The If Game (4 page)

‘No.'

‘What sort of man? What did he look like?'

‘Old. White hair.'

‘How old? Tall or short? What did he say?'

‘He seemed as if he thought he knew me. But I've never seen him before. But I don't know him, do I?'

‘No, you don't. What else?'

‘Nothing else. I got away.'

‘He didn't say his name?'

‘No.'

Dad sat silent for a moment or two. Then he said, ‘Did he seem to be looking for you?'

‘No. He was just there when I came up to where he was sitting and then he said, “Back already?” as if he'd been expecting me.'

‘He didn't say back from where?'

‘That's when he said about an aunt. He thought I'd been to see her.'

‘Did he know your name?'

‘He didn't say so. But if he thought I belonged to his family, he wouldn't have to say it, would he?'

Stephen could see that Dad was upset. ‘Tell me exactly what this man looked like. Old, you said?'

‘Not very. Like I said, he had white hair. Not a lot of it.'

‘He didn't say who he was?'

‘He thought I knew. It was really weird.'

What was just as weird was the way Dad was taking this. Stephen could see that he was worried. Stephen said, ‘That's why I was asking you about twins.'

‘Twins? What are you talking about?'

‘When I got back from being out that day. I asked you if I could ever have had a twin. I thought perhaps there was someone who looked exactly like me and that was why he picked on me.'

‘When was that? I'd forgotten.'

‘Couple of weeks ago.'

‘And you haven't seen him again since then?'

‘No.'

‘No one's written to you?'

‘No.' This was really puzzling. Why should Dad think that anyone would write to him? Stephen never got letters. An occasional—very occasional—picture postcard from a school friend away on holiday was all the post he ever got.

‘Where did you say you saw this man?'

‘Near Bridge Street.'

‘In the street, was it? He didn't ask you in anywhere?'

Stephen hesitated a moment before he said, ‘Yes, out of doors.' It had been out of doors, even though he'd expected that door to lead into a house. Dad didn't appear to notice the hesitation. He said, ‘If you see that man again, Stephen, don't talk to him. If he tries to get talking to you, just walk away and leave him be.'

‘D'you think he's dangerous?' Stephen asked.

‘Not exactly. But I don't want you to have anything to do with him.'

‘Do you know who he is, then? Is he a murderer? Or what?' Stephen's vivid imagination had already cast the man as a child abductor. Perhaps a dangerous lunatic, who shouldn't really be out on the streets. Whatever he was, he found it exciting as well as scary. He said, ‘Dad, I'm not a baby. You don't think I'd go off with someone just because they asked?'

‘No. Well, don't. ‘That's all.'

‘But if you think he's dangerous, shouldn't we tell the police?'

‘I didn't say he was dangerous. It's just ... I don't think he's someone you should know.'

‘You know him, though, don't you?' Stephen asked.

Dad didn't answer. Stephen was used to Dad's not answering questions. He felt sure that Dad must know the old man. So what was wrong with him? Why was Dad upset about him?

That evening he was intrigued to see Dad writing a letter. He suspected that this was something to do with the incident with the old man. Dad wrote quite a few letters, one every Sunday, but Stephen never knew whom he wrote to, and if he asked, he was never told. Dad always took the letters to post himself, Stephen never had sight of the envelopes. Generally he wrote quite fast, but this letter seemed to be giving him trouble. He kept on stopping, and looking round the room, scratching his head and sighing. It was a short letter, not near as long as those he ordinarily wrote. He didn't address the envelope straight off, either. He had to go to his room first. To look up the address, Stephen guessed. Could he be writing to the police? It was all very mysterious. It was also annoying. Dad was treating him like a small child, afraid that he was in danger of being abducted by a stranger. Stephen's dignity was insulted. He was sure he could look after himself.

In spite of his dad's warnings, Stephen spent quite a lot of time during the next few weeks looking around to see if he could find the old man again. But he never caught sight of him or of anyone like him, and as time went on, his interest in the mystery waned. He was also looking around whenever he was out in the town in case he saw Alex, whom he would have chosen to avoid. It was just his bad luck that one Saturday morning, as he came out on to the road from his own house, she was coming out from next door. It was impossible to pretend that they hadn't seen each other. They were almost face to face. Stephen felt horrible. Not only because he knew he'd been unprovokedly rude at their last meeting, but more, because he'd mistaken her for a boy. Had he said anything in their brief conversation which could have told her of his mistake? That would be unbearably embarrassing.

He saw that she had turned red. Perhaps she was going to pay him back for telling her that he didn't want her company. But instead she said, ‘Hi!', and it was guarded but not unfriendly.

Stephen hoped that she might have forgotten their last meeting. He also said, ‘Hi!'

‘You still cross with me?' she asked.

‘No.' To his surprise, he found he wasn't. It wasn't her fault that he'd thought of her as a boy.

‘You were last time we met. Outside that funny house you wanted to go into.'

He wouldn't admit it, so he said, ‘Well, I'm not now.'

‘I'm just going to get my mum's paper,' she said. The post office, which sold newspapers, was in the opposite direction from where Stephen meant to go. Gratefully, he said, I've got to go this way.' He certainly didn't want her hanging around again.

‘Bye then,' she said and was off.

Not too bad, he thought. She could have been really fed up with the way he'd spoken to her after that odd experience in the sham house. He went to Dan's house and found Mike already there. They kicked a ball around for a bit, but it wasn't the same as having enough people for two proper teams. Stephen left them and went to the library to see if there were any books he might want to read, but he found it difficult to choose anything that interested him for more than half an hour or so. He almost wished that the short Easter holiday was over already. He was surprised to find, a week later, that he was quite pleased when the summer term started, and he was back at school. Time could drag there, but the clock didn't seem to go anything like as slowly as at home.

The weather changed for the better, too. After a miserably cold, wet April, the sun came out and the wind blew softly. One Saturday, walking back from visiting Mike, he found himself in a street he didn't know well, one side of a square of rather elegant houses. There were little pillars, supporting small balconies over the front doors, and the tops of the ground floor windows were arched. There were brick walls separating the houses. Stephen supposed that behind these were the houses' gardens. He was strolling along, admiring the houses and wishing he and his dad lived in something as nice to look at, when he suddenly stopped. He felt muzzy, and his heart seemed to be beating twice as fast as it should. He had had this feeling before and now he knew what it was.
He looked around. Opposite to him was a green garden door, set in one of the walls. With a sinking of the heart, he realized that this was one of the doors he had to go through.

But how could he just walk into someone's garden? He crossed the road and examined the door. It had a large round wooden handle, and he tried it, but though it turned, the door did not open. Indeed, above the handle was a keyhole.

It was a keyhole for a Yale key. And Stephen had a Yale key, one of the three he had found in the garden. It was in his room at home, but he did not hesitate. He went back to the flat, took the key out of the chutney jar and ran back to the door in the wall.

When he was back in the square, he tried to consider what would be the best way of getting through that door. He could, of course, simply try his key in the door, and if it opened, just walk in. But he was unwilling to do that. He looked at the front door of the house to which he supposed the garden belonged, and wondered whether to ring the bell and ask if he might have a look at the garden. No. He couldn't do that. They'd think he was crazy. He decided that it would be better to use his key and open the door, and if anyone challenged him, he would say that it was all a mistake, he'd lost his way and thought that this was his garden. It sounded an unlikely story, but he couldn't think of anything better. So he inserted the key in the lock. It turned and when he also used the wooden handle the door swung inwards.

Stephen looked cautiously through the gap. He saw the garden he'd expected. It was large and green and seemed full of people, all talking. They were sitting round a big table spread with food. But as he looked, the talking died down and all heads were turned towards him. He was acutely embarrassed.

He said, ‘I'm sorry. I just wanted to know what was here.' He half expected to be told to go away quickly, or even to be told he had no business to open a door into an unknown garden. Instead of this, a woman got up from the table and came towards him. She was smiling.

‘Well, come in, now you're here,' she said. Her hand was on his shoulder and she was pushing him towards the table. ‘Just in time. Chris hasn't cut the cake yet.'

Stephen saw now that on the table there was a large iced cake, with candles. Behind it was a small boy with curly brown hair. He said, ‘I'm going to cut it now!' and flourished a knife. A voice called out, ‘Blow out the candles first!'

The boy took a deep breath and blew. All the candles but one went out. Someone leaned forward and pinched it so that the little flame disappeared.

‘Now cut it!' someone said.

‘But you must wish!' a woman said.

The boy said, ‘I'm going to.'

‘You mustn't tell us what it is,' another voice said.

The boy, Chris, said, ‘Shan't tell anyone.' He plunged the knife into the cake, but to cut a slice was more than he could manage. The woman who had told him to wish was beside him, and she held his hand and guided the knife so that the pieces of cake, which were more like mounds of crumbs than slices, could be piled on a plate.

Stephen expected that at any moment someone would realize that he had no right to be there. But the woman who had pushed him towards the table, handed the plate to him as he approached where they were standing. ‘Go on, it's good,' she said, and Stephen, not knowing how to refuse, took the smallest slice he could see. She was right. It was good.

‘I'm sorry. I didn't mean to barge in,' he said, his mouth full of cake.

‘You didn't barge in. Didn't you get the invitation?' she asked, also through a mouthful of crumbs. He didn't know how to answer that. Of course he hadn't had an invitation to the birthday of someone he'd never met before. He looked round at the other guests to see if there could be anyone there whom he knew, who might have invited him. But they were all strangers. Not only strangers, but something about the way they spoke made him think that they were not English. They had a curious accent which he couldn't name, and yet they talked as if English were their native tongue. American perhaps?

‘I know Chris asked for you to come,' the woman said.

Stephen felt acutely uncomfortable. Here he was again, with people who seemed to know him, though he had no idea who they were. He said, ‘I think there's been a mistake. I didn't really mean to come to his party

But she interrupted him. ‘Just because you didn't like what Rose said the other day? You shouldn't hold it against Chris. It wasn't anything to do with him.'

More confusing than ever. Stephen said, ‘Who's Rose?'

The woman stared. ‘Rose. You know Rose,' she said.

‘No. I don't. Look! It's all a mistake. I shouldn't have come in here. I don't know any of you. I don't know Rose and I've never seen you before.'

‘There's no need to take it like that. Calm down, won't you?' the woman said.

‘I'm quite calm,' Stephen said. It wasn't true. He was angry and frightened. He didn't know what was going on. It seemed as if there were people around who were out to confuse him, to pretend that he was someone he wasn't. He said, ‘All right, if you think I know you, tell me who I am. You don't even know my name.'

‘Not know you? I've known you since you were a baby.

You're Deedie,' the woman said. She turned round to address the rest of the company. ‘Here's Deedie, playing the usual games, pretending he doesn't know us. What do you think of that?'

Stephen had the impression that the people seated round the table were all standing up and staring at him, with angry eyes. But he didn't wait to see more. Shaken to the core, he turned and ran for the door in the wall. The key was still in his hand. He pushed it into the keyhole, turned the wooden knob and, to his relief, found himself on the pavement outside.

Stephen went home, disturbed. It seemed that here, in the town he'd lived in all his life, there were people who thought they knew him, whom he was supposed to know. It had been bad enough when it was only the old man. He could explain that to himself as a mistake made by an old man's failing eyesight. But the people today hadn't been old and there were several of them. Worse, and more puzzling still, they had known his name. Not his name today, but the name he'd been called by when he was very young and couldn't pronounce ‘Stephen' himself. It was enough to make him feel dizzy, without the extra pressure of the feelings he had when he saw a door and knew he had to go through it.