Children's Author
Helen Laycock
Every day when I walked my children to school, we passed a house where an old lady lived. She was in a wheelchair. At the front of her house was a wide porch with low windows, and along the windowsill were so many pots, full of flowers and plants.
I imagined that she could be a witch and that these were herbs she was growing for spell recipes...
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At the very end of Mrs Moonsong’s back garden was a small footpath overgrown with weeds. The footpath led from a small wood which Izzy could see from her own bedroom window. To get to it, the children had to make their way to the country lane that ran quite close to Izzy’s house and climb over a stile that led them through a field then into the wood.
By now it was dark and the wood had become quite a scary place. Without a torch and with only three-quarters of the moon’s light, they could not see where they were stepping. Their sense of hearing seemed suddenly sharper. Twigs cracked, bushes rustled and the wood pigeons called to one another as the children picked their way along the path. Tall nettles brushed their hands as they reached out blindly for direction. Finally, they found themselves at the back end of the gardens of Arnison Avenue.
‘Now it’s just a matter of spotting the right house in the dark,’ said Izzy. It wasn’t difficult. One of them had children’s play equipment in the garden, another had lights on upstairs and Izzy could see a young couple decorating. Mrs Moonsong’s house was mostly in darkness, apart from a dim, flickering light downstairs – more candles. ‘That’s definitely hers,’ said Izzy, climbing over the rickety ivy-clad fence. ‘There’s her shed.’
Joe followed and they headed up the garden towards the back of the house.
‘Well, if she is in bed,’ said Izzy, ‘she’s got the curtains open and the lights off.’
‘I suppose that’s possible,’ said Joe.
‘She usually has the bedroom window open so that she can hear the wind chimes.’
‘And it’s closed,’ concluded Joe. ‘So, what shall we do now? We can’t inform the police, because we don’t actually know that anything’s happened.’
Joe and Izzy made their way back down the garden. As they passed the shed, Joe stopped and went back to look through the side window. It was so dark he couldn’t really see inside.
‘What can you see?’ whispered Izzy.
‘Nothing much. It all looks very neat, but I can’t see details.’
‘Let me have a look,’ said Izzy, standing on her toes. She tutted. ‘It’s just too dark.’ She lowered her heels and thought. ‘Wait a minute!’ With that, she ran around to the shed door which faced the house. ‘It’s not locked!’
Izzy checked the house over her shoulder. Nothing had changed. She lifted the catch to the shed door and it swung open easily. Now she was inside she could see it was organised in orderly fashion. It was very tidy, with shelves of pots and garden tools hung neatly at the sides.
Very tidy, except for one thing.
In the middle of the shed floor was Mrs Moonsong’s downstairs wheelchair!
Something strange is going on at 13 Arnison Avenue...
Joe and Izzy are determined to find out what has happened to Mrs Moonsong and what her strange hippie nephew, Dylan has to do with it.
Here is an excerpt from the story where Joe and Izzy have sneaked into the back of Dylan's van:
Izzy and Joe felt every jolt in the back of the van. It was hard to breathe under the heavy blankets, so they made little gaps to let in some air around their faces. Unfortunately, the air was petrol-laden and soon they began to feel very sick. Dylan’s journey was a very twisty one. It seemed as though they had taken the country roads.
After about forty minutes, the sound became dull as the road surface changed and the van bumped to a stop. They had driven on to grass, it seemed. They heard Dylan get out, but lay still for another five minutes in case he was heading from the driver’s seat to the back of the van. Fortunately, he wasn’t. Joe’s head came out first and he knelt up like a meerkat.
‘Blimey!
Izzy sat up, too, and looked through the van window. They had stopped in a field which was full of tepees and piles of twigs from dead camp fires. In the distance, a group of hippies was sitting round a fire with guitars and tambourines and several hippies were wandering about in kaftans, ponchos and dashikis.
If you're not sure what these items of clothing are, here's a little help:
A witch, a potion, a hippy, ley lines, a door, a fire, a mystery...
'Mrs Moonsong sat in the tiny room lit only by flickering candlelight and a small beam of moonlight slanting through the small roof window, hoping and praying... '