The Boggart and the Monster by Susan Cooper Page B

stay with Devon MacDevon that I learned about boggarts properly.”
    She took a long thoughtful drag at the straw sticking out of her can of Pepsi-Cola, which looked almost as incongruous next to her snow-white hair as the red Wellington boots.
    â€œYou met
our
Boggatt,”
said Jessup with pride.
    â€œNot exactly. Your Boggart tried to get rid of me.Salt in my drinking water, sand in my soap dish, thistles in my bed. All his tricks said loud and clear,
go home
. My brother was staying at Castle Keep too, but nothing at all happened to him.”
    â€œOh dear,”
Emily said.
“Why didn’t the Boggart like you?”
    â€œTo tell the truth,”
said Miss Urquhart,
“I think he was afraid I was wanting to marry the MacDevon.”
    â€œAnd were you?”
Jessup said.
    â€œJess!”
said Emily.
    â€œOh, that’s all right,”
Miss Urquhart said. She smiled, rather wistfully, and Emily could suddenly see the echo of a pretty young face inside the old, lined one.
“I did find him very attractive, I must say. But I was only in my early twenties, and he was forty-five at least, and already set in his ways. He never did marry anyone. I think perhaps he found it easier to live with a boggart than with a wife.”
    â€œThat was his loss,”
said Mr. Maconochie gallantly, even though he had never wanted to live with a wife either.
    â€œHave a chocolate biscuit,”
Tommy said.
    â€œThank you,”
said Miss Urquhart to both of them, and she took a biscuit.
“Anyway, he spoke to me quite openly about the Boggart, and apologized for him. And when I came home I found myself coming quite often to this castle, here where we sit now, and listening for our own boggart.”
    Mr. Maconochie said,
“Listening?”
    â€œThat’s the only word I can think of for it,”
Miss Urquhart said. She took a bite of her chocolate biscuit.
    â€œFeeling what he’s feeling,”
said Emily. She thought of the sad wail she had heard from the loch that morning, which nobody else had been able to hear.
    â€œThat’s right,”
said Miss Urquhart.
    â€œHmm,”
said Mr. Maconochie noncommittally.
    Miss Urquhart ate the rest of her biscuit, got to her feet and held out a hand to him.
“Come with me and I’ll show you,”
she said.
    â€œWhat?”
said Mr. Maconochie. He peered up at her through his bristly grey eyebrows.
    â€œCome!”
Miss Urquhart stood there small and insistent, holding out her hand.
“You are an Urquhart and so am I, and with that much family feeling focused on Nessie, we shall hear what he is feeling. You just have to concentrate. I’ll show you.”
    Since she showed no sign of moving, Mr. Maconochie, looking very skeptical, unfolded his long legs and stood up, and the old lady took his hand and led him toward the outer wall of the castle. Beyond it, a little path ran along the top of a grassy slope overlooking the loch. Like a mother settling a small child, she sat him down on the edge of the path, looking out over the water, and sat herself beside him. Loch Ness lay below them, and from its further bank the forested green hillside rose to ridges of bare rock.
    Emily, Jessup and Tommy stayed behind, in the grass-wrapped center of the castle.
    â€œOkay then, Jess,”
said Emily
“The Boggart wanted us to come here, you said — and we’ve come. So what happens next?”
    â€œBeats me,”
Jessup said.
    â€œMaybe it’s already happening”
said Tommy.
“Maybe it’s Miss Urquhart, and the listening.”
    *  *  *
    N ESSIE SLOWED DOWN , and drifted upward a little, closer to the surface of the water. The Boggart could see it like a glimmering ceiling several feet above them.
    â€œ
My castle’s just over that way,
”
Nessie said.
“
My poor ruined castle.
”
    â€œ
Take boggatt-shape,
”
the Boggart said,
“
and we’ll go up and have a