One

A dream has the power to poison sleep – Percy Bysshe Shelly

The road from Moulinsart village was thin and winding, and lined with trees the closer it drew to the manor house. It was peaceful and remote, passing by a few houses that were hidden from the road by high hedges, and rarely busy. In winter, it was slippery and some of the corners could be treacherous, but in the summer it was a beautiful walk – shaded and cool in parts, warm and joyous in others.

This morning it was peaceful, and though it was still relatively early in the morning it was beginning to heat up. It would be another wonderful summer's day in this small corner of Belgium.

Most of the windows in the manor were thrown open to the early morning heat. In the distance, a sheep bawled happily and the songbirds called to one another from the tops of the trees. The park stretched from the front of the property; curled around one side of the manor, and sprawled across the back fields and meadows.

A single woodpecker swooped down from the sky and landed on a small sycamore that grew at the front of the manor house. It tilted its head to one side as it stared at the bark of the young tree. It hopped closer to the trunk, considered its options, and began to hammer furiously, sending a sharp rap-tap through the still air.

The sound woke Captain Haddock up. Yawning, he turned over on to his back and stretched luxuriously. After a short moment, he realised that the rap-tapping had continued.

"Who is it?" he called sleepily, blinking at the light that flooded through the open window. Dust motes drifted lazily in the shafts of bright light.

"It is Nester, sir, with your breakfast." The familiar voice of the manor's butler made the Captain's stomach wake up. It growled and he grinned: he always had an apatite first thing in the morning.

"Come in," he said.

The door burst open and Bianca Castafiore walked in, panache radiating from her stylish form. The Captain recoiled, dragging his blankets up around his chin and clamping down on the scream that was trying to fight its way out of his mouth. Instead, he managed a high-pitched keen that escaped through his gritted teeth. "Thundering typhoons! Wh… what?" he asked weakly.

"Good morning, my dear friend!" the large woman crooned. She was, he decided, too loud for mornings. "I have brought your medicine!" She waved a bottle of Loch Lomond at him as she approached. He stared at it warily.

"I can't drink that," he protested. "Blistering barnacles, woman, you know I can't drink whisky any more!" An unknown experiment carried out on his unsuspecting person had rendered him unable to stomach his favourite poison. The summer was going to slip by without Calculus finding a cure for it, he just knew that it would, and one of his favourite past-times was sitting on the back veranda in the warm summer evenings, watching the sun set with a glass of whisky. Pain in the asses, always thinking about his welfare. To the devil with them!

"Now now," La Castafiore said. She was so close to him they were practically nose to nose. "You must take your medicine, like a good boy!" Her face started to twist and mutate before his very eyes. The nose became longer, the eyes narrowed and glared at him menacingly, and her teeth were sharper. As he watched, her perfectly coiffured hair stiffened like the spines of a porcupine, and grew up into feathers, turning her into some kind of demonic bird. "Take your medicine!" she screamed at him, her voice heavy like a man's.

The Captain thrashed and screamed, trying to fight her off. Clucking bells, but she was strong! His feet kicked uselessly, trapped in the blankets that had somehow managed to wrap themselves around his body. "Tintin!" he shrieked. "Help me!"

In the bedroom down the hall, Snowy woke up. He had been sleeping on the chair in front of the window, enjoying the cooler air, but now he was bristling and barking loudly. Tintin sat up and blinked the sleep from his eyes. "Hah?" he said stupidly. Then he heard the frantic cries ("Away, ostragoth! Get back, coelacanth!") and jumped out of bed, tripping over a slipper. He kicked it away, and it bounced off Snowy, who was now at the closed door, barking shrilly. He yelped as the slipper collided with him, but it was more from fear than anything else, judging by the Look he sent his master. Tintin cursed quietly in French and wrenched the door open, tearing after the dog towards the Captain's bedroom. He went in and saw the Captain still sleeping – clearly having some sort of nightmare – and thrashing about in the bed. He went to his friend and tried to shake him awake, and ended up getting a smack in the face for his trouble. He cursed again and tried a different tactic, grabbing the Captain's left foot and shaking it until the man awoke.

The Captain sat up with a final, strangled yell. Catching sight of Tintin, he sagged a little, rubbing his face with his hands. "Oh, blistering barnacles, what a nightmare!" he said with a shudder.

"Nightmare?" Tintin raised one eyebrow. Now the initial shock had worn off, he could see the humour in the situation. Even though his cheek stung from the Captain's hand.

"It was horrible," the Captain said in a hollow voice. "The horror…"

"What was it?" Tintin struggled to keep his smile hidden.

"Bianca Castafiore. Here. In my room."

Tintin quickly pressed his hand against his mouth to suppress a laugh. "That's it?" he asked. "That's all?"

"No, it was… it was evil." The Captain shuddered again. "She came in, bossy as ever – maybe even more bossy than usual – and tried to force-feed me whisky. Then she turned into a bird."

Tintin laughed aloud. "I see," he said flippantly. "Plenty to scream about there."

"I didn't scream," the Captain insisted grumpily. Now that he was awake, with sunlight flooding the room, the dream seemed ridiculous. "I cried out. No, I, er, I called out. Manfully."

"Mm. I'm sure you did."

"You just misheard, that's all."

"Bien sûr."

"Because you were asleep."

"C'était un hurlement."

"Exactly."

"Exactement."

The phone rang, interrupting the Captain from his scowling. Tintin picked it up and rattled off something in French. His mouth dropped open at the reply, and he quickly changed to English.

"Good morning, signora!" He cast an amazed look at the Captain, whose face drained of colour. "Yes, it's such a pleasure to hear from you again. How are you? … I see! You're in Brussels!"

"Sod this for a game of toy soldiers!" The Captain fought his way free of the blankets and got out of bed. Grabbing some clothes from the wardrobe, he fled the room, leaving Tintin to talk to the signora.

"I'm afraid you just missed him," Tintin said into the receiver, grinning at the Captain's flight. He was very manfully running away.

"Yes," she replied, her voice horribly clear through the phone line. "I've just arrived from Los Angeles. I'm here for two days – just a stop over, really. I'm planning on coming and embracing you; you and my brave Hassock. How is the dear man?"

"He's fine," Tintin lied. "I'm sure he'll be very sorry to have missed you…"

"Tomorrow then. Oh!" Against all odds, her voice actually rose with disappointment. "Tomorrow is impossible! I have a date with Endaddine."

"Endaddine?" Only half listening, Tintin had coaxed Snowy up onto the Captain's bed. Clamping the phone between his cheek and shoulder, he had covered Snowy with the blanket and was scratching at the lump, which growled happily and proceeded to dig furiously.

"Don't tell me you don't know Endaddine!" La Castafiore said shrilly. "The great, the one and only Endaddine Akass! He is a fascinating man, darling, absolutely fascinating. You simply must meet him. He's the most ma-a-arvellous mystic. He lays his hands on your head and you're magnetised for a year. In fact, I'm going to spend a few days with him, on Ischia. You absolutely have to meet him; he's inspired. But I must leave you now, I'm going window shopping. Lots of kisses to my dear Paddock! Ciao!"

Tintin put the phone down and let Snowy out. With a yawn, he padded back to his own room and got dressed. Once he was ready (and had finished messing about on Facebook – that Farmville was such a time-waster. He didn't know why anyone played. He only tended his own crops and visited his friends' farms. And sometimes did the quests. Most of the quests. And bought farm cash on his credit card. And set alarms on his phone to remind him when his shorter-lived crops were ready. But that was all. He certainly didn't PM people to ask them to send him stuff. Except for Chang. But Chang played too, so that was ok.) he headed down for breakfast.

The dining room was empty, and set for one. Nestor, the butler they had sort of… inherited when they got the manor, appeared with a fresh plate of croissants. "Where is the Captain?" Tintin asked as he helped himself to a cup of coffee. He never spoke French to Nester: the man was an old-school British butler. It had to be the Queen's own English or nothing at all.

"He went out, sir," Nester replied. "He seemed in a great hurry. He didn't even drink his tea. He said he wouldn't be back until this evening."

"Oh." Tintin shrugged. "Fine. I have the whole day to work on that stupid book…" That was becoming a pain in the backside too. He'd agreed to publish a collection of his earlier articles – some of the more exciting and sociologically-based stuff about gang culture in Paris, including drugs and prostitution – as a book, but most of the articles had been written when he was still working for The Daily Reporter, and they were getting into a snit about releasing their rights to his work without any money. They wanted something stupid, like 50% of the royalties, but he was sure another day of tedious negotiations with his agent and the editor would get them to see sense.

Although probably not.

He looked out of the window at the beautiful day, and wished he'd run off with the Captain.