The Ribbajack: And Other Haunting Tales Page 5

  Whoever it was must be almost close to reaching the passage where she stood. Telling herself that she could run down to the lecture hall and lock herself in, Maggie summoned up all her courage and peeped around the corner. There was nobody in sight—the corridor was empty. Peering down into the gloom, she could make out a small movement. Then something occurred to her. Shoving out her arm, she waved, and dimly made out the other arm waving back at her.

  It was the big mirror on the end wall by the library.

  Maggie stepped out into the corridor and laughed. Fancy almost frightening yourself to death in an empty building because of a shadow of some twigs and a wall mirror. It was ridiculous. Boldly she strode down to the library, even taking time to stop in front of the mirror and make faces at herself. Opening the library door, she walked in, the door swishing close behind her. Maggie shrugged. All the doors in the school did that, due to some type of hydraulic device built over them.

  At least there was some daylight in here; one wall had large windows facing out onto the lawn and the road beyond. Between that there was a big old sycamore tree with a bench built around its base, where the students sat in the warm weather to read their books. The windows had only single glazing. Maggie rubbed her hands together. It was quite chilly in the room.

  Even in the twilight she could see her coat, draped carelessly over the arm of a chair in the far corner. Stupid coat, she hated the thing more than ever. Sensible, warm and totally out of fashion. She should have put her foot down flatly in the shop and refused to wear it. But as usual, her mother had won the argument. Maggie sniffed the still air. What was that smell?

  Flowers, maybe, it smelt like flowers. Roses, but not freshly picked. It was not a pleasant odour—musty, cloyingly sweet. A picture of a cemetery vase filled with long-dead roses came to mind.

  Trying to ignore the noxious smell, Maggie made her way across to the coat, avoiding a stepladder with a pile of old books resting on its top step. The smell increased until it filled the air with its thick repugnance. She grabbed the coat and muffled her mouth and nostrils with it. Maggie stood facing the corner, feeling rather light-headed. It was like being trapped in a dream, wanting to run from the room but unable to arouse her torpid limbs into movement.

  The knowledge that she was not alone in the library stole gradually over her senses. Someone was standing in the darkening room, close behind her. Panicked thoughts jumbled about in Maggie’s mind. Whether she liked it or not, she could not stand endlessly there, staring at the wall and the bookshelves. To get out of the library, she would have to turn and confront the nameless person who was standing within touching distance of her back. She bit hard on her lower lip, forcing her feet, legs, her body and head to turn in small, jerky movements. Terror rose in her throat like bile, causing her to taste the dreadful smell which permeated the entire room.

  Maggie was not sure at first whether the girl she was staring at was a living being or an apparition. She was about Maggie’s age, clad from neck to ankle in a long embroidered dress of fawn muslin. Her hair was a cloud of wispy blonde ringlets reaching almost to her waist. The strange girl wore gloves of white silk, elbow length. She held a single-stemmed rose, the colour of dark blood, in her left hand. Maggie took in all of this in one fascinated glance. But it was the girl’s face which frightened her. The skin shone like a porcelain doll in a museum, ivory hued and alabaster smooth. Her eyes, intensely blue, stared unblinkingly at Maggie, who was riveted to the spot, like a bird mesmerised by a snake. An awful realisation numbed Maggie’s brain. The girl was blocking her way to the door—she had her cornered.

  The girl seemed to read her thoughts. She smiled at Maggie. Her thin lips opened, revealing decayed, irregular teeth. Then her mouth creased in a wide grin as the bright blue eyes glittered insanely. It was a smile of pure evil. Her right hand rose in a gesture beckoning Maggie toward her. The girl’s chilling smile, and the overpowering scent exuding from her mouth, enveloped Maggie. She felt herself going faint, the blood in her veins turning to ice water, which broke out in a cold sweat through her skin. Fear gripped Maggie’s heart in its horrific claws, then, like a dam bursting, a wild, terrified scream issued from her.

  “Eeeeeyaaaargh!”

  Triggered by the sound of her own fear, Maggie bolted and ran. Avoiding the girl, she fled, knocking aside the stepladder in her path, sending books spilling across the floor. For an awful second, which seemed to last an eternity, Maggie fumbled with the door handle. Then she was out of the library and tearing headlong down the corridor. The building boomed to the sound of her feet pounding the floor. Maggie’s legs went like pistons as she hit the main door, sending it slamming back on its hinges as she shot out onto the gravelled path. Unreasoning horror lent wings to her feet, while her breath rasped out in sobbing gasps. Out onto the sidewalk she sped, as if the hounds of hell were on her heels. A truck rumbled by on the road, its engine noise bringing her back to the world of normality.

  Maggie stumbled to a halt, teeth chattering, legs wobbling, her whole body shaking uncontrollably. But somehow or other, she was still holding tight to the coat. Maggie grasped the bars of the school railings, staring back at the building, scarcely able to believe what she saw.

  Across the lawn, beyond the big leafless sycamore, behind the library windows, the ghastly girl was staring back at her. Bathed in a pool of pale spectral light, still holding the rose, still waving with that beckoning gesture . . . and still smiling that smile which encompassed deep, limitless evil.

  Maggie turned and hurried swiftly away, her face buried in the coat. The beautiful coat her mother had bought for her—it smelled like home, comfort and all the everyday things of life. No scent was ever sweeter.

  It was late Saturday evening when the security patrol informed the caretaker that his school was left unlocked. He came out to secure it. However, he did a quick check of all the rooms to make sure nothing was amiss.

  It was not the first time the old building had managed to unlock itself, though the caretaker blamed shrinking woodwork and the wind. He made a note to inform the school governors.

  Only the library looked as if anybody had been there. Mr. Ryan, the caretaker, noticed the open door. Switching the lighting on, he went to investigate. Fallen stepladder, some old books scattered about, no harm done really, probably a strong gust of wind from down the corridor. The books were big, ancient, dusty volumes from the top shelf, where reference archives were kept. He gathered them up and stacked them on a table. The last book lay open, the way it had fallen. Mr. Ryan picked it up, sat down at the table and began reading from the open pages:The present school is built on the site of Frederick Edward Tranter’s family mansion. His magnificent library was preserved and forms part of the Leah Edwina Tranter School. Leah, the Tranters’ only child, died in mysterious circumstances when she was only fourteen. Many of the locals were convinced that she poisoned herself. Not much is known of Leah, save that she was a solitary girl. She was never popular with the local children, many said that she frightened them.

  Leah had a private governess who was responsible for her education. She left within six months of taking up the post; no other ladies ever came to replace her. Leah spent a short but lonely life, as her parents, Frederick and Marguerite, were prominent socialites and travellers.

  On returning from a tour of Europe one November, Frederick Tranter discovered his daughter’s body in the library. She had been dead several days, and lay concealed behind a bookcase, holding a red rose in one hand. The servants, cook, gardener, butler and footmaid swore they had not seen her for some time. They assumed she had gone off to stay with relatives. Frederick Tranter was so affected by the death of his only child that he became a recluse.

  His wife left him and went to live in Georgia, the state of her birth. None of the servants would stay in the big house with Frederick, who took to drinking heavily and staying alone in the library for days upon end. After his death it was found that he had left a will and the remainder
of his money. His wish was that a school would be built on the site of his home. It would provide educational facilities for the local children. He stipulated that the building be named the Leah Edwina Tranter School, as a memoriam to his daughter.

  The All Ireland Champion Versus the Nye Add

  I WAS TOLD THIS TALE BY MY FATHER’S SON,

  so I’ll tell it as he told it to me.

  I can recite the thing word perfect,

  ’cos I’m an only child, you see?

  The stream starts up in the mountains, and like all sensible water, it runs downhill. It’s there that it joins the river and flows into the great, wide ocean. Which is how nature ordained it should. A little village stands near the riverbank with a grand view of the ocean, no more than two miles away. Now, if you sit still and listen, I’ll tell you a tale which comes from that very village itself. Are you listening?

  Well, if you travel anywhere in the beautiful country of Ireland, wherever people live, be it town, city or village, there’s always an All Ireland Champion. Oh, it’s a fact, sure enough. Each one of these distinguished folk holds the All Ireland Medal for a variety of mar vellous things. Dancing, singing, leaping, jumping, eating, drinking, playing hurley, chasing pigs or destroying foxes, playing the fiddle or reciting poetry, to name but a few categories. But the fellow I’m about to tell you of is Roddy Mooney, the All Ireland Champion Fisherman. Roddy lived in a neat ould cottage near the river with his dear mother, the Widow Mooney, because he was scarce nineteen summers and not ould enough to start a family of his own. Did I hear you say that eighteen is a bit green for an All Ireland Champion? Well, I’m not given to lying, and by the beard of the holy Saint Patrick, you’d better believe me!

  Roddy Mooney had caught more fish than Biddy Culhane had eaten hot dinners (and that’s a grand ould number if you’ve seen Biddy at the dinner table). Ah, yes, to be sure, Roddy had caught trout, perch, pike, grayling, chubb, dace, eels, lobster, crabs, garfish and all manner of watery beasts. He’d snared them with rod, line, net, gaff, spear and bare hands. Nothing ever escaped Roddy Mooney. There was not a whit of space on the walls of his ma’s cottage that was not festooned with frames, mounts and glass cases full of great stuffed fishes. Widow Mooney, good woman that she was, was forever dusting and polishing the trophies, which were the proof of her darling son’s skills as an All Ireland Champion Fisherman.

  But things are never as they seem, and in actual fact, poor ould Widow Mooney was hard put to keep body and soul of them both together. She grew cabbage and spuds in season, and kept a few pigs and chickens on the plot behind her neat cottage. They never had fish, because Roddy hated the taste of scaled things. There were times when his dear ould mother would have eaten the leg off a tinker’s donkey for a nice bit of fish. But Roddy wouldn’t dream of bringing home fish to cook. He kept the finest specimens for his display, but all the rest he threw back or chopped up for bait. So, despite the fact that he was a champion angler, Roddy Mooney was a great lazy lump of a lad who would not lift a finger to help his mother, and her a widow, too. But aren’t I the one for rattlin’ on. Let’s get down to the story, and a queer ould tale it is, I promise you!

  So then, there’s little Mickey Hennessy, one fine golden summer noon. Ten years old, and a slip of a boy, with no more meat on him than a butcher’s pencil. Fishing by the river, armed with no more than a crooked stick, a yard of string and a bent pin from his ma’s apron with a worm dangling from it (the bent pin, I mean, not his ma’s apron). Mickey fancied himself as a Junior All Ireland Champion. When along comes Roddy Mooney himself.

  “So then, me little man, what are you doin’, tryin’ to drown that worm?” says Roddy.

  Says Mickey, looking serious, “I am not. Sure, I’m after tryin’ to catch meself a Nye Add!”

  Roddy looks at little Mickey as if he was christened with a vinegar bottle and had his brains completely destroyed. “A Nye Add, is it? An’ what in the name of all that’s good an’ holy is a Nye Add?”

  So Mickey, being the grand lad that he is, explains all about Nye Adds (though I’m not sure if that’s the plural). “Barney Gilhooly told me that a Nye Add is a fine pretty lady who lives under the water. Barney used to be a sailor, y’see, an’ he’s the man who’d know. He said he saw many a one of them when he was off the coast of Calatrumpia years ago.”

  Roddy sits himself down on the bank, next to Mickey. “Barney Gilhooly, that terrible ould fibber? All he ever sailed on was the village pond, and all he ever saw was through the bottom of a whisky bottle. So, what did Barney say a Nye Add looks like?”

  Little Mickey pulls in his line. The worm is drooping, so he casts it back again for a further bath. “He said that a Nye Add is half a woman and half a fish, but a rare beauty. He said sometimes they used to come out onto the rocks, combin’ their hair an’ singin’. Sure, Barney said that the sound could drive a man mad completely!”

  Roddy laughs. “Then Barney must’ve heard the Nye Add singin’, ’cos he’s as mad as Rafferty’s pig with a bee in its bonnet. Now let me get this straight, Mickey. A creature that’s half fish an’ half a woman, but not altogether either. Livin’ under the water, an’ comin’ out now and again to comb her hair an’ sing, just to drive fellers daft. Sounds like an underwater banshee to me.”

  “Aye, she may be just that,” says Mickey. “Sure, I’ll let you know when I catch one an’ get a good look at her.”

  Roddy does no more than glance at Mickey’s fishing gear, then he laughs. “Mickey, me little tater, you’ve got more chance of of seein’ O’Hara’s goat singin’ in the church choir than ye have of catchin’ the creature. What makes you think there’d be such a thing in this ould river?”

  “Because I saw one here not an hour since,” says Mickey.

  “I think you’ve been sittin’ out too long in the sun. So where did ye see it, pray tell?” says Roddy.

  So little Mickey explains. “Me ma sent me for a duck egg, for me da’s tea. I was walkin’ along the footpath by here when I sees Mulligan’s dog. Sure, he was creatin’ an awful racket, barkin’ an’ howlin’ at somethin’ in the water. So I goes to see what all fuss was in aid of. That’s when I saw the Nye Add swimmin’ around under those bushes by the far bank. Well, she saw me, an’ dived straight down an’ hid, so she did!”

  Roddy looks over to the spot Mickey had indicated. Something occurrs to him which gives him pause to chuckle. “Are ye sure it never had a fish’s head an’ a lady’s bottom?”

  Little Mickey does not like being made fun of. “Arr, away, ye great eejit, I saw it with me own two eyes. The top was woman, an’ the bottom was fish. ’Twas a Nye Add, she looked just like Barney Gilhooly said she should!”

  The lad seems serious, and Roddy is getting curious. “Just over there, ye say?”

  As Mickey nods, Roddy picks up a stone about the size of his fist. He heaves it out into the river and hits the very spot where Mickey had seen the creature.

  The stone had scarce struck water, when a great fluke-shaped tail rises and slaps down hard on the surface of the river, drenching them both with spray.

  Little Mickey Hennessy wipes the water from his eyes. “That was her tail. Now will you believe me, Roddy Mooney?”

  The All Ireland Champion Fisherman grabs little Mickey’s shirtfront, causing half the buttons to pop off. “That’s no Nye Add nor water banshee! All I could see was its tail, but that’s a fish, the biggest ever seen in Irish freshwater, I’ll bet. A shark, or a dolphin, or some kind of deep-sea big-game fish found its way upriver from the ocean. Mickey, ye darlin’ little man, will ye do somethin’ for me?”

  “I will if ye stop tearin’ the shirt from off me young body,” says Mickey. So Roddy tells him the plan.

  “Stand guard here an’ watch in case the fish moves. I’m goin’ home for my anglin’ tackle. I’ll be back before ye know it, so I will!”

  The good Widow Mooney is chucking turf bricks onto the fire when in dashes her son like a nun with a bee in her
bonnet.

  “Sit ye down, me luvly son. I’ve mashed some grand taters an’ buttermilk up for your tea,” says his ma.

  But the All Ireland Champion is already packing all his tackle in a wicker creel. Maggots, hooks, lines, ledgers and floats. “Sure I haven’t the time t’be sittin’ round feedin’ me gob, Ma. There’s a fine big ould fish needs catchin’!”

  He seizes a selection of rods and sundry other poles, then grabs his lucky hat, the one with all the bright-coloured flies stuck in it. Jamming it on, Roddy knots the hat strings under his chin and goes tearing out of the door, with his ma shouting after him, “I’ll put it in the oven to keep warm for ye, son!”

  So then, there’s Little Mickey marching up and down the bank with his twig over his shoulder, keeping guard over the spot, as Roddy arrives in a cloud of dust. Mickey salutes like an Enniskillen Dragoon. “Sure I’ve not seen it move, so it must still be there!”

  Roddy Mooney starts unpacking tackle, talking to himself the way that All Ireland Champion Fishermen do. “Now, will the beast be takin’ a woolly nymph, or a red hackle weaver? I’d best use me good split-cane rod, an’ a heavy line. Where’s those musket ball ledgers, an’ a decent float? Mickey, will ye stop pacin’ up’n’down like a half-paid officer? Get that maggot tin an’ sling some ground bait out.”

  Like most small boys, Mickey loves to play with maggots. Shoving his hand into the battered tin, he rummages about happily among the squirming mass of maggots. “Ah, sure, I don’t know whether or not Nye Adds eat these.”