Without another word they both raced upstairs. At the open door of the big bedroom they paused, staring. The grand lady and her maid were nowhere to be seen. The four-poster stood askew on its broken legs. The dust lay thick upon the floor. Everything was just as it had been when they first came to the inn and explored the rooms.
Giles grabbed his sister by the arm.
‘The horses!’ he cried. ‘Let’s see if they’re gone, too.’
A scamper down the stairs and out through the back door. A rush across the yard. And in a twinkling the big stable door was thrown open.
The only living thing to be seen was a large black cat which came out to meet them, blinking in the new and sudden light.
Silently they went back into the house. They were barely inside when Giles felt the shell burning in his pocket again. He pulled it out and listened.
‘It’s Mother and Father,’ he said to Anne. ‘They’re nearly frantic because we’ve been away all night. I can hear Mother crying her heart out, and Father stamping back and forth across the floor. Now they’re talking again—Sh!’
For a moment Giles was silent. Then he burst out with:
‘Oh, my goodness, this is dreadful! Father thinks Agnes has kidnapped us. Shragga the Witch, as they call her—child-stealing—and all that. Somebody saw us with her the other day when we went to the beach. Father is going to the Mayor to have her arrested. Quick! There’s no time to lose. Let’s get back home!’
Together they ran out of the dining-hall. But at the door Anne caught her brother’s sleeve and held him as she looked back for a last glimpse.