All Sorts of Possible (7 page)

Mason’s giant hands cupped Daniel’s shoulders like tiger’s paws.

‘It’s the fit,’ whispered Daniel.

‘The what?’

‘The fit.’

Mason grinned. ‘And what’s that then? What’s the fit?’ he asked, clamping his hands even tighter round Daniel’s shoulders.

Mason clapped his hands like a giant toddler too excited to speak until he had managed to calm down.

‘Daniel, this all sounds perfect,’ he said. ‘You’re a godsend.’ He winked at the boy and then produced a silver signet ring from his jacket pocket and held it up in
the orange light oozing out of the naked bulb. ‘I drop by so Lawson can solve a little problem of mine, because he’s my go-to guy for anything I can’t sort out, and discover
you’re here too. Daniel! The . . . the . . .’ He wafted a hand in front of him as if trying to catch the right words eluding him. ‘The . . . “magic boy” . . . who can
help Lawson do even more wondrous things than he ever could before.’

Mason slapped his thigh so hard that Daniel flinched. ‘This is all meant to be. This is . . .’ he drummed a big finger against his lips, ‘. . . fate.’ He beamed and shook
his head. ‘You have to marvel at the way the world works, don’t you? About how things always pan out the way you need them to.’ He held out the ring to Lawson. ‘I want to
see you two at work solving this problem of mine. I’m fascinated to see what you and the boy can do with this connection of yours. This . . . this . . .’

‘. . . fit,’ finished Lawson.

‘Precisely. So tell me what you can about the man who owned this ring for starters, Lawson. Think of it as a test for you both. I want to know if this fit can help you find the flask you
know I’m so desperate to have. Tracking it down is your top priority after all, and you’ve been working on it for weeks.’

But Lawson shook his head. ‘Our last effort took a lot out of me. I don’t know how hard we can push making the fit for now. About what might happen if we do.’

But Mason didn’t seem to hear. He just grabbed Lawson’s wrist, popping the fingers open, and put the silver ring in his palm, then perched himself on the seat of the armchair and
took out a small black notebook and a pen.

‘Lawson, you work for me, remember? Or would you like me to remind you some other way? I could ask the lads to help with that,’ he said, jolting a thumb towards Frank and Jiff.

Lawson stood staring at Mason for a moment and closed his fist round the ring and shook his head. ‘We’ll see what we can do.’

‘He’s gonna nick that ring, boss,’ giggled Frank, licking the scar above his lip.

‘Yeah, it’ll vanish right in front of our eyes,’ said Jiff, who shifted about to get comfortable on the sofa. Daniel noticed that the man had a hunched back, the top portion of
his spine humped like something had been stuffed beneath his jacket.

Mason raised a hand and the two men stopped laughing and the room filled with quiet. The only sound was the hum of the naked bulb above them.

Daniel looked at the floor when Mason stared at him, unsure what was going to happen or what he should do. And then he felt that warm golden sensation flicker up in his chest again.

When he looked up at Lawson, the man’s white face was already strained, the little tendons standing out in his neck like lengths of cord pulled tight. Lawson nodded and managed to smile.
‘Just focus on me, Daniel. Don’t be scared. Let’s just do what we did last time and see if I can connect with you even better than before.’

He closed his eyes. He clenched his fist harder round the ring, the knuckles shining whiter. Mutterings started rolling off his lips in whispers that could barely be heard.

Mason leant forward as if trying to listen, flipping open his notebook and readying his pen. Frank and Jiff were watching intently too.

When Lawson’s voice began to rise a little louder, Daniel felt the sensation in his chest increase. Like a hummingbird flitting, caged behind his ribs. The golden shimmer inside him grew
brighter and warmer, filling out the secret space even more than it had done before.

Images wafted at the corners of his eyes, drifting round the dull-lit room, vanishing if he looked too closely at them.

The body of a man, lit by a street light . . .

. . . lying in a pool of blood in a quiet road bordered by shops shuttered up for the night . . .

. . . the silver signet ring on his little finger.

Silver boot tips beside the dead man’s head and then somebody’s hand reaching down, the fingers hooking round the handle of a leather briefcase lying in the road.

A white car disappearing down the street into the dark.

He could hear Lawson describing these things as if he was seeing them too behind his lidded eyes. Lawson told Mason it was his money in the briefcase. That it had been taken
from the man who had been wearing the silver signet ring after he had been knocked down by a white car. Mason was nodding as he listened, jotting down details in his notebook, his tongue darting
out between his lips as he concentrated on what Lawson was telling him.

‘Who took it, Lawson?’ he asked. ‘
Who
took my briefcase full of money?’ Lawson’s face twitched harder, the muscles dancing in his cheeks, his lips
bleaching as he tried to see more. ‘Who was it, Lawson?’ growled Mason, his pen poised. ‘Tell me the number plate of this white car at least. Something I can use.’

As Lawson’s voice grew louder and more garbled, repeating the things he had already said, Daniel felt the wonderful warmth in his chest start to burn and become painful. It felt like the
flame from a match was being held against his skin. As Lawson’s voice became more frantic, the pain worsened.

‘Stop,’ said Daniel. ‘Stop. Something’s not right.’ He wasn’t sure if he had said that loud enough. Or said it at all. His mouth felt like it was turned
inside out. ‘Something’s wrong,’ he said again, but all he heard was a mumble in his throat.

‘What’s that, boy?’ asked Mason. ‘What did you say?’

But Daniel ignored him, focusing on Lawson instead, who was starting to shake, one of his eyes rolling up white into his head, like a pebble had been placed in the socket.

‘Let go,’ said Daniel with all the strength he could muster in his voice, the pain in his chest increasing as if someone was turning up a dial. ‘This feels as far as we can
go.’

Lawson wiped his nose with the back of his hand and there was a tiny stripe of blood across it, wet like paint. ‘Don’t panic, Daniel,’ he said. ‘You need to keep your
heart open. We need to see how much of a fit we can really make.’

‘Attaboy, Lawson,’ said Mason. ‘Keep working it. Tell me who stole my money.’

‘But something’s not right,’ replied Daniel, shaking his head. ‘It’s painful. It’s not like it was before.’

‘Don’t shut me out,’ shouted Lawson, his face waxing and waning, shining with sweat. ‘Don’t you want to know what we can really do? If we can help your
father?’

There was a painful knocking in Daniel’s forehead now. Each time he blinked, he saw Lawson’s face inside him and it felt as though the man was trying to take over his body with his
very being, reaching deep down into him. He could sense how scared Lawson was of Mason. How desperate he was to find out what the big, bald man wanted to know.

But, as the burning sensation in Daniel’s chest became more intense, he gritted his teeth and tried to ride it out because he wanted to know what the fit could really do too, whether it
might be powerful enough to bring his father back.

‘I won’t shut you out,’ he gasped. ‘I want to know. I want to see what we can do.’

Mason whooped. He muttered and swore and wiped his brow with the back of a meaty hand.

Daniel heard a strange sound starting up inside him, a clicking, like someone flicking a light switch on and off. Slow and regular at first, then steadily becoming faster and faster, until it
was just a constant buzzy sound, warbling inside him. It pounded his ears like an alarm. When it stopped suddenly, without warning, Daniel felt a jolt, as if a wire had been cut, and the pain in
his chest vanished immediately too, leaving just a hole again, filled with cold, gleaming dark.

Everyone in the room saw Lawson’s fist explode like a grenade.

The stump of his wrist was left raw and red and white. Like something still oozing blood on a butcher’s slab. The hand itself was nothing but mess on the walls and the ceiling.

Frank picked a bloody finger out of his lap and held it up, making a face to Jiff, who was laughing hysterically.

Lawson dropped to his knees and his head lolled forward on to his chest, the stump of his arm still outstretched as though being offered up for inspection. He began to shake and cough and he
raised his head, and, when he opened his eyes, he smiled, apparently unaware of his missing hand.

But then, slowly, his smile reversed, becoming the mirror image of itself, and he began to shake, his cheeks draining whiter and whiter. He tried clutching his arm to his chest, cupping his
remaining hand round it, below the stump, and rocking it like a baby.

‘Help me,’ he whispered. ‘Help me.’

But no one moved as Lawson’s stump pumped more blood down his arm.

‘Who’s got my money, Lawson?’ asked Mason calmly.

Daniel
knew
that Mason’s white handkerchief was on the floor beside Lawson. He
knew
he was kneeling down and picking it up. And he
knew
he was wrapping the
handkerchief round the man’s arm, fumbling with both ends of what was to become a simple knot to try and stem the flow of blood.

But he did not seem to own these movements. They just seemed to happen of their own accord.

As soon as it was tied, the handkerchief was already soaked, leaking crimson drops on to the floor. When Lawson put out his good arm to try and steady himself, it collapsed at the elbow as soon
as he put some weight on it and he hit the carpet with a grunt. He lay on his side in the shape of a question mark, a fierce line pumping in his throat, looking up at Daniel through narrow-slitted
eyes.

There was so much blood it was eating up the carpet.

And sitting in all that red was the silver signet ring.

When Mason crouched beside Daniel and touched the top of his shoulder, the boy flinched, and Mason had to grab him tight with one big hand so he didn’t topple over. The man picked up the
ring from the floor with a tissue he had plucked from a box on the sideboard. ‘Go and get a glass of water from the kitchen,’ he said softly. ‘We’ll ring for an
ambulance.’

When Daniel reached up a shaking hand for a tumbler in the cabinet, his mind was scrambled with different thoughts.

There was blood on the back of his hands and he set the glass down so he could rinse them off under the cold tap. He scrubbed the skin with a washing-up brush until it was red and sore. The pain
focused him down to a single thought that was clear and bright and hard, just like the tumbler beside him on the worktop catching the daylight.

He shut the kitchen door as quietly as he could and pulled out a wooden chair from the table and wedged it underneath the handle.

Go
, said a voice inside him.
Run
. But Daniel made himself walk slowly to the back door and open it quietly . . .

. . . birdsong and sunshine and a long stretch of lawn.

The garden was bordered by a tall wooden fence on all sides and he searched for the best way to climb it.

‘DANIEL?’ shouted Mason from the hallway.

Daniel stood with his foot raised like a tightrope walker waiting for the right moment to step out on to a high wire as he looked for a way out.

‘DANIEL!’ came Mason’s voice more urgently. ‘Don’t go doing anything stupid now.’ Behind him the door handle wiggled vigorously, but the chair held it fast.
And then a great force thumped against the door and the whole frame shuddered as the chair legs wobbled. Another crash came and two bright splinters popped out like fangs from the white painted
wood around the top hinge.

Daniel spotted a compost bin positioned beside the fence and knew it was his way up and over.

‘Daniel, I know who you are. Everyone does after what happened to you. And I know where your dad is. Addenbrooke’s Hospital, right?’

Daniel put his foot down. The sunshine warmed his face, but he was deathly cold inside.

‘I’ll have to pay him a visit if you don’t open this door. So let me in, little piggy, or I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow it right down.’

Daniel wanted to step out on to the grass. To run home back to his aunt and tell her everything. But he couldn’t. Not after Mason had mentioned his father. So he pulled the back door shut
and turned round and picked up the tumbler from the worktop and filled it from the tap. He carried it in a wobbly hand and pulled away the chair.

Mason was standing in the hallway, hands in his pockets. So casual was his stance, he could have been waiting for a bus. He took the tumbler, drained it and put in on the sideboard, wiping his
mouth with his hand.

‘Lawson’s dead,’ he said simply and then he turned round, making for the front door. ‘You’re coming with me.’

Daniel grabbed the edge of the sideboard to steady himself. He opened his mouth to ask if Lawson was really dead. About what had happened to the ambulance. But he found himself asking a
different question. ‘Where are we going?’

‘I thought we’d visit your dad now. Say hello.’ Mason opened the front door and he seemed to grow even bigger in the daylight that flooded in from outside.

Daniel walked towards him, glancing into the sitting room as he did so. Lawson was on the floor, staring up at the ceiling, not blinking. Daniel looked away quickly. His legs were nothing but
air. But he managed to make it out through the open door where he drew in great looping breaths that tasted of sunlight and green leaves and warm red bricks.

‘Don’t worry about your mess,’ said Mason, shutting the front door. ‘Frank and Jiff’ll clean it up.’ He cupped a big hand to his ear. ‘What’s
that?’

Daniel said nothing. Mason leant further towards him as if he was trying to hear something very quiet.