Erhalten Sie Zugang zu diesem und mehr als 300000 Büchern ab EUR 5,99 monatlich.
- Herausgeber: Crown House Publishing
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Serie: Don't Doubt the Rainbow
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
The first book in the series, The Five Clues, is a real-time murder-mystery thriller and family drama, combining an exciting race against time with a heart-rending story about a teenager learning to live with the loss of a beloved parent. Walking back from her mother's grave, 13-year-old schoolgirl Edie Marble finds a note in a pocket of the sheepskin coat that she hasn't worn since the day, a year earlier, when she received the awful news of her mother's death. The note is from her mother, who had been looking into a corporate human rights violation and had become fearful for her life after receiving death threats. She trusts only Edie because of their special bond and Edie's intelligence and has laid a trail of clues for Edie to find that will help her to shed light on the violation and uncover the mystery around her death. Through her wit and determination, Edie steadily gathers evidence and negotiates the dramatic twists and turns of the story by collaborating with her friends and family to gradually unearth a sinister attempt by a pharmaceutical company to conceal their illegal development of a lethal virus. As Edie's investigations progress she is introduced, in parallel, to the Three Principles, which help her conquer various psychological stresses and support her in coming to terms with her grief.Reading age 11+.
Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:
Seitenzahl: 384
Das E-Book (TTS) können Sie hören im Abo „Legimi Premium” in Legimi-Apps auf:
Ähnliche
To Mum and Dad No longer here, but always here
CONTENTS
HOW IT ALL STARTED
‘Shall we start in Marie Curie, Cancer Research or just go straight to Shelter?’ asked Mum, as we walked down Gladwell Road towards the centre of Crouch End.
‘Straight to Shelter!’ I exclaimed, grinning. ‘They always have the best stuff.’
With Dad and Eli watching football on the telly, Mum and I had developed a weekend habit of sauntering into Crouch End and, best of all, browsing around the charity shops for hidden treasure. I also loved our coffee shop chats after the shopping, when Mum would share with me her latest human rights investigations. She was so passionate about standing up for people and making the world a better place, and some of her stories were incredible: corruption in government, workers being taken advantage of, the dumping of toxic waste. Mum said that Dad and Eli weren’t interested, but I couldn’t get enough – and I even helped her out sometimes. She once joked that if she wasn’t careful I’d take over her job!
I knew the walk by heart: cross over Landrock to Drylands Road, left on Weston Park, right down Elder Avenue and left onto Tottenham Lane. From there, we marched down the busy high street, past the Post Office and made a sharp right through the red door into affordable shopping heaven. Inside, our pattern was well established: we split up, perused what was on offer separately, then shared our findings. According to Dad, I rifled through the clothing ivracks in a manner identical to Mum. I told him he watched football just like Eli.
I’d gathered a pretty blue cotton blouse and silver earrings by the time Mum beckoned me over. She’d found a book of puzzles – for a daughter who loved problem-solving – plus an old paperback.
‘This is one of my all-time favourites,’ Mum pronounced. ‘I read it when I was …’ she sized me up with a smile, ‘maybe a year or two older than you.’
I looked down at the cover: ‘The Midwich Cuckoos,’ I probed.
Mum took a moment, which she often did, before replying: ‘People think that John Wyndham was just a science fiction author because of Day of the Triffids, but he was much more than that. He wrote about how people behave when put in unusual circumstances – and what lengths they’ll go to in order to survive.’
I thought that through and then asked: ‘So what’s this one about?’
I could sense Mum’s mind ticking over. ‘It’s been a while but … as I remember … in a quiet English village the minds of children are taken over by an alien force, which then exerts telepathic control over objects and humans.’
‘Sounds horrible!’ I reacted.
‘You should read the book,’ Mum continued. ‘They made it into a creepy black-and-white movie in the sixties called Village of the Damned.’
‘I’m not sure I fancy it right now, Mum. I’ve only just finished Lord of the Flies … which was pretty disturbing.’
vBut Mum paid no attention and leant in: ‘You should read it.’
‘Mum, I don’t really want to—’ I started to explain.
‘Read it!’ Mum pressed in a louder voice, completely out of character. Other customers looked over in concern.
I started feeling anxious and became aware of a pounding in my chest. Something wasn’t right.
‘Read it!!’ Mum repeated insistently, her eyes now glazed and intense.
No, something really wasn’t right. I’d had this dream a few times before and Mum had never behaved like this. In fact, this was the only dream that brought back good memories, at least until I returned to reality.
‘Read it!!’ Mum urged again, but her words were entangled, confused, a combination of forcefulness and plea. I looked down, on the verge of tears, and the book seemed to have disappeared, replaced by something else on her palm.
‘Read me!!’ Mum demanded oddly, but I’d had enough. I needed to wake up and get out of the dream. Right now. And I did – eventually.
What I didn’t know then, however, was that this dream would be the moment – the very moment, a year after Mum’s death – when my world would transform yet again. When, over the next few weeks, I would change from regular schoolgirl to national celebrity and star detective.
Along the way I’ve become stronger, tougher and more self-aware. But I’ve seen things that nobody, let alone someone my age, should ever see.
My name is Edie Marble, and this is my story. vi
CHAPTER 1
FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE
Unable to sleep, Edie lay in bed and tried not to think about the day she’d been dreading for weeks. Staring at the ceiling, she wondered about what determined the different things that happened to different people: whether you had a brother or a sister, whether you were born into a slum in the suburbs of New Delhi or a privileged home in north London, whether you were popular at school or not, whether your mum lived or died.
Eventually, Edie’s dad came into the room.
‘How are you feeling?’ he asked, perching on the edge of Edie’s bed.
‘Okay,’ Edie replied, although ‘numb’ would have been a truer answer.
‘I know this will be a hard day,’ Dad continued, gently touching her hand. ‘But we’ll get through it together and move on.’
The evidence around Edie suggested that nobody had moved on yet. Her brother Eli, who was now ten, had withdrawn into his shell since Mum’s death. He refused to talk about her or even join in looking at old photographs. Although he had friends, Eli seemed increasingly to prefer playing alone. And he wetted his bed – not every night, but two or three times a week since the tragedy. Dad had done his 2utmost to keep everything together, but he was still suffering badly himself. In the evenings, Edie sometimes heard her dad sobbing quietly in the lounge, turning up the volume on the TV to mask the noise. He’d immersed himself in work and was drinking more whisky than ever.
As for herself, Edie knew that she hadn’t moved on yet and still couldn’t understand – truly understand – why her world had been turned upside down. Edie woke up every day thinking about Mum and fell asleep comforted by the image of her mother – her beautiful, dark-haired, dark-eyed mother – stroking her hair. Edie’s schoolwork had suffered and her friends didn’t seem to know what to say to her. Worst, perhaps, were the nightmares that just wouldn’t go away.
Edie eventually managed to drag herself out of bed, put on her slippers and a fleece, and made her way downstairs. On the last step, still half asleep, Edie slipped and lost her footing. She gasped and looked down at the Buffy slippers with their poor grip. Mum had bought them the week before she died and seemed to find them cute. It was just like Mum, so busy with her own work that she didn’t realise the vampire slayer was old news.
‘Crunchy Nut cornflakes?’ asked Dad, too perkily for this day.
‘I’m not hungry,’ Edie replied.
‘You’ve got to eat something, luv,’ he continued. ‘It’s going to be a long day. What about your favourite, one of those Müller yoghurts?’
3‘I’m not hungry,’ Edie repeated more firmly. She glanced over at Eli sitting quietly at the table, munching on some peanut-buttery toast. He seemed oblivious to it all, concentrating on the football pages of the newspaper. Inside, though, she knew he was anxious.
‘I’ll make you something else then, maybe some eggs on—’
Edie raised her voice further. ‘I told you, I’m not hungry!’ After a short-lived but fierce glare, Edie grabbed something from the fridge then turned defiantly and left the kitchen for the playroom.
It was here that Edie found solace, not just on this day but often since her mum had died. In truth, it wasn’t the playroom that provided the comfort but what lay right outside on the outdoor decking. Edie opened the back door, took a couple of steps into the garden, crouched down and looked inside the cage.
‘Where are you Günther, my little fella?’ she called.
A shuffle of claws on wood, the shifting of straw and her treasured guinea pig’s face popped out from the bedding. Edie released the cage door, felt around and pulled out her cuddly brown and white friend. Back inside the playroom, she held him up to her chest and peered into his eyes. Günther squeaked at her lovingly, twitching his little whiskers. ‘What’s it like to be a guinea pig?’ Edie wondered momentarily, then instinctively knew the answer: a lot less complicated than being a human.
Edie sat on the sofa and stroked her warm companion’s furry back as he gazed around the room. Günther nibbled on 4the carrot Edie had brought from the fridge, then decided he preferred her fleece zipper. His little claws held on to her thumb. Fifteen minutes of quiet affection, including changing his water and food and freshening up his hay, was all Edie needed in the mornings. By then, she normally felt emotionally refreshed. Today, however, Edie lingered, until interrupted by a shout from the next room.
‘Come on, luv – we’re leaving at nine o’clock.’
Taking her time, Edie placed Günther carefully back in his cage, locked the door and went back upstairs to get dressed.
‘What does a thirteen-year-old girl wear for a stone-setting?’ Edie pondered as she rummaged through her wardrobe. The sombre occasion marked a year after a person’s death in the Jewish religion, probably meaning similar clothes to a funeral, so Edie picked out black tights, a grey sleeveless dress with thick shoulder-straps and a white long-sleeved T-shirt to go underneath. Another reminder: her mum had bought her this dress for an eco-award ceremony a month before her death, where she’d been given a prize for exposing a water pollution scandal. Just the two of them went, as Dad had been on call for the surgery, and Edie had been so proud of her mum.
Last, Edie opened the top drawer of her bedside table and reached for the ceramic dish that contained her few items of jewellery. Edie picked out the heart-shaped locket that Mum had given her on her eleventh birthday. The locket 5had originally belonged to Edie’s mum’s mother – or Mama, as the kids called her – and had been lovingly handed down. The gold was tarnished and the chain had been replaced, but the locket still opened with a crisp click to reveal a tiny old photo of Mum as a young teenager. Edie had carefully cut out and inserted that photo the day before the funeral, and Edie wore the locket at those times when she really needed her mum’s presence. A day like today.
Downstairs they were still getting ready. Eli was wearing an olive coloured shirt and brown corduroy trousers which made him look too grown-up and silly. Her dad wore a dark-blue suit, white shirt and plain tie. Always appropriate, never wanting to stick out. The doorbell rang.
‘Are we ready, then?’ Dad asked. Nobody answered.
‘Come on, kids,’ Dad continued. ‘Let’s not make this harder than it needs to be.’
Eli put on his black school shoes and Edie was about to do likewise, but then noticed her brown calf-length suede boots which would be more comfortable for trudging around the cemetery.
As Edie reached for her warm school coat something stirred within her, but she couldn’t work it out for a moment. Then Edie remembered. It was one of her dreams, a recent one in which she was at the cemetery but she wasn’t wearing her school coat. Instead, Edie had on the sheepskin coat her mum had bought for her – the coat Edie had been wearing when the teacher had approached her in the school playground with the forlorn expression of someone bearing dreadful news. The coat Edie associated with that moment 6and had never worn since.
Edie bolted upstairs, grabbed the sheepskin from her cupboard and slung it on. She ran back down to join the others in the minicab and off they set.
‘Can we watch the game later?’ Eli asked, as they snaked through the traffic towards Edgwarebury Cemetery in north London.
Dad didn’t answer at first and stared blankly through the window.
‘I don’t know,’ he responded eventually, without averting his look to face the children. ‘Let’s see how things go and what time we get back.’
‘Will Aubameyang be playing?’ her brother continued, seemingly oblivious to the gravity of the day.
‘Can’t you ever stop talking about football?’ Edie interrupted angrily. ‘We’re on the way to Mum’s stone-setting and all you can think about is stupid footballers.’
Eli winced for a moment when Edie raised her voice, then just continued to gaze out at the road. He still seemed to be keeping his sadness deep inside.
‘I know how hard today is,’ Dad said quietly. ‘But it’s hard for us all, luv. Please try not to take it out on your brother.’
Edie knew her dad was right, but she found it hard and got upset easily. As silence descended, Edie went to that familiar place inside her mind. If her dad had only driven Mum to the appointment that fateful day a year ago, Edie’s 7world wouldn’t have changed forever. Edie remembered almost by heart the conversation she’d overheard. Dad had said he was too busy with work to take Mum to the meeting, though, in truth, they’d argued about her latest human rights investigation. Despite being supportive of Mum’s work, Dad felt the latest case was taking a toll. After bickering briefly, they’d eventually settled on a drop-off at Finsbury Park Tube station. Within ten minutes, the Victoria line was closed with a dead person on the tracks.
Edie knew the accident wasn’t her dad’s fault but she found it hard not to blame him, a little. Right now, though, she needed comforting herself. Tears were welling up as Edie turned to her dad.
‘This is the worst day of my life,’ she said gently, in a way that invited an embrace.
Edie burst out crying and held on tight, eyes closed. For a few minutes, Dad stroked her back and slowly the tears receded. When the car turned a sharp corner, Edie instinctively reopened her eyes to catch a glimpse of the cemetery gates as they passed by.
‘Actually,’ she said to her dad. ‘It’s the second worst day.’
Half an hour later, and with all the preparations done, the crunch of tyres on gravel heralded the arrival of the others. Edie recognised the silver Honda Jazz before Eli blurted out: ‘That’s Mama and Papa.’ Eli ran over to their grandparents and Papa lifted him up. Mama came over and wrapped her arms around Edie. Back came the tears.
8Edie’s mum’s parents, Anya and Maurice (Mama and Papa, according to the kids), had tried to be helpful since the death of their daughter. Although desperate themselves from the tragic occurrence, they’d tried to help Dad, their son-in-law, but he’d been largely resistant. Offers of meals were spurned, conversations rebutted and answerphone messages ignored. The only exception was assistance with the kids: Mama and Papa had been a real support to Edie and Eli, whenever they were given the chance.
Edie was particularly close to her grandmother. Mama was never fazed by Edie’s driven nature and was always open to patiently talking things through. Undoubtedly, Edie reminded Mama of her own daughter: strong-willed, passionate and inquisitive. Mama had once remarked: ‘One day, Edie, all your questions will get you into trouble – just like your mum!’
On the other side of the family, connections were not so strong. Edie had never known her dad’s mother, who’d died before she was born, and Edie’s dad’s father lived in Toronto – a retired doctor who played golf and kept to himself. Although Grandpa David had made it to England for the funeral, he wasn’t here for the stone-setting.
‘How are you doing?’ Mama asked with concern.
‘I just want it to be over,’ Edie answered honestly.
Mama looked her straight in the eye. ‘Me too,’ she said.
The moment of kindred spirit was broken by a tap on Edie’s arm. She spun around.
‘You came!’ exclaimed Edie. ‘I was worried that—’
‘Of course I came, silly,’ was the response. ‘I wouldn’t 9miss this for the world!’
Edie wouldn’t have let anybody get away with that kind of comment – except for her best mate, Lizzie, who’d befriended Edie through her transition to Highgate Hill from state school over a year ago. Whilst Edie’s other classmates hadn’t known how to deal with Edie and her loss, Lizzie kept on trying. Some things worked, some things didn’t, but Lizzie wasn’t deterred, although her natural kind-heartedness was beginning to be tested. Edie smiled, turned away from Mama and hugged her best friend hard.
‘Stay by me through the whole thing,’ Edie whispered into Lizzie’s ear.
‘Just what I was planning,’ came the hushed reply. Edie turned to Mama, who gave her a smile that said it was okay if she headed off.
‘Is anybody else from school coming?’ asked Lizzie, as they made their way around the side of the car park to the back of the main building.
‘I didn’t ask anyone else,’ replied Edie curtly. ‘You’re the only one I don’t mind seeing me in this state.’
‘What do you mean – in this state?’
Edie contemplated for a moment and then replied truthfully. ‘Helpless,’ she proclaimed.
Away from the hubbub, the girls watched quietly as people arrived: friends of her parents, whom Edie hardly ever saw any more, plus some of her mum’s work colleagues from the human rights movement. Edie recognised a couple of old friends of her dad’s – Richard, from Dad’s schooldays, and a friend from university, Miles, with his partner, John. Despite 10place: her mother’s grave. Although the sun was out, Edie felt a chill come over her and pulled the sheepskin collar up around her neck. It was surprisingly comforting to have the special coat on again.
11Quiet descended and the rabbi began with the prayers. Edie looked over at some of the black lettering beneath the Hebrew on the smooth, light-grey headstone:
ALEXANDRA LEILA FRANKLIN A WONDERFUL MOTHER AND A CHERISHED WIFE – WE MISS YOU DEARLY.
They’d argued at home for days about the wording. Edie had wanted something more direct, more honest: ‘The best mum ever, we love you more than words can describe. P.S. Life isn’t bloody fair.’ But her dad had trumped her with something more ‘appropriate’.
One by one, close family members then followed a Jewish ritual. A year ago at the funeral, each had taken the spade, spooned some gravel and earth onto its flat surface and deposited the material into the grave, a hollow clang sounding as each spade-load landed on the coffin. To mark the stone-setting, though, a personally chosen small stone was carefully placed onto the flat slab of granite at the base of the headstone. Edie had brought with her an oval, dark-grey piece of pumice that she’d found with her mum when walking on the beach in the Canaries. Edie felt hypnotised by the little rock, resting peacefully beneath the word ‘Alexandra’.
12‘It’s over, Edie,’ said Mama suddenly.
‘Can you stop squeezing my hand so tight,’ pleaded Lizzie. Edie looked down to see her friend’s hand turning blue. She loosened her grip but didn’t let go.
‘Let’s head back,’ said Dad.
Edie nodded, but then asked, ‘Can I have a little time here by myself?’
‘Of course, luv,’ Dad replied. ‘Don’t be too long, though.’
Something caught the corner of Edie’s eye. Initially, she thought it was a spade, left carelessly at a nearby graveside, but then another glint. Edie turned her gaze towards the edge of the cemetery, where the sun was bright and she had to shield her eyes. A cloud briefly gave respite, but when it passed, there it was again: the glimmer of a parked car.
At first, Edie thought little of it, but then noticed that the car was inside the cemetery perimeter, on a track around the edge. Next to the vehicle stood a man. He was about sixty metres away but, undoubtedly, was staring directly at Edie. One thing that Mum had taught her was the importance of observational skills: if something looked out of place, make a mental note of it. So Edie did: the man appeared to be in his forties with short hair, possibly balding. He was smartly dressed in an expensive looking dark coat and sunglasses. The car seemed flashy too: a Mercedes or maybe a Bentley. Black, darkened windows, suspicious looking. For a moment, their gaze seemed to meet. Then, quite suddenly, the man turned towards the car, banged twice on the roof with his gloved 13hand, got in the back and the car drove off.
The car was tracking the circuit of the cemetery and seemed to be getting nearer. Unsettled, Edie quickened her step towards the others. Abruptly, tyres screeched as a left turn was made through the car park, and the car was onto the main road and away. Edie stopped for a second, breathless. She looked up and saw Lizzie waiting by the prayer hall near the main entrance. Lizzie hadn’t noticed Edie yet.
The sun had gone in again and Edie felt the chill return. She pulled the sheepskin collar up further and shoved her hands into her coat pockets. The fingers of her right hand came into contact with some paper. Edie explored deeper inside the pocket, suspecting an old cinema ticket or party invitation. But this felt bigger. That was odd, Edie thought. She hadn’t remembered putting anything in her pocket. Then again, Edie hadn’t put her hands in there since they’d left the house. Maybe not even at the house.
Carefully, Edie removed the object from her pocket and discovered an envelope. She stared at the front and her eyes opened wider. Just one word: ‘Edie’. But it wasn’t the word that was making her heart race, it was the handwriting. Unquestionably, it was her mum’s.
Edie looked up. Lizzie still hadn’t seen her. Fingers shaking, Edie tried to open the flap. It was sealed tight and her nervousness wasn’t helping. Finally, she managed to pull out the paper from inside. Edie unfolded a single sheet and started reading. 14
My darling Edie,
If you are reading this now, it means something dreadful has happened to me. I might even be dead, most probably murdered …
A heave from her stomach, a terrible heat. Edie turned her head to the side and violently threw up.
CHAPTER 2
THE NOTE
‘Get in, sweetie.’ Edie’s father flung open the passenger door to the Nissan as he spoke. ‘Quickly, in you get – I’m not allowed to stop by the school gates.’ Edie hopped into the front seat next to her dad.
For the past five days, Edie had been reluctant to open the envelope and look at the note from her mother that she’d resealed inside – perhaps through fear, perhaps fear of disappointment, or perhaps something else. At after-school detention – a result of the sympathetic art teacher, Miss Watson, losing patience with Edie and Lizzie for continually talking in class – Edie had stared down blankly at the lined paper, her mind preoccupied by what was locked carefully away in her bedroom desk. Thankfully, Lizzie had cajoled Edie into finishing the stupid detention task set by Mr Bowling, the maths teacher, otherwise there would have been further punishment. But Lizzie’s kindness made Edie feel guilty about not sharing her secret.
‘How was it?’ Dad asked.
‘Okay,’ Edie responded flatly. A silence fell as they moved slowly through the Highgate traffic. Glancing sideways, Edie had a moment of affection for her dad, rare over the past year. She noticed how his profile had aged 16and seemed to be drawn in perpetual sadness, although he remained handsome for a man in his mid-forties.
‘How’s your day been, Dad?’
Taken aback, Edie’s father gathered his thoughts. ‘Busy clinic this morning – must have been over thirty patients – then a couple of visits.’ After a further pause he continued: ‘Dr Martial has asked to see me again on Monday, to discuss “how things are going”. He says there have been more complaints from patients.’
‘What do they expect?’ Edie ventured. ‘You’ve had the stone-setting and now everybody seems to have forgotten that your wife’s died!’ She calmed down before asking, ‘What will you say to Dr Martial?’
‘I don’t know – same as before, I guess,’ responded her dad meekly. ‘They’re losing patience, though. If a patient is unhappy with me, they just go and see Martial, Friedman or Peters the next day, increasing everybody’s workload.’
Edie liked two of her dad’s GP colleagues at the practice, but she couldn’t stand smarmy Dr Martial, although her dad insisted that Martial – as the senior partner – should act as her and Eli’s GP. The traffic jammed to a standstill because of a problem at the pedestrian crossing down the hill.
‘How have the nightmares been?’ Dad asked. ‘Had any more?’
The question jolted a memory of the previous night. In the dream, all the family were on a cruise ship during a terrible storm. As a siren rang and people tore around frantically, one lifeboat was lowered towards the sea, with a 17single person aboard. Edie had screamed at her mum not to leave without her, but even as the lifeboat neared the raging waves, her mum had calmly replied that she wouldn’t. Despite this, the lifeboat disappeared into the distance, tossed about by the dark waters with one woman standing motionless in the middle.
‘No, nothing recently,’ Edie fibbed.
Back home twenty minutes later, the end-of-the-week routine began. Friday nights at the Franklins’ house had always been special. Prayers marked the start of the Sabbath, candles were lit and blessings were said over wine and special bread, challah. They’d done this before Edie’s mother had died and had continued since.
After Dad’s roast chicken dinner had been devoured and cleared away, the threesome gathered on the sofa – Dad sandwiched between the children – for their Friday night ritual of watching the remake of the 1970s sci-fi show Battlestar Galactica. In the middle of an episode in series three, just as Commander Adama instructed the crew to find the Cylon on the ship, Dad noticed that Edie was fast asleep. He gently picked her up and carried her to bed.
Although sleep should have provided Edie with much needed escape from the reality of life without her beloved Mum, the regular nightmares meant that time in bed was often scary and unpleasant. That is, except for the occasional dream that brought back feelings of warmth and love, memories of events that Edie wanted to keep hold of. The charity shop 18dream, which came from time to time, was just that.
But not on this occasion. As Edie stood in Shelter opposite her mum, this dream had become as unwelcome as the nightmares. And it didn’t make sense: her mum’s behaviour had turned from kind to unsettling and she was pressing this odd book, The Midwich Cuckoos, urgently on Edie. Even more strangely, the book seemed to be altering in appearance just as her mum’s words were changing.
‘Read me!!’ Mum stressed again.
Edie lowered her head: the book had disappeared and, instead, resting on her mum’s palm was the envelope – the same envelope Edie had touched a hundred times since finding it in her pocket at the cemetery. Edie looked up and their faces were just inches apart. The message from her mum was becoming clear.
Calmly, Edie opened her eyes, her gaze resting on the darkened ceiling. With her pulse settling, Edie wiped the cold sweat off her face, pulled back the covers and got out of bed. From the top drawer of her desk she retrieved the carefully concealed envelope. Edie returned to her bed, dragged the duvet over her head and turned on her torch. Without giving herself time to reconsider, she opened the envelope and took out the note. Edie carefully unfolded the paper and read.
My darling Edie,
If you are reading this now, it means something dreadful has happened to me. I might even be dead, most probably murdered. 19
I have been uncovering what I believe to be a major corporate crime and violation of human rights. As I have been getting closer to the evidence, however, the perpetrators seem to have become aware of me. I sense that I am being followed, and in the supermarket last week an unpleasant character coldly but violently threatened me – and our family. I have encountered this kind of thing before, but this time it feels different, more real. And I am scared for all of us.
I have left you a series of clues, five in total, which I hope will help you to complete my investigation and bring these brutes to justice. I couldn’t leave the clues for anybody else. I trust you implicitly – we’re like peas in a pod – and only you will be able to work out the trail. At the same time, the clues will, I hope, help you in other ways.
Be bold, be brave and carry my life force with you.
With unconditional, ever-lasting love, Mum xxx
P.S. Almost forgot! Here’s the first clue:
Only by working through this clue do you get to the next one.
20The moment she reached the end, Edie returned straight to the beginning and reread the letter. Then Edie read it a third time, before sticking her head out from under the duvet for some air, still cool and fresh before the central heating came on. After the unbearable stress of the past few days, Edie experienced a curious sense of release, and she let out a sigh. A knowing sigh. Her mum’s death wasn’t an accident, one of those random tragic events that people were relieved had happened to somebody else. No, it was cold-blooded murder, and so it had meaning. And that meaning gave Edie purpose. There was a mystery to be solved, and the mystery started with a puzzle.
At first, her head spinning, Edie was unsure what form of clue she’d been presented with. Her mum was a creative thinker, independently minded, a beats-to-her-own-drum kind of person, so the clue could mean almost anything. Was it a riddle? A task to be performed? Maybe even a fake clue, in case it fell into the wrong hands?
Or was the clue a reference to the Three Principles of psychology that had so interested Mum over the past few years? Mum had once described the Three Principles as ‘an understanding of how the mind works’, and she often brought this understanding into conversations with Edie. Edie loved those chats because they made her feel special (Mum seldom spoke about the Three Principles with Dad or Eli). Mum also shared lots of material with Edie about the principles – web articles, podcasts and books – but Edie didn’t often look at them because the learning had been much less important than the private time and closeness with her mum.
21Whatever the clue actually referred to, what made things harder was that Edie had no real idea about the direction of travel. Would this clue provide some sort of answer or simply lead to the next clue?
Several hours earlier, unbeknownst to Edie as she slept in front of the TV, her dad closed the lounge curtains, failing to notice the thickly set man lurking outside. Once the lights in the house were out, the former soldier – known to his clients as Zero – made his way back to his flat near King’s Cross. Earlier that day, Zero had been forced to call the man who’d hired him over a year ago – Peter Goswell – using the agreed mobile number. At the pharmaceutical company headquarters, Goswell’s trusted personal assistant, Margaret, had interrupted her boss, the chief executive, in the middle of an important meeting to take the call. ‘It’s your special phone,’ she’d whispered, referring to an old iPhone 6 that was kept carefully locked in the office when not in Goswell’s possession.
Goswell wasn’t happy as he’d been regaling three of the company’s board members – a barrister, an economist and a doctor – with the story he’d told a hundred times: how he had come up with the name Stop It! for the successful anti-diarrhoea drug that had made the company millions, and how he – Peter Goswell – had also suggested Flu-Away for their new antiviral medicine. And Flu-Away, now completing final clinical trials, was going to make them all a fortune.
22In the quiet of his office, Goswell saw on the screen that it was Zero calling and, minutes later, had slammed his clenched fist on the desk after the henchman had given him the news about the death of the drug company’s director of research and development, Dr Thomas Stephenson. The wallop had knocked over the family photo of Goswell’s wife, Jane, two daughters and their beloved black Labrador, Homer, sitting together outside his country home in Cambridgeshire.
‘I don’t want to watch Friends.’
Ignoring her brother’s plea, Edie grabbed the two remote controls on the coffee table and made for the DVD player. ‘You’ve already been down here playing games for hours, so I think I’m allowed to watch what I want!’
Eli’s tone shifted from defensive to insistent: ‘I haven’t watched any TV at all. And I hate Friends.’
‘But you’ve been on the iPad and that stupid FIFA game non-stop. It’s the same thing.’
Their father burst in, his Saturday morning lie-in disturbed: ‘What’s all this noise about?’ he bellowed.
‘She always wants to watch Friends … and I hate it!’
‘And he’s always playing that stupid football game,’ Edie countered.
‘Enough! Enough! No more television and no more iPad today,’ came the unwanted verdict. Flicking the TV off, their grumpy father continued: ‘That’s what happens if you can’t decide together.’
23Eli trudged quietly upstairs. With his eyes closed, he counted the six steps from the playroom up to the ground-level hallway. Then, a hard turn to the right, eyes still screwed shut to blot out the next section of fourteen steps up to the first landing. On this occasion, however, Eli stopped exactly halfway up. He waited there, his fingers grasping the bannister. Was it okay to look? He shouldn’t really as inevitably it upset him, but he paused and then opened his eyes a crack. Slowly, Eli allowed the framed image on the wall to take shape.
The photograph was taken on Hampstead Heath, the summer before his mum’s death. With Edie busy elsewhere, Mum, Dad and Eli had decided to have a picnic on the vast lawn in front of Kenwood House. Eli had played football with his dad on the grass – the first time he’d ever beaten him – then his mum, playfully, had challenged Eli to a wrestling competition. And that was when the photo had been taken, with Eli attempting to pin down her shoulders, their expressions a combination of concentration, joy and elemental love. Looking at the picture helped to recall the day: her smell, the touch of her skin, her giggled but serious declaration of ‘I’ll never give up!’ But then the horrible darkness took hold again.
At the top of the stairs, Eli took in the group shot of his mum’s family: Mama, Papa, Auntie Ruth, Mum and her twin sister, Miriam, who’d died from cancer as a child. Momentarily, Eli remembered the ‘special’ photo of Miriam, as his mum called it: a beautiful black-and-white snap in Papa’s study in Hendon.
24Soon, Eli’s attention drifted towards his sister’s bedroom. She’d been behaving strangely, even for her, over the past week. Eli tiptoed into Edie’s room, avoiding the squeaky loose plank under the carpet in front of the door. Inside, Eli immediately started poking around, whilst listening keenly for any sign of his approaching sibling. Under the bed – nothing. Behind the bedside table – just a few dusty hairclips. Beneath the small rug that Mum had brought back from India – no joy. The desk, though, might prove more fruitful.
‘What are you doing?’
Taken aback, Eli froze. Edie repeated, louder this time, ‘What do you think you’re doing?!’
Edie’s face was red with anger. ‘Nothing … I lost my headphones,’ he replied softly.
‘You’re looking through my stuff!’ Edie approached and the smaller child cowered.
Dad shouted from the kitchen: ‘What’s going on up there?’
The interruption provided Eli with the momentary distraction that was needed. He bolted past his sister, up the remaining flights of stairs, turned sharply into his own bedroom at the top of the house and closed the door firmly.
Back at school the following Monday, Edie was in the middle of another argument with Polly when the bell rang at the end of art. Edie packed up her bag and headed for the classroom door, where Lizzie caught up with her. Two periods to go 25until the end of another long day, although those periods were double games and, in preparation, Edie took two puffs from her blue Ventolin inhaler.
The constant drizzle since morning meant that the outdoor activity had been replaced with dreaded swimming. Together, the two girls did the fifteen-minute walk over to the Atkins Centre pool practically in silence, Edie feeling guilty but also certain that she couldn’t share anything yet about her extraordinary discovery.
‘Twenty lengths – all of you,’ Mr Richards pronounced. ‘Three, two, one …’ and he blew the infernal whistle.
After kicking off, Edie was soon into her flow, doing breaststroke up, across and then down the swimming lane. Eight days had passed since she’d found the note, three since she’d read it fully. The written image of the clue was clearly etched in her mind: Only by working through this clue do you get to the next one. She repeated it silently in her mind, over and over, as the first length drifted by.
The rhythmic nature of swimming created a kind of semi-meditative state, and Edie recalled the immense mental effort of the days since finding the clue. At first, her analysis had focused on the specific words. It was difficult to see how the word ‘only’ had special significance, but ‘working’ seemed important. Edie had wondered whether it was a reference to her mum’s job, so she went through her work-related files in the study when Dad was out, but they yielded nothing of obvious relevance. Edie had even phoned her mother’s closest work colleague to find out if anything important had been left at the human rights organisation office.
26Was ‘working’ supposed to steer Edie towards her own schoolwork? Again, this was hard to comprehend, but Edie had nevertheless gone through all her own folders, as well as the box file that her parents kept containing information about Highgate Hill School. Nothing. Carefully, Edie had then worked through the entirety of her father’s office, rifling through drawers and shelves, being sure to replace everything back as it had been. All fruitless.
Later, Edie had directed her attention at ‘through this clue’. She’d held the paper up to her ceiling light and shone a torch straight through it, in the hope that words would visibly materialise as if written with one of those magic pens. Further disappointment. Out of the blue, a thought had then struck Edie that perhaps ‘through this clue’ was an indication that the whole clue carried the answer. She’d assigned a number to each letter, as per their alphabet position, and had totalled the points for each word: Only (66) by (27) working (97) through (97) this (56) clue (41) do (19) you (61) get (32) to (35) the (33) next (63) one (34). These figures had seemed devoid of meaning, as had the sum for the whole sentence (661).
Edie’s arms were flagging from the repetition of the same stroke, so she switched to a front crawl. How many lengths now? The next tack she’d taken with the clue was systematic: over the weekend, Edie had worked her way through the whole house room by room with feverish but careful intent, hoping for some kind of sign. Once again, though, the approach had proved unrewarding.
Four strokes with the arms, sharp head-tilt to the right 27and deep inhalation of oxygen to feed the fatigued muscles. Staring at the pool bottom, a particular dark thought reentered her consciousness. What if she never worked out the clue and was left in awful ignorance of what it all meant? Or, what if her mother hadn’t had time to complete the full set? Such bleak prospects weren’t to be dwelt on.
With her arms weakening, Edie switched to backstroke. Where was everybody else, she pondered, as her hands touched the end of the pool. On the half-turn, Edie felt a strong pat on her head and a loud whistle in her ear. Pulling her goggles off, Edie surfaced to face the glare of a man crouched at the poolside.
‘What on earth are you doing, Franklin?’ asked Mr Richards sternly. ‘I’ve been blowing this darn whistle for over a minute. Now get out!’
A ripple of laughter was audible across the cluster of girls and boys from her class, amassed at the water’s edge.
Red-faced, Edie clambered out.
Lizzie and Edie, weary from the exertion of the swimming class, slowly climbed the hill back up to Highgate village. Halfway up, Edie stopped and reached into the front pouch of her bag. A combination of the exercise and the cold winter air had made her wheezy. After two deep breaths in, Edie shook the blue inhaler. It was nearly empty and her mum had always warned her never to run out. She made a mental note to book an appointment with Dr Martial.
At the top of the hill, the girls veered right through 28the parade of shops, briefly contemplated – and then rejected – the idea of a hot chocolate at Costa Coffee, then headed downhill towards Archway. A left-hand turn at the traffic lights took them onto Hornsey Lane and within a few minutes they were close to Lizzie’s house on Stanhope Road.
‘I’m off here,’ announced Lizzie at the corner.
‘I’ll come with you,’ suggested Edie, ‘then take the Parkland Walk back home.’
‘Are you serious? It’ll be too dark for that.’
‘It’ll be fine,’ Edie countered.
But Lizzie wasn’t to be deterred. The Parkland Walk was a tree-lined public path – from Crouch End through to Archway in one direction and to Muswell Hill and Finsbury Park in the other – which had been created from a disused railway line. During daylight hours it was busy with joggers, dog-walkers and parents with bicycle-happy kids. When the light went, however, the path was quickly deserted and muggings were not uncommon.
‘Absolutely not,’ Lizzie asserted.
Touched by her friend’s concern, Edie acquiesced. ‘Okay, I’ll go home through the streets.’ She gave Lizzie a quick hug and set off.
By the time Edie reached her house it was completely dark. She put the keys in the lock and opened the front door.
‘Hi, sweetie,’ cried her father from the lounge.
‘Hi, Dad.’ Edie took off her coat and stood in the doorway.
29‘How was your day?’ Dad asked brightly from the comfort of his favourite leather armchair by the window, perhaps after an early whisky.
‘Fine, thanks. How was yours?’
‘Oh, you know, okay. Martial was up to his usual old tricks.’
Edie thought for a second. ‘One day, you should punch his lights out!’
‘Hopefully it won’t ever come to that … but it does sound appealing!’
Edie felt a loving sadness for the man slumped peacefully in isolation. As she approached, he held out a hand for his daughter to clasp. Edie leant over.
‘What are you doing, Dad?’
‘The Guardian cryptic crossword, but it’s too hard for me.’
Something stirred inside Edie as her dad continued: ‘Your mum was the one who was always good at these.’
Edie felt a cold chill rise through her chest as her dad carried on: ‘Take this clue, for example: “Two lovers in play (5,3,6).” What does that mean?’
There was just a short pause before Edie assisted. ‘Dad, it’s Romeo and Juliet.’
‘Oooh, I think you’re right. Yes, that fits in. How did you know that, sweetie?’
Edie responded with knowledge and clarity. ‘Most cryptic crossword clues need to be split in two, and each side of the clue leads you to the same answer. Here,’ she pointed, ‘the split comes after “two lovers”, who are obviously Romeo 30and Juliet, and “play”, which tells you the answer is also a play. A Shakespeare play.’
‘Wow, how did you find that out?’
Edie waited. ‘Mum taught me.’ Her dad was about to say something but never got the chance as Edie bolted upstairs. ‘Sorry, Dad, I’ve got some homework to do.’
