The Deadly 7

by Garth Jennings

  Unfortunately Hilda was the kind of person who was incapable of answering a simple question with a simple answer.

  “Oh, she’s a mess. Well, she would be, wouldn’t she? I mean, you hear about terrible things happening in foreign countries, but you never expect them to happen to you, do you? That’s why I never go abroad. No. Just not safe, is it?”

  “You’re taking him home by car, I assume?” asked Mrs. Vigars.

  “Well his mother can’t drive, can she, not in the state she’s in right now,” said Hilda in her rattling voice. “Besides, she’s busy packing.”

  “Packing? For what?” asked Nelson, but Mrs. Vigars stepped in.

  “Mrs. Mills, I appreciate your coming to collect Nelson. Now I think it’s best if we let you get him home as quickly as possible.” The headmistress took one last look at Nelson’s restored face and said, “It’s going to be all right.”

  Nelson nodded. Mrs. Vigars could have said she was from Mars and could melt cheese with her mind and he would have believed her. She was just one of those people you believed. And right now, believing that everything was going to be all right was a very good thing indeed.

  * * *

  Hilda parked her car in front of her own house and climbed out in a cloud of cigarette smoke before opening Nelson’s door, which was protected with a childproof lock. “I’ll see you in, dear,” she said, and even though he really didn’t want anything more to do with her, Nelson felt it best not to protest.

  The first thing Nelson noticed was the two taxis parked outside his house. The drivers stood leaning against their cars.

  * * *

  The apple-green front door was ajar, there were two open suitcases piled high with clothes by the door, and Nelson could hear his mother’s voice, thick with tears, coming from the kitchen. The house was a bomb site.

  “Mum!” called out Nelson, and his mother came running toward him in her dressing gown, with the phone pressed to her ear and her face drenched with tears. “He’s here,” she sobbed into the phone, before falling to her knees and hugging Nelson as if she was trying to stop herself from falling down a hole. He’d seen his mother cry a million times— she would even cry at baby-wipe advertisements (“Oh, it doesn’t seem that long ago I was doing that for you!” she would gulp)—but he had never seen her so drained of happiness. It freaked Nelson out to see his funny and crazy mum looking so sad.

  “Thanks for bringing me home, Hilda,” said Nelson, who made a move as if to close the door.

  “I expect you want me to stay for a bit.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Oh. Well, you know where I am if you need anything, dear” were her last words before Nelson managed to close the door.

  “Speak to your dad,” said his mother in a shuddering voice, and as Nelson took hold of the phone his mother crumpled onto the bottom step of the staircase as if she was a puppet and someone had just cut all her strings.

  “Dad?” said Nelson, and there was silence on the other end.

  Then, “Nelson, my love,” said his father, “are you all right?”

  Nelson nodded before remembering his father couldn’t see him. “Yes, Dad. I’m fine. Is there any news?”

  Nelson’s mum was trying to close one of the suitcases, but there was too much spilling from the sides for the locks to connect.

  “They haven’t found her yet, Nelson. But the police are looking for her, and we’re going to help them.”

  “There are two taxis outside, Dad.”

  “Yes. That’s right. Listen, Nelson, I’m going to fly straight to Spain from Brussels, okay? Your mother is meeting me in Cadaqués, and I need you to help me get her into that taxi. Her plane leaves in two hours.”

  “What about me?”

  “Nelson, I need you to be really grown up now. You are going to stay with Uncle Pogo. Remember him?”

  “Yes, but … No!” pleaded Nelson. “I’m coming with you!”

  Nelson’s mother was still trying in vain to close her suitcase.

  “Nelson, I know this is horrible,” said his father, “but we don’t know what to expect and we can’t take you with us.”

  “I’m not staying with Uncle Pogo. He’s a nutcase.”

  “I promise you—I promise—we will be back before you know it, and everything is going to be fine.” Nelson felt his father wasn’t telling the truth.

  “Who’s going to look after Minty?” he said, spying the dog fast asleep by the back door.

  “Hilda’s agreed to pop in and feed her while we’re away.”

  “I could stay here too then.”

  “Look, we have to do this, and you just have to … You just have to be my big guy, all right? Get your mother in that taxi, Nelson—she cannot miss that plane. Okay?”

  “Okay,” said Nelson.

  “I have to go now, Nelson.”

  “Okay. Bye.”

  Nelson put the phone back on its base and noticed the flashing red message light. There were twelve new messages. They’d never had that many messages before.

  Every single thing about today was crazy.

  In less than two minutes Nelson had managed to finish packing his bags, fetch his mother’s wallet and passport from his father’s desk drawer, and close both her suitcases. One of the drivers took the luggage and Nelson’s mother dropped into the back seat of the taxi before lurching forward to kiss Nelson.

  “Don’t worry, Mum. I’ll be fine. Just get on that plane, all right?”

  “Did your play go all right, love?” she mumbled.

  “Yeah, fine.” Nelson looked at the taxi driver, who was clearly feeling rather uncomfortable.

  “She has to go to Terminal 5 at Heathrow. She mustn’t be late.” The driver nodded and started the engine. Nelson kissed his mother then closed the door, and the taxi drove away. He waited to see it turn the corner before looking back toward the house.

  “So I’m taking you to Hammersmith—Box Elder Drive, is that right?” said the second taxi driver, reading from his phone.

  “Er, yeah,” said Nelson. “I’ll just go and get my bag.”

  UNCLE POGO

  Uncle Pogo’s house had to be the most badly kept home in the whole of England. The front yard was piled high with bizarre artifacts gathered from yard sales and junkyards, which made it seem less like a home and more like a graveyard for weird stuff. It looked as if the wall around the yard had just given up and crumbled in shame, and it would be hard to imagine a more unwelcoming entrance than the corrugated steel front door sprayed with the words: BEWARE DOG.

  Nelson’s heart sank even lower than it had been before. He paid the driver and dragged his backpack out of the taxi, triggering the security light above Uncle Pogo’s front gate. The monstrous yard was instantly flooded with the kind of blinding light you would expect from a spaceship trying to beam you up, and a dog behind the house began barking like crazy. Though Nelson couldn’t see the dog, he could tell that this was the bark of an animal that would enjoy chewing your shoes to shreds, preferably while you were still wearing them.

  Nelson shielded his eyes from the light as he hauled his bulging backpack onto his back. In his haste to leave, he had packed way too much stuff. He hadn’t wanted to even think about how long he would be away, so he had just taken everything from his drawer and stuffed it in.

  Behind him he could hear the rattle of the stationary taxi lingering while the driver argued with his wife over their vacation plans.

  Still dazzled by the security light, Nelson groped around for the bell, but all he felt was cold rusty metal and the alarming thud of the crazed dog leaping repeatedly against the other side of the door. The security light suddenly switched off, and as Nelson’s eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom he spotted a piece of paper that was stuck to the door using thick silver tape.

  Nelson reached for the note and tore it off the front door.

  Nelson spun around to see the taxi driver pulling away from the curb. “Stop! Wait!” he yelled, waving his
one free arm over his head. The rusty old cab, with its greasy sunken seats and air freshener from hell, ground to a halt.

  “Where to now?” mumbled the driver over his elbow, which was sticking out of his window.

  Nelson looked at the badly scrawled note. “I have to go to St. Paul’s Cathedral.”

  * * *

  As the taxi rocketed along the bus lane of the Victoria Embankment, narrowly missing a cyclist here and there, Nelson sat frozen, wondering why his parents could ever have thought staying with Uncle Pogo was a safe option. It was true he didn’t have any other relatives. Obviously no friends from school. Of course there were kids he vaguely knew, but he didn’t have the kinds of friends he needed now. Emergency friends. Best friends. The kind of friends Celeste had. People she had fun with and shared secrets with. Nelson didn’t have any of that. His mum might have been wrong to put him in the drama group, but she was right about one thing: Nelson could really do with some decent friends. Even one would do.

  He cautiously slid over to the right side of the taxi, watching bits of London flash by. The Millennium Wheel, Waterloo Bridge, the great Lego blocks of the South Bank … all looked reassuringly solid against the gathering rain clouds and the great unknown he was zooming toward. He zipped his coat a little higher and felt something hard in the top pocket, like a frozen pea pressed against his chest. For a moment he didn’t know what it was—a button maybe? But as he pressed down on the same spot again his brain was suddenly flooded with a memory.

  The pendant.

  He had Celeste’s pendant in his pocket. He had been carrying it since the day she left for the school trip to Spain. She’d been so excited about going. When he’d said goodbye to her she’d known he was sad to see her go. “Wear this,” she had said, and taken off her pendant.

  “I’m not wearing a girl’s necklace,” Nelson had snorted.

  “This isn’t just any old necklace. It’s my lucky charm. It belonged to my mum. And it’s magic.”

  “Yeah, right,” Nelson had said sarcastically.

  “You won’t ever be sad with this on,” said Celeste, and she’d gone right ahead and hung it around his neck. Once she was out of sight, Nelson had taken it off. A cloudy red stone, no bigger than a pea, clasped by little silver leaves on the end of a silver chain as thin and as delicate as spider’s silk. How could anything this unremarkable be magic? He had stuffed it into his coat pocket and forgotten all about it until now.

  Suddenly everything made sense.

  The necklace. Celeste’s lucky charm. She wasn’t wearing it in Spain and that’s why something terrible had happened to her there. The great big impossible truth he had not been able to swallow dropped into his stomach like a bowling ball. Celeste, the most wonderful big sister of all time and the best human being he had ever met, was gone, maybe even dead. Dead. That thought packed such a punch that it knocked all the air from Nelson’s lungs. He started to cry. He must have had a hidden reservoir in his head just for tears because they poured from his eyes. Like his head had sprung two leaks.

  He carried on crying through the heavy rush-hour traffic by the River Thames all the way to his destination.

  The taxi pulled off the main road and hurtled down a tiny cobbled one-way street. Pedestrians jumped back from the edge of the curb as the taxi swung around the narrow corners of Carter Lane before tearing down increasingly narrow roads. Nelson braced himself, one hand against the window, the other gripping the pendant.

  There was a sudden screech of brakes, and Nelson slid off his seat onto his well-padded backpack.

  * * *

  “I’ll call yer back!” yelled the taxi driver into his phone. “St. Paul’s!” he barked through the intercom, and Nelson climbed out, relieved to be in one piece and free from the death wish of his driver.

  The storm clouds began rumbling overhead and Nelson foraged nervously in the top flap of his backpack for the money he had taken from the jar in the kitchen. When the driver gave him the change, Nelson sheepishly pretended to count it. He was useless with numbers, and as the taxi drove off he stuffed the fistful of bills and coins deep into the back pocket of his jeans.

  For a few moments it seemed to Nelson as if he was the only living thing around. No cars, people, or even pigeons. Just the sound of a police siren wailing in the distance. It was as if everyone knew there was a massive storm coming and only someone really stupid would be standing in the street without an umbrella right now. Nelson buried his nose in the crook of his arm and let his coat soak up the tears left in his eyes.

  So much for the lucky pendant.

  If it really was magic and brought you good luck, then there was no way Nelson would be standing all on his own on the streets of London with the promise of being drenched by a storm at any second. Even so, Nelson put the necklace on and tucked the stone under his T-shirt.

  This is St. Paul’s Cathedral.

  If you look carefully, you can see a man up there.

  “Nelson!” called a voice, but there was no one to be seen. The doors to St. Paul’s were shut and the pizza restaurant opposite looked empty.

  “Nelson! Ahoy!” cried the voice again. Nelson looked up at the magnificent dome of the cathedral to see a tiny figure dressed in orange overalls clinging to a rope.

  “You got my note then!”

  And with that, the little orange figure began rappelling down the side of the building toward a van with the words POGO PLUMBERS written on the side. You might expect to see a window cleaner hanging from ropes in order to clean the windows of a tall building, but you don’t expect to see a plumber dangling off the side of a cathedral.

  “Won’t be a mo!” said the man, and he wasn’t exaggerating, because precisely one “mo” later he seemed to lose control of the ropes and make a sudden dash to earth. There was a yelp followed by a snap! as he fell from the rope and dropped into a chubby little bush far below.

  Nelson ran to the site of the accident, dragging his stupidly big backpack with him. He half expected to find a mangled man impaled on a branch.

  “Uncle Pogo! Are you all right?”

  “Uh, y-yes. Yep. Ooof. Think so. Might have twisted my, er…” said the orange man as he plopped out onto the grass. The bush sprang back into its original position, with only a few snapped branches to show for the intrusion.

  Uncle Pogo got to his feet and brushed the leaves and twigs from his overalls and hair. He was a strange sight—more than six feet tall and very thin except for his belly, which looked as if he had stuffed a cushion up his sweater. Short curly orange hair clung to the top of his head, matching the lurid color of his overalls, his pale skin was peppered with freckles, and his cheeks were set in a permanent blush of red. But the most striking thing about this man was his right foot: it was pointing backward. If you had twisted your leg like this you would be in agony, but Uncle Pogo had no reason to cry out in pain, because where you or I have a knee and a shin with a foot on the end of it, he had a plastic leg. “Just a tick,” he said, before leaning all of his weight onto the right leg and turning his entire body around it. It made a grinding sound just like a pepper mill, followed by a click as the foot was reset.

  Nelson looked up at this orange-colored, one-legged man and found it hard to believe that his parents had thought this was a good idea. “Hello, Uncle Pogo,” he said.

  “Crikey O’Mikey, you were only this big when I last saw you,” said Uncle Pogo, one hand suggesting the same height as his hips.

  “Maybe you’ll turn out to be a big’un like me, eh?” and he hopped back toward his van.

  You might need to refer to this family tree a little later on in the story, so make a note of this page number.

  As you can see, Uncle Pogo was actually named Perry and he was the big brother to twin sisters Carla and Isabelle (Celeste’s mother). This meant he wasn’t actually related to Nelson at all, but Celeste saw him from time to time and the whole family had always called him Uncle Pogo—it just seemed to fit. The name Pogo had b
een bestowed upon him when he arrived at primary school because of his initials: Perry Oliver Graham Osborne, Pogo for short. Pogo grew up wanting to be a rugby player, but that all ended the night of a terrible tragedy. Both his sisters had been caught in a fire at their family home and it was while he was trying to rescue them that a wall had fallen and crushed his leg.

  His rugby days were over, but being an eccentric and inventive soul, he had fashioned himself a new leg out of fiberglass and decorated it with orange and white stripes like a traffic cone. According to Celeste, Pogo’s leg had hidden compartments and the kind of gizmos you would expect from a Swiss Army knife. (Although Nelson believed Celeste would never lie to him, he had never seen any sign of this being true.) Pogo found a new career as a plumber and general fix-it man. Being both reliable and extremely able, he was never out of work. However, none of this explained what he’d been doing on the top of St. Paul’s Cathedral.

  * * *

  The back doors of the van had also been painted with the POGO PLUMBERS logo (the letters in the style of pipes), but someone had scratched out the “G,” so that now it read PO O PLUMBERS. Normally Nelson would have found this kind of thing hysterical, but right now he was feeling far from normal. He was confused and tired and, if he was honest, pretty scared, but Uncle Pogo was too busy to notice. He opened the rear doors of his van and threw his ropes on top of a great pile of pipes, toolboxes, and rolls and rolls of plastic sheeting. “What were you doing up there, Uncle Pogo?” asked Nelson.

  “Aha! I will reveal all in just a mo,” said Pogo. “Follow me.”

  “Where are we going?” said Nelson, but his voice was drowned out by a massive thunderclap.

  Pogo grinned and clapped his hands. “Whoa, it’s close. Fantastic! This couldn’t be better timing.”

  “Timing for what?” asked Nelson. “What are you doing here?” That dizzy feeling he’d had before he fainted during Katy Newman’s play was threatening to come back. The thunder rumbled again.