Page 99 of The Secret Christmas Library
‘This is it,’ said Jamie. ‘I can sense it.’
Mirren nodded. ‘I think so.’
He tore the stitches of the mattress cover apart, and fished inside, until he pulled out a soft, faded old jiffy bag.
He handed it to her. ‘You open it.’
‘Absolutely not. You do it.’
In the end, they tugged at it together, carefully opening the bag, and pulled it out. It was well wrapped up, covered in layers and layers of bubble wrap.
‘Is it more letters?’ breathed Mirren. Jamie looked at her and shook it.
‘I don’t think so,’ he said.
And that was the moment the flaming branch fell against the roof.
47
Mirren screamed and Jamie looked up.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Out! Out! Get out! Run back towards the house!’
‘Not without you,’ said Mirren. ‘I’ll run across the loch and die.’
‘Okay,’ he said, tucking the parcel carefully into an inside pocket of his jacket. ‘Follow me.’
Outside the house, they ran around the back, and he handed her another fire extinguisher. ‘Know how to use one of these?’
‘I absolutely don’t!’
‘Okay, well . . . don’t open it in your face.’
He showed her how to pull off the black safety guard, and they directed the foam towards the branch on the roof, which lay there smouldering among the thatch. Mirren’s aim was terrible, but Jamie managed to bank it carefully, smothering the flame and adding as much of the spray as he could for good measure.
‘Okay,’ he said, as it finally damped down. ‘Okay.’
He was breathing hard as he put down the fire extinguisher, just as Mirren turned round to see that a line of low hedging had caught on the side of the kitchen garden – and was racing closer to the castle. They could hear Roger outside somewhere, barking his head off.
‘Quick!’
But they couldn’t move quickly with their stupid snowshoes – or at least Mirren couldn’t. They forged their way ahead as well as they could, hot and red-faced, Mirren’s muscles all screaming at her as she deeply regretted not paying attention to the CrossFit machine.
‘Bloody hell,’ she said.
Jamie was looking at the smouldering hedge. ‘You go ahead! Wake up the others! We’ll get them out!’
‘Where?’ said Mirren.
‘Well, we’ll get them downstairs. Just in case. It’s not going to make it to the house, though. It won’t. It can’t.’
‘We didn’t think it would make it to the cottage!’
Jamie frowned, looking back. The maze was still ablaze; the cottages seemed safe for the time being. ‘I’ll bring the fire extinguishers up. Every one we can find. We’ll need to wake everyone. Buckets too. Cover it in snow.’
They went in the main door, the big old wooden entrance creaking furiously at being opened, as it so seldom was. Jamie left it open, then found the huge old gong and started hitting it. Roger stayed outside, as if astounded that the humans could be so stupid.
‘EVERYONE! UP! UP! EVERYONE!!’
