The Amazing Mind of Alice Makin

by Shea, Alan

  ‘Great fireworks. We could see them from the Spicers’ bonfire. Much better than theirs.’

  Firework after firework lights up the sky, till it seems like it’s going to go on for ever. Everybody’s saying what a great display it is. I remember I’ve still got the sparklers in my pocket. I light them from the bonfire and give them to some little kids. They run through the darkness, trailing sparks. Wheeling and turning, making Spitfire noises.

  Flash joins in: chasing sparks, chasing his tail, eating smoke, barking. A lot of dogs don’t like fireworks, but to Flash it’s a big adventure. Mum’s right, he is a bit scatty; in a nice way. I reckon his idea of heaven would be riding in the cart with a bone, waving sparklers. You get the feeling if you gave him a lighted sparkler he would run around with it making Spitfire noises too.

  One thing’s for sure. It’s the best bonfire night I could ever have imagined.

  Mum gets me up early. We’re out of bread. It’s cold. I feel sleepy still, only half awake. Snow has scattered itself, icing-sugar white, on the pavements. I carefully tread the first shapes. Announce myself in footprints to the morning. Breathe whispers of secret fog to heaven.

  The snow changes the streets. Deadens noise. Footsteps become a crunch of tight sound. I put out my arm and let some flakes settle on it, fragile papery layers of light, crystal-thin. I catch some on my tongue; they melt like dreams.

  I’m cold. My shoe has a hole in it. The snow soaks my sock, freezing my foot. I move quickly, half walking, half sliding on the pavements. I have to cross the old bomb site where we had our bonfire last night; the ashes are still smouldering. I stand looking around for a while. Remembering. Trying to see the colour of last night in the silver-white snow sky of the day. I mimic the noises of rockets, pirouette like the Catherine wheel. Get embarrassed. Hope no one’s seen me.

  I make my way down to the street, slipping and sliding, to where the Spicer twins were last night. Then I take a short cut across another lot of rubble. As I cross I can see where they had their bonfire. Smouldering ashes are still sending wispy signals. Doesn’t look as though it was as big as ours.

  I pull out a dead rocket case from the snow. I find a banger case. Score a goal with it. Scoop up a handful of Roman candle shells, blackened and charred, throw them into the air as if I could toss life back into them. They fall limply back to earth. I squint at the scorched instructions on a big rocket: Light the blue touchpaper, then stand well back . . .

  I remember I’m supposed to be buying bread, cross the road to the shop, still thinking about our bonfire and theirs. But I’ve got this feeling that something’s not right. What is it?

  I stop, as if the empty street has just called out my name, and stand there for a while holding the rocket case in my hand, thinking about it. I try to think clearly. Be logical, Alice. Work it out. I need someone to talk to.

  ‘You there, Sherlock?’

  ‘As ever, dear girl.’

  ‘Think we’ve got another mystery on our hands.’

  ‘I’m your man, then.’

  ‘Something’s not right here.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Something’s missing.’

  ‘What is, dear girl?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  Sherlock sucks at his pipe. ‘Well, if it’s any help, the first thing I always did was to look for the evidence.’

  That’s it! Evidence. Or rather, no evidence. I solve the puzzle. Except the puzzle becomes a riddle. The answer becomes a question.

  I know what’s missing, but it doesn’t make sense. You can’t make nonsense make sense.

  I turn and run back to the old bomb site as fast as I can. Bert will be furious if I’m late with the bread, but I have to know.

  I run the whole way. I pass Norman. He stops to talk. I don’t. Calls out after me. ‘Brilliant fireworks last night, Al. My dad said they must have cost a fortune.’

  I get to the site of our bonfire and stand there, sucking in cold air, hands on hips. I get my breath back. The snow is getting thicker now, the powdery white coating is already nearly an inch thick. My heart is pounding. I start looking for clues, keeping to the edge of the bomb site first, and working my way around. I hope I’m going to find what I’m looking for. If I don’t, I won’t know what to think.

  I search for over half an hour. Carefully, eyes on the ground, I cover the whole area, but they’re not there. No sign. In my head, more questions. There must be answers, there’ve got to be. But there aren’t.

  9

  Missing evidence

  I walk slowly home. I try to think. Where the Spicers had their bonfire, the ground is littered with dead cases – everywhere you look you can see burned-out firework shells. But where we had the biggest and best fireworks that anyone had ever seen there isn’t a single firework case to be found. Not one. That’s what was missing. It’s as if our fireworks never existed.

  I’m still trying to puzzle it out as I walk down the passage. I go down to the front room. Open the door.

  He’s sitting at the table, his fingers drumming on the top. He looks up.

  ‘Where you been?’

  ‘Getting the bread.’

  His eyes narrow. ‘Don’t lie to me.’

  ‘I’m not lying.’

  ‘Well, where is it then?’

  The bread. Blow and bugger.

  ‘I forgot it.’

  He stands up and moves towards me. ‘Liar. You were with that boy again.’

  ‘I wasn’t! Ask Mum.’

  ‘I don’t need to ask anyone anything. Get to your room and stay there!’

  ‘But I just . . .’

  He turns to me. His eyes fix me, like they’re boring through my skin. My words die.

  ‘I know you were with that boy last night.’

  There’s something in his voice. Like a threat. Like his voice is acid eating into everything. I take a step back.

  ‘I – I was with a lot of people.’

  His eyes are still fixed on me in that cold stare. Like he knows.

  ‘Don’t back chat. I told you to keep away from him. He’s trouble. D’you hear me?’

  I don’t say anything. I want to argue, but I’m afraid.

  ‘I said, do you hear me?’ His voice sinks, sounds threatening. My cheek burns.

  ‘I hear you.’

  I go out through the kitchen. Mumble under my breath as I walk up the passage. I open the door to the bedroom. Don’t go in. Slam it hard. Wait in the shadows for a while in case he comes to check on me. He doesn’t. I wait. I wait a little longer than usual. When Bert’s like that he scares me. Still, it’s all quiet now so I’ll just nip up to Reggie’s for a sec and tell him about the firework cases. See what he makes of it.

  The stairs are dark, as usual. The bare bulb at the very top blinks out just enough light for a flea’s tea party. I take another look. Make sure Bert’s not watching me from somewhere. There are lots of creepy shadows about in this old passage but I can’t see him. So, here goes.

  Slowly I start to creep up the first stairs. Glad to get away. These first treads are the noisy ones so I have to watch it here. I take a couple at a time. Not jumping. Just long strides, then carefully haul myself up by the banisters. I’m lost in my thoughts so I don’t notice at first. Then I do. These stairs always creak. But for some reason they’re not creaking now. They seem sort of soft. Soft? They’ve never been soft before. It’s like walking on mud.

  I look down at my feet but it’s so dark I can’t see a thing. Something’s wrong. I know it. I can feel it. Trouble is, I don’t know what. It smells different too. Not the usual hundred-year-old-armpit smell but a kind of earth smell. Like trees and plants and stuff. Like I’ve stumbled into a jungle. Jungle? Get a grip, Alice, you’re losing it. What was that? A noise. Sounded like a bird singing. Can’t be. Right. The quicker I get up to Reggie’s flat the better.

  I try to move faster, but it’s difficult. I’m just about to turn on to the first landing when I trip over some
thing. Go sprawling headfirst into the dark. Must just be some old rubbish someone’s chucked down. I could have broken my neck.

  I reach out and try to feel what it is. Yuk! It’s slimy . . . thick . . . feels a bit like . . . wood . . . a branch of some kind and there’s . . . leaves! It’s got leaves on it. Can’t be. I hold it up. It’s like some sort of creeper. I try to move it but it’s too heavy. I can’t budge it. I go to step back and nearly fall over another one. They seem to be everywhere. And the ground is shifting under my feet. Turning to mud. A swamp. There are insects buzzing around my head. The creaking stairs have become a pathway through a jungle.

  I walk through a curtain of creepers. This is just like one of the games I play. I’m an explorer coming through an equatorial jungle. In the jungle game I get trapped, caught up in giant creepers, but I’m not playing any games now. What is this, what’s going on?

  I feel something slip around my ankle, then up my leg. It’s rough. Cuts into my flesh. I bend down. Grab it. It’s one of the creepers. It tightens. Ouch! That hurts. I try to pull it off. Another comes from nowhere and curls over my hand. The banisters are changing from solid wooden rails to twisting, slithering creepers. It’s like the shadows on the stairs are all coming to life. They reach out to me: curling tentacles twisting around my arms, grabbing at my body.

  I pull hard. I have to try to get out of this. I can feel more and more of them, like wriggling fat snakes. I try really hard not to get frightened but my heart is bumping like a dodgem car. My feet are sinking in the swamp. I need help.

  Although I don’t have a real dad, sometimes I get a funny feeling that someone is there. Like when I’m in trouble. No one flies down to my rescue like Superman; I’m not saying that, it’s just a tiny feeling. That feather-brushing-my-face feeling. It happens now and I get an idea from out the blue.

  Mrs Cassidy! Of course. Her door is just round the corner. If only I could move. Trouble is, I can’t. There are creepers all around me now. They’re coming out of the walls. Up through the floor. Writhing up my legs. Tying themselves in knots around me.

  I start to panic. I’m thrashing around but I can’t break away. I take in a deep breath and scream as loud as I’ve ever done in my life. It explodes into the air. Rings around the empty staircase, bounces back off the cold stone walls.

  ‘Who is it? Who’s there?’

  Mrs Cassidy’s door swings open. Light floods out. Soundlessly the creepers slide out of sight. Slink back into the walls and floors. Dissolve. Disappear. The banisters grow firm, the ground is solid under my feet. It’s like the jungle world has collapsed in on itself. A tangle of thoughts has dissolved.

  Mrs Cassidy’s head peeps around the door.

  ‘Who is it? What’s going on out there?’

  I feel a bit sheepish.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Cassidy. It’s only me.’

  ‘Alice? Is that you? Where are you?’

  ‘Down here, Mrs Cassidy.’

  ‘What you doing, love? You all right?’

  ‘Not really, Mrs Cassidy. I was trapped in a jungle by some creepers and I couldn’t get out. Sorry I screamed so loud.’

  ‘Terrible places them jungles, Alice. My Fred was in one during the war, you know. Bit early for games though, love.’

  ‘It wasn’t a game.’

  ‘If you say so, dear. We’re just having our breakfast. Nice bowl of porridge with a bit of syrup. Or, in my Fred’s case, a nice bowl of syrup with a bit of porridge. Sweet tooth you know, ducks. You all right now?’

  ‘Think so.’

  ‘Too many comics, I expect. Them stairs are dark. Bit scary. Smells like a jungle an’ all, sometimes.’

  ‘Seemed real to me.’

  ‘My Fred reckons you’ve got a vivid imagination, Alice. “Betty,” he says, “that young Alice has got a vivid imagination.” Know what that is, dear?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Means colourful.’

  ‘Right.’

  I’m not sure if she thinks that’s good or bad.

  ‘I’d best get on, Mrs Cassidy.’

  I start to go back down the stairs.

  She shakes her head, mutters, ‘I don’t know, jungle indeed.’

  Shuts her door. The light goes.

  I’m still feeling a bit shaky. One thing being in a game when you know you’re in one. Another being in one when you don’t. I’ll go and see Reggie later. Think I’ve had enough excitement for one day.

  I’m almost down when I see him. He hasn’t seen me yet. He’s in the shadow at the bottom of the stairs. Our front room door is open and a wedge of light escapes. It catches part of his face. He’s leaning against the wall smoking, staring up.

  I stop. Crouch in the darkness, watching him. He’s got this twisted smile on his face. Like he knows what’s happened. But that’s impossible. Maybe he heard me scream.

  He takes one last puff, then flicks his cigarette into the air. He always does that. Sparks fly off. He turns, goes back into the front room.

  10

  Lolly sticks and the law of averages

  Bonfire night becomes another memory. Locked away. I try to stop thinking about the weird things that have been going on. Strange things happen sometimes. Especially in dark places when shadows come out to play.

  Christmas comes. Reggie and Granddad go away somewhere. I’ve never known anybody round here ever go away. Except some of the older boys – to prison.

  I’ve decided not to play games on the stairs any more. I’m letting my imagination get the better of me. My mum says that. ‘You mustn’t let your imagination get the better of you, sweetheart.’ Sounds like I’m in a fight with my own imagination. Alice Makin in the blue corner; her imagination in the red. Will it get the better of her in tonight’s big fight? Ding, ding, round one. Come out boxing.

  When we get back to school after the holidays Reggie’s not there. I wonder if he’s going to come back at all. But after a couple of weeks he turns up. Funny, it’s as if he’s never been away. Our friendship’s a favourite old jumper. You might not wear it for a while, but when you put it back on it’s just as comfortable as when you last wore it. And you know you’re still going to be wearing it when all the other jumpers, the ones you thought you’d wear for ever, you don’t like any more.

  I never did get a chance to ask Reggie about the fireworks. I suppose he must have found them. That’s what he must have meant when he said they were ‘kind of just there’. Or maybe he did pinch them. You never know. But not being able to find any leftover cases was really strange. Most likely the wind blew them away.

  Anyway, I’ve been too busy to think about that. We’ve got some good news. Mum is going to have a baby. And I’m really busy at school: Sister Bernadette has asked me to write a play. She wants our form to put it on at the end of the summer term, for the junior school down the road. It seemed a bit of a scary idea at first. I wasn’t sure I could do it. But then I had this great idea: I’d try to write a play about Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson and how they get called in to investigate a mystery in Nursery Rhyme land.

  I told some of the others and George Morgan asked if he could be Sherlock Holmes. I think he thinks Holmes is like one of the detectives in the comic books he reads and he’ll get a gun. Then Veronica found out George was going to be in it and suddenly decided she just had to play Watson. Interesting. She’s good, though. I told Mum. She said, ‘I’m not surprised, she’s a proper little actress, that one,’ in that funny kind of way she has when she’s saying one thing, but really means something different.

  I’ve known Veronica Silk and George since we were in the Infants together at Saint Mary’s. George used to sit behind me. One day while we were doing Art, I heard this snip and felt a tug at my hair. He’d cut a lump of it off. Veronica said he did it because he liked me. It made me wonder what he would do if he didn’t like someone. But he’s all right really. I wanted him and Reggie to be friends. George tried, but Reggie didn’t. He wasn’t rude or anything, just .
. . well, distant, I suppose.

  I sometimes feel Reggie’s got something he really wants to say to me. To get off his chest. And everyone else is just getting in the way. I asked him about it once. He just shrugged.

  And so the months go by. Winter snow melts. Time warms its hands by the light of the morning. In school we daydream through lessons, play street games in alleys, hide and seek times, sing songs without names, with words without end. Run in and out of days, make friends with a smile, enemies with a look.

  ‘Alice, you in there?’

  I’m working on the play in the old air-raid shelter when I hear Reggie scrambling across the bomb site. We usually prop a bit of wood over the opening to the shelter, but it’s such a nice day I didn’t bother. It’s nice and light in here, what with the big holes in the canvas roof.

  At first I don’t answer. Once I start on a story I can’t get the characters out of my head and I’m always thinking about what’s going to happen to them.

  ‘Alice?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m here.’

  Flash barks at the sound of my voice. They both appear at the opening. ‘What you d-doing?’

  ‘I’m writing the play for school.’

  Flash pushes in like he owns the place. Sniffs around. Sees an old piece of paper on the floor. Pushes it with his nose. Looks for a minute like he’s trying to read it. Then changes his mind and starts growling at it.

  Reggie ducks in. Sits down. Looks over my shoulder, which I hate.

  ‘W-what’s it about?’

  ‘Sherlock Holmes. He’s this—’

  ‘I know. Famous d-detective. I like him too. I know all his adventures.’

  ‘Well, you don’t know this one, ’cos I’m making it up.’

  ‘Want to go over the p-park?’

  ‘No, I think I’ll stay and do my play. I’m getting into it now.’

  ‘Come on, it’s n-nice out.’

  ‘No. I wanna get this done.’

  ‘Come on, you can tell m-me all about the play on the way. I’ve got some money. I’ll buy you an ice lolly if you like.’