by Justin D'Ath
I gave him my fingertip to suck on, and Tommy stopped crying. Easy as.
But now I could hear something else: Thwop, thwop, thwop, thwop!
‘Helicopter,’ said the short man.
‘Do you think it’s the police?’ asked Beanie Man.
‘Whoever it is,’ said the boss, ‘we don’t want them to see us.’
She turned to the small man. ‘Peewee, get rid of the snowmobile.’
‘Steve,’ she said to Beanie Man, ‘find somewhere to hide the van while we wait for the others.’
‘And you, Mr Mum,’ she said, grabbing my arm, ‘come with me.’
The boss led me around the side of the campervan and tugged open the door. ‘Get in,’ she ordered.
There wasn’t much room. The narrow, caravan-like interior was crammed with gear – crates, boxes, folding chairs, sleeping bags. There was even stuff piled on the stove top. I squeezed in next to some cartons on the end of the bed.
‘Take care of the baby,’ the boss said, before slamming the door and locking it.
Tommy and I were plunged into semi-darkness. A pile of cartons was stacked against one of the windows, and a flowery curtain was drawn across the other one. It was nice to be out of the glare of the snowy landscape. Nice to still be alive.
Mr Mum, I thought. As long as I took care of Tommy, the kidnappers probably wouldn’t hurt me. But I’d never actually looked after a baby before, only watched Aunty Erin.
A shiver ran through me.
Pease don’t poo your nappy, Tommy, I said nervously.
The campervan rocked as the boss climbed in next to Beanie Man, who I now knew as Steve. She said something to him and the engine roared into life. I held onto Tommy and braced my back against the cartons as the campervan made a wobbly three-point turn, then accelerated down the road with a loud clatter of tyre chains.
Tommy started crying again. I offered him a series of fingertips to suck on, but he didn’t want any of them. I didn’t blame him. The past half-hour had been pretty traumatic. Falling out of a cable car; taking a massive wipe-out in the snow at over a hundred kilometres per hour; riding on an avalanche – it was lucky he was just a baby and didn’t understand what was going on.
But I did. And I had a bad feeling that the next half-hour was going to be even worse.
8
ROADBLOCK
The campervan slowed and stopped. We’d been driving for less than five minutes. Its engine kept running. I heard a helicopter flying low overhead. Thwop, thwop, thwop, thwop. Then all I heard was Tommy.
‘Waah waah waaaaaah!’
I knew the boss and Steve would be able to hear him, too.
‘Chill out, little dude,’ I whispered, ‘or the boss might get someone else to look after you.’
And that would be the end of Mr Mum.
How do you stop a baby crying? I thought desperately.
Feed him, said the little voice in my head.
What with?
Change his nappy, then.
No way! I’d never changed a nappy in my life. And you can’t change a nappy if you haven’t got a clean one to put back on.
Okay, try rocking him.
That was something I could do. I lifted Tommy in my arms and started rocking him like Aunty Erin used to do with Nissa.
No joy. Tommy kept crying.
Sing to him.
I’m not a very good singer, but it was worth a try. Softly, so the kidnappers in the front wouldn’t hear, I started singing. Amazingly, Tommy seemed to like it. After three verses of Mary had a little lamb, he stopped crying.
I didn’t know many baby songs, so I started changing the words. Mary had a little prince, Rockabye Tommy, The wheels of the campervan go round and round. For a while, it took my mind off what was going on.
But the wheels of the van weren’t going round and round. It sat there with its engine running. I didn’t hear the helicopter again. At one stage there were clinking sounds outside, like someone fiddling with the tyre chains. I kept rocking Tommy and singing to him. It was cold in the back of the campervan. I grabbed one of the sleeping bags and wrapped it around us.
Finally, I heard voices. A key turned in the lock and the door swung open. It was no longer so glary outside. The campervan was parked under a tree – I guess to hide it from the helicopter. There was bush all around us, and grey clouds had moved across the sun. Three men climbed in the back with me and Tommy – the two men from the cable car, who I’d last seen at the top of the avalanche, and the small man called Peewee. All three were puffing noisily, as if they’d been running. Their breath fogged the chilled air. It was a squeeze to fit everyone in. The two men from the cable car settled themselves in the narrow floor space, Peewee squashed in next to me.
I’d stopped singing as soon as the door opened, and that set Tommy off again.
‘Waah waah waah waah!’
‘What’s wrong with that baby?’ asked the boss, looking in. She’d removed her white ski suit and was wearing a pink quilted jacket, a matching pink hat with fluffy ear-warmers, and jeans. She no longer looked like a kidnapper; she looked like a normal woman out for a day in the snow.
‘I think he’s hungry,’ I said.
‘Well, feed him, Mr Mum.’
‘What with?’
The boss waved a hand at all the gear piled around us.
‘You’ll find everything you need in here somewhere.’
Then she slammed the door, plunging us into semi-darkness. I heard the front door close, and the campervan lurched into motion.
I’d hoped the movement might soothe Tommy, but it made his crying worse.
‘WAAH WAAH WAAH WAAAAAAH!’
Peewee jabbed me with his elbow. ‘You heard the boss – feed the little bludger.’
‘What with?’ I asked again.
One of the other men pointed. ‘There’s milk in that esky near your foot,’ he said.
A plastic cooler was jammed between two cartons.
Inside were twelve baby bottles filled with white liquid.
I asked Peewee to hold Tommy while I opened one of the bottles and tried to fit the teat. It was a bit tricky in the bumping, swaying vehicle and I spilt some on Peewee’s leg.
‘Be careful, you clumsy idiot!’
‘Sorry,’ I said, but I didn’t mean it.
Peewee screwed up his nose and quickly handed Tommy back. ‘He stinks!’
Uh oh, I thought.
‘There are nappies in that box behind you,’ said the man who’d pointed out the esky.
I looked behind me. There was an entire carton of disposable nappies. Now I had no excuse not to change Tommy. But I didn’t want to do it.
‘I’ll feed him first,’ I said.
Tommy kept turning his head away. He didn’t want to drink. Probably because the milk was stone cold. Then it occurred to me that the baby prince might never have drunk from a bottle before. But he needed a feed. I kept pushing the rubber teat into his mouth. Finally he got the idea and started sucking.
‘Thank heavens for that!’ sighed Peewee.
‘Good onya, Mr Mum,’ said the third kidnapper – the one who’d been silent until that moment.
I felt proud of myself. And relieved. They might be kidnappers, but underneath they were just ordinary men.
Maybe they wouldn’t kill me when this was over.
That’s if Steve didn’t kill us all first. He was driving like a maniac. The big, top-heavy campervan was hammering along the road at breakneck speed. It swayed around corners like a rally car, tyres squealing. I could no longer hear the clank and rattle of tyre chains. Steve and the boss must have removed them while the van was hidden under the trees. That meant we were heading out of the snow country.
Where are we going? I wondered.
Suddenly the campervan slowed down. There were two loud thumps on the partition between the driver’s cabin and the van’s rear section. It sounded like a warning. The three kidnappers in with me exchanged scared looks. One of them stood up a
nd made a tiny gap in the curtains.
‘Police!’ he hissed.
Peewee pressed something against my ribs. I didn’t have to look down to know what it was. ‘Not a peep out of you,’ he warned, as the van came to a standstill.
There were voices outside, and the crackle of a radio.
I smiled, despite the pistol. The boss and her gang must have spent weeks planning their daring kidnap, but they hadn’t put enough thought into how they’d get away afterwards. News of their crime must have spread across the airwaves within minutes of it happening, and the police had sprung into action.
We were at a roadblock.
9
HOOLEY DOOLEY!
I heard the crunch of boots on gravel, then a man’s voice outside the driver’s door.
‘Good afternoon, sir.’
‘G’day, officers,’ said Steve. He sounded friendly and relaxed, which really surprised me. ‘What’s happening?’
‘There’s been an incident back up the mountain and we’re checking all vehicles leaving the area.’
Yay! I thought.
Around me, the three kidnappers seemed to hold their breath.
‘What kind of incident?’ the boss asked, in a sweet, girly voice I hadn’t heard before.
‘A kidnapping, madam. Princess Monica’s baby has been abducted.’
‘Oh, how awful!’ gasped the boss. ‘Who would do such a terrible thing?’
‘That’s what we’re trying to find out, madam,’ said a second policeman. ‘Would you mind telling us what you’re doing in the area?’
Look in the back, I thought, trying to project my thoughts through the thin walls of the campervan to the two policemen outside.
‘It’s our honeymoon,’ Steve said. ‘We got married last Saturday.’
‘Congratulations,’ said both policemen.
I listened in disbelief. The police had fallen for it! They were searching for a gang of kidnappers wearing ski suits, not a just-married couple driving a campervan.
‘I can’t believe they’ve taken that sweet little baby,’ the boss said. She sounded like she was almost crying. What an actor!
‘Don’t worry, madam,’ said the first policeman, ‘we’re doing everything in our power to find him.’
Look in the back!
‘What kind of lowlife scum would kidnap a baby?’ Steve muttered.
Your kind, I thought. Only the pistol pressed against my ribcage kept me silent.
‘We’re doing our best to catch them,’ said the first policeman.
‘Enjoy the rest of your honeymoon,’ said the second policeman.
I couldn’t believe it. They were letting us go!
Tommy must have sensed the tension in my body, because suddenly he jerked away from the bottle and let out a squawk. With the speed of a striking cobra, Peewee brought his other hand up and clamped it across Tommy’s face.
‘Don’t!’ I whispered, trying to wrench the hand away. ‘You’ll suffocate him!’
Peewee jabbed the pistol so hard into my ribs that I nearly cried out in pain.
‘Shut up!’ he hissed in my ear. ‘If the police open that door, you’re dead.’
Time seemed to stand still. All I could hear was the roar of my pulse in my ears. All I could think about was Tommy not being able to breathe. The three kidnappers were frozen like statues. Had the policemen heard us? If they had – and if they came to investigate – the next sound might be the last thing I ever heard. The muzzle blast of a .357 magnum.
After what seemed like forever but was probably only a couple of seconds, there was a clunk of gears and the rumble of the campervan’s engine. Next moment, we moved slowly through the roadblock.
‘Phew!’ breathed one of the kidnappers in the back with me.
We heard the boss and Steve laughing in the front. But I wasn’t laughing.
‘Get your hand off the baby,’ I said to Peewee.
‘Says who?’ he asked, giving me another vicious prod with the pistol.
‘He can’t breathe!’
‘Peewee, lay off!’ said one of the others. ‘The last thing we want is a dead prince.’
Peewee gave a cruel laugh. But he took his hand away. Tommy’s tiny face was white. For a horrible moment, I thought he was dead. Then he coughed and spluttered a couple of times, his face went from white to pink, and he started screaming.
I lifted him to my shoulder and rocked gently from side to side, patting his back like Aunty Erin used to do when Nissa was upset. Tommy howled.
‘He sounds perfectly healthy to me,’ sneered Peewee, sliding his pistol back inside his ski suit.
I bit the inside of my lip to stop myself from telling Peewee what I thought of him. It wasn’t nice. Instead, I talked softly to Tommy.
‘There, there, little guy. It’s going to be okay. Nobody’s going to hurt you.’
Tommy hiccupped, then burped.
‘He’s pretty bad-mannered for a prince,’ joked Peewee.
I ignored him and concentrated on Tommy. He’d stopped crying. It must have been wind that was upsetting him, not what Peewee had done. I tried him with the bottle again, but this time the baby absolutely refused to drink.
‘Get me a nappy,’ I said to Peewee.
‘Get it yourself, Mr Mum.’
I shrugged. ‘Okay. You hold the baby, and I’ll get it.’
I was bluffing. No way was I going to let Peewee get his hands on Tommy again after what had just happened, but the kidnapper didn’t know that. He ripped open the carton and handed me a nappy.
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Now give me a bit of room.’
This time Peewee didn’t argue. He slid quickly off the bed and joined the others on the floor. I set Tommy on his back and began undoing his clothing. There was lots of it, layer after layer. Princess Monica had him rugged up like an Eskimo. Finally, I reached the nappy.
Hooley dooley! What a pong!
Holding my breath, I peeled back the final layer.
10
WHO’S THE WUSS?
The three kidnappers turned their heads the other way for the entire time I changed Tommy. I was glad they weren’t watching – because I didn’t do a very good job. It was messy. And I wrecked two nappies before I worked out how to do up the little sticky tags on the sides.
‘Nice work, Mr Mum,’ one of the kidnappers said when finally I got the job done. It was the man who’d told Peewee off for nearly smothering the baby prince. He seemed nicer than the others.
‘Thanks,’ I said. And gave him a smile – not because I liked him (I didn’t), but because I wanted him to like me.
If he liked me, I thought, he might stand up for me at crunch time – when the boss decided I was no longer any use to them.
The campervan slowed and made a sharp right-hand turn. I felt the wheels leave the smooth bitumen and crunch onto gravel. One of the kidnappers stood up and peeped through the curtains.
‘Sawpit Road,’ he said.
It was an unusual name. I added it to the list of names already in my head – Peewee, Steve, a woman called ‘the boss’. It wasn’t a long list, but everything I learned about the kidnappers and where they were taking me and Tommy might be useful later on.
We rattled along Sawpit Road for three or four minutes. Then we slowed again and turned left off the gravel road onto what felt like a bumpy dirt track. Steve drove at a crawling pace. The campervan swayed and creaked like a ship in a storm. Leaves brushed against the sides, branches scraped along the roof. We must have been in a forest, following an overgrown fire trail or four-wheel-drive track. I wedged myself between two boxes and tried to cushion Tommy from the worst of the bumps and jolts. Just his head poked out of my ski suit.
His eyes were closed. He was fast asleep.
Poor little kid, I thought. He’d had a rough day.
The nice kidnapper winked at me. ‘Nearly there,’ he said.
I wasn’t sure if that was good news or not. Because ‘there’ could only be one place –
the kidnappers’ hide-out.
What would they do with me when we got there?
We crossed a ricketty wooden bridge. The planks rattled under our wheels. I heard a river below us.
Then I heard another sound – the rasping whine of a chainsaw.
Steve slammed on the brakes so suddenly that Tommy’s empty bottle rolled off the bed and clattered to the floor. The three kidnappers in the back with us looked at each other in alarm.
‘Hear that?’ asked Peewee.
‘Sounds like a chainsaw,’ said one of the others.
Steve switched off the engine and we heard him talking to the boss.
‘… must be someone collecting firewood,’ he said. ‘Shhhh!’ said the boss.
We all held our breath and listened, but the chainsaw had fallen silent. The only sounds were the burbling river and the distant laughter of a kookaburra.
‘Get the truck out of sight,’ the boss said. ‘We can’t afford to be seen.’
Steve started the engine and the campervan lurched forward. But we hadn’t travelled very far when we stopped again. I heard the passenger door creak open, then bang closed as the boss got out. There was a squealing noise, like rusty hinges, from in front of the vehicle. Steve edged it forward a few more metres, then killed the engine. The rusty hinges squealed again – from behind us this time – and everything went dim.
The door at the rear of the campervan swung open. The boss peered in. ‘Everybody out,’ she said softly.
I climbed stiffly out behind the others. The van was parked inside a big, echoey building, surrounded by rusty machinery. Rising from one of the machines was a huge, round saw blade as big as a beach umbrella. We were in an abandoned sawmill.
‘Home, sweet home!’ said one of the men, having a yawn and a stretch.
‘Keep your voice down,’ warned the boss. ‘We might have company.’
‘You mean the guy with the chainsaw?’ Peewee waved his pistol. ‘I’ll take care of him.’
‘Don’t be an idiot.’
‘But he might have seen us.’
‘Unlikely,’ said the boss. ‘The chainsaw didn’t sound close.’
‘Then why are we whispering?’ asked Peewee.
The boss narrowed her eyes at him. ‘There are two ways this can go, Peewee. Either we come out of it filthy rich, or we wind up behind bars for a very long time.’