The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

boys to shrivel back into their seats and stare dejectedly into their laps.
    “Then get up to your room and stay there until you are prepared to tell me about this person,” Cal dismissed them from his sight as he snatched up his knife and fork and gripped them like scraggly throats. Meli watched with dismay as the boys threw back their chairs, and were gone like two cheetahs. She’d already tried that tact, and it didn’t work.
    Cal and Meli locked glances. It seemed to Meli that the issue was now about the boys disobedience in supplying answers, rather than the issue that they had brought two mice into the house without permission. Who was this Finn? For some unknown reason the question turned her blood to slush. Finn was an unusual name, and there’d already been one in the village. Why were they too terrified to tell them about him?
    “And what do you know about this Finn?” Cal now turned his attention to Cassie. Having taken some delight in adding to the boys troubles, she had the grace to squirm slightly in her seat.
    “I don’t know, it’s only that I’ve heard them talking, through the walls. They seem quite friendly with him,” she played her fork over the peaks of mashed spud on her plate, creating delicate creamy swirls.
    “And?” Cal probed.
    “And, that’s all.” Cassie met her father’s gaze steadily.
    Without lowering his exasperated eyes, he skewered a chunk of chicken onto his fork, and then lay it down. Twisting his head he looked at his wife. “Well, I don’t know what to make of this. How can they have this strange friend, and you don’t know about him?”
    Heat shot into Meli’s face. How dare he. “What are you saying? That I’m a bad mother? That I should be on their tails the whole time?” Although her tone was justifiably angry there was a touch of defensiveness to it. She had just been having the same thought. She had been so wrapped up in herself and her work that she had allowed them free rein, been negligent. It was bad enough admitting this to herself, but to have her husband accuse her of it was just too much.
    Cal’s face was the colour of beetroot, and through his thin hair, Meli could see it spreading up and over his scalp. Clambering to his feet he called Quassi and then together they left. Meli sat staring at her own plate. She felt Cassie’s eyes on her.
    “Sorry,” Cassie said.
    “What are you sorry for?” Meli asked, raising her head as though it weighed half a ton. “It’s not your fault.” Cassie got up and left as well. Meli sat miserably looking at the five barely touched meals.

Chapter 20

    Mrs. Barber, the robust Mrs. Swindon and the diminutive Mrs. Rushmore, formed an orderly queue at her door, precisely at two o’clock, all dressed in their best Sunday frocks. Mrs. Barber looked so vastly different, out of her habitual nylon, although there were subtle reminders that pink must be her favourite colour. It probably had something to do with the fevered pink flamingos that vulgarised the otherwise sedate ground-sweeping robe of delicate Wedgwood. With her strapping build, and limp, sparrow-brown hair, she did rather resemble a transvestite. Quickly suppressing any urge to fall around laughing, Meli turned her attention to the two other women. Standing, clinging together by the arms, staring at her with round, gobstopper sized eyes, they looked petrified. Either they were still suffering from shell-shock resulting from their friends attire, or they expected Meli to use witchcraft and turn them all into frogs. She suspected that they had been coerced into coming. She tried to restrain the grin tugging frantically at her lips, only allowing it to settle into a smile.
    “It’s so good of you all to come,” she welcomed them, closing the door to the lodge. “I have been looking forward to it so much.” Mrs. Rushmore turned white as a ghost. Leading the way to the studio, Meli studied the three womens reflections in the window. They all looked as though one boo, and they would all scamper and vanish into the woodlands like startled rabbits. She wondered what they were expecting. Probably some blackened room with cowls, where dismembered body parts from bats and mice were strung from the ceiling, and where the heads of corpses dug up from the graveyard were boiling away in a cauldron.
    Pushing open the door, she stood to one side and ushered them in with a gentile sweep of her arm. Somehow the trio squashed their various sized frames into