Phantom Horse 3: Phantom Horse Disappears Read online

  I led Phantom out, mounted, and rode into one of the small fields where I had marked out a school with boulders. I trotted round and round, circling, changing the rein, doing shoulder in. I cantered. I halted. I reined back. But I kept seeing Fiona standing in the doorway in her white nightie saying, “Why couldn’t you leave things as they were?” Then I observed Cousin Mary watching me over the gate.

  “He’s very beautiful,” she called. “Did you have a good breakfast? Did Fiona look after you all right? I had to go shopping.”

  “Yes, thank you,” I answered, though, of course, Fiona had not looked after me. “Isn’t it a wonderful day?”

  “We’ll go out this afternoon after an early lunch. We’ll go to Pearse’s cottage. It’s quite a way, so don’t be long,” she called.

  The sun was really up now and shone warmly on my back. I jumped Phantom over a wall, then another and another until we were in the hills riding towards the gorse on the top. Sheep watched us from behind boulders. Ammunition, I thought. Why would anyone want it here?

  The ground was wet underfoot. Phantom picked his way carefully. He shied at an old shoe lying in a bog and danced sideways. He threw his head about and I knew he wanted a wide open space – a chance to stretch himself.

  Presently I turned homewards. Angus was waiting for me in the yard. “Hurry up,” he called. “Lunch is waiting.”

  “I ought to clean my tack,” I replied.

  “You can’t. We’re going out. It’s going to take hours to get there and hours to get back.”

  “We’re going to Pearse’s cottage,” I replied. “How did you know?”

  “Cousin Mary told me.”

  “ Who was Pearse?” I asked.

  “He fought the British.”

  “Oh no!” I exclaimed. “Did we kill him?”

  “I expect so … ”

  Angus helped me untack Phantom. “How was your fishing?”

  “Nothing much. I went with some local boys, but they had to go to school after a bit. Apparently Fiona’s father and grandfather both grew up here.”

  “Where is her father?”

  “In the United States.”

  “Does he ever come back?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  We were walking towards the house now. Lunch was on the table. Fiona was wearing a striped summer dress and sat staring out of the window.

  “Did you have a good ride? I saw you in the hills,” said Cousin Mary. “There are a lot of bogs up there, so be careful.”

  “I will,” I promised. “I try to stick to the paths.”

  “And don’t go too far; if a fog comes down you can’t see a thing. People have perished out there,” continued Cousin Mary.

  Lunch was soon over. Because Angus insisted on it I changed into a dress and he put on clean jeans and a striped shirt. Cousin Mary brought the car round to the front door. The dogs watched us leave with disappointed faces. Their names were Connelly – Connie for short – and Sean.

  It was a long drive. England seemed far away. When we reached the cottage we found it staring at the hills. The doors were locked and there was no one to show us round. We seemed to have come a long way for very little, but it was very peaceful. Nothing seemed to move.

  There were wild donkeys on the hills and turf-cutters were drinking tea out of flasks. Fiona hardly spoke on the trip home and when she did she looked out of the window. I could think of nothing to say, but Angus made jokes, telling Cousin Mary about his exams and about Mr Bone whom everyone called Skeleton, and then about Aunt Nina’s hats. Cousin Mary laughed and said that she would miss us no end when we had gone.

  When we reached home there were some bits of cardboard blowing about the yard and tyre marks on the gravel, but no one seemed to notice or, if they did, they made no comment. Donnie O’Reagan had just finished lunging a magnificent grey in the paddock behind his house.

  Later on, Angus and I wandered round to the stables and, having said goodnight to Phantom, we watched Donnie leading in the grey.

  “He’s beautiful, isn’t he? I wouldn’t grow out of him, not in a hundred years. But I bet he’s worth a packet!” Angus exclaimed.

  The horse had the sort of head that pulls at your heart strings. His eye was large, his cheek broad, his nose tapering. His neck was a little short of muscle, but that would come. He had plenty of heart room, a long sloping shoulder, a well-set-on tail and magnificent quarters. His hoofs were round, his pasterns sloping. He had a long, low stride and he went quietly and confidently like someone who knows where he’s going. Angus’s eyes had gone all glassy. He had fallen for the horse completely. I knew the feeling. I had felt the same over Phantom.

  “How much?” he asked. “How much do you want for him, Donnie?” Anxiety and excitement were in his voice, fairly mixed.

  “I wouldn’t be knowing. Four thousand, five …” Donnie O’Reagan waved his arm upwards as though the sky was the limit and I saw the hope disappear from Angus’s face.

  “I shall never get a horse,” he muttered, “I know I shan’t.” I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  “He may go to America,” Donnie O’Reagan said. “There’s a man coming over next month. He always visits me. He’s a real horseman, you understand.”

  I understood. The grey would do well in Virginia where they like big horses.

  We went slowly towards the house. “Tomorrow we move into action,” said my brother. “We will have the whole day to ourselves.”

  “But what can we do?” I asked. “Why can’t we just let things drift? The ammunition isn’t harming anyone.”

  My brother stared at me as though I were mad. “Haven’t you ever heard of gun-running?” he asked. “Don’t you realise what harm all these guns and ammunition could do?”

  “Of course. But they’re not harming anyone at the moment, are they?” I argued.

  “They could kill hundreds of innocent people. We can’t just leave them there,” cried Angus. “Have you no conscience?”

  “Don’t do anything until I’ve written to Dad for advice,” I said, as we entered the house.

  “That will take far too long,” cried Angus. “We can’t wait. We must act before anything awful happens …”

  I knew I couldn’t change his mind. He was too impatient to wait. For him everything must be cut-and-dried.

  “Well, I shall think about it all night,” he continued, as though he were making a concession. “And by tomorrow morning I shall know what to do.”

  Fiona opened the kitchen door to call “Suppertime!”

  “She’s been listening,” I muttered.

  “She can’t have heard. The door was shut and we weren’t talking loudly,” replied Angus in a hushed voice.

  “But our voices are loud, everyone says so.” I was afraid now. “Please don’t do anything yet,” I pleaded. “Let’s tell Cousin Mary what we’ve discovered.”

  We were passing through the dining room towards the kitchen and we both automatically fell silent. I looked around me and again I had the feeling that time was running out. I wished that I could control Angus somehow. I wanted to make him look before he leaped into goodness knows what disaster.

  After supper and the washing-up I knocked on his bedroom door and went inside.

  “Don’t do anything until you’ve spoken to Cousin Mary,” I implored him. “Don’t tell the police. She might go to prison.”

  “The ammunition is there to kill someone,” replied Angus. “And it isn’t army ammunition, because this isn’t an army dump. Anyway, I don’t know what I’m going to do yet. Most likely I shall visit the attic again tomorrow, so don’t panic.”

  I returned to my room and wrote a long letter to Mum and Dad, telling them everything. I covered four large pages on both sides and put Cousin Mary’s telephone number at the bottom. It was the longest letter I have ever written. I put it in an envelope and wrote airmail in one corner. Afterwards, I felt much better.

  It was nearly midnight by the time I h
ad finished. I thought, Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, until the last moment of recorded time. We had been doing Macbeth at school.

  I thought of the grey and how he would suit Angus if we ever had enough money to buy him. I thought of Phantom’s outstanding beauty, and how he was really more suited to a film set in California than the rough hills outside. Sleep wouldn’t come. Gradually I started to fear everything: the shadows in the room, Fiona. I imagined Dad kidnapped, gagged and tied to a chair, Mum dying of cholera, Angus riding into an ambush, and then, without warning I fell asleep as the roosters started to proclaim a new day.

  7

  I wakened to find Fiona standing beside my bed. She was dressed for Dublin in a cotton dress, white sandals and a cardigan. “We are going now,” she said. “Breakfast is on the table. Mrs O’Flattery will wash it up and make the beds. She is a very competent woman.”

  I rubbed the sleep from my eyes. Fiona was not looking at me. “And I should leave well alone, truly I would,” she added, staring through the window at the sky outside.

  “Thank you. I’m sorry I overslept.”

  She shut the door behind her and presently I heard the sound of a car going away down the drive. Angus met me in the passage. “They’ve gone,” he said unnecessarily. “We’ve got the whole day to ourselves.”

  “Why don’t we go for a picnic? You can have Peppermint. We can ride right over the hills and it would do Phantom good. He’s not getting enough exercise.”

  “I’ll think about it,” replied Angus. “The key to the attic has disappeared from under the stairs – I suppose Fiona has hidden it somewhere. Now why should a prospective nun be mixed up with gun-running?”

  “Let’s enjoy ourselves, just for today,” I pleaded.

  But I have never been able to influence Angus and today was no exception. He hurried in to breakfast, whistling in an infuriating way which made me want to throw the salt-cellar at him. “Fantastic! Scrambled eggs. They’re a bit watery on top and lukewarm, but otherwise smashing,” he cried, taking three-quarters for himself.

  “You’re the most selfish person I ever met,” I answered. “Look at your helping.”

  “Boys need more than girls.”

  “That’s what you think.”

  Suddenly I hated him. “You spoil everything,” I shouted. “You just want Cousin Mary to go to prison. As long as you get your way you don’t care what happens to anyone else.”

  “Oh shut up, pieface,” replied Angus, helping himself to toast. “You’re a coward, that’s your trouble.”

  “I’m not, and you know it,” I shouted. “Who got you down that mountain in Virginia when you were lying unconscious?”

  “That wasn’t anything. Anyway, the men carried me down,” replied Angus, pouring himself two cups of milk, one after another. “It’s all right, I’ve left some for you,” he added. “And now I’m going out for a ride. I’m going to look for some geological specimens and do some thinking. And I don’t want you, you’re much too cross.”

  “Thank you very much. I wouldn’t go with you if you went down on your knees and begged me,” I cried. “And you’ve only left me a thimbleful of milk. Look!”

  “That’s your hard luck,” replied Angus, leaving the table. “First come, first served – that’s my motto.”

  “I’ve written to Mum and Dad. I’ve told them everything, so they will know whom to blame if things go wrong.”

  “Thank you, that’s very noble of you,” replied Angus sarcastically.

  “You’re supposed to take your dirty dishes to the kitchen,” I added as he strode out of the room, his hands deep in his pockets, looking suddenly like a younger version of Dad. “I’m not taking them.”

  “They can stay there, then,” shouted Angus, laughing.

  I cleared the table and was still hating him when I went upstairs to fetch my letter. But it wasn’t there. I stared at the table where I had put it, then I went through all my pockets. After that I looked on the hall table and all over the dining room. It was not addressed, so no one would have posted it – either Fiona or Angus must have taken it, but which?

  Mrs O’Flattery had arrived by this time. She put an arm round me and asked how I was liking Ireland, and said that England was a terrible place these days with murders every hour. We chatted for a bit and then I went down the drive to the stables where I found Donnie O’Reagan grooming Phantom.

  “Let me,” I said. “Honestly.”

  “Your brother has been gone thirty minutes or more,” he said in his soft Irish voice. “He will be waiting for you no doubt.”

  “I’m not going with him,” I replied. “He wants to be alone.”

  Donnie O’Reagan shook his head and handed me the brush he was using. “The Pony Club meets over the hill next week,” he told me. “You can go if you like.”

  “That’s a great idea,” I answered. “Do they mind visitors?”

  “You would be welcome, I’m sure of that.”

  I groomed Phantom for ages; there seemed nothing else to do. When I led him out of the stable at last there was a light drizzle falling which hid the hills from view. I schooled Phantom in spite of the rain. Slowly a mist descended. Angus will be back soon, I thought, and I shan’t speak to him, not a word.

  I hacked Phantom up the road and back, and when I put him away Angus still hadn’t come home. Mrs O’Flattery was just leaving when I went inside. “I’ve put your dinner ready for you,” she said. “It’s only something cold.”

  “Thank you very much.”

  “You’re welcome. You will be all right now, won’t you?” she asked.

  “Of course.”

  The house felt empty when she had gone. I stood at the window staring at the falling rain. It’s just like Angus to be late, I thought. If I was selfish I would begin lunch. I would eat all the best bits. But two wrongs don’t make a right, so I’ll wait. I found a newspaper and started to read, but I couldn’t concentrate. I stood up and looked out again.

  The hills were blanketed in rain. And where was Angus? The first pangs of anxiety started to gnaw. He can’t still be gathering stones, I thought, not in the rain. He’s not that keen. The dogs watched my face. They were lonely too. I started to walk about the house and they followed me from room to room with dismal faces.

  It’s just a terrible day, I thought. First there was breakfast, then my letter disappearing and now this. I would have given anything to hear Angus coming in. I looked at lunch. There were a few over-cooked potatoes, ham salad, and a bowl of stewed gooseberries; but I wasn’t hungry. I looked out of the window again and the landscape seemed to mock me. The clock in the hall said twenty to two … My knees started to feel weak and I could hear my heart thumping against my ribs. I’ll eat something to give me strength, I thought, and then I will saddle Phantom and go out and look for him. I won’t get lost because Phantom will know the way back. I forced myself to eat some ham and salad. The rain was coming down in torrents.

  I shut my eyes and prayed, “Please God let him be coming along the drive now. Let him be all right.” I opened them, expecting a miracle, but the drive was still empty. I fetched my waterproof jacket from upstairs and the dogs followed. Never had the house seemed so gloomy, so remote and forgotten.

  “You can’t come,” I told the dogs. “Can’t you see it’s raining? Cousin Mary and Fiona will be back soon, God willing.” I heard footsteps on the drive and rushed to the front door, but it was only one of the O’Reagan children with a mackintosh over his head.

  “The horse is back,” he shouted.

  “What?” I cried stupidly. “What horse?” “Your brother’s horse. He’s come back on his own. He’s in the stable.”

  I slammed the front door and ran towards the stable. My heart was like a sledge-hammer banging against my ribs. “I knew something awful had happened,” I cried. “What shall I do?”

  But the child did not know. “Father’s not at home,” he said, “Mother se
nt me.”

  “I will go up on the hills on my horse,” I answered.

  “They are awful wild.”

  “I know.”

  Mrs O’Reagan was in the yard holding Peppermint. “I don’t know how to take his tackle off,” she said.

  She was soaking wet. “The little one is ill,” she said. “I can’t stay. He’s awfully bad. We will be seeing Dr O’Sullivan any minute now. He will make him better, please God.”

  I took hold of Peppermint. His reins were broken and one stirrup and leather were missing.

  “He needs a rub down,” I said, but Mrs O’Reagan had left already with the boy to wait the arrival of Dr O’Sullivan. I felt terribly alone. I took off Peppermint’s tack and rubbed him as quickly as I could with a cloth. Then I fetched Phantom’s tack from the saddle room. All the time I was trying not to think too hard, trying not to let my imagination work, trying not to panic. Meanwhile, the rain kept falling, bucketful after bucketful, onto the wild, brown hills.

  Phantom opened his mouth and took the bit. I knew he would go in spite of the rain, and go till he dropped. I led him out, mounted and turned his head to the hills. Now that I was in the saddle, hope started to come back. Angus might be sheltering behind a rock, I thought, or have reached a road and be walking home.

  The priest had arrived on a bicycle And he went into the O’Reagans’ cottage, soon to be followed by a doctor carrying a case.

  I wish Cousin Mary was at home, I thought. I wish we had gone to Dublin with them. Nothing can be worse than this. The rain smacked against my face. There was nothing to be seen on the hills. They seemed to go on and on for ever, to be as endless as a rain-soaked sea. Phantom’s hoofs squelched in the peaty earth. It was difficult to ride fast. Every few minutes I stopped to call, “Angus, where are you? Angus!” And nothing answered, nothing at all.