Dear Scarlett (14 page)

We don’t bother to get dressed. Anyway, that would raise suspicion. We abandon the lilos on the tank, and in our swimsuits, tiptoe through the gap in the hedge behind the watercress beds and stumble into the airfield.

The control tower looks exactly like a shed balanced on a pyramid of girders.

“What are we looking for?” says Ellie, panting over the grass.

“I don’t know, we’re just looking up.”

It doesn’t take long, it isn’t far away. There’s a huge red sign saying KEEP OUT and some barbed-wire
balls, but someone’s cut a path through and we pick our way past without tearing ourselves to pieces. In retrospect, clothing might have been a good idea, but it’s too late now. We stop under the legs of the tower and stare up.

I’ve hoped that “up” would be obvious. But when I look up, all I can see is the underside of the tower. There’s a rusty ladder from the ground to a small trapdoor.

“Scarlett?” says Ellie doubtfully.

I put my foot on the first rung of the ladder. It’s hot from the sun, but feels solid, so I climb the next and so on.

“Scar-lett,” calls Ellie.

But I keep going until I can reach the trapdoor, which is held closed by a padlock. A small rusty padlock, but a padlock all the same.

Rats.

So this is why he gave me his tools. Not for penguins, or sweets, but for the airfield.

Rats, rats, rats.

“What is it?” calls Ellie.

“A padlock.”

“Oh, pooh,” she says. “Shall I go back for your dad’s tools?”

“No – you’ll get caught. We’ll have to think of something else. Can you find a rock?”

Ellie starts searching around on the ground; there’s nothing but grass and tarmac. But at the edge of the airfield there’s a pile of old farm equipment rusting by the hedge.

“There!” I point. “A bar, or anything?”

I start to clamber back down the ladder. The metal rungs are hard on my feet, so Ellie reaches the pile of rubbish long before I make the bottom of the ladder.

“Here!” she shouts. She’s waving a thing like a crowbar. “Will this do?”

I clamber up the ladder again, this time much more conscious of only wearing a swimsuit. The ladder’s rusty and my knees scrape against the rough metal, and I’ve nowhere to carry the iron bar. I have to jam it under my armpit until I reach the top. I wobble it above my head until it wedges through the loop that the padlock’s attached to. I twist it round and the wood splinters, letting the screws of the loop loose.

“Mind out!” I shout and throw the bar to the ground.

There’s a piece of wood acting as a fastener, so
I twirl it round and the trapdoor above my head becomes heavy. I have to duck to let it open.

I look down at Ellie. “I’m going in. Do you want to come?”

“No thanks, I’ll be a lookout.”

She makes a thumbs up and, with a mixture of fear and excitement, I hoist myself up through the opening.

It’s exactly like a shed. An octagonal shed with an amazing view, all the way over to the sea, and back to our garden. It’s even more like a shed because it’s filled with old rubbish. Although all the walls have windows, someone’s hung things on nails above them, so the view’s spotted with gas masks and ancient furry jackets and it’s all smothered in cobwebs.

In the middle of the space, next to the trapdoor, is a huge desk piled high with old electrical stuff, dials and knobs and wires as if someone started to empty the place but gave up when they realised
they’d have to lug it all down the ladder.

Under one of the windows, the one that faces towards our house, lies a much more modern rucksack, and a toolkit. I pick up the rucksack and shake the contents on to the floor.

“What have you found?” shouts Ellie, from below.

“Nothing much,” I say.

There’s glue, paper, scissors, a brand-new sweatshirt, still with tags on, an empty water bottle, a torch, a teach-yourself Mandarin Chinese book, an empty sandwich box and a pair of binoculars. Wedged in the bottom, there’s one of those sleeping bags that squeeze into impossibly tiny bags, and a high-tech inflatable mattress in the shape of a coffin.

He slept up here?

I pick up the binoculars. Dad’s? I look through them. The wood on the side of the shed looks very big, the floorboards so close that they’re out of focus. I lift the binoculars so that I’m looking through the window and point them towards our garden. Fantastic – I can see mice running along the edge of the compost heap. I can see Uncle Derek changing into his tracksuit in Mum’s bedroom,
my bedroom curtains, closed against the sun, and Mum cutting bread in the kitchen. I can even see what Syd’s watching on TV.

I stare through the binoculars at my brother moving around in the house.

So he watched us. He saw me, all the time. He’d have seen me getting up in the morning, going to bed at night. He’d have watched me go to school on the first day, in Mum’s car, wearing my first school uniform. He must have seen the plumber under the sink, Mum fussing about, trying to make tea. He’d have watched it from here, the day he wrote the letter. I look around, and there’s a biro lying on the dusty desk, with a few sheets of yellowed paper.

I blow the dust away. There in Dad’s writing are a mass of false starts. The letter, written a hundred times in different ways:
Scarlett love, Darling Scarlett, My dearest little one…

All written while I played outside in the garden with Mum’s teapot and the leaves. I collect up all the paper.

“Scarlett – are you all right?” yells Ellie from below.

“Sorry – yes, but I haven’t found it yet. Whatever it is.”

“Look up?” she says.

I do look up.

There’s another trapdoor. Not locked, but there’s no way of getting up there, no ladder.

I pull the chair across the wooden floor until it’s underneath the trapdoor and stand on tiptoes. I can just reach the bolt. It takes several goes to get it to slide across but in the end, the trapdoor slams open, showing a rectangle of blue sky.

The roof slopes, so I place my fingers over the lower edge of the opening and pull myself up. It hurts, the prickly stuff on the outside of the roof digs into my fingers and I nearly let go, but just manage to hang on long enough to throw my shoulders over the edge of the opening. I balance for an age to get my breath back before scraping the rest of my body through the hole.

This is high up. I look down the slope of the roof; there’s a small railing around the side, but it’s been there for a horribly long time and I don’t suppose it would stop me falling. Keeping my fingers on the hatchway, so that if I feel dizzy I can fall back into the room below, I look up and around. Above me, a short ladder leads to a mass of antennae and small things that look like satellite
dishes. They’re all grey and ancient.

Keep looking up.

“Scarlett!” Ellie’s voice, but really far away now. I know she’s not warning me about Uncle Derek and Mum, they’re still in the house, I can see shapes moving about in the kitchen.

“Yes – I’m on top now.”

But I can’t hear her answer. Now I’m up here, it’s as if the sounds come from further away – there’s a tractor in a field over at Dampington, a load of seagulls circling the zoo, children playing in the park, a car engine quite close, probably Uncle Derek going to work, and the really close sound of the antennae rubbing against each other. The sun’s warm on my skin, but there is a breeze up here.

What an excellent place.

Perhaps that’s what Dad wanted me to find; a new point of view.

Keep looking up.

There’s nothing above but the old metalwork, and probably an even better view.

I turn really slowly, my feet still kicking in the empty room below and bend my back until I can sit on the edge of the trapdoor. From here I can crawl up the prickly roofing cover to the ladder.

I try not to think about down. But I can’t help imagining Ellie underneath the tower, tiny, and me on top, also tiny, and the distance between me and the ground: vast. And the ground underneath isn’t exactly bouncy, and there isn’t a safety net.

So instead I think about Dad.

Dad sitting up here with his binoculars.

Dad crawling over the roof, the little sharp green edges of the roofing digging into his knees.

Dad sleeping in the tower, eating sandwiches, learning Chinese; living as close to us as he could, waiting for his next mission.

I wonder if Mum knew he was there? I imagine her signalling to him out of the window, meeting him by the big tank in the dark.

And then I look out across the fields and try to get inside Dad’s head.

I don’t think she knew he was there. I think it was a secret, to keep us safe. I think he did everything to keep us safe.

The ladder feels strong. When I pull on it, it doesn’t flex. Safe? I think about some of the gym equipment at school. It’s probably about the same age.

Putting my left foot on the bottom rung I haul
the rest of my body up until I’m standing on it and can lock my arms around the top.

From here, I can see the sea.

There’s a ferry coming into the harbour, followed by a huge crowd of seagulls.

This is an even better view; I can practically see the Isle of Wight.

Keep looking up.

So I look up.

One tall grey mast.

One short grey mast. Covered in lichen.

Two meshy square things on sticks.

One large grey satellite dish, catching the light.

One large grey satellite dish, not catching the light.

I look again.

The satellite dish that’s catching the light is really bright.

Ridiculously bright.

I’m not going to get excited, but I’ll take a look, just to be sure.

I climb the ladder so that my arms are above it; there isn’t really anything to hang on to now, except the antennae. I hold the taller antennae, and rub my fingers across the middle of the satellite dish.

It’s lumpy.

Really gently, I pick at one of the lumps, it comes away in my hand and I stare at it.

I pluck eight diamonds from the dish, stuff them inside my swimsuit and pick my way down the ladder. My heart’s pumping crazily, I’m not sure if it’s the height or the diamonds, and I have to stop several times on my way down the roof.

When I reach the trapdoor, I drop through on to the floor and look around for something to hold the diamonds. Dad’s backpack, just the thing.

I slip the diamonds into the smallest pocket and stop.

I could take the backpack up with me, and some pliers from the toolkit to help pick off the rest of
the diamonds.

Or I could rush down and show Ellie, and Mum and Uncle Derek, and I could tell Mum about the sweets and give her these diamonds at the same time.

I can wait for the rest of the diamonds.

Dad’s backpack’s big, so it’s hard to get through the trapdoor, and I have to take the rungs really slowly because it feels like I’m being pulled backwards.

“Ellie, I’ve found them, they’re up on the satellite dish, there must be loads. I’ve got some here.”

There’s no answer, I look around, but I can’t see her.

“Ellie?”

I keep climbing down, slowly, one rung at a time, although I’d love to put my feet on either side and whizz down like a fireman.

I’m nearly at the bottom. “Ellie?”

“Scarlett.” A hand touches me on the shoulder.

I stop.

That isn’t Ellie, and it isn’t Uncle Derek either.

I look round.

The chauffeur. He’s holding the backpack, even though I’m still wearing it.

“Thanks, Scarlett,” he says. “Saved us a lot of bother.”

“Where’s Ellie?” I say.

“Safe, if you cooperate. How many did you get?”

I shrug. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t be silly, girly. What you got in that backpack? Eh?”

He closes one hand round my wrist and I pull away, but he’s much stronger than me.

Something moves behind him, it’s the big black car and the lady mayoress is at the wheel, but she can’t drive through the barbed wire.

“Where’s Ellie?” I cry, leaning back, but going nowhere, my feet can’t grip enough to get away.

“’Urry up, you idiot – get the brat in,” the huge woman shouts from the car.

She throws the back door open and I see Ellie inside, tied up in sweaters.

“Help!” I yell, still clinging to the backpack. I know my voice’ll be lost in the seagulls. But I try again. “HELP!”

“Heeeeelllllpppppp!” screams Ellie at the top of her voice. “Daaaaaad!!!”

“Shut up!” says the man, trying to get me through the gap in the wire. I kick, but with no shoes he
doesn’t seem to notice and I’m losing ground, although I’ve still got the backpack.

He lifts me off the ground and carries me through the wire until we’re almost at the car.

“Dadddddd!” yells Ellie, impressively loudly, and the woman stuffs a stocking in her mouth.

“HELP!” I shout, and pull the pocket on the side of the bag with my teeth. Using my knee, I flip the bag over to tip the diamonds on to the ground. Even there, on the tarmac they glow. The man stops – caught between rescuing the diamonds and bundling me into the car.

It’s as if the world’s stopped, they’re both staring, and Ellie too, and although I’d love nothing better than to watch the evening sun dancing on the diamonds, I take my chance and sink my teeth as hard as I can into his arm.

“Yow!” he screams.

Ellie rolls from the car, spluttering, but despite her size the woman leaps to grab her, whisking her up in the air and dumping her back in the car.

I bite harder; his flesh feels weird under my teeth.

“DEVIL CHILD!” the man bellows, kicking at me. He lands one on my foot. I nearly let go, but clamp my jaws down on his arm, feeling his skin
rupture.

“GET OFF!” he yells, running backwards towards the barbed wire. “OW!” The wire snags the back of his head.

I let go and run in the direction of home. We need help.

A figure in black springs towards me, over our garden hedge. “HEY!” It’s Uncle Derek. “YOU – LEAVE MY GIRLS ALONE!” He moves so fast that the chauffeur seems to be in slow motion, his legs striding out, but getting nowhere, before Uncle Derek throws him to the ground.

I turn and sprint in the direction of the car. I don’t know what I can do about stopping it, but the lady mayoress is scrabbling on the tarmac, trying to pick up the diamonds, she hasn’t made it back into the driving seat yet.

“Hey!” I yell.

She turns, breaking her stride, and I skip past and jump into the driving seat. I slam the door and push down the lock. For a moment she just stares before grabbing the door handle, her eyes burning with fury through the glass. Behind her I can see Uncle Derek trying to get handcuffs on the chauffeur.

I reach down with my feet. Two pedals. One must be go, one must be stop. I put my hands on the wheel and press the right-hand one.

The barbed wire makes a horrible noise along the side of the car.

Such a shame about the paintwork.

But lovely watching the lady mayoress run for her life.

As we follow her slowly round the air field, and chase her back to Uncle Derek, I think about the words in my ear.

My girls,
he said.

My girls.

I like the sound of that.