by Jenny Oliver
Zadie said, ‘So shall we read the next clue?’ She turned to Ruben as she said it and picked a couple of old spiderweb strands from his shirt.
Olive had forgotten all about the clues.
Ruben seemed distracted from being preened by his daughter – torn between whether to shrug her off or let her continue to sort out his filthy shirt. In the end he stepped away slightly so he could continue the dusting off himself, which meant he handed the clue to Olive.
Olive was once again walloped in the chest by the sight of her dad’s scrawling handwriting but this time rather than distance herself from it she allowed herself to fall into it. To see his tanned calloused hand as it held the pen, the speed with which he wrote, like everything was holding him back from life’s adventures.
‘There you are in the treetops. There you are in the sky. There you are in the water. Always nearby …’
Ruben looked up blankly. ‘Well, that’s just gobbledegook.’
Olive wasn’t really concentrating on the words because her mind was being flooded with images of her and her dad. Things she had just accepted as part of her childhood suddenly seemed exotic and crazy and completely unforgettable. The times he took her bouldering round the headland with the waves lapping beneath them, canyoning the hidden gorges and plunge pools. Just her and her dad – Dolly always left behind for being too young or for having whined one too many times that it was raining or too cold. But Olive had camped in mid-winter with little more than a bivouac of sticks and a blanket, fuelled by her dad’s obsession to both overcome and become one with nature. They poached, they skinned, they cooked in ovens dug out of the mud. They rafted down vertical rapids on homemade rafts thrashed together with string. Whether she had done it to impress him or because she wanted to was never in question, she just went along because when he was home he invited her and it made her feel special.
Thinking about it now, it wasn’t that she had forgotten those times, it was that she had taken them as normal, absorbed them as generic childhood events. Like the camping at Halloween. Yet now, looking back, the precious uniqueness of the trips left her with such a mix of sorrow and joy, it made her breath catch.
‘What do you think, Olive?’
‘What do I think about what? Oh sorry, yeah, erm …’ Olive stared at the clue, trying to get her brain to focus on the riddle. Then she laughed, more genuinely relaxed than she had been since she arrived. ‘I have absolutely no idea.’
Ruben raised his hands in the air. ‘Well, we’re nailing this, aren’t we?’
Chapter Nine
Dolly was sweating. Her leather jacket was draped over the bike seat along with Fox’s, their helmets strapped onto the back with their bags. The rain had cleared. Disappeared like it had never happened. The sun burnt through the clouds like fire. The bike had refused to start when Fox had tried it. Dolly’s phone had no signal and Fox’s screen had cracked in the crash and was now half black and unresponsive.
All around them was corn. Stretching high up into the sky. Corn leaves, corn stalks, corn cobs trying to break free of their leafy green casings.
‘I’m going to lift you up and you need to look around and see what you can see,’ Fox said, wiping sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.
Dolly didn’t love the idea of him lifting her up. She was still smarting from Fox’s little tell-off before he removed her helmet. Dolly wasn’t used to being told off. Or rather, wasn’t used to being told off and it resonating. Boring down into her body like a worm. When she was told off at work she just shrugged it off because she was usually right anyway. And she had never been told off as a kid. Her mum didn’t believe in it. ‘Raised voices crush the spirit,’ she would say, admonishing Olive for yelling at Dolly for something she’d done: going into her room without knocking or scratching a CD. Olive would stomp off in irritation while Dolly would shuffle closer to her mum and let her hair be plaited or lie on the carpet with her nose pressed up to their knackered old dog, Everest, while her mum dreamily sketched the pair of them.
‘OK,’ Dolly replied to Fox’s suggestion because there wasn’t really another option.
He came up behind her and put his big hands on her waist, lifting her up like an ice skater in a show. One minute she was on the ground, the next she was in the air. It was the strangest sensation; Dolly was strong and agile and independent, she wasn’t used to being at another’s mercy, but there was certainly a novelty to being hoisted effortlessly off the floor by big manly arms. The thought of it made her want to laugh.
‘What can you see?’
Suddenly Dolly had the giggles. ‘Nothing,’ she said, trying to stop herself laughing.
‘Dolly, stop pissing about, we’re stuck in a bloody cornfield.’
‘I know, sorry.’ She put her hand over her mouth to try and contain the urge to snigger. ‘Erm, what can I see?’
‘Hurry up,’ Fox urged. ‘You’re not light, you know.’
That made it less funny. She’d been imagining herself like a feather. ‘All right!’ She gave the horizon a once-over. ‘It’s just fields,’ she said. Fox’s arms were starting to waver.
‘Can you see the road?’
‘No.’ She squinted towards a copse of trees in the distance. ‘I think I can see a roof by some trees over there.’ She pointed ahead of them.
‘You think or you can?’ he asked, voice tinged with irritation.
‘I think I can,’ she snapped.
Fox dropped her to the ground with an exhale of effort.
‘All right, I’m not that heavy!’ Dolly smarted.
Fox had his arms crossed over his chest, clearly wanting to keep to the point.
Dolly straightened her blue T-shirt, which was streaked with dirt and sweat. ‘I think there was a roof. It was over there.’ She pointed to where she’d been looking.
‘So about thirty degrees due east?’ said Fox.
‘If you say so,’ Dolly replied, one brow arched.
Fox shook his head, sighing with exasperation; he’d clearly had enough of her. She didn’t want to think too much about the fact she’d managed to really piss off the most Zen unpiss-off-able police officer on the force. But at least he’d stopped quoting Buddhist monks at her.
The corn stalks were sticky and the leaves whipped annoyingly against their faces as they started to trudge thirty degrees due east in the heat. Fox was clearly having trouble with his ankle but wasn’t going to admit it. Dolly’s shoulder had started to throb. Sweat poured down her back and across her forehead. Fox’s T-shirt was damp. The motorbike looked heavy to push. Dolly’s trainers were rubbing her heels. She was thirsty.
Suddenly Fox stopped and held up his hand for Dolly to do the same.
‘What?’ she grumbled.
‘Sssh!’ he whispered, then pointing at the ground ahead of them said, ‘Look!’
‘What?’ she whispered, concerned, looking to where he was pointing for imminent danger, only to see a tiny mouse nibbling on a fallen cob of corn, a kernel in its little paws.
Dolly frowned. ‘The mouse?’ she asked quietly.
‘Yes, the mouse,’ he replied, crouching as low as he could while still holding the bike so he could get a better look.
Dolly couldn’t quite believe he’d stopped them to look at a mouse. There was a snarky remark poised on the tip of her tongue but something made her hold it back.
She glanced from the mouse to Fox, who was transfixed by the furry little creature. Dolly wondered if he would have stopped had he been with Mungo and Rogers. Probably. But they wouldn’t have hesitated to quip something cutting in return, to stamp their feet so it ran away or joke about mouse kebab for dinner. They were who Dolly had made herself comfortable with on the force. They armed her with a sardonic shield of one-upmanship.
But Fox wasn’t interested in any witty quip she might reply. He was too busy studying the fluffy little rodent. He didn’t care about Dolly. He wasn’t in it for the laugh. She was free, she realised, to crouch down ne
xt to him and look at the mouse too, but somehow, it took more effort than it would to clap her hands and guffaw, Mungo and Rogers style; to pause, silent and not care. It was something she did only in her own flat when she gave all her plants a bath, wiping their dusty leaves one by one, or bought nuts that she would never eat herself so she could feed them to the sparrows. It was the side of her that had scratched her legs creeping through bracken at Willoughby Park to catch a glimpse of the baby fawn. That cycled off before breakfast with a jam jar for tadpoles or made her own fishing rod to catch tiddlers in the stream.
How funny that a mouse could mean so much. Its little mouth and black beady eyes. She glanced again at Fox, who was still transfixed, and realised that it wasn’t the mouse, it was the freedom to unselfconsciously enjoy a simple moment if she was brave enough to take it. No bravado, no jokey defence mechanism. She lowered herself down, shoulder to shoulder with Fox, and tried her best to watch in peaceful silence.
The moment, however, only emphasised the fact she wasn’t at peace. She couldn’t calmly watch because, she realised, her moral compass was askew. She owed Fox an apology and would be restlessly on the back foot until she gave it to him.
Sensing he was being looked at, Fox turned his head. The mouse caught the movement and froze. A second later it had disappeared into the corn.
‘It’s gone,’ Dolly said.
Fox nodded. ‘Let’s carry on,’ he said, hands on the handlebars, using the bike to flatten the corn ahead of them.
Dolly watched his back as he pushed forward in the heat. She looked at the dents in the side of the motorbike. She put her hands in her pockets. She breathed in through her nose, psyching herself up, ‘Fox …’
He paused and turned, ‘Yeah?’
No, she couldn’t do it. ‘Nothing.’ When she mulled the words over in her brain, it went against her every instinct. Admission of guilt felt like it would give him the upper hand.
Fox trudged on. The corn stalks fell. Dolly glanced behind to see how far they’d come. An arcing line like a crop circle behind them.
She saw how the rainwater collected where the corn leaves joined the stalk in tiny glistening puddles possibly for use by the plant later on. She wondered whether to point it out to Fox but realised she couldn’t. It made her too vulnerable to ridicule.
She ran her fingers along the leaves as they walked. The sun beat heavy on her hair, burning her scalp.
How did he manage to have such an effect on her sense of right and wrong? He was so annoying.
Just apologise, Dolly, and be done with it! She looked up at the trickle of sweat between the muscles in his neck. ‘Fox,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ he replied, pushing on with the bike, leaning forward now with effort.
Dolly took a breath, stealing herself. ‘I’m sorry, you know, about what happened with the bikers, but I didn’t know they’d follow us.’
She didn’t know what she was expecting but Fox didn’t even pause. Didn’t even turn or say, ‘That’s OK.’
Unsure what else to say, she added, ‘And, well, I’m sorry you’re annoyed about the damage to your bike.’
He paused. ‘You’re sorry I’m annoyed or you’re sorry for the damage?’
‘Well technically I didn’t do the damage—’
Fox held up a hand for her to stop and kept walking. Dolly had no choice but to follow. Her sense of wrongdoing no better than it was before. Worse possibly.
Chapter Ten
Ruben, Olive and Zadie took the shaded path through the woodlands back to the Big House, a little more bonded by the camaraderie brought out by the clues.
‘I’m hungry,’ said Zadie.
‘So am I,’ agreed Ruben, which clearly wasn’t the answer Zadie was used to by the jut of her bottom lip. He imagined her mother kept a stash of suitable snacks in her bag for such occasions.
‘We could get a rabbit,’ he said, purely to wind her up.
Zadie’s face fell in horror. ‘What do you mean, get a rabbit?’
Ruben shrugged. ‘Trap it. Skin it. Cook it on a fire. More likely a stoat around these parts, though.’
This was more than Zadie could endure. ‘He’s not going to do that, is he?’ she asked Olive quietly, who shook her head, gesturing back towards Ruben, who was trying not to grin as he said, ‘Maybe a fat pigeon if we’re lucky.’
‘Please make him stop,’ urged Zadie, throwing Ruben a glare, at which he laughed and said, ‘Just kidding, I wouldn’t have the faintest idea how to kill a rabbit or a stoat.’
They walked on some more. Zadie peppering her pouts with the occasional desperate moan of ‘I’m starving.’
Olive came to the rescue, pausing in the woodland to tear some berries off a bush. ‘You can eat these,’ she said, handing them to Zadie.
‘What if they kill me?’ Zadie looked very dubiously down at the fruit. ‘I don’t want to die before finding the treasure.’
Olive laughed. ‘They’re bilberries, they won’t kill you.’
Zadie tentatively put one in her mouth. Ruben ripped a handful off the bush and scoffed the lot.
‘They’re quite tasty,’ Zadie admitted, nibbling on another.
Olive bent down and picked a yellow chanterelle mushroom. ‘You can eat these too, but it’s better to cook them.’
‘Wow, how do you know this stuff?’ Zadie was impressed.
Olive said, ‘My dad taught me.’
Zadie glanced across at Ruben as if expecting similar dad-like tutelage from him but he held his hands up and said, ‘Don’t look at me, kid, I’m as clueless as you. The only place I forage is Waitrose.’
Zadie picked some more bilberries. ‘That’s OK,’ she said, mouth full. ‘I learn loads already off my stepdad, Barry. He knows everything. And I really like acting and reading and he’s in an amateur dramatics group.’
Ruben snorted a laugh at the idea.
Zadie frowned at him, her forehead furrowed in question.
Chastened, Ruben said, ‘Sorry, I don’t know why I laughed.’
They walked on through the dappled woods, light dancing on the leaves.
‘So you like acting; do you want to be an actress when you’re older?’ Olive asked.
‘Oh yeah, definitely,’ Zadie replied without hesitation.
Ruben had to stifle a sigh.
‘I love acting,’ Zadie went on. ‘Shakespeare especially. I think actually at the moment, I’d prefer to be a playwright. Or a poet. But preferably a playwright …’ And she was off. Ruben wondered if it was a skill not to have to pause for breath. Maybe he could tout her out to Britain’s Got Talent?
But Olive was listening, nodding, smiling. Was she humouring her or actually listening?
They crunched on through the dry forest. The smell of pine and sun-warmed bark all around them.
‘I did want to be an actress but I get really bad stage fright, like totally frozen.’ Zadie made a face as if she were mid-strangulation. ‘It’s because of all the overthinking. My brain just kind of short-circuits under pressure. But like, if there was no audience, you know, then I think I’d be a really good actress.’ She nodded, as if enthusiasm could encourage Olive into agreement. ‘My mum always says so.’
Ruben thought how mums were by far the biggest liars in the world. Not his mum. She was always straight to the point, no sugar-coating for the de Lacy boy. But other mums, normal mums, they were big fat liars. Half the world’s problems could probably be traced back to the maternal softening of the blow.
Next to him, Olive was saying, ‘I’m sure you’ll be an excellent actress.’
‘Not if she’s got stage fright.’ Ruben popped another bilberry into his mouth. The last thing he wanted to encourage was a fruitless and no doubt very expensive pipe dream.
Olive gave him a nudge as if he was being too discouraging, but Zadie was nodding. ‘Yes. That’s exactly right. Sometimes I go down to the beach – you know, on the pier – and just stand there and recite a monologue or a poem. I make myself
do it. It’s really hard but sometimes people stop and listen. Once though, a group of boys from school stood in a line next to me pretending to be me, you know, mimicking me. I made myself carry on but …’
How could this girl be his daughter? No de Lacy in their right mind would do something like that. ‘Why would you do that to yourself?’ Ruben imagined himself as one of those schoolboys, thinking he was hilarious doing a mock Shakespearian bow next to the weird poetry geek.
‘You can never give in to the bullies,’ said Zadie.
Ruben was incredulous. ‘But you can also not give them the ammunition.’
Zadie shook her head. ‘That’s victim-blaming,’ she admonished.
Ruben rolled his eyes. ‘No, it’s common sense.’
The forest was getting denser. Brambles scratched their legs and arms. Well-trodden fox paths pressed the long grass flat.
‘So what are you saying, Ruben?’ Olive tipped her head, clearly intrigued. ‘That Zadie shouldn’t do something because a group of boys in her class can’t handle it?’
‘No,’ he sighed, pushing a branch out of the way. ‘I’m saying there are certain conventions of “normal” behaviour in life and if you’re going to step out of them, you have to be prepared for the consequences.’
Zadie shrugged, completely unaffected. ‘But I don’t want to be normal. I want to be me.’
The statement seemed to stall Olive completely as she tried to detangle her jeans from a bramble.
Ruben held his hands wide as if defenceless. ‘I’m just making the point that standing on the pier at twelve years old reciting Shakespearean monologues is never going to end happily.’
‘It didn’t end too badly,’ Zadie said, pausing as she did battle with the leaves of an enormous fern. ‘I made fifty-seven pounds in tips.’
‘Really?’ Ruben was impressed. Zadie grinned proudly as he helped her with the bracken. Maybe she was a de Lacy after all.
They popped out of the forest darkness into the bright manicured perfection of the south lawn. A poplar-lined avenue that led up to a lake with a fountain in one direction and the old orangery in the other.
