Milo and One Dead Angry Druid (2 page)
Read Milo and One Dead Angry Druid Online
Authors: Mary Arrigan
A
s we went through the school gates Shane stopped.
‘Hey! I’ve a great idea, Milo. Let’s go to the museum and see the stone that Miss Lee says is like mine.’
‘Museum? It’s not even raining, Shane!’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Shane. ‘I’m going anyway. You coming?’
Well, I was curious – as you would be about a stone that drives a lazy lizard wild, so I decided to go along with Shane to see what all the fuss was about. But as we went around the corner into the alley that was a short cut to Main Street, we met trouble.
‘Well, if isn’t Fatman and Stick Insect. Goin’ somewhere nice, eh?’
I groaned silently inside my head. This was all we needed – Crunch Kelly and Wedge Murphy from sixth class – whenever they actually came to school, that is. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that those names were just any old made-up nicknames, but you’d be wrong. Kelly could really make your bones crunch and Murphy
could wedge your underpants right up to your armpits. You get the picture? Not pleasant.
They stood in front of us, blocking our way, and Crunch patted Shane’s tight, black curly hair. I clutched my schoolbag, ready to take a swing at them – and seeing the words ‘death-wish’ flashing in my mind. But it was Shane’s takeaway bag that grabbed their attention.
‘Hey, Crunch, look what we got here,’ laughed Wedge, pointing to it. ‘Takeaway! You hungry, Crunch? Me too. Hand it over, Fatman.’
Shane hugged the bag. ‘It’s not takeaway,’ he muttered. ‘It’s a rock.’
‘Yeah, right,’ snarled Wedge. ‘Like, you bring rocks around with you to eat, Fatman? When my good friend says to hand over
your grub, you hand it over, OK?’
Then he snatched the takeaway bag from Shane – who did put up a bit of a fight, but we were like week-old jelly against these low-lifes. We watched with horror as they scarpered down the alley. I looked at my best mate, standing like a burst balloon and, with a surge of anger I belted off after those two like I was on fire, sparks shooting from my eyes.
I’d like to be able to say that I caught up with our attackers and beat THEM into week-old jelly, but the truth is that I found the bag thrown on the ground around the corner and the stone dumped a few yards farther on. So, they didn’t fancy rock curry! I laughed with a whoosh of relief as I picked up the ancient tingly stone and put it back in the bag. Shane was puffing his way towards
me. I held up the bag.
‘You got it!’ he stopped in eye-popping amazement.
‘I did,’ I laughed. ‘I remembered my taekwon-do skills and sent them off with massive bruises.’
Shane took the bag and checked out the stone. ‘Wow!’ he said. ‘You really did get it back, Milo.’
‘Yep,’ I stood up straight in macho-mode.
Then Shane looked at me with a sort of puzzled squint.
‘Milo, you and me, we only lasted two Saturdays at junior taekwon-do when we were seven. And we were both rubbish and learnt nothing so how …?’
‘OK, OK,’ I said. ‘So they threw it at me when they saw me coming at them with all guns blazing …’
Shane laughed and punched my shoulder.
‘All right,’ I muttered. ‘So they threw it away when they found out it was really only a stone, but hey, I’m still the hero.’
A
nd so we went to the museum on the corner of Main Street and Chapel Lane. It had once been a posh town house, but in the mid-eighteen hundreds the family went back to England. Dad said it was the rain, boredom and the constant diet of bacon and watery cabbage that drove them away.
‘Besides,’ he went on, ‘the shortage of other gentry around here meant they had only one another to talk to. There are only so many ways you can talk to the same people about the Irish weather and hunting foxes before going doolally.’
We wandered through the old farm things and moth-eaten animals with bits of their stuffing leaking out. It didn’t take long to find the glass case with the stone in it. Shane saw it first.
‘Wow!’ he shouted. ‘Look, Milo!’
Sure enough, there it was, sitting on a green velvet cloth. Shane took his stone from the bag and we compared it to the one in the case.
‘It’s a dead ringer for yours,’ I said.
‘It’s part of it!’ exclaimed Shane. ‘Can’t you see? If the two pieces were put together,
the pattern would form complete circles. This is mega.’
On a plaque beside the display window there was a sign, which said:
Underneath there was more writing, but the words were covered by years of dust.
‘That’s him!’ exclaimed Shane, practically dancing with wobbly excitement. ‘See? I told you. That’s the man who used to live in our house. If
this
bit of stone was in our garden, then
that
bit must have been there too.’
‘Keep your voice down,’ I said. ‘We’ll be thrown out.’
Too late.
A man with a frown attached to his hairy eyebrows was already making his way towards us. It was Mister Conway, keeper of the museum, wearing a dusty suit that fitted right in with the surroundings.
Shane shoved the stone into the takeaway bag before he could see it.
‘What are you two up to?’ Mister Conway asked.
‘What makes you think we’re up to anything?’ said Shane. ‘We only came to look at the old stuff.’
‘None of your lip,’ snapped Mister Conway. ‘I’ve had my eye on you two.’
‘Like, you think we came in to steal a rusty plough or a wormy butter churn?’ said Shane.
‘Ssshh, Shane,’ I muttered, elbowing his tummy. ‘Come on. We were just leaving anyway.’ I pulled him after me down the front steps into the sunny street.
Shane couldn’t stop talking about the two bits of stone. You’d think they were gold nuggets the way he was going on.
‘They’re just stones, Shane,’ I said. ‘So they were once stuck together, but they’re still only bits of old stone with squiggly bits on them.’
There it was, that strange, tingly feeling again.
S
hane stopped when we got near his house. Big Ella was in the garden. Not weeding, because she said that every growing thing had a right to life; which was why the garden was a thick jungle. Shane shoved the takeaway bag into my hands.
‘You take this, Milo,’ he said. ‘Gran would
have a fit if she thought I’d taken the stone.’
‘What?’ I said, backing away. ‘You mean she didn’t know you had it?’
‘Well, you know Gran. She got vibes or something. She said she didn’t want anyone to know about it because there’d be a fuss, like history nerds coming around the place with those little shovels you see them using on the History Channel. Nosing about and asking for tea and biscuits and taking stuff away.’
‘Can’t you pretend there’s just school stuff in the bag?’ I said.
Shane shook his head. ‘She has X-ray eyes, my gran. Go on, just for a little while,’ he pleaded. ‘I’ll phone you when the coast is clear and we’ll put it back. What’s the big deal?’
I gave a big
‘you’ll pay for this favour’
sigh
and took the bag. I quickly stuffed it into my schoolbag before my fingers could tingle again. Shane opened his squeaky gate.
‘See you later,’ he said with a wink.
I wasn’t happy about being stuck with his crummy stone, not now that I knew about its past. But with Big Ella waving cheerfully at me, I couldn’t very well start an argument. You don’t do things like that to your best mate. So I waved back and went down to my own house. I hid that stone under the stairs. No way was I going to have it in my room.
Later on, when Mum was catching up on
Fair City
and
Coronation Street,
the phone rang in the hall.
‘You get that, Milo. There’s a love,’ said Mum.
At first there was no reply to my ‘hello’ when I picked up the phone. There was a lot of background crackling and then the wheezy sound of someone breathing. Some saddo joker, I thought. Then I heard Shane’s voice.
‘Milo!’ he cried.
‘It’s you!’ I laughed. ‘I might have known. What’re you up to?’
‘Milo! The stone!’
Such drama! ‘OK, OK,’ I said. ‘No need to overact.’
‘Milo …!’ Shane’s voice faded away.
I laughed when I put down the phone. I was well used to Shane and his huge dramas. He could just have asked me nicely to bring over the stone. But trust Shane to do his scary-voice thing. Still, I was glad to be getting rid of his old stone.
‘Back in a while, Mum,’ I called out, taking the bag from under the stairs. ‘I’m just going over to Shane’s.’
‘Be back before dark,’ Mum replied.
Well, that doesn’t give me very long, I thought, as I pulled the front door shut. It was already dusk and all the neighbours’ lights were on. All except one. I was surprised when I reached Shane’s house and saw that it was in dusky darkness. Big Ella must have gone for a takeaway. Shane was probably lying in wait to pounce on me. Well, I’d be ready for him. But he didn’t pounce. And there was no answer to the special knock Shane and I used whenever we called to one another’s houses. By now his antics were getting right up my nose. ‘I know you’re there,’ I called out through the letterbox. ‘Come on, Shane, open up.’
I wasn’t enjoying this creepiness. ‘Stop acting the dork.’ Then I laughed to myself when I realised that he was probably waiting for me at the stony place. I headed down the wild back garden.
‘Ha!’ I shouted when I saw the figure poking about the stones that Big Ella had dug up. ‘You could have waited for me. You owe me at least a Crunchie for hanging on to this thing for you.’
The figure stopped and turned towards me. But it wasn’t Shane. No, no. It definitely wasn’t Shane. Even in that dim evening light, I could see the putty-coloured face and staring eyes of someone who didn’t belong in this world.
