The Ghostly Blinkers Read online

  .

  Bloomsbury Publishing, London, Berlin and New York

  First published in Great Britain in May 2010 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  36 Soho Square, London, W1D 3QY

  This electronic edition published in May 2010 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  Text and illustrations copyright © Babette Cole 2010

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  All rights reserved

  You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise

  make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means

  (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying,

  printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the

  publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication

  may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN 978 1 4088 1161 0

  www.bloomsbury.com

  www.babette-cole.com

  Visit www.bloomsbury.com to find out more about our authors and their books

  You will find extracts, author interviews, author events and you can sign up for

  newsletters to be the first to hear about our latest releases and special offers

  .

  To Willy O’Mahony

  CHAPTER ONE

  An Ill Wind

  January blew in with a cold blast, rattling the windows of Fetlocks Hall and howling around its draughty corridors.

  Portia Manning-Smythe, headmistress of this very unusual pony school, sat huddled up in her study by a crackling log fire. So tall were the ceilings of the great Georgian house that the fire was about as effective as a candle. She was wearing a stout overcoat, a headscarf with a woolly hat on top and fingerless racing mittens. She was studying the Racing Post.

  There were only a few days left before the winter term started and the children and their ponies would be back at school. The staff who had stayed on over Christmas to look after the resident ponies had been wonderful. One or two of the children also remained to help keep the ponies fit. Sam Hedges was one of them. She now had a second pony to ride besides her brave little Landsman. She had taken on Hob, the pony Potty Smythe (as she was known) had rescued from the ghastly Fudge family, who had been planning to sell him to the knacker man in Bristol. Hob was proving to be a brilliant event pony. Even his temperament had improved now that his previous owner had left the school.

  Everybody was delighted the awful Tracy Fudge and the other two Pony Brats, Jade Andrews and Benjamin Faulkner-Fitzpain, had left Fetlocks Hall because our pony world of Terestequinus was a safer place without them. However, there was a downside to their departure.

  The Pony Brats’ parents had been obnoxious too but they were very rich. Their fees and patronage were now sadly missing. Andrew Fiddlit, the school accountant, had been right. Without the Pony Brats Fetlocks Hall was struggling to survive financially. January had not only a cold wind but an ill one of numerous unpayable bills!

  Refusing to skimp on the ponies’ comforts, the headmistress had decided not to order any oil for the school’s central heating. Sydney Sidewinder, the school caretaker, and poor old Mr Pennypot, the gardener, were sent out to cut wood which they stored in the old ice house. Sidewinder complained bitterly about having to lug it all over the house to keep the fireplaces stocked. The domestic staff needed stacks of logs to keep the fires going in the great house.

  The cook, Mrs Honeybun, was instructed to buy cheaper cuts of meat for the kitchen and to shop at the low-cost cash and carry in Yeovil instead of the posh shops of Sherborne.

  Ben Faloon, stable lad and brilliant shot, kept her supplied with game and Mr Pennypot had revived the old forcing house for winter vegetables.

  Potty Smythe was just managing to keep the school going by the skin of its teeth until a nasty brown envelope spun through the letter box marked ‘Confidential’. Groaning, she picked it up from the mat in the outer hall.

  She opened it and then sank into a chair. She took a deep breath. The letter was from a firm of solicitors called Grabbit and Screwworthy. The cheque she had written to the builders, who had fixed the crumbling ballroom roof at Fetlocks Hall, had been returned because there was simply not enough money in the bank account to cover it. They were now demanding payment in full – a rib-crunching one hundred thousand pounds!

  Potty Smythe called the school accountant.

  ‘Fiddlit,’ she boomed, ‘what the blazes is this? You’d better get round here straight away!’

  Andrew Fiddlit sighed when he saw the letter.

  ‘I’m sorry, Portia, dear old thing,’ he frowned, ‘but what did you do with the money I told you to set aside in a separate account for repairs?’

  ‘The east wing,’ sighed the headmistress.

  ‘You should have boarded it up and let it fall down,’ said Fiddlit.

  ‘It was keeping up the rest of the school,’ she returned. ‘If I hadn’t had the walls underpinned, Fetlocks would have slid down the hill into Middlemarsh!’

  ‘I suppose you were relying on money from the Pony Brats’ parents to get you out of this fix,’ said the accountant, sitting down with his head in his hands. ‘If this comes to court the judge will want to know why they took their kids out of school.’

  Potty Smythe imagined trying to tell a judge and jury that three evil children, about to become A students at Fetlocks and receive certain magical powers, had left the school of their own accord – with the help of a ten-year-old girl from Milton Keynes called Penny Simms who happened to be a Unicorn Princess!

  If Penny had not cleverly arranged the Pony Brats’ departure, our world would have been taken over by millions of fire-breathing little red scaly Devliped ponies and their King. They had planned to seize the mythical scales, the Equilibrium of Goodness. These are always guarded by unicorns to keep the world a good place for us all to live in. If the Devlipeds had tipped the scales in the direction of evil and the unicorns lost control of them, it would have been the end to all that is fair and true!

  With a story like that, the court would have sent the headmistress of Fetlocks Hall to the nearest lunatic asylum.

  ‘How much have we got in the kitty?’ asked Potty Smythe.

  ‘Nothing,’ replied Fiddlit. ‘You’ll have to get the bank to give you an overdraft or loan to keep the school going but that will only last you three months. On the other hand you could sell the ancestral portraits in the refectory. They are by Sir Joshua Reynolds.’

  Portia Manning-Smythe imagined selling the Fitznicely family portraits to unsuspecting people who would soon find out the paintings were the homes of Antonia and Arabella, Lady Sarah Fitznicely and her husband, Sir Walter, all of whom were former unicorn aristocracy and had been dead for hundreds of years. They were the resident school ghosts and would haunt wherever their pictures were hung.

  ‘Impossible,’ she said. ‘But I do have some nice Dior and Norman Hartnell ball gowns from the 1950s upstairs. They may fetch something. The jewellery has all gone to the pawn shop already, I’m afraid.’

  In spite of the frugal conditions in the main building the ponies continued to enjoy complete luxury in their warm stables, snuggled up deep in golden straw. Most of the ponies were clipped out, wearing three rugs each and quilted hoods, while the humans at Fetlocks were shivering miserably. The four-legged inhabitants of the school were eagerly awaiting the return of the children and their other pony friends who had gone home with them for the Christmas holidays. They were particularly looking forward to seeing their favourite little girl and Unicorn Princess, Penny Simms.

  It had been four weeks since she had said goodbye to them all and they missed her terribly – especially the little skewbald pony Patch, Penny’s very special friend.

  You can imagine the excitement when the line of lorries, cars with trailers attached and an old red Land Rover came in through the great rusty gates and up the carriage drive to Fetlocks Hall the following Monday.

  Ponies whinnied to each other, children leaned out of car or lorry windows, waving hockey sticks and jumping whips, cheering and yelling wild cries called ‘view hollas’ at each other, and happy parents smiled, knowing their children would have a great time back at school. Loading ramps slapped down in the stable yard. Excited ponies clattered down them, pleased to be back.

  Bunty Bevan’s old red Land Rover rumbled up the drive with an excited Penny Simms and various terriers on board. The Fitznicely family were waiting for her at the entrance to the park. Antonia and Arabella, looking splendid in their green velvet habits, mounted side-saddle on their chestnut ponies, galloped up to the car and sped alongside. They were joined shortly after by their lovely mother, Lady Sarah, on a handsome dapple grey and Sir Walter on his bay hunter.

  ‘So pleased you are back at last, Princess Penny,’ called Sir Walter.

  ‘What does the speedometer read, Penny?’ shouted Antonia. ‘I want to know how fast Merryanzer is galloping!’

  Of course nobody could see the Fitznicelys except Penny so she could only smile at them and hold a finger to her lips.

  They hooted with ghostly laughter and raced away to jump the park railings and disappear into the mist.

  Bunty Bevan pulled up at the foot of the stone steps leading up to the great house. Penny leapt out of the Land Rover and ran like a wild r
abbit straight for the stable yard.

  ‘Welcome back, Penny,’ cried all the ponies together.

  Penny stopped and curtsied to them.

  ‘Nice to be home, ponies,’ she said in their own language of Equalese, one of the magical gifts she had acquired during her test to become a Unicorn Princess.

  ‘Penny, I’m over here!’ shouted Patch.

  She ran over to his stable and gave him a great hug round his brown and white neck.

  ‘Oh, Patch! I’ve missed you so!’ she laughed, offering him the juicy red apple she’d saved from her lunch.

  ‘Me too,’ said Patch. ‘Henry and Ben have taken good care of us. Hob’s turned into a really nice pony. He and Landsman have become good friends. Now Sam’s got two ponies, she rides all day. She’s gone team-chasing mad. It’s her latest craze. Potty Smythe’s hooked as well. Sam’s got her to enter two teams for the Templecombe Team Chase next Saturday. We all have to gallop one and a half miles at top speed over twenty-four jumps. The fastest team wins. Sam’s captain of one team and Carlos is captain of the other. She’s been riding me in the afternoons or leading me off one of the others so I’m feeling pretty fit.’

  ‘Sounds really exciting,’ said Penny, who had never been team chasing in her life but knew the rules.

  Just then Sam Hedges clattered into the yard on a very fit-looking Hob, leading an equally athletic Landsman.

  ‘Hi, Pen,’ she said, neatly dismounting and throwing the reins over Hob’s head.

  The two school chums gave each other a hug.

  ‘Princess Penny,’ said Hob, nuzzling her shoulder, ‘I love you very much. If it were not for you I’d be in a tin by now!’

  ‘And I would not have such a loyal and good friend,’ added Landsman.

  ‘You two have become real buddies,’ said Penny in Equalese.

  Of course Sam could not hear this conversation. It just looked as if the ponies were rubbing their noses against Penny’s cheek.

  ‘They seem to have hit it off, Sam,’ she said, stroking their velvety muzzles. ‘They look amazingly well.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Sam, ‘there’s a reason for that. We’re going team chasing next Saturday. You’re on Carlos’s team, The Conquistadors, with Dom and Pip. There have to be four riders and ponies in a team, the fastest three through the finish to count. I’m not running with you lot because The Speed Freaks have asked me to be on their team.’

  ‘They sound completely mad!’ said Penny.

  ‘We are,’ laughed Sam. ‘We were on fire last week when we won the Melbury Team Chase. We were the fastest team round over two miles and twenty-eight fences!’

  ‘Who’s on your team?’ asked Penny.

  ‘Henry’s on Ned Kelly, Pat Fairbrass on Groundcover, the retrained racehorse he got from the local rehoming centre, and a new boy who’s just moved into the village called Matt Khareef. He’s from Dubai. His parents are dead rich. They’ve got oil wells or something. His dad is an Arab and his mum is from around here. They came just before Christmas to look for a school for Matt. He rides a star so I’ve lent him Lannie. I’m riding Hob. We’re all walking the course on Friday afternoon.’

  Portia Manning-Smythe was standing at the top of the steps talking to parents and trying to stop her deerhounds from chasing their dogs.

  Her old chum, Bunty Bevan, came up the steps carrying Penny’s small tatty suitcase. Bunty was Penny’s riding instructress from Milton Keynes. It was she who had discovered Penny’s talent and been instrumental in getting Penny into Fetlocks Hall. She had offered to drive Penny back to school as Mr and Mrs Simms’ car was being repaired.

  ‘Bunty, old fruit!’ beamed Potty Smythe. ‘Had a good trip down? Penny’s on the yard already, I suppose. I heard the ponies. Come in for tea?’

  The two old friends sat by the fire in the headmistress’s study with a cup of tea in one hand and a slice of fruit cake in the other.

  ‘How’s it been down here?’ asked Bunty Bevan. ‘Had a good Christmas, Pot?’

  ‘Busy,’ said her friend.‘Topping Boxing Day race meeting at Wincanton.’

  ‘I went to Gilly Jumpwell’s for New Year,’ said Bunty. ‘She still looks fabulous and rides as well as ever. She’s training young riders and event horses all over the world now. She’s just got back from New Zealand, lucky thing.’

  ‘I remember her winning the European Championships years ago,’ said Potty. ‘Those were the days! I say, maybe I could ask her if she’d come down here and do a bit of teaching at Fetlocks.’

  ‘She’d be expensive,’ added Bunty, sipping her tea.

  ‘I wondered if she’d do it without a fee for old times’ sake,’ added Potty. After all they had been top event riders together in the past. ‘Trouble is, old girl, the Fetlocks piggy bank is somewhat empty since the Pony Brats left. The long and the short of it is the school’s financially going down the drain. I’m being taken to court for not paying the builder for repairing the wretched ballroom roof that caved in last month. I doubt if the school will survive after this term. There’s simply not enough money to run it any more. I’m afraid we will have to close down but worst of all, the ponies will have to be sold as we will not even be able to feed them!’

  Bunty spluttered into her tea.

  ‘Hell’s bells, Pot,’ she coughed, ‘that’s really sticky going! I’d help you if I had the cash. There has to be a way of saving the school. There’s always our Penny. She’s a resourceful child. She got us all out of a mess the last time.’

  Bunty Bevan was not supposed to know about the Secret Unicorn Society (S.U.S.), but she had a pretty good idea of what it was all about. She’d guessed Penny had somehow played an important part in getting rid of the Pony Brats.

  ‘She could be our only hope,’ sighed the headmistress.

  It was a very worried Miss Bevan who finally bid her best friend goodbye and headed home for Milton Keynes. However, she was certain if anyone could save the school from being closed down and all the ponies sold off . . . it was Penny Simms.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Back to the Track

  Once the ponies were settled in their stables, rugged up and munching their feed, the children said goodbye to their parents until half-term and made their way into the Hall.

  Carlos Cavello had just returned from Brazil and found England very cold indeed. He was not prepared for the icy blasts of Fetlocks Hall with no central heating.

  Philippa Horsington-Charmers, Penny’s other room-mate besides Sam Hedges, had come back from Cornwall where she had been staying with Dominic Trelawney and his family for Christmas. She, like Sam, was an orphan and had no family to go home to. Waggit, Pip’s show pony, had travelled with her to Sennen in Dom’s trailer with his dressage pony, Sir Fin. They were all pleased to be back. Sennen was a long way from anywhere. It was beautiful in the summer but wild and windy in the winter. Dom’s parents were surfing instructors. They were both young, healthy and blond – as was their son – but not very horsey.

  They lived in an old lighthouse on the edge of a cliff. The ponies were put up in the local equestrian centre, which had a big indoor arena. Dom always kept Sir Fin there as the lighthouse had no space for ponies. He could practise his dressage at the centre anyway.

  Penny greeted all her friends on the way back from the yard, swapping Christmas tales and jokes. She ran up the stone steps to give her headmistress a hug but stopped on the third one between the two stone unicorns as their eyes lit up and shot out a welcoming rainbow of stars. Nobody else could see them of course except for Potty Smythe, who gave a squeal of delight.

  ‘You see, Penny, nothing’s changed,’ she laughed.

  Later, when things had quietened down, Princess Penny went back to the same step.

  Making sure she was all alone she tapped it three times. It shot up on a hinge to reveal the hiding place of the magical gifts King Valentine Silverwings, King of the Unicorns, had given her at her coronation: the silver vial of Unicorn Tears with their healing powers, the Lance of Courage for her protection against evil, and Queen Starlight’s Horn with which she could control any wild beast or monster. They were all still there.

  Henry Wellington-Green, head groom at Fetlocks, bustled around the yard hanging up the ponies’ rugs on the name pegs. She made sure all their tack had returned clean, arranged their grooming kits on the shelves in the tack room, and attended to any dietary requirements that might have changed in the holidays.