The Misfits Club Read online

  INTERPOL

  WANTED PERSON

  LAMBERT, ALEX

  WANTED BY THE JUDICIAL AUTHORITIES OF THE USA FOR PROSECUTION/TO SERVE A SENTENCE

  IDENTITY PARTICULARS

  Present Family Name: Lambert

  Forename: Alex

  Date of Birth: 03/03/1972

  Place of Birth: Ireland

  Languages Spoken: English, French

  CHARGES

  Grand larceny. Illegal import and export of goods.

  IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION,

  PLEASE CONTACT:

  Your local police force

  General Secretariat of Interpol

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Brian could hardly believe it. His friends were turning into wimps right before his eyes. He knew Chris was a nervous character, but he’d always thought that he’d be one of those people who’d come through for you when it really counted, but, no, he was actually refusing to chase after the criminals. Brian was even more surprised at the others. Hannah had spent half her life with her head buried in detective novels and, now that she had the chance to solve a real mystery, she was running away from it. Where was their sense of adventure?

  ‘Say it again, because I can’t believe my ears,’ Brian said.

  ‘We’re not tracking them,’ Chris said.

  ‘Speak for yourself,’ Sam said.

  ‘We can’t risk it. Debra’s smart. She’ll be keeping an eye on things and if she spots us acting suspiciously today, she’ll definitely tell our parents and we can say goodbye to this investigation,’ Hannah said. ‘Being able to leave the house at some point in our lives is an important part of being able to find those guys.’

  ‘But we have to look for them now, don’t we? They could be in Zanzibar or Moscow or Lima by tonight,’ Amelia said.

  ‘Thank you, Amelia,’ Brian said. He was really starting to warm to her. First the jelly snakes, now this. She’d only been an official member of the club for a few hours, yet she wasn’t giving up like the rest of them.

  ‘We’ll find another way,’ Hannah said.

  She checked the time on her phone. ‘Lunch first, then we’ll work something out. Trust me.’

  Amelia did trust her. Hannah seemed smart. ‘OK, I’ll wait until after lunch too,’ Amelia said.

  ‘So, it’s settled just like that?’ Brian said. He was so frustrated he wanted to hit something. What was wrong with all of them? Didn’t they care? This was their last adventure, their last time together. Could they not see how important this was? ‘Well, you lot can stay at home eating and making plans, but I’m going out and I’m going to find those two. I’ll do it by myself if I have to.’

  His belly rumbled, a great big rolling thunder of a sound.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ Amelia asked.

  ‘That wasn’t my stomach,’ he snapped. There was no time to be hungry, even though he was starving as usual.

  It rumbled again, even louder this time. The other four looked at him.

  ‘OK, that one was me,’ he admitted.

  ‘Want to come back to my grandmother’s? She’ll make you something to eat. It’ll make it easier for us all to meet up and decide our next move afterwards,’ Amelia said.

  ‘No, I don’t. I want to do some detectivising and I want to do it now.’

  ‘Might be better doing that on a full stomach. Brains are sharper when you’re not hungry. Do you like old-fashioned food like bacon and cabbage and home-made soups and things like that?’

  ‘I’ll eat anything,’ Brian said. He was still angry, but what Amelia was promising sounded like just what he needed.

  ‘Brian’s got the constitution of an ox with a stomach made of cement,’ Chris said. ‘I once saw him eat four packets of crisps and two packets of bitterly sour Gummies just before he ate a fry-up for breakfast. And it wasn’t a small breakfast either.’

  Amelia tried her best not to look disgusted.

  ‘I do like food,’ Brian said. ‘Maybe it wouldn’t do any harm to have a quick bite before we get going again.’

  ‘We’ll meet up at four p.m., at headquarters. That OK for everyone?’ Hannah asked.

  Brian had never spoken to Amelia’s grandmother before. He’d seen her a few times when he’d been coming in or out of Hannah’s house and she’d been at her gate, and he’d even waved to her once or twice, but he’d never spoken to her. She was a big bundle of a woman who always seemed ready to laugh.

  ‘This isn’t my first time seeing this young man,’ Amelia’s grandmother said.

  Now that he was standing close to her, Brian noticed how grey her hair was and that her face was both ruddy-cheeked and heavily lined.

  ‘What’s your name?’ she asked.

  ‘Brian.’

  ‘Brian? You don’t look like a Brian to me. I think I’ll call you Derek instead. My name is Florence, but you can call me Mrs Parkinson.’

  Brian looked to Amelia, unsure of what to say or do.

  ‘Is that all right with you, Derek?’

  ‘Not really, Mrs Parkinson. My name is Brian.’

  ‘He’s got backbone. Good, good. You’re not as terrible at making friends as I suspected, Amelia. Well done – first that Hannah girl, although her parents are exceptionally dull, and now Derek here. Progress is being made. Come in and make yourself at home.’

  The farmhouse kitchen was unlike any kitchen Brian had ever been in before. Pots of meat and vegetables bubbled on the black-and-white range cooker. Clothes were hung out to dry on makeshift lines that criss-crossed the room, including some giant knickers that made Brian blush and turn away when he realized that they probably belonged to Florence. Crockery that needed a wash was piled in the sink. The place was messy and cluttered, but even though he was normally tidy himself he liked it.

  Although she looked strong and clumpy, Florence Parkinson was light on her feet. She almost floated across the kitchen. She took a wooden spoon and began to stir something that bubbled in a large silver pot, something that Brian thought smelled absolutely delicious.

  ‘It’s stew again, I’m afraid,’ Gran said. ‘Do you like stew, Derek?’

  ‘Brian. Yes, I love it.’

  ‘Fabulous. You’re not one of those picky eaters, then? Not like my darling granddaughter. She has to know the ingredients in everything before she’ll consider trying it. Is this organic, Gran? Well, it’s been grown in a ruddy field, Amelia, and fertilized with cow sh—’

  ‘What have you been up to this morning, Gran?’ Amelia interrupted.

  ‘This’n’that, this’n’that. Right, you two, wash your paws and we’ll eat.’

  Amelia picked out some of the dishes from the sink and placed them on the draining board. Both Brian and Amelia leaned into the sink at the same time to wash their hands. Amelia turned on the tap then passed the red bar of carbolic soap to Brian.

  ‘You get used to the smell,’ she said, referring to the soap.

  ‘It smells like the stuff you put on your leg when you get a cut,’ Brian said.

  ‘You’ll find a lot of things in Gran’s house that you won’t find in other people’s,’ she said.

  Their conversation was interrupted by the bleating of a lamb.

  ‘Shoo, Richard Hannay, shoo,’ Gran said.

  A little black lamb had click-clacked into the kitchen without anyone noticing. Brian watched, amazed, as Amelia’s grandmother ushered him out again, flapping a tea towel at his hindquarters as the little guy scampered back outside.

  ‘You’re nothing but a pest, Richard Hannay,’ she said, pulling the back door shut, although she said it in such a way that Brian knew she liked him.

  ‘His mother died and Gran raised him herself. He’s sort of adapted to being with the flock now, but every so often he wanders back into the kitchen for a nose around.’

  ‘Why is he called Richard Hannay?’

  ‘I think it’s from a film or something. Gran calls all the animals after characters from films and books.’

  �
�Your grandmother is . . .’ Brian began, not quite finding the right words to finish the sentence.

  ‘She’s nothing like my dad – he’s her son. Dad likes everything neat and tidy and just so, but Gran, well, everything’s all messy and topsy-turvy with her. You never know what’s going to happen next.’

  Brian quite liked that. Especially, when what happened next was a superb lunch. It tasted every bit as good as it had smelled and he relished every bite. He normally didn’t eat vegetables since his father had such a hatred of them, but he loved these – fresh parsnips and carrots and peas and onions. He decided he’d happily go to Florence’s for lunch every day of the week. Unlike Brian, Amelia picked at her food, pushing it around her plate. She’d barely eaten half of it by the time her grandmother had started to clear up.

  ‘Right, you two, you’ve had your lunch, now it’s time to pay for your meal.’

  Brian looked worried. ‘I don’t have any money on me right now. I—’

  ‘Oh, Derek, you are a funny little fella. I’m not expecting you to pay with money. I’m expecting you to pay with manual labour.’

  Florence needed them to help her fix a broken fence that was threatening to fall down and let her small flock of sheep roam free. She gave Brian a pair of tattered navy overalls that were a couple of sizes too big for him. He had to roll up the sleeves and legs so he could move around. Even though he didn’t mind wearing his own trainers, Florence wouldn’t hear of it. She gave him one of her spare pairs of wellingtons; they were a pale pink and covered in bright blue polka dots.

  ‘I’m not wearing those,’ he spluttered when he saw them.

  ‘Why ever not?’ Florence asked.

  ‘They’re girls’ wellies.’

  ‘Nonsense, they’re just a little colourful – that’s all,’ she replied. She looked down at her own black pair, streaked with muck. ‘Although, I have to admit, I prefer these. The pair you’re wearing were a present. More a fashion statement than a working pair of wellingtons. Whoever bought them for me doesn’t know much about wellingtons or farm life.’

  ‘I bought them for you,’ Amelia pouted.

  Florence broke into great peals of laughter. ‘I really put my foot in it there, didn’t I?’ she said, giving her granddaughter a friendly shove. ‘Right, Derek, if you’re brave enough to wear them, then you can come for lunch tomorrow as well.’

  That was enough for Brian. He hated wellies, but he loved Florence’s cooking.

  ‘I look ridiculous,’ he said, minutes later, as they tramped through the field.

  If he was hoping Amelia would reassure him that he didn’t actually look ridiculous, it was a false hope. She kept sniggering at him. When she wasn’t sniggering, she was taking photos with her phone, photos she was planning to show to the others later on. The grumpier Brian grew, the more delighted she became. The wellies weren’t just too colourful, they were a little too big as well, something that Florence had remedied by crumpling up some newspaper and stuffing it in the toe of each boot.

  ‘You’re a bit short for your age, aren’t you?’ she said, although not unkindly.

  Brian’s sense of ridiculousness was made worse by Amelia’s stylishness. She looked as if she was heading for a fashion show rather than a couple of hours’ work in the field.

  Brian soon found out that physical work wasn’t as bad as his father made out. In fact, he quite enjoyed it. Brian held the fence posts in place while Florence hammered them into the doughy earth with a huge sledgehammer. Then they tacked the silver-coloured mesh wire to the post.

  Amelia did her best to help, but she was more of a hindrance and was annoyed with herself when she kept making silly mistakes. She couldn’t understand how she was able to do so well in school, always near the top of her class, yet doing something like putting up a fence made her look foolish. She fell over twice, somehow managed to staple her second favourite cardigan to a post and was finally persuaded to take a break when, after insisting she could control the sledgehammer, she almost smashed Brian’s toes. Luckily, she hit the part of the wellington that was filled with crumpled paper.

  ‘I’m not normally this soft with her,’ Florence whispered when Amelia was engrossed in posting a picture of them working online. ‘But she’s finding it difficult now, having to move out of her own home because of all the rows and the baby stuff. It’s a big change.’

  Brian didn’t know what to say, so he just nodded. He thought Amelia had said she was here for a few weeks to look after her grandmother. He didn’t think he’d ever met anybody who needed less looking after than Florence Parkinson. And what was all that about the baby stuff and having to move out? He wondered why Amelia had lied to him.

  Florence smiled. ‘You’re a good worker.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he said.

  He’d enjoyed the work. Really enjoyed it. And, to his surprise, he found he liked the praise too. It made him feel all warm and sort of glowy inside, not that he’d tell anyone that.

  By the time they’d finished and washed up and Amelia had changed outfits – from her farm working clothes into a print sweatshirt and skinny jeans – it was a few minutes past four o’clock. They were late meeting the others in the den.

  Chris stood up. He had a blue folder in his hand. He opened it and handed a printout to each of them. It was the picture Amelia had taken at the cottage, the one he’d enlarged to A3 size the previous day.

  ‘We have to find out who this person is,’ Hannah said. ‘I think he’s the guy in charge of the stolen goods and I believe he has at least one man, maybe two working for him. One of them seems to be lazy and he smokes. The other seems to want to do his job properly.’

  ‘They might have already left the country or at least gone somewhere that’s difficult for us to find them,’ Chris said.

  ‘Like Zanzibar,’ Amelia said.

  ‘Yes, Amelia, like Zanzibar.’

  ‘We’re not going to be able to search for them anywhere that isn’t within cycling distance of Newpark,’ Brian said.

  ‘I know, but we have to assume they’re still in the area. Just because they moved the goods, it doesn’t mean they’ve moved them very far. They might be just driving around . . .’ Hannah said.

  For a moment, it looked as if there was something wrong with Brian. He shut his eyes and lay back on a beanbag without saying a word. Amelia guessed he had some kind of headache, but she was wrong.

  ‘Are you OK?’ she asked.

  He put a finger to his lips to ask for silence. He needed to think. Driving around, Hannah had said. Mrs Doherty, the shopkeeper, hadn’t recognized the two men who’d been in the Subaru Impreza. She’d thought they were just driving around too.

  It was coming back to him now. He hadn’t recognized the voices in the cottage immediately because when he’d heard them previously – other than when they’d been roaring threats at him – he’d been groggy after his fall. They’d sounded slightly different then, a little blurry, if a sound could be blurry. That’s why it had taken him a while to remember. But it was them, all right. He was sure of it. His eyes snapped open, like a villain suddenly coming back to life at the end of a film.

  ‘Nice creepy vibe,’ Sam said.

  ‘The two men in the cottage drive a Subaru Impreza,’ Brian said.

  ‘Wow, that was some really impressive Sherlock Holmestype deductions there,’ Chris said. ‘How do you know? Paint flecks from the car on their clothing? One of them carrying a distinctive key fob that only works on that type of car? Something else from the mind palace?’

  ‘No,’ Brian said. ‘I saw them driving it.’

  He explained what had happened to him when he’d encountered the men at Mrs Doherty’s shop. Sam was annoyed that Brian hadn’t told them the story before, seeing as how their days were normally lacking in adventure, but he was shushed by the others. Brian told them everything he remembered about the situation.

  ‘This gets more and more interesting,’ Hannah said.

  Sam rolled his eyes
. Any time Hannah grew excited by a case, she said things were getting interesting.

  ‘Have you ever seen them around Newpark before?’ she asked.

  ‘Never,’ Brian said. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to remember the car’s licence plate number, but Hannah reckoned they had enough information to get started.

  Chris took note of descriptions of the men. He was planning to find an online photofit programme later, but, to his surprise, Amelia volunteered her services as an artist. She explained that she spent some of her free time sketching and painting. She’d never shown her friends at home any of her work or even told them she drew. Somehow, she felt more comfortable around her new friends than she did with her friends back home.

  Hannah gave her a pencil and paper, and Amelia got to work. Her skill as an artist was impressive, but her attempts to recreate the men’s faces took longer than necessary due to Brian’s inability to describe them clearly.

  ‘He had a fatter head.’

  ‘Wider? More jowly? Chubbier cheeks?’

  ‘Just fatter. Make it fatter.’

  ‘How exactly? You’re not making clear.’

  ‘Put more fat on his head.’

  Finally, he was happy with the likenesses Amelia produced.

  ‘Yes, that’s them. It’s actually really like them. That’s great, Amelia.’

  ‘Shut up,’ Amelia muttered, embarrassed but pleased.

  ‘We have to come up with a strategy,’ Chris said.

  ‘Of course we do,’ Sam said. ‘We should colour code it and print it out and laminate it and give it a sensible name.’

  Chris ignored the sarcasm. He unrolled the poster of the man in the woods. He looked a little like one of the men Amelia had drawn, but it was difficult to be sure.’

  The Misfits Club now knew what at least two of the men they were searching for looked like. They just had no idea how to find them.

  PROGRESS REPORT

  ON THE CASE OF

  ‘THE COTTAGE IN THE WOODS’

  By Hannah Fitzgerald