The Hoax

by Paul Clayton

  Chapter Seventy-Two

  ‘Oh God, I’m sorry. I think it’s nerves.’ Shannon emerged from the bush she’d disappeared behind in order to find somewhere to pee.

  ‘It’s that coffee,’ said Frankie, ‘and delayed shock. After all, last time you went was before your brother decided to roll the car off the motorway.’

  Jonny walked on. Sometimes Mum said the wrong thing. So he’d crashed the car. He wasn’t getting into a discussion about what had happened. He’d driven well. It might have been easier to keep it on the road if Shannon hadn’t decided to clamber through to the back seat and knocked his arm off the wheel. But now wasn’t the time to go there. ‘Come on, Mum,’ he said. ‘Let’s keep moving.’

  Shannon joined them on the path. ‘Sorry about the pee thing. Didn’t do much anyway.’

  ‘Too much detail.’ Jonny moved off again.

  They walked on through a small wood, which hid them from the few scattered houses. It was far better for the limping one-sleeved trio to stay out of sight, thought Jonny, after what he’d had done to the car. Not that there’d been a choice, he told himself. They were here for Henry. It was no time to be caught in a stolen vehicle.

  Luckily that last stretch of the motorway had been almost empty and there was nobody on the slip road to see what had happened to the car. The vehicle would have burnt out before anyone got to it.

  The sky grew darker and the sun looked to have withdrawn for the day. Jonny suspected it wouldn’t be long before the heavens opened. They’d get drenched. ‘When we get out of these woods, it’s all open fields and we should see the lighthouse ahead.’ The trees were starting to thin out and Jonny could see a field, fallow for winter.

  Frankie caught up with him. ‘Have you any idea what we’ll do? When we get there? Is this a stupid idea?’

  ‘I don’t think it’s any more stupid than turning up for a job that didn’t exist.’

  Frankie’s eyes fell to the ground and Jonny took her hand. ‘Sorry, Mum, that wasn’t fair. You’ve always done everything you could for us three. I know it’s not been easy. You’ve been brilliant, the best mum any of us could hope for. Now it’s time for us to do this together. I hope you’re right about where Henry is.’

  Frankie smiled. Rising on tiptoe, she put a hand behind his head to pull his forehead down and kiss him. ‘I do find it hard to say how fantastic you are ... but you are.’

  ‘Mum, Jonny! Look.’ They both turned to see Shannon standing where the trees met the field. She took something out of her bag and held it up in front of her. Set against ominous charcoal clouds was a lighthouse, a white lighthouse with two small cottages at its base. The lighthouse in the picture that Shannon was holding.

  Chapter Seventy-Three

  Henry wished that the tall man had let him stay in the lantern room but, as soon as the door had opened, he’d untied Henry from the railing and shoved him out onto the narrow ledge of the gallery that ran round the outside.

  The wind was blowing hard and cold up here at the top of the tower, and the darkness of the approaching storm made the place seem even more dangerous. Now Henry could see down to the ground, he realised how many stairs he’d climbed on the way up here. Below them white gravel surrounded the lighthouse, and the driveway led out to the nearby road. A grassy bank covered the other side of the road and rose to a cliff edge, beyond which was what looked like a long drop to the sea. The wind was pushing the waves into angry mountains.

  The man pulled Henry around the gallery until he was facing the driveway then, using the rope once again, he fastened Henry to the gallery rail. The shortness of the rope meant that Henry had little movement.

  ‘Why do I have to be out here?’ At first, Henry didn’t think the man had heard him. The wind was blowing loudly, snatching his words away across the darkening skies. But as the man was about to disappear back through the door to the staircase, he turned. Henry could feel his eyes glaring through the slits in the balaclava but he couldn’t hear what he was saying. The man lifted his arms and hands in a comic shrug as if to say, ‘Not my fault,’ and disappeared through the door.

  Henry explored the limitations of the rope. It allowed him to move barely a foot in either direction. There was no shelter. When the rain came, this would not be a good place. He looked down over the balustrade in time to see the man leave the front of the lighthouse and cross to the cottages on the right-hand side. Why had they left him out here? Surely someone would see him and rescue him? Then he realised that anyone passing by the lighthouse would have to look up and see the rope. He suspected that was a difficult thing to spot, and the wind would carry any screams for help far out to sea before they reached the ears of a would-be rescuer.

  The lighthouse stood on its own plot of land and behind that was a vast, flat field. In the pre-storm light, it looked as though someone had dusted its surface with chalk, a white-covered brown stain across the landscape.

  How small he must look up here, thought Henry. To any passer-by glancing up, he could be a post in the railing. He’d always looked up to Jonny who, at six foot, seemed to never stop growing. That was what Henry wanted to be more than anything: tall. But Frankie had been clear. ‘You have different dads, my darling. Different genes. I don’t think you’ll be wearing any of Jonny’s hand-me-downs.’

  Standing there, battered by the wind, he wondered if he was always going to be small.

  Something caught his eye. Three moving shapes on the far side of the chalk-stained field. Were they sheep looking for shelter? They appeared to be making a straight path across the field towards the lighthouse. Three of them. A mother, a brother and a sister?

  Given that his hands were roped together, he wasn’t able to wave. Surely it was too much to hope that those three insignificant dots moving across the field were coming to his rescue. But hope was all he had.

  Chapter Seventy-Four

  ‘Look.’ Frankie pointed at the lighthouse as the three of them stood in the field. ‘There’s something going on up there.’

  They’d started their journey across the enormous expanse of what looked like lunar terrain between the woodland and the lighthouse. Now they watched as two figures emerged onto the balcony. One was tall; behind him, half hidden by the railing, there was a tiny Henry-sized figure.

  Frankie stumbled across the soil. ‘I want it to be him and I don’t want it to be him. What’s going on?’

  ‘We need to keep walking across this field and keep our eye on what’s going on up there. We don’t know anything for sure.’ Jonny had taken command.

  ‘Should we split up?’ said Shannon.

  ‘If there’s something going on and they see any of us running across the field then, kaboom, it’s all over,’ Frankie said.

  ‘It’s a good thought, Mum.’ Jonny could see that Frankie was against them splitting up. ‘What if Shannon were to skirt around the outside of the field? She can keep an eye on us, and if anything happens she can go and get help.’

  ‘I don’t know what to say. I’m a bit of a mess, frankly. You two have been brilliant. If you think that’s the right idea, then let’s do it,’ said Frankie.

  Shannon peeled off to the left until she got to the hedgerow, which she followed as discreetly as she could. From where Jonny was standing, it looked like it would bring her round the other side of the two cottages.

  Jonny and Frankie continued to walk in a straight line across the field. ‘We still don’t know what we’re going to do when we get there, do we?’ Frankie had never felt less in charge in her life. It was as if all her natural instincts as a mother had drained away. The one thing she was sure of was that, if it came to it, she would fight. She would fight like a lioness. These were her kids, and no one was messing with them.

  ‘Mum, we’ve been playing it by ear. Let’s carry on. If that’s Henry up there then we know there is somebody else to deal with.’ Jonny waited for
her response. She smiled at him and set off.

  The wind made it hard to walk forward and look upwards, but from time to time both of them managed it. They could see the little figure moving from side to side.

  ‘Oh God,’ shouted Frankie. ‘I think he’s tied to the railing. Please God, let’s get him down.’

  ***

  Now that she was on her own, Shannon made much quicker progress. Staying close to the hedgerow to make herself less visible, she ran along the edge of the field. Leaping over a low wall that separated the field from the lighthouse, she soon arrived at the back of the two cottages.

  Built at a slight angle on either side of the base of the lighthouse, the one on the left seemed dark and uninhabited but there was a light on in what appeared to be the kitchen window of the right-hand cottage. A large dark-blue car stood between the buildings.

  Shannon wondered what to do for the best. Should she creep into the house and see if she could find out what was going on and who these people were, or should she make a quick dash to the front and get to the top of the lighthouse? She was still trying to decide when the back door of the cottage opened. She flung herself into the hedge, twigs and thorns biting into her side.

  Someone came out of the door and crossed to the car. A scarf and a black woollen hat wrapped around their neck meant that Shannon couldn’t get an idea of who the person was, but they opened the driver’s door of the car and retrieved a small bag which they took back into the cottage. Shannon relaxed and scuttled a little further along the hedgerow. She was sure the visitor to the car was not the person they’d seen earlier on the balcony, so they had more than one person to be wary of.

  ***

  Jonny and Frankie splashed across the field. By running across to the right, they kept out of the direct line of sight of the houses. The weather continued to worsen and the dank smell of earth filled the air.

  At one point, Jonny was convinced the lighthouse door was about to open. He threw himself flat on the ground, with Frankie following suit. She lay still, spluttering through a mouthful of foul-tasting soil, then heard Jonny mutter, ‘False alarm,’ and scramble back to his feet.

  He scurried across the field, stooping low. Frankie made herself a promise that if they got through all this successfully, she would join a gym or buy a bike or enlist in the SAS. If motherhood was going to call for these sorts of skills, she needed retraining.

  As they closed in on the lighthouse, they saw the low wall circling the land it stood on, in the middle of which was a white gate. Jonny pushed it open, let Frankie pass through ahead of him, then they both crouched by the wall on the other side. It gave them a little shelter from the beating rain, and they took a moment to regain their breath.

  Now they were closer, they saw that the lighthouse was octagonal. A gabled door was set into one wall almost opposite them and to the right was a small white shed. As they considered what to do next, the front door of the lighthouse opened. They moved to the left and hid behind the shed.

  Frankie held her breath and grabbed Jonny’s shoulder. ‘What do we do?’

  Jonny peered round the corner of the shed. ‘Whoever it was has gone into the cottage. I can’t see if there’s anyone still up top, but I think we have to risk it.’

  That wasn’t what Frankie wanted to hear. ‘Okay. What’s the plan?’

  ‘Follow me.’ Without another word, Jonny set off from the cover of the shed across a path, over the green lawn and onto the white gravel surrounding the lighthouse. Frankie did her best to keep up, aware of her feet crunching on the surface as they reached the front door.

  Jonny turned the handle and pushed the door. Frankie expected him to find it locked. When Jonny stepped through it, she followed him, her stomach churning.

  Chapter Seventy-Five

  Henry was growing colder and colder. The wind was an unbroken icy blast and now rain had started to splatter from the sky. He couldn’t crouch and gain any shelter and, with his hands tied as they were, he couldn’t lift his jacket hood to protect him from the rain.

  There was nowhere to hide. Looking down through a mixture of tears and rain, Henry saw two figures racing towards the lighthouse door. He hardly dared to hope but he called out to them anyway, a feeble cry against the storm-battered building. They had to be coming to help him. Why else would they be running around?

  Neither of his captors had returned since tying him to the gallery railing. He yearned for the comfort of the lantern room. He had long given up the battle against crying and let the tears flow freely. Somehow, in some way, this was his fault. He could only hope for a way out.

  Chapter Seventy-Six

  Shannon waited a little longer by the hedge in case anybody else came out of the kitchen to the car. From where she was squatting, she saw Jonny and her mum go through a gate in the wall. Her first thought was to run across and join them, but she wasn’t sure that was the best thing. She knew someone was in the house, but who? Would knowing bring her closer to working out what was going on?

  She scurried across the gravel, trying to make as little noise as possible. Arriving at the door, she peered through a frosted-glass panel. There were no signs of life and she tested the handle. It opened.

  Slipping through the door, she found herself at one end of a dark, wood-lined corridor. The place smelt stale and unused. To her right was an open door into the kitchen. A mug of tea stood steaming on the table.

  Perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea after all. She hated all those girls in films who, despite knowing there was a maniac at large, still went exploring in white nighties through gloomy, creepy houses. This was her moment to turn round and go back.

  That was when she heard voices.

  They were coming from further down the corridor near the front of the house. She inched along, keeping close to the left-hand wall. Coming to a door, she pushed herself back against it, squashing her backpack on the wood.

  ‘The kid’s still up the tower, yes?’

  ‘Yeah, tied to the railings. Soaked by now, no doubt.’

  ‘Good. If I know her, it won’t be long before they’re here.’

  Shannon was holding her breath to the point of bursting. The sound of the second voice made her gasp and she caught her breath. She knew that voice. There was something recognisable about both of them, and yet she couldn’t place where she’d heard them before.

  ‘Did you make that cup of tea or not?’

  Shannon took that as a sign someone would be heading back to the kitchen. She reached behind her and turned the handle of the door she was leaning against. She half expected to find herself in some sort of hall cupboard, but no; instead, there was a second door in front of her, indistinguishable from the first. She tried the handle and found it wouldn’t move. She was in some sort of tiny space between rooms, or even between the houses.

  She heard the voices again, but this time they were on the other side of the locked door. And this time she knew who they were.

  ***

  Frankie followed Jonny through the door into the lighthouse. She didn’t know what to expect but she was taken aback by the dusty little sitting room inside. Eight walls gave the room a circular feel. There was a tired old sofa and armchair in the centre. Along one section of the wall stood a small dining table with two chairs, and further along a sink, a stove and some lockers. The place was dirty and looked like it had remained untouched for a long time. Even so, Frankie thought how cosy it would be in here when the wind and the rain were battling round the lighthouse on a stormy night.

  The key feature of the room was a grand, circular, metal staircase leading up through a hole in the ceiling to the next floor. At the bottom on the left-hand side was a wooden door.

  They stood at the foot of the stairs. ‘I think we have to go up to the top,’ said Jonny.

  Frankie hesitated. ‘Both of us?’

  Jonny nodded
. ‘Yeah. I know we split from Shannon, but I think you and I should stick together. We don’t know who else is up there, and we still don’t know if this is a wild goose chase.’

  There was a sharp tap from the other side of the door. Frankie jumped. Jonny leant forward and tried the handle, but someone had locked the door. ‘I did hear that, didn’t I?’ whispered Frankie.

  Jonny put a finger to his lips and nodded. Raising his hand, he tapped twice on the door. After a second or so, two taps came back. He put his head next to the door and placed his ear against the wood. ‘It’s me,’ he said and strained to hear. ‘Just tap once.’ The tap on the door came back. ‘I think it’s Shannon,’ he mouthed to Frankie. ‘Where are you?’

  Frankie moved closer to the door. ‘Are you in that house, darling?’ A tap came back. ‘Are you okay?’ Another tap.

  Jonny leant forward. ‘Is there anybody else in there?’

  Silence. Then a tap.

  ‘We’re going to try and get to the top of the tower, see who’s up there. Try and meet us outside if you can.’

  The message was returned with a single tap. Jonny turned and, quietly as they could, he and Frankie started to climb the metal steps.

  ***

  Shannon listened for anything further from Jonny but all was quiet. She’d been too afraid to speak in case the people in the house heard her. Now she was aware of a commotion behind her. She heard voices again.

  ‘Somebody’s been poking around.’

  Shannon wracked her brains. Whose voice was that?

  ‘The back door is ajar. I think there’s somebody here. No doubt they’re making their way up the tower now.’

  ‘Then let’s not waste any time.’

  A door opened, footsteps passed where she was hiding and a heavy door slammed. Then there was silence. Whoever they were, they were going up the lighthouse. Mum and Jonny were going to be in trouble.