The Secret Passage - Chapter Two
Mr Agnew, Miss Pin and the Face at the Window
by Nina Bawden

John was awake before the others the next morning. The bare attic was flooded with clear sunlight and when he climbed up on to the rickety chair to look out of the window, he saw a pale blue sky with little clouds floating high up in it, like puffs of smoke. At the end of the garden was a line of houses with blue slate roofs and, behind them, a darker blue line where the sky met the sea. Everywhere, gulls were diving and screaming, making a tremendous noise that almost drowned the rhythmic sucking sound of the sea on the beach.

The garden immediately below the window was long and bare and narrow; at the end of it, there was a wooden shed. The garden of the big house on the other side of the high brick wall, was much larger and looked dense and overgrown with a thick shrubbery of dark, speckly evergreens.

John jumped off the chair. "Wake up," he said, "Mary, wake up. Come and look at the sea."

Mary yawned sleepily and rolled over in bed.

Ben sat up and sneezed so hard that his bed rattled.

Mary opened her eyes. "You've caught a cold," she said accusingly.

"I habend." Ben glared at her before he sneezed again. He said in a hoarse voice, "I habend gotta code."

Aunt Mabel thought differently.

"You'll stay indoors this morning," she said, after Ben had sneezed his way through breakfast. (Ben had never had a cold before and he had no idea how to be polite about it. When he wanted to sneeze, he just sneezed: it was like sitting at a table with an erupting volcano.) "John and Mary can go out," Aunt Mabel went on. "But you must stay with me."

"I don't want to," Ben said. "I want to go out. It'll make me worse to stay in a stuffy old house."

"You'll do as you're told," Aunt Mabel said.

She spoke rather sharply. She thought Ben was likely to be more difficult to control than John and Mary. She was probably right. Ben wasn't really spoiled or even particularly naughty, but he was tough, determined little boy who had been simply used to having his own way. Up to now, there had been no real reason why he shouldn't have it. In Africa, there had been no need for a lot of tiresome rules; since his parents had known Ben was sensible enough to keep out of danger, they had let him go more or less where he liked and do what he liked. The first person who had tried to hedge him in was Mrs Epsom with her endless, boring, "Don't do this . . . don't do that." It seemed to Ben, suddenly, that Aunt Mabel was going to be just like her, and he went dark red with anger.

"I won't," he said. "I won't. I wan' to go and look at the sea. I habend gotta code." And he gave a simply tremendous sneeze.

Perhaps if Aunt Mabel had laughed at him, it would have been all right. But she didn't. She was too worried in case Ben would not obey her. She knew very little about children; certainly, she had no idea how to manage Ben any more than she would have known how to manage a strange wild animal suddenly dumped down in her kitchen.

She said briskly, "Don't be stupid. I won't have it. If you go out, you might get pneumonia and I've got enough to do without nursing a sick child. If you don't do what you're told, you'll have to go straight up to your room and stay there."

Ben looked at Aunt Mabel and Aunt Mabel looked at Ben. If Mary hadn't been so nervous about what was going to happen, she might have noticed that they both looked rather alike for the moment, staring at each other with the same angry, determined expression in their brown eyes. Then the colour vanished from Ben's face and he looked as white as a piece of paper, with two dark holes for eyes.

"I hate you," he said. "I hate you." And he flew at Aunt Mabel, whirling his arms like a small windmill in a gale.

She caught hold of him by the wrists. She slapped him once, on his bare, sturdy legs. Then she took him by the collar and marched him out of the room with a grim expression on her face.

Mary and John stood still, feeling shocked and unhappy. John crept to the door and listened, but there was no sound from upstairs. They waited for about five minutes, until Aunt Mabel came back into the kitchen, stalked past them without a glance and bent over to poke the Beast. She riddled violently, so many hair pins tinkling on to the floor that her bun became unfastened and her hair fell down like a curling grey snake. She slammed the boiler door and turned to face them, two red spots high up on her cheeks, hands on hips, feet firmly planted at ten to two. She was wearing a pair of flat, flappy houseshoes; Mary thought that they made her look rather like a pair of kippers She said curtly, "Ben's got to learn to do what he's told. But that's no reason why you should hang about looking like a pair of miseries. Get your coats on and go down to the sea - a bit of air will do you good."

Mary said nervously. "If you don't mind, Aunt Mabel, we - we'd rather not go without Ben the first time. We'd rather wait until his cold is better."

Aunt Mabel looked at her. Then she shrugged her shoulders and said grudgingly, "All right. I don't mind what you do as long as you clear out from under my feet." She began to clear the table. Mary started to help her, but she said, "I'll do this - if you want to help you can go and tell Mr Agnew his breakfast will be ready in ten minutes."

John looked doubtfully at Mary. "Where is Mr Agnew?"

"Shed at bottom of garden. Put your coats on. Wind's bitter."

They went up the basement stairs and along the passage to the back door. The long, thin garden was empty and bare-looking, even when the summer came, John thought, nothing much would ever grow there. A sound of hammering came from the wooden shed and on a nail outside the open door a man's jacket was hanging. It wasn't an ordinary looking jacket - it was huge, immense, more like an over-coat. The children stared at it, amazed. John whispered, "He must be the biggest man in the world..."

"Ssh," Mary said, because Mr Agnew had suddenly appeared in the doorway. He was big - a vast, red-haired giant with piercing blue eyes under shaggy eyebrows and great, hairy, gingery arms emerging from a short-sleeved red shirt. "Well," he said. "What is it? Who are you?" He looked and sounded very fierce.

"Please," Mary said in a small voice, "Please, Aunt Mabel said to tell you breakfast is almost ready."

He looked down at her, frowning. Then his brow cleared and he laughed, a great, resounding laugh that echoed round the narrow, walled garden like thunder. The children understood why his snore was so loud - everything about Mr Agnew was larger than life. "Why - it's the Orphanage," he said. He clapped a big, hammy hand on each of their shoulders. "Come in," he said. "Come into the workshop."

"We're not orphans," John said with dignity, but Mr Agnew did not appear to hear him. He propelled them into the shed. In the centre of the wooden floor stood a great lump of some sort of stone, taller even than Mr Agnew. "Well," he said, "what do you think of it? Don't be afraid - just tell me."

The children looked at the statue in silence.

"What is it?" Mary said.

Mr Agnew gave an explosive snort. "Can't you see? D'you mean to tell me you can't see?"

"I can," John said unexpectedly.

Mr Agnew bent his bright blue gaze upon him. "Well?" he said in a threatening voice.

"It's a fat woman," John said. "Kneeling."

They didn't understand why Mr Agnew should laugh at that, but he did, longer and louder than he had laughed before. His big stomach shook like jelly, tears streamed down his cheeks, he began to gasp for breath and ended in a kind of hoot like a ship's siren, Hoo, hoo, hoo... John and Mary watched him, astonished. Finally, he wiped his eyes and said in a choking voice, "That's good. That's rich. My Venus, my beautiful Venus - fat woman, kneeling. Hoo, hoo..." He slapped the statue affectionately with his hand. That's brought me down a peg. D'you know, I think that's what I shall call her."

He stood for a moment, gazing at the statue and rasping his hand over his plump, unshaven chin. He seemed to have forgotten the children altogether.

John said, "Your breakfast's ready, Mr Agnew."

"What?" Oh..." He smiled at John. "Don't call me Mr Agnew. Call me Uncle Abe. Honorary Uncle." He reached his jacket down from the hook and began to put it on. "Do you like messing about with clay? There's some terracotta on that bench. See what you can do with it."

He picked up two lumps of the red clay, big as footballs, and tossed one to each of them. Mary looked at hers, and then at the front of her coat. "It's very kind of you," she said. "But - but Aunt Mabel might be cross." She thought of Mrs Epsom. "If we get dirty, I mean."

Uncle Abe drew his bristly eyebrows together. "You're not afraid of Mabel, surely?" He looked searchingly at their downcast faces. "Good lord - I believe you are." He sounded as if the idea astonished him and made him rather angry. "You needn't be, y'know," he said, frowning sternly. "Your Aunt's an angel. Understand that? An Angel." He glared at them, turned on his heel and marched towards the house.

"She's a funny sort of angel," John said thoughtfully.

"Yes." Mary sighed and looked up at the top floor of The Haven, at the tiny attic window that glinted in the sun. "Poor Ben. He must be awfully miserable," she said.

But Ben wasn't miserable, he was far too angry. No one had ever slapped him before or punished him in any way. He sat on the edge of his little bed, rebellion and fury burning in his heart, muttering crossly under his breath. He had sneezed so much that his head ached. When he had been angry in Africa, he had always gone off on his own, with Balthazar, until he felt better. He began to think about Balthazar and how he would probably never see him again and after a little while he began to feel comfortably sad and a lot less angry. He thought it had been rather unkind of him to tell Aunt Mabel that he hated her. Perhaps it had made her cry. He hadn't really meant to make her cry. He thought she had probably not meant to be so cross with him and that she might easily feel unhappy about it now. He decided that he would go and find her - not to say he was sorry, because he didn't think he had done anything wrong - but so that she could say she was sorry to him.

He crept down the stairs, rather cautiously just in case she wasn't feeling as sorry as she ought to feel, just yet, and stood at the top of the basement stairs. He was just going to start down to the kitchen when he heard a deep, man's voice and then Aunt Mabel's, answering him. Ben sighed. It was no good going down to the kirchen if she wasn't alone, she would just shoo him back to his room. He decided to explore a little instead. He peered into the big, silent dining room that smelt musty and shut up and had lots of tables with chairs stuck up on top of them. There was a big, dark sideboard with lots of bottles of sauce on it and a grandfather clock in the corner that ticked with a fat, comfortable sound. Ben unscrewed the tops of some of the bottles and tasted the sauces with his tongue. Then he found a glass and a spoon in a cupboard in the sideboard and tried making a mixture to drink. He mixed and tasted and mixed and tasted until his tongue felt rather sore. So he cleaned the glass and the spoon, very carefully with his dirty handkerchief, and put them back.

Further along the passage, there was a closed door. Ben wondered if it led into another empty room; he was just about to turn the handle when he thought he heard someone talking inside. Not quite someone, though - it had been a thin, squeaky sound, rather like a mouse talking. He waited for a little, then, very quietly, he opened the door and went in.

He must have been wrong, he thought, because there was no one there. It was a small roon, and very dark. Thick velvet curtains hung at the window, leaving only a narrow slit for the light to come through. The walls seemed to be hung with rich, dark red material that had gold thread woven into it. Above the mantelpiece there was a big picture in a heavy gilt frame, but it was so dark that Ben could not see what it was meant to be. The room was very full of chests and little tables - so full, in fact, that there was barely room to walk. In front of the fireplace there was a perfectly ordinary woodern towel horse with clothes folded over it that looked out of place, Ben thought, inthis rather grand, gloomy room. Near the towel hourse, Ben saw something that interested him. On a small, carved table, there was a collection of miniature china and some small, pretty figures carved in a kind of green, cloudy glass. Ben threaded his way through the furniture, being very careful not to knock anything over, and picked up a tiny cup painted with freen and yellow flowers.

Behind him a voice said, "Careful, Boy. That piece is valuable."

He was startled that he almost dropped the cup. He put it down gently on the table and said, severely, "You made me jump."

There was someone in the room after all, watching him with eyes that were dark and shiny as boot buttons. The clothes horse was being used as a screen, and inside that screen, in front of a tall oil stove, sat a little old woman in a brilliantly coloured shawl and a queer hat that was all feathers. Beneath the hat her tiny face peeped out; it was wrinkled all over and a pale, yellowish colour. Although she was wearing a shawl and the feather hat, her feet were bare and resting in an enamel bath steaming with hot water. She held a kettle in her lap; another sizzled on the top of the oil stove.

"Who are you?" Ben said, rather rudely.

The old woman's eyes snapped. "I think that is a question I should ask you."

"I'm Ben Mallory," Ben said.

She bowed her head in a queenly way so that all the feathers dipped and waved.

"I am Muriel Pin. Delighted to make your aquaintance."

She was wearing long, black gloves. Very slowly, she took the right one off. Her fingers were thin and frail looking and covered with rings that flashed as she held out her hand. Ben took it and they shook hands gravely.

"Are you cold?" Ben said.

"Yes, I am, Mr Mallory. How very intelligent of you to observe - people seldom do. Mrs Haggard, now, thinks I am simply eccentric." Her voice sank to a thread of a whisper. "I believe she thinks I am a little mad. Mad Muriel, she calss me behind my back - she thinks I don't know it. Servants have no respect nowadays."

"I'm cold too," Ben said. He thought the hot bath and the kettles were a very sensible way of keeping warm. "I've been cold ever since I came to England."

Miss Pin placed her ungloved hand against the side of the kettle on her lap. "Getting cool," she said. She exchanged it for the kettle on the oil stove, poured more hot water into the bath and then held the empty kettle towards Ben. "Would you mind filling this up for me, Mr Mallory. Over in the corner - there." She pointed with a scrawny finger.

In the corner there was a brown velvet curtain that rattled back on brass rings and revealed a washbasin. Ben filled the kettle creafully - it was rather a tricky business - and took it back.

"Put it down here," the old lady commanded. "No, no, stupid boy... can't you see?" She bent sideways and picked up something from the floor. "This is Sir Lancelot," she said. She showed him a small tortoise with a green ribbon tied round his shell. She spoke to it in the thin, squeaky voice Ben had heard through the door. "Sir Lancelot - meet Mr Benjamin Mallory." The tortoise slid out his scaly old head and blinked black eyes at Ben. "He suffers with the cold, as I do. Sometimes I give him baths in warm olive oil. You may stroke his chin, if you care to."

Gently, Ben stroked the dry old chin. He said, "Do tortoises like that? I wish I had a pet. In Africa, I had a chameleon." He thought perhaps Miss Pin would like to hear about Balthazar, so he sat down on a red leather stool beside the enamel bath, and told her about him. She seemed very interested.

"Tell me about Africa," she said, her boot-button eyes glistening. "It must be a very wild, strange place. I have always wished to travel but my Dear Papa never allowed it, though he, of course, spent much of his life in India. Until his Enemies hounded him out, of course. When that happened, we fled to Henstable." She gave a little sigh. "We came here when I was a child of ten and I have never left it since."

"How old are you?" Ben asked.

"Eighty-two."

Ben drew a deep breath. He looked at her face and her shawl and her feathered hat and thought he had never seen anyone so odd-looking, or so old. "Who are the Enemies?" he said.

"Hush." Miss Pin leaned forward in her chair, hunching herself up until she looked like a crooked old witch. "Don't speak so loud. They are all around us - watchinng and listening. You need not be afraid, though. We are quite safe, her in this hous. That is why Dear Papa named it The Haven. Even should They force their way in, there are places to hide. Places where They would never find us. You're not afraid, are you?"

"Of course not," Ben said boldly, though her secretive, whispering voice sent delicious shivers running up and down his spine. "If They came in, though - the Enemies, I mean, where would you hide?"

She said slowly, "I don't know that I should tell you. Can you keep a secret?" She looked at him thoughtfully. "I believe you can. You're a sensible boy, aren't you?"

Ben nodded, hugging his knees. He thought she was the most interesting grown-up he had met for a long time.

She took the kettle off the oil stove, tested the temperature, and placed it on her lap. "When we came here," she said, "I thought this a very old house. So poky - so different from our grand house in London. I was a very lonely child - Dear Papa would not allow me mix with other children in case I should meet an Enemy, you see. I had everything a child could want, we were very rich, you see, because of all the treasure Papa had brought home from India, but for most of the time I was very dull. Then, one afternoon when Cook was out, I discovered the secret passage. I was exploring the cellar..."

"What is a cellar?" Ben said.

In his excitement, he spoke much too loudly. Aunt Mabel who was outside in the passage, heard him and thrust open the door. "Ben, you naughty boy," she said in an exasperated voice. "I thought I told you to stay in your room?" She seized Ben's arm and jerked him crossly up from his stool. "Do as I tell you another time. I'm sorry he's bothered you, Miss Pin."

Miss Pin was sitting very upright in her chair. In spite of her funny hat and her bare feet and the kettle in her lap, Ben thought she looked grand and imperious, rather like a queen. She spoke like a queen, too.

"You are exceeding your duties, Mrs Haggard. Mr Mallory is a friend of mine. I am pleased to have him visit me."

"Oh. Oh well, if you say so..." Aunt Mabel sounded rather flustered. "But you'll tire yourself - you know the doctor said you weren't to tire yourself." In spite of her grumpy voice, Ben saw that she was very gentle as she plumped up the cushions behind the old lady's back and settled her more comfortably against them.

"It tires me far more to be lonely all day," Muriel Pin said. She looked at Ben. "You'll come again, won't you?" She sounded quavery and humble, suddenly, not queenly at all.

"Yes, I'll come back," Ben said.

"I'd like to give you a present," the old lady said. "Come here."

Ben stood beside her, while she selected a tiny horse from the little table beside her. "Look after him," she said. "Papa brought him back from India."

The horse felt cool in his hand. "Thank you," Ben said, "He's lovely. I'll take care of him for ever."

"Come along Ben, do," Aunt Mabel said, from the door.

When they were outside in the passage, she marched him along it until they were safely out of earshot. Then she took his shoulder and turned him to face her. She said sternly, "Listen to me, Ben. You're not to bother Miss Pin, whatever she says. She's old and sick. Let me see what she gave you."

Rather reluctantly, Ben showed her the little, pale green horse.

Aunt Mabel sighed. "Well, I suppose she can spare that, she's got enough old junk. It'll be one thing less for me to dust. But you're not to take anything else. Or ask for anything. Do you understand that? She's a poor woman and she can't afford to give greedy little boys presents."
Ben was furiously angry. "I wouldn't ask for presents. And anyway, she's not poor. She's rich. She told me." He was so cross that he went red, right to the tips of his ears.

Aunt Mabel looked at him. Then she shrugged her shoulders. She said, half to herself, "I suppose it's harmless enough." She glanced at her watch. "Your cold sounds better to me. It won't hurt you to run along into the garden with the others."

When Ben ran into the garden, he was bursting to tell Mary and John about Miss Pin and to show them his little horse. But they were far too preoccupied to listen to him. They were standing halfway down the garden, staring up at the big, neglected old house on the other side of the high brick wall. The sun had moved round in the sky and the windows were all in shadow. They looked very blank and empty.

"But I did see it," John was saying in an excited voice. "I did, I did."

"What did you see?" Ben panted up to them, the little horse clasped tightly in his hand.

Mary laughed. "John thinks he saw someone in the house next door but he couldn't have, because the house is empty. Aunt Mabel said so. So he's just being silly."

"I'm not." John went red. He hated it when Mary laughed at him. He was breathing rather fast and his hands were clenched in front of him. "I'm sure I saw a face - a face at the window."