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“THE NAME’S SECURITY, Max Security.” A pale, wiry figure of uncertain age emerged at our feet from beneath a leaf-covered camouflage net. “Well, actually it’s not, but if I told you my real name, I’d have to kill you.”
I hoped his deadpan manner indicated dry humour rather than murderous intent.
As he threw back the net and stood up, I realised he’d just climbed out of a hole in the ground. Not a rabbit hole, like Alice in Wonderland’s, but a square structure, reinforced with bricks and concrete, with a metal ladder embedded in its side. If there’d been a house on top of it, I’d have called it a storm cellar. I wondered whether it led to an underground bunker.
Max drew himself up to his full height, towering over Joe as well as me. Then he dragged the net up behind him, pulled it over his head, and let it hang down over his whole body, like a camouflaged ghost. He glanced rapidly to left and right.
“It’s OK, Max, we’re quite alone,” said Joe. “This is just a flying visit to introduce you formally to our newest member of staff, Gemma Lamb, while the rest of the staff welcome the girls.”
“Good call. Gemma needs to get the lie of the land before we let the parents loose on her.” Max appraised me with a long, hard stare, pink-rimmed eyes squinting against the sunshine. With his dark receding hair slicked back from his forehead, he reminded me of a mole.
Uncomfortable under his penetrating gaze, I broke eye contact, only to find myself transfixed by his combat trousers. I’d never seen combat trousers used in anger before. I keep things like my phone and tissues in the pockets of mine. Max’s bulged with handcuffs and batons.
Joe lay a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Gemma. Max is on our side.”
I was glad he thought so.
“So, what’s your story, Gemma Lamb?” asked Max. “Anything I should know about you? What are you running away from? That’s what they all do here, you know. They’re all on the run from something.”
I let out a strangled laugh and brushed Joe’s hand away. “On the run? What, you mean like criminals?”
Joe slipped his hands into the pockets of his tennis skirt. “What Max means is that staff come here for a fresh start. Just like the girls.”
Max nodded. “Joe here wanted to start over after the premature end of his career as a professional athlete.”
Joe certainly had the build of a career athlete. I wondered what kind of injury had curtailed his success. He wasn’t limping.
“Which was your sport, Joe?”
Should I have heard of him? Not that I could have named many famous sportspeople, despite Steven’s addiction to Sky Sports. He wasn’t Mo Farah nor Andy Murray, I knew that much.
“Cycling.” Joe sounded less enthusiastic than I’d expected. “But no sportsperson’s career lasts long these days. I barely get on a bike any more.”
Max leaned towards me. “But when he does, you should see him go! Dashes down that drive in a blur.”
“Well, the drive is nearly a mile long,” said Joe. “There’s plenty of time to get a good speed up.”
Max nodded. “Goes like a rocket, he does. If there was a superhero called Cycleman who cycled at the speed of light, Joe here would be his daytime persona.”
Joe shuffled his trainers in the scrubby grass.
“Yes, well, enough about me and my illustrious past. This tour’s about Gemma, not me. Gemma, anything you need to tell Max?”
“I didn’t learn to ride a bike till I was twelve.”
“I mean in his professional capacity. Any security worries? I can leave you alone with him to discuss it if that helps.”
When Joe took a step back, as if about to depart, I grabbed his arm quickly. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be alone with this coiled spring in fully-loaded combat trousers.
“That won’t be necessary, thanks. I’ve nothing to declare. No secret stash of gold bullion beneath my bed, if that’s the sort of thing you mean.”
I forced a laugh, as if this might all be a game, but Max’s face was serious.
“Gold bullion wouldn’t be such an issue, as it’s very heavy to carry off. Cash, now, that’s more of a temptation. Much easier to steal, and more tempting in low denominations. Big notes are harder to spend.”
Joe glanced at his chunky sports watch. On a less muscular arm it would have looked ungainly. “I guess we’re all done here, Gemma. We should press on and leave Max to carry out his surveillance duties once the girls start arriving.” He turned to Max. “Good to see you, Max. Perhaps we’ll catch up on my afternoon off for a game of poker?”
Max grinned for the first time. “Always happy to take your money, son.” Then he startled me by standing to attention and offering a brisk military salute. “Pleasure to meet you too, ma’am.”
The only salute I was qualified to do was the one I’d used to make my Brownie Promise. I couldn’t remember which fingers to use, so I simply smiled politely and said goodbye. Immediately Max threw his camouflage net down the hole in the ground and clambered after it, his steel toe-caps dinging against the metal ladder. Once his head was below ground level, he reached up to pull the turf-covered hatch back into place – a metal drain cover, disguised with fake grass. I watched Joe’s muscular calf flex as he trod down the real grass that had been disturbed at the edge of the hatch until we couldn’t see the join. The uninitiated would never have guessed what lay beneath.
I frowned, puzzled.
“How can Max keep a look-out on the girls from down there?”
Joe beckoned me back up the slope, offering me his hand to haul me up to the main path. I hesitated. He seemed to be touching me a lot for someone I’d only just met. But the bank was steep, so I accepted.
“Oh, he doesn’t. That’s just an entry point to one of the underground tunnels. He’ll be off to the hatch by the cattle grid on the drive now, to watch the comings and goings of the girls and their parents, counting them in and out, logging car registration plates and so on.”
“You mean he pops up like a meerkat at strategic points around the school? I can picture him springing out of grassy knolls like a Teletubby.”
Joe narrowed his eyes. “A meerkat whose hands are registered with the police as a deadly weapon. A Teletubby who keeps knuckledusters in his big red handbag. That’s Max’s story, anyway.”
