Fart Club

Chapter 1

I'll start at the beginning. My dad always told me that was the best
thing to do. Perhaps that's because he wasn't very good at endings. He
walked out on me, my mum and my little brother, Jack, over two years
ago without even saying good-bye. But that's not my story. The
beginning of this story is the beginning of the Fart Club.
The Fart Club, it's not a great name for a club, is it? It's not the
sort of name you would hear and think, "that's a club I want to belong
to, a place I want to go." It's not up there with the Secret Seven, the
Famous Five and I doubt Harry Potter would ever want to join. To be
honest, I don't even want to be in it myself. I'm too old for clubs.
I'm fourteen and clubs aren't cool (except Manchester United Football
Club). Clubs are what rich kids belong to. When I think club I picture
little Johnny going off to play tennis, or rugby or polo. I've never
even been to Cubs. Mum said it was a form of social conditioning. Dad
said it was because we couldn't afford the uniform.
But like it or lump it, I'm in a club and the club I'm in is called
the Fart Club. My best friends Billy and Bell and my brother Jack are
in this club too and I don't know how they feel about it either. That's
just the way it is, how the cookie crumbled.
My mum says that in this life you have to accept the cards that you
are dealt.
I always say, whoever smelt it dealt it.
It was Billy's sister who gave us the name. Let me tell you, Billy's
sister is something else. She wants to be pop star, but to be honest
she looks more like an exploding star. She's got supernova written all
over her. She's not the sort of girl you would want to meet on a dark
night. And that day we didn't want to meet her either. We weren't given
a choice. We weren't the masters of our own destiny. Get the
picture?
That day, me and Jack, and Billy and Bell were in Billy's room just
hanging out, minding nobody's business but our own, not thinking of
forming a club at all. Billy was pushing up his glasses and wiping his
top lip with his T-shirt showing us all that big belly of his and going
on and on about Star Trek Voyager like he always does when in burst
Geraldine, or Geri as she likes to be called these days. Geri, as you
might have guessed, is Billy's sister.
Geri was furious because she couldn't find her hairbrush. For Geri,
losing a hairbrush is
about a big a deal as Manchester United losing the FA cup final is to
me. It's the end of the world. And Geri was screaming at us because she
was sure that Billy was the one who took it.
Now, call me stupid, but you only had to look at the mop on Billy's
head to know that he and a hairbrush hadn't been on intimate terms for
quite some time. Probably not since Chelsea last won the league
championship. (And for those of you that don't know, that really is a
long time).
But Geri wasn't looking at Billy's head, she was stomping around the
room throwing clothes, toys, anything and her face was red.
She was particularly upset that she couldn't find her hairbrush that
day of all days because she was currently entertaining in her room four
of her pop star wannabe friends. They were planning to do each other's
hair and then take over the world's catwalks, charts, movie screens, or
something like that. It was not a minor crisis, it was a major one.
Kylie, Billy's sister's best friend, was probably on the telephone in
the hall right then trying to get through to Tony Blair, Bill Clinton,
Sporty Spice, anyone.
"It's not here," said Billy finally. Billy was getting quite upset as
he had just seen his Voyager series six videos tossed into the middle
of the floor. "It's not here."
Geri, turned on him. "It must be. My hairbrush didn't just walk away,
did it?"
She was right. I'll give her that, I couldn't fault her logic. More
than likely it was true that her hairbrush hadn't sprouted legs and
gone for a stroll.
"I haven't got it," said Billy weakly, "I haven't." He lifted up his
T-shirt and wiped his forehead. We all got a view of that big stomach
again.
Let me just tell you in case you hadn't worked it out yet, Billy is
not an action hero, he is not Bruce Willis. He is not Arnold
Swarzenegger. He is not even Stuart Little.
"You're lying," screamed Geri as Billy's Star Trek annuals fell onto
the floor. "Where is it!? Where's my hairbrush!"
Meanwhile, me and Jack and Bell were just watching, not doing
anything. We weren't scared you know, but what could we do? Older
sisters are like grandmothers' sloppy kisses. Best avoided.
By the way, for those of you who are thinking that this scene is not
very believable, a bit over the top, then I feel very happy for you.
You have obviously not grown up on a poor council estate and you have
not come across characters like Geri. In my life characters like Geri
have been two a penny, or if you happen to be reading this story in
America, a dime a dozen. (And just for those of you who may be reading
this in some foreign translation and don't know what dimes or pennies
are, what I want to say is that I have met a lot of people like Geri. A
lot.)
I don't know how long this would have gone on for, how long we would
have been witness to the tornado that was Billy's sister if at that
point Kylie's head hadn't appeared at Billy's bedroom
"Geri," she said loudly and then she said it louder because Geri
wasn't listening. "GERI!"
This time Geri stopped and turned towards the door. "Yes?"
Kylie held up a hairbrush. "Found it."
"Oh," said Geri.
Now, if you are expecting Geri to apologise, to say sorry and to
lovingly replace the Star Trek videos to their former position then you
would be wrong. Very wrong. Instead Geri turned to look at us, brushed
her long blond hair out of her face and spoke those words that were to
become so famous, so important in our lives.
"You lot," she said, "are such a bunch of farts. You should form a
club. The Fart Club." And she laughed as if she was the funniest person
in the world who had just said the funniest thing in the world. Then
she left the room.
Hooray!
And that might have been the end of it and the name the Fart Club
might never have stuck if it hadn't been for my idea. Sometimes I get
ideas. Usually it happens when I'm at school and usually it happens
during double geography on a Thursday afternoon or double maths on a
Friday morning and usually, no sorry, never does my idea have anything
to do with that particular lesson. But right then I had an idea. I had
an idea as I watched poor Billy picking up all his thrown things.
"Billy," I said, "where's your mum?"
Billy stopped and looked at me. He squinted his eyes. I could see him
thinking. Billy always wanted to answer a question literally. And
obviously he didn't know exactly to the square centimetre where his mum
was, so he was concentrating very hard in the hope that an image would
flash into his mind telling him his mother's precise location and then
he could relay it to me.
"Billy," I said, giving him another, easier question, "is your mother
in the house? In this house?"
Billy sighed and pushed up his glasses. "No, she's not. She's
out."
"Good, then I have a plan."
Billy, Jack and Bell all looked at me.
I've just had a thought. If you are starting to worry that you don't
know much about Billy, Jack or Bell and that this book is going to be
all about me, me, ME, then don't panic. DON'T PANIC, OK? I'll tell you
more about them later. But first things first. Start at the beginning
and work your way forward. That's what my dad told me and that's what
I'm going to do. I'm going to tell you about the Fart Club first.
That's the start, the beginning, the defining moment.
So while Billy and Jack and Bell were staring at me I told them my
plan.
Jack liked it the best, but then he would because he's only seven and
Bell liked it the least and I guess that's because she's a girl. (But
please don't tell her I said that because she'll hit me. And when Bell
hits you, you know it. You know it right then because of the pain and
you know it the next day because of the bruise.)
When I had finished talking and everyone understood the plan, even
Billy, we took a vote. It was unanimous and so we all trooped down to
the kitchen.
I checked the cupboards and Billy checked the fridge. We were in luck.
We found the perfect ingredients. There were four tins of baked beans,
two litre bottles of coke, one family size tub of coleslaw and half a
cauliflower. Half a cauliflower, that was the killer, believe me.
We ate the whole lot sitting at the kitchen table and then we went
upstairs to wait. We sat on Billy's bed and we waited. And waited.
Nobody talked much. We were like soldiers about to go into battle. We
were like the Manchester United players sitting in the changing room
just before their European Cup final. We were like bad pupils outside
headmasters' offices.
Get it? We waited and we were quiet.
After about half an hour I looked at Jack and I looked at Billy and I
looked at Bell and I nodded and they all nodded back.
"Ready?" I said.
"Ready," they all said, all together.
I held up my left hand and I counted down with my fingers. Three. Two.
One.
As the final finger fell we all leapt up and ran from the room.
The pop star wannabes never knew what hit them, or rather they did
know, that was the funny thing.
I was first in the room, then Billy, then Bell and finally little
Jack.
The girls were all sitting on Geri's bed and I'll never forget their
faces.
"Go for it!" I shouted.
We all turned our backs, bent our knees, pushed out our behinds. And
then we let rip.
We became exactly the kind club that Geri had told us to become.
And that is the beginning of the Fart Club and how we got our
name.
But even that, I'm sorry to say is not the beginning of this story,
not really. And if you have read this chapter and are thinking of
putting the book down because you think it's going to be all about
breaking wind then let you tell me it's not, it's about more than that.
Much more. I just wanted to start you off properly. I wanted to start
you off with a bang, a trumpet blast of noise. The real start comes
next.
As my dad always said, a story can have many beginnings, but it only
has one end.
I don't what he meant exactly, but it sounds right, doesn't it?

Chapter 2

Have you ever seen one of those movies where the characters are walking
in a line at the beginning to the backing of some pumping rock track,
where the camera zooms in on one of these characters, selects a face
and then the screen freezes and a corny voice tells you all about this
character's personality?
No? Well, anyway, OK, just bear with me.
I want you to imagine me and Jack and Billy and Bell all walking along
a pavement. We are shoulder to shoulder. Maybe we are chatting or
laughing or kicking a can, but whatever, we all seem to be fairly
relaxed. Behind us you can see a battered housing estate of run down
terraced houses. You assume that's where we live. Gradually the camera
moves in. It gets closer and closer until one person is filling the
screen and then the action stops, the image freezes.
Billy.
Billy is fat. He's not chubby, plump, round or even overweight. He's
just fat. Like some fat people Billy doesn't wear big loose clothes, he
doesn't try to hide his fatness. No. Billy squeezes himself into little
tight T-shirts, cut-off shorts. You see, while Billy maybe shy,
unconfident, hesitant, the one thing Billy doesn't care about is his
weight. Billy likes the size he is, he finds hysterical the huge folds
of his flesh and will at any point wobble bits of himself just to get a
laugh. Billy is a real mountain of a boy. What else? Oh yes, Billy is
twelve. And one more thing. Billy loves Star Trek Voyager. He eats,
breaths and sleeps Star Trek Voyager. He watches it. A lot. All the
time. Often. OK?
The camera starts moving again, a few mores steps are taken by the
group and gradually another face fills the screen. Freeze.
Bell.
Bell is a tomboy. But don't tell her I said that. In fact, never tell
Bell anything I say because Bell has a temper. But just for argument's
sake let's imagine that you did tell Bell she was a tomboy and just for
argument's sake let's pretend that Bell hasn't hit you. Then what would
Bell say?
Firstly, Bell would tell you not to label her. She would say humans
are not goods in a shop, humans are not all the same, humans do not
need labels. And then she would say that just because she hangs around
with boys, shaves her head, wears scruffy jeans, doesn't wear make up
and doesn't think Britney Spears is the best thing since sliced bread
it doesn't mean she's a tomboy. She would say that she is quite happy
being a girl. She would say that, after all, this is the twenty-first
century.
What I want to say is that Bell is a tomboy. I'm sorry, she just is.
And she's thirteen.
Ready? The camera moves again. The camera freezes again. Next.
Jack.
Jack is the youngest of the bunch. He's only seven. But Jack isn't
your typical seven year old. He's not into Pok?mon or Star Wars or
anything like that. Jack loves toy soldiers. You know, the little
moulded plastic ones about three centimetres high? He's got hundreds of
them. He keeps them under his bed in shoe boxes. He likes everything to
do with these soldiers, he likes their colours, the way you can set up
whole battles, the way they don't break when they crash against the
wall after a particularly big explosion. And when Jack's not playing
with them he's reading little black and white comic books about
soldiers, Commando etc. He's just about soldier crazy in fact. He loves
heroes. (More about that later.)
Oh yes, and Jack's my brother. Maybe I'm biased but I think he's a
good kid. And he's cute. When he gives me that smile of his I'd do
almost anything for him. I love my brother. But don't tell anyone I
said that, I've got my reputation to think of.
And now the camera moves on to the final face, the last of the
group.
Jake.
Jake, that's me. I know, my brother's Jack and I'm Jake. I'm fourteen,
which means for those of you who aren't very good at maths, that
there's seven years between us. In seven years our parents couldn't
change more than one letter in the names they thought up for their
children. Think about it, Jack, Jake. When I consider this lack of
imagination I often wonder how my mum and dad stayed together as long
as they did. I often wonder why my dad didn't leave sooner.
And what can I tell you about me? Nothing. Zippo. Zilch. Diddley
squat.
You'll have to read on. I don't want to give it all away too soon.
Where would be the fun in that?
Now that the introductions are done, the titles are over if you like,
it's time to go to the first scene. I know, it's another
beginning.
Are you sitting comfortably? Yes? Then go ahead.
It is the first day of the Summer holidays and someone is shaking me
awake. I open my eyes.
I see the ceiling, I see a poster of Manchester United, I see Jack.
Jack is wearing his Star Wars pyjamas, pyjamas he doesn't like because
he really wanted Commando ones, (but Aunty Maureen, who lives in
Swansea and works in a false leg factory, didn't know that). Jack is
shaking my shoulder and saying my name.
"Jake! Jake! Wake up. It's time for breakfast."
I groan and look at the clock by my bed. It says seven thirty. It says
early. "It's early," I say. It seems especially early because as I
said, today is the first day of the Summer holidays. Today is a day to
be sleeping until midday. At least.
"Mum's calling us. Come on. Wake up."
And then I hear it too, "Jake and Jack! Jake and Jack! Breakfast!"
It's coming from downstairs. It's my mum. My mum has a voice that can
stop buses. I know from experience. I've seen it happen.
I groan and get out of bed. I am not wearing pyjamas. I am wearing
underpants and a fake Man U T-shirt. I'm too old for pyjamas. I also
think I'm too old to be sharing a room with my seven year old brother,
love him as I do. But unless I want to go in and curl up with my mum I
don't have much choice. Our house has only two bedrooms.
"Jake and Jack!" comes the voice again.
I rub my eyes, scratch my stomach, stretch my arms in the air and then
and only then do I follow Jack down the stairs.
Mum is in the kitchen looking threatening with a large metal spoon.
She's staring at her watch and waiting to pounce on the eggs I can see
boiling in a pan.
"I called you a hundred times," she says.
"Sorry," I say, trying not to yawn.
"I'm going to be late."
"Sorry," I say again.
"And if I'm late I'll be in trouble with the boss. I can't afford to
lose this job."
I pull out a chair and sit down at the table. I put my head in my
hands. I'm still tired.
"I called you a hundred times."
"She did," says Jack and nods his head. "More than a hundred."
My mum stares at Jack, trying to work out whether he is being
sarcastic or not and then turns back to her eggs.
This is pretty standard breakfast dialogue for our house. My mum is
always saying she is saying or doing things a hundred times and she is
always saying she is going to be late. My mum has two jobs. I know she
works hard and I feel sorry for her but I just wish she wouldn't always
seem to be blaming me for it. Let me just tell you, before she tells
you herself, everything my mum does, she does for us.
"I'm doing this for you," says my mum, right on cue. "I'm cooking for
you and I'm going to work for you."
"But it's early. It's the start of the holidays. Couldn't you have let
us sleep?"
She turns on me, pointing the spoon. "You may have a holiday, but I
don't."
"Sorry," I say. My mum always knows how to make me feel guilty. And I
am always saying sorry.
"Sit down Jack."
Jack sits down and then we both watch as our mum tries to get the eggs
out of the water with the spoon. Don't ask me why she doesn't just pour
the water away like other mums do. Perhaps because that would be too
easy. Nothing in our life has ever been easy.
The first egg comes out OK and the second, but the third wobbles
precariously on the spoon and splashes back into the pan, sending
boiling water shooting up in the air.
My mother says that word. You know, the one that starts with the
letter before t and ends in the letter after s and has the short form
of hello in the middle. But at least she didn't say that other word.
The one that starts with you know what and finishes with you know what
and has those other two letters in between.
Jack giggles and puts his hand over his mouth.
My mother is going to say something else but she doesn't. Instead she
looks at her watch and sighs and then she looks at me and Jack.
"Today is the first day of the summer holidays."
"I know," I say. I nudge Jack in the side.
"I know," he says.
"I want to lay down some ground rules. I have to work and I don't need
any trouble. I don't want to have to tell you everything a hundred
times."
"OK," I say. I agree with that. I don't want to hear everything a
hundred times. I doubt I want to hear it even once.
Jack nods.
"Firstly," says my mum, "no smoking."
"We don't smoke," I say. It's true, we don't. Never.
"Well don't start. And no drinking."
"We don't drink," I say and already I'm wondering how long this list
is going to be. I'm wondering if she is going to go through every
single bad thing she can think of. I'm wondering if we will still be
here in the Christmas holidays denying any intention to assassinate
several minor world leaders.
However, I am relieved to see my mother look at her watch again and
sigh. I am not relieved, however, to see her fix me with her hardest
stare. "And none of the other."
"No way!" I say shocked. To be honest I don't really know what she
means by "the other" but by the look on my mum's face it is obviously
something pretty bad so I agree not to do it just to cut this lecture
short.
Now my mother is picking up her handbag and putting it over her
shoulder.
We are nearly free.
"And I don't want you going to Clacton and playing on those machines.
OK?"
"OK," I say.
"OK," says Jack.
Then my mother kisses us both and she heads out of the door, telling
us once more to be good boys and not to get up to any mischief. I watch
with relief as the door closes. We all love our parents, but we love
them more when we can't see them, when they are safely out of the
way.
I clap my hands and tickle Jack under the armpits. He giggles and
slides off his chair and goes to the fridge to get a chocolate
biscuit.
"So," he says, munching, "what are we going to do today?"
I put my head on one side and smile. "How about we go to Clacton and
play on the
machines?"
"Hooray!" he says. "With the Fart Club?"
"Of course."
"Hooray!"
And going to Clacton that day with the Fart Club really is the
beginning of our adventure. I promise.

Chapter 3

I just want to clarify something, set something straight in your minds.
When Jack asked me if we were going to Clacton with the Fart Club I
don't want you to think that that is how we always refer to ourselves,
that we call ourselves the Fart Club in capital letters. I don't want
you to think that we have had membership cards made up, that we have
secret passwords, secret handshakes or that we go knocking door to door
actively trying to recruit new members. We don't.
It is only Jack who calls us the Fart Club. I've thought about this a
lot and I've got a couple of ideas as to why. The first reason, I
believe, is because of his age. Fart is still a funny word, and action,
for Jack. Someone only has to break wind and Jack is in stitches,
helpless on the floor. But that, I don't think, is the main reason Jack
goes on about the Fart Club. I don't think it has anything to do with
either the sound or the bad smell. The club part of the phrase, I
believe, is more important than the fart part.
As I already told you, our dad walked out on us two years ago and our
mum is always at work. I think Jack calling us a club gives his life a
little cohesion, a little stability. He belongs to something. He is a
member of something. He is not alone.
And who am I to take that away from him?
So that morning when I say we are going to Clacton with the Fart Club
Jack is as happy as a pig in a pen, a duck in water. Or something like
that. He is running around the kitchen and he wants to go now, that
minute. But I tell him that it is only eight o'clock and too early, too
early certainly to go calling for friends. Billy is not renowned for
being an early riser. Billy is, quite frankly, lazy.
So I turn the tele on and sit Jack down in front of the Big Breakfast
and tell him I'm going to have a shower.
"OK Bro," he says.
Jack often calls me Bro. It is short for brother (of course) and while
it makes me feel like some seventeen foot black man from an American
basketball team I quite like it.
"Be good," I say and then I go upstairs and climb back into bed. I
just told you Billy's lazy. Well, that's something I have in common
with him. I have to admit, I'm lazy too. I like sleeping, I like
stretching out in a nice comfortable bed. I like it, a lot.
Later, I am woken by someone shaking me. I open my eyes and see Jack's
face.
"It's ten o'clock," he says and then repeats it in case I didn't
understand. "Ten o'clock." He doesn't look happy.
I rub my eyes, I stretch, I yawn and then I pull aside my duvet and
leap out of bed. "Get ready!" I shout at the top of my voice. "Get
ready!" And I run around and around the bedroom beating my chest. I
jump on my bed, I jump on Jack's bed. I repeat over and over, "We're
going to Clacton. We're going to Clacton!"
Jack stands in the middle of the floor and he watches me and
laughs.
Sometimes I play the fool just to make him laugh.
When I stop running and Jack stops laughing we do get ready. Jack asks
me who should go in the shower first and I shrug and say and I don't
think we need showers and Jack grins and nods and says no, he doesn't
think we do. I pull on jeans and trainers over the clothes that I slept
in and Jack pulls off his Star Wars pyjamas and pulls on the clothes he
was wearing the day before.
"We're ready," I say.
Jack looks at me. "Don't we have to brush our hair?"
"Um...." I say, "no, I don't think so." It is, after all, the Summer
holidays. More than that, it's the first day of the Summer
holidays.
Jack nods and half-grins and says, "No, I don't think so
either."
So we're ready to go. And we go.
Even though I haven't called Bell or Billy I know they'll be in. I
know they won't have gone anywhere else with anyone else. Me and Jack,
and Billy and Bell always hang around together. It's not that we stink
or that we are hideously ugly and nobody wants to be with us, it's just
that the others on this estate are all wasters. They do the things I
don't do which my mother tells me not to do. They smoke and they drink.
They probably get up to "the other" too, whatever that is. Most nights
they can be found hanging around in the bus shelter begging strangers
to go into the off licence for them, to buy them bottles of cider,
packets of fags.
"Bro?" says Jack as we are nearing Billy's house.
"Yes?"
"Do you think we'll have an adventure this Summer?" He looks up at me.
"Do you think we'll be heroes?"
"You'll always be my hero," I say and I ring the bell.
It's a corny line I know, but there's a time for corn. The time is
usually when the truth is painful. You see, I don't believe in heroes.
Heroes don't come riding over the hill, come riding into town on
powerful horses. Heroes don't save the day. They do that only in
movies. That's something I know and Jack will have to learn. I don't
want him to learn it. Not yet.
Billy answers the door. He is dressed in his usual tight T-shirt and
he is eating a doughnut.
"We're going to Clacton," says Jack.
Billy pushes up his glasses and nods and takes another bite of his
doughnut.
"Now," I say.
Billy opens his mouth to say something and I know already that he is
going to tell me that he hasn't finished his breakfast or that he's
just got to watch one episode of Star Trek Voyager so I hold up my hand
Indian greeting style. This means I want him to shut up before he even
starts.
"Now," I say.
And Billy opens his mouth again and nothing comes out and he looks
like a fish and Jack laughs.
"Ready?" I say and Billy nods and we go.
Next we collect Bell and we are off to the station, off to
Clacton.
Summer holidays here we come.

"I've got three pounds fifty," says Bell, holding out some coins on her
palm.
"And I've got five pounds," says Billy proudly. "Mum gave it to me for
lunch."
"And we've got," I say, looking at Jack and nudging him in the side,
"a lot of love to give you both. A lot of love." I raise my hand to my
lips and blow Billy and Bell a kiss.
"You two," says Bell, glaring, "are users."
"That's nice," I say.
"You're leeches, spongers, freeloaders, hangers-on." Bell stops and
takes a breath. "You're both bumsuckers."
"Charming," I say, acting offended.
"What's a bumsucker?" asks Jack.
"It's what you are," says Bell, "the pair of you."
But I know Bell doesn't mean it. Bell is the kind of person who often
says the opposite to what she means. I know she knows that if I had
money I would give it to her. It's just that, unfortunately, me and
money are like Geri Halliwell and the Spice Girls. We don't meet very
often.
"Look," says Billy, pointing excitedly, "the sea!"
He's right and we crowd over to the window to look. It is our first
glimpse of the sea that Summer and we all turn to each other and smile.
I should tell you, we are sitting on the train. I should also tell you,
none of us have tickets. I know this is bad, wrong, but hey, nobody's
perfect and I don't want you to think you're reading one of those books
about saints that they give you at school from time to time. And
besides, Clacton is only fifteen minutes away and nobody ever checks
the tickets. We'd be fools to pay. We don't want to be fools.
Pretty soon, after the sea has disappeared behind buildings and after
Jack has asked three more times what a bumsucker is and Billy, literal
minded as ever, has explained it to him in far too much detail for my
liking, we are pulling into the station. We pile off the train as soon
as the doors slide open and it doesn't take us long to come to the
conclusion that we are all hungry. We decide that what we'd most like
to do is to get a bag of chips and sit on the front and look at the
beach and at the sea. So fifteen minutes later that is exactly what we
are doing.
Buying chips and sitting next to the sea is the kind of plan I like.
It's easily accomplished and about as complicated as I want anything to
be in the holidays.
It's not a hot day, the sun isn't shining and there aren't many people
on the sand, only a few old couples who you know are probably always
there come hell or high water and have possibly been there ever since
that war they like to tell us about or maybe even since huge dinosaurs
roamed the Earth. And in the distance, past them, the sea waters are
grey and cold-looking.
But we don't care about the weather or the coldness of the sea or the
lack of people because we are happy. We are sitting in a line, me and
Jack and Billy and Bell with bags of hot chips on our laps and we are
not at school. NOT AT SCHOOL.
"So," says Bell, a chip hovering in front of her mouth, "what are we
going to do this
Summer?"
Billy opens his mouth and I think he is going to say something but he
doesn't. He just pops a chip in it. Perhaps that is his answer. Billy
is going to eat.
"Well?" says Bell, and looks at me.
I shrug. Bell is always thinking of the big picture, grand plans. I
just want to be, take life as it comes, go with the flow. At school
they are always talking about the future and it's one of mum's
favourite topics too. In my own time I want to take things in my own
time, at my own pace. So I look at Bell and I say, "I don't know.
Nothing, I guess."
"We're going to have an adventure," says Jack.
Bell glares at me and smiles at Jack. "What kind of adventure?"
"Um...." says Jack and he scratches his head, "pirates and gold and
smugglers."
"Oh," says Bell.
"And soldiers," adds Jack and makes his hand into a gun and shoots at
a swooping seagull.
"Oh," says Bell. "An adventure would be nice." And now she looks at me
and Billy. "But I think we should do something Constructive."
She says constructive like that, with a capital C. And in my mind I
groan. In my head I say bad words. Constructive things are the last
kind of things I want to be doing.
"We should do some charity work, help people who are less fortunate
than ourselves. Yes. We should help the homeless."
The homeless?
"The homeless," says Bell again and she smiles. "Yes."
And what do I say to that? How do I reply? I say nothing. At all. I
eat my last chip. I scrunch the paper up into a ball. I toss the ball
over my head. And then I leap from the wall and I am running across the
sand towards the sea. As I am running I pull off first one trainer and
then the other and then off come my jeans, my T-shirt and I am in the
water. I am hopping from foot to foot and I am waving my arms in the
air. I am singing at the top of my voice, "We're all going on a Summer
Holiday...." and so on.
On the wall I see Billy and Jack laughing and Bell with her arms
folded. Then I see Jack leap off the wall too and he is running too and
he is standing next to me in the sea, and then Billy is there as well,
wading through the water, puffing and pushing up his glasses and
finally Bell uncrosses her arms and joins us. We are all in the water
now and we are all laughing and splashing each other and we are all
shouting mad crazy things.
We are on holiday!
Later, when we have done splashing, are all splashed out, we flop down
on the beach. It's true to say, however, that we are still damp, still
more than moist. Bell was the only one who had the brains to bring a
towel and one towel between four doesn't really work, not very
well.
"I'm wet," says Jack.
I look at him and I have to agree. He is wet. Jack being considerably
shorter than the rest of us, the water we were in was much deeper for
him.
"Why don't we go for a walk?" says Bell.
"Yeah," says Jack. His eyes light up. "We can look for crabs."
Now I am no biology expert but even I know that crabs live in and
around water. Jack is already wet and I also know that however careful
he is, we are, that looking for crabs will involve getting even wetter.
This wouldn't be a bad thing in itself but I can already imagine my
mum's face if I turn up at home with my brother looking like fishboy,
like the child from Atlantis. I don't want trouble, not yet, not on the
first day of the holidays. That wouldn't be wise. It wouldn't be a
clever ploy in the game of mother son cat and mouse. But luckily I have
an idea.
"How about we go to the amusements?"
Jack claps his hands, Billy breaks into big smiles and I know I am on
to a winner.
The amusements are only a short walk away, up the beach and along the
front. We hear them before we see them. We hear kids' shouts, the
electronic wail of video machines, the dull thuck of air tennis.
I'm not actually that excited. Don't get me wrong, I like video games,
but I also know they cost money. And while I don't mind my friends
buying me the occasional bag of chips, I wouldn't want them to pay for
me to play on an arcade machine. I'm really not the bumsucker Bell said
I was. But I can see from Jack's and Billy's faces that they think they
have died and gone to heaven.
"What do you want to go on first?" says Billy.
"Um...." I say.
"I wonder if there'll be a Star Trek game."
"Why don't you boldly go and seek it out?"
"Make it so." Billy pushes up his glasses and steps up his pace. I
have never seen his fat thighs move so fast.
We arrive outside the amusements. The noise is even louder and through
the folded back glass doors I see lights flashing, crowds of kids
crowding round the colourful wooden sides of the machines.
"I might wait outside," said Bell. "I might get a Coke."
I look inside and then look at Bell.
"I might stay here," I say. "If you don't mind looking after Jack?" I
say to Billy.
Billy says he will and then Billy and Jack run inside and disappear
into the crowd. Bell and I watch them go and then we look at each other
and smile.
For those of you who are going whooo and think there is something
going on between me and Bell then please stop. There isn't. I do know
that girls exist but Bell isn't one of them. What I mean is that Bell's
my friend, my mate. That's all. There are certain things I don't let
get in the way of certain things, if you know what I mean. And besides,
I don't fancy Bell.
My mum has told me that she thinks Bell is beautiful. She talked of
bone structure and skin tone but it all just went over my head.
Sometimes when Bell is not looking I look at her and try and see what
my mum was talking about. I can't. I can see only the Bell I
know.
Bell and I buy a coke, or rather she buys me a coke and we sit on the
sea wall and we place our cans between our legs. Bell starts talking
about world peace or poverty or something and I am nodding my head,
saying yes every now and again when she pauses but I am not really
listening. I am just staring out to sea and thinking boy things. I am
thinking about football and other things. You know?
Time passes. We finish our Cokes and throw the cans into a nearby bin
and Bell is still talking, about Bosnian refugees and war crimes and
military dictators I think, and I'm thinking about things my mother
would tell me not to think about when suddenly I feel someone tugging
my T-shirt from behind.
I turn and Jack is there.
"There's a strange boy."
"Strange? What do you mean?" To Jack anyone slightly different is
strange. He thinks Tony Blair is strange and hides behind the sofa
whenever he comes on the tele.
"He's looking," says Jack.
"Oh," I say. Looking?
"And he smells." Jack pauses. "He smells like a dustbin."
"Oh," I say.
"He looks Suspicious."
Jack says suspicious the same way Bell said constructive earlier, with
a very big letter.
Part of me is just thinking that I should tell Jack to ignore this
boy, to give him a wide berth and to hold his nose (his own, not the
boy's) but another part of me, the big brother part is saying that I
should go and have a look, maybe there is something in it, maybe the
boy is Suspicious. Eventually, after quite a tussle, the big brother
part wins.
Goddammit!
Bell says she will stay on the wall and I jump down and set off after
Jack. We go across the road and into the amusement arcade. The noise is
extremely loud and there are people everywhere. We push our way deep
into the crowd, Jack in front, me behind, and then we stop.
"There," says Jack quietly and he points.
In truth, Jack didn't need to point, I just needed to follow my nose.
You see, Jack was right. The boy does smell. The smell is super strong,
super bad. If ever we had auditions for entry into the Fart Club, then
this boy would get in no problem. He would be vice-president in six
months, president within the year.
The boy is tall, skinny and beneath his dirty skin I can make out
freckles. He has short blond hair that is sticking up everywhere and he
is wearing far too many clothes. And Jack was also right about the
staring. The boy is staring. He is staring hard at a group of kids
gathered around one of the bleeping machines.
I didn't know then that this boy was Carl. I didn't know then that
this was the start of our adventure.
"Look," Jack says, "he's staring."
I am going to reply that there is no law against staring, that staring
is not a crime against Queen and country when the boy makes his
move.
As Jack and I are looking at him, the boy glances to the left and to
the right, but not behind, so he doesn't see us, and then he walks
towards the group of kids playing on the machine. He moves quickly and
in seconds he is behind them, close to them. They don't pay any
attention to him, not even to the smell. They don't wrinkle their
noses, they don't look around.
"What's he doing?" says Jack.
I shake my head. I don't know. But the boy does look suspicious, with
a capital S.
The freckled boy now checks to the left and to the right again and
then leans over as if to look at the screen to see what is going
on.
What is going on?
At this point Billy comes over and joins us. He is grinning from head
to toe and is obviously about to tell us something but I hold up for my
hand for him to be quiet. I nod my head in the direction we are looking
and Billy guesses something is going on and he stands with us and
starts watching as well.
If we hadn't been looking so carefully then we wouldn't have seen it.
We wouldn't have seen the freckled boy's hand slip to the back pocket
of one of the boys in front of him. We wouldn't have seen him carefully
lift out a wallet. We wouldn't have seen him back off and then start to
walk away.
But we did.
We see that the freckled boy is a pickpocket.
And I'm not sure what would have happened next if it hadn't been for
Jack. For when Jack sees the boy beginning to walk away he opens his
mouth and screams as loud as he can.
"Stop! Thief! Stop! Thief!"
It's like a scene from one of those old black and white movies. I half
expect, what are they called, yes, the Keystone Cops to appear tumbling
and jumping from behind a wall. They don't. But the shouts do have an
effect.
The freckled boy stops dead, looks at Jack, looks at me and then
starts to run. He legs it, pushing his way through the crowd.
"Go on!" shouts Jack and slaps me on the thigh. "After him. After
him!"
"Engage!" says Billy. "Engage!"
It seems that suddenly everyone in the amusement arcade has turned to
look at me. Little Jack is staring at me and Billy is staring at me.
It's like they all expect me to do something.
So I do it.
I run.
And now we have begun, we have begun our adventure.

Chapter 4

I don't want to give you the wrong impression and I don't want you all
to think that I'm some kind of hero because I'm not. But put yourself
in my position. You have just witnessed a crime and your little brother
is looking at you like you are one of those Greek gods, like he expects
you to do something, to save the world. You would do what I do too. You
would set off in chase too.
And anyway, I guess my instincts just take over. You know instincts,
the things that make us like animals? No. Well, go to the park and have
a look. Watch proud owners exercising their hounds, do some
investigating and you'll see that when one of dog sees another dog and
the first dog starts to run, then the second will run too.
Automatically. That's instinct.
So I run.
By this time, by the time I have placed one foot in front of the other
at speed and then again and I am running, the boy is already out the
door. He has quite a start. I push past the startled people he has left
in his wake, saying, "Sorry, sorry," as if everything is all my fault
and I tumble out into the street. I can see the boy far ahead, a pair
of whirring arms and legs. I turn and shout at Billy, telling him to
stay with Jack and I am off.
I run past Bell who is still sitting on the sandy brick of the sea
wall and she kind of looks at me like I've gone mad and I see her mouth
open and I guess she's going to ask me what I think I'm doing but I'm
already gone. She is behind me and the wind is blowing in my
hair.
The boy is in the distance. Like I said before he's tall and like all
tall people he's got long legs. Right then I'm wishing I had long legs
too. I'm wishing I had long stilt legs which could take metres long
strides and at the same time I'm asking myself what I'm doing.
"What are you doing?"
I look to my left and Bell is there running by my side, arms pumping.
It was Bell who just spoke to me. She is bouncing along quite
happily.
I open my mouth and I am going to explain, going to explain everything
that happened in the arcade, about the pickpocket boy, but my lungs are
saying, "No! No!" so instead I just blurt out, "Gotta catch him," and I
point to the distant figure.
If anything the boy is already further away and the distance seems to
be increasing with every beat of the shoe, each slap of my sole. I am
not known for my running, I am not famous for it. In school when they
pick the cross country team my name is not on the tip of the selector's
tongue, in fact, it is probably hidden under his armpit or down the
back of his trousers, somewhere not easily discovered. You see, during
games I am more likely to be found hiding in the sport's cupboard than
jogging on the playing field. And it shows. I am already puffing like
an old man.
I want to give up. I just want to stop. But Bell is at my side and I
don't want to be a quitter in front of her. She would tell Jack what a
pussy I am, what a wet fish. What a bumsucker. And I don't want that.
No sir. So I carry on.
Ahead, the boy skids to a stop and cuts down a narrow alley. I can't
see him now and I am thinking already that I have lost him, that I have
failed. I force myself to go faster, concentrate on moving my legs. I
try to block out the growing pain in my side. Bell is still there,
keeping pace, blowing hard like me.
Together we skid to a stop at the top of the alley. I am gasping for
breath and I put my hands on my knees. Bell puts her hands on her
sides. We look at each other and we smile a smile that seems to say,
"Are we too young for a cardiac arrests?" and then we look down the
alley. We see a fence, we see a couple of rusty old bikes, we see some
overflowing dustbins. We don't see any boys with freckled faces. Not
one.
"We've lost him," I gasp.
Bell breathes in and out a couple of times and then says, "Lost who?
Who were we
chasing?"
"The boy."
"I know the boy. But why? Why are we chasing him?"
I take a few more deep breaths. "Because he was running."
Bell slaps her forehead and by the look on her face I guess she is
going to chase me. "Tell me why the boy was running and why we were
chasing him or you won't be doing any walking for quite some time."
Bell isn't going to chase me, she's going to break my legs.
I don't want broken legs so I am just about to tell Bell, I am just
about to explain to her what I saw in the arcade but right at that
moment there's a crash from halfway down the alley and we hear that
word which begins with the letter before t and ends in letter after s
and the boy appears from behind a dustbin looking startled.
"It's him!" I shout at Bell and the chase is on again.
The far end of the alley gives out onto a main street and now we have
to dodge past kids with ice creams and old ladies with young dogs and
behind us I hear cries of anger. I want to shout back that I'm on
police work, that I'm fighting for justice, but I don't, I just keep
running, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other.
And the boy in front, he never looks back.
"We're heading for the sea," shouts Bell.
She's right. In the distance I don't see land, I don't see shops and
people. I see the beach, I see the sea and the horizon, the big wide
horizon. Perhaps the boy has a boat waiting. Perhaps he is going to
swim for it. Perhaps he's French.
The boy is at the sea wall now and as he puts one hand on it to launch
himself over he slips. He crashes on the top of the wall and falls onto
the beach below. I hear a scream and more bad words and I see the boy
holding his ankle, rocking backwards and forwards. Then he looks back,
sees us and leaps up and is running again.
But we are gaining.
The boy isn't going so fast. His ankle is obviously troubling him, and
his shoulders are bobbing up and down.
Bell and I are at the wall, over it. The sand is underfoot.
The boy isn't running anymore, he is hobbling.
And I'm beginning to wonder what I will do if I catch him. Maybe I'll
have to fight him. I'm not good at fighting. In fact, I've only ever
had one fight and I lost that. I discovered that when someone hits you
it hurts. It's not like it appears in the movies. And even if I win the
fight, what then? Do I carry the boy's limp body to the police station
and dump it on the reception desk? I don't think so.
Every step now I am getting nearer and at the same time each step is
getting heavier. My feet are sinking into the soft sand. I've lost
sight of Bell but I can hear her, just, behind me.
And I can smell the boy again.
He's only two steps ahead.
I remember my old games teacher telling how to tackle in rugby. "Go
for the back of the knees. Hit him there and he'll come down like a
sack of potatoes."
The back of the knees. A sack of potatoes.
I make one final effort, digging the toes of my shoes into the sand
for leverage and then I leap.
Success.
There is contact and I am falling onto the sand and the boy is falling
in front of me and I have my arms around his legs and there is that
terrible, terrible smell and then nothing.
Nothing.

I open my eyes. Jack is there and Billy and Bell are there. I am lying
on the beach. It is raining. The drizzle is cool on my face.
"What happened?"
"You passed out," says Bell.
"Passed out?" And then I feel it, feel the throbbing in my head. I put
my hand up and discover a large lump on my temple.
"He kicked you," says Bell.
"In the head," says Billy. Thank you Billy for pointing that out. Like
I couldn't have worked that out for myself.
"You got him," says Jack, looking at me admiringly.
"And he got away," says Bell, not so admiringly.
"Next time," says Jack, and he smiles at me. "You'll get him next
time."
Next time? I'm thinking there won't be a next time and I'm about to
say so in no uncertain terms when the rain that was falling lightly
just before starts to come down more heavily. In fact, it's suddenly
pouring, big drops that stain your T-shirt, drip down the back of your
neck.
I stop worrying about my head and start worrying about my little
brother and his already wet clothes.
"Come on," I say, leaping up from the sand. "Let's go."
And we are all running now, running towards the station and home,
running through the pouring rain.
On the train Billy is quiet. He is looking out of the window and
sometimes he turns to us and opens his mouth and then closes it again
until I can't stand it anymore.
"What is it?"
Billy pushes up his glasses and looks at me. "We should go to the
police."
Bell and Jack, who have been playing smacksies, on hearing the word
police, stop what they're doing and look at Billy.
"Police?"
Billy takes off his glasses and wipes them on his tight T-shirt,
showing us that famous fat belly of his. He puts the glasses back on.
"Yeah, you know, tell them what we saw."
I am going say something but Bell gets in first.
"What?" she says. "We tell them that someone we don't know stole a
wallet from someone we don't know and then braveheart here lost the
first someone on the beach. It's not a good idea."
I agree with her, except for the braveheart bit.
Billy's face goes red. He folds his arms. "It was you who said you
wanted to do something Constructive."
It is Bell's turn to open her mouth and close it.
"But Bell's right," I say, looking at Billy. "The police would laugh
at us." I shrug. "It's just a wallet. I don't want to get involved."
It's true. It's the Summer. I don't want to be involved in
anything.
Jack who hasn't said anything yet, who has been listening patiently,
now opens his mouth and speaks. "We can go back to that amusement
arcade and we can wait for the boy and then follow him. Secretly. Then
we can tell the police where he lives. It'll be an adventure." He
smiles. "A real adventure."
I suddenly wish I had a mute brother, a brother who had lost all
ability to talk. I can see where Jack's words will lead.
Bell, obviously stung by Billy's "Constructive" comment, nods her
head, and pats Jack on the head. "We could," she says. "We don't just
want to do nothing all Summer."
"No," says Billy, and nods his head too, happy to be getting support
from Bell. "Not nothing."
"We are the Fart Club," says Jack, seriously.
"Yes, we are," say Billy and Bell together.
What are they talking about? I thought I had demonstrated quite well
on the beach that I am not Bruce Willis. I am not an all action hero.
All I want to do during the Summer is hang around and do nothing.
Nothing. I don't want any problems, especially not other
people's.
I am about to say all this when we pull in at the station, the doors
of the train hiss open and the conversation ends. However, I already
have a feeling that it will not be the last I hear about the freckled
boy. I already have a feeling it will not be the last I hear about
having an adventure.

Later that night we meet at Billy's house. We watch a couple of Star
Trek Voyager videos. Billy's mum, who is as fat and round as him, pops
constantly in and out of the room with drinks of coke and plates of
biscuits. In our house we just eat biscuits out of a packet but Billy's
mum always puts them on a plate, neatly arranged. She always turns the
chocolate ones upside-down, hides them. I guess she thinks it will be a
nice surprise when you get one. Or maybe she's just loopy.
After the video, before the credits have even finished rolling, Bell
mentions that boy again. To be honest, I'd been expecting it. Bell says
why don't we do what Jack says, why don't we see if we can find the boy
and follow him. I want to say that Jack is seven years old and since
when did we start doing what a seven year old says but I don't because
I don't want to hurt Jack's feelings.
Bell says that she doesn't expect anything to come of it but it would
be kind of fun to hang around in the amusements with a purpose.
Billy nods his head and says, "purpose" three times and I want to
laugh and say that up until this point in his life Billy's only purpose
has been to eat and to get fatter and fatter. But I don't say this
either because I don't want to hurt Billy's feelings either.
Jack claps his hands and says, "We're the Fart Club," loudly and gets
a funny look from Billy's mum who has just walked into the room with
another plate of biscuits.
When she has gone I decide to make a stand, I decide to come out with
all guns blazing. "I don't want adventure." I say. "I don't want to be
running along beaches. I don't want any more kicks in the head." I say
it finally. I say it like I mean it. I do mean it. And when I say
something and mean it then it usually happens. I am the oldest. Like my
mum says, you can't argue with age or beauty. Or a madman with a
pistol, she sometimes adds.
The subject, I thank my lucky stars, is dropped. Completely. Or so I
believe.
And then, all of a sudden, it is time to go home. Jack and I say our
goodbyes, take a final biscuit and make the short journey up the road
spilling crumbs, talking rubbish. At our house I put my key in the lock
and push open the door. Jack rushes in ahead of me, as usual, and then
something strange happens, something not usual. Something
unusual.
It is something that changes everything.
I see Jack stop dead at the door of the lounge. I see his mouth drop
open, his eyes widen. He looks like he has seen a ghost, not a very
nice one. In three steps I am behind him and I stare into the lounge
too. I see what he sees too. It is not a ghost. Unfortunately.
Mum is there on the sofa and she has a man with her. A MAN. The man is
young-looking, blond-looking. He has boyfriend potential written all
over his smooth forehead, all over his cool clothes, all over his
neatly brushed hair. My mum and this man spring apart as they notice
us.
"Oh," says my mum. "You're home."
"Yes," I say, "we are."
"This is Jeremy," says my mum and she looks embarrassed. "He's a work
colleague, a
colleague from work." Then she tuts and looks at her watch. "Look at
the time. It's way past you boys' bedtime."
She doesn't have to say any more because Jack is already running up
the stairs. I look at my mum, give her one of those hard stares she is
so good at, and then I follow Jack up.
By the time I get in the bedroom Jack is lying face down on the bed. I
don't have to hear the noises to know that he's crying. Jack hates
seeing my mum with another man, a man who isn't my father, I mean. For
me, it's cool, I want her to have a life, I want her to be happy. But
me, I'm not seven. I just wish my mum would be more discreet.
I go and kneel by Jack's bed. I put an arm around his shoulder. I say
his name and then I say it again louder and he looks up. His nose is
running, and there are tears sliding down the sides of his face.
"You OK?" I say. Stupid question, I know.
Jack sniffs and wipes his nose with the back of hand. He nods. "Yes,"
he says. Stupid answer.
I have an idea, a way to cheer Jack up.
"I've been thinking about what you said on the train, about what I
said at Billy's."
Jack nods again and sniffs again.
"Maybe it would be a good idea to go back to that amusement arcade and
follow that boy."
"You think?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
No, not really, but if it makes Jack happy. "We are the Fart
Club."
"Yes," says Jack. "The Fart Club."
"We'll have an adventure."
Jack nods. "An adventure." He smiles.
He smiles. My idea worked.
"Now go to sleep. Mum's right. It is late."
"Goodnight Bro," Jack says and I pull off my clothes and get into
bed.
Before I fall asleep I wonder what I have let myself in for.

Chapter 5

I awake to the sound of gunfire, rapid and loud. I imagine war, I
imagine alien invasion, I imagine sudden death, a bullet to the heart,
a bullet through the head. I flick open my eyes and sit bolt upright in
bed. I scan the room for any attackers, any foes. I see only
Jack.
Jack is sitting in the centre of the floor and around him are spread
the battalions of his plastic soldiers. The sound of gunfire is coming
from him. As he shoots out each shot from between his lips he scatters
legions of the men with one of his little hands.
I lean back on one elbow and watch him play. He's like Mickey Mouse in
that Disney movie Fantasia, causing havoc. After a while he notices me
looking.
"Did I wake you, Bro?"
I shake my head. "No." Of course he woke me but I don't mind. Too
much. I don't mind anything too much, I am on holiday. I don't have to
go to school. I don't have to study. I look at the alarm clock by the
side of my bed and see that it is eleven o'clock. Eleven o'clock! I
have been asleep for twelve hours. Perfect.
"Mum's already gone," says Jack, "and Jeremy." And as Jack says
"Jeremy" he makes an extra loud explosion noise and sends a whole troop
of little yellow soldiers flying across the room. They crash into the
wall and land in a heap. "Jeremy slept on the sofa. Our sofa. In our
lounge. He's just gone. With our mum."
"Oh," I say.
"Mum left some money for our lunch, asked what we were doing today,
but don't worry, I didn't tell her about Clacton. I didn't tell her
about the boy."
Clacton. The boy.
I had hoped Jack would have forgotten about Clacton. I had hoped he
would have forgotten our agreement to chase pickpocketing strangers and
to save the world from the forces of evil. Obviously, he hadn't.
I am just about to open my mouth and say something clever and witty
that will distract Jack from his plans and allow me to spend the Summer
holidays doing what I do best, nothing, when there is a loud knock at
the door downstairs.
I look at Jack and Jack looks at me and then the knock comes
again.
I sigh, pull aside the duvet and go down to answer it.
Bell and Billy are standing on the step.
"There was no need to dress up for us," says Bell.
I look down at myself and see that I am wearing a pair of underpants
and the fake Man U T-shirt. What did I tell you about Bell being good
at saying the opposite to what she means?
"Aren't you going to invite us in to your beautiful home?" says Bell.
"Into your palace, your mansion?"
I don't say anything, I just give one of my smiles and stand aside and
Billy and Bell walk past. Jack appears at the top of the stairs and
grins when he sees our visitors and he shouts down a hello. Billy and
Bell shout hello back and then Bell looks at me, "Now," she says, "go
upstairs and get ready and then we'll tell you our plan."
Plan. I don't like the sound of this. First Jack with his Clacton and
now Bell with her plan. I'm hoping it is a plan to do nothing, a plan
to watch tele and eat ice cream. I'm scratching my head about to ask if
this is the case when Bell speaks again.
"GO!" she says. I go.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't usually like being told what to do. I
am not a servant. When my mum or a teacher gives me an order I don't
jump to attention, I don't click my heels and say, yes sir. But somehow
from Bell, I don't mind. So I run upstairs, throw on some jeans and
trainers, throw some jeans and trainers on Jack too and then we go down
to the lounge.
Billy and Bell are sitting on the sofa.
Billy pushes up his glasses and looks at Bell.
"Now," Bell starts, placing her hands on her knees, "you don't ask a
doctor to fly a plane, do you?"
"No," I say. "You don't." I am puzzled. I don't know where Bell is
going with this. I flop down onto the floor with my back to the
television and Jack sits next to me.
"And you don't ask a pilot to mend your television," says Bell.
I shake my head.
"And you don't," says Billy, pushing up his glasses, "ask a kangaroo
to jump a queue."
We all look at Billy and Billy looks down at his feet and then Bell
starts again. "You see," she says, "me and Billy have been thinking
about that boy."
Can't anyone forget about that boy?
Jack eyes light up. "Jake told me last night that we're going to get
him."
No, nobody can forget.
What did I tell you about me being the oldest, about the others doing
as I say? Go back and cross that line out. It seems that I was wrong,
completely wrong. It seems that everybody wants adventure, wants
excitement, wants action. It seems that my wishes count for peanuts,
chickenfeed, a fig. Nothing.
"Then we're all agreed," says Bell. "We all agree that Jack's plan is
a good one and Billy and me were thinking that if we are going to
follow this boy then we should practice."
"Practice?" I say. My dream of a day of doing nothing is bursting. To
be honest, it has
already popped.
"Yes," says Bell. "Practice. A repeated action as a means of acquiring
skill."
Ah, practice. Now I think I get it. I think I understand now what Bell
meant by doctors and planes, pilots and televisions. You can only
become a pilot by practice. You can only repair a TV with practice. She
wants us to become experts in following, in silent pursuit. She wants
us to train for it. For a long time.
"Bell and I decided," says Billy, talking quickly, "that we should go
to the town centre, you know, and one person walks and the others have
to follow without being seen, and then we do it again with another
person and then another until we're all good at it, you know,
following. What do you think?"
What do I think? I think it's a stupid idea.
"Good idea," says Jack and he claps his hands.
Billy and Bell look at him and smile and I can see that I am going to
be outvoted.
"Well?" says Bell and looks at me.
I sigh. "One condition."
"Yes?"
"After we have found out where this boy lives and told the
police."
"Yes?"
"After that, we will spend the rest of the Summer doing nothing. We
will go to the beach, we will watch tele, we will be lazy."
"Agreed," says Bell.
"Agreed," says Billy.
"Hooray," says Jack and he starts running around the room.

Billy and Bell and Jack and I are in the town centre. We are standing
by the fountain.
"You first," says Bell to me. "You know what to do?"
I nod my head. "I walk around for fifteen minutes and then come back
here. Easy."
"And you know what to do?" says Bell looking at Billy and Jack.
Billy and Jack nod their heads and Billy says, "We follow Jake. We try
not to let him see us. We come back here and tell you exactly where he
went."
"Good," says Bell. "Now, go."
Billy and Jack and I all look at each other and I don't know about
them but certainly I feel a little foolish.
"Go!" says Bell and claps her hands. "Go!"
So I go. I turn and I amble towards the CD store. I try not to think
that someone is following me. I try to tell myself that I am just out
shopping. If I tell myself this then I might not feel so stupid.
I enter the Our Price, wander to the far wall and look at the
Playstation games. After a couple of minutes this gets boring because I
haven't got a Playstation.
I go back out of the shop, turn right and walk along Eld Lane. There
are lots of arts and craft shops here that don't interest me. They
contain things that your posh aunty would like and would display
proudly on her window-ledge. I stop briefly and look in the window of
the joke shop. They have the usual stuff, masks, fake blood, fake
fingers in a box. Things that would give your posh aunty a heart
attack. Then I am at the end of Eld Lane and on a main road. There is a
sports shop here and I pop in and have a look at the new Manchester
United kit. I look at the price and I nearly have a heart attack and
then I work my way back in a circle to the fountain in the precinct
where Bell is waiting for me.
"Well done," she says and pats me on the back.
I smile to myself. Well done. All I did was wander around the shops.
What would Bell do if I performed a cartwheel, swallowed a sword, rode
a unicycle, had kittens?
I am stopped in my thoughts by Billy and Jack turning up.
"So?" says Bell and she looks at them.
Billy and Jack are looking sheepish.
"Yes?" says Bell.
"He went to the CD shop," says Billy eagerly. "To Our Price."
"I know," snaps Bell. She sounds annoyed. "I can see that from here. I
can see the CD shop from here. And then? Where did he go?"
Billy is examining the cracks in the pavement. "Um..."
"Yes?" says Bell.
"Um...." says Billy. His face is going red. "You see, I was hungry and
I thought I would just buy a doughnut and I did and there was a queue
and..."
"You lost him?" says Bell.
"Yes," says Billy and he looks at the floor again.
"And you Jack?" says Bell, turning to my younger brother.
"Well," says Jack and he puts his hands on his hips and looks serious,
"he went to the CD shop and then he went somewhere else and then he
went somewhere else and then he walked a bit and then he came back here
and there he is." He points at me. "We got him." He smiles.
I smile.
"So you lost him too?" says Bell.
"Yes," says Jack.
"Hopeless," says Bell. "We try again. This time I walk and Jake you
follow me. We're doing this until we get it right."
Two hours later I am looking at the little dial on my watch that tells
me what the date is. I am wondering how many days it is before we have
to go back to school. I can't work it out exactly but it's a lot.
Four hours later I am thinking that my feet hurt and that I am hungry.
But I am also thinking that I am getting quite good at this following
lark and I am thinking maybe that Bell isn't as dumb as she looks.
Actually Bell doesn't look that dumb. So I am thinking that maybe Bell
is not as dumb as Billy looks.
Six hours later when I really have had enough and I feel like I could
follow a shadow on a dark night to the ends of the Earth and back, Bell
claps her hands and says that that is enough. She says we are
ready.
I want to cry with happiness. I want to get down on my knees and kiss
the floor. I want to dance a jig. I don't. I'm a boy, we don't do
things like that.

That night, after another evening of turned-over chocolate biscuits and
a couple of adventures of the Star Trek Voyager in which vicious aliens
are beaten by intrepid space rangers Jack and I head home.
Jack goes quiet when we near the house and I know he is wondering if
Jeremy will be there again. I cross my fingers and look up at a star
and make a wish. I put my key in the door and push it open.
From the lounge we hear the sound of laughter, a woman's and a
man's.
Jeremy.
So much for crossing your fingers. So much for wishing upon a
star.
Jack runs upstairs and I look after him and then go into the lounge.
Mum and Jeremy are sitting on the sofa. They are drinking wine (from
wine glasses I haven't seen since the death of Grandpa Joe four years
earlier), they are deep in conversation and, wait for this, they are
holding hands. HOLDING HANDS. Who is the teenager in this house after
all?
I cough and mum looks up.
"You're home," she says.
"Yes," I say. "I am." I feel we've been here before.
"This is Jeremy," she says. Yes, we've definitely been here
before.
"He's a colleague from work," I say, "a work colleague."
"Yes," my mum says and she looks embarrassed.
Jeremy smiles at me and I nod my head towards him and then I look back
at my mum. "I'm going to bed. I'm tired." It's true, I am tired. All
that following has nearly killed me. "Night mum."
"Night Jake," she says, "Jack alright?"
"Yeah," I say. "He's fine."
I don't say that Jack is probably, as we speak, crying his eyes out on
the bed. I don't say it because I love my mum and I don't want her to
feel guilty. I'm not so selfish as to think she doesn't need someone in
her life, doesn't need a man, a boyfriend, a partner, someone who is
not either of her two sons. But there's also another reason why I don't
say it, a deeper reason. I don't say it because, as far as Jack is
concerned, I always think I can handle everything. I think that I can
take care of him.
But don't tell anyone, OK, they'll think I'm soft, they'll think I'm a
right rank sucker.
"Well, see you in the morning," my mum says and I say, "see you in the
morning" back and then I head upstairs.
As I expected Jack is lying on his bed, but this time he's not crying.
He's not crying, but he has got his head buried in his pillow. I go
over to him and once again I put my arm around his shoulders.
"I'm OK," he says, his voice muffled.
"I know you're OK, I just wanted to tell you that we'll be relying on
you tomorrow."
Jack doesn't say anything.
"We can't do it without you."
No answer.
"In fact, we couldn't possible do it without you. Not at all."
And now Jack does look up and look at me. "Do what without me?"
"Catch that boy. We can't do it without you."
"No," Jack says and nods, "that's right, you can't do it without me.
We're ?
gunna catch that boy." He smiles.
What did I tell you? I know how to take care of my brother, I know how
to make him happy.
"Goodnight," I say.
"Goodnight," says Jack back.
I turn out the light and I fall asleep thinking of freckled boys and
silent shadowing, mums on sofas and boyfriends wearing wine
glasses.

Chapter 6

It can be funny sometimes to look back and see how something started,
how something began. Often you find that events don't start with a big
thing, a big bang, a trumpet fanfare or a sixty-one gun salute like you
expected. Instead you usually find they began with something quite
insignificant, something small, something silly. Understand? No. Don't
worry, I'll explain.
I'LL EXPLAIN.
For example, take this whole Fart Club phenomenon. It didn't start
because me and Jack and Billy and Bill all sat down one day and decided
we wanted to form a gang, wanted to be important and do important
things. It started because Billy's sister, Geri, lost her
hairbrush.
And that Summer, the reason I agreed to go to Clacton that day to try
to catch the freckled boy was because of Jeremy. If it hadn't been for
Jeremy I wouldn't have had to make Jack feel like he belonged to
something, I wouldn't have had to go along with that crazy plan. I
would have put my foot down harder and said, no, not me. I would have
spent the whole of the Summer in bed. I would have spent the whole of
the Summer being lazy. Definitely.
This is what I'm thinking on the third day of my Summer holidays as I
find myself leaning once more on the sea wall opposite the amusement
arcade. I'm also thinking something else.
"I feel stupid," I say. That's what I'm also thinking.
"You look fine," says Bell.
"Yes," says Billy and he nods his head and then he has to push up his
glasses as they slip down his nose. "Fine."
I don't feel fine, I don't feel fine at all. I am wearing a baseball
cap and dark glasses. I am in disguise. The disguise is Bell's idea.
When she turned up at my house that morning she said she had had an
idea. She said that as the freckled boy had seen me before, right up
close, there was a chance that he would recognise me and that if he saw
me he would run away. She said I needed a disguise. My heart was
sinking even before she pulled the baseball hat and glasses out of her
bag. She was very proud of herself.
The hat wouldn't have been so bad if it didn't have one of those big
foam hammers sticking out of it. You know the ones I mean. They're
supposed to be funny because it's supposed to look as if the head of
the hammer is hitting you on the head. Ha ha. And the glasses wouldn't
have been so bad if they weren't quite so huge, quite so round and if
the sun was shining just a little. It wasn't.
So all in all I feel stupid. Very stupid.
"You look OK," says Bell. "Stop worrying."
And just as she says this a girl from a gang of girls walking past on
the other side of the street notices me. She says something to her
friends and then they all turn, all look at me and they all
giggle.
"You've ruined my street-cred," I say.
"Jake," says Bell, her face straight, "you don't have any street-cred.
You never brush your hair, you wear the same football shirt every day.
I saw a programme about kids living on a rubbish dump in the
Philippines. They have more street-cred than you. Much more."
Billy and Jake turn their backs. I can't see their faces but I know
from the noise they're making that they are laughing. I pull myself up
on the wall and fold my arms. If Bell could see my eyes she would know
that I am giving her a look that can kill.
"Anyway," says Bell, "it doesn't matter what you look like as long as
the freckled boy doesn't recognise you."
Right then I don't care about the freckled boy at all. The freckled
boy could be emptying the vaults of the Bank of England and I wouldn't
bat an eyelid, lift a finger, raise an eyebrow. You see, I am bored and
I am tired. I'll fill you in on the complete picture.
It is ten o'clock in the morning and we have already been waiting here
for one hour. For those of you who are not good at maths and for those
who don't have an intimate knowledge of train times and know the
distance between my house and the station let me just tell you that the
combination of all these factors meant that I had to get up early.
EARLY. And let me just remind you in case it has slipped your mind, I
am on holiday. HOLIDAY. Is that clear?
So, all in all, I am not happy.
I stretch my arms up in the air and I yawn loudly. Across the street I
have a clear view of the amusement arcade. It is almost empty. I wonder
how long we will have to wait.
"I wonder how long we will have to wait," says Billy, seeming to read
my thoughts. He takes off his glasses and wipes them on his T-shirt.
"You see," he says, "um..."
"Yes?" says Bell.
"Yes?" says Jack.
"Um...." says Billy and then stops, his mouth open.
"You're hungry," I say. It's not a good guess. It's what Billy always
says.
Billy goes red. "Well just a little. Just a little bit. I wouldn't
mind something." And he cleans his glasses again.
Bell sighs.
Jack tugs my arm and I look down at him and he says that he is hungry
too. Quite.
Bell looks out to sea and then she turns back to us and says why don't
Jack and Billy go and get us some breakfast. We all agree it's a good
plan and then they go.
Once they've gone Bell pulls herself up onto the wall. She looks at
me. Hard. I know she is going to ask me a question. A difficult
one.
"You're not keen on this idea, are you?"
"Um...."
"You're not happy to be sitting on this wall, watching?"
"Well I...." I don't know what to say.
"It's OK." Bell rubs a hand over her head and now I know she is going
to say something serious. She always rubs a hand on her head when she
has something serious to say. "I understand what you feel," she says,
"but please try and understand what I feel too. I want to do something
this Summer. Something useful." Bell pauses and looks out at the sea
again. "I want to achieve something. Ever since dad left, I feel like
such a...., such a....failure."
"Oh," I say. Bell's dad left her mum about the same time that my dad
left my mum. That's one of the reasons why we became such good friends.
But I didn't know that she felt a failure. I didn't know that she felt
like Jack. Now I did know I understood. I understood why she wanted to
catch this boy. I understood why it was important to her because I
understood why it was important to Jack.
They both wanted to feel a part of something.
"We'll find out where he lives," I say, "and we'll tell the police.
We'll get a reward."
"Do you think so?"
"Yes," I say. "I do." I smile and Bell smiles back, a big beaming
smile.
I did it again. I made someone smile. I am a hero. I am just about to
tell Bell a joke about an Englishman, an Irishman, and a Scotsman to
change that smile into a laugh when Billy and Jack come back holding
paper bags of sandwiches and cans of coke. I don't tell my joke. Now I
only want to eat. Maybe I'm not a hero after all.
We eat sitting on the wall, keeping one eye on the amusement arcade
for our freckled friend. There are more people across the road now and
little crowds are starting to form around the machines. Above us, the
sun is trying to break through the clouds and on the beach behind us a
few old couples have appeared. They are sitting on ?
deckchairs. Further away is the sea. It looks appealing, more appealing
than this wall.
After we have finished eating I have an idea. A good idea.
I say that we look suspicious gathered here like this in a group. I
say that we should wait in twos, that two people would be less
noticeable than four and that the two who aren't waiting could go off
and do something else (ie they could have some fun). I'm careful to
play down the fun side of the idea and play up the suspicious side. I
take a vote.
Jack puts up his hand straight away. Well done little brother.
Billy looks at Bell and then at me and then he pushes up his glasses.
He puts up his hand.
Bell looks at the two raised hands. She rubs her head. She puts up her
hand too.
They agree. Hooray! The day might not be wasted after all.
It is decided that Jack and I will go off first and that we will come
back in one hour. I resist the temptation to say that we should
synchronise our watches. I doubt Bell would find it funny.
I ask Jack what he wants to do and he says he would like to go on the
beach and look for crabs and I say OK. We say goodbye to Billy and Bell
and off we go. On the sand Jack takes off his shoes and hands them to
me and then goes running towards the water. I watch for a second and
then run after him.
At the water's edge I pull off my shoes too and I stuff my socks
inside them. I scream at the cold ocean and hop from foot to foot and
then Jack says he will race me to the rocks. We charge through the
waves, making our own waves. Jack wins. (I let him.)
There are many shiny pools here and the rocks are green and slippery.
We dip our hands in the water that is not as cold as the sea water and
we turn over stones. We pull off limpets and throw them at each other.
We laugh. We are having a good time.
I find a starfish and Jack tells me not to touch it, it might sting me
and I touch it and he screams and then I tell him that starfish don't
sting and he nods his head and says that he thought that they didn't
but he wasn't sure.
For the first time I feel that I really am on holiday, that I am
really free and then all of a sudden it is time to go back. I happen to
glance at my watch and I see that we only have five minutes before our
shift starts. So we put on our shoes and we run back up the beach. We
arrive breathless at the wall opposite the amusements and rest our
hands on our knees.
"We didn't see him," says Bell.
"He didn't come," says Billy. "Not at all. Not yet."
"OK," I say and I nod my head and then Bell and Billy say goodbye and
they go.
The arcade is really busy now and the air is filled with the sounds of
shouting and the wail of the machines. The sun is out and it's quite
hot. I am pleased because at least my sunglasses don't look so stupid.
The hat, of course, that still looks stupid. It will always look
stupid. The only time it wouldn't look stupid would be if I were to go
to a convention for hammer hats and I were surrounded by hundreds of
hats just like mine. And perhaps, maybe even then, it would still look
stupid.
After five minutes of waiting, just standing there doing nothing, Jack
looks at me and says that he's bored. Tell me something new. I'm bored
too.
"But we're having an adventure," I say.
Jack puts his head on one side and then the other. "I like the
adventure part. But I don't like this part. This part is boring."
What can I say? He's right. I suggest we play a game of I-spy.
I go first. It is something beginning with H. Jack doesn't get it. It
is the hammer on the hat on my head.
Then it is Jack's turn. His word begins with S. I know it's the sea
but I pretend that I haven't a clue. I say "sand", "seagull",
"swimming", "sarsaparilla", and I give up. "It's the sea, silly," says
Jack and he slaps his forehead.
Then it's my turn again, then Jack's, then mine. On and on. On and
on.
When Billy and Bell come back I am so happy. If I had to play I-spy
anymore I would poke my eyes out with a compass just so I couldn't play
anymore. The only thing I haven't spied in the last hour is a freckled
boy who smells.
Now Billy and Bell are back Jack and I can go off for our hour of fun.
We decide to go to the beach again. We make a sandcastle (Jack's idea)
and we try to bounce stones on the water (my idea) and then we have to
go back. The time is up.
This time Jack and I play paper, scissors, stone, and any other games
I can think of. We don't see any freckled boys. Not one.
By two o'clock I am so bored.
By three o'clock I am looking at that date dial on my watch once more
and I am trying to work out how many days it is before I have to go
back to school once more.
At four o'clock just as it is coming to the end of my and Jack's turn
outside the amusements and just as I am thinking that I am going to go
insane with boredom and that I will have to spend the rest of my life
locked up in a lunatic asylum four things happen all at once.
Yes. Four.
Really. FOUR. Count them.
Number one. Jack says that he suddenly needs to go to the toilet.
Desperately.
Number two. Billy and Bell return.
Number three. Walking down the street as happy as can be and hand in
hand I see my mum and Jeremy.
Number four. Just behind my mother and Jeremy and heading directly for
the amusement arcade I see what I have been waiting for all day. I see
the tall freckled boy with the blond hair.
Believe me now? One. Two. Three. Four.

Chapter 7

I am like a juggler. I have to keep all my balls in the air. If I drop
one then the trick is over, the illusion is shattered.
Let me explain.
I have to arrange for Jack to go to the toilet. One ball.
I have to make sure my mum doesn't see me and Jack. We have been told
not to come to Clacton. Two balls.
I have to make sure Jack doesn't see mum and Jeremy. I know he will be
upset. Three balls.
I have to keep my eye on the freckled boy. Four balls.
I have to do all these things at the same time with nobody noticing.
Five balls.
Anybody who has ever juggled with five balls will tell you that it is
not easy, not easy at all.
Luckily, I am a genius. Luckily, I am an expert juggler.
I tell Jack to wee against the sea wall and before he has a chance to
tell me that he doesn't want to do it in public, that he can't, I tell
Billy and Bell to link arms and make a circle around him. I reassure
Jack that no one will see him. Jack smiles, nods and pulls down his
zip.
With this simple action I achieve all my goals. I keep all my balls in
the air.
No. One. Jack no longer needs to go to the toilet.
No. Two. Because Billy and Bell are standing between Jack and the
opposite pavement my mother can't see Jack.
No. Three. For the same reason as above Jack can't see my mother and
Jeremy.
No. Four. I can keep my eye on the freckled boy. I am in disguise. He
won't recognise me.
No. Five. I can keep my eye on my mum. I am in disguise. She won't
recognise me.
Brilliant, don't you think?
And it works.
By the time Jack has done up his zip and Billy and Bell have moved
away from him, my mother and Jeremy have gone safely past and the boy
has disappeared into the amusement arcade. Jack hasn't seen my mother
and Jeremy and they haven't seen us. Success. Mission impossible.
Mission accomplished.
Now it's time to put our plan into action. It's time to put some
action into our plan. I no longer feel bored. Blood is pumping through
my body, about to burst out of my eyes, out of my ears. I spin round to
look at the others. They are leaning against the sea wall, chatting,
avoiding the puddle Jack has made. They still don't know I have seen
the boy. They are as ignorant as cats in bags.
"I saw him," I whisper through clenched teeth. I don't know why I
whisper. But I do.
"Saw who?" says Billy and scratches his stomach.
"Gary Lineker," I want to say. "The American President," I feel like
saying. I don't. "The boy. The freckled boy. I saw the freckled boy. He
went into the arcade."
The faces of the others transform. Now they look like cats let out of
bags. They look like cats who have been let out of bags and then have
found a big pile of food and a warm fire to curl up in front of. They
look happy.
"Hooray!" says Jack (quietly).
"Bingo!" says Billy (quietly too).
"We've got him," says Bell. She rubs her hand over her head. "We've
got him."
It's not true, we haven't got him yet but I know what Bell means. It's
just a matter of time before freckles comes out of the arcade. It is
not a game anymore, it is not a fantasy. It is really happening. Don't
tell anyone, not a soul, but I have to admit that this is better than
doing the nothing I wanted to do. This is better than lying in bed,
lazing on the beach. This beats that kind of nothing hands down. This
beats that nothing into a cocked hat. With bells on.
There are no more games of I-spy, no more competitions of paper,
scissors, stone. And I no longer have any wish or desire to look for
crabs, bounce round pebbles off the top of the sea. Me and Jack and
Billy and Bell are only staring at the entrance of the arcade across
the road waiting for the boy to appear. We hear the constant bleeping
of the games machines, we hear the shouts of excited children, we hear
the gentle sound of the sea. But between us there is silence, total
silence.
Ten minutes go by. And another ten. And then another ten. Each minute
seems to pass more slowly than the last, each second seems longer than
the previous one.
My eyes start to hurt from all the staring and I keep thinking I see
the boy. But I don't. It always turns out to be someone else. Another
boy. Another freckle. Another smell.
And then finally, just when I think I can't stand the tension anymore,
when I think my eyes are going to pop out and hang down my cheeks, he
appears. Just like that. He appears.
"It's him," says Billy quietly. Yes, thank you Billy. We did
know.
The boy looks to the left, to the right, puts his head down and walks
up the street, away from
"He's getting away," says Jack.
"There he goes," says Billy and he points. "There she blows."
"Right," says Bell, taking charge, "you know what to do. You know the
plan."
She's right, we do know the plan, we'd practised it enough times. But
just let me explain it to you, I wouldn't want you to be confused.
Ready? OK. Here goes.
The plan is simple and is based on the mechanics of a relay team. One
person will be close behind the boy and the rest of us will be spread
out in a line at five metre intervals along the street. Every couple of
minutes, the person at the head of our line stops and goes to the back.
The person who was then second moves up and becomes the closest
follower of the boy. Simple.
If at any point the boy happens to look around then he won't see all
four members of the Fart Club hot on his heels. He will only see one
person and that person will be continually changing.
I am the one who is to be the closest pursuer first. Billy and Bell
and Jack slap me on the back and wish me good luck and I say thank you
and I say power to the Fart Club or
something corny like that and I am off.
I hurry up the street, dodging pedestrians and within moments I am
behind the boy. If I want I could reach out and touch him. I don't
want. I see once again that he is not clean. In fact, he is super
filthy and the smell is as I remember it. Disgusting. He couldn't have
had a bath for weeks. I doubt he could pick out a bar of soap from a
line up of household products. I am tempted to move back, away from the
smell, but I don't. I just concentrate on the following, on not losing
sight of him.
We are walking along the main street that runs parallel to the beach.
There are many people and it is easy to blend in, to be one of the
crowd. The boy is walking quickly, weaving in and out of the other
pedestrians. It's like he has an appointment and is hurrying to it. Or
like he is training for one of those Olympic walks. Whatever, I have
trouble keeping up.
Then suddenly the boy, or freckles as I decide I will call him, stops.
I am so close I almost crash into his back. The hammer on the hat on my
head nearly hits him on the head. Luckily, I just manage to pull up in
time. Freckles spins on his heel and ducks into the large souvenir shop
here.
I look behind me, signal for Billy (who is the closest behind me) to
stop and I enter the shop
I immediately spy freckles at the far wall, hovering by the sweet
counter. I move closer, squeezing past a group of girls who are
giggling either at the saucy postcards in front of them or the large
hammer hat on my head. I hope it's the former. I pray. I pretend I am
looking at sticks of rock, plastic windmills on long sticks but really
I am watching the boy. I am not surprised by what I see. Not
really.
As the shopkeeper, an old woman with bottle-bottom thick glasses, goes
to serve a mother with two identical screaming babies in a double
pushchair I see the boy look carefully around him. I see him reach out
with that famous hand of his. I see him slip first one, then another,
then another Mars Bar into the pocket of his jacket.
Then he is out of the shop like a flash and I am in pursuit again. The
chase is back on.
Fifty metres further down the street I feel a tap on my shoulder. It
is Billy and it is my turn to go to the back. I stop and smile as first
Bell and then Jack go past. I don't say anything but in my head I wish
them luck.
When Jack is a good distance ahead, I start walking again. I can no
longer see the boy but I know he is up there somewhere. This thought
keeps the excitement pumping through my body. I don't want this feeling
to end.
I keep walking and I keep my eyes on Jack. The feeling doesn't
end.
Then Billy is behind me, then Bell. I am moving up the line, they are
moving down. Jack is just ahead of me. He is the closest to the boy
now, the one currently directly behind him. This means it is my turn
again next.
We have left the shops behind now and we are walking through a housing
estate. There are no more shoppers, only the occasional group of kids
kicking a ball against a wall or a lone child on a bicycle. If anything
freckles is walking even more quickly and Jack with his short legs is
almost having to jog to keep up, almost having to run. And then all of
a sudden, again, the boy stops.
In the middle of nowhere, he stops. Dead.
Jack stops. I stop. I know that behind me Billy and Bell will have
stopped too. I also know that if the boy turns around he will surely
see us all spread out in a line down the street. We will be spotted,
rumbled. Freckles will get wise to us, see the light, twig.
I need to act quickly. I need to use my circus skills again. This
time, however, I don't need to be a juggler, I need to be a magician. I
need to make us disappear.
"Abracadabra," I mutter under my breath. "A la khazam."
And as if by magic, I have a plan.
As long as the boy doesn't turn around we should be OK. We should be
all right.
I take ten swift paces and I am behind Jack. I crouch down, whisper
something in his ear and nod to my left. Jack nods back. Ahead, I see
the boy shift slightly. I freeze and stop breathing. The boy stops
shifting. He doesn't turn, he doesn't look back. I unfreeze and start
breathing. I raise my left hand. Slowly. I count down three with my
fingers and as the last finger falls Jack and I start walking
backwards. Slowly. We keep our eyes on the boy. We try to be as silent
as possible.
We take one step. Another. We are nearing our goal.
Freckles scratches his head. He scratches under his arm. I wonder if
he has fleas. I hope he doesn't have a flea on his back. I hope he
doesn't twist around.
He doesn't.
Jack and I get closer and closer. Until it's time.....
"Now," I whisper to Jack. "Now."
In a single moment and in perfect synchronisation Jack and I both dive
to our left. We fly through the air in a beautiful arc, more
spectacular, I'm sure, than any European goalkeeper. And after what
seems like hours, months, years, we stop flying and we land in a tangle
of limbs on soft grass. We are not hurt, we are not injured. But more
importantly, we are hidden behind a high wall. The boy can't see us.
The boy hasn't seen us.
Now do you believe in magic? Now do you believe in witchcraft?
Moments later, and much less spectacularly, Jack and I are joined by
Billy and Bell.
"Well done," says Billy.
"What's going on?" whispers Bell. Good question. "What's he doing?"
Another good question.
I stand up. I brush grass off my jeans. "I'm not sure. Maybe he's
waiting for someone."
Billy nods his head. "I think he's waiting for someone." He pushes up
his glasses. "Maybe that's why he's waiting. For someone." Thank you
Billy.
I whisper for the others to be quiet, very quiet, and then I peer
around the wall. I see the street, I see some parked cars, I see the
boy. He is leaning against a lamppost now and by the movement of his
lips I guess that he is whistling. We are about twenty metres away and
we don't hear anything. If he is good at whistling then this is a pity.
I like a good tune. If he is bad at whistling then I thank God. There
is nothing worse than a bad whistler.
I turn back to the others and tell them what is happening, nothing,
and then I settle down to wait. Again. I have never done so much
waiting in my life, except maybe when I was waiting for my dad to come
back and that doesn't count. That wasn't waiting, that was false
hope.
I stand looking around the edge of the wall, watching the boy. I
glance continually at my watch. Each time I am surprised to see that
only a few seconds have passed, only one or two. But because I am
looking so often at my watch I know it is exactly seven minutes before
it happens.
It.
Suddenly from a side street appears another boy. He is scruffy like
our freckled friend and I guess about the same age. I don't need to
sniff him to know that he smells too. Even from here I can see the
dirt.
I nudge Jack and Jack nudges Billy and Billy nudges Bell and then we
are all squinting around the side of the wall trying to see what's
happening. We are all quiet, dead quiet. We all witness the following.
Blow by blow.
As new boy walks up to freckles, freckles pushes himself away from the
lamppost and puts his hands in his pockets. The two boys exchange
words. There are no smiles or handshakes, no friendly greetings. They
don't look like friends. New boy speaks and freckles shakes his head
and then new boy says something louder. We can almost hear the words.
Almost. But not quite. New boy raises his fist and pulls it back behind
his shoulder. The meaning is clear, he is ready to punch.
Freckles whips his hands out of his pockets and holds them palms up to
the boy. He then reaches quickly back into the side pocket of his coat
and takes something out. He passes it to new boy and new boy looks at
it. New boy says something else and now, suddenly, he does hit
freckles. There is a loud crack and a cry. Freckles falls to the floor
and new boy is off back down the side street where he appeared
from.
I turn and look at Jack and Billy and Bell. "What's going on?"
Billy opens his mouth and is going to say something, but Bell gets in
first.
"Look," she whispers and points.
I turn back and see that freckles is getting off his feet. He starts
walking again. Quickly.
"Follow him," says Bell.
We don't need any encouragement. We follow.
Five minutes later we are out of the housing estate and climbing a
steep hill. The road is narrow with tall hedges on either side and the
four of us are more spread out, the distance between each of us
greater. I indicate for the others to keep as close to the hedge as
possible, but still, all freckles has to do is turn round. It wouldn't
take a genius to work out that something suspicious is going on. You
see, apart from us, this road is deserted.
But freckles doesn't look round. Not once. He is walking quickly. He
has his left hand over one eye. The eye where he was hit.
We continue our routine of changing places every couple of minutes. It
seems pointless on such a deserted road but we do it anyway.
Then the hill ends. The hedges end. I am on a flat plateau. In the
distance far below I can see the blue of the sea. And there is a
house.
The house is large and made of grey bricks. It has seen better times,
much better times. Half of the tiles are missing from the roof and half
the roof is missing from the house. The bottom two windows are badly
boarded up with planks of wood and the top two windows are empty
squares. What must once have been a garden is now an overgrown mess of
grass and shrubs and where there once must have been a front door there
is nothing. Just a hole.
It doesn't look as if anyone has lived there for quite some time. I am
soon proved to be wrong.
Without looking around, the boy disappears into the doorway.
I hide myself behind a tree and wait for the others who are now
nearing the top of the hill. One by one they gather behind me, behind
the tree.
"Well," I say, "we know where he lives. We can go to the police. We've
done it."
"Yes," says Bell. But she doesn't sound sure, she doesn't sound sure
at all. She looks over my shoulder and looks at the house.
"Do you think he lives there?" says Jack.
Billy opens his mouth and is about to say something but I never find
out what it is. At that moment, loud in the quiet, there is the sound
of dogs barking. It is coming from the house.
We all turn. From behind the shelter of the tree we all look towards
the house.
All is not as it was before. Not quite.
Standing in the doorway are two very muscular vicious-looking ?
Rottweilers. One is mostly black and one is mostly white. And the dogs
are not alone. Standing behind them is an equally muscular, equally
vicious-looking man. He has a bald head and several days worth of
stubble on his chin. He is wearing a white vest which does nothing to
hide his huge tattooed arms. Quite clearly, as we are all watching, we
hear him speak.
"What is it girls? What can we smell? Do we smell our dinner?"

Chapter 8

"I thought they were going to eat me," says Jack.
"Don't be silly," I say. "Dogs don't eat people."
"Don't they?"
"No. They don't."
Jack put his hands on his knees and leans forward. "They look like
they do. They look like they could. In one mouthful."
"Well, they don't. They couldn't."
"Not even Bottwailers?"
"Not even Rottweilers."
"Oh."
I see Billy's mouth opening and I give him a warning look. He shuts
his mouth and doesn't say anything. He doesn't say that dogs don't eat
people but sometimes they do bite, especially big vicious dogs like
those black and white Rottweilers.
I don't want Jack to think about Rottweilers. I don't want him having
nightmares. I know dogs biting him is exactly the sort of thing he
would have nightmares about.
We are sitting on the train and we are going home. If you had told me
earlier that I would be so pleased to be going home I wouldn't have
believed you. If you had told me earlier that I would be so happy to be
in one piece I would have laughed in your face.
That was before what happened happened, that was before our narrow
escape. Let me explain, let me take you back a couple of hours.
As we heard the man speak we all froze. Any one of us could have won a
game of statues, any one of us might very recently have stared deep
into the eyes of a Gorgon and been turned into stone.
"What is it, girls?" the man said. His voice wasn't kind, it wasn't
nice. He spoke like a Hollywood bad guy about to take over the world.
"What do we smell?"
I put my arms around Jack and pulled him to me. I could feel his heart
racing, I could feel my own heart racing it back. Billy pursed his lips
and pushed up his glasses. Bell wrapped her arms around herself. And we
all inched closer to the trunk of the tree, trying to hide ourselves
more completely from the man.
The man, meanwhile, was moving closer. The dogs barked again and
goosebumps appeared on my arms. We're not doing anything wrong, I told
myself. There was no reason why we shouldn't step out from behind the
tree and wish the man a good afternoon, I told myself. Yet I felt that
that wouldn't have been a very clever thing to do. The man looked like
trouble. What am I saying, the man was trouble. He had two very hungry
looking dogs.
"Come on girls. Let's have a look. No need to pull."
No need to pull? What did he mean?
"No need to pull. Slowly now."
And then I got it. I got what I had hardly noticed. The dogs were on
leads.
Leads. Thank God for leads. The leads gave us some time.
If the dogs hadn't been on leads then they would have run straight to
us. They would have been around the side of that tree and they would
have done what I said to Jack they wouldn't do. They would have bitten
us, eaten us. I had seen programmes on Rottweiler attacks. I knew that
once Rottweilers had locked on to you it was very difficult to get them
to let go. Very difficult.
And leads or not, the dogs were still getting closer.
I was really beginning to think that I had made a mistake. I was
really beginning to wish that I hadn't tried to divert attention away
from Jeremy with this plan to follow the boy. I was beginning to wish
that I was lying on the beach, lying in bed, lying anywhere.
Behind us, behind the tree, we heard the snap of a twig and then near,
we heard the snuffles of the dogs. They were heading directly towards
us.
I pulled Jack tighter against me. I looked at Billy and I looked at
Bell and I could see in their eyes what I believed was reflected in my
own. Fear.
I heard the sound of a footstep on loose soil and the low growl of a
dog. They came from just the other side of the tree. In a few seconds
we would be discovered.
Discovered and who knows what?
I took a deep breath and I have to admit, I closed my eyes. I closed
my eyes and I wished on that star again.
And then out of nowhere, like a ninetieth minute winner scored in the
dying seconds of a game, came a result that surprised everyone. Just as
I was thinking that that was it, that I was going to be faced by a
large man and two very large dogs, something happened, something saved
us. There was a loud shout from the direction of the house.
"Ben! Ben!"
"Yeah!" came a reply from behind our tree, from our man. "What is
it?"
"It's your mobile! Your mobile's ringing!"
The man cursed under his breath and then he said loudly, "Come on
girls! We can come back later."
We heard heavy footsteps heading away from us, heading, I guessed,
back to the house.
We were safe. What did I tell you about wishing on a star? Works every
time.
I couldn't help my face splitting into a huge grin. It was a grin I
saw mirrored on the faces of the others. We were four Cheshire cats,
four smiling idiots, four sunbeams on a cloudy day. And then what did
we do? What did the famous Fart Club do? We ran all the way back to the
station and jumped on the first train home.
"It was close," says Bell.
"It was," I reply. "But we did it."
"We did it," says Billy and he makes a fist in the air. "We really
followed him."
"Hooray!" says Jack.
Something catches my eye and I glance out of the window of the moving
train. I see backs of houses, then suddenly the houses finish, give way
to a sports field. Some kids are playing chase here and seeing them,
carefree and having fun, I remember something. I smile and I look back
at Bell.
"So it's over."
She looks puzzled. She looks at me like I'm speaking Egyptian. "What
do you mean?"
"You said that once we found out where the boy lives we'd go to the
police. And then it would be over. We'd enjoy our holiday."
"Ah," says Bell. She rubs a hand over the top of her head. It's not a
good sign. I've told you already that this is something she does when
she's thinking. I don't want Bell to think. I just want her to agree
with me. "Did you enjoy today?" she says finally.
The question throws me. It isn't a fair question.
Jack claps his hands. "I enjoyed it."
See what I mean. It's the sort of question that is not to the point.
It's the sort of question that could lead somewhere.
Billy nods his head. "I enjoyed it. Very much."
I sigh. I enjoyed it too. But I can see my dream of lazing on the
beach slipping away. AGAIN.
"That boy," says Bell, "I don't think we should report him to the
police."
"But he's a pickpocket," I say. "He's a thief. I saw him steal three
Mars bars. King-size ones."
Bell crosses her arms, a sure sign she is going into battle. "Maybe he
was hungry."
"Nobody's that hungry! Nobody can eat three king-size Mars bars! It's
like eating four shredded wheat. It's like eating all your greens. It's
like eating as much as you can eat at an all-you-can-eat restaurant and
then calling the manager and asking for more."
"I disagree," says Bell. "I think he was that hungry. I think he's
homeless."
"But...." I start saying. I am interrupted by the train shooting into
a tunnel and my words are lost in the whoosh of compressed air.
As we pop out the other side Bell starts talking before I have chance
to object. "Look at the evidence," she says.
Billy nods his head. I know he is trying to look wise.
Bell holds up a hand and counts down her points as she speaks. "Number
one. He smells. Number two. He doesn't look like he has washed his
clothes for months. Number three. We follow him to his home and
discover his home is a derelict house. Number four. He is so hungry he
has to steal food. And," Bell stops and takes a deep breath, "number
five. I think he's in trouble."
Bell says the word trouble quietly. She does this for dramatic effect.
I'm thinking that Bell is very good at talking. I'm thinking that she
should become a politician when she's older. I'm thinking she's uses
the word trouble as bait.
"Trouble," says Jack. "What trouble?" Well done little brother, you've
taken the bait.
Bell leans closer. "Think about what we saw." She pauses giving us
time to think and then she continues. "We saw our boy, freckles, give
that other boy something. Maybe it was a wallet. Maybe that boy is
forcing freckles to steal for him. And maybe it is something to do with
that man in the house. Maybe he is the ringleader." Bell sits back on
her chair satisfied. "We should do something to help."
She looks around at us. Billy nods. Jack nods. Things are getting out
of hand.
"What can we do?" I say "How can we help? We're just four kids on a
Summer holiday. We're not the SAS, we're not the PowerRangers."
Bell doesn't say anything. Billy doesn't say anything. But Jack looks
at me, he smiles
sweetly and he says something, he says something very important.
"But we can help. We're the Fart Club. Don't forget, we're the Fart
Club."
When I look back on the events that happen later I feel that this was
the defining moment of our Summer. Jack saying, "We are the Fart Club"
at that point changed everything. I believe that if Jack hadn't said
the words Fart Club then then nothing would have happened in response
to Bell's request that we help the boy. If it hadn't been for the
invocation of the Fart Club we probably wouldn't have done anything. We
probably would have agreed that we couldn't help.
But Jack's words altered everything.
However stupid the name of our club and however much we treated it as
a joke, we were still a club.
And clubs do things.
For example, if you are in a football club you play football. If you
belong to a chess club you play chess. If you are in the cubs you do
bob-a-job. Get the picture?
Our club is the Fart Club. It was true that we had taken on the name
as a joke but since then, even I had to admit, it had come to mean
something. We had used the club to set ourselves apart from Billy's
sister and friends. Our togetherness made us different from the other
wasters on the council estate where we lived. It had helped me and Jack
and Bell get over the disappearance of our fathers.
So when Jack said Fart Club we all felt that we should help this boy.
Suddenly we all felt it was our duty as members of a club that stood
for helping the underdogs.
And so despite myself, totally despite myself, I found myself agreeing
with Bell.
"OK," I said. "We'll do it. We'll help the boy."
Bell smiled. Jack smiled. Billy smiled. We all smiled.
"The Fart Club," we said together. "The Fart Club!"
"THE FART CLUB!"

Chapter 9

The next morning I am woken by a loud smacking sound. I flick open my
eyes and sit bolt upright in bed imagining all kinds of horrors. I see
my mother standing there and I see Jack already awake, rubbing his
eyes. My heart starts beating fast.
"What's going on?"
My mother doesn't answer, she only claps her hands. I realise this was
the loud noise, the noise that woke me up.
"Mum!" I say. "You nearly frightened me to death." I slump back
against my pillow.
"Attention! Attention!" says my mother. "Now hear this! Now hear this!
Attention! Attention!"
I groan and I look at my mother. "It's early. It's the Summer holidays
and it's early. Can't you be quiet? Just a little? Can't you leave me
to sleep? Just a lot?"
If I wanted sympathy, however, then I fail to get it. My mum fixes me
with a hard stare and repeats her attention, attention, now hear this,
now hear this spiel. She means business.
By the way, for those of you who are starting to think that the above
behaviour is a bit strange then let me just tell you that my mum
sometimes acts a bit off the beaten track, a bit round the bend.
Sometimes, if you didn't know her better, you'd think she was, like
Billy's mum with her biscuit trick, completely loopy.
"Mum," says Jack. "You're funny." Well, that's another way of putting
it.
My mum clears her throat, looks first at me, then at Jack. "A report,"
she says, "has just come in from both BBC and ITV News Services. It
states that there has been a severe build-up of dirt at an unspecified
location due west of the nation's capital. Sources suggest that this
problem is being dealt with. More to follow in our lunch-time
bulletin." My mum holds a fist in front of her mouth and makes a noise
like a trumpet. This means she has finished.
If you are scratching your heads and wondering quite what my mum is
on, let me translate. What, I think, my mum is saying is that the house
is filthy and she wants us to clean it.
"It's time," says my mum, "for some Spring cleaning."
See, I was spot on. I hit the nail right on the head.
"But," says Jack, rubbing his eyes again, "it's not Spring. It's
Summer."
Well done little brother, good point. But I know this fine display of
logic reasoning will have no effect on my mum. Logic and parents are
rarely found hand in hand. Logic and parents are not best of
friends.
"OK," say my mum, "not Spring cleaning then. We'll do Summer
cleaning."
See? Who's ever heard of Summer cleaning? Who's ever heard of a mother
waking her
children pretending to be a news reporter?
"I don't want to clean," says Jack.
My mother puts her hands on her hips. "I don't want to hear I don't
want. I want to hear, yes mum, right away mum."
I sigh. Jack sighs. We don't move. We don't say, yes mum. We don't
say, right away mum. We don't say anything.
My mother smiles. I recognise the sign. She is trying a different
tack. "It's ages since we've done anything together, me and my
beautiful boys. It'll be fun."
Fun! Is she serious? Feather dusters are not fun. Hoovers are not fun.
I sigh again. Jack sighs again.
"Now!" says my mother loudly and claps her hands. "The FUN starts NOW!
Get UP!"
I groan, pull aside the duvet and climb out of bed. I know as the Borg
drone in Star Trek Voyager always says, "Resistance is futile."
And so it is that at ten o'clock, when there is a knock at the front
door, I am to be found leaning over the toilet bowl with a brush in one
hand and a bottle of Domestos bleach in the other, scrubbing
away.
"Jake! It's Billy and Bell," shouts Jack from, I guess, the front
door. "Billy and Bell."
Billy and Bell. I'd been expecting them. I put down my cleaning tools
and fly down the stairs and sure enough, there are Billy and Bell on
the step.
"Nice gloves," says Bell with a smile on her face.
I look at my hands. I see that I am still wearing the bright orange
Marigolds my mum gave me earlier. "Ha ha," I say. "I'm cleaning."
"A woman's work is never done," says Bell.
I nod my head.
"A woman's place truly is in the home," says Bell.
I nod my head again.
"You'll make someone a wonderful wife one day," says Bell.
I am just about to strangle Bell with my orange gloves when my mum
appears. She puts an arm around me in that embarrassing way mum's do,
especially single mums I've noticed, and she says, "I'm sorry but
Jake's not allowed to come out to play today."
Come out to play! Who does my mum think I am? Little Jack Horner? Wee
Willie Winkie? Bo Peep?
"Oh," says Bell. She looks disappointed. And I know why. We'd planned
to go to Clacton. We'd planned to find the boy again. And save his
life.
"But," my mum says, "if you'd like to come in and help clean then you
are more than welcome. I know how much you two love cleaning."
My mum, of course, is joking.
"Um...." says Billy, his face starting to go red. He pushes up his
glasses. "Thank you Mrs Jack and Jake.... but...um...actually..."
"I'm joking, Billy," says my mum.
"Yes," says Billy. He wipes his palms on the front of his jeans.
"Joking."
"So," I say, "we'll do it tomorrow, yes?" And I wink. My mother is
still standing behind me and she can't see the wink. Only Billy and
Bell can see the wink. I am a good winker. Very good. To me, the
meaning of the wink is obvious. It is obvious that the 'it' and the
wink go hand in hand and they refer to our plan.
But obviously not.
Billy starts to open his mouth and I just know that he is going to ask
what I'm talking about, what we'll do tomorrow, why I'm winking. I know
Billy is going to give the game away. Luckily Bell has enough sense for
the both of them. She grabs Billy's arm and digs in her nails. Billy
says ow! and Bell says goodbye and I shut the door.
Phew!
"What is 'it'?" says my mum.
Not so phew!
"Well?" says my mum.
"Nothing mum," I say. "Gotta clean that toilet." And I charge up the
stairs like I am being chased by wolves.
At twelve o'clock, as I am involved in picking up what seem to be
endless amounts of plastic soldiers off my bedroom floor and dropping
them into equally endless amounts of shoe boxes, my mum shouts that
lunch is ready. I realise, suddenly, that I'm starving and I fling a
final soldier in a box and run down the stairs.
Jack is already seated at the table clutching a knife and fork. At
least I guess it's Jack. The person sitting there is rather hard to
recognise. If it is Jack then I would have to assume that all the dirt
he has cleaned from the house has been transferred directly to his
body. You see, this boy is dirty. This boy is filthy. His face is black
and his clothes look like the 'before' example on one of those 'before'
and 'after' adverts for wondrous washing powders.
"Hi Bro," says the boy.
The boy called me Bro, it must be Jack. "Hi," I say and sit
down.
My mum is standing at the cooker doing something clever with a packet
of frozen fish-fingers, a bag of oven chips and a can of spaghetti
hoops. Within moments she plonks plates down in front of me and Jack. A
sprinkling of salt, a dash of vinegar and a dollop of tomato sauce
later we start to eat.
It is only as I place the last chip in my mouth that I realise my mum
hasn't eaten anything. It is only then too that I realise she is
looking nervous. She looks like she did that day she told us dad had
left. He couldn't have left again, he hadn't even come back. I figure
it must be something else. Something important. I realise that there's
more to this cleaning, this day together, than meets the eye.
My mum runs her hand through her hair. She stands up. She sits down.
She examines closely the nail polish on her fingers. I can't stand it
anymore so I put her out of her misery.
"What is it, mum?"
My mum picks up the salt-cellar and then puts it down again.
"Mum?"
She sighs. "It's difficult."
I don't like the sound of this. I don't want to hear the word
difficult. I want to hear the words fun, happiness, money. The Summer
holidays had already become more complicated than I wished.
"As you know," says my mum, running her hand through her hair again,
"me and Jeremy have been spending a lot of time together...."
She is right, I do know. I am the one who is consoling her youngest
son every night.
"....and we've become fond of each other. Very fond...."
Even beneath the dirt on his face I can see that Jack has gone
white.
"....and it's just that Jeremy has a few problems at the
moment..."
Jeremy has problems!
"....he is going to be thrown out of his house and I
said....well.....I said that he could come and stay here with us....on
the sofa....it wouldn't be forever....anyway he'll be coming next
week.... just for a while."
I am about to open my mouth to say something but I don't. Something
else happens. With a sob Jack leaps off his seat and runs up the
stairs. I look at my mum, she looks at me. She holds up her hand and
then she stands and goes after Jack. I stay where I am and stare at the
wall.
Mum wants Jeremy to stay here with us. How do I feel about that? Until
a few days ago I didn't know Jeremy existed. Now I'm going to have to
face him every day over breakfast, wait patiently while he uses the
bathroom, dodge him on the stairs. There are also lots of other
thoughts going through my head. Dad thoughts. Will Jeremy try and
become pally with me?
Will he suggest that we go down the park and kick a ball around? Will
he one day put his arm around me and tell me that he thinks of me as a
son he never had?
I am still thinking these thoughts fifteen minutes later when my mum
comes back down the stairs. She looks like she has been crying. She
sits down.
"You OK?" I ask.
My mum nods. "You know I love you, don't you?"
"Yes," I say. I pull my funny face. "If you've told me once, you've
told me a hundred times."
"Ha ha," she says and wipes her nose. "If it's going to cause problems
then I'll tell Jeremy not to come. I didn't know how Jack felt. I
didn't."
"It'll be OK," I say.
"I only wanted to help a friend."
"I know."
"I don't think Jack....
"I'll speak to Jack," I say. "I know how to handle him."
My mum looks at me and wipes her nose again. "When did you get to be
so smart?"
About the same time my dad left I want to say but I don't. I just tell
my mum to remember that I'm smart next time she gets my report card and
it's full of Ds. She laughs and tells me not to be cheeky. There's a
big difference between being cheeky and being smart she says and I say
of course there is, cheekiness is what gets me Ds and smartness is what
would get me As and then I run upstairs to see if Jack is OK.
In fact, Jack is half OK. He is sitting on his bed, which is better
than him lying on his bed, and there are streaks in the dirt on his
face where the tears have run, which is worse than if his cheeks had no
streaks. I have a plan.
"Come on," I say loudly and I clap my hands. "We haven't got much
time."
Jack looks at me and wipes his nose on the back of his hand. "Time?
Time for what?"
"Until the next train leaves for Clacton."
"You mean...."
"Yes I mean...."
Jack almost smiles. Almost.
"Hurry up. Get in the shower. You look like you've been kissing a
cowpat."
Jack giggles.
"We've got to find that boy."
"Yes," says Jack, "we've got to find that boy." He nods his
head.
"Fart Club to the rescue."
"Hooray!" says Jack and runs towards the bathroom.
My mum was right, I am smart. Super smart.

Thirty minutes later Jack and I have rounded up Billy and Bell and we
are sitting on the train. I don't really expect to find freckles, I
just want to take Jack's mind off of things. I want to take Jack's mind
off Jeremy. If I'm honest, I want to take my own mind off Jeremy
too.
As the train arrives and we step down onto the platform Bell says we
should head straight for the amusement arcade. She says that it's
already late. She's right, it is getting late, but as I feel the
afternoon sun on my face and catch the glint of the water in the
distance I fancy a dip in the sea. I've already had enough tension for
one day and besides, I'm carrying towels and trunks in the bag over my
shoulder. It would be a shame not to use them.
"Half an hour," I say to Bell, "just give me half an hour on the
beach." And I smile and Jack smiles as well and even Billy smiles and
Bell can't refuse. She gives in.
It turns out that Billy has brought his trunks too, so before you can
say 'freckles' three times Billy, Jack and me are standing on the beach
with our towels wrapped around our waists getting changed. My towel
slips and everyone sees my bum and everyone laughs and I scream and
pull up my trunks and run towards the sea. I scream again as the cold
water hits me and soaks my skin. Soon Jack is by my side and then
Billy. Finally Bell.
None of us can swim, not properly, but we have a good time splashing
each other with freezing water and jumping in the crashing waves. Jack
and I laugh at Billy's big belly and he wobbles it like a jelly and we
laugh some more. And then we are tired and we run shivering up the
beach and wrap towels around ourselves.
It is as I am rubbing my wet hair and trying to get sand out of my
ears and not really thinking about anything at all that I see him. I
see the boy. I see freckles. He is sitting not three metres away, fully
clothed. He has his arms around his legs and his chin is resting on his
knees.
And just as I see him he turns and he sees me. Our eyes are locked
together.
Then everything happens quickly.
You see, I am not wearing my disguise. I am not wearing my huge
sunglasses and stupid hat with a hammer on it. Freckles must recognise
me, must recognise me as the boy who chased him just a few days earlier
because he leaps up. He shouts a bad word and starts legging it down
the beach.
The others all look up now and they see the boy too and all at once
they say, "After him Jack!"
Here we go again.
I set off in pursuit.

Chapter 10

This is stupid. This is crazy. I'm running along Clacton beach, dressed
only in a pair of swimming trunks, chasing a boy I have never met and
whose name I don't even know. I am doing this because my friends, the
famous Fart Club, have decided that we are going to offer help. As for
me, I'm not at all sure that freckles wants our help. He's certainly
doing his best to show me a clean pair of heels. He's pulling further
away with each step and I'm thinking that if ever he's at a loose end
he could join the English one hundred metre sprint team. I'm also
thinking that if he could kick a ball and run at the same time he could
play on the wing for Man U. He's that fast.
I realise that I'll never catch him. Or that if I am going to catch
him I'll have to use my brain. That shouldn't be too difficult, it was,
after all, only this morning that my mum told me I was clever.
She was right, I am clever. I have an idea.
I stop and put my hands on my hips. "Hey!" I shout as loud as I can.
"Stop! Stop!"
It's not the best of plans, is it? But see what happens.
The boy, on hearing the shout behind him, twists his head. It's that
instinct thing again. He's still running forward but now, at the same
time, he's also looking back over his shoulder. He sees me. He doesn't
see the plank of driftwood lying in front of him. A plank of driftwood
is just the sort of thing someone could trip over if they weren't
looking. And that's exactly what the boy is not doing, looking.
His left foot hits the plank.
In less than one second the boy goes from moving more swiftly than a
black panther to flying through the air less elegantly than a sack of
potatoes. He lets out a loud scream and he lands heavily on the sand.
By the way he curls up into a ball I guess he's winded himself, by the
look on his face I guess he's in pain.
He's not running anymore. Not at all.
Success.
I take my opportunity and quickly I'm on top of him, pinning his
shoulders to the sand with my knees. He looks into my face, splutters
and spits sand out of his mouth and then releases a stream of those
words good parents are always telling their naughty children not to
say. Freckles really knows how to use these words and he is still using
them when Billy, Bell and Jack arrive and stand around us in a
circle.
"Hey, calm down. We want to help."
Freckles struggles some more and swears some more and I repeat that we
want to help. I promise we won't hurt him. Actually, I had been afraid
freckles would hurt me. I had been afraid that he would just toss me
aside and make his escape. I told you I'm not much of a fighter. In
fact, I'm nothing of a fighter. But luckily, neither is freckles. Let
me tell you, freckles is not strong. Freckles has a body that would
make a chopstick look obese, a matchstick look hefty. More bluntly,
freckles is skinny. I know because I'm sitting on his chest and his
ribs are sticking painfully into my bum. Sitting on freckles I feel
like one of those Indian showmen who sit lotus position on a bed of
nails. I feel like a doctor has asked me to drop my pants, bend over
and then has then invited a whole hospital-ful of nurses to practice
their injection technique on my behind. I'm not comfortable and I wish
the boy would stop struggling.
"Calm down," says Bell, "calm down," and this time, maybe because Bell
is a girl or maybe because Bell looks harder than me, or maybe,
finally, because freckles has decided he'll never escape, he stops
moving.
"I'm getting off," I say. "Don't try and run away. Really, we want to
help you."
Slowly I stand up, lifting myself off freckles' body and I go and
stand with the others. We all watch together as freckles sits up. He
looks at our faces one by one, his eyes darting between us. He reminds
me of a cat that has been hit by an articulated lorry. I remind myself
of one of those naff bystanders who watch a cat who has been hit by an
articulated lorry but don't actually do anything.
Eventually freckles speaks. I'll leave out all the bad words just in
case my grandma should happen one day to pick up this book. For those
of you who aren't my grandmother feel free to add any words you feel
necessary. Add plenty.
"If you want to help me then why are you chasing me?"
Good question. I am still thinking how to answer it when Billy
speaks.
"At first we wanted to chase you. Now we want to help you. We were
only chasing you this time because you ran. If you hadn't run then we
wouldn't have chased you. See?"
Well done Billy. I think you've just about covered everything.
"I don't understand," says the boy.
Or maybe not.
"Sit down," I say to the others and they all sit down on the sand.
"I'll explain," I say to the boy.
Freckles shrugs. "OK." He says it like he doesn't really care, like
he's not really interested. He says it like he means, "I'll listen to
your story and then maybe you'll let me go." He reaches into his jacket
pocket and pulls out the dirty stub of an old cigarette. He lights it
with a match from a box and starts to smoke.
I take a deep breath, being careful not to breath in cigarette smoke,
and I begin to tell freckles my story. I explain how on the first day
of the Summer holidays we saw him pickpocketing and I chased him and he
kicked me in the head. The boy nods his head and says he remembers. He
looks bored. I explain how we decided to find out where he lived and
then to report him to the police. I tell him how we followed him from
the amusement arcade, how we saw that other boy hit him and then
watched him go into the house on the hill. When I mention the name Ben
and the two Rottweiler dogs the boy stubs his cigarette viciously out
in the sand and tells us we were lucky, very lucky, that Ben didn't see
us. By the way that he says it, I know he means it.
Finally, I go on to say that because of what we'd seen we'd decided he
was in trouble, that he needed help and that we were going to help him.
When I say the word help a smile crosses the boy's lips. It is not a
happy smile. It is a rueful, bitter smile, pulled back over yellow
teeth.
"Help me, how can you help me?" He laughs. And like his smile, his
laugh is not a happy laugh. It is hollow and empty. "What can you lot
do for me?"
And now it is Jack's turn to speak. He looks the boy directly in the
eye and he speaks. "But we can help," he says, "we're the Fart
Club."
The Fart Club, everything always seems to come back to the Fart
Club.
The boy looks back at Jack. "What did you say?"
"I said," says Jack very seriously, "that we're the Fart Club. Me and
Jack and Billy and Bell, we're the Fart Club."
Something happens now that surprises me. As Jack says Fart Club for
the last time something happens to the boy's face, something lifts. I
see his teeth again and a strange noise starts to come from him. At
first I think he's having a heart attack or a seizure but then as I see
him slap the sand with the palm of his hand and wipe a tear from his
eye I realise that he's laughing. He's laughing and he can't
stop.
Billy and Bell and Jack and I just watch, speechless until eventually
freckles manages to get himself under control. He looks at me and says,
"Fart Club" and then he is off again, screaming with laughter. This
time I start laughing too, and then Billy starts, then Bell and then we
are all laughing, laughing hysterically unable to stop.
Later, much later, when I knew freckles very well, and we had had
quite an adventure together, he told me that if Jack hadn't said those
words that day, if Jack hadn't mentioned the Fart Club then he would
never have told us his story. Up until that point he thought we were
just a bunch of geeky kids and he was just waiting for an opportunity
to get away from us. But when he heard Jack say Fart Club he thought
that it was the funniest thing he had heard in ages, that that day on
the beach was the first day he had laughed for weeks, in fact, he had
forgotten what it was like to laugh at all. He said he decided to share
all his problems with us then because they had been building up inside
him for months, years and he hadn't ever had anyone to talk to, had
never met anyone who was interested in him, anyone who wanted to
help.
"So you want to help me?" says Carl.
We all nod our heads. We have just introduced ourselves. I now know
freckles is Carl, and he knows Billy is Billy, Bell is Bell, Jack is
Jack and I am me.
"It's a long story and I don't know where to start."
"Start at the beginning and continue until you get to the end," I say.
Remember? It's what my dad told me. That and "don't wee into the wind"
are the only two useful pieces of advice my dad ever gave me.
Carl looks at Jack. "It's a very boring story," he says and he fakes a
yawn. "Very long."
I understand what Carl is saying and I like him for it. He is saying
that his story is a story that isn't suitable for young children.
"Why don't you go and look for crabs?" I say to Jack and he kind of
smiles. I can see that half of him wants to stay and hear the story and
half of him wants to go. "I promise I'll call you when we get to the
next exciting part of the adventure."
"You won't do any chasing without me?"
"Not one step."
"No following?"
"Not at all."
"No leaping through the air and punching?"
"I guarantee it."
Jack claps his hands and doesn't need to hear any more. He is off
running towards the rock pools. I watch him go and then I turn to my
new friend.
"Start," I say.
Carl lights another of his cigarette stumps, looks me in the face,
looks Billy in the face, looks Bell in the face and then he
starts.
I'll put down here what Carl says like a speech but that isn't how it
was really. There were times when Carl stopped to relight his
cigarette, or wipe a tear from his eye, and there many times when he
swore. I'll leave all those bits out. I'll just give you the bare
story. You only have to imagine me and Billy and Bell sitting on the
hard sand under the hot sun listening breathless to his every word.
It's better like that. More dramatic.
Are you ready? Then I'll hand over to Carl. It's his turn to
talk.
"It all starts with drink," Carl says, "and that's where I'll start
because it's the beginning really. It all began with too much to drink.
I can't remember a time when my parents weren't drunk. My mum wasn't so
bad. When she'd had a few she just fell asleep. But my dad he was
violent. He used to hit me. He'd hit me all the time for any little
thing. I spoke too quietly. Bang. I talked too loudly. Bang. I didn't
talk at all. Bang. Bang. Bang. I was scared to move, to do anything and
I thought it was normal. I thought it was normal for your parents to
hit you.
"When I was younger no one seemed to notice. Maybe my dad didn't hit
me so hard then, but after I started at senior school teachers began to
say things about the bruises. I always had bruises, on my face, on my
arms, on my legs, everywhere. I'd lie and say I fell over in the
playground, or fell off my bike, or I ran into a tree. Eventually I ran
out of things to bump into and the teachers got suspicious and didn't
believe me anymore.
"When the social worker came round to the house my mum and dad put on
a front, they were like perfect parents, calling me sweetheart and love
and for a minute I thought I was going crazy. At one point my dad put
his arm around me and said how much we enjoyed playing football
together and I nearly dropped down dead. Later my dad nearly knocked me
down dead. He said it was my fault that people had come round to the
house and he hit me again. And again. And again.
"Dad told the hospital I'd been injured in a boxing competition but I
told the nurses the truth, that I was a punch-bag. About a week after
that they took me out of school, the social I mean, and I never saw my
parents again. I wouldn't have cared if my life had improved. It
didn't, it got worse.
"For about a month or so I was in a children's home and then a couple
took me, adopted me. They had a nice house, nice friends, nice jobs,
nice everything. I didn't fit in. I wasn't nice. For a start, I kept
having these nightmares. I would wake up the whole house with my
screaming. The couple said it was OK, that it didn't matter, but I
could see that it was annoying them. I tried to stop but I couldn't.
When my nice mother's nice mother came to stay and I sleepwalked into
her room screaming and completely naked I think that was the last
straw. It broke their nice camel's nice back. They took me back to the
home, like I was a faulty product they had bought. Thank you but no
thank you.
"After that no one seemed interested. One year turned into two and I
suppose I became difficult. No, no question, I was difficult. Who
wouldn't be? Life in the home was tough. The home was no home sweet
home, it was more home hell-hole. The stronger children picked on me
and I picked on the weaker ones. It was a dog eat dog world, only less
civilised. Sometimes even dogs get on.
"Then one day a couple wanted to take me. I was told by a member of
staff that it was my last chance. My last chance, like I had done
something wrong, like I was to blame for my life so far. So I nodded my
head and behaved all innocent and this couple took me. But I was
already wild by then, already crazy. You see, I loved fire. Night after
night I stole boxes of my new dad's matches and took them up to my
room. I would light one match after another and stare into the flame.
Fire was powerful and I controlled it. Or so I thought. Because of
course the inevitable happened. There was a fire, a real fire, a big
one. The whole house went up. No one was hurt, but I knew they'd send
me back. I couldn't go back there, I couldn't go back to the home. So I
ran away.
"It was just after my fourteenth birthday when I arrived in London. I
stood on Kings Cross station and cried. I didn't have anything and I
didn't have anybody, only the flame damaged clothes I stood up in. But
somehow I survived. I found other kids like me, street kids, kids that
society had forgotten, kids that normal people walk past every day with
their noses held high. But I was OK. Life was hard but I was OK. I
concentrated on surviving and thinking about the next day, where my
food would come from, where I would sleep. Until one day I met
Ben...."
When Carl says Ben he stops talking. I assume that it's just a pause
and he'll resume the story. But after a minute Carl still hasn't
spoken. He has wrapped his arms around his bent knees and is staring
out to sea. He looks sad, sadder than he looked before.
I look at Bell and then I look back at Carl. "So, tell us about
Ben."
Carl answers but he doesn't say anything about Ben.
"Jack, where's Jack? Where's your brother?"
I look towards the shore, I look towards the rock pools.
Jack is not there.
In a panic I stand up and shout Jack's name. There's no answer. I
shout it again, louder. Still no answer.
Jack is missing.

Chapter 11

"He'll be OK," says Bell, putting a hand on my arm. "He's probably just
wandered off somewhere. He's probably on the rocks. We'll find him.
Don't worry."
I'm sure Bell is right. I'm sure Jack will be OK. Jack is always
wandering off, it's what seven olds do best. But I'm not a hundred per
cent sure. My heart's started beating so fast I guess it's trying to
break out of my chest. It wouldn't surprise me if any minute I saw it
bouncing along the sand looking for Jack by itself.
"You go that way," I say to Billy and Bell and I point along the
beach. "And we'll go this way." I point to the rocks. By we I mean me
and Carl.
Billy and Bell set off at a jog. "Come on," I say to Carl and we're
off too. Running.
I blame myself. How could I have been so stupid to let Jack go off by
himself? How could I have taken my eyes off of him? If anything has
happened to him then I will never forgive myself. Never.
Carl and I are at the rocks in no time. There's a group of little kids
here, all about four years old, splashing about in one of the
pools.
"Have you seen a boy?" I say. "A boy who looks like me, only smaller,
less tall?" I'm speaking quickly, I'm waving my arms in the air and I
must look like a crazy man. My hair is sticking up and sand is stuck to
my body from where I've been lying on the beach. I must look like
exactly the sort of person parents warn their children not to talk to.
"Have you seen that kind of boy?"
The kids look at me. I can see in their eyes they are thinking of
making a run for it. I try to calm myself down.
"He's about this high," I say and indicate Jack's height with my hand.
"And he has blond hair. He's wearing red swimming trunks like mine.
He's my brother."
"We're looking for crabs," says one of the four year olds. "We haven't
found any. Do you want to help?"
Do I want to help? Are Manchester United a troupe of ballerinas?
No.
I take a deep breath. I am about to restart my description of Jack
when I hear my name called. I recognise the voice.
It's Jack.
I spin and around and try to see where the shout came from. I can't. I
can't see Jack. I hear the voice again and then Carl grabs my arm and
points.
"There!"
I follow Carl's finger. Oh my God! Jack's in the sea. He's about ten
metres out and he's waving his arm in the air and shouting my name. A
wave rolls over his head and then he calls my name again. "Jake!
Jake!"
"We have to get him," says Carl. "I've been swimming from this beach
before. The tide is strong. He'll be swept out to sea."
I take a deep breath. I feel wretched, terrible, awful. I feel all
those bad words that Carl uses so well. "I can't swim," I say. "I can't
swim."
Carl doesn't say anything, he does something. He pulls off his shoes,
his jeans, his jacket, his jumper and his T-shirt. He turns to me,
smiles, tells me not to worry and he jumps into the water. He
disappears beneath the surface and for a moment I lose sight of him. I
look frantically around and then I spot him. He is heading towards
Jack. He is swimming powerfully, more powerfully than I would have
thought possible with that skinny body of his. The pickpocket and thief
is going to save my brother.
And I feel more useless than I have ever felt in my life.
"What's happening?"
Billy and Bell have appeared at my side. It is Billy who asked the
question. I don't answer it. I open my mouth but no words come out so I
just point. Billy and Bell follow my finger and we all watch the rescue
attempt together.
Carl is getting nearer to Jack. There are only a few metres between
them and the gap is closing, closing with each stroke of Carl's arms,
each kick of his feet. And then suddenly there is an extra big wave and
I lose sight of Jack's head. My heart bursts out of my chest and
collapses on the rock.
The wave crashes, Jack's head bobs back into sight and Carl is next to
him. I promise myself that I will never shout at Jack again. I promise
myself that I will spoil him and do whatever he wishes so long as he's
safe.
"It's OK," says Bell. "He's got him. He's going to be OK. He's going
to be OK."
She's right. I almost can't believe it but she's right. Carl has one
arm around Jack's body and he's started swimming backwards like I've
seen the lifeguards do on Baywatch. I can see Jack's feet kicking. They
are heading towards the shore.
Billy and Bell and I clamber down from the rocks and run to the beach.
Carl and Jack are getting nearer and nearer. I look at Bell and she
squeezes my arm.
"They're OK."
Carl and Jack reach the shallows and they are able to walk. I splash
into the water and throw my arms around Jack.
"Did you see me?" he says. He's grinning and his teeth are chattering.
"I was swimming. I was really swimming. Did you see me?"
I don't answer, I can't, my heart is still lying dead on the
rocks.
Bell puts an arm around Jack. "We saw you, but you scared us to
death." And then she looks at Carl. "Nice underpants."
What did I tell you about Bell saying the opposite to what she
means?
Carl looks down at his underpants and he sees what we all see. The
water has made the material see-through. They leave nothing to the
imagination, not a thing. For the second time that day Carl laughs. He
leaps into the air and does a twirl and starts to laugh. He does a
dance and jiggles his hips, showing off his see-through underpants and
he can't stop laughing. He has a laugh that is infectious and soon we
are all laughing, laughing just as if one of us hadn't nearly drowned,
hadn't nearly lost their life.
When everyone has stopped laughing and we are quite sure we won't
start again I wipe my eyes and I speak. "Come on. Let's get dry. Carl,
you can borrow my towel."
"Thank you," he says.
"No. Thank you," I say. "Thank you." And I mean it. I have never meant
anything more.

Later, we are sitting in a greasy spoon cafe. We have put our money
together and bought two big plates of chips and a cup of steaming hot
chocolate for each of us. I have collected my heart off the rocks and I
am feeling better. I am trying not to think about what could have
happened, what might have been. Luckily I have something to distract
me.
While I was retrieving my heart Carl retrieved his clothes. Sitting in
the coffee shop I realise once again how much these clothes stink, how
much they whiff. They smell coming from them is like the collected
sweat from a million miners' armpits, the scrapings from a thousand zoo
keepers' shoes, the pong from a hundred skunks' tails. But right now I
don't care. Right now Carl is my favourite person in the whole world.
Except Jack.
"I was really swimming," says Jack and he takes a sip of his drink. He
has already told us about two hundred times that he was really
swimming. I don't mind how many times he tells us as long as he never
does it again.
I fix Jack with on of my mother's hard stares. "Exactly how did you
start swimming?"
"Well," says Jack and shoves a chip in his mouth, "one minute I was
reaching into the water looking for a crab and the next minute I was
swimming. It's great."
"So you fell in?"
"Yes," says Jack and takes another chip. "I fell in."
I put on my big brother serious voice. "I want you to promise me
something, Jack."
Jack looks at me. "What?"
"That you'll never try swimming again. Not without me being
there."
"Oh," says Jack. He looks disappointed.
"Promise me."
Jack takes another chip and he smiles. He looks at Carl and then back
at me. "On one condition."
He's seven years old, where did he learn about conditions? I sigh.
"OK. What's the condition?"
Jack looks at Carl again. "I'll tell you later. But I promise. No more
swimming."
"Good, no more swimming. We're agreed."
And now I turn to Carl. It's time to leap out of the frying pan and
into the fire, or maybe that should be, out of the water and into the
fire. I haven't forgotten about Ben and I want to hear the end of the
story. I know Billy and Bell also want to hear. I take a chip and I am
just about to ask my question, just about to get the answer, when there
is the sound of the cafe door opening behind me.
"Oh my goodness!" says Carl. He doesn't really say that but what he
really says could not be printed, at least not without lots of
asterisks.
"Carl, what is it?" Carl's face has gone white and his eyes have
widened. The eyes are fixed on something behind me.
"What is it?" says Bell. "Are you OK?"
Carl doesn't answer, he just stares and shakes his head. He looks like
he has seen a ghost. A very scary ghost.
I tell myself that ghosts don't exist, there couldn't be a ghost and I
turn to see what Carl is looking at. I was right, there isn't a ghost,
there is only a boy. He is standing in the doorway and he is staring at
our table. He is, however, not just any boy, he is a boy I recognise
and I understand why Carl has gone pale. The boy standing there is the
boy we saw hitting Carl a few days earlier.
"I have to go," says Carl.
"But...."
Carl pushes away his cup. "Really. I have to go. Now."
Carl stands, starts to walk towards the boy and then just as he is
going past me, I am sitting on the end of the table, he leans and
whispers in my ear. "I'll meet you on the beach tomorrow. Midday."
Before I can whisper a reply he is already out the door.
The mystery deepens. Now it is not just a mystery about a pickpocket,
it is a mystery about a pickpocket I know, a pickpocket who saved my
brother's life. That makes a difference. A big difference.

That evening I remember my promise to spoil Jack, so when my mum gets
home from work I beg money off her. I am expecting strong resistance, I
am expecting a fight but to my surprise she opens her purse and gives
my a fiver. I don't question why. I just kiss her on the cheek, grab
Jack and head to the video store.
I tell Jack he can watch anything he likes and he chooses Tarzan even
though he has seen it about a zillion times. I take the case to the
desk and with the change I buy a bag of Malteasers, Jack's favourite
and a bottle of Coke, Jack's favourite too and then we go to Bell's
house. Her mum is out for the evening and we have the house to
ourselves. We flop down on the floor and put on our video.
We watch goggle-eyed, mesmerised and then, after the film has
finished, after Tarzan has rescued Jane and after Jane has fallen in
love with Tarzan and they both live happily ever after, we talk about
Carl and we talk about Ben. Jack asks who Ben is and so we have to
remind him, Ben is the man with the dogs and Jack says yes, he
remembers now. Billy says that maybe Ben is a spy and Carl and the
other boys are spies too. I ask Billy if he has been at his parents'
drinks cabinet and he goes red and ums and harrs a bit and says no he
hasn't. He doesn't mention spies again.
Then Jack yawns and that starts me yawning too and I realise I am
tired. It has been a long day. Jack and I say goodbye, promise to meet
Billy and Bell the next day and we head home. I forget to wish on a
star and as we go in the house I hear mum and Jeremy talking in the
lounge. I curse under my breath and hurry Jack up the stairs and
thankfully he seems OK. We clean our and teeth and then we get into our
beds.
I lie on my left side, I lie on my right. I put my hands behind my
head. I count sheep. I count dogs. I count cats. I can't sleep. There
are a lot of things on my mind. Jack almost drowning. Carl. The boy in
the cafe. Ben. I have the idea of counting days in history. January the
first nineteen hundred and one. January the second nineteen hundred and
one. It seems to be working and just when I think I am finally drifting
off Jack speaks.
"Bro, are you awake?"
"No, I'm asleep."
Jack giggles. "No you're not."
I say that I am and Jack says I'm not and this goes on for a while and
then Jack asks me if I remember his condition.
"No," I say. I don't.
"You know, the condition so I won't swim again."
"Oh, yes." I remember now and I ask him what it is.
"I promise not to swim again...."
"Yes?"
"I really promise that I won't swim again...."
"Yes?"
"If you let Carl...."
"Yes?"
"If you let Carl become a member of the Fart Club."
The Fart Club. Again. Jack wants Carl to be a member of our club. I
remember that I'd promised myself earlier that I would do anything that
Jack wanted.
"No problem," I say. "I think it's a good idea. I think it's an
excellent idea. Carl can join the Fart Club."
"Hooray!" says Jack. "Hooray!"
And then I fall asleep dreaming of swimming and diving, see-through
underpants and international spy rings.

Chapter 12

I look at my watch. It is ten past twelve. Carl is late and I am
beginning to worry. Twenty-four hours ago all I wanted to do was to do
nothing. But not anymore. A lot can happen in twenty-four hours. It is
like one day you hate West Ham, you think they are the worst club in
the world but then it's the last day of the season and West Ham have to
beat Chelsea for Man U to win the league and they do it, West Ham beat
Chelsea and Man U have won, they are the league champions. Then you
love West Ham, you feel you owe them something. Well, that's how I feel
about Carl. He rescued Jack and I owe him.
"Can I go in the sea, bro?"
Jack has obviously got bored of the sandcastle he is making. He has
folded his arms and is staring at me.
"I thought we agreed no swimming."
Jack nods his head, unfolds his arms and pats a sand turret. "But we
didn't say no splashing."
"I'll go with him," says Bell.
"And me," says Billy.
"Can I, bro? Please."
"OK," I say. I give in.
I watch Billy and Bell and Jack run down to the water. Billy today
looks ridiculous. He has squeezed himself into a pair of tiny trunks.
Pink flesh is bursting from around the edges and the trunks look as if
at any minute they are going to split and ping off into the sea. I
smile to myself and then I go blind.
Not blind exactly but someone has put their hands over my eyes.
"Guess who?" says a voice.
It is not difficult to guess. The smell gives it away. "The shah of
Iran?" I say.
"No," says Carl. "It's me, Carl."
Well I never!
Carl plonks himself down next to me on the sand and he says hello and
I say hello back and then I don't know what to say. I have a lot of
questions but I don't want to leap in like a bad tackle. I don't want
to be shown a red card. Carl wraps his arms around his knees and stares
out to sea. He is dressed as he was the day before. The same jeans, the
same T-shirt, the same jacket. Jacket! The sun is shining and the day
is hot. I am just in my trunks. The whole beach is in swimwear. I think
of something to say.
"Aren't you hot like that? In that jacket?"
Carl shakes his head. "If I leave it then one of the others will nab
it."
I'm going to ask what others, I'm going to ask if by others he means
the boy who hit him, the boy we saw in the cafe the day before but at
that moment Jack comes charging up the beach spraying sand and throws
himself on Carl. Carl screams and leaps up and says Jack is getting him
wet and Jack giggles and shakes his head and shakes more water onto
Carl and then Billy and Bell appear dripping water as well. My
questions to Carl will have to wait.
Billy asks Carl if he is hot dressed like that and Carl looks at me
and smiles and says no he isn't and Billy says he must be like one of
those reptiles that has cold blood running through its body. He says he
has seen similar things on Voyager so he knows all about it. Carl nods
his head and looks at me and smiles again.
By the time everyone is dry and sitting in a circle on the beach I am
desperate to ask Carl to finish his story. I'm not very good at
mysteries. If someone gives me a crime book I'll turn straight to the
last chapter just to find out how it ends. When the football season is
nearing its climax and I don't know who's going to win, I can't sleep,
I'm a nightmare to be with. So I open my mouth to speak, to ask the
questions I've been wanting to ask, about Ben, about the boy, but Jack
gets in first.
"Carl, we were wondering if you'd like to join our club?"
Carl looks at each of us. "You want me to join the...." He pauses and
blows a loud raspberry on the back of his hand, "....Club."
I had to admit that when put like that, it did sound kind of
stupid.
"Carl," says Jack, looking serious, "it's not a joke. We don't ask
everyone to be a member."
I catch Bell's eye and we both stifle a laugh.
"No," says Carl, "I'm sure you don't."
"It's because you saved me that I want you to join. You were very
brave."
"Oh," says Carl.
"And if you join then you can hang around with us. You can come to the
beach, and go to the arcade. You can watch videos, eat chips, drink hot
chocolate and lots of things. It's fun."
"Oh," says Carl again and now it's his turn to look serious. "When you
put it like that, then I think I'd like to join." He nods his head
solemnly.
"Hooray!" says Jack and he claps his hands. "But, of course, you have
to pass the initiation test."
Initiation test? It is the first I've heard of an initiation test. I
look at Billy and Bell and they look as puzzled as me.
"Sure," says Carl and shrugs his shoulders. "Tell me what I have to
do."

We are sitting in the same cafe we were in the day before. We are
sitting at the same table. This time, however, we are not eating chips,
we are not drinking hot chocolate. We are watching Carl. In front of
Carl are two plates piled high with baked beans on toast and a size
glass of Coke.
Carl is preparing.
"Eat more," says Jack. "Eat more."
These are the only words anyone has spoken in the last ten minutes.
The atmosphere is as tense as if we are soldiers about to go into
battle. I've had this feeling once before. I had it the Geri couldn't
find her hairbrush and our famous club was formed.
"Come on," says Jack. "Eat! Drink!"
It has to be said that Carl is doing just that. He is shovelling food
into his mouth and taking great gulps of his fizzy Coke. He finishes
one plate and starts on the second. Either he is very hungry or he is
very keen to join our club. I think the truth is that he's both. I know
our club is stupid, a joke, but I also know it's better to belong to
something than to nothing at all. Ask any Manchester City player.
Carl slides the last few beans onto his fork and lifts them to his
mouth. He chews, once, twice, swallows and then downs the last few
centimetres from his glass.
"I've finished," he says and crosses his hands over his stomach. "I'm
going to burst."
"Not yet," says Jack and we all laugh.
When we have stopped laughing I look at Carl. "Are you ready?" I
say.
Carl nods.
"Then let's go."
About two hundred metres from the cafe is a very impressive building.
It has a line of circular stone columns in front of it and a triangular
shaped roof. There are lots of carvings on this roof, people's heads
and stuff like that. This building is just about the biggest building
in Clacton, it's just about the biggest building anywhere. It looks
like a Roman temple. It isn't. It's an art gallery.
As we step into the huge reception area with its high ceiling our
footsteps echo loudly on the tiled floor.
"It's perfect," says Jack.
He's right, it is perfect. I look at Carl and we smile. "How do you
feel?"
He shrugs. "A little nervous."
"You'll be OK," says Billy. "Just concentrate. Concentrate."
Carl nods his head. "Concentrate." And off we go.
We walk as a group from room to room, trying not to catch the eye of
the sour faced security guards. Every wall is filled with enormous
paintings. There are battle scenes, old boats with billowing sails,
views from bridges in foreign countries and a whole room full of
portraits of men in black hats who look as if they have sat on very
sharp carrots.
However, we are not looking at the paintings, we are looking for an
opportunity. It is Jack who spots it.
"There!" he says in a whisper and points. "There!"
We look in the direction of his outstretched finger. Yes! It's the
open goal of opportunities, the chance of a lifetime.
In front of a very large painting of a very fat lady sitting on a sad
looking horse is a man. The man is wearing a green jacket, black
trousers and on his head is a hat. The hat is no ordinary hat, however.
On top of the hat, right in the centre, is a pole and attached to this
pole is a triangular flag.
The man is a tour guide.
Gathered around the man, listening to him talk, are about thirty very
old ladies and very old gentlemen. They are all dressed in their Sunday
best. The men are in shirts and ties and the ladies in long cotton
dresses. They are moving their wrinkled heads up and down as they
listen to the man's words.
It really is a perfect situation.
"You know what to do," I say to Carl.
Carl nods his head. He doesn't say anything but one by one he shakes
our hands.
"Good luck," says Bell.
"Good luck," says Billy.
"Knock them dead," says Jack.
As Carl sets off towards the pensioners we hide ourselves behind a
large potted plant. We'll be able to watch the action safely through
its green fronds without being seen.
Jack looks up at me. "Do you think he'll do it?"
"Of course. Of course he will." I put an arm around Jack's shoulder
and he grins. I grin back. At our side Billy and Bell are totally
silent.
In the centre of the room Carl is striding confidently across the
floor. He is nearing the target. Bell squeezes my arm and I hold my
breath.
The man in the green hat with the flag turns his back on his charges
and points at the lady on the horse. He is saying something. He doesn't
see Carl. If this was a pantomime we would shout, "look out behind
you!" But it's not, so we don't.
Carl is walking around the edge of the group. He looks like any other
visitor to the gallery. No one is paying him any attention.
The man is still talking, the pensioners are still listening and I am
still holding my breath.
Here we go.
Carl reaches the front of the group and now, suddenly, he nips to his
left. He positions himself right in front of the picture, right in
front of everyone. He spins on his heel so his back is to the
pensioners and for a moment it looks like he is looking at the picture
too. It looks like he is looking at the bottom left hand corner of the
picture because he is leaning forward and he has bent his knees
slightly.
One or two of the old ladies are tutting and nudging each other. I can
imagine them saying that this young boy is rude, that he is standing
directly in their line of sight.
They don't know the half of it. Yet.
We see Carl's lips pucker in concentration.
Bell glances at me. "He's going to do it. He's really going to do
it."
And then Carl does it. Carl farts.
The sound is enormous, huge. It's like a thunderclap, a twenty-four
gun salute. The noise bounces off the walls of the chamber and the echo
increases the sound, doubles it, triples it.
The ladies and gentlemen at the front recoil as if they are being
strafed by machine gun fire and their action forces those behind them
to move back too. The whole group is in turmoil. They don't know what's
hit them.
And then Carl does it again. If anything, this time, the noise is
louder. One old lady screams and falls into the arms of the gentleman
next to her. Someone is calling for smelling salts (ironic, I think)
and someone else is calling for the police, for the army, the fire
brigade, anything.
The man with the hat has turned from the picture. He sees Carl next to
him and although I doubt he knows exactly what is happening, he guesses
it is something to do with Carl. He raises his fist.
"Stop!" the man shouts and then Carl is flying past us, he is making a
run for it.
"Come on," he calls, "let's get out of here."
We don't waste any time and within seconds we are running after Carl.
We are running out of the building, running past surprised security
guards, running out of the door. We don't stop running until we get to
the beach.
We collapse breathless on the sand.
"Oh my God!" says Carl. "Did you see their faces? Did you see their
faces?"
I want to answer but I can't, I'm laughing too much. I can't get the
image of Carl bent in front of the picture, all those old ladies
screaming out of my head. I lie back on the sand and try to control my
laughing. I try to think of boring things. I try to think of homework,
geography, double maths on a Friday morning but it doesn't work.
Finally, just when my sides are aching so much I guess I'm about two
millimetres away from laughing myself to death I think of Jack in the
water and I stop laughing. I sit up. I see that the others look just
how I imagine I look. Their faces are red, their eyes are watering and
their cheeks are puffy.
"So," says Carl, "did I get in?"
"Sorry?"
"Am I a member of your club?"
I look at Bell, I look at Billy, I look at Jack. They all nod their
heads.
"You're in."
"You have the best fart in the world," says Jack.
"Thank you," says Carl. He smiles and then picks some sand up in his
fist. He lets it run out onto the beach. "And now I'm a member, what do
I have to do?"
What does he have to do? Like I said before, we don't have membership
cards, we don't have rule books, we don't have anything. Carl doesn't
have to do anything.
Next to me Billy pushes up his glasses. "You have to tell us the end
of your story. You have to tell us about Ben."
Well done Billy. That's right. That's what Carl has to do. I can't
believe I'd forgotten.
"Um...." says Carl. He stands up. Quickly. Nervously. "I'd love to
tell you," he says, "but I have to go. I have things to do. Next time,
I promise."
He starts to walk up the beach.
"Hey! Carl! I want to hear the story! I want to hear it now!"
Carl turns and while still walking backwards he shouts, "I'll see you
tomorrow. Same time. I'll tell you tomorrow. I promise. Long live the
Fart Club."
He raises his left hand to his mouth blows a long and loud raspberry
and then he is gone.

Chapter 13

I am asleep and I am dreaming. I have an image of Carl in my head. I
see him bent in front of the picture of the fat lady on the horse. I
see the look of concentration on his face and then I hear the sound
that is like gunfire. It is loud, very loud. I wake up with a jump and
I'm surprised I can still hear the sounds from my dream. Only they
aren't in my dream, they are coming from outside. Patapatapat.
I climb out from under my duvet and pad across the floor, trying not
to wake Jack. I pull aside the curtains. I see a wall of water. It is
raining. It is raining cats. It is raining dogs. It's raining
hard.
"It's raining."
I turn and see Jack is awake. He is rubbing his eyes. I sing that song
about raining and pouring and old men snoring and Jack giggles and rubs
his eyes some more. Then he asks about Clacton.
Clacton? Good question. I look out of the window again. Several dogs
and then several dogs fly past and land on the ground with a growl and
a meow.
"Well," says Jack, scratching his head, "are we going?"
You know me and mysteries. A few raindrops can't stop me, a few
injured animals won't get in my way.
"Of course we're going."
"Hooray!" says Jack and claps his hands. "Hooray!"

At breakfast I notice mum is not her usual self. Sorry, I should say
that my mum is not one of her usual selves. She is not her moody self
and she is not her jolly self. She looks like someone who has something
on her mind. I ask her if she is OK.
"I have something on my mind."
Bingo! Well done Jake. I ask her what it is.
She runs her hand through her hair. "Oh, nothing. Nothing love.
Really."
The alarm bells should have started ringing then. I should have known
then that when my mum says nothing, she means something, something very
big. But I am too busy thinking about my own life, my own adventure to
consider that something is going on in my mum's life too. If I had
stopped and thought about it then I might have worked out what was
going to happen later. But I don't. I don't at all.
After I have eaten my toast and Jack has eaten his Weetabix my mum
pulls on her coat and says she has to go to work. As if we didn't know.
She asks me and Jack what we're doing that day and I put on my innocent
face and say nothing special, not much. I don't tell my mum we are
going to Clacton, I don't mention Carl's name, not even in a whisper. I
try to appear calm, as if I have nothing on my mind. But as soon as my
mum is out the door I rush upstairs and pull out my and Jack's new
anoraks. We put them on and we are ready to go. We are ready to go and
meet Carl. Ready to hear the story about Ben.
But first let me tell you something else. Let me tell you about our
new anoraks.
Mum must have bought them cheap as a pair because they are exactly the
same size. So while mine is tight around my shoulders and rides up my
stomach if I put my hand in the air, Jack's reaches to his feet. Both
of us look ridiculous. I look like a tomato sandwich wrapped too
tightly in clingfilm and Jack looks like he's wearing one of those
saggy condoms you sometimes see lying about in the street.
I look at Jack and smile. "Nice anorak."
He smiles back. "Nice anorak too, bro."
And why do we say this? We say it, I believe, because for once we want
to get in there with the sarcastic comment before Bell.
Outside, the rain is still pouring down. We knock first for Billy and
then for Bell, running from house to house trying to keep out of the
rain. Trying and failing.
"Nice anoraks," says Bell as soon as she sees us.
"We know," say Jack and I together and we both laugh and Bell looks a
little put out but not quite so put out that she doesn't smile when I
say that today is the day we will get to the bottom of Carl's story,
today is the day we begin our quest to save Carl. Although quite who or
what we're saving him from we still don't exactly know.
By the time we reach the station, by the time we have completed the
first toe of the first leg of our journey, we are already soaking wet.
I have discovered that not only are the anoraks the wrong size, they
also let in water.
Luckily we don't have to wait long before the train whooshes into the
station. We clamber on and find a double seat and then I look out of
the window and watch the passing countryside. I don't join in the
conversation with the others. I want some time to think about Carl. I
can't wait to hear the end of his story and I'm praying that he'll be
there, that he won't be put off by the rain. I don't think he will. He
doesn't look like the kind of person who would be put off by a little
rain. Don't forget, I've seen him in the water. This boy is half
fish.
As the train pulls into Clacton I am the first off and I call
impatiently for the others to hurry up. Then as soon as they are all
next to me on the platform I am hurrying them out of the station. The
weather in Clacton is no better than at home. If anything it is more
windy, more rainy, more catty, more doggy.
We run to the sea front, splashing through puddles, hugging the sides
of the buildings for shelter. However, the shelter is no good, the rain
is too strong and we arrive at the amusement arcade looking like
drowned rats, drowned cats, drowned anything.
We stand in the doorway of the arcade, gasping for breath, and look
out across the beach. Just in case you hadn't guessed, let me tell you,
the beach is empty. There are no people on it, not even one old man
with his trousers rolled up, with a hankie on his head. The sea is
crashing violently on the shore and everywhere you look is rain.
"Nice," says Bell. "Fancy a bit of sunbathing?"
Ha ha, I want to say but I don't.
"Do you think he'll come?" asks Jack.
That's what I want to say. "I don't know. We'll have to wait."
And that is what we do. We wait and we wait. I look at my watch and I
look again. The time creeps slowly by. Jack and Billy and Bell all want
to play I-spy so we play endless games until I am going mad and want to
kill the person who invented such a boring game. Just when I think I
can't stand it anymore and I am stuck on something beginning with C and
I know it's not the chemist's, not the candy floss machine and not even
the chip shop Billy says, "no silly, Carl begins with C. It's
Carl."
And then I see him, I see Carl walking towards us and wonder how I
ever missed him and then almost at the same time I realise why I did.
Carl looks different.
"Where's your jacket?" I ask.
"Last night, I took it off for a minute and somebody nicked it." He
looks at Jack. "I was
annoyed," he says. "Really very annoyed."
I can see why. Next to Carl we appear dry. Carl could not have looked
wetter if he had gone for a swim in all his clothes and then stood
under a shower while being hosed down by all the Queen's gardeners. I
hope you understand what I mean.
"So," says Carl, wiping water from his forehead, "what are we going to
do?"
I have an idea. As a large drop lands on my head I have an idea, an
idea to get us out of the rain.
"We're going home."
"Oh," says Carl. He looks disappointed. "But I just got here."
"I know. We're going home, and you're going with us."
"Oh," says Carl again, beginning to smile. "Are you sure it's OK?" His
eyes have lit up. He looks like the cat that has got the cream. He
looks like a cat that has got a bucketful of cream. He looks like a
homeless boy who has been offered a home.
I nod my head. "Sure."
Carl is really smiling. "OK," he says, "OK." If I wanted I could count
his teeth. I don't. Counting teeth is not something I'm in to, not
really.

On the train on the way home I have another idea. I seem to be full of
them today. Sometimes I have days like that and sometimes I don't. I
have this particular idea because I am sitting next to Carl and I have
it because as Carl's clothes start to dry, they also start to smell.
Badly. I don't say anything all the way back, not a word, I don't even
hold my nose but as soon as we walk through my front door I turn to
Carl and I put my idea into action.
"Get those things off."
It's what my mum always says to me when I come home after football
practice and I am covered from head to toe in mud. I try to imitate her
stern face as well.
I must have got it right because without saying anything Carl starts
to pull off a shoe. I slap my forehead with my palm.
"Not here. Upstairs. Upstairs!" If my mum could see me she would be
proud. Actually, if my mum could see me she would probably ask what
this strange, freckled, skinny, smelly boy was doing in our
house.
I tell Billy and Bell and Jack to wait in the lounge and then I tell
Carl to follow me upstairs. I head straight for the bathroom with Carl
right behind me.
I sit on the side of the bath and look at Carl. "Now, get
undressed."
"Yes sir. Right away sir," says Carl and he laughs. If what he said
was true, that he hadn't laughed in ages, then he had certainly been
making up for it in the last few days. More than making up for
it.
"You don't have to sir me. Just call me boss."
Carl laughs again and then starts to take off his clothes. I twist the
taps and water shoots out into the bath.
"Can I just ask you something?" Carl says, pulling his T-shirt over
his head.
I nod my head.
"Are you trying to tell me something?"
I don't understand. "Sorry?"
Then I notice Carl looking at the bath, looking at the rising water,
looking at the growing pile of his clothes on the floor. I
understand.
"I'm not trying to tell you something. I am telling you something. You
stink."
"Thanks," says Carl, as he pulls off a sock and I almost collapse from
the pong. "If I wasn't a member of your Fart Club I'd be upset you said
that."
I smile an evil smile. "Just because you're a member of the Fart Club,
it doesn't mean you have to smell like a fart."
"Hey!" says the now naked Carl and he lifts his leg and tries to kick
me.
Luckily I see the blow coming. I grab the incoming foot with both
hands and I twist and push and with a yelp and a spinning of arms Carl
topples backwards into the bath with a huge splash. He says something I
won't repeat and I pick up his dirty clothes and run out of the room
laughing.
I bundle Carl's clothes into the washing machine and choose the
programme that says extra soiled, there isn't one that says extra extra
extra soiled, I check, and then I sort out some of my own clothes for
Carl to wear in the meantime. As I go back into the bathroom to leave
them on the floor Carl looks at me and smiles. He is scrubbing his arms
with a sponge. I can see pale flesh, not dark dirt. The water is
already black.
"I'm having a bath."
"I can see. But I think after you've been in there it's the bath
that's going to need a bath."
I don't wait for an answer, I know it will be rude. Instead I leave
Carl in peace and privacy and I go downstairs and join the others. I
find them sitting quietly on the sofa. They look like they are waiting
to see a doctor. I squeeze in between Billy and Jack and I wait for
that doctor with them. Of course, we're not really waiting to see a
doctor, we're waiting to hear Carl's story, we're waiting to hear about
Ben.
Ten minutes pass, twenty. After thirty minutes I go to the bottom of
the stairs and shout up. I'm worried that Carl has fallen asleep,
fallen under the water and drowned like Jack nearly did the day before.
Carl's shout is so loud I'm pretty sure that he's not dead. He says
that he'll be down in a minute.
We wait one minute. We wait ten. Just as we are waiting for the
twentieth minute someone who looks like Carl appears in the room.
"What have you done with Carl?" asks Bell.
"Very funny," says the boy who looks a bit like Carl.
"That is Carl, Bell," says Jack. "He just looks different."
"He's clean," says Billy.
"I know," says Bell. "I was just being sarcastic."
Carl does a twirl. "I feel great. That's the first bath I've had since
nineteen ninety-six."
Jack scratches his head. "I was three in nineteen ninety-six."
Billy pushes up his glasses. "Nineteen ninety-six, that's four years
ago."
Carl sits down. He looks suddenly serious. His smile has suddenly
disappeared. He looks at each one of us in turn. "Thank you," he says.
"Thank you all."
"That's OK," I say. "No problem."
"No," says Carl, "really, thank you."
And then Carl does something that surprises us all. He does something
out of the blue. He does something out of the pink, the red and the
green. Carl puts his head in his hands and starts to cry.
"I used to cry before I had a bath," says Jack, "not after."
I tell Jack to be quiet and Bell and I go over and sit next to Carl.
We both put an arm around him and Billy goes into the kitchen and comes
back with a paper towel. Carl takes it and wipes first his nose and
then his eyes.
"Sorry. It's just been such a long time."
"Four years is a long time between baths," says Billy.
Carl sniffs. "No, I mean it's been a long time since anyone was nice
to me, since I had
proper friends."
"Oh," says Billy.
"Do you want to talk about it?" I ask.
Carl blows his nose. "About Ben you mean?"
I nod my head.
"OK. I promised you already. I'll tell you the story." He looks at
Jack. I understand his meaning. So does Jack.
"I want to stay," he says. His face is adamant.
"All right," I say, giving in, knowing already it is a battle I could
never win, "you can stay."
Jack smiles. And Carl tells his story.
If you want to find out Carl's story, please go to the next chapter.
It's all there in full, in glorious Technicolor.
And what a story it is.

Chapter 14

Carl's Story

The day I met Ben it was raining too, raining hard like today. I was
sitting under a bridge behind Charing Cross station and I was cold and
I was wet. I'd pulled my sleeping-bag over me and me and about four
other lads were watching the rain fall. I was hungry and I wanted the
rain to stop so I could go out and beg for money. Nobody ever gives
anything when it's raining. When it's raining all you can do is wait
and pray for it to end.
It was the dogs I saw first. Suddenly they were hurtling towards me
like two balls of muscle, one black and one white. The other lads leapt
up and started screaming but I stayed where I was. I wasn't scared of
dogs. I was only scared of humans. That was a lesson I'd learnt from
experience.
It was a good lesson because the dogs ignored me and started barking
only at the screaming boys. They were really going for it, both boys
and dogs. I thought they were going to raise the dead. Or the police at
least.
Then, above all this noise, I heard someone shouting, "Where are you
girls? Where are you girls?" and Ben appeared from out of the
rain.
Ben. That was my first sight of Ben and every day since then I've
wished I'd never set eyes on him. Ever.
"Sorry," said Ben, looking at me and then looking at the boys, "we
didn't mean to scare you, we didn't mean to make you jump." Ben always
speaks like that, always says we and never I, as if him and the dogs
are one person. He told the dogs to shut up and they did straight away
and then he told them to come to him and they did, all quiet and meek.
And as the dogs walked away the boys started acting like they were
never scared at all. They started joking with each other and slapping
each other on the arm and calling each other all sorts of names.
But Ben ignored them, he only spoke to me. He said that he was lost
and that he wanted to go to Trafalgar Square. He asked me if I knew
where it was and I said I did and he said, "where then?" and I gave him
directions. But Ben said he was no good at following directions and
that if I went with him then he would give me a couple of quid. It
seemed like easy money and I had nothing better to do, so I
agreed.
I never saw my home under the bridge again. I never saw those boys
again.
On the way to Trafalgar Square Ben asked me what I was doing, and how
I got money. I didn't like being asked questions, especially by strange
older men, but I was thinking of the money I had been promised. So I
told him. I didn't think I was giving anything away, I thought the
answers were obvious. I told Ben I didn't do anything and that I lived
under the bridge and made a living begging for money.
Ben nodded his head and said that he thought it was very interesting,
only he didn't say that, he said, "we think that's very interesting,
yes we do," and he looked down at his dogs.
Then Ben asked me if I had ever read Oliver Twist. I said that I had
never read any books, that books weren't much use in my way of life,
except if I found one I would keep it and use the pages as toilet
paper. Ben said that that was a pity and that Oliver Twist was a very
interesting book. He said that it was right up my street, and it would
really open my eyes. I wondered what he meant and as there was still a
long way to go to Trafalgar Square I asked him to explain.
Ben said that Oliver Twist was about a group of homeless people, just
like me, and I interrupted and said that that wasn't really the kind of
book I needed to be reading, that was the kind of book I could write.
Ben told me to hang on and not to be impatient. He said, "we haven't
finished explaining yet." He said that these young people in Oliver
Twist form a gang and that they have a very kind protector who teaches
them things and takes care of their welfare. He said that this
protector gives them shelter and love. I said that that sounded nice
and Ben said it was nice and then he stopped.
He turned in the street and looked at me. The rain was still pouring
down and dripping off our heads. Ben said that he had been lying to me.
He said that he knew where Trafalgar Square was and I said oh, did that
mean I wouldn't get my money. That was the first time I saw Ben laugh.
In fact, it's the only time I've ever seen Ben laugh. When Ben stopped
laughing he told me not to worry and that he would give me plenty of
money. He said that if I gave him a few hours of my time he would
explain how. He said I'd be rich.
I didn't believe him, not at all, but my life was boring and I was
always ready to hear a story however tall. To be honest, the taller the
story the more I liked it and any story was better than sitting under a
bridge and looking at the rain. So I agreed. I said that, in fact,
after checking my diary I had found that I did indeed have a couple of
hours to spare. Ben said that was good and he asked if he could buy me
a coffee. I said yes right away. A story and a hot drink I definitely
couldn't refuse.
Ben told the dogs to wait outside this little cafe and we went in to
the sound of a bell ringing above our heads. Ben asked me if I fancied
a cake as well as a coffee and I thought Ben was just about the nicest
person I had ever met. Ben bought me one cake and then another and he
watched me eat. After I finished the second cake and licked clean my
fingers Ben said that if I wanted I could eat cake every day. I said
that that would be very nice although I still didn't believe him. I
told him to start his tale.
Ben looked me in the eye and asked me if I remembered what he had told
me about Oliver Twist and I said I wasn't an idiot, of course I
remembered, he had only told me a few minutes before. Ben said good,
very good and then he leant over the table and started to talk in a low
whisper. He told me the whole story in the same quiet voice as if it
was the biggest secret in the whole wide world. And now I'm going to
tell you.
Ben started by saying that he happened to know of just such a gang as
in Oliver Twist. In fact, he said, he was the leader of this gang.
(Actually he said, "we know of this gang" and "we lead this gang, yes
we do" and he looked at the two dogs through the window.) He said that
he was always looking for new blood and he'd known I was right for him
as soon as he'd seen that I wasn't afraid of his girls. He asked me if
I wanted to hear more.
I said of course. No one had ever told me I was right for anything and
besides, I thought that if I listened to the end, I might even get
another cake. So Ben continued. He told me that he had a house on the
coast and that there were lots of girls and boys there just like me,
but living in comfort and eating cake every day. He told me many
wonderful stories about this gang, about what a good time they had,
what good friends they were. He told me how in the Summer months they
went to the beach and went swimming and how in the Winter they would
build huge fires and snuggle around them for warmth. He told me of the
fireworks they had on Bonfire night and of the many presents they had
at Christmas. He told me so many things that I totally forgot about
wanting another cake. It all sounded great. So when Ben took a deep
breath and said, "in fact, we are on our way home now and you can join
us if you like. We would be honoured, yes we would" I didn't have to
think, I just said yes. I said yes I would love to go. And so I did, I
went.
When I saw the house I thought it was about the best thing I'd ever
seen. Don't forget I'd been living under a bridge for almost a year.
The house was dry and it had a roof. That was enough for me.
Ben introduced me to the others and said I was his latest acquisition.
Everybody nodded their heads and said hello and then Ben showed me
where I could sleep. It was a top bunk with a duvet and sheets. Now I
was sure, Ben was definitely the nicest person I had ever met. After
our dinner of fish and chips Ben said he wanted to speak to me. He
asked me all about my life, where I was born, who my parents were,
everything. I told him.
That night, I thought Ben was my best friend in the world. However, it
wasn't long before I changed my mind, it wasn't long before I realised
I was wrong, completely wrong.
The next morning I was woken by a loud noise. I rubbed my eyes and sat
up. The noise was coming from Ben. He was shouting that it was time for
work, time for work, over and over. Work, nobody had told me about work
but as the others were all climbing out of their beds and groaning and
gathering in a group I guessed it was only right that I joined
them.
Ben came and stood at the front of this group, one of his dogs on
either side of him, and took out a small notebook. He looked down at it
and started to read. He read out a name and then a job, a name and then
a job. He was like a sergeant giving orders. As each boy or girl heard
their order they would say, "yes Ben, we promise to do our best," and
then they would leave straight away without another word.
The group got smaller and smaller until eventually there was only me
and another boy left, a small runty boy with yellow eyes. Ben looked at
me and said because I was new I would be working with this other boy.
He said that I was to pay careful attention, to learn quickly, and then
he said to both of us that we were on the phone boxes. He said, "we
hope you have a good day, yes we do." The boy nodded his head and we
were off.
I didn't know what being on the phone boxes meant so I asked yellow
eyes and on the way down the hill to wherever we were going he
explained it to me. He said that being on the phone boxes meant that we
had to go to every phone box in town and check the change return to see
if there were any coins. I thought that sounded OK and I said so and
the boy looked at me and said something that I couldn't repeat in front
of Jack. I didn't understand.
Soon, however, I did understand. While the job sounded OK, it wasn't.
It was boring. It was the kind of job that made begging seem
interesting, it was the kind of job that made sitting under a bridge in
the rain seem desirable. After two hours I was desperate to stop. We
had collected a grand total of sixty pee between us. I said to the boy
we should have a break but the boy said we weren't allowed. He said
that if Ben found out he would kill us. I said that that couldn't be
true, that Ben was the nicest person I had ever met and the boy
laughed. The boy laughed long and loud.
The following day I was checking the coin returns of the machines in
the arcade and the day after that I was begging outside the train
station. And every time I said that Ben was the nicest person in the
world the person I was with laughed. It was always the same kind of
laugh. Long and loud.
This went on for two weeks. At the end of every day we had to give our
money to Ben and he wrote down the figures in his little book. And
every day there was some job, we even worked on a Sunday.
At the beginning of the third week Ben said that it was time for me to
go out on my own. He said he wanted me to do the phone boxes and he
asked me if I thought I could manage it. I said I could, of course I
could and off I went. I was glad to be only in my own company for a
change and I almost bounced down the hill into town.
I remember well that that day was a beautiful hot summer day. After
two hours I was exhausted and bored of going from box to box. The sweat
was running down my body and my clothes were sticking to me. As I was
next to the beach I had an idea. I thought I would take a dip in the
sea. So I did. Then I thought I would have a lie down on the beach. So
I did.
I had a lovely time. Ben was right, Ben had changed my life. I was
happy.
When I got home that evening I handed over my money to Ben. I was
proud because I had collected more by myself than I had working with
the yellow-eyed boy on my second day in the house. Ben took the money
and wrote down the amount in his little book. And then whack! He hit me
across the head. I went crashing to the floor and blood was pouring
from my lip. Ben said that if ever I took a break again while I was
working then he would kill me. He said that I hadn't just let myself
down I had let everybody down. That evening at dinner I was very quiet
and I kept myself to myself.
Later, when I was lying in my bed and thinking about my life and my
cut lip Ben came to my bedside. He knelt down beside me and whispered
into my ear. He said that apart from my one mistake I was doing well,
very well. He said that I was not to let one little mistake get me
down. He said that I was much brighter than any of the other boys, he
had noticed it right away, and he said that he had a special job for
me. He said, "we have decided you are going to go on to big things, yes
we have." And then he stood up and disappeared into the shadows.
Despite myself I was excited. I forgot about my cut lip and I fell
asleep dreaming of adventure.
In the months after that I came to understand that that was how Ben
worked. He would knock you down and then later he would flatter you. He
made you feel that he was being hard on you only because you were above
the others.
I realise now that he was doing the same to everyone. He was always
telling everyone they were better than everyone else. He did this to
create competition between us. Ben knew that if there was competition
between us we would always be ready to stab each other in the back. But
I didn't realise that then. Not yet.
The day after Ben hit me he didn't call my name out in the morning.
When I was left standing there all alone, when the others had all gone,
he put an arm around my shoulders and said he was going to train me to
be a pickpocket. He said, "you're going to be a pickpocket, yes you
are?"
Being a pickpocket was the hardest job in the house and it was also
the one that brought in the most money. And the most respect. There
were two pickpockets already and they always got the best food, didn't
have to get up so early in the morning and had a certain amount of
freedom.
So when Ben said I was going to be a pickpocket I was excited. I said
great and wow and Ben said there wasn't enough time for all those
words. He told me to follow him, there was no time like the present, a
lot of work to do.
We went out onto the land behind the house and Ben started to teach me
the art of picking pockets. Hour after hour, day after day, he made me
practice and every night I fell into bed exhausted. But I was happy.
You see, I was a natural. For the first time in my life I was good at
something. I could take a wallet from a back pocket, a front pocket,
the inside of a jacket. It was all the same to me. And the person I did
it to never noticed anything.
Only two weeks after my training started I was out doing it on the
streets. I would pick ten or twelve wallets a day. Sometimes I would
come home with hundreds of pounds. And for a while as Ben counted how
much I had made and wrote it down in his little book I was so proud. I
enjoyed the glances of envy I got from the other kids. For once, I was
happy.
But that feeling passed. That feeling soon passed.
I started to lay awake at night and think about what I was doing. I
was stealing. I was a thief. Before, when I'd been a beggar, people had
given me money of their own free will. They had had a choice. But when
I took someone's wallet, they had no choice. I began to worry about the
people I took the money from. Maybe that was all the money they had,
maybe me taking the money meant that they couldn't eat, pay the
rent.
I decided I didn't want to be a pickpocket anymore.
I went to Ben and said could I go back to the phone boxes, go back to
begging. You can guess his answer. I don't need to tell you that he hit
me. He said, "we remember your story boy, yes we do." He said why
didn't he tell social services about me, why didn't he send me back to
a home, or a prison for young offenders. Or why didn't he tell my
father where I was.
The message was clear, Ben was blackmailing me.
I thought of running away, of going back to London. But I couldn't
stand to be homeless again. I couldn't stand the thought of living on
the streets, sleeping out in all weathers.
So I made a choice. I am fifteen and a half now. I decided that when I
was sixteen things would be different. I would go into a job centre and
I would find a job, asked to be signed up on some programme. Or I would
join the army. At least when I was sixteen I would have some
rights.
It gave me something to look forward to. And that's what I'm doing
now. I'm counting down the days.
When I'm sixteen, everything will change.
As long as nothing happens in the next six months, then everything
will be OK.
That's my story. That's all. And if you still want to be my friends
then I would be very happy. Very happy.

Chapter 15

Carl stops talking and I look at Billy, I look at Bell, I look at Jack,
I look at everyone. I don't know what to say. Luckily, Jack is on the
ball. He is on the ball and he shoots. He knows exactly what to
say.
"But what about the boy?"
"Sorry?" says Carl.
"The boy who hit you, the boy in the cafe."
"Oh...."
"Yes," says Bell, leaning forward. "What about him? Why did he hit
you?"
Carl stands. He scratches an armpit. "I'm just going to the toilet.
I'll be down in a minute.... I'll be back in a while....""
"Carl....?" I start but Carl has already gone, he is already bounding
out of the room.
We have no choice but to wait. We listen to Carl going up the stairs,
we listen to Carl in the toilet, we listen to the flush of the cistern
and then just as we hear Carl's footsteps coming back down the stairs
and just as we think we are going to hear some more of his story
something happens.
There is the sound of a key in a lock and the front door opens.
Instinctively we all turn, we all look towards the door, and there is
my mum. My mum and someone else. My mum is not alone. Standing just
behind her and holding two very large bags is Jeremy.
Suddenly the alarm bells that should have started ringing earlier that
morning start ringing loudly. I now understand the reason for my mum's
tension at breakfast.
Today is the day Jeremy is moving in.
Jeremy looks nervously around at us, at his (un)welcoming party. "Hi
guys," he says and he lifts a hand and attempts a smile. It is not a
winning smile and I have to say it doesn't win. Jack leaps up off the
sofa and runs upstairs clutching his hands to his head. Both me and my
mum stare after him. Both me and my mum say his name.
Our party seems to have ended.
The rest of Carl's story will have to wait. The story about the boy
will have to wait.
I hurriedly say goodbye to my friends, I hand Carl his newly clean
clothes and then I go up to see Jack, followed closely by mum.
Meanwhile, Jeremy sits down on the sofa and looks at the blank TV
screen.

Later that night I spend hours talking about Carl with Jack. I do this
for two reasons. The first reason is that I really want to talk about
Carl. It was quite a story he told us, quite a tale, something worth
talking about. And the second reason is to distract Jack's attention
away from Jeremy. I have seen enough tears for one day. I have seen
enough tears for one week.
Jack and I try to think of a plan to help Carl, to save him from his
life as a thief. Jack starts by saying that Carl can come and live with
us. I say that I don't think mum would be too pleased about that. I say
that she wouldn't be a cow jumping over the moon. I don't, however,
make the point that at the minute our mum seems quite keen to take in
waifs and strays ie. Jeremy. Jeremy is exactly what I'm not trying to
remind Jack of.
Jack then goes on to say that he has seen a TV programme about some
children who look after an injured soldier in their shed. He says that
Carl can come and live in our shed, secretly, and that every night
we'll take food out to him. I point out that we don't have a shed and
that idea bites the dust.
Eventually, some time after midnight, we are all out of ideas and we
fall asleep without a plan. But on the plus side we also fall asleep
without having mentioned Jeremy.
The following morning we get up early and go to see Carl, planless but
happy to be in his company anyway. We meet him on the beach in bright
sunshine. We have a nice time, we splash in the sea, we eat ice creams.
Carl however doesn't want and won't talk about the boy who hit him. He
says that that's a story best left for another time, another day. He
says that it's a story for dark nights and stormy weather. And we can't
argue with that. We don't argue with that. We have fun.
The next day we see Carl again. And the next. And so on.
If our club was the kind of club that had membership cards then Carl's
would definitely have already slipped through his door in a shiny white
envelope. He is one of us, one of the gang, a part of the whole, a fart
among farts. We get used to his itching, we get used to him smoking
ends of cigarettes he has found. And the Summer almost returns to
normal. Almost. We eat chips, we go to the beach, Jack builds
sandcastles and I relax. I am as lazy as I had always wanted to be.
Everything is fine and if Carl has to disappear for a few hours every
day to steal wallets then we try not to think about it too much. We try
not to think about Jeremy too much either.
When we wake up every day and when we go home every night Jeremy is
there. He has breakfast with us in the morning, he watches tele with us
in the evening and every night he sleeps on the sofa. The best way, I
think, I can explain my feelings for Jeremy is by talking about Man U.
After all, families and football teams are very similar.
Integrating a new member into an existing team can often be a problem.
For example, in recent years Man U have had so many goalkeepers;
Taiebi, Bosnich, Van de Gouw, Bartez. None of them have been
particularly successful. Taiebi let a ball pass through his legs in an
important European match and never played again. Bosnich couldn't kick
and was dropped. Van de Gouw was good but too old. And the latest was
Bartez. He came with a good reputation but nobody was sure yet.
With any new member you cannot guarantee success. You never really
know how they will work out.
Jeremy is exactly like a new team member, a new goalkeeper in our
house. Jack, mum and me are the basic team and Jeremy is the latest
transfer. For the moment I am giving him the benefit of the doubt, I'm
not sure if he can save balls or not. But Jack is really having
problems. Jeremy is a team-mate he isn't getting on with. If Jack had
to describe Jeremy in goalkeeping terms he would say Jeremy had butter
fingers, he would say that Jeremy couldn't catch a cold on a trip to
the North Pole, he would say he had seen better saving from a
spendthrift.
To put it plainly, Jack doesn't like Jeremy. Not much.
So when, about a week after Jeremy has moved in, Carl says he has a
special day planned for us I am happy. I think a special day is just
what Jack needs.

"Where is he?" I say, looking at my watch. Billy and Bell and Jack and
me are sitting on Clacton beach. The sun is shining and it is already
hot. It looks like it is going to be one of those perfect blue-skied
Summer days.
Bell rubs a hand over her head. "Don't worry, he'll be here."
Despite her words I can see Bell is worried too. I know she's thinking
something might have happened to Carl. We all are. That's the problem
being friends with a homeless thief, you never know if they might be
arrested, beaten up or forcibly adopted by a family of lunatics.
Then Jack speaks and points. "There he is. I see him. I see
him."
"Where?" I say and then I see him too. Or rather I see someone closely
resembling the late Count Dracula walking towards us.
"New coat?" I say to Carl as he arrives.
"Yes, do you like it?" Carl does a twirl, showing off his latest
acquisition.
"Nice," says Bell. "Very nice."
Of course, Bell is lying. The coat is not nice at all. It is blacker
than the blackest night, thicker than the thickest plank, longer than
the longest lesson. In fact, the coat is so long that it drags in the
sand as Carl walks. But that is not the coat's most noticeable feature.
No. You see, the coat has a huge sticking up collar which encircles
Carl's neck and cast a shadow over his face. It is the kind of collar
that takes the biscuit, takes the biscuit and then eats it. All in all,
I have to say that it is definitely the kind of coat a budding vampire
would wear.
"You look like something from a horror film," says Billy.
"Thank you," says Carl in a deep horror film voice and he raises his
arms in the air and widens his eyes. "I'm the evil Count Carl from
Transylvania." Jack screams and laughs and Carl chases him around and
around in a circle.
When eventually they stop running around in a circle and sit down on
the beach, breathless, and nobody is saying anything I look at Carl and
say, "So what's this special day then?"
"Ah yes," says Carl in his horror film voice again. "The special day."
He stands and sweeps his coat dramatically around him and starts
walking up the beach towards the rocks. "Follow me," he says and he
laughs like a monster. "Follow me."
Billy and Bell and Jack and me all look at each other and smile and
then we jump up and follow.
Once at the rocks Jack wants to stop and look for crabs but Carl says
we don't have enough time and we all wonder time for what but we don't
have time to ask because Carl is already further ahead walking quickly.
He turns round every now and again and tells us to hurry up. He always
does it in the same horror film voice.
The rocks start to get bigger and bigger and now we have to help each
other clamber over them. Billy is finding it difficult. His breaths are
coming in puffs, his face is greasy with sweat and his glasses are
slipping down his nose more than usual. After one particularly big rock
he stops and puts his hand on his hips.
"I can't go any further. No further can I go."
"And neither can we," I say, stopping as well. We are directly in
front of a very tall cliff. There doesn't seem to be any way
forward.
Bell looks up at the bare rocks, looks right to the open sea and then
looks back at Carl. "This is special. I've never seen anything so
beautiful."
"Ha ha," says Carl and nods at the cliff. "We're going that way. Take
off your shoes and do as I do. Not far now. I promise."
Before we have chance to answer Carl is off once more. He is heading
towards the cliff and for a minute I think he's going to climb it. I'm
going to shout that it's too dangerous, that there is no way Jack could
do it (or me) but Carl doesn't climb, not even an inch, instead he
steps into the water at the base of the cliff and starts to edge around
the front of it. I look at the others, shrug, take off my shoes and
then go after him.
Just below the surface of the water, almost invisible to the eye, is a
rock ledge. It extends all along the front of the cliff and there is
just enough space to walk single file along it, which is what we do.
Carl is first, then Jack, me, Billy and finally Bell. We shuffle slowly
forward, looking down at our feet to make sure we don't miss our
footing, don't plunge head first into the sea and get swept away to
France, Spain, Africa. Nobody speaks. I feel a little scared, but don't
tell anyone, don't tell a soul.
After about five minutes of our dangerous journey, after about five
minutes of holding my breath, five minutes of sweating palms, the ledge
finishes, the cliff finishes and we step onto sand. Dry land.
Hooray!
Carl turns to look at us, grins a big beaming grin and spreads wide
his arms. "Well, what do you think?"
And only now do I look around.
Wow! Great! Amazing! Fab! That's what I think.
On all sides of us are high cliffs, rocky walls, the only access
apparently being the way we came. We are standing on the perfect
semicircle of a golden sandy beach. It seems more Caribbean island than
Clacton, more East Indies than East Anglia. It looks like
paradise.
"It's great," says Bell.
"I love it," says Billy.
I just smile and pat Jack on the head.
"Good," says Carl, "I'm glad you like it. I chose this place because
of its privacy. I didn't want you to be embarrassed."
I put my head on one side. "Embarrassed?"
"Yes," says Carl, nodding, "embarrassed. Sometimes these things can be
embarrassing if people are watching."
I stare at Carl hard. "What things?"
Carl looks at each of us in turn. He pauses dramatically.
"What things?"
"I'm going to teach you all to swim."
Jack jumps on the spot, Billy pushes up his glasses, Bell rubs a hand
over her head. I don't do anything, I just look out at the sea, at the
gently crashing waves. I wonder if soon I'll be doing a perfect
breaststroke across it's undulating surface.
Carl claps his hands. "Come on. Get changed. Lessons are about to
start."
We don't answer, we act. We pull on our swimming things and in less
than five minutes all five of us are standing at the water's
edge.
"Nice trunks," says Bell to Carl.
"Thanks," says Carl, "Do you like them?"
"What can I say?" says Bell.
Indeed, what can she say? I guess Carl probably found the trunks in
the same place he found the jacket. If Dracula went swimming they are
exactly the sort of trunks I imagine he would wear. The trunks are
black and baggy and reach all the way down to Carl's shins. Around the
bottom someone has sewn little plastic teeth, or maybe they are little
plastic fangs.
"Right then," says Carl, "who's first?"
I'm not nervous, not at all. Honestly. I look down at the sand. I'm
looking for shells. Honestly.
"Who's first?"
I push Billy forward. I'm kind like that. I watch him walk nervously
into the sea.

Chapter 16

An hour after arriving on the private beach I'm wondering why no-one
had ever told me that swimming is so easy. It is just a matter of
kicking your legs and waving your arms at the same time. Any idiot can
do that. After doing some kicking and waving while being supported by
another person I am ready to give it a go by myself.
I take a deep breath and lower myself into the water. I lift my feet
off the bottom. I rotate my arms, I flap my feet. I am moving through
the waves. I am swimming.
"Look," I shout, "I'm swim...Glug. Glug. Glug."
Swimming is easy. Swimming and talking, now that's a different
matter.
Another hour after that we all seem to have got the hang of it. We can
swim, not like fish, not like dolphins, not even like dogs, but we can
swim. And we can also float. Carl has shown us how to lie on our backs
and float in the water. All in all I think I prefer floating, swimming
is altogether too energetic.
"Nice this, isn't it?" says Billy.
Billy is floating next to me. His belly is sticking up out of the
water like a very small white mountain.
"Yes," I say, "very nice."
In fact, I have never felt so relaxed. The sun is on my face, the
water is cool around me. I am happy, content. I want to stay like this
forever. I close my eyes. The Summer holidays have turned out to be
perfect. My new friend is perfect. Everything is per....
Ah!!!!
Something slithers against my shoulder.
Ah!!!!
I imagine a shark. Or a whale. Or an octopus. I feel the something now
brush against my middle. I scream again and I flick open my eyes.
I see that, in fact, it is not a shark, a whale or an octopus. It is
Bell.
Bell is standing next to me and her hands are on my waist and before I
can ask myself or even ask her why her hands are on my waist she is
doing something to me. She is doing something evil, cruel, something
that you should never do to a relaxing boy who is enjoying his first
experience of floating. She is ripping off my trunks.
Before I have chance to react, before I have chance to do anything, in
one quick movement they're gone.
"I've got them," shouts Bell and she laughs.
I spin upright in the water, make a lunge for Bell but she slips out
of my hands. She slips away and then she is getting away and I can only
watch helplessly as she reaches the beach. Bell is on the beach, my
swimming trunks are on the beach and I am in the sea. Naked. Naked as
the day I was born. Naked as a baby. Naked as a...... no, we won't go
there.
Bell starts doing a dance on the sand waving my trunks in the
air.
"Come back!"
Bell waves my trunks once more. "Come and get them."
"Bell please!"
Bell doesn't answer, she only grins. Then Carl appears next to her. I
see him grinning too. "Lunch-time!" he shouts. "Lunch!" I notice now
what I hadn't noticed before, that Carl has a bag with him. It must
have been hidden under his jacket. Out of this bag he is taking food.
There are sandwiches, crisps, cans of drink, sausages.
"Lunch!" shouts Bell and looks at me. "Come and get your lunch."
Billy and Jack leap out of the water, go running up the beach and join
Carl and Bell. And I feel a right plonker standing there with only the
water between me and my plonker.
"Sausage," shouts Bell and holds up a sausage and everyone laughs and
looks at me.
Very funny. Not.
I don't know if you have ever stood naked in the water and watched
other people eating but it's not very nice, not really, especially not
when you're starving. I have just decided that I can't stand it
anymore, that I am going to walk up out of the water with my very own,
highly personal, sausage on full display when I see Carl whisper
something to Jack. I see Jack jump up and come running down to the
shore with a towel.
Hooray! I love my brother. I love Carl.
I join the others to a round of applause and the singing of that
famous stripper music. I ignore them all, I just eat.
After dinner, after we have stuffed ourselves stupid, we lie on the
beach with our hands behind our heads and we talk rubbish. If you have
good friends then you will know exactly what talking rubbish is. It is
all the things that are most important to you but you know if you ever
said them to your parents they would say, "What are you talking about?
Don't talk rubbish."
Just when I am thinking that I have had enough of talking rubbish,
that I am all talked out and that I am going to fall asleep, Carl
suddenly sits up, tosses aside the butt of the cigarette he has been
puffing on and tells us to get dressed. He says we are going, we are
leaving, we are departing.
I ask Carl where we are going but he doesn't answer. He only smiles
and tells me to shift my behind. "Come on," he says. "Pronto.
Pronto."
I don't like being told to hurry up, not usually and especially not
when I am on holiday and especially not in Spanish. But today is Carl's
day, he is in charge and so far he isn't doing a bad job. So I do as I
am told and I hurry up, I pronto, pronto.
The tide has come in slightly and as we creep past the side of the
cliff the water is up to our knees. I step on a piece of seaweed and I
nearly slip and I shout out. Carl looks back at me over his
shoulder.
"Don't panic, if you fall in you can swim now."
For all of those of you who are thinking, yes, he's right, let me tell
you, there is a big difference between swimming from the safety of the
shore and falling in the deep ocean, a big difference. About three
metres. More simply, more than enough to drown in.
But eventually, after five nerve wracking heart thumping minutes we
reach the other side of the cliff and I am happy to be on dry land and
to be able to put my shoes back on. I don't get down on my knees and
kiss the earth, not quite. I only go halfway. I only get down on my
knees.
Carl looks at me, shakes his head and then sets off at pace once more
across the rocks. Me and Jack and Billy and Bell set off at pace after
him.
Soon we are back on the beach where we started from earlier that
morning and then soon after that we are up on the sea front, striding
along. Billy is puffing but Carl says we don't have time to stop. He
tells us we are going to be late. Late for what, we want to ask but we
don't get chance. Carl is storming ahead. We follow him down one
street, along another and then we stop.
We are in front of the cinema.
"Are we going to the cinema?" says Jack. His eyes have lit up and are
almost popping out of his head. "Are we going to see a film?"
I understand his excitement. The last time we went to the cinema was
about the same time Carl last had a bath. Four years previously. Going
to the cinema is not something that in my family we can afford. But
Carl doesn't know that. He is looking up at the movie posters.
"What do you fancy seeing?"
I'm trying to think how I can say I haven't got the necessary notes
without appearing like a pauper when Billy opens his mouth.
"I can't afford it."
Carl grins. "Whoever said anything about affording it? Come on. This
way." And almost in a flash he disappears down a narrow side street. I
look at Billy and Bell and Jack, we all shrug and then we follow.
Again.
If Carl bought a pipe and put on a multicoloured coat ie became the
Pied Piper, and if we suddenly changed into large brown rodents ie
became rats, we couldn't have followed Carl more. We dodge past
overflowing bins, crates of rotting fruit and finally come to a stop
just behind our leader.
Carl nods at a pair of green fire doors, open green fire doors. "Lazy
people always come out this way." He smiles. "And clever people always
go in this way. Ready? After three. And when I say duck, duck."
Carl holds up three fingers. He counts down. Three. Two. One.
On one we go, on the last finger falling we go. We go through the
doors and we are in the cinema. We are in the auditorium. We have
sneaked in the back door. Without paying. A penny.
"Here! Quick!" Carl nips between the front and second row of seats.
"Now, duck! Duck!"
We duck. We are hiding between the chairs amongst empty boxes of
popcorn and discarded soft drink cups. Carl looks at me and whispers,
"As long as the projectionist doesn't see us we are safe. The
usherettes never come in to clean between the performances."
"And if they do?" I whisper back.
Carl makes a cutting motion across his throat with his hand. "But
don't worry, we'll be OK."
I half believe Carl. And I half don't. I keep thinking a fierce
looking usherette is going to appear with a powerful torch in one hand
and a frozen choc-ice in the other and whisk us away to the local
police. I keep imagining my mum's angry face. I put my arms around Jack
who is giggling with fear and I feel his heart thumping through his
chest. I know exactly what he's going through. My heart is thumping
through my chest too. But at least we are not thinking about Jeremy, at
least Jack is not thinking about Jeremy.
The minutes pass slowly and just when I feel as if I have been there
for at least a week and maybe a fortnight there is a noise behind us
and new people start to file in. Carl says that it is safe to get up,
we can now blend in.
As we fold down our seats I can't stop myself grinning. We've done it,
we've got in for free, for nothing. And before you give me a lecture
about theft and breaking and entering just let me defend myself, just
let me say a few words.
Some things are right and some things are wrong. I know that. I'm not
without the moral values they go on about at school. Some things,
however, are more wrong than others. Shooting someone in the head, for
example, is very wrong. And on the same scale, kicking an old lady in
the shins and stealing her handbag is quite wrong. By comparison,
sneaking into a cinema on a hot August afternoon with your closest
friends doesn't seem so bad. Don't misunderstand me, it still isn't the
right thing to do, we wouldn't receive medals from the Queen if we did
it every day but it's not so awful. Anyway, I told you at the beginning
of this book, I'm not perfect, I'm not an angel.
And precisely because I'm not an angel I'm able to settle down in my
chair and wait for the beginning of the film without even a hint of a
guilty conscience. Before long, the lights dim and the curtains
open.
"Shhh," says Jack. "It's starting."
The film is about chickens. Now I wouldn't have said that anyone could
make a good film about chickens, but then this film isn't good. It's
great. It's wonderful. Amazing. What can I say? I love it. And I know
the others love it too. All the way through I can hear them laughing by
my side.
I like the chicken who is always knitting the best. When she thinks
she's going to be killed she knits herself a noose. Funny. And the last
sequence is something else. It's hen-tastic.
When the film has finished and the credits have rolled and Jack has
asked everybody in turn if they thought it was the best film they had
ever seen and we have all said yes, we stand up, stretch, yawn and head
out of the front doors of the cinema, just like everyone who paid. We
even say thank you to the staff on the doors.
And then just as we are stepping out onto the street, just as we think
that we are safe, that we got away with a freebie movie there is the
sound of someone shouting behind us. "Oi, you kids. Stop!"
I turn and I see a man in the uniform of the cinema looking at us and
shaking his fist.
"Oi, you kids, you never paid!"
I look at Carl and he looks at me and then we look at Billy and Bell
and Jack.
"Run," says Carl.
And we do. We run. I don't know if I am imagining it or not but I
think I hear the sound of footsteps behind me and I run all the
harder.
We dodge startled shoppers, we frighten old ladies with dogs. Small
children turn to look at us with smiles and wonder what kind of game
we're playing and one fat man even gives us a round of applause. Maybe
he thinks a heat for the next Olympics sprint race is taking place
right there on Clacton sea front.
We run until we can't run anymore, until our sides are aching with
stitches, until our lungs are bursting for air, until we are sure that
whoever was chasing us has long since gone. And then and only then do
we collapse on our backs on the floor of a small park gasping for
breath. It is Carl who is able to speak first.
"Well," he says, "I hope you all had a nice day."
"Excellent," gasps Jack.
"The tops," says Bell.
Billy can't say anything and just nods his head.
"Nice," I say. "Thank you."
Carl smiles. "No thank you. I mean it, thank you. You're the best
friends I've ever had. You're the greatest friends in the world. I
never want to lose you."
And then he stands up and says goodbye. He says he will see us the
next day at the usual time. We say OK and watch him down the street.
Nothing seems strange. Nothing seems different. We have no idea of the
events that are about to happen.
We have no idea of the change that is about to take place.
You see, the next day when we go to meet Carl he isn't there.
The day after that he isn't there either.
It is on the third day that we begin to worry. We really think that
something bad has happened to him. We think that we will never see
again.

Chapter 17

"Mum," says Jack accusingly, "Jeremy's eaten all the Weetabix."
It is breakfast time on the fourth morning since we have seen Carl and
our nuclear family is about to have a nuclear explosion. It has been
looming on the horizon for days, ever since Carl disappeared, ever
since Jack didn't have anything to take his mind off Jeremy.
"I'll make you some toast," says my mum, standing from the
table.
"I don't want toast," says Jack. "I want Weetabix. I always have
Weetabix."
I look at Jack, I look at my mum, I look at Jeremy. In my head I am
counting down the
seconds to the blast.
"I think I've got some bacon in the fridge," says my mum. "I'll make
you a bacon sandwich."
Jack loves bacon, it's his favourite. "I don't want bacon." He glares
at Jeremy as Jeremy lifts a spoonful of Weetabix into his mouth. "I
want Weetabix."
The clock is ticking.
"What about chocolate?" says my mum. Now I know she is desperate.
Usually my mum wouldn't stand for such behaviour from Jack. She would
usually have clunked him over the head long before now and told him to
eat what he was given.
"I want Weetabix," says Jack. "Just Weetabix, like I always do."
"Here," says Jeremy and pushes his bowl towards Jack, "I've only had a
little bit. You can have it." He attempts a smile.
"I don't want your Weetabix," says Jack adamantly.
"Go on," says Jeremy and he pushes the bowl nearer. "Have it.
Please."
At the same time as Jeremy pushes the bowl nearer Jack decides to push
the bowl back. The bowl, stuck in the middle, stuck between two hands,
doesn't know which way to go and makes a suicidal leap onto the floor.
It lands with a crash and smashes into pieces scattering flakes of
Weetabix everywhere.
Boom!
"It wasn't my fault," say Jeremy and Jack at the same time and they
both look at my mother.
I expect my mother to scream, to burst, for fireworks to come out of
her head. I expect her to explode, on a nuclear scale. But she doesn't.
She says something about the time, about work and then she turns her
back on us. Her shoulders start to go up and down. I recognise the
signs, I know she is crying.
Jeremy obviously recognises the signs too, obviously knows my mum is
crying too because he jumps up, goes over to my mum and puts an arm
around her shoulder. This is the final straw for Jack, seeing Jeremy's
arm around my mum and he decides he doesn't want any breakfast at all,
not even Weetabix and he runs upstairs.
I look at my mum's back for a while wondering if I should say or do
anything. I eventually decide there isn't much I could say or do so I
go upstairs too. I find Jack kneeling in front of his chest of drawers
shoving underwear into my school bag.
Jack wipes a tear from under his eye. "I'm running away."
I sit down on my bed. "Good idea," I say. I don't think it's a good
idea but I have a plan. "Where are you going to go?"
"Um.... don't know. Away."
I don't say anything.
"I'll go and live in that big house on the hill."
Bell would love that. We are supposed to be helping the homeless, not
adding to them.
"All by yourself?" I ask. "With Ben and his dogs?"
"Um...." says Jack. He is not packing so quickly now.
"What do you think Billy and Bell would say?"
Jack drops a sock and turns to look at me. "I think they'd tell me not
to. I think they'd say it's not a good idea."
"I think so. And anyway how can you help Carl find a home if you
haven't got one of your own?"
"I can't."
"No, you can't." Then I take the trump card out of my hand. "And do we
even know where Carl is?"
"No," says Jack. He shakes his head. "We haven't seen him for three
days."
I lay the trump card on the table. "If you run away today, how can you
help with the plan."
"What plan?" says Jack. He pushes shut his drawer and comes and sits
next to me on the bed.
"The plan to find Carl."
"I don't know about that plan."
"Then listen," I say, "and I'll tell you."

"So tell me about this plan again," says Billy.
I slap my forehead. I've already explained it, as my mother would say,
a hundred times. I explained it on the way to the station, I explained
it on the train and I even explained it on the way up to the house. I
don't want to explain it anymore.
"Just watch," I say, "and keep quiet. Keep very quiet."
We are lying on our bellies behind a bush about five metres from the
door of the house on the hill, the house where Carl lives. The plan is
very simple. We watch the door and we wait to see if Carl comes out. If
he does then we call him, we get him to come over to us and we ask him
where he's been for the last few days. That's all there is to it. I
don't know which bit Billy wants me to explain.
"Look," hisses Bell, "someone's coming."
Sure enough the door is opening. A boy who couldn't have been much
older than Jack appears. His clothes are filthy, his hair is filthy. He
scratches his head and heads straight down the hill.
"He must be off to do the work Carl told us about," says Bell.
I nod my head and before I finish nodding the door is opening again.
This time it's a girl. The girl coughs and then walks past where we're
hiding. We get a good look at her and I'm glad that we are hiding. The
girl looks rough. She looks harder than a whole platoon of SAS
soldiers. Next to this girl, the tomboyish Bell would look like a
Barbie doll, a Barbie doll dressed in her best frock.
In all the door opens fifteen times and each time it opens a new
specimen of dirtiness comes out. But no Carl. Not a shoe, not even a
shoelace.
Ten minutes after the door has opened for the last time, during which
time we have been lying there saying nothing, doing nothing, Bell
speaks. She says out loud what I have been thinking.
"What do we do now?"
The answer is, I don't know. My plan relied on us seeing Carl. I
thought that even though we hadn't seen him he must still be doing the
work he had told us about. I thought he would come out of the house. He
hadn't and my plan had gone down the pan.
"Let's wait," I say, improvising. "Maybe he'll be out in a
minute."
The others seem to think this is a good idea. At least, nobody
complains, nobody says anything. And so we wait. That's no problem,
this Summer we've become experts at waiting.
This waiting, however, is a different kind of waiting to the waiting
we've done before. During this waiting we have to be quiet. We're
pretty sure Ben is inside the house with his dogs and we don't want him
to hear us, we don't want him to come out. We don't want the dogs to
eat us alive.
Actually, for me, the silence is a blessing in disguise. We don't have
to play any more of those boring games of I-spy. Instead I rest my chin
on my hands and daydream. I think about football, swimming and I think
about Cathy. Cathy is two years older than me and lives across the
street and in my daydream she is teaching me how to shoot a net in
netball. She is just jumping up with the ball in her hands when someone
outside my dream shakes my forearm. The movement causes my chin to slip
off my hand and my face crashes painfully down into the dirt.
"The door," whispers Bell, "it's opening."
I spit a small pebble and half a leaf out of my mouth and see that
Bell is right. The door is opening. I feel my whole body go
tense.
"It might be Carl," says Billy.
"Hooray!" says Jack quietly.
A foot appears. A shin. Then a whole leg. A body. A big massive body.
It is not Carl. It is Ben. And he is closely followed by the two
Rottweilers.
"That's right girls," we clearly hear him say, "we are going for our
walk, yes we are. We are going for our walk."
I hold my breath and clamp my arms against my body. I'm worried the
dogs will smell either my breath or my armpits. Luckily the dogs don't
give us a glance. They head around the back of the house pulling Ben
behind them and they disappear from sight.
Nobody dares to speak for about two hours, or maybe it's just two
minutes. It's Bell who finally opens her mouth.
"I have a plan," she says.
I know what the plan is going to be, I just know. She is going to say
that someone should go in the house and see if they can find any sign
of Carl.
"Someone should go in the house," says Bell, "see if they can find any
sign of Carl."
I told you.
Bell looks at me eagerly. "What do you think?"
I think the plan is crazy, dangerous, stupid, but I don't have a
better one so I agree. I still feel I owe Carl, I still remember him
rescuing my little brother. It's not something I'll ever forget. And
anyway, I like Carl. He's a member of our gang, he taught us how to
swim. I want to help him.
We decide we should draw lots to see who goes in. I pluck four blades
of grass from the ground and place them between my thumb and index
finger. One of the blades is shorter than the others. The person who
pulls it will go.
Billy is to choose first. He pushes up his glasses. He draws.
Long.
Then Bell. She rubs a hand over her head. She draws. Long too.
There are only two blades left. One long. One short.
Jack looks at me and smiles. He closes his eyes and reaches for a
blade. I see his hand coming towards me. Slowly. I move my own hand so
that Jack picks the blade I want, the blade I think is best for
him.
Jack opens his eyes. He pulls a disappointed face. "Long. It's you,
Bro."
He's right, it is me. I made it so. I take a deep breath.
"Good luck," everyone says and I say I hope I don't need it, I say I
hope that luck doesn't come into it. I stand and brush the dust from
the ground off my clothes. I try to put on a brave face. I say goodbye,
see you soon, and then I slowly creep around the side of the bush,
creep on towards the house until I am standing in front of the
door.
Big old houses on hills generally get a reputation for being haunted.
Little kids will speak about them in quiet tones and tell each other
stories about the bogey-man who lives there. Older kids will dare each
other to go inside, to even spend the night there.
The fear I am feeling now is greater than any fear I would have felt
going into a haunted house. I know this house isn't haunted. I know the
danger inside here is only too real.
I take another deep breath, look over my shoulder to where I know the
others are hiding and then I push open the door and step inside.
The first thing that hits me is the smell. It is like Carl only
tenfold, a hundredfold. It sticks in my throat and I feel like I'm
going to keel over, collapse on the floor. I hold my nose, try only to
breathe through my mouth and this helps. A little. The second thing I
notice is the darkness. There is no light coming into the house from
outside.
I remain standing in the doorway, giving my eyes time to get used to
the dimness, until gradually shapes begin to come into view. I see now
that I am in a big room, a room that seems to extend for the whole
length of the house. On the floor in front of me I can just make out
mattresses and it looks like there are more mattresses over to my left.
To my right there are piles of what, I guess, are bedding and clothes.
It's what I don't see, however, that makes me happy. I don't see any
people. It looks like the house is empty.
In my chest my heart is going berserk again, beating itself suicidally
against my ribs. I promise it that I'll try to stop putting myself in
scary situations if only it will hold out for me this time. I doubt
already that it's a promise I can keep.
I remember Carl's story and I remember that he said he slept in the
top bunk of a bunk bed. I squint my eyes and then bingo. I see two
double bunks on a far wall.
Trying to be as quiet as possible I creep over to where the beds are.
I step over mattresses, climb over mountains of clothes until
eventually I make it, I make it to the other side. It is super dark
here in this corner and I almost can't see anything, almost can't see
the hand in front of my face. I have to rely on touch alone. I put a
hand out and feel along the first bed, patting the covers, feeling
under the blankets. Nothing. Nobody. I don't lose heart, I don't lose
hope. I move across to the next bed and then suddenly two things happen
at once.
I step in something wet and I hear a movement from in front of
me.
I freeze.
"Who is it?" says a voice.
My heart does a somersault of joy, of relief. The voice belongs to
Carl. "Carl," I say, lifting my foot out of whatever I have stood in,
"it's me, Jake."
"Jake?"
"Yes. Me. Jake. Remember?"
"You shouldn't have come here. You should go now, before Ben comes
back. It's dangerous."
Dangerous? I don't like the sound of that.
"We were worried about you. We haven't seen you for a few days." And
to be truthful I still can't see Carl now. It really is very
dark.
"I'm fine," says Carl. "Really, I'm fine." He says it in a voice I
recognise. It is like the one Bell uses when she says the opposite to
what she means.
I reach along the bed. I find Carl's arm. I squeeze. "Come on Carl.
What's going on? We want to help you."
Suddenly there is a flare of light. Blinding light. For a moment I see
a lighter. I see Carl's hand. I see Carl's face.
Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!
The light goes out and the room returns to darkness.
"You think you can help with this? Now go."
I don't go. I reach for the ladder I have just seen in the light and I
climb up. I perch on the side of Carl's bed. "What happened?"
"Nothing."
Nothing, that famous word. When people say nothing, generally they
mean the opposite. They mean something. And Carl's face wasn't nothing.
In the brief second of the flame from the lighter I had seen enough. I
had seen swollen eyes, a cut lip, a broken nose. I had seen
blood.
I feel along the bed and this time I find Carl's shoulder. I pat it
reassuringly. I try to think what my mum would say in a situation like
this. I try to think what Sir Alec Ferguson would say to one of his
team in a situation like this. I have an idea. I decide to go for
it.
"Carl, there are three people out there who want to help you. And
there's one person in here who wants to help you too. Me. I'm not going
anywhere until you tell me. I'm not going anywhere until you tell me
what's going on. You saved my brother's life. Give me a chance to do
something for you. Please."
I hear a movement on the bed. "I don't want you to get
involved."
"We're already involved. We're here, aren't we?"
I hear a sigh.
"Come on. Tell me."
I hear another sigh and then Carl speaks. "Jazz.... he's one of the
boys in the house.... he told Ben about you.... about me being with
you."
"About us?" I'm not sure I understand.
"Yeah. We're not allowed to have friends. Not friends outside the
house anyway."
"And Ben did that to your face because you're friends with us?" I
can't believe it.
"Not only that. Jazz said other things as well. He's had it in for me
ever since I came to the house. You see, before I arrived he was the
best pickpocket here. He's jealous. He's always telling Ben stories
about me. He's always trying to find out stuff about me."
Now I'm beginning to understand. In the darkness I'm beginning to see
the light. "He's the boy we saw hit you, the one in the cafe?"
"Yeah."
I pat Carl's shoulder again.
"Jazz told Ben I was planning to leave. When I'm sixteen. Ben said no
way, I couldn't. He said wherever I go he'll find me. He said he'll
never let me leave."
"Oh," I say. I don't know what to say.
I hear Carl shift on the bed. "Don't worry. This is my life. Thanks
for everything over the past couple of weeks but I don't think I can
see you again. I don't want to get you in trouble. I don't want to get
beaten up again."
"But..." I start to say. Carl interrupts me.
"It's for the best."
He sounds like a parent. They always says things are for the best when
they're doing something that's unpleasant, which probably isn't for the
best at all. And right there and then on that bed, right at that
moment, I make a decision. I make a big decision. I decide I am going
to get Carl out of this mess by doing whatever I have to do. I decide I
have done enough lying on the beach, spent enough time being lazy,
eaten enough chips. I decide it is time for action. I suddenly feel
like Manchester United at home, John Wayne in a Western, Mel Gibson in
an action movie. I feel invincible.
"Do you want to carry on like this for the rest of your life?" I
ask.
There's no answer from the bed.
"Do you?"
"Of course not."
"Then we'll help you. We'll sort Ben out."
"But Jake, how?"
"You leave the how to me."
"Jake, honestly, it's impossible."
"Have you forgotten? We're the Fart Club."
I hear a laugh from the bed.
"That's better. Now repeat after me. I am a member of the Fart Club. I
will conquer all."
There is silence again.
"Do it!"
"I am a member of the Fart Club," says Carl, "and I will conquer
all."
"Louder," I say and Carl repeats the phrase louder and then I say
louder again and this time Carl shouts and I shout with him. We shout
Fart Club, Fart Club at the tops of our voices.
"Good," I say. "Now I want you to meet us tomorrow. Same time. Do you
think you can get away without being seen?"
"I'll do it," says Carl, sounding more positive. "I am a member of the
Fart Club."
"That's right, you are. Well done."
"You better go now. Ben will be back."
"Right," I say and I jump from the bed. I land in something wet again
with a splash.
"Jake?"
"Yes?"
"You've just stood in our potty."
"Potty?"
I can hear Carl laughing on the bed. "If anyone needs to go to the
toilet in the night they go in that pot. And I thought I was the one in
the...."
"See you tomorrow Carl," I say and I squelch across the floor. I can
still hear Carl laughing as I shut the door behind me.

Chapter 18

"Oh my God!" says Bell.
"Oh my God!" says Billy.
"You look funny," says Jack.
It is twelve o'clock and we are sitting on the beach. Carl has just
arrived. In daylight his face doesn't look any better. In fact, it
looks worse. He looks like he has gone five rounds with a heavyweight
boxer. With his hands tied behind his back. With his feet set in a
concrete block.
"How are you feeling?" I ask.
Carl shrugs and then looks over his shoulder. "I'm fine, but we need
to hide. If any of the others from the house see me they might tell
Ben. My face has been rearranged enough for one week."
I couldn't agree more. Any more rearranging and Carl's face wouldn't
look like a face at all, it would look like a piece of very rare steak,
or one of those Mr Potato Head toys with the eyes, ears, nose all stuck
in the wrong places. I have an idea.
"Come on," I say. "Let's go."
I stand up and before I can be asked any questions I start to walk up
the beach towards the street. I go at quite a pace and the others only
catch me as I am walking past the amusement arcade, the place where our
adventure began.
"Where we going?" asks Carl, pulling the huge collar of his coat
closer around himself.
"A place where no one will see you, a place where you'll be
safe."
"Sounds good," says Carl, "but where is it? Scotland? The Isle of Man?
Timbuktu?"
"My house."
"And then are we going to tell Carl our plan?" asks Jack. Jack is
bouncing along on my left, looking excited. "Are we?"
Carl looks at me. "What plan?"
What plan? Good question, but I don't want to answer it. Yet.
"Later," I say, taking a left turn. "First let's get you out of the
way. That's the most important thing. I don't want to cause you any
more trouble."
Arriving at the station we see a train already standing at the
platform and we run to catch it. I pull open a door ignoring the
guard's angry shouts behind me and one by one the others leap on. Carl
is the last and as I help him in, slam shut the door, the train begins
to pull off. We made it. We caught the train. But more importantly
we're over the first hurdle. No one spotted Carl.
The journey passes in silence. The only thing I want to speak about is
the plan, but the train is not the place to discuss it, someone might
overhear, someone might inform the police. It's that kind of
plan.
The day before, after we had made our way down the hill away from the
house, Billy and Bell and Jack and I had talked for hours about Carl,
about what we could do to help him. We couldn't think of anything,
nothing at all until eventually, just as we were about to give up, just
as we were about to call it a night, Billy had an idea.
At first his idea seemed too stupid, too much like something from a
movie, too over the top and too dangerous. But the more we thought
about it, the more we talked about it, the more we believed it might
just work. And besides we couldn't come up with anything else. We
agreed to go for it. We agreed to reach for the sky. We agreed to carry
out Billy's plan....
"Bro, we're here. Bro!"
Jack's voice snaps me out of my daydream and I see that, indeed, the
train has pulled at our station. I blink my eyes. "Sorry," I say, "I
was miles away."
Actually, I'm lying. I wasn't miles away, I was very near. I was in
the house on the hill. In my mind I was facing up to Ben and his dogs.
No wonder my palms are sweaty, no wonder my heart is racing. I take a
deep breath, wipe my hands on my shorts and get off the train.
We sneak out of the side of the station (we don't have tickets) and
walk to the bus-stop. Ten minutes later we get on the bus. Ten minutes
after that we are home. We are standing on the front step. I turn to
the others.
"I'll go in first and check the house is empty."
By empty, I mean Jeremy-free. Jeremy is just the sort of spanner we
don't need in our works. I turn my key in the lock and push open the
door. "Hello!" I call. Nothing. "Hello!" I call again. Louder. Still no
answer. He's not here. Hooray!
I tell everyone to come in and we all file into the living-room.
Billy, Bell and Carl sit on the sofa and Jack and I squeeze onto an
armchair.
"Are we going to tell him our plan now?" asks Jack excitedly. "Are
we?"
I look at Carl again. I look at his face, at his bruised eyes, swollen
lips, the dried blood.
"I think we should put something on those cuts first."
Bell rubs her hand over her head. "I agree. They look pretty
bad."
Billy pushes his glasses up and nods. "They do. Pretty bad.
Yes."
Jack sighs and then very slowly nods too. "OK."
It is agreed.
"Actually," says Carl, "can I ask a tiny favour?"
We're going to save his life, I don't think a tiny favour is out of
the question. "Ask away," I say.
"If you don't mind...."
"Yes?"
"If it's not too much trouble...."
"Yes?" says Bell.
"I'd....um.... I'd like to have a bath."
"Carl wants a bath," says Jack as if it is the most amazing thing he
has ever heard.
"Sure," I say. "Of course you can. Follow me."
I think I know why Carl wants to have a bath. I think there are two
reasons. The first reason is that, obviously, having a bath is
something Carl can't usually do. Now is a chance to wash off the filth
of his life, the grime of his existence. The second reason, I think, is
that Carl knows he's going to hear our plan and that the plan will
probably involve some danger. So I imagine he sees the bath as his last
chance to have some luxury, relaxation, peace. Who can blame him? I
can't. I'm almost tempted to get in with him.
Carl follows me up the stairs and into the bathroom. I put the plug in
its hole, turn on the taps. Water comes spurting out, the bath starts
to fill. Normal. I am not expecting a shock. As Carl pulls off his
T-shirt and I see his skinny body I get one, a big one. I say a very
bad word. You would too if you saw what I saw. All down Carl's back
there are long deep red bruises.
"He really hit you," I say.
"Yes he did. He really hit me. A lot."
And then I don't know what to say. But seeing Carl's battered body in
its entirety I am more determined than ever to go through with the
plan, however dangerous it might be. However stupid.
I pick up Carl's discarded clothes and go downstairs. I shove the
clothes in the washing-machine, select super-soiled and then go through
to the living room and sit with the others. There is a tense, nervous,
expectant silence which lasts until Carl arrives, thirty minutes
later.
"Well," he says as he walks through the door, "I'm ready."
He looks ready, ready for something, although I'm not quite sure what.
Carl has appeared in the lounge wearing only two towels. He has one
wrapped around his waist and one draped over his shoulders. I tell him
to sit down and Bell and I go over to him and rub antiseptic cream into
his cuts, his bruises, his grazes and his welts. He makes a joke about
Swedish women and massage but I can see the pain on his face as we
touch him. Soon he is covered almost entirely in white ointment.
"Feel better?" I ask.
Carl grins, causing him to wince because of his damaged lips. "I
should get beaten up more often if I'm going to get all this
fuss."
"Ha ha," I say.
Jack, who up until this point has been sitting quietly in the chair,
obviously can't contain himself any longer. "Now are we going to tell
Carl our plan? Please."
I look at the others and they all nods their heads.
"Are you ready?" I say to Carl.
"As I'll ever be."
"Then I'll start."
I follow my father's advice. The advice about starting at the
beginning that is, not the advice about weeing into the wind. I tell
Carl our plan. Occasionally the others add bits when I forget something
and Carl asks the odd question but more or less it is me doing the
talking. When I get to the end I sit back in my chair and fold my
arms.
"Well?" I say.
Carl shakes his head. "I can't let you do it. It's too
dangerous."
I unfold my arms and lean forward. "Carl, I've decided."
"We've decided," says Bell.
"Yes," says Billy and pushes up his glasses. "Most definitely. All
done. All dusted."
"But we can't even be sure it'll work," says Carl. "It's too
risky."
I fix Carl with a stare. "Tell me, what's the thing that Ben wants
more than anything in the world?"
"That's easy," says Carl, "money."
"And what he is most afraid of?"
"Easy again. The police."
I clap my hands. "Then it'll work. It's got to."
Carl scratches one ear, scratches the other. He begins to smile.
"You're right. You might be right."
"So you agree then?" says Bell.
"You'll let us help you?" says Billy. "You let us make it so."
Carl really smiles now. "OK, OK. I give in. We'll do it."
"Hooray!" says Jack and he starts to run around and around the room.
He stops, suddenly, when there is the distinctive sound of the front
door opening.
I look towards the hall but I know who it will be, I know it will be
my mum and Jeremy. Therefore I'm not surprised when they appear in the
doorway. I wasn't expecting it to be anyone else. Not Santa Clause. Not
the tooth fairy. Not even the cavalry. Talk of the plan will have to be
put on hold. Planning any action will have to be done later.
My mum looks at Carl. He is still wearing only the two towels. "We're
running a sauna now, are we?"
What did I tell you about my mum? She's hilarious, isn't she?
"I'll get dressed," says Carl and stands up.
"You can't," I say. I remember something, something I did. "Your
clothes are still in the washer."
"Oh," says my mum, "so we're a sauna and a wash-house."
Good one mum.
"Jeremy walks around in towels," says Jack. "Jeremy washes his clothes
in the washing-machine. Our washing-machine."
I see my mum's mouth open, I see Jeremy's face going red. I'm
imagining that nuclear explosion again, that firework display. I leap
in to save the day. Don't I always?
"Come on everybody," I say, clapping my hands, "upstairs, upstairs.
The Roman orgy will be starting shortly. Don't panic, there're towels
enough for everyone. Please collect them from the airing cupboard on
your way into the forum. Come along now, don't dawdle. Don't
delay."
Billy and Bell and Carl look at me as if I am slightly mad, let me
tell you, I am slightly mad and then they disappear up the stairs. I
grab Jack, put him under my arm and follow them up. Luckily I see that
my mum and Jeremy are smiling. A bit of cheek is always a good solution
to any heated situation.
In my room I open some drawers and find Carl some clean clothes. He
puts them on and apart from being a bit small they look OK. He then
notices the time on my alarm clock and he says he better leave, better
get back to the house before Ben misses him. We wouldn't want that, we
wouldn't want Carl to get into any more trouble so we go downstairs, go
out of the house and go back to the station.
At the station we sit on a wooden bench and talk about the plan, its
ins and outs, its minor details, until eventually the train arrives
with a lot of noise and banging of doors. We say our goodbyes and Carl
gets on. We watch him move down the carriage, take a seat. And then he
obviously has an idea because he jumps up and puts his face to the open
window. The train is starting to pull away.
"About this plan? When do we put it into action? When will it
start?"
"Oh," I say. "I thought it was clear. It has to be tomorrow."
"Tomorrow!"
"Yes, tomorrow. I'll meet you at twelve o'clock on the beach. Don't be
late. Don't be late."
And then the train is gone taking Carl with it.
Already, even before it is out of sight, I am thinking about the next
day. I am wondering what I am doing and if I have gone quite mad. But
more than anything I am hoping that plan will work. I cross all my
fingers and all my toes.

Chapter 19

I wake early with a jump and then lie with my eyes open, staring at the
ceiling. I think about the plan, I think about homeless thieves, mad
men, vicious dogs. I wonder how things will turn out, how it will all
end and I am still wondering, still none the wiser when I hear the
sound of my mum going downstairs. I sit up in bed. It's time for
breakfast, time to get up, time for the beginning of the rest of my
life. I go and wake Jack.
"You nervous?" he says as soon as he opens his eyes. Not, "hello."
Not, "good morning." Not, "why don't we call the whole thing
off?"
"No. Course not. Remember what you have to do?"
Jack looks down at his bed and starts fiddling with the edge of his
duvet.
"Remember?"
Jack looks up. "Be nice to Jeremy."
"Yes, be nice to Jeremy. It's only for one day. You can do it."
It's important that Jack is nice to Jeremy because this morning I
don't need any fights, any scenes, any bowls of cereal flying through
the air. I need my mum in a good mood, a very good mood.
Jack and I pull on some clothes and head down to the breakfast
table.
"Morning Jeremy," says Jack and smiles.
My mum looks at Jack. She looks suspicious, she looks as if she is
waiting for the sucker punch.
"Beautiful day," says Jack. "Gorgeous."
I nudge Jack under the table. It is a fine tightrope we are walking
on, a careful balancing act. I don't want Jack to go too far. I don't
want Jack to ask Jeremy to stand, drop his trousers and then for Jack
to kiss both cheeks of Jeremy's bottom. But we do have to be pleasant.
And we are. We pass slices of toast, pots of jam. We make polite small
talk about Jeremy's work and most importantly we don't, or rather Jack
doesn't, have any big fights over who's going to eat the last
Weetabix.
Pretty soon breakfast is almost over and we are doing well, very well.
It seems that for once we'll finish a meal and around the table
there'll be no sulky faces, no angry words. In fact, my mum looks quite
happy. If there was a moon she would be over it. I see her glance at
Jeremy and smile. Jack and I have done a good job. We have nearly
walked right across our tightrope. Our goal is in sight.
Now is the moment to strike.
"Mum?" I say.
My mum fixes the lid on the margarine tub and looks at me. "Yes my
wonderful son, what can I do for you?"
Nice one mum. I ignore the sarcasm and ask my question as planned.
"You know Billy?"
"Yes, I know Billy," says my mum slowly.
"Good. And you know that every year his family go camping for a few
days?
"Yes...."
"And you know that sometimes I go with them?"
"Yes...."
"Well.... today is the day they go and I was wondering....I was
wondering...."
My mum smiles. "You were wondering whether it's African or Indian
elephants that have very big ears?"
"Very funny mum. No I was wondering, because Billy's mum said it would
be OK...."
"If you could go with them?" says my mum, interrupting me. She looks
at Jack. "What about you Jack?"
"I don't want to go," he says and pulls a face. "I don't like
camping."
Well done Jack. So far the plan is going according to plan.
"I'm not sure," says my mum. "It's a bit short notice."
"More tea, Jeremy?" I say brightly. "Another biscuit?"
Of course I'm not really offering Jeremy tea, I'm not really offering
him a biscuit. In fact, I'm blackmailing my mum. When I say, 'more tea
Jeremy?' what I'm really saying is that if my mum agrees to let me go
camping, then I will be nice to Jeremy. The meaning, I believe, is
obvious.
"And how long are they going for?" asks my mum. It seems that for the
moment she is ignoring my offer to Jeremy. But I know she is thinking
about it, I can see it in her eyes.
"They're going for three nights. They'll be back on Thursday. Thursday
morning."
"More tea Jeremy?" says Jack. "A biscuit?"
Well done little brother. Well done. Good job.
For those of you who are not very clever, for those of you two hands
short of being ambidextrous, let me tell you Jack is not really
offering Jeremy tea either. His offer has the same meaning as mine. Let
Jake go and I'll be nice to Jeremy.
My mother sighs and looks at her watch. She looks at Jeremy, she looks
at Jack, she looks at me. I can see defeat in her eyes. "You better go
and pack then."
"Thanks mum," I say and leap from my chair. "Come on Jack. Give me a
hand."
Jack gets up to follow me and as we leave the room I hear Jeremy say
to my mother, "I'm offered two cups of tea, two biscuits and what do I
get? Nothing."
"Jeremy," replies my mum, "you've got a lot to learn about children. A
lot."
By the way, if you are feeling slightly confused and if you are trying
to work out why suddenly I'm going camping with Billy, let me explain.
While it is true that Billy's family are going camping, it is not true
that I am going with them. Not at all. You see, for our plan to work I
need to be able to disappear for a few days without my mum missing me.
Billy's parents going away and my mum thinking I'm with them gives me
the perfect cover. I can do what I have to do and my mum will be none
the wiser.
In the bedroom I shove a few things into my schoolbag and then I go
back downstairs. I say goodbye to my mum and she hugs me and tells me
to be a good boy and I say of course I will be and then Jack and I are
out of the door.
Objective number one successfully completed. Now for the next
stage.
Billy and Bell are waiting for us at the corner by the bus-stop as
arranged.
"I did it," I say to Billy. "How about you?"
Billy pushes up his glasses and smiles. "Everything is done. I told my
mum I didn't want to go camping with them this year. I told her Bell's
mum had said I could stay at their house. I made it so."
"She wasn't suspicious?"
Billy shakes his head. "I think she was pleased. Geri doesn't want to
go either. Mum said it would be nice for her and dad to have a few days
by themselves."
"Well done," I say.
"Hooray!" says Jack.
Hooray indeed. Everything is sorted. My mum thinks I'm with Billy and
Billy's mum thinks he's with Bell.
I turn to Bell. "Did you bring the stuff?"
Bell nods and reaches in her bag. She passes me a length of rope and a
roll of masking
"This is it then," I say. "I'll be off."
"Good luck," says Bell.
"May the force be with you," says Billy, for once at a loss of Voyager
words.
"Be careful," says Jack and he puts his arms around my waist and gives
me a hug. "Be very careful. And here...." He reaches into his pocket
and presses something into my hand. "Take this. For luck."
I look to see what it is, what Jack has given me and there, resting on
my palm I see one of Jack's plastic soldiers, his favourite soldier in
fact, GI Jake he calls it. "Thanks," I say. "I'll take good care of
him." And then I shake each one of them by the hand and I say goodbye.
I try to look brave. I don't know if I succeed. I don't feel very
brave. I don't feel very brave at all.
I catch the bus to the station by myself and then I catch the train by
myself. I don't want a big send off, a lot of drama. I don't want to
feel like a soldier going off to battle, I don't want to feel like GI
Jake. I don't want to feel that what I'm doing is dangerous and that I
might not come back.
On the train I think back over the events of the Summer. I try to work
out where everything started and how we came to be involved in this
plan. Again and again I come to the same conclusion. Everything started
with that missing hairbrush. If Geri hadn't lost her hairbrush we
wouldn't have formed the Fart Club and if we hadn't formed the Fart
Club we wouldn't have decided to help Carl.
I wonder what would have happened if Geri had lost something really
important, if Geri, for example, had lost her favourite lipstick. Then
everything would have been much worse. We would probably now be on a
deep cover mission for NATO in some unstable African nation. I should
be grateful.
Eventually, after some delay, the train pulls into the station. The
doors hiss open and I get off and walk slowly towards the beach. I walk
towards my rendezvous with Carl, my rendezvous with destiny, with
danger. The day is cold and cloudy and I am not surprised to see the
beach is almost empty. There are only a couple of young people walking
their dogs, a couple of old people sitting in deckchairs and there,
right in the centre of the beach, sitting all alone and hunched up, my
friend, Carl.
He sees me from a distance and waves. I wave back and then a few
minutes later I am sitting next to him. I notice the bruises on his
face have changed from brown to yellow, are slightly less swollen.
However, they still look painful.
"I've been thinking," he says, looking out at the sea.
"Yes?"
"I can't let you do it, it's too dangerous. I'll be OK, I'll manage as
I am."
I had been expecting this. I have to admit that half of me had even
been hoping Carl would say those words. Half of me was ready to pull
out. Our plan was crazy. But when I saw Carl sitting all alone on the
beach in that huge vampire coat, when I saw the bruises on his face, I
decided that I had to help. I liked him, he was a member of the Fart
Club and, perhaps most importantly, he had dived into the water and
saved Jack's life. I still owed him.
"It's arranged," I say. "It's sorted with my mum, Billy's mum. I've
got the rope, the tape. We have to go through with it. I want to go
through with it."
Carl digs his hands into the sand and comes up with a shell. He looks
at it, turns it over in his hands and then speaks. "You really think
it'll work?"
I nod my head. "I really do."
"I'll never forget this you know. Never." He is still looking at the
shell.
"It's OK."
"You've made me feel visible again."
"Sorry?" I don't understand.
Carl throws the shell towards the sea and turns to face me. "Because I
look like this," he holds up his arms, "because I smell like this
everyone knows I'm homeless. People cross the street to avoid me. When
I was begging people would ignore me. They wouldn't even say sorry,
sorry they didn't have any change. They would look right through me as
if I was invisible, as if I was nothing. People don't understand that I
don't want to be like this. My parents didn't want me, foster parents
didn't want me. That's OK, that's their choice but people should
understand that I want what they've got. I want a normal life, a normal
mum, a normal dad. I even want a normal dog. So if you really do help
me, then thank you, but I have to tell you, you've already helped me.
You've made me feel human again. When you look at me you don't see
through me, you just see me. That's more than anyone's given me in a
long time."
I don't know what to say. So I don't say anything. I stand up.
"Come on." I force a smile and strike a pose. "Let's do it. Let's put
this show on the road."
Carl stands too and together we head up the beach.
It's time for action.

Chapter 20

It is difficult to breathe and my wrists are sore. It is difficult to
breathe because I have masking tape stuck over my mouth. My wrists are
sore because they are tied behind my back. Let me explain.
I am sitting on a wooden chair in the middle of the room of the
abandoned house on the hill. The house is dimly lit by flickering
candles and in the gloom I can just make out Carl. He is lying on his
bunk and he is watching me. We have been like this for nearly two
hours, two long hours. My muscles are starting to ache. I have no
feeling in my left arm and too much feeling in my right. My bum is
completely numb.
One by one I have seen the other kids return to the house. Some pay me
no attention at all, as if it is quite normal for them to return home
and find a boy tied to a chair in the centre of their room. Others,
however, come over and look at me. They examine my binds and then ask
Carl who I am. Carl says, not yet, he will explain when Ben comes back
and they nod their heads, accept this as an answer and wander
off.
The last of the kids to arrive is Jazz. I recognise him as the boy who
hit Carl, the one who we saw in the cafe. He stops in the doorway,
looks at me and squints his eyes. His face is narrow and the nose
pointed. I try to think what he reminds me of and then I get it. He
looks like a rat.
I see him go over to the bunk on which Carl is lying. He puts his head
close to Carl's and whispers something. I see Carl shake his head and
then I see Jazz laugh. The laugh is high-pitched, irritating, like
fingers scraping on a blackboard.
Jazz turns away from Carl, walks over to my chair and stands in front
of me. He leans over so that his face is right in front of mine. He
grins. It is not, however, a grin of pleasure. It is the grin of a
Hollywood bad guy. Moreover, a Hollywood bad guy with very bad teeth,
very bad breath.
I am aware, more than ever, that I can't move and that I am, as such,
totally defenceless. I am not ashamed to say it, I am afraid. Very
afraid.
Over Jazz's shoulder I see Carl shift on the bed. I hope he is
readying himself to pounce, readying himself to leap to my defence if
Jazz should try anything funny. I hope he is not just suffering from an
itch.
Jazz leans even closer. I can see his pitted skin, I can smell his
stinking breath. His mouth opens and I feel hot air on my cheek. He is
about to say something and then suddenly he stops, closes his mouth. He
has heard something. He turns his head towards the door.
I turn my head too and now I hear the noise as well. From outside
comes the clear sound of dogs barking. It is Ben. Ben is coming
home.
"Later," hisses Jazz into my ear and he slinks back into the shadows
just as the front door opens.
The dogs appear first pulling on their leather leads and then there is
Ben, massive and dressed in a white vest just as I remember. Ben sees
me, puts his head on one side and starts to walk over.
It is really happening. We are really doing it. The plan is in
motion.
And if you are worrying that you don't understand what's going on,
that you haven't got a clue what the plan is, don't worry, DON'T PANIC.
It will all become clear as the story unfolds. I promise.
Ben is getting nearer. My heart is beating faster. Out of the corner
of my eye I see Carl slide from his top bunk, I see him set off across
the floor. He arrives in front of me exactly at the same time as Ben
and the two Rottweilers. I take a deep breath. Let me tell you, taking
a deep breath is difficult with tape over your mouth.
"Well, well," says Ben in that voice I recognise, "what have we here?
What have we here? A new recruit?"
Carl folds his arms across his chest. "He's mine."
"Mine?" says Ben quickly, flicking back his huge bald head, moving his
eyes from me to Carl. "What's this mine, mine all of a sudden? Aren't
we family? Aren't you forgetting that what's yours is mine?"
Carl places a hand on my shoulder. "This is the boy Jazz told you
about. The one who is supposed to be my friend. That's what I mean when
I say he's mine." And as Carl says mine, he laughs. It is not a nice
laugh, it is not like the laugh I have got used to.
I notice that several of the house-mates have moved closer to the
chair. They are evidently keen to hear what is going on.
"We don't understand," says Ben. "What is your friend doing here and
why is he tied to a chair?"
I take another deep breath. It's make or break time, time to see if we
can really pull it off, time to see if our plan is as well executed as
the D-day landings, or a big a flop as the Gunpowder Plot.
"I've kidnapped him," says Carl matter of factly.
I hear a gasp from the crowd of onlookers. Even in this band of
thieves and pickpockets, urchins and beggars, kidnapping is obviously
something a bit out of the ordinary, a bit more than an everyday
crime.
"Kidnap?" says Ben, raising both eyebrows. "We have kidnapped
him?"
Carl's voice remains strong. "Yes. I've kidnapped him. Just
that."
Ben turns from me and looks directly at Carl. "My boy, kidnapping is
not what we do? We didn't teach you to kidnap, no we didn't. We taught
you to use your hands, to slip them into unsuspecting pockets. We
didn't mention kidnapping, not at all, no we didn't."
"We didn't," says Carl, "but you did tell me to take a more active
role. You told me to use my brain. You said you wanted me to bring more
money into the house. This will bring us money. Lots of it, don't you
worry."
Ben glances at me and then orders the boys and girls who have gathered
around the chair to move away. Reluctantly they retreat to their beds
and then Ben places an arm around Carl's shoulder, a big massive arm. I
remember this is an arm joined to the fist that caused so much damage
to Carl's face, to Carl's body. I wonder if Ben is going to twist this
arm now, snap off Carl's head, feed it to the dogs. Luckily, he
doesn't, he just continues talking.
"We can't get involved in this, no we can't. We must take him back,
yes we must."
This is not in the plan. This is not what we expected to happen.
"Take him back?" Carl looks surprised. He probably is surprised.
Ben nods his head. "My boy, my boy, this could jeopardise everything.
A kidnapping is a big thing. What if the police start poking in their
long long noses..." Ben shrugs. "All our careful work ruined. Little by
little, that's the secret of making money. Bit by bit. Coin by coin.
Penny by penny. Isn't that right, girls?"
The dogs give little barks and I see doubt flicker over Carl's face.
Much as I would love to be released, allowed to go home, that won't
help Carl, that isn't part of our plan. Behind my back I cross my
fingers, I pray that Carl will think of something.
"But," says Carl and a small smile flickers across his face, "if we
take him back now what's to stop him going to the police anyway? He
knows where we live. We lose anyway." Carl claps his hands together and
his voice raises slightly. "But if we scare the mother, the father,
then they won't dare talk to the police. They'll pay the money and be
glad the whole thing is over. Ben, his parents are rich. Very rich. As
long as we're not greedy, they'll just pay."
When Ben hears the word rich then his eyes widen, his chest starts to
go up and down. I think we've hooked him.
"Rich you say." The dogs bark again and leap up at Ben's side.
"Yes, Ben. Rich. Rich."
Ben scratches his chin. "Maybe we can do it. Maybe we can, yes we can.
Maybe just this once...."
"So you agree?" says Carl. I can hear the excitement in his
voice.
"We'll think about it. We'll think about it, yes we will." Ben nods
his head. "We'll give you our decision in the morning. Now, let's eat.
Let's eat."
Ben and Carl move away from me and over to a corner of the room where
someone has lit a gas lamp. In the light I can make out a table and
from somewhere bags and bags of fish and chips have appeared. The boys
and girls, on Ben's orders, start tucking greedily in. They eat
standing up, using only their fingers as knives and forks. They remind
me of a pack of hyenas I saw on a wildlife programme. But I have to be
honest, I wish I was a hyena with them. I'm starving, ravenous. I
haven't eaten since breakfast that morning. However, no food comes my
way, not even one chip and I can only watch as hyenas put back their
heads and drop pieces of steaming fish into their waiting mouths.
If that isn't torture enough, my arms are also aching like billy-oh,
like nothing on earth. I try to move them to get some relief but Carl
has done too good a job with the ropes. I'm thinking he shouldn't be in
the Fart Club at all, he should hotfoot it down to the clubhouse and
join the Boy Scouts. He has a natural ability with knots. They are very
tight. And if you also happen to be wondering about the condition of my
bum, let me tell you, so am I. I'm not sure at all if it still exists.
There is no feeling there whatsoever.
I start thinking of the comfort of my own home, the softness of my own
bed. I wonder what Jack, Billy and Bell are doing. I imagine Bell
running her hands over her head, Billy pushing up his glasses, Jack
pacing. They must be concerned, worried to death. They can join the
club, so am I.
After dinner has been eaten and the fish and chip papers have been
thrown away I see Ben pick up the lamp. I watch as he walks to the far
side of the room to a sort of raised platform. He casts eerie shadows
around him on the walls as he moves. He puts the lamp down on the floor
and the two dogs sit at his feet. One on the left and one on the right.
Ben claps his hands three times. Something is going down. I hope it's
not me.
The boys and girls of the house on hearing these claps come and stand
in a circle in front of Ben. They are completely silent and even though
Ben is far from me I hear his words clearly.
"Tonight is a special night for us," he says, "and we don't mean
because of our honoured guest, no we don't."
A few of the children turn and look at me and sman.
"No, tonight is special because we have a special job, a very special
job, yes we do." Ben pauses and folds his arms. The quiet is absolute.
If Ben had a mane of golden hair he could have been the Lion King. If
he had an Italian accent he could have been the head of the
Mafia.
"It has come to our notice," says Ben, "that a certain house some
fifty miles from here will be empty this evening, yes it will. And you
know how fond we are of empty houses, yes you do, especially ones full
of nice things, beautiful objects, wonderful wonders." Ben's face
breaks into a smile and I see him look around at the group. "You know
how we like a bit of b and e, a bit of breaking and entering."
Heads nod up and down and several people say, "yes Ben, yes
Ben."
"Now, this job, this visit," continues Ben, "will involve an overnight
trip away from our lovely home, but the rewards make it worth while,
yes they do, the rewards will be plenty, yes they will. There are sacks
to be filled, bags to be packed. There are many treasures to be gained.
It is easy, very easy, yes it is. But...." Ben pauses and looks around
at the group, "we need volunteers, yes we do. We need two brave
volunteers."
Ben looks around at the group once more and if he wanted an indication
of his influence, his magnetism, he gets it. Every single person shoots
their hand up into the air. Every single person, that is, except me and
Carl.
Ben studies each face carefully. He reaches down and pats each of the
dogs on its head.
"Thank you Jimmy," he says. "Thank you Carl."
Carl?
Ben has chosen Carl to go.
A whole dictionary of bad words fly through my brain.
I must have heard wrong. There must be another Carl in the house. But
no, my Carl has gone to the front and is now chatting with Ben. Ben is
explaining something and Carl and the boy who must be Jimmy are nodding
their heads. Up and down.
I start to panic. I feel a drop of sweat slide down my side from my
armpit and suddenly I need to go to the toilet. Desperately.
My breath is coming quickly, in and out, in and out, through my
nose.
If Carl goes, then the plan can't work. If Carl goes then everything
goes wrong.
Ben is patting the two boys on the back now and he is guiding them
towards the front door. Carl glances over to me and then looks away. In
that moment I see a lot of things. I see despair, hopelessness. I see
an apology.
I twist my head to catch a final sight of Carl as he disappears out of
the door.
The plan has gone wrong. Completely wrong.
I am up the creek without a paddle. I am up the creek without a
boat.
I take a big gulp and turn to look at Ben. He is walking towards
me.

Chapter 21

Let me explain the plan. I mean, at least, let me explain how the plan
was supposed to have worked, what was supposed to have happened. Before
it all crumbled like a 3-0 lead on a windy Spring afternoon.
As you have already seen, I have been kidnapped. Of course, I haven't
really been kidnapped. It's just a trick. The idea was that Carl would
get Ben to agree to the kidnapping and that by doing this Ben would
hang himself with the rope we provided. You see a kidnapping, as Ben
himself said, is a big thing, the kind of thing the police wouldn't be
over the moon about. It is the kind of thing you could go to prison
for, for a long time.
We believed that once Ben saw me there in the house, tied up and
neatly packaged he wouldn't be able to resist the chance of making some
real money, we believed that he would see me and only see pound signs.
And then later that night after Ben had committed himself to the plan,
when he was in deep and when everyone was asleep, Carl would loosen my
ropes and I would escape.
I would escape, but Ben would be trapped.
As soon as I was free I was to make my way to the nearest telephone
box and call the police. I couldn't tell the police that I had been
kidnapped, because then they would want to interview me, they would
find out the truth. So I would tell them that I had seen a man with a
gun and I would describe Ben and tell them where I had seen him, at the
house on the hill. Men with guns is something police can't resist, they
would be on their way to the house before you could say boo to a
goose.
Meanwhile back at the house, ten minutes after my departure and about
the same time as I was on the phone, Carl would wake everyone and tell
them that he had been woken by a noise and had discovered my escape.
The house would be in panic. Carl would warn them that I would go to
the police and then post himself as a look out while Ben figured out
what to do.
When the police cars I had summoned were to be seen in the distance
Carl would go back into the house and warn everyone that the police
were on their way. We figured Ben wouldn't have any choice. We figured
Ben would run, we figured Ben would believe he was involved in a
kidnapping, even though he wasn't, not really. Ben would have to tell
everyone to leave. The boys would scatter.
Ben would go.
A round of applause. The plan is successful.
We guessed that Ben would be too scared to come back to the house and
so Carl would be able to carry on living there until he was sixteen and
then get on with his life as he had planned.
Simple.
Except it doesn't happen like that. With Carl gone there is no one to
release me. With Carl gone I am really kidnapped.
I am very scared. And Ben is still walking towards me.
He comes to a stop and nods at something or someone over my shoulder.
I try to twist my head to see what or who but I only see wall. Then I
feel hands on the back of my neck and the tape over my mouth is being
ripped off. With a final painful pull, a stretching of skin, it is gone
and my mouth is free. I take several much needed deep breaths and then
I speak.
"Let me go," I say. It is both what I feel I should say and what I
want to say. "Let me go," I say again. It's all I can think of.
Ben holds up his hands and smiles. He doesn't answer me.
"Let me go," I say for a third time.
Ben clicks his fingers and quick as a flash, quicker than a flash, I
have a white Rottweiler between my legs. By between my legs I mean that
the dog is standing in front of me and it's glistening nose is resting
on the zip of my jeans. Resting purposefully on the zip of my jeans, if
you get my meaning. I certainly get the meaning, I only wish I didn't.
I can hear the dog's breath coming in and out.
I take a gulp of air and then hold myself very still, super still.
Tied up as I am, I can't move much, but the little I can move I hold as
steady as a rock. If I was playing a game of statues I would win. Hands
down. If I was being one of those nude models that artists use I would
receive a bonus. For being so static.
"Now," says Ben, "we don't want to hear any more about letting or any
more about going, no we don't. Understand?"
I nod my head. Very slightly. I don't want to upset the dog.
"You are our guest."
I nod my head again.
"We want you to feel that you have been treated well. We want you to
feel that you have had a pleasant stay, yes we do." Ben glances at the
dog between my legs. "She likes you. She doesn't get so close to
everyone. You should be flattered, yes you should."
Somehow I don't feel flattered. I would prefer it if the dog didn't
like me. I would prefer it if she couldn't stand me, didn't want to be
in the same room as me at all. I would prefer it if me and Dr Doolittle
had as much in common as chalk and cheese.
"Now," says Ben, "we want you to answer some questions, yes we do.
Some simple questions. If we feel you are not telling the truth, the
absolute truth, then our friend here will start her dinner early. Once
she starts it is very difficult to get her to stop, yes it is.
Understand?"
I nod my head. (Again moving it very slightly.)
"We can't hear you. Understand?"
"Yes," I say. "I understand."
"Good." Ben smiles again. "Remember, one lie and you'll never be a man
my boy, no you won't. Just tell us the truth."
The truth. The truth is a problem.
I have to lie, I don't see I have any choice. If I tell Ben the truth
then I will surely be for the chop, or the snip. If I tell the truth
I'll be dead. Or a eunuch. I will just have to lie very well. Luckily,
lying is something I am good at. "No mum, we didn't go to Clacton
today.", "No gran, the jumper's lovely. I love pink.", "No sir, I don't
think you're stupid, not at all."
"Jazz," says Ben, "get me a chair."
Jazz, who apparently has been standing behind me all this time, now
crosses the room and returns with a chair. He places it down next to
Ben, gives me an evil grin and then slinks back into the shadows. Ben
sits and shuffles closer to me.
"Now, let's start." He pats the dog on the head. "Name?"
I tell Ben my real name. I figure the less lies I tell the
better.
"Age?"
I tell Ben my real age.
"Address?"
Problem number one. I can't give my real address. My estate is known
for its poverty. I give an address from the posh side of town, a place
my mum used to work as a cleaner. It seems Ben believes me, anyway, he
asks his next question.
"Father's job?"
I haven't seen my father for years but the last time I saw him he was
working in a chip shop. "He's in retail," I say.
Ben scratches his chin. He doesn't give an order to bite. So far I
seem to be doing OK. At least, I'm not yet missing any vital
parts.
"And your parents are rich?"
I nod my head. "We have a holiday home in France. We have three
bathrooms. We have our own box at Manchester United. Dad drives me up
there for every home game."
"We see," says Ben. I can see him thinking. I can see him adding up in
his mind just what a holiday home, three bathrooms and a box a Man U
would cost.
"My father loves me," I say. "He'd give you anything to get me back.
Anything." This is the biggest lie I have told so far, the biggest lie
I have ever told in my life. I hold my breath. I'm sure the truth must
be written on my face. I wait for the bite. It doesn't come. I wait for
sharp teeth to sink into my tender flesh. They don't.
"Good," says Ben. He stands up and walks around our chairs. For a
minute he disappears behind me and then he appears again. He sits down.
"Now," he says, "if we did decide to ask your parents for a little
reward for taking care of you here, for looking after you so well,
what's to stop you bleating to the police, making up some tall
story?"
"I wouldn't," I say. "My parents wouldn't, they wouldn't say
anything."
Ben pauses. He flexes a muscle in his arm and then he looks at me.
"No, we don't think you would, no we don't. And you know why?"
I shake my head. I don't know why.
Ben smiles again, leans very close to me. He speaks slowly. And with
menace. "My friends have had a good sniff of you, a very good sniff,
yes they have. They never forget a smell, no they don't. And if you
should happen to go to the police, if you should happen to tell them
tales about us, then we guarantee that we will hunt you down. Whenever
you least expect it we will be there, one day we will be there, yes we
will. And let me assure you my friends' bark isn't worse than their
bite, no it isn't. Their bite is very bad. Very bad. Do we make
ourselves clear?"
"Yes," I say. "Very clear."
In fact everything is all too clear. The future's bright, the future's
Ben. It seems that not only has Ben decided to go ahead with the
kidnapping plan, he is going to do it with pleasure. At some point in
the next day Ben is going to try to contact my rich father in retail
and demand money. At some point in the next day Ben is going to find
out I am not telling the truth. He is going to find out that the whole
thing is a lie.
I don't even want to imagine what he will do to me.
Things are not going well.
Ben stands. "Before we put the tape back on, do you have any
request?"
I nod my head. I have one request. "I would like to go to
toilet."

Chapter 22

When Man U were in the 1999 European Cup final against Bayern Munich
and were 1-0 down with only two minutes to go I thought I knew what
fear was. I thought I knew what it was to have a beating heart, sweaty
palms and for each passing second to be a painful moment. I was wrong.
What I am feeling now is what real fear is. Believe me.
To put it simply, I am being held prisoner in a deserted house by a
gang of thieves and a pair of ferocious dogs. To put it more simply, I
am terrified.
My only consolation, my only hope, is that on that night of the
European Cup final, when the odds were stacked against them, Man U not
only drew level, but they also won in the dying seconds of the game.
Behind my back I cross my fingers and pray for a similar result, a
similar miracle to save me.
It is about an hour, I think, since Ben spoke to me, since Jazz took
me over to the potty and I was allowed to go to the toilet. And then
both Ben and Jazz disappeared with the dogs into a room at the back of
the house that I hadn't noticed before. They hadn't come out since.
Don't get me wrong, I don't miss them and I certainly don't miss the
dogs. They give me the willies. Still, I guess, it's better they give
me the willies than they take my willy, if you get my meaning.
The boys and girls in the house, meanwhile, have lit more of the gas
lamps and the room is filled with their flickering light. I can see
clearly now the dirty mattresses, the piles of clothes, the collection
of strange objects; there's an overturned supermarket trolley, half a
dozen traffic cones, a flag from a golf course and most bizarrely a
lollipop person's pole. There is clutter everywhere. It is like a bomb
has gone off in a storehouse filled with objects that never made it on
to the shelves of Oxfam.
Nobody is paying me any attention at all. I might as well be some new
living ornament, part of the collected rubbish. A few of the boys are
sitting on one of the mattresses playing cards with a grubby deck and
some of the girls are practising dance steps in front of a tiny radio
belching out heavily distorted sound. And others are just lying on
their beds, chatting. They could almost be normal kids anywhere, except
they're not. Their life is not normal at all.
Occasionally amidst the babble, when voices are raised, I catch bits
of conversations, snippets of speech. The words they use make Carl's
speech seem black and white. Let me tell you, their language is
colourful. More colourful than the most colourful rainbow.
For example on the bed where the card game is taking place, about
every five minutes, one of the boys will suddenly start screaming abuse
at another of the players and I think a fight will break out. But it
doesn't. The words are ignored and the game or activity goes on as
before, as if nothing has been said.
I should tell you, by the way, that my hands are still tied to the
chair and my mouth is still gagged. I have long since lost all feeling
in my muscles, in my limbs. As an experiment I try flexing my fingers,
just a little. Immediately, pain shoots up my arms, down my spine and
on to my toes. My whole body is wracked in agony. I grit my teeth and I
want to scream but I can't. Screaming is impossible with half a roll of
masking tape fixed around my face. I decide to give making any more
movements a miss. I just hope that when I am eventually released my
body will still work. No, more honestly, I just hope that I will be
released.
Time passes. And then more time passes. The boys are still playing
cards and the girls are still dancing and I am still sitting in my
chair. There are no windows in the room but I guess that it must
already be dark outside, that night must already have come. I am more
hungry than ever, my throat is dry from a lack of water and, oh yes, I
am still scared.
My thoughts turn to home. I think of Jack and Billy and Bell. I think
of my mum and, strangely, I think of Jeremy. I feel guilty. Seeing
these kids living like this I feel guilty for giving him and my mum a
hard time. Our life isn't too bad. I realise that Jack and I are lucky,
our mum loves us. That's the important thing. That's the most important
thing. We have someone who cares for us.
"Boys and girls! Boys and girls!"
The sudden shout startles me and I twist my head and see that Ben has
appeared from his room. Cards are put down and the dancing stops, the
radio is switched off. Those who were lying down on their beds sit up.
Everyone is looking at Ben. Everyone is quiet.
"Boys and girls," he says again, "it is time for bed. But first, let
us pray."
Pray? Praying is just about the last thing I expected. But I see the
children put their hands together and bow their heads.
"Dear God," says Ben in a loud voice, "once more we ask you to look
down with kindness on our humble house, yes we do. Tomorrow we will
wake to a new day, yes we will and we ask most humbly for the
following." One of the children coughs and receives a hard stare from
Ben. The boy stops coughing, goes red and then Ben continues. "Please
let the good people of this fair city give plentifully to our beggars.
Please let large quantities of coins be left in each and every phone
box and please ensure our pickpockets have nimble fingers so that they
may be better able to steal fat wallets. We ask you to bless our gang
of thieves, yes we do."
"Please bless our gang of thieves," repeat all the children.
"And finally, dear God," continues Ben, "tonight we have a special
request, yes we have. In our home this evening we have an honoured
guest that you, in your wisdom, have seen fit to place in our way.
Please could you ensure that his father pays promptly so that no harm
should come to him. Just let the father pay promptly. Amen."
"Pay promptly. Amen," repeat all the children.
Ben claps his hands. "Five minutes and in bed."
Prayer time is obviously over.
Cards are put away, the radio is collected off the table and hidden
under a bed and one by one the lights are put out until there is only
one lamp left burning. I stare into its light and think about the
prayers.
I'm sure that Ben is not a religious man, I'm sure that Ben and a
church would never be in the same place at the same time, but it is
obvious the prayers are a nightly ritual. I think I know why. Ben says
payers for the same reason I belong to the Fart Club. I don't believe
in the Fart Club, as I said, we don't have membership cards, secret
handshakes ?
etc yet I am a member. It gives me and Billy and Bell and Jack a sense
of belonging. Ben says prayers in the house to give the children this
same sense of belonging, togetherness. He says the prayers to create a
group identity. And if the children have a group identity then they
will steal more for Ben, do anything he says, because they identify him
as a leader.
I figure that Ben is not stupid. And if anything my fear grows. I
don't see how I am going to get out of this situation. It is looking
very black. Super black.
"Say goodnight," says Ben.
"Goodnight," everyone says at once and then Ben flicks off the final
light and the room is plunged into darkness.
I listen to the muffled conversations which little by little become
quieter and quieter. And then there is silence. My eyes adjust to the
darkness, but the darkness is so complete I can hardly make out
anything. Almost nothing.
I don't know how long I sit there. I think once again of my bedroom at
home. I think of Jack. I think of the mess I am in. Outside I hear the
noises of the night, the wind in the trees, the hoot of an owl and
inside I hear the occasional shift of a sleeping body, somebody
snoring.
Time passes and I would give anything to be with Jack and for him to
ask me for a game of I-spy. I promise myself that if I ever get out of
this I will play I-spy until the cows come home. And then go back out
again.
I don't think I will ever sleep. My brain is going too fast, my body
is too uncomfortable, my heart beating too strongly. But eventually,
after I don't know how long, I feel my eyes closing. I feel my mind
slipping away, entering that land that exists only in our brains, the
land of dreams.
And I dream of dogs chasing me. I am running along a beach and the
dogs are behind me, getting closer and closer. I can hear their paws
landing on the sand, the sound increasing. One of the dogs leaps, flies
through the air, lands heavily on my back. I crash to the floor,
hitting hard sand. I feel the dog's hot breath on my cheek, I smell its
disgusting stink. It is going to bite. I see its mouth opening. I see
its sharp teeth....
I wake up. I can still smell the breath, hot and stinking.
I flick open my eyes. I see that I am lying on the floor. I see that
my chair has toppled over.
And I see something else. I see the reason for the smell of bad
breath.
I see Carl.
I am alert immediately. I remember where I am immediately.
"Carl, you're back!" I try to say. But I can't. I still have the tape
over my mouth. The words come out like a muffled groan.
Carl puts a finger to his lips, "Quiet. I haven't got time to explain
now. It's sorted. Everything is sorted. Just remember that when Ben
asks you for your telephone number you have to give him Billy's number.
Don't forget. Billy's number. Apart from that go with the flow. Go with
the flow."
And then Carl is gone and he is standing with the other boys in front
of Ben. Ben is taking objects out of one of the three brown sacks that
are obviously the result of Carl's night away and he is smiling.
Just go with the flow, Carl says. Well, that's easy for him to say. At
the moment my body is so stiff I can't move at all. I wonder if I'll
ever walk again. Whatever, I'm sure I'll never flow.
But maybe I'll have to. And soon.
I see Ben put the brown sack down. He is walking towards me.

Chapter 23

Ben stops in front of me and once again he nods at something or someone
over my shoulder. This time I know what to expect. Sure enough, I feel
hands on my neck and the tape is being ripped away. This time, however,
the pain is greater. I feel like my lips have been pulled right
off.
Ben smiles. "We hope you had a good night, yes we do."
Great, I want to say. Beautiful, I want to say. I guess this is what
Bell would answer. As you know, Bell always says the opposite to what
she means. But I don't, I don't say anything. I just concentrate on
breathing, sucking the air into my lungs.
"We have been thinking about you all night, yes we have." Ben gives a
sigh as if he has had a very difficult time. "And we have decided that
although we like having you here so much, so very much, we should take
you home, yes we should."
Despite myself, I smile and I cause myself new pain. My lips are not
yet ready for movement.
"Of course," continues Ben, "everything in this world has a price,
nothing is free, nothing is without cost and we would naturally expect
a fee for returning you to your right and proper owners." He smiles
again. "We would like to think of the payment as a reward. Yes a
reward."
I can think of plenty of rewards I would like to give Ben. But none of
them involve money, if you get my meaning. You don't. OK. Well then, my
rewards would involve big knives and torture, vats of boiling oil and
burning skin. Understand? Good.
"And to facilitate the collection of this reward," says Ben, oblivious
to my thoughts, "we need certain details from you. Yes, that's what we
need. Details."
Ben stops talking, crosses his hands over his belly and looks at me as
if he has asked me a question and expects an answer.
"Sorry?" I say. I am confused.
"What we need is a telephone number. We need your father's telephone
number, yes we do."
Ah.
I remember Carl's words. I hope they weren't only a part of my morning
nightmare. I hope I am doing the right thing. I cross my fingers, I
wish upon a star and then slowly and very carefully I tell Ben Billy's
phone number. Ben nods after each digit but he doesn't write anything
down. I wonder if he will want me to repeat it but he doesn't. Instead
he nods over my shoulder and new tape is fixed over my mouth. It is
tighter than ever and I am back to struggling for each breath through
my nose.
Ben says he will speak to me later and then walks off, followed, as
ever, by his two dogs. I watch him go and just as I am wondering if he
is going to disappear into his room, just as I am thinking that if he
does disappear then maybe Carl will get a chance to talk to me, Ben
stops walking. He comes to a full stop and he turns and claps his hands
three times. I know the signal. So does everyone else. The house
members gather in a circle around him.
Ben takes a small notebook out of his pocket, opens it up and then
reads out a name. I realise what's happening. It's the morning
roll-call and job allocation Carl told me about. Sure enough, one by
one the children are given tasks and one by one the children leave with
a promise to do their best. The crowd in the room gets smaller and
smaller. Eventually only Carl, Jazz and Ben are left. And me. But I'm
not going anywhere.
I imagine that Carl's name will be the next to be called out, that he
will be the next to be sent off and I will be alone again. It doesn't
happen. Instead Ben raises his hands and beckons the two remaining boys
to him.
What's going on?
Ben says a few words I can't catch and then Carl is walking towards
me.
Carl is coming towards me. By himself.
If I could move my lips then I would smile. Regardless of the pain I
promise you.
As Carl arrives next to my chair, he leans close to my ear. "Ben has
sent me to take you to the toilet. He's going to phone the number you
gave him. Don't worry, Billy will be there. He knows what to say. I
haven't got time to explain but as I told you, just go with the flow.
Now follow me."
Follow him. That's not so simple. My legs are dead, completely
useless. I nod to my thighs and luckily Carl gets my meaning. He places
an arm around me and half carries me over to his bunk bed where the
potty is. If I was able to talk I would probably ask Carl why he didn't
just bring the potty over to me. But I can't, I can't say
anything.
After I have been, after I have used the potty, and as Carl is sitting
me back down in my chair he winks at me and whispers, "Don't worry,"
and then he heads back to where Ben and Jazz are still quietly
talking.
Don't worry. That's easy for him to say. He's not relying on Billy to
save his life. Billy. I suddenly have an image of Billy in my brain. He
has a puzzled look on his face, "Kidnapped who?" he says, pushing up
his glasses. If anything, my heart starts beating faster.
After Carl rejoins the group, Ben, Jazz and Carl all go into the room
at the back of the house and I have to wait again. I wonder what
possible plan the others could have come up with to save me. I run
various ideas through my head but can't think of anything sensible. If
I can't think of anything sensible then I dread to think what they have
come up with. I imagine SAS style raids, I imagine rescues by lone
heroes. I am just imagining a tunnel under the floor of the house when
Ben and Jazz and Carl are coming back towards me.
It's time for action. I feel it in the air.
It is Carl who takes off my tape this time. He does it more gently
than Jazz but still it is
painful.
"We have just talked to your father," says Ben. "He's a very
reasonable man, yes he is."
If Ben has really spoken to my father then I think he is a very lucky
man. I have seen neither hide nor hair of him for over two years.
"A very reasonable man," says Ben again as if he can't quite believe
himself how reasonable my father was. "He was grateful to us for taking
good care of his most beloved son, yes he was. He did not hesitate when
we suggested that we should receive a reward for all our fine efforts,
no he didn't."
That's nice, I want to say Bell style. You already know how I feel
about Ben's reward.
"We are going to untie your hands and then we are going to take a
little trip, yes we are. But first we'll give you some advice. If you
run, the dogs will bite you. If you make any sudden moves, the dogs
will bite you. If you try to talk to anyone or signal for help, the
dogs will bite you. In fact, you're going to have to work very hard not
to get bitten. Do we make ourselves clear?"
"Perfectly," I say. I look at the dogs which are, as ever, at Ben's
side. If it came to a chase I wouldn't fancy my chances. If it came to
a fight I wouldn't stand a chance.
Jazz disappears behind my back and I feel my hands being untied. As
the ropes are released I slowly bring my arms in front of me. The
wrists are red and raw where the ropes have been and my muscles are
dead from being in the same position for so long.
"Stand up."
I look at Ben.
"Stand up!"
Stand up. I don't know if I can. I put my hands on the wooden seat and
attempt to push myself up. The muscles in both my legs and arms scream
out in agony. I flop back down onto the chair.
"Stand up," says Ben again and the two dogs growl menacingly.
I try again this time I am standing. Dogs growling menacingly are a
good incentive. If Ben asked me to perform ballet and the dogs growled
I think I could do it. I could perform pirouettes around the
room.
"Walk."
I take a step. And then another. And I am walking. I am walking like
Frankenstein walks in all those old horror movies. I am not bending my
knees and I am holding my arms out in front of me to aid my balance.
It's a pity that there isn't a Hollywood casting director in the room.
I would be given a part immediately. I can see it now, Jake, star of
Son of Frankenstein.
After Ben and the others have watched me for a few minutes and my
walking has improved slightly and I am no longer Frankenstein's son,
maybe only a distant cousin, Ben speaks again.
"We'll be going now. Remember what we said. No funny business."
I glance at the two dogs. I don't think I could forget.
Ben heads out of the door and I follow.
As I step outside the sun blinds me. I am no longer Frankenstein, I am
Dracula. I feel the light will kill me. There is light everywhere,
bright light. I put my hand up to shield my eyes and set off down the
hill. Ben is in the lead, then Carl, then me and Jazz brings up the
rear.
We are going to meet my father. So I am told. He is going to hand over
a big pile of money for my release. So I am told. I don't believe it.
Not a word of it.
I stare at Carl's back and wonder what he has planned. Whatever it is,
I hope it works. I hope there will be no bloodshed, no tears, no dog
bites.
We reach the bottom of the hill and continue walking through the
housing estate there. I see a group of boys kicking a football against
a wall. They are laughing and shouting at one another. I hate them,
they are free.
Ben glances at his watch and steps up the pace.
We soon leave the estate behind and soon we are walking past shops.
Old women are eyeing vegetables suspiciously and little kids are
tugging at their mothers' skirts asking for sweeties. I hate them too,
they are free too.
The day really is hot. Sweat is sliding down my back and my T-shirt is
sticking to me. I think of Billy and what he might have said to Ben on
the phone. I look at the dogs, see their long front teeth. What is the
plan? What is the plan? One step, another.
The sea appears on the horizon and then draws nearer. We are walking
along the sea front. There are more people. Whole families have been
encouraged out by the hot weather, mothers, fathers, kids clutching ice
creams, laughing and running. There are people everywhere. Even the
road is full. Cars are bumper to bumper looking for parking
spaces.
It is a perfect Summer day.
Except it's not, I am a prisoner, a walking prisoner.
Where are we going?
We go past the cinema where we watched the film about chickens and the
alley where the fire doors are. We go past the museum where Carl proved
himself to be a member of our club and in front of me I notice the dogs
have their tongues hanging out. They are hot too. Don't get me wrong, I
like dogs, but I wish these particular dogs would keel over and die
from heatstroke. Then I might want to make a run for it.
Suddenly we stop and I nearly bump into Carl's back. We are outside
the amusement arcade, the place where we saw Carl for the very first
time. Ben turns to look at me.
"We're meeting your father in here, yes we are. When you see him then
tell me. Don't try and approach him. We've warned him any trouble and
you will be in trouble, yes we have. He seems like a reasonable
man."
I take a deep breath. So this is where I am meeting my father. I would
say the chances of that happening are slim. I would say the chances of
that happening are none.
We go inside. Ben, then Carl, then me, then Jazz. The same order as
before.
The arcade, today, is full of kids. They are everywhere, crowding
around the machines, screaming at the tops of their voices, competing
with the computer generated noises from the games.
"We're early," says Ben. "Over here."
I follow Ben and we come to a stop in a corner that is relatively
quiet.
"Watch out for your father."
I do as I am told. I look for him. I promise you I really do look for
him and time passes. I pray that Carl really does have a plan or I
could be waiting here forever to see my father. I've already been
waiting for him for the past two years.
And then, as I am looking, I spy a face I recognise.
It is not, however, my dad. Not even nearly.
It is Jack.
He seems to be looking at me but at the same time not looking at me. I
work it out. He's acting like he doesn't know me. It must be part of
the plan.
Then I see Billy, then Bell. The whole gang is here.
Hooray for the Fart Club.
Then I see someone else. Someone whose face is almost as surprising as
my father's would have been. The whole gang is here plus one.
I see Jeremy.

Chapter 24

Jeremy. What is he doing here?
I can think of two possibilities. Number one, he is here by chance.
Number two, he has something to do with the plan. If he is here by
chance then that could mean trouble, he could give the game away. If he
is here to help then it's quite likely that at some time in the near
future I will drop down dead from shock.
Just at this moment Jeremy turns towards me and gives me a very
distinct wink.
He is here to help.
Did I ever tell you how much I care for Jeremy? How very much?
I feel a sharp dig in my side and then I hear Ben's voice hissing in
my ear.
"Have you seen him yet? Have you seen him?"
"Who?" I want to ask. "The tooth fairy? Santa Claus? Jesus Christ?" I
don't. I shake my head and say no, no I haven't seen my father.
"He's late, yes he is."
"My father's always late," I say. Well, that was certainly true. Very
true.
"I'm going for a walk," says Carl, pushing himself away from the
machine he is leaning on. "See if I can get some wallets."
"Good idea," says Ben, scratching his chin. "We think that's a good
idea, yes we do."
Ben may think it's a good idea, but I don't. I don't know what's going
on. I watch Carl blend into the crowd and then I follow him as he makes
his way across the floor. He stops next to Jeremy. Jeremy is playing a
game. He is holding a gun and shooting at little aliens on a screen.
His face is set in concentration.
Carl looks at Jeremy's face and then at the screen and then he moves a
little nearer. I see Carl's right hand move slowly down to Jeremy's
back pocket. I see him extend his index finger and his thumb and then
slowly, slowly lift Jeremy's wallet from his back pocket. He slips the
wallet into his own pocket.
OK, I think. Very nice, I think. I don't know what to think.
"He's ten minutes late now," says Ben, glancing at his watch.
Ben is standing on one side of me with the dogs, Jazz is standing on
the other. It would be fair to say that I am boxed in. It would be fair
to say that it would be difficult to escape.
"Only ten minutes is good for him," I say, trying to sound like I mean
it.
"It's not good for you," says Ben, "my girls are getting
hungry."
I look down at the dogs. I wish some jobsworth would come up to us and
say no dogs allowed in the amusement arcade. I wish he would say that
the dogs have to be impounded and exterminated. It doesn't happen. I
take a big gulp of air and turn my eyes back to Carl.
I see that Carl has now drifted over towards Bell and Jack. I watch as
he leans first next to Bell, takes her purse, and then leans next to
Jack, lifts his wallet. This surprises me the most. I didn't even know
Jack had a wallet. In fact, I'm sure that two days ago he didn't.
That's what happens when you get kidnapped, you grow apart from your
family so quickly. Things change so quickly.
"Fifteen minutes late," says Ben in my ear. "If he's not here in five
then we're leaving, yes we are. We'll just have to send your father a
little memento of his son, a little piece of you. We'll see then if he
wants to pay, yes we will."
I take a deep breath and feel a drop of sweat slide down my side. I
turn my eyes back to Carl and pray that whatever he is up to, he'll get
up to it pretty damn quick. I'm not keen on the idea of Ben sending a
bit of me to my father. I'm keen on all my bits.
I see Carl heading back towards us. I'm surprised. I'd been expecting
him to do to Billy what he'd done to the others, I'd been expecting him
to take Billy's wallet. And then I realise it's a while since I've seen
Billy. I quickly scan all the faces gathered around the machines. Billy
is not there. Which means he has gone somewhere else and he is doing
something else.
The plot thickens. The mystery deepens.
Carl is getting nearer now and then just as he is a few steps away,
just as he is within
touching distance, I see him trip. He trips, he flies through the air
and he lands heavily on Ben. Ben crashes to the floor.
"Sorry boss," says Carl, helping Ben back to his feet. "I must have
tripped on my shoelace. Sorry boss."
Ben is looking angry but at the same time he's trying not to cause a
scene, trying not to draw attention to himself. He is brushing dust off
his jeans. The dogs have stood up.
Carl looks at me and he winks. Somehow I get the feeling that the trip
was not accidental. Somehow I get the feeling that the plan has really
started.
The next thing that happens makes me sure that it has. There is a loud
shout from across the arcade.
"Thief! Thief!"
I look over, but I don't really need to look. I recognise the voice.
It is Jeremy.
Then there is another voice. It is Bell. Then another, a little voice,
Jack. They are saying the same thing. "Thief! Thief!
And at the same time as they are shouting, Jeremy, Bell and Jack are
all patting themselves as if they have lost something. People are
stopping what they are doing and turning to see what all the fuss is
about.
Next to me Ben's eyes have widened. He is starting to look
worried.
"It was him," says Jack loudly. "Him." And he points at Ben.
Ben's eyes widen even more and he is definitely worried. He turns to
Carl and says something unrepeatable.
My heart, as ever, is going mad.
"Police!" shouts Jeremy. "Someone call the police." He is walking
towards our group.
All the children in the arcade have stopped playing the games now.
They are all looking at us. Every single one.
We are as still as statues. Even the dogs have frozen. Only Jeremy is
moving.
"Police!" says Jeremy again. "Someone get the police."
"It was him," says Jack, still pointing at Ben.
Ben looks to the left and to the right. I know what he's doing, he's
looking for an escape route. There isn't one, only the front exit. Ben
puts an arm on my elbow and begins to edge us slowly towards the door.
Everyone is still staring at us.
Ben's face reminds me of that of a bull about to charge, a bomb about
to explode.
"Keep calm," says Jazz, speaking for the first time. "We haven't done
anything."
"No," agrees Ben, "we haven't done anything, no we haven't."
Except kidnap me, I want to say. Except run a gang of thieves, I want
to say. I don't. I don't say anything.
"Police!" shouts Jeremy once more.
Our group has nearly made it to the door, is about to step outside,
when a big blue and red wall blocks our way.
The red in the wall is Billy in his red Voyager T-shirt. The blue is
the blue of a policeman's uniform. For the first time in a long time I
feel hope in my chest.
We come to a halt. Dead.
"What's going on here then?" says the policeman in true policeman
fashion.
Ben opens his mouth but no sound comes out. So it is Jack who speaks
first. Pulling Bell behind him he has arrived at the policeman's side.
He curls his lip and I see a tear roll down his cheek. "This man," he
pokes Ben in his thigh, "stole my wallet. He stole my new wallet."
Another tear falls.
"And mine," chips in Bell.
"And this one," says Jeremy, indicating Jazz, "he took mine."
"I didn't," says Jazz.
"Me neither," says Ben. "We didn't do anything. We didn't do anything,
no we didn't."
The policeman puts his hands on his hips. He gives Ben and Jazz a
disapproving stare. "If you gentlemen would be so kind as to empty your
pockets, I'm sure we can clear the incident
I see Ben look at Jazz, I see Jazz look back at Ben. I can imagine
what they are thinking. They are thinking that they haven't stolen any
wallets. They are thinking that if they empty their pockets the
policeman will have no choice but to let them go. And they can take me
with them. They can still go ahead with the kidnapping plan.
"No problem officer," says Ben. "We don't mind at all, no we don't. We
can empty our pockets, yes we can."
"Good," says the policeman. "Do it."
All eyes are on Ben and Jazz. There is silence in the arcade.
At the same time Jazz and Ben put their hands in their pockets. At the
same time they bring them out again. If they could move in such harmony
while swimming then I'm sure there would be a place for them on the
Olympic synchronised swimming team. However, I'm sure swimming is the
last thing on Ben's and Jazz's minds. They both have a look of
astonishment on their faces.
You see, in Jazz's hand is Jeremy's wallet. In Ben's hand are Bell's
and Jack's wallets.
I look at Carl and smile. I know how the wallets got there. I know
that he put them in Ben's and Jazz's pockets. I know now that not only
is Carl a great pickpocket, he is also a great put-in-the-pocket.
The policeman puffs up his chest. "I think you gentleman should
accompany me down to the station."
Ben looks at Jazz and Jazz looks at Ben. Ben nods and then with one
leap they both hurl themselves at the policeman. The policeman tumbles
to the floor with a crash and Ben and Jazz are out of the door, across
the road, leaping over the sea wall and running up the beach. They are
closely followed by the two dogs.
I am free.
But they are getting away.

Chapter 25

"Keep an eye on them," I say to Carl quickly. "Watch where they go.
We'll help the policeman."
Carl nods his head and then dashes across the road. I see him jump
onto the sea wall and look out across the beach. I turn to my saviour
on the floor.
"Are you OK?"
"Fine," says the policeman. He is sitting up, rubbing a spot on his
back, looking slightly dazed.
"Here's your hat," says Jack, passing the policeman his
headwear.
"It's not a hat," says Bell, "it's a helmet. It's called a
hel-met."
"Oh," says Jack. "It looks like a hat to me."
Somehow I think they are missing the point.
"They're getting away," I say. That's the point. I know because I've
seen The Bill. I've seen any number of Hollywood movies. I've sometimes
even watched Inspector Morse with my mum.
The policeman stands, brushes himself down, places his helmet
carefully on his head and looks out across the beach.
"Looks like we've lost them," he says. "I can't see them. Long gone.
Sorry."
It sounds like he doesn't care. It sounds like he is ready to leave.
But then, I realise, he doesn't know Ben runs a gang of thieves, he
doesn't know I am a kidnappee, he doesn't know about the Fart Club's
plan to help Carl. For him, a couple of nicked wallets is not the crime
of the century, it's not even crime of the day. And while I'm happy for
my own freedom, for my own escape, I'm thinking about Carl. What will
he do? He's back to the beginning again, back to having no hope about
his future. We promised we would help him. We promised to get
Ben.
"After them!" I say to the policeman. "Go after them."
He looks across the beach, looks back at me. "Well...."
"I'd be willing to prosecute," says Jeremy. "If you catch them. People
like that need to be punished."
Well done Jeremy! I couldn't agree more.
"Me too," says Jack. "I'd plosicute, too. Definitely."
"And me," says Bell. "I'd prosecute, I mean."
The policeman sighs. He lifts his walkie-talkie off his belt and I
hear him call for back-up. He reclips the walkie-talkie. He puts his
hands on his hips.
"Come on," shouts Carl, impatiently from across the road. "This way.
We know the way."
"No time like the present," says Jeremy.
And so it is that the policeman, Jeremy and all the members of the
Fart Club set off across the beach at a run. If the policeman thinks it
strange that we should be accompanying him then he doesn't say
anything. In fact, he doesn't say anything at all. He is not a very
talkative policeman. I don't care. As long as he talks to Ben, as long
as he reads Ben his rights, tells his he's nicked, I don't care if he
never says another word. Ever.
Soon we reach the place where the beach ends and the rocks start and
we are scrambling over them, helping each other up. We've been here
before.
"If they've gone where I think they have," says Carl with a smile,
"there's no escape."
The policeman looks at him. Suspiciously.
"We play here sometimes," says Carl. "We know the area." And then he
doesn't say any more but lifts Jack over a particularly high
shelf.
We are going at a swift pace and soon we are all sweating, starting to
puff. And while my heart is beating fast, for the first time in ages,
it's beating fast because of physical exertion, not because of fear.
The shoe is well and truly on the other foot. It is Ben who soon enough
won't be free. It will be Ben who will be a prisoner.
I hope. I pray.
We reach the place that looks like a dead end. There is the high
towering cliff, there is the churning sea to the right.
The policeman takes off his helmet and scratches his head. "They're
gone."
Carl has already sat down and has already pulled off his shoes and
socks. "Follow me."
Me and Jack and Billy and Bell all sit down too and all start pulling
off our shoes and socks too and for a minute the policeman and Jeremy
watch us and then they start doing the same.
"Do you think we'll get them?" whispers Jack to me.
I nod my head.
"Hooray!" he says very quietly.
Billy pushes up his glasses and pulls down his T-shirt which has
ridden up over his stomach. "Ready?"
"Ready," says Bell.
"Ready," says Jeremy.
"Ready," says the policeman.
We are all ready.
Carl is the first to step in the water and we all follow in a line.
The water is higher than last time and I put my hand on Jack's
shoulder. The last thing we need is for him to fall in again. And to be
honest, I also need to steady myself. I can feel the tension rising. My
palms are sweating, I can hear the blood pounding in my ears. It's like
there are five minutes left of a game and Man U are 1-0 down. They have
attack after attack. I am breathless waiting for that equalising goal.
It doesn't come. It doesn't come.
Slowly, slowly we reach the other side of the cliff.
Carl turns and looks back at us. "We're nearly there," he whispers.
"Get ready."
I take a deep breath. I am ready, ready as I'll ever be.
Carl is the first to step onto the beach and then one by one we gather
around him. It is just as I remember it, high cliff, perfect sand in a
semicircle. There is only one difference. Today the beach is not
deserted, not completely. I see Ben and Jazz. They are lying quite
still on their backs with their hands behind their heads, their eyes
closed. They think they are safe, they think they have escaped.
They are wrong.
The policeman clears his throat and in the silence the sound is as
loud as a small volcano erupting. And quick as an erupting volcano the
two prone bodies sit up. They do not look pleased to see us. They do
not roll out a red carpet and hold out a welcoming hand. No.
"You have the right to remain...." our friend the policeman starts
saying and then stops.
He stops because in the instant between Ben spotting us and the
policeman opening his mouth Ben has leant over to the two Rottweilers,
said something in their ears and now the dogs are running towards us
with all the speed of a very speedy pair of greyhounds. Their mouths
are open and I can see their sharp teeth.
What did I say about my heart only beating because of exertion? Forget
that. Put it right out of your mind.
My nightmare of dogs chasing me on the beach is coming true. Very
true.
I'm sure that Jack won't mind me telling you, because after all he is
only seven, but as he sees the dogs running towards him he lets out a
scream. The rest of us go pale.
Just when you think things are going your way, you find yourself up
that stretch of water without means of propulsion again. Just when you
are about to celebrate victory, there is the double whammy of two goals
in injury time.
The dogs are spraying sand in all directions as they run. They are
getting closer. And closer. I can see the whites of their eyes.
If I had a gun it would be time to shoot.
If I had a bow and arrow it would be time to launch the arrow.
I remember Ben's words. I think of sharp teeth sinking into soft
flesh.
The policeman pulls out his truncheon. He spreads his legs and
prepares himself for attack. Billy pushes up his glasses and Bell rubs
a hand over her head. I glance over my shoulder, back at the way we
came. The path along the cliff seems impossibly far away. We would
never make it in time.
We would be eaten before we got there.
We're doomed, or so I believe.
Just as I am thanking God for the wonderful life I have had so far and
asking for at least little Jack to be spared Carl takes two steps
forward. He is standing at the front of the group and is the closest to
the oncoming dogs. "He's mad," I think. I hold my breath and wait for
impact, wait for the dogs to pounce, for Carl to fall. It doesn't
happen.
It DOESN'T happen! Get it?
The dogs don't leap. Carl doesn't fall.
Instead, I see Carl raise his hands in the air, palms forward and I
hear his words as he
speaks.
"Easy girls."
That's it. That's all. But the words have more power than a punch on
the nose, the waving of a wand, the referee's final blow of the
whistle.
It is not so much that the dogs stop running, it is more that their
run changes. They are no longer charging at us like a pair of Exocet
missiles, they are now bounding gleefully along like a couple of Spring
bunnies. Their menacing looks have changed into happy doggy smiles,
their angry barking into pleasurable yelps. They come to a stop in
front of Carl, jump up and take turns licking his face.
The killer dogs are licking Carl's face. I slap Jack on the back.
Whoopee! And then I catch sight of Ben.
If you have never seen a man's jaw drop, let me tell you, it is a
funny thing. Ben's jaw drops so far it nearly hits the sand.
"That's the man officer," says Jeremy right on cue. "That's the man
who stole my wallet."
"And mine," says Bell.
"And mine," says Jack. "He took it. My new wallet."
"Don't worry," says the policeman, "I think we've got him."
I have to agree, I think he's right. We have got him. Ben looks like a
balloon that has been popped, a cracker that has been pulled, a game of
football that has been lost. He looks crestfallen, beaten,
defeated.
He all but holds out his hands for the handcuffs to be slapped on. He
all but walks himself to the station and locks himself in a cell.
Less than five minutes later, just as Carl finally manages to calm the
two dogs down, just as Ben finally manages to pick up his dropped jaw,
two more police officers arrive. They read Ben and Jazz their rights
and tell us to go at our convenience to the police station to make a
statement. Then Ben and Jazz are led away. I don't mention the
kidnapping but it doesn't matter, I don't need to. Ben and Jazz will be
convicted as pickpockets, convicted for resisting arrest, convicted for
hitting a policeman and trying to kill said policeman with dangerous
dogs. And while they won't be in prison forever, while they won't spend
the rest of their days breaking rocks, at least it will be enough time
for Carl to sort himself out, enough time for Carl to reach sixteen and
start the life he wants.
As the policemen and Ben and Jazz disappear back around the cliff I
turn to the others.
"We did it," I say.
Billy pushes up his glasses. "We did," he says, "we did it."
Bell rubs a hand over her head. "Carl's free. We saved him."
"Hooray," says Jack and then he reaches up to Jeremy and takes his
hand in his own. "Thanks Jeremy. Thanks a lot."
Jeremy looks down and smiles, "That's OK," he says. "That's OK."
"I owe you guys," says Carl. "I really owe you." And he gives me a big
hug. Under the circumstances I don't mind. Under the circumstances I
feel it's the right thing to do. I hug him
And that's it. That's our story. There are just a few more things to
explain, a few loose ends to tie up. I promise you, you'll find all the
information you want in the last chapter.
But first, in case I forget later, I'd just like to thank you for
seeing this story through to the end, for reading each and every page.
And if you think this has been an exciting adventure, if you think this
has been a roller-coaster ride of a Summer, just wait until you hear
what happened to Carl the following Christmas. But that, as they say,
is another story. That, as my father would say, is another beginning,
another book. And we haven't reached the end of this one yet. So please
turn over.

Chapter 26

So I suppose you want to know what happens next, how the whole thing
wraps up? As if I haven't told you enough already, as if I haven't gone
on and on. But I guess if you want to, then I should oblige, I should
bow to your wishes.
Are you ready? Are you sitting comfortably, free from any
distractions, out of your parents' vocal range? Yes? OK, then I'll
start.
That day on the beach, after the dust has settled, or I should say
after the sand has settled, and Ben and Jazz have been whisked away by
our friendly policeman, the first thing I want to know is what Jeremy
is doing there. Of course I don't ask it like that, I don't come right
out and say, "What are you doing here?", that would be plain rude.
Instead I turn to Bell and ask her to explain to me, if she would be so
kind, what is going on, what had been happening while I was a prisoner,
how they had come up with their plan. I know that Jeremy's name will
come into it somewhere and that all will be revealed.
Bell tells me to sit down on the beach and I do and the others do too
and then she starts to talk. It is mostly Bell who tells the story,
although occasionally Jack or Billy or Carl chip in with a word or two.
Or three.
Bell says that Carl called them at Billy's house on the night of my
kidnapping. I ask Carl how he had called them and he says he managed to
sneak off for five minutes on his way to the job Ben had sent him on.
Well done Carl. Bell says that they panicked and didn't know what to
do. She and Jack and Billy talked until bedtime and didn't come up with
a single idea.
Bell says the idea came to her in the night. She had been thinking
about the Summer, about how we had met Carl. And then it hit her. Carl
was a pickpocket. If Carl could pick pockets then it was more than
likely he could put things in pockets too. From there the plan was
hatched. They would set Ben up as a thief, tar him with his own brush,
detonate him with his own fuse.
When Ben called it was Billy he spoke to, not my father, although
Billy was pretending to be my father (and if you knew my father and if
you knew Billy you would realise what a funny thing this is) and Billy,
as my father, arranged to meet Ben and me in the amusement arcade. He
arranged to give Ben a bag full of money. And the Fart Club arranged to
set Ben up.
But then they hit on a snag. Bell said that if the plan was to work
well then it would be better if an adult accused Ben of stealing. An
accusation from an adult, she figured, would sound a lot better than
one from a group of kids. So they needed a grown-up. And quick. Billy's
parents were away camping, Bell's mum was at work. The only adult
around was Jeremy.
Jeremy. So that was it.
Jack had to be persuaded to go and speak to Jeremy. It was only when
Bell said that it was the only way of saving me that he agreed. And
then he told Jeremy everything. He told Jeremy about Carl, about Ben,
about the dogs. And to the surprise of everyone, without hesitation,
Jeremy agreed to help.
It's like I told you before. I always thought Jeremy was a decent guy,
sound as a pound, one in a million.
"And that," says Bell, "is that. You know the rest."
I agree with her, that is that, I do know the rest. The plan had
worked and Ben and Jazz were no longer a menace to society. Or more
importantly, they were no longer a menace to Carl.
And then Jack tugs my arm. "Bro?"
"Yes?"
"Can I ask you something?"
"Of course." I am expecting that Jack wants to ask me about my night
in the house of horrors. I expect that he wants to know what it was
like to be tied to a chair, to spend time in captivity. I expect that
he wants to know how brave I was, how I never lost faith, how I always
believed that right would win the day. But no. He doesn't ask that at
all.
"Can we go swimming?"
Swimming, Jack wants to go swimming. I look around at the others, look
at their faces. I see smiles forming on their lips. Swimming, swimming
would be nice. It is, after all, still the Summer holiday. It is, after
all, a hot day. We are, after all, on a beach. And, I realise, for the
first time in a long time we don't have anything to worry about, we
don't have any people to save, any evil people to destroy. In our own
little world we have done the equivalent of Batman saving Gotham City,
Superman saving the world, Watford winning the FA Cup.
"OK," I say. "Let's swim."
And we all jump up, pull off our clothes and go swimming in our
underwear. Jeremy too. Jeremy is a good swimmer and he teaches me and
Jack how to swim underwater, how to swim through each other's
legs.
What can I say? We have a nice day. We have a great day, we enjoy
ourselves.
Then, finally, it is time to go home. We say goodbye to Carl and he
says goodbye back and we promise to see him again the next day and he
says we will, we definitely will and he says thank you again and hugs
me again and then we go off to the station. We get on the train and we
don't buy tickets and Jeremy doesn't buy a ticket either.
How good is that?
Pretty soon, we are back at the house.
"Where have you been?" says my mother angrily as soon as I walk in.
And I know what she is going to say next, I know she is going to say
that she has spoken to Billy's mum and she knows I haven't been
camping, I know she is going to say that she has told me a hundred
times not to lie, not to make up stories. But she doesn't say it. She
stops because she has noticed something.
"What....?" she says and then, "How....?" and then she doesn't say
anything.
"Hello mum," says Jack.
My mum opens her mouth but this time nothing at all comes out. Instead
she just smiles. She smiles and has her mouth open at the same time.
Try it. You will look as ridiculous as my mum is looking then.
And what is it that so surprises her so much? I can tell you. The
sight that has made my mum go so giddy is this. Jack is holding
Jeremy's hand. Jack and Jeremy are suddenly best of friends.
"What's the big deal, mum?" I want to say. "Didn't I tell you things
would work out? Didn't I tell you to chill out?" I want to say. But I
don't. I just slap Jeremy on the back and ask my mum what time tea will
be ready, I'm starving.

"I'm starving," says Billy and rubs his stomach.
"Nearly there," I say. "Hold on."
"You sure Ben won't be there?" says Jack.
I sigh. It is about the tenth time Jack has asked me this. Or the
hundredth. "Ben's in prison. He won't be there. Not for a long
time."
"Positive?"
"Positive."
"Hooray!" says Jack.
Hooray! I couldn't agree more. The day after the capture on the beach,
Jack and Bell and Jeremy had all trooped down to the police station and
made their statements. They had picked Jazz and Ben out of line ups and
said yes, they were the people who had stolen their wallets, they
should be locked away for good. Ben and Jazz had been charged and Carl
was free. Free as a bird, free as the wind, free as a plastic toy in a
box of Weetabix. It was all over.
And it is now one week later and Billy and Bell, Jack and I are
heading up the hill to Carl's house (the house formerly known as Ben's
house). Carl has invited us to lunch.
As we reach the top I see the house there as I remember it, big and
ugly-looking. Not good memories I have to say. Not good at all.
We walk up to the door. We don't knock. We walk in, all
together.
Wow!
If I wasn't sure I was in the same place I never would have believed I
was in the same place. Everything has changed. Totally.
For a start the room is bright. The boards have been pulled off the
windows and sunlight is streaming through. And where once there was
mess, now there is order. Where once there was chaos, now there is
cohesion. The room is tidy. My mum would be proud. The clothes have
been picked up off the floor, the beds have been made and all the junk
has disappeared. There are no more shopping trolleys, no more golf
flags. There is no more bad smell.
"Hello," says Carl, smiling. "Just in time. Lunch is ready."
On the table are bag after bag of fish and chips. Well, some things
never change. There are some things you wouldn't want to change.
"Lovely," says Billy and pushes up his glasses. I can see his eyes
gleaming. "Lovely."
"Tuck in," says Carl.
We do. If there was a prize for tucking in we would win it. We tuck in
for a good five minutes and then I think of something I want to ask,
something delicate.
"So...." I say, biting off the end of a chip.
"So...." says Carl, doing the same.
We are sitting on the floor all in a circle. The fish and chips are on
the floor as well, on their paper, in front of us.
"What are you going to do?" I say. That's what I want to ask. That's
what I want to know. I want to know what Carl's plans are. Now that he
is free, I mean. Anyway, he knows what I mean.
"Well," says Carl, licking his fingers, "I've come up with four
things."
"Four?" says Billy.
"The number after three?" says Jack.
Carl nods. "Four."
"Go on," I say.
"Number one," says Carl. "And this is the most important. I am going
to go ahead with my former plan. As I said before, as soon as I am
sixteen then I am going to change my life."
"Right," I say.
"Good idea," says Bell.
"A change is as good as a holiday," says Billy.
"Number two. In the meantime, I am going to carry on with Ben's system
in this house." As I open my mouth to protest Carl holds up his hand.
"But not in Ben's way. It will be much more relaxed. Much more. And no
more stealing. I mean pickpocketing. From now on we will live on what
we find or what people give us through begging."
"OK," says Bell.
"Nice," says Jack.
"Beggars can't be choosers," says Billy and nods his head.
"Number three," says Carl, giving Billy a funny look, "as discussed
with you Jake, I will study. I will join the library and become well
read. Intelligent."
"Good idea," says Bell.
"Very wise," says Billy and drops an extra large piece of fish in his
mouth."
"And finally number four...." Carl pauses.
"Yes?" I say.
"Yes?" says Jack.
"How many?" says Billy.
"Number four," says Carl. "I promise to do my best to hold up all the
principles of the Fart Club."
"Hooray for the Fart Club," says Jack.
"Hooray for the Fart Club," says Billy.
"Hooray for the Fart Club," says Bell.
"Principles," I think, "what principles?"
And that is the end and as you can see, we are back to the beginning
again. Back to the Fart Club.
Everything always comes back to the Fart Club.
I wouldn't want it any other way.
And before I go, before I sign off, I want to give you some advice.
Form a Fart Club of your own. Believe me, you'll have adventures you
never dreamt of.
Let it be said. The Fart Club opens doors.