The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

who he was.
    Impressed by the awesome sight, Cal made a point of introducing himself when he went to the bar to get their drinks. “So, you’re the one who renamed my boys?”
    “And it wasn’t easy, believe me,” Tim stated in his gravelly voice. Swivelling his head on his ostrich-neck, he turned, and glancing across at Meli, inclined his head almost imperceptibly. Despite what the people in the Post Office had said, Meli had come to the conclusion that Tim was not such a sourpuss as they liked to make out. Personally, she believed that the reason for his dead-pan expression was that his skin was stretched so tightly across his skull, that it was humanly impossible for it to shift and glide in order to convey any emotion. In fact, she likened him to a Crème Egg, hard on the outside, but once you’d bit through, the middle was a pleasant surprise: soft-centred and quite sweet.
    “I see Elsa is up to her old tricks.” Somehow, across the noisy bar, Meli’s ears pricked up on hearing Elsa’s name. Like a shot, she was on her feet and crossing the room to join the two men. She didn’t want to miss out on a word. She was two paces away, when a man at the bar swung round, with a pint of beer and a glass of wine in his hands. They collided, but with some deft hand movements, the man managed to keep his grip on the drinks and didn’t spill a drop. The word ‘sorry’ reached the tip of Meli’s tongue, when she realised who it was. Bill; the Countesses Bill. Meeting the brittle coal-black eyes the word disintegrated. She wouldn’t apologise to him. Meeting him glare for glare, Meli side-stepped him and took his place beside Cal at the bar.
    “Every now and then, Elsa turns the track into a scrap yard, then just as suddenly she has it all removed.” Tim was saying.
    “You mean the vehicles aren’t going to be a permanent fixture?” Meli gasped, clutching Cal’s arm in relief.
    Tim flicked his ocean blue eyes at her. “Has anyone invaded her space recently? Any unwelcome cars parked on the track, or by the entrance?”
    “Yes, we had visitors a month or so ago, and they parked out there.”
    He nodded knowingly, his wispy hair rippling around his head like the spiky petals of a giant sunflower caught in a gust of wind; tinged yellow in the artificial light. “That would explain it. Always sends her potty.” Tim picked up his pint of Guinness, took a long, slow draw of the black liquid, and then replacing it on the counter, wiped a frothy moustache onto the back of his shirt sleeve.
    “Really?” Cal and Meli asked together.
    Ralph, the landlords son who was serving, joined in. “Oh yeah, we’ve had all sorts there. Even had an old Sherman tank once. God knows where she got that from.”
    “Then it’s not just us,” Meli couldn’t have kept the relief from her voice even if someone had offered her a million pounds, it blazed from her green eyes like sunshine on a pond. Hopefully this latest news meant that they wouldn’t need to have words with Elsa; that Elsa would soon get rid of them as suddenly as they had arrived.
    “What’s the longest she’s kept them?” Cal was asking.
    “Oh, ‘bout a year,” Tim glanced at Ralph for confirmation.
    “Yea, about a year,” he agreed, nodding his head as he finished drying the pint glass in his hand. The sunshine dimmed in Meli’s eyes.
    When they were on their own, Cal and Meli discussed this latest information. “What do we do? Wait for her to get rid of them, or speak to her?” Meli asked.
    “Given our recent experiences, I don’t know if it would make the slightest bit of difference even if we did try speaking to her. Might even make things worse.” He shrugged helplessly. They decided to wait and see what happened.

    “What is it?” Meli muttered sleepily, lifting her heavy head from the pillow, woken from a deep slumber by strange, unidentifiable noises from outside. Flinging out a hand, she fumbled around for the switch on the bedside lamp. Cal was already slipping out of bed, his naked backside glowing faintly like a large full moon as the light struck it. The rumbling was getting louder. It sounded like an avalanche of rocks thundering towards them, the vibrations making the bed shake. Drawing back the curtain, Cal stared down.
    “What the?” he groaned, running his fingers through the thin mat of hair on his scalp. “I don’t believe it.”
    “What is it?” Meli vaulted from the bed. Earthquake? Erupting volcano? Spaceship?