The Stag's Head

Johnny McGrew moved almost soundlessly through the thick dust coating the red deep pile carpet. The only sound was the soft swish flup that the sole of his left boot made: it was half detached from the rest of the shoe, and dragged a little. Hands shaking slightly he pulled his dad’s packet of cigarettes out from some inner recess of his jacket, then struck a match on an old tapestry. The light showed him another set of footsteps, running alongside his slightly smaller pair in the dust. They were just as fresh.1

He swung around, heart hammering against his ribcage, holding the match as if it was a beacon that could ward off enemies. All that he saw was the faint glimmer of the glass from the broken window; the entrance that he had used. He took a long drag on the cigarette, and felt his heart calm. He was being irrational; of course, he knew who had made those footsteps. The question was, where were they?2

“Arrgh,” he dropped the match hurriedly and sucked his fingers. 3

“That you Johnny?” came a voice out of the darkness, drowning out the last echoes of his squeal. “Danny?” Johnny hissed back. Daniel Cody stepped out of the shadows, grinning evilly. “Not scared are you?” he asked. 4

“Me? Course not.” Johnny snorted derisively, trying to hide the tremor in his voice. 5

“Good, here, give us a puff of that fag.” Danny took the dog end out of Johnny’s fingers, then looked around. 6

“Where do you think they are?” asked Johnny, nervously despite his best efforts.7

“I dunno.” Danny fished a cracked pocket watch out of his coat and held the cigarette up to the face, trying to illuminate it. “It’s past one, they should be here by now,” he said at last. 8

“We’re in the right place, ain’t we?”9

“Course! How many ‘House on the Hills’ do you think there are? Thick as two short planks you is.” He gave Johnny a little push, a one-handed, almost sophisticated shove.10

“I ain’t!” snarled Johnny, and pushed back harder, and with more vehemence.11

“Don’t you push me!” Danny was just about to hit Johnny when there was a hollow sound that rattled through the otherwise silent house. Without realising it the two boys clutched the nearest thing; each other. 12

“Ere, Danny this house ain’t haunted, is it?”13

“Nah,” replied Danny, but his voice was shaking, and he sounded uncertain. “It was just an owl, that’s all. Some featherbrained bird. Ghosts ain’t real.” He stubbed out the cigarette on the carpet, trying to regain some of his former slouchy tough guy manner.14

“You know what I think Danny?”15

“What?” asked Danny, a little more aggressively than he had intended.16

“I think if they ain’t here in five minutes, we go. I ain’t stickin’ around here much longer. This place gives me the creeps.”17

“Wimp.” But secretly Danny agreed.18

“We done it though, don’t we?” asked Johnny, his grammar becoming even worse than usual in his fear. “We came ‘ere, an’ they didn’t. We won the bet, right?”19

“Nah, we still gotta get the proof.” Danny looked across at the stag’s head, hanging over the fireplace.20

“Ain’t that stealing though?”21

“So, you’ve stolen before, ain’t you?”22

“Well, yeah, but never someone’s head.”23

“You idiot, you make it sound so bad, no one lives here, there ain’t no one gonna miss it, therefore it ain’t proper stealing.” Johnny looked mollified by this argument.24

“Come on then,” he said, “let’s get it.”25

They started down the stairs into the moonlit entrance hall, the stairs groaning in protest at being used again after so many years. They each dragged a velvet cushioned, moth-eaten chair to under the head, then climbed up. Their hands were inches away from the head when, with a terrible crash, the stag’s head came off the wall, and threw up a cloud of dust where it landed on the carpet. Its glass eyes glared at them from their new angle on the floor. “That’s it, I’m off.” said Johnny. He leapt down off the chair, hared back up the stairs and out of the window, followed closely by Danny, all pretence at bravery abandoned. 26

Piers and Greg appeared from out of the shadows on either side, laughing. “How thick can you get?” asked Piers. “Not to notice a bleedin’ great rope is tied to each antler.” 27

“Can you imagine their faces tomorrow, when we show them this?” agreed Greg. Together they picked up the head and, staggering slightly under it’s weight, left by the unlocked front door.28