The Remarkables (The Remarkable Owen Johnson, part 1) (5 page)

Owen walked back to his house, feeling a mixture of happiness and confusion. Katie’s kiss, whilst hardly passionate, was the first sign of physical affection that she had ever shown him. He had always hoped that she thought of him in the same way that he did of her, but was terrified that their friendship would be broken if he acted upon such feelings.

He decided to
revisit the scene of the earlier peculiarities by walking back through the park, which by now was busy with young families and joggers going about their morning routines. He looked toward the leisure centre and thought back on this morning’s adventures.

The top of the building
that he had scaled looked even higher from afar. How on earth had he climbed up? The use of invisible bricks now seemed like the ravings of a madman. Mind you, prior to this morning so did the likelihood of Katie kissing him, so anything was possible.

He crossed the park without incident, and was about to take the
exit towards his home, when he noticed the man in the narrow-brimmed hat was back under his tree on the opposite side to Owen. He wondered why someone would hang around a park all day and hoped that he didn’t have any sinister intentions. The man seemed to be following Owen’s movements, so he hastened his pace.

Leaving the park, Owen turned left and crossed over to the entrance to his road
, then continued towards his house. As he passed her house he noticed that Mrs Argyle was not to be seen behind any of her windows.

Unusually
his father’s car was still on the drive. Owen thought back to the morning and couldn’t remember him saying he was working from home, which he occasionally did. As he neared the house Owen noticed that the front door was wide open as well. “Dad must be running late,” Owen thought. He stepped through the front door.

“D
ad?!” he called out. No answer. The hairs on the back of his neck were tingling, as were his hands as if there was a static charge in the air. Venturing into the kitchen he saw that the breakfast plates had not been cleared away. That definitely was not like his father, who was fastidious in his tidiness.

He went to the hallway
and peered up the stairs. “You there, Dad?”

He was
starting to become concerned. He ran up the stairs and quickly scanned each of the upstairs rooms, bathrooms included. No sign of his father.

Deciding he would
call the power plant, he went downstairs to the living room where the telephone lived by the front window. On the notepad beside it his father had started to write a note addressed to Celia, presumably referring to Mrs Argyle as Owen didn’t think he knew any other Celias. The note consisted of a large letter ‘p’ with a circle drawn around it, and written below a single word: ‘RUN’.

Owen tore the note off the pad, deciding to quiz his neighbour about it
urgently. As he turned around he saw movement from the back of the room. At the far end, which ran the length of the house, was a man in a long grey jacket and a hat with a narrow brim. It was the man he had seen in the park on his journeys to and from school.

“Who..?” Owen began to ask, but instinct told him that now w
as not the time for questions. He ran from the room to the hallway and made for the front door. Before he could reach it something cold hit his back and he stumbled. Landing on his hands he noticed that the tingling sensation had returned to them, as had the feint glow.

He
turned his head and saw the man standing in the doorway to the kitchen, his hands raised towards him.

“Do not run,” it instructed in a strained
, rasping voice that was so strange sounding it encouraged Owen to do the exact opposite.

Owen slowly stood up and felt his back, his hands quickly withdrawing from the su
dden cold sensation they felt. His bag was covered in ice.

The front door behind him burst open
, through which walked Mrs Argyle purposefully.

“Run!” Owen shouted.
Mrs Argyle stood firm, and swung her right arm in a wide arc towards the centre of her body. As her hand passed in front of her chest Owen felt a strong force push him from his left hand side, launching him through the air into the living room where he landed safely on the sofa. Before he landed though, he saw a white ball of light pass quickly down the hall, through the spot that he had stood. He sprang back up to see Mrs Argyle striding down the hallway, holding her arms close together in front of her, her palms facing together.

“Go!” s
he called out, not looking at him but staring toward the kitchen and the man that stood within. Owen ran back out of the room into the hallway, just behind Mrs Argyle as she passed by. The long window by the front door was frosted over, whereas normally it was completely clear. He was about to exit through the front door when he noticed a bright light coming from behind him. Stopping he turned back to look over his shoulder.

The kitchen was bathed in a
white glow, and even from what must have been over three metres away Owen could feel the bitter cold that was emanating from it. He could see the outline of Mrs Argyle and her hat, still stood with her arms held forward. He could also see the man silhouetted in the kitchen, a dark shadow from which the light seemed to be emitting. The black and white tiled floor on which he stood was slowly being replaced by a layer of ice.

“Who are you?” Mrs Argyle responded in her usual calm voice, unperturbed by the arctic conditions that were enveloping the house.

There was no vocal response from the kitchen, but the light d
id seem to become more intense. Mrs Argyle took a couple of steps back then lunged forward, resting down on one knee. She thrust her arms further towards the kitchen, hands apart and palms pointing ahead.

The man lurched back but remained standing,
directing his arms towards Mrs Argyle as she did to him, focusing the light upon her. Owen could see her grey coat was becoming covered in ice, which was making a crunching sound as she moved back slightly. Then the man jumped forward suddenly, sending a ball of light at her which Mrs Argyle deflected back past the man. It hit the kitchen cabinets which were instantly encased in a thick layer of ice.

From the light
, flurries of snow were starting to form, swirling around the man so that he looked like he was standing in a giant snow globe. He pushed forward again, knocking Mrs Argyle into the air, her back hitting the ceiling. She fell back to the ground but landed cat-like on all fours; her hat still perched on her head as if stuck there with glue.

Pouncing forwards she sprinted towards the kitchen, her arms thrust
before her. The man was flung backwards, crashing into the kitchen cupboards, shattering the icy covering he had just created. He fell and slid on the icy floor, settling by the glass doors that led to the garden where he struggled to stand back up.

Mrs Argyle gave one last push towards him with her arms and he blasted through the doors
and into the garden, landing through the roof of the shed which in turn collapsed in on itself. Mrs Argyle knelt and rested on one hand, looking down toward the ground.

Owen could hear
that her breathing sounded laboured. He ran to her side, asking if she was okay.

Mrs Argyle paused,
and then stood up effortlessly. “Right as nine-pence,” she declared, taking a few steps towards the kitchen. The entire room was encased in a thick layer of ice, as if it had been sitting in a deep freeze for months, a thick layer of snow covering the floor. Owen skidded on the floor and had to use Mrs Argyle to stop himself from falling over.

“
What the bloody hell?” Owen asked, referring both to the man and the sub-zero environment that had manifested itself the space of minutes.

Mrs Argyle
didn’t answer at first, as she was busy scanning the remains of the garden shed for any sign of the expelled man. “We should leave,” she announced, brushing the ice off of her coat.

“Dad,” Owen said, remembering that his father was missing under mysterious circumstances.

“Where is your father?” Mrs Argyle asked. “I presumed that he was at home, what with his car being on the drive.”

“No, the pl
ace was empty when I got home; the front door was wide open too.” Owen remembered the note, which he handed to her explaining where he had found it. Mrs Argyle frowned and went pale. She screwed the note up in her hand, and then slipped it into her coat pocket.

“We
should leave,” she repeated.

“What about D
ad?” Owen asked, concerned at how anxious his usually unflappable neighbour had become.

“
Your father is in danger and so are you. Where does he keep his car keys?”

“Usually in the drawer
of that cabinet in the hall. How is he in danger?”

Mrs Argyle
ignored him and walked to the drawer in which she rummaged for the keys.  Retrieving them she beckoned for Owen to follow her. “Come on, you can drive”.

“
I haven’t had any lessons yet,” Owen pointed out.

Mrs Argyle’
s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Well I can’t,” she replied in a manner that implied that the merest suggestion that someone of her age might have learned to drive at some point was the height of absurdity. “Why haven’t you learned yet?” she countered.

“I’m sixteen,
” Owen explained, although he felt that an explanation really wasn’t necessary. “I think you’ve had more opportunities than me,” he added, then remembering what had occurred just moments before: “And what happened in the kitchen with the man and the flash? And the ice? And what’s happened to my dad?!”

“Plenty of
time to explain all that,” she said firmly, and then with a smile, “please Owen, you must trust me.”

Owen stared back at the woman he had known for most of his life and decided to put his faith in her, as his father had
done on so many occasions in the past. He nodded and walked towards her.

Mrs Argyle
nodded in response then marched out to the car and pulled at the car handle. She looked up at Owen quizzically, who by now was at the passenger door.  “It’s locked”.

“You hav
e to press the button on the key,” he explained. Mrs Argyle fumbled with the key and the doors clicked open.

“Oh that’s very clever
,” she declared, beaming at the little piece of plastic in her hand. The fact that Mrs Argyle was impressed by a car remote and unfazed by today’s events had not escaped Owen’s notice. He shook his head at her in bewilderment.

“Get in then
,” she called from the driver’s seat, where she had just clicked her seat belt in to place. Owen climbed in beside her.

“Now then
,” she said to no-one in particular, then after locating where the key went and managing to start the engine she cried “onwards!”, as if she was going into battle.

Mrs Argyle and Owen surveyed the damage that she had just caused by driving a large estate car into a garage door.

“Well that was unexpected,
” Mrs Argyle commented.

Not t
o Owen it wasn’t, his day being far from humdrum thus far.

“Well we can’t drive that now
,” she declared, giving the concertinaed front wing an assessing kick. It quivered in response for a moment, before clattering onto the floor in defeat. Mrs Argyle shrugged. “I suppose we’d better make a dash for it on foot.”

Owen stared at the car in disbelief;
it was a good half a metre shorter than it was a minute ago and had now also undressed itself of its other front wing.

“Come on then slow coach!”
Mrs Argyle called out cheerfully. Owen trotted after her, who by now was halfway down their street. “Where are we going?” Owen asked.

“Somewhere far away and sharpish
,” she replied, her head darting from side to side. At the end of the road she motioned for him to stop behind her, and peered around the hedge on the corner. “All clear.” Again she made a hand signal, this time for Owen to follow her. She’d clearly been watching too many old war films as she was behaving as if she was about to storm an enemy stronghold.

“Where are we going?” Owen repeated.

“You’ve asked me that.” Mrs Argyle looked directly at him but kept walking. “Is your head bothering you?”

“My head?” replied Owen incred
ulously. “My head is the least of my worries. What’s bothering me is: who was that man and where is my dad?!”

Mrs Argyle shrug
ged her shoulders unhelpfully. This rather annoyed Owen as it was pretty clear she was more aware of what was occurring today than she was letting on. “I don’t know exactly where your father is. But what with all the bother over the years from that wretched plant of his, we had an agreement that if you or your brother were ever in danger I’d take you away somewhere safe, like we used to in the past, remember?”

Owen did indeed remember.
He must have been about seven or eight when they first started building the plant. There was anger from local residents who didn’t want the landscape ruined or their air and water polluted, but that was usually confined to council meetings and angry letters to the local newspaper.

But some of the protestors targeted those who worked at the plant, including Owen’s dad
and Katie’s parents. Both families had bricks thrown through their car windows and threats of violence delivered to their houses. On one occasion Owen and Jack had spent the entire summer holidays away with Mrs Argyle because of the frequency of attacks.

Mrs Argyle
took the crumpled note out of her pocket and looked at it again, before tucking it away once more. “Was there any sign of a struggle when you first got home?” she asked.

“Not that I could tell.
But he left the door open and that’s really unlike him, as is leaving his car. Has he been kidnapped or something?”

Mrs Argyle frowned briefly, but
resumed smiling shortly after. “More likely that he got a taxi or left by foot.” She patted him on the shoulder reassuredly. It had no effect whatsoever.

“
We should still go to the police though, tell them about that man in the kitchen,” Owen suggested.

“
And tell them what? There was no sign of a struggle, so they won’t start a search for your father. We’ll call his work in a bit, he’s probably there. And as for that man, he was likely to have been a burglar who we scared off, and I don’t fancy spending an afternoon in a police station explaining why I gave him a thick ear.”

Owen stopped in his trac
ks. “A thick ear?!  You did more than that! You knocked him back without even laying a finger on him, and you did the same to me! It’s a good job that sofa was there!” Although his head was spinning, his thoughts did seem to be starting to settle. “And it was you that stopped me from hitting the ground earlier.” He was starting to feel scared of this unassuming old lady. “What are you?”

Mrs Ar
gyle’s face was stony serious, her lips pursed. She appeared to be wrestling with conflicting thoughts as she stared at Owen, before she settled into a frown. “Now listen to me, Owen Johnson. There is a time for questions and answers but that time is not now. There are things in this world that you do not currently understand, but you will soon. There are powers in us that you don’t understand,
but you will soon
. Right now you need to trust me.”

“But my dad….”

“Please, Owen.” She held out her hand, her features softening. “Trust me as your father always has done. The safest course of action is for us to get out of town for a while; it’s what he’d want us to do.”

Owen
had so many questions, so many things that had happened that he didn’t understand, but one thing was clear: Mrs Argyle was clearly going to do her upmost to keep him from harm. In fact, when he thought about the manner in which she had evicted the man from his kitchen, she was probably the safest person to be with right now. He took her hand and she squeezed it back, before letting go.

“Come on then
,” she smiled, but this was quickly replaced by a cross look. “Damn it!” she cursed. “I haven’t got my purse. Have you got any money?”

“A few quid in my bag,
” and then remembering why he had the money: “I’m supposed to be meeting Katie!”

“Sh
e’ll have to wait, I’m afraid. We need to get to the train station, pronto.”

Owen remembered back t
o the morning and Katie’s kiss. “I really ought to see her before we leave.”

“Why?
She’s not going anywhere. And her parents would not have wanted her being dragged into all of this.”  Mrs Argyle clearly did not have the time nor the inclination to be trifled with affairs of the heart, so Owen didn’t bother explaining to her about Katie’s imminent trip to her grandfather’s.

“Well where
are
we going to then?” he sighed.

“Good question.”
Mrs Argyle tapped her teeth with the nail of her index finger and hummed a tune. “I know someone who we can bunk down with. He’s a lousy cook but he’ll be able to set you straight on a few things.” She smiled at Owen. “I’ll just overcomplicate things if you allow me to explain; I haven’t got the patience for detailed question and answer sessions.”

Whilst Owen suspected that she was just delaying explaining today’s events, it was
evident that Mrs Argyle’s mind was made up. She picked up her pace to clarify her steadfastness, walking at such a speed that Owen had to break into an occasional jog to keep up with.

“
How is young Katie Morgan?” Mrs Argyle began. “Is she your girlfriend now?”

Owen felt himself redden.
“What?  No!” he said with feigned incredulity.

Mrs Argyle smiled.
“Not for the want of trying, then?”

“She’s just a friend.”
Owen’s face was like a furnace.

“
It was a terrible loss, her parents’ death.” Mrs Argyle spoke as if they were part of some great assignment together. “I can see why you two are so close. Death forms a bond that cannot be easily broken.”

They walked on in silence for
a quarter of an hour or so, Owen’s thoughts meandering between today’s events and his own bereavement, until they reached the station.

“Righty-oh,” Mrs Argyle said, clapping her hands together. “
You go and buy a ticket and I’ll meet you on the platform in a jiffy.”

Owen
wished that Mrs Argyle’s instructions were a little bit more detailed. “A ticket to where?”

“We’re
heading to a town called Tring. Just a single ticket will do; don’t worry about a return.”

Owen looked toward the ticket hall
to see where he could buy one from. He turned back to Mrs Argyle but she had vanished. Spinning on the spot he couldn’t see any sign of her, but the ladies’ toilet was nearby so he assumed that she must have needed to answer the call of nature (rather quickly based on the speed in which she had vanished). Sighing inwardly he concluded that he was unlikely to understand anything about today and reached into his bag for his wallet.

After c
onsulting a poster on the wall with the cost of fares, he worked out that he had just enough for his own ticket, but not for Mrs Argyle. Rather than waiting for her to reappear so that he could explain this to her, he decided that she would probably prefer him to at least purchase one for himself whilst he was waiting. He chose to buy it from the self-service machine, as his still bloody appearance might provide too many opportunities for questioning from the woman at the counter.

He made his way to the platform, feeding his ticket to the automated barriers en route
, which in turn spat them back at him ungratefully. Walking down the platform, he was greeted by Mrs Argyle, and wondered how had she had got there so quickly.

“Ah, here you are
,” she said in an exasperated tone, “the train will be along in two ticks.” She peered down the track expectantly.

“When did you get your ticket?”
Owen asked.

“Oh, I have a pass.
Old age does have some benefits you know.”

Owen wasn’t convinced by this, suspecting that Mrs Argyle
was once again was either hiding or bending the truth. His suspicions of her being slightly dishonest were further enhanced by her hiding behind a pillar whenever a member of staff was in view. Before she had to do this for the fourth time, the train ambled up to the platform.

“Come on then!”
Mrs Argyle encouraged, and climbed aboard. Owen followed, settling into in a seat in front of her in the deserted carriage. She was examining the train’s route on a map on the wall. “Six stops then we hop off. Our host for the night lives in the country not far from there.” Satisfied with their itinerary, she peered down the aisle in both directions. “I wonder if there’s a trolley service? I’m famished!”

“
Urrm, I doubt it.” The last thing on Owen’s mind was food. He lent back in his seat as the train started moving out of the station, as another train was also pulling away from the adjacent platform. Just as the last carriage vanished from his view, he saw a man standing facing him, dressed in a long grey coat and a brimmed hat. Owen jumped out of his seat and pointed. “Him!”

Mrs Argyle looked up. 
“Who?”

By now
the platform was out of view. Owen stood up and ran down the carriage. “Him!  The man in the funny hat, who was in my kitchen!”

“Oh him.
The hat’s a trilby, very smart if a little old fashioned. In my opinion they suit a lady’s head more than a man’s, but then fashion was never my strongest suit.” Mrs Argyle seemed unimpressed by the man’s persistence, an attitude hardly befitting what had happened between them both and that had resulted in the Johnson’s kitchen having frostbite, the back windows being obliterated, and the untimely demise of their garden shed. “I wondered whether he’d track us.”

Owen stared at her and flappe
d his arms. “How-?  But he was-?!” Words failed him.

“Sit down; you’ll do yourself an inj
ury. We’re well on our way now; I doubt he’ll be able to follow us.” Mrs Argyle was now staring out the window intently as well now, which seemed to betray her outwardly calm demeanour.

“Not be able to follow? We’re on a train!
We can hardly give him the slip by doing a u-turn or by parking behind a hedge, can we?!”

“We’ll be safe and sound before he catches up
, and he’s unlikely to know where we’re headed. Come, have a rest while you can.” Mrs Argyle patted the seat Owen had just vacated.

“Jack!”
Owen exclaimed, suddenly remembering that his brother was still at home when he left this morning.

“
Your brother is safe and sound, that I
do
know. A minibus carted him off just after you left this morning. Where’s he headed to? Denmark?”

“
Denmark, yes,” Owen confirmed, feeling bad for forgetting about his younger brother, but glad that he was safe.

“Very nice.”

“Have you been there?”

Mrs Argyle stared out of the window, not fo
cussing on anything particular. “A couple of times. A long time ago now, though…” She looked lost in thought.

Owen decided
that it was best not to bother her with any further questions. The train briefly stopped at the next four stations, with only a handful of passengers getting on and off, none of whom chose their carriage. He examined his bloodied reflection in the window. “I’m going to get changed out of these clothes.”

“Hmmm?
” Mrs Argyle turned her head to him and looked at his bloodied school uniform.  “Oh, good idea. Sort your hair out as well,” Mrs Argyle replied before resuming her distant gaze on the English countryside.

Owen made his way into the adjoining
carriage where the toilet was. Closing the door behind him he stared at himself in the mirror. He hadn’t realised how much blood he had in his hair. He switched on the taps and dipped his head under the water, being careful not to disturb Mrs Argyle’s handiwork that was keeping his wound closed. The small sink meant he could only wash the top of his head so quite a lot of blood remained, but it was certainly an improvement. He took off his shirt and used it to dry his hair, then changed into the jeans and t-shirt he had packed for his trip to the pub.