What Abigail Did That Summer

by Ben Aaronovitch

  ‘This is Abigail,’ says Simon, and lets go so he can jump back to stand next to me, beaming. ‘She’s my friend.’

  ‘How lovely,’ says Simon’s mum. ‘Where did you meet?’

  ‘I went to the shop,’ says Simon. ‘For Angelica.’

  This is either a really good lie or a really bad one, depending on whether Simon really did run an errand for the housekeeper earlier today. ’Cause one thing I can tell for certain is that Simon’s mum is going to check.

  ‘Well, thank you for coming round, Abigail,’ says Simon’s mum. ‘But it’s getting late so I think perhaps you should go home.’

  ‘Mum,’ says Simon in a whiny voice that makes him sound five and makes his mum frown.

  ‘It’s eight o’clock,’ says his mum in a crisp head teacher voice which she turns on me. ‘I’m sure your parents want you back.’

  As his mum herds me down the stairs, Simon asks her whether I can come play tomorrow.

  ‘That depends on whether you do your homework or not,’ she says.

  When we are at the front door, Simon’s mum frowns at the darkening sky and asks me whether I don’t want to call my parents and have them come fetch me. I say I don’t have a phone because there’s no way I’m letting her see my clapped-out Samsung and weirdly that seems to cheer her up. She offers to ‘run’ me home in her car but I tell her I’ll be fine.

  ‘Are you sure?’ she asks reluctantly.

  ‘Sure,’ I say.

  7

  Stuff You Need to Know

  You don’t actually have to cross the Heath to get from Simon’s house to mine. It’s probably quicker to walk down to South End Green and catch a 46 to the end of Prince of Wales Road, but I like crossing the Heath in the dark. The trick is to be faster and quieter than any potential mugger, child molester or general wasteman and there’s a thrill to it.

  You don’t have to go over the top of Kite Hill, either. But I like the view.

  So I’m running up the path that climbs the back of the hill, and I’m trying this trick I read about where you place your heel down first and roll over your foot instead of just slapping it down. Do it right and you run through the night as silent as a ghost, with just your heartbeat and the rush of the wind in your ears.

  ‘Oi!’ calls a voice behind me. ‘Hold up!’

  I’m more annoyed than frightened, because you’d have to be Usain Bolt to beat me up this hill – and I’m thinking he’s got better things to do than chase me. I lean into the run, flinging my hands behind me the way Molly does, and fly up the hill.

  ‘Hold up – I need to talk to you!’ calls the voice behind me, much closer than it should be.

  I push harder, abandoning the silent run and the jet plane arms and concentrating on pumping my legs as fast as possible. Ahead is the brow of the hill, a dark hump against the light-polluted sky.

  ‘Abbey Girl, stop!’ cries the voice and it’s right on my heels, but I finally twig what’s following me up the hill. I slow up a bit, but I don’t stop until we’re standing right at the top of the hill by the metal panorama plaque that tells you what all the landmarks are called. There are at least a dozen olds up here, walking their dogs or drinking beer and watching the view over London.

  ‘Not here,’ says the voice from down by my feet, and I feel the brush of fur against my calves as the speaker tries to hide behind my legs. ‘Somewhere where there’s fewer dogs.’

  Too late – a white and black collie is padding towards us, tail down, head cocked to one side, eyes bright. Weird eyes, I notice, one dark, one light. Its nose wrinkles as it sniffs.

  ‘Listen, you sheep shagger,’ hisses the voice. ‘Any closer and you’re going to get yourself sanctioned.’

  The collie stops, but I can see a shaggy Labrador zeroing in.

  ‘Shit,’ says the voice. ‘A gun dog – quick, pick me up.’

  The Labrador is passing the collie, head down, intent, tail swishing back and forth.

  ‘Quick!’ says the voice.

  Sighing, I reach down and grab the fox at my feet and pull it up into my arms. It’s heavy, twenty kilos at least, twice what a normal fox would weigh. It rubs the top of its head under my chin as I try to find a comfortable way to hold the squirming animal. The Labrador and the collie have stopped advancing and are looking at us with a Them humans is crazy look. I reckon the dogs know exactly what I’m carrying, but fortunately up in the growing darkness on Kite Hill their owners do not.

  ‘Let’s exfiltrate to a safe location,’ says the fox. ‘Before I wet myself.’

  *

  We are sitting on a bench next to the path that runs a hundred metres downslope of the main one across the summit. It’s shadowed by trees and bushes, and if people see us they’ll just think I’m a crazy person talking to my dog.

  The fox is sitting in my lap and still nuzzling my chin, which is beginning to vex me so I tell it to stop.

  ‘Don’t you like that?’ says the fox. The voice is slightly wheezy and pitched high. I suspect this is a vixen. ‘In training they said it promoted co-operation in humans.’

  ‘Not if you don’t stop,’ I say, and the vixen stops. I ask her name.

  ‘Complicated,’ she says, and I say, ‘That’s a funny name.’

  ‘Names are complicated,’ she says. ‘But you can call me Indigo.’

  It’s full dark now but there’s enough light pollution to make out the kids’ playground and the athletics track at the bottom of the hill. An Overground train is running into Gospel Oak Station and an ambulance is racing in the opposite direction down Mansfield Road – heading for the Royal Free with its blue and white light bars silently flashing.

  I find I’m idly scratching the soft fur on Indigo’s neck, which she seems to like.

  ‘What do you want, Indigo?’ I ask.

  ‘I’m supposed to brief you on things you need to know,’ she says, and stretches her neck so I can reach her throat.

  I’ve met these talking foxes before. They look like Vulpes vulpes but they’re much bigger. And because they can talk, that means they must have a different voice box and throat arrangement. And they can hold a sustained conversation, which indicates human levels of intelligence. Although, to be fair, I’ve met some bare stupid people who could have a conversation, so that might not prove anything.

  ‘Who wants you to brief me?’ I ask.

  ‘Control,’ says Indigo.

  ‘And who’s Control when he’s at home?’

  ‘Control is she who gives me orders.’

  ‘Is she a fox?’

  ‘Well, I’m not about to take orders from a cat, am I?’

  ‘What are you supposed to tell me?’ I ask.

  Indigo squirms a bit, rubbing her face against my shoulder.

  ‘Do the scratchy thing again,’ she says.

  So I do and she tells me that there’s something growing in or around the Heath.

  ‘Growing like what?’ I ask. ‘Like a tree, an animal, a fungus?’

  ‘It’s a something,’ says Indigo. ‘No physical shape and no smell but it’s “wrong” and it affects humans, young humans.’

  ‘Okay,’ I say soothingly, because I can feel Indigo getting agitated under my hand.

  ‘It’s getting stronger,’ she says. ‘But we can’t pin it down because it’s a human thing, not a fox thing.’

  ‘Is that why you’re telling me?’ I ask. ‘You want me to do something?’

  ‘We want you to keep your nose in the wind for us.’

  ‘Why me?’

  ‘Because you’re on the list of human assets in this sector.’

  ‘That’s not actually an explanation, is it?’

  ‘It’s a short list,’ says Indigo, and nuzzles my neck again. ‘And you’ve got connections with the world of magic.’

  ‘Wait – is t
his something to do with the missing kids?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ says Indigo. ‘We’re not good at invisible stuff. We like things we can smell, or bite, or eat – especially eat.’

  ‘What do you eat?’

  ‘Everything,’ says Indigo. ‘We’re omnivores.’

  *

  I’m in my bedroom, which is about the same size as Simon’s mum’s downstairs guest loo. When I got back my mum was asleep on the sofa, but she woke up when she heard me come in and I helped her bath Paul. I think he likes it better when there’s two of us giving him a bath ’cause we can mess about a bit. He can’t talk any more but he can still smile, sort of, so you know when he’s having a laugh. Once Paul was settled and my mum had gone back to sleep in front of the TV, I went to my room to make notes and think about foxes and missing girls.

  The news is wall-to-wall Rushpool-this and Rushpool-that, with Rushpool in big blood-red letters over that picture of the two little white girls wearing matching sun hats. There’s nothing on Google News about Jessica and Natali, but when I check the Metropolitan Police website there is a notification that both girls had been returned to their homes safely.

  Returned to their homes safely was standard Fed speak and tells me nothing. I’m wondering whether they were found and returned home or they returned themselves home. There was definitely something sus3 about the way Natali came round to see me and Jessica recruited Simon. I stick on the word ‘recruited’ because I realise that’s what it was – me and Simon were being recruited – but for what? The foxes think something is wrong, and the foxes have been right before – one warned me that there was trouble across the river and the next thing you know a tower block in Elephant and Castle gets blown up. Yeah, Skygarden, that’s what I’m talking about.

  We still don’t know where the talking foxes come from, what they think they’re up to, or why they’re up in my business. I gave one half a Greggs sausage roll once. Maybe they imprinted. I don’t know.

  Paul is restless. I can hear him shifting about through the wall that separates our bedrooms. I am listening in case he wakes up and Mum needs help, but he settles down.

  Natali and Jessica have been returned to their families.

  Mr and Mrs Fed will have filed the case and gone on to something else.

  Tomorrow I’ll keep my nose in the wind – it’s not like I’ve got anything better to do.

  3 Short for ‘suspicious’ but with overtones of wrongness and outrage. Young people seem to be able to pack a great deal of meaning into a single syllable.

  8

  The Gap Between the Branches

  Simon is leaning on the fence at the top of Parliament Hill and when I ask him who he’s waiting for he says me. Which is surprising, since I hadn’t planned to come out this morning. I had been planning to stay in bed instead, but Paul was restless and I knew if I stayed in the flat I’d soon be up and helping Mum. I told her I was going to the library but that was really Plan B if Simon wasn’t home.

  Library is always a good excuse, because if Mum calls I can pretend that I have my phone on silent.

  I join Simon at the railing and ask whether he climbed out the window again, and he smiles shyly – which I take as a yes.

  ‘Aren’t you worried you’re going to fall?’ I ask.

  ‘No,’ he says. ‘Did you know there’s a fox in that bush?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘He’s watching us,’ he says.

  ‘It’s a she,’ I say. ‘A vixen.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘She told me last night,’ I say.

  Simon’s face is a pleasant blank – which I’ve learnt is him thinking about something. And when he thinks about something he thinks about it properly, so I’m not that surprised when he says –

  ‘So it’s a talking fox.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Her name is Indigo – why don’t you say hello?’

  I’ve done my research so I know that foxes have wicked hearing and that Indigo has been following every word I’ve said. She’s hidden pretty deep in the bush but when I look over she’s giving me a definite bad look. The look gets even worse when Simon walks over and crouches down to introduce himself.

  Good, I’m thinking, let’s see if you can resist the smile.

  A white goth girl I recognise from school walks past me and then stops by the big Welcome to the Heath sign. I don’t know her name but she’s in year 114 and has freckles, a black frock coat and knee-high boots. She is checking her phone and looking around like she’s waiting for someone. She starts looking at me with a puzzled expression, and I think maybe she’s wondering whether I’m who she’s supposed to meet. She is raising her hand to wave hello when a boy walks up to her and introduces himself. He’s white, overweight, brown-haired, wearing a blue Save Our Seas T-shirt and knee-length red canvas shorts. I check his shoes – generic black trainers. He’s talking and Goth Girl is nodding. Then they turn and walk off, north, towards the barrows. I have an idea.

  ‘Indigo,’ I say without looking in her direction. ‘Follow the girl in black and tell me where she goes.’

  Simon yelps and fur brushes the backs of my calves as Indigo races along the railings and vanishes into the bushes on the other side. I’m proper speechless because I never expected Indigo to do what I said, and now I’m thinking of the possibilities . . . which are endless.

  Simon sits back on the railing beside me.

  ‘Do you want to climb trees?’ he asks.

  *

  ‘Jump!’ calls Simon. But it ain’t going to happen – no way.

  I’m standing on a limb six metres up a tree in Kenwood with one arm tight around the trunk because, this far up the tree, the branch is thin enough to wobble every time I shift my weight. I’m looking over at Simon, who is standing on the limb of a completely different tree. He’s practically standing on the tip of his branch and it bows under his weight while he steadies himself by holding an even thinner branch above his head.

  ‘Jump!’ he calls.

  And it’s not even a jump between my branch and his, it’s less than a third of a metre – more of a step really. If I’m willing to let go of the trunk and walk along to where the limb gets too thin to bear my weight. It should be easy. It looked easy when Simon did it a minute ago. But I can’t seem to make myself let go of the trunk.

  Probably shouldn’t have looked down.

  ‘It’s easy,’ he calls again. And, to prove his point, he steps back to my tree.

  And slips.

  It’s that fast that he’s dropped out of sight before I can even move.

  I let go and lunge forward onto the branch. I meant to straddle it, but it’s too narrow and I roll right off. I manage to lock both hands around the branch, the wood burning my palms as I find myself dangling over nothing.

  I can hear Simon laughing below me.

  My arms are being pulled out of their sockets and bark is scraping my hands as they slip slowly off the branch. I want to yell for help but the sound is caught in my throat. I can’t pull myself up, so I’m looking for somewhere to put my feet. But looking down, all I can see is the ground. I kick forwards and backwards and suddenly my heel catches on something out of sight behind me. I try to tighten my grip on the branch above me but I’m going to slip any second.

  I swing back, make a wild guess as to where the branch behind my legs is, and get my foot on it. My fingers slip but now I’ve got my foot braced and adjust my grip. I get my other foot on the branch and now my only problem is that I’m leaning forward and spread-eagled.

  I hear Simon laugh again, somewhere below me, and look down to see him climbing up to join me. He has a big grin, despite the bruise that runs up the left side of his face from chin to eyebrow.

  ‘Tree climbing is over,’ I say, and he pouts.

  4 High scho
ol sophomore.

  9

  The Lady Greets the Slave or Vice Versa

  Given that I’d delivered Simon home with a black eye and a limp, I thought Angelica took it pretty well. Simon wanted to sneak in via his tree again but I wasn’t having that. I was still reliving the moment when his head dropped out of sight. There’s bold and then there’s just being stupid.

  ‘Did you fall out of a tree again?’ Angelica asks, and gets the grin in return.

  She doesn’t want to let me in.

  ‘He’s not supposed to go out today,’ she says. ‘He’s supposed to do his homework.’

  ‘I can help with that,’ I say.

  Angelica gives me a suspicious look. But I’ve been watching how Simon gets round grown-ups, and give her an innocent smile. I practised it in the mirror last night. She frowns, but I tell her we can come down and work in the kitchen if she likes and that does the trick. Next thing we’re on our way upstairs with a plate full of snacks, a bottle of Florida-style fizzy orange drink and a packet of frozen peas for Simon to hold against his bruised cheek.

  Once we’re done with the mini sausage rolls, the mini-salads and I’m not sure what they are but they taste of peanut butter, Simon wants to play Risk, but I pull out his Latin textbook instead. There’s a Post-it note stuck to the cover that says Do exercise 1.1 to 1.4 xxx.

  This is odd, because either Simon is older than he looks or he’s starting Latin GCSE a year early. Nothing wrong with that. I started two years early – but I have motivation. If I pass my Latin GCSE I get to learn magic. Peter promised and Peter better not be lying.

  More likely Simon’s mum is trying to give Simon a head start.

  These first exercises are easy, because they’re easing you into the idea of inflection which we don’t do in English no more, because we use word order instead. Once you’ve got your head round that, you can stick your slave in front of the woman and still have her salute him. Femina servum salutat. What makes it long5 is memorising all the inflections, which change with tense and other things. I was hoping if I made it a game Simon would pick it up quicker, but he doesn’t. One thing I noticed, though, is once he’s got it stuck in his head, there it stays.