The Beasts of Clawstone Castle

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

The cattle were back in Clawstone Park. The drugs they had been given had worn off; the beasts roamed as they had always done. Rollo, during his last days before his parents’ return, watched from the wall.

The fuss and the excitement had died down — the stories in the newspapers, the visits from the police — but not everything was quite the same. The smallest calf, the one the children had rescued from the operating table, no longer behaved in the way that the Wild White Cattle of Clawstone Park were supposed to behave. It had become tame and stood by the gate mooing for the children, and though Sir George did not approve of this, the calf became a pet and wandered in and out of the courtyard and up the stairs.

Nor were the ghosts completely the same. They had used up so much ectoplasmic force at Blackscar that they wanted to rest rather than haunt.

‘We will haunt, of course; we’ll do anything to help,’ said Brenda. ‘But I don’t seem to be into strangling the way I was.’

But the real trouble was Ranulf. Ranulf in a way had been the leader of the ghosts, the one that spoke for them. Without the rat he became a slightly fatter ghost, and quieter.

‘You’re pleased, though, aren’t you?’ people would ask.

‘Of course I’m pleased,’ he would snap. ‘What do you think?’

But he was very grumpy all the same — and of course the horror of Ranulf opening his shirt had been very much part of the haunting. When a ghost opens his shirt and shows people a rat gnawing his heart it is one thing. When he opens his shirt and shows them an ordinary chest with a few hairs on it, it is another.

Then there were The Feet. They had forced The Feet to come back with them, but they were damp all the time and no one doubted that it was tears rather than sweat that they were producing. Nor was there any chance that they would be much use on Open Days. Ned had put on the CD of eightsome reels, and one toe had twitched slightly but that was all.

‘I could go back to making lavender bags,’ said Aunt Emily, but Madlyn said quickly that she thought this would be bad for Aunt Emily’s eyes and they would think of some other way of getting hold of money.

And then something quite unexpected happened.

An American who was on holiday in Great Britain stopped his car outside Clawstone and asked if it would be possible to look round. He was very interested in old buildings, he said, and though he knew it was not an Open Day he would be so pleased.

Because he had asked so nicely and seemed such a friendly man, Sir George agreed, and he asked the children if they would show him round.

The American liked the dungeon and the armoury and the banqueting hall — and then they showed him the museum, where he admired the sewing machine and the stuffed duck that had choked on a stickleback and the collection of Interesting Stones.

And then he stopped in front of the Hoggart.

‘My, my!’ he said. ‘But that’s amazing. That’s extraordinary. I’m a Hoggart!’

The children looked at him, hoping he had not gone off his head. A Hoggart was a small brown thing with a few letters stamped on it. What’s more, it had been found in Clawstone; there was no other Hoggart in the world. Cousin Howard had spent many hours in his library trying to find out about Hoggarts and he had found nothing.

But the man repeated what he had said.

‘I’m a Hoggart. I’m Frederick Washington Hoggart. Here — look.’

And he took out his wallet and showed them his credit cards — rows and rows of them — and sure enough, he was a Hoggart. He was also in a very excited state.

‘Could you please ask your great-uncle to let me see that thing? I’ll handle it so carefully you wouldn’t believe. Only I must see it. I must see those letters underneath.’

So they called Uncle George and he took the Hoggart from its stand and handed it to the American.

He looked at it for a long time. Then very slowly he turned it inside out, to reveal a few patches of matted hair.

‘Oh my, my… I can’t believe it — it’s incredible,’ he said, and there were tears in his eyes. ‘This is the most amazing day of my life.’

He was so overcome that they had to find him a chair.

‘See those letters,’ he said when he had recovered himself. ‘They are the name of my great-greatgrandfather.’

And he told them about Josiah Frederick Hoggart, who had fought under George Washington in the American War of Independence.

‘He was with him when they crossed the Delaware and overcame the British, and later he helped him with his business affairs. And of course Washington never forgot a friend and before he died he left instructions that Josiah should be invited to his funeral. It was a big honour, you can imagine — he was given a place right in front and needless to say he ordered a new wig. A special one made by the best craftsman in the state. It was powdered, of course; he wore it under his tricorne. And then when everyone swept off their hats because the coffin was coming past, Josiah swept off his wig as well!’

Mr Hoggart broke off, overcome again by emotion.

‘Oh, the disgrace,’ he went on. ‘The embarrassment! He sent his slaves running after it but it was blown into the Potomac River and was washed away. It was a terrible blow to his family — the wig worn at the interment of George Washington lost and gone. It would have been our way of proving what an old family the Hoggarts are.’

He stopped and dabbed his eyes again.

‘It’s very small for a wig,’ said Madlyn.

‘Well, it’s only part of it, of course — but it’s enough to show that it’s authentic. Oh, wait till I tell my wife — Clara’s so proud of the Hoggart ancestry.’ He broke off again, shaking his head. ‘Only I don’t understand — how could it possibly have got to Clawstone?’

Sir George had been listening carefully. ‘Actually it was found in an old chest in our attic — and now I think of it, it was a sea-chest. My great-great-uncle was the captain of a frigate and he might well have sailed as far as the mouth of the Potomac. It’s not impossible that one of his sailors picked it up.’

The American was still holding the Hoggart in his hands. It looked more than ever like part of a Pekinese that had fallen on hard times. Now he rose to his feet.

‘Sir George, I know what this must mean to you. You must prize it above everything in your collection. But if you would sell it to me — I can’t tell you what it would mean.’

Sir George was about to open his mouth and say that Mr Hoggart was welcome to the thing, it had no value for him But before he could do so, Madlyn had stepped heavily on his foot.

‘How much would you give for it?’ she asked.

‘Would you take two?’ asked the American. ‘Two million, of course.’

‘Pounds or dollars?’ said Madlyn.

‘Dollars. But, say, if that’s not enough, how about two and a half? The money doesn’t matter to me — I manufacture non-stick pans and you’d be amazed how many people need those. I could go up to three but I might have to call Clara—’

Sir George swallowed.

‘Two and a half is enough,’ he said, and found his hand pumped up and down by the blissful Mr Hoggart.

‘Thank you, sir. Thank you. You’ve made me a very happy man. Oh, wait till I call Clara. We’ll keep it under glass in the hall where everyone can see it.’

Sir George did not say so, but he too was a very happy man. The money, carefully invested, would see to the upkeep of the cattle for years and years and years.

Knowing that the ghosts could rest now and that Aunt Emily did not need to make lavender bags or bake scones was a great relief. Even so, it was difficult not to be sad when the time came to go home.

For Rollo the thought of returning to London was made easier because of something his parents had told him on the telephone.

His skink had become a father. There were five baby skinks; not eggs but proper skinks the size of little fingernails. There’d been a letter from the zoo.

‘So I suppose I’m a sort of skink grandfather,’ said Rollo.

‘We’ll be back at Christmas,’ said Madlyn, standing close to Ned as they waited for the taxi to take them to the station.

‘And at Easter,’ said Rollo.

But they were back even sooner than that because they were invited to a funeral.