Copyright

First published in hardback in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2014 First published in paperback in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2015 HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd, HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF The HarperCollins Children’s Books website address is www.harpercollins.co.uk

Visit Lauren Child on the web at www.milkmonitor.com www.rubyredfort.com

Text copyright © Lauren Child 2014 Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2015, Cover photography © Sandro Sodano

Lauren Child asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

Based on an original series design by David Mackintosh

Inside illustrations by David Mackintosh

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this eBook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers.

Source ISBN: 9780007334131

Ebook Edition © OCTOBER 2013 ISBN: 9780007586806

Version: 2019-07-17

Don’t miss the previous Ruby Redfort adventures:

Ruby Redfort: Look Into My Eyes

Ruby Redfort: Take Your Last Breath

Ruby Redfort: Catch Your Death

Dedication

For cousin Phoebe

and cousin Lucy

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Fall

An Ordinary kid

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Epilogue

Epilogue 2

From the Twinford Echo. . .

How Ruby decoded Claude’s touch code

Traille

A note on parkour

A note on

A note on the Gorilla Test

Read More from Ruby Redfort

Acknowledgments

About the Publisher

‘Fearlessness is often regarded as one of the keys to freedom. But does fear not serve a purpose? Is this deeply primal emotion not there to guide us, to help us sidestep danger and prompt us to take a safer path?

The question should be asked: is it always a positive quality to be fearless?

Why do we fear fear?’

DR JOSEPHINE HONEYBONE, founder of the Heimlich Good Emotion Institute, from her thesis, The Worthy Emotion.

ONE BRIGHT SUNNY DAY IN OCTOBER, a woman looked up to see a five-year-old girl wriggle out of a tiny fifteenth-storey window. As far as the woman could make out, the child was lured by the desire to reach a yellow balloon that had become snagged on the ironwork of the building’s fire escape. The girl seemed unaware of the life-threatening drop that yawned beneath her and, without concern, edged forward on hands and knees. She paused when she encountered a hole in the rusting metal walkway – then put her hand through it as if to make sure the gap was real.

The woman on the sidewalk held her breath.

The child reached out across the void but could not quite grasp the long pink ribbon that tethered the balloon, and it gave a mocking nod, turning to reveal its printed smiley face. The girl, who was attending her cousin’s birthday, wondered if the balloon had floated in from some other celebration. Because this balloon was different from most: attached to its string was a brown paper tag, like an old-fashioned luggage label. The child began to wonder if the tag was a message, a greeting from some far-away place.

What was it trying to tell her?

All at once the little girl stood up quite straight – then she confidently stepped onto the metal beam that had once supported the fire escape floor, her fingers almost within touching distance of the balloon now, but not quite. For one whole minute the child stood completely still and then, very slowly, she took her hands from the safety rail, spread her arms wide like a tightrope walker might, and continued to pursue the balloon by stepping one foot exactly in front of the other along the narrow iron strut that jutted from the building.

The woman on the sidewalk gasped, unsure if she should call out, or if her cry might cause the girl to lose her balance and fall. She could neither run for help nor warn the child – so she just stood there rooted to the ground, waiting for tragedy to play out.

The girl, unaware of the woman’s dilemma, was interested only in the label tied to the balloon’s string. What did it say?

She grabbed for it but as she did so her foot slipped, she toppled forward and, with yellow balloon in hand, fell towards earth.

The woman on the sidewalk covered her eyes and screamed and a man walking his dog froze.

As the child fell she thought about Agent Deliberately Dangerous and his amazing floating cloak – a gravity-defying garment that always brought him safely back down to earth. She thought about what she had eaten for breakfast: a bowl of Puffed Pops and two whole glasses of banana milk. Was this enough to make the difference between floating like a leaf and plummeting like a stone? She thought about what noise she would make when she hit the sidewalk. Would it make a boing sound like that Looney Toons dog, or would she land, cat-like, on her feet?

And just as it seemed she was going to smack down hard on the tarmac, something amazing happened. A truck drew up – it belonged to the Twinford featherbed company – and the little girl landed with a puff, plumb-square in the middle of it. Of course all of this happened in the space of 3.2 seconds but it played out in cartoon time.

A couple of blocks away, when the truck stopped at a red light, the child climbed out unnoticed and walked back to the party, balloon in hand.

When she got to the street corner she paused to examine the tag. Disappointingly, there was no message; it was entirely blank, save for an image of two eyes tightly shut. Still, she untied it from the balloon’s string and tucked it in her pocket. She had gone to a lot of trouble to get it and in any case who knew when a brown label might come in handy?

She let go of the smiling balloon and it climbed back into the sky until it was so high it was no longer visible.

The woman from the sidewalk searched and searched but there was no sign, no visible trace of the girl who had fallen from the sky.

WHEN RUBY REDFORT WAS EIGHT SHE TOOK PART IN AN EXPERIMENT. She and thirty-three other participants were asked to watch a piece of film which showed six people – three in white T-shirts and three in black T-shirts – throwing basketballs to each other. The task was to count the number of times the players in white passed the ball.

Ruby counted sixteen passes.

This was the correct answer.

She also noticed the gorilla.

Or more accurately, the man in the gorilla suit who walked across the basketball court, stopped, beat his chest and strolled out of shot.

Fifteen of her co-watchers noticed this too.

Ruby also noticed that one of the three players dressed in black departed the game when the gorilla appeared.

Five of her co-watchers noticed this too.

Ruby noticed the curtain in the background change colour, from red to orange.

Zero of her co-watchers noticed this.

The psychologists conducting the experiment declared that Ruby was a remarkably focused individual, but also had an extraordinary ability to see everything all at once.

Aside from the things Ruby had spotted in the content of the film, she had also noticed one of her co-watchers (the one with the mole on her left cheek) sticking a piece of chewing gum (the brand was Fruity Chews) under the adjacent seat, another (the guy with the hayfever) knocking over his glass of water, and a third (a woman with a Band-Aid on her fourth finger) anxiously twisting her earring (she was wearing mismatched socks, very slightly different shades of green).

Not that any of these three observations had anything to do with the experiment Ruby was taking part in.

Some several years later. . .

Chapter 1.

RUBY REDFORT LOOKED DOWN.

She could see the traffic moving like little inching bugs, far, far beneath her feet. She could feel a hot breeze on her face and hear the muffled sounds of car horns and sirens. It was a day like most of the days had been that summer – too hot to be comfortable; the sort of heat that brought irritability and rage and left a sense of general malaise.

Ruby surveyed the whole beautiful picture that was Twinford City – all detail gone from this height, just the matrix of streets and building blocks; huge skyscrapers punctuating the grid. Outside the city, the big beyond: desert to the east, ocean to the west and mountains marching north. From up here on her ledge she could see the giant blinking eye that was the logo of the city eye hospital, with its slogan beneath it: “the window to your soul”.

The eye-hospital sign had been there since 1937 and was something of a landmark. People actually travelled downtown to have their picture taken with the neon eye winking above them.

As Ruby sat there on the ledge of the Sandwich, she was contemplating recent events, and the various ways she had almost met her death – the past couple of months had offered a range of possibilities. Death by wolf, death by gunshot, death by exposure, death by cliff fall, death by fire. In one way it didn’t make for happy reminiscing, but in another it sort of did. She was alive after all, because somehow she had dodged bullets – metaphorical and literal – and was now sitting calmly watching the world go by. It was unlike Ruby to dwell on things, but Mr Death had come so close to knocking at her door that she found herself fascinated by the very thought of it.

Now here she was sitting on the window ledge of a skyscraper, with news of an approaching storm on its way. Some would regard this as a risky activity. Ruby did not. Disappointingly, as far as she was concerned, at this exact moment there were no gusting winds, no adverse weather conditions, not even a stray pigeon looking to take a peck out of her. She judged her spot on Mr Barnaby H. Cleethorp’s windowsill to be no more dangerous than sitting on a park bench in Twinford Square. Well, that wasn’t quite true; there was the danger that Mr Cleethorps would finish his meeting with her father early and they would both give her grief for parking her behind on the ledge of his seventy-second-floor window and playing fast and loose with gravity. But it was hardly the high-octane excitement Ruby had become used to during the past five months as a Spectrum Agent.

Ruby was in the Sandwich Building – or rather sitting on the outside of it – because her father had insisted on bringing her to work with him.

‘Until that cast comes off your arm honey, I’m not letting you out of my sight.’

Her father had become rather over-protective since Ruby’s accident, and he would now only trust her care to his equally jittery wife, Sabina, or the housekeeper, Mrs Digby. A broken arm, an injured foot, singed hair – how close his only child had come to being burnt to a cinder!

Forest fires are very unpredictable, what was she even doing out there on Wolf Paw Mountain? Brant Redfort had asked himself, and indeed anyone and everyone who had walked through the door in the days after the incident.

Brant, as a consequence, was now plagued by fear: he was waking up at four am contemplating the horror of life without his girl. The thought was making him crazy. His fearfulness spread to his wife like a contagious disease and now for the very first time in Ruby’s thirteen years her parents wanted to know exactly where she was and exactly what she was doing at all times. Ruby was going ‘nuts’ as she so delicately put it.

‘Let them worry,’ advised Mrs Digby, a wise old bird who had been with the family since Mrs Redfort was a girl. ‘They’ve never had the sane sense to worry before, it will do them the power of good to employ a little imagination.’

‘Why?’ asked Ruby. ‘What’s the point of them getting all torn up with terror. What benefit is it gonna do them?’

‘They’re too trusting,’ replied Mrs Digby. ‘They don’t see the bad in things like I do.’ Mrs Digby was a big believer in seeing the bad in things – think the worst and you will never be disappointed. It was a motto that had stood her in good stead.

So for now Ruby was doing what her parents wanted; she was biding her time and looking forward to the day when she could lose the arm cast and get her parents off her case.

Ruby’s father was in advertising – the public relations, meet ’n’ greet, shake-you-by-the-hand side of the business. Being friendly to the big important clients was an important job and Brant Redfort was very good at it. Typically, therefore, Brant searched for a tie that might appeal to the client – in this instance, Barnaby Cleethorps, a conservative fellow but a jolly sort. Brant had picked out one that was patterned a little like a red and white chequered tablecloth, scattered with tiny picnic things. Just the ticket, he had winked at himself in the mirror.

As Brant came down for breakfast that morning, he caught sight of his daughter, lounging on the patio table, banana milk in one hand, zombie comic in the other, her T-shirt bearing the words what are you looking at duhbrain?

He sighed. It seemed unlikely that Ruby would be following him into a career in public relations.

‘Now be careful Ruby,’ warned her mother. ‘There are some unsavoury types downtown.’

‘You do know I’m going to Dad’s client’s office, don’tcha?’ said Ruby, sucking down the dregs of her banana milk.

‘Say no more,’ muttered Mrs Digby, who had a notion that the advertising business was rife with unsavoury types.

Brant kissed his wife on the cheek, ‘I’ll keep an eye on her, honey, never fear. What possible harm can come to her in the Barnaby Cleethorps offices?’

Sabina kissed her daughter and hugged her as if a month might pass before seeing her again.

‘Mom, you gotta chill,’ said Ruby, disentangling herself from her mother’s embrace and stepping into the chauffeur-driven, air-conditioned car.

They arrived on 3rd Avenue and took the elevator up to the seventy–second floor. Mr Cleethorps greeted them – ‘nice to meet you young Ruby’ – and he pumped Ruby’s good hand so hard she thought it might come loose from its socket. ‘I see you have been in the wars, but I understand from your father that you’re quite the brave little lady.’

Ruby smiled the smile of a five-year-old, which was obviously what Mr Cleethorps had mistaken her for. ‘How about a drink for our small guest,’ he said. He turned to his assistant, who nodded and smiled and went off to find something suitable – Ruby suspected milk.

As it turned out she was right. She rolled her eyes. Ruby was not a fan of milk, unless flavoured with strawberry, chocolate or her particular favourite, banana.

Once alone Ruby set about finding a good place to dispose of her beverage. There were no plants in the reception area and it didn’t seem good manners to tip it into one of the ornamental glass vases. She scanned the room further and that’s when she noticed that a section of the window in the waiting area could be opened. She stood on a stool, reached up and pulled on the latch. She pushed the window open and a fresh breeze blew in and Ruby couldn’t help wondering how nice it might feel to sit out in that pollution-free air . . .

And that’s how Ruby came to be sitting on the ledge of a very tall building, six hundred feet above street level, wiggling her toes and contemplating the whole big picture. She felt truly calm sitting here on the edge of nowhere. Ruby Redfort had no issue with heights; she’d never suffered vertigo, never felt that strange desire to let herself fall. Fear had never dominated Ruby’s actions, but now fear wasn’t even playing a part. It seemed she had reached a state of fearlessness.

Ruby picked up the glass and flung the milk from it, watching it disperse into tiny droplets that disappeared into the air. She placed the empty glass carefully on the ledge and decided she wouldn’t mind taking a little wander round the building, see her dad schmoozing Barnaby Cleethorps – why not?

The ledge was relatively wide and it was easy to walk to the south corner window and peek into Mr Cleethorp’s office. A slide presentation was obviously in progress, since the slatted blinds were all pulled down, and Ruby could only observe what was going on by peeking through the gaps. A number of the Barnaby Cleethorps team were gathered round looking at designs prepared by the creatives at her father’s agency. There, projected onto the screen, was the slogan the ad agency had spent weeks fine-tuning: “You Have to Feel it To Believe It!”

Ruby could see Mr Barnaby Cleethorps’ face and it was not a happy one. She adjusted her position on the ledge so she could see her father’s expression. As always, he looked remarkably cool, not in any way flustered, but she knew he must be feeling the strain because he was heading towards the window, and when her father was feeling tense his response was usually to let in some air. Tension brought on a sort of claustrophobia – too much stress in one room made it difficult for him to breathe.

Ruby ducked down, making herself as small as she could. Not that Brant could have seen her through the Venetian blind, but she didn’t want to take any chances.

The opening of the seventy-second-floor window might have helped Brant Redfort regain his calm, but for his daughter it had entirely the opposite effect. The problem was that Ruby had not anticipated how the window might open; she was expecting it to hinge in the middle when in fact this huge window was of the pivoting variety, and as her father yanked it open Ruby was flung out into thin air. She landed in – or, more accurately, dangled from – one of those window-cleaning cradles that travels the length and breadth of skyscrapers, allowing maintenance guys to squeegee the acres of glass. Luckily there were no maintenance guys in it now, though unluckily it meant there was no one to pull Ruby back in.

Now, suspended six hundred feet above the downtown traffic which crawled and tooted beneath her, she could see the irony of the situation – her father, intent on keeping her safe, had almost brought about her demise.

But at this precise moment she was struggling to see the funny side.

Chapter 2.

HANGING THERE BY HER FINGERTIPS, Ruby looked down at the map of streets. She could see the city’s famous old movie theatre, the Scarlet Pagoda; the Japanese garden in front of it, the lampposts decked in bunting and lights to celebrate this year’s Twinford Film Festival: A Date with Thrills.

The festival was to be a celebration of romantic thriller movies of the kind that she and Mrs Digby loved, and the situation Ruby currently found herself in was no doubt one seen in many of these pictures.

Only for Ruby this was no stunt, there was no safety net, and she needed to get a grip before someone raised the alarm. She heaved herself into the window-cleaning cradle and found the controls that would carry her back to her original window. She knew which one it was because it had an empty milk glass sitting in front of it.

She was just clambering out of the cradle when she heard a voice.

‘Hey kid, would you come in from there?’

Ruby looked up to see a tall, well-groomed man in a well-cut suit standing in the room. He appeared moderately anxious.

‘Am I making you nervous?’ asked Ruby.

‘The only person making me nervous is the meter maid on 3rd Avenue where I’m double-parked.’

‘Geez Hitch, why don’t you just find a parking spot like a normal person?’

‘You think it’s easy parking in this city?’ Hitch replied.

Ruby sighed, swivelled herself round and dropped back in through the window. She landed on the long elegant coffee table, the main feature of the sleek reception room. Pens went skidding across its surface and a bowl of marbles upturned, contents spinning in all directions and disappearing under furniture.

Hitch rolled his eyes. ‘Good going kid.’

‘OK, OK,’ said Ruby gathering up the pens and plonking them back in their pen pot. ‘Don’t have a total baby about it, man.’

HITCH: ‘It’s not me who’s going to have the “baby”. Mr Barnaby H. Cleethorps is a very particular man.’

RUBY: ‘What’s he gonna do, dangle me out of the window by my toes?’

HITCH : ‘Probably.’

RUBY: ‘Boy this guy must really like his pens tidy!’

HITCH: ‘You better believe it Redfort.’

RUBY: ‘So what are you doing here? You back from summer vacation?’

HITCH: ‘Something like that.’

RUBY: ‘Where have you been anyway?’

HITCH: ‘It’s classified.’

RUBY: ‘Your vacations are classified?’

HITCH: ‘I wasn’t on vacation.’

RUBY: ‘But you just said you were.’

HITCH: ‘No I didn’t, you did.’

RUBY: ‘Boy, have I missed small-talking to you. So where are we going?’

HITCH: ‘Elevator.’

RUBY: ‘You know I can’t leave, my dad won’t let me out of his sight.’

HITCH: ‘I’ve cleared it, your father has entrusted me with your safety.’

RUBY: ‘He clearly doesn’t know your safety record – so what are we doing?’

HITCH: ‘I’m going to have a cup of coffee and you are going to be grilled.’

‘Huh?’

HITCH: ‘Our boss, she wants to talk to you.’

To the outside world, Hitch was the Redforts’ household manager, but to the few in the know he was actually a highly trained Spectrum agent, living undercover at the Redfort home, stationed there to mentor and protect Ruby Redfort, Spectrum’s youngest recruit. Their boss was LB, head of Spectrum 8.

They took the elevator down to street level. It wasn’t the quickest ride since the building was an old one and the elevator cars were far from state of the art.

‘I thought I was on sick leave,’ said Ruby.

‘Not any more,’ said Hitch.

‘Anything going down at Spectrum?’ asked Ruby. ‘A new case?’ Ruby had been a Spectrum agent and expert code breaker since April, and in that time she had worked on three cases. All three had nearly got her killed. But then evading death sort of went with the territory.

‘Don’t ask me, I’m just the bozo driving the car,’ replied Hitch.

Ruby gave him a look, aware that if anyone was going to know anything then it was Hitch. But that said, there was no point trying to get him to talk; if he didn’t want to then he never would. That was the thing about Hitch: he kept his mouth shut.

SPECTRUM RULE 1: KEEP IT ZIPPED. He had to: as one of the highest-ranking agents at Spectrum 8, he was trusted with heavily classified information. He didn’t squeal for anything or anybody.

So how had a top-notch spy wound up working undercover as bodyguard to a thirteen-year-old kid? Hitch, for one, asked himself this question practically every day.

They strode out of the Sandwich Building to see a meter maid busy studying Hitch’s car.

Where to start? He was parked in a tow-zone, facing in the wrong direction, one of the wheels up on the sidewalk, the vehicle abandoned for twenty-one minutes. This was going to be one long ticket.

Hitch just raised an eyebrow. ‘Wait here kid.’

The meter maid had her hands on her hips, like she meant business. She looked ready for a fight, like she was thinking, Here he comes, another bozo who doesn’t want to take responsibility for his own dumb actions.

Hitch strolled over and the meter maid crossed her arms – a defensive move.

Hitch leaned against his car and began talking – well not so much talking as chatting. The meter maid shifted her weight and relaxed her arms so she now stood with one hand on her hip – was she actually smiling?

Man, you’re good, thought Ruby. Hitch could talk his way out of a maze.

The conversation, for that’s what it had become, went on for some time. What is he telling her?

The meter maid looked over to where Ruby stood, then she stuck her ticket pad back in her pocket. She laughed and nodded her head.

She raised an arm as if to high-five Hitch. He wasn’t the high-fiving type, Ruby knew that, so instead he gave her a kind of salute. Happy with that, the meter maid walked off whistling a merry tune.

Ruby climbed into the car. ‘What did you say to her?’

‘Just explained what a great kid you are,’ replied Hitch as he slid into the driver’s seat.

‘Yeah, right – apart from that?’ said Ruby.

‘I said I could get her courtside tickets to the Twinford Sneakers play-offs.’

‘And can you?’

‘Sure, the organiser is an old friend of mine.’

‘I thought you secret agents didn’t have friends?’

‘No, you’re thinking of tax inspectors,’ said Hitch, starting the engine. ‘I’ve got more friends than I can handle.’

‘Funny,’ said Ruby, ‘I’ve never met any of them.’

‘They’re all the shy and retiring type,’ said Hitch.

Ruby looked at him. ‘You sure they’re not the invisible, imaginary type?’

‘Oh, they’re just quiet,’ said Hitch. ‘A game of cards and an early night.’

‘Sounds like a hoot, wish I could meet ’em.’

‘Ah, you wouldn’t like ’em kid,’ said Hitch. ‘Not one of them has an interest in bubblegum.’

Chapter 3.

IT WAS NO REAL SURPRISE TO RUBY that Hitch himself was bringing her into HQ today. Sure, she had been into the building’s hub many times and worked endless long hours in its secure surrounds, but even so knowledge of the ‘way in’ was not a given. The Spy Agency’s entrance moved frequently and Ruby was not among the privileged few informed of Spectrum 8’s plans and architectural changes. Hitch was her link to this underground world and without him she could very easily find herself shut out in the cold. You mess up, you’re out for good.

Last time Ruby had visited was by way of the little kid playground in the middle of Central City Park, and to Ruby’s huge annoyance and humiliation Vapona Begwell – fellow pupil, schoolyard enemy and major irritation – had observed her crawling into the kids’ caterpillar tunnel. Ruby still hadn’t lived it down and Bugwart (as Ruby called her) wasn’t about to let anyone forget it – ever.

Of course, Vapona had no idea what “Little Red Ridingfort” was actually doing in the caterpillar tunnel and she never would. To tell the secret of Spectrum was forbidden. That said, there was one person outside the organisation who did know, and he was Clancy Crew, the most loyal ally a school kid could have, and Ruby Redfort’s closest friend. He would part with body parts before divulging a sworn-to secret.

‘So where is the Spectrum portal this time?’ asked Ruby.

‘If I told you it was the toddler playground, what would you say?’ replied Hitch.

‘You have to be kidding!’ said Ruby. ‘You’re telling me I have to walk into the little kid playground and crawl into that activity fun tunnel again?’

Hitch said nothing.

‘Man, I bet this was your idea, you get a big kick outta this don’t you; humiliate the kid, watch her street credibility sink below zero. . . I bet you’re laughing all day long.’

Hitch looked at her out of the corner of his eye.

‘You really serious about this?’ asked Ruby.

‘Nah, I’m just messing with you Redfort. You should see the look on your face. You know, you can really whine when you want to.’

‘You shouldn’t kid around with people that way. It interferes with a trusting relationship.’

‘You shouldn’t get wound up so easily Redfort. You’ll get a reputation for being flappy.’

Ruby glared at him.

It had been around five months now since Hitch had walked through the Redforts’ front door and taken up work in their stylish modern home under the guise of ‘household manager’. Ruby’s mom still insisted on introducing him as the butler, even though Hitch had on many occasions more than hinted that he would prefer her not to.

This kind of undercover work would ordinarily be beneath someone of Hitch’s status, but Ruby Redfort was no ordinary assignment. The reason: she was the brightest code breaker to step into Spectrum since the late Bradley Baker. Bradley Baker had begun his career as a boy, had died a man, and was to this day a hero mourned by every agent at Spectrum. Bradley Baker was a legend and – to Ruby – a pain in the derrière.

It was hard to outdo a dead super-agent, but Ruby was certainly in the business of trying. She was ambitious; not just determined to outclass Baker’s code-breaking ability, but also to become at least as good a field agent. Whether she would or not remained to be seen.

So Hitch, for now, was her official protector. He had been a field agent for a long time now and was highly trained in many disciplines. It hadn’t exactly been his idea of a whole bunch of fun. Watching over a school kid was not without its frustrations, particularly a school kid with a big mouth. But Ruby grew on him. That was the thing about her – you just found yourself wishing she were there even when you wanted her to go jump in a lake.

She was sharp as a tack and keen as a knife; determined, hardworking, loyal and – luckily – pretty funny with it. There were few Spectrum agents Hitch could say all that about.

Hitch got a beep on his watch. He took the call through his earpiece and Ruby had no idea what was being said. All she knew was that three seconds later they were heading back in the direction they had come and were now making their way once again to the downtown city centre.

‘What’s the deal?’ asked Ruby.

‘I guess Spectrum are ramping up security,’ said Hitch. ‘They’ve moved the “way in” again.’

‘Something happened?’ she asked.

‘Something’s always happened,’ he replied.

Downtown all the buildings were tall, even the short ones. Imposing heavy-stone department stores, offices, government buildings, banks and apartment blocks. Skyscrapers rose up hundreds of feet, and when you looked up the city tapered away into blue. The older Twinfordites often referred to this part of the city as Mini Manhattan or Little-L.A., because it bore a certain resemblance to both; a sort of mixture of uptown New York and downtown L.A. Although in terms of square mileage it was not on the same scale as either.

The buildings were by and large attractive, many dating back to the 1920s and 30s. There were newer ones of course, all glass and steel, but when one stood in just the right spot and looked upwards beyond the modern street signage and billboards, one could imagine Twinford City past. This was why downtown Twinford was often used for feature films depicting another age, when 1930s mobsters screeched through the streets and elegantly dressed couples danced through the night.

This part of town was an area that Ruby loved – it was exciting somehow to lose one’s self, to become anonymous, in the crisscrossing streets; ant-like to someone looking down from the top of the gargantuan architecture.

Hitch parked underneath the building known as the Schroeder, in a single empty space among the seemingly endless rows of stationary cars. There was nothing to indicate that this one lone parking spot had been reserved for Hitch’s silver convertible, but Ruby got the impression that somehow it had. The car park ramps spiralled down below them and Ruby wondered just how many vehicles were sitting under this vast building.

‘1,500,’ said Hitch, as if reading her thoughts. ‘1,517 if you count the maintenance team’s trucks. All parked on three underground levels under seventy-seven floors of concrete, steel and glass. Makes the mind boggle, doesn’t it?’

‘Makes the mind wonder if you shouldn’t get out more,’ said Ruby. ‘Maybe call up some of those “fun friends” of yours, live a little.’

They climbed out of the car and walked across to the elevator. Someone had scratched a tiny image of a housefly next to the ‘down’ button, and there was a trail line etched into the steel of the doors as if the fly had just buzzed out. The doors opened and Ruby and Hitch stepped in. Hitch snapped open what seemed to be an invisible panel, pressed some digits and the doors behind them closed and the doors in front of them opened. They exited. On the other side was a dusty old service elevator. Hitch clanged open the concertina metal gate and they stepped into the rough wide box, punched the button marked “−8” and a second or seven later they began to move unsteadily towards the bottom of the elevator shaft, the dark lit up by a single naked light bulb that swung above them, casting eerie shadows as they descended.

How many would guess that this tired-looking elevator with its mean light source might lead to one of the world’s most sophisticated intelligence operations? Well, Ruby Redfort might; she had seen it all before.

Chapter 4.

WHEN THE DOORS OPENED THEY WERE IN A VERY DIFFERENT SPACE: huge, subterranean and sleek. No dust, no cobwebs, no bugs – of either variety.

‘So what exactly does our boss want to talk to me about?’ asked Ruby.

‘It’s not my business to say,’ said Hitch.

Ruby hadn’t seen LB, the head of Spectrum 8, since before the whole Blue Wolf mission had kicked off.

The thing was, by the time Ruby had been helicoptered off Wolf Paw Mountain and rushed to the emergency room, LB had had her own crisis to take care of; she’d been called away on urgent duty and unable to attend Ruby’s official debrief. That task had been passed to another agent.

‘Will she be in a good mood dya think?’ said Ruby, knowing this was about as likely as LB showing up in a pink trouser suit – LB only ever wore white.

Hitch didn’t answer. He just pointed to a waiting area, with sleek white chairs.

HITCH: ‘Wait here kid.’

RUBY: ‘OK.’

HITCH: ‘Here? You got that?’

RUBY: ‘Uh huh.’

HITCH: ‘That’s a yes, right?’

RUBY: ‘Uh huh.’

HITCH: ‘You’ll be called in about fifteen, OK?’

RUBY: ‘OK.’

HITCH: ‘Don’t move.’

RUBY: ‘Got it.’

Fifteen minutes, thought Ruby. Enough time to drink a soda. And, she walked off in the direction of the Spectrum canteen.

She got herself a can of Fizz and sat down on one of the stylish chairs arranged around one of the many cool-looking tables, all lit by low hanging lights. The effect was cosy and conspiratorial. The Spectrum canteen was no ordinary work cafeteria – like all things Spectrum, it gave the impression of being very pleased with itself.

Ruby took out her book of Rules, a small magenta pink notebook with the word RULES printed in bright red letters across the front.

She’d had this book of rules since she was four years old and it had grown into quite a list over the years. Seventy-nine of them in fact. Now she had a new rule to add.

DON’T STAND ON A WINDOW LEDGE IF YOU AREN’T COMPLETELY SURE WHETHER THE WINDOW OPENS INWARDS OR OUTWARDS.

OK, it was quite a specific rule. But a useful one. She’d improve on it later, give it a bit more pizzazz.

‘You look better.’

Ruby looked up to see Dr Harper, the Spectrum medic who had treated her when she was brought in from Wolf Paw Mountain.

‘Better than what?’

‘Better than what you looked like the last time I saw you.’

‘Yeah, well last time you saw me, I had the flu, plus an injured foot, a broken arm and I’d nearly died of being burnt to death.’

‘Yes, your hair doesn’t look so good,’ said Harper, making a face. ‘Still a bit. . . crispy. So is the arm giving you any trouble?’

‘Nah, not really,’ said Ruby. ‘But it itches like crazy.’

‘Yes, that’s healing for you,’ said Dr Harper. ‘Itchy.’

‘Anything you can give me for it?’ asked Ruby hopefully.

‘Yes,’ said Dr Harper reaching into her top pocket. ‘This.’ She handed Ruby a yellow pencil.

‘Thanks,’ said Ruby, ‘does it come with any directions?’

‘Yes, avoid the sharp end,’ replied Dr Harper.

‘How about my foot?’

The doctor gave it the once-over and declared it ‘good to go’.

‘You sure?’ asked Ruby.

‘Trust me, I’m a doctor,’ said Harper.

‘And there I was thinking you might be a comedian. What about my arm?’

‘Oh,’ said Dr Harper, ‘that’s healed too. I’d cut you out of that cast right now but I got to be somewhere.’ She looked at her watch anxiously.

‘A medical emergency?’ asked Ruby.

‘A table for two at the Twinford Grand,’ said Dr Harper.

‘You won’t help me out of this thing because you got a lunch date?’

‘Did no one ever tell you lunch is the most important meal of the day?’

‘That’s breakfast,’ said Ruby.

‘Oh dear, I missed breakfast,’ said Harper. ‘So, I guess twice as important that I don’t miss lunch.’

‘I’m glad I’m not dying,’ said Ruby.

‘No one dies of an arm cast,’ said Harper.

‘And you say you’re not a comedian,’ said Ruby.

‘See you next fall,’ called Dr Harper as she made her way out of the canteen.

Before Ruby had a chance to get back to her thoughts, a voice came through the cafeteria intercom system. ‘Redfort, Ruby, report immediately to Spectrum 8. Agent in charge, office situated on black and white level. HQ.’

The voice belonged to the Spectrum information announcer, a person Ruby had never actually laid eyes on, but imagined would not be someone you would want to land up on a desert island with.

She guessed the owner of this voice resided in the same general department as Buzz, the mushroom-like woman who manned the fifty-plus telephones in an office just off the central atrium. Why he couldn’t just say, ‘Ruby Redfort to LB’s office, pronto,’ Ruby didn’t know.

She finished her drink and slowly got to her feet, then she sauntered off to find LB.

‘Howdy,’ she said as she passed Buzz, who was as usual on the phone and talking to who knew what. Buzz blinked at her, pointed to her watch and continued her call.

As Ruby approached LB’s office she could see the door was slightly ajar and as she got nearer she could hear fragments of a discussion; the voices semi-hushed, she could only pick up words at intervals so they were separated from their meaning:

‘apparently removed without authorisation. . .’

‘. . . from the department of defence?’

‘that’s what we’ve been told’

‘highly classified?’

‘affirmative. . .’

‘but how could anyone make it in?’

‘entered via an air vent. . . I know it seems impossible’

‘nothing else tampered with?’

‘No sign of anything else missing, no sign of anyone or anything anywhere else in the building.’

‘You worried about our security?’

‘Always. I’m. . .’

‘. . .but only an idiot would attempt—’

She knocked and the conversation stopped dead.

‘Come in,’ said LB, her voice sounding even more gravelly and drawn-out than usual. ‘And close the darned door Redfort.’

Ruby pushed it shut behind her and walked over to the empty seat next to Hitch. He tapped his watch and gave her a look to say, why in the world of reason can’t you follow orders? She slung her satchel across the back of the chair and slumped down. Then she looked from LB to Hitch.

Hitch’s brow was ever so slightly furrowed; LB seemed not quite as composed as usual. In her hand was an object which she was turning over and over in her palm: a smooth rectangle of clear plastic or Lucite, the shape and size of a key tag perhaps. But the thing attached to it was no house key, or at least if it was, it was a pretty state-of-the-art locking device. When LB caught Ruby’s gaze she frowned, and slipped the thing into the pocket of her white jacket.

‘What’s with you guys?’ asked Ruby. ‘Did your kittens get run over or something?’

Hitch raised an eyebrow. ‘I wish the problem were a simple case of a couple of flat cats,’ he said, ‘and I speak as a cat lover.’

‘Must be serious then,’ said Ruby. ‘So you gonna tell me about it?’

‘No,’ said LB.

Ruby shrugged. ‘OK. So anything you do wanna share?’

LB gathered her papers into a neat pile and then peered at Ruby through her large white-rimmed soft-tinted glasses. Today she looked tired. Working late? Or is she not sleeping so good?

‘So. You did well Redfort. It’s a pity that you couldn’t manage to secure the wolf, but you prevented the suspect acquiring it and that is something.’

LB was referring back to the previous case Ruby had been assigned to, when she had indeed done well, albeit in a messy, skin-of-her-teeth sort of way. She had used her code-breaking and detective skills to figure out who had let loose a load of rare and wild animals from a zoo owned by a private collector. She had discovered the zookeeper was to blame, though he had later been murdered by those who had commissioned the crime.

The perpetrators had been a young woman, believed to be a perfumer, named Lorelei von Leyden, and her mysterious sponsor about whom they knew nothing other than that – from her accent and the location of her initial coded message – she was Australian. Both were prepared to kill more than once to get their hands on the Cyan scent – an intoxicating perfume extracted from the near extinct Cyan wolf. The scent was the stuff of myth and legend; a few drops were worth a small fortune.

The only problem was some of this scent had been successfully stolen.

‘Unfortunately,’ said LB, echoing Ruby’s thoughts, ‘they got away with it. So while I can congratulate you for cracking the case, I can’t help but feel it is a shame that you managed to let the vial of Cyan get into enemy hands, and the two main assailants disappear into the wide blue yonder. But there we are, amateur hour I dare say comes to us all.’

LB had an unfortunate way of turning what might first be construed as praise into something rather more approaching a dressing-down. Fortunately or unfortunately, Ruby had become accustomed to it and didn’t let it bother her.

‘Going back to the events of that particular encounter, can you repeat again exactly what it was that the Australian woman said to you before she encouraged you to walk off that cliff?’

‘I’m unlikely to forget,’ said Ruby. ‘I thought they were gonna be the last words I ever heard.’ This was no lie.

Ruby paused for a second, concentrating so she might recall it perfectly, and then said, ‘She asked me to hand over the vial of Cyan – she had a gun, so I did. I guess I thought she was intending to sell it for its perfume value, since it’s worth a lot – so I said, “All this so you can make some money out of some stupid fragrance.” And she said, “Is that what you think this is about? No sweetie, this is not about some high-end perfume counter cluttered up with rich folk wanting to waste their money. This is about something important, more important than you could ever imagine.”’

LB said nothing, but stared straight ahead into the middle distance as if trying to focus on something that was too far away to see. No one spoke and the silence was only broken by the sound of Buzz’s voice coming through the intercom.

‘Agent Farrow from security is here to see you.’

LB nodded. ‘I’ll be one minute.’ She turned back to Ruby. ‘Well Redfort, I recognise that you showed great initiative and courage when you went into the mountains to recover the Cyan wolf, but. . .’

She paused. Ruby looked over at Hitch, his face betrayed nothing.

‘But,’ continued LB, ‘you also headed into the field, alone and without backup. You ignored direct Spectrum orders. And you would not be alive today if one of our agents hadn’t risked his life to haul you out of there.’

Ruby opened her mouth to protest.

LB raised her hand. ‘As I said, you displayed good qualities. But you also took unacceptable risks. So as of this moment, you are off the field agent programme. To put it in terms you might understand, you’re grounded Redfort.’

‘You have to be kidding,’ said Ruby.

‘You think I have time to kid around?’ said LB. Her eyes were steel – nothing about her suggested that she ever kidded around. ‘You will be permitted to take one further test, and your results will be evaluated. The outcome will determine your future field agent suitability.’ She looked over at Hitch. ‘You can thank your colleague here for this chance. Be ready for it. There will be no warning, you fail to show, you fail the test.’

LB stood, gathered her papers and exited the room. Not another word spoken; silence but for the swish of her elegant white skirt as she padded barefoot down the corridor.

When they were alone, Ruby turned to Hitch. ‘Grounded?’

Hitch looked her square in the eye. ‘Be more grateful,’ he said. ‘LB was ready to kick you off of the field training for good and always.’

‘Why? I cracked the case.’

‘You solved part of the case,’ said Hitch. ‘But you let the bad guys get away. And you nearly died in the process.’

‘Nearly dying is a sackable offence?’

‘Redfort, we can’t afford to lose good code breakers, nor for that matter agents. A lot of investment goes into training you up, plus you play fast and loose with your life and every last one of our lives is at risk.’

Ruby said nothing.

‘Besides,’ he said, ‘do you have any idea how difficult it is to find thirteen-year-old school kids who can crack a code?’

She looked at him. ‘Yeah right,’ she said.

They left Spectrum, and rode the elevator back to ground level and were once again in the Schroeder car park. They climbed into the car. ‘So who’s the idiot, anyway?’ asked Ruby.

‘What idiot?’ asked Hitch.

‘The idiot you were talking about when I arrived.’

‘You are if you think I’m blabbing to a school kid.’

‘Worth a shot,’ said Ruby.

‘Which is what Spectrum might think if I go ahead and repeat classified information without authorisation.’

‘They’d shoot you?’

‘They might consider it.’

‘Really?’

‘No Redfort, not really, at least I doubt it, but they might fire me.’

‘That would suck,’ she said.

Hitch nodded. ‘Yes, it would. I’d have to go and get a real job.’ He shuddered.

‘I’m sure my parents would keep you on.’

‘Yes,’ said Hitch. ‘That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.’

Meanwhile,

via a secure transmitter line,

a man and woman were

talking. . .

‘So you have the 8 key?’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘It can’t be done.’

‘Everything can be done.’

‘You don’t understand, the subject has kept it safe. Security has been increased since I acquired the other two items—’

‘Why two items? I only instructed you to bring back one.’

‘I took something for myself. I saw it in their lab as I was leaving and thought I could use it.’

‘Use it for what?’

‘It’s personal.’

‘I’m not paying you to steal “useful” items for yourself, I don’t want you attracting attention by busting into labs and taking what you want.’

‘Relax, they won’t even know I took it, they won’t even know I was there.’

‘Just don’t get distracted Birdboy. You need to keep your eye on the ball.’

‘I’ll get what you want but you need to give me time.’

‘I don’t have time, I need it now!’

‘It’s not easy to access.’

‘Of course not, I wouldn’t need you if it was.’

‘It’s more difficult than I thought.’

‘I thought you were supposed to be brilliant?’

‘I thought you were supposed to be dead, Valerie.’

‘You see? Everything’s possible.’

‘Becoming undead is possible?’

‘It would seem so.’

Chapter 5.

‘HEY RUBE,’ SAID HER FATHER, LOOKING UP. He was in the living room and looking weary. He was lounging back in his chair, the one he liked to sit in if his day had been tough. Mr Barnaby Cleethorps had obviously been a handful. Hitch was mixing a drink at the bar.

‘Good trip to the dentist?’ asked Brant.

‘Uh?’ said Ruby. ‘The dentist? Umm. . .’

‘That’s OK honey, dumb question. When does one ever want to go to the dentist, right?’

‘When one has a cavity?’ said Ruby.

‘So you had a cavity?’ said her father.

‘False alarm,’ said Ruby, wondering why Hitch hadn’t briefed her about the ‘trip to the dentist’.

‘Hitch was with you the whole time, of course?’ her father asked anxiously.

‘Oh yeah, he was there all right.’ She flashed a look at Hitch. ‘Weasel,’ she mouthed.

Hitch handed Ruby a glass of lemonade, and whispered as he passed, ‘Just keeping you on your toes kid. Keep sharp and stay alive.’

‘What a lovely sentiment, I’ll be sure to write it in your next birthday card,’ hissed Ruby, giving him a death stare.

Brant Redfort looked at his watch. ‘Do you think supper’s ready?’

‘I hope so, I’m starving,’ said Ruby.

‘You didn’t eat lunch?’ Brant asked, alarmed.

‘Yeah, sure I did, I’m just sorta double hungry these days. Probably the healing process; one needs to eat twice as much.’

Brant Redfort looked troubled. ‘I’ll talk to your mother about it; can’t have my girl’s healing process compromised,’ he said, ruffling her hair. She tried not to growl at him – she hated the hair–ruffle thing – but her father looked so tired she didn’t want to give him a hard time.

‘So what else happened today?’ he asked.

‘The doc said I could finally get this lump of plaster sawn off,’ said Ruby, holding her cast up.

‘That’s swell news honey.’

‘I wanna do it as quick as possible,’ said Ruby. ‘Tomorrow would be good, you know what I’m saying?’

‘The Scarlet Pagoda! Absolutely. You’ll want to look your best for tomorrow night’s theatre fundraiser.’

‘That’s right Dad, looking my best is what I live for.’

‘Look, I’ll get onto Doctor Shepherd, I’ll bet he can wriggle you onto his list – get one of his guys to do it. I don’t want just anyone sawing into my Rube’s arm.’ He mussed her hair again and picked up the phone.

‘Hello Frank, Brant here. . . very well thank you! And you? . . .And Wallis? . . .And the kids? . . .And your parents? . . .Your sister Betty? . . .Glad to hear it. The thing is, Ruby needs a plaster cast removed pronto and I was wondering if you could slide her in tomorrow, get one of your best guys to do it? . . .Swell Frank, I appreciate it. I’ll wait to hear from you.’ He hung up. ‘Looks like you’re all set for tomorrow night’s costume shindig. All of fashionable Twinford will be turning out for it. And you know we Redforts have to be there looking a million dollars.’

Ruby did know. Her parents were nice – more than nice, they were very, very likeable, friendly, sociable, popular people. Take this Scarlet Pagoda fundraiser, for example. Mr and Mrs Redfort were right at the top of the invitation list. If they hadn’t been able to make the date then there was a good chance that the date would have been changed to fit with their social schedules. They were fun folk, influential, and they always gave generously.

Their daughter, Ruby, was also popular, but in a totally different way and for totally different reasons. For one thing, she did not go out of her way to be friendly. She was never wilfully unkind nor unfair, but she didn’t feel the need to be liked for the sake of being liked. She felt no motivation to be popular and perhaps for this very reason, she was. Magnetically so.

‘Thanks Dad,’ said Ruby, heading towards the stairs.

‘No problem,’ said Brant. ‘Soon that arm cast will be behind you and you’ll be back playing ping-pong with your pals.’

Brant Redfort was unaware that Ruby had been playing ping-pong with her pals and doing numerous other things she always did – she wasn’t going to let a broken arm cramp her style and she wasn’t afraid of a little pain.

Ruby went on up to her room, closed the door securely behind her and pulled at a wooden slat that concealed a secret compartment where she kept one of her yellow notebooks (the other 624 were hidden under the floorboards and not a living human soul had ever read one word of what she wrote). It was in these that she noted down everything of interest and anything that might one day be of interest. Her RULE 16 being EVEN THE MUNDANE CAN TELL A STORY and her RULE 34 being YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN SOMETHING IS GOING TO COME IN HANDY – this included seemingly useless information.

Picking up a pen, Ruby wrote:

What is the test I have to pass? How can I find out? Need to be prepared.

What were LB and Hitch talking about exactly? Something removed or possibly stolen? From a high-security location?

LB looked edgy, off her game. Why?

Ruby didn’t know the answers to any of these questions, but one thing was for sure – she was going to try to find out. There was no way she was going to put up with this whole grounded deal.

Later, at dinner, Ruby was listening to her parents discussing the proposed renovation of the Scarlet Pagoda. Tomorrow night’s party was in aid of this cause. There would be a high-end raffle and some of the prizes were quite spectacular; Sabina, for example, had her heart set on winning the Ada Borland portrait – Ada Borland being a world-famous photographer who had offered as one of the prizes the extreme honour of photographing the winner or their loved one. Sabina had bought approximately fifty-two raffle tickets to date.

Aside from this highlight, Sabina was in charge of commissioning the famous Twinford sculptor, Louisa Parker, to create a piece of art that might stand in the Japanese Garden in front of the theatre once the restoration work was completed. There had been much discussion between committee members about who the sculpture should represent. No one could agree, most feeling it should be either the person donating the largest sum of money to the theatre fund, or someone of influence in Twinford society, but everyone hoped the resulting sculpture would be a lot more attractive than Mayor Abraham’s recent statue, which loomed down from the Skylark Building and scared the living daylights out of everyone who saw it.

‘It should be a sculpture of someone who performed at the theatre during its heyday,’ said Sabina.

‘How about a star from a film shown there when it first became a movie theatre?’ suggested Brant.

‘Or,’ said Sabina, her eyes lighting up as the flicker of a very good idea came to her, ‘how about someone whose film was set in the Scarlet Pagoda and then later shown in the Scarlet Pagoda?’

‘You mean, thingy?’ said Brant.

‘Yes, what’s-her-name,’ agreed Sabina.

‘Yes, the film star being honoured this year. . .’ said Brant.

They both looked at Ruby.

‘Margo Bardem,’ said Ruby. ‘Her career began in the Scarlet Pagoda as an assistant hairdresser and make-up artist, she got spotted and stepped in to replace the main actress in her debut movie The Cat that Got the Canary, produced and directed by George Katsel, who later married Bardem. It was both filmed on location in the Scarlet Pagoda and premiered there in 1952.’

‘Ruby, you are like a sitting encyclopedia,’ said her mother, clapping her hands together.

‘I read the film festival publicity flyer,’ said Ruby.

‘I just hope we raise enough money to rescue that beautiful building,’ said Brant. ‘Can you imagine a Twinford without the Scarlet Pagoda?’

‘I’m not sure the wrecking ball wouldn’t be such an unwelcome idea for that old pile,’ said Mrs Digby, as she entered the room with a large casserole dish.

‘Oh Mrs Digby!’ exclaimed Sabina. ‘You surely don’t mean that.’

‘When you’ve grown up in a rotten falling-down old shack during the great depression, I tell you, you set your sights on something wipe-clean and fungus free.’

Sabina was speechless.

‘I’ll tell you something for nothing,’ said Mrs Digby, heaving the huge dish onto the table, ‘you wouldn’t get me stepping one little toe into that Scarlet Pagoda, no siree, thank you for asking.’

‘Why ever not?’ asked Sabina.

‘The spirit world is why not,’ said Mrs Digby folding her arms.

‘You’re not serious Mrs D? You surely don’t believe that old hokum about hauntings?’ said Brant.

‘Call it what you will, don’t expect me to be there.’

‘But you love those old movies,’ said Ruby. ‘Just think, you might even get the chance to meet some of your screen idols.’

‘I’m not risking it,’ said Mrs Digby. ‘I might find myself face to face with the paranormal.’

‘Are you for real?’ said Ruby. ‘You actually believe in all that?’

‘I most certainly do,’ said Mrs Digby. ‘Kicking and screaming is the only way you’ll drag me in there.’

‘So we can’t interest you in a free ticket to the costume show tomorrow night?’ asked Sabina.

‘You most certainly can’t,’ said Mrs Digby.

‘So who on earth should we invite at this short notice?’ said Sabina.

‘Ask Elaine Lemon,’ said Brant.

‘Good idea,’ said Mrs Digby. ‘She’d scare the pants off any ghoul going.’

At which point the telephone rang.

Ruby left the table and answered the phone. ‘Hello Clance,’ she said. He often phoned during supper: he couldn’t seem to get the hang of the fact that not everyone ate at the exact same time as his family.

‘Hey, how’d you know it was me?’ said Clancy.

‘Because I’m midway through dinner and you often call when I’m midway through dinner,’ replied Ruby. ‘It’s a probability thing. The likelihood is it will be you – you or Mrs Lemon.’

‘Is that so?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you want me to hang up?’

‘Not now you’ve already interfered with my whole digestive process.’

‘Oh, OK.’

‘So why did you call?’

‘I wondered if you had got my message?’

‘What message?’

‘The one I left in the tree.’

‘What did it say?’

‘Call me immediately.’

‘So obviously not.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

‘So why did you want me to call?’

‘To see if you might wanna meet up, no big deal or anything.’

‘Why didn’t you leave a message on my answer machine?’

‘I’m not sure.’ Pause. ‘Force of habit?’

‘Ruby honey,’ called her mother, ‘could you maybe replace the receiver and come back to the table. It’s such a shame when the family dinner is interrupted by the telephone. And it plays crazy potatoes with one’s digestion.’

‘You hear that Clance, now you’ve upset my mom’s digestive process too.’

‘Extend my apologies,’ said Clancy.

‘You can extend them yourself if you wanna come over?’

‘Nah, I feel like sitting up a tree.’

‘Look, how about I see you in twenty minutes on Amster Green. I need to get out, stretch my legs and get some decent conversation.’

‘I thought your folks wouldn’t let you out on your own?’ said Clancy.

‘I’ll bring Bug,’ said Ruby. ‘You know what they say, you’re never alone with a husky at your side.’

‘Who says that?’ muttered Clancy as he hung up the phone.

Ruby sat down at the table.

‘What’s that on your face?’ asked her mother. She was peering at her now, fork in hand, studying her daughter’s face. ‘Is it a bruise?’

‘Probably dirt,’ said Ruby. ‘I might go take a shower.’

But Sabina reached out her hand and began rubbing at Ruby’s cheek.

‘Ow,’ cried Ruby.

‘That’s not dirt,’ confirmed Sabina. ‘You’re probably anaemic, people bruise easily when they’re anaemic – and they become anaemic when their body is under stress.’

‘OK, OK, I promise I’ll stop being anaemic if you lay off rubbing my face,’ said Ruby.

‘A good healthy diet is what you need young lady. Plenty of. . . what’s it called, Brant.’

‘Iron,’ said Ruby.

‘I’ll order some in,’ said Sabina dropping her napkin and leaving the table. ‘Tomorrow is the Scarlet Pagoda costume benefit and I don’t want you looking like one of the exhibits.’

Chapter 6.

RUBY WAS RIGHT – her parents did agree to let her take a stroll with Bug at her side. It was of course ‘down to that dog’ that Ruby was alive at all.

If he hadn’t come running back to alert the fire crew to her plight then she wouldn’t be lying here today with a broken arm, injured foot and badly singed hair. Sabina had told all her friends the story of their hero dog. This account of Ruby’s rescue was true, of course, minus a few key details.

Ruby and her ever-loyal husky set off down Cedarwood Drive and at the corner turned right and joined Amster Street. On her way to the green, Ruby dropped by Marty’s minimart to pick up some bubblegum. Ordinarily she would carry a pack with her, but she had been unusually careless and her dad had found her stash of Hubble-Yum under the couch while she was in hospital getting her arm fixed up and had disposed of it. Her father was waging a one-man war against bubblegum.

Ruby came out of the minimart and noticed some kid with a styled-unstyled look – he was standing there with two other boys but he sort of looked like he might be waiting for someone. When she passed him he half turned around like he might say something to her, but he didn’t. Instead he jumped on his skateboard and grabbed the bumper of a passing truck and was carried off into the traffic.

It was kind of impressive – dangerous, sure – but practical in a cool sort of way. Skitching was something she needed to try.

When Ruby reached the green she looked up at the old oak and searched for some sign of Clancy. She could see the bike that had once been hers and was now his, but he was not visible. She whistled – two short, one long – and immediately the whistle came back, one long two short. He was already up high in the tree’s branches.

Bug lay down on the grass – he knew the deal – and he waited patiently while Ruby set about climbing. It took longer than usual, what with her arm trouble, but she was a good climber so she made it OK.

Ruby and Clancy Crew sat side by side on the old oak’s highest sitting branch. From here they looked down on Amster Green and its surrounding shops. The leaves were so plentiful that no one could see them from the sidewalk. The two of them used the tree not only for hanging out in, but also as a good place to hide coded messages for one another. Even if someone was smart enough to find the origami notes in the knots of the tree’s bark, they certainly wouldn’t be smart enough to decipher the ciphers.

The sun was still hot considering the time of day, so the foliage provided welcome shade. Though school summer vacation was nearly over, there was no sign of summer’s end or of fall’s beginning anywhere on the horizon – not a frost-curled leaf or a gusty breeze. Certainly no one yet believed that it was ever going to be any different, any cooler. It seemed no Twinforder could remember back to when the weather had been anything less than 30 degrees. It had been a remarkable summer. The best of it had meant beach time and barbecues and long social evenings, swimming in garden pools and hanging out late into the night, but no one could deny that this had come at a cost – the heat-wave had exhausted the city and left forests ravaged by fire. The fire services had been on red alert and crime had been a little higher too, something to do with the temperature boiling people’s minds, or so the psychologists said.

‘My mom doesn’t think the weather’s ever gonna break,’ said Clancy.

‘Yeah, well, your mom’s wrong,’ said Ruby.

‘Well, duh, of course I know that. I’m just making the point that it’s hard to imagine, it just seems so normal, being hot all the time, never having to remember a sweater, for instance.’

‘Yeah,’ said Ruby, ‘but any day now it’s gonna break and when it does, you’ll be needing more than a sweater.’ She itched her broken arm by sliding the yellow pencil under the cast and moving it from side to side.

‘I can’t wait that long,’ said Clancy.

‘Chew on some ice or something,’ suggested Ruby. ‘Oh boy, will I ever be glad to get this cast removed.’

‘When are they hacking it off?’ asked Clancy, who was hoping to be there when the nurse cut through the plaster with the electric saw thing.

‘Tomorrow,’ said Ruby. ‘They warned me when I had it put on that my arm might be all withered and hairy and not the same as the other one.’

Clancy stared at her, his mouth forming an O.

‘Don’t look so excited about it,’ said Ruby.

‘I wasn’t looking excited, I was looking interested. I mean mismatched arms – could be cool.’

‘Well, the hairiness is temporary.’

‘Shame,’ said Clancy. ‘Hey, have you been watching that show?’

‘What show?’

‘That illusionist guy, Darnley Rex,’ said Clancy. ‘He has a new show, you know, magic and stuff. Boy does it ever do your head in.’

‘It’s all about planting an idea in your brain. It’s all done with words, that’s what you gotta remember,’ said Ruby. ‘Before you know it, they have convinced your mind to think you are seeing something else or even are something else and the next thing you know you are clucking like a chicken.’

‘I sorta wish it was magic, though,’ said Clancy. ‘I mean I know it isn’t, but wouldn’t it be crazy if it was?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Ruby, ‘if Darnley Rex could get the whole country clucking like chickens then he could take over the world. Not a happy prospect.’

A minute passed before Clancy ventured, ‘So have they given you a medal yet?’

‘Who?’ said Ruby.

‘Spectrum, have Spectrum awarded you a medal?’

‘A medal for what?’ said Ruby.

Clancy looked puzzled. ‘For nearly being burnt alive in a forest fire, of course.’

‘Why would they do that? People don’t just go around getting medals for not getting burnt alive in forest fires, otherwise everyone and anyone would get one.’

‘OK, not just for not getting burnt alive, but how about all that other stuff you did?’

‘That’s what I’m paid for, that is my actual job,’ said Ruby. She paused. ‘Though, maybe not for much longer,’ she added.

‘What?’

‘Spectrum. They’ve taken me off field training indefinitely.’

‘Indefinitely?’ mouthed Clancy.

‘Well, unless I take this test and pass it – fail and I’m out, stuck at a desk for the rest of my career, like old Froghorn. It’s kind of a last-chance-saloon kind of deal.’

‘You’re not serious!’ said Clancy. He was flapping his arms now. ‘You cracked that whole wolf case! They should be giving you a medal, to show their appreciation, a job well done and all that, like in the army, not—’

‘Look Clance,’ Ruby interrupted, ‘for A: this ain’t the army, and for B: it wasn’t a job well done. I’m bummed about it too, but I think what you gotta understand is that it isn’t really a thanking-with-a-medal-type situation – I mean there’s no “thanking” in secret agenting. You do well, you get another assignment; you louse up, you get your marching orders – that’s about it. I pulled it outta the bag with the whole code-breaking-and-case-solving thing, but I loused up my survival training, nearly got myself killed, and worse – lost what was left of the Cyan perfume. It’s not medal-worthy stuff. So. . . I guess I’m lucky I’m even getting another chance.’

She didn’t feel lucky though. She felt royally hard done by. Clancy sucked hard on his drink. ‘What’s the test?’

‘No idea.’

‘But you’ll pass it, right?’

‘I sure hope so,’ said Ruby. She didn’t want to think about what she’d do if she got kicked out of the Spectrum Field Agent Training Programme. Sure, she got a big buzz out of code breaking, but she lived for the thrill of working as a bona fide all-action agent.

They climbed back down the tree. Ruby was quicker on the descent, though when she made the final jump from the low branch to the ground she stumbled and found she was unable to steady herself. She thumped down on the grass and landed awkwardly on her shoulder.

‘Rube, you sure you’re ready to go back to work?’ asked Clancy.

‘Sure I’m sure, never felt better, considering.’ She dusted herself down.

‘Well, that’s great Rube, but have you considered that this traumatic event may have had a traumatic impact on you? Subconscious and all – but there nonetheless?’

‘Have you been reading your Aunt Tatum’s psychology books again?’

‘I’m just saying.’

‘Clancy, you’re over-thinking stuff. I am totally AOK, except for I have a very itchy and possibly hairy arm.’

‘I hate to be the one to notice, but your balance is a little off too, like you’re not so sure of yourself,’ remarked Clancy.

‘My balance is good, better than good – great. It’s just this plaster cast throwing me off.’

Clancy looked at her hard. ‘If you say so Rube, then I believe you.’

He didn’t believe her, not for a minute. Ruby knew that, but she didn’t want to discuss it further – talking about this kind of stuff was fine when it related to other people, in fact she found it fascinating. Talking about this stuff in relation to her was very tedious.

When she got back home she went straight up to her room and on up to the roof where she could sit in private and think her own thoughts undisturbed. What she was thinking about was the Spectrum test. What would it be? Survival? Agility? Strength?

And what would happen if she failed?

It was too awful to contemplate.

She stared up into the starlit sky and searched for meteors. It was the end of the season but she couldn’t help looking and Ruby’s patience knew few bounds. It was like a sort of meditation, looking up into the infinity above her, and it allowed her to think. She heard the soft padding feet of her dog.

‘Hey there boy,’ she scratched him behind the ears. ‘What’s next for old Ruby Redfort do you think?’ She looked at the husky like he might answer back.

Three cases and five months into her agent career and she already felt like she had always done the job – she certainly wasn’t ready to give it up.

She thought back to the past month’s events – the meeting with the Australian, her close encounter with the perfumer Lorelei. . . there was more to that whole conspiracy than she could fathom. Why had the Australian woman commissioned Lorelei to steal the Cyan scent? What was she planning to do with it? Where were they now? What did they really want and when would they resurface? Perhaps never, though this seemed unlikely – in every thriller she had ever read, the evil genius always came back for a curtain call.

Ruby found herself actually longing for this to be the case for these two, and she wished with a strange hope that it would be sooner rather than later. . . her curiosity made her want it so.

As Ruby gazed up at the dark sky, hand on Bug’s warm head, she heard distant sirens, lots of them, drifting through the night air from downtown Twinford. They sounded like a warning cry of things to come. And as Ruby listened, another alarm sounded in her mind, and she was suddenly almost able to hear LB’s voice, the words sharp and unequivocal – ‘Too much curiosity can be fatal.’

It was a warning Ruby had been given on many occasions and had always ignored. Would she heed it this time?

History suggested not.

High

above the

howling sirens. . .

. . .above the slow-turning red and white lights of emergency vehicles, a tiny figure walked across the barely illuminated sky. He trod the air between two colossal buildings, his feet feeling the invisible path, skywalking.

The sirens and lights were not for him. Further down the street, a building was burning.

Well, it was none of his concern.

When he had crossed the void he stepped lightly onto the rooftop and vanished as if he were a mere figment of the imagination.

Chapter 7.

RUBY REDFORT WOKE TO THE SOUND OF THE TELEPHONE. At least, she thought it was a telephone. She stumbled out of bed and staggered to her feet. But she couldn’t seem to locate the ringing. She had a lot of phones – a whole collection of them. One shaped like a shell, one a lobster, another a squirrel in a tux. There was also a donut, a hamburger, a few shaped like telephones, and a whole lot more.

As Ruby scanned the room, trying to work out where exactly the noise was coming from, it slowly dawned on her that the sound was no ringing phone and in fact was almost certainly emanating from her watch, which was tucked away in her desk drawer. The watch was no ordinary Timex, Ingersol or Swiss. This watch was custom made, multifunctional, radio equipped, and though often referred to as a Rescue Watch, its official title was the Spectrum Escape Watch. It had once belonged to Bradley Baker when he was a kid.

Now it belonged to Ruby.

Ruby picked it up and switched it to speak-mode.

‘So how’s the broken arm doing?’ came a perky voice.

‘You woke me to ask me that?’ said Ruby.

‘It’s ten am,’ said the voice.

‘I wasn’t aware,’ said Ruby.

‘Perhaps you should set your alarm.’

‘I don’t need to. I got people like you bothering me.’

‘So the arm, is it giving you any trouble?’

‘Yeah, it’s preventing me from sleeping.’

‘How’s that?’

‘People keep calling to ask how it is.’

‘Is that so,’ said the voice, ‘and how is it?’

‘Itchy,’ said Ruby.

‘That’s a good sign,’ said the voice, ‘means it’s healing.’

‘So people keep telling me. By the way, do you mind giving me some idea of who you are?’ Ruby asked.

‘Oh I’m sorry, did I neglect to say?’

‘Uh huh,’ yawned Ruby.

‘I’m Agent Gill. LB asked me to coordinate your field test. Just wanted to say hi.’

‘Hi back,’ said Ruby scratching her arm with the yellow pencil. She tottered into the bathroom and examined her face in the mirror. ‘So this is a survival test?’ she asked, fake-casually.

‘I can neither confirm nor deny,’ said Gill. ‘When’s the cast due off?’

‘Today,’ said Ruby.

‘That’s good because you’re going to need both arms for this; fitness is key.’

‘Isn’t it always?’ said Ruby.

‘That’s correct, so you might want to get back on your bicycle and put in some miles. Give yourself a bit of a workout.’

‘I would, only I don’t have a bike,’ said Ruby.

‘Sure you do, I’ve seen you riding around, yellow isn’t it?’

‘Green,’ said Ruby.

‘That’s the one,’ said Gill. ‘Yep, you got to get back on that green bike of yours.’

‘It’s blue,’ said Ruby.

‘You just said it was green.’

‘Not any more.’

‘How so?’ said Gill.

‘I sprayed it Windrush blue and gave it to my pal Clancy.’

‘That was nice of you,’ said Gill.

‘Yeah, maybe, but it leaves me walking I guess.’

Gill sighed down the end of the phone line. ‘That’s what you get for being nice.’

‘Tell me about it,’ said Ruby.

‘My advice, take up jogging,’ said Gill.

‘You woke me to suggest I should take up jogging?’

‘No,’ said Gill, ‘I woke you to inform you that you’ll be contacted any day soon, maybe in the next few hours. You need to be on standby.’

‘You contacted me to tell me that you’ll be contacting me. . .?’

‘Correct, I’ll be contacting you,’ said Gill, and hung up.

Ruby’s watch vibrated – she looked at the words that appeared on the surface of the glass that covered the dial.

Be prepared!

‘I’ll count the hours,’ muttered Ruby. The truth was that despite her sarcastic tone she really was counting the hours. Life as it had been before Spectrum recruitment now seemed humdrum. Sure, she could happily live a week or two without the thrill of Spy agency work; her friends were amusing, her family likeable, there were books, there was music, museums, galleries, cinema, diners, rollerskates, the great outdoors, the great indoors, and then there was TV, and of course, ping-pong – all available to entertain, occupy and stretch her curious mind. But Ruby was no ordinary thirteen-year-old; her mind needed a lot of stretching and occupying.

As Ruby set about looking for things to wear she noticed a note, clearly pinned on her door by Mrs Digby. It said:

DON’T FORGET THE DO TONIGHT! 6.30 SHARP. MAKE SURE YOU’VE WASHED BEHIND YOUR EARS (WITH SOAP). PS YOUR MOTHER HAS BOUGHT YOU

A DRESS (YOU’RE NOT GONNA LIKE IT).

Ruby rolled her eyes and began the search for her Yellow Stripe sneakers and a fresh T-shirt. Her eyes settled on one – red with black text, the words pleading: please tell me I’m not awake.

Ruby had many T-shirts, all pretty similar in tone, all bearing slogans, statements or questions, some funny, some impolite, some funny and impolite. They caused her mother great consternation but Ruby wasn’t the sort of kid to let someone else’s opinion get in the way of her wardrobe, particularly not her mother’s.

‘You’ll appreciate me one day,’ Sabina would often say.

‘Mom, I appreciate you now,’ was always Ruby’s reply, ‘it’s just these outfits you keep buying me are causing me to appreciate you less than I would if you didn’t buy them.’

The intercom in Ruby’s room buzzed. ‘Yuh huh,’ said Ruby into the speaker.

‘This is your housekeeper, you know, the wretched old lady who attends to your every need?’

‘Hullo Mrs Digby, what can I do for you?’

‘Just reminding you about tonight,’ said the housekeeper. ‘Your mother and father want you hosed down, dressed, shoes shined, standing at the front door by six-thirty sharp.’

‘You already told me that in your note – anything else you wanna repeat?’

‘Yep, six-thirty sharp – be there or be in peril.’

Mrs Digby had been housekeeper to the Redforts for just about ever and she knew Ruby inside out and back to front. And one thing she was sure as eggs is eggs about was that Ruby Redfort would never be winning any punctuality award. She was a terrible time-keeper.

The buzzer buzzed again. ‘There’s a note from your father, stuck to the refrigerator.’

‘And?’ said Ruby.

‘And what?’ said Mrs Digby.

‘And what does it say?’

‘If you got your lazy self down here you could see for yourself.’

The housekeeper hung up and Ruby went downstairs to find something to eat.

The note was still fixed to the refrigerator. It read:

Dr Shepherd has found time for you in his schedule. Be at the St Angelina hospital at 1.15 pm. My chauffeur Bob will collect you from the house at 12.30 and return you home. Do not take the subway. And seriously, honey, don’t be late, the guy is doing me a big favour here. Love Pop.

Ruby looked at her watch; she had more than a couple of hours before she needed to be there. Time enough to check out the vintage store on Amster and find a dress she might want to wear to the evening’s event. Obviously she wasn’t going to wear the dress her mother had picked for her. But maybe if she wore a dress it would make Sabina happy.

She got lucky – the dress she particularly liked fitted perfectly, or at least would once she applied a little sticky tape to the hem. She also found a cool-looking old paperback thriller that she thought might be an OK read. Her dad would doubtless have booked his chauffeur to pick her up way early and she would rather read her book in the sun than in an air-conditioned waiting room. She would make a call.

As she was leaving she caught sight of the payphone in front of the store. She dialled her father’s number and was put through to his personal assistant.

‘Hi Dorothy, Sabina Redfort here. Look I’ve decided to drive Ruby to the hospital myself, you know how it is with kids, I just want to ensure she gets there on time and I know Bob’s a wonderful chauffeur and all but can he wrestle a teenager into a car on time? I doubt it. . .’ (Ruby laughed in exactly the way her mother would.) ‘Yes Dorothy, I hear you! So if you could cancel Bob, I would be very grateful, oh and don’t tell my husband he will think I’m being a worry worm. . . It’s wart? Really? Worry wart?’ (She laughed again.) ‘Bye, bye, bye.’

Ruby’s impersonation of her mother had got so good over the years that not even her mother could tell the difference.

Ruby sat down on the bench, leaned her back to the wall, and smiled to herself. She wasn’t sure how she was going to get to the hospital with no bike, but she’d solve that problem later. She opened the vintage-store book, No Time to Scream, leaned back against the wall and began to read.

Ruby quickly lost track of time; the book was a lot more engrossing than she had expected it to be. She had almost read the whole 275 pages while she sipped on her slushy when she sensed someone’s gaze and looked up. The kid from yesterday evening, the one standing outside the minimart with the styled-unstyled hair, was standing on top of the payphone, as if no one was going to mind, or perhaps he didn’t care either way.

Ruby thought about him on his skateboard, hitching a ride from that truck; she really should try that. He was one of those kids who knew he was good-looking – only today he looked awkward and was fiddling with his key-chain which he had looped to his pocket, a self-conscious tough-guy look which wasn’t really working for him. He seemed to be preparing to smile, to say something even.

‘Hey,’ he said.

‘Hey back,’ replied Ruby. She had put down her slushy and was busy trying to find her hat; it was somewhere in her satchel. ‘By the way, I think that lady wants to make a call.’ She indicated the elderly woman who was clearly working up the courage to ask the boy to step off the payphone. He shrugged and jumped down.

‘So what’s your name?’ asked the boy.

‘I believe it’s traditional to introduce yourself first before asking a personal question like, what’s your name.’

‘What’s your name is a personal question?’ said the boy.

‘It is to me, unless of course you are a law enforcement officer, or person in a position of ultimate authority, and if you are I guess what’s your name would be a demand.’ She paused without looking up. ‘Are you in the whole law enforcement business?’

The boy sounded flustered when he replied, ‘Am I what?’

‘In law enforcement?’ said Ruby.

‘Uh, no,’ said the boy uncertainly.

‘Didn’t think so,’ said Ruby. She resumed her satchel rifling. ‘So what is it?’

‘What’s what?’ said the boy.

‘Your name buster.’

‘My name?’

‘What? You got amnesia? Or you in the police protection programme?’

The boy actually smiled at this, surprised, like he had never met a girl before who wasn’t falling over herself to get his attention.

‘My name. . .’ announced the boy. He was about to disclose this piece of information when Ruby caught sight of something alarming – it was the clock above the pharmacy door.

Darn! The hospital; her appointment. She was late.

‘Look, I’m sure you got a really nice name buster, and I’m sure it suits you and all but tell me next time because I gotta scoot.’ She had jammed on her hat, finally retrieved from her bag, and was already hailing a cab, opening the door and climbing into it.

The kid with the hair watched as the taxi joined the other cars, all waiting for the lights to change from red to green. Glancing down he saw Ruby’s book on the bench.

‘Hey, your book!’ he yelled. He began to run, zig-zagging through the moving traffic, but the lights had changed and the cab was picking up speed.

‘Keep it for me,’ she shouted back. ‘I want to know how it ends.’

Chapter 8.

THE RADIO WAS TUNED TO TTR, Twinford Talk Radio, and the local news debate was blaring out. First a story about the mayor’s statue, newly commissioned by the mayor himself – it had upset a lot of Twinfordites.

‘IT’S JUST SO UNSPEAKABLY UGLY,’ said Roxy from North Twinford.

‘I HAVE TO SAY, MY TODDLER CRIES EVERY TIME WE PASS BY,’ agreed Judy from Midtown Avenue. ‘I FEEL LIKE THROWING A BLANKET OVER IT, YOU KNOW WHAT I’M SAYING?’

‘I sure as heck do, Judy,’ said the cab driver, ‘it’s just about the ugliest thing I ever laid eyes on.’ The driver looked at Ruby in the rearview mirror. ‘You a fan?’

‘I’m into horror if that’s what you’re asking,’ said Ruby. The sculptor who had attempted to capture the mayor in stone had clearly been going for some kind of modernist vibe, but the result was pure nightmare.

‘I hear you kid!’ said the cab driver, punching the horn. He stuck his head out of the window. ‘Get outta my way lady!’

TTR had moved on to another story about the predicted storms, which despite regular weather updates had yet to ravage Twinford.

‘I MEAN THEY KEEP TELLING US THIS HURRICANE IS ON ITS WAY BUT THERE ISN’T ENOUGH WIND TO FLY A KITE, I PROMISE YOU, I’VE TRIED,’ said Steve from Ocean Bay Suburb.

The other big debate was about a presumed robbery that had taken place on the twenty-sixth floor of the Lakeridge Square apartments. Presumed, because nothing had actually been reported missing yet. ‘LAKERIDGE RESIDENTS TARGETED BY HIGHRISE THIEF,’ announced Ted, the show’s host.

‘I’ll bet it has something to do with that skywalker,’ said the cab driver.

‘What skywalker?’ said Ruby.

‘Some clown’s been spotted walking between those fancy apartments in the city downtown,’ said the cab driver. ‘Doesn’t worry me, I live on the ground floor of a lowrise out in East Twinford.’

‘What, you mean he’s been seen walking on roofs?’

‘No, walking on the air is what I heard,’ said the cab driver. ‘Just strolling between the buildings.’

‘Sounds unlikely,’ said Ruby.

‘SO HOW IS THIS GUY DOING IT, ALICE? HIGH WIRES OR SUPERPOWERS? AND WHAT DO YOU THINK THE TWINFORD POLICE SHOULD BE DOING ABOUT THIS GUY, IF ANYTHING?’

‘DO YOU KNOW WHAT I THINK?’ said Alice from East Twinford. ‘GOOD LUCK TO HIM! I WISH I HAD THE MONEY TO LIVE IN THE LAKERIDGE BUILDING. THESE RICH FOLK HAVE MORE MONEY THAN THEY CAN HANDLE. WHAT DO THEY CARE IF SOME THIEF BREAKS INTO THEIR APARTMENT AND STEALS ONE OF THEIR VALUABLES? THEY SHOULDN’T HAVE ALL THIS WEALTH, IT’S NOT RIGHT, IF I HAD MY WAY I WOULD—’

‘THANK YOU FOR THAT INTERESTING POINT OF VIEW, ALICE, I MIGHT JUST CUT YOU OFF THERE,’ said Ted.

It was an intriguing discussion and Ruby was disappointed when the radio show moved onto the less interesting subject of bathroom limescale. She tuned out and instead let her thoughts drift as she watched the city flick past the cab window. It was only when Ruby had travelled halfway to where she needed to be that she realised she wasn’t going to have enough money to pay for the entire cab journey. Heck, she didn’t have enough to pay the distance she had already travelled. She had spent her dollars on the dress and the book, and now she was short.

‘Look man, you’re gonna have to pull over, I’ll step out here,’ Ruby said to the driver. ‘I’m outta funds.’

The cab screeched to a halt.

‘Unless. . . I don’t suppose. . .’ Ruby ventured, handing him every nickel and dime, ‘you might wanna help out a kid with a busted arm?’

‘Scram,’ said the driver, pointing his thumb in the direction of the sidewalk.

‘Thanks for your kindness sir,’ called Ruby, as the cab driver pulled away. ‘I’ll remember you in my will!’

Ruby arrived at the hospital almost a half-hour late and was met by a sour-faced nurse. Her name tag read, “Nurse Driver”.

‘You’re late,’ she said.

‘Only twenty-seven minutes,’ said Ruby.

‘Late is late,’ said the nurse.

‘Too late?’ asked Ruby.

‘Dr Shepherd has gone,’ said Nurse Driver, hands on hips.

‘Really.’

‘Dr Shepherd is a busy man.’

‘Sorry,’ said Ruby, giving her the old Ruby Redfort sad eyes. ‘I had such trouble getting here, first of all I—’

Nurse Driver raised her hand to stop the tide of excuses. ‘If you promise not to say another word, I’ll see what I can do.’ She made a few calls and told Ruby to sit it out on the hard plastic chairs in the waiting area.

Ruby picked up a crumpled copy of the Twinford Mirror. On page two was a piece about the Lakeridge break-in. Mr Baradi was quite shaken up to find the front door to his twenty-sixth-floor apartment wide open when he arose at 6.20 am.

‘It was unlocked from the inside,’ he explained to the police from the 24th precinct. ‘I ask you,’ he continued, ‘how in the name of rigatoni did that happen?’ Nothing so far has been discovered missing, but the search continues.

Forty-five minutes later Nurse Driver ushered Ruby inside a small white box of a room and informed her that the doctor would see her presently. One hour twenty-seven minutes later the door still hadn’t opened. Ruby read all the notices and information pinned to the walls, first in English and then in Spanish and then in Braille. At last the door opened.

‘So, want to get that thing off?’ said the technician, pointing at her arm.

‘Umm, yeah, that would be nice. Don’t get me wrong, it’s been great, but I oughta be getting back to my parents or they might decide to rent out my room.’

The technician didn’t rise to Ruby’s sarcasm. ‘Is that a yes?’ she said.

‘Yes,’ said Ruby.

‘A yes please?’

‘Yes please mam,’ said Ruby.

‘Better,’ said the technician, who then set about her task and soon enough Ruby’s arm was free of its plaster casing.

‘You got any advice for me?’ asked Ruby, pointing to her newly liberated arm. It felt weirdly draughty, now the plaster was off.

‘Uh huh,’ said the technician, ‘you might want to relax that attitude of yours. It’s not good for your future health.’

Ruby smiled at her. ‘Seeing as how you’re a medical person, I will bear that in mind.’ Then she thanked the technician, offering her a cube of bubblegum, which the technician accepted, and then Ruby strolled back down the corridor and out of the hospital.

Ruby took a taxi home, alerted Hitch to her cash-poor circumstances, and he came out to settle up with the driver – and her father was none the wiser.

Ruby walked into the kitchen to find her mother having her hair put up into an elaborate sort of do. Sabina was turning the pages of the latest copy of the Whispering Weekly, a sort of gossip and fashion journal. The gossip was about celebrities: mostly actors and singers, and the fashion was almost all about how the celebrities looked disastrous in their chosen gowns. FAMOUSLY FABULOUS? OR TRAGICALLY TERRIBLE?

There was one whole section dedicated to mishaps: close-ups of laddered stockings, pimples, ageing skin or bad hair. Tammy the hairdresser kept leaning over Sabina’s shoulder and tutting sympathetically and occasionally even turning the pages. The story Tammy was most interested in was about the actress who had had the misfortune to use a brand of make-up known as Face Flawless. Evidently the actress had attempted to conceal her blemishes so that she might look picture-perfect for her film premiere – the only thing was, Face Flawless used an ingredient in its formula that reacted badly under flash photography. The result was far from flawless: all the areas it covered glowed white. Poor Jessica Riley, her face was just a mess of circles and powdery blotches.

‘My heart goes out to her,’ said Tammy, making a sad face. ‘They shouldn’t print these stories.’ She waited for Sabina to turn the page. ‘I mean look at her,’ she said pointing a comb at a singer who had been snapped in an ill-fitting bathing suit. ‘Poor thing – gosh, though, she might want to think about shrinking those thighs.’

‘I’m sure she feels a lot better knowing that twenty million people like you all pity her,’ said Ruby.

Brant Redfort walked in. ‘Oh Ruby, you look different.’

Sabina looked up from the magazine. ‘Yes, you do. Why I wonder. . .?’

‘Could it be my. . . arm. . .?’ said Ruby.

‘Yes!’ said her parents both at once.

‘We should celebrate!’ said her father.

‘You know me, I love to celebrate,’ said her mother clapping her hands together. ‘Hitch!’ she called, ‘We’re celebrating! Could you rustle up something celebratory?’

There was a long ring from the doorbell followed by another and another.

Mrs Digby answered to find Clancy hopping from one foot to the other.

‘Jeepers child, keep your shorts on.’

‘Sorry!’ called Clancy as he ran up the stairs two at a time.

Clancy had cycled over especially to see the arm.

‘It’s not as hairy as I’d hoped,’ he said when Ruby showed it to him, ‘but it is definitely hairier than the other one.’

Ruby rolled her eyes. ‘Boy, do you live a sheltered life.’

‘Hey Clancy,’ said Sabina, ‘how come you’re not all scrubbed up for the Scarlet Pagoda benefit tonight? It’s a dressy affair, you know.’

Clancy’s face immediately dropped. ‘Because I’m not going is why.’

‘What? Are you insane?’ said Ruby. ‘Have you actually lost your whole complete mind?’

‘My dad has a last-minute ambassadorial dinner tonight so I am strictly on family duty.’

Ruby folded her arms.

‘Look, no one’s as bummed about it as I am,’ said Clancy. ‘I really wanted to be there. I mean, aren’t they showing costumes from The Crab Man Cometh?’

Ruby’s parents looked blank but Ruby nodded.

‘You sure you don’t want to come with us, Clancy dear?’ asked Sabina.

‘Good thinking honey,’ agreed Brant. ‘Come with us.’

‘You gotta come Bozo,’ said Ruby. ‘They’re all the costumes that have appeared in every horror movie you love – and other films too, the cool ones not the schlocky stuff.’

Clancy let out a pathetic laugh. ‘I know! It’s not like I haven’t been looking forward to it for weeks. But you think my dad is gonna let me off to go to that when he’s got Ambassador Sanchez coming? She has eight kids, get that? Eight!’

‘So?’ said Ruby.

‘So,’ said Clancy, ‘my dad only has six kids.’

Ruby looked at him. ‘Is this a competitive thing?’

‘You bet it is. Do you know how difficult it is for women to get on in the political arena?’

‘You’re preaching to the choir,’ said Ruby.

‘So Ambassador Sanchez makes my father look like a lightweight, at least that’s how my dad sees it. Sanchez is the queen of the career family – I mean, heck, she even baked her own cake when the president dropped by last month. She is a single mother of eight and an ambassador who bakes cakes for the president.’

‘She sounds super,’ said Sabina.

‘So your dad’s gonna fight back?’ said Brant.

‘Oh he’s fighting back all right,’ said Clancy. ‘He’s determined to at least look like this really great dad who spends his time looking after his great kids while he does a really great job of doing his great job. So he wants us all there.’

‘What about his really great wife?’ asked Sabina, sipping on one of the celebratory drinks Hitch had just rustled up.

‘She’s having her hair done,’ said Clancy. ‘She had it done yesterday too.’

‘Well, you know what they say, great hair opens doors,’ said Brant.

Clancy scrunkled his nose at this, perhaps trying to work out the truth of the statement. ‘Maybe. . . anyway, he wants us all there with good hair, while he is busy making Twinford believe his career is really great and we are great and he is great and Twinford can be great. You get it?’

‘I get it,’ said Ruby. ‘You can’t come because you are all busy being great and getting your hair done.’

Clancy nodded. That was about the size of it.

Chapter 9.

RUBY WAS LOOKING FORWARD TO THE EVENING. Not so much the ‘do’ itself – all that party yacking was sure to be a total yawn – but the costumes, they promised to be pretty interesting.

Aside from reading, movies were Ruby’s greatest passion, particularly thrillers and horror – a passion she shared with Mrs Digby. Nothing cheered Mrs Digby as much as a good murder story. Too bad she isn’t prepared to risk a few ghosts, thought Ruby. Tonight was going to be a bonanza of thriller movie memorabilia.

Ruby took longer than usual to get ready. She’d had to make a couple of minor adjustments to the new dress she had bought – namely hacking four inches off the hem and fixing it in place with tacky glue. She was largely pleased with the overall effect, and once she had her new shades on too she really looked the business. All in all, she was looking forward to the costume show. At least it would take her mind off worrying about that dumb Spectrum test.

‘That’s what you’re wearing?’

Sabina Redfort stared at her daughter, who was attired in a strange misshapen dress with worn-looking shoes and over-the-knee socks. Obscuring her eyes were a pair of huge white, square-framed sunglasses.

The dress had very obviously been purchased at a vintage store or possibly off a charity rail. It was on the large side and covered in a loud pink and yellow paisley print. She had pulled it together with a wide white buckle belt.

Jeepers! thought Sabina, maybe the kid actually pulled it out of a dumpster.

‘What?’ said Ruby, reading her mother’s thoughts, made obvious by the expression on her face.

Her mother closed her eyes and shook her head like she was trying to dislodge the vision.

‘OK,’ said Sabina, ‘I’m not going to make a thing of it, let’s just go and have a nice time. I’ll pretend you’re wearing that lovely peach dress I got you at the department store – why aren’t you wearing that lovely peach dress I got you at the department store?’

Brant Redfort, now dressed in an elegant black suit, walked into the living room to find his wife, a picture in rose with matching accessories.

‘You look sensational honey,’ he said kissing his wife. ‘You too. . . Ruby.’ He uttered this compliment before he had really taken in the vision that was his daughter. ‘You look very. . . very. . .’ He paused, searching for some word that might not insult but that might also be truthful. He could find no word.

‘I’ll take very very,’ said Ruby. ‘No need to get your underwear in a bunch on my account.’

Hitch drove the Redforts to the venue. It was a big deal affair, red carpet, the whole circus.

The costume show was being held at the Scarlet Pagoda – the proceeds from the very expensive tickets and raffle would hopefully raise enough money to keep the old art deco building from crumbling to dust. The place was considered an architectural gem of great historical importance, having been built in the heyday of the roaring twenties. Any elderly star worth an Oscar had tripped across this stage.

And many of those stars had left their footprints – literally. Outside the theatre was Twinford’s own walk of fame, where brass star shapes were set into the sidewalk, commemorating the town’s most famous. Next to each star was a cast of the actors’ shoes, their footprints pressed into wet concrete.

Ruby and her family walked past the footprints, and as they walked Sabina gave a running commentary.

‘There’s Fletch Gregory, what a man, and oh, look at dear little Arthur Mudge’s teeny feet – I always thought he was taller, and goodness, are those really Margo Bardem’s?’

And on into the theatre.

It had begun as a theatre for circus and stage productions, then much later it had become a movie theatre. But now it was just a room, a large empty space, where each week another tiny gold mosaic tile would drop from the ceiling. A place where the elegant ladies who silently stared out from the murals faded a little more each year. Soon, if nothing were done, their faces would disappear altogether and then the wrecking ball would be called in.

For tonight, though, it was a sparkling extravaganza of a party; a hint of the things to come when it was renovated. Everyone who was anyone was there, champagne glasses in hand, laughing and chatting as elegant young waiters glided around with silver trays of canapés.

As soon as Ruby and her parents walked in they were surrounded. ‘It’s such a wonderful example of the deco era,’ said Dora Shoering, Twinford’s self-declared expert on all things historical. She had to talk loudly over the hubbub of voices and chinking glasses. ‘You can touch the history, run your hands over it, breathe it into your lungs.’ The women all took deep breaths.

Sabina coughed – the Pagoda was a haven for dust mites. ‘You know your onions, Dora. I mean it would be a perfect sadness if it were destroyed,’ she said.

‘I totally agree,’ agreed Marjorie Humbert, who was now looking for a tissue, having just run her hands over history. ‘It would be Twinford’s bitter loss.’

Elaine Lemon joined them. ‘So what are you ladies talking about? Gossip I hope!’

‘Oh we were just saying how it would be the most terrible pity if they were to flatten this building,’ said Marjorie.

‘I so concur,’ said Elaine, opting for a sad-face expression. ‘It would be the most awful tragedy.’ She paused. ‘A tragic one.’ In truth, Elaine was not there because she was remotely interested in the Scarlet Pagoda, but had eagerly accepted Sabina’s offer of a free ticket because everyone else was going.

Ruby felt this conversation wasn’t really going places and so moved off in search of something entertaining. As she circled around the room she recognised many big names from the stage and screen, including one of her favourites, Erica Grey. She was a star of the B-movies and had played some of the most curious and monstrous villains on the medium-sized screen. She was originally from Alabama and spoke in a drawn-out drawl, her voice rich and deep. Every few sentences she would throw her head back and laugh – her red lipsticked mouth opening wide to display perfectly white shining teeth.

Ruby weaved her way on through the crowd and caught a glimpse of Crazy Cops actor Dirk Draylon as he made his way to his seat on the other side of the catwalk. Apparently the show was about to begin.

Boy, Mrs Digby would love this, she thought.

There were many other well-known personalities mingling in the crowd but none whom Ruby felt eager to shake hands with. Not because she didn’t admire them, she did, she just had a wariness about meeting screen heroes; meeting one’s hero could be a mistake, a big let-down. This illusionary world that was film often survived better if it was never contaminated by real life.

At least that’s what she thought until she met the make-up artist Frederick Lutz. Frederick Lutz was a man Ruby greatly admired – a true artist, he had created some of the most startling monsters, villains and victims of the screen, as well as making up the faces of the great and beautiful.

They chatted for a while and then he thanked her for her compliments, and as she moved off to find her seat he called, ‘If you ever need make-up for a very important occasion then think of me – it would be my great pleasure Ms Redfort.’

‘You can bet I will,’ said Ruby, who was thinking Halloween. Then she turned and bumped heads with her friend Red Monroe.

‘I’ve been looking for you,’ said Red, rubbing her forehead.

‘Hey Red, where’s Sadie?’ asked Ruby clutching her nose.

‘Oh, Sadie’s just backstage helping the radioactive lobster fix his pincers.’ She said this as if it was not so very different from mentioning that someone needed help straightening their bow tie.

Red’s mom, usually referred to as ‘Sadie’, was a costume designer – she mainly designed for thrillers and sci-fi flicks and had done more than her share of B-movie work. Ruby liked hanging out at Red’s place because her mother always had something unusual going on in her studio and Mrs Monroe was often to be found with pencil poised, asking some kind of curious question. ‘So Ruby, tell me, what do you think a Grungemeister looks like? Do you think he would have fingers or grabbers?’

Ruby and Red made their way to their seats. Elliot Finch was already there, studying the programme.

The lights went down. Everyone clapped.

‘Clancy not here?’ whispered Red.

‘He had to smile for his dad,’ replied Ruby.

‘That kid’s gonna dislocate his jaw one of these days.’

‘Tell me about it,’ said Ruby.

A crabby lady in the row behind them started making shushing sounds.

‘Welcome to the opening of the Twinford Film Festival – A Date with Thrills!’ said the host Ray Conner, bounding onto the stage.

Applause from the audience.

Ray Conner was a bit of a cheeseball, in Ruby’s opinion.

‘As you all know, tonight’s extravaganza is a fundraiser in aid of this beautiful theatre of ours, the Scarlet Pagoda.’

Pause for more applause. Smiling from the host.

‘The title of this year’s festival is A Date with Thrills, in other words, Thriller Flicks, be they comic, romantic or just plain terrifying. And tonight we are particularly celebrating our wonderful costume designers, all too often unseen.’

More clapping, especially from Red, whose mother was a costume designer, after all.

Smiling and nodding from host.

‘During the next few weeks Twinford movie theatres will be showing some fabulous films from years gone by. The wonderful work of stars such as: Betsy Blume, Leonard Fuller and Crompton Haynes, culminating in a tribute to the wonderful actress, Margo Bardem, who as a young thing worked in this theatre as a hairdresser and whose career began with a romantic thriller that was both shot and later premiered in this very auditorium in 1952, and who subsequently went on to dominate the romantic thriller genre.’

More applause. A tight smile from Betsy Blume.

‘Sadly, Margo Bardem can’t be here tonight. . .’

A groan from the audience.

‘. . .but she will of course be joining us for the film festival finale on Friday 15th!’

Applause.

‘Thank you, thank you,’ said Ray, trying to be heard above the clapping. ‘This, folks, will be a very special occasion, because on that night at this very theatre will be the world premiere of Feel the Fear, a movie that also features the Scarlet Pagoda in some scenes. A movie shot in 1954 but for some reason never shown, so you lucky people will have the chance to be its first audience!’

Wild applause now.

‘Jeepers,’ whispered Elliot, ‘I wish this guy would move it along a little.’

‘Talking of this wonderful actress, one of the highlights of this particular evening will be the fabulous costumes worn by Ms Bardem in the thrillers: The Truth Will Out, The Last Wish, Catch Your Death and of course The Cat that Got the Canary.

Yes, tonight you will all be fortunate enough to see those awe-inspiring outfits worn by Ms Bardem that made those particular pictures such a movie sensation. . .’ He paused for suspense.

‘The feather dress. . .’ Applause.

‘The white fur trim gown. . .’ Applause.

‘And yes, those legendary US size 3s, the Little Yellow Shoes.’ Applause.

‘The list goes on,’ said Ray, who was going on a little too much as far as Ruby was concerned.

‘You will also be dazzled by costumes from films such as Fingers from Outer Space, It’s Behind You and The Claw at the Window.

There was a loud whistling – there were obviously a lot of The Claw at the Window appreciators in the audience.

‘And folks, let’s not forget the other of this evening’s highlights – the raffle!’

More frenzy, Ruby suspected most of it generated by her own mother.

After a bit more build-up, the show finally began. Music started up, Ray Conner thankfully slipped stage right, and a succession of models started strutting across the stage in a variety of outfits, each one more outlandish than the last. Ruby was engrossed – her favourite movies were coming to life.

Red too leaned forward in her seat. ‘Isn’t that the dress from Two’s Company, Three’s a Shroud?’

‘I believe so,’ said Ruby.

‘It looks like it’s made from actual cobwebs and look at that. . .’ As Red stretched her arm out to point towards another costume classic, she knocked her drink right into her lap.

‘Oh cripes, not again!’ said Red, violently wiping at her dress.

‘If that’s a blue slushy Red, you better go pour water on it,’ said Elliot. ‘That stuff stains, man – talk about radioactive.’

Red had an accident of this nature most hours of the week, and she was well practised at dashing to restrooms or water fountains.

While Red made her way to the bathroom to deal with the slushy, Ruby and Elliot continued to enjoy the show – there was so much more to the outfits than one ever saw when just viewing on a screen. It was fair to say, some of the costumes were a whole lot better than the movies they had appeared in.

Fifteen minutes later, Ruby looked up to see Red making her way back to her seat. By the looks on people’s faces she was stepping on an awful lot of toes. As she got closer, Ruby saw that the blood seemed to have drained from her face, which gave her a strange almost ghostly appearance.

‘What’s up with you?’ Ruby asked, as Red finally sat down beside her. ‘You look like you just ran into the Scorpion Spectre.’

‘Yeah, well maybe I did – I got lost and ended up backstage, and there is something weird back there. It may not be the scorpion but it sure to goodness put the wind up me.’

‘Seriously?’ said Elliot.

‘I tell you, I think this place is haunted, just like they say,’ said Red.

Ruby gave her the once-over. ‘Look, maybe you should ease up on the slushies Red – you know they put a lot of chemicals in those things. I think some of them mighta gone to your head.’

‘I’m not kidding around you guys. I know I tend to walk into a lot of things but this time I swear I tripped over something that wasn’t there – I mean there was something there, nothing I could see, but there was something – I mean, I couldn’t have tripped over nothing, right? And I swear I heard footsteps.’

‘Red, you are always tripping over nothing,’ said Ruby.

Red stared back at them both. ‘Well this time I didn’t,’ she said firmly. ‘This time it wasn’t down to me.’

And the weirdest thing was. . . Ruby believed her.

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