Never Odd or Even Read online

  ‘Shut yer face, Weirdo. I want that football book. The one about the Young Lions. Give it to me now or I’ll smash yer face in.’

  I told him he would have to wait until Mrs. Eve came back and she would decide if

  he could borrow the book. He grabbed me by the throat and snarled like a bull terrier (that’s a simile, but it’s not really hyperbole because that’s just how he was).

  ‘What part of NOW don’t you get?’ he yelled, snatching the book off the display – the book with a footballer called Shahdan Sulaiman on the cover. Then he whacked me round the head with it.

  I went all numb and couldn’t see properly. He then put his horrible bent nose (just like the Child Catcher’s crooked one) right up to mine and hissed with breath that smelt like blocked drains.

  ‘If you tell anyone I’ve hit yer, I’ll come round your house in the night, smash every window and set light to yer cat. That’s a promise. I know where yer live and me and my brothers will come and sort you out if you don’t do exactly what I tell yer. That little bash with a book was nothing. If you want a nose like mine, no teeth, and a metal plate in yer head, just grass on me and I’ll put the boot in big time.’

  Although I didn’t really understand everything he said, I knew this wasn’t just a threat. He meant every word of it. He and his brothers terrorised anyone who dared to upset them.

  As if I needed any further warnings, he then whispered in my ear, ‘If yer mum don’t want her nice metallic blue Nissan dealt with, yer’d better do as yer told. Clear?’

  I nodded. It was all I could do. It wasn’t worth the risk of reporting him to Mrs.

  Eve, because I knew that could make things worse. Mr. Adam would just tell me to ‘avoid confrontation, keep away from him and don’t wind him up’. (Anyway, how can you wind a person up if they don’t wear a watch? All Victor Criddle has on his wrist is a gross tattoo.)

  Just then Hannah came to my rescue and said quietly, ‘Sorry, Victor – we’re having a bit of trouble with the fingerprint reader at the moment so we’re not able to process loans at the minute. If you pop back at the end of lunch, we’ll see what we can do. I’ll keep the book safe for you. How’s that?’

  Amazingly he didn’t swear or shout. He just grabbed me by the collar and snarled again, ‘OK, Weirdo. Bring that book and give it to me on the bus. If yer don’t, yer dead.’

  So I said, ‘Do you mean to say you would commit murder for a book, Victor?’

  He just grunted. ‘In your case, yeah.’

  I thought I would try to deflect his aggression with something verbal so I said, ‘You wouldn’t just be committing homicide but libricide.’(Libri is Latin for books).

  ‘In your case, it’d be weirdicide. If I don’t get that book for when I get home, I’ll smash yer teeth so far down yer throat that you’ll need a long-handled broom to brush ‘em.’

  He threw me backwards onto the booking- out desk and off he stomped.

  I just stared at the door after he’d gone. My tie was wrenched round my neck, I was still feeling numb from the hit on the head and I even felt a bit sick.

  Hannah pushed the football book into my hand.

  ‘I think it might be a good idea if you take this and give it to him on the bus home. Otherwise he could turn nasty.’

  I was about to argue, as it seemed like I was giving in to his threats. But there again, I knew Hannah was being wise, because that’s what she is.

  ‘But we won’t be able to book this out to him if we can’t scan his thumbprint.’

  (Extra information: We’ve got one of those ace systems where we don’t use library tickets or cards. Each library user just presses their thumb on the scanner, which takes a reading in milliseconds and converts the image into a unique digital sequence, which is then encrypted and stored. This is called biometrics and I often like to examine the software that makes this work.)

  Hannah looked at me with one of her funny looks – but I never know what it means.

  ‘It is still working, but I said it wasn’t just to get rid of him. You’ll have to book it out on your thumbprint instead. It’s no big deal. BTW, the only other time Victor Criddle took a book out, the scanner wouldn’t work on him. WRM, he’s the only one the computer didn’t like. I’m not surprised, either.’

  She didn’t need to tell me all that, as I’d already analysed the problem.

  When the thumbprint reader didn’t work and Victor Criddle got all stressy, I later checked the scan with enlarged printouts of his thumbprint. No wonder it didn’t match – he’d obviously had a fight (or been bitten by his ferret), as his thumb was all scarred and scratched, so his print was no longer the same and the digital sequence didn’t match up.

  I flicked through the football book about the Young Lions and the footballer Shahdan Sulaiman.

  ‘Tell you what,’ I said to Hannah, ‘I’ll take this book out, but it’s our secret. We’ll call it Operation Shahdan. From now on we can refer to Victor Criddle as Shahdan – our own special codename.’

  Hannah liked that idea and I put the book in my bag so I could give it to ‘Shahdan’ on the bus home. That was my plan – but it didn’t go quite like I thought it would.

  Shahdan (alias Victor Criddle) was nowhere to be seen on the school bus. Apparently he’d been caught doing something terrible in the boiler room and was on an after-school detention.

  So now I had a problem. His words were still shouting inside my head: ‘If I don’t get that book for when I get home, I’ll smash yer teeth so far down yer throat that you’ll need a long-handled broom to brush ‘em.’

  As I hate going to the dentist at the best of times, there was only one thing for it. I would have to take that book round to Victor Criddle’s house that evening if I didn’t want to lose all my teeth, get beaten into a pulp or endanger Mum’s car, the cat and all our windows.

  Although I knew that the dreaded Criddle house was at the end of the row and next to the alley leading into the park, I wasn’t prepared for the shock when I got to the front gate, with the book clutched in my hands.

  There it was – the number on their door: 24. Until that moment, the number 24 had been one of my very favourites. From then on, it will never be quite the same. My NUMBERS CRUNCH LAW 3 will probably end up at the bottom of my list, but here it is in case you want to know something magic about the number 24.

  As I stood there at that front gate, with its broken 24 hanging off it, I suddenly heard, ‘Oi, Weirdo – what do yer want?’

  I looked up at a bedroom window where Victor Criddle peered down, spitting at me and grinning.

  I called up to him, ‘I’ve brought you your book.’

  His horrible laugh was like nothing I’ve ever heard coming from a human. Before I knew it, his face had disappeared from his bedroom window and the front door was opening.

  I should have walked away right then, but it was too late. The worst was about to happen ... the monster was emerging from the dangerous dragon’s den.

  (BTW this is not only alliteration but also a metaphor, because Victor Criddle isn’t actually a dragon. He’s worse.)

  TUESDAY

  I’ve never liked dogs – especially big ones with hot, smelly breath.

  When number 24’s front door flew open and a huge Doberman leapt out in a froth of saliva and growls, I jumped back behind the front gate and slammed it shut. It didn’t stop the savage beast snapping at my legs through the gaps and splattering my trousers with hot strings of slimy spit.

  Above the snarls and yelps, I heard a horrible cackling howl – which was Victor Criddle’s sickening laugh. He was just as scary as his pet werewolf. (I’m not sure if this is a metaphor or just hyperbole. Or maybe it’s the actual truth.)

  Beyond the slobbering jaws in front of me (both the dog’s and ‘Shahdan’s’), I saw a row of hutches where ferrets were scampering up and down and squealing. The front garden (it was nothing like a proper garden – just a scrap yard) was
littered with a rusty fridge, a torn leather sofa, an upside-down motorbike with a wheel missing, various exhaust pipes and three wheelie bins crammed full of junk. All buzzing with flies.

  Victor Criddle pulled on the dog’s collar, not to stop it chewing me to pieces, but so he could get past it to lunge at me and grab the book from my fingers.

  ‘Leave him, Sabre. He’s Weirdo. If you bite him, you’ll catch something geeky and turn into a librarian.

  ‘This is the book I want. You’re not so stupid as you look, Weirdo. I thought I’d have to come round and do your place in to teach you a lesson for not doing as you were told.’

  I tried to be helpful and said, ‘It’s due back in two weeks on the 27th, but I suggest the 25th, which is your library day.’

  The next thing I knew was a burning pain round my ear where he smacked the book on my head again. I nearly fell over, and as I was trying to get my balance back I heard a gruff, ‘Oi, Vic – who’s that kid?’

  ‘He’s a wimpy, weedy, weirdo from school. He’s well odd.’

  Standing at the front door was one of Victor Criddle’s older brothers. I could tell he was a brother because he looked just the same, with an identical bent nose and scary eyes. He was just bigger – like a picture in a book in the library about the Yeti.

  ‘Well tell him to hide these quick. They’re coming to raid us.’

  He threw two big boxes onto the ferret hutches.

  ‘Keep these in yer shed, kid. If yer say a word, you’ll wake up with stitches and bits of yer face missing.’

  I could hear a police siren getting louder as the bigger Criddle rushed over to me with the boxes.

  ‘Put your arms out and hold these.’

  ‘What are they?’ I asked.

  ‘None of your business. They’re boxes of cartons, that’s all. Just get moving. Fast.’

  The boxes weren’t as heavy as they looked, but I was still struggling to hold them both, when suddenly the two Criddles ran indoors, dragging the barking Doberman with them. Their front door slammed shut and I was left to stagger home, struggling to peer over the top of the boxes.

  I looked back to see Victor Criddle making obscene gestures at me from his bedroom window, just as a police car came squealing round the corner.

  I carried on walking and as I turned into my road I looked over my shoulder to see two police cars screech to a halt outside number

  24. Eight policemen ran through the gate, but I knew it wasn’t a good idea to hang around and watch.

  I carried on towards home and eventually stumbled my way into our back garden to put the boxes in the shed. I was just about to go indoors when I decided it might be interesting to take a look inside one of the boxes – so I did.

  Both boxes held 20 cartons of cigarettes. Each carton held 10 packets. Each packet contained 20 cigarettes. So how many cigarettes in 2 boxes?

  That’s a lot of cigarettes to have in your shed. I looked on my laptop to find out how much a packet of cigarettes costs. This brand was £7.60 a packet, so you can work out how much these two boxes were worth.

  It was only then that I realised I had just become a criminal. After all, it’s a criminal offence to receive stolen goods and I had no doubt that Big Criddle had just stolen them and passed them on to me for safe-keeping.

  So now I had another problem – just what should I do with thousands of stolen cigarettes? What would you have done? (BTW this is not a rhetorical question but one you should be able to answer for yourself.)

  I didn’t tell Mum what was hidden in the shed, or about what happened on my worst Friday 13th ever. She would have got really stressed and would have needed to go to the doctor again.

  I decided I’d ask Hannah for advice on Monday. Now that I was a criminal I had to think like one – so I couldn’t just phone, text or email her. Police forensic experts might use digital evidence to prove I was the receiver of stolen goods. From now on I would have to be really careful. I wondered what Sherlock Holmes would have done in my situation.

  On Saturday morning I was woken by Mum screaming. Her car was parked outside our house and it was covered in red spray paint. Vandals had struck in the night and, of course, I knew exactly who it was. I felt really furious and frightened at the same time.

  Mum was in a terrible state and she phoned the police. They told her to leave the car just where it was and an officer would call round to see the damage and fill in a form.

  Mum took some tablets and went back to bed with a migraine, while I did Sudoku and watched TV. It wasn’t until 17.27 that the police called. I answered the door to a WPC and I took her into the sitting room. Mum was still in bed.

  ‘I’m going to tell you about the crime,’ I began. ‘I know exactly what happened and I want you to go round to number 24 Rutland Drive and arrest them. You’ll need a few strong officers, as the Criddles are big and tough and they’ve got dogs and ferrets. I want you to lock up Victor Criddle because he’s a bully and it was him who sprayed my mum’s car.’

  She looked at me and smiled in an odd sort of way.

  ‘Can you prove it was him?’ she asked.

  I told her that that was surely her job and the skill of CSI officers to find all trace evidence.

  ‘There are likely to be fibres on Mum’s car that will match exactly Victor Criddle’s clothes. There is bound to be paint on his clothes, too, and spray cans at his house matching the exact paint at the crime scene. Possibly flakes of blue metallic paint from Mum’s car would be under Criddle’s fingernails, which chemical analysis would match up. There may even be dog hairs on the car that match his Doberman and there are likely to be fingerprints. If you need an enlarged thumbprint of his, I can provide a copy first thing on Monday morning. It’s on our library system.’

  She gave me another silly smile.

  ‘It’s been raining all afternoon, so the vehicle in question will be washed clean of such evidence, I’m afraid. Besides... ’

  I have to admit that I shouted at her then. ‘Well why didn’t you come earlier, then? What’s the point of investigating a crime when the crime scene has been contaminated?’

  She asked me why I was so certain that it was Victor Criddle who’d vandalised the car. It was time for me to confess that I was an accomplice to theft because I was made to hide the stolen goods.

  I asked her to follow me out to the shed, where she would discover all the evidence she needed to be able to make an arrest of the Criddle gang of thieves.

  I opened the shed door and pointed to the corner where I’d hidden the boxes of cigarette cartons. She smiled oddly again and just said, ‘Where?’

  I couldn’t believe it. They’d gone.

  Back in the house the policewoman told me that ‘off the record’ the Criddles were currently under investigation for various incidents but, due to lack of evidence, she was unable to add this case to their enquiries.

  I shouted at her again, ‘But Victor Criddle is HORRIBLE.’

  She told me it was not a crime to be horrible and if it was, the prisons would be full twenty times over. She said they would give us a crime number for this case of deliberate vandalism of Mum’s car and they would keep an eye on things, but there was nothing more she could do.

  ‘But you’ve got to stop Victor Criddle!’

  I think I must have shouted louder than ever, because Mum came downstairs looking very drowsy, just as the WPC said ‘Unless any particular individual was caught in the act of vandalism or captured on CCTV, there is no hard evidence as to who committed the offence and, even though we may suspect Victor Criddle, there are no further formal proceedings to be taken.’

  After the police officer had gone, I went outside to look at Mum’s car more closely. Lines and squiggles of red paint were all over the bonnet, roof and doors. It was only later when I looked at it from my bedroom window that I could make out a few letters.

  It said: becos u opend the box.

  Just because I’d dar
ed to peep inside one of the boxes, they’d done that to Mum’s car. I knew that it was also a warning to me to keep my mouth shut.

  I went back into the shed to see if I could find just one trace of incriminating evidence to get Victor Criddle locked up for good.

  Nothing.

  When I went to bed that night, I lay thinking for hours. Lots of questions were going through my head.

  I always keep a notepad by my bed, so I can jot down special number rules, puzzles and stuff. I thought of Victor running into his house, so I made an anagram from his road name: DEVIL TURD RAN (RUTLAND DRIVE ). Then I thought of the empty shed and wrote: NO TRACE NOT ONE CARTON.

  (That’s what I call a comic ironic palindromic chronic shame.)

  WEDNESDAY

  It would take a mega-crime before the police would decide to act on my advice.

  The weeks that followed the Criddles’ attack on Mum’s car were the worst in my life. Not a day went by when Shahdan (I couldn’t even say his real name) didn’t torment me, threaten me, hit me, spit at me or take things from my bag. Some days he made me give him money and sandwiches.

  Then the worst thing of all happened, when he gripped me in a headlock. He grabbed the cord round my neck and wrenched off my memory stick, then threw it down a drain. I was so upset that I shouted and screamed at him – but he only laughed even more. I couldn’t speak for the rest of the day.

  There was no point trying to tell anyone what he did because:

  a) no one wanted to know,

  b) it made me feel like I couldn’t look after myself, so I was a useless failure, and

  c) he told me what he and his brothers would do to me and my Mum if I ever told anyone.

  I couldn’t talk to Mum about any of this, because when she gets upset she takes even more tablets and I can’t wake her up. Hannah knew about some of what was going on, but I didn’t feel I could talk to her either, especially as she was in the middle of some extra exams.