The Missing Skull Page 6

  “Recently, the Soviet empire, our most recent invader, collapsed and Ukraine became an independent country. For the first time we had control of our destiny, but we are still on a crossroads, and we have powerful neighbors. Should we look east, or should we look west, and if we choose one direction, what will our neighbors on the other side do? I think difficult times are ahead for my country. I am an old man, but I wish to go home to help as much as I am able to and be buried in the land where I was born. Is that too much to wish for?”

  “No,” I say, “but why can’t you just go?”

  “Life appears simple when you are young, Steven. Many years ago, it seemed that way for me as well. I was certain that I could help my country by passing information to other countries I thought could help us.”

  “You were a spy?” I ask in shock.

  “That is a bit dramatic,” Koval says with a tired smile. “I had information and I decided who should know it. So, with the help of another young man, I came to your country, thinking that my information would make a difference. I was wrong, but of course I could not go back home. Your government let me stay for no charge in this delightful place, so I have lived here ever since. My needs are catered to and I am given a small allowance, but I have no savings and so I cannot travel far.

  “Now, I do not blame your government for keeping me here—they have been generous enough, and it was my decision to come here—but now things are different in my home. It will be safe for me to return, and I wish to do so. Your government does not wish to help me, and so I contacted the man who helped me before, and he agreed to assist me once more by supplying the funds to make my return possible. I think you can guess who that man was and is.”

  It takes me a moment to work out what Koval means, but then it hits me like a freight train. “Grandfather?”

  Koval nods and takes another drink of his beer. “Yes, Steven. The one I hope will assist me in getting home is your grandfather, David McLean.”

  FOURTEEN

  I stare at Koval and try to work out how the story he has told me fits in with my grandfather, who brought me here on a road trip and set up a mystery for me to solve around Tom Thomson’s missing skull. That much I am sure of. What I’m not sure of is everything else.

  Is Grandfather really involved with Koval and using our trip as a cover to bring him money so he can get home? Are Sophie and Jason/Carl really trying to steal that money? Have I misunderstood clues in the game Grandfather set up for me and stumbled into this? Or is it all a much more elaborate game than Grandfather told me?

  “Do you know anything about Tom Thomson?” I ask, hoping to surprise Koval into a reaction.

  It doesn’t work. Koval casually drains his beer glass and says, “It is impossible to live around here and not know that name. Every year new people come here with a new conspiracy theory about his death.”

  “What do you think happened to him?”

  Koval shrugs. “I always believe the simplest answer. I think he died in a fishing accident and his body was moved home, where he is buried today. Anything else is unprovable and too complicated. But I have a question for you. If you did not bring the money from your grandfather, why has he not come himself to see me?”

  It’s a good question, and one I can’t answer. So I ask another one. “Do you know a woman called Sophie or a guy called Jason or Carl?”

  “The names mean nothing,” Koval says with a vague wave of his empty glass. “Fetch me another beer, please, Steven, while I think on what this all might mean.”

  I do as Koval asks. As I straighten up, I glance out the window and almost drop the bottle. Three figures are on the dock, getting ready to go out in the red boat—Sophie, Jason/Carl and my grandfather. I stare for a moment as Sophie starts the outboard motor and then I turn and dash back through to the main room.

  “They’re leaving! They’ve got Grandfather! I have to go!” I yell as I head for the door. On the way, I drop the beer on Koval’s chair. I hear him shout after me, “Good luck!”

  This time I don’t care who sees me going through the resort. I tear along the corridor, narrowly missing a startled waiter pushing a trolley laden with drinks and snacks. The corridor opens into a wide atrium, and I skid to a halt on the polished tile floor to get my bearings. To my left is a long reception desk where an old couple is signing in while a bored porter leans on a cart stacked high with pink suitcases.

  To my right several people are sitting in plush chairs, sipping expensive-looking drinks. Several turn their heads to look at me. On the other side of the drinkers is a set of glass doors leading onto an outside patio, the lawn, the dock and a view of the red boat bumping its way over the waves toward the island.

  I head for the doors. A waiter steps forward and politely asks if he can help me. “No, thanks,” I say as I sidestep him, cross the patio in half a dozen strides and hurtle down the lawn. By the time I’m on the dock, the red boat is almost at the island.

  “Stop!” I yell as loudly as I can, but it’s hopeless. There’s no way they can hear me at that distance and over the roar of the outboard. I wave frantically, but no one notices except the waiter, who has followed me down from the patio. “I think you should leave now, sir,” he says.

  “Right,” I say as I push past him, an idea forming in my mind. I sprint along the shore and scramble over the fence. I glance over at the island, where Jason/Carl is tying up the boat as the others climb out onto the shore. Then I keep running.

  By the time I get to the beached canoe, I’m struggling for breath and battered and scratched from running through the underbrush. The canoe has come to a stop wedged between a pair of rocks. There’s a couple of inches of water in the bottom, but I’m relieved to see that the paddle and life vest are still there. I put on the life vest and stand on a rock, knee deep in cold lake water, while I haul the canoe off the rocks. Getting in without tipping is tricky, but I manage and begin paddling toward the island.

  The going is hard against the wind and the waves, and the water in the bottom of the canoe makes it tippy. I look around for a bailer, but there’s nothing, so I have no choice but to keep going.

  What was a pleasant paddle earlier in the day seems to take forever, and my arms are aching and I’m soaked by the spray by the time I get close to the island. I turn the canoe so the prow faces straight at the shore, but that’s a mistake. It means that the canoe is now side-on to the waves. A particularly large one catches me full-on. The canoe tips, the water sloshes over to one side, I lose my balance, and suddenly I’m swallowing lake water.

  My head breaks the surface, and I cough and splutter. The canoe is beside me, upside down, and there’s no way I can turn it over on my own. I feel panic rising. Am I to end up like Tom Thomson, a drowned corpse found floating in the lake days later? I try screaming for help but only succeed in swallowing another mouthful of water. I kick my legs wildly—and stub my toe on a rock.

  The pain seems to calm my fright. I feel around with my feet until I find a rock to stand on. The shore is quite close; so is the canoe. I launch myself off the rock and grab the overturned hull. With a combination of kicking and pushing off underwater rocks, I edge toward the shore. Soon I can place both feet on the bottom. It’s a struggle, and I stumble a lot on the slippery rocks, but I manage to drag the canoe to shore and partly out of the water. I don’t have the strength or interest to turn it over or try and find a place to tie it up. I clamber over the rocks and lean against a tree to catch my breath and decide what to do next.

  I’m sheltered from the wind, but I’m soaked through, and heavy clouds are building, blocking any sunlight. I begin to shiver. From somewhere in the recesses of my tired brain, I drag up a fun fact that Sam once told me—most people don’t get hypothermia in the winter, when they tend to wear lots of clothing. The danger of chilling your body enough to be in danger is greatest in August, when people are taken by surprise by an accident and are dressed for warm weather, such as a T-shirt and shorts. It’s August, I
’ve just been surprised by an accident, and I’m wearing only a T-shirt and shorts.

  “Thanks, Sam,” I murmur as I jump up and down and flail my arms to try to warm up.

  FIFTEEN

  Waving my arms helps a bit, but I still can’t stop shivering. I need to get moving. I know Grandfather’s on the island and possibly in danger, but where? Looking around, I notice that I am close to the spot where Jason/Carl tied up the red boat when he came to take me back to the mainland. After a few moments’ searching, I find the path leading into the trees.

  It feels good to be doing something, but I wish I had more of a plan. The island’s quite large and heavily treed. There’s a lot of land to search and plenty of places to hide if someone doesn’t want to be found. All I can do is try.

  There are no roads on the island, but it’s crisscrossed with paths, some of which are little more than deer trails that I have to push my way through. Pretty soon I have lost all sense of direction and am simply walking trails at random. Occasionally I stumble into a clearing, sometimes the same clearing several times. All the while, I’m getting colder and more discouraged. Eventually I huddle down against a tree beside the trail and hug my legs to my chest to try and conserve heat. I’ll just rest for a minute or two before going on. I feel totally miserable and wish that Grandfather had never come up with the dumb idea of taking his grandsons on special trips. I’d give anything to be warm and back home. I’d even happily spend the week playing Warhammer with Sam and his nerdy friends. Just when things can’t get any worse, thunder rumbles in the distance, and it begins to rain.

  The large raindrops from the approaching storm make quite the noise, splashing through the trees. That’s probably why I don’t hear the man coming up behind me until I feel his hand on my shoulder.

  Despite my misery and exhaustion, I leap to my feet and spin around. The man is tall and strongly built. His head is shaved, and he has a dark beard. Fortunately, he’s smiling.

  “You look kind of cold,” he says, stating the obvious in a broad American accent. “D’you know more people get hypothermia in August than in January?”

  “I know,” I stammer through chattering teeth, wondering if I’ve been discovered by one of Sam’s relatives.

  The man takes off his jacket, wraps it around my shoulders and pulls the hood up. It’s about five sizes too big for me, but it has a fleece lining and it’s still warm from his body heat. I pull it tight around me and instantly feel better.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “No problem. What’re you doing wandering around these woods with a storm coming on?”

  “My canoe tipped in the wind,” I say.

  The man nods. “Shipwreck,” he says. “People tend to take the lake for granted, but it can be treacherous, especially at this time of year when thunderstorms come through. They seem to appear from nowhere sometimes.” As if to emphasize what he’s saying, thunder crashes deafeningly overhead. “You look a bit better,” the man says. “You feel warmer?”

  I nod weakly.

  “Would some hot chocolate improve the situation even more?”

  I nod harder.

  “Let’s go then. I’ve got a cabin at the south end of the island. There are dry clothes there as well. I suspect they’ll be a bit large for you, but better than nothing.”

  My savior strides off down the trail and I follow. I’ve almost stopped shivering, but my feet feel like lumps of ice. My companion doesn’t seem to mind that he has given up his jacket. He’s striding along so fast that I almost have to run to keep up. “My name’s Steve,” I say in an effort to engage him in conversation and slow him down. “What’s yours?”

  “Carl,” he says over his shoulder without breaking stride.

  I stop dead in my tracks and stare at the man’s back as he keeps going along the trail. He could be the figure I glimpsed at Grandfather’s cabin. But if this is Carl, who’s the guy with Sophie? “Wait,” I shout as I begin to run. “Did you say Carl?”

  “Common name,” the guy says.

  I’ve almost caught up to him when we burst out into a small clearing. Through the driving rain, I can see a cabin, much nicer than the one Grandfather and I are in. Behind it is a dock where two boats bob, one of which is the red one from the resort. I don’t have the time or energy to work out what this means because Carl strides up to the cabin and pushes the door open. I stumble in behind him. The first thing I see around Carl’s imposing bulk is a wonderful fire crackling in the hearth. Then I see that we’re not alone.

  Three figures are standing in the middle of the room. “It took you long enough to get here,” Grandfather says with a smile.

  I want to run to him, but Carl places a firm hand on my shoulder. Grandfather, giving me a broad wink, steps over to stand beside Carl.

  Sophie is standing a couple of paces in front of me with Jason, as I think of her companion now, behind her. His nose is red and looks like it hurts. Neither one seems happy to see us. “What are you doing here?” Sophie asks.

  I can’t answer because I have no clue what’s going on, but Grandfather says, “It didn’t work out the way you wanted, Sophie, but the game’s over now.”

  “Not yet,” Sophie replies, her face twisted in anger. She raises her hand, and I see she’s holding the pistol she fired in the cabin. “The game’s not over until I say it’s over. Tell me where the money’s hidden.”

  “The pistol won’t do you any good now.” Grandfather shakes his head. “It really is over. And I have to get my grandson some dry clothes and something hot to drink so he can warm up.”

  Sophie raises her arm higher and points the gun at Grandfather. “I’m finished with your games,” she says. “I’m deadly serious. I want that money.” For a moment we stand like a group of figures in a wax museum, Sophie front and center and angry, Jason in the background, looking worried, Carl standing calmly beside me, Grandfather relaxed and smiling, and me just wanting to get out of my wet clothes and hunker down in front of the roaring fire.

  Someone has to do something. “Sophie,” I say, shrugging off Carl’s hand and taking a step forward. Sophie half turns toward me. The gun moves away from Grandfather. I don’t think. I just leap. Well, leap’s not the right word. It’s more a couple of stumbling steps before I trip on the hem of Carl’s vast jacket. I cannon into Sophie’s legs. She yells in surprise and falls heavily backward across the coffee table in front of the fire. Her arms flail wildly and the pistol flies in a wide arc to land at Jason’s feet. He stares at it uncertainly for a moment, picks it up and waves it about as if trying to decide who to point it at.

  “Be careful, Jason,” Sophie says from the floor beside me. “It has a hair trigger.”

  Jason glances down at Sophie. “We can still get the money,” he says. He points the gun at Grandfather and pulls the trigger.

  SIXTEEN

  The explosion of the gunshot is just as loud as the one in the other cabin earlier in the day and leaves my ears ringing. The difference is that this time Grandfather’s been shot. I scream in horror and jump to my feet. Grandfather’s still standing beside Carl, smiling at me. Why isn’t he on the floor in a spreading pool of blood?

  Jason is staring stupidly at the gun in his hand. “I didn’t mean to shoot,” he says. Carl steps forward and takes the gun from Jason’s unresisting grip.

  Sophie struggles to her feet. “What happened?” she asks.

  “Blanks,” Grandfather says. “You don’t think I’d let you run around near my grandson with a loaded gun, do you?”

  “But how did you…?”

  “Enough for now,” Grandfather says. “I told you the game was over.” He turns to Carl. “The worst of the weather’s probably past now. These summer thunderstorms never last long. Perhaps you could take Sophie and Jason back over to the mainland while I find some dry clothes for Steven. I imagine he has some questions.”

  “Sure thing,” Carl says. “Can I have my jacket back?”

  In a daze I hand Carl his j
acket and watch as he hustles the other two out of the cabin. Boy, do I have questions.

  “Get over by the fire,” Grandfather tells me, “and take off those wet clothes. I’ll find some dry ones and see if I can fix us a hot drink.”

  “Carl said there was hot chocolate,” I suggest.

  “Perfect,” Grandfather says.

  * * *

  It’s amazing how feeling comfortable can change your view of the world. A short time ago I was cold, scared and confused. I’m still confused, but I feel safe and warm. I’m dressed in clothes that are ridiculously big for me, but they’re dry, and the heat from the fire is warming my bones. Best of all, I’m clasping a large steaming mug of hot chocolate. It even has marshmallow bits floating in it.

  “So, you have some questions,” Grandfather says as he sits down across from me.

  “No kidding,” I say. “I spent half of today convinced I had everything worked out and the other half terrified that I was caught in some vast, dangerous plot I don’t understand. What’s going on?”

  Grandfather laughs. “I imagine it has been a bit confusing for you, but before I answer your questions, can you tell me in detail what happened to you today?”

  “Sure.” Between sips of hot chocolate, I go over the day. I tell him about working out the first clue, meeting Jason, going over to the island, being brought back to the cabin, where Sophie fired the gun in the air, going to the resort to try to rescue Grandfather, stumbling into Koval’s room, seeing Grandfather being taken to the island, and my adventure with the canoe. It’s comforting to say it all out loud, but it doesn’t make any more sense than it did before.