Vampire Voles by Garry Kilworth

Author:Garry Kilworth [Garry Kilworth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Random House Children's UK
Published: 2002-05-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The cellars revealed nothing but the usual junk. No coffins, no grave earth, no horrible smell of vampires. Monty was absolutely sure they were on the right track. Everything added up to the count being the source of the vampire voles. All the circumstantial evidence pointed to that fact. Yet there was no direct evidence.

‘Something doesn’t add up here,’ he said to the others, as they gathered again in the hall. ‘Something’s not quite right. I suggest we begin searching the rooms. We’ll have to split up, because we’ve got an awful lot of them to get through before nightfall.’

Maudlin said, ‘Look, the count might come back at any minute – then we’ll look good, won’t we? Guests rummaging through his castle. That’s bad manners, that.’

‘He won’t be back,’ said Bryony. ‘He’s hiding somewhere until the deadly daylight has gone.’

Maudlin refused to search on his own. He said he would accompany Scruff. So they split into three parties and divided the castle between them.

Monty began in the west wing and made his way to the centre of the castle. It was a quicker business than he expected. Most of the rooms were empty, containing little but dust. Seventeen of these dusty, tomb-like rooms he inspected, finding little to interest him. Finally, he struck gold: an occupied room, just above the grand staircase. It proved to be the count’s bedroom. There was the count’s evening cloak, draped over the bed, which looked as if it had been slept in. ‘Curiouser and curiouser,’ muttered Monty. He inspected the dressing-table, finding rather a lot of make-up there for a male weasel, unless that weasel was quite vain. ‘Or hiding something,’ he murmured. Finally, looking under the bed, he discovered a suitcase.

‘Hello! Anyone home? Where is everybody?’

The shout went through the castle. The count? Monty looked at his pocket watch. It was just noon. Would such a creature be abroad in the middle of the day? ‘Stranger and stranger,’ Monty said, nodding to himself, ‘yet it’s becoming clearer.’

Going down to the great hall, Monty found the count with a shopping basket in his paw, wearing a red riding hood. Bryony had got there before Monty, and she was saying, ‘You really have been shopping.’

‘Yes, of course,’ said the count. ‘I said so in my note, didn’t I? I thought you might like some meat, so I brought four steaks. I don’t eat meat myself . . .’

‘You don’t each much of anythin’, do you?’ announced Scruff severely, entering the room with Maudlin at his heels. ‘In fact you don’t eat anyfink at all, eh?’

‘What is the fellow talking about?’ said the count, with what sounded like a false clack of the teeth.

Maudlin went straight up to the count and confronted him. ‘Those water voles in your garden! What are they doing there?’

Again that clack. ‘A question I ask myself quite frequently. They seem to wander up from the river. But, you see, I value all mammal life, that’s why I’m a vegetarian. I couldn’t chase them away.

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