The Turnarounders and the Arbuckle Rescue (4 page)

‘And that’s the last we’ll say on the matter!’ she called from the darkness, before emerging with a tin of sardines, opening them and tipping them into the bowl. ‘Hungry?’

Ralf glanced at the bowl, which she was mixing ferociously. ‘I’m fine, thanks,’ he said softly, then left her to it.

On the morning of his twelfth birthday, Ralf woke with a start. Grumbling to himself, he dressed and made a quick check of his attic. All was as he’d left it – a bit tatty and lopsided, but no major damage. The roof hadn’t blown off in the night and a falling meteor had not flattened him. But, he thought gloomily, there was still plenty of time for either of these things to happen.

He stomped over to the calendar with the day’s date marked off so heavily in red and stared at it critically. What was special about today? Nothing. Twelve years old? Who cared? With his thickest, blackest pen Ralf scribbled off the previous day then shook his head. He really must get a grip. Just then, Gloria launched into her morning ‘voice exercise’ routine. Her screeching echoed through the walls. Ralf winced. Everything was normal.

He didn’t know it then, but the rest of the day would be far from normal. The ‘Something’ that he had been waiting for had, in fact, already happened.

A minute later Ralf scrambled through the trapdoor, down the ladder and on to the upstairs landing. Gloria was in the bathroom – the room had a lovely echo – and he could see her clearly through the open door. Arms outstretched and shouting, she was transfixed by her own reflection in the mirror. The fact that she sounded like a distressed cat trapped in a large saucepan did not seem to bother her.

‘Morning,’ said Ralf, half-heartedly.

‘Still here then?’ Gloria patte
d him on the arm. ‘Never mind, boy.’ Then she forgot him. ‘Me, me, me, meeee! Ai, ai, ai ai!’

He went down stairs and then out of the front door to collect the milk. A plane droned overhead. He squinted skywards and his heart bubbled in his chest as a lone Spitfire cut across the sky and sliced into a bank of clouds in the distance. He’d read about old fighter planes, of course, but had only
ever seen them in displays and flies by on the Queen’s birthday. Strange that one should be heading across London alone at this time in the morning.

In fact, it was more than strange. There were n
o aircraft cleared to fly over the Heath that day and this particular Spitfire had not been seen in British skies for over sixty years.

Ralf stooped to pick up the milk, but a flare of electricity across his neck stopped him short. At the far end of the drive, standing in the shadow of the gate was
The Hooded Man. The man he’d seen outside Pizza Piazza! A pole of some sort towered over him. Was it some kind of placard? At the top of the pole, something metal flashed in the morning sun and then the man was gone.

For a second Ralf panicked, thinking that some form of disaster was bound to follow but then his brain took over from his instincts. There was no reason to think that seeing
The Hooded Man meant something bad would happen. It might not even be the same man! And even if it was, it was certainly none of his business.

It was not until much, much later that Ralf realised how spectacularly wrong he was about that.

There was no birthday breakfast waiting but Ralf expected none. There was milk, bread and some not too rancid butter and he ate quickly. He had just started to clear away his plate and the remains of Gloria’s breakfast (some spaghetti hoops, two pickled onions and a gin sling) when the front door bell rang.

‘Ranulf A. Osborne?’ The Police Officer in the shadow of the old porch was not in uniform and his ash-grey suit looked like it had seen better days. The photograph on his ID card had either been taken a long time ago or this man was having a very bad week.

‘WHAT?’ the officer barked. ‘
What
did you say?’

Ralf winced. He’d done it again. He’d tried speaking but something other than English had popped out of his mouth. He must concentrate.

‘Ralf,’ he said finally. ‘People usually call me Ralf.’

‘Detective Inspector Burrowes. I’d like to ask you a few questions.’ The Inspector, who knew nothing of Gloria and her RULES, actually started to step into the hall.

‘I can’t have questions in here!’ Gloria swooped down the stairs and flapped at Ralf’s shoulder like a giant pterodactyl. ‘They would definitely affect The Flow!’

‘The flow -?’ Burrowes looked confused.

‘Exactly,’ Gloria confirmed, as if that explained everything.

The police officer sighed. ‘If you are unwilling to cooperate here, then I will have to ask you to accompany me to the station.’

‘Yes, yes. Off you go!’ Gloria thrust Ralf’s jacket into his arms and shoved him towards the door.

‘Will you be accompanying him, Madam?’ Burrowes asked.

‘Heavens no!’ breezed Gloria. ‘Far too busy – Affairs of State – you know how it is.’

Ralf and Burrowes were both standing on the driveway before they knew what was happening. The door closed.

A cloud covered the sun and the detective squinted at Ralf’s face. ‘Have we met?’

‘I don’t think so.’

Burrowes frowned then shook himself like an old dog. ‘Right,’ he said, wearily. ‘If you’ll come with me.’

The door twitched open again and Gloria’s face appeared in the gap.

‘What’s it about?’ she asked.

‘It’s very serious,’ said Burrowes dramatically.

‘Gosh!’ Gloria’s amber eyes twinkled. Then she winked at Ralf. ‘How exciting!’

An hour later, Ralf was sitting in a police interview room at New Scotland Yard, clutching a murky looking cup of tea and staring at the first paragraph of a dog eared paperback. Every so often he looked up from the page to stare out of the window at the River Thames below. An ornate barge, filled with people in bright Elizabethan costume, floated downstream. Towards the rear of the boat a woman sat on a fur covered throne. She wore a high winged collar and her red hair was decked with jewels. It was obvious to Ralf that this was some theatre group, touting for publicity.

He didn’t notice that no one on the riverbank stopped to stare. Passers-by did not even glance at the barge – they carried on with their business as if they couldn’t even see it. It was almost as if it wasn’t there.

Ralf watched the boat drift downriver enviously. That was how he’d like to be spending his birthday, he thought, bobbing peacefully on the waves, maybe doing a spot of fishing. He chuckled inwardly. What an odd thought! He’d never been fishing before in his life. Suddenly his smile died. His breath caught in his throat as he spotted something in the shadow of a building on the other side of the street. There he was again! It was the same hooded man who’d been standing at the end of his drive only a couple of hours ago. Ralf frowned down at him but was snapped back to more urgent matters by the door opening. D.I. Burrowes slouched into the room and dropped a heavy file on to the table.

‘Suppose you start by telling me where you were on the evening of Wednesday the twenty-sixth!’ He dragged out a chair and settled himself noisily on the other side of the table.

‘At home.’

‘Are you sure? Don’t want to think about it? It’s over a week ago now.’

Ralf couldn’t figure out where this was going at all. He put his cup down and looked Burrowes straight in the eye. ‘I was definitely at home.’

‘That’s pretty impressive.’ Burrowes stretched, leaned back on his chair and put his hands behind his head. ‘I’m trained to remember things, but even I would probably have to take a minute or two to think about where I was eleven days ago.’ He smiled at Ralf and let the silence build.

Burrowes’ shirt was gaping open at the waist to reveal a triangle of white flesh, gingery hair and belly button fluff. The cheesy butter sat uneasily in Ralf’s stomach and he quickly looked away.

‘I know I was at home because I’m always at home in the evenings.’

‘And if I was to ask your little gang out there, they’d say the same thing, would they?’

Now Ralf was really confused. ‘Gang?’

Burrowes nodded towards the window. Ralf looked out into the busy police station. Lined up against the back wall on plastic chairs were four kids.

This was the moment. This was the exact second Ralf should have understood. His eyes flickered. There was a shadow of a frown. But then it passed.

He did not remember their faces.

He did not remember his promise.

He didn’t remember anything.

‘Gang?’

He almost laughed. This was great, it really was. The police thought he was in a gang and these losers were supposed to be it. Typical.

The tallest boy in the row was shuffling a pack of cards, his face a mask of concentration as they flew through his nimble fingers. Ralf ought to have been impressed but he was too distracted by the
boy’s appearance. He had cornrow plaits and his dark skin was contrasted by the oddest assortment of clothing Ralf had ever seen – patchwork dungarees and a clashing, tie-dyed shirt. Next to him was a very small pasty-faced boy, wearing expensive trainers and baggy jeans. Despite the hot weather, he was sporting a woolly hat complete with earflaps and a fluffy pom-pom. These two must have been arrested for crimes against fashion, Ralf thought, something the other two kids in the row might also be accused of. The last boy, who Ralf took to be about his own age, was wearing a suit and tie – oh, dear. He was thin and pale, with a mop of curly brown hair, glasses and dark shadows under his eyes. The girl on the end had caramel skin and short, spiky, black hair and would have been quite nice looking except that she was wearing one of those white pyjama-type Karate suits, a pair of old trainers and a face like thunder. The face, combined with the black belt round her waist, made Ralf want to laugh.

How could Burrowes possibly think he had anything to do with these four?

‘I don’t know those people.’ He turned to face Burrowes again. ‘Look, I don’t know what you think I’ve done, but honestly, there’s been a mistake. I’ve never seen any of them before.’

‘Now, listen here!’ Burrowes growled suddenly. ‘We can do this two ways. Either you can tell me what you lot were up to last Wednesday or I can start making your life pretty miserable.’

Here we go, the Hard-Man-Harry policeman chat. Ralf had heard it before, from beat Bobbies who regularly escorted him back to school and twice from the Education Welfare Officer. It didn’t get any better.

‘It’s your choice,’ said Burrowes flatly.

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ Ralf said speaking very slowly to make Burrowes understand. ‘I was at home on that Wednesday. All night. Reading.’

‘Oh, cut the choir boy act, will you!’ Burrowes slammed the flat of his palm on the folder in front of him. ‘You’re obviously bright, but you’ve got a file here as long as my arm – we both know you’re no angel.’

‘That stuff before was a mistake. I told the other officers that.’

Burrowes seemed not to have heard. ‘Let’s take a look at this file shall we?’

Ralf walked back to the table and sat down, resigned. ‘Fine.’

‘So, then – s
chool. The Educational Welfare Officer has been round to your house four times in the past six months. You’ve missed over half of the last year. Been ill?’ he asked snidely.

Ralf didn’t want to play cat and mouse. ‘You’ve met my guardian – you’ve seen what she’s like.’

Burrowes snorted. ‘Okay, we’ll leave school for the moment. What happened at Highgate Ponds in May?’

Ralf saw there was no escape. ‘There were some kids about to go in the water. One of them couldn’t swim well enough so I stopped him.’

‘Knew him did you?’

‘No.’

‘Then how did you know he couldn’t swim?’

‘I just knew, okay?’

‘You held a seven year old on the ground with one arm behind his back for nearly twenty minutes! You’re lucky his parents didn’t press charges.’

‘They didn’t press charges because they knew he couldn’t swim!’

‘You scared him, Ralf. You must see that.’

Ralf scowled stubbornly. ‘Better scared than dead.’

Burrowes shuffled his papers then stared at Ralf quizzically.

‘What?’ Ralf snapped.

‘Are you sure we haven’t met? You seem very familiar.’

The Inspector did look familiar now he thought about it, but there was no way Ralf was going to say anything. He shook his head. He wasn’t going to complicate things further by having one of his moments.

Burrowes glared at him. ‘What’s the deal with the face?’

‘I was born with it.’

‘Very funny. Anything I should know about?’

Ralf sighed. ‘I fell down some stairs yesterday. I’m fine, though, in case you were worried.’

Burrowes ignored the sarcasm. ‘How did you fall?’

Ralf showed a flicker of a smile. ‘On my head.’

‘Don’t get smart.’

‘I slipped, all right. It wasn’t a big deal.’ Ralf didn’t say that he’d been pushed. He didn’t feel like talking about Julian Kingston-Hawke and his poisonous friends or the embarrassment of crashing down the stairs in front of the whole of Year Seven.