The Secret Key

by Lena Jones

  Before I know it, I’m running back in the direction that I’ve just come from, and as I round a bend in the path I see what I feared – the old lady in the tan coat lying on the ground. The bike is next to her, but only for a second – the rider revs the engine and speeds away.

  ‘Hey!’ I shout after the rider, rather pointlessly. ‘Stop!’

  Of course, the bike does no such thing, and just disappears down the winding path. I rush over to where the woman lies on the ground. Her hat is askew, her eyes closed, and the contents of her handbag are strewn over the path.

  I stand frozen for a second, stunned. I have to check myself – I haven’t Changed Channel. This is not a dream. This is really happening.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I ask, and she opens her eyes slightly, but just looks blearily at me, then blacks out.

  ‘Help!’ I shout. ‘Someone, help!’

  There is hardly anyone around, but JP comes running over.

  ‘We need to call an ambulance. I’ll call nine-nine-nine,’ I say.

  ‘You have a mobile?’ He sounds surprised.

  ‘Well, of course,’ I say, a little peeved. ‘I’m just not glued to it all the time. We need to hurry.’

  I reach into my satchel and take out the phone. I press the ‘on’ button, but it seems to take forever to power up.

  ‘JP, could you go and see if there’s a warden nearby?’

  JP makes off across the lawns, the sole of one shoe flapping as he runs.

  I turn my attention back to the woman. She looks almost too peaceful, and for a second I’m worried that she might have died while I was distracted.

  My phone finally powers up; I call nine-nine-nine and ask for an ambulance. The woman keeps me on the line at first, asks about the lady’s breathing and pulse. Her right arm is twisted oddly under her and looks broken. Carefully, I unbutton the cuff of her coat sleeve and find her wrist. Pressing my fingers to her skin, I find a regular – if rapid – pulse.

  The woman on the end of the line hangs up, telling me the ambulance is about to arrive and I should make sure they can see me. Taking my hand away, I notice something unusual on the old lady’s wrist – a tattoo of a key.

  It’s very simple – one long line and three short, like the teeth of an old deadlock. Dad has a dozen keys like that on a ring, which open the old iron gates and grilles in the park, but it seems a strange thing to have tattooed on your wrist, especially for an old lady. The handle of the tattoo key is a circle with a dot inside, a bit like an eye. It’s outlined in white ink, which shines silvery on her dark skin. I start to put her scattered things back in her handbag, hoping to find a next-of-kin contact. There’s lipstick, some mints in a tin, a pen, a large set of keys (none of which are deadlocks) and a purse.

  There’s no perfume in the bag, though I can smell that she is wearing some. I sniff again – I can’t help it – it comes instinctively to me. A waft of vanilla, a hint of leather and carnation. Tabac Blond, first made by Caron in 1919. An expensive perfume.

  Her clothes are plain, but her blouse has the feel of silk. The mother-of-pearl buttons might be plastic, but I’m not so sure. I look in the purse for a contact telephone number, but find nothing except several business cards.

  Prof. Dorothy D’Oliveira

  Senior Fellow, Hydrology Studies

  Royal Geographical Society

  Hydrology? What does that mean? ‘Hydro’ is from the Greek for ‘water’. So, she studies water? Out of ideas, I go back to making sure she’s comfortable. I don’t risk moving her right arm, though it looks uncomfortable bent beneath her. But, as I fold my blazer and place it under her head, I spot something in her left hand. I don’t know how I missed it at first. With a glance at her peaceful face, I gently prise her fingers open to find a piece of folded pink newspaper – a page from the Financial Times. Looking around to see if anyone is watching, I open it out.

  It has the usual stories – mergers of electronics companies, CEOs getting millions of pounds in bonuses, a story about London pollution. Without thinking, I fold the paper and slip it into my blazer pocket. JP hasn’t returned yet, so I’m left alone to watch over the professor. Somewhere nearby, a siren starts wailing. I have an idea – opening my satchel, I take out a small brown bottle, unstopper it, and wave it under her nose.

  It was insanely difficult to find smelling salts in London chemists. Finally, a pharmacy on Old Compton Street had agreed to sell me some, on the condition that I leave my name and address.

  After a moment, the professor starts to take deeper breaths, and coughs twice. She opens her eyes and looks at me. The sound of the siren is much louder now, and I can see the ambulance racing across the lawns towards us, churning furrows into the dew-soft grass. Dad won’t be happy. It stops right next to us. The two paramedics jump out and start to tend to their patient.

  ‘What’s that you’ve got there?’ A paramedic points to the bottle I’m holding.

  ‘Sal volatile.’

  He looks blank.

  ‘Spirit of hartshorn?’

  ‘What?’

  I suspect the man of being a little slow.

  ‘Ammonium carbonate with lavender oil.’

  ‘Ah, aromatherapy. New age.’

  I sigh. ‘If you say so.’

  They check the woman’s pulse and breathing, and shine a light in her eyes to check for concussion. Then they apply a sling before loading her on to a stretcher. The one who called my smelling salts ‘new age’ asks me some questions about what happened.

  ‘Hit by a motorbike?’ He shares a look with his colleague. ‘She’s lucky not to be more seriously hurt.’

  ‘Pretty unlucky to get hit at this time of the day in a park, mind,’ says the other paramedic.

  ‘Luck has nothing to do with it,’ I say. ‘This was deliberate.’

  I give the paramedics my home address and say I’m happy to talk to the police. I think about offering to ride with the professor to the hospital, but before I get the chance the ambulance leaves, and I stand there feeling as though I’ve woken from a dream. But this was no dream, and when I reach into my blazer pocket – yes! – there it is – the folded sheet of newspaper.

  ‘Thank goodness for that,’ I breathe. There is a strange tingle behind my eyes. In the spotless blue sky above me, clouds are starting to form. Not just any clouds – they are spelling out words.

  The clouds form and dissolve away just as fast. My heart is racing. I pick up my satchel and start to walk, replaying the events in my mind, and several images refuse to fade.

  I think of the biker, whose face was hidden by the dark helmet. I think about the business cards from the Royal Geographical Society. And, most of all, I think about the key tattoo, in its silvery ink. I’ve never seen that symbol before. I pause – or have I? There’s something at the back of my mind, just niggling away at me …

  I stop, feeling frustrated.

  I’m already late for school, so surely it can wait another minute. I sit down on a park bench and open my satchel, taking out my current casebook. I’m so excited; it might as well be the first one – this is a new beginning. I flip open the notebook to the opening page and cross out the details about the local shopkeeper’s parking violations. I write the heading: ‘Hit-and-Run – Hyde Park’, underlining it a couple of times. Then I jot down some quick notes –

  1. Old lady knocked down in Hyde Park. The path was wide. Was this deliberate? What could the motive be?

  2. Her perfume was expensive, and she had an unusual tattoo (sketch overleaf). Something seems odd here – what is her story?

  3. Business card says she is a member of the Royal Geographical Society – do they know more about her?

  I look over all those exciting question marks for a moment, puzzling it over.

  Something is afoot, of that I am sure.

  ‘So, you saw an old lady knocked down in the park by a motorbike, and now you want us to investigate?’

  Liam is staring down at my notebook and fr
owning. We’re in form class, before lessons. ‘Don’t people get knocked down all the time? What makes this one any different?’

  I glance to the front. Mr Laskey is behind his desk, reading the newspaper, and it’s hard to tell whether he’s sleeping or not. The rest of 8C are chatting noisily, so there is little chance of our conversation being overheard. Still, there isn’t much time to tell Liam everything that has happened. Brianna Pike, one of the three CCs, is sitting on the desk next to us, but she’s too wrapped up with doing her make-up to pay us any attention.

  ‘Not just an old lady getting knocked down,’ I whisper. ‘There was something funny about it. This didn’t look like an accident. There were … unusual circumstances. Comprenez-vous?’

  ‘You mean –’ he glances around at our classmates before continuing in a whisper – ‘you think someone might have targeted her?’ He sounds more excited than normal about one of my cases.

  ‘Exactly! And if you come with me to the Royal Geographical Society, I’ll prove it to you.’ I hold out the professor’s business card.

  He takes it and reads. ‘Professor D’Oliveira, Senior Fellow, Hydrology Studiesd—’

  ‘We need to get going – now,’ I say, cutting him off. ‘Time is of the essence.’

  ‘Whoa, hold up! We’ve got school. What’s the hurry?’

  ‘I need to solve this before the police do.’

  ‘But we have a maths test! And you almost got expelled yesterday! Just wait till we’re finished.’ His voice is plaintive – Liam loves maths tests. He runs a hand through his hair, making it stick up at strange angles. I resist the urge to reach over and smooth it down. I catch the eye of two girls, who seem to be staring at Liam. That’s been happening a lot lately, since his growth spurt. They scowl at me and I shoot them a sweet smile as they start whispering to each other.

  I lower my voice. ‘I’m going now. Are you coming or not?’ I hiss. I draw my notebook back towards me across the desk and stare down at it, trying not to be influenced by the pleading look in his eyes.

  He sounds strained. ‘Erm … not.’

  ‘All right. But you can still help out with something.’

  He brightens. ‘What?’

  ‘On the woman’s wrist, there was a symbol.’

  ‘A symbol?’

  ‘Well, a tattoo. I feel like I’ve seen it somewhere before. I need you to find out what it means.’

  ‘Sure. What did it look like?’

  ‘I’ll draw it for you.’ I take my fountain pen and draw from memory the eye-and-key tattoo. ‘I was thinking you could check Masonic symbols first, then alchemical, witchcraft …’

  ‘OK … I’ll scan it into my laptop and run some image-recognition algorithms to—’

  ‘Yes, yes. Whatever you have to do.’ I should have mentioned before that Liam is a computer genius. When he gets going about techy stuff, I have no idea quite when he’ll stop.

  ‘Right, I’d better be off then.’

  Liam shrugs. ‘You’re going to be in so much trouble if you’re caught, Aggie … Oh, wait! Hang on a sec.’ He reaches into his bag and pulls out a black box, which he holds up to my mouth. ‘At least if I’m here I can cover for you. Say “here”.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just do it.’

  ‘Here.’ I repeat into the box.

  He takes the box away and presses a button.

  Here, says the box in my voice.

  ‘I can hide this at the back of the class and remote control it with my phone when they call the register.’

  ‘Can’t you just say “here” for me?’

  ‘Do you think my impersonation of you is that good?’ Liam raises an eyebrow.

  ‘Point taken. Now, I really need to go!’

  ‘How are you going to get out? They’ve already locked the gates.’

  ‘Well, it’s a Thursday, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah, so?’ He looks blank.

  I smile.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll tell you later.’

  Getting out of form class is as easy as excusing myself to use the loo. From there on, things become complicated. When I woke this morning, my brain felt grey and heavy, like an old wash rag that needed wringing out. But now I’m full of energy, which is good – I’ll need to be as awake as possible to escape St Regis.

  I take the stairs down to the assembly hall, my footsteps echoing on the stone floor. I have three minutes before the bell goes and everyone rushes out of class. I make it past the biology labs, alongside the headmaster’s office and into the Great Hall with its polished maple floor. This is where we have assemblies, and where we sit exams. Even though the hall is empty, I feel watched by an invisible presence, and not just from the dusty frames of St Regis’ past alumni. I shiver and hurry on.

  Creeping quickly over to the back doors, I hurry out on to the playing fields. I take off my red beret, crouch down, and start to run under the windows of the maths department, where students are still in form class. From an open window, I can hear one of Dr Hargrave’s sermons on innocence and obedience.

  ‘The rules are there to protect students from themselves. Stay within the rules, children, and you have nothing to fear …’

  ‘… and nothing to gain,’ I mutter, forging on.

  At the end of the block, I stop and peer round the corner. The entire school is ringed by a three-metre-high wire fence, impenetrable with the tools I have on me (strawberry-flavoured eraser, 2HB pencil). The only way out is in disguise, and I’m looking right at one – between the sports teacher’s hut and the door to the kitchens stand the half-dozen wheelie bins that are collected by the council twice a week.

  I know Mr Harrison, the PE teacher, will be having a cigarette in the privacy of his hut before the first class arrives to collect their hockey sticks and basketballs. He’s a creature of habit (full-tar, slim filter), and I’m relying on that. Smoke signals from the window support my hunch. Coast clear, I creep across the open ground to the bins and quickly look inside each of them in turn. All of them are full to the brim with tied-up rubbish sacks. What a pain.

  Quickly, making as little noise as possible, I empty one bin, stashing the sacks in the space between the hut and the back wall of the school. I take off Mum’s scarf and put it in my pocket – I don’t want it getting dirty. For a second I hear a noise from the hut and freeze, but nobody comes out. The bin is empty. I peer in. There is a thin, brownish slime at the bottom, and a strong smell of rotten fruit. I sigh. With a last look at my polished shoes and my lint-brushed skirt, I start to climb in.

  As I do, there’s a sound of unlocking from the kitchen door. Quickly, I crouch down in the foul-smelling bin and shut the lid. I’m in warm, smelly darkness, but I can hear well enough.

  ‘Oi, Charlie! You got anything else that needs chucking? I’m gonna put the bins out.’ It’s one of the kitchen workers.

  ‘Yeah,’ replied another voice, ‘take these peelings.’

  There are muffled noises and footsteps coming closer. I close my eyes and hope he doesn’t pick the bin I’m in. A moment later, light floods in. I look up. A young, stubbled face peers at me, looking startled.

  ‘Oh, hey, David!’ I say cheerfully.

  ‘Again, Agatha?’ He does not seem thrilled to see me.

  ‘Look, David—’

  ‘Dave.’

  ‘Dave, this is very important.’

  ‘It was very important last time. I could lose my job!’ He speaks in an urgent whisper.

  ‘Look, this is the last time, I swear. Never again.’

  He stares at me, unspeaking, then back to the kitchen, then at me again.

  ‘Never again,’ he says. ‘And if you get caught, I didn’t know you were in there, OK?’

  ‘Sure.’

  He dumps the bag of potato peelings on my head and slams the bin shut. If I weren’t in hiding, I might have sworn. I spend another five minutes in cramped confinement, trying to shift the soggy bin bag from my head without making a sound. I hear Dav
e taking the bins around me, one by one, to the gates. I’m sure he’s leaving mine until last, prolonging my discomfort. Finally, I feel my centre of gravity shift sideways, and we begin the bumpy ride to the bin depot. With a last thud, my journey is complete.

  I wait a moment until Dave has time to go back inside the gates. A dribble of cold juice has escaped the bin bag and trickles down my neck. A shiver runs up my spine. With the bag on top of me, it’s impossible to peek out and see if the coast is clear. Instead, deciding I can’t put it off any longer, I spring out.

  The bin depot is outside the school grounds, next to the H83 bus stop. A small old man flattens himself against the shelter in shock.

  ‘Sorry!’ I leap out of the bin and make off down the road at speed, slinging my satchel over my shoulder.

  ‘Stop!’ he yells ‘You … you criminal!’

  I shout over my shoulder, feeling the need to correct him.

  ‘I’m not a criminal – I’m a detective!’

  Away from the bus stop, I take out my notebook. Where to start? Hmm. First I should take another look at the crime scene – the longer I leave it, the more it’ll be contaminated with litter from passing tourists. Time is of the essence. From Hyde Park I can then walk to the Royal Geographical Society – the base for Professor D’Oliveira – on Kensington Gore. My body is tingling, almost light-headed. What is this feeling, I wonder? Then I realise –

  Adrenaline! I feel alive!

  As I hurry back towards Hyde Park, I have to skirt round crowds of tourists on every corner, stopping to have their pictures taken beside red phone boxes. When I get to the park, I use my best subterfuge to keep out of sight of Dad’s gardeners, most of whom will know me if they spot me.

  I cross the grass, rather than taking the main paths, hiding behind trees and shrubs, and only moving when I’m sure the coast is clear. As I reach the scene of the hit-and-run, I take a quick look around. There are plenty of people, but there aren’t any abandoned wheelbarrows or lawnmowers to suggest a gardener is nearby.