Long Lankin by Lindsey Barraclough Read Free Book Online Page A

“It’s like that poem we do in Elocution with Mrs. Lipkiss —”
    “Oh, yeah,” says Pete, suddenly flinging himself down on the floor, kicking his legs, and grabbing his stomach. “‘When they shot him down on the highway’ — aargh — ’Down like a dog on the highway’ — aargh —”
    “Shut up! Not that one, you dope,” Roger whispers loudly. “You’ll go to hell making all that noise in a church. Get up! I mean that poem about the stately Spanish galleon coming through the isthmus.”
    “Eh?” says Pete, standing up again.
    “You know . . . ‘with a cargo of diamonds, emeralds, amethysts, Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.’”
    “What’s gold moidores?”
    “Don’t know. I’ll have to look it up.”
    “What’s cinnamon, then?”
    “Oh, leave off — I don’t know, something sparkly. Now, shut up. Look, Cora, this is the altar.”
    Under the window is a long table covered with a clean white cloth edged with lace and lined with sharp creases like Nan Drumm’s starched Sunday tablecloth. In the middle towards the back is a brass cross with three tall creamy candles in fancy silver candlesticks on either side of it. A long heavy curtain like the one in the tower, with a fringe and tassels, hangs behind the altar.
    A huge wooden eagle with its face turned sideways and a narrow ledge on its back for a book stands on the floor in front of the pews. I run my fingers over the feathers carved on its outstretched wings. The wood feels warm and smooth.
    “Get out of that pulpit, you ninny!” Roger turns and hisses to Pete, who, with furrowed brow and arms raised, is about to deliver a sermon. Muttering to himself, Pete comes down the steps and goes back down the aisle to where Mimi is waiting. She hasn’t moved an inch from her spot near the door since we came in.
    “Here, this’ll do,” Pete calls, lifting up a chair from a line of three standing along the back wall. There’s a box on the back of it with a couple of books inside.
    When we get the chair down to the old gate, Roger stands on it while I keep it steady.
    “There’s definitely writing here,” he says, “but it’s in the shadow. Hang on, I’ve got an idea.” He jumps down. “In my encyclopaedia it tells you about doing rubbings.”
    “What are you going on about now?” I say.
    “Look, you get a bit of paper and you put it over the thing you want to copy, like some old tree bark or something, then you rub it with a crayon and the thing comes out on the paper.”
    “So where are we going to get a crayon and some paper out here?”
    “I’ve got a pencil. It’s still got some lead in,” says Pete. He turns out his pocket and holds out his palm. Pulling away some grubby fluff with his finger, he uncovers a few bits of dead bird, a couple of Quality Streets with bite marks, a dried-up spider with half its legs missing, and the chewed stub of a pencil.
    “For heaven’s sake, put that stuff away,” says Roger. “It’s worse than one of Baby Pamela’s nappies.”
    “I ain’t touching that pencil,” I say. “You could get typhoid fever from that.”
    “I’ll do it, then. Give it here,” says Roger, grabbing it. He spits on it and rolls it dry on his trousers. “Now, where are we going to get paper?”
    “Look, here’s some,” I say, taking out one of the books from the back of the chair.
“Hymns Ancient and Modern.”
    I open it in the middle and rip a page out. It’s hymn numbers 109 to 112.
    “Flippin’ heck!” yelps Roger. “That’s a huge sin, most probably mortal!”
    “Well, it’s too late now,” I say, giving him the paper. “You should’ve warned me.”
    “You might be all right,” says Pete. “It’s a Protestant book. I don’t think Protestants do mortal sins.”
    Roger climbs back onto the chair and places the paper on the beam of the arch. The chair legs wobble dangerously as he scribbles with the stub of pencil.
    “This paper isn’t big enough,” he calls down. “I can