Then he said, “Why do you always give in to him? Why do you let him tell us what to do?”
She shook her head without answering, dragging the back of her hand across her face. “Please,” she said. “What did you find out?”
Warren rolled over to face her. “When I was little,” he said, “I used to think that he had secret cameras hidden in my room. I thought he could see into my mind. Because you always told him everything.”
His mother looked away. “He’s not a bad man,” she muttered. “He’s only trying to look after us all. And I’ve tried to be strong. But I don’t understand what he’s doing now. And I can’t bear—” She turned back. “Please, Warren.”
Warren felt so tired that he could hardly put the words together. It seemed like an impossible effort. For a few seconds he just stared at his mother, without focusing. Then he mumbled, “The tall one’s called Doherty. He lives in a house near the park.”
He closed his eyes to shut out the eagerness that flared in his mother’s face, but she wouldn’t let him stop there. She pulled impatiently at his arm.
“If you know where he is, we have to get hold of him.” She was whispering now, in a low, quick voice. “We have to find him and make him say what they’ve done with Hope.”
“But suppose it’s too horrible,” Warren said. Speaking into the darkness behind his eyelids. Even thinking about it was hard, like carrying a heavy weight up a hill. “Dad was there. He knows. And if he won’t tell—if he won’t even talk about Hope—it must be something dreadful.”
“You think it’s worse than the things I’m imagining?” His mother’s voice was still low, but now it was savage. “I’ll go mad if I don’t find out. You have to help me, Warren.”
He wanted to say No. He wanted to say, I’m scared. I can’t do it. But he was afraid she would start to hate him if he said no. She’d always taught him to look after Hope, because that was what brothers were meant to do. And he’d found it for himself, in the dancing letters of Hope’s name. Program the son.
Opening his eyes, he looked at his mother’s wet face. “I saw one of the other kidnappers,” he said abruptly. “The girl. I tapped on the window, and she was afraid. So I thought—maybe—”
The words clogged his throat. It had all seemed so clear, so possible when he was hurrying home from the bus stop, but now it felt as feeble and foolish as everything else he did.
But his mother didn’t seem to think it was foolish. She leaned forward intently. “Maybe what?” she whispered.
Warren swallowed. “Well, maybe—if we could frighten them a bit more—they might give something away.”
He wasn’t expecting his mother to understand. She didn’t know what it was like to be so frightened that you would say anything, do anything, to get rid of the threat. He thought she would laugh at him.
But she didn’t. She met his eyes steadily. “How can we do it?” she whispered. “How can we scare them?”
Warren looked at the door for a moment, listening until he was sure that he could hear his father downstairs, out of earshot. When he was sure it was safe, he told his mother about the idea he’d had on the bus.
HE HADN’T BEEN PLANNING TO DO IT STRAIGHTAWAY, THAT evening. But his mother wouldn’t let him wait until the next day. When he suggested that, she shook her head furiously.
“Think how terrified Hope must be,” she whispered. “She won’t know what’s going on. And we’ve got to rescue her quickly, before—”
She didn’t spell it out, but Warren knew what she meant. Before the social workers find her. And the police. If anyone like that got hold of Hope, she would never come home again. If there was even a chance that his plan might work, they couldn’t risk waiting. They had to try it now.
“But what about Dad?” Warren muttered. “He’ll go berserk if he hears us—”
“He’s not going to hear us.” His mother had it worked out already. “It’s my evening for shopping, isn’t it? If I tell him I feel too ill to do it, he’ll go instead—and we’ll have an hour and a half to ourselves.”
Was it really that simple? Warren couldn’t believe it was going to work. By the time they went downstairs his mother’s face was pale and tense, but he worried that she wouldn’t be able to keep up the pretense. Surely his father would see she was acting. Or sense that something odd was going on. Or refuse to go shopping. Or—
But none of those things happened. An hour later, Warren stood at the front window nervously watching his father back the car out of the garage. The engine didn’t stop suddenly. His father didn’t come storming back into the house, shouting furiously, Did you really think you could trick me? The car just turned onto the road and drove off around the corner, and for an instant, the house was totally still and silent.
Then Warren heard his mother’s voice behind him. “Come on. Let’s do it.”
He turned and looked at her. She was standing in the doorway, with the tape in her hand.
“You’ve found the phone number?” she said.
He nodded. He’d checked it five times in the phone book. Taking the cassette from his mother, he slid it into the tape player. When he switched it on, the player rustled for a moment, and then Hope’s thin, clear voice spoke.
“Ou-T . . .”
Warren pressed the pause button and picked up the phone. Quickly, before he had time to think about what he was doing, he dialed the number. His mother held the tape player up to the mouthpiece and they both leaned in close, ready to catch any sounds from the other end.
The phone rang four times, five times, six times. Then the ringing stopped suddenly, and Warren braced himself, ready to speak. Is Robert there? But he didn’t need to say anything.
“Hello?” It was Doherty himself. Warren would have known that loud, arrogant voice anywhere. He pressed the button and set the tape player going.
“Hello?” Doherty said again. Impatient now. “I can’t hear you.”
The voice that answered him was Hope’s, utterly distinctive and unmistakable. “Out . . . out . . .”
Doherty drew in his breath sharply. “Hello?” he said once more. But this time he sounded hesitant and uncertain. Warren had to bite his tongue to stop himself yelping with triumph.
“Out!” said Hope again, more insistently this time. Warren could almost see her standing in the secret room with her arms held up.
Very tentatively, Doherty said, “Hope?”
Warren pushed the phone at his mother, making her hold it so that he could turn up the volume on the tape. Then he leaned in again, to make sure he didn’t miss anything.
“. . . out . . . out . . .”
“Hope?” Doherty was speaking faster now. “Is that you? Where are you?”
Warren recognized that anxious note—and he knew the feelings that went with it. They’d knocked Doherty off balance. Made him unsure about what was happening. Good! He turned up the volume again.
“Out!”
Doherty drew in his breath—and then a different voice came down the phone. It was fainter, as if the speaker was standing on the other side of the room. “Rob? What’s the matter? Are you all right?”
It was the fox-girl! It had to be!
Doherty didn’t answer, but Warren heard her coming across to the phone.
“Hasmegg,” Hope’s voice said conversationally. “Dohfuss, Wonn. Hasmegg.”
This time the fox-girl’s voice was much clearer. “It’s not her, Rob. How could she reach a phone?”
“Ssh!” Doherty said fiercely. “Listen.”
Then the phone went dead.
“Quick!” Warren’s mother said. “What’s the number? Get it again!”
Her finger was already on the button, rewinding the tape. It took a few moments, but as it finished Warren was already redialing. This time, the phone hardly had time to ring before it was answered. Doherty said something very fast. Hardly above a whisper.
It sounded like, “Law?”
What did that mean? Did h
e think they were the police? Warren strained his ears to catch the next word, but when it came, it was the fox-girl speaking.
“It’s not her, Rob. You know it’s not. It must be someone imitating her voice. Ring off.”
“Be quiet, Em!” Doherty snapped.
Emma, Warren thought, snatching at the name. Emma Doherty. It was a second before he realized that the phone had gone dead again. He put the phone down, feeling drained and disappointed.
“Sorry,” he muttered. “That wasn’t a lot of use, was it?”
“Oh yes, it was.” His mother’s eyes were glittering. “Didn’t you hear the boy say, Hope, where are you? He was very surprised. And the girl said, How could she reach a phone? They weren’t expecting to hear her on the phone—because they know where she is. They’ve got her shut up somewhere.”
Warren’s throat was suddenly dry. “You don’t think she’s dead, then?”
“No. No.” His mother screwed up her fists. “If she was dead, that boy would have guessed it was a recording. She’s alive—and they know where she is. We’ve got to make them tell us. If only we could get them here and lock them up until they talk!”
She said it wildly, thumping the air with her fists. But as soon as the words were out, she froze. For a second she was very, very still. Then she lifted her head and looked at Warren.
His mind made a huge, terrifying leap. But we can’t—
“We have to,” his mother said fiercely, as though she’d read his mind. “Otherwise we’ll never see Hope again. We have to get them here and make them tell us.”
Warren was trembling, but he couldn’t look away. He’d never seen her like that before. The need to find Hope scorched out of her, obliterating everything else. He could feel himself being caught up and swept along by it.
“B-but how can we?” he stuttered. “We’ll never manage—”
“Yes we will,” his mother said. She was calm now. Perfectly, terrifyingly calm. “We have to watch them. Watch everything they do and everywhere they go—until we know the right one to take, and the right moment to do it. And then I’ll hire a van.”
That was when Warren really understood that she was serious. His mind made a picture of her walking into a vanhire office and holding out her license. She was going to do it. And she thought he was going to help.
“What about Dad?” he muttered
“We won’t tell him,” she said. “Not until we’ve found Hope.”
That was the most frightening thing of all. Warren had never even imagined his parents on different sides. Now he was being asked to choose between them and he didn’t know how. His whole life had suddenly become impossible.
“But what can I do?” he muttered. “I’m no use—”
“You can help me shadow them,” his mother said quickly. “And when the right moment comes, you’ll have to help. I can’t do it on my own.”
Warren didn’t say anything. Looking at her, he understood that it was too late to draw back. Somehow, without realizing it, he’d already become part of the plan. He and his mother were going to kidnap one of the kidnappers.
“THERE WERE THREE KIDNAPPERS,” SAID ZAK. “A TALL ONE, A SHORT ONE, and a witch with ginger hair. They carried off the old man’s daughter and took her far away from home.”
Bando leaned forward anxiously from his place beside Lorn. “Did they kill her?”
All around the circle, people held their breath—and so did Lorn. Are you going to make that up, too, Zak? she thought bitterly. Are you going to twist the story some more?
But Zak shook his head at Bando. “Oh no, they didn’t kill her,” he said. “Nothing as simple as that. They wanted to keep her alive. So they took her far, far away, into a great dark forest. And there they cramped her and bent her and squashed her and SHRANK her—”
He lifted his hands from the drum skin, spreading the fingers like claws. Twisting them cruelly to compress the empty air until Lorn could almost see the tiny, soft body of the old man’s daughter, shrinking, shrinking, shrinking . . .
“They squeezed her smaller and smaller and smaller,” Zak whispered. “Until she was no bigger than a bean. Until she was—as small as we are.”
A long, shocked sigh ran around the cavern. Suddenly, the story had come very close to everyone. They all knew what it was to be snatched away from the ordinary, familiar world and plunged into a totally different life. They all knew what it was to find themselves trapped in bodies so small that each day was a fight for survival. Every person there had been snatched away and shrunk—without knowing why or how.
Was Zak’s story going to explain all that at last? Was it going to unravel the mystery? That was what they all wanted and their longing drew them deep into the story. Lorn saw their faces grow rapt and intent.
And she knew they were all on the side of the old man and his family—and against the robbers who’d snatched the old man’s daughter away.
It wasn’t like that, she wanted to shout. You’re hearing it wrong. It wasn’t like that at all. But she couldn’t say the words. How could she interrupt and break the spell of the story?
Zak waited until the cavern was completely silent again. Then he went on. “They shrank the poor stolen girl until she was no bigger than—this.” He held up a hand, with the thumb and forefinger nearly touching. “Then they squashed her into a hole in the ground and stopped up the hole with thorns. She couldn’t escape. She was trapped in the forest, unable to go home to her father. And as for him—”
As for him—A huge, dark shape loomed suddenly in Lorn’s mind, blotting out the firelight and the familiar, friendly faces. As for him— She could hardly breathe, hardly hear Zak’s voice as it went steadily on and on.
“The old man’s heart was broken,” Zak said. “The hole in the ground was empty. His daughter was gone.”
For a second, he let the words hang. Then he rattled his fingers sharply against the drum skin.
“His wife and his son couldn’t bear to see him so distraught. They pulled on their battered old boots and their shabby hats, picked up their walking sticks and set out into the world to find the precious girl who’d been stolen away.”
“NO!” said Lorn.
The word was out before she could stop it. She found herself on her feet, yelling across the circle at Zak.
“Why are you telling them lies? That’s not how it was! It’s not true!”
There was a gasp, all around the circle. No one had ever challenged Zak like that before. No one had ever broken a story. Horrified faces looked up at her and Bando tugged her arm, trying to pull her down again.
“Don’t be cross, Lorn,” he whispered. “It’s only a story. Stories don’t have to be true.”
He sounded bewildered and upset. The others were starting to look angry and Lorn knew they wanted her to sit down and be quiet, but she couldn’t stop. Her whole body was rigid with fury.
“You’re twisting everything!” she yelled. “That old man kept his daughter locked up—and you’re turning him into a hero.”
“Oh, come on!” Perdew joined in, rolling his eyes at the ceiling. “He kept her locked up because he was trying to protect her. It’s not like real life. It’s a story.”
But it was like real life. Couldn’t he see that? That was why Zak’s stories held them so that they listened almost without breathing. He knew how to mirror the things they tried to hide. Perdew was the bravest hunter of them all, and the strongest, too, apart from Bando. But even he was afraid, like the rest of them. Afraid of the animals that could gulp him down in a second. Afraid of the terrible, deadly cold that would kill anyone who stepped outside the cavern now. When Perdew listened to Zak, surely he knew—
But none of them seemed to know. They were all muttering at Lorn, as though she’d interrupted just to be awkward.
“Why don’t you sit down?”
“Wait and see what happens!”
“It’s Zak’s story. He knows what he’s doing!”
They just w
anted her to be quiet, so they could find out what happened next. But how could she be quiet? Zak had taken Hope’s story—her story—and turned it into something false. She had only just got her memories back and now he was trying to take them away again. Twisting them into nonsense.
“That’s not how it was,” she said again. Speaking steadily this time. Meeting Zak’s eyes across the circle.
Zak didn’t attempt to contradict her. He danced his fingers lightly over the drum skin. “All right, then,” he said. “Give us your version, Lorn. What was it like?” He smiled a small, taunting smile.
For a second, she couldn’t speak. What was it like? She knew now, but there were no words to fit what she knew. The memories were too strong, too vivid. They wouldn’t fit into the neat pattern of a story. I was . . . I felt . . . it was like . . .
How could she make the others understand?
Zak’s clear, blue stare was fixed on her face as he went on with his version of the story again, speaking every word as though it was aimed straight at her. “The old man’s wife and son set out from their house, looking for clues to help them find the lost girl. Their darling. Their treasure. They were determined to get her back from the wicked robbers.”
Lorn couldn’t go on standing where she was. All the others were scowling up at her, angry and impatient, because she was in the way. She had to let Zak go on—or tell them her own version.
But where could she start? Zak had already conjured up three evil robbers, three villains who kidnapped defenseless people and imprisoned them in a tiny world. His words were echoing in every heart in the cavern. Snatched away . . . too small to get home . . . They all knew how that felt.
That was what Zak’s stories did. He told them who they were. They’d all been shocked and helpless when they arrived in the cavern, terrified at finding themselves in a world that had suddenly become unimaginably huge. Patiently, Zak had reshaped it to fit them, so that it made a different kind of sense. He’d given new names to the plants and animals—and to everyone in the cavern as well.
The Nightmare Game Page 4
