Mind Blind

by Lari Don

  Then I had an idea. Only a glimmer of one, but the first bright thing I’d had in my head since the black suddenness of Borthwick’s death. “No, you’re right. Let’s not warn my family about MI5 yet.”

  “But then you risk MI5 catching your family.”

  “Don’t underestimate my mum and Malcolm. I’d back them against a handful of spooks in raincoats any day, especially when the spooks don’t yet know exactly what we can do. And perhaps while everyone is confused, we can sneak through and get ourselves a bit of leverage.”

  “Leverage? What do you mean?” Lucy asked.

  “The information everyone wants, the page that links the codename Lomond with Billy’s surname.”

  “But you want to destroy the report to protect your family. How can you use it as leverage? What do you want that either MI5 or your family will give you in exchange?”

  “Life. Not death. There’s been too much death this week.”

  “Life? Your life?”

  “No, Lucy. Your life. If we find the flash drive, I can use it to persuade my family not to kill you. I can threaten to give the codename page to MI5 unless Malcolm promises to leave you alone.”

  Lucy was almost as surprised as William Borthwick had been.

  CHAPTER 30

  Lucy Shaw, 31st October

  If I was choosing a knight in shining armour, probably he wouldn’t be a violent Scottish teenager with a scuffed leather jacket and scary blue eyes, who had a habit of throwing up and fainting in public.

  Probably he wouldn’t have kidnapped my sister and kicked a man to death in front of me.

  But Hollywood heroes and fantasy princes can’t read their enemies’ intentions round corners or answer my questions before I ask them.

  “I’m not doing this because I like you, obviously.”

  “Obviously.”

  “I’m doing this because I’m struggling to cope with the number of dead people in my head already. You’re irritating enough when you’re alive, Lucy. You’d drive me nuts if I had your last breath in my head.”

  Delightful. He’s got some crazy plan to take on his family and MI5 to save my life, not because of my sparkling wit and stunning good looks, but because he doesn’t want me to haunt him.

  Still, at least he’s trying.

  We got out of the stone column quite easily.

  We waited until Bain couldn’t detect any police or family or surveillance teams. Then, in the very early morning, we left. We opened the door, walked out and walked away.

  The plan we’d agreed in the cold dark hours under the statue, after the torch battery died, was that we would go to Leith and see who was staking out Vince’s house.

  “Always do the recce,” Bain said. “Preparation is never wasted. Forewarned is forearmed.”

  Before he could think of any other clichés, I agreed. Partly to shut him up, but mainly because I’d been useless at giving him information about my uncle’s flat and the surrounding streets. If we were going to get in and out without being identified by MI5 or captured by his family, we needed more useful facts than: the door is blue, he has a real snakeskin in a drawer and I think the hall carpet is red.

  So we walked from the centre of Edinburgh towards Leith and its docks. The rain had stopped, but it was still cold and windy.

  We didn’t talk much as we walked. We had talked ourselves out, sitting in the huge stone column. He knew I was afraid of the dark, so he’d just chatted like a normal human being, to keep me calm.

  We’d talked about films and books. And the difference between team sports like football and lone sports like running and climbing, then the difference between people who enjoy the former (me) and people who enjoy the latter (him).

  There was lots of stuff we didn’t talk about. Mothers and sisters, uncles and fathers. And once it was dark, we didn’t talk about death either.

  But now we were back to business, on our way to recce the site, to devise a plan for getting in.

  I already had a plan. But it was so silly I was trying not to think it, in case it made him laugh.

  “Go on, then,” he said eventually. “What’s your plan?”

  “How do you know I have a plan?”

  “You’re bursting with it, Lucy.”

  “I don’t want to tell you. It’s silly.”

  “Silly is fine. A laugh will do us both good.”

  So I said, “It’s Halloween.”

  “Yeah. Ghosts and spooks and witch burning. Not my favourite time of year.”

  “You go trick or treating up here, don’t you?”

  “We call it guising. Dressing up, in disguise. Guising.”

  I nodded. “That’ll work. We have two problems to solve before we can get to my uncle’s house. One is getting past your family. The other is getting past MI5.”

  “Yes. And I would add getting out again as a top priority.”

  “I have no idea how to get past your family in either direction, but I think we could get in and out past MI5 quite easily.”

  He made a hurry-up gesture with his gloved hands.

  “What are they looking for?” I asked.

  “If they’ve asked about passengers on buses that arrived just before Borthwick was killed, they’re looking for two teenagers, one black, one blond, going to your uncle’s house.”

  I grinned. “Tonight there will be dozens of kids, toddlers to teens, going to my uncle’s house. We stayed with Uncle Vince one Halloween and there’s a real community feel in his terrace, with kids knocking on every door, singing songs and telling jokes, then getting an apple and some sweets. All we have to do is −”

  Bain laughed in delight. “All we have to do is dress up, knock on a few other doors before we go to your uncle’s and we’ll blend in. Brilliant! So after we’ve finished this recce, we buy ourselves cheesy costumes, hide up for the rest of the day, then knock on his door tonight. And you can say: Hi Uncle Vince, rather than a sweetie, can I have Nana’s urn?” He laughed again.

  I was ridiculously pleased that he liked my idea, even though it was only the middle bit of a plan.

  We reached the foot of Leith Walk and Bain turned to face me. I knew what he wanted. With MI5 and the local police and his family after him, he didn’t have time to search Edinburgh for a Vincent Shaw. He needed me to give him my uncle’s address.

  But once he had the address, I was more use to him dead, unable to give evidence against him.

  And even though he said he would use the flash drive to keep his family away from me, I couldn’t be sure…

  “Don’t you trust me, Lucy? Aren’t we a team now?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Yeah. Why would anyone want me on their team?” He stamped on an empty crisp packet as it blew past. “I know I’ve done some horrible things, but I’m trying to do the right thing now, and I just need you to give me the address.”

  “But then will you still need me? You’re starting to survive pretty well out here on your own.”

  “Of course I’ll need you. Your Uncle Vince is more likely to give the urn to you than me. You’re his beloved niece, I’m either some weirdo he doesn’t know or someone he suspects of kidnapping both his nieces.”

  “You didn’t kidnap me! I followed you.”

  “I know that. But your family don’t. They just know you’ve vanished.”

  I must be either completely self-centred or completely stupid, because I hadn’t thought about that all the time we’d been on the run. I’d been away from home for more than 24 hours! Mum and Dad must be panicking, thinking that I’d never come home, that they’d lost both of us.

  I sat down on a wet bench. “Oh no. I’m so selfish. I never even thought.”

  “It’ll be fine. If we get the flash drive this evening, I can negotiate with Malcolm tonight and you’ll be home tomorrow.”

  He lifted his head, like an animal sniffing a scent.

  “Your uncle lives that way,” he jerked his arm to the right, “doesn’t he?”

>   “Yes. Can you sense them? Are they there?”

  “They’re all there, family and spooks.” He pointed urgently down another street and we walked briskly for a block, ducked round a corner, then jogged into a wide tree-filled park. We stopped by the wooden fence round a kids’ play area.

  “How can we do a recce when we can’t get near?” I asked.

  “I can work out where they’re stationed by circling round just close enough for me to sense them. I need to know the layout of the street too, but you can give me that.”

  “How? I’ve told you all I know.”

  “No, you haven’t. Have you ever been here before?” He waved at the climbing frame.

  “Yeah. Uncle Vince brought us when we were kids.”

  “But you didn’t mention a play park to me. You didn’t remember it until we got here, did you?”

  I shook my head.

  “You have more in your memory than you realise. So, show me the way from this park to your uncle’s.”

  “You want me to talk you through it?”

  “No, I want you to think it. So I can read everything in your head.”

  He took off one glove and held out his right hand.

  “But won’t you go all, you know, sweaty and wobbly, then collapse?”

  “Probably. But if you promise not to draw a moustache and glasses on me if I faint, I’m prepared to take the risk. Give me your hand.”

  I felt him jerk away in revulsion as soon as we touched. But he held on tight and looked me in the eye. “Think about walking from here to your uncle’s. Take it slow. Don’t worry about me.”

  I closed my eyes and I remembered the way.

  I walked through the park, past a roundabout and up a hill. A raincoat on my back and a sister by my side. Up the hill, past a new school and an old school, then turning into the terraced streets that locals called ‘the colonies’. One long narrow dead-end street led to half a dozen even narrower ones, branching off like ribs from a spine. I walked past cars parked tightly against the pavement, little gardens, thin houses. I turned left into my uncle’s terrace, climbed the outdoor stairs, then opened the blue door with the snake knocker. I stepped onto the red carpet and heard Viv demand the hot chocolate Uncle Vince always made…

  Bain dropped my hand and leant against the fence, his fists clenched, one gloved and one bare. He dragged great lungfuls of air into his chest.

  But he stayed on his feet. Then grinned at me. “That worked. I must be getting better at this. Or better at you, anyway.” He stood up straight. “So, only one way in and out of the colonies. They can’t chase us by car in there; we’ll be much faster on foot. And you’re right about a real community feel. With houses so close together and tiny gardens, anyone hanging about all day will be very obvious.”

  “I didn’t tell you all that.”

  “No, because you didn’t know you knew it, and you don’t see it the way I see it. So now let’s find out where my family and MI5 are waiting for us.”

  Ciaran Bain, 31st October

  I was boring Lucy. She was knackered and cold and we’d already walked a wide uneven loop around the colonies twice.

  I walked down streets until I sensed my family and the spooks, then moved back, to get away from the intensity of their emotions, marked their locations on the map and moved further round.

  By the time we saw the first uniformed teenager heading to school, Lucy was ready to drop. “You’ve proved you can sneak up on your family, so can we have breakfast now, please?”

  I had all the information I was going to get, so we clambered on a bus, returned to the city centre, found a café under a church, and bought a hot drink and a croissant each.

  When she was warm enough to pay attention, I showed her my carefully marked map. “See these two sets of dots? The red ones are MI5 spooks, close to your uncle’s terrace. They’re mostly in parked cars, but there are a few floating around on foot, probably dressed as BT engineers or other workmen.

  “But they don’t know that my family are out here on the main road − the blue dots − watching the only way in and out of the colonies.

  “The family know the surveillance teams are there, that’s why they aren’t any closer to the target. But I don’t detect the level of fear and caution there would be if Mum and Malcolm knew the surveillance teams were MI5 rather than police. They’re watching the watchers, but they’re waiting for us.”

  “They’re all waiting for us.”

  “Yes. The spooks want us for the death of their pal, and because they assume I’m one of Lomond’s descendants. But they don’t know they’re surrounded by a whole team of the mindreaders they’re searching for.

  “My family want to kill you because you know too much, and they want to teach me a lesson. Though from the emotions I detected when we were walking round Leith, I suspect that Malcolm has given up trying to teach me anything and just wants to get rid of me.”

  I took a sip of cold hot chocolate, remembering how familiar Malcolm’s emotions had felt. As we’d walked round the colonies, I had recognised the decision to kill someone. The decision my family had made just before Vivien’s death. Now Malcolm was making the same decision about me. I took another sip, and focussed on our plan.

  “Mostly, though, my family want to get the copy of the report. But they don’t know for sure that there is a copy, where the copy is or what form it’s in. So I might be able to persuade them to let us go in and find the copy then give it to them on our way out.” I rubbed my cut lip again, the pain a useful reminder of my weakness, while I wondered if that plan would work.

  Lucy was already convinced it wouldn’t. “So you’re going to ask your family nicely to let us past and promise them they can catch us on the way out once we have the prize. But if everyone knows they’re going to punish you and kill me, they’ll never believe you would agree to that; they’ll think you’re planning to double-cross them.”

  “So I’ll tell them I’m planning to double-cross you.”

  She shivered. She found that very easy to believe.

  I thought for a minute. That could work. “Yeah. I’ll tell them that if they let us in, you’ll get the copy from your uncle, then on the way out, I’ll give them the copy and you, if they promise not to punish me.”

  “You’ll promise your family they can kill me, if they don’t hurt you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And they’ll believe that?”

  I grinned. “Well. Do you believe it?”

  She picked at her croissant. “I don’t know what to believe.”

  “Lucy, I’ve told you, I don’t want you dead. You see how I react to death. I admit I’m being selfish rather than heroic, but I really don’t want you dead. I want you safe, alive and in Winslow. So, let’s have another hot chocolate then get out of here…”

  But she didn’t trust me. I’d shown her how easy it would be for me to protect myself and my family for the price of her life. And I’d realised it myself too.

  If I could get the secret, elude the spooks, save my family, impress my mum, change Malcolm’s mind about me, and all I had to sacrifice was one argumentative girl from London, that was a rational decision. Wasn’t it?

  But I needed Lucy on my side until the end, or the plan wouldn’t work.

  So I had to convince her I was double-crossing Malcolm, convince Malcolm I was double-crossing her, and keep in mind whose side I was really on.

  Mine. My side. No one else’s. I wasn’t trying to be a hero. I was just trying to survive.

  CHAPTER 31

  Lucy Shaw, 31st October

  “You can’t dress up like that!”

  “Why not? This was all they had left, apart from wizards and vampires.”

  Bain was dressed as Death. Skull mask, black cloak, scythe over his shoulder. He didn’t seem to think it was tasteless.

  He’d offered to buy me a costume too, but I stopped letting Mum buy me clothes years ago, and I wasn’t about to let someone else take ov
er. So I’d gone shopping as well.

  Now I was a witch, with a warty mask, nylon gloves with silver nails, a long cloak, a tall hat and a large plastic cauldron to put apples, chocolate and dead relatives in.

  We were comparing disguises in my room in a backpackers’ hostel in the touristy centre of Edinburgh. We’d bamboozled the receptionist with Bain’s dodgy ID and a handful of cash, and rented a couple of single rooms for the day, so we could sleep and shower.

  Now it was after 4 p.m. and the light was already starting to fade in this cold northern city. Time to go guising. But first we had to negotiate our passage through the family from hell.

  Bain showed me the cheap new phone he’d bought. “We’ll call Malcolm once we’re on our way, so if they trace the call we’re already moving towards them.”

  We left the hostel with our masks perched on top of our heads and our thin cloaks blowing behind us. As we walked down the steep cobbled hill, I said, “In this phone call, you’re going to offer to give me to your family if they let us past to get the urn?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I’m supposed to not know this.”

  “Obviously. Or you wouldn’t be daft enough to play along.”

  “And I’m not daft, am I? And because you’ve told me what you’re planning, I’m supposed to believe you’re double-crossing them and being honest with me.”

  “It would be handy if you could read minds, Lucy, because then you’d know I’m telling the truth. Though how could you not trust me, when I’m dressed like this?” He whirled his plastic scythe over his head.

  But I couldn’t trust him. Not completely. I’d also bought a phone while I was out, and kept it hidden. If he did betray me, I could dial 999 and land everyone in the cells until the police sorted out the goodies from the baddies.

  And that wasn’t the only phone I had in my pocket. I could call MI5 too.

  Ciaran Bain, 31st October