The Lornea Island Detective Club Read online

  It takes me a few moments to work out why I don't like her logic here.

  "Yeah but she's not just a bit mad though is she? She's batshit fucking crazy."

  Amber laughs really hard at this.

  "Come on Billy. We've got to give it a go at least? I tell you what. Don't cash the check. If we can't help her we'll just give it back. That way there’s no ethical problem."

  Again I think about what I could do with the money. How I could use it to put Dad back on the right path. Then I notice that Amber is still staring at me, ignoring the road that she’s driving along.

  "Come on Billy." She makes a thing of fluttering her eyelids at me, though I know she's doing it ironically.

  "Could you keep your eyes on the road please?"

  She doesn't. "Pretty please Billy," she laughs, pursing her lips. I think it's only luck we're on a straight bit of road, and Amber hasn't driven off the cliff edge already, but there is a bend coming up.

  "Amber!" I say.

  "Billy..." Now her eyes are almost closed and she's making a kissing face.

  "OK. OK, just look at the road will you!"

  And with that Amber laughs, and looks forward again.

  So like that we sort of take on the case.

  Fourteen

  Dad's not in when I get home, so I grab some food and take it up to my room.

  I'm about to open my bedroom door when I remember the hair. The one I stuck across the entrance, like in the James Bond film. I almost don't bother checking, since my mind is so on the Mrs. Jacobs case now, but something makes me stop. I put down my plate and carefully I examine the door frame. For a moment I don't understand it, because I can't even find the hair that I left. And then I realize the implication of this. That's the whole point of it. It means someone's been into my room while I was out. It can't have been Dad. He knows not to, and anyway he's been at work all day. So that only leaves one possibility. Tucker. Or Peter. Or whatever his name is.

  I stand, on the upstairs landing for a moment, thinking about this. Then things get worse. From inside my room I start to hear a strange noise. I don't know what it is, but it's coming from inside my room. It sounds like – I don't know – it sounds almost like a weird breathing noise. I start to get a bit worried, since I'm alone in the house. I wonder if he could still be in there. I think about getting some sort of weapon, I could probably find a baseball bat in the shed somewhere. Then I realize this is all ridiculous – I can't be scared to go into my own bedroom. So I tell myself not to be stupid and take hold of the door handle.

  "Hello?" I call out, trying to make myself sound totally confident. The noise stops, but no one answers. Then the noise begins again.

  I can feel my face frowning tightly. I grip the door handle and very quickly I turn it, and push the door open. Then I get a real shock.

  For a second I don't see anything out of place, then there's a loud screeching noise and then a large fluffy football of brown feathers throws itself at me and starts pecking at my face. Two long wings beat around my ears.

  "Urgh! Steven! Get off!"

  I try to push him away, but he's so eager to see me he almost knocks me back into the hallway. He must have been hungry, here on his own. I get him sat on my arm and go into the room. Then I see what the noise is, he's been trying to eat the corner of my desk, scratching at it with his beak. It really is time I released him. He’s going a bit crazy locked up in here all day.

  I share my dinner with Steven, which kind of means he eats most of it. And while that happens I start researching Henry Jacobs. But there's so many people with that name that I don't find anything, even when I add other keywords like Lornea Island, or disappeared, or murder. It's a bit disappointing actually, and I'm pleased when I hear Dad coming home. I get up to see him, but then I hear Tucker's voice as well. Or whatever his name is. And I don't want to see Tucker, so I stay upstairs. Dad shouts up the stairs to see where I am, but I shout back that I've got to do homework. And then, after a bit more work, I go to bed.

  I have school the next day. Actually I've been having a few issues at school. I didn't tell you, because it's not really a big deal, but since you're here, you might as well know. It's just some of the boys in my class. They're idiots, the problem is, they're quite big idiots. I expect you probably had kids like them when you were at school. Or if you're still in school, you probably know kids like them right now. They're the type who sit at the back of the class, messing about and complaining that school is boring. It's so ironic though, because the only reason the classes are boring is because we have to do such basic stuff so that they'll understand it.

  Today one of them brought in a bag of candies – jellies shaped like little Coke bottles – and they spent the lesson sucking them to make them sticky, and then flicking bits of them at the teacher, Miss Smith, when she tried to write on the whiteboard. She didn't notice at first, just wondered why they were laughing so much, but then she did notice, and she did the worst thing possible, which was to try and pretend it wasn't happening. I don't know why they don't train teachers not to do that. It never works, it just makes the whole class laugh along with the idiots. That's what happened this morning, until more and more people were throwing the sticky bits of candy at her every time her back was turned.

  Anyway, what happened next was this. I was trying to get on with my work, when I felt something hit me in the back of my head. And when I touched my hair to see what it was, it wasn't just one piece of jelly, it was a whole wad of half-chewed cola bottles stuck together, all slimy and tangled in with my hair. And when I turned around to see who did it, right away I saw James Drolley looking right at me. He's kinda the leader of the idiots. But then, there were also quite a few of the other boys, also looking and laughing. So there's no way I could tell Miss Smith who it was.

  Actually I'm not going to say anymore. I suppose it's just one of those things, but it did kind of mess up my morning.

  When lunchtime finally comes I go straight up to the school library and I see Amber sitting by the computers. For some reason I suddenly feel really pleased to see her. I don't know why. But just as I'm about to go over to her I stop myself. She didn't text me this morning, and I'm only assuming she's here working on our case, but what if she isn't? What if she's actually just doing her school work, and she's not really serious about wanting to investigate Mrs. Jacobs case at all?

  So I hesitate, not sure if I should go and speak to her after all. I almost turn around to leave, but then she looks up and spots me.

  "Hey Billy! Over here."

  Usually I wouldn't like it when people are loud in the library, but I don't mind now. So I go over to her, and sure enough it's not school work she's doing, but research into Mrs. Jacobs. This makes me very pleased.

  "What are you grinning at?" Amber asks.

  "I'm not grinning."

  "Yes you are."

  I'm pretty sure I wasn't grinning, but just in case I was, I make sure I stop.

  "Now what are you doing? Are you ill?"

  "No! I'm..." I concentrate on settling my face into a serious look.

  "That's better. Now sit down, we've got work to do. Lots of work." She pushes a chair out next to her, and I sit down.

  "I've been searching for Henry Jacobs..."

  I lean in and examine her screen.

  "Trouble is, there's loads of people on Facebook with that name. So we're gonna have to scroll through them one by one until we..."

  "That won't work."

  "What? Why not?"

  "I looked last night. There's seven thousand three hundred and forty seven people called Henry Jacobs. And probably more who can't use computers."

  "How do you know that?"

  "I found a website that tells you. You type a name in, and it counts how many Facebook profiles there are for that name. And loads of them will have their security set to private, so you won't be able to see them anyway."

  "Shit." Amber says.

  "And even if you could see
them, it's hardly likely he's going to have set up a Facebook account in his old name, if he wanted to disappear."

  Amber frowns. "Alright then. What do we do then?"

  "You could add search terms to his name," I say.

  "Like what?"

  "Well, if you type in 'Henry Jacobs' plus 'Lornea Island' plus 'disappeared' then it helps to narrow down the results."

  Right away Amber starts to type into the computer.

  "But there's no point doing that either," I tell her. She stops and sighs.

  "Why not?"

  "Well it's obvious isn't it?"

  Amber hesitates. "Is it?"

  "Yeah. It's because the internet wasn't invented then."

  She frowns again, deeper this time.

  "The internet wasn't invented until 1983. Well, actually some people say it didn't really exist until the 1990s when Tim Berners Lee invented the world wide web, but either way it's not going to have any information on someone who went missing in 1979."

  "Alright, alright. I get the point." Amber looks despondent.

  "So what do we do then?"

  I reach into my bag and begin to pull out a folder.

  "We might not be able to search for Henry Jacobs, but we can search for Barbara Jacobs." I open the folder and start to read.

  "Barbara June Jacobs is the granddaughter of the Charles Jacobs, who opened the first silver mine at Lornea Island's Northend in 1899. While the Northend mine closed with the 1950 disaster, Northend Mining Corporation is still a major player in international ore mining around the world, particularly in Africa. Barbara Jacobs sat on the Northend Mining Corporation board of directors until 2005 when she stepped down."

  "How do you know all that?" Amber asks, and I hand her the paper I'm reading. On it there's a picture of Mrs. Jacobs, only quite a bit younger, and wearing a red ball gown.

  "She was on something called the Lornea Island Council. When you click on her picture, this is what comes up."

  Amber spends a long time reading all the pages I've printed out. In front of her there's a packet of sandwiches. And just looking at them makes me feel quite hungry, because I didn't have time to make any lunch this morning. And also, because between Tucker and Steven, we don't have much food left in the house.

  "Can I have a sandwich?" I ask."

  "Huh?" Amber looks up. "Yeah sure. They're not very nice though. Tuna mayo, but the tuna was old. All I could find in the cupboard."

  She goes back to her reading. And because I've already read it all, I take a sandwich and start to eat it.

  "OK. So we know she's old Lornea Island, and she likes going to charity events. So she’s rich, but we knew that already. What we don't know is anything about her husband, let alone how he went missing. Or even if he did. So how do we find him?"

  Amber's right about the tuna. It's a bit nasty. I decide to wrap up what's left and give it to Steven later. Amber looks up.

  "I did have one idea." I kind of say, with my mouth still half full of mashed up fish.

  "What?"

  I can't help but smile a little bit, because this is a really good idea.

  "You know how I said the internet was only invented in 1983, except for people who don't regard it as the real internet until Tim Berners Lee...

  "Yeah."

  "Well. You also know about The Island Times, the biggest newspaper on Lornea Island? How you can search through old editions of the paper on the internet?"

  "Yeah," Amber says, and already she’s pulling up the website. I smile some more.

  "Then you also know it only goes back to 2000, because they didn't do the internet before then?"

  Amber stops. "Oh. Yeah I knew that too." Even though I know she didn’t. Not really.

  "Well they still made the newspaper, back then. Still wrote it I mean."

  "So?"

  "So, you can still search it. It's just not on the internet. You have to go to the actual newspaper office and do searches there. They have a special room for it. On a microfiche machine. It says so on their website.

  Amber stares at me for a moment, looking thoughtful.

  "Show me." She says.

  I lean across to use the keyboard, still talking while I type the address and the page loads.

  "It's just like in those movies." I go on, because I'm not sure if she really understands properly.

  "What movies?"

  "You know the kind of movies. Where they're searching for something in files somewhere. And it always takes them forever, but then, right at the end they find it. Here you go."

  Amber reads on the website about the Island Times reading room. And then suddenly she just gets up, brushing all her papers together.

  "Come on."

  "Where are we going?"

  "To the newspaper office. I've got mom's car."

  I'm a bit surprised by this, since we only get an hour for lunch, and we've already had fifteen minutes. We won't be able to get there and back in time.

  "What about class?" I say.

  "What about class?"

  "Well, we might miss it..."

  "So? This is way more important."

  I totally don't know what to say to that, but Amber's already gone.

  Fifteen

  I stuff my folder back in my bag. Amber hasn't put away the books she's used, so I quickly dump them onto the trolley that Mrs. Lopez uses to put the returned books back to where they go on the shelves, because you're not supposed to just leave them on the computer tables like Amber did.

  Then I start to run, I can see Amber at the bottom of the stairs, and it doesn't look like she's going to wait for me at all. I just about catch her up in the lobby, and I'm about to say something when she stops.

  "Wait here, I need to pee," she says, and then she disappears into the girls' bathroom. I'm starting to think that Amber is quite an annoying person.

  But then something amazing happens. I start to look around the lobby – it’s one of those spaces that you don't really look at much, even though you go through it every day. There's a long reception desk, empty, because the receptionists have a little room they work from. Then there’s a few plants to trick parents and visitors into thinking Newlea High School is a much nicer place than it really is. And up on the wall there's all this wood paneling, with all the names of important people in the school over the years. Like an honors board. And for some reason I start to read down the names on the honors board. I'm not really paying attention, I'm just passing the time, when suddenly I notice something.

  But before I can do anything about it, I'm interrupted by a voice right behind me.

  "Hey Wheatley!"

  I recognize the voice at once. It's James Drolley, the idiot from my class earlier. When I turn around he's with all the other boys who ruined Geography earlier.

  "Hanging out by the girl's bathroom Wheatley? Why don't you just go in there?"

  Drolley's friends all start laughing, as if what he said was actually a joke. Though it isn't really. I don't reply. I get a bad feeling that they're not just going to walk by. It's lunchtime after all, they've got plenty of time.

  And sure enough I’m right. They all stop and gather round me in a circle. Then James steps really close to me.

  "Why’d ya get in the way?" Drolley asks. He pushes me in the chest. He's one of the smallest boys in the class, not much bigger than I am. I think it bothers him a bit.

  "In the way of what?" I ask.

  "In class you fucktard! I was aiming for Smith. Until you got in the way." He shoves me again, harder this time. The others laugh again.

  "Go on James," one of his friends says. “Hit him.” The boy’s name is Paul. I used to be sort of friends with Paul, but then he got in with James Drolley and his gang instead.

  There's no point answering any of them, so I turn away from Drolley, and look back at the wooden honors board again, not quite believing what I saw before. But then I get pushed really hard from behind, and I nearly fall over.

  "Don't fuc
king ignore me Wheatley." Drolley says. I only just manage to stay on my feet, and somehow my bag comes off my shoulder. Then suddenly Drolley is holding it. I realize it hurts where he pulled it from me.

  "Hey," I say. I sense I need to concentrate now or things are going to turn bad.

  "Give it back."

  "Why?" James challenges. "You gonna make me?" He shakes my bag.

  "You got any food for me Wheatley? I'm kinda hungry."

  "No," I say. "I haven't got anything."

  Drolley stares at me for a second. "Let's check shall we? Make sure you're telling the truth." Then he unzips my bag and looks inside. As he does so I remember the tuna mayo sandwich I wrapped up for Steven.

  "Well lookie here..." Drolley pulls it out and opens the packet. “Mmmm. Tuna sandwich. My favorite. So you were lying Wheatley. You little fucking shit. You think you can lie to me?" He throws the sandwich to one of his friends, but with the packet open the two bits of bread separate and it all falls to the floor where Paul stamps on it.

  "Awww fuck.” Drolley says. “I can’t eat that now Wheatley. You got any more?" He looks again in the bag, pulling out my books and folders to check if anything else is there. Then he pulls out the folder I made last night. I get a sudden, sinking feeling in my stomach.

  "Hey, what's the fuck is this?"

  On the front of the folder that Drolley is holding is a the logo Amber drew for the detective agency, only I've colored it in, and made it better. Arranged around the drawing are words, in a circle around the image of the magnifying glass. Drolley turns his head as he tries to read them.

  "Newlea Island... Detective Agency?" His face lights up in delight, because – even though he's stupid – he knows when he's hit upon something he can use.

  "Is that you Wheatley? Are you the Newlea Island fucking Detective Agency?" He opens it, letting some pages waft to the floor, and starts reading out my notes. I sense this is about to get really out of control when there's a sudden scream from across the lobby.