Revenge of the Beast by Jack Meggitt-Phillips

Author:Jack Meggitt-Phillips
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aladdin
Published: 2022-03-22T00:00:00+00:00

“Rematch?” said the old man.

“I probably shouldn’t,” said Ebenezer, glancing at the clock. But then he figured that he might as well, because Bethany wouldn’t want him getting in the way of the apologizing and partying anyway. “Okay. But this is definitely the last one.”

It definitely wasn’t the last one, because Ebenezer lost that round—and he was determined not to leave on a defeat. The old man won the next game after that as well, but Ebenezer evened the score with a tight fourth-round victory. It seemed a pity not to stay for a decider.

“How’s your wild carrot, by the way?” asked the old man as he set up the board for the final game. Ebenezer greeted his question with a puzzled look. “You told me yesterday that you lived with one.”

“Oh, I see. No, not a wild carrot—a child and a parrot,” said Ebenezer. “They’re both fine. The child’s throwing a party; the parrot’s getting ready for a show.”

“A show? Can I come? It’s got to be better than whatever’s going on in this place.”

“Absolutely. She’s now decided that she wants as many people there as possible, so the more the merrier. It’s very strange—she’s had a complete change of mind about the whole…”

Ebenezer’s tongue was stopped by his thoughts as he dwelled upon all of Claudette’s strange behavior. The fainting, the gauntness, the black eyes, the snappy tones, the sudden desire to put on the biggest show the neighborhood had ever seen… All of it happening at the same time that the objects had begun to make mischief.

For the first time, Ebenezer put the two things together, and a horrid, preposterous thought started to grow in his head. If Claudette’s mind had changed, then what… or who had changed it?

“Sorry, Clinke, I’ve got to go,” he said.

“But you can’t go! We haven’t finished the game!” said the old man in a pleading tone.

A few centuries ago, Ebenezer would have given anything to have such a willing game-playing companion, but now he ran out of the building and quickly drove home—way past the speed limit. It was four o’clock when he got back to the house. He headed straight to the grand sitting room to see how the apology party was going. It turned out that the party wasn’t going at all.

Bethany was seated amongst a mountain of sandwiches and a river of fizzy drinks. Her cheeks were in her hands, and tears were leaking from her eyes.

“I have not had an awesome afternoon,” she said.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.