Blood Tracks (22 page)

Danny tutted and shuffled up to bed but Gina remained standing there, in the unlit room, mesmerized by the shining blood-red stones at the bottom of the dark, humming tank.

Curiosity got the better of her; she walked over to the family computer and sat down.

I might as well look it up now. I’m awake anyway. It’ll be quicker without Danny jumping around me.

The screen flickered into life and she brought up a search engine. She paused, pondering how to describe what she’d seen.

She tried a few keyword combinations until some relevant results came up. Gina’s brow crinkled as she scrolled down the screen. Links to articles about the same topic kept coming up, again and again. She opened the first one and her eyes scanned the text.

“No way,” she laughed to herself. She clicked on the next link and the next and despite her cynicism she became more and more engrossed – all the articles seemed to agree.

She shook her head.
There must be some other explanation.
She focused on the other suggestions and read carefully, but none of them really matched what she was seeing.

She looked back to the fish tank. The glow from the stones was fading fast! Gina rushed across to it. Her instinct told her to get the stones out while she could still identify them. She lifted the hood and slowly sank her arm to the bottom of the tank, delicately plucking out the five stones, trying not to distress the fish, who were darting around frantically like they were looking for a fire exit.

“Sorry,” she whispered as she put the hood back down and waited for the disturbed water to settle again. She turned on the main light in the living room and examined her catch. Five chunky, cloudy blue stones, their surfaces rough and uneven. She ran her fingertips over their bumpy exteriors then, one by one, she held them up to the light. There was no trace of any red, of any glow. Now there was little to distinguish them from the hundreds of other stones that lined the floor of the tank. Some may have been slightly bigger, some were smaller and, between them, they covered the whole spectrum of the colour blue, but all looked nothing out of the ordinary.

Danny put his head under the pillow, trying to block out his alarm clock.

“Doh! Get up, buddy! You’re late,” Homer Simpson declared. Danny groaned, hitting Homer’s shiny head to silence him. Opening one eye, he looked at the clock display. He
was
late, really late! Why hadn’t he heard the first alarm go off? Why hadn’t he heard his mum coming into his room, telling him to wake up?

He shot out of bed, tussling with his uniform until he was fully clothed. Excitement suddenly bubbled up in him as he remembered the strange discovery of last night. He went to get Gina, but her room was empty. Danny headed down to the living room and found a yellow Post-it note stuck on the fish tank.

Danny, I’ve taken the glowing stones out of the tank. (Don’t panic, I was careful.) Just want to find out more about them. I’ll get them back to you soon. Hope you don’t mind. Gina x

“What!” He threw his hands up in protest. “That’s not fair.” He stomped into the kitchen, frustrated that he had no one to complain to.

The doorbell rang and Danny opened it to a blurry-eyed Tom, dressed in a crisp work suit. Tom didn’t wait to be invited in. He headed for the kitchen, groaning, “I’m just picking up my car but, God, I need a strong coffee! Has your mum gone to work?”

“Yeah. There’s only me in, but I’m late for school.”

Tom stood over the kettle, spooning coffee into a mug. “Give me a minute and I’ll give you a lift. Did anyone find my aftershave?”

“Don’t know. Not sure.” Danny shrugged. “You look terrible.”

“Thanks. This time it
is
a hangover. Let my face be a warning to you about the evils of drink.” He gave a weak smile. “Anyway, what were you shouting about? I could hear you from the pavement.”

“It’s Gina! She’s gone and taken the stones,” Danny began to rant. “She didn’t even ask me! It’s not fair, because she made me go back to bed and she said we’d
both
look it up in the morning but now she’s gone and taken them and they’re mine! I wanted to bring my friends back and show them. They’re so cool!”

Tom winced at the noise level.

“What are you raving on about, Danny?” he said wearily.

“The blue stones in the fish tank. You know…chunky, kind of…cloudy-looking.”

“I’ve got to be honest with you, I hadn’t really noticed, but I’ll take your word for it,” Tom said, pouring the boiling water into the mug.

“The thing is, Uncle Tom, I came down last night to check the fish were okay. I was worried about them after what you said about that bulb you put in. Anyway, I hadn’t turned it off. I thought the fish might be hurt or something. But they were fine.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Has it done the trick?” Tom yawned, picking up the mug.

“Yeah, the water’s all clear. It’s brilliant! But the mad thing is, when I turned that light off, five of the stones at the bottom of the tank just started to glow, and I mean
really
glow, blood-red – it was incredible – like magic.”

Tom froze. The mug hovered by his lips.

“Cloudy
blue
stones that glowed
red
.” His voice was a whisper, his bloodshot eyes narrowed.

“Yeah. You should have seen them, it was amazing!”

“And the UV bulb had been on?”

“Yes, but they only started glowing when I switched if off.”

“Your dad bought you that fish tank, didn’t he?” Tom asked urgently.

“Yeah, for my birthday. It was last thing he ever bought me. That’s why Gina had no right to take those stones. I want them back.”

“When did he give it to you?”

“He didn’t get a chance to give it to me. He’d gone and got it the day he died. It was in the back of his car when he went to that bridge with Gina.” Danny’s voice began to quiver; he didn’t want to associate the present with this memory.

Tom stepped towards Danny, fixing him with a manic stare. “Did you choose the stones?”

“No, they came with the tank.”

“So your dad chose them?” He sounded like a cross-examining barrister.

Danny shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe, but it could have come as a package, you know, with the tank and filter and stuff,” he said, increasingly baffled by Tom’s questions.

Tom threw the mug down on the kitchen table and charged towards the living room. “Are any still glowing?”

“No! Haven’t you been listening, Uncle Tom?” Danny said, exasperated.

Danny followed and watched as Tom stared into the tank, before switching on the UV bulb and swishing the front curtains closed.

“Shut the door, Danny, and close the curtains down there,” he ordered, pointing to the far end of the room.

“I don’t know why you’re bothering. They’re not in there,” Danny said as he shrouded the room in darkness.

“Ssh!” Tom hissed, crouching in front of the tank to scrutinize the bed of stones.

Danny could only hold his silence for a minute before blurting out in frustration, “Gina’s taken them. We’ll just have to wait till she gets home and I’ll show you then.”

“What about her bedroom?” Tom said, thinking out loud.

He sprinted up the stairs and into Gina’s room. He scanned it and, not seeing the stones on display, he began to rifle through her cupboards. He felt along the top of the wardrobe, got on his hands and knees to look under her bed, tossed her pillow and duvet off the bed before upturning the mattress, pushing her pile of revision books onto the floor and feverishly prising open trinket boxes from the drawers of the dressing table. Danny stood in the doorway, watching open-mouthed as the room was turned upside down. “Why are you doing this? What’s wrong?” he squeaked.

Tom didn’t answer; he turned to the wall collage that bombarded him with images of Martin Wilson. Sour sweat glistened on Tom’s forehead. His breathing heavy, he stood like a pumped-up boxer, waiting for the bell. “You crafty bastard, Marty,” he muttered to the photographs.

Tom lurched down the stairs two steps at a time, with Danny at his heels.

Back at the fish tank, he turned off the light and held his breath. The tank remained in darkness.

Danny opened the curtains, letting the sunlight flood the room. “They’re not in there.”

“But are you absolutely sure she took them all?”

“Well…I think so, probably,” he wavered.

“I need to be sure,” Tom said, flinging up the hood of the tank and, without even pausing to roll up his sleeves, plunging his arm into the watery world.

“What are you doing? Stop it! You’re going to hurt the fish!” Danny howled.

“There could still be some buried underneath that haven’t been exposed to the light,” Tom growled, grabbing a handful of stones from the bottom, and unearthing a maelstrom of debris that instantly polluted the waters. Plants that had been embedded in the stones began to float up to the surface and the fish swayed violently in the turbulence.

“Don’t just stand there! Go and get me some plastic bags, anything I can put these stones into.”

“No! Stop it! Stop it!” Danny’s face was hot with rage and distress.

“Do as you’re told!” Tom barked, this time dragging his hand along the bottom of the tank like a dredger.

Fish began to wash over the sides of the tank in a tidal wave of water. Danny watched in horror as the ground became awash with bright, shimmering bodies, flapping frantically against the floorboards.

Danny scrambled around the floor, delicately lifting the dying fish into the palm of his hand. “Move out of the way!” he shouted at Tom. “I’ve got to get them back in the water.”

But Tom shoved him away, causing the fish to catapult out of his hand.

Danny felt rage overwhelming him. He ran at Tom, springing up onto his back, wrapping his arms around Tom’s neck and his legs around his waist, trying to pull the big man away from the tank.

The shock of the attack caught Tom off guard; he stumbled back for a moment, but regained his balance and fought to prise Danny’s limpet limbs from him.

“Danny, get off me!” His voice was strangulated.

“You leave my tank alone!” Danny bawled into Tom’s ear, tightening his grip as the man tried to shake him off. Danny clung on like a cowboy at a rodeo, but he could feel his hands beginning to slide apart, his ankles unlocking. Tom grunted as he separated Danny’s hands and sent him flying backwards through the air. He landed on the ground with a thud.

Tom’s febrile face loomed over him. “Don’t you dare get up!”

Danny immediately sat up, defiantly.

“I’m warning you,” Tom hissed, jabbing a threatening finger at Danny’s face. “Stay down!”

Tom took off his jacket and laid it out on the floor. He continued scooping out handfuls of the blue stones and deposited them onto the jacket. He groaned in frustration; it was taking too long. He walked over to the display shelf, grabbing a weighty metal running trophy with Martin’s name engraved on the plaque.

“Cover your face,” he ordered.

“No!” screamed Danny, as he saw Tom swing the trophy from behind his head and smash it into the fish tank. The impact created a pinhole crack in the centre of the glass and, for a split second, the sheet seemed to have survived. But then as Danny watched in horror, fracture lines started to crackle outwards, until the whole sheet of glass suddenly shattered, and water flooded out, carrying with it the remaining fish.

There was the sound of squelching and crunching as Tom stepped on flailing fish and broken glass to lean into the desecrated tank. He picked out the flaccid plants and coral. He discarded the pirate ship, before shovelling the rest of the stones into the jacket on the ground. He then bundled it up and tied it like a bulging knapsack and went to leave.

He stepped past Danny, who was sitting, hugging his knees, head bowed. Tom swallowed hard, his voice thick. “I’m sorry, Danny. This is important. I promise I’ll get you a new tank. Don’t cry, eh? Forgive your Uncle Tom.”

But Danny didn’t answer. He bit his lip, desperate to stop his tears, afraid of this man who was suddenly a stranger to him.

Gina was nearing the school gates when her phone rang.
Home
flashed up on the screen.

“Hello?”

“Gina…Uncle Tom has gone mental,” Danny sobbed. “He’s looking for those glowing stones. He smashed up my fish tank. He wrecked your room. He was
really
scary. He’ll be looking for you. He knows you’ve got the stones. I’ve tried to get hold of Mum but she’s not answering. I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Calm down, Danny. What did he say about the stones?”

“Nothing! He just went crazy.”

“Listen, you’re best off in school. Have you got money for the bus?”

“Yeah.”

“Then go to school. I’ll keep trying Mum.”

“But what if he’s there when I get home? I don’t want to be on my own with him.”

“Don’t worry. Mum will sort it out. I’ll see you later. Love you!” Gina said anxiously.

As the call ended, her phone beeped. Someone had been trying to get through. She listened to the message.

The voice made her stomach lurch. “Hi, Gina, it’s Uncle Tom. Give me a call, will you, as soon as you can?”

She opened her school bag and unzipped her fluffy purple pencil case. The five cloudy blue stones sat atop an assortment of pens, compasses and protractors. She zipped it up again and turned away from the school gates, swimming against the tide of students who were flooding towards the entrance. As soon as she was out of sight of the school buildings she started to run.

As Gina entered Neptune’s Aquarium she was relieved to see that Jamie was there.

“Hi, Jamie,” she said as she approached him.

“Hi, nice to see you again. How’s your brother’s tank doing?” he asked.

“Actually, I’ve come about some of the stones that were in it.” She emptied the stones from her pencil case into Jamie’s hand. “They glow red – do you sell ones like these?”

Jamie inspected them. “No. We do sell glowing stones for decoration in the tanks, but they’re made of shiny, hard plastic material. Your ones are real stone. They look more like some of the bedding stones we stock.” He handed them back to Gina. “Sorry if I haven’t been much help.”

“No, don’t worry. You’ve been really helpful, thanks.”

Gina’s phone went to voicemail yet again. Tom cursed. He tried to think things through.
She usually has her phone on her but she’ll be in school so she’s probably turned it off. Maybe she’ll check it later. Okay, I’m wasting valuable time here. I’ve got to get things moving.

Tom dialled another number.

“Mr. Egon, it’s Tom Cotter here.”

“Hello, Mr. Cotter. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you.”

“No, well…I’d like you to come and see me. I have items that may be of great interest to you.”

“Really? I haven’t heard about this from Mr. Sissouma,” he said, puzzled.

“That’s because they’re nothing to do with him. I would like you to come and verify these objects.”

“But what about Mr. Sissouma?” Egon said gravely.

“Don’t worry about him. If these objects are what I suspect they are, your visit will be very worthwhile.”

Gina arrived at P.J. Harpers and loitered outside, deciding what to do.

It’s too crazy, isn’t it?

Her phone rang. She ignored it – it was Tom yet again.

How many times is that? Five? Six? Look at how he’s behaving. What he did this morning. Yeah, I need to go in there.

The bell on the door rang out as Gina entered the jeweller’s. She stood nervously in the carpeted square surrounded on three sides by cabinets displaying seductively lit jewellery.

She approached the flash sales assistant in the sharp suit, who eyed her suspiciously.

“Hello,” she said, trying to sound as mature as possible.

“Can I help you?” he asked curtly.

“I’m hoping so.” She smiled stiffly. “I have some stones that I’d like you to look at, please.”

The sales assistant watched as Gina got out her fluffy purple pencil case and handed him the five objects.

He looked disapprovingly from the dull stones to the teenage girl. “Are you sure you need a jeweller’s? These look like something you’d buy from a seaside rock shop.”

“Please just look at them.”

“Sorry, I can’t help you. We’re busy. But thanks for calling,” he said sarcastically.

Gina surveyed the empty shop and narrowed her eyes. “Look, you obviously don’t know much. Could I talk to someone who does?”

The man seemed most put out.

“I’m not leaving until I see someone who actually knows their job,” she said, folding her arms and standing firm in the middle of the shop floor.

The man huffed and called out, “Mr. Fenton, there’s a girl here who’s refusing to leave the shop unless someone looks at some grubby old stones she’s got.”

An older man appeared from the back of the shop. “Is there a problem, Mr. Drake?”

“This girl wants us to check out these stones.” He rolled his eyes, whispering loudly, “She’s a total time-waster – look at the state of them.”

“Shouldn’t you be at school, young lady?” Mr. Fenton asked archly.

“It’s a teacher training day,” Gina replied.

“Then why are you in your uniform?”

“I forgot, didn’t I – turned up, wondered why the place was so quiet.” She pulled a gormless face. “Anyway, would you look at these stones for me?”

“Will you leave without any fuss if I do?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Come on, let’s see what we’ve got then.” Mr. Fenton spread the stones out on a black cloth and pulled a loupe out of his pocket, putting it to his eye. He picked up one of the stones with tweezers and examined it with the magnifying lens. He turned the stone slowly around before picking up the next one, then the next. He scrutinized each one without comment, but Gina noticed an almost imperceptible twitch of his mouth.

He lowered the loupe from his eye and proceeded to put one of the stones to his lips.

“Lovely and cold,” he whispered excitedly. “Gary, get the tester out.”

“Which one?” Gary Drake asked.

“The one that checks for thermal conductivity.”

“No!” he said incredulously.

“Yes! Now!”

“What are they? Please tell me.” Gina was practically dancing on the spot.

“Patience,” Mr. Fenton replied, placing the stones gently inside the little open box. He touched wires to each of the stones in turn, his eyes and grin getting wider with each reading.

Gina felt like she was about to burst. “Please tell me what they are.”

“What you have here, young lady,” Mr. Fenton announced, “are gem quality, blue rough diamonds. Quite extraordinary! In all my years of working in this shop I’ve never even seen a genuine blue diamond. They estimate that for every ten thousand diamonds mined only one will be of colour. These stones are extremely valuable.”

“But they just look like grubby cloudy stones,” Gary Drake protested.

“They’re uncut, Gary. This is what diamonds look like when they come out of the earth. You’ve only seen them all cut and polished and ready to sell to our customers. An expert diamond cutter could transform these stones into breathtaking gems.”

“They glow red, you know, when they’ve been under a UV light,” Gina said, giddy with excitement. “I looked it up on the internet but it just sounded too crazy that they could be diamonds.”

“Where did you get them from?” Mr. Fenton’s voice was suddenly stern.

Gina hesitated. “They…they were my dad’s.”

“And where did
he
get them from?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged.

Mr Fenton frowned. “This is all very unusual. I’m afraid I can’t let you walk out of here with these gems. I need to keep hold of them and you need to stay here while I make a phone call. I think you and your dad will have some questions to answer so we can get to the bottom of this.”

“You don’t understand! I’ve got to go. Please give me my stones back.”

“Didn’t you hear what Mr. Fenton said? You’ve got to stay, until we sort this out,” Gary Drake said, surreptitiously pushing a button under the counter.

The button set off a clanking sound. Gina looked to the front of the shop and saw metal grates starting to roll down over the windows and doorway of the jeweller’s.

She leaned right over the counter, her feet off the ground, and grabbed the stones out of the box.

“No you don’t!” Gary Drake said, seizing her by her school jumper. Gina wriggled like a fish on a hook until she’d managed to slip out from his grip, leaving the jumper in Drake’s clenched hands. She grabbed her bag and ran to the door, the grates now nearing the ground. Drake jumped over the counter after her. She swung the door open and dropped down onto her stomach, sliding under the clanking metal that was only centimetres above her. She pulled her feet clear just as the grates clanged to the ground, trapping the furious assistant behind them.

“Raise the grates, Mr. Fenton,” she heard Drake cry as she sprinted away.