Dancing Jax

Robin Jarvis

For my mother, who loved dancing.

Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words can do so much worse. I used to take words for granted. But words hold tremendous power. Arranged in the right order, they can make you cry with laughter or understand a stranger’s pain. And yet it only takes one to hurt another human being. In some countries there are laws against the use of certain words, and that’s a good thing. Those words are charged with hatred and need to be locked away until they and their power are forgotten.

The same is true of books, only more so.

Some books are harmful, even dangerous. They twist people’s minds and feed the darkest recesses of the human soul. They should be banned or destroyed. This is a story about one of them, written by one of the most evil men ever to have lived. I hope there are enough of you left out there to read it and believe and resist – before it’s too late.

Martin Baxter, yesterday

Welcome, sacred stranger. Enter the magickal Kingdom of the Dancing Jacks, with a brisk step and blessings upon you. Your place at Court is reserved and your presence long anticipated. Within these rousing pages, rewarding new friendships await. You are warmly invited to learn our ways and stories. Walk and play with us, repair by our fires and share our dreaming and restorative pleasures. Herein lie the understanding, acceptance and belonging you have so yearned to find. Join us, cherished reader, and escape the travails of those earthly measures that daily erode your humble spirit. Come to us – we shall coddle you, safe and close.

So mote it be.

Austerly Fellows, Imbolc 1936

Contents

Cover

Title Page

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

The dance will go on…

Addicted to Dancing Jax?

The Wyrd Museum, Book One: The Woven Path

The Wyrd Museum, Book Two: Raven’s Knot

The Wyrd Museum, Book Three: The Fatal Strand

Copyright

About the Publisher

Chapter 1

Beyond the Silvering Sea, within thirteen green, girdling hills, lies the wondrous Kingdom of the Dawn Prince. Yet inside his White Castle, the throne stands empty. For many long years he has been lost in exile and thus the Ismus, his Holy Enchanter, reigns in his stead — till the day of his glorious returning and the restoration of his splendour evermore.

THE DOOR SHIVERED. One more powerful kick and the lock ripped from the rotting frame.

It burst inward with savage force. Splinters and crackled paint exploded into a large, deserted hall and decades of dust rose up in a dry cloud. For the first time in too long, fierce daylight bleached its way in and insects clattered their escape over bare and lifting floorboards.

A pair of greedy eyes darted round the empty house as the man leered across the threshold.

“Nice one.”

Dragging the back of one grimy hand over his mouth, he stepped inside and the glittering dust whirled around him.

“Damp and the urination of rats.”

He was describing the stale must of the house, but the description suited him just as well.

He was a wiry stoat of a man, dressed in scuffed jeans and a torn biker jacket that had known three different owners, in almost as many decades, before it had come to him. He liked that it had a history and often claimed that it owned him, rather than the other way round.

His face was always alert, never still – feral and filthy and hostile. The skin that clad it was white and clammy and poorly nourished. When other substances were available, food was spurned by Jezza.

Even now his nicotine fingers were trembling and twitching. It was half eleven in the morning. All he’d had was a can of Red Stripe and that was only because he’d finished the last of the stolen vodka the night before.

Behind him a female voice asked, “Was this worth our last spit of petrol then?”

Jezza’s magpie eyes danced over the dingily patterned wallpaper that ran up the stairs to the landing. It was blotched here and there with black mould. The house was a big one and must have been impressive in its Victorian heyday, but now it was dark and damaged through years of neglect. Yet the man knew there were treasures to be harvested.

He was determined to gut the place and make a few quid. There was a bloke in Southwold who paid cash without questions for this salvage junk. Original fireplaces were bloody good money. If they’d already been snatched, there were always copper pipes, taps and internal doors. Most of the windows were boarded over and those that weren’t were smashed so there was nothing to be had there. Jezza’s rancid gaze ran over the banister rails. Yes, even them.

The girl edged in behind. She was no more than twenty, but the knockabout life with Jezza and the others had leeched the bloom of youth from her face. The peroxide had long grown out of her dark hair and now only the spiky tips remained a lifeless yellow. A straggling streak of turquoise at one temple was the last effort she had made, but that too was faded.

“Told you it was a big old place,” she said. “Keep us juicy for months this will.”

Jezza shrugged his narrow shoulders.

“Depends what’s left,” he answered, swaggering down the spacious hall towards a blistered door. He paused to circle a covetous, dirty finger around the tarnished brass knob, sourly reflecting that it was exactly the same colour as her hair tips, except that the doorknob had retained some shine. He wrenched it around.

“Sod all come here,” the girl muttered to his back. “I told you.”

Behind her, two figures pushed through the entrance. The first was around six foot tall. The other had a much shorter, slighter build. The burly one was dressed in a shapeless camouflage jacket, with a long, ratty ponytail hanging down his back and an unkempt beard half covering his face.

“Hello, home, I’m honey!” he announced, throwing his arms wide.

The other gagged as he pushed him inside. “Have you blown off again?”

“I’m a fart starter – a twisted fart starter!” sang the laughing reply.

“Your backside makes my eyes bleed, man.”

“Mmm… Bisto. You can dip your bread in that one, Tommo.”

The man called Tommo dodged around him and fled deeper into the hall. He wore grubby denim and his brown hair was loose and curly. “There’s got to be a rotting alien in your guts, Miller,” he spluttered. “Them guffs aren’t human.”

“Grow up, for God’s sake,” the girl told them irritably. “We should’ve brought Howie and Dave instead.”

“Howie and Dave don’t have our power tools,” Tommo answered, raising his hand and pressing an invisible trigger as he made a drill sound behind his teeth.

Miller lumbered further in and flexed his arms, sucking in his stomach at the same time. “And we is the muscle,” he declared. “Jezza needs he-men to rip this place to bits.”

“By the power of Greyskull!” Tommo called out, holding an imaginary sword aloft.

“The power of the Chuckle Brothers,” she observed dryly. Before the girl could stop them, he and Tommo seized her hands and started pulling her from side to side.

“To me, to you, to me, to you!” they chanted in unison.

“Get off!” she yelled, which only encouraged them to do it more.

“You lot!” Jezza’s voice called out to them sharply. “In here – now.”

The game stopped immediately. The girl threw them filthy looks. “Saddo losers,” she snapped, but there was a smirk on her face when she turned her back and followed Jezza into the nearest room.

“She meant you,” Miller told Tommo.

Tommo pressed his forefingers against the other man’s temple and made the drill noise again.

The girl’s grey eyes flicked about the spacious reception room. At first she could not see Jezza. The rags of light that poked through the imperfectly boarded windows contrasted with the deep wells of gloom around them. Apart from a card table and a red leather armchair, blackened with mildew, the room seemed empty. Then, as her vision adjusted, she found him. He was standing before a grand fireplace, leaning on the mantel as if he was already master of the house.

There was a sneer on his face.

“No one ever goes there, Jezza,” he said, repeating her words of the previous night and nodding at the opposite wall.

The girl turned and looked at the rotten panelling. It was covered in painted scrawl.

“Only kids,” she said with a shrug.

“Kids have sticky mitts,” he spat in reply before returning his attention to the fireplace and running his hands over it.

“Marble,” he announced, trailing his fingers through the mantel’s grime. “You have to tease these out dead gentle. Should fetch in plenty, and if there’s more, we’ll be laughing.”

The young woman touched the graffiti-covered wall, quietly reading the peeling words.

“Marc Bolan, The Sweet, Remember you’re a Womble, Mungo Jerry… this was a kid from a long time ago,” she said with a faint smile. “They’d be old as my mum now.”

“Young Wombles take your partners!” Miller sang as he and Tommo came waltzing in. “If you Minuetto Allegretto, you will live to be old.”

“You two won’t if you don’t stop dicking about,” Jezza warned them.

The men ceased and Tommo pointed to the mouldy chair.

“That’s what your fetid innards look like,” he muttered at Miller.

“You’re obsessed by my bowels,” the man answered with a bemused shake of the head.

“That’s because I can’t escape them! You keep making me breathe them in all the time!”

“You love it!”

Any further bickering was quelled by a fierce glance from Jezza. Then his eyes darted back to the girl. She was kneeling and rustling paper.

“What you got there?” he demanded.

“Kids’ magazine,” she answered, not looking up. “All yellow now and crinkly – look at those flares and the dodgy hair! There’s some old cans and sweet wrappers here too, Fresca and Aztec bars. Been a long time since this break-in.”

“Is it a girly mag?” Tommo asked brightly.

“For kids?” she snorted. “It looks like it’s all about the telly, besides – you’ve got enough of them mags already, Tommo.”

“He could open a library,” Miller agreed.

The girl looked at the magazine’s faded cover. Bold chunky type declared it was called Look–in, but there was also a name written on the corner in biro by a long retired newsagent:

Runecliffe.

She let the magazine fall to the floor.

Jezza stared about the room, his face twitching. “I don’t get it,” he said. “How come no one comes here? How come this place hasn’t been knocked down or tarted up by some rich knob with three cars and a split-level wife and an illegal immigrant nanny for their spoilt Siobhans and Zacharys? Prime, this place is, prime and begging for the developers.”

“The location, location, location’s no good,” Miller said, “We’re in the middle of nowhere here, and it was a long drive down that track full of potholes. We wouldn’t have guessed this place was here if we didn’t know about it and were looking.”

“Dirty big places like this don’t vanish off maps or land registries,” Jezza answered. “It don’t make sense. It must belong to someone.”

“If it does, they can’t care about it,” Tommo said. “Look at the state of it. Mr Muscle, where are you now?”

“We could squat in it,” Miller announced. “Get everyone over and fix it up a bit. Be a palace this would.”

“No!” the girl interrupted, rubbing her arms. “This is a sad house. It’s sad and depressing and I don’t like it.”

“All the more reason to pull it to pieces,” Jezza stated. “Nice, sellable, chopped-up pieces, and who’s going to complain? Perfect job this one, couldn’t be tastier!”

“I’ll start unloading the van,” Tommo said. “Come with me, Gasguts.”

“There you go again!” Miller cried. “You’re obsessed!”

“Wait!” Jezza barked suddenly. “Leave the tools for now.”

He was looking at the girl. She had risen and was staring into space, the expression drained from her features.

“Shee,” he said. “Shee!”

The girl started.

“How did you know about this place?” he asked.

The question nettled her and she moved towards the door.

“I just did,” she answered evasively. “I need a smoke and my lighter’s in the van.”

She hurried from the room, through the hall and out into the bright sunlight. The large, forbidding bulk of the house reared high behind her and she shivered as she fled back to the shabby camper van, parked up the overgrown drive. It was a horrible house. She hated it. She couldn’t wait to get out of it.

The VW’s familiar orange and cream colours reassured her and she let out a great breath of relief as she leaned against the dented passenger door.

“Stupid beggar,” she rebuked herself, pulling a cigarette out of her pocket and letting it hang in her lips as she lifted her eyes to gaze back at the imposing building.

It was a drab, ugly edifice, built of dull, grey stone in the heavy-handed, Victorian Gothic style, with a corner tower and too many gables. Planks and boards obscured the ground-floor windows, but higher up they were mostly uncovered and shaped like they belonged in a church.

Shiela hissed through her teeth at it. “Don’t you look at me like that,” she whispered.

Tall, misshapen trees crowded around it; there was even a tree growing in the middle of the drive, which was why they had to park the van so far away.

A rook or a crow cawed somewhere above and the lonely, unpleasant croaking made her shiver.

“Like a graveyard,” she murmured. “A graveyard for dead houses. There’s no life in that place, no life and never no love.”

Then a jangling rattle dragged her attention back to the front porch, where Jezza was standing, shaking the van keys.

“What freaked you out in there?” he asked as he sauntered over.

“I wasn’t freaked out. The air was bad. Stuffy and stale.”

“You put up with worse, with Miller in the back seat.”

“OK, I just don’t like that place. Give me them keys, I’m gasping.”

He snatched his hand away from her, dangling them just out of reach.

“That’s two questions you’ve avoided now,” he said, beginning to sound irritated. “Do you want me to force the answers out of you?”

“No, Jezza!” she said. “Just let me light up – for God’s sake!”

He threw the keys at her and a minute later she was dragging on the cigarette. Her fingers were trembling.

“It’s just a place I’ve heard about,” she explained, blowing out a stream of pale blue smoke. “Every town has one – the deserted old house. A place other kids dare you to go to, knock on the door, break in and spend the night.”

“What is this?” Jezza sounded annoyed. “Scooby sodding Doo? Don’t give me that crap.”

“It’s bloody true!” Shiela swore. “If you were from round here, you’d know, you’d have heard about it. Only in this case it’s not made up. That’s a… I dunno – a sick place. Not even kids dare each other to come here any more.”

“They’re too busy stuck in front of their Xboxes or glued to the Net to do anything real these days,” the man said.

“Good for them,” she muttered.

“The Web’s for rejects,” he pronounced. “All them misfits hiding in their rooms yakking away to other people they’ll never meet, using fake pictures and pretending to be someone else. No one knows who they are any more and those who do aren’t satisfied with it. You never know who you’re really talking to on there.”

She understood it was no use arguing with him. Jezza liked to make sweeping, preaching statements and wouldn’t listen to anyone who disagreed with him. He certainly hadn’t listened to her for a long time now. As for “misfits”, what else were they?

“It’s good for finding out stuff,” she said half-heartedly.

Jezza smirked sarcastically. “Yeah,” he said. “All that information, branching out from here and there. It’s the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Shee – and how mad is it that people are accessing it via their Apples! Ha – it’s Genesis all over again and we’re cocking it up a second time.”

“I wouldn’t call this Eden,” Shiela said.

“And you’re not Eve,” he told her bluntly, before considering the house again. “And you’re not blonde enough to be Yvette ruddy Fielding either. Got ghosts, has it?”

She shrugged and flicked some ash on the ground.

“No such thing,” he stated. “Only real things matter in this life, and there’s enough nasty realness to keep you worried and scared without inventing other mad stuff. The things to be frightened of in this world are just round the corner, hiding in your beans-on-toast existence. That’s where true evil breeds best. Under your noses, in plain sight: it’s the domestic abuse of the terrified wife three doors down and her neighbours who turn the telly up to drown out the noise; it’s the nurse in the care home who hates herself and takes it out on the patients; it’s the kids too scared to speak out; it’s the man kicking his dog in the ribs because it doesn’t bite back… it’s everywhere around us. Society, that’s the Petri dish where evil flourishes, not in empty old houses like this beauty.”

Shiela looked at him, at the sharp features that she had once found attractive: the sly, crafty shape of his narrow eyes and the unhealthy pallor that had marked him out as different and interesting. Then, unexpectedly, he turned his crooked smile on her and she was surprised to find that she still fancied him. She was always surprised. Jezza possessed a mesmeric charm, a way of making her overlook his bullying ego and ruthless self-interest. He exerted it over the others in the group too. He was, without question, their leader, and gathered waifs and strays to him like some kind of street prophet, and in their own inept, confused way, they were his disciples.

Taking the cigarette, he leaned beside her and stared intently up at the great, unlovely house.

“We could live off this dump for a year or more,” he said. “Must be all sorts in there. Might even be stuff left in the attics – or the cellars, and the odd stick of furniture too. You did good, Shee.”

“Wish I’d never said anything about it,” she said softly.

“I might just keep you around a while longer,” he chuckled with a wink, but she knew he probably meant that veiled threat.

Suddenly, inside the house, a man’s voice screamed.

Jezza sprang forward like a cat and rushed back to the porch. Shiela lit another cigarette and waited.

Chapter 2

Bonded to the Ismus, though by no means his only dalliance, is the fair Labella, the High Priestess. She outranks the other damsels of the Court, yea — even the proud queens of the four Under Kings and see how their eyes flash at her when she parades by. Coeval with her are the Harlequin Priests — that silent pair arrayed so bright and yet so grim and grave of face. Let not they point to the dark colours of their motley — dance on and dance by quick, my sprightly love.

RICHARD MILLER WAS sitting on the stairs. He was sweating and shaken and seemed to have shrunken into his shabby camouflage jacket, like a tortoise in its shell. Tommo stood in front of him, looking completely bemused and wondering if he could risk laughing and not receive a thump or a kick in return.

“What’s gone on?” demanded Jezza when he came rushing in.

Tommo put one hand over his heart. “Nothing to do with me!” he explained hurriedly. “Pongo here had a fit going up the stairs.”

“Sounded like you’d fell through them!” Jezza said.

Miller lifted his face and looked warily over his shoulder. “There was something up there,” he said in a hoarse whisper.

“What?” Jezza snapped.

“Dunno… just something.”

“Like what?”

“Like nothing I ever felt before,” the big man answered slowly.

“Where?”

It was Tommo who answered that one. “Just up on that little landing there,” he said, with a definite chuckle in his voice. “Stopped dead in his tracks he did and then, wham – he bawls his head off and leaps about, like he had jump leads clamped to his bits.”

Jezza looked up to where the staircase turned at a right angle to the wall before continuing to the first floor. There was nothing to see in the gloom, except a tall, boarded window and a particularly large patch of black mould that seemed to bleed down from the upper shadows.

“Go on then,” Jezza said impatiently. “What was it, a floating face or a demonic monkey or something?”

“Nah,” Tommo sniggered. “Evil monkeys live in closets.”

“I’m sick of this ghost garbage, man,” Jezza said. “First Shee, now you.”

Miller wasn’t listening. He was tentatively sniffing the back of one hand. Then he pushed his sleeve up to the elbow to inspect his heavily tattooed forearm.

“What you doing?” Tommo hooted. “You madpot!”

Miller looked up at them. “There was a terrible stink,” he said.

“Always is with you!” Tommo agreed.

Miller shook his head. “A stink of damp!” he said. “Terrible stink of damp – like rotting leaves – or worse. Decayed and rotten and rank and death, cold death.”

“Just normal damp and wet rot,” Jezza told him. “What d’you expect in a rancid dump like this, Chanel No 5 potpourri?”

Miller wiped his hand on his clothes. “No,” he breathed. “No, it wasn’t normal. There was something else. When I touched…”

He jumped up, almost knocking Tommo over, and glared back at the staircase.

“That wall!” he cried. “When I put my hand on it. The bloody stuff moved! Ran over my bloody hand and up my arm! I had to shake it off!”

“What stuff?” asked Jezza sternly.

Miller turned a bewildered, fearful face to him. “The mould!” he said. “The black bloody mould! I felt it on my skin – it’s alive!”

He gave the stairs one last look, then blundered towards the front door, only to find Shiela standing there.

“Jezza,” she called. “Let’s ditch this place. I want to go – right now.”

The man looked at her and placed his hand on the banister. “Just cos Miller puts his great mitt in a web and feels a spider run over him?” he said. “Don’t be a stupider cow than normal, Shee.”

“It wasn’t no spider!” Miller shouted.

“Roaches or woodlice then,” Jezza said, not caring either way. “Get real. There’s no way I’m leaving this gold mine. It belongs to me now. I’m going to strip it right down and flog even the bricks, if they’re worth anything.”

“Listen to Miller!” she told him.

Jezza ignored her and jumped nimbly on to the first stair.

“Jezza!” Shiela said urgently as he began to ascend. “Don’t! It’s a bad place.”

“Don’t go up there!” Miller joined in.

“Oh, Mr Ghostman…” Jezza sang out as he climbed slowly, step by step. “I’m so going to kick your see-through arse and evict you off my property. This is my gaff now, you hear me? And unless you can pay rent, in living cash, you aren’t welcome.”

“Ha!” Tommo laughed. “You tell him. Who we gonna call? Umm… just Jezza – he ain’t afraid of no ghost!”

“Belief in the supernatural is cut from the same twisted psychology as the need for religion,” Jezza began propounding. “It’s a man-made hang-up, yet another method of controlling the gullible proletariat by the fat cats at the top to keep us down and scared and not dare to ask real questions of the real people. Instead they made us kneel and pray against the terrors in the night that they invented. It’s always been about control; there is no evil substance to darkness – it’s just an absence of light.

“Like I always say, you should only be afraid of realness. It’s not some vampire that’ll get you along the lonely midnight lane, but the paranoid schizophrenic who prefers junk to his meds and believes his Ricicles are telling him to collect human livers in a blue bucket. Be scared of that poor sod, and the NHS trusts who turf him into the community expecting him to function without proper care because it’s cheaper and they can afford some extra salmon on the buffet when the next bigwig comes round for the usual glad-handing and a mugshot in the local rag.”

“Listen to me, for God’s sake!” Shiela cried. “I know who that kid was, the one with the magazine. I know what happened to him. Jezza – stop. Come down!”

The man reached the small landing. He half turned to grin at them. That conceited little grin which always preceded some proud, pig-headed action. Then, turning away into the wedge of shadow, he reached out with both hands and placed them squarely in the centre of the mould on the wall.

“Stupid to the power of ten,” Shiela uttered in disgust.

The three disciples waited. Staring up at the back of the man they knew only as Jezza, they watched and wondered. Jezza remained perfectly still. He made no sound. He just stayed with his hands against the wall and the moments dragged into minutes. Shiela dug her fingernails into her arms. The tension was unbearable.

“That’s enough!” she said, unable to take it any longer. “This isn’t funny!”

“Yeah,” Miller called. “Joke over.”

Jezza did not move.

Tommo smiled at the others. “Chill,” he told them.

“Rich,” the girl said to Miller. “Go get him. Bring him down.”

The burly man hesitated.

“Bring him down!” she repeated forcefully, pushing him forward.

Miller moved towards the stairs. Passing a puzzled-looking Tommo, he began to climb, reluctantly.

“Come on,” he called up. “Enough’s enough. You’re spooking Shiela.”

“You two are so over-reacting,” Tommo declared. “Jezza’s winding you up. Whirrrrrrrr – there you go.”

Miller neared the small landing. His forehead began to sweat as he recalled the terror that had overwhelmed him before. He took a deep breath and smelled the same putrid reek of decay, and coughed as it caught the back of his throat.

He took a step closer to Jezza. The man’s head was hidden in the gloom and when Miller leaned sideways to catch sight of his face, he could see nothing but a black profile.

“Jezza, mate,” he said. “Stop this now.”

In the corner of his eye something moved over the wall. He jumped back and stumbled down two steps.

“Jesus!” he cried.

And then Jezza stirred. He jerked his head back then turned slowly around. His narrow eyes danced over his followers as if viewing them properly for the first time and a smile spread across his face.

“Look at you,” he laughed softly. “Doesn’t take much to panic my little chickens, does it? Another minute and you’d be screaming – and all for the fear of nothing at all. Very instructive.”

“You’re bleeding hilarious you are,” Shiela snapped.

“And you’re terminally predictable,” he answered coldly.

His eyes left her mutinous, wounded stare and fixed on Miller in front of him.

The big man was looking past him, at the wall. But there was nothing to see in the shadows there, just the staining mould.

“You’re in my way,” Jezza told him.

Miller shook himself. Whatever he had thought he had seen was no longer there. He lumbered about and stomped back down the stairs, glad to feel the floor beneath him once more. With far lighter, almost dancing steps, Jezza followed.

“I wasn’t scared!” Tommo piped up. “Dunno what’s wrong with these two today.”

“Shut it, you tedious prat,” Jezza instructed, without even looking at him.

Shiela grimaced. Sometimes he repulsed her. He could treat people like dirt, even those closest to him. She saw Tommo react as if he’d been slapped and she wanted to be far, far away from this life she had chosen for herself. Why did she and the rest of them put up with it? Why did they keep coming back and seeking this creature’s approval? What did it ever get them?

“I’ll be in the van,” she declared, moving back into the sunlight that streamed through the door.

Before she even set foot on the porch, Jezza was behind her. He seized hold of her wrist and spun her around. Grabbing the back of her hair, he pulled her face to his and kissed her roughly on the mouth.

Shiela struggled and kicked him on the shin.

“Sod off!” she spat.

“Don’t go yet,” he said, releasing her. “Come on, there’s more to see. Let’s me and you explore on our own. Come on, girl.”

She blinked at him in surprise. He hadn’t kissed her like that for a long time.

“Tommo, Miller!” he ordered, “You two go look through the rest of these rooms down here.”

The men glanced at each other uncertainly. Neither of them wanted to be there any more.

Jezza turned the full power of his stare on them. “Only this floor mind,” he warned. “No one, but no one, is to go upstairs. Do you hear me?”

“I wouldn’t if you paid me,” Miller muttered.

“Be about it then, rabbits,” Jezza said with a nod towards the other rooms.

With a cautious look at Shiela to make sure she was OK, they made for one of the other doors leading off the hall. If they had rechecked the first one, they would have seen that the red leather of the armchair was now no longer covered in mould.

“Just you and me, kid,” Jezza said, smiling at Shiela.

The girl was wiping her mouth on her sleeve. “What have you been eating?” she asked, spitting on the floor. “Tastes like… soil or something. Have a mint!”

“I’m just an earthy guy,” he said and there was that wink again. Then he surprised her a second time by taking hold of her hand, only gently, far more gently and tenderly than he had ever been. “This way,” he said, leading her further into the hall.

“I don’t want to be in here,” she protested. “I want to sit in the van. I’ll wait there.”

But he was so insistent, his voice so coaxing and persuasive, that, before she realised, they were standing before a door in the panelling beneath the stairs. With a flourish, Jezza yanked it open.

It was pitch-black inside and a waft of cold, dead air flowed across Shiela’s face.

“What’s in there?” she asked, backing away.

“Cellar,” he replied.

“There’s no chance in hell I’m going down there! Even if we’d brought torches I wouldn’t.”

Jezza reached into the darkness and caught hold of a Bakelite switch dangling on a corded flex from the sloping ceiling. An instant later a dim bulb illuminated a flight of steps leading downward.

“How did you know that was there?” she asked. “How come the power’s still on?”

Jezza was already descending. There was a strange, barely contained excitement in him. It was as if he knew what was down there, as if he knew exactly what was waiting.

“It’ll be swarming with rats!” she said. “I’m not coming with you.”

He looked back at her – his eyes shining like an owl’s in the light.

“There’s no rats down here,” he assured her with consummate confidence. “They’re not allowed.”

Shiela watched his figure bob further down the steps. “Come back!” she called. “Jezza!”

He disappeared round a corner and she wished she’d kicked him harder.

“Jezza…?” she shouted.

She was alone. “Tommo, Miller…” she said, but her voice faltered and wherever they were they did not hear her.

Shiela looked anxiously at the open front door. The sunlight had dimmed and the outside seemed grey. A wind was shaking the trees.

“Save me, save me,” she whispered urgently. Everything appeared threatening. Shiela thought of the magazine and what had happened to the boy it had belonged to all those years ago. Suddenly a gust of wind banged the front door against the wall. It bounced back and slammed shut. The hall was plunged into darkness.

The girl yelled and flung herself down the stairs.

“Jezza!” she cried. “Jezza!”

She leaped down two steps at a time and whirled around breathlessly. The cellar was built of vaulted grey stone that formed small, dungeon-like chambers, each with a single light bulb suspended from the apex of the ceiling.

The first chamber was empty, but a draught was moving the hanging light and the shadows swung sickeningly around her.

“Jezza…” she called again. “Damn – what the hell am I doing down here? You need your brains testing, you crazy—”

She couldn’t find a word dumb enough to describe herself. She shivered, but noticed that although it was cold down here, it was the only place in that awful house that was not damp.

“Jezza!”

No answer. She moved warily across the chamber to the next archway. That too was empty, except for strange drawings chalked on the walls, but this was not childish graffiti like the scribbles above. Here were intricate geometric patterns, interlocking circles and squares, surrounded by florid lettering spelling out Latin words. Shiela stared at them and her skin crawled. She had seen Howie, another of Jezza’s disciples, tattoo similar pentacles on the backs of many heavy-metal fans and wallowing emos.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Jezza spoke in her ear.

The girl flinched and hit him. “Take me to the van right now!” she demanded.

“Wait till you see this,” he said, leading her to the next chamber.

“I’ve seen enough!” she replied, tugging away from him.

“No, just this,” he said firmly. “Come on, girl.”

They passed into the third chamber. It was larger than the previous two. Three wide, concentric circles had been inscribed into the stone floor, in the centre of which were six large wooden crates.

“What’s them?” she asked.

“The jackpot, girl. Only the ruddy jackpot.”

“But what’s inside?”

With a triumphant laugh, he leaped into the circles. A rusty crowbar was lying across the top of one crate and he grasped it with both hands.

“Let’s open them and find out!” he yelled.

“No,” Shiela objected. “Leave it. There could be anything in there. Jezza, leave it!”

The man took no notice and was busily prising off one of the lids. The old nails squeaked and the wood splintered. Shiela looked around and cursed herself for ever suggesting they come here.

“Bobby Runecliffe!” she blurted, edging away. “That was the name of the boy. He was famous, all over the news back then. My mum knew him. They were in the same class. Bobby disappeared one night when he was thirteen. He was missing for three days. They finally found him wandering out on the motorway, but he was different – mental. He couldn’t speak. When they took him home, he killed all his pets, strangled them. Then he tried to do the same to his kid sister. He’s been locked up ever since. Nobody knew where he’d been, but it must have been here. Oh, God, it was here and it drove him crazy. Jezza – don’t open that! Please!”

He only laughed in answer as the final nail was torn free and he wrenched the lid clear.

Shiela was shaking. The adrenalin was coursing through her veins. She was ready to race away at the slightest thing.

“If something flies out of there,” she said.

Above them, in the rest of the house, Miller’s voice was bawling. “Guys! You will not believe this! Guys! This is seriously weird, man!”

Shiela spun around. “What?” she cried. “What did he say?”

Jezza dropped the crowbar and the noise of it clanging on the stone floor made her scream.

“Don’t do that!” she yelled.

“Calm down, baby,” he muttered, gazing admiringly into the open crate. “Calm down.”

“That was Miller,” she said. “He might need help.”

Jezza chuckled. “I think our flatulent friend has merely discovered my conservatory,” he told her. “Nothing to worry about.”

Shiela stared at him. “How do you…?”

He grinned up at her and beckoned with his cigarette-stained fingers. “Come look,” he said. “Look what we found.”

“I don’t want to see,” she told him. “I’m so out of here.”

Jezza dipped his hand inside the crate.

“Don’t be scared, my honey, my pet,” he said.

In spite of herself, Shelia remained. Jezza was always bizarre and never behaved as society expected him to. That was part of the attraction. But this was different. She had not seen this side to him before.

Now he stood before her, holding something that caused his eyes to widen, and he drew in a marvelling breath.

“Look at this,” he whispered reverently. “There’s plenty more in the box. Each one is packed with them.”

Shiela lowered her eyes to the thing in his hands and the surprise and relief almost made her laugh out loud.

“It’s just a book!” she exclaimed. “Just a… kids’ storybook!”

His grin grew wider as he gave it to her. In the stark glare of the bare bulb she could see it was old, but had never been read. The dust cover was in mint condition, with only a few foxed marks speckling it. The illustration was an outdated style, but it had a certain period charm and she read the title aloud.

“Dancing Jacks.”

Jezza pressed his face against hers. “Yes,” he said, breathing damp and decay upon her as he smiled. “It’s just a book, my fair Shiela… bella.”

Chapter 3

And so: those rascally Knaves, who set the Court cavorting. How they do behave, it’s really worth reporting. The Jill of Hearts, a hungry temptress, she’ll steal a kiss from lad and lass. The Jack of Diamonds prefers shinier pleasures, gold and jools are his best treasures. The Jill of Spades is coldly cunning, a secret plot and you’re done in. The Jack of Clubs, beasts and fowl adore him, all raise a shout and sing aloud — four Dancing Jacks have entered in!

“SIT DOWN AND settle down,” Martin Baxter said in that practised tone that only experienced teachers ever seemed capable of. It was loud enough to be heard above the scuffle and din of thirty kids flooding into a classroom, yet it wasn’t shouting and it required no great effort on his part.

“Coats off. Hurry up. Glen, do that tie up properly. Keeley, take your earphones out. If I see them again, your MP3 player is going in my little drawer till the end of term. Don’t think I won’t – it’ll be company for the mobiles.”

Surly young faces stared back at him and he beamed pleasantly in return. That always annoyed them. He hated this Year 10. Yes, actually hated them. They were just as bad when they were in Year 9. Actually, no, not all of them; some of the kids were OK. There were some genuinely nice, bright ones. But most of them, even the most naive and idealistic of the new staff had to admit, were hard work and there were one or two that he had long since classified as downright scum. Unfortunately that very scum were in his lesson right now.

In the far left corner, Keeley slid on to her seat in front of her two friends, Emma and Ashleigh. The three of them immediately began singing a Lady Gaga song and only stopped when they caught sight of Mr Baxter staring at them.

“Where do you three think you are?” he asked.

“In a boring maths lesson,” the hard-faced Emma answered.

“We’re going to enter the next X Factor, Sir,” Ashleigh explained.

“Don’t you need even a modicum of talent for that?” he inquired.

“Yeah, so we’ve got to practise,” Keeley argued.

“We’re going to blow that Cowell bloke away!” Ashleigh said. “We’re going to be famous and be in all the mags.”

Their teacher looked surprised. “Are there many specialist publications just for gobby imbeciles then?” he asked. “Actually that’d be most of them,” he murmured under his breath.

“You’re mean and sarky, Sir,” Emma grumbled.

“Ain’t that the truth,” he retorted with a fixed grin. “You’ve got as much chance of being singers as three cats yowling in a dustbin.”

The girls pouted and fell to whispering to one another.

“‘When shall we three meet again?’ probably,” Mr Baxter muttered, although he knew he was slandering Macbeth’s witches. Over the past few years he had come to realise that these three girls had no redeeming qualities and were getting worse. They had absolutely no regard for anyone except themselves and constantly showed their displeasure at having to attend school instead of being allowed to stay at home watching Jeremy Kyle.

“And who do you think you are?” Mr Baxter told one boy who came traipsing in with his trousers hanging down over his backside, displaying his underwear. “Pull them up!”

“You can’t discriminate against me, Sir,” came the rebellious reply. “It’s my identity, innit. I’m doing it to support my brothers. I won’t yank up my saggys.”

Martin raised his eyebrows. “Your brother works in Halfords,” he said with a weary sigh. “And I didn’t realise bright purple pants with Thomas the Tank Engine on them were very hip hop.”

“Yeah, well, my best ones is in the wash and I wouldn’t wear them to this poxy school anyways.”

“Be that as it may,” Martin said, above the titters. “The fact remains, that’s not how you’re supposed to wear your uniform so pull them up or you’ll be staying behind every night this week and every night after that until you do pull them up.”

“You is well bullying me, Sir.”

“Owen,” Martin said with a weary sigh. “Why do you insist on speaking like that?”

“It’s who I is, innit.”

“No, it isn’t. For one thing, you’re ginger, for another – you’re Welsh.”

“I is ghetto.”

“You’re as ghetto as Angela Lansbury, only nowhere near as cool and I’m sure she doesn’t reek of Clearasil and athlete’s foot powder. Now save who you is till you get outside the school gates, then you can drop your trousers down past your bony knees for all I care.”

Owen hitched his trousers up and sat down noisily, slinging his bag on the desk before him.

Martin Baxter groaned inwardly. He didn’t mind what cultures the kids tapped into. It was normal and healthy to seek for an identity, but in recent years he’d become aware just how homogenised that identity had become. Was it any surprise though when just about every other television programme was fronted by presenters with forced mockney accents, as if working-class London was the centre of the cool universe and nowhere else mattered. It made him wince whenever he heard the kids here in Felixstowe trying to mimic the cod East End accents that grunted around Walford. Whatever happened to quirky individuality? Sadly he reflected that, like the coast here in Suffolk, it was being eroded.

The maths teacher felt it was going to be one of those days. Thank heavens it was Friday. He had no idea just how bad that day was going to become. No one did.

When the shuffling and unrest had subsided, he sat at his desk and pulled a sheaf of papers from his battered leather briefcase.

“Before we start,” he said. “Let’s have a look at last week’s test.”

One of the three huddled girls looked up in alarm.

“You’re not going to read the marks out, Sir?” she asked in exaggerated dismay.

Martin beamed again. “Oh, you betcha!” he said brightly. “Let’s all have a laugh and see who the thickies are – as if we needed reminding.”

“That is so not fair,” she said, covering her face.

“Shall I start with you then, Emma, and get it out of the way? Here we are, 23 per cent – that’s a new record for you. You must have actually been awake during one lesson. Now Ashleigh and Keeley, 19 and 21 per cent respectively.”

“No respect about that!” roared one of the boys, slapping his desk. “That is so shaming!”

Martin smiled at him next. “Kevin Stipe, a whopping 17 per cent! Who’d have thought chatting to your pals and larking about instead of listening to me would produce such lame results? There can’t be a connection there, surely? Coincidence? Nah…”

Kevin Stipe sank into his chair while Emma and her cohorts shook their hands at him and jeered.

“Quiet!” Martin called. He read out a few more pitiful scores before looking across to the side of the class where a thin-faced, pretty girl, was hiding behind her hair.

“Sandra Dixon,” he said, this time with a genuine smile. “Ninety-four per cent. Well done, Sandra. Now who would have thought that paying attention and getting on with your work in class could produce that result? You know, I really do think there’s something in that theory. Take note, the rest of you.”

Emma and her cronies pulled faces at Sandra’s back and Ashleigh scrunched up a scrap of paper to lob at her head.

“You just dare!” Martin growled at her. “You’ll be in the Head’s office so fast, your shoes will leave skid marks on the corridor floor.”

“Skid marks!” Kevin guffawed.

Just then the door opened and a tall, fair-haired lad with a sports bag slung over his shoulder came ambling in. Without so much as a glance at Martin Baxter, he headed for his empty seat. Keeley and Ashleigh whistled through their teeth at him. They had recently decided his was the best bottom in the school.

“Conor!” Martin said. “Where’ve you been? Why are you drifting in here so late?”

The boy looked at him insolently. “I was helping Mr Hitchin, Sir,” he said.

“Then you’ll have a note from him for me to that effect.”

“No, Sir.”

“OK, you’ve just earned yourself some extra time here tonight.”

“Can’t do that, I’ve got football.”

“Conor, you’ve been here long enough to know how this place works. If you come to my lesson late, without a valid reason, then it’s automatic detention.”

“But there’s a match on!”

“If that was so important to you, you’d have made sure you were here on time and not get detention.”

“That’s not fair!”

“Excuse me, do I know you? Now sit down.”

Conor slumped in his seat and mouthed an obscenity when Mr Baxter wasn’t looking. Then he glanced round to see if any of his classmates had seen him do it. Sandra Dixon’s disgusted eyes met his and he mimed a kiss at her. Sandra turned away.

Martin Baxter looked up just in time to catch that exchange. He felt sorry for students like Sandra, the ones who enjoyed their lessons and worked hard. Even the ones who weren’t as capable but tried their best were a pleasure to teach, but the number of wasters and wilfully ignorant, disruptive kids was growing every year and the government’s policy of inclusion meant that they dragged everyone else in the class down to their level and held them back. As teachers, they weren’t even allowed to use the word “fail” any more; they were now instructed to adopt the phrase “deferred success”. Martin had to laugh at that; some of these kids would be deferring success for the rest of their lives.

The profession was not the same as when he first started, over twenty years ago. Now he was also expected to be a policeman and a social worker, but he absolutely refused to be a clownish entertainer like some of his colleagues. They had lost the respect of their pupils and now had to perform every lesson in order to engage and keep their attention. Consequently very little proper teaching was done. As far as Martin was concerned, the kids were here to learn and, for him, that meant the old-fashioned way of drilling it into them. He didn’t care if they found it repetitive; this method worked – or at least it did for those who listened and were prepared to apply themselves.

“OK, open your books!” he told them. “We’re going to find the area of triangles today – you lucky lot.”

He was deaf to the expected groans from the usual quarters.

“I haven’t got a pen, Sir,” Keeley drawled.

“I hear what you’re saying,” he answered, with his broadest smile yet, “and I’m filing it away under ‘Not My Problem’.”

The rest of the day passed uneventfully. Two periods with Years 8 and 7 went by smoothly. They were usually the best years – the bored cynicism and slouching indifference hadn’t taken control yet – but even so, kids just weren’t the same as they used to be. Teachers were constantly being told to be mindful of attention-deficit syndromes, a condition which Martin always relabelled ‘bone-idle’. Those pupils with supposed limited attention spans were more than capable of spending hours on their PlayStations without any problem. They wouldn’t have been able to get away with that excuse thirty years ago, but now they were aware of it and played up to it – though not in his classes.

After detention, Martin Baxter walked down the polished corridor to the staffroom to make a much-needed coffee before heading home. For the umpteenth time that day he wished he could change jobs and do something else entirely, but at the age of forty-three that really wasn’t a viable option.

Entering the deserted staffroom, he deposited his briefcase on the nearest chair and rinsed a mug in the sink. The view from the window showed the staff car park and the school gates. A few of the older kids were still lingering beyond them. He recognised Emma and the other two members of her coven leaning against the railings, no longer practising their tuneless singing. He knew they’d never stick at it. Like so many other people nowadays, they expected wealth and celebrity without having to do anything to earn it. They saw other people becoming famous for having no discernible talent or having to work hard, so why should they? Role models now were celebrated, even idolised, for their stupidity; no wonder it was such a fight to get some of the kids to understand why an education was important.

“Can I have a word, Martin?”

A broad, big-shouldered man with a paunch and a florid face had popped his head around the door. Martin Baxter always thought the Headteacher looked like an actor who only ever played snarling detective superintendents on television. Maybe that was why he was such an effective Head. Most of the kids held him in awe. The good ones respected him and the rest instinctively recognised his innate authority. Barry Milligan tolerated no nonsense from anyone and even intimidated some of his staff.

He didn’t intimidate Martin. They’d both been at this school too long for that. They were the longest serving members of staff. Martin often reflected that if they’d committed murder instead of starting work here, their prison sentences wouldn’t have lasted so long and they’d be free by now.

“What can I do for you?” the maths teacher asked. “I can offer you a very horrible coffee, but I’m afraid all the Hobnobs have been pinched.”

Barry wandered over. He always looked like he was going to arrest you and yell, “You’re nicked, you slaaag!” right in your face. Martin suppressed a smile.

“I’ve had Douggy Wynn griping about some lad you kept in detention instead of letting him play football,” the Head explained.

“Conor Westlake?”

“That’s the toerag. Our Mr Wynn isn’t happy that his best striker didn’t get to the match till half-time.”

“Are you having a go?”

Barry patted his old friend on the back. “Douggy never sees the bigger picture,” he said. “He only thinks about his own subject and winning trophies.”

“Well, he hasn’t won any in the two years he’s been teaching here,” Martin replied. “If that gymnasty has got a problem with me enforcing some kind of discipline on the mouthy Conors of this place then he can come say it to my face instead of moaning to you.”

Barry raised his hands. “Only passing it on,” he declared. “Mind you, if we played rugby at this school instead of football…”

“I wouldn’t dare spoil your favourite game!” Martin laughed.

“Game?” Barry gasped, looking mortified. “Don’t blaspheme, Martin! That’s my religion you’re talking about and I’ll be worshipping at the blessed temple of my beloved Saxons again tomorrow.”

Martin shook his head and chuckled. Barry’s main love had always been rugby. He had even played for Felixstowe in his youth. In their early years at the school, he would often appear on Monday morning with a curious, curler-shaped bandage in his hair or a black eye or scabby, scraped forehead where a boot had trodden on him. That was another reason the kids respected him, that and the way he used to fling wooden-backed board rubbers at the heads of the lads who weren’t paying attention in his classes. Yes, you could actually do that sort of thing back then and not be sacked or put on some sort of register – and so his legend had grown. Nowadays though, Barry Milligan was resembling the shape of the ball more and more.

Martin lifted the mug of steaming black coffee to his lips when he realised Barry was regarding him curiously. He mentally classified this expression as Do yourself a favour, you lowlife – and tell us what we want to know.

Then Barry said, “If the kids here ever found out about your religion, Martin, and what you were into, they’d make your life unbearable and eat you for breakfast.”

Martin grinned. He knew Barry was right. He blew on his coffee and glanced out of the window.

“Hell!” he shouted, slamming the mug on the side and rushing for the door.

It only took an instant for Barry to clock what was happening before he too rushed from the staff-room.

Outside, Emma and her friends were kicking and punching Sandra Dixon.

Chapter 4

The Jockey: that tittuping mischief-maker in caramel colours, he who rides all at Court and makes them chase in circles for his impish glee. Not even the Ismus escapes his naughty, wayward pranks. Though they beat him, flail him and lock him in the tower gaol, this toffee-toned trickster always springs back, ripe and ready for more games and wicked japes. Tiptoe by, lest he set his jaunty cap at you and sets your dance a-spinning for his fun.

SANDRA HAD STAYED late to do her homework in the library. It was easier there than at home, with her two younger brothers arguing all the time and cranking their music up to deafening levels to spite each other. Besides, she liked being surrounded by the books and the glow of computer screens that weren’t displaying high-speed chases or shooting bullets at marauding zombies.

When Miss Hopwood, the librarian, turned the screens off and announced it was time to leave, Sandra and the other six members of the after-school homework club packed their bags and filed outside.

She was an intelligent, quiet girl who didn’t make friends easily. Throughout most of her school life her best friend had been Debbie Gaskill. They had gone everywhere together. They were both tall and willowy and had often been mistaken for sisters. They shared the same interests and had never quarrelled once. But last term Debbie’s father had been promoted and the family had been compelled to move to Leicester. So now Sandra found herself alone. Of course, she stayed in touch with Debbie via Facebook and texting; they spoke once or twice a week and visits were planned – but it wasn’t the same.

Sandra threw herself into her studies even more and ignored the jibes from some of the other pupils. She enjoyed maths and English and was good at French, so what? They enjoyed reading Heat and squealing at celebrities displaying cellulite or with spotty foreheads and wearing clothes that were a size too small.

As she passed through the school gates, she only became aware of Emma, Keeley and Ashleigh when they spoke to her.

“Miss 94 Per Cent!” Emma said in a taunting jeer.

“Miss Brown Nose!” added Keeley. “It’s right up Baxter’s behind.”

Ashleigh made a slurping sound behind her teeth.

“Don’t you get sick of sucking up all the time, you freak?” Emma asked, as the girls began to circle her.

Sandra tried to ignore them and walk on, but they weren’t about to let that happen. They were just warming up.

“You keep them cow eyes off Conor Westlake,” Keeley ordered. “You listening?”

“Yeah,” Ashleigh chimed in. “He’s not interested in a stuck-up drip like you so back off.”

Sandra couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“Conor Westlake?” she laughed. “What are you on about?”

“Don’t give me that!” Emma screamed in her face. “I saw you two today. You was throwing yourself at him, flirting with him in front of everyone. Getting him to blow kisses!”

“Slapper!” Ashleigh taunted in agreement. “You got nothing he wants!” Emma continued, jabbing a finger in the girl’s face. “So jog on, you skinny munter!”

“Minger!” Ashleigh contributed.

“There’s no way anyone wants to bounce on a bag of antlers like you!”

Sandra stopped walking and, with a cool dignity that maddened the girls even more, said, “Conor Westlake has never read a book in his life that he hasn’t coloured in. He’s almost as retarded as the three of you, so why on earth would I…?”

Before she could finish the sentence, an incensed Emma had thumped her in the stomach and Sandra had crumpled to the ground. Then they laid into her.

Conor Westlake was brimming with resentment. At that moment he despised Mr Baxter with all his young heart. Because of that miserable old maths teacher he had missed the first half of the game, by which time it was too late and their team couldn’t hope to recover from the beating the other school was giving them. He had stormed off the field as soon as the whistle blew and grabbed his stuff from the changing room.

Still in his kit, the boy stomped towards the gates, the studs of his boots clacking over the tarmac path. When he heard the shrieks and squawks of Emma and her friends, he snapped out of his brooding resentment and stared at them for a moment, wondering why they were kicking a large coat on the floor. Then he realised that coat was really another girl and he raced forward.

“Hoy!” he bawled. “Get off her!”

Emma and the others looked up and glared at him, snarling like young lionesses over a carcass.

“Here’s lover boy!” Keeley spat at him.

Emma would have lunged at him as well, but it was then that Mr Baxter and the Head came rushing from the school.

The girls screamed abuse and ran off, leaving Conor shaking his head at them and Sandra quailing on the ground, clutching her sides and stomach.

“You all right?” he asked, kneeling down.

Sandra turned an ashen, angry face on him and only then did he realise who he had saved. “Stay away from me!” she yelled. “Don’t you touch me!”

“I didn’t do nothing!” he exclaimed. “Ungrateful cow! I shouldn’t have bothered.”

“Get off me!” she cried.

The thunderous voice of Barry Milligan interrupted them. “Westlake!” he hollered furiously. “Outside my office, now!”

“But I didn’t do…”

“I said now!” the Head shouted, his face turning purple.

Conor took a last, confused but angry look at Sandra and stormed back into the school.

“How bad is it?” Martin was asking the girl. “Can you move?”

Sandra nodded, but she was trembling.

“Get her inside,” Barry said. “She’s in shock.”

“She needs an ambulance,” Martin answered. “She shouldn’t be moved till they’ve had a look at her.”

The girl brushed his hands away and, with a grimace, raised herself off the ground. “I’m all right,” she told them as she picked herself up. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s a police matter,” the Head corrected her.

And then a new sound made all three of them turn. Behind the main school building, on the football field, there were furious shrieks and shouts and wild screaming. A pitched battle between the two teams and their supporters was under way.

“It’s a war zone, this place,” Martin muttered. “These kids are out of control.”

The next hour was a bit of a blur. Martin had helped Sandra into the staffroom and made her a cup of sweet tea, then called her parents to come and collect her. Meanwhile Barry had run to the field to see what was going on there.

Martin had been right. It really was a war zone. Douggy Wynn and the games teacher from the other school stood on the sidelines, powerless to stop the violence. They blew their whistles and tried to pull fighting groups apart, but it was no use. About forty kids were engaged in a fierce confrontation. Barry looked on in shock and disgust. This was pure animal savagery.

Here and there around the field, stunned parents were watching and at least one of them had already called the police because soon a siren could be heard racing down the main road.

Some of the kids scarpered at the sound, but others were locked in combat and were oblivious to the blaring wail that grew steadily louder and closer.

“What a bloody mess,” Barry said.

Two police cars turned up at the gates and the caretaker had been on the ball enough to open the barrier so they drove straight on to the field. Seven boys were arrested, two of them in their torn kits. The others pelted away.

Barry was in a cold rage and, if there was any space not filled with anger, it was topped up with shame. When he spoke to the police officers, he could see they held him, as Head, partly responsible. It was no comfort to discover that only three of the arrested lads belonged to his school. Then both of those emotions turned to shock when a police officer showed him the four-inch knife she had found on one of the boys.

“We’ve never had anything like this before,” he said.

“You do now, Sir,” the stern young policewoman informed him. “This could have been a lot worse than it was. There could have been a fatal stabbing here today. We’re going to need you and everyone else to make witness statements about this incident.”

Barry nodded then he remembered Sandra Dixon. “There was another incident, just before this,” he said. “One of our girls was beaten up outside the gates by three other girls. I was just about to call you about that.”

“Not a good day for this place, is it, Sir?” the policewoman said judgementally.

Barry Milligan had to agree with her.

Quarter to seven on a Friday night and Martin was still stuck in school. He’d called Carol, his partner, to warn her he was going to be late and give her a brief sketch of events, but she was incensed about something else. The bank had been on to her, or she had been on to the bank… either way she was livid. Martin was not in the mood to listen to her woes on top of everything else so he was relieved when Barry Milligan came into the staffroom and he could make his excuses and ring off.

“Tell me what else could go wrong today?” the Head barked, making a beeline for the kettle. “It’s a bloody asylum this place! The governors are going to love this.”

“Was anyone hurt on the field?” Martin asked.

“Busted noses and fat lips mostly. We was dead lucky it wasn’t worse. A knife, for God’s sake! A sodding knife!”

“It wasn’t one of our lads though.”

“Doesn’t matter whose it was, I’m not having that kind of thing anywhere near my school. I knew it’d happen here one day, but not so soon. This isn’t an inner city.”

“We still have gangs and hoodies and joyriders round here though.”

“Yes, well – just wait till Monday morning!”

“What do you mean?”

“Had a word with the police. They’re going to set up a knife arch at the gate first thing. If any of our lot are bringing knives in, we’ll know about it.”

Martin shook his head. “I remember when the most dangerous thing you’d find in a kid’s bag was a spud gun.”

“God, I miss those days,” the Head sighed. “It’s the feminisation of education, that’s what’s brought this on. And too much government interference, trying out each new trendy idea instead of leaving us to do our jobs properly. Just look what we’ve ended up with – a bloody chaotic shambles and kids armed to the teeth, thinking they’re gangsters.”

Martin wasn’t going to enter into that debate, even though he agreed with him.

“So how did it kick off?” he asked.

“More bloody oiling,” Barry told him.

Martin understood. Oiling was the latest unpleasant method of attacking someone in Felixstowe. Martin knew several people who had been oiled, his partner’s mother for one. It had been a terrifying and upsetting experience for her. Bottles of vegetable oil were cheaper than boxes of eggs and the oil itself was messier and smellier and more difficult to get out of clothes. A jumbo, 3-litre container was only a few quid and could be decanted into empty sports drink bottles, the type with the pull-up nozzle that could squirt several metres. Such small bottles could also be carried very discreetly in the large pockets of a fleece or a hoody. Gangs would steam through a crowded street and douse their selected victim with the stuff. It was disgusting. The situation had grown so bad that the police had advised local supermarkets not to sell vegetable oil to anyone under the age of eighteen.

“By the way,” he said. “Sandra’s mother came while you were with the police. She’s taken her to casualty to be checked over, but said she’ll be in touch.”

“I bet she will,” Barry grunted. “I don’t blame her. Those three girls are going to get a visit tonight from the law. They already had a word with that Conor lad.”

“Oh,” Martin said. “Sandra told me he had nothing to do with it.”

Barry shrugged. “Well, they’ve taken a statement anyway. This coffee really is foul muck, isn’t it? You know what I need right now? About half a dozen pints. I’m going to swill this bloody awful day away – you joining me?”

Martin declined. Barry spent too many hours in The Half Moon in Walton. That and his devotion to rugby were what had driven his wife away two years ago. She had taken the Labrador with her too. Barry missed the dog far more than her.

At ten past seven, Martin Baxter finally sat in his car. As he drove out of the school, he tried to close his mind to the traumas of the day. No one, especially him, suspected that much worse was yet to come. This weekend was going to be the turning point in the lives of everyone. At long last the world was going to learn about Dancing Jacks and it would never be the same again.

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