It was well into the night by the time Simon and Pony cycled back up the path to Ned’s house. They wheeled their bikes back through the garden, rolling them into a long tin shed that stood at the far corner. Simon felt the grass flicker against his ankles, wet in the night-time air: in the darkness it could have been water or blood.

Pony reached into the shed and flicked a switch, unpacking light from the door. Simon could see—along with mud-caked garden tools and cans of paint-thinner and petrol—a shiny red and blue BMX, with a ribbon attached to its handlebars.

‘Gin’s birthday,’ said Pony. ‘We got him a bike.’

‘Oh,’ said Simon. ‘That’s right. There’s a party, isn’t there.’

‘Tomorrow.’

‘Yes. Tomorrow.’ Simon knew they were both avoiding talking about what they’d just seen. Their voices, echoing off the walls, the violence. The threat. ‘Do you think—’ Simon tailed off.

‘What?’

‘Do you think they’ll go back to the lake tomorrow? Madaline, I mean. To keep searching.’

Pony blew out his cheeks. ‘Simon,’ he said, shaking his head. He wheeled his bike into the shed. ‘You just don’t get it, do you.’

Simon rolled his bike in too. ‘Get what? I don’t—’ He stopped. The rest of the shed was a long wooden workbench, as big and thick as a car, scored with scars and nicks, clamped with coloured vices. To one side, all down the wall, was a row of hooks and shelves, locked behind glass, full of tools: hammers and chisels, knives and corkscrews. Ned’s wife, Simon thought. Stephanie. Carving, creating.

Pony took the handlebars of Simon’s bike and stared right into his eyes. The weak orange light turned Pony’s skin to street maps. ‘We can’t trust them,’ he whispered. His voice was a dripping drain. ‘You heard what Kuiper said.’

Simon tried to remember the exact words he’d heard.

‘The whole town?’

Pony scrunched up his face. He leaned past Simon, pulling the shed’s door closed, sealing them in near-silence. He went over to the bench, took off his rucksack. He pulled something out of it, clunking it down onto the wood. A tin can.

‘Is that…?’

‘Yep. Took it from the storeroom.’

Simon felt a fresh panic. ‘What if they realise it’s missing?’

‘One can? They won’t miss it. Kuiper took one himself.’ Pony reached back into his rucksack and pulled out a thick pocketknife.

‘You can’t open it,’ said Simon.

‘Listen, I don’t like this any more than you do, but if you want to find your parents, we’re going to have to work out what’s going on in this town.’ Simon felt numb. He thought of a thousand empty houses, waiting for him to move through them. He nodded.

‘Okay then.’ Pony flicked open his pocket knife to reveal
an old-fashioned can opener, with a hooked end, like you
sometimes saw in Westerns and movies about soldiers. With an expert twist of his wrists, Pony made the can opener’s edge bite its way around the rim of the can, peeling its top off bit by bit.
Eventually Pony was able to lever off the lid off. His eyes
narrowed. He turned the can over, and Simon heard a wet flop.

Peaches. Glistening orange. Juice swelling out to the bench’s edge, dribbling over.

‘What the hell?’ Pony shook the can. A small rattle. He turned it back over. Reaching in, he pulled out a dripping sealed bag, made from thick black plastic. Pony grinned, the first time Simon had seen him smile. ‘Bingo.’

‘What is it?’ Simon came closer.

Pony flipped shut the can opener and switched his pocketknife to a thin blade. He slid it carefully through the top of the bag. A handful of small off-white tablets fell onto the table, rattling
like heavy rain. They were about the same size as a Panadol, Simon thought, but they were a different shape. He picked one up, brought it to his nose to sniff.

Pony suddenly lunged at him, grabbing his wrist.

‘Ow! What’s that for?’

Pony plucked the pill from between Simon’s fingers. ‘You can’t just swallow these,’ he said.

‘I wasn’t going to swallow it,’ said Simon. ‘I was just going to smell it.’

‘Right,’ said Pony, gathering the pills into a pile on the bench. ‘You just shouldn’t swallow them, that’s all. They’re drugs.’

‘Drugs?’ The word alone sent a cannon to Simon’s stomach. This was a word deep in the forest of the adult world. A secret word like sex, or insurance.

Pony switched on a lamp that was clamped to the bench. He bent down, picked up a single pill, held it in his palm under the light. ‘Got to be,’ he said. ‘Amphetamines, maybe.’

‘What are amphetamines?’ Simon peered at Pony’s hand.

‘Big trouble is what they are.’

Simon looked over at Pony’s face, reflected strangely in the under-glow of the lamp. It looked older, the wear of age sitting strangely on his features. ‘How do you know about drugs?’ Simon hated his voice then, how young it sounded.

‘My mum,’ he said, ‘I told you. She worked in a doctor’s surgery. I spent a lot of time with her there.’ Pony picked, unconsciously, at the band-aid on his wrist. ‘These things,’ he weighed the pill, the amphetamine, in his hand, ‘these tiny things do horrible things to people.’

Simon exhaled a breath he didn’t realise he’d held in. He said, ‘So Tarden and Kuiper are taking drugs.’

‘They’re doing more than just taking them,’ said Pony. ‘You saw how many cans were in that storeroom.’

‘Why are there so many, then?’

‘I don’t know. They might be selling them, or holding them for someone else.’

‘We’ve got to tell someone,’ said Simon, ‘the police.’ He saw Madaline’s face, heard her promising to find his parents. ‘Madaline.’

Pony rubbed the side of his face. ‘I’m not sure that’s safe,’ he said. ‘Could be a risk.’

‘You think Madaline could be…involved somehow?’ Simon thought he sounded like a police officer now. Words he’d heard on TV.

‘Maybe not just Madaline.’

‘Who else?’

‘Who knows? But there’s no way they could keep that many drugs just sitting there without someone in the town knowing.’

‘What about the other policeman? Madaline’s boss?’

‘Tommy?’ said Pony, ‘he’s even worse. He’s friends with them all already. He probably helps them.’

Simon’s voice stammered. ‘My…mum and dad—’ He felt dizzy. ‘What have they got to do with all this? Tarden said they took care of them. What does that mean?’

Pony put his hand on Simon’s shoulder. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Well we can’t do nothing!’ Simon was surprised by the loudness of his voice. ‘We can’t just do nothing!’

Pony began putting the pills back into their bag. ‘We’re going to work this out,’ he said. ‘We’re going to find out.’ He fished a bulldog clip from his rucksack, and snapped it to the drug bag to seal it. ‘Tomorrow, though. Nothing else we can do tonight.’

‘But…what if—’ Simon could hardly bring himself to think it. What if Kuiper had killed his mum and dad? What if they weren’t just missing, but dead? He tried to push the thought from his mind, but it was like trying to cram a snarling monster into a honey jar.