Oreo

Eight: The Reunion

I quickly thanked Evelyn and sped right out of the manor, clutching the three pictures.

‘Reo, you know what?’ I grinned. ‘You were right – this does have something to do with Mary-Anne’s son!’

‘What happened?’ he said, running by my side. I waved the photograph at him and he took it carefully in his hands. It must have been hard to see with the bad quality and the low light, but it figured it out.

‘Dude, Evelyn’s dad is Mary-Anne’s son?’ Reo cried, narrowly avoiding a rabbit hole and a twisted ankle.

‘Yeah!’ I said, sprinting now. When we got back to the house it was still very dark and we didn’t want to go and wake everyone up, so we crept inside as quietly as possible. Instead of going to lie down like Reo did, I tip-toed up the stairs and into the boy’s bedroom. I held the photo of Evelyn’s up to the one in the frame on the dresser. ‘You knew, didn’t you? I asked you where to find someone and you made that newspaper fly at me. It turned out... that someone is you.’ I smiled softly. I stood there, just admiring the pictures for a moment, before I added, ‘Thank you.’ and left the room. On my way out I noticed a sign stuck to the door, which read; ‘Carson’s Room’.

‘So that’s your name... Carson.’ I said quietly as I went back downstairs to get some rest.

And before I knew it, we had set out on our search for the town known as Hawksley. It didn’t take long to find; it was about 2 miles north-east of Amberton. ‘Quick, or we’ll miss the march!’ I told everybody as we approached the humble-looking village. Reo was close beside me, eager to spot Carson. Mum, Dad, Mary-Anne, Rosalie and Kai had all gone off to the cute little stone shop to stock up on food. A small group of citizens had gathered on the other side of the street, and some people were leaning out of windows or stood on their doorsteps waving at the specks in the distance.

‘OK boys, think fast – we need to get Carson to follow us back, without showing ourselves up or ruining the march.’ I said quietly to Axel and Reo. Reo mumbled thoughtfully. Axel also looked as though he was thinking hard, but after a moment he only shrugged. The army group was getting ever closer, and I panicked and growled with frustration. We were going to miss our chance. But then Axel began grinning like a madman. He pushed between Reo and I, then continued to wriggle through the crowd before we could call his name. He ran along the side of the street, dipping behind buildings so as not to be noticed by the onlookers. With the army photo of Carson clutched in his hand, reo leapt out of the crowd, closely followed by myself. We chased after Axel as quick as our legs could carry us, but neither of us could ever catch up to a professional pick-pocket like him. He was really fast and athletic; so he’d already got level with the front few soldiers by the time we caught up to him. ‘Hey, stop!’ he cried, playing up his German accent. All three of us were hidden with our backs pressed against the rear of the shop my parents were inside. I peeked around the edge of it and I could see that Axel’s yell had distracted a few of the soldiers. 

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ I hissed, giving him a sharp nudge with my elbow.

‘Oi!’ Soldiers!’ he hollered. Now quite a lot of the troops were now looking worried, despite their efforts to stay poker-faced.

‘Vich von of you ist Carson grey?’ he cried. All the heads turned to one man near the front of the march. I gazed down at the photo in Reo’s hand and instantly recognised him as the man I needed to get.

‘Now what?’ I asked Axel. ‘What’s the next step in your genius plan?’

The maniacal grin crept over his face again, and I knew exactly what it meant.

‘Oh God no.’ I whispered. 

‘GERONIMO!’ he cried, zooming out of sight. Reo and I rushed to the edge of the shop just in time to see Axel’s mouse-brown hair disappear into the throng of baffled soldiers.

‘That boy...’ I muttered under my breath.

‘Should we go and help him?’ asked Reo, eyes searching the crowd, which was now complete chaos.

‘Nah, even if he seems like a nutter, he knows what he’s doing... I hope so, anyway.’ I said.

Every so often one of the soldiers would reach their hands into the space beside them, but a second later another soldier would grab out, and every time another one of the troops would grasp fruitlessly, so eventually we could see a path of reaching soldiers and could work out where Axel was moving. Was he seriously pick-pocketing now, of all times?

No, of course not.

“Avery, Reo, now would be a good time to jump in!” Axel’s voice rang out over the sea of heads. All the soldiers turned to the crowd on the other side of the street, glaring to see who would answer. We wouldn’t get a better opportunity than this.

I sprinted out of our cover head-long into the mound of troops. They now had three of us to scrabble for so I just squirmed around, making sure I wasn’t getting caught but also trying to distract everyone. It wasn’t working; the majority were focused on Reo and Axel, who were trying to coax Carson into coming with them. I was tugging on people’s coats, nudging them in the ribs, knocking on their helmets, but everyone was still trained on the boys. What more could I do?

“MOOOOOOOOOO!” I hollered. The hub-bub in the street was silenced. Every person stared directly at me. “Uhh, I’m a cow...?” I tried.

“That’s it!” Reo decided, hauling Carson onto his shoulders. “Axel, his legs are yours to carry.”

Time started again at double speed. Several soldiers lunged after me, but I slipped out of their reach and to the side, just catching a glimpse of Reo and Axel carrying a wriggling Carson across the road, closely pursued by some angry soldiers. I shot over and threw myself at them.

“We can’t hold him; he’s too strong!” Reo cried, clearly struggling. A thumping in my head and with no idea what to do, I just knocked the soldiers away from me and ran to Carson, who had managed to escape Axel and Reo’s clutches. I launched myself at the back of his neck and clung on as though I was taking a piggy-back ride. He tried to shake me off but I held on tight and cried, “I know you’re confused, I don’t blame you, but you’ve got to come with us. For Mary-Anne... For Evelyn Florence.”

At the mention of his child’s name, Carson immediately stopped resisting.

“How do you know my daughter’s name?”

“I’ll tell you, all you have to do is run.”

Just as I felt grasping fingertips touch my back, Carson’s legs swung forward and we were off. Now, seeing the Soldier Carson ‘willingly’ ran away from them, the other troops stopped chasing us and instead stood there, gawping with confusion. I grinned victoriously back at them.

“Well, Axel, we did manage to get Carson, but your plan kind of went the opposite way of ‘not show ourselves up and ruin the march’.” I said.

“Just a bit!” laughed Reo, sprinting beside us after Axel, who was leading the way. Despite all the breath he’d just used up avoiding the troops, Axel was having no trouble keeping ahead of the trained soldier and was barely panting. I put this down to his pick-pocketing and shook the thought from my mind. My parents had noticed the commotion we’d caused in Hawksley’s march, and had briskly led the other out of the shop and followed us back to Mary-Anne’s home. We escorted Carson into his old bedroom for a moment’s rest. We kept Mary-Anne and her son apart until we had prepared a rich lunch and had a chance to get our breath back and wash our dirty faces and hands. Carson strolled down the stairs, smiling at his childhood home. Almost in slow motion, he turned around and there was a shimmer in his eyes as he saw his mother.

He grinned, bounded down the steps and flung himself into Mary-Anne’s arms. Tears were falling down her cheeks but she was beaming. “I thought I’d lost you...” she mumbled. I saw it right then, in my head; the photograph of the little boy and his loving mother.