brink, looking down on to the landing of their new house. Hearing low voices he knelt to peer inside and something banged against his thigh: something in his jacket pocket. He reached in with his left hand and pulled out a shiny object that made him gasp in delight.
It was Mr Grantham’s pocket-watch.
‘Amanda,’ he murmured. ‘Amanda put it in my pocket.’
He descended the loft ladder to the landing, just in time to hear the end of a sentence from Jordy at the other end of the landing, where he and Chloe were standing with Ben and Dipa.
Jordy was saying, ‘… be very long.’
‘Here I am,’ said Alex, smiling weakly, realising he had come down from Attica just seconds after his step-brother and sister. ‘I was right behind them.’
Alex could not fail to see how the faces of his brother and sister lit up with pleasure and relief on seeing him. It was worth it, to come back to the real world, just to see how much they thought of him. If he ever doubted he was loved, he doubted it no longer. These were his family. They had missed him, even for that short time. Chloe especially. He wanted to go up to her and hug her, but of course he couldn’t, not in front of his parents. They had no idea what the three of them had been through. Maybe next week he would want to strangle his sister, but today he thought the world of her.
‘What have they been doing up there?’ asked Dipa, folding her arms and looking at Ben. ‘Look at them! Where did you get those smelly old clothes, Alex? And you two,’ she turned on Chloe and Jordy, ‘you look like rag-bags on legs.’
‘We found them in the attic,’ Chloe said.
Ben said with a questioning look, ‘Aren’t you all just a teeny bit old for playing dressing-up?’
‘It was only for a laugh,’ said Jordy. ‘We were just amusing ourselves.’
‘And the backpacks?’ enquired Dipa.
‘Oh, these,’ Alex said, ‘we found them too – and look – I’ve got Mr Grantham’s watch.’
He held it up triumphantly, with both Chloe and Jordy crying things like, ‘Well done, bruv.’ ‘What a star!’
‘Mr Grantham’s watch?’ asked Ben, looking at Dipa. ‘What’s that all about?’
Dipa’s folded arms tightened round her chest. ‘Don’t look at me. I’ve got no idea.’
‘Mr Grantham lost a watch in the attic when he was a young man,’ explained Chloe. ‘We said we’d look for it for him. And Alex managed to find it.’
‘And a letter,’ said Alex, ‘from his old girlfriend.’
He pulled the envelope out of his pocket and showed it to them.
‘I hope you haven’t read it,’ Dipa said. ‘That wouldn’t be right.’
‘What?’ cried Jordy, who was better at fibs than the other two. ‘Up there in the dark?’
‘Well, I’m glad you Boy Scouts have been doing good deeds,’ Ben said impatiently, ‘and I’m very impressed by it all. I’m sure Mr Grantham will be grateful. But now I think you’d all better go to your rooms and get out of those rags. You, young man,’ he addressed Alex, ‘smell like a sewer. In fact, you all pong. You’re a filthy bunch of herberts and I want you showered and changed within the hour. Your mother’s going to cook us a curry for supper.’
Nelson suddenly appeared as if by magic from round one of the bedroom doorways. He limped into view and let out a pathetic yowl. Curry. Nelson loved left-overs, and of all the left-overs he liked best, curry was at the top of the list, followed by sardines and beef sausages. Nelson knew only a few words in English and ‘curry’ was one of them.
‘Yes, we know,’ said Alex, bending to stroke his erst-while ginger saviour, ‘grub is very important, isn’t it?’
Nelson purred.
The children went to their rooms, but as soon as Dipa and Ben descended the stairs, they all met up again in Jordy’s room.
‘So,’ whispered Chloe to Alex, ‘you found it?’
‘Wasn’t easy,’ murmured Alex, showing them the silver watch again. He wound it round to the hour so that it played Frère Jacques a little before snapping it shut again. ‘I had to cross that water tank and …’ He gave them a brief overview of his adventures since he left them on the edge of the tank. ‘Anyway, Amanda gave me the watch in the end – put it in my pocket, so’s I couldn’t even thank her for it.’