“Thanks ever so much, Pip.Now.Let’s try to be sensible about this.”Her mind ran over the day.“A lot of the apples from the winter-store for the gwiberary went missing yesterday.I thought it might be the twins again, but what if some poor vagrant got into it?”
“No one breaks into stately homes forapples, Una!“ Pip objected.
“Didit sound like an apple to you?”
“Oh.I suppose it did,” said Pip slowly.“Look here.Does it really matter if someone nabs the silver, or whatnot?Can’t the squire replace it?What if we just hole up here until it’s light?”
Una stared at him in horror.
Pip turned red.“I won’t tell if you don’t, and after all, if you’re really my aunt, how could anyone object to it…”
“It’s not aboutpropriety, Pip!“ Una burst out.“And goodness knows I’d as soon share a room with you as my own brother—more so!But I’m not about to risk losing the muncher!”
Una shuddered at the thought.She’d already failed to stop one intruder looting the abbey—two in as many nights was simply too much to bear.
Pip’s eyes narrowed.“Youarescared.”
“I’m scared of never sleeping again,” she replied, pulling her boots on.“Wouldn’t you be, too?With a fruit-stealing phantom on the loose—hiding by day, crunching away by night?Absolutely not.Why, it’s worse than the old Bleeding Monk that Martha used to talk about.At least his bleeding didn’t make a sound to keep you awake.”
Una finished tying her laces and looked at Pip.
“I’m glad you’re here, Pip,” she admitted softly.“I’d be ever so scared if you weren’t.”
Pip looked embarrassed.Una went to the old toy chest and drew something out.“Arm yourself, Pip!”she said grimly.
“That’s a play sword, Una.”
“I know, but it gave me a goose egg on my head back in the day, when Violetwouldplay Richard the Lionheart, and made me play Saladin.Me, of all people!”
Pip laughed despite himself.“She tried to make me do it, you know.She said I was the only one swarthy enough to play a Saracen,” he recalled, taking the toy sabre and waving it about to test it.“I think I was much better at running away from her than you were.”
They looked at each other for a moment.
“You never speak of her,” Pip said, as if he’d noticed for the first time.
“What’s the use?”Una said, exhaling.“It was Violet who was the best of all of us at running away, in the end.I just hope she’s happy—wherever she is—now that she’s got away from all of us.”Una stood and tied her shawl round her firmly, fastening her dragon-keeper’s belt round her waist and tucking the shawl into it.“Let’s go.”
They went systematically through each room, casting the light of their lamps into every corner, Oolong padding along at their feet.
But they found nothing.
One or two times they thought they heard an extra patter on the floorboards or a step on the stair, always beyond the reach of the lamplight.
“The Bleeding Monk,” they would whisper to each other, and snort with laughter, and then pinch each other to stop laughing.
“Have we done our duty yet?”Pip asked with a yawn.
“Almost.I want to check the glasshouse.”
Una knew she would sleep better if she could find him.
Pip let out a groan, then followed her.The downstairs door to the glasshouse stood ever so slightly open.
Una and Pip looked at each other.
“Perhaps they forgot to lock up,” Pip whispered.
But they both knew it wasn’t that.
