The Eye of the Serpent

by Simon Cheshire

  A couple of hours later, I’d finished. I was exhausted. I was also left with the same amount of floor space I’d have had in a small kitchen cupboard. My desk, notes and chair were all squashed up in a line. So much for that idea!

  I was about to start yelling, jumping up and down, tearing my hair out and generally having a screaming fit, when there was a sharp knock at the shed door.

  ‘Saxby? You in there?’ called a commanding, posh-sounding voice. ‘This is an emergency!’

  Standing outside on the grass was Tom Bland, a gangly, swirly-blond-haired guy from St Egbert’s School. He was rarely in the same lessons as me, but I knew him well. Everyone at St Egbert’s knew Tom Bland.

  He was going to be the next Big Name in showbiz. So he said. To anyone who’d listen. He was in all the school plays, and he was convinced that he was, literally, the world’s greatest actor. He was quite good, actually. But only quite good. The thing he was most famous for at St Egbert’s was being a right drama queen. (Or should I say drama king? Drama Royal Person of Some Kind, anyway).

  ‘What’s the emergency?’ I said, poking my head out of the shed.

  ‘This!’ cried Tom, flapping a sheet of newspaper in my face. ‘This! It’s outrageous! It’s a disgrace!’

  Leaving the shed door open (otherwise we’d probably have run out of oxygen in there within a couple of minutes), I pointed him towards my Thinking Chair. With my stuff all squished in as it was, I had to wriggle on to the top of my filing cabinet. I had to hold on, too, to avoid sliding off.

  ‘Start from the beginning,’ I said. ‘How can I help you?’

  Tom took a deep breath or two, eyes closed.

  ‘Take a look at this page from today’s local newspaper,’ he said, handing it over to me with a flourish. ‘Steel your nerves, Saxby! Prepare to reel in horror!’

  I opened out the page and read out the headline in front of me. ‘Dog Show Cancelled.’

  ‘Noooo,’ he cried, ‘the bit above that!’

  I looked at the bit above that. There was a colour photo showing a kid of about our age, whom I didn’t know. Standing behind him were two adults, presumably his parents, whom I didn’t know. Standing next to them was a weird-looking man, with a T-shirt and a huge mouth, whom I also didn’t know. The brief report beside the picture was headed: Competition Winner Visits Radio Station.

  I wasn’t reeling in anything very much, let alone horror.

  ‘Look at the kid’s name!’ cried Tom.

  I read the photo caption. Pictured with his proud parents is Thomas Bland, whose winning entry earned him a VIP trip to the Vibe FM studios, and the chance to appear on the station’s weekly Theatre Review show. ‘The theatre is his dream,’ said his mother Petula. ‘He’s very talented.’

  ‘So he’s got the same name as you, and he also likes acting,’ I said. ‘Interesting coincidence. Incovenient if you ended up in the same school play, but hardly a crime.’

  ‘No, no, you don’t understand,’ he wailed. ‘That’s supposed to be me! It was me who won that competition! Someone I don’t know has stolen my identity! My name! And he’s nicked my competition prize, too! It’s an outrage! What am I going to do, Saxby? What am I going to dooo?’

  See what I mean? A right drama queen/king/royal person.

  CHAPTER

  TWO

  ‘YOU’VE GOT NO IDEA WHO this kid is?’ I asked.

  ‘None!’ cried Tom. ‘I’ve never seen him, or his shabby-looking parents, in my life! How did he steal my prize? How did he even know I’d won it? Who is he? One thing I do know, he’s a total amateur. I’d have made sure I got twice as big an article, and a bigger picture.’

  ‘Hang on, hang on,’ I said. ‘What stopped you claiming this prize?’

  Tom grimaced angrily. ‘It’s like this. I heard about the radio station’s competition a few weeks ago. Although the prize didn’t involve acting, as such, it was perfect for me because I’d be able to speak to the public about the theatre, the subject I know best. Also, of course, I’d get a chance to inform the listening millions about what a treat they’d be in for if they came along to one of my school play performances.’

  I seriously doubted that a rubbish station like Vibe FM had an audience of millions. However, I let the point go. Tom was in full flow.

  ‘So I prepared my entry, which had to be a review of a play I’d seen recently, and uploaded it to their website. The following week, one of the station’s DJs – that’s him there in the photo – phoned and said I’d won. Not a great surprise. My review was pretty good. He said the station would be sending me a package in the post, containing a load of Vibe FM freebies, and most importantly my Special VIP Golden Lucky Visitor’s Pass. So far, so good. I waited, and waited, and waited. Nothing turned up. I was going to give it until tomorrow, and then ring this DJ and ask him to get his act together. But this morning, to my absolute horror, I see this in the local rag! It’s appalling! Dreadful! Inexcusable! That wretched kid should be hurled into jail! The incredible cheek of it! I’ve never been so —’

  ‘Yeah, OK,’ I said, paddling both hands in mid-air to tell him to calm down. ‘Let’s examine this carefully. Have you spoken to the radio station today?’

  ‘Of course,’ cried Tom. ‘I called them as soon as I saw this picture! They said the package was sent, and as far as they’re concerned, I turned up, had a great time, and went home again! They suggested it was me who was the imposter! Me!’

  ‘So I assume the imposter went ahead and appeared on this Theatre Review show? Did you hear it?’

  ‘No. I had no idea he’d be on it! I said to that DJ this morning on the phone, wasn’t he aware that this kid wasn’t the one who’d written that superb winning entry? And you know what he said? He said, no he wasn’t, but he was aware that the kid was a polite, well-mannered boy and not some rude, hysterical prima donna! Dreadful man!’

  ‘Hmm, dreadful, yes,’ I muttered. ‘Did he say when the package was posted?’

  ‘Yes, it went by first class, recorded delivery, the day after he originally called me. That meant it had to be signed for when it arrived. The postman would have to get a signature on his clipboard before handing the package over.’

  ‘And that didn’t happen?’ I said.

  ‘No,’ said Tom. ‘By my estimate, the package should have arrived at my house on either the fifteenth or sixteenth of May, the seventeenth at the latest.’

  I jotted a few notes down in my notebook. ‘I’ll need to speak to your postman, I think.’

  ‘Postwoman, on our street, actually’ said Tom. ‘Postlady? Postgirl? Anyway, I’ve already questioned her. Our post always arrives at eleven o’clock, give or take five minutes. I was waiting for her this morning and asked her if she remembered bringing a package for me.’

  ‘And did she?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Ah! When?’

  ‘She can’t remember.’

  ‘Bum.’

  ‘She says she brought the package, but nobody was in, and she left one of those card thingies, that says: We tried to deliver a parcel, but you were out, and now you’ll have to come and fetch it yourself, you know?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen them. Like a postcard. I take it there’s no card tucked out of sight under your doormat or anything?’

  ‘No way. I’ve searched. Twice,’ said Tom.

  At this point, I could see three distinct alternatives. There were three possibilities relating to the fate of the parcel and/or the postcard.

  Can you work out what they were?

  Possibility 1: The postwoman was mistaken and the parcel was simply delivered to the wrong address, this mysterious kid’s address.

  Possibility 2: The postwoman was telling the truth and the parcel was picked up by someone else from the post sorting office.

  Possibility 3: The postwoman was telling the truth, and the card she left was picked up by someone outside Tom’s household and used to collect the parcel.

  ‘OK,’ I said, ‘let’s s
ee now . . . On the days you would have expected the package to arrive, was there someone at your house?’

  ‘Yes, without the faintest shadow of a doubt,’ said Tom. ‘Both my parents were at home on the fifteenth and sixteenth, and all three of us were there on the seventeenth. It was a Saturday.’

  ‘And what if the package arrived after those dates? If it arrived later than expected?’

  ‘There would still be someone at home. I guarantee it.’

  This implied that Possibility 1 was the most likely.

  ‘Who else is there at home? Could someone have collected that package and then forgotten about it?’ I said.

  ‘There’s only my parents,’ said Tom. ‘And there’s no way they’d have forgotten. I’ve asked them about it again and again and again. And again.’

  This implied that either Possibility 1 or Possibility 3 were the most likely. So, on balance, it looked like the postwoman was telling porkies. Or had a defective memory.

  But . . . were we really looking at a simple coincidence here? Could the parcel have been accidentally delivered to another kid, who spotted the mistake and decided to take advantage of it? That was a question which couldn’t be answered unless I could track this kid down!

  ‘I suppose it’s also possible,’ I said, ‘that the radio station could have made the mistake. Perhaps you didn’t win after all. Maybe the DJ called the wrong number.’

  ‘What, he meant to call another Tom Bland? Who’d also entered the same competition?’

  ‘Weird coincidences do happen,’ I said. ‘Believe me, I’ve come across some pretty eye-popping ones in my time.’

  ‘No,’ said Tom, folding his arms crossly. ‘When he originally called, he checked my address, to make sure he’d send the package to the right place.’

  ‘Ah,’ I said. ‘I can see that this business is going to be more complex that it first appears. Can I keep this newspaper page?’

  ‘Please do,’ sniffed Tom. ‘If I have to look at those smug faces for one more minute I think I’ll vomit.’

  ‘I’ll report back to you as soon as I can. In the meantime, I need to think.’

  A Page From My Notebook

  Everything turns on the real identity of this ‘other’ Tom Bland. (Assuming, that is, that his real name isn’t Tom Bland!)

  Priority 1: Identify the imposter.

  Priority 2: Listen to that Theatre Review show the imposter appeared on. This could contain important clues. Will get Izzy on the case!

  There are still a lot of questions floating around in my head.

  Is this a set up? Is someone playing a trick on Tom? He’s not exactly the most popular person at school! No, probably not – it’s all rather too elaborate for a practical joke. Isn’t it?

  Looking back at my three Possibilities, No 1 stands out so far, but WHY would the postwoman be sure she’d had the parcel if she hadn’t? It doesn’t make any sense for her to LIE, she’d have nothing to gain. No, I think Possibility 3 is the likely one.

  But if someone DID steal that postcard, then (once again!) WHY? If you saw a delivery card sitting there, you’d have no idea what the delivery WAS. It might be a garden gnome, or a pile of dirty underwear, or something else you wouldn’t want in a million years. Would you really steal the card without knowing what you’d end up with? WAIT! Unless, somehow, the one who nicked the card DID know about the package’s contents? A-HA! Now THAT makes sense! Should check this with Tom tomorrow.

  CHAPTER

  THREE

  FOLLOWING THE ADVICE OF MY notebook, I went to find Tom at school the next morning. He was pinning a small poster to the noticeboard, advertising a show he was in at a local amateur dramatics club.

  ‘That competition entry of yours,’ I said. ‘Who else knew about it?’

  ‘Apart from my parents, nobody’ said Tom, standing back to make sure the poster was up straight.

  ‘And what about after you knew you’d won?’ I said.

  ‘Same thing,’ said Tom.

  ‘What, you’ve told nobody at school? No friends, relatives, neighbours? Not the people at the amateur dramatics club?’

  Tom gave me a theatrical stare. ‘The cultural savages of this school wouldn’t be interested, would they? And as for my fellow artistes at the club, well, they’d only be bitterly jealous. So, no, nobody . . .’ (You can see why he wasn’t the most popular kid in school, can’t you . . .)

  ‘Sorry, you’ll have to excuse me,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a rehearsal for the end-of-term musical.’

  And off he went. I was left feeling even more puzzled than before. So, I thought, the only other people, outside Tom and his parents, who could have known about that package were the people at the radio station. And they were the ones who were giving the prize away!

  None of it made any sense. I went to find my great friend and Official Ruler of Infoland, Izzy Moustique.

  ‘Whatcha working on?’ she said.

  ‘A strange case of stolen identity,’ I said. ‘Someone at this school has been impersonated by a kid he’s never even seen before.’ I fetched the newspaper page from my school bag.

  ‘Who’s the someone?’ said Izzy.

  ‘Tom Bland,’ I said.

  ‘Tom Bland?’ said Izzy, wrinkling her nose. That stuck-up pig? Why didn’t you tell him to go take a running jump?’

  I glared at her. ‘You should know me better than that. My job is to see justice done, not to judge who deserves justice.’

  I think she felt suitably told off. She pulled a stretchy-mouthed face at me. I handed her the page.

  ‘Is this the kid?’ she said, unfolding the page and examining the picture.

  ‘Yup,’ I said. ‘You’re the best-connected person I know. I need you to circulate that photo around your social network. Someone must know that guy.’

  ‘Okey-dokey’ said Izzy.

  ‘One more thing,’ I said. ‘Can you get hold of a recording of the Theatre Review show on Vibe FM? The last two or three programmes should do.’

  ‘Okey-dokey again,’ said Izzy.

  At that moment, the bell sounded for the next lesson. As I trudged reluctantly towards the Pit Of Doom (or ‘maths’ as some people call it), I was totally confident that my investigations were heading for success. Izzy’s grapevine was sure to locate that kid, and Izzy’s amazing research skills would soon turn up that radio show, too. Both these things would give me important clues.

  As soon as school was finished for the day, I headed to the post office in the town centre, to gather up another important clue. I needed to find out who had signed for Tom’s parcel.

  I was hoping that – if the package had simply gone to the wrong house – this whoever-had-signed had put down their real name before realising that the package wasn’t for them after all. (Mind you, there was also the possibility that whoever-had-signed actually was called Tom Bland, by coincidence, and that the . . .) ArRRGgh! The possible complications were starting to make my brain itch!

  Let’s just get a look at that signature, I thought. Whatever it says, it’s an important clue. I’ll deal with the complications later!

  Inside the post office, I went around to the parcels collection area. Behind the chunky counter and the scratched plastic screen on top of it, were racks of battered packages wrapped in brown paper and covered in address labels and barcodes. I pressed the little buzzer on the counter marked Press for Service and a tiny man with big glasses appeared.

  ‘Yes?’ he said, in a voice like a cat being stepped on.

  ‘Hello. I need to see a signature. I think a parcel might have been delivered to the wrong place, and —’

  ‘Not possible, friend. Address on parcel, parcel delivered correctly. Mistakes not possible, friend.’

  I thought for a moment or two. ‘OKaaaaay,’ I said. ‘I think a parcel might have been delivered correctly, but I need to check who signed for it.’

  ‘Not possible, friend,’ said Mr Tiny Big Glasses. ‘Not without completing form B451Q, Request
for Delivery Information.’

  ‘OKaaaaay,’ I said. ‘Do you have a copy of form B451Q, Request for Delivery Information, that I can fill in?’

  ‘No. Post office website download only.’

  ‘I see,’ I said. ‘Let’s suppose I download the form, fill it in, and bring it back here. Then can I check who signed?’

  ‘No. Apply by website only. Email reply to your application will be forwarded within twenty-one working days.’

  ‘I see,’ I said. ‘But I can get the information after twenty-one working days, can I?’

  ‘No. Must be eighteen years old or above.’

  ‘I see. Would it help if I said I was a detective following up an important clue?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I see,’ I said. I considered the matter carefully. ‘While I’m here, can I ask a question about deliveries?’

  ‘Fire away, friend. We’re here to help.’ He pointed to the little badge that was pinned to his short-sleeved shirt. It said: Here to Help.

  ‘OKaaaay,’ I said. ‘A friend of mine says he gets his mail delivered every day at exactly eleven o’clock. Would that be an accurate thing for him to say, do you suppose, at all, perhaps, maybe?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Deliveries from this office one hundred per cent timed to schedule. Failure to deliver at the specified time is not possible. Except on every third Saturday, obviously.’

  ‘Why?’ I said. ‘What happens every third Saturday?’

  ‘Training session. All deliveries timed at thirty minutes later than normal on those dates. Recent dates being June seventh, May seventeeth, April twenty-sixth.’

  ‘I see. Well, thank you very much, and goodbye.’ I stalked out of the post office grumbling under my breath.

  Hmm. So. No clue there, then.

  Oh well, never mind, I thought to myself. The clues that will come from Izzy’s enquiries should be enough to make definite progress on this case. I decided to head for —

  Wait!

  I had been given a clue after all! I thought back to what Tom had told me about the delivery of the package. Then I remembered what that miserable twerp in the post office had told me about deliveries. A quick cross-reference gave me an important fact that Tom was unlikely to be aware of!