melbourne Sydney Auckland

Johannesburg and agencies throughout the world

Copyright © Joan Aiken Enterprises Ltd 1995

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

First published in Great Britain by Jonathan Cape Limited 1995

Red Fox edition 1996

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not,

by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or

otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent

in any form of binding or cover other than that in which

it is published and without a similar condition including

this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

The right of Joan Aiken to be identified as the author of

this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

Printed and bound in Great Britain by

Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading, Berkshire

RANDOM HOUSE UK Limited Reg. No. 954009

Papers used by Random House UK Limited

are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in

sustainable forests. The manufacturing processes conform to

the environmental regulations of the country of origin

ISBN 0 09 955851 3

E
VERY NIGHT, AROUND NINE O’CLOCK IN
C
OLD
Shoulder Road, the screaming began. It came from the end house in the row. It was not very loud. The sound was like the cries of the gulls who flew and whirled along the shingle-bank on the seaward side of the road.

People who lived in the road (there were not many of them) took no notice of the screaming. It’s the gulls, they thought, or the wind; or, whatever it is, it’s no business of ours.

Only one person felt differently, and she lived next door to the house from which the screaming came.

Night after night she clenched her hands and stood trembling by the window.

Something has got to be done, she thought. Something
must
be done.

At last she did it.

O
N A CHILLY EVENING IN LATE SPRING, MANY
years ago, the schooner
Dark Diamond
was feeling her way through the narrow passage known as the Downs, between the coast of Kent and the Goodwin Sands. Nothing could be seen, nothing could be heard, save the creak of ropes and the wash of water along the side of the ship. Fog lay like thick white wool over the English Channel. If there were lights along the shore, half a mile away, they were hidden behind the misty blanket.

“But likely there’s none,” observed Captain Podmore on the bridge, gloomily peering ahead and rubbing his bristly chin. “That tarnal great flood-wave what came a-raging down this coast last January – that drowned a many souls along the Essex and Kent shores. And swept away a many houses. Folk is still hard at work putting all to rights – those as wasn’t drownded. They do say the naval boat-yard at Deal was a right hurrah’s-nest – stove-in vessels perched atop of house-roofs; and they found one thirty-three-gun frigate a couple of miles inland at Womenswold, lodged in the crotch of a big old chestnut tree. It’s still there, I’ve heard tell; nobody can figure out a way to get it down.”

The two passengers on board the
Dark Diamond
, who were standing with Captain Podmore on the bridge, looked at one another anxiously.

“Your mother, Arun—” began the girl.

“Nay, nay, I know what you’re a-thinking,” Captain Podmore said hastily. “You’re a-thinking that Mrs Twite might ha’ fared badly down at Folkestone town. But don’t you be frit, Arun my boy, you can surely set your mind at rest. Folkestone did none so badly. That turble flood-wave bore on south’ards, on towards France, arter it scraped Dover. Towns west o’Dover didn’t get it nigh so hard. And, farther down the Channel, past the Island, it were naught to write home about.”

“That’s the Isle of Wight?” asked the girl.

“Right, Missie Is. That’s why the old
Dark Diamond
come through without a splinter off her gunwale.” He patted his ship affectionately. “We was hove to in Poole Harbour, and never felt no more than a ripple.”

“Up north it was dreadful,” said Is. “The whole town of Blastburn was flooded out, and the coal-mine filled with water.”

“Aye, because the doddy fools thought fit to build their town low down inside of a cave. What could they expect – do there come a high tide? And what’s befallen that Channel Tunnel the Folkestone people spent years a-building, I wonder?”

“Did they finish the tunnel, then?” asked Arun. “They were still digging it when I ran off from home.”

“Aye, ’twas finished and working – unless the tidal wave stove it in.”

“Do people ride through to France on horseback, then?” asked Is.

“Nay, nay, lass, they’ve a wagon-train that runs through, once a day. You can fit a tidy-sized coach in one o’ they wagons, and they have horse-boxes too, and folks does the crossing inside o’ their own carriages. Twenty-six miles to Boulogne, it be, and that-ar old train does the crossing in only one hour, will you credit it?”

Captain Podmore spat vexedly over the side of his ship. “And the worst of it is, that-there tunnel is putting honest free-traders out of business.”

“Why, Captain Podmore?”

“Why, up to five years agone, there was a big cross-Channel trade in run goods – any brig sailing these waters, you could lay your sweet life she’d be half full of run brandy, or ‘baccy, or French kickshawses. But now all these cargoes, they comes through by tunnel. (Folk do say.) Taking the bread out of our mouthses! There be a new tribe of folk running the business – the
Merry Gentry
, they calls theirselves. – O’ course
I
don’t have owt to do wi’ them,” he added hastily. “Very nasty coves they are, to tangle with, ’tis said. Hang you up by your heels from a lamppost as soon as kiss-your-hand. To make an example, d’ye see? So folks knows better than to meddle with their comings and goings.”

“But aren’t there police or customs officers at the entrance to the tunnel, at each end, to oversee what comes through?”

“Oh, aye,” said the Captain. He winked. “They has a gate at each end, like a portcullis. And a chap at the gate to lock-all-fast when the train has run by. And other coves in King’s uniforms a-poking and a-prodding at folkses’ bags and bundles. But, lord bless ye, there’s a deal of contraband still goes through. A coin in the hand is worth two in the bank, and a blind horse knows which side his hay be buttered on. – Mammoths’ tusks, they do say, is the prime article these days.”

“
Mammoths’ tusks
?”

“
I
wouldn’t be a-knowing,” said Captain Podmore virtuously. “Sea-coal and a drop o’ Highland Malt is all
I
ever carry. But ’tis said they dug up a deal of those old, frozen long-ago elephant critters up in the step-lands near Muscovy and Hell-Sinky. Loads o’ they tusks are a-coming south, through Norroway and Jutland and the Lowlands and Normandy; and now, the word goes, they runs ’em through the Tunnel.”

“But what in the world do folk want mammoths’ tusks
for
?” asked Is. “Diamonds, now, I could understand—”

“They carves ’em into snuffboxes, lassie. Sneeze-coffers. – Or into false teeth,” added Captain Podmore. “All the crack, sneeze-boxes made from mammoth tusks are. And rich folks nowadays has sham teeth screwed in when their own has worn out. Flying in the face of Nature, if you ask me. Anyhow there’s a mighty deal of rhino to be made in the trade, so ’tis said.”

He peered forward, for Dover light was now faintly to be seen ahead, and most of his attention must be given to navigation.

“But don’t you fret about your Ma, Arun my boy,” he went on after a minute. “Folkestone town be set mainly on the cliff. That way the folk stayed high and dry.”

“Yes,” agreed Arun. But still he sounded worried.

It’s because he ran away from home, Is thought, and never wrote to his Mum in years. And now he feels bad about it.

“Hearken, young ’uns,” said Captain Podmore, when they had passed Dover and were putting in towards Folkestone. “Ye’ll not think me disobliging if I don’t take ye right into harbour, but get my man Sam to row ye to the foot of the jetty steps?”

“Of course we don’t mind,” said Arun, a little puzzled. “It was very kind of you to bring us all the way south from Stonemouth. But why – why don’t you plan to go into harbour here?”

Captain Podmore laid a finger alongside his nose. “What the eye don’t see, the heart don’t glather over,” he said. “They be mortal sharp, they Preventive chaps around Folkestone, and there were a little bit of bother over French strums—”

“Strums?”

“What you’d call periwigs, for the Mayor and Corporation, what never paid a penny of Duty. I’d as lief not show my nose in this port until they’ve other matters on their minds – let alone cut queer whids with the Merry Gentry, who are powerful strong along this stretch o’ the coast, so ’tis said . . .”

He stared ahead into the foggy dark and called softly, “Ease her to stabb’rd, Sam!”

“The
Mayor and Corporation
? Well!” said Is, shocked.

“Eh, well, when it comes to run goods, Missie, even the highest in the land ain’t too toploftical. That’s why the folkses that fetches the goods gets to be so powerful strong. Now bring her to, Sam! And step lively, lower a dinghy, but don’t let me hear one dunt or scrunch.”

So, after whispered farewells and thanks, Is and Arun found themselves, ten minutes later, at the foot of the dripping, slimy stone steps that led up to the seaward end of Folkestone Pier.