Gideon the Cutpurse Read online

  ‘It’s all right, Molly, I’m okay …’ With one hand still on the generator, she reached towards the Golden Labrador.

  ‘Don’t touch her!’ cried Dr Dyer, just too late. The static electricity flowing from the Van der Graaf generator through Kate’s fingers set every hair on Molly’s golden coat on end. The poor animal whimpered in fright and she shot like a bullet out of the laboratory door into the corridor before anyone could grab hold of her.

  ‘Quick! Don’t let her get away,’ shouted Dr Dyer. ‘Heaven knows what mischief she could find to do in this place …’

  He raced towards the door and in his haste tripped over a box of printer paper. He fell badly and clutched at his knee, wincing in pain. Peter and Kate rushed to help him.

  ‘Don’t worry about me – get that dog!’

  They tore after Molly, hearing the clatter of her claws as she skidded on the grey lino. As he ran, Peter watched Kate’s red hair in front of him, swishing from side to side as if in slow motion, and every so often he caught a glimpse of Molly’s solid form accelerating in front of them. He was dimly aware of hurtling along the long corridor and then down the basement stairs and through a half-open door, aware of just trying to keep up with Kate until, from one second to the next, the course of his life changed, and he charged slap bang into … nothing. The world dissolved for Peter. All sensation ceased. No pain. No noise. No heat. No great light. None of the things you might think would accompany such a momentous event – just an instantaneous, inexplicable, cavernous NOTHING.

  A terrible dread came over me as I lay concealed within the bush. Although I was well hidden, to be so close to this foul creature who had been on my trail for so many days was a torment. I watched the Tar Man examining his new-found treasure, his familiar greasy hat perched on his crooked head. I do not deny that I was sorely tempted to escape while the Tar Man was thus occupied with his unexpected booty. Yet I sat back down in my prickly hawthorn bush, resolved to follow my conscience and stay with the children until they were out of danger – for I knew what it was to feel remorse. I had learned that lesson long ago.

  The Life and Times of Gideon Seymour,

  Cutpurse and Gentleman, 1792

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Three-cornered Hat

  In which Peter finds himself in a

  puzzling and precarious predicament

  As he was either asleep or unconscious, Peter had no idea of the danger he was in. In his dream he was being sucked down a great, dark tunnel that had no end and no beginning. Spirals of light floated through him and his whole body tingled as if he were being dissolved in sherbet. Like a fairground ride, he did not want it to stop.

  He did not notice when the black and white cow with the long horns came over and licked the salt from his eyes with her meaty, pink tongue. Streaks of saliva dripped down his cheeks. Peter brushed the Longhorn away in his sleep. The sudden movement startled her and she moved away, giving him sidelong glances now and then.

  Nor did Peter notice a menacing figure some five metres behind him although there was someone else who did: a young, blond-haired man was crouching, fearful, in a thicket of hawthorn bushes some little way away. The frightening individual, whose every movement the young man closely observed, was a tall, powerfully built man who wore a vast, ragged coat and a black hat in the shape of a triangle. He carried his head at a curious angle and his square shoulders were hunched over the end of a wooden cart to which was tethered a piebald horse. He was cursing and blowing as he heaved a large, heavy object into position on the cart and attempted to secure it with some oddments of rope. The object appeared to be some kind of device or machine. All of a sudden, the man leaped backwards away from the cart as if he had received an electric shock. He then stood rooted to the spot for several minutes, clearly too terrified to move. At last he found the courage to approach the object once more.

  It was easy to see why he had taken fright: all down the right-hand side, the ropes were sinking into the base of the machine as though into thick mud. And again, on this side but not on the other, the machine itself was becoming transparent, like dark glass, or treacle. The man took out a fierce-looking knife and, with a trembling hand, struck the solid side of the object, which produced a sharp, ringing sound. Then he struck the transparent side. This time the blade sank instantly and silently into the object and then stuck there as if it were set in stone. The man pulled with all his might then tried to jerk it out but to no avail. Frustrated, he let go of the handle and stood scratching his head in bewilderment. As he watched, the knife blade started to slide smoothly out of its own accord as if repelled by the very substance from which the machine had been made.

  Meanwhile Peter was beginning to emerge from his dream world and became aware of a terrible pain throbbing inside his head. It felt as though his brain had grown too large for his skull and was pressing up against the inside of his forehead. He lay quietly, unable to move, gradually becoming conscious of sunshine on his face and a cool breeze which ruffled his hair. He struggled to shift to one side of what felt like a large stone digging into his ribs. Things weren’t making sense but Peter was too dazed and confused to let that bother him. He listened to birds twittering and bees buzzing and crickets chirruping. When he heard a kind of snorting noise he tried to take a look but his eyelids refused to obey orders and remained firmly closed. Then he noticed that his legs felt really weird, too – almost as if they weren’t there. And he longed for something to drink. Some Coca-Cola would be nice. Oh yes, some ice-cold Coca-Cola would be perfect. He licked his parched lips and decided to go down to the kitchen to see what he could find.

  As Peter concentrated all his efforts on opening his eyelids, a sharp, tweaking pain made him realise that it was because his eyelashes were firmly stuck together, crusted over with some dried up gooey stuff. He tried to work up some spittle in his poor dry mouth and spat into the palms of his hands. Then he rubbed his eyes furiously. The world, in a blinding flash of sunlight, came into view. He opened and closed his eyes until they stopped watering and he could focus properly again. His eyes widened. This wasn’t his home, this wasn’t London, this wasn’t what he was expecting. No, this was most definitely not what he was expecting.

  The cow stood in front of him, tearing up great chunks of grass and snorting through her nose as she chewed. She flicked her tail and twitched her muscles in an effort to shoo away a cloud of flies that hovered around her. Beyond the animal a beautiful valley stretched as far as the eye could see. The grass was long and had turned to hay; dandelion seeds and thistledown floated through the air. Still too woozy to be seriously frightened, Peter reasoned that he was still dreaming. The sun seemed terribly bright and he rested his arm over his eyes to shade them.

  And then, so abruptly that he did not have time to react, two gnarled, filthy hands landed on his chest and started to prod and press him through his padded anorak as if he were a suspect being searched by the police. The hands worked their way from neck to toe, their cunning fingers sliding into every pocket, checking every crease. Peter felt his woollen scarf being pulled from his neck and heard the jingle of coins as his pocket money was removed from his trouser pocket. It was only his sense of self-preservation that kept Peter from screaming. He froze. He had the sense to close his eyes and go limp when he felt his arm being lifted away from his face. The owner of those black fingernails scrutinised him and pinched his cheek. Peter managed not to flinch, held his breath, played dead. A pungent smell of tobacco smoke and ale and stale sweat made him want to retch but he fought the urge. He could feel those unseen eyes burning into him. By now his heart was thumping so hard he felt certain the man must be able to hear it but a second later Peter’s arm was allowed to flop back down over his eyes.

  He let his breath out as slowly and silently as he could manage and cautiously opened his eyelids a crack. Now it was Peter’s turn to scrutinise his attacker from under his arm. The man was crouching next to him alternately inspecting the pound coins
he had stolen and biting them between his back teeth. Then he turned his attention to Peter’s trainers, stroking the material, examining the soles, pulling at the laces. Peter’s heart started to beat even harder – what was so interesting about his trainers? Was he a thief or was he just crazy? The man had a strong, angular nose and black hair that escaped in rats’ tails from under a strange, triangular hat. The thing which caught Peter’s attention above all was a terrible scar, a startling white against his dark, weather-beaten skin, which snaked down into his face in the shape of a crescent moon that started above his right eyebrow and reached down to below his jaw. There was something not quite right about his neck, too, for he held his head constantly tipped to one side.

  Now the man stood up and stepped over his legs, but not before giving him a sharp kick to his shins. To Peter’s alarm, he could scarcely feel the impact of the kick. A terrible thought flashed into his mind. Have I been in an accident? Can I walk?

  ‘Never try to hoodwink a hoodwinker,’ a slow, rasping voice calmly announced. ‘I know that you are awake.’ The stranger leaned over and pulled Peter’s arm from his face. The sun was low in the sky and when Peter opened his eyes he was dazzled. He squinted at his assailant who now knelt at Peter’s feet examining a handful of long, bright red hair. Peter heaved himself up on his elbows as well as he could to see where the hair had come from and saw that the body of a girl was draped over his ankles. He all but cried out in shock. Who was she? The man tugged on the hair, pulling up the girl’s head from its grassy resting place. He examined her face dispassionately and then lowered the hair, letting the head drop back down into the mud. Peter watched in horror as the man drew out a long knife and pulled on the long red hair once more.

  ‘No! No!’ shouted Peter. ‘Please don’t!’

  The man turned to look at him and as Peter stared into that terrible face he knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that this was a man capable of anything.

  ‘Life is not kind, young master. Nor fair neither. Haven’t you learned that yet? Don’t go expecting kindness from one who has been shown none.’

  Then the man laughed and pinched Peter’s cheek again. This time Peter pushed his hand away. The man laughed again and picked up a few strands of the silky hair and rubbed them between finger and thumb. He cut them and let them float to the ground.

  ‘I could dine handsomely for a month on hair of this quality.’ He paused and then continued. ‘You have no cause to fear me – not so long as you’re free with your information. If I’d wanted you dead you’d already be at Saint Peter’s gate. But tell me this, if you please: what manner of contraption is it that spews out children more dead than alive onto this desolate place?’

  Behind them, an unseen hand from within a large hawthorn bush aimed a stone at the flank of the piebald horse. The stone found its target and the old mare whinnied in pain and shock. She strained to shift the heavy cart up the slope and was soon disappearing at a fast canter over the brow of the hill. The curious machine lurched precariously on the back of the cart.

  The man looked from Peter to the escaping animal and back again, undecided what to do. Then he sprang up and set off in hot pursuit of his horse and cart. He was a powerful and surprisingly elegant runner. Peter had the feeling that, despite his wrecked face, this was still quite a young man. He turned at the top of the slope and shouted down to Peter so that his voice echoed all around the valley: ‘I have other, pressing matters to attend to. Find me at the Black Lion Tavern in Covent Garden if you want to see your infernal machine again – and if you have any sense don’t come empty-handed. Ask for Blueskin, though many do call me the Tar Man.’

  The Tar Man was now lost to view in the next valley and Peter listened to the distant rumble of the cart growing fainter and fainter. He let his head sink back onto a clump of buttercups. He felt sick and faint and the pain in his head throbbed unbearably. The Tar Man – what kind of a name was that? What infernal machine? He stared up at a hawk hovering above him in the pale blue sky and thought of nothing at all. The limp body of the girl was still bundled across his ankles, her bright hair trailing in the mud next to his feet. Soon Peter slipped out of the real world and lost consciousness once more. This time he dreamt that he was a spider caught at the bottom of a glass, and each time he started to climb out, he found himself sliding back to the bottom.

  By the time Dr Dyer had picked himself up off the floor and got down to the basement, there was no sign of the children. Molly soon reappeared, although she was trembling with fright. ‘Kate! Peter!’ called Dr Dyer at the top of his voice. There was an eerie silence. Dr Dyer had the feeling in the pit of his stomach that something terrible had occurred. He looked round at Tim’s laboratory and his feeling of dread increased. The anti-gravity machine was gone! For a moment, where the machine should have been, Dr Dyer had the strange sensation that he was seeing the blade of a knife, point down, floating in mid-air. He shook his head and looked again. It was gone. ‘Kate! Peter!’ he shouted. ‘Molly’s here. Where are you? Lunch will be getting cold!’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The Howl of a Wolf

  In which the police and Kate come to some

  conclusions about their predicament and

  the children spend the night in a birch wood

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!’

  Peter was instantly awake again. He propped himself up on his elbows and gawped at the strange girl who was silhouetted against the crimson sky as the last rays of the sun lit up the valley that stretched out before him. Her screams echoed all around, bouncing off one slope after another until each one repeated itself, deafeningly, three or four times. Peter watched the girl staring in horror at a handful of hair which she held in front of her. The sight of the red hair reminded him of something … a memory flickered tantalisingly on the surface of his mind then vanished just as quickly. Peter’s head throbbed even more sitting like this and he slumped back down into the long grass.

  As frightened as she had ever been in her life, Kate looked wildly around her, quite incapable of making any sense of what had happened to her. Where on earth was she? And what kind of creepy person would cut off a chunk of her hair? And where was that person now? She let go of the clump of hair and the breeze carried it towards a giant thistle where the long, red strands got caught up in its spiky leaves like horsehair on barbed wire. The sight of it was strangely upsetting. She screamed again.

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’

  Peter put his hands over his ears. His head hurt far too much to cope with this.

  Kate didn’t particularly want to stop screaming because when she did she was going to have to decide what else to do – and frankly that was going to be difficult. Where was her Dad? Where was Molly? What …

  ‘Shut up!’ shouted Peter over the racket.

  Kate’s mouth remained open but no more noise came out as she looked down at the skinny boy who sat gaping up at her. His dark hair was sticking up on end and buttercup petals were sticking to his cheek. He looked as horrified as she felt.

  ‘Oh, no, it’s you!’ she exclaimed. Bits of straw and dry mud were now stuck to her matted hair.

  ‘I don’t know you!’ cried Peter. ‘Who are you? What have you done to me?’

  Kate walked unsteadily over to Peter. She sank down onto her knees next to him and tore the hair away from her face, showing a mass of golden freckles over pale cheeks and frightened, grey eyes. All the screaming had made her voice husky.

  ‘What do you mean, you don’t know me? I’ve only been forced to spend half the morning with you … except then it was winter and now it’s summer and then we were with my Dad and now we’re … in this place. I knew you were going to be trouble as soon as I saw you.’

  Peter looked at her in silent astonishment. He was so confused he could not tell whether this was dream or reality. The girl looked familiar but he really couldn’t remember who she was.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Kate asked
. ‘You’re ever so pale. Did you know you’ve got a massive bruise on your forehead?’ She touched him where a large purple bruise was blossoming on his temple and Peter winced.

  ‘And I’ve lost Molly! Oh, Molly, Molly, where are you?’

  Kate was on the verge of crying again and quickly turned away from Peter and reached into her pocket for a handkerchief. She blew her nose noisily and sat quietly for a minute to compose herself. There has to be a logical explanation for all this! I just can’t see it right now … And it must be because Peter’s been hit on the head that he can’t remember who I am …

  Peter turned to watch Kate get to her feet purposefully. She sprinted up the slope behind him, shading her eyes and scanning the horizon for signs of life. Then she whistled through her teeth like the farmers do at sheepdog trials. ‘Molly, come!’ she shouted. ‘Molly, come!’

  Peter lay watching this scene play out before him like a film at the cinema. It began to seem like this was happening to someone else when, suddenly, an excruciating, tingling pain started to run up and down Peter’s legs like an electric current. He writhed in agony, rolling backwards and forwards in the long grass and clutching at the calves of his legs. It was Peter’s turn to let out a piercing shriek that ricocheted across the peaceful landscape. He tried to stand up and immediately fell over. As his shoulder blades hit the ground there was a suspicious squelching sound. Peter was in too much pain to take any notice for the moment.