Lula Does the Hula (16 page)

The crunch of another step closer. ‘Heeere doggy doggy doggy dog! Where aaaare you?’ The singsong call chilled me to the bone. Boodle didn’t like it either. Her nostrils flared and a low growl rumbled in her throat. My grip on the scruff of her neck tightened into a fist straight away. I made big eyes at her and shook my head, mouthing, ‘NO!’

The torchlight stopped instantly and bounced in our direction, searching all around the seat we were hiding behind. Jack reached over to me and just as I was thinking he really was being careless and stupid and irresponsible and and and –

he flicked a stone high over our heads at a low gliding angle.

The torchlight bounced quickly away as stone clicked against stone in the opposite direction.

‘Oh, doooggy,’ sang the man. ‘I’ve got you now.’ He hurried away, and didn’t stop, crashing heedlessly right out of the clearing, through the bracken and up on to the slopes.

We stayed frozen in our hiding place until not a flicker of torchlight could be seen.

When I felt it was safe, I nodded. Jack took the keys from Boodle’s mouth and shoved them in his pocket.

‘I think you should leave those here,’ I said. ‘Most definitely. You’re going to make things complicated.’

Jack smiled at me, but it was strained. ‘Lula, I’m so sorry I said to leave Boodle. I just wanted to get you out of here.’

I shot a glance over my shoulder. ‘Just drop the keys. It’s time to go.’ And I was off, with Boodle on a tight leash. And we didn’t stop, not even at my front gate. Just kept going till we were all the way inside.

Jack didn’t stay for longer than five minutes when we got home. He could barely look me in the eye as he asked if I was really okay. Then he took off for his digs with my backpack full of dead bird, sand, water, bits of sodden bread, after checking that I’d locked the door behind him, and that my phone was working.

He called me when he got back home, but the conversation was stilted and left me feeling upset enough to cry. How could the perfect plan to win Jack back from Jazz have gone so horribly wrong?

‘You sure you okay?’ he’d asked.

‘I’m
fine
!’ I said testily, then felt bad straight away. He was just worrying about me, and I shouldn’t snap just because I was freaked out by the fact that we’d stumbled upon a murder scene. ‘Is Forest still okay to test that stuff?’

‘He is. And I called the cops from a payphone on the corner of Aston and Freeman. Said Parcel Brewster is presumed dead.’

I swallowed. ‘The anonymous tip-off. Good. No camera
at that callbox. Jason and Jessica are always snogging in it. Hey, I’ll ask Arns to ring me when his mum has news about it. Our inside line to the police force. See? Alex and I do know people.’

‘Mm,’ he said. ‘You sure you’re okay?’

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ I cried before I could stop myself. ‘Stop treating me like a child!’

‘I’m not, Lula! That’s the last thing I –’

‘I’m sorry,’ I interrupted. ‘I . . . I just can’t believe Parcel . . .’ My throat clenched shut and I couldn’t speak for a moment. ‘I’m being a total b–’

‘No, you’re not,’ comforted Jack. ‘I get it. You’re upset.’

‘It’s not just that. Jack, I’m worried we won’t be able to do anything because I was so stupid, making us trespass . . . Did you check your camera? Can you send the police an mpg file?’

Jack took a deep breath. ‘You’re not going to like this.’

‘Oh no. What?’

‘There’s no sound. And it was so dark it’s impossible to make out anything at all.’

‘
No!
’

‘I’m sorry.’

I sighed. ‘Don’t apologise. You were brilliant to think of it in the first place. All that came to my mind was hiding. Will you phone me when Forest has some answers?’

He was silent on the other side, as if he were thinking
about something, and then he said, ‘Sure, and will you call me with information from the police department? To check that they’re taking the tip-off seriously?’

‘Yes. Of course. If I hear anything.’

We said goodbye, both of us feeling deflated and upset. Well,
I
felt upset. Difficult to know what goes through boys’ minds. Like, did he think I was a total amateur after tonight’s mess? What an idiot I was. I’d put myself on the same level as Jazz with the journo leads, and now look. How could I have hoped to compete? All I’d done was embarrass myself entirely and put us in terrible danger; I was still the silly schoolgirl, someone he had to worry about all the time, and Jazz was still the beautiful independent university student, her sparkling career and fantastic contacts all before her – a far more appealing girlfriend candidate.

I puffed out an exhausted breath, and would have collapsed on my bed, but Boodle pushed against me and went, ‘Wrooarf,’ at my pocket.

‘Oh my goodness!’ I said, my pulse thundering up to race pace again. I stood quickly and carefully, and cautiously eased the tiny duckling out of my jacket pocket into the light. Its eyes were closed and it was completely still, but I could feel its heart beating fast in its fragile chest. It didn’t take long to make it a nest out of my fake Blahniks’ shoebox. I put the carton on the floor next to my bed and went into the main house to make it some warm oats, Grandma Bird’s
cure-all for feathered creatures in need. When I got back to the annexe, I found Boodle curled round the box, huffing her warm breath on the duckling, which still hadn’t moved.

At first it seemed I’d never get the little thing’s bill open to get the oats in, but with patience I think some finally went down. I covered the bowl and put it in the kitchen. I’d try again in the morning.

Great-aunt Phoebe called across the courtyard at eleven to check that I was okay and ready for bed. ‘Your young man has gone, Tallulah?’

‘Yes, Aunt Phoebe,’ I replied, opening the living-room window so she could hear me. ‘He’s gone.’

‘Penelope says Boodle can stay over with you tonight.’ Aunt Phoebe stepped closer, shading her eyes from the glare of my outside light. ‘Lula? Are you all right? You sound tired.’

‘I am.’

She came up to my window and bent down to look at my face. ‘He didn’t seem to stay after you got back from your walk. Did you two have a disagreement?’

‘Kind of,’ I answered, and felt suddenly teary.

Aunt Phoebe kissed me first on one cheek then the other. ‘He’ll see the light,’ she assured me. ‘You’re one in a gazillion. Have a hot bath and get some sleep now, Tallulah.’

So the thing about pets is that they’re a huge responsibility. I know this now because at some inhumane hour a little bird in a box in my room began
peep-peep
ing like there’s no tomorrow. To be honest, the peeping didn’t wake me, but Boodle thumping my head with her enormous paw did.

I rolled out of bed, staggered to the kitchen and picked up the bowl of oats. Back in bed, I sat cross-legged, bird box on lap, feeding. The duckling spread its wings with delight and gaped, putting its head right back. In went the oats. When it had had enough, it settled down again and Boodle curled round the box. I tried to go back to sleep, but box, Boodle and my body did not all fit comfortably and I was
not
king of the heap, that’s for sure. When a faint glow finally seeped through the blinds, I threw on my running stuff and headed out.

Usually I run up the mountain road, but last night’s experiences had me thinking I really didn’t want to be anywhere near there, especially as it was still pretty dark and misty, so I turned down Darling Street, which runs past the side of our house, down a steep incline, into a welter of little roads and tightly packed houses. Not many lights were on, but the streetlamps were bright, the roads quiet and I felt safe. After about half an hour of hard running I was starting to feel better in my head – less angry and confused about my beautiful boyfriend – though my back was still
plaguing me. Then suddenly I remembered I’d left Boodle inside and that she hadn’t been out to do her business yet.

Frik!
I thought.
That could be a biiig accident
. Nothing about Boodle was small, especially not her poos. I was in the centre of town now, and began pelting up Hill Street, the chimneys of Cluny’s Crematorium dark against the skyline. Working hard up the incline, I heard the car before I saw its dark shadow, and I’m pretty sure whoever was driving wouldn’t have seen me, though they were rumbling along at a strangely slow and furtive speed.

Something made me duck behind a tree, I don’t know what. The car drifted to a halt outside the crematorium, and a figure emerged from the mist, carrying a heavy load that seemed to slip and slide in his arms. He staggered up the steps to Cluny’s veranda, deposited the package and thumped the door loudly with his fist before dashing away.

The car door slammed and the vehicle was off. I couldn’t see it, but I heard it take a hard right up Henderson Avenue a few houses up.

‘Couriers,’ I muttered in disgust. ‘Don’t even wait for a signature any more.’ I shook my head at what a scaredy cat I’d become, and stepped out from behind the tree.

How it happened I don’t quite know, but suddenly I was down on my knees on the pavement, bent over in agony.

‘Nyeeep!’ I squealed, clutching my back. The spasm of pain wracked my whole body, and I didn’t think any human being had ever felt such suffering. ‘Frik! Frik! Frik!’ My spine had well and truly spasmed. Or pinched a nerve. Or slipped a disc. Or, actually, just
broken
, judging by the pain.

‘Bumly poxly bum bum!’ I whimpered.

I somehow managed to ride the spasm out, taking deep breaths, trying to relax.

There. That was better.

I looked up. Cluny’s was just a few metres away, and my house two hundred from there. Maybe three.

Okay. I just had to get to a standing position, and then I could shuffle home.

Bit by bit, by gripping on to the trunk of the tree, I managed to haul myself up. I was hunched over like Quasimodo from Notre Dame, and didn’t even have the guts to brush the gravel from my knees. Only essential movements would do right now. I took a step.

‘Nyeeep!’

And another.

‘Nyeeep!’

The pain sent tears coursing down my cheeks.

‘You frikking useless girl!’ I scolded, and took two more steps.

‘Nyeeep frik! Nyeeep frik!’

I stopped and heaved more teary breaths.

‘Bliddy Alex and her hula frikking hula class!’

It must have taken me twenty minutes to get the twenty metres to Cluny’s. The mist was fading away. I looked down the road. I still couldn’t see my home. The pain from my back was making my legs shudder and shake. I stopped and held on to the crematorium railing.

‘Hello, dead people,’ I whispered. ‘So sorry to trespass.’

I took another step and my left leg buckled.

‘Nyhee!’ I gripped the railing with all my might and my leg steadied.

‘Okay,’ I muttered. ‘Plan B.’

Inch by agonising inch I got myself up the two steps and on to the veranda. Finally I was at the front door, legs shaking badly now. I wasn’t sure if it was from the exertion, the pain or the fright of a multitude of dead, past and present, within.

I rang the bell.

And waited.

I had been ringing and waiting for about fifteen minutes. Every time I was just about to give up, I’d try to turn away
and make for home, but I couldn’t move a muscle without my whole body spasming again.

I held my breath and rang again, leaving my forefinger on the buzzer so that the faraway ringing went on and on and on. Then I lifted my fist, and, though it nearly killed me, I whacked on that door like Bludgeon gaining entry to a perp’s hideout.

At last, the sound of footsteps. The door clicked and vibrated as bolts were shot back and latches unlocked, and then there I was face to face with Helen Cluny’s scary dad.

Mr Cluny was everything you’d expect from the town’s undertaker: tall and thin and ghostly white. His hair was sparse to the point of baldness, just short drifts of white across a strong-shaped head. His eyes were the most lively part of him and right now the dark blue of them sparkled with anger. ‘You have been banging on my door since the crack of dawn!’ he bellowed at me. ‘Not even bothering with the etiquette of the doorbell!’

‘Uh, that wasn’t me,’ I said quickly, remembering the courier delivery.

‘Banging and blasting then ringing and ringing! We were up for all hours last night incinerating birds! This family is exhausted! What do you want?’ His thick silver eyebrows beetled together and I saw that the knucklebones of his hands gripping the door and frame were shining through his thin, papery skin.

‘Sorry to bother you, Mr Cluny,’ I said, white-faced and feeling sick and shaky, ‘but I’ve hurt myself and I can’t get home.’ It came out suitably pathetic, and Mr Cluny’s thunderous face looked a little less furious.

A shape shifted in the darkness behind him. ‘Who is it, Arthur dear?’

‘Helen’s friend,’ he barked over his shoulder. ‘Sally Bird’s granddaughter. The witchy one. The one with the boy trouble.’