Alice looked just as I remembered her, but as she spoke now, she sounded different – completely confident of success. Was she being overconfident?
‘Is it dangerous?’ I asked nervously.
‘I won’t lie to you, Tom. Of course it’s dangerous. But we’ve been in danger from the dark from the moment we met, and we’ve always come through safely. Don’t see why this shouldn’t be the same.’
Suddenly she rushed into my arms and kissed me fiercely on the lips. Before I could respond, it was over; she broke away from me and began to walk off.
I stared after her in shock. I was stunned. Why had she kissed me? Could it really be that she cared for me as much as I cared for her? I had never known. I desperately wanted to hold her in my arms again.
Alice turned, looked back and called out over her shoulder: ‘Take care, Tom! Don’t tell Old Gregory you’ve seen me. It’s best that way.’
And then she was gone. There was so much I hadn’t had time to ask her. What had it been like in the dark? How had she managed to survive and retrieve the blade I now held in my hand?
I walked back towards the house sadly. I was very relieved that Alice had returned safely, but now I had something else to worry about. What were Alice and Grimalkin about to attempt? No doubt there were great risks involved.
She’d asked me not to tell my master that I’d met her. One part of me agreed with her; it was probably for the best to keep it from him – he’d only ask questions. But I’d kept too many things from him in the past. Now I’d have to hide the blade to make sure he didn’t see it.
I’d been feeling increasingly guilty about such deceptions. Each had seemed very necessary at the time, but they had accumulated, and the more there were, the worse I’d felt. This was one more to add to the list, and I didn’t like it.
THE FOLLOWING DAY, late in the morning, the Spook and I were sitting at a table in his new Chipenden library. Opposite us sat a small thin man dressed in a black three-piece suit and a white shirt with a dark grey tie. He was a lawyer, a Mr Timothy Potts, who had made the journey south from Caster. He was taking notes as my master spoke.
The Spook was making his will. Or, to be more accurate, he was updating it.
As he did so, I looked around, only half listening. The house had burned down and been rebuilt, and now almost everything within it was new. The library smelled of fresh wood. The shelves were still mostly empty and probably contained fewer than three dozen books. It would take a long time to restore it, and much of what had burned was irreplaceable – especially the legacy of books written by former spooks, with their personal accounts of how they’d practised their trade. We dealt with ghosts, ghasts, boggarts and witches – all manner of things from the dark. So we relied on books and notebooks a lot. Our careful records were vital: we looked to the past in order to prepare for the future.
‘So those are my wishes,’ ended the Spook very firmly.
Mr Potts adjusted the glasses on the bridge of his nose and coughed to clear his throat. ‘I’ll read it back to you, Mr Gregory. Please interrupt if you have anything to add or feel that I have not accurately recorded those wishes.’
The Spook nodded, and Mr Potts began to read very slowly, with hardly a trace of a County accent. He sounded really posh. He was obviously an ‘incomer’ who had been born and educated down south.
‘I leave my two main houses, at Chipenden and Anglezarke, to my apprentice, Thomas Ward, including all fixtures, fittings, books and tools of the trade. They remain his, as long as he lives, on condition that he practises the trade of spook for as long as he is able. In his own will, he may only leave them to another spook, and on these same conditions.’
I was sad to hear those words. It made me feel as if my time as the Spook’s apprentice was almost over. But I took a deep breath and tried to think positively. Our time together might be drawing to a close, but surely we had another couple of years – time to complete my apprenticeship properly and then perhaps continue when I was a fully trained spook, so that I could take some of the burden off his shoulders.
‘I grant the use of my third house north of Caster, which I inherited from William Arkwright, to Judd Brinscall for as long as he practises as a spook in that location. In the event of his death or early retirement from the trade, that property with its library will revert to the ownership of Thomas Ward on the same terms stipulated for my other properties.’
Bill Arkwright had died fighting the dark in Greece. Now Judd Brinscall, a previous apprentice of the Spook, had taken up residence in Bill’s old water mill and was attempting to deal with the water witches there.
Mr Potts gave a little cough. ‘Is that correct, Mr Gregory?’
‘Aye, it’s correct,’ my master confirmed.
‘What about your other financial affairs? Have you any income to dispose of?’
The Spook shook his head. ‘There is nothing significant, Mr Potts. This is not a trade that makes a man rich. But if money is in my possession at my death, I leave that to my apprentice, Master Ward.’
‘Very well.’ Potts made a further short note before packing up his papers, pushing back his chair and rising to his feet. He took his pocket watch from his waistcoat and glanced at the time before tucking it away again. ‘I will write this up in the proper manner and return here next week so that you may sign the document.’
The two men shook hands, and then it was my duty to escort the lawyer through the garden and off the premises – otherwise he would have been in danger from the Spook’s pet boggart, which guarded against intruders, both human and otherwise.
After setting Mr Potts safely on his way, I returned to the library to find my master still sitting in the same position. He was slumped in his chair, staring down at the tabletop. He had aged a lot during the past two years; his beard was now totally white and his face gaunt. He probably felt that his life was drawing to a close. That, no doubt, was why he wanted to put his affairs in order. He certainly did not look happy.
In a few moments he was going to feel a lot worse.
Alice had asked me to keep her return and work with Grimalkin secret. But I’d been feeling guilty about it: my master was planning to entrust me with his property and his work after his death, whenever that might be. There were important things that I had to confess; things that would anger and dismay him. And I felt that now was the right time.