Emily's Penny Dreadful (6 page)

  “
But that’s the
poshest part of town,” said Miley. “I once went to a fancy fish
restaurant there, with Mama and Papa and a rich relative. How did
you end up working here?”

  “
I was kidnapped,”
said Ned.

 
Miley almost dropped
her next lot of matches in fright. “What!” she exclaimed. “That
only ever happens in books.”

  “
Huh!” said Ned.
“That’s all you know. I was out for a walk with my faithful hound,
Dulo, when I was set upon by ruffians. Dulo barked like a canine
warrior

possessed. He tried to bite my assailants
but they had

a carriage waiting and bundled me into it,
spiriting me away.”

  “
That’s dreadful,”
said Miley. “Why?”

  “
They were going to
ransom me for a lot of money,” explained Ned. “What my kidnappers
didn’t know was that my father’s business had gone up in flames
just the week before.”

  “
Up in flames!”
exclaimed Miley in horror.

  “
It was toast,” said
Ned, which made Miley feel hungry all over again. “He had no money
left in all the world.”

  “
I know what that’s
like,” said Miley. “I left all of mine in my Hippo
Bank.”

  “
Your
what?”

  “
My Hippo Bank. It’s
exactly the same as a piggy

bank but in the shape of a
hippopotamus.”

“
Oh,” said Ned. “I see.
I’ve never come across one of those. Well, anyway, because the
police were on my trail and getting close, my kidnappers
handed me over to the woman who runs this match
factory.”

  “
Bacon,” said
Miley.

  “
What?”

  “
Bacon. That’s what
I call her,” Miley explained. “She looks like a piece of bacon. He
looks like a pork pie.”

 
Ned giggled. “I
suppose they do,” he said. “That’s

clever of you to see the similarities.”

  “
I have ambitions to
be a writer,” said Miley. “I’m glad my similes make you
smile.”

  “
Hmm,” said Ned.
“Well, I’ll call them Bacon and Pork Pie from now on as
well.”

  “
I don’t mind
sharing my ideas with you,” said Miley. “I have plenty of
them.”

  “
You’re very
generous,” said Ned. “As well as clever. But I suppose you often
get annoyed and suffer from brain-strain?”

  “
Why do you say
that?” asked Miley.

  “
Only because my
father says that brain-strain is a writer’s Achilles
Heel.”

  “
Is a what?” asked
Miley.

  “
An Achilles Heel.
It’s a weak spot,” said Ned. “The sort of thing that causes a
person’s downfall.”

 
Miley rubbed her
head. Her brain was quickly becoming befuddled by counting matches
but she

didn’t think it had ever got strained by
making up stories.  

  “
Achilles was an
Ancient Greek hero,” Ned went on.

  “
I haven’t got up to
Ancient Greek heroes in my

school reader yet,” Miley admitted.

“
You won’t get a chance,
not in this place,” said Ned, which made Miley even more determined
to escape The Devil’s Element. She wasn’t going to miss out on
Ancient Greek heroes just because of Bacon and Pork Pie.

  “
Achilles shouldn’t
have been able to be killed, since his mother dipped him into the
river of immortality,” Ned continued. “Except she held him by his
heel, which meant that that part of him never got wet, so he was
vulnerable. He was shot in the heel by a poisonous
arrow.”

  “
What a wonderful
story!” said Miley.

  “
It is,” said Ned.
“Except it wasn’t so wonderful for Achilles. I mean, there you are,
thinking you’re going to live forever when, WHAM, you’re shot in
the heel by a poisonous arrow. I love reading stories about Ancient
Greek heroes but I’ll probably never read another book again, not
as long as I live.”

  “
You will,” said
Miley. “I promise.”

  “
Don’t make promises
you can’t keep,” said Ned.  “Anyway, I was telling you what
happened to me. After I was handed over to Bacon, the police lost
track

of me. Now no one knows where I am.”

  “
I know where you
are,” said Miley.

  “
That’s of no use to
me, or the constabulary,” said Ned, “but I suppose you meant it
kindly.”

  “
Have I been
kidnapped, too?” said Miley. “Bacon said I had to work for her and
then I could go home.”

  “
I reckon you’re
here to stay,” said Ned. “Like the rest of us.”

 
Miley wanted to cry
but she managed to put on a brave face. “I’m not staying here,” she
said. “There must be a way out. I’ll find it, no matter how long it
takes. And I bet Bacon has an Achilles Heel.”

  “
Those are brave
words,” said Ned. “Just like the words of a Ancient Greek hero.
Good luck, Miley. You’ll need it.”

Chapter Six

As Emily paused in her writing to stand up
and stretch, Sibbie barged into the room.

  “
Are you
still
at it?’ she said. “You’ve been in here nearly all of Saturday
and half of Sunday already. Mum and Dad think you’ve run away,
you’ve been so quiet!”

  “
Ha, ha, not funny,”
said Emily.

“
Show me!” Sibbie demanded,
reaching out for Emily’s exercise book.

  “
No! Go
away!”

  “
Please yourself,”
said Sibbie.

  “
I will,” said
Emily.

  “
Maybe I’ll sneak in
and read it when you’re not here,” Sibbie threatened.

  “
You wouldn’t dare,”
said Emily.

  “
Maybe,” said
Sibbie. “Or maybe not. Not that I care about your silly story,
anyway.”

  “
It’s not a silly
story. It’s a dreadful one,” Emily said.

  “
It’s silly. Very,
very silly,” said Sibbie. “I’m right, you’re wrong,” she chanted as
she barged out again.

 
One part of Emily
wanted to stop writing for the day

but another part wanted to carry on.

 
The part that wanted
to carry on, won.

Chapter 11

“
Do you have a piece of
string?” Miley asked Ned.

  “
Yes, I think
so.”

  “
How long is
it.”

 
Ned fished in one of
his pockets and pulled out a piece of string about an inch
long.

  “
Is that all?” said
Emily.

  “
What did you
expect?” said Ned. “And why on earth do you want string
anyway?”

  “
I thought if it was
long enough I could tie a stone to one end, throw it up to one of
those high windows and climb out. Then I could find the police and
bring them back here to rescue you and all the other
children.”

  “
You’re mad,” said
Ned. “String is too thin. You’d fall and break your neck. Rope is
what you need, and even then it would be far too
dangerous.”

 
Ned was right. He
was always right it seemed.

Chapter 12

From her vantage point on the bottom-hard
bench of the factory, Miley carried on searching for ways to

escape The Devil’s Element but, apart from
the string

idea, she couldn’t come up
with a single escape plan. Not that she had very much time for
planning.

 
If she wasn’t busy
counting matches and putting them into match boxes – which she was
busy doing most of the time – she was either eating (not much at
all because it tasted too horrible) or sleeping (not long enough at
all).  

However, one night, Miley
forced herself to stay awake. Bacon always woke them up at first
light so sleep was really important but Miley had decided that a
night search was far more important than sleeping.

When the factory clock
struck midnight, Miley slipped from her bed and went out into the
corridor. Apart from that very first night, when she had slept in a
room of her own, Miley now slept in a dormitory with the three
other factory girls. Their names were Dorothy (Dot for short),
Isabel (Issy for short) and Bibsie (Bibi for short.)

 
Dot, Issy and Bibi
were fast asleep. Bibi was snoring. She didn’t know she snored and
no one was brave

enough to tell her because Bibi had a short
temper. Bibi was good at flicking matches at people who

annoyed her. Her aim was deadly and a
flicked match hurt the skin. Despite her fear of Bacon, Bibi was
rather reckless with her matches, which made Bacon sizzle angrily,
and that made Bibi even more annoyed. She took her annoyance out on
the other girls. Miley didn’t blame her. If she’d had a temper as
bad as Bibi’s then Miley knew she would also have become a reckless
match flicker.

Bacon never locked the door of the
dormitory. She knew that the children would be far too exhausted to
go anywhere, even if they thought there was somewhere to go. But
that didn’t really explain why Bacon had locked Miley’s door that
very first night.

Perhaps there was an escape route, which
none of them knew about. That was what Miley was hoping for, and
counting on.  

Miley was too scared to
venture out into the darkness of the factory by herself so she
crept into the boy’s dormitory down the corridor. There were
two

other boys besides Ned. Their names were
Athol and

Charlie. They were younger than Ned and
younger than the girls as well.

Miley knew that Ned slept
closest to the door of the

dormitory because the other boys felt safer
that way.

  “
Ned,” she
whispered, “are you awake?” She shook Ned as she asked her
question.

  “
Are you awake,
Ned?” Miley repeated.

  “
I am now,” grumped
Ned. “What do you want?”

  “
I’m looking for a
way out,” said Miley.

  “
You won’t find it
in the boys’ dormitory,” said Ned.

  “
Of course not,”
said Miley. “I know that. Will you come with me?”

  “
If Bacon catches us
. . .” Ned did not finish his sentence.

  “
Bacon snores louder
than Bibi,” said Miley. “Listen. Can you hear her?”

  “
I always thought
that was water grumbling in the pipes,” said Ned.

  “
No, it’s definitely
Bacon,” said Miley.

  “
It must be late,”
said Ned. “Or early. We should sleep while we can.”

  “
We must escape if
we can,” said Miley.

 
Ned sighed. “Oh, all
right. I’ll come with you.”

Chapter 13

They trekked through the corridor. They
stepped down the rickety staircase that led from the dormitories to
the factory floor. They walked across the factory floor towards the
kitchen. Moonlight glimmered and shimmered down onto them from the
high windows.

  “
That’s where Pork
Pie always sits,” said Miley. “With his newspapers. He’s either
reading or eating. Sometimes both together”

  “
Pork Pie is Bacon’s
guard as well as her husband,” said Ned. “The kitchen really is the
only way out of the factory. The way you came in, remember? Through
the Inward Goods Only door, into the night watchman’s cellar, up
the other staircase into the kitchen. All those doors will be
locked and, even if they weren’t, the night watchman will be
waiting and watching outside.”  

“
I feel certain it’s not
the only way out,” said Miley. “What if there’s another door that
we haven’t seen

yet, and what if that one
is unlocked?”

  “
Fat chance,” said
Ned.

  “
When you came here,
where did you come in?”

asked Miley.

  “
I don’t remember,”
said Ned. “I was trussed up in a sack, like a giant potato, and
couldn’t see a thing.”

  “
That must have been
ghastly,” said Miley.

  “
It was,” said Ned,
with a shudder.

 
They kept their
distance from the kitchen and looked everywhere else instead. But
Ned was right. There was no sign of a door in any of the match
factory walls. Just bricks on three sides and one side piled high
with large boxes into which the smaller match boxes were
packed. 

 
Just then both Miley
and Ned heard a noise. Actually, they stopped hearing a
noise.

  “
Bacon’s not snoring
any more,” said Ned.

  “
That means she’s
awake,” said Miley.

  “
Quick!” said
Ned.

 
They scuttled like
night spiders across the factory floor, past the kitchen, up the
stairs, into the corridor, back to their beds. Just as Miley pulled
the thin, buggy

sheet over herself she heard footsteps
outside her

dormitory.  

In the moonlight from one
of the escape-proof windows she saw Bacon peering into the room.
The