Pure Dead Brilliant (15 page)

...and Mrs. McLachlan Spills the Salt

A
s instructed by Signor Strega-Borgia, Latch sounded the gong for dinner and scratched his gnat bites absentmindedly. He'd lit a small fire in the library, for the evening had turned chilly and fingers of mist were creeping up toward StregaSchloss from the waters of Lochnagargoyle.

Chewing the remains of a toasted shuttlecock, Tock crawled out of the moat and picked a water lily to tuck behind his ear by way of ornament. He gazed at the lit windows of StregaSchloss in happy anticipation of dinner before lolloping across the rose-quartz drive toward the front door. Just as he reached the first stone step the sound of a muted squeal caused him to stop and listen. It came again, apparently from ground level—the unmistakable sound of some creature in pain. As a vegetarian, he piously hoped that it wasn't someone else's dinner putting up a protest, but nonetheless he peered anxiously around, wondering where the sound was coming from. Bats flitted across the darkening sky, leaving their roost under the eaves of StregaSchloss to head for their nocturnal hunting grounds. The crocodile briefly entertained the notion that what he'd heard was the sound of the bat's high-pitched sonar squeaks; he was about to climb the remaining steps and head indoors when the sound came again, louder and clearer, repeating one word over and over in a rising scale of terror.

“Help—help—help—help!”

All at once Tock realized that the sound was coming from the dungeons. A ventilation shaft that allowed air to pass to and from the subterranean passages under StregaSchloss had a mesh-covered outlet next to the front door. Something is happening down there, Tock thought, and by the sound of it, the something was happening to Nestor. The baby dragon's shrieks were so shrill that they carried in the still air, out across the meadow, along the jetty, and down into the deeps of Lochnagargoyle. From a wish to offer assistance coupled with a strong desire to make Nestor shut up, Tock bounded up the steps and was dutifully cleaning his claws on the boot scraper when from the direction of the loch came a powerful roar—the awesome lung capacity of its unknown maker causing the crocodile to abandon all attempts at personal hygiene and scrabble frantically into the safety of StregaSchloss.

Chest heaving and eyes wide, he slammed the door behind him and sank back against it with a little gasp as Mrs. McLachlan came into view, sweeping down the stairs with Damp in her arms. Something about the nanny's demeanor set off alarm bells in Tock's head. Looking down at his claws,
he realized that he had tracked rather a large quantity of
slime from the bottom of the moat across the threshold of StregaSchloss, and by the expression on Mrs. McLachlan's face, it appeared that this lapse of protocol had not escaped her attention either.

“Wash those filthy, dirrrty claws before you come to the table,” she said, turning her back and striding along the corridor to the kitchen.

“But—but—” Tock bleated, “there's something happening in the dungeons. . . . Nestor—”

“Nestor's
mother
will look after him,” Mrs. McLachlan said over her shoulder, her voice chilly enough to freeze-dry the forlorn water lily drooping from Tock's ear, “and unless
you
wish to eat your dinner in the moat, you had better do as you're told.”

From experience, Tock knew that resistance was futile, so he opened the door to the downstairs bathroom and meekly obeyed. Such was his fear of Mrs. McLachlan's ire that Tock didn't complain that some unknown houseguest appeared to have shaved off their chin warts with a blunt fish knife and had left all the grisly evidence of this do-it-yourself surgery dotted around the porcelain of the sink. When he emerged, squeaky clean and redolent of lily-scented soap, it was to find Titus standing in the middle of the hall, apparently engaged in conversation with his T-shirt.

“Would you
quit
that?” he demanded, unaware that he was the subject of the crocodile's puzzled scrutiny. “I think we've just missed her. She's probably taken Damp in to dinner. No—ahhh—urgggh, you're so hairy—no,
don't
.”

From above came the murmur of many voices, doors opening and closing, and approaching footsteps. The houseguests had responded to Latch's summons and were gathering for their nocturnal assault on the larders of StregaSchloss.

“For
heaven's
sake,” Titus hissed, peering down inside his
T-shirt and, to the bewilderment of Tock, addressing one or both of his nipples. “Now I'm going to have to take you in to dinner. Keep still, or you might end up losing more than a leg—”

With a small honk, Tock bolted along the corridor to the kitchen and headed inside. The first guest had appeared at the head of the staircase and was sniffing appreciatively at the aromas wafting out from the kitchen.

“Something smells heavenly.” Hecate Brinstone hastened downstairs and smiled at Titus, her face still horribly swollen from her earlier encounter with the enraged hornets. “I look an absolute
fright,
” she sighed, catching sight of her reflection in the highly polished case of the grandfather clock.

“Um—no—er, I've seen far worse frights,” Titus confessed with a teenager's awkward gallantry. “You look—um—fine.”

A faint
tchhhh
came from inside his T-shirt as, flushing pink, Titus offered the witch his arm and accompanied her in to dinner.

There were still two empty places laid at the kitchen table as Luciano staggered to the sink with a cauldron of pasta. Tipping it with effort into a massive colander, he turned to the guests waiting at the table and wondered out loud what was keeping Pandora and Fiamma d'Infer. Just then, the missing witch appeared from the unexpected location of the wine cellar, a bottle of vintage Barolo in each hand. Luciano abandoned his pasta and leapt across the kitchen to block her path.

“I don't wish to sound churlish, but I really would prefer it if you would put those bottles back where you found them.” Luciano attempted to minimize the embarrassment of ordering a guest to unhand the wine by lowering his voice to an almost inaudible whisper, but his face betrayed his anger at Fiamma's presumption that she could plunder the wine cellar at will.

“I thought these would be quite gluggable with your heroic culinary
efforts,
” the witch sneered, her body language indicating that she had little intention of obeying her host.

“Those are not ‘gluggable' wines, Miss d'Infer.” Luciano reached out to take the bottles from her and met with resistance. “Those are priceless vintages laid down with a special occasion in mind.” Luciano began to tug at the bottles, having to redouble his efforts with every word he gasped out, as it began to dawn on him that this witch was ten times stronger than he. “This. Evening. Is. Not. Special. Enough.”

The kitchen door opened to admit Pandora, who hesitated, unable to take her place at the table until Fiamma and Luciano moved out of the way. Slipping into the kitchen in Pandora's wake, Multitudina and Terminus scuttled across the stone floor and vanished beneath the dresser, not swiftly enough to avoid being spotted by Fiamma.

“Eughhh—
disgusting
!” she spat, releasing the bottles so abruptly that Luciano nearly lost his balance. “Running around the
kitchen
. Honestly, Baci darling, what with rat pee in the fish, rodent droppings in the coffee, and now free-range vermin at the dinner table, I'm beginning to wonder why on earth I ever agreed to come here. . . .”

Signora Strega-Borgia blushed deeply. As if watching Luciano playing tug-of-war with the bottles of Barolo wasn't humiliating enough, now to be confronted with her own utter lack of skills in the domestic-hygiene department was mortifying beyond belief. She looked up at where Fiamma was still standing, tapping one foot impatiently and staring at her as if to say,
Right, serf,
do
something about this.

“Pandora
.
”
Baci's voice was icy. “I've told you countless times before about letting your rats run free. For the last time, I do
not
permit free-range rodents to roam around the house. Either you keep them under control or I am going to get a cat to do the job for you.” Turning to Fiamma, she continued, her voice warm and conciliatory, “I
do
apologize for my daughter's disgusting practices. Honestly . . .
children
. Do take a seat, Fiamma. Pandora, get rid of them
now
.”

Sitting round the corner of the table from his mother, Titus was aghast. Poor Pandora, he thought, she
loves
those rats. And if Mum finds out that I've got a free-range tarantula down my shirt, she'll go bananas. Why on earth is she being so
nice
to that spider-murdering woman? Doesn't she know that she's dangerous?

Next to him, Mrs. McLachlan patted his arm. “Pass the salt, please, dear,” she murmured, just as Luciano brought the first tureen of pasta to the table.

Hunched on the floor in front of the dresser, Pandora was endeavoring to entice her rats out from their hiding place. Her face on fire from the humiliation of public chastisement, she peered into the darkness to where the rats cowered behind a barrier of dust balls and long-lost plastic medicine spoons.

“A
c-c-c-cat
?” Terminus stuttered. “She can't be serious,
can she?”

“What's a ‘cat'?” Multitudina was utterly confused. In all her lifetime she'd never encountered one, and was at a loss to understand what all the fuss was about.

Terminus, her literary skills honed by Tarantella's tutelage, was far more aware of the many dangers lurking in the world outside StregaSchloss. “Big, furry things with teeth,” she explained. “Sometimes they vanish, leaving their smiles hanging in the air; occasionally they wear boots. They're renowned for riding pillion on broomsticks and hanging out with royalty, and they live on a diet of rats and cream.”

“What's our trained biped doing?” Multitudina asked, distracted by the sight of Pandora.

“Trying to catch our attention, I believe.” Terminus watched as Pandora squeezed her arm underneath the dresser with a small lump of Parmesan extended in her grasp.

“How thoughtful,” Multitudina murmured, reaching out and snatching the cheese greedily. “And look, she's brought some more. . . .”

Pandora's hand withdrew and reappeared slightly farther away, holding a fresh piece of Parmesan. Little by little she coaxed the rats out from under the dresser until, drowsy and replete with cheese, they allowed her to pick them up and remove them from the kitchen.

“Oh my goodness!” Mrs. McLachlan blurted. “I'm
so
sorry. Heavens, that was clumsy of me,” as with a dramatic gesture akin to one of Luciano's operatic armsweeps, the nanny overturned the salt dish, spilling most of its contents across the table onto Fiamma's lap. With a hiss of annoyance, the witch sprang to her feet and ran out of the kitchen before anyone noticed that, in common with all her demon kin, she was unable to tolerate prolonged contact with salt.

Mrs. McLachlan watched her hasty exit and shrugged apologetically. “Dear, dear. That seems a bit
extreme
—” she continued, absolving herself. “It's only
salt,
when all's said and done. Never mind, at least I didn't spill it in the
food
. Mmmmm, this is simply delicious—my compliments to the chefs.”

Sitting farther down the table, the estate lawyer gazed at his plate in dismay. He loathed Mediterranean food, and this meal confirmed all his worst nightmares about dealing with Italian clients. Still, he comforted himself, once the boy has signed the paperwork and banked his inheritance, my days of dining with the Borgias will be over. At long last I'll be able to sever my connection with this dodgy family and return to a career that doesn't involve laundering money for the criminal underworld. Under the pretext of dabbing his mouth with his napkin, he gazed at the bent heads around the table. Eighteen of them, he counted rapidly, plus the rat-girl, the woman who'd received a lapful of salt, plus—he swallowed rapidly—plus those . . . creatures . . . slobbering and dribbling at the other end of the table. He shuddered at the sheer number of mouths avidly consuming bowlfuls of disgusting pasta and mentally consigned the entire population of StregaSchloss to perdition. Meeting Titus's eyes across the table, the lawyer attempted a smile, which faded rapidly as he realized that something large was moving beneath the child's shirt. A lump the size of a tennis ball appeared to be climbing up from his navel to his throat. The boy dropped his gaze to his lap and color flooded his cheeks.

Mumbling an excuse, Titus fled from the kitchen, the speed of his exit causing Tarantella to tumble down to his waistband moaning, “Give me a break—ow, slow
down
! That hurts,
you cretin.”

Ignoring her, Titus took the stairs two at a time and arrived, breathing heavily, at his sister's bedroom door. “Pan, it's me. Open up.”

There was a clunk as Pandora undid the lock and let him in. Titus immediately dragged his T-shirt hem up to his throat, exposing Tarantella clinging to his navel as if her life depended on it.