‘I love Mexican food,’ said Grenville, whose favourite thing in the world was a Mexican wrestler known as ‘the Prawn’.
‘Name three Mexican foods,’ said Clover, not believing him for a second.
‘Easy,’ said Grenville. ‘Mexican eggs, Mexican dips and Mexican chips.’
Grenville had obviously been doing quite a lot of research on the culture. His love of El Gamba was all-encompassing. ‘To be like the prawn,’ he would tell anyone who would listen, ‘you have to think like a prawn!’
And then he would explain the PRAWN PUNCH! and the SHRIMP SHRUG! and the GAMBA GAMBLE! and the totally classic PRAWN TOSS! and tell them about a million prawn facts and then they’d get bored and fall asleep. Grenville had even paid Clover six Chomps and a gargantuan gobstopper to make his El Gamba costume far more elaborate and impressive. And she had done quite the job! He didn’t just have a standard mask and cape these days – he had a hot-pink bodysuit and Clover had plans for eyes and antennae too!
‘Yes, well, anyway, back to soil erosion,’ said Mr Longblather.
Hamish wondered how else they might distract Mr Longblather from talking about soil erosion, because Mr Longblather was one of those teachers you could quite easily divert to another topic. All you had to do was say something like, ‘Can you tell us about what trains were like when you were a kid?’ and before you knew it, he’d spent forty minutes talking about the history of the railway network and totally forgotten to give you the homework he’d been planning.
But then a hand shot up for a different reason.
‘What about the Amazon?’ asked Alice. ‘Can we talk about the Amazon again?’
Mr Longblather sighed.
‘This is not a “greatest hits” class,’ he said, flattening his moustache down. ‘I don’t take requests, Miss Shepherd.’
Hamish smiled at Alice. She had become totally obsessed with the Amazon rainforest ever since she’d discovered the truth about her grandma. She was desperate for more information. Even things she’d heard before. She loved to imagine her mysterious grandma hunting yetis and giant spiders and massive HellToads. And she had so many questions.
The last time anyone had heard from Alice’s Granny Lydia was when she’d decided to head to the Amazon to hunt down the one monster that had truly terrified her. The same monster that had scared her so much it had caused a white stripe to appear in her hair – a stripe that would last generations! One that Alice shared, and which she liked to dye blue.
I’m talking about the BÜÜÜÜG.
Have you ever seen a BÜÜÜÜG?
I certainly hope not.
Anyway, Lydia never came back from that last trip and her real reason for going had been a secret up until Alice’s discovery at Christmas.
The rest of the PDF thought that she’d probably been gobbled up or something, but no one wanted to say that in front of Alice as she was desperate to believe that her grandma was out there somewhere.
Mr Longblather had been told about poor old missing Lydia too, which is why he usually indulged Alice’s questions, despite his protests at repeating himself. He pulled down a map of the Amazon he kept on a roller on the wall. Alice had started asking so often that it was just easier to have one always to hand. What Mr Longblather didn’t know was that Alice kept asking questions to look for clues, in case her grandma was still around and able to help and she could somehow track her down.
‘Fine,’ Mr Longblather said. ‘The Amazon rainforest is the world’s largest rainforest, which you can find across Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia—’
‘Not this again!’ said Grenville Bile, grumpily. ‘Why don’t you just go find your nan if it means that much to you, Alice? You’ve got a bike.’
‘Listen, prawn face,’ said Alice, turning around with a face like thunder but remaining very calm. ‘Maybe I will one day. Though probably not by bike. And I ask my questions because it’s important to be prepared. And of course it means that much to me. It’s family.’
She shot him a withering glance, but Grenville couldn’t even spell withering so it was mostly wasted on him. Alice cracked her knuckles and decided to let it go.
‘Yeah, it’s family,’ said Grenville, forgetting to be scared of Alice, even though you totally should. ‘But you never even met her. You told us that she disappeared when your mum was a little girl.’
‘She had her reasons,’ said Alice, seething. ‘Because Grandma Lydia was not someone who gives up. And neither am I.’
‘Prove it,’ said Grenville, who had learned to talk like this from watching old wrestling videos and had just decided that making Alice angry might be a way to distract Mr Longblather from trying to continue the lesson.
Alice leaned down and pulled an ancient-looking notebook out of her bag. It had old postcards and newspaper clippings poking from it and Hamish recognised it as Alice’s grandma’s travel diary. She never seemed to go anywhere without it lately.
‘I’m looking for clues, Grenville, and do you know why? Because that’s what she’d have done. Because she’s part of me. And as this monster gets closer, we’re all starting to realise how important family is, aren’t we?’
Maybe this was Alice’s way of coping with The News, thought Hamish. To focus on something else. To imagine an adventure she could control. But then she said something that stopped him in his tracks.
‘That’s the thing about family,’ she said. ‘They’re always a part of us.’
Hamish shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
‘Their good bits, and their bad bits, they all go into us,’ she said, on a roll now. ‘Our family makes us who we are.’
An image of Scarmarsh formed in Hamish’s mind and he promptly tried to push it away, but he was starting to feel a bit sick.
‘There’s no getting away from it,’ said Alice, opening the diary to a picture of Lydia.
‘You can’t hide from it. Whatever is in your blood, is in your blood.’
Hamish stood up and left the room.
5
DAYS UNTIL ARRIVAL: YUP, STILL 5
‘Hey, H! What’s up?’ said Buster, bounding over to Hamish in the playground at break. ‘You just stood up and walked out! I was all like, “why’s Hamish stood up and walked out?” ’
‘I was, um, feeling a bit sick,’ said Hamish. ‘What did Mr Longblather say?’
‘He looked like he was going to get annoyed so we just asked him what trains were like when he was young.’
The rest of the PDF joined the boys in the playground.
‘Right!’ Clover said, sounding determined. ‘Now that we finally have a break from “education”, we can focus on the important stuff. What are we going to do about this monster? The rest of the country won’t have anything to do with us until we sort this out! We’ve got to nip it in the butt!’
Hamish had heard they were planning to build an even bigger wall around Starkley in the next few days. Just to really send a message to the monster that while Starkley may be of interest to it, that was no reason to attack the rest of the country. Of course, some people were furious. What happened to everyone being in it together? But the new prime minister, Anna Tank-Topp, had been adamant. Starkley seemed to love monsters, and monsters seemed to love Starkley, she declared. What was sacrificing one little town if it saved thousands more? And if people wanted to stay there – even though they couldn’t get as many sausages or sweeties – that was their problem!
All this just made people prouder to be living in brave, plucky Starkley right now. The Starkley Town Council flag flew proudly on roofs and in gardens.
Of course, secretly the kids knew their parents would be planning for the worst. Unless Belasko could come up with an amazing plan in the next five days, then they’d be forced to move. Buster would end up at his auntie’s house in London. Clover’s family would head for Suffolk. Venk had family in Scotland. Whatever happened, though, the PDF knew it was important not to lose sight of the present because it wasn’t too late to stop
the monster!
So far, the gang had three main plans of their own:
‘Hmm,’ said Hamish. ‘Well, I’m not sure we’ve quite cracked it yet.’
‘I wonder if Granny Lydia ever faced anything like this,’ said Alice, leafing through the travel diary.
‘Can I see?’ said Elliot, and she handed it to him.
He smiled at the pictures.
There was Lydia in snowshoes.
There she was on top of a mountain.
There was a picture she’d taken of an elephant. A ticket stub.
And there was one of her travel reviews with a photograph of her taken outside a big hotel, with three ornate domes on top. Lydia had a curious expression on her face, thought Elliot. She was smiling, sure. But it was quite a forced smile.
‘This was published the day before she disappeared,’ said Alice.
The headline underneath the picture read:
‘Alice,’ said Buster, looking a bit sheepish. ‘Have you ever considered that maybe your grandma didn’t just disappear?’
Alice knew what Buster was going to say, because she’d thought about it herself.
‘Sometimes people vanish on purpose,’ he said, sadly. ‘Sometimes . . . they might have a secret that makes them not want to be found.’
Hamish winced at the word secret. He hated hiding things from his best friends. The PDF always shared everything, but he was ashamed about his link to Scarmarsh and worried that if he did tell his pals they would react badly. What if they no longer trusted him, because how could you truly trust the nephew of the second most evil villain in the universe?
Or, worse, what if they blamed him?
Blamed him for everything. For the WorldStoppers, for the SpyTraps, maybe even for the monster making its way towards Starkley now? What if they were angry at him for how much everything had changed in their boring little town for the worse?
But, really, at the root of all Hamish’s worries was the fact that he was scared. He didn’t want to tell them just in case they were right.
‘Uh, guys?’ said Elliot, peering more closely at Lydia’s diary. ‘I think there might be more to Lydia’s story than we thought.’
‘What are you talking about?’ asked Alice.
‘I think I’ve found a clue,’ said Elliot. ‘A good one.’
‘I’ve been through that book a thousand times,’ said Alice. ‘I think if there was a good clue I’d have found it by now.’
‘What have you seen, El?’ said Hamish, grateful for any distraction from his own thoughts.
‘This article,’ said Elliot. ‘Look at it.’
‘It’s the last piece she ever wrote as a travel writer. Just as she was going into the Amazon.’ Alice shrugged. ‘What about it?’
‘Does she really look happy in that photo?’ said Elliot. ‘Or, just under the surface, does she look scared? The strange smile? The bulging eyes? The sheen of sweat?’
‘Maybe she’d just had a bad curry?’ said Buster. ‘Mmm, curry.’
But the closer they looked . . . yes. Perhaps the look of fear was indeed there, just under the surface.
‘But that’s not a clue,’ continued Venk. ‘A clue is like a fingerprint or a hidden message or something. Not a bad photo after a dodgy korma.’
‘Yes, Venk,’ said Elliot. ‘So now look at the headline . . .’
They did.
Hotel Empanada Leaves People Marvellously Entertained! Everyone looked blank.
So Elliot tapped at the H in Hotel.
And then the E in Empanada.
And then he moved his way along the sentence . . .
HOTEL
EMPANADA
LEAVES
PEOPLE
MARVELLOUSLY
ENTERTAINED!
‘H. E. L. P. M. E.!’ gasped Alice. ‘Grandma Lydia must have known what was going to happen! She was asking for help because she knew it was a trap!’
‘Oh,’ said Elliot, wisely. ‘It gets a lot more interesting than that . . .’
6
DAYS UNTIL ARRIVAL: JUST OVER 4 (5)
‘This is AMAZING!’ yelled Alice, pounding down the street as her friends tried to keep up with her.
‘This is INSANE!’
Alice was pretty much the fastest runner in Starkley. Let’s just say the others were not.
‘Wait!’ puffed Elliot. ‘Shouldn’t we discuss this?’
‘YOU KIDS STAY SAFE!’ yelled PC Wix, watching them run through the empty street. ‘Make sure you’re in by curfew tonight!’
‘Shouldn’t you be in school?’ yelled Madame Cous Cous, polishing her window. The News had been bad for International World of Treats. Fewer people were coming to Starkley these days, and not much stock was getting in either. All Madame Cous Cous had to sell these days was Frinkley Fudge, and some Starkley Spiced Apple Slime, which was just some rotten apples she’d put pepper on.
Alice burst through the front door of her house and bounded upstairs, pausing once and once only to kiss her rabbit, Benny.
By the time the others had made it to her room, Alice was already coming back down the ladder to the loft carrying a small bag.
‘Gonna need a decent bag,’ she said.
‘Wait,’ said Hamish. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Isn’t it obvious?’ said Alice, starting to throw things in the bag. ‘She might still be out there! We have to save Grandma Lydia. We have to go to the Amazon.’
‘What?!’ said Buster.
‘Uh, that sounds pretty far away,’ said Clover. ‘And shouldn’t we be concentrating on this sea monster? Like, that feels like it should be our next mission . . . I mean, it’s not rocket salad.’
‘Fine,’ said Alice. ‘You stay and deal with that. And maybe Belasko can take me to the Amazon.’
But everyone knew what their answer would be: we’ve got our own problems right here in Starkley! There’s a sea monster coming, Alice! We can’t send a plane off to the Amazon to find someone’s nana who disappeared into the ether decades ago and might not even still be alive! Where would you even start?!
‘You said the clue was more interesting than just the words, Elliot,’ said Alice. ‘Did you find something else?’
‘Lydia is holding up a map in the photo,’ said Elliot. ‘Why would she do that? Unless it was to help show exactly where she was heading the next day?’
‘Good thought,’ said Venk.
‘But this is even more intriguing,’ said Elliot. ‘Just like with the headline, if you take the first letter of each word in the opening sentence in the Hotel Empanada review, it spells out something too . . .’
ANY SEASON, KURIOUS FOREIGNERS OFTEN REALISE HOTELS ARE REALLY RATHER YUMMY!
‘She spelled “curious” wrong,’ said Venk. ‘And, how can a hotel be “yummy”? Who’s eating hotels?’
‘To be fair, it must be pretty hard to hide clues while still conveying a good sense of the travel experience,’ said Clover.
Alice worked it out. A . . . S . . . K . . .
‘Ask for Harry!’ she said. ‘But where? How?’
‘I guess at Hotel Empanada,’ said Hamish. ‘If it still exists. I mean, this was a long time ago, Alice.’
‘Then that just means she’s been waiting years for someone to help her. I know she’s still out there, Hamish.’
Hamish could see the determination in his friend’s eyes. But Alice couldn’t go to the Amazon! It was on the other side of the world! They’d have to get, like, a bus, and a cab, and a train, and then probably walk for a bit, and then get a coach to the airport, and then get a plane, and then another plane, and then a bus, and a train . . . and that would be just to get out of Britain! Plus, Hamish only had about forty pounds saved up from Christmas, and he was pretty sure there was no way their parents would let them go to the Amazon on some crazy granny-hunt. Because what if it was all just a wild goose chase?
But he didn’t want to discourage Alice, who was now packing monster books, a self-defence guide called K
ickin’ Butt and a nut and pickle baguette.
‘Hotel Empanada!’ said Elliot, excited, pointing at some scribbled-down notes at the back of the travel diary. ‘Lydia wrote down the phone number!’
‘Great!’ said Alice. ‘So I can call it, ask for Harry, and see what happens.’
Hamish was secretly pretty sure that would be the end of it. The number would probably not even work. Whoever Harry was would have retired. But at least Alice would have tried and she could move on from thinking about Lydia.
Clover tossed her the home phone and Alice started to dial.
She put it on speakerphone and the kids gathered round.
A long, dull ringtone crackled into life.
BVVVVVVVV.
The number worked!
BVVVVVVVV.
But surely it wouldn’t still be Hotel Empanada?
BVVVVVVVV.
And surely Harry wouldn’t be there?
BVVVVVVVV.
And surely no one would ever have heard of Lydia?
BVVVVVVVV.
This was going on a bit too long.
BVVVVVV— ‘Hello?’
The kids gasped. A voice. A young, male voice, with a slight accent.
‘Hello,’ said Alice. ‘My name is Alice Shepherd and I’m looking for my grandma Lydia. Is Harry there?’
Silence.
Then . . .
‘I’m logging the co-ordinates of your phone,’ said the voice. ‘Hotel Empanada is pleased to offer a shuttlebus service.’
And just before the line went dead, the voice uttered two more words.
‘Be prepared.’
THE DREAM
Floating away from his friends, across the sea . . . the rain as hard as needles. And this time it was clearer than ever.
Hamish and the Monster Patrol Page 2
