Goblins and Ghosties (4 page)

Under the vicar's instructions, the villagers took the body, chopped off the head and burnt it along with the rest. They scattered the ashes to the four winds and that, it seems, was the end of the Croglin Grange vampire.

But Amelia never got back the use of her right arm, in spite of all that the doctors could do. It was as if the arm were dead. And cold, so cold! As cold as the vampire's touch.

Hold Him, Tubbs!

Southern United States

There were three of us in those days, John-Henry and me and Tubbs. I don't rightly know why we called him Tubbs. It wasn't his family name and no way would you have said he was tubby. Tubbs was small and skinny – but a fighter! Many's the time John-Henry and me had earned us the price of a meal and a bed for the night by betting on Tubbs when he got into a scrap.

‘Hold him, Tubbs!' we'd yell, as soon as he
got
the other guy in a bear hug. ‘Now you've got him!' (This being generally more of a no-holds-barred sort of wrestling match than a regular fist-fight.) Next thing, Tubbs would hook his leg round and the other guy would be flat on his back in the dust. Game over.

Most of the time, we just travelled around, looking for any sort of work, wherever we could find it. We didn't look too hard, just for enough to pay for a meal or two and a roof over our heads come nightfall.

Came the day when our luck ran out. We were miles from anywhere, no sign of shelter. Night was coming on, the rain was drizzling down and we could see it was going to get a whole lot worse before it got better. Then, we came upon this old plantation house. No one living there, that was plain to see from the creepers growing up the walls, the broken windows and the shutters hanging off their hinges.

‘This'll do us for the night, I reckon,' said John-Henry.

‘Reckon it will,' I said. ‘Ain't no one around to tell us we can't.'

That's
where I was wrong. Lord knows how long he'd been watching us, dressed all in black from his hat to his boots, sitting there so still on his great black horse. Night coming on and no moon to see by, we'd never have noticed him if he hadn't spoken.

‘Ain't no-one been living in that old house since way back,' he said. ‘Ain't no one around here who'd stay in that house so much as one hour after nightfall and expect to come out alive.'

‘Why's that?' said Tubbs.

‘Because of the spook,' said the man. ‘I'm just warning you, friendly like. You stay away.' He turned his horse and rode away before we could ask him if there was any place nearby where we could beg a bed for the night and a bite to eat in exchange for a hand's turn of work in the morning.

‘Spook!' said Tubbs. ‘You believe that stuff? He was just trying to scare us off.'

‘All the same,' said John-Henry, ‘maybe we'd better not risk it.'

‘We can shelter out here under the trees just as good,' I said.

‘
Rain's coming on harder,' said Tubbs. ‘I want a solid roof over my head tonight.'

He went on up to the house. Soon we could see, by the flickering light, that he'd lit a fire in the old fireplace. We could tell by the smell he was cooking himself a bite to eat.

‘Sure you won't join me?' he called.

‘No, no, we're fine out of here,' we shouted back – though we weren't. Nothing but damp wood lying around, so we couldn't get a fire to light. Nothing to eat but cold beans and stale bread. No place dry enough for us to catch a wink of sleep. The rain was soon coming down so hard, we might as well have been sitting under a waterfall for all the shelter the trees gave.

I thought of Tubbs settling down to sleep, snug as a bug in a rug. Even thought of joining him once or twice.

Glad I didn't.

Must have been around midnight, came this mighty clap of thunder. Lightning flashed, brighter than daylight.

Soon as my eyes stopped seeing fireworks, I could see there was something there in the
room
with Tubbs. That thing was blacker than black, like looking into a deep, dark, bottomless hole. It loomed over Tubbs lying there on the floor. Its voice, when it spoke, fair set my insides churning.

‘Do you know who I am?' it said.

‘Reckon you must be the spook we was told about,' said Tubbs. ‘I'm Tubbs. Now we're acquainted, I'd be obliged if you'll leave me to get my beauty sleep.' He turned over and closed his eyes.

‘Hey!' said the spook. ‘I haven't finished with you yet.'

Tubbs opened his eyes. He stood up, very slowly, like a spring uncoiling. ‘That sounds to me like fighting talk,' said Tubbs. He stood there, squaring up to that spook, all five foot four of him.

‘My money's on Tubbs,' said John-Henry. ‘What do you think?'

‘I don't know,' I said. ‘I never saw him wrestle a spook before.'

‘He's got to go straight for the bear hug,' said John-Henry, ‘before that spook knows
what's
hit him. Go for it, Tubbs!'

‘You can take him!' I yelled.

As soon as the fight got started, I could see old Tubbs was in trouble.

That spook was more like smoke than solid flesh and blood. Every time Tubbs got his arms around it, the spook would just kind of dissolve into nothing, then pop up again behind him. But its fists were rock-hard solid. Time and again we saw old Tubbs go flying through the air and hit the wall, then pick himself up and come back fighting.

John-Henry and me, we kept on yelling encouragement.

‘Go for him, Tubbs!'

‘Look out! He's behind you.'

I could see old Tubbs was tiring, but he wasn't about to give up. Seemed like the spook was tiring too. Next time Tubbs got him in that bear hug, the spook didn't turn to smoke. It hugged old Tubbs right back. Like two lovers dancing, they went waltzing round the room.

‘Now you've got him, Tubbs!' roared John-Henry.

‘
Hold him, Tubbs!' I yelled. ‘Don't let him go!'

‘I won't!' the spook roared back.

It shot up in the air taking Tubbs with it, straight through the ceiling, so fast that we both thought we'd see them shoot through the roof any second.

But we didn't.

We listened for sounds of the fight going on up above, but there was nothing. That house was silent as the grave.

‘You think we should go look for him?' said John-Henry.

‘Let's leave it till morning,' I said.

Soon as it was light, we checked out that house from top to bottom, opening cupboards, knocking on walls, calling out, ‘Tubbs! Are you there?'

Nothing.

‘Looks like old Tubbs is gone for good,' said John-Henry.

I shook my head. ‘He'll be back,' I said. ‘Just as soon as he's licked that spook.'

That must be some fight they're having in Spookland, though. We ain't seen hide nor hair of old Tubbs from that day to this.

The Grateful Dead

Gypsy

There was once a gypsy who'd grown tired of the travelling life and decided it was time to settle down. He'd saved enough money over the years to set himself up in business, in a small way. A shop, maybe, since buying and selling was what he'd always been good at.

The question was, what sort of shop? And in which town or village? None of the places he'd passed through on his travels seemed exactly
right,
but the gypsy was a great believer in Fate. Fate would bring him to the place where he was supposed to be after all his years of travelling and he'd know it the moment he saw it. Meanwhile, he kept travelling on.

One day, as he was passing a graveyard, he heard a man shouting at the top of his voice, ‘Give me back my money, you dirty gypsy!'

The gypsy looked around, surprised. He'd never owed anyone money in his life.

But it wasn't him the man was shouting at.

The man was kicking at a newly covered grave. ‘Come out!' he yelled. ‘And give me my money!‘

‘Peace, friend,' said the gypsy. ‘Let the dead rest in peace.'

‘Would you?' said the man, ‘if you were in my shoes? This cheating gypsy borrowed money from me. If he thinks he can get out of paying me by burying himself six feet under, he's got another think coming.'

‘I'll pay his debt,' said the gypsy. ‘How much did he owe you?'

The sum the man said he was owed turned
about
to be nearly half the money the gypsy had put by, but the gypsy didn't argue. He paid the man, then lingered a while by the grave so that he wouldn't have to walk on into town with this odious fellow for company.

Dusk was falling by the time he took to the road again.

He found there was someone walking beside him, keeping pace with him, step by step. How long the man had been there was hard to say, since the sun had set and the moon was not yet risen. The stranger walked so softly, it might have been no more than the gypsy's own shadow. The gypsy asked the stranger, ‘How far is it to the town? Do you know?'

And the stranger answered him, ‘It's just over this next hill. I lived there for a while, but then – you'd understand, being a travelling man yourself – sometimes the urge to move on becomes too strong.'

‘Still, I'm thinking it's time I settled down,' said the gypsy. ‘I've money saved and a pretty good head for business…'

‘Ah! That's what I don't have,' said the
stranger.
‘I trained as a butcher – none better, if I do say it myself – but as to the buying and selling and keeping the books straight…'

‘I'm a great believer in Fate,' said the gypsy. ‘I'd say it was Fate that threw us together.'

To cut a long story short, the two of them set up a butchery business together in that very same town. The gypsy did the buying and selling and his new partner worked behind the scenes, slaughtering, butchering, jointing, slicing and mincing, curing hams and making sausages, patés and pies. Word soon got about that this was the best butcher's shop for miles around.

There was just one thing that always seemed to be sold out, though the gypsy never saw the going of it. No matter how many times he was asked for liver, there was never any in the storeroom when he went to look.

In the end he asked his partner, ‘What has happened to all the liver again?'

The butcher said simply, ‘I ate it.'

‘Oh. All of it?'

‘I'm sorry. I need it, you see, for the blood.'

Now
the gypsy came to look at him, he did always look a bit peaky.

‘You should get out more,' he said. ‘Fresh air and sunshine is what you need.'

But he could hardly tell his partner not to eat the liver, since the man took no share of the profits they were making.

‘Why should I?' he said, ‘I put no money into the business. What right have I to take money out? What do I need money for anyway? I have all I need.'

‘A house would be nice, though, wouldn't it? And a few home comforts. You don't have to sleep in that draughty old lean-to out the back.'