Spurling had heaved three wooden crates out of the helicopter. He was surrounded by black, painted faces now, their expressions ugly and menacing.
“He supplied them with guns. Oh—it’s been done before, Tad! The Arambayans had blowpipes, bows and arrows, spears. But now their enemy, the Cruel People, had joined the twentieth century. They had guns. Automatic rifles. And fueled by alcohol and greed, they attacked their poor neighbors.”
Dr. Aftexcludor fell silent, but the crystal ball told its own story. He saw the Arambayan village, a circle of straw-covered huts on the edge of a river. He saw the women with their children, the men swimming and laughing in the clear water. Then there was a shot. It came from the edge of the forest. A young boy, barely older than Tad, was thrown wounded to the ground and then the Cruel People were on them, swarming over the village as more shots rang out and the flames rose from the first of the houses.
Tad covered his eyes. He couldn’t take any more.
“It was my father,” he muttered. “It was Sir Hubert Spencer and Beautiful World.”
“Solo was one of the very few who escaped alive,” Dr. Aftexcludor went on. “You might say he’s the last of the Arambayans. I’ve looked after him ever since, but he has no real life . . .” His voice trailed away. “I’m sorry,” he said at length. “But you said you wanted to hear. You said you were ready.”
“I know.” Tad felt an intense sadness, deeper than anything he had experienced in his life. It was as if a river were running through him. “I had to know,” he said at last. “And . . . I suppose . . . I’m glad I know now.”
“Yes.”
Tad stood up. Suddenly he knew what he had to do. “Good-bye, Dr. Aftexcludor,” he said. “Thank you.”
“Good-bye, Tad. And good luck.”
Tad paused at the door. “There is one thing,” he said. “Will I . . . will you ever change me back into Tad Spencer?”
Dr. Aftexcludor shook his head. “Only you can do that,” he said. “You can be what—and who—you want to be.”
Tad left. He never saw Dr. Aftexcludor again.
When Tad got back to the caravan, Eric and Doll Snarby had finally woken up and were once again tucking into a mountainous breakfast, this time consisting entirely of kippers. Tad had never seen so many kippers slipping and slithering over one another on one plate. Finn was sitting in a corner, smoking a cigarette.
“My Bob!” Doll sobbed by way of greeting. “Back ’ome at last!” She picked up one of the kippers and used it to wipe her nose. “I been so worried about you!”
“It’s true,” Eric added. “Your mum’s been worrying ’erself to death. Some nights she’s only managed nine pizzas.”
“My little boy!” Doll sniffed.
“And a dozen Mars bars. She ’ad a dozen Mars bars. But apart from that, she couldn’t eat a thing!”
“Shut up, the two of you,” Finn snapped, and the Snarbys fell silent. Finn leaned forward and held something up, a narrow book with a blue cover. His eyes locked into Tad’s. “Where did you get this, you thieving vermin?” he demanded.
Tad recognized the checkbook that he had taken from his own bedroom in Knightsbridge. His hand fell automatically to his back pants pocket.
“It was in the back of the cab,” Finn explained. “Must ’ave slipped out your back pocket.”
“It’s mine!” Tad said.
“Yours, is it? That’s funny. ’Cause it ’asn’t got your name in it.” Finn opened the checkbook. “‘Thomas Arnold David Spencer,’” he read. He scratched his cheek, his nails rasping against three days’ stubble. “So who’s he?” he demanded.
“Leave the boy alone, Finn,” Doll said.
“You stay out of this, Doll, or by heaven, I’ll pull your leg off and kick you with it.” Finn turned back to Tad. “Who is he?”
“He’s no one. Some rich kid. He’s the son of Sir Hubert Spencer. You know . . .”
“Sir Hubert Spencer, Beautiful World?” Finn weighed the checkbook in his hand. “Pickpocketed it, did you?”
“Yes.”
“What did I tell you about stealing!” Eric Snarby leaned forward and slapped Tad hard on the side of his head. “If you’re going to steal something, make sure you can sell it. A checkbook’s no blooming good! Why didn’t you get ’is watch?”
“Wait a minute. Wait a minute . . .” Finn was thinking. You could almost see the thoughts passing one at a time across his eyes. “The Spencers, they got a place down near Ipswich,” he muttered. “Snatchmore Hall or something . . .”
“What—you going to burgle it?” Doll asked.
“Not burgle it. No.” Finn raised the checkbook to his nostrils and sniffed it. He let out a pleasurable sigh. “A rich kid with his own bank account, that’s given old Finn a thought. Maybe burgling ain’t the right game for us. Maybe there’s an easier way . . .”
“What you got in mind, Finn?” Eric demanded.
“You wait and see,” Finn replied. “Just you wait and see.”
PRIME STEAK
Tad clung to the branch
of the oak tree, his dangling feet only inches from the razor wire and broken glass below. Using all his strength, he swung one hand in front of the other and passed over the garden wall. If he dropped onto the ground now, he would break both his legs, but just as he remembered there would be, a great pile of grass clippings had been left, close to the wall. Tad gritted his teeth, then let go with both hands. He fell, hit the pile and sank to his waist in the cut grass. Fortunately, the weather had been dry. The grass was old and soggy, but not the mush he had feared.
He stood up inside the grounds of Snatchmore Hall, the home that had once been his.
He made his way quickly toward the house, taking care not to be seen. As he drew closer, he ducked behind trees or ran crouching from bush to bush. At last he came to the edge of the lawn with the swimming pool to one side and the side entrance to the house just ahead. As he paused, catching his breath, there was a sudden movement and he ducked back out of sight. A car had started up and was rolling down the driveway toward the main gate. Tad caught sight of Spurling behind the wheel. And where was the grim-faced chauffeur off to now? he wondered. Looking for more children to invite to the Center? Or perhaps selling more weapons to wipe out another uncooperative Indian tribe?
The car passed through the electronic gates, which swung smoothly shut behind it. At least that was one less danger to have to worry about. He had already seen Mrs. O’Blimey leave the house to go shopping. Mitzy was on vacation. Lady Geranium Spencer would still be in bed.
That just left Bob Snarby. On his own.
Tad had to cross about a hundred yards of open ground to reach the safety of the house and he was once again grateful for this new body of his. He could cover the ground in less than a minute. He tensed himself, then darted forward.
And stopped.
Finn and he had planned all this carefully, taking into account the electronic gates, the wall, the video cameras and the trip wires concealed in the garden. But they had forgotten the last security measure in the house—and now it was too late.
Vicious had sprung out as if from nowhere. The oversize dalmatian stood in front of him, its hackles rising, its lips pulled back to reveal its specially sharpened teeth. There was a savage hunger in its eyes as it padded forward, its paws barely seeming to touch the ground. Tad remembered the last intruder to come across Vicious, the 107 stitches the man had needed. When he had left the hospital, he had looked like a jigsaw puzzle.
Tad looked around. He was right out in the open, with nowhere to run. If he turned and tried to make it back to the trees, the dog would be on him before he had taken three paces. It was about to spring. Every single part of the creature was poised for the attack. Tad closed his eyes and prepared for the worst.
“You can be what—and who—you want to be.”
It was as if the words had been whispered in his ear. They were virtually the last words that Dr. Aftexcludor had spoken to him, and remembering them now, Tad suddenly had an idea.
He opened his eyes and held out his hand, palm down, showing it to the dog.
“Vicious . . .” he muttered.
The dog growled again.
“Good old Vicious! Don’t you know me, boy? It’s Tad! You remember me!”
The dog looked at him blankly. And it didn’t stop growling.
“You know it’s me!” Tad insisted. He tapped his chest. “I’m in here. I know it’s not my body, but it’s still me. You’re not going to hurt me, are you!”
And then the dalmatian wagged its tail! It recognized him!
Tad let out his breath in a huge sigh of relief. Vicious was drooling now, expecting an éclair. Tad pointed with one finger. “Basket!” he commanded.
“Basket!” Tad said again.
The dog turned and ran into the house. Tad watched it go with a sense of elation. It wasn’t just that he had survived the encounter. It was something more. Despite his new face, his new clothes, even his new smell, he now realized that deep down there
was
still a part of him that was Tad Spencer. And always would be.
With more hope and excitement than he had felt in weeks, Tad ran the rest of the way and went in through the kitchen door.
He had known it would be open. Mrs. O’Blimey was always forgetting to lock it, and as Tad had suspected, the kitchen was empty. There was a second door on the other side and he went through it, passing into a small, bare room filled with television monitors, video recorders and other equipment; the security room of Snatchmore Hall.
Tad sat down in front of a console. Set in the panel opposite him was a color television screen showing a wobbling image of the main gates. Next to it was a grid with ten numbered buttons and a microphone. Tad punched in a code: 1-10-8.
There was a buzz and the gates swung open.
Tad kept his eyes on the screen. A battered white van had appeared with IPSWICH SLAUGHTERHOUSE—LOVELY FRESH MEAT painted on the side. Finn had stolen the van the day before and it was, of course, he who was behind the wheel. As he drove through the gates and onto the driveway, he leaned out of the window and gave a thumbs-up sign to the closed-circuit camera. Tad pressed the buttons again and the gates closed.
He was waiting for Finn by the kitchen door when the van arrived. Finn killed the engine and got out. “Any trouble?” he demanded.
“No,” Tad replied. “The chauffeur’s out. There’s no sign of the servants. And Mum . . . I mean . . . Lady Geranium must still be in bed.”
“Good boy! Good boy!” Finn reached into the van and pulled out a sack. Perhaps it really had been used for carrying meat once, as it was old and stained and smelled horrible. “Right. Let’s go,” he said.
The two of them set off on tiptoe through the house. Everything felt unreal to Tad—just as it had when he’d broken into the mews house in London. To be in his home yet at the same time an intruder, breaking the law . . . it made him dizzy just to think about it. But he couldn’t tell Finn that. In fact, it almost amused him, pretending that he was here for the first time.
“What a place! What a place!” Finn whispered as they crossed the main hall and made for the stairs. There was a little antique table leaning against a wall and Finn stopped beside it. He picked up a silver cigarette box and held it to the light. “Worth a few bucks,” he whispered.
“That’s not what we’re here for,” Tad reminded him in a low voice.
“Shame to leave it, though.” Finn slipped the box into his pocket and crept on. The two of them climbed the stairs and started along a corridor, Finn softly opening each door he came to and peering into the room behind. The door they wanted was the fifth on the right. Tad could have found his way to it blindfolded. But once again, he said nothing. He would let Finn do it his way.
A bathroom. A sauna. An empty bedroom. A dressing room. Finn reached the fifth door and opened it. The sound of snoring rose and fell in the half-light. Finn whistled softly and hitched up the sack. Tad followed him into what had once been his bedroom.
It was a wreck. The carpet was almost completely hidden by the candy wrappers, potato-chip bags, cookie boxes, crumpled comics, old socks and smelly underwear that covered it. The neat shelves of books and computer games (his books, his computer games!) had been torn apart and one of the computers had a broken screen and grape jelly all over the keyboard. One wall had been covered by a zigzagging line of spray paint. The whole room stank of cigarette smoke.
Finn took this all in and smiled. “He treats his room just like you do, Bob,” he muttered.
“Shhh!” Tad’s eyes had been drawn to the bed, where the room’s occupant lay, his stomach in the air, snoring heavily. Once again Tad had the strange sensation of realizing that he was looking at himself, but this time he felt only disgust. The boy on the bed resembled nothing so much as a huge jellyfish. His arms and legs were splayed out and his silk pajamas had slipped down to reveal a great, swollen belly. Rolls of fat bulged underneath the pajamas, and as the boy breathed they moved—but in different directions. Bob Snarby had fallen asleep with his mouth wide open and there was a bead of saliva caught between his upper and lower lip that quivered each time he snored.
“Is this really me?” Tad muttered. “Was this me?”
“What?” Finn hissed.
“Nothing.”
“What a slob!” Finn muttered. “I hope the sack’s big enough!”
Tad and Finn crept forward, right up to the sleeping boy. They exchanged a glance. “Now!” Finn said.
Together they pounced. Bob Snarby didn’t even have time to open his eyes before he found himself grabbed and half buried in the foul-smelling sack. As Finn hoisted him up, Tad pulled. The sack slid over Bob’s head, down his body and over his feet. As the end came clear, Finn produced a length of rope and tied it in a tight knot. “Prime steak,” he muttered, and grinned at his own joke. “Now let’s get him loaded up.”
A few minutes later the gates of Snatchmore Hall opened for a second time and the white butcher’s van rocketed out and veered off down the lane. Finn was gripping the wheel, staring out with wide, manic eyes. Tad was sitting next to him. The sack was kicking and squirming in the back.