Beware the Clopper! Read online

  VIKING

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street

  New York, New York 10014

  First published in the United States of America by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2016

  Text copyright © 2016 by John Bemelmans Marciano

  Illustrations copyright © 2016 by Sophie Blackall

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  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA IS AVAILABLE.

  eBook ISBN: 9780698175457

  Version_1

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  OPENING NOTE

  MAP OF BENEVENTO

  THE WITCHES OF BENEVENTO

  1 Too Slow

  2 Life with Daddy

  3 A Bad Omen

  4 A Short Chapter Which Leaves Everyone Hungry

  5 Laundry Day

  6 The Fire

  7 Curiosity

  8 The Most Amazing Thing Yet!

  9 The Home of the Clopper

  10 The Tale of Maria Beppina

  11 Party Time

  CLOSING NOTE

  WITCHONARY

  HOW THEY LIVED

  HISTORICAL NOTE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR AND ILLUSTRATOR

  They say that there are no curious children in Benevento. There can’t be, for a curious child would never last long here.

  In Benevento, danger lurks at every turn, from mischiefing Janara to grabby Manalonga, from evil spirits who lurk in archways to demons—such as myself and my friends here—who hide in animal form.

  And then . . . there’s the CLOPPER!

  The Clopper lurks in the remains of the ancient Roman Theater, chasing children who dare to cross it. Some say she’s a Janara trapped outside of her body, others that she is a goddess whose powers have fizzled, and still others that she’s an old lady made crazy by the loss of her baby countless moons ago. (I know the truth, but I’ll never tell!)

  To avoid the many dangers of Benevento, children must learn to say their spells, make the correct offerings, and know when to run. Just as you won’t get hit if you look both ways before crossing the street, witches shouldn’t bother you so long as you follow the rules.

  But . . . what happens when the rules start to change? Or you can’t run fast enough? Or—most dangerous of all— you start to get CURIOUS.

  YOUR CONSTANT FRIEND,

  SIGISMONDO

  (WITH BRUNO AND RAFAELLA)

  1

  TOO SLOW

  “ARE you guys ready?” Primo says.

  Right now, all the kids are at the edge of the open courtyard of the Theater, bracing themselves for a race with the Clopper. Maria Beppina has a lump in her throat.

  This is the worst part of her day.

  Maria Beppina is always the last kid to make it through the Theater. She is the slowest kid in the Triggio, and she’s afraid that one day the Clopper is going to get her.

  None of the other witches in town bother Maria Beppina. The reason is that she is excellent at following rules.

  Maria Beppina always keeps to the middle of bridges and sings LA-la-la-la-LA! at the top of her lungs, and never once has she heard the voice of a Manalonga. She hangs salt on her door every night, even though Janara rarely do mischiefs inside the town walls. She not only gives the horns and spits when she walks through the arch but holds her breath too, lest she inhale any bad magic from Malefix, the nasty spirit who lives there.

  The problem with the Clopper is that avoiding her has nothing to do with following rules. It is a test of physical ability. And when it comes to stuff like that, Maria Beppina isn’t excellent at all.

  “Let’s do it!” Primo shouts, and all the kids take off racing, giggling and laughing as they go. Already, Maria Beppina is behind.

  Her dad doesn’t believe that witches exist. He thinks to get by in life you just need to read books and be smart. He doesn’t understand that sometimes you have to be strong. Or fast.

  The other kids are getting farther and farther ahead. Maria Beppina feels like she is almost caught.

  Not only is the sound of the one wooden shoe of the witch getting louder—she can feel the Clopper’s breath on her neck!

  Maria Beppina can see that Rosa is already to the other side. Primo is just a couple of steps behind her, like always. But now Emilio and Sergio are across too, and she’s still running.

  “Come on, Maria Beppina!” Sergio yells.

  ClopclopclopCLOPCLOPCLOP!

  Finally, Maria Beppina makes it to the safety of the other side. It is like waking from a nightmare to realize you are safe in bed. She feels a stitch in her side like a needle in her ribs. All the kids are huffing and puffing, hands on their knees. Well, all the kids except Rosa.

  “If you don’t watch out,” Primo says to Maria Beppina, “the Clopper’s gonna get you!”

  “What would—huff huff—happen if—huff huff—she did?” Maria Beppina says.

  Everybody laughs. “Nobody’s ever been caught by the Clopper!” Primo says, mocking her.

  “It’s true,” Emilio agrees, as a point of fact.

  Maria Beppina would blush, but her face is already so red from running it can’t get redder.

  “But what would happen?” Sergio says. “Would she strangle you? Would she drag you down to the Underworld like a Manalonga and turn you into her servant? Would she roast you on a spit and eat you?”

  No one knows, not even Emilio. And no one wants to find out, either.

  Maria Beppina, however, can’t sleep all night. This isn’t because of the mischiefs of any Janara, but from something even more unsettling: curiosity.

  2

  LIFE WITH DADDY

  THE Metamorphoses . . . Orlando Furioso . . . The Odyssey . . .

  Maria Beppina puts down the feather duster and sneezes. Her father says, “Salute,” which means “health.”

  “Daddy, do we really need to dust all these books?”

  “I think your sneeze answers that question,” Daddy says, not looking up from the map he is working on.

  What she really wants to say is, Daddy, do we really need all these books? It makes everyone in the Triggio think they’re weird. None of Maria Beppina’s friends even know how to read, and not their parents either. Bad enough that her father surveys land and draws maps, and even worse that he’s from Naples. It makes them like foreigners here.

  Maria Beppina opens a shutter, and immediately gets carried away on the smell of the air. It’s such a beautiful day outside! Not a cloud in the sky.

  “Close that shutter!” Daddy says. “I don’t want the wind blowing my papers around.”

  “There’s no breeze,” Maria Beppina says under her breath as she closes the window. She then cracks it back open quietly, just a bit.

  She wishes she could be outdoors like her friends. Maria Beppina understands that she has to do the household chores—there are only the two of them, after all—but to also have to do reading and math and history lessons, it’s not fair! Her friends and cousins all work, but doing fun things. Outside things.

  Today could have
been different. Today the Twins asked her to help on the farm. All the kids went to help, and all the parents let them. Except hers.

  For days, the Janara have been doing mischiefs at the Twins’—everyone is talking about it—but today’s was the worst. All the tiles got blown off the barn roof last night and scattered into the fields.

  It’s crazy! Janara never go that far. But what’s really unsettling is that it’s too early for Mischief Season. And it isn’t just at the Twins’ farm, either—it’s all across the countryside.

  Maria Beppina doesn’t like it, not one bit. There are rules that even witches are supposed to live by. If the rules aren’t followed, how can anyone ever feel safe?

  “Can I please go now?” Maria Beppina says. “I finished everything.”

  “Yes, yes, you can go,” Daddy says, still not looking up.

  Maria Beppina opens the door and feels several large, fat drops of rain fall on her. By the time she gets to the bottom of the stairs she has to run right back up—it’s a storm. How is that possible? It was the perfect day just a minute ago!

  “The window!” Daddy says, holding his papers down as his eyeglasses fall off his nose. “The blasted window! When I tell you to shut it I mean lock it!”

  Maria Beppina closes the wind-blown shutters, getting her face drenched in the process. She’s disappointed at not getting to go to the Twins’, but also worried. Does this sudden storm have anything to do with the early Mischief Season? And when the Clopper almost caught her the other day, was that part of it too?

  “Don’t you think it’s strange,” she says, “that the weather would change all at once?”

  “It’s spring,” Daddy says. “That’s what happens in spring.”

  “People say that when the weather changes like this it’s because of Janara.”

  Daddy drops his compass and finally looks up from his map. “How many times have I told you not to listen to that nonsense! Witches don’t exist! That everyone here believes in them only goes to show how small-minded and superstitious and stupid the people who live in this town are.”

  “But how can you deny it?” Maria Beppina says. “The farmers are all going crazy with the mischiefs—they say it’s the worst Janara Season ever! And Sergio has a ghost living upstairs that he has to spend half the day taking care of!”

  “Have you ever seen this ghost?”

  “Well, no,” Maria Beppina says. “Only he can.”

  “Sergio.” Her dad shakes his head, looking in the direction of his house, right across the alley. “That is one strange boy. . . .”

  “Well, I hear the clopping of the Clopper every time I run through the Theater,” Maria Beppina says. “The other day she almost caught me!”

  “You know who built that theater, don’t you?”

  Maria Beppina groans inside, because she knows what’s coming next. The Romans.

  “The Romans built that theater! Almost two thousand years ago, and look at it! Still standing.” Daddy raises a triumphant finger in the air. “That’s engineering! That’s Science!”

  “How can you know everything the Romans did two thousand years ago,” Maria Beppina says, “but have no idea what’s happening to the people around you right here, right now?”

  “Trust me, Maria Beppina. There is nothing that happens that cannot be explained by Science.”

  “But even you think that the rooster who belongs to the blacksmith is a demon.”

  “Now that is true,” her dad says. “That blasted rooster! He jumped on my shoulder and practically pecked a hole in my head yesterday. I can hardly go outside!”

  Maria Beppina is about to ask her father how Science can explain a demon taking the form of a rooster, but she never gets the chance.

  3

  A BAD OMEN

  TOC TOC

  Maria Beppina knows that knock. It’s Primo. She opens the door to her cousin standing there, getting soaked in the pouring rain.

  “Dinner,” he says. “Eel.”

  “Hey, Primo, how was . . .” She was going to finish the sentence “. . . putting the roof back on the Twins’ barn?” but her cousin is already splashing his way back downstairs.

  Maria Beppina feels her face burn. She and her dad live upstairs from her cousins. On the one hand, it’s great, because Maria Beppina gets to be a part of their family. On the other hand, she’s not a part of their family—not totally.

  Maria Beppina sneaks away without her dad noticing she’s barefoot (she’s the only kid who has to wear shoes) and rushes down the stairs into the driving, deafening rain. She fast opens the door to her cousins’ and—

  “NO!” Primo’s entire family yells.

  She feels something slimy pass over her bare foot. It is the grossest, yuckiest feeling she has ever had to feel. Maria Beppina looks down and sees a fat black eel, its tail now slithering over her toes and the rest of it out the door.

  The next moment, Primo is pushing past her, and she slips and falls against the door to the ground, tripping Isidora and holding up the rest of the family.

  “Get out of the way! Dinner is on the loose!”

  Butt soaked, Maria Beppina gets herself up, and does her best to race after everyone, but even Primo’s grandmother is faster than she is.

  Maria Beppina feels dumb and embarrassed. Please, oh please, let Primo catch that eel!

  But he doesn’t.

  The eel swims through the flooded streets all the way to the Cemetery of Dead Babies. Maria Beppina can’t see what’s going on, but she hears Primo’s family all yelling at him, “Go get it!”

  He waits too long and the eel slithers down the well in front of the cemetery chapel.

  Everyone turns on each other—Aunt Zufia blames Uncle Mimì, Uncle Mimì blames Aunt Zufia, Isidora blames Primo—but all Maria Beppina hears is Primo blame her for opening the door.

  They all start back toward home, and Maria Beppina is glad at least for the rain, so no one can see her tears.

  4

  A SHORT CHAPTER WHICH LEAVES EVERYONE HUNGRY

  DINNER is slim pickings. The kids scour the bottom of the pasta barrel for every last broken strand of spaghetti, and dream about the eel meal that could have been. Gloomying the mood further is Primo’s momma, who is still mad at his poppa. Uncle Mimì, however, is never gloomy.

  “So long as I have my maccheroni, I am a happy man,” Uncle Mimì says, holding some long, stringy noodles above his mouth and slurping them down. “No king could be happier!”

  “Why did you bother getting the eel, then?” Aunt Zufia grumbles.

  “Momma, can I have more?” Primo says.

  “There is no more!”

  “What about that plate?” he says, pointing.

  “That’s for your uncle,” Aunt Zufia says, meaning Maria Beppina’s dad. “You can have bread if you’re still hungry.”

  “But it’s as hard as a rock!” Primo says.

  “Then soak it in some water.”

  Primo makes a face and cleans his plate with a finger.

  Primo’s sister Isidora starts clearing the table, and Maria Beppina helps her. In the meantime, Nonna Jovanna keeps talking about what just happened.

  “Forget your hunger! That eel! That eel is the worst sign I have ever seen!” she says, gripping the red-chili-pepper charm on her necklace. It wards off the evil spirits that might be angry at her for talking about this. “A fish that swims in the streets! What will it be next? Manalonga in the trees?”

  Maria Beppina’s aunt and uncle just roll their eyes whenever Nonna Jovanna gets like this. They believe in witches of course—only her dad doesn’t—but Nonna Jovanna is always finding the worst signs in anything that is the least bit out of the ordinary. But still, there’s something about her bug-eyed gaze tonight that spooks Maria Beppina.

  Primo brings a bunch of dishes to the tub to
wash. He never does that.

  “Psst!” he whispers to Maria Beppina. “I have to tell you something!”

  “What is it?” she whispers back.

  “I saw a Manalonga!” he says. “In the well. That’s why I didn’t grab the eel. It was talking to me. It even reached up to grab me!” He drops the plates in with a clink and a splash. “I’m almost sure it did!”

  “Here, Maria Beppina,” Aunt Zufia says, handing her the plate with the last few strands of maccheroni on it. “Bring this up to your father.”

  The rain has broken into a drizzle, which Maria Beppina doesn’t mind. What she does mind is that something strange is going on. Nonna Jovanna was right about the eel being a bad sign. It was leading Primo to a Mana- longa! Just the thought of it gives Maria Beppina goosebumps.

  If only her father were right, about there being no such thing as witches.

  But he’s not.

  5

  LAUNDRY DAY

  TOC TOC

  Maria Beppina is just finishing putting the laundry into a sack when she hears Primo’s knock.

  “Hey, cousin!” Primo says, sounding unusually happy to see Maria Beppina.

  He walks right past her to Daddy’s stacks of books. “So, what do you know about augurs?” he says, staring at the books like a flock of strange birds he’s never seen before.

  “I’ve heard my dad talk about them,” she says. “How Roman priests would read the insides of animals and stuff.” Skeevo, she thinks.

  “You know all the weird things that have been going on? Well, I bet we can figure out why it’s all happening if we augur an animal or two.” Primo points at the stacks. “Do you think your dad has a book about it?”