She opened Jack’s bedroom door first and was surprised to see his bed empty and already made. Perhaps he was growing up and becoming responsible at last. There was a maths book, some geometry instruments and a jotter lying open on the floor. He was a clever lad and took his studies seriously. Despite his dyslexia he was doing well at school and planned to do biology at university. She thought he must be in Amy’s room. She crossed the hallway and tapped on the door before opening it. She was met by an icy blast of air blowing in through the wide open bedroom window.
‘DOUG!’ yelled Beth. ‘Get up here at once.’
One of the twin beds was messed up as if someone had been playing on it rather than sleeping in it, but the other bed, the guest bed, was exactly as she had left it the morning before, with the little pink teddy lying on the pillow. The ipod dock on the book shelf and the bedside lights were still switched on. Two piles of clothes lay, one on each chair; two pairs of shoes and a calculator were by the door. The room looked absolutely normal apart from the fact there were no occupants. Beth glanced at her watch just as Doug arrived at the top of the stairs. It was nine fifteen.
‘Doug, look. The kids aren’t here. Where are they? Where could they be?’ said Beth, her voice rising with each question.
‘Calm down, Beth. They’re probably in Jack’s room,’ he said, walking across towards his son’s bedroom door.
‘No, no, they’re not. I went to wake Jack first. When he wasn’t in his room I assumed he was already up and had come over to Amy’s.’ She shivered, partly because of the open window, and partly with anxiety.
‘And that window - it’s wide open,’ she said, reaching over to close it. ‘Why would it be wide open?’
‘Better leave it,’ said Doug.
‘Why? Why do I have to leave it Doug? It’s freezing in here. Why do I have to leave it? You don’t think….’ Beth couldn’t finish the sentence.
‘It’s probably nothing.’ He put his arm around her shoulders to reassure her. ‘There’s bound to be a rational explanation. They’ve probably gone next door to Shelley’s or something. But just in case, it’s better to leave the room exactly as you found it.’
‘You don’t mean, surely you don’t mean, this could be a crime scene. No, no, that can’t be true. You’re right. They’ll be next door,’ said Beth and she was already half way down the stairs to the phone in the hall. Trembling, she punched in the number for next door and after what seemed like an age, she heard the familiar voice of Shelley’s mother, Yvonne.
‘Hello, 776954,’ she said.
‘Hi, Yvonne, it’s Beth here. Sorry to bother you at this time.’
‘That’s OK Beth. What’s the problem? Has Shelley forgotten her toothbrush? Send her over for it.’
‘No, it’s not that. I thought that maybe the kids had come round to your house already?’
‘Not unless they crept in without telling us. Little monkeys. Hold on and I’ll just check upstairs.’
Beth felt the colour draining from her cheeks. She slid down against the wall until she was sitting on the bottom step. ‘Yvonne’s gone to check upstairs,’ said Beth. Doug opened the front door and looked into the street.
‘No sign of them here,’ said Yvonne quite cheerfully, not understanding the full implications of the situation. ‘Maybe they’ve popped out to the shop. Did Shelley eat breakfast this morning? I have the hardest time getting that child to eat breakfast.’
‘Eh no, none of them ate breakfast yet. That’s the problem. I don’t know where they are.’
There was a pause on the line. ‘What d’you mean? What do you mean you don’t know where they are? Shelley slept at your house last night didn’t she?’ Yvonne’s voice rose with each sentence.
‘Well, yes, yes, I think she did. They both went up to bed around ten o’clock, but when I went to wake them up five minutes ago, they, they…..’ Beth collapsed in a heap and started to cry. Doug took the phone.
‘Yvonne, you had better come round here. Let’s stay calm. I’m sure there’ll be a rational explanation.’
Less than half a minute later a stressed Yvonne McGregor burst in through the Patons’ front door. Beth and Doug were still standing in the hall, not sure what to do next. ‘I knew I shouldn’t let Shelley have a sleep over….. I knew they would get up to something like this….. they are a bad influence on each other….. each one egging the other on, always dreaming up hair brained ideas….. Have you asked Jack? Maybe he knows where they’ve gone…..maybe they’ve headed up to town to do some Christmas shopping….. wish I’d given Shelley a mobile phone now….. she’s been asking for ages….. I got her one for Christmas but it’s still wrapped up under the tree. Has Amy got one? Have you tried ringing her?’ gasped Yvonne, without pausing for breath.
With his arm still around his wife’s shoulders, Doug took charge of the situation. ‘Jack’s not here either,’ he said. ‘He does have a phone, but there it is lying on the bookshelf. So there’s no point in ringing it. And I doubt very much if they have gone off on a shopping trip. The girls are still wearing their pyjamas and slippers.’
‘Pyjamas? They’re missing in their pyjamas? They’ll freeze to death. What are they thinking about?’ said Yvonne. ‘Do you think they might just be in your back garden? Maybe Jack is showing them an interesting bird or insect or something.’
‘It’s worth a look,’ said Doug. ‘Let’s spend a few minutes searching the immediate neighbourhood. We’ll begin with our own gardens, including the sheds. We’ll go up and down the street, knock on a few doors. Somebody must’ve seen them. Leave both our front doors unlocked in case they come back while we are looking. If after ten minutes there’s no sign of them we’ll have to call the police.’
Beth was glad to have something constructive to do. She convinced herself that this nightmare would soon be over and that there was a simple explanation for the ‘temporary’ disappearance of the children. She wiped her tears, took a deep breath and nodded, too afraid to speak; afraid she would start crying again. Yvonne, on the other hand, found it necessary to fill every silent gap with speech, even though no one was listening.
‘Right then, I’ll get Rob,’ she said. ‘He and I can go to the right side of the street, after we search our garden that is…and the garage….maybe something interesting in the garage….maybe a strange kind of insect….. Then I’ll ask old Mrs. Chambers, she’s always looking out her window. She’ll have seen the children… if they went that way…’ her voice tailed off as she went out the Patons’ gate, but her lips continued to move until she got to her own door and then a very loud ‘ROB!’ was heard.
Ten minutes later, the McGregors and the Patons were standing again in the Patons’ hall as Doug picked up the phone and dialed the police.
‘Let’s sit down, and have some coffee, while we wait. They’re sending someone round straight away and there’s nothing we can do until they get here,’ said Doug. Beth sniffed into a tissue. Rob looked worried but thoughtful as if he were searching for an answer. Yvonne went on and on filling the space with nervous half sentences.
When the phone rang a few minutes later they all jumped and sprang to answer it. Maybe it was news of the children or better still, maybe it was the children. Beth got there first, and snatching the phone from the cradle said, ‘Hello, Beth Paton here.’ She put the phone on loudspeaker so they could all hear the conversation.
A small voice said, ‘Hi, Mrs. Paton? It’s Jody.’
‘Hello Jody, I’m sorry but Amy’s not in…she…’
‘I know,’ interrupted Jody, ‘that’s why I’m calling.’
‘You know? Is she with you? Let me speak to her,’ said Beth.
‘I can’t. She’s not here. But I think I know where she is. And Jack and Shelley too.’
‘Thank goodness for that,’ said Beth, smiling for the first time. ‘Where are they?’
‘In Never Land….with Peter Pan,’ said Jody. ‘Well that’s what it says on the email I got this morning.’
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‘What kind of a sick joke is this Jody? We are all out of our minds with worry and all you can do is to make fun of us with some stupid story about Peter Pan,’ snapped Beth. ‘Don’t waste our time. The police are on their way.’
‘Please Mrs. Paton, listen. If you check your email, you’ll find a message too. Jack asked me to call you because he knew you wouldn’t be thinking about looking at emails first thing in the morning, especially after you found the kids missing. But according to the email Peter Pan came late last night and took them on a trip to Never Land. They were supposed to be back by morning but there has been some problem with the pirates stealing the fairy dust. They’ll be back as soon as they can get some more. They say you’re not to worry.’
The four adults sat silent for at least ten seconds with mouths gaping open.
‘Hello? Hello? You still there?’ asked Jody.
‘Eh… yes,’ said Beth absentmindedly, remembering the wide open bedroom window. ‘Thanks Jody. Thanks for letting us know. We’ll keep in touch. Bye now.’
Suddenly they all talked at once.
‘Peter Pan?’
‘Never Land?
‘Fairy dust?’
‘Pirates?’
‘And they expect us not to worry?’
A loud knock at the door brought them back to the moment. The police! What were they going to tell the police?
Doug opened the door to two sympathetic looking police officers, one male and one female. The man spoke. ‘Mr. Paton? I’m DI Johnston and this is my colleague WPC Ferguson. You called to report some children missing?’
‘Yes. Yes,’ said Doug. ‘Please come in.’
The police officers stood close to the door of the living room and looked at the four distraught parents. WPC Ferguson took out her notebook and the DI began the questioning. ‘We’ll need the names, ages and descriptions of the children. So let’s start there shall we?’ The police officers made routine notes as the parents spoke and showed no reaction until they heard the girls were dressed in pyjamas.
‘You don’t mean to say these kids might have been out all night in just PJs? It’s two below freezing right now and snow’s forecast,’ said a very serious looking detective inspector. ‘A couple more questions and we’ll be on to this straight away.’
‘Have any of you any idea where they might’ve gone? Did they talk about going any place? Any clues at all to the reason behind their disappearance?’ asked the policewoman.
‘The bedroom window was wide open when I went in their room this morning,’ said Beth. ‘It looked like they left in a hurry. The lights and the ipod dock were still on.’
‘Jody says they’ve gone to Never Land with Peter Pan,’ said Yvonne McGregor.
‘Who’s Jody? Would she know anything about their disappearance? D’you have her number? We need to speak to her.’
‘She phoned a few minutes ago, just before you knocked at the door. She’s a friend of Amy’s and Shelley’s and she said she got an email from them this morning saying they were in Never Land, with Peter Pan. Actually she said an email was also sent to us but we haven’t had a chance to check yet,’ answered Doug.
‘This could be serious,’ said WPC Ferguson. ‘Sounds like somebody on the internet, posing as Peter Pan, may have lured your children away. We’ll take a look at your computer now, and we’ll probably need to take it down to the station for thorough checking.’
‘But if you take our computer, our kids won’t be able to contact us from Never Land,’ said Doug.
‘Never Land? Never Land? Come on now, sir. You don’t really believe that do you?’ asked the detective. ‘There is no such place as Never Land. Never was, and never will be. And there’s no such boy as Peter Pan.’
‘How can you be so sure?’ said Beth. ‘Did you know there really was a Darling family in Kensington Gardens? And we might be related to them.’
The police officers looked at one another as though they thought these parents were all totally mad. Doug switched on the computer and waited for it to boot up. He hit a few keys and typed in a password. ‘There it is,’ he said. ‘An email from Jack. From Never Land.’
‘What does it say?’ asked Beth as everybody, including the two police officers, peered over Doug’s shoulder, to read the email.
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject : All OK
Hi all frends and family,
sory about our suden dissapearance. I was trying to hold onto Amys feet to stop her going threw the window when Peter threw some of the fairy dust on me too so here we all are in Never Land. I can’t tell you much about it yet becuse we have just got here. We were supossed to be back before morning…well Peter said we would be….but now he’s discovered that some pirates have made off with all avalible fairy dust and there is no way…or so he says…. that we can make more in time to get home by morning. Maybe tomorow morning if we sukseed in all the challanges it takes to get the ingredents. Pirates have never done this before so it is a bit of a puzzle. Tinker Bell said she heard them talking about kidnaping a scientist or something. Better watch out if you see anybody wearing an eye patch. Ha ha, just joking. We’re OK. I’ll take care of the girls. You can email us here. And I will try to keep you posted. Thats if I do’nt get eatn by a crocodile here in Never Land. Who knows?
Love Jack
PS Do’nt worry and do’nt go doing anything crazy like calling the police!
‘A bit late for that,’ said Rob, opening his mouth for the first time.
‘Well, wherever they are, that’s definitely Jack. His writing’s always peppered with spelling mistakes. He’s dyslexic you know. A smart kid…. but mildly dyslexic. I’d know his writing anywhere,’ said Beth, feeling reassured.
‘We’ll get back to the office and make a full report. Their descriptions will be circulated and all patrols will be on the lookout for them. If that really is your son’s writing, Mrs. Paton, it sounds like they’re fairly safe. Probably playing some sort of prank. But one thing is for sure, they are not in Never Land!’ With that the two police officers left in haste.
‘What’re we going to do now?’ asked Yvonne. ‘We can’t just sit around here and wait. We should be out in the streets, looking and asking questions and searching all the places they might have gone. We could phone all their friends, and contact the school and all their clubs. And what about trying….’
‘Good idea,’ interrupted Doug. ‘You go ahead and do that. I’ll stay here in case they come back. Meanwhile I’ll send a reply to this email right now, before the police come back and take our computer.’
Yvonne and Rob left and Beth put on her coat. ‘Are you going searching with Yvonne and Rob?’ asked Doug.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘I’ll leave that to the police. I’m going on another kind of search. I’m going to Register House to look further into the Darling connection. I just have the strangest feeling about this Doug, the strangest feeling. And what was that about a scientist being kidnapped? Yes, a very strange feeling indeed. I’ll see you later. Text me immediately there’s any news.’
CHAPTER 9
A Tale With a Twist
Peter took the silver cube from Amy. ‘You might be reading it in the wrong order. It’s hard to know where to start with a cube,’ said Peter, studying the small metal object with the tiny writing. After a moment or two’s concentration he announced, ‘I think I’ve got it! Listen.’ He began to read.
‘Well done brave seeker, you passed the test.
And now clue number two,
From where you stand, walk 3 miles west
And this is what to do.
Stand still and close your eyes my dear
Don’t fall asleep my friend
But listen…. listen and you’ll hear,
The call of the Growzli Hen.
Five eggs are sheltered in that nest
And you must bring forth two
Be careful not to touch the re
st
Lest a spell be cast on you.’
‘Claudia will set us down exactly where we should be and then we will follow the instructions from there,’ announced Peter. ‘This one should be easier.’ And he tossed the silver cube to Jack.
As predicted the dust seekers were laid gently on the ground some distance away from the foot of the volcano. They were just in time to hear the rumbling, hissing, stony monster build up to a crescendo and see flames and molten lava spew from the exact spot they had been standing on, not a minute earlier. The sound of the erupting volcano also stirred two sleeping pirates lying behind the rock. ‘Wake up, Noddler,’ said Jukes, shaking his comrade roughly. ‘Our quarry is back. And that volcano is spitting fire. We’d better get out of here and keep close to them children.’
‘That was scary,’ said Shelley. ‘I didn’t think we’d ever get down from there.’
‘It was exciting,’ replied Amy. ‘You have to have faith in Peter.’
‘Let’s just get on with this mad dust hunt. The sooner we do, the sooner we get back home,’ said Jack. He was finding it difficult to have faith in a boy who had fairies as companions. It went so much against everything he believed. He’d spent his whole life learning facts and now he seemed to be living in a fictitious nightmare.
‘What next? Let’s read the clue bit by bit,’ he said looking again at the metal cube now in his hand. ‘We have to walk three miles west, close our eyes and listen for the call of the Growzli Hen. That shouldn’t be too difficult.’
‘I agree, not too difficult at all,’ said Peter. He paused then went on. ‘But two miles west of here is Dragon Land and we have to go through it to get to where the nest is.’
‘So not too difficult huh? Thought it was too good to be true.’
‘We could be lucky. The Dragons may be asleep. Or they may be off somewhere on a hunt. The only way to find out is to proceed. And there is always Trevor if all else fails.’ Peter strode out in the direction of the nest. ‘Come on, keep up, we shall be fine. Don’t worry,’ he ordered.
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