Free Christmas Tales of Terror by Chris Priestley Page A

emerged. Her heart clenched like a fist and she slumped across Theresa, who was screaming now herself as she woke to find herself looking into her cousin’s frozen, staring face.
     
    One day, many years later, Uncle Gregory arrived at his sister’s house to tell Elizabeth’s parents he had received a letter from his lawyer enclosing some rather interesting papers concerning Farthing Lodge.
    Uncle Gregory showed them letters and clippings detailing the sorry tragedy of a climbing boy who died at the house in the 1780s.
    A cruel and barbarous sweep – a common enough character in those less enlightened times – had tried to force the poor boy higher up the chimney, until the little fellow slipped, breaking his neck on a ledge and becoming jammed as he fell. According to the papers, he was dead by the time they prised him free and dragged him out.
    Elizabeth’s parents did not need to ask in which chimney the fatality was reported to have taken place.
    Farthing Lodge had been put on the market not long after the incident with Elizabeth – though, many years on, a buyer was still to be found. Theresa had refused to sleep there after that terrifying night.
    Elizabeth herself was never told about the sweep or the boy. There seemed little point. She had ceased to speak after that night, and had retreated into a world of her own. She would spend hours making jigsaws alone in her room, living in a self-imposed silence.
    Elizabeth was, in fact, a perfect picture of calm and peace. Unless, that is, she saw the smallest speck of soot. Oh, the screams there would be then!

7
    The Last Present
     
    Miranda Butler yawned. She had forgotten how tiring the present-giving part of Christmas morning was. It was lovely to receive presents, but frightfully boring to have to wait patiently while other people opened theirs.
    ‘There’s one last present here that doesn’t have a name on it,’ said her brother, Ralph, as he crawled out from under the Christmas tree.
    ‘Does anyone recognise it?’ said Miranda’s mother.
    The present was poorly wrapped, the cheap paper not quite being held in place by some crudely knotted string. Blank faces greeted the question.
    ‘I think one of the servants must have put it there, then,’ said Miranda’s mother, putting a hand to her heart and smiling. ‘Gladys, perhaps. How sweet.’
    Miranda smiled as she saw her father roll his eyes.
    ‘Who’s going to open it, then?’ said Ralph.
    ‘Well, I suppose you should as you’re holding it,’ said his father.
    Ralph grinned and pulled the string and paper away and set the present down on the rug. It was a toy drummer boy, standing about a foot high. He wore a shirt with horizontal navy blue and white stripes, a pair of white trousers and a straw boater hat with a red band around it. The costume was grubby and stained, the hat rather battered.
    The drum was carried on a strap that looped over the boy’s shoulder and under his arm, and he held a drumstick in each hand. The drum was large and hung at an angle. It had a painting of a sailing ship on the side.
    The drummer boy was not at all attractive. His eyes were rather too real, staring in a frozen expression of wildness utterly out of keeping with his gloomy, downturned, red-painted mouth. The rest of his face was white, except for two large dots of red on his cheeks.
    ‘Well!’ said Miranda’s mother. ‘What an ugly fellow!’
    Miranda stared at it in confusion.
    ‘What is it, dear?’ asked her grandmother. ‘I can’t see.’
    ‘It’s a toy,’ said Miranda’s mother, grimacing. ‘Some sort of drummer boy.’
    Miranda frowned. She had seen that drummer boy before; she was sure of it. Several days earlier, a pedlar had visited their home. She had thought it was a man when she came round the corner of the house with Ginny, their wolfhound. Ginny had barked furiously, making the figure turn at their approach.
    The pedlar was horrible and filthy, dressed in a huge overcoat that looked