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Running Scared

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Chapter 11

Previously...

As I heard the sound of an engine grow fainter, I felt more despair at that moment than I have ever felt in my life.

Would Daddy come back and give himself up?

On the one hand, I hoped that he would, on the other, I hated the idea of him giving up to those thugs.

We had gone through so much in such a short space of time and I wondered if we would ever see our father again and whether we would still be alive in a weeks’ time. I was under no illusions that these people would stop at nothing in their quest to get to my Daddy and I dreaded the future like never before.

And now the story continues...

I wondered what Claire and the others were thinking? If I was Claire, I would be frantic by now. I had no idea how long we had been in this place. Our phones had been taken away from us, so we had no contact with the outside world or couldn’t be traced. For some reason our watches had been taken too, so we had no idea as to what time it was.

Amelia was sitting in the corner, rocking herself and crying. I went over and sat beside her and gave her a hug. We both had a good cry and I think that it made us feel a bit better for some reason.

After a while, Amelia touched my face where that brute had hit me. I winced, as it was quite painful and my tongue was sore where I had bit it.
I now wished that I had kept my mouth shut. It was a hard lesson.

‘Does it hurt?’ she asked.

‘Mmm,’ I admitted.

‘What’s going to happen to us?’

‘I don’t know honey, but I bet that everyone is looking for us and that we’ll get out of this somehow.’

I had tried to sound positive for Amelia, but it was hard to be positive knowing how ruthless these people were.

It led me to wonder who “they” were. Were they working for the government or just thugs, hired to do a nasty job? Were we expendable? Probably, I thought. And what about the police, were they in on this or just blindly following orders to find us?

I glanced over to the door and noticed the cooler bag that thug number two had left there.

I went over and unzipped the bag. Inside were some pre-packed sandwiches bought from a supermarket or petrol station, together with some cans of cola and bottled water and a couple of bars of chocolate. Not much, but better than nothing.

Amelia was now sitting on her bed, looking into space. I worried about her. She was only a kid and I had to do something to cheer her up, maybe some food?

I took a sandwich, choc bar and can of cola over to her.

‘Here, have this.’

‘I’m not hungry.’

I staggered back and gave a little scream.

‘What?’ she asked, looking puzzled.

‘You,’ I gasped, ‘not hungry, are you a clone and what have you done with my sister?’

She giggled at that and then, cheering up a bit, reluctantly took the food and drink.

‘You’re silly Emma.’

It seemed so natural calling each other by our new names. I kind of preferred them and I thought that I might keep mine when all this nastiness was over. My acceptance by everyone that I was a girl and not a boy was the only positive thing to happen to me since all this mess started. It might seem daft to think of that in the current circumstances, but it gave me a little bit of comfort and I would take anything going at that moment!

I smiled and joined her on the bed as we ate our small meal. I did wonder in passing whether the food could have been drugged, but on reflection, I didn’t think so as what would be the point of that? They had us locked up and they could have harmed us at any time but we were, I assumed, some sort of pawns in the sick game they were playing.

It didn’t take us long to eat the sandwich and chocolate bar although I had to be a bit careful as my tongue was pretty sore. I was kind of glad that there was no mirror on the wall. My face probably wasn’t a very pretty thing to look at. I was hungrier than I thought and it left me wanting more, but at least food helped me feel a bit better and Amelia looked a bit more chirpy.

It was a strange, unreal situation that we were in. After eating, we just sat on our musty beds and wondered what was going to happen.

I tried to reassure Amelia.

‘At least they’ve fed us. If they wanted to harm us, they would have starved us,’

Or even worse, killed us, I thought.

‘ I miss Daddy,’ sniffed Amelia.

‘Me too, squirt.’

‘Don’t call me squirt,’ she said and threw her pillow at me.

I wasn’t going to have that, so I threw mine at her and we were soon in the throes of a pillow fight.

It didn’t last long, as the pillows burst and we were covered in feathers but at least it broke the tension a bit, which was my cunning intention.

After that bit of fun, we just sat there, wondering what would happen to us. Would we get more food and drink? I hoped so, as starving to death or dying of thirst weren’t very nice things to think of. But there again, to have food and drink, those horrible men would have to come back and I didn’t look forward to that possibility. The head brute, man or whatever you wanted to call him, hinted that they would not come back unless Daddy cooperated, whatever that meant.

I estimated that we were there for about two days and nights but it was difficult to know as we had no watches and only had the rays of light from the shuttered windows to go by. The food, such as it was, had run out and there was very little water left. We were both starving and getting more than a little desperate. The boredom took its toll and we began to get on each other’s nerves and we had silly rows about stupid things. I can’t remember what about, but each hour that passed seemed to get longer and longer and I was feeling desperate about our situation. I almost got to the stage when I would welcome the return of our kidnappers just for something to happen.

I suppose I had thought that we might be rescued and that the countryside was being scoured for us but apart from some noisy birds, all was quiet. I didn’t hear any cars, trains or anything that indicated that we were close to any sort of civilisation. It was all very worrying and depressing.

I wondered what the others were doing. Were they worried about us? Would they call the police? I supposed that they would have had to and that worried me because I didn’t know which side the police were on.

I suppose that it was mid-afternoon. Amelia was lying on her bed asleep, covered with her coat to keep her warm. December wasn’t the best month to be imprisoned without any heating. At least when she was asleep, she wouldn’t be worrying about what was to become us. I felt in my bones that no one was going to come to rescue us in the near future and as far as those men were concerned, we were expendable.

I couldn’t believe that the men who captured us had anything to do with the authorities or government. The authorities were the good guys, weren’t they? Maybe I was being naïve, what did I know? Daddy said something about suspicions people in his department and the police had definitely been looking for us on the train, so were they just following orders to find us or was it something else. I felt my face where the man had hit me, feeling all the more confused as to who were the good guys and who were the bad ones.

In the end, I had enough of fruitless speculation and going over the same things again and again and again. I decided to do the same as my sister and just tried to sleep. It beat the hell out of worry and the boredom.

Despite the things going on in my head, I finally dropped off. I had no idea how long I was asleep but when I woke up, I saw that it was just getting light outside. Amelia was still in the land of nod and I decided not to wake her. What was the point, weren’t going anywhere.

In the gloom, I went over to the door and tried the handle, it was locked, of course. It was very solid and I didn’t think it would be easy for anyone to break it open. For lack of anything better to do, I went over to one of the shuttered windows. The window itself was locked and anyway, the shutters on the outside were closed and looked very secure. The other window was the same and I despaired of ever getting us out of there.

I went over to my bed and sat down with my head in my hands. I was very close to tears. It wouldn’t take much to push me over the edge, but I had to be strong for Amelia. I missed my father so much and hadn’t felt this bad since Mummy died so horribly.

I pulled out a tissue from in my coat pocket and blew my nose gently and somehow, I dropped the tissue on the floor.

Stooping down to pick the tissue up, I noticed, under my bed, the carpet had a slight depression under it.

For lack of anything better to do, I quietly moved the bed out of the way. I didn’t want to disturb my sister so I tried to make as little noise as possible, although normally, she could sleep through the middle of a fireworks display.

The stained and worn carpet definitely had a square depression in it. I wrinkled my nose as the carpet smelt of… I didn’t know what. I peeled back the edge and blinked in surprise when it revealed a square wooden trapdoor!

I managed to get my fingers under the edge of the hatch and swore silently in an unladylike manner when I broke one of my nails in the process. But I didn’t worry about that for long, as I pulled the trapdoor up and out of the way. It creaked alarmingly on its rusty hinges and it looked like it hadn’t been opened in ages. I saw some stone steps leading down into complete darkness.

I could feel cold air coming from below, so I realised that this could be our way out. Maybe, it wasn’t just a cellar but a way out of our prison!

‘What,’ asked a sleepy Amelia yawning. The noise must have woken her up.

I turned and looked at her.

‘Wake up sleepy head. I’ve found a trap door.’

This grabbed her attention rather more quickly than usual!

She jumped off the bed and came over.

‘It looks rather dark,’ she said uncertainly, ‘it’s probably an old cellar and full of spiders, rats and snakes.’

She always had a bit of a wild imagination, not like me, all calm and brave.

Who was I kidding?

‘I can feel a bit of a breeze.’ I said.

‘Can you? Wow, maybe it’s a way out.’

‘That’s what I was thinking. Shall we try?’

‘It is very dark.’ She replied uncertainly.

‘Well, do you really want to stay here and starve?’

‘Of course not. OK let’s do it.’

I grinned at her and then, after Amelia put her coat on, we made our way over to the trapdoor. Then I had a sudden thought.

‘Hang on a minute. Help me drag the beds up against the door.’

I thought that it might be an idea to barricade the door in case the baddies turned up suddenly. It might give us a few minutes.

We heaved and pushed the beds hard up against the door and then went back over to the trapdoor.

‘You lead the way,’ said Amelia bravely…not.

I gulped. This was not going to be easy. Who knows what was down there? We had no light to guide us and I was just an incy-wincy bit scared of the dark, although I would never live it down if I told my sister.

‘Right,’ I said as confidently as I could manage, ‘I’ll go first and you follow on closely. When we get to the bottom, hold on to the tail of my coat, OK?’

‘Yes, get on with it.’

It was alright for her; I was the one leading the way!

I sat down on the floor with my legs hanging over the opening, one foot on the first step. With a deep breath, I stood up and started to go down. I had my hand up against the roughly hewn wall and after a few steps, I came across a handrail which I gripped like someone who had just been thrown a lifebelt ring.

‘There’s a rail on your left,’ I said as I continued down, feeling my steps like a blind person, which, I suppose, I was, near enough at that moment.

I could hear Amelia breathing hard behind me and could sense that she was not enjoying this.

I suppose there were about twenty steps until I reached the floor, which was hard rock, like the steps but felt a bit gritty underfoot.

‘I’m at the bottom now,’ I said.

Amelia bumped into me.

‘Careful,’ I said.

‘Sorree,’ she replied indignantly.

‘She’ll have to go,’ I thought

Looking back up from where we came, I could see the opening and the faint light coming from the room above. I could also see the steps dimly as my eyes grew accustomed to the poor light.

There was a definite breeze coming from somewhere and now that my eyes had become accustomed to the dark, I could see that we weren’t in a cellar but a passage. This didn’t surprise me as I had heard stories of smugglers tunnels both in Devon and Cornwall. In the distance, I could see a chink of light coming from the roof and we headed that way, being careful of where we put our feet and hoping that we didn’t come across nasty creepy crawlies or worse, rats.

My bravery, such as it was, had its limits.

I held onto Amelia’s rather sweaty hand or was that mine that was damp? Never mind that, we continued on slowly and carefully. The chink of light grew larger and larger until we were under it. Looking up, I could see some metal rails lodged in the rocks, that formed a ladder. Above the ladder was an opening that appeared to be partially covered in branches.

‘Shall we go up?’ I asked.

‘Der, obviously,’ said cheeky chops.

She definitely had to go. Where, I didn’t know? But I would think of something when I had the chance and we weren’t fleeing for our lives.

I bravely went first, so if a rung broke and I fell, I would land on her and serve her right!

Such silly thoughts spurred me on as I went ever up towards the opening. Amelia followed close behind. She should have waited for me to get to the top, but I think that she was as spooked as I was about staying in that dark and dingy tunnel. I heard an animal type squeak from below and it sounded like it might be a rat, so that made me go faster.

‘Hurry up, slowcoach,’ exclaimed Amelia bumping up against my leg. I think that she heard the squeak too!

The metal rungs were somewhat rusty and I wondered how long ago that the ladder had last been used. The granite walls looked roughly hewn, giving me the impression that the passage was very old, perhaps used by smugglers?

I didn’t have much time to ponder as Amelia let out a little scream as we heard the scurrying of tiny feet and squeaking sounds.

‘H…hurry up!’

I continued climbing the ladder as fast as my feet would take me, hoping and praying that a rung wouldn’t break.

I reached the top and pulled myself up over the edge, pushing some overgrown bushes out of the way and scratching my hands in the process. I then turned to help Amelia, not that she needed much help as she came up and out of the opening a bit like a cork out of a bottle of champagne.

‘Oooh, I feel all creepy and crawly,’ said Amelia, brushing down her cobwebbed coat.

Looking down, I saw that I was in the same condition. I didn’t much like spiders either and we checked each other out for any signs of life on our clothes. Luckily, all clear.

Looking around, I saw that we were in a small clearing, surrounded by high bushes. The hole itself had been covered in branches and bracken, presumably hiding it from prying eyes.
It all confirmed to me that the secret tunnel was more than likely something to do with smuggling.

I pushed a bush out of the way and saw that we were by the side of a narrow, seldom used lane with grass growing down the middle. At the end of the lane, just fifty yards away, was an old cottage and it didn’t take much brainpower to work out that this was our former prison. It was strange, I thought that we had gone a lot further than that in the tunnel. Mind you, you can’t really judge distance very well in the dark.

‘Let me see,’ said Amelia, pushing me out of the way.

‘Wow, was that where they kept us?’

‘Looks like it.’

‘We’re well out of that! I’m hungry and thirsty.’

‘Always thinking of your stomach.’

‘Aren’t you hungry and thirsty then?’

‘A bit.’ I admitted, ‘We’ll go and see…’

I stopped talking as I heard the sound of an engine in the distance, coming closer.

We both pulled back to hide amongst the bushes and not soon enough, as a car came down the lane at a terrific speed, throwing up dirt as it went.

I had hopes that it might be someone there to rescue us and we both carefully looked out from our hiding place and saw two men get out of the car. They were wearing balaclavas and I knew that they were the men who had kidnapped us.

They went over to the front door and tried to open it. They found some resistance and they pushed hard before it finally opened and they rushed in. slamming the door closed behind them.

‘Now we’re for it!’ said Amelia.

I had a mad idea.

I went over to the hole and covered it up with as many branches as I could find.

‘What are you doing. This is no time for doing gardening.’

‘Shut up and help me cover the opening. Quick we haven’t much time.’

We did as best as we could and soon the opening was completed covered over.

‘Come on, let's go.’

‘Where?’

‘To the cottage, where else.’

‘Are you mad?’

‘Probably. Now come on, no questions.’

We pushed through a gap in the hedge and ran down the lane towards the cottage with Amelia constantly complaining behind me.

We reached the cottage and saw the front door. I was gambling on the fact that the men were by now in the passage trying to follow us and that they would not just come out of the cottage.

There was a key in the lock of the cottage door and I locked it and then as an afterthought, threw the key in a patch of stinging nettles. Why? I hadn’t a clue but it seemed a good idea at the time. Then I wondered what to do next.

‘Emma?’

‘What?’

‘The key is in the car ignition.’

‘So what?’

‘Let’s pinch it?’

‘What?’

‘The car, silly.’

‘I can’t drive.’

‘You drove that go-kart at the fair once.’

‘Yes, but a car is different.’

‘Have you any better idea?’

I had visions of the men getting through the passage and up that ladder.

‘Oh sod it, let's try it.’

‘You swore, I’ll tell Daddy about that.’

‘You would, you snitch! Oh come on then, at least we can try. Get in the car and for goodness sake, put on your seat belt.’

I got into the driver’s seat. It was miles back and I had to pull the seat as far forward as I could towards the steering wheel for me to just about reach the pedals. I put on the seat belt and then tried to remember what I had seen when other people like my dad had driven. At least the car was an automatic, so I didn’t have to worry about gears.

I didn’t have much time to think, I just pressed the ignition button and the car engine started.

I looked down and put the gear lever thingy into drive and the car crept forward. Not a good idea as there was a wall six feet in front of the car. I slammed on the brake, put the lever in reverse and the car went backwards a bit too fast. In the reversing camera, I saw that we were now in danger of hitting a tree.

‘Watch out,’ shouted Amelia.

Once again, I slammed on the brakes. This driving business was harder than I thought!

‘Not so fast, I want to get out of this alive.’

‘Shut up squirt. If you think that you can do any better, you try it.’

‘I would if I had long enough legs.’

I put the lever into drive again and then, turning the steering wheel, I gently accelerated and managed somehow to turn the car around, so it was facing the right way.

‘What are you waiting for?’

I gulped and then pressed down on the accelerator. The car moved forward but I was finding it difficult to keep to a straight line as the lane was rutted and had holes in it.

‘Oh no.’ exclaimed Amelia.

I gasped as up ahead to our left, the two men burst out from the bushes and came out onto the road. They saw us immediately and they both had guns in their hands, aiming them at us.

‘Duck down,’ I shouted.

I went as low as I could whilst still seeing in front of me and just kept moving. My heart was in my mouth and I impulsively pressed down hard on the go pedal and the car shot forward.

There was a huge bang and the windscreen had two holes in it. Later, I was amazed that the screen didn’t shatter. The two men were a few feet in front of the car by now and I didn’t apply the brakes.

I’m a gentle person and I wouldn’t hurt a fly, but at that moment, I didn’t want to do anything but to get away and if they were stupid enough to stay in the road, they would get run over.

They both dived out of the way and we accelerated down the road. Unfortunately, one of the men was too late in getting out of the way and there was a sickening thud as I hit him a glancing blow with the wing of the car.

‘What’s happening?’

‘Keep down.’

It was a good job I told her this as, in our mad dash to get away, the car was hit by several bullets in the back, including the rear windscreen that exploded into hundreds of pieces.

We turned a bend and looking at the rearview mirror, I could see that we were out of sight of the men. It was then safe for me to sit up properly. How I managed to get the car that far was nothing short of amazing.

I felt sick as I realised that I had hit that man. I hated him but I didn’t want to kill him. I stopped the car for a moment.

‘You can sit up now. They’ve gone.’ I said with a quavering voice.

‘What happened.’

‘We got away from them.’

‘That was cool.’

‘Cool…cool, are you mad?’

‘Just like in a film. You were like James Bond or is it Jane Bond?’

‘You do talk rubbish sometimes. Blimey, I was nearly wetting myself.’

‘Gross, too much information Emma.’

That bit of banter helped to calm me down a bit and after a moment I well enough to carry on.

We went down the lane at a slower pace, knowing that there was no danger now from those men. It took a while for my heart to stop beating furiously. I had never been so scared in my life. I wondered at the calmness of my sister and then remembered that she had seen nothing after she spotted the men bursting out from the bushes. Lucky her, I was going to need intensive therapy after all this was over!

We came to the end of the lane and I wondered where I should go.

‘Where are we?’

‘I don’t know, do I. Why not turn on that satnav thingy?’

I felt a bit of a twit, Of course, the sat-nav!

I stopped at the junction. The flaming car kept wanting to creep forward so I stuck it in neutral and pulled the handbrake up. I then pressed a few buttons and finally, the satnav screen jumped into life.

The map showed on the screen and I zoomed out far enough to tell us where we were. Of course, not knowing anywhere in Devon or Cornwall, I was none the wiser. So I keyed in Penmarris and the sat-nav showed us the way back. I had thought that we might be miles away, but we weren’t we were just ten miles from there.

‘That’s not far is it?’ said Amelia.

‘No, I don’t know whether to stop and ask for help somewhere or try to drive the thing home.’

‘Drive home; we don’t know who we can trust.’

‘It’s against the law for me to drive.’

‘What’s more important, breaking a few silly rules or getting us back safely?’

I thought for a moment.

‘Breaking a few silly rules,’ I replied.

‘That’s my girl!’

I pressed GO on the sat-nav and turned left, as instructed.

There were no other cars on the road, which was almost as narrow as the lane that we had just left. I was glad of that as I wasn’t sure that my driving skills would allow me to do anything complicated like passing another car or heaven forbid, anything bigger.

Luckily the holes in the windscreen were to the side and they didn’t impair my vision much, just making a whistling noise where the wind came in. It was really cold in there as we had no rear windscreen and I had to have the heater full on to counteract that.

I got a bit more used to driving the car after a bit and only scraped a wall once. I wasn’t too bothered about that as the thing had more bullet holes than Swiss cheese and anyway, it wasn’t mine.

After a bit, Amelia chirped up.

‘I’m hungry. Can we go to a McDonald’s?’

‘No, are you nuts?’

‘No, just hungry and thirsty.’

‘One, I don’t know where McDonald's is around here. Maybe none at all and two, just think what would be said if we turned up in this car, in the state that it’s in and people saw a kid driving it? Don’t you think that they might be a little bit suspicious?’

‘Maybe.’ She admitted. ‘So, how long till we get home?’

I looked at the screen.

‘About twenty minutes. I’m not driving fast though.’

‘You’re only doing 15 miles an hour. At this rate, I’ll be seventy by the time we get back. I could walk faster.’

‘Want to get out and walk?’

‘Don’t get huffy with me, but you could drive a wee bit faster.’

‘Don’t talk about wee. I am dying to go,’

‘Pull over in that layby then, we can go in the bushes.’

I was kind of desperate. I don’t know why because we hadn’t had much to drink lately. It must have been nerves. I pulled over and we both got out and ran in different directions.

I had just finished doing my stuff and adjusting my tights and skirt, not as easy as it sounds, when in the distance, I heard sirens. I hid behind a bush and then a police car whizzed past us, going in the direction that we had come from. It must have been doing 70 at least.

‘Emma,’ called Amelia.

I came out of the bushes and there was Amelia, looking worried.

‘Is that anything to do with us?’ she asked.

‘Possibly. Look we have to get going. We need to get back home.’

‘Home?’

‘Well, Auntie’s mansion anyway. It’s our home for the moment isn’t it?’

She shrugged.

‘OK, stop talking and start driving, but for goodness sake go faster!’

I shook my head. I’ll never understand her if I lived to be a hundred. One minute she’s the scared little girl who still sucks her thumb when she sleeps and the next, she acts older than me; not that I’m that ancient!

We got back in the car, belted up and continued our journey. Soon we reached the main road and were belting along at 25 miles per hour. I daren’t go any faster as I wasn’t exactly confident but at least Amelia stopped complaining about the speed.

As the road was wider now and I was feeling easier about driving the car, I wasn’t too worried when the occasional car went past us, although I nearly had kittens when an articulated lorry overtook us on a bend and blew his horn, making me almost jump out of my seat. The impatience of some people!

Eventually, there was the sign for Penmarris and we went up the hill, around the bend and there in front of us was the large gates that led us into the mansion’s grounds.

The gravel drive led up for some distance, turned left past the mole infested lawns and the fountain spewing water high into the air and then finally, the mansion itself came into view.

I was so relieved to get back safely and couldn’t wait to see the others.

I screeched to a stop, the engine running.

My heart was in my mouth.

There, in front of us were no less than three police cars, a police van and an ambulance.

A couple of policemen had noticed us and came running over.

I wanted to turn the car around and get away, but there was no chance of that, as another police car came up behind us, effectively hemming us in.

Amelia started crying and I felt like it too. I didn’t trust the police in any way shape or form. After getting away from one set of villains, I had no doubt the police would take us away to God knows where and then hold on to us until Daddy came back.

The driver’s door was wrenched open…

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If you can, please do the kudo-thingie...many thanks and hugs! ~Sue