Beswitched (20 page)

Dulcie sighed. “I’ve got a beastly blister on my heel. You go on, and I’ll catch up with you when I’ve had a rest.”

Sweet-natured as she was, Dulcie could be stubborn. She had made up her mind, and she was not going to budge.

“OK,” Flora said. “We last saw the others going up that bank—see you later.”

She set off at a brisk walking pace. On the other side of the grassy bank ahead, there was the big, green sweep of Crow Hill. At the top of the hill was the forbidden Compton
Wood, which stood between the runners and their meeting point at the post office. What path had the hares taken? The light was turning dull. Flora paused to stare at the hillside, with its thin trail of white paper.

In the distance, two girls were running—one determined hound in a blue sash, chasing one hare. Flora thought she recognized Pete. How had she managed to get so far behind the other hares?

She’ll catch it from Miss Gatling
, Flora thought.

Crikey—Pete had run straight into the wood. Now she really would catch it.

A few seconds later, the hound ran right in after her. Flora couldn’t see who it was, and the girl was too far off to shout at. Flora set off up the hill as fast as she could. Of course it was tempting to take the shortcut, like Pete and the other girl, but she wasn’t sure she knew the way through the wood, and it was big enough to get lost in. At the top of the hill, she saw one piece of white paper stuck to a bush, showing the path she had to take. The afternoon was fading, and she was starting to think about tea.

She was just guessing that Pete would have been caught by the hound by now, and would be nearly at the finishing point—when Pete herself suddenly walked out of a clump of trees, right in front of her.

The two girls stared at each other.

“Pallox!” said Pete crossly. “I suppose this means I’ve been captured—after all my hard work!”

“But I thought you’d been captured ages ago,” Flora said. “Where’s the other girl?”

“And it would have to be you. You’re just determined to spoil every single thing I do.”

“I saw someone running into the trees behind you,” Flora said.

Pete shrugged impatiently. “Well, she didn’t get me, and you did. Come on. Let’s get to the wretched post office.” She started off across the grass.

“Wait!” Flora was uneasy, though she didn’t know exactly why. It was as if someone had told her the answer to something important, without telling her the question. “I did see someone following you—shouldn’t we wait for her?”

“What for?”

“I don’t know.” The strange, uneasy feeling was growing. “To make sure she’s OK.”

“Why wouldn’t she be? Come on!”

“You go on,” Flora said. “I’ll wait here for a minute. If she doesn’t come out, I’ll start looking for her.”

Pete rolled her eyes. “All right, I did see someone. It was Consuela—your new bosom friend. But she didn’t see me. I wasn’t going to get myself caught by the likes of her!”

“Can’t you forget your silly feud for a second?” Flora looked at Pete’s angry face, and did not like her one bit. How could she ever have liked her? She could swear she was hiding something. “Consuela might be lost. She might be hurt.”

“Well, we can just tell Miss Gatling. If she’s sprained her ankle it won’t hurt her to wait for a few minutes.”

“Pete! I don’t believe you sometimes!” Flora was afraid. All her instincts told her something was wrong. Pete looked
incredibly shifty. “What are you talking about? What sprained ankle?”

“ALL RIGHT!” Pete shouted. “I saw her slip into the quarry—satisfied?”

“No! How did she get out?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean? You didn’t just leave her there!”

Pete’s scowl deepened. “I didn’t want to get captured!”

“I’m going to look for her!” Flora turned and followed the overgrown path into the wood. She called Consuela’s name—loudly enough to make the birds fly out of the branches above her—but there was no reply. “Consuela!”

Pete ran to catch up with her. “All right, I’ll come with you, since you can’t stop nagging. But she’s probably just sulking.”

“She fell into the quarry—and you left her,” Flora said furiously. “All because you didn’t want to lose a point in a stupid game! Where’ve you been, anyway? How come you got left behind by the other hares?”

“If you must know, Miss Goody Two-shoes, I got out of breath, so I hid up a tree until all the hounds had gone past.”

“Shh a minute—” Flora grabbed Pete’s hand. “I think I heard something!”

“What?”

“Shhh!”

They both stood still, letting the silence settle around them, and Flora heard the sound again—a faint cry, like an animal at the end of its strength.

This time, Pete had to come off it and admit that
something was really wrong. She ran along the twisting path through the trees, towards the old quarry, with Flora close behind her. The quarry was a huge clearing in the middle of the wood. The stone ground had been dug out into a crater at least thirty feet deep.

Flora looked over the edge. At the bottom of the pit, a still figure lay beside a heap of loose rocks. “Consuela!”

Consuela’s leg was twisted at an odd, sickening angle. Flora looked round frantically for a way to get down to her without slipping—as the farmer had warned, there were loose stones scattered everywhere. If she put her foot in the wrong place, she could easily slip right down to the depths.

Pete had turned very pale, and was no longer being a pain. Even she could tell this was an emergency. “One of us should go down to her, and one of us should run for help.”

“But help from where?” wailed Flora. “The school’s miles away!”

“I know,” Pete said. “Ethel’s house—it’s easily the nearest—” She turned and pelted away down the path.

Flora was alone now. She looked doubtfully at the steep sides of the quarry. If she fell to her death in the past—but she couldn’t afford to start thinking like this, or she would panic.

“Help!” Consuela cried feebly.

“I’m coming!” Flora called. “Stay there!”

What an idiotic thing to say, when Consuela had no choice. Flora walked around the edge of the crater, until she found a place where the sides were less steep, and there was
a sort of path down to the bottom. Some of the stones were loose, and there was a hairy moment when she sent a large rock crashing down, but she told herself to imagine she was climbing on the cliffs at Merrythorpe and managed not to stumble.

Consuela lay in a huddle. Her face was an awful grayish white, striped with tears. Flora gingerly took her cold hand, and she turned her head.

“Flora?” she murmured.

“Yes, it’s me—someone’ll be here to rescue you in a minute.” She hoped this was true. Could the abominable Pete really be trusted with something so important?

“I think I’ve broken my leg—it really hurts! I’m not going to die, am I?”

“No, of course not.” Flora squeezed Consuela’s hand. “My mum broke her leg last year when we went skiing, and she’s fine now.” She had forgotten what century she was in—where would the other Flora’s mother have gone skiing in British India?

“Truly?” Consuela was too dazed with pain to notice. “Mummy won’t like it if I have a limp.”

Her mother sounded like a cow. Flora thought of Mum in the twenty-first century, and had to swallow hard so she wouldn’t start crying. “Truly,” she said. “You won’t have even a bit of a limp.”

Where was Pete? How were they going to get Consuela out of the quarry? Did they have helicopter ambulances in 1935—did they even have helicopters? The light was fading,
and Consuela had gone very quiet. Flora shifted to a more comfortable position. There was nothing she could do but wait.

There were lights at the top of the quarry, and voices.

“Flora! Are you all right?”

“Hold on, Miss—we’re coming!”

A few loose stones crashed to the ground. Someone with a lantern was stumbling down the steep path, towards Flora and Consuela. It was Ethel, unfamiliar in a flowered dress and cardigan. And after her came her dad, Mr. Munns, and her brother Ron, carrying ropes and sheets and an old door they were using as a stretcher. Flora was so glad to see them that she forgot about 1930s girls not hugging and threw her arms round Ethel.

As Pete said later, Ethel was a “trump.” She soothed poor Consuela, stroking her forehead while her father and brother strapped her to the makeshift stretcher. She helped them carry it up the path as slowly and smoothly as possible.

The cottage where Ethel’s family lived was tiny, and packed with people. Ethel’s mum, Mrs. Munns, was a tall, solid woman, in a huge apron, with a loud voice that never stopped rapping out instructions.

“Bring her in the parlor—that’s it, I’ve pulled out the couch—don’t you fret, my duck, I’ve sent Lizzie to tell the school, and little Ernie’s run for Dr. Whitty—Eth, get these girls a cup of hot tea—careful, Ron! Don’t go jolting and jouncing the poor little love! What’s her name? Consuela—well, that’s pretty—can you hear me, Consuela?
I know it hurts, but what a brave girl you are! I’ve always said that quarry was a danger—Dad, put on a pan of hot water, the doctor always seems to want it—”

Flora found herself squashed into a hot corner beside the fireplace next to Pete, drinking a cup of sweet tea.

“And you two,” Mrs. Munns said, “aren’t you lovely girls, to go looking for your friend? I don’t hardly like to think what would’ve happened if you hadn’t!”

“I’m ever so glad this is my day off,” Ethel said. She smiled into Consuela’s face. “Now I can hold your hand right through, and not leave you for a single minute.”

She was a very kind girl, and it made her pretty face absolutely beautiful, Flora thought.

Pete was silent and pale, more shaken than Flora had ever seen her. It was slightly surprising that she was so freaked out.

Flora whispered, “Pete, are you OK?”

Pete only nodded, and wouldn’t look Flora in the eye.

Flora did not understand—was she in shock? “What’s up?” she hissed to Pete. “Are you going to faint, or something?”

“No.”

Mrs. Munns was trying to clear the tiny room. She had only just shooed Ethel’s brothers and sisters upstairs, however, when there was another commotion. A car was heard in the lane outside. A skinny little girl of about nine burst in, gabbling something about a man and a big car—Flora guessed this must be Lizzie, who had run to St. Winifred’s.

Miss Bradley appeared in the doorway. “Consuela—you poor child! Mrs. Munns, this is tremendously good of you—”

“Is she here?” a man’s voice asked behind her. “Is she going to be all right?”

Miss Bradley stood aside and a tall man came in. He was dressed in a black suit that looked glossy and expensive, and he filled the small room with a scent of lemon soap. He knelt down beside Consuela. “My darling!”

She opened her eyes. “Daddy?”

“Don’t worry about anything, darling. I’m here now.”

Consuela stared at him, as if she didn’t believe her eyes. “But—you’re in Kenya!”

“I didn’t tell you I was coming,” he said, “because I didn’t know if your mother would let me see you. But I have the best possible news—she signed a piece of paper this morning, which means you’re coming to live with me!”

Wow
, thought Flora,
this is as good as magic, and we didn’t even cast a spell
.

She caught Consuela’s dazed eye, and gave her a huge smile.

“Well, you two pickles!” Miss Bradley said cheerfully. “You’ve had the entire school in an uproar, and given poor Miss Gatling the fright of her life! We were just setting out to search for the three of you when Lizzie came dashing in—and just as the head was telephoning for an ambulance, Mr. Carver suddenly turned up—talk about a night to remember!”

“It was my fault,” Pete said loudly. “Consuela only went into the wood because she was following me.”

“Never mind about that now, dear. The ambulance is coming to take Consuela to the nursing home, and you two must get back to school.”

Consuela murmured, “Couldn’t I stay here with Ethel?” She was still gripping Ethel’s hand.

Mrs. Munns laughed. “Bless you, duck, you’d be welcome if I had the space!”

Mr. Carver looked at Ethel, and said, “I can’t thank you enough.”

“And don’t forget to thank these two young ladies,” said Mrs. Munns. “They went searching for Consuela the minute they missed her—didn’t even wait to tell the teacher.”

Mr. Carver stood up and solemnly shook hands with Flora and Pete. “Thanks awfully. I’m jolly glad Consuela has such first-rate pals.”

Pete hung her head, as if he had told her off instead of thanking her—Flora couldn’t understand it. She didn’t even cheer up when they were driven back to St. Winifred’s in Mr. Carver’s gorgeous car. It was long and low and sleek, and the inside smelled like a posh suitcase. Miss Bradley rode in front beside the driver, because she wanted to look at the dashboard. The backseat was sealed off with a panel of glass.

Flora leaned back luxuriously. “I could get used to this! Pete? What’s the matter with you? Are you ill?”

Pete buried her face in her hands and burst into tears.

“Pete?” Flora tried to put her arm around her, but she shrugged away.

“Don’t—you don’t know what I’ve done!”

“What’re you talking about?”

Pete whispered, “I—I pushed her!”

18
A Credit to the School