Desperate Measures Read online

  ‘We’re here,’ I whispered quietly into the darkness. ‘We really are here.’

  Chapter 23

  In the morning, Jamie said to hurry and get up because we were going to see Great Auntie Irene but when I got out of my sleeping bag my legs felt all wobbly and tired. My jeans were nearly dry but I didn’t feel like hurrying anywhere, even to see Great Auntie Irene and Jip, but Vicky said I’d probably feel better in a little while and gave me a drink of water from her bottle. She checked my cuts and bruises and kept asking me if I felt dizzy.

  We followed the stream. I nearly fell in because it was slippery and Vicky and Jamie had to help me. After a while we came out of the woods and could see the lake. Jamie and I started to cheer and shout hurray until Vicky said we had to be quiet, just in case. I wanted to go down to the water but Vicky said, ‘No, look.’ She was pointing to Great Auntie Irene’s house. I felt so happy I forgot I was tired. We ran along the lake edge until we saw a path.

  ‘Come on,’ Jamie said. ‘It leads straight to the house, remember?’

  We were nearly at the bottom of Great Auntie’s garden when we saw the back door open and a lady come out. She had curly black hair and dark brown skin.

  ‘She looks like Maxine’s mum!’ I whispered to Vicky.

  ‘Must be a visitor,’ she said. ‘Or maybe it’s someone who helps out with chores or something.’

  ‘She won’t need her any more with us around,’ I said.

  A tall man with yellow hair followed her out of the house carrying a large cardboard box.

  ‘Who’s that then?’ I asked.

  ‘They’re burgling her,’ said Jamie. ‘Come on!’

  He climbed over the gate and into Great Auntie’s back garden as the lady and man walked round the side of the house. Jamie started running.

  ‘Jamie wait . . .’

  Vicky and I followed him, but by the time we got to the house the burglars had got into a red car and were driving off.

  ‘They’ve probably tied her up. We’ve got to help her,’ yelled Jamie.

  We went up to the back door. Vicky slowly pushed it open. It creaked like doors always do in scary films.

  ‘Great Auntie Irene . . .?’ she called quietly.

  There was no one in the kitchen. The house was quiet. The kitchen looked different. Great Auntie Irene used to have a big cupboard with shelves on top with lots of pretty cups and plates and a big brown teapot and two china cats with a photo of us lot between them. It had all vanished like magic. Instead of Jip’s old basket there was a big furry cushion on the floor.

  ‘Where is she Vicky?’ I said. ‘I want Great Auntie Irene.’

  The door to the hallway started to open – Great Auntie Irene had heard us at last.

  But it wasn’t her. It was a boy. A tall boy with toffee-coloured skin and jumpy brown eyes.

  ‘What have you done with Great Auntie Irene?’ said Jamie, going up close and sticking his face into the boy’s. The boy stepped backwards.

  ‘Nothing . . . Who are you?’

  ‘We’re her relatives and we’ve come to see her.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’ His voice went all shaky. ‘This is my house – you’d better get out before my parents get back or —’

  ‘But she lives here.’

  ‘No she doesn’t!’

  Then Jip came bounding through the kitchen door.

  ‘Jip!’

  Jamie knelt down and gave him a big cuddle. Jip licked him excitedly.

  ‘His name’s Max.’

  Jamie moved over to the other side of the kitchen and said ‘Jip!’ The dog ran to him.

  ‘See. His name’s Jip. He belongs to our auntie.’

  ‘Max,’ called the boy. The dog turned and bounded back. ‘I found him just after we moved in. He was hanging around outside the back door, pawing and whining to come in. He was half starved and his coat was all matted.’ He looked at Vicky. ‘Mum thinks he must have belonged to the old lady who lived here before us.’

  ‘So where is she now?’

  The boy pushed his shoulders up and down.

  ‘I think she died . . .’

  Chapter 24

  I sank down on a nearby chair.

  ‘Where’s Great Auntie Irene?’ Re asked.

  ‘She’s not here, Re. She’s dead,’ I said quietly. Rhianna started to cry.

  Jamie kicked the table and thumped it hard with his fist.

  ‘It’s not fair!’

  ‘D’you mind —’ the boy started, but Jamie swung round and glared at him fiercely from under his dark caterpillar eyebrows. Warily, the boy took another step back. He looked about my age or a bit older but Jamie was pretty scary when he was angry.

  ‘So what are we going to do now?’ Jamie asked, glaring at me.

  I sighed. I didn’t feel like stating the blooming obvious. It was all over. Finished. We’d have to go back. Re would go to the residential school and Jamie and I would be farmed out with strangers. We probably wouldn’t see each other for months.

  The boy was glancing nervously at Jamie as if he might bite him at any moment.

  ‘So . . . What’s going on?’

  I looked at the boy. Perhaps there was a way. Maybe this wasn’t the end of our adventure.

  ‘Can you keep a secret?’ I blurted out.

  The boy shrugged, puzzled. ‘Course.’

  ‘Don’t tell him anything,’ snapped Jamie.

  ‘My name’s Daniel.’

  I looked at him and suddenly the doubts rose up in me. Could I trust him? His eyes darted warily between us, as if he was expecting trouble. Then I remembered what Elizabeth had said about desperate times calling for desperate measures. I made my choice.

  ‘We’ve run away.’

  Daniel turned and stared at me. I could feel myself going bright red. His face suddenly changed, his eyes opening wide. ‘You’re those Davies kids, aren’t you? I saw your pictures on the telly last night. Everyone’s looking for you.’

  ‘We’re not going back.’

  ‘My mum and dad’ll be home any minute.’

  ‘They mustn’t see us. They mustn’t know anything about us.’

  ‘But —’

  ‘We’ve found a cave —’ started Rhianna.

  ‘That’s my cave!’

  ‘It’s ours now,’ Jamie interrupted, glaring at Daniel fiercely.

  Outside there were sounds of a car drawing up.

  ‘Will you help us?’ I begged him. ‘Please . . .’

  He looked uncomfortably from Jamie to me to Rhianna.

  The doors of a car slammed. Rhianna started to wail loudly and embarrassingly.

  ‘Not now, Re, for goodness’ sake!’

  ‘But I don’t want to go to that school. I want to stay with you and Jamie.’

  The boy pulled a face. Something had helped him make his decision.

  ‘OK . . . I’ll help. But you’ll have to be quick – and quiet.’

  Rhianna stopped her noise and he led us through the hall and into the living room. Quickly, he unlocked and opened the French windows.

  ‘Daniel?’ a woman’s voice called from the kitchen.

  ‘Coming!’ He turned to us. ‘Stay at the cave. They don’t know about it. No one does. I’ll bring you some food and stuff as soon as I can.’

  Before I could stop her, Rhianna dived forward and threw her arms round him in a big bear hug. ‘Thank you!’

  The boy grinned, and for a moment his sad eyes lit up and he looked like a different person.

  Quickly he unhooked himself from Rhianna. ‘Just don’t mess up my cave, all right?’

  As Re nodded, Daniel’s mum called him again from the hall.

  ‘Now go!’ he urged, hurrying us into the garden.

  Chapter 25

  Daniel brought us tons of food – pork pies, bananas, jaffa cakes (my favourite), cheese, bread rolls, potatoes, milk, orange juice and loads of other stuff. Yum. He even brought plates, cups and some knives and forks and sp
oons.

  We were so hungry but do you know, bossy old Vicky made us wait till we’d swept out the cave for spiders and put our sleeping bags out over the bushes to get any bugs out.

  We made the cave really cosy – Daniel and Jamie pulled the floor rug outside and we each held a corner and waved it up and down and banged it with our hands and a big cloud of dust came out of it making us sneeze and cough. When we couldn’t get any more dust out of it we took it back inside the cave and spread it out on the floor again. We put all the food and the plates and stuff up on the shelf. There was room for my little penguin, my Furby, my baldy Barbies, Baby Emma with the poked out eyes and my disco lamp too. I was glad I brought my lamp even though there wasn’t anywhere to plug it in. Vicky’s torch didn’t work any more but Jamie said I could borrow his torch and shine it behind the lamp. I picked some of the pink flowers and put them on the shelf too in a cup with some water. I put the photo of us all next to the flowers then I gave Baby Emma a bath in the stream and put her outside the cave on a bush to dry in the sunshine.

  We had pork pie and bananas for breakfast. Vicky said it wasn’t really breakfast because it must have been nearly lunch-time and when we’d finished we were still hungry so we ate all the jaffa cakes too.

  ‘Beats school dinner,’ Jamie said doing one of his mega burps. Vicky told him off for being disgusting but then Daniel did an even bigger burp. Jamie looked impressed. No one can do burps louder than him. Not even Ollie Stanmore.

  But Vicky didn’t tell Daniel off. She didn’t say anything at all.

  ‘You haven’t told Daniel off,’ I said but she wasn’t listening. She was just smiling at Daniel like I wasn’t there or something.

  ‘Vicky you haven’t told Daniel off. Tell him off too or it’s not fair on Jamie.’

  She made a face at me. Her eyes went all big and staring.

  ‘Why are you making that face?’ She still didn’t answer and she made her teeth all gritty. ‘Jamie why’s Vicky making that funny face?’

  Jamie shrugged. ‘P’raps she’s trying to do a burp and it’s got stuck halfway.’

  He started laughing. Daniel looked at Vicky. She stopped making the funny face and looked down.

  ‘In some countries it’s really rude if you don’t burp,’ he said quickly. ‘Means you think the meal was rubbish.’

  I tried to do a big burp too but it came out wrong. Everyone just laughed and Jamie said I sounded like a frog with a sore throat.

  ‘What’s your school like?’ I asked Daniel. He didn’t say anything for a bit then he just poked the ground with a stick.

  ‘I don’t go to school any more,’ he said really quietly.

  ‘Everyone goes to school,’ I said.

  ‘I don’t.’

  ‘So what makes you so different?’ asked Jamie in his watch out or I’ll whack you voice.

  ‘My mum and dad teach me at home. They’re allowed.’

  ‘I bet,’ said Jamie.

  Jip went up to Daniel and nuzzled his leg. He got up. ‘I’m taking Max down to the lake,’ he said without looking at us.

  Chapter 26

  There wasn’t anyone at the lake. That was what I’d loved when we’d stayed at Great Auntie Irene’s – we hardly ever used to see a soul, just the occasional boat pottering by or a bedraggled hiker, lost because he’d strayed off the usual walkers’ paths. Most people stuck to the other shore where the road ran all the way along the lakeside up to the town.

  It was calm and sunny today, with no wind to ripple the dark velvety water, and the island stood lush and green about thirty metres away.

  Poor Great Auntie Irene. I couldn’t believe that we would never see her again. Upside down, near the water’s edge lay her old dinghy. It was pretty ropey years ago but now it looked even more battered and forlorn than ever, with its paint flaking off like old scabs and its name – Guinevere – half rubbed away.

  ‘Vicky look!’ called Rhianna, plonking herself down on its upturned hull. ‘Mum used to sit here by this boat and watch us play, remember?’

  ‘Yeah. Mind you don’t fall off.’

  ‘I won’t. Don’t fuss.’

  I bit my lip. Fussing was easier than remembering. Jamie looked on enviously as Daniel threw Jip a stick. He bounced eagerly into the lake, creating splashes of white spray and then swimming back with the stick in his mouth, just his head visible. He laid it at Daniel’s feet, shook himself madly, drenching him in rainbow droplets, then looked meaningfully at him as if to say, ‘Well hurry up, throw it again!’

  It was scorching hot. I sat down on the upturned boat next to Re and we took off our trainers and socks. Our feet were black with dirt and grime and mine were blistered.

  Gingerly, we tiptoed over the grass and stones down to the water’s edge. I dipped a toe in and drew back with a big gasp but a little detail like ice-cold water was never going to put Re off.

  ‘Come on, Vicky, don’t be such a conkhog! It’s lovely and warm.’

  ‘It’s freezing!’ I squealed. But Rhianna didn’t care. She was already paddling merrily in.

  ‘Vicky, let’s play Monster Feet!’

  I looked over at Daniel who was watching us. I could have died with embarrassment. Monster Feet was a game we used to play in our old paddling pool when Mum was alive.

  Basically it consisted of stomping flat-footed in and out of the pool with our arms outstretched, making daft noises. It could last anything from five minutes to an hour depending on Re’s enthusiasm. I glanced at her. She was already getting into role, Sumo wrestler style, lurching and swaying from one foot to the other and growling softly.

  ‘Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhh!’

  I sighed. It looked like we were in for a long session . . .

  Suddenly Jamie rushed past us. He’d pulled off his T- shirt, socks and trainers and rolled up his jeans. With a loud whoop he crashed into the water, then turned and started splashing us. Re screamed and tried to run away from him.

  ‘Jamie, stop it! Daniel’s mum and dad might hear us,’ I snapped irritably.

  ‘They’ve gone out,’ said Daniel who called to Jip to come out of the lake.

  ‘Thought they were supposed to be teaching you,’ teased Jamie as he got ready to give us another almighty soaking.

  ‘Shut up, Jamie,’ I said, looking at Daniel who was glaring coldly at Jamie.

  ‘Shut up yourself,’ he retorted, splashing Re and me more furiously.

  I’d had enough, what with Re’s Monster Feet and now Jamie soaking me there was no longer any point worrying what Daniel thought about me.

  ‘Right, you’ve asked for it!’ I cupped my hands and threw as much water at him as I could. ‘Get him, Re!’ I yelled and war was declared.

  Five minutes later the three of us were soaked through. Rhianna and Jamie continued the fight, laughing and yelling and chasing each other round and round like a couple of puppies. I waded out of the lake and threw myself down on to the ground next to Daniel. Jip lay by his side, wet and smelly, vigorously chewing on his precious stick.

  ‘I haven’t even got a towel,’ I said with a lame laugh.

  Daniel ignored me and continued staring out at the lake.

  ‘Re’s . . .’ I wanted to explain my sister to him. I searched for the right words. ‘She’s just kind of young for her age. She doesn’t understand stuff.’

  ‘She’s OK.’

  ‘Sometimes. Sometimes not.’

  ‘You can’t choose your family – just your friends.’ He was scowling at Jamie.

  ‘Jamie doesn’t mean to be nasty, really he doesn’t.’

  ‘Could have fooled me.’

  ‘He’s just angry. That’s all. Takes things out on other people.’

  There was a brief silence. Then Daniel looked at me sheepishly. ‘Me too.’

  We exchanged a small smile. The ice was broken.

  I looked over the shimmering lake at two white swans dipping their black and orange beaks into the silky water, then turning their long graceful nec
ks to preen their feathers.

  ‘Pretty cool here, isn’t it?’ I said.

  I started telling Daniel about the park where Rosie and I would hang out sometimes after school. Rosie called it an oasis of tranquillity but that’s just her sense of humour. Some of its more attractive features included broken swings that were roped off but never mended, a rusty old pram floating on the boating lake and colourful graffiti covering the walls of the public loos. I looked out over the lake again as one of the swans stretched its wings and flapped them elegantly. No contest.

  ‘They nested on the island last year,’ said Daniel quietly. ‘And the year before.’

  ‘Guess they know a good place when they see it . . . Like your cave.’

  Daniel smiled. ‘Not as comfy as home though.’

  Now it was my turn to clam up. Daniel looked at me, his dark brown eyes becoming soft and gentle. I shuffled my feet, slightly embarrassed by his steady gaze.

  ‘We were in care,’ I said. ‘Can’t call that a proper home.’

  ‘S’pose not.’

  ‘Our mum’s dead.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘S’OK.’ I gave a little laugh to show him it didn’t matter. ‘She died ages ago.’

  I tried to conjure up her face in my mind’s eye but it was as if some invisible force was rubbing out the details as fast as I tried to remember them. Shocked, I concentrated harder but all I could see was her small shrunken form, swaddled in blankets, and eased awkwardly into a deck chair next to Guinevere where she dozed undisturbed under the pretence of watching us play.

  ‘You all right?’ Daniel asked.

  ‘Course.’ I pasted on a grin. ‘So . . . Is it fun having your parents teach you?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Not bad. Can’t get away with “The dog’s eaten my homework” excuse any more though.’

  I laughed a bit too loudly and a bit too long. Daniel looked at me. I needed to fill the gap, keep things normal.

  ‘So aren’t you s’posed to be, like, having lessons now?’

  ‘Mum and Dad are decorating so I’m actually working hard on my project.’

  ‘What sort of project?’