On the other hand, if none of us was there, our folks might think we had all slipped out early in the morning and maybe not worry too much about it, at least for the day. In the meantime, I told the others, we could sleep in one of Big Hughie’s cowsheds on the edge of the Cotton Bog, and in the morning go back to Wariff Hill and have a good look for Cowlick.

  The boys weren’t too sure of my idea at first, but when they thought about it they realised we couldn’t go home without Cowlick. They also knew we couldn’t stay in the open much longer. If the heat meant thunder, it also meant lightning, and none of us likes to be out in the open when there’s lightning, especially when we’re wet and everything else is wet. So in the end, with a last anxious and guilty glance back up at the sinister shadow which we had been forced to leave without Cowlick, we crossed into the fields on the other side of the road and made our way towards the cowsheds.

  We had decided on the second cowshed, as the first one is open at both ends, but the first one had quite a surprise in store for us. We were about a field’s length from it when we saw a flickering light in it. Our first instinct was to run. Then we realised the light was from an open fire, and we were immediately curious. Holding on to Prince, I led the way forward.

  As we stole closer we could see shadows in the firelight, and even before we saw their faces we recognised the voices of none other than Juno and Shouting Sam. They were sitting on stones by the side of the fire, and now and then they would take a swig from a bottle or turn a rabbit cooking on a spit.

  ‘You know what, Shuno,’ we heard Shouting Sam say drunkenly, ‘I think it wash shusht a – hic – shusht a ghosht!’

  ‘A ghosht, a ghosht was it?’ repeated Juno, and bending closer to Sam, he pointed to his own forehead with the bottle and asked, ‘Does that look like a ghosht? Huh – huh?’

  Shouting Sam blinked hard as he tried to focus on the bruises Juno was showing him.

  Juno looked at him. ‘Ah!’ he exclaimed, taking another swig of the bottle and wiping his mouth with his sleeve, ‘you know what I think? I think you’re drunk – drunk ash a, ash a …’

  He seemed to be so full of drink himself that it was lapping up around his throat, and he swallowed hard to keep it down.

  We moved closer, excited by what Shouting Sam had said. Was this mention of a ghost just drunken talk? Or had he seen something on Wariff Hill too? We didn’t want to delay in case they spotted us. Yet we thought that if we waited just a little longer we might learn something.

  Prince had other ideas. Before we could stop him, he struggled free and streaked towards the fire. With a fierce snarl and a flash of fangs, he hurled himself straight at them, right up over the fire. The sight of that powerful black form leaping from the shadows must have struck terror into their hearts. Picking themselves up, they fled screaming into the darkness beyond, the loud-speaker and all the other paraphernalia that Sam always carries around with him banging loudly as they ran.

  At a loss to understand what had got into Prince, we ran forward. He came back into the light of the fire, and when we saw what it was, we had to laugh. It wasn’t Juno and Shouting Sam he had gone for at all. It was the rabbit cooking on the spit! He had got it too, spit and all, in that powerful leap across the fire.

  Poor Prince, he must have been starving when he got the smell of that rabbit. It did smell appetising. Suddenly we realised we were as hungry as he was, and that he would have to share it. Quickly we retrieved a good portion of it that he hadn’t touched and tucked in, taking the precaution at the same time of keeping enough for another meal.

  We wondered where Juno and Sam had stopped running, and it occurred to us that with all the drink they had taken they might pluck up enough courage to sneak back. If so, the sooner we moved on to the other cowshed, the better. Before leaving, we took the stones that ringed the fire and rolled them over into the nearest hedge and put out the fire and scattered the ashes. Thus, we thought, if they did venture back, they’d find no trace of the fire in the darkness and might think in their drunkenness they had imagined the whole thing.

  There were several cows in the other shed. We could see them in the light of the torch, lying together on the earthen floor, as we climbed the rickety stairs to the loft. Our outside clothes were soaked, so we took them off, together with our Wellingtons and socks, and left them on a bale of straw to dry. Then we snuggled down into the hay.

  As the rain dripped down the worn timbers and the cows chewed peacefully on their cuds below, we pondered the mysterious disappearance of Cowlick.

  ‘He can’t have vanished into thin air,’ I said.

  ‘Maybe he couldn’t find us in the dark and went on home,’ suggested Doubter from the darkness on my left.

  ‘But all he had to do was blow his bourtree whistle,’ I said.

  ‘Or give us a shout,’ added Curly.

  ‘Unless he got further away than he thought,’ said Doubter, ‘and he didn’t hear us and we didn’t hear him.’

  ‘… and lost his way and is scared to move for fear he might walk into the swamps,’ put in Totey.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘It’s all very strange. Still, I hope you’re right. If so, he’ll be sheltering round there somewhere. Anyway, we’ll go back and look for him in the morning.’

  ‘Seeing as we haven’t found any phantom, what do you think is going on up on Wariff Hill?’ asked Doubter.

  ‘Yes,’ said Curly, ‘if it wasn’t the phantom, what was the ghostly light we saw? And what has it got to do with the legend?’

  ‘Maybe somebody’s watching the castle from up there,’ suggested Totey.

  ‘In the dark?’ said I. ‘Don’t forget it’s at night these things seem to happen on Wariff Hill.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Curly, ‘somebody’s practising black magic up there at night – to try and solve the legend.’ There was no comment, and he went on. ‘Why not? Weren’t places like that used for human sacrifices and all sorts of things long ago?’

  ‘Maybe so,’ I said, ‘but I’m beginning to think it’s nothing so far-fetched as phantoms and black magic. Did it ever occur to you that maybe somebody is using the hill to signal somebody at the castle?’

  ‘You mean Felicity’s father, or some of the ex-

  convicts?’ suggested Doubter.

  ‘What for?’ asked Curly.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘but you must admit, it might explain the light we’ve been seeing up there.’

  Just then the storm broke, and even though we had been expecting it all evening, it broke with such suddenness that it gave us a start. The first flash lit up the whole loft through a small netting-wire window near the roof. Seconds later, an ear-splitting burst of thunder erupted right over the shed and rolled away across the Cotton Bog. After that there was dead silence, but only for a moment or two. Suddenly the heavens opened, and the rain came thundering down in torrents.

  That was the start of it. The rain settled down to a steady downpour, and flashes of sheet lightning and thunder continued at intervals, and we were glad we were inside and not out in it. We are scared of any kind of lightning, but sheet lightning scares us more than the forked kind. It seems to run across the ground and flit over everything and we’ve never liked the idea of being out in the open and in the way of it. It’s always a sickening flash too, like the yellow-blue light that comes from the electric wires when high winds make them touch.

  After a real bright flash we would wait for the thunder, knowing that when the lightning was bright the thunder would be very loud, and when it would go ripping across the shed we would try and imagine what it was. Somehow we couldn’t get away from the idea that it was caused by big black clouds crashing together like giant boulders. It was powerful and frightening at the same time, and we snuggled still further into the hay and tried to guess where and when the next clap would come, and we listened to the rain drumming on the felt roof.

  Normally, I think, there’s nothing nicer than to be warm and comfortable and to be lying listening to the rain, but there was nothing nice about it that night. We were thinking of it falling on the hazel bushes that cover Wariff Hill. We were thinking of Cowlick somewhere in among them, enveloped by the darkness and the storm, a victim of the Legend of the Golden Key.

  I for one couldn’t help thinking of that part of the legend that goes:

  The man is dead

  But life allows

  He’ll run forever

  Beneath the boughs …

  I couldn’t help wondering if Cowlick was thinking about it up there in the hazels, or wherever he was. Indeed, wherever he was, for where could he be? What could have befallen him? I closed my eyes. Eventually the thunder shifted away from the Cotton Bog, and we dropped off into a troubled sleep.

  10. UNVEILING THE MISTS

  The chittering of goldfinches woke us next morning. Prince was already awake and licking himself down, and the cows had gone out to graze. It was a lovely day. The clouds were white, there was plenty of blue sky and the sun was already drying out the storm-washed fields. The Cotton Bog was sparkling with tufts of cotton grass and soft stars of thistledown, barely dry, drifted across the fields.

  There was nobody about, and without further ado we cut back across the road to Wariff Hill. The bull wasn’t in the field, which was lucky for us, as the swamps were flooded from the night’s rain. Taking good care to stay together, we searched the hill and the fairy fort. We were hoping against hope that we would find Cowlick sheltering under a bush or behind a boulder. Desperately we searched and searched. We looked everywhere, but there was no sign of him. Finally, feeling utterly disheartened and full of fresh fears for his safety, we returned to the cowshed which we were using as a hideout.

  We were hungry and dirty, so we scouted around until we found a spring of nice clear water and had a long drink and freshened up. We also found water-cress, and picked a handful of the best and washed it. Then we made our way up to a large patch of thistles and ragwort at the top of the field, and hunkered down in the middle of it. In there nobody could see us, and we could keep an eye on Wariff Hill and the road, as well as the fields right back to Big Hughie’s place and to the castle. While the goldfinches had their breakfast on the thistle-tops, we finished off the remainder of the rabbit. It tasted good with the watercress and we made the best of it, as we knew it might be a long time before we got anything more to eat.

  After that we began talking things over and planning our next move. The question was, what had happened to Cowlick? Where was he? Had he lost his way and walked into the swamps, or had he stumbled into the hands of whatever or whoever was behind the strange goings-on at Wariff Hill? Surely, we reasoned, he knew only too well the danger of the swamps, especially in the darkness, and would have been extra careful to avoid them. No, whatever had happened to him must have happened quickly – so quickly that he hadn’t been able to shout or sound a warning bleep on his bourtree whistle. Had he been seized by someone spying on the castle – perhaps the broken-nosed man and his companions? If so, why? And who were they? Or had something even more sinister befallen him? What did it all have to do with the Legend of the Golden Key, the phantom, and the lost treasure of the Kings, or with the attempt to steal the paintings?

  We had a lot of questions and few answers. Then, as we pondered them and had another look at the spade guinea we had found, something Curly had said gave me an idea. It was what he had said about black magic. Wasn’t Juno always offering to get his mother to tell us our fortune? Wasn’t he always saying how she possessed the power to ‘penetrate the mysterious mists of time that veil the future’, to use his own words? Maybe she could use her strange powers to enlighten us on the events that had resulted in Cowlick’s disappearance. Maybe even tell us where he was.

  At a loss for what else to do and unable to come up with a better suggestion, the others agreed that at least it was worth a try, so off we set. We decided to stay off the road, so we crossed over and headed along the fields towards Juno’s camp. On the way we spotted him on the roadside supervising the usual hive of activity that surrounds road-making operations. Curious, we stole up behind a hedge to have a closer look. My father and Doubter’s father were there, as they work for the council, and we were relieved to see them, for it meant our absence from home hadn’t been noticed yet. We could also see that one of Juno’s carts was leaning sideways on a broken wheel near a large hole in the road. It looked as if it had come a cropper in a cave-in caused by the night’s heavy rain. True to form, Juno was making a big thing of it, saying he couldn’t understand it and how he might have been killed and a lot of balderdash like that. Of course, he was enjoying every minute of it. We didn’t like the idea of approaching Rosie direct, but we knew Juno would be there all day, so we decided to go ahead and chance finding her in an agreeable mood.

  Whether it was because we had carried Juno home from Wariff Hill or not, I don’t know, but Rosie actually invited us in. Normally we wouldn’t have ventured into the caravan with her for love or money. Her bulging eyes, her long nose and her straggly hair make her look like – well, like a witch. On this occasion, however, we were in no position to be fussy about a thing like that, and in no time at all we were sitting staring at that glass ball of hers. We told her everything, except about the spade guinea, in case she might want it as payment, and asked her if she could please tell us where our friend Cowlick was.

  Round and round the crystal ball Rosie wove her scrawny hands, at the same time saying all sorts of gibberish we couldn’t understand. All the while her eyes were getting bigger. Finally, speaking as if she was in a trance and seeing it all in the depths of the crystal ball, she told us:

  ‘Your friend is well

  But for how long

  I cannot tell

  My ball is dark

  With some bad deed

  Of this my sign

  You must take heed

  In timeless mists

  A glitter I behold

  What could it be

  Could it be … gold?’

  We looked at each other, and she continued:

  ‘One is tall, one is fair

  That this foul deed

  It would ensnare …’

  ‘But, but …’ I started. But before I could ask her anything she was on her feet, and with a sweep of her hand bade us,

  ‘Go, make haste

  Bid them beware …’

  One thing for certain, we made haste out of that caravan and back up to the hideout. If we ever doubted Rosie’s ability to tell fortunes, we didn’t doubt it now. We could hardly think, we were so excited. She hadn’t told us where Cowlick was, but she did say he was well. Also, we knew now that the time had come when we must warn the Kings that there was a plot to steal not only their paintings but, we believed, the lost treasure of the Legend of the Golden Key which they needed so much. We must tell them all we knew, help them expose the thieves and, we could only hope, find Cowlick in the process.

  The problem was, how to get to the castle. If we went home, the police would be brought in to search for Cowlick and there would be such a commotion that whoever was after the treasure would be put on their guard and might never be flushed out. If we walked straight up to the lodge gate of the castle, the chances were that we wouldn’t be allowed in. At the same time we couldn’t get in over the boundary wall now, if it was being fitted with a burglar alarm as Old Daddy Armstrong had said.

  For a long while it seemed to us there was nothing we could do.

  ‘Unless we could wade in under the bridge,’ suggested Curly. ‘You know, where the river goes into the estate.’

  Doubter shook his head. ‘The river would be too deep now with all the rain.’

  ‘That’s true,’ I said. ‘But wait … wait! Maybe we could build some sort of raft that would take us under the bridge.’

  ‘That’s it,’ Curly agreed, ‘a raft.’

  ‘But we couldn’t make a raft over there,’ said Doubter. ‘Somebody in the estate would be sure to spot us, and we could never carry it over that far.’

  ‘We wouldn’t have to,’ I explained. ‘Isn’t the river in flood? We could build it at the back of the Whin Hill where nobody would see us, and sail down the river.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Doubter, ‘but what will we make it with?’

  ‘There’s a coil of rope here in the cowshed,’ I said. ‘Let’s get it and come on. I’ve an idea.’

  It was lunchtime, and the scene of the road-making operations was deserted. Having made sure no one was watching, we took an empty tar barrel each and rolled them down to the wooden bridge on the edge of Mr Stockman’s corn fields. Then I dispatched Doubter to get a good long ash pole for pushing the raft, while Curly, Totey and I made our way back up the fields to the wooden gate that leads out onto the brae. Sensing something was afoot, Prince was as excited as could be.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ asked Curly when I started to uncoil the wire that held the gate in place.

  ‘I’m taking off the gate. Come on, give me a hand.’

  ‘Mr Stockman will have your life,’ protested Curly. ‘And anyway, what’s the big idea?’

  ‘Simple!’ I said. ‘We tie the barrels under the gate … and we have a raft.’

  ‘But you can’t go and take a man’s gate just like that,’ said Curly.

  ‘Why not?’ I said. ‘We’ll only be doing him a favour. The corn is nearly ripe, and he’ll be taking the gate off soon himself to let in the combine harvester. Anyhow, this is a desperate situation and it requires desperate measures. Cowlick would do the same for you, wouldn’t he?’

  Curly couldn’t argue with that, so he pitched in and gave a hand, while Totey kept watch to make sure we weren’t caught in the act.