by Ross Welford
‘You were just messing about on your uncle’s boat. All an accident.’
That’s all there’s time for, otherwise the lady on the sofa might have got suspicious. She stands up.
‘Aidan.’ She sounds serious. ‘I’m Detective Sergeant Simm, and you have got some explaining to do.’
Perhaps now is when I have to learn to be better at lying. Can I just say, at this point, that if you want to learn how to lie convincingly, don’t practise with a police officer? For a start, they are very good at spotting liars, and besides – you should always tell the truth, anyway.
That said, here is the big fat lie I tell to the police.
I sit in a room with a uniformed officer, and Detective Sergeant Simm. I am not, apparently, ‘under arrest’. I’m just ‘answering questions’.
We fancied an adventure, I say.
We caught a bus to Amble.
While Roxy went for a swim, Alfie and I checked out Uncle Jasper’s boat.
We unmoored it, and only meant to take it out into the harbour, but the wind pushed us in the wrong direction.
We hadn’t known that Uncle Jasper was passed out, drunk, in the cabin.
No, it does not sound convincing.
Wayland G. and the rest of his crew would be telling a very different story. The true story of a boy diving off a boat into a stormy sea, and a bearded madman assaulting coastguard volunteers, and stealing an inflatable rescue boat …
Then there’s Mum and Dad to deal with. They’re on their way with Precious Minto. It’s all going to be very difficult. I do not feel well.
‘May I have a glass of water, please?’ I say. DS Simm gets up and leaves the room, and I am left alone with the policeman in uniform.
Neither of us says anything, and in the silence I hear a helicopter overhead.
‘’S come from Bamburgh, that has,’ says the policeman. ‘They’ll be pickin’ up your mate.’
The rain has eased to a drizzle. Dr Heinz has opened the tent flaps to let the light in, and she, Jasper and I sit in camping chairs round the trestle table. We have no choice. I mean what else are we going to do? Fight him?
No one says anything for ages. Finally Jasper takes a deep breath and says: ‘It’s been a while, Alve.’
‘You could say that.’ I am trying to be ‘cool’, but inside me there is a storm just as violent as the real one that has just passed.
Jasper is sitting opposite me at a wooden table in a tent on a tiny, windswept island.
He clasps his hands, as if in prayer, and speaks slowly. ‘A long while to find what is rightfully mine.’
‘Yours?’
He nods. ‘Indeed mine. Until your father stole it from me.’
This is an unexpected development. ‘He won it in battle,’ I say with some force.
Jasper shrugs. ‘Same thing. He and his … his gang attacked me and my men. I survived, but he took the biggest prize. I call that theft.’
Is this the story that Mam told me?
‘You and your men were raiding an undefended village, and my valiant father fought you off. If you survived then that means my father showed you mercy. You should be thankful.’
Dr Heinz interrupts. ‘Vait! Vait! When was zis happening?’ We both turn to her. I think we had almost forgotten she was there.
‘About eleven hundred years ago,’ replies Jasper calmly, and she gasps. ‘A bit more, actually. I have suspected the life-pearl was here, on Cockett Island, for many years. But I never knew where exactly. Believe me I have looked. I would return every few decades. I lost track of you and your mother and I thought maybe it was lost forever. Maybe you had taken it. Maybe you were both dead.’
‘And then you found me.’
‘I found a wife. She had a nephew. Who had a friend. Who was you.’
There is another long pause, and then we all turn to look outside the tent at the same time. There is a faint thap-thap-thap sound coming from the sky. Dr Heinz says, ‘A helicopter.’
Soon it will land. Police will get out and after that … who knows?
This is my only chance, and my eyes flick to where the clay box is.
Big mistake.
‘Over there, is it?’ asks Jasper, almost whispering. ‘That lump under the blanket?’ He stands up, and, in one swift movement, whips the blanket away, revealing the box, which he seizes in both hands.
‘Stop!’ cries Dr Heinz, getting to her feet.
‘Or what, old lady?’ He does not look at her; his eyes are greedily feasting on the object in his hands.
‘Jasper, please!’ I say. ‘Think about it. You are a man. I have never had the chance to grow up.’ I am pleading.
‘When your father stole this from me, there were five livperler left – is that what you call them, still? Your father used one, your mother too, and you. That should mean that there are two remaining, should it not? That would have been one each.’
My throat tightens.
‘But you wasted one, did you not? You wasted one on a cat!’
I gasp. ‘It was an accident!’ I am close to tears now. ‘I was young, I was … I was stupid.’
‘Indeed you were, Alve. Indeed you were.’
‘How did you know? About the cat?’
Jasper grins. ‘I did not. You just admitted it. It was a hunch: there were plenty of stories about a woman and her son and their cat. I just put two and two together, and you have just given me the answer.’ He pauses and spits out the word again. ‘A cat? Anyone so stupid deserves everything they get.’ His eyes burn with demented fury.
Then, without warning, he smashes the clay box onto the wooden table and it cracks apart, the hardened resin shattering. Dr Heinz gives a little shriek.
There, nestled in a tight bundle of sheep’s wool, is a small glass ball. The last remaining life-pearl in the world.
‘Can you imagine what this is worth?’ says Jasper, teasing the wool apart with his long, bony fingers. ‘The fortune I shall be able to make?’
My jaw drops open. ‘Y-you mean you do not want it for yourself?’
Jasper grins his sickly grin. ‘I am certainly not going to use it. What on earth did you think? Are you quite mad, little man? Modern science should have little difficulty analysing the liquid inside. Right here is a secret that has been lost for a thousand years. Death overcome, do you see? The power to live forever.’ His eyes widen manically.
Dr Heinz shakes her head and says softly, ‘We are not meant to live forever. It is against … against everysing.’
Jasper turns his head and says with faked surprise, ‘Oh! Are you still here? Why?’
In the split second that his attention is distracted from the pearl of glass before us, I grab it. Jasper’s hand is too slow, and I instantly toss the glass ball into my mouth. His eyes widen in horror. I am trying to swallow it, but I just cannot: the saltwater, the retching and coughing – my throat is swollen and dry.
‘NO! You little devil!’
He reaches out and grabs me by the throat with both hands. ‘Spit it out, you son of a coward! Sick it up now! God help me, I’ll kill you, you little fiend, just like I killed your father!’
This is terrifying and painful, and his strong hands squeeze my neck harder. Did he just say, like I killed your father?
I am struggling to breathe, and my head is swimming and his words are bouncing around in my head, when out of the corner of my eye I see Dr Heinz lifting up a spade and with an almighty whack she brings it down on the back of Jasper’s skull.
Now, when that sort of thing happens in films, the noise is usually a crack, or a clang if the weapon is metal. In real life, I can tell you it is not like that. It is just a very loud thud.
Also in films, the recipient of such a blow will instantly be rendered unconscious. He will slump to the floor, job done.
He will not do what Jasper does, which is to cry out, ‘OOOWW! You filthy old witch!’
He spins round in anger, but Dr Heinz is holding him at bay, the spade pointing
forward like a spear. I use the distraction to dash out of the tent and up the beach. A steep path leads from the sand up to a large area of dry grass at the top of the cliff, and I scramble up this to get away from him, but he follows me, bellowing curses in a language I have never even heard before.
It was him. On the boat. The man with the beard who shouted at me. And who pushed Da overboard. My breath is rasping in my throat but I have to keep going.
‘I’ll cut your face open if I need to, you hell-dog!’
Something glints in the light – a large knife in his hand – and I have no doubt at that moment that he means what he says.
Above us, the helicopter is circling. I need to keep away from Jasper just long enough for it to land on the grass. How much time will that take? Another minute?
The stones of the path are loose and they crumble away beneath my bare feet as I scramble higher up the cliff face. But Jasper is bigger, stronger and has not just completed a massive swim.
I am exhausted, and he is getting closer.
Three paces more, two …
I try to reach for a tuft of grass at the top of the cliff path, and I feel Jasper’s hand grab my ankle.
I scream out, ‘No! Get off!’ but I am being dragged back, and, as I open my mouth to scream, the life-pearl pops out. I see it arc through the air and bounce off a rock. It rolls back down the path, coming to rest below me, just beyond my reach.
With a desperate lunge, I extend my free arm, but I cannot stretch far enough.
Jasper has seen it but he cannot reach it, either. Above me, my fist has found a thick root to hold on to, and I have stopped slipping back.
And there we stay for a few seconds. Me hanging on to the root, with my face pressed into the cliffside, and Jasper gripping my ankle. But we are unsteady. One of Jasper’s feet has nothing to support it. One slip and we will both tumble back onto the rocks.
‘Just like I killed your father …’
Do I care if he dies?
I can feel the root giving way above me, and we both slip down the cliff face, bringing Jasper nearer to the life-pearl, but still not close enough for him to grab it.
‘Just like I killed your father …’
The words echo back at me as though from inside a cave.
Do I care if I die with him?
When I dare to look down, he has the blade of the knife gripped in his teeth, freeing up his other hand to grip my ankle. The weight is pulling me down, down, and I know that the end is seconds away.
Desperately my fingers dig into the loose earth next to the root, scrabbling for a new hold, but it’s no use. As I slide back, I’m screaming, ‘No!’ when I feel something grip my thumb, and then the wrist of my bandaged arm. The agony is searing, but I cannot even scream in pain, I am so terrified.
‘I’ve got him!’ I hear from above. ‘Come on, son. I’ve got you!’ I look up into the face of a man – police officer, coastguard, soldier? I do not know, but I am being pulled apart: Jasper at my ankle and this man who now has both of my wrists. The weight of me and Jasper is pulling him over the edge as well.
With a frantic kick, my foot comes free. Jasper is hanging on with one hand, his feet frantically trying to gain a grip on the steep, pebbly path.
If I wriggle too hard, the coastguard will be pulled over the lip of the cliff and all three of us will fall, so instead I kick my foot towards the cliff face again and again, crushing Jasper’s hand, until I hear a curse and feel his grip loosen.
But he does not fall. Spreadeagled against the cliff face, his toes resting on a grassy tuft, Jasper is panting hoarsely and he looks up, with panic in his eyes, as I’m pulled to safety.
‘Help me!’ he gasps.
There is no time for the man who pulled me up to do anything but check that I am safe, then turn his attention back to Jasper, hanging on to the cliffside. Another man is running from the helicopter, but it will take him several seconds to get here and Jasper does not have that long.
I lean down over the cliff edge, the stones and sharp grasses making new scratches on my bare chest, and I stretch my arm out to Jasper. I cannot let him fall. Murderer or not, I am not about to let someone die.
‘No! Get back!’ yells my rescuer but Jasper is reaching for me …
Reaching … stretching …
Then suddenly his eyes are no longer on mine and I follow his gaze to the life-pearl, nestled in a crack. It is too far for me to stretch, but Jasper’s eyes are crazed with greed and determination.
‘No, Jasper – you can’t reach,’ I shout. ‘Take my hand instead!’
I really think for a moment that he is going to. But he cannot stop himself. With a small grunt of exertion, he grabs the knife from his mouth and extends it towards the life-pearl, dislodging it from the crack. In one movement, he drops the knife and grabs the pearl in his fist. But Jasper’s greed has overbalanced him. He sways backwards, croaking, ‘Ah … no … ah … no …’
Both my rescuer and I are now leaning over the cliff edge, trying to reach him. Jasper stretches out his hand – manages to touch mine. I feel the life-pearl between our palms. Is he giving it to me? It is hard to tell. Our eyes meet, but I can’t get a proper grip on his hand, and his weight is toppling him backwards.
I cannot watch. I know I cannot hold him, and I screw my eyes shut as he slips away. He does not even scream.
I cannot look down.
Then I hear a sickening, dull thump on the rocks below.
There are two men above me now, and they haul me to the safety of the level grass.
I am trembling, shivering, shaking and sobbing, sucking in great lungfuls of air while the man hugs me and rocks me like Mam used to.
My fists are clenched tight and in one hand I can feel the glass ball pressing into my palm.
I am held strongly by my rescuer who keeps saying, ‘Shh, OK, son, shh, you’re OK, son.’
And, for the first time since Mam died, I think I might be.
The helicopter has taken Jasper to the big hospital in Cramlington. They will come back in about an hour, they said. I am left with Dr Heinz, who has made hot tinned soup on her little camping stove, replaced the dressing on my arm, cleaned up the scratches on my chest with stuff from her first-aid kit, and wrapped me up in a blanket again. All the while, I am clutching the life-pearl tightly. I am not sure if she has noticed.
Dr Heinz and I sit in the canvas chairs, drinking our soup and saying nothing. I do not really feel like talking, and I suppose she understands that.
I am startled when her mobile telephone rings. Dr Heinz steps outside the tent, but I can hear everything she says.
‘Ah! Prudence, my dear … Vell, I can’t really talk, I have a visitor here on ze island, and I shall tell you all about it soon, but it has been a werry dramatic morning …’
I guess that this is Pru, the lady she lives with. There is a pause while Dr Heinz listens, and then:
‘Oh really? Vere? Ach, the poor pussycat … vill she eat anysing? Nein? Her teeth? Ach schade! That iss a pity … then yes, I agree, my dear, perhaps that is the kindest sing …’
I have leapt to my feet, discarding the blanket and spilling hot soup on the sandy floor of the tent as I rush out. It’s the teeth: how many cats have half of their teeth missing?
‘That must be Biffa!’ I shout. ‘Give me the telephone!’ I grab it without waiting and almost yell down the phone, ‘Is she black with patches of white on her neck?’
On the other end of the line, I hear Pru’s rather startled voice. ‘Er … yes, she is. Who is this, please?’
‘I am sorry. My name is Alfie Monk and I think you have found my cat. Is she alive?’
‘Well, yes … but she is very weak. I’m sorry to say that I really don’t think she will survive. The kindest thing is to …’
‘No! Don’t let her die! She is a thousand years old.’ Quite what Pru makes of that last statement, I do not know, but she speaks gently.
‘Alfie, love, she won’t eat
anything. It’s hopeless.’
‘Crab!’ I say. ‘Anything with crab in it. That is her favourite. Tinned crab, fresh crab, crab paste … anything!’
‘I … I’ll try, Alfie, love, but I really don’t think …’
Her last words are drowned out by the thwap-thwap-thwap of the helicopter returning to take us back to the mainland.
As we get into the helicopter, Dr Heinz puts her mouth close to my ear and shouts above the noise: ‘Your secret is safe vith me, Alfie,’ and she squeezes my shoulder. She smiles to herself for the whole of the short helicopter journey, loving the adventure.
I look out of the window at the puffins swooping below us, then catch sight of my reflection in the helicopter window, and I am surprised to see that I am smiling too.
Questions.
People.
People and questions. Everyone wants to know just what on earth has been going on.
You cannot blame them, only the truth would not work, would it?
Aidan’s parents, and Libby, and Precious Minto have arrived in Precious’s old Ford Fiesta. Sangeeta is there too, and Dr Heinz: all of us in the little police station at Amble.
Nobody, it seems, can work out what to do.
Aidan has stuck to the line that Jasper went a bit loopy when he found us on his boat. His call to the coastguard about being trapped in the cabin must have been ‘a joke’. Jasper is in a coma in hospital and cannot contribute to the argument.
Nobody – so far – has connected Roxy to the fake call regarding her dad on a windsurfer.
My story is that, in a fury that we had boarded his boat, Jasper chased me onto the island and pursued me up the cliff path, where he stumbled and fell thirty feet onto the rocks below.
Does it make sense?
Well, it is certainly easier to believe than the truth. Besides I am finding it hard to concentrate on anything except Biffa.
Dr Heinz adopts an air of bewilderment and – I am certain – exaggerates her German accent to sound even more puzzled. I think she is trying to protect me from more questions.
‘Vot iss zis all about?’ she keeps saying. ‘I vos peacefully in mein tent sitting, und zen zere vos all zis kerfufflen, mit helicopters und everysing. Ach mein Gott …’ and so on. I trust her.