Read Online The Legend of the Phantom Highwayman by Tom McCaughren - Free Book Online Page A

closer. He had to get away.
    Clutching his stomach, he staggered back up the road. Everything was swirling around before his eyes … the road, the ditches, the hills, the moon.
    â€˜There he is!’ he heard a voice shout. He tried to run, but somehow the road seemed to get steeper and steeper and he didn’t have the strength to climb it. It was like a nightmare. Next moment, he felt a hand grabbing him by the shoulder and he knew he was caught.
    It was then that the strangest thing of all happened.
    As Tapser looked up, he saw the phantom highwayman above him, blunderbuss in hand. And from afar he seemed to hear a voice say, ‘Stand and deliver!’
    â€˜Hugh Rua,’ he gasped sickly to himself.
    â€˜Stand and deliver!’ he seemed to hear the phantom figure say again.
    Tapser’s head was spinning. He felt an arm going around him, and a cool breeze on his face as he was carried through the night, holding on for dear life behind the phantom rider. The cape was flapping in his face and he reached up to brush it away but lost his grip and found himself falling, falling, falling …
    â€˜Tapser,’ he heard a voice saying.
    He looked up. Someone was bending over him, and a coat was brushing his face. He pushed it aside and saw the dark figures of the phantom highwayman and his horse rearing up into the night sky.
    â€˜Tapser, are you all right? It’s Cowlick.’
    Slowly Cowlick came into focus. Róisín and Rachel were there too.
    â€˜Where am I?’ he asked.
    â€˜At the memorial,’ Rachel told him.
    He blinked and looked up at the statue of Hugh Rua and his horse. ‘Give me a hand,’ he said.
    â€˜What happened?’ asked Róisín.
    â€˜Let’s get him down to the house first,’ said Cowlick. ‘He seems a bit dazed.’
    By the time they reached the house, the cool night air had helped Tapser to get over his gulp of poteen. Now and then he felt as if he was going to be sick, but otherwise he had recovered enough to lie on the bed and tell the others what had happened.
    â€˜Sorry we were so long catching up with you,’ said Cowlick. ‘But I was fast asleep when you woke me. So were the girls.’
    â€˜I thought you were right behind me,’ said Tapser.
    â€˜I didn’t know you’d gone until I woke up properly,’ Cowlick told him.
    â€˜And by the time we all got dressed, you must have been up on the High Road,’ said Róisín.
    â€˜We thought Cowlick was having us on when he told us you had seen the phantom highwayman,’ said Rachel. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t your imagination?’
    â€˜The trees up there can look very scary at night,’ said Róisín gently.
    â€˜It was him all right,’ Tapser asserted. ‘And if he hadn’t come along when he did, dear knows where I’d be now.’
    â€˜Do you think it was the same lorry that we saw at the Castle Spa last night?’ asked Cowlick.
    â€˜Could be. It looked the same, from what I could see of it.’
    â€˜And what about the men?’ asked Cowlick. ‘Did you recognise any of them?’
    Tapser shook his head. ‘All I know is that they were after me, and they would have got me too if it hadn’t been for Hugh Rua.’
    â€˜I think you were imagining things,’ said Rachel. ‘It must have been the poteen you swallowed.’
    â€˜But I heard the men saying, “There he is!” and then one of them caught me,’ said Tapser.
    â€˜That was us,’ Róisín told him.
    â€˜That’s right,’ said Cowlick. ‘We carried you back to the memorial. We didn’t see any smugglers – or phantoms.’
    â€˜But Hugh Rua saved me from them,’ said Tapser. ‘I heard him saying, “Stand and deliver”.’
    â€˜Don’t be silly,’ said Rachel, ‘that must have been Cowlick. He told us to stand aside and give you