Frozen in Time (24 page)

‘We could ask that nice librarian to help,’ said Freddy, as he and Ben checked in their bowling shoes and left the club. A few elderly men and women waved to them. Freddy, with his posh accent and perfect manners, had made quite an impression on them. They’d urged him to join the juniors.

‘I don’t think so,’ said Ben.

‘Why ever not? She liked us. She’d be glad to help—she said so.’

Ben shook his head. He didn’t know why but he felt uneasy about the librarian. Her eyes were a little too sharp when she’d looked at Freddy in the high street yesterday. Of course, she couldn’t possibly guess their odd secret, but even so … Ben’s instincts about people were good. He was a fairly quiet boy, mainly because of his tendency to stammer, and while he was saying little he was listening a lot. And observing a lot. He didn’t know why he didn’t want to go back to the library—he just knew it.

‘The town council building will have lists of people and where they live, for voting and all that,’ he said to Freddy. ‘Let’s try there first. Or we might get a phone book—he might be in there, although loads of people are ex-directory these days, what with all the sales calls.’

‘Sales calls?’ said Freddy, hitching his schoolbag up on his shoulder. ‘You mean salesmen actually
telephone
you now? That’s a bit much!’

They arrived at the town council building, which was on the other side of the road from the library in a very similar building, and made their way first to the public telephone hood inside it. This was where a small magistrates’ court was held, so the phones were there for the public to use, because mobiles weren’t allowed in the building. To Ben’s immense surprise he found an almost whole phone book chained to the shelf beneath the plastic hood.

‘Shaw—that’s his surname—Percival Shaw,’ said Freddy, while Ben thumbed through to the Ss. He found quite a number of Shaws but only two P. Shaws. One was in a district some miles away, so he guessed the more local one would be where Percy lived. If it
was
Percy at all.

‘Twenty-one Riverside Close,’ said Ben. ‘It’s not too far from here—just the other side of the park. Come on.’

‘You’re sure that’s him?’ asked Freddy, prodding the phone book. ‘Perhaps you should telephone him.’

Ben nodded. He punched the number from the book onto the grimy metal keypad and listened for ringing—but the number fed back one long note.

‘Number unobtainable,’ muttered Ben. He re-dialled to be sure, but it was the same.

‘Well, it’s the only P. Shaw there, and it’s within walking distance of Darkwell House and the woods on the top of the hill, where Percy goes every day. What’s up with your fingers?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ said Freddy, curling his plasters away into his palm. Ben stared at him. The boy was colouring up slightly.

‘What? What did you do?’

‘Just bent back my fingernails … doing that wretched washing up business, that’s all. Come on— are we going or aren’t we?’

Ben hesitated. They
could
ask to see the electoral rolls, to be certain where Percy lived, but again the nagging feeling of unease rose inside him. It would attract attention. Best hope that this was the right P. Shaw.

They set off again, along the high street. Ben noticed that Freddy didn’t give all the mad 2009 stuff a second glance now. He marvelled at how quickly the boy seemed to have adapted to it all. There was no denying it—Freddy was infinitely cooler than he was. Ben didn’t mind though. He was definitely going to get Freddy to give him roller skating lessons. He’d always been a bit too cautious to do really well at skating—Freddy couldn’t be more different. They reached the park beside the river inside ten minutes and would have been over the bridge and into Riverside Close in another four. But Ben stopped dead as soon as they got into the park. Quickly he pulled Freddy behind the public toilets. ‘What?’ said Freddy.

‘Over on the bridge! Oh hell—it’s Roly! And …’ he peered quickly around the brick corner and then pulled back again, ‘yeah—the Pincer twins, Jim Lewis … and a couple of others, I think, from Roly’s posse. We can’t get over that bridge!’

‘Is there another way we can go?’ asked Freddy, also darting his head around the corner now, and bringing it back with a grim expression.

‘No, this is the only way over to Riverside Close. We could go up the valley and backtrack along the A road from Silchester, but it would take us
hours.
We’ll just have to wait until they go … although they hang around there for hours sometimes. They like to throw things at the ducks.’

Freddy pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes. Then he grinned. ‘Righto, then—we’ll go across the river.’

‘What? Didn’t you see them? We’ll never make it. We’ll be mashed potato before we even get halfway. We haven’t got skates on today, either!’

‘Don’t need skates—just bathers—or shorts,’ said Freddy.

‘You what?’

‘Well, you have got some, haven’t you? Your PE shorts? Let’s nip in here and get them on. We’re going across the river. Down by that bend there. It shouldn’t take five minutes to swim it.’

‘Swim it? Swim the river?’ Ben gaped at him. ‘Are you mad? We can’t swim it!’

‘Why ever not? We used to swim it all the time in 1956.’

‘But—but …’ Ben stared down to the river bank on the far side of the park. The river was not fast but it was very wide along the Amhill valley and quite deep in the middle. People did paddle at the edges sometimes, but kids were always being warned not to bathe in it. There were big signs forbidding it. He didn’t know why. Probably so the local council didn’t have to worry about being sued if somebody stood on a broken bottle. Freddy had already nipped inside the public toilets and was even now coming back out with his black PE shorts on, stuffing his clothes and shoes into his school bag.

‘We can leave these here, till we get back,’ he said, swinging his bag up on top of the toilets’ roof. ‘Nobody will see them there. Come on—what are you waiting for? I say, you
can
swim, can’t you?’

‘Yes—yes, of course I c-can,’ gulped Ben and it was the stammer that made him do it. The second it twitched across his tongue he got angry. He was
not
going to let Freddy think he was afraid … even though he was.

Two minutes later they were at the river bank, ignoring the little kids and their mums in the play area and stepping down into the pebbly shallows of the River Am. ‘Brrrr!’ said Freddy brightly, wading in up to his knees. Ben followed, feeling goosebumps prickle up his legs. It was a very warm September day, but the river was still cold. ‘Right then,’ said Freddy, now up to his waist in rippling blue-green river, ‘nice and quick does the trick!’ And he launched himself straight out across the surface of the water and began to execute fast over-arm strokes through the water, causing some alarm to the nearby ducks.

Ben took a deep breath and followed him. The shock nearly made him shriek, but he knew that the boys on the bridge could look round and see them by now, and if he made any noise it wouldn’t help. He hoped he and Freddy were far enough downstream to be unrecognizable. Certainly, not one of them would ever expect to see
him
swimming across the River Am.

The current was worryingly strong by the time he reached the middle of the river and the first unwelcome tingle of panic moved in Ben’s stomach—but through the splashes his hands were making he could see Freddy, still powering through the water like a champion, and he was determined not to be left behind. He’d just thrown caution to the wind, hadn’t he? There was no going back. The far side of the river reached out to them now—a protruding bank with trees and shrubs, ready to hide them when they reached the bank. He heard a shout from the bridge—then a whistle. But he realized, even through the rush of the disturbed water all around him, that these were not hostile noises—they were curious, even impressed noises. He must remember not to look up towards those noises when he got to shore.

Freddy helped him out of the water at the other side and for a moment Ben just stood, shivering with excitement and delight. Keeping his back to the bridge, he glanced back to the other side—he had swum the River Am! ‘Good fun, yes?’ said Freddy. ‘Me and Poll used to do it all the time with local children, in the hols. We used to have races. Don’t you do that here any more?’

Ben shook his head regretfully. ‘Council doesn’t allow it.’

Freddy made a scornful snort. ‘Sounds like your council members are a bunch of lily-livered old codgers to me! Where on earth did you get them from?’

‘Well … er … most of them probably used to swim the River Am with you,’ said Ben.

Freddy grimaced. ‘Oh. Well, pretty poor show then, the lot of them!’

Dripping slightly, they picked their way through the little wooded area and across to a path that led into Riverside Close. Number 21 was a small red-brick house on the end of a terrace with a neatly kept front garden and late honeysuckle growing around its door. Hesitantly Ben lifted his hand and pressed the doorbell. Inside the house there was a distant jingle. They stood and waited. Nobody came. Ben rang again.

‘Oh blow!’ said Freddy. ‘After all that he’s not even in! It’s too bad!’ He leaned down and peered through the letter box and as he did so the door clicked and opened inwards. Freddy fell into the hallway with a surprised gasp and then scrambled to his feet. ‘I say—I say, Mr Shaw … are you in?’ he called. There was no reply.

‘We should go,’ said Ben, uneasily. ‘It’s not right to go in.’

‘Mr Shaw! We need to speak to you!’ called Freddy and wandered further into the hallway.

‘You can’t just—’ Ben stopped and sighed. Freddy was already peering into the little front room.

‘It’s all right—I’m not going to burgle the place! Just having a bit of a squint around. I don’t like this— I don’t like it at all. First JJ and now Percy. Where is he?’

‘He might just be up the shop or something,’ said Ben, edging around the door after Freddy. The sitting room was tidy and smelled of furniture polish and old wood. The furniture was elderly but clean. The small fireplace held an old fashioned grille gas fire and the TV was a big square one, in a wooden cabinet. A clock ticked steadily on the mantelpiece.

‘Come on, we should go,’ said Ben.

‘No. Not yet.’ Freddy went past him back into the hallway and along to the little kitchen at the back. A glance through the dining room door showed him there was nobody there either and the kitchen, painted pale green and with furniture not unlike the stuff in the vault, was also empty. A dishcloth lay folded and dry over the hot tap nozzle of the old Ascot water heater on the wall. ‘There’s something odd going on,’ said Freddy and Ben knew he was right. He could feel it. He didn’t object when Freddy climbed the stairs and checked the bathroom, the small back bedroom, and the front bedroom. All were just the same really. Neat, well kept, clean—and empty.

‘Do you really think he’s disappeared?’ asked Ben in almost a whisper as they padded across the highly patterned carpet on the landing. Through its small square window the sky was darkening. ‘He was going to tell us stuff, wasn’t he? He was going to look into the files again.’

‘Maybe he found something out and had to dash off somewhere in his motorcar,’ said Freddy.

Ben shrugged. He couldn’t quite picture old Percy dashing anywhere, and he was pretty sure he didn’t have a car. He was about to say they should give it up and go when he heard something scrape. A hollow, long scrape. He felt something fall on his shoulder.

‘F-Freddy,’ he whispered. His hair prickled from his neck to his forehead. Now he could hear breathing. Freddy looked back at him. ‘What?’

Ben looked up and shouted out in horror.

Polly sang old-fashioned songs in a sweet, breathy voice, as she rummaged through the many wiggly bits of cardboard and tried to find a corner.

Rachel smiled, in spite of her anxiety. Polly was quite happy at that moment, lost in the big thousand-piece jigsaw of a Swiss chalet which an aunt had given them for Christmas, and which would almost certainly never have been opened if they hadn’t dug Polly up. She had cleared space on the dining room table and was ordering all the pieces into sides and non-sides, and, of course, the four corners. She sniffed a little and then went on singing. Rachel looked at her watch. It was gone six now. Where were Ben and Freddy? Surely they must have found Percy by now? She had been expecting them to turn up, or at least phone, at any time for the last hour, with
some
kind of information. Hopefully with news that Percy had heard from Uncle Jerome and that he was even now on his way back to Darkwood House. She looked wishfully through the tall dining room window, up to the gate. Clouds had rolled in across the warm day and it was getting dark. She thought she could hear thunder in the distance. She switched the table lamp on, so they could see the jigsaw better.