CHAPTER 2
THE JOURNEY BEGINS
The Castle was well known throughout the length and breadth of Deep Wood. It sat at the edge of an immense forest that covered all the land as far as the eye could see to the north, south, and east; the western side was protected by cliffs that fell into the restless, foam-covered
The Castle was built by elves in order to protect them from something evil that lurked in Deep Wood in bygone days. They never found who or what it was that was killing the elves. Curiously, however, whenever the moon slipped between the earth and the sun and the day turned into night, elves would immediately stop whatever it was they were doing and rush home as fast as they could because they knew from legend that at such times the Lord of Hell walked in Deep Wood.
Zoë and her family had heard about the mysterious goings-on in Deep Wood in the past but put it down to folk lore and an overactive imagination. Fairy tales are full of beastly stories; but this was definitely not that type of story.
Zoë, her brother, and her parents and grandparents were about to become the principle actors in one of the most incredible adventures ever played-out in Deep Wood!
***
A misty rain had begun to fall as Basil raised the heavy bonnet of his old Ford Zephyr. “Good God isn’t that just absolutely beautiful!” he sang passionately; and his big blue eyes scanned the spotless, six-cylinder cast-iron engine. He was as happy as a pig in mud. Satisfied that all was well with his pride and joy, he slid behind the leather-bound steering wheel and sat there waiting. Odin and Mathew kept him company.
“I wonder what’s keeping them?” He grumbled and shot a look towards the house. He ignored Odin’s sloppy lick and Mathew’s rather questionable advice about shortcuts to the Castle. All of a sudden Basil felt a creeping sensation on the back of his neck. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Caroline; she was steaming towards him and she looked rather cranky. Basil swallowed nervously as she approached; she couldn’t possibly be mad at him - he’d been ready for ages! Odin barked excitedly.
“Thanks a lot for your help Basil!” Caroline snapped and pulled his door open. “I want you to get out of the car and get the suitcase if that’s all right with you?” She glared at him. Basil leapt from the car like a man possessed and returned shortly afterwards with the suitcase and a box of tissues. Basil pulled himself behind the steering wheel once more. Odin gave him an extra-sloppy lick on the cheek.
“Have you been to the toilet yet, Odin?” Basil asked suspiciously; he squinted at Odin in the rear-view mirror and swabbed saliva from his face. Odin didn’t reply and stared at Basil like a mentally challenged garden gnome. “Right then mate, you’re not going till you’ve been to the toilet, and that’s a promise!” He growled like a headmaster at a reform school for delinquent Rottweilers.
Odin’s attention was on something far more exciting than Basil’s jaw jacking; Samantha, Odin’s arch territorial rival had just jumped over the fence and was casually trotting towards him, tail held stiffly at the attention, to see what was going on. Odin didn’t like Samantha because she piddled on his favourite piddling places; she was also too snoopy for his liking. He shot from the car like a cannonball with a double charge of black-powder and rocketed after her like a heat-seeking missile; Basil chugged after him like an old puffing-billy steam engine; and the Goblin-fly flapped after Basil and trilled with excitement. Mathew and Zoë cried with laughter; and Caroline tried her best to look as inconspicuous as possible, just in case the neighbours were watching.
A tense calm finally descended on the Scott family; Samantha was chased home in a state of considerable distress; Odin had a big pee and followed it up with a huge poop; and Caroline and Basil slid into the car in silence; they looked glum and avoided eye contact. Caroline, Basil, and the Goblin-fly sat in the front of the car; Basil was the driver and Caroline the navigator; the Goblin-fly was the uninvited guest. Zoë, Mathew and Odin sat in the back. They quietly pulled out from their driveway and turned onto the open road. The exciting adventure to Deep Wood had finally begun.
The adventure had also just begun for Wesley-boy and his gang of hooligan field mice; they were also off to Deep Wood. Rumour had it Deep Wood was full of pretty girl field mice who were desperate for the company of randy boy field mice! They lounged about in the boot of Basil’s car and passed away the time telling naughty jokes and drinking claret from Basil’s wine cask.
***
“There’s that Irish wolfhound!” Basil shouted and pointed at a long-limbed, thin dog in the act of depositing something thoroughly disgusting on the Vicar’s doormat.
“They’ll need a coal shovel to move that donation!” Mathew laughed; Basil laughed with him. Odin wailed like he always did whenever there was a full moon; and the Goblin-fly buzzed round Basil’s head eagerly. Caroline and Zoë ignored the crass exhibition.
“Where’d that fly come from?” Basil said suddenly and adjusted his glasses for a better look; then the penny dropped. “That’s the Goblin-fly bugger that helped itself to my tea this morning!” He shouted and made a valiant attempt to knock its block off. He then returned to the subject of that dog. The Goblin-fly sat on his shoulder and beamed happily.
“The owner of that dog should be prosecuted!” He protested loudly. “And fouling people’s property is just not on!”
“What was that Basil?” Mathew said with a snigger. “Did you say he missed the Vicar’s door mat?” Basil didn’t reply.
“Dog owners who take no notice of council bylaws should be heavily fined and flogged!” He grumbled angrily and steam issued from both of his nostrils. “And crapping on the Vicar’s doormat is a public health hazard as well!”
“Especially if the Vicar steps in it,” Mathew shouted and quaked with laughter. “And he’s pissing on the Vicar’s roses now; have a look Basil, quick.”
Basil’s forehead slumped over his eyebrows and he mumbled something very rude under his breath. “And if I ever catch you doing that Odin,” he said very sternly, “I’ll be very cross indeed!” Odin gave Basil another sloppy lick and the Goblin-fly squealed with excitement.
“And wasn’t that the dog I operated on last year?” He asked Caroline in a tone that indicated he definitely had. “It had a broken hip, or a touch of gastric or a sore ear or something like that if I remember correctly?”
“It had a bad case of fleas Basil,” said Caroline distantly. “And do you remember how rude you were to Mrs Coventry?” Basil shot her a glance and sniggered.
“Oh, I remember that old hag all right,” he said disapprovingly. “And I also remember telling her that her dog ought to be locked up.”
Caroline gave him a scathing look. “Well you didn’t have to tell her that she ought to be locked up as well!” Basil rocked with laugher till his eyes watered. “Ah yes,” he said with a satisfied look in his misty eyes. “That was my finest hour.”
“And I know who really should be locked up!” said Caroline; she fixed her eyes on Basil. “No wonder business has fallen off lately. I’m surprised anyone comes to see you!”
“Well my precious ladybug let me put it to you this way,” he said smoothly, though his eyes and facial expression said he was more than a little put out by what Caroline had just said. “In this life you get exactly what you pay for, and there’s no substitute for quality. So if people want a good veterinary once-over for their animals they come to see me; and furthermore,” he said hotly, “they’d never get the same level of professional service from any other vet.”
“I can believe that!” Caroline said with a loud sigh.
They hurtled through the town in relative silence, except for an occasional black outburst from Basil about something utterly trivial, like Odin’s farting; and they soon found themselves in the refreshingly beautiful English countryside.
“God’s own country!” Basil said reverently and narrowly avoided squashing a rabbit that had been sitting in the middle of the road admiring the same sight.
“I’ve always wanted to be a farmer you know,” he said dreamily. “Just think of it getting up early in the morning, growing your own food, making your own designer sausages, bread, and bacon; collecting your own free-range eggs.” He sighed so profoundly that he feared his heart would break. “Ah yes,” he said with a tremble in his voice, “I could have been a good farmer, talking to the animals.” Basil felt a tear roll down his cheek and he sniffed as another tear blossomed on the tip of his nose.
“Why don’t you concentrate on the here and now Basil?” said Caroline reproachfully; “and why start working now?”
Basil’s face wilted with self-pity and the realisation that what Caroline had just said was true. A swirling fog of black depression quickly filled his mind; he’d never be a farmer after all.
“You can be a farmer if you really want to Daddy,” said Zoë; she smiled and gave Basil an encouraging pat on the back.
“You’d love to get up before dawn seven days a week, 352 days a year and work from before dawn to well after sunset, and then do the paperwork before you start again; and no TV. And if you’re really lucky,” she continued with a giggle, “you might just manage a few hours sleep.”
Mathew laughed, and leaning over the front seat gave Basil a manly bear hug. “Let’s face it Basil my old mate,” he said trying to reassure Basil. “The only time you’re ever likely to be up before dawn is if the house was on fire. And I’ve heard you talking to the animals! And I can tell you right here and now that what I heard wasn’t very nice!” Basil groaned in despair.
As mid-morning approached they turned off the main road and stopped next to a thick stand of elm trees; they were grotesquely twisted by the ravages of age, disease, and extreme weather.
“This is as good a place as any for a picnic, I suppose,” said Basil; he was trying very hard to sound cheerful. Caroline replied with a chilly nod, and without uttering a single word pulled herself from the car and stepped into the cold mountain air. Caroline shivered inwardly as she took-in the bleak scenery; she wrapped her coat tightly around her and opened a picnic basket - it contained potato salad, roast chicken, and many other tasty morsels.
“I hope this makes everybody feel better,” said Zoë; she dragged a camp table and four chairs behind her. Basil, Mathew, and Basil’s little mate stayed in the car. Odin busied himself with chasing inquisitive rabbits.
“The food’s ready!” shouted Caroline; she tried ever so hard to sound cheerful under the bleak circumstances. Basil and Mathew refused to leave the comfort of the car. “Will you bring me some food please dear?” he said like an invalid. “And don’t forget the tea and two spoons of sugar, stirred, please.” He pouted his lips smugly and gave Mathew a wink. Caroline’s eyes narrowed and her face lengthened; she looked as though she was about to murder someone in very close proximity to Mathew; the next thing, they were sitting at the table like chastised school boys.
The Frightfully Terrible and Thoroughly Horrible Hooligan Boys were fast asleep, drunk to be more precise, in Mathew’s suitcase.
“By the way Basil,” said Mathew scooping another dollop of potato salad onto his plate. “I just thought you ought to know that well-dressed blowfly just dived into your potato salad!”
Basil immediately raised his plate for a better look; yes, Mathew was right: The Goblin-fly was swimming around his plate like a brazen tart touting for business; it dived into the mayonnaise and surfaced holding a piece of chicken which it ate greedily. Basil’s forehead furrowed and his lips stretched into a snarl.
“It’s that bleeding Goblin-fly again!” he growled and tried to spear the intruder with his fork. The Goblin-fly easily avoided the fork thrusts and blew Basil a chicken and mayonnaise-flavour kiss. Basil’s eyes twinkled brightly.
“Oh what a cute wee fellow!” he sang happily, and a broad smile spread across his face; Basil had found a friend.
“I wonder why the little fellow’s so fond of me?” he said and carefully spooned his new mate onto his knee and helped him to wipe-off most of the mayonnaise from his colour-coordinated clothing.
“Gee thanks Baz mate,” chirped the happy little Goblin-fly. Basil was now his best friend in the whole world. He pulled out his notebook and scribbled: Baz is my best, best, best friend.
“It’s a pleasure, mate,” said Basil with a crackle in his voice. “Can I call you ‘Goby’ mate?” The Goblin-fly nodded and buzzed excitedly around Basil’s head and gave him a Goblin-fly-sized hug. Caroline rolled her eyes. “Stop talking to that blowfly Basil,” she said crossly. “And I don’t care how well-dressed he is!” Then she rounded on Mathew. “And stop encouraging him!” she said angrily.
Basil gave the impression of being profoundly offended by Caroline’s outburst and so did his little mate; he sat on Basil’s shoulder and fumed with anger at the outrage that had been directed at Basil by Caroline. The Goblin-fly couldn’t contain his emotions any longer and, in a show of extreme defiance, wedged his thumbs into his floppy ears and wiggled his fingers vigorously; he followed-up this vulgar act with another disgusting display of bad manners: He stuck out his tongue and let off a ripper raspberry. Satisfied that it was now clear to all where his loyalty lay, he gave Basil a Goblin-fly-size peck on the cheek. Basil grinned and gave his mate a wee pat on the head.
“You just can’t help yourself can you, Basil?” said Caroline scathingly.
Basil’s ignored Caroline and watched his little mate tucking into a blob of mayonnaise on his shirt. “Had enough, Goby mate?” he said warmly and roared with laughter as his bloated little friend let off a booming raspberry from both ends.
“Yes thank you Baz mate,” he purred happily and gently rubbed his swollen stomach.
All of a sudden a violent thunderstorm exploded like an atom bomb above them, and a cloudburst let loose a torrent of rain and sharp slivers of ice. The ancient elms wailed as never before; and the sky filled with twisted and torn branches.
Basil hastily shunted everybody into the car as debris showered around them and locked the doors against something that he felt rather than saw. They couldn’t see more than a few feet through the storm; it was safer to stay in the car and wait for the storm to fade away; the alternative was to get out of there immediately; however, if they chose the latter, they risked getting killed by driving off a cliff, or something equally dramatic. But they were soon to find that it was just as dangerous to remain in the car!
A searing bolt of lightning suddenly flashed into the elm tree next to the car and vaporised it; it was instantly followed by an ear-cracking clap of thunder; the ground shook under the deafening noise.
“The Devil’s come to get you Basil!” The Goblin-fly squealed. “We must go now Basil!” he shrieked urgently and tugged at Basil’s collar. It was definitely time to go, visibility or not. The rain thrashed the windscreen as Basil steered the car back onto the road and made off as fast as he could; he was hell-bent on getting as much distance as possible between them and that possessed forest.
They had been travelling in silence for some time; the storm was now behind them, but another was fast approaching; the sky up ahead was getting darker and heavy black clouds piled-up like mountains. Basil turned on the headlights and accelerated; he was very jumpy.
They sped on, when all of a sudden Basil screamed like a witch whose broom had just caught fire while flying in the vicinity of the moon; there, in the yellow beam of the car headlights, were dozens of glowing eyes, and they were all fixed on him! “What’s that?” he screamed as though he were about to have a nervous breakdown; a vein on his forehead threatened to burst at any moment. Basil slowed the car and grasped his Smith and Wesson revolver.
“They’re sheep!” Caroline shouted just in case Basil was about to do something absolutely stupid; he growled aggressively and lowered the hand cannon; but the sheep stood their ground and dropped their heads, as if challenging him to come on; this was the mating season and there were no thorny bushes on the road to get in the way of what ever it was that they were doing.
“Drive slowly and they’ll soon move,” said Caroline. But Mathew was spoiling for a fight.
“Put your foot down Basil!” he said belligerently and reached for Basil’s loaded Smith and Wesson revolver. Caroline’s jaw dropped at the sight of the heavy silver gun in Mathew’s hand; she immediately confiscated it.
“Where did he get that gun?” Caroline snapped; her eyes were alight with the fire of suspicion; Basil gulped nervously and hitched-up a broken smile.
“How should I know?” He said defensively and jumped on the accelerator; the upshot was very predictable: the sheep scattered like leaves caught-up in a whirlpool; however, the young, virile rams trotted briskly after the car in order to impress the pretty young ewes with their bravery.
“You’re absolutely impossible Basil!” said Caroline as she removed her hands from her eyes. Zoë reminded him of his duty-of-care to all creatures great and small, which included sheep.
“Well done Basil,” said Mathew leaning closer to his father. “If you’d just gone a little bit faster you could’ve clipped that big ram; and did you see the size of his big hairy balls?” Basil roared with laugher and clenched his cheeks tight to stop another haemorrhoid from popping out.
“You’re both disgusting!” said Caroline. “And so is your colourful mate, Basil.”
They drove on in silence, until forced to stop by a wooden barrier placed across the road. “What on earth is it this time?” said Basil.
“Maybe it’s there to stop people who like talking to flies Basil?” Mathew said with a chuckle in his voice. Basil ignored him and edged the car closer.
“There’s a notice on it,” he said in a tone that suggested he was greatly surprised that the council had the common decency to offer a reason for putting a barrier across the road.
“It says DETOUR, BRIDGE UNDER REPAIR” said Basil needlessly; they could all read. He turned on Caroline as though she was responsible for everything bad that had happened to them since they left home. “Bridge, what bridge?” he yelled and adjusted his glasses that had slid down his nose in the excitement.
“I’ve never heard of a bridge on this road before, have you?” he asked Caroline. “And the arrow points towards that dirt track.” He said pointing at the dirt track; it disappeared into the darkness of the forest. Although he didn’t admit it, Basil was worried.
“No, I haven’t heard of a bridge on this road either,” she whispered and fixed her eyes on the dark, menacing, forest; she looked pale with worry. “Perhaps it was the thunderstorm this morning. I’ve got a very bad feeling about this trip Basil,” she said with a tremble in her voice. “I think we should go back home.”
Basil didn’t reply; sweat blossomed on his forehead and ran down his cheeks in a series of meandering rivulets. Odin began to bark frantically; his big, dilated, brown eyes were fixed on something shadowy skirting the edge of the forest.
The Goblin-fly also had his eyes fixed on the shadowy apparition; he sat on Basil’s shoulder and buzzed nervously. He hauled himself closer to Basil’s ear. “Baz mate,” he squeaked urgently, “you must go home at once!”
“There’s definitely something in the forest!” Caroline whispered. “I can feel it. And whatever it is,” she added nervously, “I think it has a lot to do with you Basil!”
“Well, I can’t see anything,” said Basil defensively. “And why should it be after me? Did you see anything moving out there Mathew?” Mathew shook his head to indicate he hadn’t.
Although Basil was worried, he was damned if he was going to call off the holiday just because something might be stalking them in the forest. He laughed quietly, but the sound that left his lips sounded more like a feeble attempt to clear a fur ball from his throat.
“There’s nothing out there,” he said in a reassuring tone. “You’re letting your imagination get the better of you!” Having said that, Basil turned the car onto the track and sped off towards Deep Wood.
“What’s that?” Zoë shouted suddenly, and nearly frightened the living daylights out of everybody in the car. Five pairs of eyes followed the direction of her finger; it pointed at a wooden ladder, the top of which protruded from what appeared to be a deep hole in the ground. Basil swabbed his forehead.
“It’s probably just a hole in the ground with the top of a ladder sticking out of it,” he said rationally and steered the car closer for a better look. A grin appeared on his face and without another word he opened the door and pulled himself into the musky forest; he peered into the void and chuckled to himself. “It’s only a hole in the ground, as I said. I’ve seen hundreds of holes like this one before. In fact, when I was a little boy I used to wander through the dark forest gathering mushrooms and hunting rabbits so that my poor mother and father and brothers and sisters wouldn’t starve; I was an incredibly brave little boy!”
“I didn’t know Basil had brothers and sisters?” Zoë whispered.
“Well I find it difficult to believe he even had a mother and father.” Mathew laughed.
“He’s an only child,” said Caroline giggling; “but the story should be a good one!”
“As I was about to say,” Basil continued; he glared daggers at Caroline. “The hole is used to trap wild pigs; and I once saw a tiny little piglet trapped at the bottom of one of them.”
“What happened to it?” Zoë asked; she was an animal liberationist.
Basil cackled like a constipated drake and smugly continued his story: “Oh that little pig didn’t go to market I can assure you of that,” he said with a cheesy grin. “A pretty little thing it was, too; well I took it home and put it in a nice, warm, padded box.” He laughed louder than before.
“They probably shared the same padded box!” Mathew suggested matter-of-factly. Basil ignored the unflattering remark and continued his story.
“And when the snooping hunters asked me if I’d seen anyone acting suspiciously in the forest I told them a nasty, big forest troll took the piglet.”
Zoë and Caroline laughed and Goby twittered like a very happy little canary. Mathew was a lot less sympathetic. “What a load of crap!”
“Are there really such creatures as trolls?” Zoë asked with a twinkle in her eye.
“Too right there are Zoë,” Basil said and put on his most honest face. “Isn’t that true, Goby mate?” He gave his little chum a tickle on the chin. The Goblin-fly nodded, chirped gaily, and tweeted “Too right there are Baz mate,” and wiped a happy tear from his soppy eyes.
“Oh, and if you’re wondering about it,” said Basil belatedly, and in a lofty, regal voice, “my mate Goby works for the Civil Service, and he’s doing an in-depth time and motion study on yours truly.” He crooned and beamed with pride. “Ah yes,” he said with a superior sigh and rolled his eyes heavenward. “My reputation is known throughout the land, just as I always expected it would be one day; and now even the Civil Service wants to know how I manage to be so extraordinarily good at everything I do.” If Basil was expecting Caroline, Zoë, and Mathew to be surprised he wasn’t wrong; they were stunned; and the Goblin-fly hummed so merrily that he sounded like an approaching swarm of bees – he didn’t want to contradict Basil’s story.
Caroline flung her head back and laughed. “What?” She cried more loudly than was necessary. “A time and motion study on you, Basil; well you’ve got to be joking!”
Basil curled his lips into an ugly sneer; he felt very hurt by whatever it was that Caroline had implied about his work practice. “No; as a matter of fact I’m definitely not joking!” he said angrily. “And, I’ll have you know that I’m highly regarded by some of the more cerebral company that I keep.”
Caroline laughed again and made a scathing reference to the drunks, who were usually so cerebral they were paralytic by closing time.
“You know Basil,” said Mathew studying his father’s scarlet-tinged face. “The way I see it, the Civil Service is probably going to recommend you for a knighthood for your amazing ability to work all day, produce nothing in that time, and get paid an awful lot of money for doing it; sounds remarkably like the Civil Service to me.” Basil groaned with despair and resolved to never complain about the Civil Service again. He decided to immediately change the subject.
“And Deep Wood’s crawling with goblins, fairies, gnomes, elves, and animals so strange that they defy description; and I should know because I’ve seen them all!”
Mathew doubled over laughing. “Yes, I’d certainly believe that Basil, especially after the vet’s annual knees-up!”
Caroline and Zoë quaked with laughter; the loyal Goblin-fly showed Mathew a threatening set of needle sharp teeth and vigorously shook his minute clenched fist at him; that cheered Basil up a bit.
“How can you treat me like this?” Basil growled crossly. “And after all I’ve done for you: years of blood, sweat, and tears.”
“Oh stop your whining Basil,” Caroline said. “We were only joking.”
Basil was just about to jump into another harangue when out of the corner of his eye he saw something very, very strange. “Look, over there!” He shouted like someone who’d definitely spent too much time sitting in the light of the full moon. “It’s a bloody big troll!” What Basil did next defies rhyme or reason. He jumped on the accelerator and threw the heavy car at the thoroughly stunned troll.
“What are you doing?” Caroline shouted in disbelief; it appeared as though Basil was about to do something really stupid again. But Basil was too absorbed in an emotional world of his own making.
The terrified troll let out a blood-curdling scream, clapped its hands over its huge, black, oval eyes, and fell kicking and screaming obscenities into the darkness of his hole.
“Basil’s right!” Mathew shouted as the car slewed to a stop next to the hole. “That really was a bloody big troll!”
Caroline and Zoë gaped with astonishment and disbelief at what Basil had just done; and with surprise because they thought trolls existed only in his feeble mind.
“That’s just typical behaviour from an uncivilised forest troll!” said Basil disapprovingly. “And it jumped into the hole without even saying hello or goodbye. And I only wanted to ask it about the road conditions up-ahead and suchlike; I’ve never seen such bad manners from a troll in my entire life!” He growled.
“You might have killed that innocent troll!” Zoë said in an accusing voice. Basil didn’t answer, his attention was drawn to something incredibly big and ugly; it was kicking up a dust storm as it charged out of the forest and made straight for Basil!
“I think we’d better get out of here right now!” he said with a lot of emotion, and the likelihood of his imminent death; he jumped on the accelerator pedal and the car took off like a V-2 rocket trailing a long tongue of blue flame.
Head down, ears back, and elbows up, Basil tore through the forest like a racing car driver who’d badly lost his way on the race circuit; in his wake he left a rolling cloud of dust and dozens of spluttering forest animals and an exceptionally angry troll. Half an hour later they came upon another incredible sight.
“Well, would you just look at that?” Basil shouted; he screeched to a halt next to a dazzling shaft of sunlight that ripped through the forest canopy and speared into the mossy ground like a golden javelin. It was an amazing transformation from darkness to light. But even more incredible was the sight of a dozen huge forest rabbits; each sat majestically on a gigantic spotted red toadstool within the circle of light. The rabbits looked very worried and agitated and spoke in hushed tones as if expecting something horrible to jump at them from the darkness at any moment. All of a sudden the biggest of the rabbits jumped off his toadstool and swaggered over to investigate what the strangers inside the car were up to; and from previous experience they were usually up to no good!
Looking dreadfully hostile, the rabbit pulled itself up onto its tiptoes and carefully studied Basil’s face through the open window; it then leaned forward and cautiously sniffed Basil’s nose; Basil sniffed the rabbit’s nose. The rabbit was definitely not impressed with Basil because it immediately pulled a strange face and scrubbed it energetically with its paws. Basil was equally unimpressed with the rabbit.
“Piss off or I’ll plug you!” He shouted threateningly, and as quick as a gunslinger produced his revolver. The rabbit squealed in terror and pelted for the safety of its burrow; the other rabbits followed.
Unknown to Basil, however, a dark spectre, half corpse and half ghost, was gliding through the forest towards him; strips of decomposing flesh hung from its head and maggots spilled from its eye sockets, ears, and mouth; and the blackened bones holding its face together jutted through the tears in its rotten skin; it was the horrible image of advanced mortification.
Mathew’s face was grey with worry; he was convinced there was something far more dreadful behind the rabbit’s bizarre behaviour than Basil’s not-out-of-the-ordinary behaviour. “I always thought forest rabbits were a bit strange, but this is really weird, Basil!” Mathew said with more than a hint of anxiety in his voice. “And I doubt it was you that frightened them away!” Mathew squinted into the darkness of the forest.
“Well, whatever it was,” said Caroline nervously, “it also frightened me!” She was visibly worried. “Get out of here now, Basil!” she demanded. “There’s definitely something out there!”
“You’re right mum,” said Zoë uneasily and pointed at something shadowy gliding along the twilight zone towards them. Caroline suddenly felt a cold, clammy shroud envelop her body; it was a sign of genuine fear.
“The holiday’s turning into a nightmare!” she cried in desperation. “You don’t suppose that the sign just might have pointed somewhere else, do you Basil? It was very stormy!”
Basil looked around tensely and swabbed perspiration from his furrowed brow. Caroline was probably right; she usually was, and they were probably on the wrong track and going in the wrong direction as well! “Anyway, it can’t be too much further to the Castle,” he lied in a crackling, high-pitched voice.
They raced through the forest like a ferret up a drainpipe; Basil was determined to put as much distance as possible between themselves and that horrible thing, or whatever it was that had frightened the rabbits away. Basil also prayed as he never prayed before for their safe deliverance.
“What the hell’s this now?” He yelled moments later and skidded to a halt alongside a wide river that cut across their path. The cloud of dust that had been following them finally caught up and billowed over the car. Basil waited for the dust to clear and cautiously wound his window down; he sniffed the air for some reason best known to him and Odin and peered at the fast-flowing water - he had to know its depth before attempting to cross it.
“It’s as quiet as an ancient grave out there!” he whispered gloomily. Basil cocked his revolver and holding the deadly weapon before him took a slow, tentative step into the unknown.
“Nothing to worry about!” he squeaked in a faltering voice and took another step, and then all hell broke loose. Basil screamed like a silverback gorilla that had just misplaced his harem; his eyes bulged from their sockets, and his jaw flapped as though it was under the control of a mentally-challenged puppeteer.
What followed was more by accident than intent: Basil fell backwards in a faint, the revolver he was clutching in a death grip went off and a large, white, flapping thing tumbled from the sky – Basil had winged it! Rearranging its ruffled feathers it jumped into the air and disappeared over the trees, but not before attempting to peck Basil to death.
“That was a goose Basil!” shrieked Zoë; she was outraged that Basil had nearly killed a goose as well as a troll, and had frightened a poor forest rabbit half to death. Mathew, however, leapt from the car and gave Basil a congratulatory slap on the back.
“You nearly got it Basil!” He shouted excitedly. Basil tossed his head back and really laughed for the first time since the start of their journey.
“Would you like to try my wand next time, Baz mate?” chirped Goby happily and offered Basil his little gold-tipped, ebony wand. Smiling proudly, Basil took the toothpick and examined it closely and chuckled.
“Thanks all the same Goby mate,” he said affectionately “but I think I’ll stick to my Smith and Wesson for the time being.” Goby tweeted like a little canary.
Basil carefully waded into the river and returned moments later beaming like a full moon. “It’s just shallow stream!” he yelled happily. “The water barely reached my ankle!” He and Mathew climbed back into the car and they set-off once more on their journey to the Castle.
The remainder of the journey was mercifully uneventful. The landscape was really spectacular and changed before their eyes so much so that in the space of only a few miles they went from the darkness of Deep Wood to the treeless, brightly-lit slopes, where the only vegetation was a dense carpet of green moss covered here and there with patches of snow.
It was very cold at the higher altitudes and icicles formed on the inside of the windows. Nonetheless, most of the deer and mountain goat they saw were grazing contentedly; while others, which had already filled their bodily needs, lazed about in the bright rays of the sun and chewed their cud.
“Wait till nightfall,” said Basil with a know-all smirk, “and those animals will be take away food for the Abominable Snowman!”
“Are there really such creatures, Mum?” Zoë asked her mother. Caroline sighed: “I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he’s on speaking terms with the Abominable Snowman!” Zoë and Mathew laughed. Basil grumbled darkly under his breath, and so did his little mate.
An hour later, and with the car engine gasping and spluttering for air in the rarefied air, they reached the highest point on Deep Wood Mountain and began their hazardous descent along what could only be described as a bumpy old goat track towards the valley floor far, far, below.
This part of their journey, as would be expected, was swift and it wasn’t long before they found themselves back on the normal road.
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