Free Soul Stealer by Martin Booth Page A

replied, “the other side of Foxhanger Hill. I live there with my mother’s cousin.”
    Tim and Pip exchanged a glance. They had suspected there might have been an ulterior motive to the invitation to supper but
     had not expected as thorough a grilling as the bacon slices had received.
    “Does your relative own the farm?”
    “No, Mrs. Ledger,” Sebastian went on, “my mother’s cousin’s husband is the rancher.”
    “Your family must be long established in the area,” Mrs. Ledger remarked.
    “In a manner of speaking,” Sebastian answered.
    Pip and Tim looked at each other: six hundred years could make Sebastian’s a local family.
    “And do you have any brothers or sisters?”
    “I am an only child,” Sebastian announced.
    He watched Pip as she cut off a piece of the crispbacon, speared it on her fork and dipped it in the poached egg yolk. It was then Tim realized that Sebastian was not quite
     sure of how to use a knife and fork.
    “And your father…?” Mrs. Ledger asked.
    “Mum!” Pip hissed, interrupting her mother and shaking her head in an attempt to halt this inquisition.
    “He’s gone away,” Sebastian announced tersely.
    Mrs. Ledger said, “I am so very sorry, Sebastian. I hadn’t meant to pry. It was most rude of me,” and she changed the subject.
    “That was close,” Tim remarked as they went upstairs to his bedroom.
    “Your mother is indeed most probing,” Sebastian declared, “yet this is the way of mothers. They must be sure of their children’s
     friends.”
    “Still,” Pip said, “I think that’ll be the end of the quizzes.”

    Throughout the night, it rained torrentially, a strong wind blowing down the river valley to drive the rain hard against Pip’s
     bedroom windows, keeping her awake. About midnight, she heard a knock on her bedroom door. It was Tim, who had also been unable
     to sleep.
    “If it keeps on like this,” he said, “the river will break its banks by morning. That ditch around the house…” he continued.
    “You mean the old ha-ha,” Pip cut in.
    “… whatever,” Tim went on. “It’s already filling up like a moat. By morning, it’s not going to be a
ha-ha
but an
uh-oh!”
    Pip glanced out of her window. Through the film of rainwater running down the pane, she could see the lights of a downstairs
     room reflecting on the rising water.
    “It’s like being in a castle,” Tim remarked, “especially with these stone mullions in the windows. All we need now are tapestries
     hanging from the walls, chain-mail vests in the wardrobe, a court jester with one of those ukulele things…”
    “A mandolin,” Pip corrected him. “Sometimes, Tim, you really are thick.”
    “… not to mention a few ditties,” Tim continued undeterred, “a couple of manky bear skins spread across the floor and an English
     longbow or two leaning in a corner with a quiver of arrows.”
    “How about a damsel in distress?” Pip suggested sarcastically.
    “That’s you, sis,” Tim answered.
    “Or an ugly fire-breathing dragon?” Pip went on.
    “Still you,” Tim added, smiling.
    The mention of animal skins spread across the floor brought to Pip’s mind a picture of Sebastian’s chamber deep underground
     beneath the house. Suddenly, a spasm of worry ran through her.
    “If the water rises much higher,” she said anxiously, “what will happen to Sebastian’s secret chamber? Or Sebastian? Down
     there, he won’t know the river is rising. He could drown like a rat in a box.”
    She began gently but insistently tapping on the wall panel. In just a few seconds, the mechanism behind it clicked and it
     swung open on silent, well-lubricated hinges.
    “What concerns you?” Sebastian inquired calmly,stepping into Pip’s room. “Your summons was quite relentless.”
    “It’s been chucking it down for yonks,” Tim said.
    “Chucking it down? Yonks?” Sebastian repeated. “I am not accustomed to your phraseology.”
    “It’s been raining hard for hours,”