Burning Secrets

by Clare Chambers

  “Is Kenny a friend of yours then?” asked Fay. To the students of Stape High he was just the person you called out if the loos were flooded or there was a dead bird on the tennis courts.

  “Not really. He brings us eggs, and vegetables from their garden next door. And he keeps saying I can have one of his kittens, but I can’t because of Chet. I used to think he was a retard, but now I think he’s just shy.”

  “He worships Mrs Ivory,” said Fay. “He used to go round cleaning windows for free until she gave him a proper job as assistant caretaker, with his own van and everything. Now he practically bows down when she passes him in the corridor.”

  Daniel picked up a rusty golf club from the broom cupboard, and went outside to practise his swing on rotten windfalls. He trampled down a patch of grass and then lined up a row of apples and began to hit them, one by one, into the trees. The bruised, over-ripe ones exploded on impact.

  While Louie disappeared upstairs to get dressed, Fay wandered out and stood, watching him. “Ramsay said to say hello,” she said.

  Daniel paused mid-swing and turned, hopefully. “Did she?”

  “She’s sorry she can’t see you. It’s not because she doesn’t want to.”

  “I know. She explained. I don’t want to get her into trouble.”

  “Well, she doesn’t want to get you into trouble either by breaking her promise to Dad.”

  “It’s OK. Trouble always finds me sooner or later.” Another apple disintegrated into a shower of pulp. A thought struck him. “How come you’re allowed here, but Ramsay isn’t?” he asked.

  “Well, Dad never specifically said I couldn’t. All he said was that Ramsay wasn’t allowed to see you. And he doesn’t know I’m here, does he?”

  Daniel couldn’t help smiling. There was something so frank and uncomplicated about Fay that reminded him of Ramsay. As he teed up the next apple, an idea began to take shape in his mind. He brought down the club and caught the apple sweetly, sending it soaring over the trees. When he turned back to Fay his face was glowing. “Will you give your sister a message from me?” he said.

  Chapter 21

  WHEN RAMSAY ARRIVED at the stables there was no sign of Joanne, the owner, or any of the other Saturday girls, and the door to the office was closed. Normally at this hour the yard would be ringing with the busy sounds of horses’ hooves and voices, and the radio babbling away to itself in the tack room.

  Midnight and Bluebell, the colts, and Holly, the chestnut mare, stood gazing solemnly at Ramsay over the tops of their stable doors, but Trampus’s stall was empty. Joanne must have taken him out, Ramsay thought, as she let herself into the tack room and put her lunch down on the bench. She noticed that the place was unusually messy, with hats and bridles and open tins of leather polish dumped carelessly. Papers were scattered over the desk along with an overturned coffee cup, and the uneaten remains of someone’s lunch. Knowing how particular Joanne was, Ramsay put away the things that had been left on the floor, wiped up the spilt coffee, threw out the abandoned sandwiches, and squared up the papers on the desk, before moving on to muck out Trampus’s stable.

  She hadn’t done more than rake the filthy straw into a pile when she heard the rattle of a car engine and a Land Rover swung into the yard with a white-faced Joanne at the wheel. She returned Ramsay’s wave with a look of dismay, and leapt out almost before the car had stopped moving, saying in a stricken voice, “What are you doing? Don’t do that!”

  “I was just . . . ” Ramsay faltered, as Joanne dashed past her and stood in the empty stable.

  “I didn’t want anything touched yet,” she insisted and then, taking in Ramsay’s bewildered expression, added in a softer voice, “You haven’t heard?”

  “Heard what?” said Ramsay. For once the island’s rumour machine had failed her.

  “About Trampus.” Ramsay felt bad news rushing up to meet her. “Gina took him out yesterday and jumped a ditch. He’s cleared it a hundred times before, but for some reason he just clipped the bank and fell badly . . . ”

  “But he’s going to be all right, isn’t he?” Ramsay asked, as though just saying it might make it true.

  Joanne shook her head. “He had to be put down. I wasn’t even there to say goodbye.” Her eyes welled up and she sniffed noisily.

  “Oh no!” said Ramsay. “Poor Trampus. What about Gina – is she hurt?”

  Joanne shook her head, blinking hard against the tears. “She rolled away, thank God: she’s hardly even got a bruise. But she’s in a terrible state. She had to leave him in the ditch, all twisted, and run half a mile to the nearest house to call out the vet, and she was there when he . . . you know. She couldn’t get hold of me because I was out on Holly.”

  “Oh no,” said Ramsay helplessly. “I wondered why it was so quiet here. I tried to tidy up,” she added, gesturing towards the tack room.

  “Oh, right, thanks,” said Joanne vaguely. She was still gazing sorrowfully around the empty stable. “I can’t believe he’s gone.”

  Ramsay stood beside her, awkwardly aware that she wasn’t providing much in the way of comforting words. But how was she supposed to console someone who was practically old enough to be her mum? She’d known Joanne for years, but they’d never been on hugging terms and she couldn’t very well start now. What should she say? When her nan had died of cancer everyone said, she was ready to go, she’d suffered enough, she’s at peace now, but that obviously didn’t apply to Trampus. Another thought struck her: if there was no Trampus, who was she going to ride? Lizzie always took Bluebell, and that left Midnight and Holly for Gina and Joanne, so there wouldn’t really be enough ponies to go around. Before she could stop herself the thought materialised into words. “Do you think you’ll get another pony to replace him?”

  Joanne looked at her strangely. “What? I can’t think about that now. I haven’t really taken in that he’s not coming back.”

  “No, I suppose not.”

  Joanne took a last look at the stable and withdrew, closing the door. Ramsay followed her, at a distance, to the tack room, where she found Joanne slumped in a chair, wearing Trampus’s old blanket like a shawl.

  Ramsay hesitated in the doorway. It seemed a shame just to go home again, having come all this way; she’d been looking forward to her ride all week. And with Lizzie not here, now might be a good time to stake a claim to Bluebell.

  “Um, Joanne, is it OK if I take Bluebell out instead then?” she said.

  Joanne seemed to have difficulty processing this simple question. “Not really, no,” she said at last, looking at Ramsay with a troubled expression. “I think it’s best if you go home. I’d rather be alone here today.”

  “Right, OK,” said Ramsay, horribly aware that she had said the wrong thing. “I’m sorry about Trampus. I wish it hadn’t happened.” She picked up her riding hat, still containing her lunch, from the shelf by the door and backed out. As she crossed the yard, she heard a stifled sob come from the tack room. Ramsay quickened her pace. As soon as she reached the lane, she began to unpack her sandwiches, calmly eating as she walked along and carefully stashing the litter back inside her hat.

  She had just taken a large bite of her apple when she remembered with a jolt that this was the one that she had brought for Trampus and which he would never now need.

  What’s wrong with me? she thought wildly, almost choking on her apple, and swallowing it in one piece so that it went down like a razor blade. Why can’t I cry like Joanne? She stood in the middle of the muddy lane and closed her eyes, trying desperately to feel something, other than mild frustration that her day had not turned out as planned.

  A long time ago, when she was six or seven, she’d found a mole in the garden, injured, perhaps by a squirrel or a fox. She had put him in a shoebox of straw and tried to feed him milk dripped from a piece of linen. She had sat for hours watching over him, in a daze of love for his tiny pointed snout and pink-gloved paws. They had kept the box in the kitchen by the range to keep it warm, bu
t in the morning he was stiff and cold. She had cried an ocean of tears over his little shoebox coffin, and given him a proper burial under the cherry tree.

  She thought of Trampus, her loyal companion over years of Saturdays, imagining his dreamy dark eyes with their thick eyelashes, and the soft velvety kiss as his lips took a sugar lump from her palm, and the way he stood, so still and obedient, while she combed the knots out of his mane. Trampus is dead, she told herself, willing herself to feel it. You will never see him or stroke him or ride him again ever. She opened her eyes. Nothing.

  “What’s wrong with me?” she shouted up at the sky, causing a cloud of startled magpies to rise, flapping reproachfully, from the high branches of a tree, and then she threw the unfinished apple into the hedgerow and began to run.

  Chapter 22

  WHEN DANIEL HAD had enough of golf practice and turned to go indoors he saw his mum at her bedroom window, tapping on the glass and beckoning him urgently.

  He found her pulling clothes out of her chest of drawers and chucking them unfolded into a small overnight case which stood open on her bed.

  “You won’t believe it,” she said, picking up a pair of dusty leather pumps from the bottom of the wardrobe and giving them a wipe on the bedspread before dropping them into the case. “I’ve just had a call from our tenants in London. The house has been burgled.”

  Daniel felt a stab of alarm. He remembered Helen saying that she was convinced someone had broken into Wren Cottage, and began to imagine a vast and sinister network of spies. If they could find and silence the hospice worker, surely they could reach London. Get a grip, he told himself sternly. It’s just coincidence. Someone in our street gets burgled about every five minutes. This time it’s our turn.

  His mum, oblivious to his inner confusion, continued her haphazard packing, as she elaborated. “They’ve lost lots of their own valuables like cameras and laptops and jewellery but they aren’t sure how much of our stuff is missing, so I’ve got to go back and make a list for the insurance company. What a nightmare.”

  “Are you going right now?” He felt a twinge of resentment at being abandoned.

  Into the suitcase went a hairbrush, thickly matted with hair, and a hooded towelling bathrobe. Once white and fluffy, it was now greyish and balding.

  “If I get the midday boat and drive non-stop I can get back to London by tonight. Then I can do the insurance stuff tomorrow, visit my editor on Monday morning, drive down to Plymouth in the evening and then get the early boat back Tuesday. Do you mind staying here and looking after yourselves?”

  Daniel shook his head. “It’s what we do anyway,” he pointed out.

  For a second his mum looked hurt, but she didn’t deny it. “You can come if you want to,” she said. “But I can’t see Louie volunteering to get on that ferry again in a hurry.”

  “No way,” said Daniel, remembering. She had puked most of the way and the sea hadn’t even been rough. He couldn’t think of anything worse than being cooped up for hours with Louie moaning and Chet barking and slobbering. Twice.

  “You won’t mind being here on your own, will you?” his mum asked, crushing the lid down on the suitcase and tugging at the zip. “It’s so safe.”

  If there had ever been a good time to confide in her now was most definitely not it, Daniel decided. In fact, as soon as Mum had gone he would phone Helen and tell her to leave him out of her investigations. He didn’t want to get involved in anything remotely dodgy right now.

  “Course not.”

  “I’d better go and say goodbye to Louie and then I’ll make a move. There’s money in the envelope on the kitchen dresser if you need it for food and things. Make sure you eat that chicken tonight because it’s nearly off.”

  Daniel smiled non-committally. As far as he was concerned those drumsticks were going straight in the bin the minute she was out of the door. Just because his mum was a fanatical sell-by-date denier he didn’t see why he should play Russian roulette at every meal. He watched out of the window as she leaned over the fence and called Louie in from Kenny’s garden. He predicted, correctly, that she wouldn’t want to say anything about the burglary or going away in front of Fay. But Fay made her excuses and left anyway, pedalling off on her rasping clanking bike.

  “Don’t mention to anyone that I’ve gone,” Mum insisted, as she hugged them goodbye in the privacy of the kitchen. “I don’t want people to know you’re on your own. Although no doubt the news will be out before I’m halfway to Port Julian.”

  “It’s OK,” said Louie, who was looking a bit unsettled by her mum’s hasty departure. She hadn’t quite had time to weigh up the advantages of two days in London against the disadvantages of the crossing.

  “Can you bring back some pizzas?” she asked.

  “I’m not going on a shopping spree,” Mum said, doubtfully.

  “Oh, and some eye make-up remover pads and nail glue and some Super-hold Root Booster Spray,” Louie added.

  But Mum was already out of the front door and trundling her overnight bag towards the car. At the gate she turned. “Look after each other while I’m away. You’ll be able to get me on my mobile once I’m back on the mainland.”

  Daniel and Louie watched the car bounce away down the pot-holed track until the rattle of the engine was swallowed up by the sound of the wind lashing the trees. They looked at each other, smiles bright with a confidence that neither of them really felt. Then they went back into the empty house, closed the door and locked it.

  Chapter 23

  DANIEL PICKED UP the phone and, stretching the cable almost to snapping point so that he could withdraw into the dining room and close the door, he dialled Helen’s number. Louie was installed in front of the TV watching a repeat of Dr Who, and safely out of earshot. Even so, he wouldn’t get involved in a long conversation, he told himself. Just a quick hello, sorry I can’t help you and goodbye. Half a minute, max. If she wasn’t there, so much the better – he could just leave a message with the boyfriend.

  But this time it was Helen herself who answered. “Daniel? What’s going on? Why haven’t you phoned?” she asked before he could launch into his prepared speech.

  “Er, I didn’t know I was supposed to,” he replied, trying to remember if he’d led her to believe he might.

  “Well, I can’t very well ring you – your mum or sister might answer. Never mind. Are you OK to talk?”

  “Yes. I was really ringing to say—”

  “Can anyone hear us?”

  “No. Louie’s watching TV and Mum’s probably halfway to London by now.”

  “She’s gone to London?”

  “Only for a couple of days – she’ll be back on Tuesday.”

  “That might be useful. Her not being there, I mean.”

  “Yes, but, Helen—”

  “I’ve been doing some research into Narveng and unless I’ve completely got the wrong end of the stick, there’s something pretty disturbing going on at Stape. I need someone to—”

  “Don’t tell me any more,” Daniel burst out, at last finding the necessary determination to interrupt her.

  There was a shocked silence on the end of the line.

  “Listen. I’m really sorry, but I don’t want to get involved in this.”

  “But you’re already involved,” Helen protested. “You’re as involved as me now.”

  “But I never asked to be. The whole point of us coming here was to get away from problems, not go looking for them. It’ll kill Mum if I get into any more trouble. That’s if she doesn’t kill me first.”

  “There won’t be any trouble if you’re careful. I just need a . . . researcher. You’re in the perfect position to go into school without anyone asking questions. I wouldn’t ask if there was anyone else that I can trust. But there isn’t.”

  Daniel felt himself weakening, and then hated himself for it. I’m not going to be made to feel guilty about things that aren’t my fault, he thought irritably. People would talk and talk and tie you u
p in knots with their talking if you let them. Teachers and solicitors and social workers and his own mum – they could bury you alive in words. “But apart from that,” he said firmly, saving his best argument for last, “I don’t even think there is anything dodgy going on at the school. I’ve been in there, I’ve seen what it’s like and I know some of the students – they’re all totally happy.”

  “Exactly,” said Helen. “They’re all perfectly happy all the time. Five hundred teenagers and none of them are ever depressed or moody or stroppy or sad or rebellious. And do you know why?”

  “Well . . . ” Daniel began, but a tiny seed of uneasiness had entered his mind.

  “Because they’re being drugged, that’s why,” Helen burst out. “Every single student at Stape High is being used in a huge experiment, without their knowledge or consent. And we’re the only people who can stop it.”

  Chapter 24

  DANIEL ARRIVED AT the old chapel at three o’clock, as arranged. The bicycle stood propped against the remains of the wall which enclosed the tiny stone ruin, so he knew she was already inside. He wondered if she’d watched his approach. His heart was drumming hard from the uphill climb that he had taken at a run, and from a mixture of excitement and nervousness at the idea of meeting her again.

  The heavy wooden door shuddered and scraped against the flagstones as he pushed it open, releasing a dry, churchy smell of wood and stone and the breath of dead candles. The windows were broken and boarded up, but what was left of the daylight leaked through a hole in the roof, and in the semi-gloom, he could see Ramsay sitting in one of the pews, facing the bare altar, her back to him. She started slightly at the sound.

  “Is that you?” she said.

  “It’s me,” Daniel replied. “Are you all right?”

  “I am now you’re here. I thought you might not come.”

  He walked up the aisle and sat in the pew directly behind her, so that he could see the back of her neck and the blonde wisps above her coat collar which had failed to make it into her two neat plaits. “If I say I’m going to do something I do it. I’d never just not turn up.”