Saving Sophia (15 page)

An understanding

What seems like hours later, Mum comes to find me. I’ve wandered out of the garden and into the fields. My trainers have wicked up all the water and I’m now more wet than dry, but I can’t stop crying and until I do I don’t want to go back into the house.

Buster came with me. He’s soaking wet now, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

“Ned was right,” I mutter to Mum as she puts her arm around my shoulder. “He said it could be lies. But I wanted to believe it.”

“I know, darling,” says Mum. “I know.”

“I wanted something exciting to happen,” I say. “I get so bored, here – with just – plants.”

Mum doesn’t say anything, just turns me so that we’re walking back towards the river.

“I know it sounds silly,” I say. “But I wanted to be a hero.”

She squeezes my shoulders. “It doesn’t sound silly at all. I think we all want to be heroes. When I was your age I wanted to be a hero; sometimes, I still do. We all want to solve problems for other people – there’s nothing wrong with it. Anyway, from what I heard, you
were
a hero.”

“Was I?”

“You saved Sophia’s life, and Miss Wesson’s. If you hadn’t broken out of that car you’d have all—” Mum stops. “It would have ended badly.”

We walk a little further.

“But she told me she never saw her mum – at all, for years at a time, that he was stealing her mum’s money, that he’d killed people, that he might even kill her mum. In fact, that her mum might already be dead.”

“Yes,” says Mum. “But imagine having someone coming between you and me, stopping us from seeing each other? She just wanted to see her mum.”

I try to imagine it, and pull Mum a little closer.

“I suppose Sophia didn’t tell you that her mum was Irene’s niece,” she says when we stop under a tree.

“What?”

“I thought I recognised her when she came in, so after you stomped out, I asked.”

“Is that how Pinhead’s been able to get hold of the house?”

Mum nods. “But because I asked, she now knows what he was up to, and she’s going to find out how he managed to get the deeds. So there’s still hope.”

“Mum, do you think Pinhead’s really a criminal?” I ask.

She laughs. “I don’t know but he’s not very nice, is he? That night in the kitchen I had him down as a bouncer.”

“Snap!” I say, and laugh for the first time in ages.

“Do you want to go back in?” asks Mum.

But I don’t. I’d rather stand in the wet.

So we wait to see Sophia climb into her mum’s shiny little rental car and see it head off down the bumpy track, muddy water spraying up the sides.

Mum doesn’t say anything, and we just wander back towards the house, kicking off our shoes in the damp porch, and padding into the kitchen, our wet socks making prints on the floor.

“She’s gone,” says Dad, unnecessarily.

I look up at Ned. I’m waiting for him to tell me he told me so but he doesn’t. “Sorry, sis,” he says. “Sorry we let it happen to us.” He stands and comes over to me and puts his arms around my shoulders. It feels lovely.

“I’ve got something for you,” I say, running for his bag that is sagging against the wall in the hall. I find Pinky and Perky and the mug with the sock and egg. “Here.”

Ned picks it out and rolls the egg on to the table. “It’s untouched. It even survived the car crash!”

I shrug, thinking of all the glass and mud and metal. “Miraculous,” I say.

“Actually, it’s not miraculous,” says Ned. “It’s to do with the design and makeup of the shell structure…”

“Shh, Ned,” says Mum. “For now, it’s miraculous.”

I laugh, because I knew that’s exactly what Ned would say.

Dad rustles around, rearranging scones on the
plate, while Mum refills the kettle and slams it on to the stove.

“I thought we were helping her,” I say.

“I know, I know,” says Dad. “No one’ll blame you for what you did.”

“Miss Sackbutt?” I ask.

Dad laughs. “Miss Sackbutt’s just very relieved that you’re back. She’s not a woman to hold grudges. She’s coming round later to see if you’re all right.”

“What about you and Mum?”

“Us?” says Dad. “It’s been an interesting week, but we’re just glad to see you home, safe.”

“Really?” I ask.

“Really,” says Dad, glancing at Mum, who is wiping her nose on her sleeve again.

When the rain stops Ned and I go for a walk together. I don’t think we ever have before, ever, but there’s a first time for everything. Dad gives us some money and we buy crisps and sweets from the post office, and although I’ve always thought we were missing out because we didn’t spend our pocket money on crisps and sweets, they’re a bit of a disappointment and what I really want is an apple.

“What did you think when you left me?” asks Ned.

I eat another spangle chew and think about it. “I think I thought I’d lost you for ever,” I say.

“Really?” says Ned. “And how did that make you feel?”

He looks far too cheerful so I say, “Great, I felt great. It was such a disappointment when I saw you again.”

Ned punches me on the arm.

It’s fine – it’s how it should be.

Miss Sackbutt turns up under a huge flowery umbrella.

“Lottie!” She drops the umbrella and wraps me in her arms before sniffing loudly and uttering, “Lottie,” again. She smells of rose water and baked beans.

“I’m really sorry,” I say, leaning her umbrella against the door. “I must have caused you the most enormous amount of trouble.”

“No, Lottie – I’m the one who should be sorry,” says Miss Sackbutt, sinking to a chair and fanning her face. “It’s all my fault – I should never have trusted that Wesson woman. I can’t
even bear to think about it. And that man, he had such a lovely car, and nice manners.” She raises her eyebrows so that they go outside her spectacle frames. “I’d no idea he wasn’t what he seemed. I feel so silly.”

Miss Sackbutt sits looking sad, somehow older and deflated as if someone popped her romantic bubble.

“I’m sorry for running away, though,” I say, looking up at Mum who nods.

“Running away?” Miss Sackbutt’s shoulders heave and she lets out a slow sigh, deflating still more. She gazes out of the kitchen door at the rain dripping from the ferns in the garden. “Running away’s not a crime. Doesn’t every child dream of running away? I know I did.”

“Did you?” asks Dad, presenting her and Mum with cracked mugs of tea.

“Oh yes, several times,” says Miss Sackbutt. “I once reached the Isle of Wight, you know.” Miss Sackbutt examines a black spot on the side of the mug. “But I wanted to get to France. I wanted an adventure.”

“How old were you?” I ask.

“Fifteen,” says Miss Sackbutt, biting into a scone.
“I was in love.”

Mum raises an eyebrow. “Who with?”

“Just France,” says Miss Sackbutt. “I think I still am.”

“Mum, what happened? I mean to you, and Dad and Ned.”

I look up at Mum. She wipes the steam from the kitchen window as if she hasn’t heard me. Eventually, she speaks. “The police found us very quickly the day after you’d left, and before Ned had returned. I was ready to throttle you. The story was very difficult to piece together. I couldn’t believe you’d been kidnapped, and I couldn’t believe you’d be stupid enough to follow a girl who has a repeated history of running away. I mean, you! Of all people. It was baffling – and very worrying.”

“Sorry,” I say.

“After a couple of days I felt that we’d entered a new kind of nightmare, where we lived in police stations and ate Pot Noodles.”

“Oh.”

“And then Ned came back to Bream in a police car, and of course I was massively relieved to see
him, but it became more worrying still. I thought we’d have to search every scrap of the country, but in the end it was you that brought you back, you survived, you did all the right things. And I’m so glad.”

Mum hugs me. I bury myself deep in her lumpy sweater and hug her back.

“And darling, why
did
you go with her?” asks Dad, as he’s feeding Buster.

“Why?”

“Yes,” says Mum. “You must have wanted something.”

“I told you, I liked her story and I wanted an adventure – she offered one. And I made her a promise.”

“Hmm…” says Dad.

“And,” I say, my heart beating faster at what I might possibly be about to say. “And – I wanted to get away from all this…” I wave my arms to show the plants and tanks of scorpions. “It’s not normal, you know – other people don’t have all this – stuff.”

Dad looks up and stares at me as if I’m talking Martian.

“Other people have parents in suits, and smart cars with dvd players.”

“Ah,” says Mum, looking at Dad. “We did wonder.”

“It’s just that we’re not normal. I sort of wish we were normal – but then…”

I look around at the crumbling plaster, the dust, the piles of books, the chipped crockery.

“It’s home.”

Estonia

The phone rings. It’s the police. They’ve found the flash drive. And they’ve found Pinhead. He’s in Estonia.

“Sorry – the brake lines? So that would mean that all the brake fluid would leak out, wouldn’t it?” Dad takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes as he listens to the person on the other end of the phone. There’s a long pause. “Attempted murder – I see.”

He listens again.

“I should think she’s pretty furious.”

More silence.

“So Maria Wesson would be a material witness then, she’d know exactly what he was up to?”

A pause.

“And what exactly was he up to?”

A pause.

“Sixteen million.” Dad makes a long low whistle. “Oh my word! What a ridiculous amount.”

A pause.

“Twenty-three companies in twelve countries? Why would anyone need so many?”

A pause.

“Squirrelling, was he? Robbing Peter to pay Paul. Of course, putting things in different pots all over the world, just in case.”

A pause.

“So actually – yes, I understand. No – we won’t tell a soul, not until it comes to court, but you’ll have to extradite him, won’t you? Hmm – could be a while then, but gosh, yes – lucky escape. Thank you. I will – yes, I will.”

Dad puts down the phone and looks at me over his glasses. “You did well, Lottie sweetie. That flash thing had everything they needed on it and the woman, Maria thingummybob, spilled the beans on him. It seems he’s been stowing Sophia’s
mother’s money away for some time. Stealing from her and lots of other people, large amounts in dodgy European property deals. Sophia was right after all. Mr Pinehead is a very nasty piece of work.”

“And what about Wesson?” asks Ned.

“She was his lover and his accomplice, but his appearance in Estonia instead of Rio as they’d planned, and cutting the brake lines of the car she was driving, seem to have loosened her tongue. Can’t help feeling a little sorry for the poor mug.”

“Brake lines?”

Dad takes off his specs and rubs the lenses on his sweater. “It seems he tried to kill you all. He tampered with the car. She may have been driving badly, but she wouldn’t have been able to slow down. He’d cut the brake lines; then once the fluid had leaked out she would have been unable to stop and the car would be lethal.”

“Flip,” says Ned.

“Oh,” is all I can say.

Dad leans forward and pulls a hair from my face. “You really did do well, sweetheart.”

“What about Irene’s house?” asks Mum.

“They didn’t say anything about that,” says Dad.
“Perhaps he never actually got his hands on it.”

“But he didn’t kill anybody?” I ask.

“No,” says Dad. “He didn’t – so far as they know – but he tried. He tried to kill you. And he and his Estonian pals have stolen a great deal of money. So when they do catch him, he’ll be going down for a long time.”

We’re playing UNO, now. All of us, in the house with the rain beating on the windows. It feels great, although something’s still hanging in the air.

Mum’s made pancakes. Dad’s serving them up with mushrooms for supper. Ned laid the table, and we played cards while we waited. And it’s lovely because we’re all getting on together really well, but I can’t help feeling that I ought to do something about Sophia. Trouble is, I don’t know what.