The Beggar’s Curse. Ann Pilling

tiny cottage was called Blake’s End. It was easy to find because it was the very last house in the village. The only other place anywhere near it was an untidy farmhouse, with an ancient caravan in a field at the front. This was Pit Farm where Tony and Sid Edge lived with their parents and their sister Violet.

      The caravan was apparently let to a family of cousins. It was moored at the edge of a great sea of rusting machinery, old radiators, car tyres, and lumps of old iron. Oliver walked past slowly, to get a good look. In a place like Stang there might be some old farming tools. There might even be a man trap. . .

      As he lurked in the lane the caravan door opened and three small children sidled out to inspect him. They were pale-faced and doughy-looking, overweight and squat, a bit like puddings. They stared at Oliver, all in a row, like a set of small toby jugs.

      But he wasn’t going to be put off by three little kids. In the long grass he could see something quite promising, a cruel-looking cutting instrument with spikes. He bent down to look at it but the Puddings never took their gaze off him. They followed every move he made with their hard little eyes. Then one of them yelled, “Mam! Mam!” and a face popped out from the doorway. “Keep your hands off that!” the woman shrieked. “This is private property. So clear off!”

      Oliver grabbed his Thermos flask and fled, hardly daring to look up at the cheerless farmhouse where the Edges lived, and he didn’t stop running till he was outside Miss Brierley’s door, at Blake’s End.

      Nobody answered his knock, so he just walked in. The old lady’s bed was in a corner under the window. She lay propped up on pillows but her eyes were shut, and her breathing was irregular and noisy. Rose Salt sat on a chair by the bed, reading slowly and carefully from a copy of The Times.

      Oliver felt rather ashamed. She could read then, and with some expression and feeling. “Rose,” he whispered. “I’ve brought the soup from Molly. You left it behind.” Her sad brown eyes slid from the newsprint to the red flask, then to his face. She said nothing, only shook her head slightly, and went on reading. The Times was obviously Miss Brierley’s bedtime story. She was dozing off quite nicely now, and Rose was pleased.

      Oliver walked slowly down the hill again, towards Blake’s Pit. The old woman was dying, he’d realised that the minute he entered the house. It wasn’t the smell, or the harsh breathing, or the papery chalk-white cheeks, or the lifeless hair. It was something in the air. Death waiting.

      It didn’t worry him. Several of his mother’s old people had been carted off to hospital and never brought back. In time, others, equally old, had replaced them. That was life. But a death like this would upset Prill. She was a touchy, nervous kind of person, with too much imagination for her own good. Oliver hoped the old woman would hang on for a bit longer, at least till they all went home.

      Her cottage was in a prime spot, with a perfect view of Blake’s Pit down below. Oliver hadn’t realised it was quite so big, and he’d forgotten how round it was. The still waters looked very broody and dark today; there was no sun, and rain was threatening. Black Pit was its original name, according to his father, and the locals said it was bottomless.

      He shivered slightly, turned up his collar and headed for Elphins. He didn’t see the three twisted little faces peering at him through the dirty caravan window, or Sid and Violet Edge spying down on him from their upstairs landing, cracking jokes about his skinny little legs.

      Prill had got up very late and spent the morning writing a letter to Angela Stringer. On their way up to Winnie Webster’s bungalow she dropped it in the letter box outside the Edges’ shop.

      “Dear Angela,” she’d written. “We’re here, and guess what? I’ve won second prize in a competition. First prize – two weeks’ holiday in Stang, Second prize – three weeks’ holiday in Stang. Ha Ha, funny joke. Do you get the message? It’s awful. We’re all freezing to death in this house. Molly Bover’s quite nice, arty, but definitely rather vague, and forgets half you say. Someone lives in called Rose Salt. She cooks and cleans up, and looks a real weirdo. I should think she’s got no parents – Molly’s the sort of person who seems to like helping ‘lame dogs’.

      And while I’m on the subject, she’s got these two horrible poodles called Potty and Dotty. Last Christmas someone left them behind, in an empty house, and Molly saved them from the vet’s needle! They obviously get on her nerves, but she felt sorry for them. ‘One of life’s nice people’, as your dad would say.

      Everyone round here is either old or peculiar, or both. There’s a vile family called Edge that seems to rule the village and has a finger in every pie. Nobody likes them, not even Molly. Their Tony (18) is the local heart-throb. Honestly, you should just see him.

      I am going riding by the way, Molly’s said she can fix it up for me. There are some horses in the village, three in a field just outside my bedroom window. But guess what? On closer inspection the one I really fancied turned out to be an old carthorse!

      Now don’t forget to write.

      In deepest gloom, Prill.”

      It really was a masterpiece of spite, and Prill put it in the letter box feeling rather uncomfortable. She hoped the Reverend Stringer wouldn’t read it too. If he did, he’d probably drop straight on to his knees and start praying for her soul.

CHAPTER FOUR

      Winnie Webster must have been lying in wait for them behind her front door, because the minute they knocked it opened quickly and they were ushered inside. She talked non-stop as she drew up chairs and made them sit down in a small, crowded room. Jessie, curiously cowed by the atmosphere, came in rather unwillingly and slumped at Prill’s feet. But the minute she wagged her tail all the ornaments on the mantelpiece rattled.

      “Oh dear,” Miss Webster said doubtfully. “I didn’t know you had a dog. I’m a cat person myself. Do you think—”

      “I’ll take her outside,” Colin said abruptly, getting up. Nobody wanted Jessie in Stang; even Molly had forgotten she was coming. He felt rather depressed as he knotted her lead round the bars of the garden gate, and the odd cooking smells that issued from Winnie’s kitchen didn’t do much to cheer him up. Molly had warned them that she was rather keen on health foods, and it was hours since breakfast.

      She gave them all a pre-lunch drink, with hard seeds at the bottom and what looked like dead leaves floating about on top. “Cinnamon,” she explained crisply, watching Prill trying to fish her bits out. “Nothing added. All freshly squeezed. Drink up now, lunch in twenty minutes.”

      The three children swallowed the strange brew obediently. Winnie Webster was like that; very small, but with a hard steel core, bustling and energetic – a little human dynamo. She was also a mad keen gardener. Outside the window a plump young man in jeans was scratching his head over an obstinate lawn mower. “That’s Porky Bover,” she explained. “No, no relation to Molly, except way back. He’s my right hand in this great garden. A marvellous worker. Now then, let’s have a chat.”

      But all they did was listen. Oliver had Winnie Webster taped in about two minutes. Women like her were always coming to see his mother. She was a Committee Lady. She went on and on about church fétes, and Christmas bazaars, and children’s pantomimes. Her life blood was in all this, now she’d retired from school teaching. But what she most wanted to talk about was the play. “You do know about it, of course?” she said, pausing only to draw breath before rushing on.

      “Sort of,” said Colin, though all Molly had told them was that some of the men and boys in the village put a play on at Easter time. It was very ancient, something to do with St George and a lot of other knights. There was a great deal of fighting in it, but everyone made friends at the end. The dead men came back to life, and they all danced round together.

      “King George actually,” corrected Winnie. “But yes, he’s a saint, of course. My dears, you wouldn’t believe the trouble I have