Burning Secrets

by Clare Chambers

  Chapter 27

  IT WAS DARK when Ramsay reached the ruined chapel a few minutes after seven-thirty, and she desperately hoped that Daniel would already be there. She unclipped the headlamp from the front of her bike and, in the sweep of its bright conical beam, could see that the heavy oak door was slightly ajar.

  “Hello? Daniel?” she called through the gap in an amplified whisper, which seemed to echo in the stony silence. No answer. Disappointed and more than a little anxious, she let herself in and stood inside the door, shining the lamp around the interior of the chapel, across the tops of the pews and into the dusty cobwebbed vaults of the roof. Slowly, mastering her nervousness, Ramsay walked down the aisle, wishing she had thought to bring another torch or some candles. When she reached the front pew where she and Daniel had sat together, she stopped. Even though he wasn’t here now it looked as though he had been earlier, because half a dozen leather prayer cushions had been arranged on the hard wooden bench to make a comfortable couch. He’d evidently thought of candles too, as there were splashes of dried wax on the floor. But where was he?

  Ramsay sat down on the padded seat and waited, playing the torchlight around the walls and hoping the batteries would last. Next time she would definitely bring candles. As she concentrated on listening out for Daniel’s approach, she became aware that the silence wasn’t really silence at all, but a whole symphony of creaks and sighs and rustles. She could almost hear the dust particles colliding.

  Ten minutes passed, then fifteen. Ramsay was glad of her thick winter coat and scarf, because the hole in the chapel roof meant that it was hardly warmer inside than out. He’ll be here any minute, she kept telling herself, with less conviction as the time went on. I’d never just not turn up, he had said last time and she had believed him. But what could be keeping him? His journey from home was far shorter than hers: ten minutes’ walk at most. How long should she wait before giving up? Ten more minutes, she decided, wishing she had some means of leaving him a note. It was then that she heard the crunch of feet on the path and a moment later the scrape of the heavy wooden door catching on the flagstones. Her heart bounded with relief and happiness.

  “Hello,” she called eagerly, and when there was no immediate reply from the shadowy doorway added less confidently, “Daniel? Is that you?”

  Chapter 28

  IT TOOK DANIEL a few seconds to realise that he was locked in. As he hesitated between his first instinct to hurl himself at the door, and his second to remain concealed, the footsteps moved off briskly down the corridor. It was too late. A sense of self-preservation stopped him from calling out, as well as something like fear – fear of having to explain himself, of the trouble he would be in, of having failed at the very first hurdle and letting Helen down.

  But as he eased himself out from the tight space between the boxes and the wall and the now flattened paper cones, he felt another kind: the fear of being imprisoned. It was the first time he’d been in a locked room since he left Lissmore. He had to close his eyes and take deep slow breaths to beat back a rising tide of panic.

  Keep calm, he told himself. It’s just a room. Nothing bad can happen. As his pulse rate returned to normal he opened his eyes and tried to work out what to do next. He thought of all the adventure stories he’d read – a locked door never proved any kind of barrier if you had a paper clip or a bent hair-pin. If only I’d got locked in the stationery cupboard, he thought.

  More out of superstition than hope, he tried the door, just in case it wasn’t really locked. Then he tried his house keys, jiggling and tweaking them in the lock, with no success. Frantically he searched the shelves for something that might stand in for a paperclip. But there was nothing suitable amongst the supplies, and he wasted valuable minutes and several disposable spoons before conceding that plastic was no match for a sturdy metal lock. So he turned to the only other escape route – a small louvre window. Its six slats of toughened glass were four inches wide and opened to an angle of forty-five degrees. Daniel could just fit his arm up as far as the elbow through the gap between each of the slats. Even if he had a club hammer as a weapon he doubted the glass would break. At least I won’t suffocate, he consoled himself, breathing in the damp autumn air. Although he could only see sky and the tops of trees through the slanted glass, he worked out that it gave on to the corner of the field by the cricket nets. Outside, dusk was falling, and it was only now that Daniel made another unwelcome discovery. There was no artificial light in the storeroom and soon it would be completely dark. Since coming to Wragge, Daniel had become used to the absolute blackness of the nights without streetlamps or traffic, or the background glow of the city – but it would certainly not make trying to escape any easier. Soon the only sources of light he had were his fish key ring, producing a bright but pencil-thin beam, and the backlit face of his watch, which gave out about as much energy as a decaying corpse.

  He glanced at the time, picked out against the bluish glow, and remembered Ramsay with a jolt that made his heart kick furiously against his ribs. It was seven-thirty. She would be waiting for him, alone and anxious in the dark ruined chapel, wondering where he was, or worse, thinking he’d changed his mind – after all his promises only the day before. He felt a volcanic pressure of rage and frustration boiling up inside him and before he could stop himself he swung a punch at the wall. It took the skin off his knuckles and made his whole arm sing with pain. He slid to the ground, clutching his ruined hand while the darkness deepened around him.

  Chapter 29

  THE DRAUGHT FROM the open door stirred the cobwebs above the altar. “I was about to give up and go home,” Ramsay called out, wondering why Daniel didn’t reply. She’d expected apologies and excuses at the very least, and had already imagined her own generous reply. There came back the silence of held breath, and for the first time it dawned on Ramsay: it’s not Daniel. Before she could react, the heavy door banged and she heard footsteps running, slithering away down the path.

  Ramsay jumped to her feet in fright, fumbling the bicycle lamp, which fell to the ground and promptly went out, stranding her in darkness. Whimpering with fear, she groped in the dust under the pew until she found it and, praying that it wasn’t broken, located the switch with shaking hands. The glass had cracked in half but the bulb still worked. Ramsay wildly raked the walls with its beam, to check that there was nothing lurking in the shadows before she fled down the aisle and out of the door. Her bicycle was lying in the long grass where she’d left it. She pulled it up and ran with it, jamming the lamp back on to its bracket without breaking her stride. And then she was up in the saddle and pedalling like crazy. The headlamp illuminated no further than ten metres ahead, but every so often a waxy moon came bowling out from behind the clouds and she could see the fields and hedges flying past her. Where the path forked, she chose the turning for The Brow, slowing slightly as the gradient began to bite. There was Winnie and Kenny’s house ahead, sheets blowing palely on the washing line, the bluish light of the TV flickering in the window, and the sight of these ordinary things gave her courage.

  It occurred to her that whoever it was who had stood there in the chapel entrance without speaking, had heard her calling Daniel’s name, and now knew that she’d been expecting him. She wondered who it could have been, and why they had run off without saying hello, since they must have recognised her. She couldn’t think of any reason why someone would have come to such a remote spot, which was not on the way to anywhere, and had been derelict for years.

  As she neared the top of the hill, The Brow loomed into view, like an ocean-going liner, every window lit up. From over the garden wall came the sound of barking, and a figure moved in the shadows. It was Louie, letting Chet out for a last run around.

  “Louie,” Ramsay called, bringing the bike to a skittering halt by the gate. “It’s me.”

  Shading her eyes from the glare of the headlamp, Louie approached, calling to Chet, who had his front paws up on the wall, ready to vault over it if
provoked.

  “Oh, hi, Ramsay,” she said, clipping the dog’s lead back on, and tugging him away. “Have you seen Daniel? I thought he was with you.”

  “No. That’s why I came. He was supposed to meet me but he didn’t turn up. I got a bit worried,” she added. “I mean, he wouldn’t just not show up, would he?”

  Louie shook her head. “He sometimes forgets to do things,” she admitted. “But only things he doesn’t want to do in the first place.”

  “I just thought . . . well, I hope nothing’s happened.” Since the fireworks Ramsay had been slightly tentative about encountering Louie again, remembering her freak-out, but she seemed perfectly placid and easy-going tonight.

  “Come in a minute,” said Louie, keeping a tight hold of Chet as she opened the gate. “It’s cold out here. Mum’s in London,” she added as Ramsay followed her towards the house. “So I’m all on my own.”

  “I didn’t know that,” said Ramsay. In her view this made it even more unlikely that Daniel would deliberately leave Louie alone with no idea where he was.

  Inside, the kitchen was in a state of chaos. The sink and draining board were piled high with unwashed plates and pans. The bin was full to overflowing, and there was a pile of empty Diet Coke bottles and other rubbish beside it. On the table was a stack of unopened post, the remains of Louie’s dinner, a jam jar of paintbrushes soaking in some murky green water, a pair of trainers and an apple with a bite out of it.

  There were muddy paw prints on the floor, things crunching ominously underfoot, and a grubby streak around the walls and cupboards at dog height. Ramsay tried hard not to look taken aback at the mess, for which Louie offered no apology or explanation.

  “Daniel left about four,” Louie was saying, brushing crumbs from two of the chairs so they could sit down. “He said he was going over to the school and then seeing you. I thought he meant he was meeting you there.”

  “No, no. We arranged to meet at the old chapel. Because, you know, it’s out of the way. But the weird thing is, someone did come into the chapel while I was there. At first I thought it was Daniel, but they ran off before I could get a look at them.”

  “Did you hear a car or anything?”

  “No, they were on foot.”

  “But who was it?” Louie asked. “There’s only us and Winnie-next-door for miles around.”

  “You don’t think it was Kenny, do you?” asked Ramsay. “I can’t really see Winnie making it up that hill without collapsing.”

  “It wasn’t Kenny,” said Louie. “I’ve just been round there to see the kittens and he was mending his van.”

  “Well, whoever it was, it still doesn’t solve the problem of Daniel. Do you think he’s all right?”

  “I don’t know,” said Louie helplessly. “He goes off without saying when he’ll be back, even at night sometimes. But if he said he’d be somewhere, he would be.”

  “Do you think we should call the police?”

  “No,” said Louie, horrified. “Daniel would kill me if I called the police.”

  “Well, someone else then.”

  “I don’t know anyone else. We haven’t got any friends here. We’ve never even had a visitor – apart from Mrs Ivory.”

  “You could phone her. She’d know what to do.”

  Louie’s expression was doubtful. “Look, I’m sure he’s OK. He can look after himself better than anyone I know.”

  Ramsay glanced at her watch. “I’ll have to go home soon or my parents will start asking questions,” she said in a worried voice. “But I don’t want to go without knowing that he’s all right.”

  “I could walk with you as far as Stape,” Louie suggested, “if you ride slowly. Maybe we’ll meet him on the way. Or I could ask in the village if anybody’s seen him. At least we’ll be doing something. I’ll bring Chet,” she added, glancing at the dog, lying prone under the kitchen table.

  Ramsay agreed eagerly so Louie put on a fleece, and scribbled a note to Daniel, in case he somehow missed them on his way back and got home before her. Daniel, where the hell are you, she wrote and then frowned and crossed it out. If he was reading the note then he was in the kitchen! She settled on Daniel, me and Ramsay have gone to Stape to see if we can find you. We’ve got Chet. Lou xx and left it on the kitchen table propped against the trainers. The two girls set off in the direction of Stape, one riding slowly, the other walking briskly, with Chet trotting along between them.

  Chapter 30

  BY THE LIGHT of his fish torch Daniel was examining the louvre window. Each of the glass slats was held along its two short edges in the rigid PVC casing of the frame, and opened parallel with one another. Daniel reckoned he would only need to remove three slats to create a space big enough to squeeze through – but the fit was so tight they refused to move. Still, driven by the thought of Ramsay waiting for him in the old chapel, and Louie, worrying at home all alone, Daniel was determined to exploit the room’s only weak point. Using one of the broken disposable spoons, he forced a sharp splinter of plastic between the PVC and the glass, on each side, working it up and down, pushing against the long edge of the pane until he felt the glass shift forward a fraction. The movement was microscopic – no more than a millimetre – but it made Daniel’s heart lurch with renewed hope. There was a chance he might escape without giving himself away. He didn’t care how long it took – what were a few hours compared to four months in Lissmore? If it was just a question of time and effort and patience: he would do it.

  He bitterly regretted punching the wall earlier, because his stronger right hand was now painful and weak – and this was a job that required two steady hands. The darkness didn’t help. As he needed both hands, he was forced to hold his torch clamped in his mouth, squeezing the gills together with his front teeth to keep it alight. Being unable to close his mouth reminded him of being at the dentist. Every few minutes he kept gagging on his own saliva and had to drop the torch to stop himself choking.

  It took an hour and a half to remove the first pane, leaving a gap between the sill and the next pane of about fifteen centimetres. He laid it on top of a cardboard box closest to the window, and set to work on the second. This time he was quicker; perhaps his technique was improving or the glass was just a looser fit, but within an hour the second pane was lying on top of the first. He tested the space – he could stick his head right out, and if he’d had an accomplice strong enough to lift him and post him through the slot like a parcel, he might not have needed to remove the third pane.

  A faint sound from somewhere outside in the blackness made him withdraw hastily. Distant voices, barely audible, came floating towards him from across the expanse of field. If this had happened two hours earlier he might have been tempted to call out for help, but he wasn’t about to give himself away now so he shrank back and waited for the sound to die out.

  When he was sure there was no one within earshot, he began work on the third pane. He was reluctant to use the fish torch in case the tiny point of light was visible to whoever had been passing, so he worked in the dark by touch alone, easing the shards of plastic spoon under the PVC, wincing with pain as he slipped and jabbed his hand. After fifteen minutes he reinstated the torch, but it still took a further hour of painstaking probing, scraping, pushing, and easing before the job was done. It was just before midnight when he stood in front of his escape hatch.

  Using one of the large cardboard cartons to give himself a leg up, Daniel carefully wriggled through the gap until he was lying across the sill on his stomach. He shifted around on to his back, clutching at the remaining slats for support, and pulled himself up into a sitting position, with his legs dangling into the room. Then he gradually shuffled back, lowering himself towards the ground until he could work one leg free. The drop from window to ground level was further outside than in, and he ended up falling the last metre or so in an ungainly heap on to the gritty tarmac. Winded and grazed, but triumphant, he clambered to his feet. He felt invincible: no walls could hold him
.

  Now he was faced with a dilemma. Louie was at home by herself and might be worried – frantic even. He should get back as soon as possible to reassure her. On the other hand, Ramsay had been stood up, abandoned in that creepy old chapel in the dark, and he was desperate to see her and explain. He was torn. Louie or Ramsay? Ramsay or Louie? Who had first claim? Ramsay’s house was only minutes from school – he practically had to pass the end of her lane to get home – whereas Louie knew about his night wanderings, so might actually be fast asleep. Plus, she had Chet, he persuaded himself, so she wasn’t really alone. Hadn’t he done enough for her over the years?

  Daniel batted these arguments back and forth as he jogged towards the sleeping village, imagining that he hadn’t yet made up his mind. But when he came to the turning for the path back across the moors to The Brow he ignored it, and carried on towards Ramsay’s house.

  Outside the café on the green where he had first spoken to Ramsay, nearly three months ago, was an old-fashioned red telephone box. He’d never noticed it before, but now it seemed like the answer to his dilemma. He would call Louie and reassure her that he was OK. Then he could go and see Ramsay with a clear conscience.

  Daniel still didn’t know the number for The Brow, but inside the phone box was a copy of the Wragge telephone directory – neither stolen nor defaced: another small miracle of island life.