Contact (4 page)

I held the page up to the light, trying to make out the words. No good.

Lamest vandalism ever,
I thought, shoving the book into my bag.
At least tear out a few pages or something.

Waiting out on the front lawn was the first piece of good news in two days. My bike was back. Reeve must have dropped it off during the night.

Good on him. Nice to know there was at least one security guard in Phoenix who wasn't completely in Shackleton's pocket. Even if he
had
made us promise never to speak to him again.

Five minutes later, I walked into the front office at school and found Jordan and Luke waiting there.

‘Seen Pryor yet?' I asked, sitting down next to Jordan.

She shook her head. Tapped her foot on the carpet. Then, like the question was bursting out of her, she said, ‘You ever heard of someone called Remi Vattel?'

‘Don't think so,' I said, raising an eyebrow. ‘Why?'

‘Because,' Jordan whispered, glancing up at Rhonda the office lady, ‘That's who the Shackleton Co-operative bought Phoenix from. Well, the land for it, anyway.'

‘Huh? Where'd you find that out?'

‘The
Time
magazine from the warehouse,' Jordan said. ‘In the article about Shackleton. It says the land for Phoenix was “acquired from the estate of Dr Remi Vattel” a few years back, by Shackleton and “eight wealthy business associates”. Whoever they are.'

‘It's probably crap,' I said. ‘Shackleton and his mates aren't gonna give anything away in an article they wrote themselves, are they?'

‘Not on purpose,' said Jordan. ‘But, still, it's worth –'

‘Good morning!' called a singsong voice from down the hall. Pryor waltzed into the room, smiling her ridiculous Cheshire Cat smile, and I felt a chill that was way beyond your normal meet-the-principal creeps.

‘Good morning, Ms Pryor,' we parroted back.

‘I really am very excited about this new endeavour of ours,' said Pryor, looming over us. ‘I am certain we're going to accomplish great things together.'

‘Me too, miss!' I said, jumping to my feet.

Two could play at the fake-enthusiasm game.

But then Pryor held up a hand. ‘No, don't all of you get up at once,' she said. ‘I think it's best if I speak to you one at a time today. It will give me an opportunity to get to know each of you a little better.'

Divide and conquer. Okay.

That was going to make life a little bit more interesting.

‘Who would like to go first?' Pryor asked.

‘You want to?' I said, turning to Luke. He was looking kind of nervous. It would be good for him to go first and get it over with. And if that meant leaving Jordan and me back here to spend some quality time together … well, I guess I was okay with that too.

‘I'll go,' smiled Jordan, standing up.

‘Excellent!' said Pryor. ‘Right this way.'

Luke smirked at me like he knew exactly what I'd been thinking.

‘Can't blame a guy for trying,' I said, watching Jordan disappear down the hall.

‘You can if he's already tried about a hundred times,' said Luke.

Like you' d know,
I thought.

But instead I said, ‘Points for persistence though, right? Besides, hundred and first time's a charm, I reckon.'

‘Uh-huh,' said Luke. ‘So, anyway, my mum emailed Ketterley yesterday to book me a flight home to see Dad.'

‘And?'

‘He said there were no flights available right now, but he'd add my name to the queue and let us know as soon as something opened up.'

‘Yeah, well, no surprises there,' I said.

‘No,' said Luke. He sighed and stared down at his feet.

I knew I should feel sorry for him, but something else was nagging at the back of my brain. I was missing something.

About five minutes later, we heard footsteps in the hall. I looked up, hoping Jordan would be able to give us some clue about what was coming.

But when Pryor came back into the room, she was alone.

‘Who's next?' she asked.

Luke shrugged and stood up.

‘Lovely,' smiled Pryor, leading him away.

More silence. Great.

Surely Pryor hadn't
done
anything to Jordan. If they were trying to keep people from asking questions about Phoenix, the mysterious disappearance of a student would be a pretty stupid move.

They wouldn't do anything. At least not until they knew for sure that we were a threat.

I closed my eyes. This was all so much easier when I could just tell myself none of it was real.

I pulled out
Utopia
again, looking for something to distract me, and had another go at reading the last paragraph through all the scribble.

I squinted at the page.

I turned it around.

And I finally realised what had been nagging at me.
You idiot.

A library book. Scribbled with black marker.

This wasn't some idiot kid's doing. It was
Crazy Bill
. He'd left a clue or a message or something.

I turned the book back up the right way. And then I saw it. Not
all
of the last paragraph had been scratched out.

Some of the letters were still showing.

I scrounged around in the bottom of my bag for a pen, completely forgetting where I was and that I should probably be more careful, and started writing the letters down in order, in the margin of the page.

B … E … H … I …

But I'd had this book out for weeks.

N … D … T … H …

If it
was
Bill, when had he done it?

E … W … I … N …

We already knew he'd broken into Jordan and Luke's houses. Had he broken into mine as well?

D … M … I … L … L …

I reached the end of the paragraph and checked through the whole thing again to make sure I hadn't missed any letters.

No. That was all of them.

BEHINDTHEWINDMILL

What was that supposed to –?

‘I hope that's not a
school
book, Mr Weir,' said Pryor, suddenly right above me.

I flinched, almost smacking my head on the wall behind me. ‘No, miss!' I lied, cramming
Utopia
back into my bag. ‘One of mine.'

Pryor glared down, seeing right through me. But I guess she was more concerned about whatever was waiting for us in her office, because she decided not to pull me up on it.

‘Shall we?' she asked.

I followed Pryor down the hall to the big metal door that led into her office. She held her key card up to the sensor, and the door clunked open.

Inside, the office looked the same as always. Pryor had this weird throne-room thing going on – antique furniture and an ancient-looking tapestry on the back wall and a massive red-and-gold rug that looked like it had been stolen from the Gryffindor common room.

The only normal bit of furniture in the room was a flimsy fold-up plastic chair parked in front of Pryor's desk. That was mine, I assumed. Just to make sure I knew my place.

Pryor sat down behind her desk and clicked at something on her laptop.

Recording our conversation again.

‘Mr Weir,' she said, leaning forward. ‘How are you?'

‘Sorry, miss?'

‘How are you?' she said again, as though it was perfectly normal for us to be chatting like this. ‘Is life treating you well?'

‘Um, yeah,' I said, caught off guard. ‘All good, thanks, miss.'

‘Good.'

Pryor reached across her desk and picked up a stack of paper. ‘I have your first assignment for you,' she said.

‘My what?'

‘Your first task as staff-student liaison officer.'

‘Oh, right,' I said. ‘What is it, miss?'

She pushed the stack of paper across the table towards me. I scanned the first page.

Phoenix High School Student
Satisfaction Questionnaire

‘A survey?' I said, flipping through the pages. ‘Are you serious, miss?'

‘Absolutely,' smiled Pryor. ‘What better way to launch this new initiative than by conducting a detailed analysis of the needs of your fellow students?'

I figured that was probably a rhetorical question.

‘I have provided each of you with thirty copies of the questionnaire,' said Pryor. ‘I would like you to have them completed by Friday, along with a summary of your findings.'

Ninety copies. That was like half the school.

‘No worries, miss!' I said, forcing myself to keep a straight face, not wanting to give her the satisfaction of knowing she was getting to me.

‘Excellent,' said Pryor. ‘Mr Weir, I hope you're as excited as I am by all of this. I know the two of us have had our differences in the past, but I believe that this project could be a real turning point for us.'

‘Yeah, me too, miss,' I said, shoving the surveys into my backpack.

‘Glad to hear it,' said Pryor. The bell rang out in the quad and she got up from her chair to see me out. I followed her to the door, hardly believing I'd got through the meeting without a single mention of what we may or may not have been up to last Saturday.

It was like none of it had ever happened. Which I guess was the point.

The bell stopped ringing, and I froze in the doorway. There was another sound coming from inside the office, so quiet I was surprised I'd even noticed it. A low, muffled buzzing.

Like a mobile phone vibrating around inside a desk drawer.

Pryor's eyes flickered.

‘Come on, Mr Weir,' she said over the buzzing. ‘Time to get to class.'

She waved me outside and shut the door.

Chapter 5

T
UESDAY
, M
AY
19
86
DAYS

‘A phone?' said Jordan. ‘You're sure that's what you heard?'

‘
Yes,
' I said again. ‘Unless Pryor's running a secret beekeeping business out of her top drawer.'

It was recess, and we were hiding out in an upstairs corridor in the English block, trying to avoid the plague of Year 7s that was still following us everywhere we went. I'd been in classes with Luke all morning, but this was the first chance I'd had to talk to Jordan since leaving Pryor's office.

‘Sorry,' said Jordan, brushing her braids back out of her face with one hand. ‘It's just – I mean, if Pryor's actually got a working phone, then this is … Hold on. Are you saying it was
her
we were chasing on Sunday?'

‘Dunno,' I said. ‘Wouldn't have thought she could run that fast, but –'

‘So what are we gonna do?' asked Luke impatiently. ‘How are we going to get in there and get it?'

‘Getting
in
isn't the problem,' I said, pulling a sandwich out of my bag. ‘Just wait until our next meeting with –'

‘We can't wait that long,' Luke cut in. ‘You know what Pryor's like. She's hardly ever here. It could be days before we see her again.'

‘That's just it, mate,' I said. ‘Just because we don't
see
Pryor doesn't mean she's not here. It means she's
in her office
. And even if she wasn't, how would you get through the door?'

‘We'll find a way,' said Luke, a desperate edge creeping into his voice. ‘Steal her key card or –'

‘No, Peter's right,' said Jordan. ‘We need to wait. We need to be smart about this.'

‘Easy for you to say,' Luke muttered, before I even had time to be surprised that Jordan was actually
agreeing
with me for a change. ‘Your dads aren't stuck on the outside.'

‘No,' said Jordan, ‘just the rest of my family and everyone else I care about.'

Luke closed his eyes. ‘I didn't mean –'

‘I know you didn't,' said Jordan. ‘My point is, we're all on the same side here.' I bristled as she reached out to touch him again. ‘I
know
you want to help your dad. But rushing in there and getting caught isn't going to help anyone.'

Luke took a breath.

‘All right,' he said eventually. ‘Yeah. You're right.'

‘The tricky part is gonna be getting Pryor
out
for long enough to grab the phone,' I said, leaning out the window to peg my sandwich wrapper at a kid walking past below us. ‘And making sure she doesn't know it was us who took it.'

The bell rang again. Now that I'd filled Jordan in on the phone, my mind was back on BEHINDTHEWINDMILL. I snatched up my bag and headed for the stairs.

‘What are you in such a hurry for?' asked Jordan. ‘Don't you two have a free period?'

‘Yeah,' I said, ‘but I need to go look for a book.'

I hadn't told her or Luke about Bill's message yet. No point getting them all hyped up until I actually had something useful to tell them.

But there was definitely no windmill in Phoenix. And since Crazy Bill's last two messages had been hidden in library books, I figured that was as good a place as any to start.