Colm & the Ghost's Revenge Read Online Free PDF Page B

This was true. Even the telly – a portable – was worth less than fifty euro and it was the most expensive item she owned.
    â€˜I’m tellin’ you nuthin’,’ the man replied.
    Kate lifted him higher. His hair brushed against the ceiling.
    â€˜Mammy,’ the man whimpered.
    Two thoughts went through his head simultaneously. The first was that Kate was far more frightening in person than in the photos he’d been given. The second was that he was glad he’d brought along two accomplices.
    Kate sensed the men before she saw them. She swung around, the wiry man still in her ferocious grip. The thugs were standing on the far side of the living room, less than ten feet away. Both were huge, bald, ugly and dressed in black.
    â€˜Hello boys. Aren’t you great for dressing up like twins. You look really cute,’ Kate sneered.
    The slightly prettier of the two smiled, revealing a mouthful of broken, yellow, rotting teeth.
    â€˜Whoa, they should put your picture on bars of chocolate as a warning. No kid would ever want to eat sweets again if they thought they’d end up looking like you.’
    The men didn’t say anything. They just took a step towards her. Uggo cracked his knuckles. Pretty Boy took out a police baton. Uh-oh, thought Kate, you had to antagonise them, didn’t you. She tried to take a step backwards but the wall was blocking her way. Her options were limited.
    â€˜Let me down,’ said the man. He was still dangling in the air and had grown quite embarrassed about it. His accomplices would be mocking him about this one for months.
    Kate sized up the situation. Three against one. She was good, but not that good. What would Cedric do in this situation, she wondered. There was only one thing for it.
    â€˜Let me down. I won’t ask you again, Kate ,’ the man said.
    Calling her Kate was his second mistake.
    Using her free hand she grabbed the wiry man by his belt buckle and hoisted him above her head in a move she’d seen Randy Orton use in a WWE match.
    â€˜It’s Miss Finkle to you, ya stick insect,’ she shouted, flinging him at the thugs. He sailed through the air accompanied by a tiny yelp. The men swiftly moved out of the way, making no effort to catch their colleague. He landed face first in a dish of soggy day-old cat food.
    Kate didn’t wait to see what happened next. She turned and sprinted for the front door as quickly as she could. It wasn’t quick enough.
    Before her hand had reached the latch, the thugs were upon her. In less than three seconds she was unconscious.

Five
    â€˜I
n the name of all that’s good and holy, what’s that smell?’ Colm’s mother cried, flapping her hand furiously in front of her face.
    Colm closed the front door, took off his shoes and popped his head round the kitchen door.
    â€˜I think, Mary, that that insufferably awful stink is our one and only child,’ his father replied.
    â€˜Hi Ma. What’s up, Da?’ Colm asked in as cheery a voice as he could muster.
    The journey home had been mortifying. The driver wouldn’t allow him on the bus – ‘Janey, son, were ya showering in sewage or wha’?’ – so he’d had to walk. A real walk of shame. Fellow pedestrians had given him a wide berth. Most had given him odd looks. More than a few had tried to be smart alecks – they’d made jokes about slurry and Stig of the Dump; one wag had told him to familiarise himself with a substance called soap that had existed for roughly five thousand years. A Yorkshire terrier had even sniffed at Colm’s shoes, before running off into the distance leaving behind an auditory trail of high-pitched whimpering, possibly traumatised for life by the appalling stench. It wasn’t Colm’s finest hour.
    â€˜What happened to you?’ his dad asked, his face a mixture of concern and amusement.
    â€˜I fell,’ Colm replied.
    His father