Mysterious and Sinister: Read an Extract from The Girl and the Ghost by Jacqueline Harvey

THE CHATEAU

Josephine Eloise Thomas presses her face against the car window.

‘Surely, it can’t be much further,’ she says, frowning.

‘No, Jet,’ her father replies, calling her by her nickname and glancing at the dashboard. ‘According to the GPS, we’re almost –’

‘There! It’s up there!’ Josephine exclaims, pointing to two tall rows of pencil pines lining a long, straight driveway. She can’t take her eyes off the chateau perched on top of the hill in all its symmetrical glory.

‘Seriously, that’s where we’re going to live! Am I dreaming?’ Josephine gasps.

It’s only been a couple of hours since she and her father, Matt, stepmother, Ellie and their golden retriever, Daisy, left Bordeaux to drive to their new home in the French countryside. And mere days since they uprooted their life in Australia, making the almost twenty-four-hour plane journey from Sydney via Dubai to Bordeaux.

Ellie leans around to look at Josephine in the back seat of the silver Citroën with Daisy lying beside her.

‘It feels a bit like a dream, doesn’t it? Although, some people might say that renovating a three-hundred-year-old chateau is more like a nightmare,’ Ellie says. ‘Actually, remind me why we’re doing this, Jet? We had a perfectly good life in Sydney, didn’t we? Is this a sensible decision? Will we actually be able to transform this place into a luxury boutique hotel or will your father die in a painting and plastering accident before our first guest arrives?’

Josephine laughs. ‘That’s a definite possibility. Although, Dad’s prowess with a paintbrush is slightly better than his performance with a power saw, so it’s more likely he’ll cut his arm off first.’

‘Surely you jest,’ Matt protests, pretending to be offended as he steers the car through a set of grand iron gates into the property. ‘I’ve spent years watching DIY YouTube videos and whatever I can’t handle, I promise I’ll pass over to the professionals. You wait and see. I have spreadsheets and timelines and enough cameras to record the whole ordeal. I am, after all, an award-winning documentary filmmaker. Maybe one day someone will even want to watch it.’

‘I’m sure it will be very entertaining, Dad,’ Josephine says. ‘Your films are always fabulous – except for the boring ones.’

‘Gee, thanks, honey,’ he replies, then glances at his wife. ‘You don’t really mean that, do you, El? You’re not having second thoughts?’ Considering his wife holds a first-class honours degree in French language and literature and has often expressed a desire to live in France, he’s slightly taken aback by her comments.

‘No – of course not,’ Ellie says with a smile. ‘We always said that Josephine and Teddy should have a chance to know their mother’s culture. And why else have I been teaching you all to speak French for the past umpteen years if you’re never going to use it? Besides, compared to the price of Sydney real estate, this place is a bargain!’

‘Is that what we’re calling it?’ Matt asks.

‘More like a money pit,’ Josephine replies with a teasing grin. ‘Speaking of Teddy, when is that big brother of mine turning up? Surely a whole month surfing in Portugal is enough?’

‘On the weekend sometime,’ Matt says. ‘He’s promised me that as soon as he gets here, he’s pulling on his workboots until Christmas. If that doesn’t encourage him to go to university, then I don’t know what will.’

As the car crunches to a halt on the gravel driveway, Josephine is out the door with Daisy before her father turns off the ignition.

In front of her, the creamy sandstone facade of the Chateau Margaux glints in the afternoon sun. The roofline reminds Josephine of a wedding cake with its matching towers at either end, its chimneys and its dormer attic windows.

She sighs as Daisy bounces excitedly beside her. ‘Isn’t this the most exciting thing ever, Daisy? Well, maybe not as thrilling as chasing ducks in the park or swimming in the harbour, but can you imagine – we’re going to live in a chateau in France. A castle! It’s on the smaller side – definitely nowhere near as big as that one down the road – but still. It’s ours!’

‘I believe that place is called Chateau Du Lac,’ her father says. ‘Translates as “the castle on the lake”, but where the lake is, remains a mystery.’

‘Perhaps we should drop by with a cake one afternoon – meet the neighbours and practise our French,’ Ellie says.

‘Oh, oui, that would be fun,’ Josephine replies. ‘Maybe a prince lives there.’

‘Or a witch?’ Matt teases.

‘I’m not afraid of witches, they’re only in fairytales,’ Josephine says. ‘But you never know, I might be able to work both into my next story. They will have to speak French, bien sûr.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Ellie says enthusiastically, ‘I can’t wait to see what you come up with now that we’re here. I know that one day, I’m going to walk into a bookshop and see rows of books with your name on them.’

Josephine laughs. ‘Maybe one day. But right now, I can’t wait to see my new room. Actually, I can’t wait to see every room.’

‘Steady on, Jet – it might take you a while,’ her dad says. ‘You know there are . . .’

Continue reading the extract here.

Buy a copy of The Girl and the Ghost here.

Synopsis

When almost-thirteen-year-old Josephine Eloise Thomas moves from Sydney to a chateau in the southwest of France, she expects many things – adventures, inspiration for the stories she loves to write and maybe finding out more about her French mother, who tragically died when she was a toddler. What she doesn’t expect is to find a beautiful gold locket with the ghost of Louis XVII trapped inside!

After being accidentally released into the twenty-first century, the young prince proves to be annoying, strange and obviously from another time. He also believes that Josephine is not who she says she is.

Then, there’s Gabriel. The grandson of the local baker – French, beautiful, an artist and definitely not a ghost.

When Josephine and Gabriel venture to the shadowy Chateau Du Lac next door to her home, the secrets become more sinister. With Louis’s help, can Josephine and Gabriel discover what her neighbours are really up to and solve the mystery of Louis and the locket too?

Jacqueline Harvey

Jacqueline Harvey worked in schools for many years but has had a passion for storytelling since she was a child. She is the author of the popular Alice-Miranda, Clementine Rose and Kensy and Max series, which have sold over one million copies in Australia alone. Her books have received numerous short-listings and awards while her picture book, The Sound of the Sea, was a CBCA Honour Book. Jacqueline speaks to thousands of young people at schools and festivals around the world, and says the characters in her books are often made up of the best bits of children she’s met over the years. While she is not a twin, like Kensy and Max she does have excellent powers of observation and has always thought she’d make a great spy. Jacqueline lives in Sydney and is currently working on more Kensy and Max adventures, and some exciting new projects too.

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