Rugby Rebel by Gerard Siggins Read Free Book Online Page B

here?’
    ‘Sorry, Eoin. A voice came to me telling me to talk to you as soon as possible. I hope you don’t mind me visiting you here.’
    ‘It’s OK, but what have you to tell me?’
    ‘I’m not even sure what it means,’ Brian replied. ‘But the message was “get someone to twist the rose on the fireplace as you push down on the opposite corners of the trapdoor”. Does that make any sense to you?’
    Eoin asked Brian to repeat the instructions before he explained about the trapdoor and the stolen phones.Brian was surprisingly up-to-date on mobile telephones, having spent most of the time since his death at the stadium on Lansdowne Road, where he saw the changing fashions and advancing technologies over the best part of a century.
    ‘Thanks, Brian.’ said Eoin, ‘I’d better wait till the lads get back before I try that. By the way I hear you’ve met the other ghost, Kevin?’
    ‘Yes, and quite a surprise it was to me. He’s a nice lad but there’s a bit of a mystery about him … I think he’s looking for something down at the Rock.’

Chapter 16
    . . . . . . . . .
    A LAN and Dylan came up to the dorm soon after Brian had left, and Eoin explained his mysterious message.
    ‘You really seem to have some serious connections with the ghostly world, Eoin,’ said Alan. ‘Someone’s trying to help us.’
    There was a black iron rose in the middle of the old, blocked-up fireplace, and Alan gripped hold of it as the other pair clambered under the bed.
    ‘Now,’ called Eoin as he and Dylan pushed down at the corners of the trapdoor. The rose was stuck, and needed some serious effort by Alan, but he soon worked it loose and a noisy mechanism cranked into life behind the walls.
    The trapdoor felt loose under Eoin’s hand. He pushed hard until the corner came free and he and Dylan got their hands underneath it. They pushed the heavy trapdoor aside and stared down into the hole.
    ‘Has anyone got a torch?’ Eoin called, and Alan brought him the bicycle lamp he used for late-night reading.
    Eoin paused, shining the light down and spotting that a short staircase led up to the opening. He looked at his friends, grinned nervously, and said, ‘Here goes.’
    Down he stepped, sweeping the lamp from left to right as he went. At the bottom he called to his friends who followed him down, first Dylan and then Alan. They shone the lamp around as their eyes got used to the darkness. On the left hand wall stood a doorway with a bolt across it, sealed with a huge lock. On the right was another door which appeared to be ajar.
    ‘Do you want to go in there?’ asked Eoin.
    ‘Yeah, let’s see where it leads,’ replied Dylan.
    ‘Hang on, guys, just wait a second. We heard the phones down here – shouldn’t we look for them first?’ suggested Alan.
    Eoin flashed the light around, taking care to light up every corner of the room and, sure enough, the three stolen mobiles were sitting on a small bench against the far wall.
    ‘Hang on,’ said Dylan. ‘We shouldn’t touch them yet – then the thieves will know we’ve been here. They don’t seem to want them immediately; maybe we should leave them here until the teachers come.’
    ‘Good thinking,’ said Alan.
    Eoin turned to the open door and slipped throughwithout touching the handle. He found himself in a corridor, and about fifteen metres away he spotted a ladder. He showed it to his pals, holding his index finger to his lips to show them he wanted them to be silent, and started up the ladder.
    He stopped at the top where he found another trapdoor , and listened. There was a muffled sound of talking and laughing, and the edges of the opening leaked light.
    He carefully went back down the ladder, again motioning to Alan and Dylan to stay quiet, and led them back along the corridor. He counted his paces as he went, and finished at the foot of the staircase to their own dorm.
    ‘23, 24, 25 … 26,’ he finished.
    ‘What was that about?’ asked