The Yoghurt Plot

by Fleur Hitchcock

  ‘How do you know?’ asks Dilan, still staring through the telescope.

  ‘I went – oh – it’s too complicated to explain now. What’s he doing?’

  ‘Getting closer.’

  ‘And?’ I say, peering at the figure in the boat.

  ‘He’s got something in his hands. It might be a petrol can … I’m not sure.’

  I imagine the speed of petrol flames. I’ve seen it plenty of times in the movies. It only takes a second for everything to go up.

  ‘What do we do?’ asks Dilan.

  ‘We grab him. Red-handed.’

  Chapter 27

  It doesn’t take long to find our way to the door at the back of the pier. Peering over the side, we can see Lorna’s still clinging to her rock, although from here I can also see that she could easily wade to shore. ‘Help,’ she wails mournfully. If Miss Swanson from drama club saw this she’d give Lorna the lead in the Christmas show. It’s a brilliant performance.

  The little orange boat is bobbing a few feet from the first of the iron girders that hold the pier up out of the sea, but out of sight of all the people on the shore. From above, Eddie Henderson’s intentions are quite clear. Two petrol cans, a load of sheets and some newspapers lie in the bottom of the dinghy. Enough to set practically anything on fire.

  Lying on my stomach and peering between the floorboards, I watch Henderson drift under the iron girders until his boat reaches the older wooden posts that are right beneath the pier and reach up into the structure.

  Dilan flattens himself against the deck and stares through the gaps. ‘He’s tying the boat up,’ he says.

  I look back towards the shore. The fire engine’s there; Lorna’s in the arms of an enormous man dressed from head to toe in yellow and the crowd is cheering.

  But the man in the boat’s not interested. He’s ripping the sheets into long strips and tying them around the legs of the pier, right below the ballroom.

  ‘Why can’t they see what he’s doing?’ asks Dilan.

  ‘The ballroom’s so large that no one can see what happens underneath the pier, just like they can’t see us. He can do what he likes. No one’ll know until they see the smoke,’ I say, looking around for anything that would help us. There’s a lifebelt, and a stack of rotting wood, and strapped to a post is something that might be an emergency flare.

  ‘Any idea how these things work?’ I ask.

  Dilan grabs it off me and bashes the end against the wooden deck. A shower of sparks springs from the end, belching smoke and stink, and then three little pompoms of orange fire leap high into the evening sky.

  I watch them and then look back towards the shore. People are pointing at us.

  ‘Here,’ I shout, jumping into the air and pointing down at my feet. ‘HE’S TRYING TO SET FIRE TO THE PIER!’

  Dilan leaps up and down and waves his arms. ‘BELOW US – in a boat!’

  I don’t suppose for one minute that they can hear us, but two firemen break into a slow run along the promenade and stop up by the telescope.

  I wave again, and look down towards the boat below.

  He’s pouring the petrol onto the sheets he wrapped around the pier, and plenty more of it is falling onto the sea, spreading in a great lethal rainbow across the waves.

  ‘He’s got petrol!’ I shout.

  ‘Yes,’ says Dilan. ‘Petrol!’

  Over by the promenade railings, I can see Dave Dando pulling at one of the firemen and pointing. Together they run for the little collection of upside-down rowing boats clustered on the beach.

  ‘Yes!’ I shout, just as Eddie Henderson rows away from the pier, hidden by the decking until he reaches the very end and the open sea.

  And, just as he throws the match …

  Chapter 28

  Dave Dando’s dad was a rowing champion when he was younger, which is just as well, because he and Dave and a fire extinguisher reach us at the same time as the first flames lick up over the boards of the pier.

  Seconds later we’re in the boat and a huge jet of water arrives from the fire engine, which has moved along the promenade and is now drenching the pier.

  ‘Who was it?’ says Dave’s dad.

  ‘Eddie Henderson? I think,’ I say.

  Dave’s dad picks the radio out of his yellow coat and says things like ‘Henderson boy’, ‘roger’ and ‘tango’ and ‘south-easterly direction’.

  Dave looks adoringly at his dad, who pats Dave on the head. ‘Good work, son,’ he says, turning the boat for the shore.

  I look back at the fire. Smoke curls into the sky, but in a slow, tired way. Beyond the pier, I can see Eddie Henderson rowing like crazy, but another boat is catching him up, this time with an outboard motor, three men in yellow and a man in a uniform.

  ‘Good work,’ says Dave’s dad. ‘Good work.’

  The sand bumps the bottom of the boat and we jump out into the arms of feather-clad women and black-suited men.

  ‘Bravo!’

  ‘Sensational!’

  ‘Magnificent!’

  Dragged from the rowing boat, we stumble up to the entrance of the pier, bowled along by the feathers and perfume until we’re rammed into the ballroom and seated in the front row.

  ‘Would you like some lemonade?’ asks a woman. ‘Some toffee?’

  ‘What about a Walnut Whip?’ asks another.

  Lorna wriggles in next to us, slightly damp, but grinning from ear to ear.

  I grin back.

  A giant voice booms through the loudspeakers, ‘Welcome, everyone! Starting a little late, but not to worry. Here in the Castle Ballroom, Shabbiton, I’d like to present our first couple in the Frank Darnell Competition cup, competing for the tango – Verity Cowley and Derek Simmons!!’

  The house lights dim and a giant spotlight centres in on the dance floor. From somewhere in the darkness a real orchestra strikes up, and a woman in a magenta backless dress trots onto the floor, her hand held by a tall, suited man with an enormous moustache. They whisk, whirl, tremble, and the audience gasps in appreciation. The woman bends backwards until her tightly pulled bun brushes the floor, her partner tosses her over his head as if she weighed as little as the sequins on her tights.

  When they finish the audience erupts into an ecstasy of clapping.

  ‘Quite good,’ says Dave, chomping a toffee. ‘For dancing.’

  ‘And now, the Castle Ballroom’s very own Arnold Wells – and Doreen Golightly. Take your places, please.’

  They sizzle. There’s no other word I can use to describe what’s happening in front of my eyes. Granddad and Miss Golightly, the school secretary, sizzle. Every movement is crisp and dynamic. I know, from watching Granddad’s videos, that their shoulder lines are perfect, that her leg lifts are spot on, that their faces are showing exactly the right level of superiority and that their eyes are meeting and burning with passion.

  For the whole time that they dance, I don’t breathe. I don’t think anyone here does. This is perfection. What we’re seeing is a dance that’ll be remembered forever. One that wouldn’t have taken place if the fridge hadn’t sent us back.

  When they finish, she’s almost flat on the ground, their fingertips touching. There’s a silence before the audience cascades into roaring applause. They stand, they clap, they shout, they slap each other on the back, while Granddad and Miss Golightly bow slightly to the judges and disappear into the darkness.

  ‘Gordon Bennett,’ says Dave.

  ‘Exactly,’ says Dilan, wiping what I know is a tear from his eye.

  ‘Was that your Granddad?’ whispers Lorna. But I can’t answer, because I’ve got a huge lump in my throat.

  Chapter 29

  We leave before the end. It’s Dilan’s idea. He says, quite rightly, that we can’t afford to get caught up in what happens next. We need to get away before we mess up time. I feel sad as we turn our backs on the pier. Watching Granddad dance was like … well, like a rainbow, or Christmas, or eating baked potatoes round a bonfire.
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  ‘I’d like to have found out who won, what happened,’ says Lorna.

  ‘But you will,’ says Dilan. ‘In the present – Granddad’ll tell us. At least he’ll have something to say when we get back, and we might actually understand some of it.’

  ‘What are you blathering on about?’ says Dave.

  Dilan blushes red and clamps his hand over his mouth. ‘Nothing,’ he says.

  Dave looks at us doubtfully.

  I say nothing. Anything I say is bound to make things worse. We’ve committed a major time-sin. We’ve made friends with someone from the past and hinted that we’re from the future. I’m sure that’s not allowed.

  Dave pinches his brow. ‘Something odd about you lot.’

  ‘Is there?’ says Lorna.

  ‘Hmm, can’t put my finger on it. Those shorts for a start,’ he says, pointing at Dilan’s pants sticking out over the top.

  We stand quietly. Personally I’m trying to think of a really good excuse for what Dilan just said.

  ‘Anyway,’ says Dave, ‘got to get home for my tea. See you around.’

  He pedals off and Dilan sighs with relief. ‘Sorry,’ he says.

  ‘Anyway, we did it,’ I say. ‘We followed the instructions from the fridge. We made Arnold dance.’

  ‘So do you think that’s what it’s all been about? Just getting Granddad to dance?’ says Dilan, hoisting up his waistband.

  I shrug. ‘It does seem a lot of fuss for just one dance.’

  We walk through a cold stretch of sea mist back home. The piles of bricks for building the estate loom up at us, and we have to follow the path carefully to find the house. We walk in almost silence, the distant music from the pier the only sound. Every now and then it stops and I pause to listen for the applause, turning around to see the faint yellow lights of the pier glowing through the mist.

  I’d really like to be back there.

  The house smells of dishcloths and boiling meat, and a suffocating warm steam catches my throat as we walk in. There are three yoghurts waiting for us in the fridge. They’re modern ones and luckily, although the telly booms through the door from the lounge, no one appears.

  ‘Ready?’ I ask.

  The other two nod and we dig into the pots of creamy, rich yoghurt.

  I keep my eyes on the floor. It changes from blue and white squares to modern brown tiles, and as it changes I’m aware of a new silence – one that shouldn’t be here in the twenty-first century. No telly. No booming dance music. ‘Granddad?’ I say, opening the door to the lounge.

  But it’s Mum sitting on the couch. Reading a book, her feet up on the end, looking happy and relaxed.

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘Yes, darling?’

  ‘Nothing,’ I say, retreating back into the kitchen and staring at Dilan and Lorna. ‘Granddad’s not on the sofa,’ I say.

  ‘Does that mean we’ve done something to him?’ says Dilan. ‘Surely we haven’t … ’

  ‘Oh dear. Have we lost him somewhere? Is he in time limbo?’ says Lorna, her eyes wide with worry.

  For a moment I contemplate the possibility. ‘I don’t see how we could have done.’

  ‘Perhaps he ate a yoghurt?’ she says. ‘You never know.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s in his room?’ says Dilan, pushing past me into the lounge. ‘Hi, Mum,’ he says, stomping over to the far side and opening Granddad’s bedroom door. But it isn’t Granddad’s bedroom: it’s a study. All neat and tidy and filled with wires and computers, not an old tissue in sight.

  Perhaps Lorna’s right, perhaps we have lost him. I feel deeply sad. Granddad was a wreck, an old shuffling man with dribble and stained cardigans, but I could still see glimpses of the young man and I wanted to tell him that, to tell him that I understood.

  But he’s gone.

  I turn back towards the fridge. The letters are all mixed up. No words at all any more. Opening the door, I search for any more yoghurts, but all the food is ordinary, almost the same food that Dilan and I put in there, plus two bottles of champagne that we didn’t.

  Everything’s almost the same, but slightly different. Like it is when you’ve been ill for a week and you wake up and come downstairs and someone’s painted the kitchen a different colour.

  ‘Do you think,’ I whisper, ‘that we’ve ended up in the future?’

  ‘Is that possible?’ asks Lorna.

  I look out of the kitchen window, towards the sea. The estate’s there, the apple tree’s there – and so’s the pier. White and shining in the evening sunlight. I look at the clock. Six fifteen. But when?

  A car crunches onto the gravel outside and we rush to the kitchen window. It’s a sports car. A low, silver thing with a soft roof and huge tyres. The driver’s door opens and a tall man in a smart grey mac springs out and opens the passenger door. I can’t see his face, but I can see the legs of the passenger. Long elegant legs with slim ankles belonging to a fine woman in her sixties. She’s Miss Golightly without the years of peanut brittle. She’s wearing a camel-coloured coat and perfectly applied lipstick. She looks a million dollars. The man turns towards us and holds out his elbow.

  It’s Granddad.

  He’s still an old man, but he’s not. He’s not bent and dribbling and sad. He’s upright, and sprightly, and has a playful smile. Together they walk towards the front door.

  Chapter 30

  ‘Granddad,’ I say, opening the door. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Grand, Sky, never been grander.’ He leans forward and pats me on the head. ‘Get out the sparkly glasses, Oliver, and we can have a toast – it’s our anniversary.’

  Dilan and I stare at each other.

  ‘Oliver?’ I say.

  ‘Your brother, Sky,’ says Miss Golightly, skipping past into the lounge. ‘Get your brother to do it. Hello, Lorna, dear, are you going to join us?’

  ‘Doreen, Arnold,’ says Mum, springing up from the sofa, which is when I realise she’s pregnant.

  ‘Stay there, pet,’ says Miss Golightly. ‘Sky’ll sort some snacks, won’t you, dear?’ she looks at me, so I turn and walk mechanically into the kitchen. Sky? My name is Sky? I like that – it’s about a million times better than Bugg.

  I open the noodle cupboard, and instead of packets of instant noodles there are crisps and cheese straws. I open a bag and empty them into a bowl.

  Sky.

  Sky.

  Sky Wells.

  It really is a whole lot better than Bugg Wells.

  And then Dad appears holding a bottle of champagne, and we all get some, and we clink glasses, and Dad says, ‘Forty years! Here’s to Dad and lovely Doreen and forty fantastic years.’ And Granddad gives Doreen a peck on the cheek, and she kisses him back properly on the mouth and I have to sit down.

  ‘Speech!’ says Mum.

  ‘Speech!’ says Dad, hugging Doreen as if she was his real mum.

  ‘Oh yes, Arnold, dear, do give us a few words,’ says Miss Golightly.

  Granddad clears his throat, takes a sip of his champagne and points at a faded colour photograph on the wall, which I have never seen before.

  ‘2nd July 1974.’ He lifts the photo from the wall and holds it in his hand as if it could transfer the memory to his fingertips. ‘What an evening! What a competition!’

  ‘Go on then, love,’ says Miss Golightly. ‘Tell them. Tell them all about it.’

  ‘It was a clear evening. A capacity crowd. The hairspray was thick … ’

  ‘And the make-up,’ says Miss Golightly with a giggle.

  ‘Ted Mildenhall was there judging, and that woman Anita Smears, and the ballroom looked magnificent.’

  ‘Oh, it did.’ Miss Golightly smiles, remembering, so that the make-up in the corner of her eyes cracks.

  Granddad gazes at Miss Golightly. ‘And so did you, Doreen.’

  ‘And you, Arnold.’

  ‘And then they stopped us,’ says Granddad. ‘Because of the fire.’

  I nearly choke on a cheese straw. ‘The fire?’
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  ‘That idiot Eddie Henderson, the one that works on the petrol pumps out at Asco, he was just a boy, thought he’d do for the pier so that the family garage could open up on the seafront. He’d vandalised the phone boxes too, done a proper job of it. Regular delinquent. It all came out in court, loads of witnesses, old John Dando saw him rowing away, but they’d never have caught him if it wasn’t for the kids.’

  ‘Kids?’ says Lorna.

  ‘Oh yes,’ says Miss Golightly. ‘There were two children on the pier. They let off a flare, so the firemen knew something was going on, and the firemen were only there because of a girl stuck on the rocks when the tide came in. All terribly lucky.’

  Lorna goes bright red and splutters over a crisp.

  ‘Imagine what would have happened otherwise,’ says Dad, topping up the champagne glasses. ‘It would have been an awful accident – all those people in the ballroom, and the whole thing made of wood.’

  The adults stare into the middle distance as if imagining the town without a pier.

  ‘Anyway, no one ever knew who those children were – they were never seen again,’ says Granddad, with another mouthful of champagne.

  ‘Really?’ asks Dilan/Oliver. ‘They had no idea?’

  Granddad shakes his head. ‘No – and the only person that might have known was Dave Dando, and he left town as soon as he could to go into fashion. Police talked to him of course, but he made no sense. His brother runs that surf shop in town. They’ve made a fortune from shorts, I believe.’

  Dilan/Oliver turns and shows me the label on the side of his shorts. Dando. I nearly drop my thimbleful of champagne.

  ‘Anyway, if it wasn’t for those kids, we’d never have won, because when they let us all back into the building, Verity and Derek were off like they’d been wound up. They danced beautifully, I could barely fault them. Maybe his second lift was a trifle wobbly, but I think I’m picking holes.’

  ‘No, they did,’ agrees Miss Golightly. ‘They danced like a dream. I remember thinking we couldn’t possibly outdo them. But … ’