Granny Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1 - GRANNY’S FOOTSTEPS

  Chapter 2 - LOVE FROM GRANNY

  Chapter 3 - TEA WITH GRANNY

  Chapter 4 - GRANNY VS. NANNY

  Chapter 5 - GRANNY MOVES IN

  Chapter 6 - GATHERING OF THE GRANNIES

  Chapter 7 - THE GOLDEN GRANNY AWARDS

  Chapter 8 - THE GRANNYMATIC ENZYME EXTRACTOR

  Chapter 9 - GOOD-BYE, GRANNY

  Chapter 10 - GRANNY COMES BACK

  Epilogue

  UP TO NO GOOD

  She was evil. For reasons that he did not yet understand, Granny hated him and wanted to hurt him in any way she could.

  Joe shivered.

  He knew the truth about Granny even if nobody else in the room could see it. But that wasn’t what frightened him.

  What frightened him was that Granny knew he knew. And she didn’t care.

  Maybe she knew that whatever Joe said, nobody would believe him. Or maybe it was something worse. Watching her, hunched up in the middle of the Christmas gauze and glitter, her eyes sliding slowly from left to right, he realized she was planning something. And that something included him.

  ALSO BY ANTHONY HOROWITZ

  THE ALEX RIDER ADVENTURES

  Stormbreaker

  Point Blank

  Skeleton Key

  Eagle Strike

  Scorpia

  Ark Angel

  Snakehead

  Stormbreaker: The Graphic Novel

  THE DIAMOND BROTHERS MYSTERIES

  The Falcon’s Malteser

  Public Enemy Number Two

  Three of Diamonds

  South by Southeast

  The Devil and His Boy

  The Complete Horowitz Horror

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  Copyright © Anthony Horowitz, 1994

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  eISBN : 978-1-101-01984-9

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  Prologue

  HEATHROW AIRPORT

  The storm broke early in the evening and by seven o’clock it looked as if Heathrow might have to shut down. Runway One had disappeared in the rain. Runway Two was a canal. Half the planes had been delayed and the other half were circling hopelessly above the clouds, waiting their turn to land. The wind had blown an Air France DC10 all the way to Luton while, in a Jumbo Jet from Tokyo, seventy-nine Japanese passengers had all thrown up at the same time. It was a night no one would forget.

  The green Mercedes reached the airport at exactly half past seven, skidding around a corner and spraying water over two traffic cops, a porter, and a visitor from Norway. Swerving across the road, it missed a taxi by inches and rocketed into the parking garage of Terminal Three. The electric side window slid down and a hand with a signet ring and the initials G W entwined in gold reached out to pluck a parking ticket from the machine. Then the car jumped forward again, shot up three ramps with the tires screaming, and crashed into a wall. Ten thousand dollars’ worth of metal and paintwork crumpled in on itself. The engine died. Steam hissed from beneath the bent and broken hood.

  The doors of the car opened and three people got out. The driver was a short, bald man. Next to him was a woman in a fur coat. The backseat had been occupied by a twelve-year-old boy.

  “You told me to park on the fourth floor!” the man screamed. “The fourth floor!”

  “Yes, Gordon…” the woman muttered.

  “But this parking lot’s only got three floors!” the man moaned. He pointed at the wreck of his car. “And now look what’s happened!”

  “Oh, Gordon…” The woman’s lips quivered. For a moment she looked terrified. Then she blinked. “Does it really matter?” she asked.

  The man stared at her. “You’re right!” he exclaimed. He laughed out loud. “It doesn’t matter at all! We’re leaving the car here! We’ll never see it again…!”

  The man and woman rushed into each other’s arms, kissed each other, and then grabbed their luggage, which the boy had meanwhile taken out of the trunk. They had only two suitcases between them and these looked as if they had been packed in a hurry. Part of a pink silk tie, a striped pajama leg, and a frilly shower cap were poking out of one side.

  “Come on!” the man exclaimed. “Let’s go…”

  But just then there was a flash of lightning and an explosion of thunder and the three of them froze, alone in the middle of the dimly lit parking garage. A plane roared past overhead.

  “Oh, Gordon…” the woman whimpered.

  “It’s all right,” Gordon snapped. “She’s not here. Keep your hair on. We’re going to be all right. I’d keep my hair on except I packed it…”

  “Come on. We’ve got to get the tickets,” the boy said. And without waiting for his parents, he began to walk toward the elevators.

  Ten minutes later, the family was lining up at the British Airways ticket desk. After the darkness of the storm, the building was unnaturally bright, like a television set with the color turned up too much. There were people everywhere, milling around with their suitcases and carry-on bags. A policeman with a machine gun patrolled the area. He was the only person smiling.

  “Good evening, sir.” The man at the ticket counter was in his early twenties with close-cropped hair and tired eyes. He had his name—OWEN—on a badge on his chest, but in his tiredness he had pinned it on upside down. “Can I help you?”

  “You certainly can, Nemo,” the man said, squinting at the badge. “I want three tickets…”

  “Three tickets, sir?” Owen coughed. He had never seen such nervous-looking passengers. They all looked as if they had just come off the worst amusement-park ride in the world. “Where to?” he asked.

  “America,” the man replied.

  “Africa,” the woman said at the same moment.

  “Australia,” the boy exclaimed.

  “Anywhere!” the man said. “Just so long as it leaves soon.”

  “And it’s got to be far away!” the woman added.

  “Well, sir…” Owen swallowed. “It would help if you actually knew where you wanted to go…”

  The man leaned forward, his eyes wild and staring. (They weren’t staring in quite the same direction, which made him look even more wild.) His clothes were expensive—tailor-made—but the ticket salesman couldn’t help noticing that he had dressed in a hurry. His tie was crooked and, more surprisingly, on the wrong side of his neck.

  “I
just want to go away,” the man hissed, “before she gets here.”

  The woman burst into tears and tried to hide her face in her mink coat. The boy began to tremble. The ticket agent’s eyes flickered to the computer screen in front of him. The computer screen flickered back. “How about the nine o’clock flight to Perth?” he suggested.

  “Scotland!” The man screamed the word so loudly that several passengers turned to look at him and the policeman dropped his machine gun.

  “Australia,” the agent said.

  “Perthect!” the man exclaimed. He snapped a gold Visa card onto the counter. “We’ll take two tickets first class and one in coach for the boy. Ow!” The man cried out as his wife’s elbow caught him on the side of his head. “All right,” he said, rubbing a red mark above his eye. “We’ll all go first class together.”

  “Certainly, sir.” The ticket agent picked up the credit card. “Mr. Gordon Warden?”

  “Yes. That’s me.”

  “And the child’s name?”

  “Jordan Warden.”

  “Jordan Warden.” The agent tapped the name into the computer. “And your wife…?”

  “Maud N. Warden,” the woman said.

  “Gordon Warden. Jordan Warden. Maud N. Warden. Right…” He tapped some more buttons and waited as the machine spat out three tickets. “Check in at Desk Eleven. And it’ll be Gate Six for boardin’, Mr. Warden.”

  Five hours later, British Airways Flight 777 took off for Perth in Western Australia. As the plane reached the end of the runway and lurched upward into the swirling night and rain, Gordon Warden and his wife sank back into their first-class seats. Mr. Warden began to giggle. “We’ve done it,” he said in a quivering voice. “We’ve beaten her…”

  “How do you know she’s not on the plane?” his wife asked.

  Mr. Warden sat bolt upright. “Stewardess!” he called. “Bring me a parachute!”

  Just across the aisle, Jordan strained in the soft half-light to get a sight of the other passengers. Had they really done it? Or were they going to see that terrible, wrinkled face turning slowly to leer at them in the crowded cabin?

  The plane reached thirty thousand feet and turned south on the first leg of its journey across the world.

  The events that had begun nine months before were finally over.

  1

  GRANNY’S FOOTSTEPS

  Nine months before, the Wardens had been a wealthy and—to all appearances—happy family living in a large house in North London. The house was called Thattlebee Hall.

  It was a huge place with eleven bedrooms, five living rooms, three staircases, and about a mile of thickly carpeted hallways. You could have played tennis in one of the bathrooms—which was something Mr. and Mrs. Warden occasionally did, quite naked, using the soap as a ball. It was also very easy to get lost. One man—who had come to read the gas meter—actually stayed there for three days before anyone noticed him, and that was only because he had parked his company van in the hall.

  The family occupied the main body of the house. There was a nanny, Mrs. Jinks, with rooms on the top floor. The west wing was occupied by two Hungarian servants—Wolfgang and Irma. And there was even a smaller house at the bottom of the garden where the gardener, a very old man called Mr. Lampy, lived with two cats and a family of moles that he had been too kind-hearted to gas.

  Gordon Warden, the head of the family, was a short and rather plump man in his early fifties. He was, of course, extremely wealthy. “My suits are tailor-made, my private yacht is sailor-made, and I drink champagne like lemonade.” This was something he often liked to say. He smoked cigars that were at least eight inches long, even though he could seldom get to the last inch without being sick. His wife, Maud, also smoked—cigarettes in her case. Sometimes, at dinner, there would be so much smoke in the room that they would be unable to see each other and guests would be gasping for fresh air by the time coffee was served.

  They also saw very little of their only child. They were not cruel people, but the fact was, there was no room for children in their world. To Mr. Warden, children meant runny noses, illnesses, and noise—which is why he employed a nanny, at great expense, to handle all that for him. Even so, he always made sure he spent at least five minutes with Jordan when he got home in the evening. He nearly always remembered his birthday. And he would smile pleasantly if he happened to pass his son in the street.

  Mr. Warden was a businessman but he never spoke about his business. This was because it was almost certainly illegal. Nobody knew exactly what he did, but some things were certain. If Mr. Warden saw a policeman approaching, he would dive into the bushes, and he seldom went anywhere without a luxurious false mustache. Mr. Warden loved luxury. As well as the made-to-measure suits, he had a liking for silk shirts and shoes made from endangered species. He had a gold tie, a gold signet ring, and three gold teeth. He was particularly proud of the teeth, and as a special sign of affection had left them to his wife in his will.

  Maud Warden did not work. She had never worked, not even at school, and as a consequence could not read or write. She was however a very fine bridge player. She played bridge twice a week, went out to lunch three times a week, and went riding on the days that were left. To amuse herself, she had piano lessons, tennis lessons, and trapeze lessons. Sometimes to please her husband she would play a Chopin nocturne or a Beethoven sonata. But he actually much preferred it when she put on her spangly leotard and swung in the air, suspended from the ceiling by her teeth.

  The Wardens had one child and weren’t even certain quite how they had ended up with him. Although he had been christened Jordan Morgan Warden, he liked to call himself Joe.

  Joe did not like his parents. He didn’t like the house, the garden, the cars, the huge meals, the cigarette smoke…any of it. It was as if he had been born in a prison cell, a very comfortable one certainly, but a prison nonetheless. All day long he dreamed of escaping. One day he would be a trapeze artist in a circus, the next a flier in the Royal Air Force. He dreamed of running away to Bosnia and becoming a relief worker or hiking to the very north of Scotland and looking after sheep. He wanted to be hungry, to feel cold, to have adventures, and to know danger, and he was angry because he knew that so long as he was a child, none of this would be his.

  The strange truth is that many rich children have a much worse life and are much less happy than poor children. This was certainly the case for Joe.

  To look at, he was a rather short boy with dark hair and a round face. He had brown eyes, but when he was daydreaming, they would soften and turn almost blue. Joe had very few friends, and what friends he did have were unfortunately just like him, locked up in their own homes and gardens. The two people closest to him were Mrs. Jinks, his nanny, and Mr. Lampy, the gardener. Often he would go down to the bottom of the garden and sit in the old shed with the two cats and the family of moles and the strange smell of gin that always hovered in the air.

  “Next week I’m going,” he would say. “I’m really going. I’m going to join the Foreign Legion. Do you think they take twelve-year-olds?”

  “I wouldn’t join the Foreign Legion, Master Warden,” the gardener would reply. “Too many foreigners for me.”

  “Don’t call me ‘Master Warden’! My name is Joe.”

  “That’s right, Master Warden. That’s what it is.” This, then, was life at Thattlebee Hall. But there was one other member of the family. She didn’t live with the Wardens, but she was somehow never far away. And the whole family, everything, would change with her coming. Even the sound of her footsteps approaching the front door would be enough to trigger it off. Scrunch… scrunch…scrunch. Suddenly the sun would seem to have gone in and the shadows would stretch out like a carpet unrolling to welcome the new arrival.

  Granny.

  She always came to the house by taxi and she never gave the driver a tip. She was a short woman and every year she seemed a little shorter. She had wiry silver hair that looked all right from a distance�
�only when you got closer could you see right through to the speckled pink surface of her skull. Her clothes, even on the hottest summer day, were thick and heavy, as were her glasses. These were enormous with bright gold frames and two different sorts of glass. Once, just for a joke, Joe tried them on. He was still bumping into things two weeks later.

  Her real name was Ivy Kettle (she was Mrs. Warden’s mother), but nobody had called her that since she had turned seventy. From that time on, she had simply been Granny. Not Grandma. Not Grandmother. Just Granny. Somehow it suited her.

  There was a time when Joe had liked his granny and had looked forward to her visits. She seemed to take a real interest in him—more so than his own parents—and she was always winking and smiling at him. Often she would give him candy or fifty pennies. But as he grew older, he had begun to notice things about his granny that he had not noticed before.

  First there were the physical details: the terrible caves in her wrists where the skin seemed to sag underneath the veins, the blotchy patches on her legs, the whiskers on her upper lip, and the really quite enormous mole on her chin. She had no clothes sense whatsoever. She had, for example, worn the same coat for twenty-seven years and it had probably been secondhand when she bought it. Granny was very cheap with everyone. But she was cheapest to herself. She never bought any new clothes. She never went to the movies. She said she would prefer to wait and see the films on video, even though she was far too cheap to buy a machine to play them on. She had a pet cat that she never fed. Tiddles was so thin that one day it was attacked by a parakeet and that was the last time it was ever seen. As for the money and candy that she gave Joe, Mrs. Warden had actually slipped them to her when she arrived. It was simply an arrangement to make Joe like Granny more.

  Then there were her table manners. Although it’s a sad thing to say, Granny’s table manners would have made a cannibal sick. She had a large mouth framed by some of the yellowest teeth in the world. These teeth were stumpy and irregular, slanting at odd angles, and actually wobbled in her gums when she laughed. But how hard they worked! Granny would eat at a fantastic rate, shoveling food in with a fork, lubricating it with a quick slurp of water, and then swallowing it with a little sucking noise and a final hiccup. Sitting at the table, she would remind you of a cement mixer at a construction site and watching her eat was both fascinating and repulsive at the same time.