1
They had arranged that Mel should pick up the device from the Gadget Man some time before the appointment by the ramp. When she called at the shop, the Gadget Man was, if anything, more excited than she.
‘You have no objection, young lady,’ he said, ‘if I come along as well. I will, of course keep a discreet distance but …’
‘No problem,’ said Mel.
‘You see, I have a real interest of sorts, having invested so much time and ingenuity in this little project. I really would like to see the device in action, so to speak.’
‘Of course, you must,’ said Mel. ‘I’m pretty keen to see it work as well. Be great to see that little dropkick get dropkicked!’
Meanwhile, the loblolly boy was safely hidden in the uppermost branches of the tree. He’d chosen his usual vantage point where he merged into the foliage but still had sufficient clearance to get a wide view of the park, the skateboard ramps and the main gates. He had taken particular care to stay hidden from late morning on, just in case Benjy’s curiosity drove him to the park well in advance of the appointment.
That had not happened, however. The first sign of their unfolding plan was Mel, wandering innocently through the gates. She looked around unobtrusively but clearly could see no sign of Benjy so glanced up at the tree. She gave a little wave in the loblolly boy’s direction although this was more in hope than certainty, for she probably wouldn’t have been able to make him out up so high in his camouflage of leaves.
Next, the loblolly boy saw the little figure of the Gadget Man, in his checked sports jacket. For some reason he was wearing bicycle clips. He hurried through the main gate looking left and right as if this were the first time he’d ever been through them. The loblolly boy could see that he was obviously trying to keep Mel in view, while at the same time just as obviously trying to make it appear that he wasn’t trying to keep Mel in view.
The loblolly boy had no way of telling the time, but he imagined from the arrival of Mel and the Gadget Man that it was close to one o’clock.
Benjy should arrive soon. In fact, if the plan were to work, Benjy would have to arrive soon. The previous afternoon the loblolly boy had flown to his father and Janice’s house. There was one car in the drive. Janice’s little red sporty number. Nobody was outside and he could not tell if Benjy was home. He flew down into the front porch, and pushed the envelope under the front door where it should easily be seen.
However, to ensure that the envelope was found, he flew across the road to the opposite house and sat there obscured by a chimney pot. He waited there a considerable time until he saw his father’s car pull into the drive. He saw his father climb out of the car and slowly walk up the drive and then round the path to the front door.
Even from a distance, he could see that his father looked hunched, drawn and diminished. Janice and Benjy between them must have been grinding him down. It made the loblolly boy feel angry, depressed and very determined that somehow he must find a way to make the Exchange.
Now as he waited impatiently in the tree, that determination was even stronger. This plan, so carefully hatched, must work. It had to.
But it could only work if Benjy turned up.
So where was he?
The loblolly boy scanned the scene once more.
Mel was standing looking about her, with her hands behind her back. The loblolly boy guessed she was holding the propeller device there. Not far away, now seated on a bench, was the Gadget Man. He was looking about, too, although his gaze would frequently return to Mel as if he were worried she might suddenly disappear and he would lose her.
The loblolly boy was about to give in to his deepest pessimism when, with a small gasp of gratitude, he saw Benjy wandering in through the front gates.
Benjy, too, was looking curiously about him. The loblolly boy could not suppress a tight little smile for he knew that Benjy, pretending to be oh so cool, must really be on a knife-edge of anticipation as he desperately tried to identify his secret admirer.
If Benjy recognised any likely candidates, he showed no sign. As far as the loblolly boy could tell, few if any of his usual gang were there. Certainly there was no Jason or Gavin. Benjy’s eyes flickered over Mel, who by now must know their quarry had arrived, but Benjy made no sign of having recognised her.
He wasn’t concerned with Mel. He was only interested in his secret admirer and the secret she (it had to be a she) had for him.
Still, the secret admirer was being maddeningly coy. Benjy, looked left and right again, and then sauntered casually over to the largest skateboard ramp and leant against it.
Now that he was in position, Mel made her move.
2
She wandered towards Benjy casually and not looking especially in his direction. When she was about two or so metres away, she looked up as if noticing him for the first time.
‘Oh, hi, Benjy,’ she said. ‘I didn’t see you there.’
‘What’s it to you?’ asked Benjy.
Clearly, he wanted her out of it.
‘Manners!’ laughed Mel. She couldn’t resist goading him. ‘Waiting for somebody?’
‘Not for you, anyway, Mole,’ said Benjy. ‘Get out of it, will you?’
‘You seen any more of that weird flying kid in the green?’ asked Mel innocently. ‘He hasn’t been around lately.’
‘I heard he died,’ said Benjy brutally.
‘No!’
‘Yeah, he asked too many stupid questions and somebody shot him.’
That was enough for Mel.
‘What do you think about my new toy, Benjy?’ she asked.
‘What new toy?’
‘This one,’ said Mel.
Then she brought the little propeller out from behind her back, held it up before Benjy’s face, and pressed the red button.
3
The Gadget Man had been keeping Mel under close surveillance. As she approached and then began to talk to the boy in the dark blue hoody, he rose from his park bench and began to walk slowly in their direction.
The loblolly boy, too, had risen to a half-crouch, pushing aside the foliage secure in the knowledge that Benjy would hardly be looking about the treetops.
Benjy found himself staring at a slowly spinning set of blades, almost like a tiny chocolate wheel except that this chocolate wheel spangled and sparkled with multi-coloured lights. The sensation was rather stroboscopic and at the same time a little unpleasant and he wanted to pull his gaze away, but to his confusion he found this was impossible. Instead, he found himself, locked, riveted and as he continued to be held in its grip, the propeller faded away and he slowly sank to all fours before a figure standing before him, a figure he did not know, except with a bone-deep knowledge that this person was a threat, an enemy he had to deal with.
Mel held the propeller at arm’s length so that the spinning blades were directly in Benjy’s line of sight. To her great relief, the device seemed to be working, for Benjy was utterly transfixed before her. Then, as she continued to hold the propeller, Benjy fell to his knees and was suddenly crouching on the ground on all fours.
Somewhat belatedly, Mel cried, ‘Sit!’
Her shout was so loud and Benjy’s behaviour so bizarre, it drew the attention of some of the other kids in the immediate vicinity and a small curious crowd began to gather. The Gadget Man, who had started his approach early, was now almost at Mel’s side.
The loblolly boy, seeing that Benjy was in dog mode, pushed the leaves aside and leapt into the air.
‘Good boy,’ cried Mel to Benjy sitting on all fours before her, and some of the kids in the crowd tittered.
It was at this point that Benjy bristling with pent up rage at the dangerous figure before him, began to snarl in a slow gravelly growl. He could feel the hair on the back of his neck rise and he narrowed his eyes into thin slits of hate.
‘Certainly a dog,’ said the Gadget Man, rubbing his hands in self-congratulation.
‘Yeah,’ muttered Mel, ‘but what kind of a dog?’
She did not see the crouching figure before her radiating obedience and submission. Quite the contrary, Benjy was displaying so much unbridled aggression she was too frightened to take her eyes off him.
And then Benjy’s guttural growling became what it had been threatening to become: a furious volley of angry barking. Woofwoofwoofwoofwoof! barked Benjy. His upper lip lifted so that more of his teeth could be revealed.
‘Sit!’ cried Mel, knowing as she uttered the word how absolutely futile it was.
For Benjy had no intention of sitting.
Benjy lunged forward, snapping and barking furiously.
Mel, white-faced and suddenly terrified, jumped backwards narrowly evading the lunging creature before her. She then turned on her heels and ran, pausing only to throw the propeller to its astonished creator as she did so. Benjy, snapping and snarling, bounded after her.
By this time, the loblolly boy had landed.
He was in time to see the transformation, but not in time to do anything about it.
Mel raced past him, with Benjy woofing at her heels with murder in his heart. If he’d had the sense to stand up and run on two legs he could easily have overtaken the terrified Mel. However, he was relentlessly in dog mode and was trapped on all fours like some homicidal one-year-old not yet able to walk.
The loblolly boy stood with the Gadget Man watching the drama unfold.
‘What was that you were saying about dogs?’ he muttered sarcastically. ‘Something about obedience, man’s best friend and all?’
The swelling crowd chased after Mel and Benjy, and the loblolly boy ran after the crowd. He saw Mel reach the relative safety of the linden tree and shimmy up it. As a boy, Benjy could easily have scaled the tree himself, but as a dog he was utterly frustrated, reduced to running round and around the bole of the tree barking savagely, pausing only from time to time to raise himself up on to his hind legs and paw at the trunk, if anything, barking even more savagely as he did so.
Mel hadn’t stopped at the lower branches; she scrambled up the tree almost as high as she could. Only when she could safely climb no further did she stop and try to take stock.
‘I’d better see how she is,’ muttered the loblolly boy to the Gadget Man who had hurried after him.
With that he flew up into the tree and found a foothold not far from the terrified girl. They were so high in the tree every movement started the branches swaying dangerously.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked.
‘He’s mad,’ whispered Mel. ‘He’s completely bonkers. Off his tree.’
‘As long as you hold tight,’ muttered the loblolly boy, ‘we won’t be.’
‘Won’t be what?’
‘Off our tree,’ said the loblolly boy.
‘Ha ha,’ said Mel. ‘Look at him!’ She released one hand to point down.
Benjy was still circling the tree snarling and barking.
They sat there for some time as all the while below Benjy continued to let loose volleys of enraged barks and growls and the crowd continued to grow. From time to time a braver person would reach for Benjy in an attempt to hold him or perhaps calm him down. Whenever this happened, Benjy would turn viciously towards the person snapping with fury and they would back off quickly.
‘I wonder how long it will last?’ asked Mel. ‘I sure don’t want to sit up here all day.’
The loblolly boy shrugged. ‘No idea,’ he said. ‘I guess it will wear off. We forgot to talk about that with the Gadget Man.’
‘We should have,’ shivered Mel.
‘Where is that bloody device, anyway?’ asked the loblolly boy. ‘Perhaps it has a reverse switch or something.’
‘I threw it back to the Gadget Man,’ said Mel. ‘I suddenly needed to get out of there and thought it might hold me up.’
‘Good,’ said the loblolly boy, ‘then if the thing has a reverse switch he’ll be able to use it.’
‘I don’t think there was a reverse switch. It just had that red button.’
‘Well, he might be able to do something. Where is he, anyway?’
Mel looked around. The Gadget Man did not seem to be immediately visible among the crowd below. She scanned the area further afield. Then she said, ‘Somehow I don’t think he’s going to be much help.’
‘Why?’
‘Look!’ Mel pointed. The Gadget Man was walking quite quickly, almost scurrying, away from the scene. Before long, he was at the main gates and was obviously leaving the park.
‘Perhaps he has some other device at home that turns mad dogs into people,’ suggested the loblolly boy.
Mel picked up his sarcasm. ‘I wish,’ she said.
The effect on Benjy did not seem to be wearing off. It even appeared to be getting more severe as his frustrations grew.
‘I think he’s frothing,’ whispered Mel.
The crowd grew.
‘Why doesn’t someone do something?’ asked Mel.
The loblolly boy looked about. ‘Perhaps they are,’ he said. ‘Look, here comes the cavalry.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Look.’
Mel followed his pointing finger. A couple of park staff, probably gardeners, were running towards the scene drawn by the commotion and the ever-growing crowd gathered around Benjy.
However, although one of the gardeners was carrying a rake, it quickly became apparent that they were not going to be of much use.
Their basic method was to shout at Benjy ordering him to stop behaving like an idiot and to get up and go home. Benjy’s response was to bark even more loudly and to snap angrily at the gardeners. When it became clear that shouting was having no effect, one of the gardeners, showing far more courage than the spectators, stepped right up to Benjy with the intention of seizing him by the scruff of his neck.
Benjy’s response was immediate and savage. He snapped angrily at the gardener’s hand and then sank his teeth into the man’s calf.
The gardener leapt back, yowling with pain, while the other gardener fended the bristling Benjy off with his rake.
There was so much commotion below: howling, shouting, barking, laughter that no one heard the sound of the ambulance before it nosed through the gates of the park, siren wailing, red light flashing.
4
As the ambulance departed, its cargo having been subdued with the aid of a large sheet and a powerful sedative administered with difficulty, Mel climbed shakily down from the tree. She had been perching precariously and she had been fending off cramp.
Now, on solid ground, she stretched her legs and stamped her feet to try to get the circulation flowing once more.
A policewoman stood nearby, waiting for her to finish these exercises.
At length, she asked gently, ‘Okay?’
Mel looked up with a little smile and nodded.
‘I’ll need to take your name and details,’ the policewoman said, taking out her pen and a notebook. Once Mel had given her name, address and phone number, the policewoman said, ‘This has all been pretty bizarre, and you’ve had a very frightening time, but the boy obviously had it in for you particularly … any idea why?’
Mel shook her head and tried to look thoughtful. ‘I don’t even know the guy,’ she said. ‘I mean, I sort of know who he is and stuff, but I don’t really know him.’
She looked up and the policewoman nodded.
‘Well, could you tell me what happened then? From your point of view, I mean.’
Mel shrugged. ‘It was really, really weird,’ she said. ‘His name’s Benjy …’
‘Yes,’ the policewoman said, ‘we have that.’
‘Well, I was just sort of kicking round in the park looking for some mates, and I sort of looked up and saw him. He saw me so I said “Hi” and we chatted for a bit and then he suddenly dropped to the ground and started behaving like a dog. I thought it was, like, some sort of stupid game so I shouted “Sit!” but then he started lunging at me and barking. Man, I was scared because I knew that it wasn’t a game at all and he was completely out of it, completely lost the plot, so I was out of there. I just ran to the nearest tree and climbed up it.’
The policewoman glanced up the tree.
‘And I’ve been stuck up there ever since with that kid barking as if he wanted to kill me or something.’
‘And you’ve no idea why?’
Mel shook her head.
‘You haven’t had any problem with him before?’
Mel shook her head again. ‘As I said, I hardly know him. He doesn’t go to my school or anything. I’ve heard stuff about him, though, like he’s been in a lot of trouble and that …’
The policewoman waited.
‘Perhaps it all got a bit too much,’ Mel suggested.
‘But nothing personal? Nothing involving you?’
Mel considered the question. There was probably no harm in mentioning the skateboard incident. She told the policewoman about how Jason and Gavin had tried to take her skateboard off her, but had eventually given it back. She did not mention that Jason’s bag and Gavin’s skateboard had ended up in the lake, nor how this had happened.
‘They were just acting tough,’ she said, ‘and anyway this Benjy kid ran away before anything began. He didn’t want to be involved.’
The policewoman gave her a little smile. ‘Well, that wouldn’t seem to have much to do with this. It’s all something of a mystery.’
‘I think he just flipped,’ said Mel, relieved that it was all over.
However, her relief was short-lived. ‘There was one other thing,’ said the policewoman. ‘Somebody witnessing the events said that you seemed to be holding some object up before the boy’s face?’
Mel’s heart lurched. She should have realised that this question would come.
She swallowed, and said. ‘I had a little propeller thing, that’s all. You know, those little things that spin in the wind. That’s right, I was showing it to him. Just a toy.’
‘Okay,’ said the policewoman. ‘Where is it? Could I see?’
Mel looked about her. ‘I don’t have it any more,’ she said. ‘I must have dropped it when he started to chase me.’
The policewoman, too, looked about but there was no sign of anything. ‘I don’t suppose it has any bearing on all of this,’ she said. ‘Are you okay now? Can we give you a lift home or anything?’
Mel shook her head. ‘No, I’ll be fine.’ She gave the policewoman a small smile. ‘Just a little stiff.’ Then she added, ‘Do you think my little propeller might have caused him to …’
The policewoman laughed. ‘Good heavens, no. I just wanted to check everything out.’
Mel smiled. ‘I just wondered that’s all.’
‘No,’ the policewoman said a little more soberly, ‘I imagine from the way he was behaving that he was probably on something.’
‘On something?’
‘Some drugs. Even quite young kids are getting hold of them now.’
‘Wow,’ said Mel.
‘A very good lesson,’ said the policewoman. ‘Well, goodbye now, Melanie. Take care.’
5
During this interview, the loblolly boy had been standing not far away. There had been a few people milling about still, one or two straining to hear Mel’s version of events. However, now as the policewoman moved off, they began to drift away as well. The loblolly boy pointed towards the swings and Mel nodded.
Shortly afterwards, they were seated on a bench not far from the swings and the children’s paddling pool.
‘She thinks Benjy’s on drugs,’ said Mel, with a wan little smile.
‘I know,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘Are you okay?’
They sat in silence for a while. A pair of ducks approached hopefully but the two of them had nothing for the ducks.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mel.
In the excitements and fury of the last forty minutes she’d been so concerned about her own safety, she hadn’t really thought of what it all meant for the loblolly boy. Remembering now what the whole exercise had been about, she realised that his hopes had been dashed yet again. Dashed so badly there was probably nothing more that could be done. They’d had one last shot at getting Benjy to cooperate and they had blown it.
‘Yeah,’ said the loblolly boy.
‘Bummer,’ said Mel.
‘Yet again,’ sighed the loblolly boy.
‘We were stupid, as usual,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘We should have guessed what sort of a bloody dog Benjy would be.’
Mel gave a grim little laugh. ‘The sort of dog the dog control guys put down,’ she said.
‘He really went for you, didn’t he,’ said the loblolly boy.
‘I reckon,’ said Mel. ‘It was not nice.’
Again they sat in silence for a time.
‘What’ll happen to him?’ asked Mel.
‘Don’t know,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘I guess he’ll go to the hospital and they’ll give him something. I hope the being-a-dog thing wears off.’
‘They’ll probably treat him like some of those guys who lose the plot or something,’ said Mel.
‘I don’t know,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘I mean, people on drugs — the drugs wear off after a while, but Benjy’s not on drugs …’
‘I know who might know what to do,’ said Mel.
The loblolly boy nodded. ‘I reckon we ought to go and see him. And there’s another thing …’
‘What’s that?’
‘I’d like to know why he ran away when you were stuck up that tree,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘That wasn’t very nice. It wasn’t nice at all.’
‘No,’ said Mel.
‘Perhaps the Captain was right after all,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘Perhaps I should be fearful of him.’
‘Not because he’s mean, surely,’ said Mel.
‘No, he’s not mean,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘But I’m beginning to think he’s a loose cannon.’
‘And full of pathetic jokes,’ said Mel.