Hacker (16 page)

‘What brings you two here?’ he asked.

I was glad Gib was standing beside me. All of a sudden I felt very nervous.

‘Er … em … Sebastian, we were wondering if we could use your PC?’ Gib said. ‘It’s for our homework which has got to be in tomorrow. Dad doesn’t have a PC any more … It won’t take long. An hour at the most.’

‘We’re packing,’ Sebastian said.

‘We won’t disturb you,’ Gib persisted. ‘Honest we won’t.
Please
.’

‘And it’ll only take an hour?’ Aunt Beth said.

‘That’s right,’ we both said.

Aunt Beth and Sebastian looked at each other for several moments. I nudged Gib with my elbow. I didn’t like this. We were obviously intruding.

‘OK, you two can use it,’ Aunt Beth said, with a reluctant smile, ‘but I do wish you’d phoned first. Sebastian, why don’t you go upstairs and prepare it for them?’

‘That’s all right, Aunt Beth,’ I began. ‘We can do that.’

‘Oh no, I insist,’ Aunt Beth argued.

After directing an irritated look at Beth, Sebastian bounded up the stairs like some great, ungainly dog.

‘Come and have a drink first.’ Aunt Beth steered us into the hall and straight into the kitchen.

‘We don’t want to put you to any trouble,’ I said.

‘It’s no trouble,’ Aunt Beth replied, her tone telling us that if that was our wish, then we had failed.

Aunt Beth poured out two glasses of milk. I ask you! Milk! After pulling a face at Gib, I pretended to sip at mine. The smell alone was enough to make me want to gag! We stood and sipped in silence. No one seemed to have anything to say.

‘I’m afraid we don’t have any fruit juice. Sebastian and I didn’t go shopping this week because we’re leaving for Rio tomorrow. The milk came from the shop around the corner.’

Don’t they sell fruit juice then? I thought without saying it.

‘How’s your dad?’ Aunt Beth asked after another pause.

I shrugged.

‘He’s fine,’ Gib replied.

‘Has anything turned up yet?’ Aunt Beth asked.

We both shook our heads.

‘Not yet,’ said Gib.

‘I’m sure it will,’ Aunt Beth smiled. ‘You’re not drinking, Vicky.’

‘I thought I’d save it for when I was working upstairs.’ I said the first thing that came into my head. Not bad! I thought.

‘You two can use the PC now.’

Sebastian’s voice from the kitchen door made me jump. I hadn’t even heard him come downstairs. He seemed to fill the whole doorway, lengthways that is. He was as skinny as a piece of string but really tall. I could only vaguely remember Aunt Beth’s first husband and Sebastian was nothing like him.

‘Come on, Vicky.’ Gib grabbed me by the arm. ‘Thanks, Aunt Beth. It’s really kind of you.’

‘Yeah, thanks,’ I repeated.

‘You can use the PC room and the bathroom – and that’s it,’ Sebastian said as we passed him. ‘The other rooms are tips and I don’t want them disturbed until our packing is finished.’

I turned round to frown at him. ‘We weren’t going to go anywhere else.’

‘Fair enough,’ Sebastian replied with a smile.

I followed Gib out into the hall.

‘Here! Hold that, Gib.’ I gave him my glass of milk. Then I took off my jacket and hung it up over the banisters.

Gib handed my milk back to me and we both walked upstairs. The back bedroom with the PC in it was the only upstairs room which had the door open. All the other bedroom doors were closed – obviously deliberately.

‘Does he think we’re going to run off with his wardrobe or something?’ I whispered to Gib.

‘Come on. We’re obviously interrupting them so the sooner we start, the sooner we’ll finish,’ Gib whispered back.

I sat down at the PC and switched it on. Whatever it was that Sebastian had been preparing upstairs, it certainly hadn’t been the computer.

‘Here, Gib, could you chuck this away for me?’ I asked, handing him my milk.

While Gib went to the bathroom with his glass and mine, I fished Dad’s memory stick out of my school bag and started running the comms program. By the time Gib came back I was through to the Universal Bank network system.

‘I don’t suppose you could do me another favour?’ I asked Gib hopefully.

‘What?’

‘That milk has left a nasty taste in my mouth,’ I said. ‘I don’t suppose you could pop to the shop around the corner and get me a fruit smoothie or a ginger beer or something? Anything but cola.’

‘Oh, all right,’ Gib said reluctantly.

It was just as well I was sitting down! I gawped at Gib. ‘You mean you’re going to do it!’

‘Just this once,’ Gib said firmly. ‘So don’t push your luck.’

I kept my mouth shut, not wanting to spoil it. He was actually going to do it. If I’d had a diary I would have noted this day down for sure.

Once Gib left I tried logging on to the System Manager’s user account on the development machine, hoping it’d have the same ‘cabbage’ password it had on the live system. I was in luck. It did. Suddenly everything was going right.

‘I’m just going to the shop at the bottom of the road,’ I heard Gib tell Aunt Beth downstairs.

I frowned at the PC screen. Something was bothering me and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what it was. I wanted to type out the staff file again, just to make sure that we hadn’t missed anything. Then I needed to double-check the
ejones
account. I wanted to make sure there’d be no holes in the proof Gib and I presented to Dad and the police. No way was Eric going to wriggle his way out of this one. I typed out the staff file, stopping the screen when it got to the Js.

Then I knew what had been troubling me.

Eric’s account was the Systems Manager’s account. The user name for that account was
SYSTEM
not
ejones
. He must have set up the
ejones
account on the sly. Better and better. If he had, then it’d be easier to prove that he and only he could have changed the
TIMETRV
program. So now to check the
ejones
account.

I typed:

SYSTEM>DISPLAYSTAFFILE/BRIEF/USER NAME=EJONES

Then
ejones
appeared on the screen.

‘Yes!’ I clenched my fists and punched the air above my head. Closer and closer … But I needed more than just the user name played back to me. I chewed on my bottom lip until I realized what I’d done wrong. I typed:

>DISPLAY STAFFILE/FULL/USERNAME=EJONES

I decided I might as well get a list of all the privileges Eric had assigned himself, as well as his full system name and a summary of all the other information held for his account. I pressed the enter key and the information I wanted appeared on the screen. Unable to believe my eyes, I stared at it. I thought I was going crazy. I
had
to be going crazy. But there it was in big, pixellated letters. There were about five lines of data but all I was interested in were the top two. I checked, double-checked and triple-checked the lines to make sure I’d typed in the user name correctly.

>EJONES: JONES, ELIZABETH JANINE: SYSTEM:

ACCOUNT_LINK=CARTER, BETH

Elizabeth Janine Jones? The account link was to Aunt Beth’s user account. That meant once Aunt Beth had logged on using her ‘Beth Carter’ account, she could then log on again as
ejones
. And hers was the only account link. The
ejones
account had to belong to Aunt Beth.

But it couldn’t. I didn’t understand at all.

All at once, the hairs on my nape started to tickle and prickle. I rubbed the back of my neck but the feeling wouldn’t go away. Then my blood turned ice cold. I turned quickly – and there was Sebastian, standing right behind me.

‘I JUST KNEW
we shouldn’t have let you in here.’

I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even blink. I just stared up at Sebastian, horrified.

‘I knew you were up to something.’ Sebastian scowled at me. ‘What kid is that keen to do their homework? But Beth wouldn’t listen to me, would she. Now what are we going to do with you?’

And the look on his face clinched it. There was no mistake.

‘Aunt Beth and
ejones
are one and the same person … You’re the ones who did this to Dad …’ I whispered. Even though I knew it was true, I still couldn’t believe it. ‘You just wait till I tell Mum and Dad. You rotten, stinking …’

‘So they don’t know yet …’ Sebastian smiled at me. A smile that made my whole body tremble.

I could’ve bitten off my tongue. My mouth was the size of the Channel Tunnel at the best of times, but now I’d really surpassed myself.
Aunt Beth and Sebastian
…

‘Why Jones? I don’t understand that bit,’ I said.

Stay calm and keep talking, Victoria, I told myself. I had to figure a way out of this.

‘So you don’t know everything, you egg-headed little snoop.’ Sebastian folded his arms across his chest.

‘I know you and Aunt Beth set up my dad,’ I said furiously, all my thoughts about keeping calm flying out of the window. ‘I know Aunt Beth doctored the
TIMETRV
file to put one million pounds in Dad’s account, and I know she’s probably transferring money into one of your accounts tonight, ready for skipping off to Rio tomorrow. I’m not stupid, you know.’

‘No, you’re not, are you? In fact, you’re too clever for your own good, Victoria,’ Sebastian said softly.

I was in deep,
deep
trouble.

‘So why Jones?’ I asked again, desperate to keep Sebastian talking while I worked out my escape route.

‘Jones was Beth’s maiden name before she married,’ Sebastian said. ‘The bank’s previous Systems Manager decided it would be easier to create a new user account for Beth when she married for the first time, instead of modifying the old one. We discovered the old account by accident. It came in very useful, very useful indeed. And no one knew about it – until now.’

The doorbell rang. I made a break for the stairs.

‘Gib! GIB!’ I screamed.

A warm, sweaty hand was clamped over my mouth. I was lifted off the ground. I kicked and punched and scratched at Sebastian’s arms but he wouldn’t let me go. He carried me out on to the landing.

‘Sebastian, what’s going on?’ Aunt Beth was at the top of the stairs. The doorbell rang again.

‘She knows,’ Sebastian said.

Aunt Beth looked from Sebastian to me and back again. Her eyes narrowed and turned stone cold, stone hard. I tried to bite Sebastian’s fingers which were still over my mouth, but I couldn’t get a grip.

‘Gi … mmm … Gi …’ My shout was totally muffled by Sebastian’s fingers.

‘Beth, do something. They could ruin everything. You’ve got to get rid of her brother,’ Sebastian hissed.

‘How do I do that?’ Aunt Beth said urgently.

‘Think of something,’ snapped Sebastian.

‘Gi … Gi …’

Her forehead furrowed, Aunt Beth went back downstairs. Sebastian dragged me back into the bedroom with the PC. I kicked and struggled furiously every millimetre of the way, but it was no good.

‘Hiya, Aunt Beth. I …’

‘Oh! Hello, Gib.’ Aunt Beth sounded surprised. ‘Didn’t you pass Vicky on your way back here?’

‘Pass her?’

‘She didn’t feel well all of a sudden, so she decided to go home.’

‘I didn’t see her,’ I heard Gib say.

Frantically, I struggled as Sebastian held me, but I couldn’t get him to let me go. His hand clamped even tighter over my mouth. I was burning hot and I could hardly breathe.

‘You must have just missed each other,’ Aunt Beth said.

‘Yeah, we must have,’ Gib said slowly.

‘Gi … Gi …’ I wriggled in Sebastian’s grasp but I couldn’t get the words out.

‘OK. ’Bye, Aunt Beth,’ Gib said.

‘NO! Don’t go!’ I screamed inside.

‘’Bye, Gib.’

I heard the front door close.

Sebastian let go of me so suddenly, my legs almost collapsed under me. If it wasn’t for him holding onto my arms, I would have fallen. Aunt Beth came running up the stairs.

‘You just wait – both of you. You’ll get what you deserve!’ I shouted, still struggling to get free.

‘Not from you, you little snot,’ Sebastian said from behind me. ‘If you think we’re going to miss out on seven million quid ’cause of you.’

Seven million
… I turned my head to stare at him.

‘Something else you didn’t know,’ Sebastian said icily.

‘What do we do now?’ Aunt Beth asked, glaring at me. ‘When Gib gets to his house, he’ll know we were lying.’

‘Get on the phone and speak to his mum and dad,’ Sebastian said. ‘Tell them that Vicky did leave but then came back here rather than walk all the way home. Tell them we’ll look after her so she’ll be sleeping here tonight.’

‘What about Vicky going to school tomorrow? We can’t let her go until we’re out of the country,’ Aunt Beth said.

‘By the time anyone knows she’s missing tomorrow, we’ll be long gone. Let’s just make sure David and Laura don’t come knocking at our front door tonight,’ Sebastian said.

‘You wicked cow!’ I yelled at Aunt Beth. ‘You’re supposed to be Mum and Dad’s friend. You’re both supposed to be Mum and Dad’s friends. You just wait …’