Boy Trouble at Trebizon

by Anne Digby

  'Lots of luck,' she said. 'I know David thinks you're pretty good.'

  Virginia was so sweet-tempered normally that Rebecca was surprised at the sharp little note in her voice when she spoke the name David.

  'By the way,' she added, 'give him my love when you see him.'

  She walked away. Rebecca watched her go, puzzled. But Mara, who was just beside her, gave her a nudge.

  'Poor Virginia. I think she has been dropped, yes?'

  'I wonder?' said Rebecca. She remembered how, in the weeks before the Hallowe'en Dance, Virginia was always dashing off on her bicycle to meet someone, eyes sparkling, prettily dressed. But she hadn't really noticed her doing that since. Not since the dance. 'You could be right, Mara.'

  'The French call it La Ronde!' shrugged Mara. 'The round!'

  'The round? What on earth are you talking about?'

  'Robbie likes Virginia . . . but Virginia likes David . . . but David likes you . . .'

  'Oh, Mara! Don't be silly. Shut up!'

  '. . . and you like Robbie!' finished Mara. 'You see, you have to. That completes the circle!'

  To Rebecca's utmost relief Mrs Barrington appeared with the car and honked the horn and wound down the car window.

  'Come on, jump in, Rebecca. We don't want you to miss that train!'

  'Just get on the courts and play to win,' said David Driscoll. He was giving them all a pep-talk in a quiet corner of the Exonford sports centre. 'The tournament, as you know, is singles only. Divided into two sections – boys and girls. It's raining so we're confined to the indoor courts. We've got to keep everything moving smartly all day. Finals at seven o'clock this evening.'

  His hair was neatly combed and parted as usually and he wore the red county track suit, with various badges on the, jacket.

  'I expect you all to get through the first two rounds easily enough. You'll be mainly up against kids who only play in the summer – keen, though, most of them! Mrs Seabrook wants to take a look at them while she's here today. But it's when we get to the semi-finals and the finals that it should be interesting.' He seemed to be looking at Rebecca and smiling at her. 'Right, go and get some coffee all of you. First three matches ten minutes from now.'

  He drew Rebecca aside for a moment.

  'You look tired. Something on your mind?'

  Rebecca shook her head.

  'Okay. Remember everything I've told you. About getting pitched up to win. Fight for every point. Concentrate.'

  Wanting to win came naturally to Rebecca. When they broke for lunch she was safely through her first two rounds and into the girls' semi-final. So was Madeleine Marks, in the other half of the draw. Victoria had fallen to a girl from the local high school and she looked woebegone.

  'I'll be out of the reserve squad now. That girl Catherine will come in in January. Just see if she doesn't.'

  Mrs Seabrook, the county tennis scout, came over to say goodbye.

  'I've got to go now. It's all meetings today! Good luck, those of you still left in. I'll hear all about it tonight!'

  So Joss was right, thought Rebecca. A selection meeting took place tonight, straight after the tournament! They'd sort out the sheep from the goats.

  Rebecca had to wait a long time for her semi-final match. With only the indoor courts in use, there was a backlog of matches to get through – mainly the boys' second rounds – and some of them were long and hard-fought. But at four o' clock a court became free for the first semi-final. It was Rebecca versus Catherine, the girl who'd given Victoria such a trouncing. She was only eleven but already a formidable little player.

  'She's not going to beat me though,' Rebecca decided.

  Rebecca took the first set 6–3. In the second set Catherine fought like a tigress to level 4–4 and that goaded Rebecca into devastating form. She raced for every shot, no matter how impossible it looked, and got everything back then retaliated with some beautiful passing shots and winning volleys. She won the second set 6–4 and with it the match.

  She was through to the final!

  'Doesn't she move beautifully?' David Driscoll commented to Miss Davenport, the middle-aged lady coach who would be taking over the reserve squad after Christmas. 'Don't you think she's a find?'

  'A natural. Very fast – and very, very graceful. There's a girl who should have started really young! She's not in command of all her strokes yet .. .'

  Rebecca walked past them, in a blur, and went to the cafeteria. All day she'd been fighting off her tiredness with sheer will-power – she must go and sit down now, get some tea. She mustn't give in!

  Sometime later Madeleine Marks came in, full of bounce and vigour. She'd won her semi-final. Just as David and his colleagues had planned it, when they'd made up the draw, the final was going to be Rebecca v. Madeleine.

  She was aching now. She was so tired! She was down 1– 3 to Madeleine in the first set. Madeleine was such a solid, chunky player . . . thwack, wallop, thwack . . . playing from the baseline, getting everything back. Try a tiny drop volley, just over the net, make her run . . . she can't move very fast . . . done it!

  Concentrate! Fight back! Tell yourself you're not tired . . . that's it . . . your game's beginning to flow now – a winning smash, straight down the line. 2 – 3, your service. Serve to the line, right on her backhand, well done! A feeble return, looping up – race to the net-punch the volley home! Level 3 – 3. Madeleine to serve.

  It's late now. It's dark. Saturday evening. What's Robbie doing? He'll have left the beach hut now. He'll be out in the town . . . What's happened? You've lost the game! Concentrate. Change ends. Don't look at the clock. Half-past seven. He'll be in some pub or other, watching those boys. Watching and waiting . . .

  Concentrate! You've got to serve. You're 3–4 down and if you lose this game it'll be 3–5 and Madeleine to serve.

  Robbie's wrong! The more you think about it . . . What's he doing trailing those boys around? They never took the car. . .Fault! It's obvious! Love-fifteen. They'd never have bothered to hide it in the barn . . . just dumped it and run for it . . . what sort of person WOULD bother?– that's the mystery . . . Love-thirty. Whatever they get up to tonight, it won't prove a thing . . . Love-forty . . . concentrate, you've got to concentrate! . . . oh, Robbie. You don't stand a chance . . . and it's all for nothing, anyway. Game to Miss Marks. Miss Marks leads by 5 games to 3.

  Madeleine won the first set 6–3 and the second 6–0. They were shaking hands at the net.

  It was all over. The match had slipped away from Rebecca, just like that.

  Her chance had slipped away, too. It must have done. No D squad after Christmas now. She felt like death.

  Rebecca got her things and made a quick exit from the Exonford sports centre.

  The big modern building with its flags flying was set a hundred yards back from the road. She had to cross a wide expanse of paved forecourt as big as a football field, lit by orange fluorescent lights. Then she'd be safely swallowed up in the anonymity of Station Road, which lay beyond a line of trees.

  She ran and she didn't look back. She was nervous that somebody might see her, call her back. She felt utterly miserable. She didn't want to talk to anybody! She just wanted to get away fast, to the station, on to a train!

  The puddles on the forecourt gleamed orange. Her tennis shoes padded as she hurried along. Everything was silent. Nobody called.

  Then she heard a strange sound, somewhere behind her. Squeak . . . whirrr . . . squeak. Squeak . . . whirrr . . . squeak.

  The noise sent a shiver down her spine.

  She's heard it somewhere before! When? Where?

  She refused to look back, but the sound was getting louder, closer.

  'Rebecca!' came a hissing whisper.

  She'd reached the trees. Slowly, she turned round.

  David Driscoll was chasing after her on his moped. But he, too, didn't want to be noticed. He was doing a strange thing. He was pedalling the heavy moped with the engine switched off.

  The sq
ueak the sound of the pedals as they drove the thick chain round without engine power and made it whirrr like the fluttering of a bird.

  Squeak . . . whirrr . . . squeak. Rebecca stared at the pedals going round. She was fascinated by the sound, but she didn't know why.

  'Don't run away!' He caught her up and dismounted. 'You silly little goose.'

  'I lost,' said Rebecca miserably.

  'I'm still going to recommend you . . . Come out of the light, we're in full view.'

  'Recommend me?' gasped Rebecca, as he took her arm and they stood under the tree together. The leaves were dripping rain down on her blonde head.

  'Of course!' said David. 'I don't know what's on your mind today, you completely lost concentration in that final. But so what! I'm going to get you into the D squad, even if it means a fight. The meeting's in less than half an hour.'

  'But – but – why?' Rebecca felt faint with relief.

  'Because you're the best, that's why!' He gripped her arm tightly and looked very intense. 'I'll be leaving for London after Christmas. And I'll go knowing that I've put you on the right road. That makes me feel good, Rebecca, because I think you're going to be great one day.'

  Rebecca was silent. She was overwhelmed.

  'I like you. We're the same type,' he said. He didn't seem to want to let go of her arm and suddenly she began to feel uncomfortable. 'Neither of us has been born with a silver spoon in our mouths. We're going to fight our way to the top! We'll meet up again – you'll see. One day, when you're a famous tennis player and I'm a big tycoon . . .' He laughed in elation. 'I'll take you out! In my Alfa Romeo. Or would you prefer to go in my Ferrari? But that's all in the future – ' He dropped her arm. 'I've got to go.'

  He walked over to his moped and gave it a little kick, as though in disgust. Rebecca felt uneasy. Those were fast cars he'd been talking about – sports cars! He'd always given the appearance of not being interested in such things. But he was!

  She could suddenly sense it. He hated that moped! Beneath the restrained exterior was another David Driscoll just roaring to get out.

  Squeak . . . whirrr . . . squeak. Now she knew where she'd heard that eerie sound before! At the back of Court House, at three in the morning, the night John Slade's car went missing!

  What was he doing collecting his moped at three in the morning and riding it away with the engine switched off? Because that was the sound she'd heard. What had he been doing between midnight, when he left Virginia, and 3 a.m. . . . ?

  'Training next week. Last session,' David was saying. He was about to wheel his moped back to the sports centre. 'See you then, Rebecca.'

  The barn! The heart of the mystery. Those hay bales were heavy. But who stronger than David?

  How might it all have happened that night? Was he feeling elated? A job at last . . . a brand new driving licence . . . Virginia Slade crazy about him! And there was her father's car sitting there . . .

  Was that it? A moment's madness . . .

  Then – disaster! What to do? Revert to type. Keep calm. The car's damaged! Tidy it away . . . neatly, carefully. Somewhere nobody's going to find it for months. Then – any little clue, you could never be sure, any questions to be asked – he'd be gone!

  'David?'

  'What?'

  'Why those cars?' she asked him. Her mouth felt dry. 'Why not a Masters X 19?'

  TWELVE

  THE ULTIMATUM

  'So you know?' He looked suddenly ill. His pallor was enhanced by the weird orange lighting of the place. He let his moped drop to the ground.

  'I've known from the beginning it wasn't Robbie Anderson,' said Rebecca. 'Now I know it was you.' She was beginning to feel angry. 'You came back to get your moped that night. It was in our courtyard. It was three o'clock exactly. Don't you remember seeing my light?'

  'Yes.' David Driscoll vividly remembered a light coming on in one of the ground floor rooms of Court House, just as he was creeping over to get his moped. It had worried him all along. 'So it was you? You switched it on – and then off again. You were watching me then!'

  He drew her back into the shadow of the trees. He seemed relieved. 'You've known all along and you've shielded me!'

  'Wrong!' snapped Rebecca. 'It's only just dawned on me.'

  'What – ' His voice was carefully modulated, everything under control. 'What, if anything, do you intend to do about it?'

  Rebecca thought she knew exactly what she intended to do.

  'Telephone Mr Slade – right now!' she replied. He'll send a party into the town and find Robbie. Before it's too late, she thought. 'That's what!'

  'You can't prove anything!' He was getting rattled. 'I'll tell them you're a little liar – '

  'Don't be daft,' said Rebecca. 'The police took fingerprints.'

  He started shaking her, hissing.

  'You can't do this to me, you can't. You'll ruin me! I've got to have a clean driving licence for this job – this would ruin me, Rebecca –'

  'What about Robbie?' she hissed back. She was boiling with anger. 'You let him take the blame! He's in all sorts of trouble already and tonight he's going to get involved with some real1y nasty characters, if I can't find somebody to stop him, because he thinks they took the car –'

  David Driscoll wasn't even listening.

  'Robbie Anderson!' he said contemptuously. He let go of her and became icily ca1m, as though he'd received a douche of cold water. It was now clear to him what had been on Rebecca's mind all day. 'Robbie Anderson will be all right. His sort always are. They'll take him back at Garth next term, I daresay. Even if they don't, Daddy will get him in somewhere else. You don't have to waste your time worrying about him!'

  He was beginning to tremble a little.

  'It's just an episode for him. It's my whole future. You're not going to give me away are you, Rebecca?' There was something rather threatening about his manner now. 'You'll shield me, won't you?'

  She was silent.

  'If you won't even do this for me,' he spoke the words very, carefully, 'why on earth should I do anything for you? It's not going to be easy getting you into the county squad, after the rubbishy way you played that final. Mrs Seabrook thinks a lot of Madeleine Marks. She and Mrs Marks play bridge together.' He threw that bit in sneeringly. 'You see what we're up against, Rebecca? I'd really have to fight for you at this meeting tonight. Why should I? Why should I bother?'

  It was an ultimatum.

  Still Rebecca said nothing.

  She'd realized it might come to this. It didn't shock her. What did shock her was that she should feel so tempted.

  This job did mean everything to David Driscoll and it was quite true what he'd said. He hadn't been born with Robbie Anderson's advantages.

  Getting a place in the county squad meant just as much to her. It was only now, faced with David's ultimatum, that she rea1ized just how much it meant . . . how much she wanted it. Her ambition had grown and hardened in the past few weeks. If only she'd had the chance to begin tennis earlier, like that girl Catherine! Or Josselyn Vining. Now time was running out. Another year and it might be too late to make any kind of a name for herself in junior tennis. They were playing at Wimbledon at fourteen now!

  Why not do as David asked, protect him?

  'Well?' He saw her hesitation.

  Rebecca was filled with shame, that she had paused, even for a moment.

  'You creep!' she said. 'I don't want you to do anything for me.'

  She turned and ran through the dripping trees and into Station Road, her feet scuffling through damp autumn leaves. Her eyes were fixed on the BT phone booth that stood halfway up the hill to the station.

  David Driscoll stepped out from between two trees and watched her hurry off along the wet, shiny pavements. He saw her slow down by the telephone booth. Stop. Go inside. Pick up the telephone.

  He returned to his moped and lifted it off its side. Then he wheeled it, very slowly, back towards the sports centre. It was raining again now, plastering hi
s hair down very flat.

  Some of the county officials were arriving in their cars. It was almost time for the meeting to start.

  'I'm very pleased you've telephoned me, Rebecca,' said Robbie's housemaster. He was badly shaken, but he was taking great pains to hide the fact. 'Dr Simpson's out this evening and if Driscoll's at a meeting, there's nothing we can do tonight. I'll contact this young man in the morning and ask him to come to the College, to talk to us. If it turns out that what you say is correct, it will then be a matter for the police.'

  'It is correct, sir,' said Rebecca. 'But it's Robbie Anderson I'm worried about –'

  'Don't be,' Mr Slade said. 'There's nothing to worry about.' Rebecca's story had filled him with alarm, but he was putting a calm face on things. 'I'll organize a search party and bring him straight back to College – before he does anything reckless!' He was very reassuring. 'I'll probably go down to the town myself. Yes, I will. He won't have come to any harm yet, but I'm very pleased you've rung me. Just leave everything to us. Anderson will be all right.'

  So that was that. Rebecca put the phone down. It was done. They'd find Robbie – he'd be all right now. She hurried to the station and just caught a train. She slumped in a corner of the carriage. Tears came to her eyes.

  By now, the selection meeting would be taking place.

  They were tears of fury and disappointment. I wish I'd never met you, Robbie Anderson, she thought. I just wish I never had.

  THIRTEEN

  DAVID HAS THE LAST WORD

  But Robbie was nowhere to be found in the town.

  'Daddy's frantic about him!' said Virginia Slade, bursting in on the six friends at ten o'clock that evening. They should have been in bed. They weren't! They were lolling around in Rebecca's room, in their pyjamas, talking in whispers. Rebecca had told them everything – except why she wasn't going to get what she'd so badly wanted. 'He's on the phone now. He wants to know if he's shown up here this evening –'

  'Of course he hasn't!' said Rebecca in alarm.

  'Have they searched the town?' demanded Tish.

  'He's nowhere in the town and they've been to the police station and –'