Contents

  Title Page

  Introduction

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Extract

  About Guy Bass

  About Pete Williamson

  Bringing the Characters to Life

  Copyright

  Greetings! To waffleboggers, figswindlers and joustabouts! To the imaginary and the unimaginary! To the living, the dead and everyone in between, my name is Keys … Skeleton Keys.

  A long time ago and not at all recently, I was an IF – an imaginary friend. But by some wonder of wild imagining I suddenly became as real as sticks! I had become unimaginary.

  Today I keep a watchful eye socket on the recently unimagined, wherever they appear. For with these fantabulant fingers I can open doors to anywhere and beyond … hidden worlds … secret places … doors to the limitless realm of all the imagination.

  Mark my words, Ol’ Mr Keys has opened more doors than you have had biscuits – and each door has led to an adventure that would make a head spin from its neck! The stories I could tell you…

  But of course stories are why you are here! Well, sit back and relax – because I have a hum-dum-dinger of a tale set to send your thoughts running for cover. A story so truly unbelievable that it must, unbelievably, be true.

  Our tale begins many moons ago in Haggard Hall – a great, looming shadow of a house far from anywhere. In Haggard Hall there lived a boy. This boy was alone, with no one to care for him and only his wild imagination for company. Haggard Hall was as lonely as darkness and so, in time, the boy imagined he had a friend. He named his IF Mr Malarkey, for a fantabulant friend, however imaginary, deserves a fantabulant name.

  Mr Malarkey was a curious creature – as round as an egg, as splendid as a starry sky and chock-brimming with magic spells and flabbergasting tricks – and he immediately made the boy feel less alone.

  Then, one fate-filled, moonish night, the boy imagined his friend so wildly and so well that something rather remarkable happened – Mr Malarkey became as real as noses!

  Mr Malarkey’s spells and tricks were even more magical and flabbergasting in real life, and all he cared about was making the boy as happy as Christmas.

  But the boy was not happy. You see, when Mr Malarkey was all in his head, the boy liked him well enough, but the moment his IF became real, something changed. The boy realized he did not want to share his home with anyone – even a figment of his own imagination. Despite the house being big enough for both of them – big enough for a hundred Mr Malarkeys – the boy wanted to be alone again.

  And so he sent his unimaginary friend away, banishing him forever from Haggard Hall. But since poor Mr Malarkey had nowhere else to go, he simply vanished in a puff of sadness, never to be seen again.

  In time the boy grew into a man, and the man into an old man. Despite his best efforts, the old man did not manage to spend his life alone. He had a family, though he reminded them as often as possible that he would prefer it if they were not there.

  I am sure you are cram-bursting at the seams to be introduced to the boy that became known as Old Man Moon. Alas, like a winged cow, it is impossible! For there is one thing about the man I have not told you…

  Old Man Moon is quite dead.

  Only the old man’s granddaughter, Luna, is sorry to see him go. And it is Luna Moon who may be the key to unlocking the mystery of this tall-but-true tale, for strange things can happen when imaginations run wild… Let us join Luna and the rest of the family at Haggard Hall. It is the dead of winter and Old Man Moon’s family has gathered to pay their respects. The funeral may be over, but the old man’s story is most certainly not…

  Night was falling as the Moon family made their way down the snow-covered hill from the chapel to the house. Luna Moon watched her cold breath puff out of her mouth as she followed her family from a distance.

  “What an emotional funeral,” declared Mum. “I haven’t laughed so much in years!”

  “I could have danced all night on the old man’s grave!” declared Dad.

  “Such fun!” chuckled Uncle Meriwether. “The only thing better than saying goodbye…”

  “…is saying good riddance!” added Aunt Summer. Luna watched her swing open the hall’s great, creaking door and everyone stomped the snow off their boots before they skipped inside the vast, grand hallway, laughing and joking.

  “Can we do it again tomorrow?” added Luna’s brother, dashing inside.

  Like Mum and Dad, Sonny was golden-haired and always looked like he’d just been on holiday. Luna, however, was as pale as paper, with sleepless eyes and a sharp bob of pure white hair. Whiter still was Luna’s pet rat, Simon Parker, who perched on her shoulder.

  “Granddad’s gone, Simon Parker, and everyone’s happy about it,” Luna said to her rat as she lingered in the doorway. “I know he wasn’t nice but he was still my granddad.”

  Luna’s rat let out a shivery squeak, keen to return to the relative warmth of Haggard Hall.

  “Luna Moon, you’re letting all the cold in!” said Mum, rushing back into the snow and taking Luna by the hand. She pulled her inside and slammed the creaking door shut. Mum was tall and willowy, with long hair at least twice as golden as sunshine and a bright white dress that went all the way to the floor.

  “Well, we’d better get warmed up then,” Aunt Summer noted with a grin, stamping her feet as she paced around the grand hallway. Luna’s aunt was short and round and, since she’d also chosen to wear a white dress and coat to Old Man Moon’s funeral, reminded Luna of a snowball. Aunt Summer tapped her chin thoughtfully. “And who knows the best way to warm up?”

  “Big hugs!” Sonny shouted excitedly.

  “Big hugs!” cried everyone except Luna. The family immediately began hugging and squeezing each other as if their lives depended on it. Simon Parker scuttled off Luna’s shoulder and into the pocket of her coat just as Mum and Dad swamped Luna with a double hug. It felt as warm as a goose-down duvet.

  “Luna Mona Moon, have we told you recently how much we love you?” asked Mum.

  “How much?” Luna asked.

  “To the moon and back,” said Dad. “Always have, always will.”

  Luna closed her eyes as Mum and Dad held her tightly. She could have melted into that moment and lived in it forever.

  “Well, I for one am still not warm enough…” Aunt Summer declared. She winked at Sonny. “I wonder what will get the blood flowing…?”

  “Jolly Jolly Joy Dance!” squealed Sonny excitedly.

  “Jolly Jolly Joy Dance!” everyone but Luna shouted.

  “No more dancing in secret for this family!” Aunt Summer exclaimed. “Uncle Meriwether, some music!”

  “Music it is!” chuckled Uncle Meriwether, who laughed at everything and was always, always hungry. “And then cake!” he added. “I’m starving…”

  As Mum and Dad squeezed the breath out of her, Luna watched Uncle Meriwether bounce over to an old record player in the corner of the hallway. He was even rounder than Aunt Summer, and between his bushy white beard and jolliness, Sonny was convinced he was secretly Father Christmas. Uncle Meriwether chuckled away as he put on a record. A moment later the sound of a jaunty piano band echoed through the house.

  “Join in, Luna! There’s not been music or dancing in this house for years!” said Aunt Summer. As her aunt took Sonny by the hands and spun him around the room, Luna felt a sudden knot of anger in the pit of her stomach.

  “You danced already,” she snapped, wriggling out of Mum and Dad’s loving embrace. “You danced on Granddad’s grave. You all took turns.”

  “Served him right!” said Aunt Summer.

  “The wicked old killjoy!” laughed Uncle Meriwether.

  “He was a rotter!” said Dad.

  “He was a swine!” said Mum.

  “His breath stinked!” shouted Sonny, keen to join in. By now, the whole family was dancing in a sort of giddy jig as Aunt Summer sang.

  “I’m Old Man Moon!

  I never let you dance!

  I’m Old Man Moon!

  I put pepper in your pants!

  I’m Old Man Moon!

  I made you eat a bee!

  I’m Old Man Moon!

  I’m dead and you are free!”

  Everyone was having a wild-eyed whale of a time – everyone except Luna. Yes, her grandfather was unkind, but Luna was fairly sure he didn’t know how to be anything else.

  “You shouldn’t be happy that someone’s gone,” muttered Luna as her rat climbed back on to her shoulder. “Not even Granddad.”

  It was not as if her grandfather had been kind to her. Every week he would try to send her away – to banish her from Haggard Hall.

  “Go on, get out! This is my house, not yours … leave me here alone!” the old man would wheeze, even as Luna sat by his bedside. As soon as he had caught his breath he’d add, “I will never leave this house … not even when I die. For I shall haunt thes e walls … I shall haunt you – from beyond the grave. I will haunt you, and it’ll serve you right!”

  Those words haunted Luna, all right. But she wasn’t sure her grandfather really meant what he said. Luna wasn’t sure he even really wanted to be alone. Perhaps, she thought, her grandfather was scared of being alone. So she stayed by his bedside until her grandfather breathed his last.

  But not everyone in her family was as forgiving as Luna.

  “Look at me, I’m Old Man Moon! I’m Old Man Moon and I’m better off dead!” laughed Aunt Summer, doing her very best impression of the old man’s crooked, backbent silhouette as she danced up the curved staircase.

  For a few moments Luna could hear her aunt’s singing as she disappeared into the shadows… Then came a sudden cry, and Aunt Summer was gone.

  “Aunt Summer?” called Luna at the Bsound of her aunt’s scream. She looked back at her family, dancing for joy in a pool of warm light. They hadn’t heard a thing over the echoing music. Luna walked slowly down the grand hallway, the floor replying to her footsteps with loud creaks. Before she reached the staircase at the hallway’s far end, she had to pass by a full-size suit of medieval armour, which stood in the middle of the room like an iron sentry. It held a sword in its metal gauntlet, and a dark plume of feathers protruded from the top of its helmet. The suit of armour had always made Luna oddly nervous, and she found herself hurrying past it to the foot of the stairs. She stared up into darkness and rested her hand on the banister. The wood was smooth and winter-cold.

  The rat on her shoulder squeaked nervously.

  “What are you worried about, Simon Parker?” Luna said, stroking the rat’s head. Being a rat, Simon Parker did not reply, but Luna smiled warmly and he seemed to calm down. Luna always felt better when Simon Parker was around. She first encountered him when she was eight years old – she had been preparing dinner for her grandfather and opened the kitchen cupboard to find the rat crouched between two tins of soup. His fur was as white as Luna’s hair and though she had never been a fan of the rats that roamed Haggard Hall, Luna felt a strange affection for this pale creature. Since her grandfather had not allowed pets of any kind in the house, Luna kept Simon Parker a secret, hiding him in the pocket of her coat whenever the old man was around. It was the first secret she had ever kept.

  It would not be the last.

  “Aunt Summer…?” Luna said in a whisper.

  Silence.

  Luna crept upstairs. She was swallowed into the gloom as she followed the curve of the banister up to the landing. Moonlight poured in from windows above her, giving everything an ice-blue hue. Where is she? Luna thought. A shiver was halfway down her spine, when:

  “…”

  Luna spun round. She could have sworn she’d heard Aunt Summer’s voice, but muffled, as if she was trapped in a cupboard.

  “Did you hear that, Simon Parker?” Her rat scuttled nervously from one shoulder to the other. “Lot of help you are,” added Luna and turned slowly towards the sound. Then she saw it:

  THE HORRIDOR.

  The corridor leading to her grandfather’s bedroom stretched out like a bad memory. The door at the far end was barely visible in the darkness. Luna’s brother (who was even more scared of Old Man Moon than he was of spiders) had nicknamed it the horridor – not just because it was long and somehow even colder than the rest of the house … not even because the Old Man usually lurked behind the dreaded door, ready to throw an insult or shoe … but because of the dozens of paintings that covered the walls. Portraits of her grandfather filled the horridor, as if the only company he enjoyed was his own. Since he had refused to smile, the old man looked the same in every portrait – ancient, sour and scowling … veins spidering beneath pale, greying skin … thin lips pressed together in disapproval … piercing, judgmental eyes.

  Did Aunt Summer go into Granddad’s room? Luna thought. Since her grandfather, ever the miser, had removed all the bulbs in the horridor, Luna had only the faintest moonlight from the landing to guide her.

  She held her breath as she moved slowly towards the door. She heard the CREAK CREEEAK of the floorboards … felt the burning stares of the portraits. Then:

  “…”

  Aunt Summer’s voice again! Still faint, but … closer? Simon Parker let out a squeak. Luna was about to reach for the door when the portrait to her left caught her eye. It wasn’t like all the others. It didn’t have her grandfather’s grumpy, grimacing face staring back at her.

  In fact, in didn’t have her grandfather’s face at all.

  It was a portrait of Aunt Summer.

  How had Luna never noticed it before? She’d been down this corridor dozens of times. And why would her grandfather let the painting hang there? He didn’t allow pictures of anyone other than himself. Luna looked closer. Aunt Summer had an odd, shocked expression on her face, but odder still was that she was wearing the same sparkling white dress and coat that she’d worn to the funeral. It was as if someone had managed to paint an entire picture of her since Luna had last seen her.

  “How…?” Luna mouthed. Then she heard Aunt Summer’s voice again, distant and desperate, and looked back at the painting. Her mouth fell open.

  The painting had changed. Or rather, Aunt Summer’s expression had changed.

  She was screaming.

  Luna had never seen anyone look so scared. The portrait of Aunt Summer was staring her in the eyes, her mouth open wide.

  “Serves her right,” hissed a voice.

  Luna spun round. There was no one there. The voice had come from nowhere … but there was no mistaking who it was.

  “G-Granddad…?” Luna gasped. She stumbled back down the corridor in surprise … and felt a hand grab her by the shoulders.

  “AAARGH!” she cried. She turned to see Dad’s face staring back at her. Behind him stood the rest of the family, wearing equally concerned expressions.

  “There you are!” said Dad. “We’ve been looking for you all over – we can’t very well do the Jolly Jolly Joy Dance without our sunbeam!”

  “Are you all right, Luna? You look pale. Well, paler,” said Mum. “What are you doing up here?”

  “Hatching a plan with Aunt Summer to steal my cake, no doubt!” chuckled Uncle Meriwether. “Where is your aunt, anyway?”

  “He – he got her,” Luna whispered. “He got Aunt Summer!”

  “What do you mean, ‘he got Aunt Summer’?” asked Dad. “Who got her?”

  “Granddad,” said Luna. “He’s come back to haunt us.”

  “Granddad came back as a ghost?”

  Sonny whimpered in panic. “He said he would! He said he’d come back to haunt us and it’d serve us right!”

  “Your grandfather has done no such thing,” said Mum sternly. “Luna Moon, why would you say that?”

  “I heard his voice,” Luna said as her rat let out a series of urgent squeaks. “Simon Parker heard it too.”

  “Now don’t be a silly sandwich,” said Dad in his serious voice. “Your grandfather is deader than dinosaurs at a disco. There’s no coming back from that.”

  “But—” Luna began.

  “Let’s not get into but-but-buts,” interrupted Mum. She pointed to Old Man Moon’s bedroom door. “Your grandfather is no more likely to come back and haunt us than he is to walk through that door.”

  There was a

  CLICK

  – then a

  CLUNK.

  Luna glanced back.

  Someone had unlocked the door to the old man’s room … from inside.

  “G-Granddad…?” Sonny gasped as the door handle slowly turned.

  Everyone froze. The only movement was the nervous twitching of Simon Parker’s whiskers.

  The door creaked open. A figure loomed in the doorway.

  “It – it’s not possible…” uttered Dad. “It can’t be the old man…”

  “He’s back!” Uncle Meriwether gasped, his voice trembling. “Back from the dead!”

  “Dead? Well, I suppose I do look a little grave…” said the figure, stepping forwards. He was tall, painfully lean and dressed in a finely tailored suit complete with breeches and a long tailcoat, white stockings and shoes with brightly polished buckles. But where you might reasonably expect to see a human head, the figure had only a creamy-white skull.

 

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