The Billionaire’s Curse Read online

  “Gerald!” Ruby cried.

  Gerald’s face contorted and with a heave, he pulled himself up and out of the shaft.

  “What about us?” Sam’s voice rang up from below.

  Gerald’s face popped over the edge of the hole. “I guess this is here for emergencies.” A rope ladder unfurled into the shaft and soon Ruby and Sam were climbing through the opening.

  For a minute they sat there, oblivious to where they were, glad to be on a level surface.

  “How did you do that, Gerald?” Ruby asked at last. “Holding on by your foot, that leaning out and clinging on by your hands—it was amazing!”

  “There’s a rock-climbing wall in the school gym back home,” Gerald said. “I find chess boring too.”

  Sam stood and shone his flashlight down into the pit.

  “I’m assuming the major doesn’t open the hatch that way,” he said. “I can’t see him hanging by his toes over the top of a mine shaft.”

  Gerald nodded, wriggling his fingers to get the blood flowing again. “Maybe there’s a hook on a stick or whatever; you know, to latch onto that hole in the rock,” he said.

  “You mean something like this?” Ruby picked up a short rod with a curved metal spike fixed to the end.

  Gerald shook his head. “Yes, something like that,” he said. “Fat lot of good it is on this side of the hole.”

  Sam swung the flashlight around them. They were in a small room, not much bigger than a walk-in wardrobe, with a single glass-paneled door. Apart from the rod with the hook, and the circular opening to the shaft below, the stone floor was bare.

  “Let’s see where we are,” Sam said, moving to the door. He turned the handle, the door opened smoothly, and Sam walked through. Gerald and Ruby were still getting to their feet when Sam’s cry broke the silence. It sounded like he was having a fit—his breathing was the staccato rattle of a machine gun. Gerald and Ruby bolted through the door. They found him lying on the ground outside the room. His arms were wrapped around his knees, clutching them to his chest. He was shivering and short, tight gasps wracked his lungs. His flashlight lay broken by his feet.

  “Sam!” Gerald dropped to his knees. “What’s the matter?”

  Ruby remained on her feet. She clicked her tongue.

  “Ignore him,” she said, shaking her head.

  “What? But he’s terrified!”

  Ruby bent down and cooed lightly in her brother’s ear, “Sam? Sa-am.” Then, to Gerald’s astonishment, she slapped him hard across the face.

  “Oi! Snap out of it!” Ruby said. “Honestly, it’s pathetic.”

  Sam’s eyes bulged and he continued to take sharp breaths, but the shivering subsided.

  “Ruby! What’d you do that for?” Gerald said. “He’s in shock!”

  “He’s dismal, is what he is.” Ruby stood up and put her hands on her hips. “You saw a rat, didn’t you?” she said accusingly at Sam.

  “B-b-big r-r-rat,” Sam stammered from the floor, extending a shaking finger and pointing across the room. “N-n-nasty hairy th-thing, with p-pointy nose and c-c-claws. Came right n-n-near m-m-me.”

  Ruby rolled her eyes. “To think we’re related.”

  Gerald helped Sam to his feet.

  “Quite a defense mechanism you’ve got there,” he said.

  “Th-th-thanks.”

  They were standing in a large, rectangular room. A barrel-vaulted roof of grimy glass allowed a good view of the moon high above. On either side were tall stone structures, like enormous gray building blocks. At the end was a set of glass doors and through them, at the top of a rise, was Beaconsfield, dark against the night sky.

  “Where are we?” Gerald asked, stepping slowly down the middle of the room.

  “There was a rat, you know,” Sam said, by way of explanation, sticking close to Gerald. “A very big one.”

  “Oh, leave off about the rat, Sam,” Ruby snapped. “We’re sick of hearing about it. All that fuss over a little rodent.” She had Sam’s flashlight and was smacking it into the palm of her hand, trying to get it to work again.

  “Big rodent,” Sam corrected her, holding his hands apart to demonstrate a creature the size of a small dog.

  Ruby let out a loud tsk and smacked the flashlight into her palm again. “There! That’s got it.”

  The torch flickered to life. It splashed light onto one of the stone structures by Ruby’s head. Wedged into the block, a foot from Ruby’s nose, was a human skull. Out of an eye socket writhed a snake, straight at her.

  Ruby’s scream woke every living thing at Beaconsfield.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The knife sliced through the soft pink flesh before hitting the bone beneath.

  Gerald smacked his lips. “This steak is delicious, Mrs. Rutherford.” He stabbed another piece with his fork from the china plate and popped it in his mouth.

  “So is this bacon,” Sam mumbled through stuffed cheeks. “Is there any more?”

  Mrs. Rutherford stacked extra rashers onto Sam’s plate beside some fried tomato and poached eggs.

  “You two have woken with healthy appetites this morning,” she said. “You must have slept well. It’s the country air, you know.”

  Gerald and Sam didn’t dare look at each other. Across the breakfast table, Ruby made heavy going of pouring herself a glass of orange juice.

  “You’re not hungry, Miss Ruby?” Mrs. Rutherford asked, bustling around the table to help her with the juice jug. “Not feeling poorly, are you?”

  Ruby shook her head. “Maybe I’ll have a small bowl of cereal,” she said.

  Ruby was still trying to recover from her encounter with the skull the night before. After the last of her scream drained from her lungs, Gerald had grabbed her by the elbow and dragged her toward the door. “They’re carvings,” he told her as they ran. The flashlight picked up details of other grotesque sculptures in the shadows—more skulls, snakes, howling demons, goblins, and other beasts. They had dashed into the night, the lights of Beaconsfield turning on behind them, the sound of dogs baying in the distance.

  Mrs. Rutherford fussed around the sideboard. “Interesting chatter in the town this morning,” she said, as if thinking out loud. “All manner of talk about a ruckus at Beaconsfield overnight.”

  The sound of cutlery scraping on china came to an abrupt halt. Sam stopped chewing, a sliver of bacon still poking out from his lips. Ruby glanced up, a spoonful of cereal halfway to her mouth. Gerald clutched a knife and fork in either hand by the side of his plate. “Is that right?” he said, in as innocent a voice as he could manage.

  “What sort of ruckus would that be, Mrs. Rutherford?” Ruby asked, ignoring the snickers from Gerald and Sam.

  “In the family crypt, so the butcher tells me. I hear the police are up there this morning having a look around.”

  “A crypt,” Sam said. “That’d be full of some scary things, wouldn’t you think, Ruby?” His sister ignored him.

  “I’ve not seen inside it,” Mrs. Rutherford said. “But I hear tell it’s not for the fainthearted.”

  “I can imagine,” Ruby said, keeping her eyes away from her brother.

  “Mrs. Piggins from the baker’s said there was a break-in. Some sort of midsummer’s pagan ritual, she says. All manner of shrieking and caterwauling going on.”

  Gerald bit his lower lip. “Just a bit of screaming, was there?” Both Sam and Ruby took a sudden interest in the contents of their breakfast plates.

  “She said it was the hippies what done it, but my guess would be local children. Always happens during school holidays.”

  “Sorry, did you say hippies?” Gerald said.

  “Yes. This district has a reputation for ancient magic, and it attracts people who go in for that sort of thing.” Mrs. Rutherford topped up their glasses with orange juice. “This place has been the center of all sorts of myths over time. For one thing, it’s supposed to be the final resting place of the Holy Grail.”

  “The one King Arthur an
d his knights of the round table spent their lives looking for?” Sam asked.

  “The very same. They say taking a sip from that holy cup will bring eternal life. Some people still believe it’s buried around here somewhere. Avonleigh was named after King Arthur’s fabled realm of Avalon.”

  They continued their breakfast in silence. The moment Mrs. Rutherford excused herself to attend to some matters in the kitchen, Sam and Gerald both started talking.

  “D’you think the casket the major’s looking for contains the Holy Grail?” Sam said.

  “It’s got to!” Gerald said. “The major’s getting on. He probably thinks drinking from the cup would mean he’d live forever.”

  “Yeah, and maybe the peak of eternal light is actually something to do with eternal life. What did the major read from that piece of paper? The peak of eternal light will show the way? The way to what?”

  “To how to live forever!” Gerald said.

  Both boys turned to Ruby.

  She sniffed.

  “Bit far-fetched, don’t you think?” she said.

  “Waddya mean?” Sam protested.

  “I mean really—King Arthur and the Holy Grail. Sounds like a story someone made up to get the tourists in.”

  “But it’s a famous legend,” Gerald said. “People have been hunting for that cup for hundreds of years. Heaps of books have been written about it.”

  Ruby laughed. “You’d have to be pretty dim to believe a story like that.”

  “Did I mention that my sister has no imagination? Hey!” A bread roll bounced off Sam’s head.

  “I may have no imagination, but I am a very good shot,” Ruby said with a self-satisfied grin.

  Just then Mrs. Rutherford returned to the dining room.

  “Mr. Fry will be ready to drive you into town in twenty minutes. Master Gerald, you’ll find there aren’t many clothes shops, but you should be able to find something more comfortable.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. Rutherford,” Gerald said. Mr. Prisk’s choice of suits and shirts was quite limiting.

  “You’ll enjoy town. It’s very quaint—lots of old buildings and such. And of course, you’ll climb the Tor.”

  Gerald looked confused.

  “It’s the big hill overlooking Glastonbury,” Mrs. Rutherford explained. “There used to be a church up there. All that’s left now is the tower—St. Michael’s Tower. You can walk up there from the town. See the whole area from the top, right into Beaconsfield.”

  Not for the first time, Gerald gave Mrs. Rutherford a curious look. She seemed to have an eerie sense of knowing what they were thinking. She smiled back at him.

  “This year the Tor’s being used for the midsummer celebrations,” she said. “They’re burning the witch up there, which’ll be nice.”

  “Uh, burning a witch?” Ruby said.

  “That’s right, Miss Ruby. This year’s special because it’s the first time in a hundred years that the moon becomes full on the stroke of midnight on Midsummer’s Eve. There’s normally fireworks and bonfires and the like. The hippies dance around banging drums and having a bit of a singsong. This year they’re strapping a straw dummy to a big wooden wheel, setting it alight, and rolling it down the Tor. It’s an ancient fertility ritual, apparently—meant to make the crops grow tall and strong. This’ll be the first time they’ve done it for years.”

  “Really?” Ruby said. “Why did they stop?”

  “Last time the wheel set Mr. Parson’s barley crop on fire and wiped out half his apple trees.”

  Gerald stifled a laugh. “He can’t have been too happy about that.”

  “No,” said Mrs. Rutherford in a reflective tone. “I expect that’s another reason the hippies aren’t too popular.”

  During the short drive Mr. Fry was even more surly than he’d been the previous day. He pulled up at the start of a winding avenue of shops in the center of the town, and Gerald, Sam, and Ruby piled out of the car.

  “I guess we’ll meet you back here in a couple of hours?” Gerald said. Fry mumbled a response and motored off.

  “He keeps growing on you, doesn’t he?” Ruby said.

  “Yeah,” Sam said. “Like a tumor. Come on, Gerald. Let’s go shopping.”

  The street was starting to fill with an odd mixture of people. There were old ladies wearing old-style dresses and cardigans, despite the warm weather, trundling shopping trolleys and crisscrossing between the grocer, the baker, and the butcher. And there were clusters of young people with dreadlocks, wearing baggy clothes of every color, chatting on the footpaths.

  Sam watched as a man strode past. He had braids in his long beard and a yellow jester’s hat on his head, and he carried a wooden staff with bells and ribbons tied to the top. A bright orange cape billowed from his shoulders. “I take it that’s a hippie, then?” Sam said.

  They crossed the narrow roadway and wandered into the first clothes shop they came to. Gerald flicked through a few racks of assorted shirts and pants.

  “There seems to be a lot of purple velvet, doesn’t there?” he said.

  Ruby shook her head. “And a lot of tie-dyed stuff as well. This might be harder than I thought.”

  After visiting half a dozen other shops and trying on some hilarious combinations of New Age frockery, they emerged with an armful of bags. Gerald wore a standard set of jeans and T-shirt.

  “That feels better!” Gerald said, stuffing the bags into his backpack. He spotted a charity bin in the grounds of a small stone church and dropped Mr. Prisk’s suit inside. “I’m sure someone will appreciate this.”

  Sam clapped his hands together. “How about a walk up the Tor, then?”

  In a few minutes they were well away from the town and wandering along a narrow tree-lined lane. The sun was warm on their faces and a few fluffy white clouds dotted a perfect summer sky.

  Sam read from a pamphlet he’d picked up in one of the shops. “It says here that King Arthur’s grave is in the grounds of Glastonbury Abbey. See, there’s some truth to those old myths.”

  “Oh please!” Ruby scoffed. “The monks at those old abbeys relied on gifts from pilgrims and visitors to survive. You’d ‘discover’ King Arthur’s grave too if it meant more tourists coming to town.”

  “There’s not a poetic bone in your body, is there?” Sam said.

  Ruby opened her mouth to reply, but Gerald interrupted, “Look!”

  Rising before them was the Tor, a lone tower on top like a candle on a birthday cake. The hill was bare of trees, and the grass was cropped short by a flock of sheep.

  The walk to the top didn’t take long, and near the summit, steps cut into the grassy slope made the final climb look easy.

  “Come on,” Sam said. “Race you.”

  They scrambled the final fifty yards to the top and collapsed on a broad stone area at the foot of the tower.

  Catching his breath, Gerald gazed up at the last remains of St. Michael’s Church. The square stone tower was stained with lichen and rose up high above them. With arched windows on each side and topped with a parapet, it was an impressive structure.

  “Now that would be a rotten job,” Sam said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Carting all the stone up the hill to build this thing.”

  They walked through a tall arched doorway at the base of the tower and joined some tourists inside. They looked up to see the tower had no roof—the sky was clear above them. Sun streamed through the windows, illuminating the dust-filled air. Near the top, jutting out of the thick walls, were narrow stone ledges.

  “They must have supported floorboards, I guess,” Gerald said. “You’d get a great view from up there.”

  Back outside they scanned the horizon. The surrounding landscape was a mostly flat patchwork of hedged fields.

  “There it is,” Ruby said, pointing to a spot in the distance. “The house at Beaconsfield.”

  Gerald shaded his eyes and followed Ruby’s extended arm. Sure enough, among the hodgepodge of orchards
and meadows, the distinctive clock tower at Beaconsfield could be seen.

  “Look how flat it is,” Ruby said. “Where on earth would you find a peak of eternal light around here?”

  Sam’s voice carried across to them from the other side of the tower.

  “Check this out.”

  They found Sam on a small grassy terrace on the other side of the hill, about twenty yards down from the base of the tower. He stood by a pile of sticks and branches. Below them, like a trail of ants, a line of people was snaking up from the bottom of the hill, carrying bundles of twigs and larger pieces of wood. Next to the pile was a large wooden wheel, like a cable drum, with what looked like a scarecrow tied to its side.

  “Meet the witch!” Sam grinned.

  Gerald stooped down and picked up a bucket, half full of thick black goo.

  “They’ve covered it with pitch,” he said. “This stuff will go off like a bomb when they light it.”

  Gerald, Sam, and Ruby watched the procession of colorfully dressed people carrying the wood up the hill, and joined the trail when it turned back toward town.

  Then, out of nowhere, Ruby said, “Why would anyone have a secret passage to a crypt?” She shivered at the memory of the night before.

  “Been weighing on your mind, has it?” Gerald chuckled. “I’m still trying to figure out why my family crest was in there.”

  They reached the spot where Mr. Fry had dropped them earlier that morning. Sam checked his watch.

  “Still a bit before we get picked up. What do you wanna do to kill time?”

  Gerald spotted a lane lined with small boutiques.

  “What say we take a look down—”

  Gerald stopped midsentence. He was staring at a girl walking up the lane toward them.

  “You!” Gerald said in amazement.

  Alisha Gupta looked at Gerald. She was dressed in designer jeans and top, a line of shopping bags strung up one arm, and a pair of large sunglasses on her head. She looked nothing like the demure daughter that they’d seen by her father’s side at the museum.