The Magnificent Lizzie Brown and the Devil's Hound Read Free Page A

saying. Acre after acre, grave after grave! It’s not right.”
    â€œThat’s it, Mrs. S.! That’s exactly it!” Bungo slurped his tea, wetting his whiskers. “How can the dead rest easy in such a place? It’s no wonder they go roving about.”
    â€œRoving about?” Erin echoed in horror.
    â€œWhy else would the animals be upset?” Ma Sullivan said. “Where there’s graves, there’s ghosts. Erin, Nora, be sure and take your rosaries with you if you go off the site.”
    Lizzie felt a twinge of anger at all these dark mutterings. Even though she had powers she couldn’t explain, it didn’t mean everything had to be mysterious and spooky. “It’s only a cemetery,” she said boldly.
    Bungo shook his shaggy head. “You won’t catch me going in there after dark. Not for a million dollars.”
    â€œI’d go,” said Sean, one of the Sullivan brothers.
    â€œYou would not,” said Patrick, another one. “You’d come running out after five minutes, shoutin’, ‘Help, help, the Cú Sídhe’s chasing after me!’”
    â€œPatrick Sullivan!” Ma shouted, slamming the kettle down hard with a bang. “Do you want to bring bad luck down on the whole lot of us, now?”
    Lizzie blinked. “What’s a . . . what you said?” It had sounded like “Coo Shee.”
    Ma hesitated, then beckoned Lizzie over to sit with her. She leaned in close, ready to share something important. The other Sullivans leaned in too, so they were all huddled over their tea like a gaggle of witches meeting over a cauldron.
    â€œSometimes they call it the Black Dog,” Ma Sullivan whispered. “Most folk know better than to call it by its real name, except for this dolt.” She smacked Patrick lightly on the back of the head and ignored his howl of protest. “Sometimes it prowls around the old mounds that the fair folk left behind them—”
    â€œFair folk?” Lizzie interrupted in disbelief. “You can’t mean . . . fairies?”
    â€œAre you going to keep interrupting or let me tell what I’ve got to tell?” snapped Ma Sullivan.
    Lizzie squirmed. “Sorry.”
    â€œThose who’ve seen it say it takes the form of a hound the size of a calf,” Ma Sullivan said. “It’s all shaggy and black and has eyes like burning coals. It lurks in graveyards, waiting for the foolish souls who’ve gone in there after dark, perhaps to take a shortcut, perhaps because they were doing some stupid dare that their brother put them up to.” She glared at Sean, who pretended he didn’t know she meant him.
    Around the stones of Kensal Green, the Devil’s Hound does roam , thought Lizzie. She was sure it was all just folklore, but she listened politely. Ma Sullivan did like to tell stories, especially at times like this, when the thunder and the rain outside just added to the tale.
    â€œThe hound goes hunting for souls,” Ma whispered. “If you hear it howl, you must run for safety — into a church, or at the very least into a well-lit house.”
    â€œOr over running water,” whispered Nora.
    Ma Sullivan nodded. “If it howls again, then run all the faster. Because it howls only three times for any one person, and if you hear the last howl before you reach a safe place, then that’s the end of you.”
    A crack of thunder shook the tent, and a figure appeared in the doorway, silhouetted by the lightning.
    Everybody gasped, as if the hound had come for them. But it was only Fitzy. He stood there in his multicolored jacket, with his club-footed son Malachy close behind.
    â€œHope I’m not interrupting your leisure time,” Fitzy said sharply. Lizzie was taken aback by the tone of his voice. He sounded moments away from an angry outburst.
    â€œWill you take a cup of tea, Fitz?” Ma said, suddenly all smiles.
    â€œNo